The Well.

A. J. Whitten.

The boy would be his.

It was only a matter of time.

And then he could walk the earth again. See the sun. Breathe fresh, sweet air, not this fetid exhale of the dead.

He had waited so long for the life-giving blood that would resurrect his body. Turn him from a pathetic, scrabbling creature into something that resembled a human again. Take away the torture of his existence and allow him out of this darkness. How long since he had seen the light?

Centuries.

Two torturous centuries, the length of his sentence. But soon that wait would be over.

He lived in the depths of h.e.l.l, in a hole where no one looked. He suffered, crawling through the muck, the wet, across stones that sc.r.a.ped what remained of his body, shred ding his skin, tearing his nails. He had learned to adapt, like a creature in the wild.

So he could wait. Wait to be fed.

She would bring the boy to him. Today. He could almost smell the boy's blood. Taste his flesh. Feel the life that would pour into him, resurrect him.

Soon. He would be whole.

And then- And then he would get his revenge.

Dying in the movies always looks cool. The hero gets a big sendoff with flames and some hot chick. Behind him, a stack of bullet-stoked g.a.n.g.b.a.n.gers' bodies are piled up in crushed SUVs. Everyone cries. Fade to black.

Dying that way rocks.

But the way I was going to die would suck. Stuck in the bottom of a well. No way out, no hope of anyone ever finding me. While some beast-creature-monster-thing waited in the corner for me to give up.

So it could eat me alive.

Oh my G.o.d.

I screamed for help, but it was a waste of time. Who could hear me this far down? Not even me, not anymore. My voice had pretty much deserted me.

Just like she had.

If I died-I couldn't think the word when, because that totally wigged me out-they wouldn't write movies about me. Cuz no one would stay past the opening credits. My fourteen years on earth had been that boring.

Until now.

I started shivering. I was cold; I ached all over. But more, I was scared. Scared all the way into my bones. My blood was popsicle juice-thick, freezing.

How long had I been here? Twenty minutes? An hour? Two? It seemed as if I'd spent my entire stupid life down here, covered in slime, wet, terrified out of my freakin' mind.

Worse, I had nowhere to go to get away from that a that thing. Whatever the h.e.l.l it was. A rat? Yeah, I told myself, it had to be a rat. Or a racc.o.o.n that had fallen in, gotten stuck like me, in the bottom of a damp, moss- and moldencrusted well. The light at the top as far away as Mars.

But you know what was worse? And yeah, there were worse things than being stuck in a hole while some monster lurked in the shadows.

Like being there because you were shoved down the well by someone who was supposed to love you.

That sucked ten times more.

My fingers felt like raw hamburger from sc.r.a.ping against the rounded, slippery bricks of the walls. But the well still held me tight. Twenty feet down. Maybe more. It was hard to tell.

There was no other way out, not unless I could pull a Superman and fly up. But I wasn't any kind of a hero, just a not-so-built high school freshman who'd been cut from the football team last week because my own father wouldn't give me a pa.s.sing grade in English.

I heard a huff-huff. Almost like a laugh. Holy c.r.a.p. Not again. I hugged the wall.

It was back.

That thing that lived in a dark s.p.a.ce, maybe a tunnel, carved in the back of the well. I didn't know what it was. And I didn't want to know. I might have been fourteen and thought I was immortal when I was standing on firm ground, but when you're stuck in a two-inch s.k.a.n.ky puddle in a well with some thing a few feet away, I don't care who you areyou're ready to p.i.s.s your pants like a three-year-old girl.

It huffed again, and then something sc.r.a.ped against the floor. A scritch-scratch.

That was a rat. Yeah, a rat, with really long claws.

Or at least, I prayed it was a rat.

But no, there it was again, louder now, too loud to be a rodent. I shrank away from the sound, but where was I going to go? I had six feet of s.p.a.ce, six feet of darkness filled with slippery, slimy wet that stuck to my clothes, my hands, like glue, but I scrabbled back all the same, away from that scritch-scratch, scritch-scratch, patiently coming closer to me, one clawing, sc.r.a.ping step at a time.

Oh G.o.d.

More huffing, as if it were smoking a huge cigar or it had an anteater nose and was inhaling my scent. Did rats eat people?

If it was a big enough rat, I bet it would. Then why hadn't this one come after me yet? What was it waiting for? Was it waiting until it sensed I'd finally given up? Or waiting until it was sure no one was ever coming back for me?

