The Dark: A Collection (Point Horror) Read Online Free PDF Page A

his chest. He was chatting
with the ticket taker.
    Harry stalked off,
patrolling the lobby as he'd been ordered to do.
    On her way to the
ladies' lounge Bianca spotted the brightly lighted section of the
lobby around the refreshments stand. The girl in the red-and-white
striped cap behind the counter was popping heaping mounds of popcorn,
piling them up into what looked like mountains behind the glass
front.
    The overhead lights
were vaguely comforting to Bianca, soothing her nerves. They made her
feel a little more relaxed, more like her old self. She could breathe
more easily here than in the darkened theater.
    Bianca couldn't
help but stroll over to the brightly lighted glass counter to examine
the different kinds of candy bars and mints illuminated under lights
of their own. She studied the silver foil wrappers with blue letters
on the peppermint candies, the bright orange wrappers with yellow
letters on the peanut butter cups, and the dark brown wrappers with
the inner silver foils on the Hershey's chocolate almond bars.
There were multi-colored packages of fruity-flavored chewing gum. She
hadn't seen a display like this in a long time — two years, in
fact.
    "What do you want?"
    Bianca looked up,
startled.
    Marianna Haynes stood
there in her white apron and red-and-white striped cap. She had her
hands on her waist, tapping her foot.
    "Just looking."
    "Hurry up! We're
closing in forty minutes as soon as the last show's over. I want to
clear out. I've been standing here for eight hours. My feet hurt."
.
    Bianca had done it
again. She couldn't stop acting so stupid that people despised her.
Marianna obviously held her in utter contempt.
    "I guess genteel
folks like you with big bank accounts don't have to worry about
stepping on other people's toes, do you? You don't care if you
make me stand here all night!"
    Bianca gaped at the
girl in confusion. Big bank accounts? Bianca wasn't rich! At least
not yet.
    "Don't give me
that innocent look!" The girl leered at Bianca. "You've got
that nice, big, juicy trust fund from the Shipleys. That's plenty
rich enough for somebody like me who earns minimum wage and has to
work my guts out for it. I've got to sweat at this job forty hours
a week, mostly nights. It's pretty hot back here with the oven for
the hot dogs, the stove for the coffee, and the popcorn-maker. Pretty
Miss Bianca Winters doesn't have to sweat like that, does she?"
    St. Simons was a
small island just off the Georgia coast. Everybody knew everybody
else's business. Bianca couldn't deny that the million dollar
trust fund existed, that she was about to come into it any week. She
didn't like to be reminded of it. She didn't deserve it.
    "I'll — I'll
take a pack of the Juicy Fruit gum," she replied apologetically.
She got out her wallet.
    Marianna glared at
her knowingly as if she figured that Bianca wouldn't have anything
smaller than a five when the gum cost only twenty-five cents a pack.
She forced Bianca to sweat every second as she counted out the change
into her palm, dollar by dollar, quarter by quarter.
    Bianca hurried across
the lobby, trying not to pay attention to that other girl's eyes
boring a hole through her back.
    She pushed open the
door to the ladies' lounge with a loud creak. She hurried through
the small sitting area, then opened the second door to the lavatory.
For a panicky instant, she was alone in the dark, except for the
lights from the street outside filtering through the one open window.
    She held her breath
as she groped along the wall for the light switch. She breathed a
sigh of relief to see the room flooded with the garish yellow light
from the single bulb overhead. It was enough to keep the darkness
away.
    Why didn't the
theater manager leave the light on all the time? Bianca reminded
herself that everyone would be inside the theater for the big,
climactic scene of The Black Widow Strikes Again, which she didn't
care to see.
    Bianca plopped her
purse down on the sink. She reached way