SHUDDERVILLE FOUR Read Online Free PDF Page B

to feel more distant, and soon she was floating away from him. She lingered somewhere above them, looking down from the ceiling like a scientist inspecting two bugs. Hector pounded his hips against her, until three—four—five hard thrusts made him shudder so crazily, his eyes rolled up in their sockets and he made an oh-God face.
    Sophie couldn’t breathe. After several long moments of struggling, she gave up. She sank into a deep sleep and thought about Jayla. A small journey began. She was tiptoeing from mushroom to mushroom, thinking at the speed of light. She heard voices. People talking gibberish. She looked into a magic mirror at her endless eyes.
    *
    A little girl was sitting cross-legged on a bed, smiling curiously at her collection of dolls and teddy bears. She had big blue eyes and shoulder-length brown hair, and embroidered on her fuzzy pink sweater was a sleepy-eyed cat. There was a pair of costume wings attached to her back with an elasticized strap—angel wings made out of fluffy pink feathers. There were rhinestones on her purple tiara, and in her hand was a magic wand with a sparkly star at the tip.
    It was Jayla.
    Sophie tried to speak to her. “Jayla?” It came out thin and watery.
    “What are you doing here?” the little girl said.
    Sophie thought she was talking to her, but then Jayla picked up one of her dolls. It was a boy doll. A Ken doll. He wore a blue shirt and khaki pants. On his feet were little plastic shoes. Now she made her Ken doll speak. “Be quiet, or he’ll hear you.”
    Jayla nodded with comic exaggeration and put a finger to her lips. “Shh.”
    Sophie looked around woozily. The room was unlike any other room she’d ever seen before. The ceiling was ten feet tall and strung with twinkly lights. The floor was painted to look like the ocean, deep blue ripples surrounded by a border of prancing sea horses. There was a clamshell armchair, a plastic dolphin rocking chair and a wooden chest of drawers with seashell handles—the sort of furniture you might find in a mermaid’s castle.
    Jayla slid down off of her bed, took a few crudely mechanical steps forward and stood blinking at the large elegant doll seated in the rocking chair. “Have you come to rescue me?” she asked.
    “Yes,” Sophie whispered. Only Jayla didn’t hear her. Didn’t see her. Didn’t acknowledge her existence.
    I’m not really here. But I can see you, my precious baby. I love you. I’ll find you, and yes, I will rescue you.
    Jayla’s eyes went wide. She picked up the large doll dressed in Victorian garb and carried it out of the strange room into an even stranger one. Sophie followed her down a short hallway past a kitchen and bathroom, then stood inside a living room that was decorated to look like the fifties. A pink-and-black sofa and two sleek armchairs, two black lacquer end tables and an old-fashioned television on a swivel pedestal. There was a white vinyl record player next to a stack of scratchy-looking records and lots of antique toys—a pinball machine, a shelf of tiny robots and futuristic-looking cars, a pink poodle clock and a stuffed monkey with a fez. The pink-tiled kitchen was large and well lit. The mint-green bathroom had an old-fashioned bathtub, the kind with clawed porcelain feet.
    Now Jayla pretended that her doll was talking to her. “Did you try the door again?” the doll asked.
    “It’s locked. I told you already. See?” Jayla walked over to a blue-painted door and jiggled on the handle.
    She made the doll try it. She had her pull on the knob and kick the door panel with her slender inadequate ceramic legs.
    “See?” Jayla told the doll. “It’s locked.”
    Sophie almost wept. Her daughter was so brave and strong.
    Now they both heard a noise upstairs. Footsteps.
    Jayla shivered and looked at the ceiling. She seemed worried. Her pretty blue eyes glazed over, and she put a finger to her lips. “We should sit down,” she said.
    She put the doll on the sofa and sat