The Masquerade (9 page)

The shrill of crow's detached cry from above made me jump. When my mind registered the noise I exhaled. I shook my shoulders trying to relax, but my wandering thoughts kept me on edge. I rarely felt this unhinged.
"It's devil's night Ella," I mumbled to myself. "Everybody and his mother are out pranking someone right now."

I backtracked to my car door, pulled it open quickly, and
lunged myself inside as though I was being chased by a serial killer from a slasher film. I locked the doors immediately and checked the backseat, just in case. I was alone in the car, but didn't feel any more comforted. I needed to
get home. I brought my car to life and flew out of the parking spot without checking my mirrors. I wasn't in the mood for safety precautions. I just wanted to go home.

"You're doing what?"

I sighed. "Mom, it's not that big of a deal."

"Running through the woods with zombies chasing you is a pretty big deal, Ella Grace Moore." She used my full name, which was never a good sign. I grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl and pushed myself up
onto the kitchen counter.

"If I get picked, I may be a zombie doing the chasing." I said with a smile. The look on her face told me she wasn't going to bite.

"Because that makes it so much better!"

"We're not doing anything wrong. It's just a bunch of teenagers playing freeze tag in costume. The 'zombies' are the chasers and the humans are the runners. It's like cops and robbers." She raised a suspicious eyebrow.

"I don't feel comfortable knowing you're running through the woods at night with people chasing you."

"They're not strangers, mom. Most of them are from school or around town. We know all of them." I took a bite out of my apple
in our pause, swallowed, and decided to beg. "Please, mom. Adam, Shiloh, and Hayley are going. I won't be alone. We will stick together."

I decided not to pull the '
I'm eighteen I can do whatever
I want
,' card. I wasn't free to do whatever I wanted until I was off payroll. That was the law. Until then, I intended to respect my mother's decisions, even if I despised them.

"It's Halloween, El. The freaks are out."

"We're all freaks, momma." I said with a wink.

She rolled her eyes. "You know what I mean, the real freaks."

"I'm going to be okay mom. Adam will be with me."

"Oh, that makes a huge difference." She said sarcastically.

I shook my head, laughing at her. I knew she was going to let me go. "I'll be fine mom." The doorbell rang. My mom exhaled and
looked away. I tossed the apple into the trash and wrapped my arms around her. "I'm going to come home." I promised her. She hugged me back tightly without saying anything. When the doorbell rang again I dropped my arms and ran
into the front hall. When I reached the door, the bell rang a third time. I pulled the door open and found Adam waiting impatiently underneath the porch light.

"Time is money you know."

I chuckled, pushed him to the side, and walked out the door.
I heard my mom's voice behind me. "Be careful, honey."

"I will, thanks mom." Adam screeched in his best girlie impersonation. My mom shook her head and bit down on her lip to suppress
her laugh.

"I'll watch over him, Mrs. Moore. Don't worry." I said, adding the cute smile I learned to master when I was little to get what I wanted from my older brother. He was a sucker for the cute innocence of a
six-year-old girl.

"Bring
her
," my mom pointed to Adam, "home by twelve."

He threw his hands up. "Alright, I just turned into a female. I'm out."

We laughed. I exchanged a promising glance with my mom to be careful. She nodded once, watching as I turned with Adam and walked down the street to his car. Adam and I were going to meet Hayley and Shiloh at the clearing
where all of the participating players were showing up. A girl who graduated from Eastside High School and a group of undergrad art students, who worked on the set of The Walking Dead in the make up department, were there to decorate the faces of those who got picked as zombies. This Halloween night was going to
be epic. Especially after last night.

.

"What do you mean I'm a human? I want to be a zombie."

The guy with huge gauges barely gave Hayley a second glance.
"Humans go to the left, zombies go to the right for make up."

Hayley glowered at him. I tugged her arm and pulled her with me to the human section. I noticed people from my school right away. A few of
them looked at me, stuck their noses up at Hayley, and turned away.

My friends and I weren't exactly favorites at school. After Adam wore the band t-shirt to school once, we were pegged as the
Misfit losers
. Whatever. My mom didn't understand why they looked down on us as
troublemakers. We were just different. We caused a commotion with our loud music and nothing more.

