During fall Melodie walked home from classes to her dorm, and kicked her way through mounds of fallen leaves like she was a kid, and didn't have to think about the heavy textbooks weighing her down. Just for a minute. And then she'd be back to work, striving for the A grade, fighting against the F grade, the big red F that she had gotten once, in high school, and had resolved to never get again.
She returned to her dorm building, closed the door, walked down the hallway. The door opened behind her. She glanced over her shoulder.
It revealed red-tinted October night beyond. She paused, frowning, as the door opened farther. Looming beyond, taking up the doorway, a towering letter F radiated electric-red light. It slid forward, dominating her vision, creeping up to her inch by inch.
She looked around, scowling. "What is that? Beth? Is that you?" She returned to the huge red F. "What is this? Some kind of craft project?" The F bumped into her. "Watch it." She looked around the back of it and found nobody. "Who's doing this?" She took a few steps away. "Oh noooo, how scaaaaary. Little Melodie's afraid of the big red F, just because she likes to stuuuuuudyyyyyy."
She waited a few seconds. Still no one appeared. "Okay, you guys have fun!" Melodie turned around and left the huge red F in the hallway.
It remained, spilling hellish light into the darkness.
"Melodie just sent me a really weird text," Beth said, sitting in the Dairy Queen parking lot with her boyfriend. She spooned another bite of Oreo Blizzard into her mouth.
"What's she say?" Vick said. "Want a bit of mine?" he asked, holding it out for her.
"Did you get peanut butter cups?" Beth asked without looking up from her phone. Vick ate the spoonful himself. "How long have we been dating now?"
"Sorry, I just spaced. I've just been thinking about our football game with State next weekend. The team's been doing really well, but how great would it be to beat a state university with our little local college team?" He spent a few seconds shoveling Blizzard into his mouth. "What'd Melodie say?"
"She said 'Very funny.' I asked her what she was talking about." Beth returned to her Blizzard. "Let's go back. It's getting cold in here."
"You were the one who wanted a Blizzard," Vick said, starting the car.
Vick hummed to himself and drummed on the car's steering wheel as Beth scooped up the last of her Blizzard. She chewed on the red plastic spoon as the car glided past skeleton trees and gloomy front lawns decorated with orange and black lights. One lawn had the full haunted-house treatment, with spiderweb gauze, plastic tombstones, inflatable ghosts, and a big, anthropomorphic peanut.
"That was weird," she said, as the lawn passed out of view. "That lawn had a big peanut as part of the decorations."
"What?" Vick asked. "A peanut? Like...a peanut, peanut?"
"Yeah, like the thing I'm allergic to," Beth said. "Weird thing to have in your Halloween decorations." She eyed the bottom of her empty Blizzard cup. "All gone."
"We could turn around and get more if you wanted. Ah, I should have gotten one for Derek. He's been helping me with calc."
"No, I need to do some work," Beth said as she stretched. "If I don't get started on that history paper, I—there's another one!"
"What? Another what?"
"Another giant peanut! Was there a really strange sale at the store or something like that?" Beth shook her head as Vick turned into the college and headed for Beth's dorm. "What a dumb decoration."
Beth thanked Vick for the treat and gave him a quick kiss. He grinned like a fool as he made the short drive to his dorm. Before too long his eyes narrowed and his mind jumped a week ahead, summoning up an army of padded, uniformed players. Their helmets hid their eyes, and muscles bulged everywhere.
Something rushed across the path of his car, and he slammed on the brakes, screeching to a halt in the middle of the street. A huge man, dressed in football pads, pounded through the hedge on the side of the road and disappeared. Vick blinked a few times, shook his head, and made it the rest of his way to his dorm.
"Some weird things happened," he said when he got into his dorm.
Derek, who sat on the couch—a forgotten sheet of notes on the table, and Derek's eyes on the TV—looked over. "Oh boy. Do tell."
A few minutes later, Derek scoffed. "You wanna hear weird, this is weird: I was coming back from the dining hall, and I found a VHS tape of The Ring. I didn't pick it up, of course, because that movie scared the bejeezus out of me when I was a kid and I have no intention of watching it again, but I come around the corner, and there's another VHS! Same movie!"
"Is that weirder than almost hitting a random football player? Beth saw her thing twice too."
"Aha." Derek raised a finger. "But I then found a third tape!"
"You know I've never seen that. Did you pick it up?" Vick said, going into his room.
"No I didn't 'pick it up'! I told you, I don't want to watch it again!"
"I hear it's good!"
"Oh, it's great! It's great at making me wet the bed when I was ten!"
Vick laughed as he untied his shoes. When he threw them into the closet, a battered, half-deflated football bounced out. "Where'd you get this?" he called to Derek.
"Get what?"
"This football." Vick picked it up. "Pretty beat up."
"Football? What football?" Derek looked up. "I don't see a football."
Vick looked down at his hands. They held nothing. He turned them over.
Still nothing. "But I was just...." He looked around. "Maybe I was...."
"You've been thinking about that game too much my guy. Get over here and enjoy a double-feature of Keanu Reeves's finest. It's Speed followed by Speed."
"A big...red...."
"An F. Like a teacher would write at the top of a paper."
