Chad shook his head. “It was like it hadn’t happened at all. Except I know it did.”
“That’s what happened to me too,” Jared Woods said, his voice trembling. Both Chad and Zack turned to look at him. “I thought it was a dream.” Slowly, still uncertain whether it had happened, he told his friends what he thought the cat had done to him last night. “But it couldn’t have been in my room,” he finished. “I mean, it was all locked up, and when my dad came in to see what was wrong—” He cut himself short an instant too late.
“Your dad?” Zack echoed. “You screamed so loud your dad came in?”
“I was asleep!” Jared said. “I mean—”
“So what’s the big deal?” Chad asked, glaring at Zack. “So what if he screamed? The only reason my folks didn’t hear me was the freakin’ cat had me by the throat.”
“That’s not what I meant,” Zack said. “I mean, could the cat have gotten out of your room when your dad came in?”
Jared shook his head. “The lights were on, and I was right by the door, and so was my dad. It was like it was there one second, and then it was just gone.”
The three boys looked at each other for a long moment.
“What are we gonna do?” Jared asked.
“It’s simple,” Zack said. “She says it’s not her cat, so she won’t care if something happens to it, right? So let’s find out if it’s her cat or not.”
“You got it?” Zack asked as Jared began working the combination to his locker, which was just two down from Zack’s own. When Jared nodded, Zack signaled to Chad Jackson, who slammed the door of his own locker and sauntered over to lounge against the wall across from Zack and Jared. The lunch bell had rung five minutes ago, and on any other day the three of them would have already been inside the cafeteria, first in line. But today they’d taken their time, hanging around in front of their lockers, waiting for the corridor to empty.
“This is gonna be fun,” Chad said, his lips twisting into a malicious grin.
“If it works.” The uncertainty in Jared Woods’s voice only made Chad’s grin turn even uglier.
“Why shouldn’t it work?”
“How do you even know we can find the stupid cat?” Jared countered.
“We know where Angel is,” Zack told him. “So we know where the cat’s going to be, right? It’s been there all morning. I checked after every class.”
“But she says it’s not even her cat,” Jared reminded Chad and Zack.
Now both of his friends were eyeing him, and Jared knew what they were thinking. “I’m not chickening out,” he said. “But what if we get caught?”
Zack rolled his eyes. “If it looks like we’re going to get caught, we won’t do anything. What do you think I am, stupid?” He glanced up and down the hallway, which was now deserted. Dumping the contents of his backpack into his locker and shutting the door fast enough so nothing fell out, he flattened the backpack and stuck it inside his jacket, pulling the zipper halfway up so he didn’t have to hold the pack in place. “Come on.”
Leading his friends down the stairs and out the front door of the school, he threaded his way through the knot of nerds who habitually sat on the front steps playing chess while eating their lunches out of the kind of lunch boxes that Zack and his friends had quit carrying in fourth grade. Ignoring them, Zack headed across the lawn to the sidewalk, and then wondered if he might not be wrong.
The black cat was nowhere to be seen.
“I thought you said it was here all morning,” Jared Woods said, trying to keep the relief from his voice.
“It was,” Zack said, starting across the street toward the spot under the big oak tree on the corner where he’d always seen the cat sitting in the morning.
But now it was gone.
“I don’t get it,” he said, frowning as he scanned the area around the tree and looked up and down the street. “It’s been here the whole morning.” As he uttered the words, the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end, and feeling a terrible presentiment of danger, he spun around.
Nothing.
He turned around again, and saw Jared and Chad gazing up into the tree.
Jared was slowly backing away, and though Chad wasn’t moving, his face had gone pale.
Zack peered up into the tree too, and found himself looking into the golden-yellow eyes of the coal-black cat, whose lips drew back, baring its teeth.
Zack’s heart pounded heavily as he remembered the cat hurtling out of the darkness last night and sinking its claws deep into the flesh of his face. Now, the cat emitted a low hiss, and again Zack felt the agonizing pain that had ripped through him a little more than twelve hours earlier. It was all he could do to keep from backing away the same as Jared had, but somehow he managed to hold his ground.
The cat’s tail twitched and it crouched lower, stretching toward him.
“Watch out,” Jared said, his voice barely above a whisper. “If he jumps at you—”
“He won’t jump at me,” Zack said. “He’s just as chicken as you are.” His eyes still locked on the cat, he pulled the backpack out of his jacket. “That’s right, isn’t it?” he asked, staring up at the cat. “You’re real brave in the dark, but when it’s light—”
Reacting to the words as if it understood them, the cat suddenly launched itself at Zack, springing from the branch with its forepaws outstretched, its claws bared, a furious yowl erupting from its throat.
Zack stepped aside at the last second and lashed at the cat with the backpack, catching it in the side and flipping it over.
The cat fell to the ground on its back but rolled over so fast Zack barely even saw it, and an instant later was on its feet again, crouched low, hissing and snarling as it faced him.
“What’s the matter, cat?” Zack taunted. “Don’t like it?”
He struck out at the cat with the backpack, and the animal lashed at the pack with its forefoot.
Zack jerked the backpack away a moment before the cat’s claws could sink into the nylon.
Now Chad joined in, peeling off the nylon jacket he was wearing over his flannel shirt and rolling it up the way he and his friends rolled towels in the locker room to flick at each other after they’d showered. As the cat kept its eyes fastened on Zack, Chad moved around and slashed at its flanks with one of the jacket’s sleeves.
Screeching, the cat leaped into the air, whirled around, and came down on all fours, hissing and spitting at Chad with even more fury than it had directed at Zack.
A second later one of the shoulder straps of Zack’s backpack came down on its back, and once more it whirled.
“Come on, Jared,” Zack said. “Take a lick or two.” Jared Woods had moved back another pace, and shook his head silently as his friends kept baiting the cat.
“What’s the matter, Woods?” Chad teased. “Afraid he might get into your room again tonight?” As Zack kept baiting the cat with his backpack, Chad snapped his rolled up jacket at Jared, who jerked back as the snap on the jacket’s sleeve stung his wrist. “You a pussy too?” Chad taunted.
With the challenge hanging over him, Jared unfastened his belt buckle and pulled it out of the loops in his pants.
As if sensing the new danger, the cat whirled to face Jared, every muscle in its body tensing as it prepared to strike. His nerve fading in the face of the animal’s fury, Jared took a step backward.
The cat moved closer to him, the tip of its tail twitching as dangerously as the rattle on the tail of a snake. Behind the cat, Jared could see Zack opening the backpack and edging closer.
Seeing what Zack was doing and understanding what he had in mind, Chad whispered to Jared, “Take another step back. Wave the belt at him.”
Taking the backward step was easy — every instinct inside Jared was screaming at him to turn and run before the cat launched itself at him and once again sank its claws into his belly. The cat, sensing Jared’s fear, edged closer, its yellow eyes glinting, its tail twitching faster.
Jared froze, too terrified now even to move.
The cat crept closer, a venomous sound coming from its mouth that sounded to Jared even more dangerous than the hiss of a snake about to strike.
The belt fell from his hands.
The cat moved closer yet, its eyes fixed on Jared as if it could see the terror in his soul, and Jared felt a cold
