The Girl from the Well

Both are also dead. Scraggly Beard’s eyes are rolled so far into his head that only the whites are showing, and Glasses suffers from deep claw marks that rake across his face and tear through his clothes. Like the Mohawk, both their faces are putrefied, decomposing.

“Hiroshi!” Acne Scars is running toward him, and Shaved Head is relieved to find him still alive, though every inch as terrified as he. “What’s going on, Hiro?” he wails. “Yasushi-chan’s dead! I…” His voice trails off as he stares down, shocked, at the two other dead boys at his feet.

“There’s nothing we can do for them now! We gotta get out of here!” Shaved Head dashes down the stairs, Acne Scars tripping and stumbling behind him. The old man and woman are still sitting by the table, though they are now clinging to each other, terrified by the commotion.

“Did you do this to fuck around with us, you old prick?” Shaved Head grabs the old man’s shoulders and shakes him hard. Acne Scars loses his balance, landing noisily on his rear by the small wardrobe. The old woman shrinks back, covering her eyes with her withered hands. “Answer me!”

But the old man does not look at him. He is looking over his shoulder at something that drains all the blood from his face.

Slowly, Shaved Head releases the old man and turns.

The wardrobe door has opened, and another pair of arms encircle Acne Scars’ neck. Half my body leans out, my hair brushing against the boy’s cringing face.

Acne Scars’ gaze is locked onto Shaved Head’s, realization dawning alongside terror on his ugly, pockmarked face.

“Hiroshi,” he whimpers. It is the last thing he will ever say.

I

dr

ag

him into the confines of the wardrobe, the door sliding shut behind us.

Shaved Head sinks to his knees. The tiny wardrobe rocks hard against the wall as terrible screams ring out from within. For some minutes these continue, until they finally cut off abruptly.

For a long moment there is silence.

Then from inside the closet the scratchings start up again. So do the low, gurgling sounds.

Shaved Head runs past the frightened couple and snatches a metal baseball bat.

“I’m not afraid of you!” he shouts. “I’m gonna kill you! I’m gonna kill you!” Crazed, he brings the bat down on the sides of the wardrobe with a strength that belies his lanky build. “I’m gonna kill you! I’m gonna kill you!” Over and over again he attacks it, and the cheap wood slowly gives way.

He smashes the doors, battering at the wardrobe until the frame shatters from the repetitive blows, until the hinges break free and the plywood splinters to reveal that there is nothing inside the wardrobe but clothes—not Acne Scars, not anything else. But the boy does not stop. He grabs at the sides of the wardrobe and pulls it down onto the floor, destroying it completely.

Shaved Head pauses, panting heavily from his exertions. “Did I kill it?” He wheezes and then starts laughing hysterically. “Hahahaha! I killed it, didn’t I? I killed it! Sonofabitch!”

He levels a kick at what remains of the wardrobe, still giggling maniacally. “You’re not going to get me, bitch,” he crows. “You’re not going to get me!”

But his laughter falters when he hears the scratching again despite everything to the contrary—a scratching coming from underneath the broken planks of wood.

Frenzied, like a man possessed, he begins to pull the heavy pieces of timber away from the floor. When most of the wood scraps have been discarded, he burrows into the pile of clothes, pawing through them until something snags his foot, forcing him to land on a

body.

It is the body of the dead girl, arms folded across her naked chest.

Her eyes open. Her bloodied hands reach up to cup either side of the boy’s cringing face, almost caressingly. She even smiles.

But those same bloody hands tighten inexorably around him, and Shaved Head is yanked forward into her waiting mouth.

It is hours before either of the old couple can be persuaded to leave their table. But when the aging man sweeps the strewn clothes away with a trembling hand, there is no trace of either the boy or the dead girl.

? ? ?