Fright Night Read online

  Dandrige eased up momentarily before dealing the final push. After all, any death—even one as stupid and trivial as this—deserved to be savored.

  Charley seized in desperation upon the lessened pressure. Bowing his back painfully, he lurched to the left, hand raking wildly across his desk.

  The night yawned black beneath him, the cold earth a good thirty feet below.

  The vampire resumed pushing. Its strength was overwhelming. “Tut tut, Charley. We don’t want to keep Mother Night waiting.”

  Charley clawed the desk surface blindly, groping for anything.

  And finding . . .

  A pencil. His fingers curled around it. He started to slide.

  Charley brought the pencil around in a blind arc that would have pierced his own throat had it missed. Instead it plowed home, impaling the dead flesh of the vampire’s hand. Dandrige howled and jerked back, hissing like a cat.

  Charley scrambled to regain his equilibrium. His back felt as if someone had tied him to a belt-sander. Great, his mind raced. Now I’ll fall out all by my myself. He pulled himself in, coughing and sputtering . . .

  . . . as Dandrige began to change.

  First came the odor of overwhelming decay, a ripe stench of death too long denied. It hit Charley like a wave, making his gorge rise and his ears fill with the buzzing of many flies. Barely able to stand it, helpless to turn away, Charley stood slack-jawed with lurid fascination as the horror unfolded before him.

  His room had been transformed into a nightmare detail from a Hieronymus Bosch painting, a livid slice of Hell pinwheeling around amid the sports-car posters and ski paraphernalia, howling and cursing in a harsh, guttural tongue. The Coors sign winked like a malevolent red eye, casting a pale glow on the room.

  Jerry Dandrige writhed and spit, too overtaken with pain and indignation to remain calm in the face of this affront. He held out his wounded hand, the pencil still protruding. A faint plume of acrid smoke wafted up from the puckered hole, mixed with the stench of charred wood.

  The vampire halted suddenly, hunkering over. Charley’s breath was ragged in his chest. His heart skipped a beat as the vampire whirled to face him.

  Charley winced. His face was the worst.

  Gone were the smooth, affluent good looks that had floored his mother. The real Jerry Dandrige was an ancient, misshapen creature with a jutting lower jaw that gaped open to reveal a host of foul yellow teeth. Its hair was coarse and brittle, its ears deformed and pointed flaps. The skin of its face was sallow and collected in hideous, liver-spotted pockets, gathering most noticeably ground its eyes.

  Its eyes . . .

  Sunken, red-rimmed pits. They burned, luminous and bulging, boring holes straight through Charley’s skull. Sapping him. The muscles in his back went slack, and he fell against the crushed wall on shaking legs.

  Unable to pull away.

  The vampire hissed then, and grasped the pencil with long crooked fingers, its nails clicking together with a chitinous sound. It fixed Charley with a stark, imperious look that did little to conceal its agony.

  And pulled the pencil out.

  Charley grimaced. The tip was blackened and still smoking. It tossed the pencil away contemptuously, and he noted sickly that a shred of withered flesh still clung to the tip, fluttering like a banner as it fell to the floor.

  The vampire smiled, a horrible withered rictus. It felt much better. The pain was receding, as was the shock of this boy’s impudence. They always were clever in desperation, it noted.

  Its appearance improved enormously as its anger subsided. Its features smoothed and tightened, its hair thickened, and some semblance of humanity returned.

  But the eyes still glowed red. The nails still clicked. And the teeth . . .

  Jerry Dandrige gazed at Charley intently. He held up his hand, the wound gaping. “See the trouble you caused me, boy?” he said, advancing for the kill.

  Charley’s bowels turned to water. “Noooo . . .” he whined helplessly.

  And then his mother started screeching at the end of the hall.

  “DAMN!” The vampire whirled, hissing sibilantly. Should’ve killed her when I had the chance.

  He turned back to the boy, who was leaning against the wall like a sack of potatoes on stilts. He wanted to trash the kid right here and now, be done with it forever. But no, he’d wait. Plenty of time, he thought, fighting back the urge to rend and tear.

  The past centuries had taught him nothing if not patience. He cast one last appraising glance at Charley and hissed again, quite involuntarily.

