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  The Slender Man

  Dexter Morgenstern

  Artwork by Anna Stockbring

  Copyright © 2012 by Dexter Morgenstern

  Artwork Copyright © 2012 Anna Stockbring

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission.

  Kindle: October 2012

  1: The Sabbath

  I can’t say I’m a spiritual person, but I definitely enjoy the Sabbath. My family is Jewish, and every weekend we get together with the Hawthorns to celebrate. We used to go to a synagogue, but ever since we moved here to Murphy, North Carolina, we've been celebrating the Sabbath the traditional way, at home. The closest synagogue here is two hours away and not good enough to be worth the trip, so every week we alternate houses with the Hawthorns, our best friends, to celebrate. To tell the truth, they are our only true friends out here. Shana, their oldest daughter is like my sister. Every Sabbath we take turns sleeping over at each other’s house.

  I met her on my first day at school here when we moved, and was so happy that I wasn't the only Jewish person there, because honestly this town is so under-populated for its size that I’ve met at least half of the people here. Shana has an olive complexion; a button nose that she complains is too big, long thick black hair, and beautiful brown eyes. She's almost exactly my size and even our birthdays are in the same month, May. Ever since we found that out we always celebrate our birthdays together and even ask for the same presents. When we turned fourteen, we both got our own guitars. When we turned fifteen, we both got Labret lip rings. We’re not sure what we want this year. We will both be turning sixteen so we want it to be something special, but a car would be too much to ask of our parents.

  It took us forever to learn how to play our guitars well and even now she's still having trouble plucking. I'm a natural at it. We found that she is a much better singer though so mostly I play the more difficult notes on my acoustic guitar, and she plays single chords while focusing on singing. It works out well, but both of us are terrible at writing lyrics and guitar tabs so often we just practice our favorite songs.

  Right now we are singing the prayer Adon Olam. We always play it, because it is my seven-year-old brother Adam's favorite hymn- well, actually his favorite song in the whole world. I'll admit that we're a little unorthodox with the way we conduct our Sabbath. Normally a song like Adon Olam would be played at the end of a Rabbi's sermon just before the food, but we don't follow that anymore. Instead we play a whole bunch of songs for our family's entertainment, and then we eat. Her sister Denise likes the song “Complicated” by Avril Lavigne, so we will do that next.

  As we play I look around the room at our audience. They're all sitting at the dining room table, eyes on us. My family, the Redwoods, is sitting to our left. Adam looks very happy and is mouthing the words while we sing. Next to him sits my mother Sarah. She has shoulder length brown hair that's starting to gray (after all, she's turning forty-five soon), and hazel eyes that look just like mine except... older. Mom doesn't seem too impressed by our sometimes off-key playing. Sometimes Shana’s guitar chords and mine don't mix well, or sometimes we'll sing on two very different notes making it sound weird, but she still looks happy that we're playing. Next to her sits my dad and he looks just as happy as ever. You can almost see tears of joy in his eyes through his almost rimless glasses. He is balding on the top of his head but is still very proud of the thick bushes around it. So proud in fact that he dyes it black to make himself look younger (although he isn’t pulling it off), and just covers his bald spot with his dark blue yarmulke. I modify my hair too though. I'm a natural brunette like my mom, but I think blonde looks better on me, so I bleach mine. Most people are shocked when they find out it's not naturally blonde. Next to him is my grandmother Hannah, but I call her Bubbe. My grandmother is very old and always seems melancholy, but whenever someone speaks to her she always smiles and appears to be enjoying herself. I don't know, maybe it's just her ashen hair and many wrinkles that make her appear so grim. Despite being in her eighties, she’s not senile at all, but I think that has to do with the fact that she has lived with us instead of being thrown into a nursing home.

