“She’s fine.”
“Lots of pretty girls here tonight,” Leighton said in a silk-smooth voice. His grin stopped south of his eyes, and in them Billy saw a cunning kind of anger. “’Course, all of them have dates. Sure a shame you don’t have a pretty girl to dance with, maybe cuddle up to after the dance is over. My boy’s out there with his girl. You know Duke, don’t you?”
“Yes sir.” Everyone knew Duke Leighton, the senior-class cutup; Duke was a year older than Billy, but he’d failed the eighth grade. He’d been an All-American linebacker for the Bulldogs two seasons in a tow, and had won a football scholarship to Auburn.
“He’s goin’ with Cindy Lewis,” Leighton said. “She’s head cheerleader at Indian Hills High.”
The rich kids’ school, Billy knew.
“You ought to know a lot of people here, Billy. Lot of people know you.”
Leighton’s voice was getting louder, as if he were pretending to shout over the music, but the shout was exaggerated. Billy noticed uneasily that he was being watched by some of the kids who hung around the edge of the dance floor; and he saw some of them whispering to each other.
“Yep!” Leighton said, very loudly. “Everybody knows Billy Creekmore! Heard you had a job up at the sawmill for a while, ain’t that right? Huh?”
He didn’t reply; he could feel people watching, and he shifted his position uneasily. To his horror, he realized there was a small hole in his left sock.
“What’d you do up there for the Chathams, Billy? Kinda sweep the place up? Did you do an Indian dance, or…” Billy turned away and started walking, but Leighton hurried after him and grasped his sleeve. “Why don’t you show everybody your Indian dance, Billy? Hey! Who wants to see an Indian dance?”
Billy said, in a quiet and dangerous voice, “Let go of my arm, Mr. Leighton.”
“What’re you gonna do?” the man sneered. “Put a curse on me?”
Billy looked into his fierce, unreasoning glare and decided to play this game his way. He leaned closer to Leighton, until their faces were only a few inches apart, and he whispered, “Yes. I’ll make your legs rot off to stamps: I’ll make your hair catch fire. I’ll make frogs grow in your fat belly.”
Leighton’s hand fell away, and he wiped his fingers on his trousers. “Sure you will. Yeah, sure. You listen to me, boy. Nobody wants you here. Nobody wants you in this school, or in this town. One damned witch is e—” He stopped suddenly, because Billy’s eyes had flared. He stepped back a few paces, mashing down shoes. “Why don’t you just get the hell out of here?”
“Leave me alone,” Billy said, and walked away. His heart was pounding. The Purple Tree was playing “Double Shot,” and the crowd was going wild.
Billy walked around the gym to a booth that sold Cokes and corndogs. He bought a Coke, drank it down, and was about to throw the crumpled cup into a trashcan when fingers grazed his cheek. He turned around; there was a short, shrill scream and four figures backed away from him. A girl said, her voice brimming with delicious terror, “I touched him, Terry! I really touched him!” There was a chorus of braying laughter, and someone off to the side asked, “Talked to any ghosts lately, Creekmore?”
He ducked his head down and pushed past a boy in a Bulldog letter jacket; his face flamed, and he knew that coming to this dance, that trying to pretend he was just like the others and could fit in after all, had been an awful mistake. There was nothing to do now but to try to get out of here, to withdraw from people yet again. Suddenly someone shoved him from the rear, and he almost went down; when he turned he saw perhaps eight or nine grinning faces, and a couple of boys with clenched fists. He knew they wanted to fight so they could show off in front of their girls, so he backed away from them and then started across the packed dance floor, twisting through a human maze of gyrating bodies. A heavyset boy with a mop of dark hair pushed his girl friend into Billy; she let out a mouselike squeak when she looked up into his face, and then the boy pulled her away to let her cower in his arms.