  “CHAR-LEY!” Mrs. Brewster caterwauled from her end of the hall, the rattlerattlerattle of her hand on the doorknob persistent. “SOMETHING’S WRONG WITH MY DOOR!”

  Charley dimly perceived the vampire bolting from the room. He hadn’t felt this high since he’d had his wisdom teeth out. His carotid arteries were working overtime to compensate for the constricted blood flow he’d experienced, courtesy of Dandrige’s grip. It took a full ten seconds for the message to cut through the fog.

  “MOM!” He stumbled out of his room, hoping he wasn’t too late.

  But his mom was okay. She stumbled out of her room, fumbling past the wreckage of her door. Charley cast about wildly, half expecting some kind of surprise attack.

  The window at the end of the hall had been thrown wide open. Dandrige was gone, for now. Charley didn’t know whether to breathe a sigh of relief or wet his drawers. He sighed, cold sweat sheening his back.

  “Charley, what happened?”

  Oh, nothing, Mom. I was just attacked by the vampire you were neighborly enough to have over for a drink, and he tried to kill me. That’s all.

  “I . . . I just had a nightmare, Mom. What happened to your door?”

  Judy looked puzzled. “Why, I don’t know!” She brightened. “But, you know, I had a nightmare just last night! I was at this white sale, and there I was, standing at the counter, and I reached for my credit cards, and suddenly I realized I was naked as the day I was born—”

  She stopped abruptly as the sudden wrenching of metal and crunching of safety glass filled the night. It continued for several vicious seconds.

  Then silence.

  Judy just stared blankly at the open window at the end of the hall. The one that overlooked the back yard. And the garage.

  “Now, what on earth was that?” She took a step toward the window, still woozy from her sleep aids. Charley grabbed her gently but firmly by the arm and wheeled her around.

  “Nothing, Mom. Just the raccoons in the garbage again. No big deal. Why don’t you just go back to sleep?”

  Judy smiled. “But what about your nightmare, son? Do you want a nice Valium?”

  Charley eased her through the door of her room. “I’m fine now, honest. Go back to bed, okay?”

  Judy offered no resistance. She yawned. “Well, I do need my sleep. I start the night shift tomorrow, you know.”

  “Yes, Mom. I know. Good night.”

  She paused, placed her hand lovingly against his cheek.

  “Charley, you’re so good . . .”

  “G’night, Mom.” He pulled her door shut, its hinges creaking loudly.

  Back in his room, Charley slumped back in his comfy chair. He was exhausted. The TV flickered in the darkness with its sound down low, mumbling in the corner like someone’s idiot cousin. The remains of his sandwich stared at him wanly.

  He couldn’t think about food. He couldn’t even think about the destruction of his room, and how he’d ever explain it.

  All he could think about at that moment was the sound from his garage. He’d spent enough time restoring that car to recognize the sound of someone trashing it. The bastard.

  He gazed up at the Shelby poster on the wall. In Memorium . . .

  The bastard.

  He gazed sullenly at the TV. Fright Night again. It was just what he needed. His hand reached over to flick off the set.

  And the phone rang.

  Charley’s
heart beat a quick one-two in his chest. He leaned over and grabbed the receiver quickly. Held it away from himself for a moment, as if it were a dead animal. And slowly, very slowly, brought it up to his ear.

  He had a fair guess who it was.

  “I know you’re there, Charley. I can see you.”

  Charley slowly turned to face the window. Sure enough, there stood Dandrige, blithely staring holes into him. His handyman was kneeling before him, rapturously bandaging his wounded hand.

  Dandrige smiled grimly. “I just destroyed your car, Charley . . .”

  No shit, you bastard!

  “. . . but that’s nothing compared to what I’m going to do to you tomorrow night.”

  The vampire hung up slowly, lackadaisically. And pulled down the shade.

  Charley sat, numbly watching the darkened window, the phone still in his hand. He sat like that until the harsh ditditdit of the phone snapped him out of it. He got up, cradled the receiver, and slumped back onto the bed. Impending doom flooded him. He turned and gazed blankly at the TV.

  The horror film dissolved into a commercial offering absurdly expensive miniatures certain to be cherished for generations. He was not impressed. Half a dozen other hucksters paraded across the screen to no avail before the dripping Fright Night logo returned. Charley turned up the sound.

