I’m terrified. I’m so scared that there’s a fifty-fifty chance that I’ll pee in Ruby’s Juicy pants. On the television, the ingénue is being chained to a wall, and the killer in the scary mask revs his chainsaw, again. Oh, geez. I hate horror movies. I hate gore. I’m not an expert on story structure, but I can figure out that things are going to get way worse before they get better in this movie. Why the violence? Why can’t we all just get along?
“You know, Norma, now would be a good time to change the channel,” I say out loud. I reach for the remote control, but I accidentally knock it off the coffee table. On the television, the ingénue is screaming for real now as the killer tortures her, and I try not to watch. I drop down off the couch to search for the controller, and I finally find it under the table. Just as I get my hand around it with my thumb poised over the channel button, a terrible clap of thunder breaks through the night. The thunder is louder than the ingénue’s screams, which makes Ruby’s house rock, like a strong earthquake.
“Holy Moses,” I say. On TV, the chainsaw maniac goes in for the kill, and blood goes everywhere. Geez, how can network television broadcast this stuff? I gasp, traumatized by the violence. The poor ass alien didn’t deserve to die like this, I think, and then the electricity goes out in Ruby’s house, throwing me into darkness.
No.
No. No. No. No. No.
This isn’t happening.
The only thing my eyes see is black, but my mind is replaying the ingénue ass alien’s murder over and over. I’ve got a huge case of the heebie-jeebies. I have the creepy feeling that the chainsaw killer is hiding in the dark corner of the den, ready to pounce.
While crouched on the floor, my bottom lip begins to quiver. I’m in total darkness. I can’t even see my hand in front of my face. The wind finds the house’s gaps and holes, and it whistles loudly through the rooms, sending a frightful chill up my spine. “Bark?” I squeak. “Come here, Bark. I’ll find you more pizza.”
I try not to be scared.
I try to be brave.
Nope. It doesn’t work.
I have no idea where Ruby’s candles and matches are, and now I’m half-sure a killer with a chainsaw is hiding somewhere in the house. Damned TV. Why don’t I read books like other people? There are no chainsaws in a good Harlequin.
“Bark?” I squeak again. Nothing. I don’t even hear the click-clack of his nails on the floor. Not that I expect loyalty from him since I’ve only dog sat with him three or four times. It’s not like I’m his owner or anything. Still, it would be nice if Bark would throw me a bone and keep me company in my moment of terror.
“Bark? Bark?”
Finally, Bark takes pity on me and comes back. I’m still scared, but the click-clacking of his nails on the floor as he walks toward the den gives me some comfort. Just as he enters the den, the lights flicker back on. “Thank God,” I breathe. With the light, the images of the scary movie recede into the corners of my mind. I turn on the television. This time, I turn it to the local news so that I’m not assaulted by more chainsaw-wielding killers. Besides, I should probably find out more about this storm of the century.
Mandy, the weather woman, reports in her tight sheath dress that the storm is a doozy, but it will be gone by the morning, when the weather will return to its perfect seventy-five and clear skies. “See?” I tell Bark. “Nothing to worry about. You were scared before. Don’t deny it.”
I go back to the kitchen and tear through the cabinets, looking for junk food. Eureka. I find an expired box of onion soda crackers shoved behind five cans of pinto beans, and I bring it back to the couch. With the promise of more food, Bark jumps on my lap. Once again we watch television together, but this time it’s boring news instead of a scary B movie. I don’t normally watch news, and watching it now reminds me why. It’s a lot of blah, blah, politics and blah, blah, the economy. Nothing exciting. I begin to drift off just as they flash a picture of an unshaved man on the screen with a prison number under his weak chin.
“Rock Tucker is considered armed and dangerous,” the good-looking anchor reports. The anchor’s teeth are blindingly white and his face doesn’t move when he talks. “Tucker, who was convicted of bank robbery in 2006, was on Summer Island for an unrelated trial but escaped authorities when he went to the men’s room.”
Convicted of bank robbery? Armed and dangerous? Maybe he’s armed with a chainsaw! My heart begins to pound, and I wake up completely, like I’ve mainlined diet pills. I hug Bark to me, feeding him a cracker when he tries to escape my neediness. I pinch myself hard to make sure that I’m not dreaming this scenario. Damn, I’m wide awake.