Oh G.o.d, oh G.o.d, oh G.o.d.

Get me out of here. I'll do my homework, clean my room, be nice to my brother, my stepfather-h.e.l.l, everyone, all the time. justplease make someone notice I'm missing.

Please.

I pressed against the wall. The stones scratched a pattern of hard lines into my back. The water beneath my Vans sloshed against my socks, slippery, thick as- G.o.d, thick as blood. But it wasn't blood. No way, wasn't blood. Every horror movie I'd ever seen raced through my mind.

Scritch-scratch.

Closer now.

Bile rose in my throat, the puke thick, burning on the rewind. I spewed chunks.

"Help!" But all that came out was a croaking whisper. Up above, I heard the barking of Whipple, my dog. Little terrier yips, useless against the well, the creature.

Who'd hear him this far from civilization? We were in the woods, for G.o.d's sake, not in the mall. Dog kept on barking his head off. Thought he was La.s.sie or something. "Whipple," I whispered, calling him even though he couldn't hear me. Like a hope-aholic, I reached up the stone wall. My hands grasped for leverage, for a nook, anything to grab, to latch on to within the cold, damp bricks. I found nothing but more of that gluey, slimy moss and crevices too thin to gain a foothold.

I was going to die. Alone down here. And no one would ever find me.

I started to cry. I didn't care if boys weren't supposed to cry. My guts twisted, and I had to punch a fist tight into my solar plexus to keep whatever was left of my lunch from riding back up the throat elevator.

Scritch-scratch. The breathing heavier, thicker. Filled with the smell of rotten eggs and dead animals. I gagged.

Oh, G.o.d. Oh, G.o.d. Oh, Jesus G.o.d. I swiped at the sweat and tears on my face. The slimy moss stuck to my cheeks, holding on like spider webs. It wouldn't let go. Was going to stay with me forever. Would be there if they found me, if they ever found my body- Buck up-stop crying. Be a man.

Trying to go somewhere?

The words came not from a person's voice, but in my head. And even weirder, not in my own voice. In another voice, one that was deep and gravelly. The voice ofa The thing. Holy freakin' c.r.a.p.

The dog kept barking, the sound of his yipping going in and out like a radio station that wouldn't stay tuned. Was he looking for help? Running in circles? Chasing a stupid rabbit?

Scritch-scratch. I'm coming closer.

More breathing, more of that smell, like a stink bomb released right under my nose. I grabbed at the walls again, but whatever sticky slime was on them wasn't enough to hold me.

I closed my eyes, thought of Megan, tried to smell her shampoo, picture the deep pools of her blue eyes. But I couldn't. It was as if trying to conjure her up in this foul place only made the whole situation worse- And this was bad enough already.

Oh, Cooper a Holy freakin' mother. Did that thing just say a my name? The rest of my lunch came hurling forward.

Someone, anyone-I didn't care if it was Harvey the Clown on Channel 3 3-please notice I was gone. But who? Who would think to come this far back in the woods?

And look in the well, of all places?

Then Whipple stopped barking. Terror filled every blank spot inside me. The last thoughts of hope ran away.

No one was coming. Who was I kidding? She wasn't coming back to get me either, and that thing- The thing's breathing got louder, the huffing increasing in volume, bouncing off the walls, heat multiplying in the small s.p.a.ce, coming at me like a mortuary fan filled with the scent of formaldehyde and rot, and then the breath was on my neck, making my tiny hairs stand at attention. I was scrabbling against the wall, knowing it was useless, knowing the thing was going to get me, eat me, have me for dinner- "Grab the rope, you idiot. I'm not going to climb down there and get you myself. G.o.d, you're such a moron."

I looked up at the circle of light above my head and saw my older brother, Faulkner. Thank G.o.d. He looked about as excited as a senior citizen at a Green Day concert, holding a thick rope and waiting for me to grab it.

I chanced a glance over my shoulder. The huffing had stopped, the darkest shadows now just shadows again, not inky pools of doom. Had I imagined it? Made the whole thing up, out of fear?

Yeah. I must have, I told myself, because it was easier than believing the truth. What could live in a well, anyway?

Yeah, it was nothing. So don't be scared. Stay awhile, Cooper.

I didn't hear that. Didn't hear a thing.

My hands trembled when I grabbed on to the rope, my palms so sweaty it took two tries before I had a solid enough grip. My Vans slipped against the well's walls. Faulkner cursed three times as he hauled me out of there, calling me stupid in English and Spanish.

