Scary Mary (14 page)

“
Not so big and bad now, are you, Kyle?”
she taunted.

He snarled and rushed her again. She didn’t
flinch. She twisted her body and pulled back her arms like a
baseball hitter. She struck his shoulder with the flat side of the
frying pan. He crashed into the cinder block wall and slid to the
floor.

“
Kill her. She isn’t any good,
just like the other one. Always whining that I didn’t love her and
that I should be nicer to her. I’ll show her nice.”

She looked around the room in astonishment. “So
you decide to speak up now? What’s with you?”

Kyle hadn’t moved from where he’d fallen. She
cautiously kicked his leg. He didn’t respond. “All right Ricky,
where are you?” she asked the basement walls. She tossed boxes
aside as she searched for the anchor. She was done being careful
with the searching. She was going to turn the basement upside down
if that was what it took to find Ricky’s stupid anchor.

Ricky didn’t respond to her question. Mary was
getting really tired of being ignored. “Ricky, where are you?” she
demanded again.

“
Guess,” Kyle said as he swept her legs
out from under her.

“
What?” Her left side hit the cement
floor. A nasty bruise guaranteed for her elbow. The frying pan once
again left her hands.

Kyle rolled on top of her, pinning her to the
floor with his body. He grabbed her wrists and pulled them above
her head. She struggled to get him off of her, but he was too
heavy.

“
Are we starting to get the
picture?”

“
Yeah, I’m starting to get it,” she
replied and kneed him in the groin, hard.

He let out a wheezy groan and rolled off her to
cradle his crotch. She picked herself up and took a step back. She
stared down at him with incredulous eyes. This was so much worse
than she’d imagined.

“
How did it happen?” she asked.

He chuckled from the floor. He rolled to his
knees. “No, no, no. I’ve got to keep some of my secrets.”

“
Come on you can tell me.” She poked him
with her foot.

“
And I said no.” He leapt up, but she
hustled back to stay out of reach.

“
It has to be something. Ghosts need an
anchor to keep them on this plane. How does a ghost possess a
person through an anchor?” she wondered aloud.

“
You won’t figure it out, until I let
you,” he said and rushed her again. She tried to lunge out of the
way, but one of his outstretched hands grabbed her and dragged her
back to the floor. He pinned her down again.

“
Get off me!” She kicked and shoved at
him, but her strength was beginning to wane.

“
Getting tired?”

“
Yeah, of you.” To her right, she saw a
lamp that had tumbled out of a box. It was round and hard. In a
last ditch effort, she threw her hip and rolled them over to it.
Kyle’s head cracked against the cement floor, and he groaned as he
reached back to massage his skull. She sat up and grabbed the lamp.
She hit him over the head with it. The lamp didn’t break, but he
fell back limply. Blood started to trickle from a nasty cut to his
temple.

She began rummaging through his pockets. He had
to have the anchor on him. Ricky couldn’t possess him by remote
control at least that was what she hoped. She searched frantically,
patting down all of his pockets, raising his shirt and pant legs to
see if anything was strapped or stuck to them.

She was perched on top of him, but she was
focused too much on finding the anchor to realize he was coming
around. He easily caught one of her wrists as she tried to lift his
shirt. “Now, aren’t we fresh?” She pulled to free herself, but his
fingers were like iron bands on her wrist. He lumbered to his feet,
dragging her with him. She couldn’t twist her arm out of his grasp.
She switched tactics and stomped on his feet to make him let go. He
retaliated by backhanding her.

Her free hand flew to her face. Her eyes
narrowed in anger, and her lips drew back in a snarl. Nobody
slapped her, ever. She raised her foot and thrust kicked him in the
stomach with all of her strength. He let go of her arm as he
stumbled back. The locket slipped out of his shirt and glinted at
his throat. She yanked it off him. He hissed in pain and turned to
attack her but stopped mid-motion.