  Peter Vincent, cloaked and bedraggled, was in rare form. He turned with a flourish, almost colliding with a rubber bat that twitched and flopped on a nylon filament. He brushed the bat away.

  “Welcome back, horror fans. I hope you’re enjoying tonight’s feature, I, A Vampire, Part Two. It’s one of my best.” He glanced around ominously. “Did you know a lot of people don’t believe in vampires?”

  The bat’s tether broke. It fell to the floor with a muffled plop. The crew broke up, their laughter leaking into Peter’s lapel mike.

  Peter Vincent drew himself up to his full height, glowering. “But I do. Because I know they exist. I have faced them in all their guises: man, woman, wolf, bat.” Charley watched, intent.

  “And I have always won. That’s why they call me ‘The Great Vampire Killer.’ ” Someone in the studio repressed a giggle. Peter flashed a killing glance. Dramatic pause.

  “Now, watch me prove it in I, A Vampire, Part Two (Two Two Two . . .)”

  His voice faded out with a ludicrous echo as a much younger Peter Vincent appeared on the screen, stake and mallet in hand. The camera panned back to reveal an endless vaulted corridor, deep in some drafty castle.

  Charley sat up, eyes glued to the screen. “Get him, Peter. Get him,” he whispered.

  And in that instant, an idea was born.

  ELEVEN

  Channel 13 occupied a nondescript red brick building on Cameron Mitchell Drive, the kind of four-lane divided highway that can be found in every city west of the Hudson River. Fast-food restaurants, gas stations and shopping malls pockmarked the land; miles of prefab suburban sprawl, giving way at the last moment to the tiny cluster of streets and buildings that marked downtown proper of Rancho Corvallis.

  Peter Vincent slipped quietly out the side door, a trench coat draped across his shoulders. He quickly descended the stairs, hoping to make it across the parking lot without incident. The day had probably been the most dismal day of his life. He walked stiffly, with a forced dignity that belied his true feelings.

  The fools, he thought. Those cretinous swine. How dare they—

  “Hey, Mr. Vincent.”

  Vincent froze. He turned, slowly and stately, to face his public: a solitary, rather haggard-looking teenager, advancing on him with an eagerness that bordered on hunger. He smiled politely, placing his hand casually on the door handle of a Mercedes sport coupe.

  “Mr. Vincent, could I speak to you for a moment? It’s terribly important.”

  Vincent sighed deeply, deftly whisking a fountain pen from his vest pocket. “Certainly . . . what would you like me to sign?”

  “Pardon me?”

  Vincent looked at the boy balefully. He repeated himself carefully, as one might to a retarded child. “What would you like me to sign? Where is your autograph book? I am rather busy, you know.”

  Charley shrugged sheepishly. “No, sir. I was curious about what you said last night on TV. You know, about believing in vampires and stuff.”

  Vincent regarded him warily. “What about it?”

  “Were you serious?”

  “Absolutely. Unfortunately,” he added dryly, “none of your generation seems to share that conviction.” His eyes flared.

  Charley stared at him. “What do you mean?”

  Peter Vincent could contain his fury no longer. “What I mean is that I have been fired. I have been fired because it would appear that no one wants to see vampire killers anymore. Or vampires, either, for that matter. Apparently, all they want are demented madmen running around in ski masks, hacking up nubile young virgins. Now, if you’ll excuse me . . .”

  Charley stood slack-jawed as Peter Vincent stepped huffily away from the Mercedes and made his way across the parking lot toward an ancient and decrepit Rambler. He fell in several paces behind the actor.

  “Mr. Vincent, wait! I believe in vampires!”

  “That’s nice,” Peter Vincent threw over his shoulder. “If only there had been more of you, perhaps my ratings would have been higher.”

  The Rambler loomed near. Charley was getting desperate. “In fact, I have one living next door. Would you . . . would you help me kill it?”

  Peter Vincent winced, stopped dead in his tracks. He turned and stared coldly at the boy. “Come again?”

  Charley stood his ground. “I said, would you help me to kill it?”