  On the other side of the dining table sits Shana’s family, the Hawthorns. Her father Matt Hawthorn is fully bald but that doesn't stop him from having a good time. He's a joyous man that's putting on some weight, but doesn't even seem to care. By contrast, his wife Barbara is very slim. She has short black hair and very few wrinkles on her face. Most people don't believe she's over forty. Shana’s sister seems to be taking up her father’s eating habits as she is a little too big for a seven year old, but her curly brown pigtails fashioned by her sister make the mix look cute.

  We finish the prayer and our families applaud us. Shana and I take each other's hand and give a low bow as a single unit before playing our next and last song for Denise. I let Shana sing this one alone while I play guitar. We found that only one guitar is necessary and well, I'm not so good at singing this one either. We play it a little differently than the original version. Shana starts with the first verse and when she finishes I come in slowly with the guitar.

  After that song we have a little more applause but then we set our guitars down and join our families at the table.

  Our moms get up and run into the kitchen to fetch the challah bread and the meal.

  “Alyssa?” asks Mr. Hawthorn. “

  Yes?” I answered.

  “Your brother is going on the camping trip to the lake tomorrow right?” he asks.

  “Yes, he is,” I say, ruffling Adam's hair. He hunches forward. Adam hates when I touch his hair, but it's a habit I picked up when he was a baby and still haven't dropped. “Do you two mind if Denise stays over tonight, too? So she can just be dropped off with Adam? I'd appreciate getting to sleep in for the weekend, and she’s got everything she needs in her backpack in the car,” he asks. I look at my Dad and he just shrugs.

  “Fine with me,” he says. I look back at Mr. Hawthorn and smile

  “Sounds like fun. She'll get to play with Adam,” I answer. He nods his appreciation.

  At that, our mothers reentered the room carrying trays. Mrs. Hawthorn sets hers down first and quickly heads back to the kitchen. My Mom sets her tray down and we sing the Motzi before she removes the cloth to reveal two warm loaves of challah- braided bread. While doing this, Mrs. Hawthorn returns with one final tray with nine shot glasses. Seven are full of red wine and two are separated from the rest full of grape juice for Adam and Denise. It's a Jewish custom to enjoy wine at the Sabbath but all our parents agree that children can only have it when they turn thirteen, so the two younger ones have a ways to go. As Mrs. Hawthorn distributes the glasses, she waves one hand to cue the blessing over fruit and the Sabbath. “

  Baruch atah Adonai...” I start.

  “Elohaynu melech ha'olam,” Shana joins followed by the rest of them, until we all finish the prayer with a loud

  “L'chayim!” which is toast that means “To Life!”

  After we eat the breaded chicken, baked potatoes, and green beans, Barbara and Matt Hawthorn say their goodbyes and then take their leave. Shana and I begin to rush up stairs but my mom stops us.

  “Nope, not yet. You need to get these dishes done first,” she said. I sigh, but that’s the way we do things. Mom cooks, Dad cleans the counters and table, I do the dishes, and Adam stays out of the way. It would be more of a chore to wash dishes on the Sabbath because our meals were always special and since there are more people, there are more dishes, but Shana always helps and the job goes by more than twice as fast.

  Once we finish the dishes, we head up the wooden staircase to my room. Shana and I
both have the habit of using the walls of the stairs for balance instead of the banister. Most of our walls seem too cluttered with portraits and decorations, but everything is at least neatly organized. That is, until we get to my room. Marked by a worn down Karen-O poster on the door, my room is the most cluttered of them all. Almost every inch of wall is taken up by some poster or picture or even some of the drawings I drew when I was Adam's age.

  On my floor are various clothes. Clean or dirty? I don't care, and I just kick them all into a pile in the corner on top of my school papers. Oh well, I'll sort through them tomorrow when I start my essay that's not due till Tuesday. I can hear Adam and Denise playing what sounds like an old Dance Dance Revolution game, but with the lack of rhythm in their trampling I bet they aren't getting very high scores.

  The clothes are just part of the mess in my room. Even my decorations are placed messily. I have lopsided posters of some of my favorite bands like Chevelle and Paramore. Mom doesn't stress me too much about the cleanliness of my room. She's more worried about my grades. I'm lingering on the low end of a B average and she doesn't want to see it decline any further.