They’re using me to scare their girl friends, Billy thought, like I was a horror movie at the drive-in! Rather than angering him, that realization struck him as being funny. He grinned and said, “Boo!” at the next girl whose boyfriend thrust her forward; she almost went gray with shock, and then the people who recognized him—people he saw every day in the high-school halls—were moving out of his way, making a path for him to get through. He laughed and bent over like a hunchback, letting his arms dangle, and moved along the human corridor like a lurching ape. Give ’em a show! he thought. That’s what they want! Girls screamed, and even their protective boyfriends edged away. Now he was getting more attention than the Purple Tree, and he knew he was making a damned fool of himself but he wanted to turn around on them the fearful image they had of him; he wanted to rub it in and let them see how stupid it was to be afraid. He grimaced like a ghoul, reaching out toward a girl whose boyfriend slapped his hands away and then backed into the crowd; he danced and jerked his head as if he’d been struck by the palsy, and now he heard people laughing and he knew he was about to break through…just about to break through—
And then he abruptly stopped, a cold chill running through him. He was facing Melissa Pettus, radiant in a pink dress and with pink ribbons in her long flowing hair, she was pressed close to a boy named Hank Orr, and she was cowering away from Billy.
Billy stared at her, and slowly straightened up. “You don’t have to be afraid,” he said, but his voice was lost in the bass-boom as the Purple Tree started to play “Down in the Boondocks.”
Something wet hit him in the face and streamed into his eyes. He couldn’t see for a few seconds, and from off to one side he heard a snort of laughter. When Billy had cleared his eyes, he saw Duke Leighton grinning several feet away; the boy was bulky, already getting fat. A slim red-haired girl clung to one arm, and his other hand held a plastic watergun.
And then Billy could smell the reek of beer rising off of himself, and he realized that Leighton had filled that gun with beer instead of water; it was one of his many practical and sometimes cruel jokes. Now if a chaperone happened to get a whiff of Billy’s clothes, Billy would be immediately thrown out. He reeked like a shithouse on a hot summer night.
“Want some more, Spookie?” Leighton called out, to a chorus of laughter. He grinned slickly, as his father had.
Anger surged within Billy. At once he propelled himself forward, shoving through several couples to get at Leighton. The other boy laughed and sprayed him in the eyes again, and then someone edged out a foot and Billy tripped over it, sprawling on the gym floor. He struggled to his feet, half blinded with beer, and a hand caught roughly at his shoulder, he spun to strike at his attacker.
It was a chaperone, a short and stocky history teacher named Kitchens; the man grabbed his shoulder again and shook him. “No fighting, mister!” he said.
“I’m not! Leighton’s trying to start trouble!”
Kitchens stood at least two inches shorter than Billy, but he was a large-shouldered man with a deep chest and a crew cut that was a holdover from his Marine days. His small dark eyes glanced toward Duke Leighton, who was standing in a protective circle of football buddies. “What about it, Duke?”
The other boy raised empty hands in a gesture of innocence, and Billy knew the watergun had been passed to safety. “I was just mindin’ my own business, and old Spookie wanted to fight.”
“That’s a damned lie! He’s got—”
Kitchens leaned toward him. “I smell liquor on you, mister! Where you keepin’ it, in your car?”
“No, I’m not drinking! I was…”
“I saw him with a flask, Mr. Kitchens!” someone said through the crowd, and Billy was almost certain it was Hank Orr’s voice. “Throw him out!”
Kitchens said, “Come on, mister,” and started pulling Billy toward the door. “You rule-breakers got to learn some respect!”
Billy knew it was pointless to struggle, and maybe it was for t
he best that he get kicked out of the May Night dance.
“I ought to take you to the boys’ adviser, that’s what I ought to do,” Kitchens was saying. “Drinking and fighting is a bad combination.”
Billy looked back and caught the reflection of light off Melissa Pettus’s hair, Hank Orr had his arm around her waist, and was pulling her toward the dance floor.
“Come on, pick out your shoes and get out of here!”
Billy stopped, resisting the man’s tugging. He had seen—or thought he’d seen—something that had driven a freezing nail of dread into his stomach. He blinked, wishing he wouldn’t see it, but yet, there it was, right there, right there…
A shimmering black haze hung around Hank Orr and Melissa Pettus. It undulated, throwing off ugly pinpoints of purplish light. He heard himself moan, and Kitchens stopped speaking to stare at him. Billy had seen the black aura glittering around another couple who were walking on the edge of the dance floor, he saw it again, from the corner of his eye: it was enveloping a senior girl named Sandra Falkner, who was doing the Jerk with her boyfriend. Panic roiled in Billy’s stomach; he wildly looked around, sure of impending disaster. The black aura glittered around a biology teacher named Mrs. Carson. A very weak aura, more purple than black, undulated around a senior football player named Gus Tompkins. He saw it yet again, clinging to a fat boy who was sitting up in the bleachers eating a corndog.
