Fog Descending (House of Crows), Lisa Unger [best summer books .TXT] 📗

him. All of them, Ian suspected, thinking about what they, too, really, truly wanted.

“I wish,” Mason said. His voice sounded funny, tight and deep. “I want—”

They waited, Claire grabbing Ian’s hand tight. What did someone like Mason want, really want? What would he be willing to say in front of Claire, Ian, and Matthew—summer friends at best?

“I want my father to die. He beats me, and my mom. He’s a drunk and a monster. And I wish he was dead.”

Claire gasped, covered her mouth. Ian and Matthew exchanged a wide-eyed look. And the air all around them felt leaden. They waited. What would happen now, as the candles flickered in the draft?

Then Mason started to laugh, like really crack up. He doubled over with it, then looked over, pointing at the three of them, who had huddled together.

“You guys,” he said. “You should see your faces. Oh my God.”

“Mason,” said Claire, her voice as stern as any mom’s.

More laughter from Mason, tears streaming. “Are you serious?” he managed between peals of laughter. “The Dark Man? You think that shit’s for real?”

“You asshole,” said Matthew, pissed, embarrassed.

Then there was a loud bang upstairs; a harsh gust of wind blew down the stairs and extinguished all the candles with a woosh. After a stunned delay, the four of them ran screaming in terror up the stairs, grabbing for each other, Ian helping Claire, Matthew leading the way. They ran through the house, footfalls rattling the walls, yells ghostly, echoing in the dark, all of them just lucky not to fall through the holes in the floor.

Outside the ruined structure they kept running—through the clearing, into the trees, until they couldn’t run anymore, sides stitching, breathless. Then, silently, they kept walking toward Merle House.

“I’m sorry,” Mason called finally, trailing behind. “I was just messing with you guys.”

“It wasn’t funny, Mason,” yelled Claire, turning around to face him. “You scared the shit out of us.”

“Well,” said Matthew, coming to a stop. “It was a little funny.”

“Yeah,” said Ian, grinning. The charge, the terror, had passed. He was nauseated from exertion, and they could see the roof of Merle House up ahead. There was still time, so maybe Penny hadn’t set off the alarm. “It was a little funny.”

“You guys are idiots,” said Claire. “I’m going home.”

When she had left them, the three of them started laughing, continuing on toward home.

“Do you really wish your father was dead?” asked Matthew.

“Yeah,” said Mason. “I really do.”

Matthew nodded but didn’t say anything else. And the laughter died again. When they got to the porch, Penny was waiting, hands on ample hips. She wore her dark hair short and dressed in simple clothes—usually some kind of pencil skirt or pleated pant with a white top, a uniform of sorts without quite being that.

“Mason and Ian, your mothers are worried about you. Please come inside and call them. Where’s Claire?”

“She went home,” said Matthew.

Ian could tell Penny didn’t like this answer by the way she pushed up her glasses, locking Matthew in a frown. “Gentlemen don’t let ladies walk home unescorted. I shouldn’t have to tell you boys that.”

“Sorry, Penny,” said Matthew. “She was mad at us, stormed off.”

“Hmm,” said the older woman. “I’m sure she had good reason.”

The boys all nodded obediently. She did. They were assholes.

“Matthew, please call her parents and tell them she’s on her way, to be on the lookout and to call if she’s not home soon.”

They all scuttled inside to obey, taking turns on the phone in the kitchen. When it was Matthew’s turn, he took the cordless phone into the hallway, his voice lowered to a whisper when it seemed like he reached Claire.

I’m sorry, Ian heard him say. Don’t be mad.

There was an unfamiliar intimacy to Matthew’s tone; maybe there was something going on between Matthew and Claire. Ian felt a tight knot of jealousy, but he pressed it back.

“What was that place?” Ian asked Mason later, as they all sat at the kitchen table eating the hamburgers and macaroni and cheese Penny had waiting for them.

“I think it was a school,” said Mason. “Like a reform school or something. Some kids I know go there to get high. They put all that crap down there, the candles, drew the circle on the ground to call the Dark Man.”

It sounded like a lie. But Matthew and Ian had had enough of Mason for one night. Mason ate and ate, like he hadn’t had a decent meal in a week—two hamburgers, three helpings of mac and cheese. And maybe he hadn’t; the kid was rail thin. He always raved about Penny’s meals, which to Ian and Matthew were pretty standard fare. Ian was relieved when he left after dinner.

“It was pretty funny, right?” Mason asked at the door, eager, Ian could tell, to ignite the laughter again.

“Yeah,” said Matthew, back to being a dick. “It was fucking hilarious.”

He shut the door while Mason was still standing there.

Mason didn’t show up the next morning; Ian, Claire, and Matthew headed to the lake. It was an easy, sunny, lazy day that ended when the fireflies began to appear in the gloaming. If anyone had asked Ian what they’d done, he wouldn’t have been able to say. Swam, lay on the towel he brought, watched Claire run and jump and swim. They’d found a nest of baby birds, mouths gaping. Looked for frogs. Climbed a tree. Ate sandwiches Penny had packed for them. Everything. Nothing. That was summer.

Ian didn’t tell the other two about the nightmares he’d had all night about the woods, about the Dark Man and Claire. How, in his dreams, it had been him in that circle, saying what he wanted, and what the Dark Man had asked of him. Just a nightmare. Stupid. Already faded to nothing. Almost.

It wasn’t until they’d gotten home to Merle House and seen the police car parked there that they’d even thought about Mason and what had happened the night before, the