Chapter 7

Joyce Byers had always cared for her sons very deeply. When her youngest, Will, had gone missing six months ago, she had desperately searched for him everywhere she could think of. People had thought she was mad when she jabbered about getting strange signals, her child talking to her through a tangle of Christmas lights. But she had not been crazy, although she still didn't understand all of what she had experienced. She sat musing in her living room when she was distracted by a knocking at the door. She got up and walked down the hallway towards the front door. She opened it and saw the face of Mrs. Wheeler.

"Hello", she said. Mrs. Wheeler returned the greeting but looked anxious, as though she was pondering on something else. "I think something's wrong with Will", she said. Joyce looked worried and confused. "What do you mean, wrong?" she asked. "Well he was with the rest of the boys last night, and they had been out somewhere, and they came back and he looked pale and sick. He's at our house now; half-exhausted by the looks of things." "Well, I'll come and pick him up, then", said Joyce, suddenly very pale-faced herself. God knew there had been enough crises with Will in the past.

Mrs. Wheeler left soon after to get will and about twenty minutes later returned with him. He did look sickly; there was a small line of spittle by his mouth from where he must have thrown up and his skin was as pale as milk. She put him to bed and gave him a glass of milk; he looked too worn out to talk about what had happened to him, and she was tired herself.

She slumped into an armchair and was about to nod off when she felt a soft pulsating. She walked around the room to look for the source and came to a cupboard in the corner of the room. She opened the doors and found a small bundle of old Christmas lights. They were tangled into a mess and covered with a thin layer of dust, and white light was pulsating out of them. She stared for a moment, and then had a thought. She had used the lights to communicate with Will in this 'alternate dimension' when he had been missing. She still had the alphabet letters she had hammered into the wall to talk to him...and they were lighting up. She stared, almost as though in a trance, at the dancing light, letters forming words forming a message. She looked closely to see what it said. I...W... As the words formed she felt trepidation turn to horror as the message was completed. It read: "I WILL FIND THEM".