Page 47 of Kill Your Darlings

i

It wasn’t a typical yellow school bus, but more like a tour bus, with plush seats and tinted windows. Wendy Eastman, one of

the first to arrive for the eighth-grade trip to D.C., decided to sit about three-quarters of the way back. If you sat too

close to the front, you looked weak, and if you sat all the way toward the back, the kids tended to be scary. She was only

fourteen, but she’d already moved towns ten times that she could count. Being a new kid at a school didn’t bother her all

that much, but it was good to have some rules for survival.

As the bus filled up, getting louder and louder, she turned so that she was looking out of the window at the middle school parking lot.

There was a dissipating layer of dew on the sports fields in the distance, and the sky had a pinkish tinge.

She’d tried to get out of this trip, but apparently all the eighth graders were required to go, or that was what her mother had told her.

Wendy did wonder about that, because she saw the check that her mother wrote out of her own bank account to send her on this trip.

If it cost money, it couldn’t be required, right?

But it didn’t matter. Her mother wanted her to go, enough that she had somehow come up with the money, so Wendy had decided to make the best of it.

Still, it was one thing to keep to yourself in school and another to have to be by yourself on a three-day road trip with

other students. There would be nowhere to hide. And it wasn’t starting well; she could see in the reflection of the window

that the kids now coming onto the bus would reach the empty seat, see that it was next to her, and move on. Maybe she’d luck

out and have both seats to herself, and then she could read all the way down, not have to talk to anyone.

But just before the bus began its journey—Mrs.Chappell, one of the parent chaperones, was calling out names from the front

of the bus and ticking the names off on her clipboard—Wendy saw a boy running across the parking lot, a plaid suitcase banging

against his legs. It was Thom Something—she knew his name because he’d frozen up while reciting “In Flanders Fields” in their

shared English class, but their teacher, Mr.Stone, had been kind about it. Mrs.Chappell reopened the bus’s door and went

down and helped him stow his bag, then Thom was slowly walking down the aisle, looking for a place to sit. He passed Wendy’s

seat, then came back and sat down next to her. Some kid two rows back made a kind of oohing sound that got a tepid laugh.

“Hey,” Thom said.

“I’m Wendy.”

“Oh, yeah. I know. We take English class together.”

They didn’t talk again until they were on the highway, riding along on the hiss of the wet road, the windows blurry with rain.

Wendy had decided not to talk unless he talked to her first, but she was intrigued by the book that sat unopened on his lap.

It was by Roald Dahl, an author she knew, but the book, a hardcover clearly borrowed from the library, was one she hadn’t

heard of. The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Six More . She asked him about it.

“It’s short stories and they’re pretty gruesome. More for adults than children.”

“Gruesome how?”

He said there was a story about two bullies shooting all these birds and then tormenting another boy. Then the bullies kill

a swan and tear its wings off, making the boy wear them. It did seem gruesome, and she wondered if he was making it up to

impress her.

They stopped at a Burger King for lunch, and Thom went and found friends to sit with, while Wendy got a table for herself.

Mrs.Chappell must have felt bad for her, because when she finally got her food she sat with Wendy and asked her a string

of questions about her life. Wendy thought it was probably more humiliating to eat with a chaperone than it was to eat alone.

Back on the bus she thought Thom might find another place to sit, but they wound up next to each other again. She had her

own book with her now that she’d retrieved from her baggage; it was Cujo by Stephen King, a paperback she’d snagged from her older brother Alan’s room the night before. She hadn’t started it yet.

“Oh,” Thom said when he saw the book. It had occurred to her that she was one-upping him in the gruesome book contest.

“Have you read a Stephen King book before?”

“No, but I saw Salem’s Lot on TV. Did you see that?” Thom said.

Wendy had heard all about that show, and how terrifying it was, from her brother. “No,” she said. “Was it scary?”

She thought Thom might act all brave, but instead, he said, “Are you familiar with the term ‘scarred for life’?”

She laughed. “Yeah, I heard it was scary.”

“Who told you that?”

“My brother saw it and told me about it.”