“
Wait…what?” he asked in a dazed voice as
he fell to his knees. He lifted his hands to his bleeding face. He
stared at his fingertips perplexed when they came away bloody.
“What the hell?”

“
Kill HER!”
Ricky shouted in stereo
in her head. She gasped and dropped the necklace. Ricky’s anchor.
The fool
had
been wearing the
anchor.

“
Kyle?” she asked.

“
What’s happening?” He kept dabbing at his
face and pulling his hands away to look at the blood smeared on
them. He couldn’t seem to understand what it was.

“
Do you remember anything?” She got down
on one knee to look him in the eye. He stared at her
wildly.

“
I wanted to kill you,” he
whispered.

“
But now you don’t. It’s okay, but you
gotta get out of here.”

Still in a bit of a daze, he got up off the
floor and stumbled up the stairs. She picked up the locket and to
follow him.

“
You won’t get away from me
that easily.”

“
I’m not going anywhere,” she said to the
empty room. She wrapped the chain of the locket around her fingers
to keep from dropping it.

“
We’ll be together forever.
Just like it’s inscribed on that stupid locket.”

“
If you hate it so much, why’d you anchor
to it, idiot?” She moved to the stairs.

“
I didn’t say you could
go!”

She was almost to the first step when a stack of
heavy boxes fell onto her. She covered her head to protect herself,
but a heavy box knocked her down and twisted her ankle
painfully.

“
Like I said, you’re not leaving.”
She dug herself out from under the boxes and scrambled out of the
junk. She winced when she put weight on her left foot. She prayed
that it was only sprained.. She limped to the stairs.

She began hopping up them. Halfway up, Ricky
grabbed her bad foot and jerked her back down. She toppled to the
bottom and hit her hurt ankle. She curled into a ball as she tried
to deal with the sharp pain.

“
Keep trying to get away. I
haven’t had this much fun in years.”

She couldn’t take much more abuse. She had to
end this, and the only way to do that was by destroying the locket.
The frying pan. Where was the frying pan? Ricky must’ve been
thinking the same thing. The frying pan came zooming across the
room toward her head. She barely jerked out of the way. It hit the
cinder block wall with a loud crack. The force of the impact bent
it and made a hole in the wall. She stared at the bent frying pan
for a second in horror. What if it had hit her head? Don’t ask
stupid questions, she scolded herself and turned back to the
stairs. She began to limp her way up again. She kept a
double-handed grasp on the banister this time. The chain of the
locket bit into her fingers. She was determined to make it to the
top. Once she was out of the basement, she’d find some other way to
destroy the locket.

“
You women are all the same.
Whining about when we’re here, and whining when we’re gone. Why
don’t you make up your mind!”

“
I’d be happy if you were gone,” Mary
muttered.

He tugged on her legs as she climbed the stairs,
but he couldn’t jerk her down them again. She grimaced each time he
grabbed her bad leg but didn’t stop her ascent. She was getting out
of that basement.

She reached the top with relief. She was almost
out. The light from the kitchen bathed her face. She grabbed the
door frame with one hand to pull herself through. The door slammed
shut on her. She cried out in pain and would’ve taken another
header down the stairs if she hadn’t been still clutching the
banister with her other hand. It stung where the door had torn the
skin on her knuckles, and a series of bruises was guaranteed across
her fingers.

Ricky laughed.
“You’re not going
anywhere.”

“
Kyle!” she screamed and beat on the door.
Boxes flew across the basement. Some of them hit the stairs and
made them shudder. Kyle threw the door open in
bewilderment.

“
What’s going on? Why are you tearing up
my basement?”

“
It’s not me, idiot.” She pushed past him.
What should she do now?

“
Oh goody, the kitchen.”
She
stopped and looked around the kitchen in terror.

A drawer on the far side slid open, and an
assortment of knives popped up.

“
Kyle, duck and cover!” Kyle dropped to
the floor and covered his head. The knives flew by him and like
sharp little missiles flew toward her. She knocked the kitchen
table over and ducked behind it. The knives plunged into it. Some
poked out of the other side at her. Ricky had quite an arm. Kyle
cowered in a corner and stared at the table and her.