Showoff. He's in Spanish III and thinks he's going to Spain after graduation, so he runs around spouting, "~ Como estds? ~Donde estd la puerta?" and c.r.a.p like that, like he's freakin' Juan Valdez. Our father thinks it shows he's got genius material. I think it's a sign of dementia.

But he was the one on the other end of the rope, pulling me away from that thing, so I kept my "~Hermano loco?" thoughts to myself. I decided I didn't mind the Spanish so much right now anyway.

"How the h.e.l.l did you end up down there?" Faulkner asked when I reached the top. He didn't offer me a hand, just stepped back and left me to scramble over the edge on my own. Hey, at least he'd come with the rope.

I brushed my pants off, but it was a wasted gesture. The slime stuck, a black-green glue with eau de decay. I watched a show about this death farm once, where these forensic guys left pigs and dead bodies outside in old cars and watched them rot, measuring the maggots on them to tell how fast a body would go from fat and fleshy to ashes and dust. About two weeks in, things got really hairy and nasty.

That was what my pants smelled like. What the well stank of. If I could have, I would have stripped off my Levi's and "Hamlet Had Issues" T-shirt-an early and ironic birthday present from my professor father-right there and burned them, but I didn't think Faulkner wanted to see me in my Hanes briefs.

"What happened?" Faulkner asked. He picked up his pace to match mine, hauling b.u.t.t out of the woods that surrounded the well and that served as a natural keep-out fence around the Jumel Vineyards to our east. The well sat in the center of the thick forest of trees, surrounded by its own little grapevine of these rare, pale champagne grapes. Our stepfather, who owned the vineyard, said those vines had been there since, like, the dawn of time. Then some smart Jumel dude bought the land for a song in, like, i 8oo-something and made gazillions. Didn't matter to me. I couldn't put enough distance between me and that Jumel history.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you." I was his younger brother. He never believed me about anything anyway.

"Try me," Faulkner demanded.

I thought for a moment about what logical explanation there might be for my ending up at the bottom of the well. "I tripped," I finally said.

Faulkner snorted. "Idiot. You tripped and fell down a well? What are you, five?"

"Just shut up." The slime was up and down my sc.r.a.pedup hands, just as stuck as it was on my pants. I was going to need one serious shower. Maybe a pressure washer.

A flurry of leaves came rushing at us in a tiny cyclone, and my heart kicked up. I took three steps back, everything inside my gut rising to choke up my throat. Oh G.o.d, it had gotten out of the well.

It was coming after me.

The smell. I could smell it.

Hear it. Panting. Breathing. Running.

And then it was on me, it- Was the dog. The stupid dog, leaping on my chest, his tiny body of fur one ma.s.sive projectile of mammal love. "Whipple, you idiot." I went to hug the dog to me, but he leaped off just as fast as he'd jumped on.

He let out a whimper, his tail ducking between his legs. He scrambled back three steps, then dropped his nose to the ground and poked it forward, like a kid about to get busted for having Marlboros in his room. Whipple took one quick sniff of the green streaks on my Vans, then whimpered again and lay down, his head on his paws, his eyes wide and scared.

Did dogs get scared of slime?

"What's wrong with him?" Faulkner asked.

"I don't know." I shrugged, as if I didn't care. But there was something. Something in that slime.

Something I didn't want to know.

"That dog's acting psycho," Faulkner said. "First he runs off yesterday and stays gone all night, and he, like, never does that. Now he's a strange. Like he inhaled gas or something."

"Leave him alone." I turned toward the house. Pretending nothing had happened. Easier than admitting something had.

Faulkner and I walked back to the house, the leaves floating up around our shoes, so ordinary, so real, almost as though I had imagined that time in the well. But I hadn't, and I knew it. I could still smell the thing on me. Could still see the long, ugly red scratches-like claw marks-on my arms and hands from the fall and from sc.r.a.ping against the stone walls. Feel the throbbing ache in my legs, my feet, my hands, from landing on the bottom.

I shuddered and shook my head, pushing the thoughts away.

Pushing away what had really happened. Because I didn't want to believe it. Yeah, so what if I wanted to hold on to a fantasy? Call me a baby; sue me for trying to be a kid a little longer. I kept telling myself the whole thing was one biga.s.s accident. That no one would purposely shove me down with that- *hat thing.

No. It didn't happen.

Not like that. I'd p.i.s.sed her off, that was all. It had been a fight, a misunderstanding.