I really have no idea why this series has lasted so long, but in the process of surviving, it has been able to lure a few new talents to its pages—or rather, talents new to the field. Nancy Holder is one of them. A professional writer with a love of Dark Fantasy, she was finally persuaded (read "bullied") into submitting some stories. She was nervous; I was confident. And "Moving Night," and the other pieces which have appeared in Shadows and elsewhere, proves another valuable point for those of us who care—love for what you're doing, excitement for the craft as well as the story, always shows through in the finished piece. You can always see it, but you can definitely feel it. And no amount of faking will save either the story or the writer. Nancy Holder doesn't fake it. She's too damn good for that.
It moved.
Petey lay in his bed, shaking with terror, his eight-year-old eyes bulging so widely they ached. His head throbbed; his grubby fists clenched tight to keep him from screaming, as the moonlight gleamed on the chair that rattled near the closet door.
It had moved, oh, no, oh no, it had moved, and no one would ever believe him. All those nights his mom and dad would come in and talk to him in syrupy voices, and tell him, Why, Petey, nothing moved. Only live things can move. And your stuffed rabbit isn't alive, and that pile of laundry isn't alive, and Mr. Robot isn't alive, and…
And they never believed him. They never did!
But the chair had moved. He had seen it. When he'd pretended to look away, then looked quickly back, he knew the chair had inched closer to the bed. He knew it was coming to get him, to eat him all up and spit out his bones, to fling him to the monsters and the bogeymen and witches with rotten teeth and no eyes who lived in the closet…
… who stuck their heads out at midnight and laughed at him when his mom and dad were asleep; and waited until the last minute for the sleepy pad pad pad of slippers, the creak of the bedroom door…
Petey ? Are you having another nightmare, dear? Don't give yourself one of those headaches!
There, it moved again! Petey wanted to scream but his throat was so dry he couldn't make a sound, not even a hoarse gasp. It moved, he swore it, please, please, someone, it moved!
He whimpered like a wounded kitten. Only live things could move. Only things that were alive.
Why didn't they ever believe him? When he whooped with white-hot fever over the dwarf in the toy chest, they just laughed. When he pleaded with them to listen listen! about the skeleton in the mattress, they said he had an active imagination. They only believed about the headaches. Headaches were real.
Maybe he needs glasses. Maybe he's allergic to pollen.
Maybe, maybe…
It moved again!
Peter bolted upright and pressed his back against the headboard. His head was splitting. They had believed him about that, but they had never done anything! They had never helped him! They had never taken away the pain!
"Stop!" Petey begged. "Stop!"
His head always hurt, like a little gremlin lived inside, sticking pins in his brain. And they talked about taking him to the doctor, and talked about taking him for tests, and talked and talked…
"Stop!"
… but they didn't care about him. They didn't love him, because his mom had had a boyfriend while his dad was on his battleship; and when he came back, she was going to have a baby. Him. Petey…
It was still moving!
… and he heard them late at night, fighting. His dad (not his read dad, his real dad was a bogeyman) would shout, "Ya shoulda gotten an abortion, Barb! Ya shoulda gotten rid of him!"
And his mother would cry and say, "I know, Jack, I know. I'm sorry."
Then last Sunday, after the kitten, his dad (the fake one) had shouted, "He's a monster! He's not human! We should send him away!" And his mother, sobbing, had replied, "Yes, Jack. I know. We will."
It moved. Tears streamed down Petey's face.
But only things that were alive could move. And the chair was not alive.
And neither was the thing sitting in it.
"I didn't mean to hurt the cat," he whispered. "Or the dog, or Mrs. Garcia's niece…" He crammed his fists in his mouth; no one knew about that.
It moved again. Much closer.
"I didn't mean to," he cried wildly. "Grown-ups are supposed to help little kids! And nobody…"
He thought of Mrs. Martin, the school nurse. She had tried to help him. When his head hurt really badly, she would let him lie down on a canvas cot in her office while she knitted. She had a big bag full of yarn and light green needles that flashed between her fingers. She wouldn't call home unless he asked her to. She would let him lie there, not moving, and every once in a while she would smile at him and say, "Feeling better?"
Sometimes he would say no just so he could stay with her. She was older than his mother but she was pretty anyway, and she always smelled like roses. She sang to him sometimes while she knitted, in-and-out, in-and-out
Bye, baby bunting, Daddy's gone a-hunting
like he was just a baby, and she told him he could grow up to be whatever he wanted.
He should be locked up! Did you see what he did to that cat? My God, Barb, he's not normal!
I know, Jack, I know.
Whatever he wanted, even President of the United States. And once he laughed and said, "Not me, Mrs. Martin!" But she shrugged and asked, "Why not? You're a bright boy with your future ahead of you."
Who was that guy you cheated on me with? Who the hell was he?
The headaches! The headaches!
At Halloween she lent him a doctor's bag and a stethoscope and told him maybe he could go to medical school and become a doctor.
"You're a good boy, Petey," she would say. "A fine young man."
He tried to tell her about the skeleton and the dwarf and the witches—oh, the witches, with their laughing, waiting for the pad, pad, pad of the slippers before they disappeared! But she didn't believe him either, and that hurt him, worse than the headaches. Mrs. Martin cared about him. He knew that. But she didn't believe him, and the pain never got better, never did.
And then she stopped working at the school and he was all alone again.
"Nobody helped me!" Petey screamed as loud as he could. "You should've helped me!"
"I'll help you now," slurred the thing in the chair.
It used to be his mother, but now she was all bloody from where he had stabbed her wasn't my fault, wasn't, was not! and the rest of her was white. Her lips were blue and her eyes were full of blood and flies were buzzing in her hair.
She hadn't moved for four days.
"It's not my fault!" he shrieked, scrabbling against the headboard. Maybe if he made a run for the door, he could escape. But she was moving, even though she was just a dead thing, not a live thing, and only live things moved.
Except his pretend dad, who was still alive—Petey could hear him moaning in the hallway—had not moved since Tuesday.
Anything he wanted to be… a fine young man.
"I'm coming for you, Petey," his mother whispered through broken teeth. He had punched her when she screamed "Monster! Monster!" until she stopped. "I'm going to give you to the skeleton in the mattress and the dwarf in the toy chest. I'm going to fling you to the eyeless witches in the closet."
President of the United States.
"Not me, Mrs. Martin!"
"Why not?"
He heard a mad, gleeful gibbering underneath the bed.
"No!" He buried his face in his hands and sobbed. "Oh, please, no! I'm sorry! Please, someone!"
The gibbering faded. The room was still.
Maybe it was just another headache. A bad dream. There was nothing…
Bye, baby bunting
When he raised his head, his mother, all oozy and gory, smelling terribly, was standing beside the bed. She smiled a toothless, gummy smile. "No more headaches."
And the chair skittered up next to her just as the closet door opened.
Anything he wanted…
And then everything moved.