“Oh God,” Billy breathed. “No…no…”
“Come on,” Kitchens said, more uncertainly. He let go of the boy and stepped back, because the boy suddenly looked as if he might throw up. “Find your shoes and get out.”
“They’re going to die,” Billy whispered hoarsely. “I can see… Death in this place…”
“Are you drunk, mister? What’s wrong with you?”
“Can’t you see it?” Billy took a faltering few steps toward the crowd. “Can’t anybody else see it?”
“Shoes or not, you’re getting your ass out of here!” Kitchens grasped his arm to shove him toward the door, but the boy broke free with an amazing strength and then he ran toward the dance floor, sliding in his socks. He pushed through the throng hanging around the floor, almost slipping on a spilled Coke, then he was through them and reaching for Melissa Pettus, reaching through the black haze to touch and warn her that Death was very near. She jerked away from him and screamed. Hank Orr stepped in his way, purplish black tendrils glittering around his body, and brought his fist up in a quick arc that snapped Billy’s head back. Billy staggered and fell, hearing the shout “FIGHT! FIGHT!” ringing in his ears. A forest of legs crowded around, but Purple Tree kept on playing “Rolling on the River.”
“Get up!” Hank Orr said, standing over him. “Come on, you…freak! I’ll stomp your ass!”
“Wait…wait,” Billy said. His head was filled with stars, exploding novas and planets. “The black aura… I see it…you’ve got to get—”
“FIGHT! FIGHT!” someone yelled gleefully. The Purple Tree stopped in midchord. Shouts and laughter echoed through the gym.
“You’re going to die!” Billy wailed, and the blood drained out of Orr’s face. He raised his fists as if to protect himself, but he didn’t dare touch Billy Creekmore again. “You…and Melissa…and Sandra Falkner…and…” There was a sudden stunned silence except for kids whooping and laughing on the other side of the gym. Billy started to rise to his feet, his lower lip swelling like a balloon, but then the crowd parted and the boys’ adviser, Mr. Marbury, came through like a steam engine, smoke swirling from the bowl of the pipe clenched between his teeth. Close in his wake was Mr. Kitchens. Marbury hauled Billy up with a hand clamped at the back of his neck, and bellowed “OUT!” He shoved Billy so fast the boy was sliding across the floor, through the throng, and past the scattered shoes toward the door.
“He’s drunk as a skunk!” Kitchens was saying. “Picking fights all over the place!”
“I know this boy. He’s a troublemaker. Drinkin’, huh? Where’d you get the booze?”
Billy tried his best to shake free, but then he was propelled through the door and Marbury spun him around. “I asked you a question, Creekmore!”
“No! I’m not…drunk…” He could hardly talk because his lip was swelling so fast. Bells still pealed in his head. “Not drunk! Something’s gonna happen! I saw it…saw the black aura!…”
“Saw what? I’ve had a gutful of you, boy! You smell like you’ve been swimmin’ in booze! I ought to suspend you on the spot!”
“No…please…listen to me! I don’t know what’s going to happen, but…”
“I do!” Marbury said. “You’re gonna stay out of that gym! And come Monday mornin’ I’m gonna have a long talk with your parents! Go on, now! If you want to drink and fight, it’ll be somewhere else!” He shoved Billy backward. Faces peered out, watching and smirking; one of them belonged to Ralph Leighton. Marbury turned and stalked to the door, then faced Billy again. “I said get out of here!”
“How about my shoes?”
“We’ll mail ’em to you!” Marbury said, and then he vanished within the gym.
Billy looked at Mr. Kitchens, who stood a few feet away from him and who now began edging toward the door. “They’re going to die,” he told the man. “I tried to warn them. They won’t listen.”
“You come back in the gym again, mister, and I might help the boys clean your clock.” Kitchens glared at him for a few seconds, then went into the gym.
