November 14
Judith feels something tickle her face.
She brushes her hand over her cheek, without even parting open her eyes. She has come home last night and she's hungover. Her outing with Mark Forrester has gone smoothly enough, but Judith has been hoping for more than mild satisfaction. Mark doesn't give her any spark of excitement, and part of her is wondering if anyone would.
The tickle comes again. Before she has presumed that it was a loose strand of her hair or something minor. Now it has earned her attention. She brushes her cheek more aggressively. The tickle transfers to her hand. This time she takes a peek.
A giant bug sits on her hand.
Screaming, Judith flings the bug off. It plops to the floor. Her head still buzzing from the scream, Judith grabs a textbook from her desk and pursues the insect. She crushes it, so it won't crawl back onto her bed.
The snap of its exoskeleton ricochets in her head. Judith leans back against the bed, trying to suppress her gag. She rests there, waiting for her gasps to slow to normal breathing.
What was that? she wonders. A cockroach? Judith does not want to look more closely to determine the bug's species. They had roaches before, but that time, fortunately for her, the roaches were content to stay in the kitchen until Mom called the exterminator.
Michael barges into the room, forgetting (as usual) to knock and ask permission to enter.
"What's wrong?" he asks. Then he sees the dead bug, and he puffs up.
"You killed him!" he accuses, tears filling his eyes.
Judith winces at the noise. Her nerves are still jangling from the scare.
By then Mom has heard Michael fussing and shouting and joins the room. "She killed Toby!" Michael sobs.
Mom sighs. "Oh Judith. You didn't."
"Who is Toby?" Judith asks, getting a better rein on her emotions.
"My pet scorpion."
"Scorpion?" Scorpions could be poisonous, right? Judith lurches to the mirror on her closet door and examines her face and neck for stings. She is relieved she finds no scratches or welts.
Michael watches, his eyes narrowed at her selfish preening.
Judith turns back to her brother. Her mother kneels on the floor. She lets Michael lean on her shoulder and rubs his shoulder in comfort. She is behaving as if it were perfectly normal to be mourning a dead scorpion.
Judith asks defensively, "What was your pet scorpion . . ."
"His name was Toby," Michael corrects indignantly.
"What was Toby doing in my room?"
Michael sniffles.
"Maybe he wanted to meet you."
"I'm sorry, Michael," she says. "It was an accident."
Michael pouts. He isn't going to accept her excuses. He continues to cry quietly.
"Is there anything I can do?"
"No." Michael shakes his head vigorously.
Judith glances over at her closet.
"I'm going to find a box," Mom tells Michael. "We'll give Toby a nice funeral."
Michael nods. His eyes shine gratefully at his mother.
II
"Stella."
I blink awake. The lights are dimmer. A thick curtain surrounds my bed. The edge by the wall is folded back by a human hand.
Ben Tramer's head appears within the gap of the curtain.
"Ben?" I have forgotten, he volunteers here in the evenings sometimes.
"Can I come in?"
"Sure."
He slips through the curtain. He is wearing light blue scrubs, which doesn't look all that different from our gym suits. I expected something more. . . doctorly. A lab coat, or something. Though I doubt they give lab coats to high school volunteers. I wouldn't know. I haven't been overnight at a hospital since I was born.
"What happened?" Ben asks.
I pause. I don't want to share that Dr. Mixter thinks I dreamed the whole thing.
"I don't know," I reply hedgingly. "I think I was asleep when it happened."
"I heard you got stitches."
"Yeah. They told me the wounds weren't that serious."
"That's good." Ben weaves his hand through his hair.
"They'll catch him," he says. "Sheriff Brackett won't give up. Not after all of that."
"I hope so."
III
My mom arrives at around seven in the morning. So does Sheriff Brackett.
Sheriff Brackett's face has grayed and withered since the Strodes' funeral. His posture sags and thin white whiskers have broken out of his chin. The more time that has passed since Annie's death, the worse he looks. When he enters my room, within his glassed-over eyes is a tiny glint of hope that I will know something that will lead to Annie's killer.
I have to disappoint him. I didn't see anything. When I tell him about the dream, I say only that I dreamed I was bleeding to death. I say nothing about my identity as Judith in it.
Sheriff Brackett asks, "Who is Steve?"
"Steve." Steve was Judith's date - and one of Michael's victims - on the night of the Halloween rampage. I rack my mind for another Steve to substitute, one that would make more sense. My search is fruitless. "I don't know."
"You said that Michael Myers was wearing Steve's mask. Do you remember that?"
I pretend I am thinking hard. I want to give the impression that I am cooperating. "Kind of."
"Do you remember why he would be wearing Steve's mask?"
"Not really." For lack of anything helpful, I offer, "I read that he doesn't like people to see his face. He likes to keep his face hidden."
"But you seemed surprised that he was wearing that mask. Steve's mask."
"I think I was still dreaming," I admit. "I didn't see him come in. I didn't realize what he was doing until I got stabbed."
Sheriff Brackett stands again. He puts away his notepad. He has not jotted down a single thing on the notepad. I expect any thing I tell him would never slip his mind. That anything I tell him about Michael Myers would remain with him until his dying day.
He retrieves a card from his shirt pocket. "If you remember anything - anything - you can call me at this number. My direct line."
"Yes, Sheriff Brackett."
I take the card and study the number.
"You take care," he says.
"Thank you."
Sheriff Brackett lumbers out.
III
Dr. Mixter has scheduled a multiple sleep latency test, or MLST, at eight o' clock, so I'm not allowed to nap today.
A nurse shows up to take my full history. She hands Mom a form. When Mom comes to the question about past sleep disturbances, Mom hesitates.
"Why'd you stop?" I ask.
"There was something," she says. "I don't know if this counts. When you were six and seven, you used to have these nightmares. In the morning, Dad or I would find you hiding in the closet under your clothes. But I'm pretty sure you were awake when you decided to do that."
I don't remember deciding to do that, or waking up and finding myself in my closet. I have never heard this before, that I had nightmares as a child.
"When I was six or seven?" I echo.
Mom talks hedgingly, as if she regretted bringing up these episodes. She has begun to see the similarities between those episodes and current events.
"Just around your birthday. Then in December, the nightmares stopped. Everyone told us they were just a childhood phase. When the nightmares stopped, we assumed they were right."
"What was I hiding from?" I ask.
"You never gave much detail about those nightmares," Mom admitted. "All I remember about them was you told us the boogeyman was after you."
IIII
Later I see Dr. Egan, a psychologist.
He asks the same questions I've answered several times already. Though this is the first time I go through the spiel without either of my parents present.
He comes to the question about my birthdate, I hesitate, but quickly recover and say it's November first. After all, that's the date on my birth certificate. He records it without comment.
He doesn't ask about my dreams, or about Michael Myers. I guess he's waiting for the results of my sleep lab first.