Demi and Kellan walk to the bus stop that heads towards the park. Dem and I had to walk a few blocks further for the bus that heads to the library.
It was silent, as usual. And I was uncomfortable, I was unsure why though. Dem and I have been alone countless times, and I haven't freaked out. So why now? There is just something about him lately. I don't know what. But it's making me crazy, that's for sure.
During the ramblings in my head we make it to the bus stop. I check the schedule.
"It's about a fifteen minute wait." I inform him. He nods and rummages through his pockets, for his iPod I suppose. Meanwhile, I pull out my phone and start to play one of the meaningless apps that I had downloaded this week. I lean against the poll and continue to play until the bus pulls up in front of us slowly.
We get on and see that the bus was practically empty except for an elderly couple. We sit a few seats away from them.
Halfway through the ride, the woman looks up, meets my gaze and smiling crinkly at me. I grin back warmly.
"You two make an adorable couple," she says, knowingly.
"Huh?" I ask dumbly.
"I said, you two make a cute couple." She repeats slowly.
I was going to tell her that we weren't together, but I decide against it. It is much easier to just to thank her and move on.
"Oh." I blush. "Thanks," I look over to Dem who has his eyes closed and ears plugged, completely oblivious to what was going on.
"I was just telling Harold, my husband here, how you reminded me of us when we were your age." She goes on. "Those were the years, don't let then go by too fast, sweetie. You children, such a shame, always in a rush to grow up. . ." She sighs.
I stay quiet, not knowing what to say. Thankfully, our stop finally came. I say a shy goodbye to the lady, and nudge Dem to get up. We both rise and the lady catches my eyes and then smiles at Dem. He gives me a questioning look, but I just brush past him in a hurry to get off the bus.
These weird things only happen to me.
* * *
After a ten minute walk, we reach a surprisingly large library. We walk in and see how empty and still it is. I look around, only spotting a few people, mostly employees and elderly.
"May I help you?" A raspy voice sounds from behind us, making me jump in shock. I turn around to see a fairly tall man hovering over us with a questionable look in his eyes as he appraises us. He must not be used children in here, and if there were any, they we're probably trouble markers.
"Actually, yes." I clear my throat. "You see, we're doing a report about the history of the town for school, and we were hoping that we could look through some old newspapers and such?"
His expression visually clears and he offers a small crooked smile. "Well, of course, come this way."
We follow him through a long hall filled with old pictures, obviously, our small town's over exaggerated accomplishments. After a few twists and turns we reached a small room with a copy machine, a clock, and many drawers. It is dusty and only illuminated by a small window in the corner.
"Alright. Here we are. Sorry about the dust no one has cleaned back here in ages. These are the oldest records, the newer ones are in a separated room, but I'm sure you'll get what you need here." He says, taking out his keys and opening a few drawers filled with newspapers.
"The drawers are ordered from year to year, by date. These particular drawers from the early to mid 90's Please keep them in order." He requests with a stern stare.
"Okay. Thank you," I say, and then pause. "What about that drawer?" I say pointing to the closed drawer.
"That drawer? There's really nothing in there, slow news year. Not many papers were published." He explains, nonchalantly. From the corner of my eye, I see Dem arch his eyebrow, clearly not convinced.
"Well, I hope you kids find what you're looking for, I'll be at the front desk if you need anything." He says walking out the room, leaving the door ajar. I immediately went to the draws, skimming through the papers, hoping to see a headline about Nightmare land.
"Aren't you going to help?" I ask Dem, who was still standing staring at the drawers.
"Whatever we need to find is what's locked in those drawers" He says, ignoring my question.
"How do you know?" I ask, still leafing through papers.
"Because, whether it may be a slow news year, there has to be at least one paper published. Think about it, Abigail. 365 days and not one thing to report? Doesn't add up." He explains, and then he walks over and nudges me the side gently. He opens the drawer just above the locked one and pulls out last newspapers.
"Read the dates on these." He says, holding them up for me to see.
"October 30th?" I read out, puzzled.
"The year ends December 31," He says, still looking through papers "What could have happened that halted the presses for two months? That happened the day after October 31? That happened on Halloween?"
"Nightmare Land." I finally understand. "We have to open that drawer, Dem."
"I know." he says , looking towards the door. "But he has the key."
"So we have to figure out a way to get it then." I say, placing my palms on the table.
* * *
We formulate a simple plan and walk out the room. We spot him, sitting at a desk, stamping papers in vast concentration.
"Um, excuse me?" I announce my presence.
"Oh, hello again." He says looking up. "Done so soon?"
"Actually no. . ." I say, trying to sound embarrassed. "We seem to, accidentally, shut and lock one of the drawers before we can put the articles back. Could you just open them for us again, please?"
"Oh that's alright. I'll get those for you later." He says kindly, dismissing us.
