Chapter 1

“Hey, if we died on this run, we wouldn’t have to go to school tomorrow,” smirked Ian as he hugged his longboard to his chest for warmth.

“Yeah, and hell probably wouldn’t be half as bad as 8^th grade,” answered Beezer. “Demons and lava and stuff are sick—way better than pre-algebra.” Beezer was thicker than Ian, so the early fall wind didn’t phase him as much as the others. Though because of his weight, he felt he had to act even more hardcore than the others. “I’d love to hang with good ole’ Lucifer.”

“Well, I hope you get your wish Beez, so I don’t have to spend another year threatening girls that make fun of you,” said Byron watching his cold breath in the morning air. “Just don’t come back and haunt me, alright?”

Byron Akins was the smallest of the group, but he was the smartest and the best at longboarding, which made sense because he probably had taken less hits to the head while riding.

The group of boys huddled together on the top of Elm Street, waiting to start their last full day of riding hills before the school year began again. As soon as classes started, Beez would be stuck in tutoring, and Ian would go back to being grounded most of the time (Ian wasn’t the most attentive, or respectful, or the smartest kid in school), and then Byron would be left alone every weekend. And riding alone got boring quick, especially on the treks uphill.

It was Byron’s idea to get up early and ride that morning. Sunday mornings were usually quiet in their town. And this one was especially still and cold. For some reason, autumn had hit early this year, which was weird for the beginning of September. The first week of school was usually a chance for middle-schoolers to show off their summer suntans, but with the cold mist that hovered over the neighborhood, Byron doubted that any kid would be caught wearing anything less than a hoodie tomorrow.

“Can you guys see anything through this fog?” asked Byron.

“Hey, if you died Beez. I would totally change the name from Killer Hill to Beezer Hill. In your honor,” said Ian, as a late, late jab at his friend.

“Ha! You better, toolbox” answered Beezer. “No Akins, I cannot see anything but my immanent death. What’s up with this weird weather anyways?”

“I don’t know, but if I stand here another second, I’m going to freeze. Let’s hit it,” said Ian as he threw his board down to the slick pavement and hurtled down the steep decline.

Beezer followed a few seconds later, and Byron brought up the rear. Because of his skill, Byron could better maneuver around the broken bodies left from any crashes, and he knew the road the best. He had learned to board on Elm, despite it being so steep that it was nicknamed Killer Hill. Byron ducked down, picked up some speed, and flew past his house, the second from the top.

Despite this being his street, Byron felt a little uneasy riding that morning. The cold weather was weird, but not as weird as the fog that seemed to engulf the neighborhood in grey. It was the kind of morning when the wet drenched the newspapers through their clear plastic sleeves and soaked through his sneakers into his socks. Byron could feel the wind under his shirt and on his bare ankles, and he shuddered, wobbling a little on his board.

“I’m the devil!” Beezer yelled as he plummeted down the hill, his weight causing him to gain enough momentum to overcome Ian, and leaving Byron to weave down the hill at his own pace. Being so small, he wasn’t quite as quick but he controlled the board well, and he darted back and forth down the street, catching quick glimpses of the mist-shrouded houses as he went by.

At the bottom of Elm, a ways past where Byron lived, the houses got fewer and older. Mr. Romero’s old shack was on the left hand side, tangled ivy scaling the sides of the decayed wood paneling, massive weeds overtaking the front yard. The neighborhood kids would avoid that place whenever possible. The only reason they would come near was the pumpkin patch in the abandoned lot across the street. Now that school was starting and Halloween was getting closer, kids would risk passing Romero’s place to sneak a pumpkin from the patch and carve it into a jack-o-lantern.

As Ian and Beezer disappeared around the bend in the road at the bottom of the hill, Byron approached Romero’s house and the patch. Byron shivered—he had slowed down quite a bit, but the wind and cold had only gotten stronger. He pulled his hands inside the sleeves of his shirt and tucked his chin down to his chest. He turned to avoid looking at Romero’s creepy old place, when he caught in the corner of his eye a quick movement in the pumpkin patch.

He glanced up and his eyes locked on to a shadowy figure sprinting through the patch, parallel to his course downhill. Before he could even respond, Byron hit a patch of gravel on the road, sending his board into a slide and his body into a tumbling mess of flailing arms and legs, ricocheting off the pavement. A second later his body skidded to a stop, his arms and legs contorted at odd angles, and his bloodied face resting on the wet ground, facing the pumpkin patch.

Laying in a heap of bent limbs, Byron struggled against the pain for a breath, but the wind was knocked out of him. Blackness quickly crept into Byron’s vision, but before he blacked out completely, he saw the shadowy figure approach.