  After I clear out a decent space on my floor, I pull out the chair from my desk and move it near my vanity for Shana to sit. I take the vanity stool and Shana and I both proceed to remove our makeup which isn't really much. We both wear eyeliner and lip gloss, and Shana wears a little blush on her cheeks, but when we finish removing the makeup from our faces, we begin reapplying nail polish.

  “What colors should we do this week?” I ask. Shana looks at the assortment of colors laying on my vanity and picks out two. We always wear two different colors of nail polish, alternating the colors on every other fingernail.

  “How 'bout... green, and black?” she asks.

  “Dark green or light?” I respond

  “Light,” she answers without hesitation.

  As we apply the nail polish to our fingernails, we begin to speak. We mostly talk about school. She and I don't really hang out with any of the other students. It's not that we're anti-social or that we don't get along with the other students, it's because both of us have parents that work in the school. Her mother is the school counselor and my father is the vice principal.

  “At least having parents at the school keeps the boys respectful,” she says.

  “Yeah, but when prom time comes that means we will probably be the only ones without a date,” I respond. She shook her head.

  “Come on Lyss, if they're afraid to approach us because of our parents, don't you think they'd be even more reluctant to reject us?” she suggests.

  “That’s evil,” I laugh.

  “How's track?” she asks. I've been part of the track team for the last two years.

  “Awful!” I exclaim.

  “Leanne has got some kind of problem with me. She always sprints to pass me and then when she's tired she makes a point to body-block me so I can't get ahead.”

  “Doesn't that slow her down too?” she asks. I shake my head.

  “No, she and I are the fastest on the team by like ten seconds, but she finishes just ahead of me like half the time now just because she does that,” I explain. I’m getting angry just thinking about it.

  “Is it really that hard to pass her?” she asks.

  “I don't know. I guess I'll just fake her out and pass her on the opposite side I approach from,” I say. She claps once, as an idea just hit her.

  “No! I have a better idea. When she speeds up to pass you, you speed up. That way she'll tire out faster and won't be able to keep up with you. She'll probably end up slowing down to third or even worse if she tries too hard,” she explains. I like that idea.

  “Well hey I'm going on my weekend jog tomorrow morning after I drop my brother- er our siblings off. You wanna come?” I ask. She looks hesitant.

  “I mentioned to my mom about our run last time. She doesn't want me going into the forest like that. She's even surprised that your mom lets you do it alone,” she says. I bite my lip and fumble my labret ring with my teeth.

  “But as long as we don't tell her,” she continues. A sly smile crosses my lips. Shana is a worrier though so I can tell that’s not the right approach.

  “My mom realizes it's dangerous too,” I say, standing up.

  I look around the mess in my room to find my purse. It's a small colorful Alice in Wonderland bag that I've had since I was ten. It's pretty worn now, but I've always used it. I open it and reach in.

  “My mom always has me carry this,” I say, pulling out a small blue cylinder.

  “Pepper spray?” she asks. I nod.

  “Your momma lets you carry that around?” she asks.

  “Makes me,” I correct. “Just don't mention it to anyone. It's not really... legal per se,” I add.

  “Well what's more legal then? A dead girl, or a crook with burning eyes?” she asks. “That's what my mom said!” I exclaim. I clasp both hands to my mouth, thinking I was too loud.

  I look at my clock and realize it's only eight. It only seems darker because of the opaque purple curtain that hides my window. My mom buys into the urban legend that people will spy on me undressing if I don't block the view from the window.

  “So anyway, if you're trying to outrun Leanne, won't I slow you down on the trail?” she asks.

  “Oh no that trail is like what three miles? I can't run that at top speed. I can barely make it at a medium pace,” I laugh. The trail is not really a paved trail, but more of a path I found that can take me all the way to the school district and even further, so I can get to almost anywhere important in the town from it.