Billy stood in the darkness, weaving on his feet. He shouted, “THEY’RE GOING TO DIE!” and in another few seconds someone closed the gym door. He staggered to it and hammered on the metal; he could feel the bass-drum vibrations of Purple Tree knocking back, and he knew everybody was dancing and having a good time again. I can’t stop it, he told himself; whatever it is, I can’t stop it! But I have to keep trying! If he couldn’t get back inside, he’d stop them when they came out; he walked away from the gym on weak, rubbery legs and sat down on a curb facing the parking lot. He could see the vague shapes of people huddled in their cars, and moonlight glanced off an upturned bottle in the backseat of a spiffy red Chevy. He wanted to sob and scream, but he gritted his teeth together and held everything inside.
Within fifteen minutes he heard shouting and laughter from the football field, and he stood up to see what was happening. Kids were leaving the gym to congregate around the mound of timber, a couple of the chaperones were dousing the wood with gasoline, and the bonfire was about to be lighted. People chased each other around the field like wild stallions, and some of the girls started doing impromptu Bulldogs cheers. Billy stood at the fence, his hands gripped into the metal mesh. A lighter sparked, and the flame touched the gasoline-soaked wood at several places around the base; the wood, most of it rough kindling, caught quickly. Fire gnawed toward the top of the pile. More students were coming out to ring the bonfire as the flames grew brighter, the heap was about twelve or thirteen feet tall, Billy saw, and some practical joker had set a chair on top of it. Sparks danced into the sky. As Billy watched, some of the kids linked hands and started to sing Fayette County High’s alma mater:
Nestled in the quiet valley
Home we love and always will;
Stands our revered alma mater
Below the woodland and the hills…
The bonfire was growing into a huge finger of flame. Billy leaned against the fence, rubbing his swollen lip. In the quick orange spray of sparks from a wet piece of wood Billy saw Melissa Pettus and Hank Orr, holding hands and standing near the bonfire’s base. The aura around them had turned blacker still, and seemed to be spreading out its dark, twisting tentacles. He saw Sandra Falkner’s face, brushed with orange light, as she stood looking up toward the bonfire’s crest. She was almost cocooned in the black aura. Gus Tompkins was standing to her left, and back about ten feet.
Billy’s fingers clenched the fence as the cold realization struck him: they were all out here now, all the kids who were enveloped by the ugly aura, and mos
t of them were standing closest to the fire. The blackness seemed to be reaching toward itself, connecting, drawing all the victims together.
A red glow pulsated at the bonfire’s center. The chair collapsed, to a scattering of applause and whoops.
…We give thanks for all God’s blessings,
Underneath his crowning sky;
Home of learning and of friendship,
Our alma mater, Fayette County…
“GET AWAY FROM THE FIRE!” Billy screamed.
The bonfire heaved, as if something were growing within it. Suddenly there were several ear-cracking pops that stopped all laughter. From the fire’s center exploded three multicolored streaks of light that shot in different directions over the field.
Roman candles, Billy thought. How did Roman candles get inside the…?
But then there was an earth-shuddering whummmmmp! and the entire mound of flaming timbers exploded from within. Billy had time to see jagged shards of wood flying like knives before a hot shock wave hit him like a brick wall, flinging him to the ground so hard the breath burst from his lungs. The earth shook again, and again; the air was filling with whistlings and shrieks, human and fireworks noises.
Billy sat up, his head ringing, his face scorched with heat; he numbly realized his hands were bleeding, and he’d left most of their skin in the fence’s mesh. Caught all along the fence were shards of wood that could’ve sliced through him like butcher knives. Roman candles shot across the field, a golden flower of sparks opened up high in the air, M-80s hammered at the sky, purple and blue and green fireworks zigzagged from the center of the bonfire’s rubble. People were running, screaming, rolling on the ground in agony. Kids with their hair and clothes on fire were dancing now to a new and hideous rhythm, others were staggering around like sleepwalkers. Billy stood up; a rain of cinders was falling, and the air stank of black powder. He saw a boy crawling away from the still-exploding bonfire, and then Billy was running toward the center of the field to help. He grasped the boy’s blackened shirt and hauled him away several yards as Roman candles rocketed overhead. A girl was screaming for her mother, over and over again, and when Billy grabbed her hand to pull her away from the mound of fire her skin came off like a glove; she moaned and passed out.