"Uh b-but." I stutter. "There's still so much we still want read."
He briefly looks at us and then sighs while rising up, grabbing his keys. "Okay."
We quickly walk through the hall and into the room.
"It's that one." I point to a drawer we purposely locked. He turns and puts the key into the lock, but before he can unlock it, I let out a shriek and fall the ground. I crumple up into a pathetic little ball, moaning.
Dem gives me look, urging me to be more believable as he makes his way, unnoticed, to the drawers.
"Owwww. . ." I groan, trying to sound convincing. The librarian immediately stops and crouches down in alarm.
"What? What is it?" He asks, panicked, moving his hands around.
"It huuuuurts!" I cry out, peeking my eyes open. I see Dem silently chuckling as he pulls the keys from the draw and put them in the other lock quickly. After opening the lock we wanted, he quickly returns them to their rightful place. Once he finishes, he gives me a thumbs-up.
"What happened? What can I do?" The man babbles. I almost feel sorry for alarming him.
"Don't worry about her, she just forgot to take her medicine. Here." Dem explains, stuffing something into my mouth.
Hmm, Tic Tacs.
"Hmm" I hum, approvingly, enjoying the taste.
"See? She's better already." He says to the pale, old man. He looks between us a few times.
"Just-just hurry up and be on your way." He says. Quickly he gets up, unlocks the drawer, and speeds out of the room, muttering something about teenagers and their drugs.
"Good job." He says still chuckling and then mocks me. "It huuuuurts!"
"Shut up." I laugh and playfully smack him "My acting skills are intermediate."
"Whatever." he rolls his eyes, still grinning. "Let's see what's in here."
He pulls the drawer open and dumps it's entire contents on the table. We both sit down, side by side, preparing to sift.
"Okay, we'll just start from the last article from the previous year."
There is really nothing about the park for awhile. But in the later dated papers, there is an announcement about the coming attraction to our town. The article includes a picture and an interview from the people behind the whole creation. William and Mary Theodore, true horror extraordinaires. They've been active in the Halloween parade and own an old novelty store not too far from here. Apparently they've been working on Nightmare Land for two years, construction had been halted a few times for unknown reasons. Now that it was finally finished they wanted it to unveil on Halloween, of course.
"Come! We welcome you to relive you're greatest terrors!
We welcome you to Nightmare Land.
Abandon all hope of ever waking up!"
"Okay, nothing super suspicious there." I say, putting it to the side after writing a few notes. "Let's see the October 31 paper."
"There's really nothing here." He says, reading it. "Just more about the grand opening." He slides it over to me to glance at. "Okay November 1st."
"It said it turned out to be a big hit with adults." He mutters. "Children, however, were terrified of course."
"Try traumatized," I snort.
"No report of incidents, accidents or anything, just a lot of interviews about how everyone was gleefully freaked out. And they said the park will remain open for the remainder of November then they'll close until next Halloween."
"Okay, let's see where it goes wrong," I say, reaching over him to the November 2nd paper. After going each article we found nothing about Nightmare Land. "Nothing here."
"Same here. Just keep searching, we'll find something eventually," He says handing me another paper. Paper after paper we found nothing. Not one word about Nightmare Land, until Dem spoke up.
"Here's what we're looking for."
"November 23rd."
"We all recall the grand opening of William and Mary Theodore's Nightmare Land. The outcome was fairly positive, people raved about how satisfyingly terrifying the park was. The park, designed to make you relive your greatest childhood fears, seemed harmless and an interesting addition to our small suburban town.
"Crowded every night, the park continued to please and terrify horror enthusiasts. However, on November 17th, there was a tragic turn of events. On one ordinary night, one avid park goer, Markus Johnson, age 16, brought his younger sister Emily Johnson, age 7, along. For awhile there was nothing out of the ordinary until Markus couldn't locate his sister at the end of the night.
"S-She was right next to me in the room, I swear." Johnson explains "We we all were let out, I couldn't find her anywhere. We looked everywhere, for hours. We couldn't find her--she just disappeared"
"After thorough investigation from our town officials. They located little Emily's body barely alive, weak and brittle in the park storage facility. She was bonded up and catatonic when officials found her. She could barely speak--obviously traumatized. But, however, they were able to make out that she repeated to mumble something about 'waking up'.
"Investigating further into the situation after locating Emily, officials found dozens of children, age's ranging from 6 to 16, in various aspects of the park -- all were bonded up and ranting about they needed to wake up. They seemed to be unaware that they were awake-- they acted as if they were living in a nightmare.
"When questioned about Emily and the other children's disappearance and capture, William and Mary responded as if they didn't know what had happened."We would never do such a thing. We would never go as far as to abduct an innocent child" Mary explains.
