Directors cut, p.5
Director's Cut, page 5
“Let’s go, Crook. Unless you want to stay down here.”
He moans and staggers toward us.
“Hurry up!” calls Gabby. “I can smell smoke. I think the fire’s getting close.”
I smell it too. Tanner seems to have set Sanford’s Folly ablaze for the second time in its history. I guess I should cut him some slack, since he was possessed by the curse when he did it. But I suspect the curse couldn’t have controlled him so easily if he’d been a decent human being.
Tanner’s heavier than the girls. He also keeps groaning and can barely stay upright. But with Gabby and Destiny adding their muscle from above us, we manage to get him out. Now it’s down to Ahmed and me.
I kneel again. “Here. Climb on my shoulders.”
“What about you?” he asks. “How do we get you out once I’m up there?”
I glance up at the others. Gabby looks at Destiny, who has a look of blank panic in her eyes. I realize I might be the only one who’s thought this through. I take a deep breath. “You don’t.”
“What?”
“You leave me behind. You get out of here, and you call 9-1-1. And the fire department shows up and gets me out.”
“Whoa, hold on!” says Destiny. “We’re not leaving you . . .”
“We’ll find a wooden beam,” says Ahmed. “Or a metal one. Or something.”
“No,” I say. “There’s not time. Just get out. I’ll be fine till the firefighters get here.”
“No way!” shouts Gabby.
“We’re wasting time,” I snap. I turn to Ahmed. “Come on, man. Please.”
Ahmed seems to swallow a fistful of protests. He moves behind me and scrambles onto my back. With his knees resting on my shoulders, I slowly stand. I reach up, and he grips my hands to steady himself as we rise. Once I’m upright, he shifts from his knees to his feet, still holding on to my hands for balance. When he’s standing on my shoulders, he lets go. I feel his weight whoosh off me. I look up. He’s clear of the hole.
Destiny’s still lying on her stomach. She stretches her good arm down as far as she can. “Come on, Alex. Just jump and grab my hand. Gabby and Ahmed will hold on to me and we’ll pull you up. Like tug of war.”
“It’s too far.” I reach up and jump as high as possible. Our fingertips don’t even brush. “See? Not going to work.”
Somewhere beyond the hole, Tanner swears loudly. “It’s coming! It’s coming for us.”
Tanner Crook, voice of our doom. Figures.
Gabby whispers something frantically to the other two.
“Guys,” I say. “If you don’t go right now, I’ll never forgive you. Seriously.”
Ahmed calls down, “Hang in there, Alex!”
And all three of them disappear from view.
I can smell the fire, eating its way through what’s left of Sanford’s Folly.
I stand in the dark and wait for my luck to run out.
Chapter 13
The smoke is starting to fill the room above me. I wonder how long it’ll take for it to filter into the basement. Compared to this, the coyote option is starting to seem like a luxurious death.
I’m thinking about texting my mom. Telling her I love her. Telling her I’m sorry. I’m fumbling with my phone when I hear Ahmed’s voice.
“Alex! Grab the rope!”
Rope?
I look up. And there it is. A rope, dangling inches from my face.
“Alex, are you okay?” Gabby’s voice. Out of breath.
“Yeah, I . . .”
“Well, come on! We don’t have all day.” That’s Destiny.
I squint toward the hole. Between the smoke upstairs and the darkness down here, I can’t even see who’s holding the rope. I just know that they’re all up there. They’re all here for me.
“Where did you get this?”
“The bell tower,” Gabby gasps out. “In the mission. That building didn’t catch fire. This time or the first time.”
So many similarities between this fire and the earlier one. I wonder if that first fire was set by Morrison, or a curse-possessed arsonist, or—
“Grab the freaking rope, Alex!” screams Destiny.
I grab it. And I hang on while my three friends haul me up out of the dark.
***
Next order of business: run for our lives.
The fire is consuming Main Street. The good news is that there’s not much wood left for it to feed on. The original fire destroyed most flammable materials. So this new blaze has to work a little harder.
But it’s definitely making the most of what it finds.
As we charge up Main Street, I pull my shirt over my mouth to block the smoke.
“Where’s Tanner?” I gasp.
“We dumped him at the fence,” says Destiny. She points to Ahmed, then herself. “While Gabby was getting the rope.”
“And one of you called 9-1-1, right?”
“One step at a time,” says Gabby. She’s clutching the film reel to her chest with one hand and the lifesaving rope with the other. I guess she does have a lot of priorities to juggle right now.