  We spend the rest of the night talking about our schoolwork. The essays we have to write are on creative historical fiction. It's a project that affects both our history and our English grade, so it's kind of important. We both have to make up short stories where we place ourselves in a historical event and then explain how our lives worked through it. Shana brings up the idea that our stories should collide so that it was the same story, but through both of our points of view. I think it's a great idea, but it makes our essays that much harder.

  “At least we got plenty of time to do it,” she says.

  “Yeah, and if I get an A on this my grades will go up, so my mother will stop breathing down my neck,” I say. “

  So, what subject? The Civil War?” she asks. I shake my head.

  “No, Ms. Alder will probably see a dozen of those and get so bored she drops our grades for it. How about something Asian?” I ask. She thinks about that for a second.

  “I haven't had Chinese food in a while,” she mumbles. From there we continue to sidetrack until it gets late. Not really late for a Saturday, but because of the whole trip tomorrow we won't get to sleep in like normal. So we drop at about ten, with her sleeping on a mat in the floor. I sleep peacefully.

  2: The Accident

  I brush my teeth. Shana is changing into some of my workout clothes since she didn't bring any of hers. It took us a while to find some in the cluttered mess around my floor, and I had to face-palm myself when I found a full work-out outfit in the closet where they belong. We found a matching Nike vinyl jacket and pants for her to wear. I’m wearing my white and gray hoody and navy blue running shorts. I spit the water into the sink and then rinse my mouth out. I floss too. I know it's something usually done at night, but I always forget and end up flossing in the morning. When I get back into my room, Shana has already brushed her teeth and is putting on some of my sneakers, while the day clothes she brought are placed neatly on my bed so she can find them easily when we get back.

  “Alyssa, hurry up!” Adam groans from outside the open door. I hold my palm out at him without even looking. I'm still grumpy from getting up at six rather than noon on a Saturday, so I'm not in any mood to be nagged. Although to be fair, Shana and I did cost him ten minutes while looking for clothes, so he's been waiting for a while. I make sure to grab my keychain, water bottle, and phone and then stuff them int
o my jacket pocket. It's not a very good phone. You have to flip it open, and it still has a dial pad, not like one of the smartphones, but I broke three cellphones in the past year so finally my parents got me the most durable one they could find. My keychain is pretty empty. It just has my house key and Mace.

  After Shana and I are both ready, I inspect Adam. I can see the ties to his swimming trunks hanging from his jeans. He’s also wearing flip-flops, a T-Shirt, and a green jacket, but I notice something missing.

  “How is Mr. Mario gonna know who you are?” I ask. He thinks for a second before realizing my point.

  “Oh yeah,” he exclaims, sticking a hand underneath his jacket and pulling out his nametag. “It needs to be visible,” I say.

  “Where's Denise?” Shana asks. Adam points downstairs and I look to see Denise, fully ready to go, lying against the door half asleep. Glad I'm not the only one still tired. At least my jog will wake me up.

  “Do you have your permission slips?” Shana asks. I completely skipped out on that, but luckily Adam is on top of the situation and pulls out a clumsily folded paper with the necessary signatures.

  “Alright, let's go,” I say, and lead Adam downstairs. Shana rouses Denise, who picks up her backpack and opens the door. As we head outside I fix my hair into a ponytail and take the lead. Luckily we're just on time as I can see the bus pulling up to the stop down the street. Adam and Denise run to the stop, thinking they're gonna miss it, but the driver just pulls up to our driveway.

  The bus door opens and I can see Mario Douglas, who everyone calls “Mr. Mario,” the kindergarten and elementary school driver that I see every morning as I drop Adam off, with a half awake smile on his face. Mr. Mario is about thirty or so and has a well-trimmed beard. It looks like he has a receding hairline but he covers it with his driver's cap, so you can't really tell. He looks really mean every time I see him. He looks even grumpier now that he's working on a Saturday and his smile doesn't fool me, but Adam says he's really nice and that he brings a bucket of candy for all of the children to take from every Friday afternoon. So maybe the only reason I think he seems mean is because he's not a morning person.