Resurrection House Read Online Free Page A

asked when I mentioned Mooncat Jack. Brian and Tommy were two older kids from our school. “This guy in a white van tried to pick them up on their way home yesterday. He wanted them to get in for a ride, but they ran home, and the guy took off. They called the cops and everything.”
    “So? What’s that got do with Mooncat Jack?” I asked.
    “Duh! Who do you think was driving the van? I mean sometimes he takes kids people want to get rid of, and Tommy and Brian are a couple of slobs, aren’t they?”
    Laughing, Joey bounced from one foot to other.
    “Yeah. Really funny,” I said. “Come on, Joey, be serious for a second.”
    “What’s the matter? Scared Mooncat Jack’s coming for you?”
    “Shut up, loser,” I said. “I’m just curious. Maybe I think it’s cool, like Freddy Kreuger or Jason or something.”
    “Don’t call me loser, loser ,” said Joey, but he stopped bouncing and glanced over his shoulder to see who might be standing around. No one was. “You know that Center Quogue kid I said Mooncat Jack stole? Well, when they found him, he was all, like, torn up and mangled and stuff.”
    “Mooncat Jack did it to him?”
    “No, it was Inspector Gadget. Duh!”
    “You’re a liar,” I said. “There’s no Mooncat Jack, and no kid got missing in Center Quogue. You don’t know anything, you jerk.”
    Joey sniffled. His smile vanished. “Chill out, Adam. I’m not making anything up. My sister told me it’s true.” Joey’s sister was in high school and Joey seemed to listen to her a whole lot more than his parents. “Mooncat Jack comes around sometimes, no one knows why or when, and takes children away. He picks a place and when he gets enough kids, he just leaves.”
    “What does he do with them?” I asked.
    “How should I know?” said Joey. “He just takes them. Sometimes he, like, kills them and dumps their bodies in the woods. Some kids no one ever sees again. Maybe he locks them up somewhere. Maybe some kids want to go with him.”
    “How many does he take?”
    Joey wrinkled his brow. “I don’t know. However many he wants. What’s your problem, anyway, scaredy cat?” Joey threw his arms out in front of him and twisted his hands like claws.  He jumped around me in a circle, chanting, “Oooh, he’s coming for yooouuu, Adam! He’s coming to take you away forever!”
    I shoved Joey hard enough to knock him backward over the curb and walked away. He threw a snowball at my back but missed.
    Across the lot stood Wilt, alone, kicking the dwindling piles of soot-spotted snow. He never spoke in class anymore, and at recess he wandered off by himself and ignored everyone else. His mother had started picking him up everyday, and we no longer walked home together. He got thinner, too, and he looked like I did that day with bags under my eyes from not sleeping, only all the time.
    I worried he might be too sick to come to my birthday party Saturday afternoon. Wilt, Joey, Eddie and Billy Cooper were supposed to come. We’d play outside for a few hours and then have cake, and then Mom wanted everyone to go home when it got dark. It would suck without Wilt.
    “Hey, Wilt,” I said. “You still having nightmares?”
    “No,” he said. “I told you I made that stuff up.”
    “But what if someone else saw Mooncat Jack?” I asked. “Like if you weren’t the only one? That would mean he was real, right?”
    Wilt looked up with watery eyes, and said, “That would mean someone was lying because he isn’t real, Adam.”
    The bell rang, then, ending recess. I wanted to say more, but Wilt ran off toward school.
    That afternoon proved Joey right for a change. Before dismissal Sister Maureen, our principal, came over the loudspeaker and warned everyone to be careful and not to walk home alone. She told the story Joey had heard, leaving out Tommy and Brian’s names, but describing the white van and the driver who offered them a ride. Notices had been sent home to our parents and phone calls