"Most of the children recovered from whatever they were exposed to in Nightmare Land-- but none were able to recall what had occurred, explaining that it felt like a hazy dream. However, little Emily remained catatonic, refusing to speak, eat, or move.
"A week later, Emily was sent to a psychological unit across country to seek help for whatever she endured. William and Mary are being tried for abduction and child abuse.
"No one knows how little Emily ended up in that storage facility or what happened to her in there, but we do know she may never be the same again.
- Alec O'Conner"
"Huh." Is all I could muster after reading the article aloud.
"Yeah." Dem agrees, rubbing his palm roughly over his face.
"So, now we know this all isn't a coincidence." I say, writing a few more notes down. "What do we do now?"
"Here's what we do." Dem says, taking my pad and pen from me. "One, find William and Mary--figure out what happened to them. Two, find Emily--figure out what happened to her. Three, investigate that storage facility they found her in. Four, find out anything else that happened that night. And five, solve this mystery and close this door. Forever."
"How do we even know Emily or the Theodore's are even still living here?" I ask.
"I don't know. Phone book?" He shrugs. "We'll find away."
"Okay, I'll make some copies of this. You look through the rest of the papers and see if there's anything else." I say, getting up and walking up to the ancient copy machine.
"Alright." He says, flipping through some papers.
While making the copies I let my mind drift, wondering how I got myself into this situation; how it turned my life upside down. I feel like I'm literally living in a nightmare--one I couldn't wake up from. This realization gave me an uneasy feeling, and I think about the note. This nightmare was not over yet. No truer words were ever written.
"Hey, look at this." Dem calls from the table, I walk over and look over his shoulder.
"This article." He peers closer to read the title. "From November 29th, states that after William and Mary's incarceration, the park was shut down indefinitely."
"Okay, that's good." I nod, and then he held up one finger, signaling to me that he wasn't finished yet. He lays the paper aside and picks up another.
"This paper is from December 16th, about two weeks later. It says that after the shutdown of the park many people were disappointed and angry--mostly teenagers. So one night a group of teens decided to visit Nightmare Land. They broke in through the back fence. Well, in a nutshell-- they all were found dead a few days later. Their bodies found in various locations of the Park."
I can't speak my mouth remains agape so he just continues. Clearly uncomfortable, he gets up and makes copies of the article, then begins speaking again.
"Since the murders happened while Mary and William were in jail they were let free obviously not responsible for the bizarre things that occurred at their park. They closed the park permanently, and banned the entire area. In various police reports, people who have tried to break in swore they heard screams and laughter emitting from the park, but they were all dismissed --considering it as a joke the youngster wanted to play. Due to the screams and disturbances, people living in nearby residences moved away and the complete area was shut off. Anyone caught on the ground could be punished by law."
"Dem-" I begin, but just end up shaking my head.
"I know." He says placing the news papers back into the drawers and locking them.
"I don't want to play this game anymore." I say.
"I know. We just-" He starts but I cut him off.
"No! Didn't you read that? Teens found dead! All because they broke into that place, no one even knows what the hell happened to them, Dem. That could have been us!" I cry out at him, getting louder and louder at each word. I sound downright hysterical, but I don't care at this moment. "Don't you remember that first night? That could have been us. We could have been killed that night!"
"You think I don't know that!?" He roars back, tendons in his neck tensing and nostrils flaring "You think I don't know we could be killed at any moment? You think I don't have nightmares about that every night? You think I don't endlessly worry about you guys? Kel? Mad? You? Dylan? Demi?! Because I do! Ok? I DO. That's why I'm right here, right now! Trying to solve this problem and move on with our lives," Dem slowly sat down in a chair, and fisted his hair "I just can't think straight anymore. It's hard. I thought after dad died the only thing I had to worry about is Demi and Mom. And now-now we have this! I don't even-- I can't even begin to ... I just ..." His breathing is ragged and uneven as he mumbles out some more incoherent words.
Emotion suddenly washes over me as I realize that I'm not only one scared here. Dem is just as terrified as I am. And he had more to lose then me. After his dad died he became the man of the house, he takes the lead and care for Demi and their mother. He is trying to protect them. And who was I trying to protect? Myself.
I sit down next to him and awkwardly put an arm around his broad shoulders.
"I'm sorry." I whisper. "I didn't know. I didn't know you felt like this. I know you're trying to protect them. You're a great brother for that."
"It's not just Demi. It's you guys too." He says, sincerely. "Listen I'm sorry for losing it just now. It's just hard sometimes."
"I just want this to be over." I admit, rubbing my eyes roughly.
"Same here." He says in his emotionless voice, putting the wall back up. He rises from the seat and grabs the copies.
"We're done?" I ask, watching him move around the room.
"Yeah. I guess." He replies, pushing the seat and walking to the door."Let's get out of here."
Before I can respond, he leaves the room