"Something slutty this way comes." I heard one of the juniors whisper to her friend. Hayley's eyes flashed to the girl. Mistake
number one: don't make fun of your elders.

"Is that you, Chlamydia?"

"It's Claudia." She retorted.

"Not what I've heard."

"Stop, Claudia, it's not worth it. She's not even that pretty." Her friend, whom I recognized as Anne, said to her.

Hayley smirked. "That's not what your boyfriend said
last night."

"Okay, we'll stand over here." I said, pulling Hayley's arm as I moved to stand outside the group of people, furthest from the girls. I looked over my shoulder and noticed Adam and Shiloh were in line to
get their makeup done. Hayley followed my gaze, a frown set on her face.

"I wanted to be a zombie." She looked down with a 5 year old pout covering her face.

I shrugged. "Maybe a few hot guys will end up chasing
us."

"In that case, I'll let them catch me." She quipped, already perked up.

After thirty minutes passed, all of the zombies were ready and in costume. The group of undergraduates, who organized the event, brought
us into the open field and spread us out. The zombies lined up together on one side of the field and the humans spread out on the other. I stood beside Hayley, rocking back and forth on the heels of my feet in excitement.

The guy with the gauges, who assigned us into the teams, stood in the middle of the field, shouting directions. "Tonight, you as humans will be tested to see if you can survive a zombie apocalypse." He
began as though reading a segment of Shakespeare. "As long as it's outside, there are no boundaries. Zombies will chase the humans," he turned to look at us, "if a zombie tags you, you are wounded. You have to remain in the spot of your attack until another human tags you. Zombies,"
he turned. "You are not actually going to bite anyone, so don't even try it. Do that on your own time." Everyone laughed in response, but he shook his head. "Any violence actual violence, you will be escorted elsewhere.
When we call time after twenty minutes, the humans left standing will make it to the next round. The humans who are still frozen or 'infected' will come back as zombies for round two."

While he continued to rattle on the rules, my eyes wandered
over the line of zombies. There were maybe fifty of them and close to two hundred humans. I knew most of the people who were chosen as zombies and they were hardly recognizable with their faces painted in gore. Half of one girls
face even looked like the skin had been torn from her flesh. I watched when Adam was getting his face done. They gave him light blue colored contacts in one eye while the makeup artist worked on his forehead. He had a large gash slicing through the middle. Shiloh wore a different shirt that was spattered
with fake blood. The corners of her lips were extended with bloody, cut open scars. She had Hayley take a bunch of pictures of her and Adam together. They were the cutest/grossest couple I'd ever seen.

A girl, who I noticed doing some of the makeup earlier, stood beside the guy shouting the rules. "Humans if you are tagged, be honest, and stay frozen. If you cheat then we will sick the zombies on you to eat your flesh. Then, and only then, is biting fair."

"Any questions?" The other guy said.

No one said anything. I wondered if the no boundaries rule really meant anywhere because I knew Adam and a group of his friends from the
skate park were planning on running through the town square to terrorize a few innocent bystanders.

"Ready!" He shouted.

I spotted Shiloh and Adam on the other side of the field.
Adam's eyes were on Hayley. He brought his hand and cut it horizontally across his throat. Hayley rolled her eyes.

"Set!"

Shiloh caught my gaze and made the,
I'm watching you
gesture with her two fingers. I shook my head, unable to conceal my smile. I
was too excited to mock any threatening gestures. My eyes did another scan across the row of zombies. There was something that struck me about them and the way we were lined up. Before I had much time to think, the guy with the massive
gauges roared.

"Go!"

Everyone dressed as a zombie lurched forward. The group of humans around us scattered. Hayley gripped my forearm while I began to
backtrack. Together we turned around and ran away from the collision of humans and zombies.

Someone from the side ran in front of us, stopping us in our tracks. I noticed his bloody face right away and screamed to Hayley, "Run
left!" With a look of determination he stopped me from running with her and slammed his hand against my shoulder.