“
What’s going on?” he yelled.

“
Badness,” she replied. She slowly got up
from the floor. How could she destroy the locket? Unfortunately,
Ricky wouldn’t wait for her to think up a solution.

The front door burst open. Mary turned to it in
terror, afraid to see what Ricky could have pulled in from the
outside.

Chapter 13

Tag Team

“
Did somebody order a cavalry?” Rachel
shouted, charging into the room. She brandished a large wooden
cross. Gran was right behind her. The old woman still had on her
kitchen apron, and she had Chowder tucked under her arm. Mary came
into the living room and stared at them in disbelief.

“
What are you guys--?” she
stammered.

“
No time for explanations,” Gran said.
“Have you found the anchor?”

Mary held up her hand with the locket.

Gran approached her with her hand outstretched.
“Okay, now we have to destroy it.”

“
You won’t get rid of me!”
Ricky
snarled.

“
Wanna bet?” Mary asked the thin
air.

“
Yeah.”
A force shoved her against
the wall. Her head cracked against the wood paneling. Mary wondered
if her brain was becoming black and blue from all these bangs she
kept taking. Her arms fell listlessly to her sides, and the chain
unraveled from her fingers. The necklace pooled to the
floor.

“
The anchor...” Her voice slurred in pain.
It slithered across the floor and under the couch. Rachel jumped
after it.

“
We’ve got to find a way to destroy it,”
Mary said as she slid down the wall. Gran rushed to her side and
bent toward her.

“
Take my hand.” She reached to take her
outstretched hand, but as their fingers grazed, Ricky threw Gran
away from her and flung the old woman into a chair. Mary watched in
alarm as an electrical cord snaked out and wrapped around her,
tying her to the chair.

“
Somebody, tell me what’s going on!” Kyle
screamed again from his corner.

Mary ignored him and staggered up unsure of her
balance. “Rachel, have you got the locket yet?”

“
Almost,” Rachel grunted. She was
stretched out full length on the floor with her arm under the
couch.

She lurched over to Gran and tried to tear off
the loops of cord binding her, but they wouldn’t budge

“
Don’t worry about me. Take one of the
pouches from my pocket. Stuff the locket into it. It should weaken
him.”

Mary nodded and took one of the pouches.

“
I don’t understand. Why do you
women keep defying me? She defied me too. I gave her everything she
ever needed. Who got her this house? Who paid the bills? Who put
food on the table? It sure wasn’t her.”

Mary made her way to Rachel, talking to the air,
“And Julie should’ve just sat there while you beat her night after
night without even a whimper.”

“
That’s right.”

“
It’s official. You don’t get any smarter
with death. You’re still as stupid as when you were alive.” She
knelt and tapped Rachel on the shoulder to give her the pouch.
Rachel took it in her free hand while she still reached under the
couch for the locket.

“
Mary, you shouldn’t provoke an angry
spirit anymore than he already is,” Gran warned.

“
You’re mad she went on, aren’t you,
Ricky? You’re mad that she left you here all alone. When she saw
her chance to leave you, she did.”

“
She didn’t leave me. I kept
her here. Close to my heart.”

“
Stop denying the obvious, Ricky. She’s
gone. She left you. I don’t hear any voice but yours.”

“
Mine’s the only one you need
to hear.”

Mary looked around nervously. Ricky was getting
angrier. She didn’t want to know what he might do next. “Rach,
hurry up with that locket.”

“
Got it!” Rachel popped up from beside the
sofa. She fumbled with the pouch to stuff the locket
inside.

“
No, you don’t!”

The sofa lurched into Rachel and knocked her
down. The locket flew out of her hands.

“
No fair,” Rachel wheezed. Mary dove for
the locket but missed it and landed on her stomach. The locket
slithered into the hallway toward the bedrooms.