“Since the docks are closed due to the storm, authorities are certain that Tucker remains somewhere on the island,” the anchor continues. “I repeat. Rock Tucker, an escaped bank robber, is somewhere on the island and is considered very dangerous. Stay inside and lock the doors.”
“Stay inside and lock the doors. We need to do that,” I tell Bark. I break out into a sweat and I mop my brow with my sweater sleeve. “We’re already inside, so that’s good. I wish you had opposable thumbs so that you could lock up the house.” I’m glued to the couch, and I may be hugging Bark a little too tightly. The movie scene replays in my head, scaring me. “The criminal probably won’t find Ruby’s house,” I continue, my voice wobbling from fear. “What are the odds of him invading this house in the middle of nowhere?”
The odds aren’t good that an armed and dangerous bank robber will find Ruby’s house and kill me, but just to make sure, I work up my courage and get off the couch in order to lock up the house. I bribe Bark with a cracker to follow me, and it works. We start in the kitchen, where I lock down the windows. One of them doesn’t have a lock, so I push the table in front of it.
“That’s so not going to stop him,” I complain to Bark. I grab a pot off the stove to use as a weapon, in case the bank robber gets inside. Bark barks at the pot. “Don’t laugh. At least it’s something.” But something isn’t much. “What am I doing? This is ridiculous. I don’t need to be a hero. I don’t need to hold down Ruby’s fort.” I can’t spend the night alone at Ruby’s house when there’s an armed criminal on the loose. I decide to call my cousin Derek, a firefighter on the island, to see if the fire department will pick me and Bark up and drop us off at my parent’s house for the night. Emergency vehicles are allowed to drive on the island, and if they’re already out handling the storm, it wouldn’t be that big of a deal to take a detour to pluck me out of danger.
I remember that my phone is in my bag by the back door, and when I take a step toward the hallway, thunder rocks the house again, even stronger than before. The lights go out, plunging us into darkness.
“Nooooo,” I moan. “No. No. No. No. No. Not before I find my phone.”
To top off the terror at being in the dark with a bank robber on the loose somewhere on the island, Bark begins to bark, and he doesn’t stop. “What are you barking at, Bark?” My voice comes out weak and wobbly. “Or who are you barking at?” I try to swallow, but I can’t. There’s a whole lot of scared blocking my throat. I can’t see a thing, my breathing is shallow, and I’m reasonably sure I’m going to pass out. Oh, how I hope I pass out. I really don’t want to be awake for this.
Over Bark’s barking, I hear the unmistakable creaking of Ruby’s front door. Someone is entering the house. Uh oh. Why didn’t I start with the front door when I was locking up the house? Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Now because of my stupidity, I’m going to die by a bank robber, probably by chainsaw. Dying by chainsaw has got to be a really, really bad way to go. I clutch the pot in my hand and try not to make a peep. If I can’t see the criminal, he can’t see me, which will make killing me that much harder. Besides, with the electricity out, he can’t plug in his chainsaw. There, that’s a bit of good news. My positive thinking doesn’t stick around, however, when Bark doesn’t stop barking, and I hear the front door close and heavy footsteps approach.
Oh my God. I’m going to die like the ingénue in a B movie, but I have significantly smaller breasts and significantly shorter hair. And I’m not blonde. And I’m not wearing a negligee. Do chainsaw killers kill brunettes? How about armed and dangerous bank robbers? How about an armed and dangerous bank robber who becomes a chainsaw killer? This can’t be happening. I can’t be killed by a chainsaw killer right after watching a chainsaw killer movie.
The heavy footsteps tell me otherwise. The killer is in the house, and he’s coming right for me, blonde or not. In the moment before he gets to the kitchen, my psyche dredges up all of my regrets, and the one that really stands out is Stone. Why didn’t I ever tell Stone how I feel? Too late now. He’ll never know, and I’ll never have a chance at a happy ending with him. Instead of living a love story with Stone, I’m going to be sliced like a hard salami and chopped like egg salad.
Geez, I’m on the verge of being murdered, and I’m hungry. That can’t be normal.
