Tonight the main screen was showing Harper Valley PTA and The Cat from Outer Space. The Creature Double Feature was Bride of Frankenstein and Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man—two of Vi’s favorites. She couldn’t wait for Iris to see the big screen, the snack bar where they loaded up on popcorn, Junior Mints, Twizzlers, and Charleston Chews (Eric’s favorite).
As she pumped the pedals on her bike, Vi wondered if Iris had ever even tasted Junior Mints or Charleston Chews. If she had, she probably wouldn’t remember, so it would be like having them for the first time. Everything was new and strange to Iris. Vi was a little jealous of her, experiencing wonderful things for the first time—Rice Krispies, Pop-Tarts, Tootsie Pops (“How many licks does it take to get to the center?” asked the wise old owl in the commercial), Saturday morning cartoons. She didn’t even know who Scooby-Doo was!
But she loved watching Iris try new things. She loved teaching her about Pop Rocks that exploded on your tongue, Creamsicles (Vi’s favorite—orange outside, vanilla inside!), and how to work a flashlight. She’d taught Iris how to tie her shoes and put her clothes on so that they weren’t backward and inside out.
* * *
VI’S LEGS WERE burning from the extra weight of Iris on the seat of her bike. They were almost there now, riding across the field, then around the back lot of Leo’s Good Deal Autos, where they sold used cars in front and had a junkyard out back. Vi imagined that Leo took pieces from broken-down cars and pieced them together like one of Eric’s chimeras.
Just behind Leo’s back lot was the fence for the drive-in. They pulled up right on time—the big screen was lit up with dancing popcorn and candy and cups of ice-cold Coca-Cola, inviting everyone to visit the snack bar, where smiling hot dogs were waiting. They laid their bikes down on the ground, and Vi found the loose section of fence, holding it open for Eric and Iris, then crawling through herself. They settled in at their usual spot: a little mound in the corner of the back row. Speakers on poles blasted out the sound.
Bride of Frankenstein started.
Vi loved the beginning, because there were Mary Shelley, her husband, Percy, and Lord Byron, and the men telling her what a great story she came up with, and she saying there’s more of the story to tell. It was a perfect night for such a tale, Mary Shelley told the men, a perfect night for mystery and horror. “The air itself is full of monsters,” she said.
Vi leaned over and explained to Iris, “That’s the woman who wrote Frankenstein. She’s the one who started it all.”
Vi’s heart went out to the monster, burned and shot, bloodhounds on his trail, villagers with pitchforks and torches chasing him down.
“He’s not bad,” she told Iris as they watched. “Just misunderstood. All he wants is a friend.”
And Iris nodded and Vi knew she got it, she truly got it, because wasn’t she a little like the monster herself? Scared and misunderstood, all alone in the world?
But Iris wasn’t alone. Not anymore. Now she had Vi and Eric.
Vi inched a little closer to Iris, and Iris didn’t move away. They sat side by side in the dark, their eyes glued to the screen.
They watched the monster, Boris Karloff in makeup and prosthetic forehead, bolts in his neck, as he was captured, tied to a pole, and paraded through town, then set upright on the pole to be stoned by villagers. Vi always thought he was like Christ in this part, but she knew better than to say that out loud to anyone, even to Iris and Eric.
“See,” Vi whispered to Iris when the monster cried at finally making a friend. “He’s more human than they are.”
As they watched, a new monster was created to be a mate and companion for the original. Electricity brought her to life, just like him. Vi loved the laboratory scenes, the machines all pulsing with light and electricity. And when the lightning struck the kite, the Bride’s bandage-wrapped body came to life, and Iris scooched even closer to Vi, side by side. Then Iris reached out and took Vi’s hand, and Vi wasn’t sure if this meant she was happy or scared, maybe a little of both.
It’s a fine line between the two, Vi thought, and she wanted to save that thought, put it away in a drawer to take out and look at later, because it felt important.
Vi held her breath, not wanting any of it to end: Iris holding her hand, the smell of popcorn, the crackle of the drive-in speakers, the movie, the link between bliss and fear.
But end it did.
There was always an ending. And in the monster movies, the monster always died. (At least until the sequel.)
They watched the Bride with her amazing lightning-bolt hair reject the monster; she screamed and gave a terrible hiss, and the monster understood then, knew that he would always be alone. Iris gripped Vi’s hand tighter. “We belong dead,” the monster said, and he pulled the lever to blow them up, setting fire to the tower, killing them.
Iris began to cry, her whole body lurching and rocking with sobs. She made a low moaning howl that was quiet at first but got louder.
“It’s okay,” Eric said. “It’s just a movie.”
She was rocking and howling in earnest now, and people in nearby cars were starting to look.
They were not supposed to be noticed. They were supposed to slip in and out of the movie like shadows. Three kids no one saw.
Vi put her arm around Iris, said, “Come on, shhh, it’s okay. Let’s go home. We’ll go home, it’s okay.”
Iris didn’t answer, just kept crying.
A man stepped toward them, a little unsteady. Vi couldn’t see his face because he was backlit by the screen playing the intermission clip with dancing popcorn and candy bars, by the bright floodlights that had come on around the snack bar.
“Your friend okay?” he asked. Vi could smell the beer on him.
“Yeah, she’s my sister. She’s fine. Just scared. Never seen a monster movie before,” Vi said.
Vi got on one side of her, Eric on the other, and they walked her back to the fence, murmuring comforting words, and slipped through. The credits rolled behind them, and people headed for the snack bar and playground for intermission.
The man called out, “Hey, where are you going?” He took a few staggering steps toward the fence, and put his hands on the links.
Vi’s heart was pounding as they got on their bikes and pedaled hard away from the drive-in, from the man still standing at the fence, watching them.
They pedaled hard and fast until they were on the dirt road, and then they had to get off and push, because the hill was too steep and Vi couldn’t do it with Iris on the seat of her bike.
Eric could have kept riding, but he dismounted too and walked alongside the girls, pushing his bike.
“It was a sad ending, wasn’t it?” Vi said to Iris as they trudged uphill.
Iris had stopped crying and howling.
“I’m sorry,” Vi said. “We should have warned you.”
“They burned up,” Iris said.
“That’s how it is in monster movies,” Eric explained. “The monster always dies.”
“Why?” Iris asked.
Vi wasn’t sure how to answer.
“Because they don’t belong,” Eric said, voice low.
And Iris started to cry again, not great howling sobs, but quietly, like a puppy snuffling. “It isn’t fair,” she said.
Vi held the handlebar of her bike with her right hand, and reached out for Iris’s hand with her left. Iris let her take it, and they walked like that in silence, all the way up the hill, the moonlight behind them stretching out their shadows, turning them all into monsters.
The Helping Hand of God: The True Story of the Hillside Inn By Julia Tetreault, Dark Passages Press, 1980