I stopped, let out a grunt, and shot a glare to the kid who tagged me. He ran after Hayley. She made a circle, as he chased her from
behind, and ran back to me. I held out my hand before she quickly high fived it. The zombie who tagged me ran after the two junior girls from before in another direction.

"Oh, Hayley!" Adam's voice sang behind me.

While running, I looked back and found Adam gaining on us. "Run!" I screamed, but it was cut off by my own laughter. It was hard to take Adam seriously with his high pitched taunts.

Hayley threw a glance over her shoulder. "Go home,
Adam!" She shouted just before he pounced on her. My hand lost grip of her arm when he knocked her off her feet. They both fell to the ground. Hayley shrieked with rage and pushed Adam off her. He rolled to the side of her on the
grass, overcome by his own laughter.

"You're down, bitch." He leaped to his feet.

She scoffed and looked at me for help. I made an attempt to heal her, but Adam blocked my move and lunged forward to tag me. I bounced back
to avoid his touch and ran in the opposite direction. I heard him behind me. I planned to make a circle in the way that Hayley had, but another zombie cut off my path. I stopped and ran right rather than turning left to help Hayley.

I looked over my shoulder and saw Adam had left me to help Shiloh chase after two guys I recognized from school. My eyes caught onto the person chasing me. He looked older, in his mid-twenties, although the make-up
aged him. The left side of his face appeared to be burned. The wound was painted in a way that made it look infected, the edges were a faded purple, while the infection itself was open and dripping with blood. There were black rings around his eyes in completion to the zombie affect.

I faced forward and continued to run when I realized his attention was focused on me. A small shrill of laughter left my lips when I looked back and found that he was still behind me. I neared the edge of the
field that touched of barrage of trees. I cast a glance to the side and noticed a few other humans were being chased into the woods.

I assumed the woods would give me a better chance of survival and losing the zombie. I dashed into the woods, weaving around trees.
I heard laughter and noticed the beam of flashlights from runners close by. I heard the zombie's feet crunching the leaves behind me so I kept my pace without looking back.

After a few minutes of running further into the woods, my
breathing grew staggered when I felt the strain in my chest as I tried to push myself. The lights from the field grew faint as we ran deeper into the woods. It was becoming difficult to make out the obstacles in my path. A stump, that I
noticed a moment too late, caught the front of my shoe and my body flung forward. My arm shot out and gripped the branch of a tree to catch my fall. My body swung to the side as I held onto the tree for support.

The man continued to run for me, despite my almost-fall.
Breathing heavily, I held my hands up. "Alright, hold on for a second. I need a time out."

He didn't slow down. He was closing in on me with set determination on his face. There was no smile, no hint of laughter to share for
the game we participated in. His apathetic expression held no sympathy for my fall.

My breath caught in the back of my throat. Why wasn't he stopping? Goose bumps ran over the surface of my skin. It was the look in his eyes forced
me to move. I didn't know why, but I suddenly understood that I had to get away from him. With a gasp that turned into a scream, I backed away from the tree that saved my fall, turned, and ran.

I was slower this time. My legs could not carry me as easily as before and breathing became difficult. The heavy weight I felt on my shoulders increased, but the fear of the man behind me kept me moving. This wasn't a game anymore. I didn't know who he was or why I was so frightened by
him, but I knew that he was chasing me with darker intentions that were beyond the game of freeze tag. I didn't want to know what would happen if he caught up with me. So I kept running. My cheeks flushed red. I threw a glance over my
shoulder. The man was still behind me and his pace was building.

"Stop!" I shouted at him, but he paid no attention to my words. Panting, I faced forward and continued to run. Twigs from the
trees I weaved in between scraped across my arms. The sting on my hands and arms from the scratches were minor in comparison to running for my life.

I was running without direction. I needed a plan, but I couldn't wrap my head around the thought of anything other than the stranger
behind me. I knew there was an old graveyard that was located near the edge of the forest. If I could get to it, I was closer to finding help than in the middle of the woods.

Utilizing the best of my senses, I veered directions and ran
in the path that I hoped would lead me to the graveyard. People I knew lived in houses just off the back street where the gravesite was located. I was out of breath, but my feet managed to carry me with the determination to find help in
one of the houses.