“He’s older?”

“Yeah. He’s a freshman at the high school.”

“I have an older sister. She’s a junior. She tells me about all the scary movies she sees as well.”

“Like what?”

“Everything. Friday the Thirteenth . The Omen film.”

“My favorite is The Exorcist ,” Wendy said suddenly, even though she’d been pretty much traumatized by watching that film at her brother’s friend’s house.

Thom looked impressed. “My sister told me all about that movie. She watched it at a slumber party. It sounded crazy.”

“It’s totally crazy,” Wendy said, and then they talked about The Exorcist for the rest of the ride. It was weird, because even though Thom hadn’t seen it, he seemed to know more about it than she

did. He’d apparently grilled his sister on every detail, plus he had a subscription to MAD magazine, so he’d read the parody version of the film, called “The Ecchorcist.” Thom had to spell it for her, and explain to her why

it was funny. Then he asked her lots of questions about the green vomit, and even asked her about the crucifix scene, which

was something she didn’t really like thinking about. What she didn’t tell him—because she didn’t have the words—was that her

favorite parts of the movie were the parts that weren’t scary at all. She’d fallen in love with the girl in the movie, with

Regan, who got to live with just her mom in this amazing house in the city. The mom was a movie star who had fancy parties

and no husband, and Wendy had found herself fantasizing about being her daughter and what that life must be like. Even at

the end of the movie it was clear that Regan didn’t remember anything about what had happened when she’d been possessed by

a demon. So in a way, she’d just get to continue her amazing life. She almost told Thom about this fantasy but thought he

might think she was weird, so she kept it to herself. Instead, she told him about the scene where Regan’s head twisted all

the way around. And she told him about the crazy steps that were outside of Regan’s apartment and how the priest fell down

them and died. When they were getting close to the end of their trip Wendy said, “You know that this is where it all takes

place?”

“What takes place?”

“The movie. It’s here in D.C.”

Thom looked confused, as though she’d just told him that the film was actually a documentary or something. “It’s set in Georgetown,

which is a neighborhood here. We’re going to go to it on this trip. Like, I’m pretty sure the steps are really here.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“I thought we were just going to go to museums and learn about the presidents.”

“I think that’s the important part.”

One of the teachers was coming down the aisle while the bus was slowing down. “This is it, kids. You need to bring everything

with you from the bus, okay?”

“MissAckles,” Thom said. She stopped and looked at him. “Are we going to Georgetown on this trip?”

“Do you have the schedule, Thom?” she said, leaning forward to talk to him, and Wendy stared at MissAckles’s incredibly long

and shiny hair.

“I guess I forgot it,” he said.

“Yes, on the last night here we’re having dinner in Georgetown. It’s all in the schedule.”

“Did you know that’s where The Exorcist happened?” Thom said.

MissAckles frowned. “You haven’t seen that movie, have you, Thom?”

“No,” he said, and Wendy wondered if he was going to give her up.

“It’s pretty scary,” the social studies teacher said. “I’m not usually a scaredy-cat about those kinds of things, but that

one got to me. And, yes, you’re right, it all happened right where we’re going.” She widened her eyes and changed her voice

a little when saying that last part.

Miss Ackles moved on, and Thom turned back to Wendy.

His cheeks were kind of red and she wondered if he had a crush on Miss Ackles, which wouldn’t really surprise her.

Her hair was really very shiny, and sometimes her sweaters were so tight you could tell she wasn’t wearing a bra.

Thom said, “Going to Georgetown, I guess. Should we find the steps?”

ii

The trip to D.C. turned out to be maybe the best trip of Thom’s life. Partly it was the freedom. His school had booked one

entire floor of a hotel, and until nine p.m., when all the kids had to be in their rooms, they were free to be anywhere they

wanted in the big hotel, including the game room down near the lobby, or the fitness room up on the top floor. Paul Barbieri

and he had gotten into an epic game of spy versus spy, Thom’s triumph coming when he ambushed Paul out by the pool area, leaping

out at him from one of the bushes that edged the tarped-over pool and making Paul squeal like a little girl.