Red Rider's Hood

She stopped for a moment when she saw me, then continued her game.

'My mama says Cedric got himself a good job, far away, and he ain't gonna be back no more,' Tina said.

'If that's what your mama says, I guess it's true.'

'I don't believe it, though,' Tina said.

'So where do you think he is?'

Tina hopped four times, picked up the little beanbag, and went back to the first square. 'I think he got himself arrested for all that bad stuff he does. I think he's locked away in a dark, dark place.' And then she left the little chalk squares of her game and came right up to me. 'I'll tell you this, though,' she said, staring me in the eye like a devil child. 'There ain't no place in this world or the next that can hold Cedric in. He'll come back, Red, you wait and see. And when he does, those who crossed him are gonna pay.'

As she went back to her game, I swore to myself I would never go down Cedric's street again.

It didn't make a difference, though, because Tina turned out to be right. One year after the Wolves fell, Cedric came back.

My parents weren't off sailing in the Mediterranean this time, but they were out for the evening. I came home to an empty house, or so I thought. I didn't think there was anything signif­icant about the day. I mean, there are some days that just burn themselves into your mental calendar. August 4 was that date for me, Marissa, and Grandma. That was the day the Wolves fell, but that anniversary had already come and gone without any fireworks.

What I didn't consider was that the lunar calendar doesn't quite track along with the months. The date was August 9. The second full moon of summer. I had gotten a summer job taking old junkyard cars and restoring them, so was pretty dirty when I got home. I figured I'd clean up, then call Marissa, to see if she wanted to go out for a burger or something. I went into my bedroom, half lit by the fading twilight. That's when I saw him.

I was so surprised I let out a quaking groan of fear?not a scream, because your first reaction is never a scream. The scream comes later, when your mind has a chance to catch up with your gut, and you know what you're dealing with.

He was there, in the corner of the room, watching me.

I got my balance back, took a deep breath, and slowly approached.

There on my bookshelf sat a skull. I didn't recognize it at first, until I took a good look at the teeth and imagined what a pair of lips might look like in front of them. Grinning. Scowl­ing. There was no doubt. This was the skull of Cedric Soames.

Grandma had told me that werewolf flesh turns to dust much faster than human flesh, but she had also told me that their bones last an eternity. 'Hard as diamonds those bones are,' she had said, 'which means the earth can never quite be free of a werewolf.'

How the skull got here, I didn't know. I thought that maybe his creepy little sister, Tina, had broken in and set it on my shelf to freak me out. Or maybe Loogie had flown it in on bat wings, to make sure I never forgot. But the Soames family had moved clear across the country a few months after Cedric dis­appeared. And as for Loogie . . . well, everyone knows a vam­pire can't enter someone's house without being invited.

As I stood there, my heart beating in overdrive, the last of the twilight faded, and the skull on my shelf transformed into the skull of a wolf.

Grandma and Marissa came over that night. We all sat on my bed and stared at the werewolf skull, which just stared back at us, unblinking, its fangs glistening with some kind of strange ectoplasm, like supernatural saliva.

'What's it doing here, Grandma?' I asked. 'What does it want?'

Grandma just shook her head. 'I know an awful lot about werewolves, Red, but don't know everything. Could be that Cedric was just too powerful to die outright. Could be some part of him is trying to come back.'

'Why me?' I asked, but I already knew the answer. I was his consigliere. And I was the one who betrayed him.

The skull vanished when the moon began to wane, but appeared again at the next full moon, and it has been coming back ever since. I've grown used to it now. Well, maybe not used to it, but resigned to it, like a death-row inmate is resigned to his fate. Because, you see, when I wake up in the morning, always just before dawn, that werewolf skull is closer to my bed that it had been when I went to sleep. Each month it gets closer, no matter where I set it before I go to sleep. I don't fear it will devour me, but I do know this: One day I'll wake up to find it clamped down on my arm, breaking just enough skin to pass down the curse.

But that hasn't happened yet, so for now I wait, looking deep into those hollow eye sockets, whispering to it so only he and I can hear.

'My, my, Cedric, what dark, empty eyes you have.'

'The better to watch you with, Red . . . The better to watch you with . . .'