At last, we’re at the fence. One by one, we slip through the opening I cut earlier. On the other side, Tanner sits slumped against the chain links. He smells pretty strongly of barbecue. And he’s still groaning like he’s at a zombie audition. I should probably feel sorrier for him. I’ll work on that later.
“Okay.” Ahmed pulls out his phone and wipes soot from his eyes. “Now we call 9-1-1.”
Gabby swears quietly. “We are soooo getting arrested for this.”
I look from the flames to the reel tucked under Gabby’s arm. “Well, who knows? Maybe our luck’s about to change.”
Chapter 14
Two weeks after our brush with a fiery death, we sit in Gabby’s apartment. The final scene of the original Man with the Silver Star flashes across her family’s flat-screen TV. John Willis’s character, US Marshal Cheswell, rides off into the sunset. The credits start to roll.
“That was decent,” Gabby says. “I mean, not Oscar material. But pretty good.”
“Way better than the other one,” I add. “At least there was a real plot.”
“Glad you enjoyed it,” says Gabby’s mom, Professor Torres. She’s visiting from California. After Gabby mailed her the film reel, Professor Torres got the print converted into a digital format. She’s writing an article about the movie and dealing with some complicated rights issues I can’t really follow. But her goal is to get it more widely distributed. She wants to set up some screenings for the public. Eventually, people might be able to buy their own copies.
For now, the four of us have gotten a private showing.
Professor Torres turns off the TV. “You’ve rescued a lost piece of film history,” she tells us. “Though I wish you’d managed to do it without trespassing.”
Nobody’s parents were thrilled about that part. But I’m making it up to my mom by keeping all my activities legal for the next year, at least.
“It was Alex’s idea,” adds Destiny.
“Wow, way to throw me under the bus! I see how it is.”
She sticks her tongue out at me, like we’re in second grade, and I laugh.
We thank Professor Torres for everything and get ready to head home for the night. Gabby walks us to the door. We’re all quiet until we get out on the front porch, out of her family’s earshot.
She clears her throat. “So. What do you think?”
“The soundtrack still annoyed me,” says Destiny.
Gabby rolls her eyes. “Not about the movie. About the curse. I mean—do you think it’s broken?”
We all chew on that for a minute.
Nothing especially bleak has happened in the past two weeks. Gabby’s computer ended up being okay, and she was able to finish her application. Destiny’s arm is healing nicely. And Tanner’s going to be fine. Besides, as long as he’s at the hospital for burn treatments, he isn’t able to torment anyone. We’ve heard a rumor that his family’s planning to live off base when they move to Florida. Which means he and Ahmed may not even be going to the same school.
And none of us got charged with arson or even with trespassing. That’s a definite win.
Some things won’t change, of course. My mom’s still going to deploy. My dad’s still going to be weirdly semi-around. Ahmed’s still going to move.
He’s the one who speaks up. “I think the curse knows we’ve done our best. That should count for something.”
It’s weird: they still surprise me. Each of them. In the past couple of months, I’ve really only scratched the surface of who they are. There’s probably a lot they don’t know about me too. And nobody can pretend we have much in common. But here we are. “Cursed” isn’t the word that comes to mind.
“I like that theory,” I say.
We stand in silence for another few seconds. Ahmed shifts the strap of his backpack. Destiny scratches at her cast. The charms on her bracelet chime softly. I put my hands in my pockets and look up at the sky. “Taps” will be playing soon.
“Well then,” says Ahmed. “See you guys tomorrow.”
“Hey,” I say, on impulse. “When you move, we’ll stay in touch, right?”
I want to believe it. So many times, I’ve said this to friends. So many times, they’ve agreed. But it’s hard. Even with texting, email, social media. Once you get to a new place, you use all your energy meeting new people. Becoming a new person. You don’t have time to keep track of the people you left behind.
But I say it anyway. And I mean it. And Ahmed says, “Yeah.” And Destiny says, “For sure.” Gabby adds, “Definitely.” And I can tell. This isn’t just for Ahmed. It’s a pact among the four of us.
And even if it doesn’t turn out the way we hope, this moment is enough. I’ll always have it to replay in my head. It’s that moment before the credits roll, when the stars of the movie have saved the day, and you can just take a breath and enjoy the company.
About the Author
Vanessa Acton is a writer and editor based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She enjoys stalking dead people (also known as historical research), drinking too much tea, and taking long walks during her home state’s annual three-week thaw.
Vanessa Acton, Director's Cut