  Peter Vincent turned red as a pulsing artery. His voice came out in clipped, shrill tones. “Oh, that’s rich! That’s just grand! Who put you up to this, boy? Murray? Olson? The whole damned imbecilic crew? Kick a man when he’s down, one last parting shot to wish me bon voyage.” Charley just stared. “And what did they promise you? A few extra quarters for your insufferable video games?”

  They had reached his car. Vincent fished for his keys, couldn’t find them.

  “The murders, Mr. Vincent! The ones in the papers! They’re being commited by a vampire and he lives next door to me!”

  Peter Vincent turned, growing weary. “Not funny, son,” he sighed. “The joke’s over, you’ve done your duty. Now toddle off and play Pac-Man or something.”

  Charley was on the verge of losing it. He grabbed Peter Vincent by the lapels, surprising the actor almost as much as himself. “MR. VINCENT, I’M NOT JOKING! I’M DEADLY SERIOUS!”

  The actor’s eyes bulged slightly in their sockets. A nut case, he thought. Perfect. I’ll be fired, harassed and murdered, all in the same morning. He peeled Charley’s fingers delicately from his lapels.

  “I’m dreadfully sorry, but there’s nothing I can do.” Charley backed off somewhat, and Vincent hurried to unlock his door.

  “But you just said you believed in vampires . . .”

  “I lied. Now leave me alone.”

  Charley stopped, momentarily stunned by the terseness of the actor’s reply. Vincent seized on the moment to jump in his car and lock the door. Charley became frantic as he started the engine, revving wildly.

  “Please, you have to listen to me! The vampire tried to kill me last night and trashed my car when he didn’t succeed!” Charley beat on the window like a maniac. Peter Vincent threw the car into reverse, started backing out.

  “He’ll be coming back for me and if I don’t get help, he’ll kill me—”

  Peter Vincent wheeled the car in a wide arc, Charley still banging on the window.

  “You’ve got to believe me!”

  Vincent cast one final look at the boy, regarding him as one might a rabid animal. He gunned the engine, the car screeching out of the parking lot.

  “MR. VINCENT!”

  Charley stood and watched helplessly as his last hope drove away.

  TWELVE
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  The phone rang often at the Thompson house, but it was never for Evil Ed. The occasional crank call at midnight Friday from a bunch of drunken jocks, sure; equally rarely, the same jocks, threatening to run his ass up the flagpole if he didn’t help them cheat on their tests.

  Other than that, a Thompson phone call could mean any one of twenty things: bowling, bridge, canasta, golf, The Tiki Room, The Golden Bear, Nick’s Steak House, Vinnie’s Pizza Heaven, the legion post, St. Vincent’s Bingo, the body shop, the beauty parlor, poker, pool, the Super Bowl, “The Guiding Light,” The National Enquirer or the rising cost of Hamburger Helper.

  None of which had anything to do with Ed. They were the staples that held together the lives of Lester and Margie Thompson, his parents. They were jolly, robust, on-the-go people with scarcely a thought in their heads. They couldn’t understand their scrawny son’s hermit-crab existence. They couldn’t understand why he didn’t go out and meet people, join the crowd, get some fun out of life.

  They couldn’t understand that he really didn’t like people very much. It was a concept that was utterly beyond them.

  But they were stuck with each other, whether any of them liked it or not. A numb sort of truce had been arrived at, and life went on: Les and Marge in the social whirl, Eddie in his room.

  When the phone rang, nobody guessed that it was for him.

  Nobody would ever have guessed that it was a girl.

  But it was, and ol’ Marge was in a regular dither about it. “Oh, Eddie!” she squealed, leading him toward the Pepto-Bismol-pink wall phone in the kitchen. “What have you been doing that we don’t know about?”

  “I put an ad in the paper for sacrificial virgins,” he quipped. She didn’t laugh. She probably didn’t even know it was a joke. Eddie groaned and let her drag him into the kitchen. One would have thought that he were being led down Death Row.

  Still, there was a part of him that burned with curiosity. Who could possibly be calling, and what could they possibly want? He ran down the list of girls who had ever given him an appraising glance, so far as he knew: Gail Blumstein, Peggy Lint, Anita Hogg, Beryl O’Flynn. Oily-haired nose-pickers, every one of them. He hoped to God that none of them had worked up the nerve to call.