Doll Face

4

Soo-Lee reached down and took Lex by the arm, pulling him away from the body and to his feet. It was an impulsive action and she was not even conscious of doing so. The only thing she was aware of was the fact that there was something very wrong here.

“Well, somebody’s gotta check him,” Creep said.

“How about you?” Lex suggested.

“Fuck that.”

Soo-Lee looked from the body to the houses and buildings, all of which were black and silent. No, none of this was right. The whole damn town almost looked like a set from a movie. That was insane and it made no sense whatever, but that’s what she was thinking.

Everything’s artificial here. Nothing’s real.

A creeping dread had gotten beneath her skin now and she started to tremble minutely. She badly wanted to take Lex by the arm and run, run as fast and far away from this place as they possibly could. She tried to speak, but her mouth was dry as sand.

“Listen,” she said when she finally got her voice working. “I think Chazz is right. I think we need to drive out of here right now.”

“At last, some common sense,” Chazz said.

“We can’t leave the scene of an accident,” Ramona reminded them. “Now let’s just figure out if this guy is okay or not. Can we all agree on that?”

Lex nodded. “Of course, but I’m telling you right now there’s something weird about that body. I’m not touching it.”

Soo-Lee held on to him tightly as if to guarantee that.

Everyone stood there a moment. Nobody said a thing. They all just waited around like mourners, staring at what was sprawled at their feet as if what Lex had said was not perfectly ridiculous, but made a certain amount of sense. In fact, they all backed away a bit in case the body moved.

“Well, somebody needs to do something,” Creep said.

“Let’s just go,” Danielle suggested.

“Oh, you people,” Ramona sighed.

She stepped away from them and whipped out her iPhone. She dialed 911. Soo-Lee held her breath. She was certain it wouldn’t work, certain they wouldn’t get a signal way out here. That’s how things worked in horror movies and she was nearly convinced that they had stepped into one, somehow and someway.

But it worked.

Ramona told the operator that they had a man down in the street. He had been hit by a car and they weren’t sure if he was alive or not, just unconscious. She answered a series of questions and then she told them where they were.

“Stokes,” she said. “Just off Highway Eight. S-T-O-K-E-S. Yes, Stokes.”

Here it comes, Soo-Lee thought. Here comes the bad part.

Ramona was clearly getting agitated. “Listen, I’m not an idiot. The sign said Stokes.” She held the iPhone away from her ear, looking at the others. “Didn’t it say Stokes?”

But nobody was sure. She had been the one who’d seen it.

“That’s what you said. Stokes,” Lex told her.

Everyone was standing there in a little knot, pressed together out of some nameless anxiety as Ramona argued with the 911 operator. Soo-Lee had nearly relaxed, thinking Ramona was bringing civilization and safety to them in the form of cops and paramedics.

But that wasn’t the case.

“They’re saying there is no fucking Stokes,” Ramona said, more than a little exasperated. “They never heard of a town called Stokes.”

Lex shrugged. “Fuck it. They should be able to track your signal with GPS.”

“Yeah,” Creep said. “They should be triangulating you right now.”

They won’t find this place, Soo-Lee thought.

Ramona finally lost it. “Just fucking get here, will you?”

Chazz laughed nervously. “See? They don’t give a fuck, so why should we?”

“Somebody’s still got to check that body,” Lex said.