Page 35 of Haunted Heart
“And I’ll fix it tomorrow.”
Julia doesn’t want to let me go, but she knows she has to.
“I will be right back.” I kiss her cheek, avoiding the teeth that haven’t gone back to the way they were when she was living. “I promise.”
Jonas looks better. Maybe watching a guy you thought was a friend get murdered is restful compared to the recently departed from Hell.
He looks at me, smiling kind of sheepishly when he sees me studying him. “I know this is probably going to make me sound like a sociopath, but… I’m okay with guys who pull this kind of shit not existing anymore.I’mnot going to kill them, but if a pissed off poltergeist decides to, I’m not going to try to stop her.”
It’s probably a good thing. “Will you help me get him to his car?”
“Yeah.” He nods, taking a deep breath. “It’s not like tonight could get any more macabre.”
It might. “Fair warning, he’s probably going to feel really gross.”
He takes him by the shoulder and I take his feet. And as soon as we pick him up, Jonas makes a repulsive noise.
He dry heaves before composing himself. “Okay, yeah. I was not expecting it to feel like a sack of loose parts.”
“That’s kind of what he is now.” Inside his skin, there’s no structure anymore, just a jumble of bone pieces and organ soup.
“How are you going to explain it?” he puffs out as we struggle around the house.
“That’s what the car’s for.”
Together we walk Dylan through the orchard, past the corn maze, and back to his car.
We both glance warily at the two other cars still parked in the dark lot.
“Think those are Chad and the other guys’?”
“Yeah, but I can’t help Minnie clean up her mess until I’ve cleaned up mine.” And she’s not asked me to.
“So… trunk?” Jonas guesses.
“No.” I dig Dylan’s keys out of his pocket. “Front seat.”
“Yeah?” I’m surprised that that surprises him.
“He’s about to drive away and have an accident.”
“Okay.” He doesn’t ask any more questions, he just helps me put Dylan in the driver’s seat.
“You’re oddly chill about this,” I remark.
“I mean… we just came back from Hell. This doesn’t feel all that strange in comparison.”
“Fair.”
The spell is simple, the words even more so. The car starts down the drive on its own and we walk behind it until it reaches the end of the drive and joins the county road. Then we watch in silence as it swerves and careens, picking up speed…
It flies into the woods, and I hear it crash heavily into the trees. I see the flash of Dylan’s t-shirt.
“He flew through the windshield,” Jonas says.
I nod, wishing I’d brought my jacket. “Should have been wearing a seatbelt.”
“Probably broke all the bones in his body.”
