"Hey Regina?" Dollface said after getting home and cleaning up for bed after waiting fifteen extra minutes for Princess's missing friend. She grinned on the bottom bunk.
Regina was smearing expensive face creams on the bunk above her. Regina grunted, annoyed.
"Wanna hear a scary story?"
"Ugh," Regina groaned, "You are so immature for your age. Aren't you supposed to be related to me somehow?"
Dollface shrugged with a funny throat noise and asked again, "Y'all wanna hear a scary story for a bedtime treat?"
"Fine." Regina said with an audible 'WHUMP!' onto her bunk.
"Y'all ever hear th'story o'Siren Head?"
"No," Regina said, especially bratty tonight. Who pissed in her cheerios today?
The late-night train rumbled and whistled in the distance like it always did. Dollface wondered if Regina would ever hear the ice on the river grind together in the early morning. Regina had seen the mist this morning and sniffed in sharp disapproval.
"Well," Dollface started, thinking of the best way to initiate her newfound sister into the land of weird, "Y'know how we're basically surrounded by woods here? Our backyards, most of the town, even the overgrown and shadowy abandoned dog park, kinda?"
"Yeah?" Regina said, obviously not caring.
"Never get lost in 'em after dark," Dollface advised, remembering one summer when she and her friend sneaked off into the woods to have a secret bonfire without any adults when they should have been in bed.
"Well duh!" Regina said, audibly eye-rolling as she climbed down the ladder of the bunk bed. Dollface could peak between the bed, curtains, and ladder to watch Regina step over to the window and pull out a hidden pack of cigarettes stashed under the bed and open the window.
"Damn! It's absolutely disgusting out there!" She slammed the window shut, shivering in her babydoll nighty even in the hot, humid summer air.
"Told ya!" Dollface said, blowing a raspberry. "Shouldn't smoke either, or Grampa'll switch ya again!"
"I'm not afraid of Eustace!" Regina flustered, the sting of willow branches from the front yard. She'd insulted his State Fair prize-winning ham for the last time. Afterward, he had her sit down and drink some water before feeding the pigs and apologizing to them.
"Why ya call 'em Eustace?" He's your grandad too!"
Regina wrinkled her perfect little nose and stomped her bare foot, not able to protest lineage and logic. She didn't want to be related to some commoner, after all, and admitting it was mortifying!
Even to her own, common peasant sister!
Regina slumped her shoulders and strutted to the closet and pulled out the fleece pajamas, glancing at her summerweight night gown in flowing silk and ribbons and nearly cried.
"Don't watch!" She snapped. Dollface fell back onto her bed even though she couldn't see anything. And even if Dollface could, she really didn't want to!
"Ya wanna hear th'story or not?" Dollface asked once Regina had propped the window and the screen open again, overpriced death sticks lit and in hand.
"Fine," Regina said, puffing a ring of smoke out the window and into the night. Dollface wrapped herself up, thanking God or whatever was up there, for creating the person who invented bed socks and family quilts, 'cause otherwise, she'd toss and turn, even in the most sweltering of summers.
"Okay, well, those woods are haunted."
"Figures." Regina said, "All forests are. If it wasn't, it would just be a bunch of trees."
"Do ya know what by?" Dollface asked, seeing she really did have a smarty pants on her hands. She checked to see if the bedroom door was closed for the night.
"No, and I don't particularly care."
"It's haunted by Siren Head!" Dollface said, trying to make her voice sound ominous.
"Don't believe you. What kind of ghost would be named that?"
"You don't have to be dead to haunt a bunch of trees, silly!" Dollface said, "And besides, Siren Head is a good name for whatever it is."
"And why is that?" Regina let out a puff of smoke into the chilly atmosphere.
"Because it's forty feet tall and has what looks like a siren instead of a head, and the openings are giant mouths with slobberin' tongues and gnashin' teeth!" Dollface said, "And whenever it wants to find its prey, it copies the sounds of sirens."
"What kind?" Regina said casually. She wouldn't get to sleep until Dollface finished her dumb children's story, so she may as well humor her.
"Police sirens. Tornado warnings. Severe weather alerts. Emergency broadcast. When it first started showin' up, it even mimicked bomb sirens." Dollface fell back, no longer watching Regina and definitely trying not to rudely gag on the smell of tobacco.
Regina continued her nicotine session, only half-listening. The train whistled to itself as it sped down the tracks. The next one would come soon, there was a crossroads nearby.
"You wanna know what the scariest part is?" Dollface asked.
Regina nodded and said, "Blow me away."
Dollface smiled, "Whenever it finds its prey, lured out of blind panic at being lost durin' an emergency, Siren Head rips 'em to pieces. And that's not even the scariest part."
"Then why'd you say it was? That's an illogical way to tell a story!"
"Nah dude," Dollface said, black eyes twinkling behind the curtain, "the scary part is when Siren Head is done."
"And what does it do when it's done?"
Dollface beamed, knowing she'd stolen Regina's peaking curiosity, "It plays the victim's wails on its system, and you can hear it for miles, wailin' an' screamin' an' cryin'…"
Dollface sighed, trailing off. She had grown so tired over the past few months with these constant late nights. At this point on her rise to stardom, there were fewer days for lesiure.
Michael would scold her for not taking care of herself, but Dollface wanted nothing more than seeing her and her friends shared success.
"And everyone can hear it, and remember why they can't leave their houses after sundown. And why they should never get lost in strange woods."
Regina was silent as Dollface began to doze.
"Oh hey," Dollface snapped awake, "Can ya turn off th'lights before ya go t'bed?"