Beth and Melodie stood across the entryway from each other. "And it was just standing there?" Beth asked, shucking her coat.
"Well, it moved toward me. It was a little creepy, just because I couldn't see anybody, but I just figure it was you and Vick doing something."
"Wasn't us. We were at Dairy Queen. Maybe Derek did it."
"Why would...." Melodie shook her head. "It was just weird."
"I saw some peanuts on the way home. That was weird too."
Melodie, who had turned away and taken a step toward her bedroom, looked over her shoulder. "I'm sorry? You saw some peanuts?"
"Yeah." Beth held her hands up. "I mean like Halloween decorations. I saw them at two different houses."
Melodie laughed. "Good thing you carry an EpiPen with you, otherwise they might have been scary!"
Beth laughed with her and opened the door to her bedroom.
A peanut sat in the middle of the floor.
"Melodie, what is this?" Beth asked, kicking the peanut into the main room.
Melodie had sat at her desk and opened her biochem textbook. She peeked out around her desk and spotted the peanut on the floor. "You should know what that is by now, Bethany." She stood up. "Don't touch it."
"Did you put it in my room?"
"Of course not. Why would I do that? It's dangerous." Melodie came to Beth and her eyes scanned the floor. "Where'd it go?"
"It's right-" Beth looked down and saw nothing but her tennis shoes. "It was right there."
"We'd better find it," Melodie said, getting onto her hands and knees. "Don't want you running into it getting a midnight snack or something."
"That was one time."
"Hey babe, how's it?" Vick asked, sprawled in a chair in front of Speed. He sat up as he listened, and Derek glanced at him as Vick's expression grew puzzled. "Uh...I guess so." He paused. "No, we're just watching Speed." He paused again. "It's a Keanu Reeves movie." A third pause. "It doesn't matter, I'll be over in a minute."
"What's up?" Derek asked when Vick ended the call.
"Uh...Beth and Melodie found a peanut in Beth's room."
"That's not very nice." Derek waited. "And?"
"And then they...lost it."
"It's not like it can get up and walk away," Derek said as Vick drove them to the girls' apartment. "Unless...what if they found Mr. Peanut?" Vick rolled his eyes as Derek continued. "That would be kinda fun I guess. Always wanted to meet Mr. Peanut. I wonder what his first name is."
A minute later all four of them hunted around Beth and Melodie's apartment—Beth wore gloves. "I'm just being careful," she said when Derek pointed out she was only allergic to eating them. "Don't you think I know more about my allergy than you do?"
"I was just asking!"
Vick pushed his head against the floor, scanning under the couch. He reached under, and pulled out a VHS tape. He glanced at the cover, snickered, and slid it across the floor. It cracked Derek, who had been looking under a sideboard radiator, in the head.
"Ah! What-" Derek put a hand to his head and looked up. "Oh, a VHS of The Ring. Really funny. Too funny, in fact!" He flopped to the floor. "A grievous wound I have been dealt! Oh, the pain!" Derek pushed the VHS away. "Where did you get them all, Vick? Was someone selling three VHS copies of The Ring online?"
"I had nothing to do with the other other three," Vick said. "That one was just under the couch."
"What was under the—did you guys see that?" Melodie said. She pointed out the window. "Somebody in football pads just ran by."
"Football pads?" Vick said, sitting up.
They sat in a rough circle in the main room of Beth and Melodie's apartment. The girls had the couch, and the boys sat on the floor.
"Football player," Vick said, pointing at himself.
"The Ring VHS tape," Derek jabbed his thumb at his chest.
"Peanut," Beth said, arms crossed in front of her.
They looked at Melodie. "Big red F," Melodie said.
Beth scowled. "You haven't seen it since the first time, have you?"
Melodie shook her head, then tilted it to the side. She grew a little grin, and hopped up from her seat. She walked to the short hall, Beth's bedroom on the left, Melodie's on the right, and the cramped bathroom at the end. She grabbed the bathroom door's handle and swung it shut. Without taking her hand off the handle, she announced: "I, Melodie Matthews, am afraid of getting an F!" She pushed the door open again.
The huge red F spilled murky red light, like a blood-filled neon light. Melodie stood in front of it, looking it up and down, and smacked her lips.
"That?" Beth said. "That's what you saw earlier?"
"Where'd it come from?" Vick asked.
Melodie shut the bathroom door, waited a second, and opened it again. The F remained.
"It's our worst fears," Derek said. "Or...sort of? Are you really afraid of big, red F's, Melodie?"
"I'm definitely afraid of getting them on assignments," Melodie said. She pushed the red F; it tipped back and forth but didn't fall over. "What do we do?"
"Stab it with an EpiPen?" Vick said.
"Let's just take a walk," Melodie said, closing the bathroom door again. Red light pouring into the hallway snapped off. "It's a nice night. And it's a Friday. Maybe it'll find someone else to pester."
"I cannot believe you," Derek said. "It goes against every piece of physics!" He pointed a finger at Melodie. "You of all people!"
"But that's why it's so effective," Melodie said. Behind them, Beth and Vick walked hand-in-hand. They strolled through the small campus's quiet quad. "The bus shouldn't be able to make the jump, but it does anyway! It might not make sense, but it's good film making!"
"I!...It!...." Derek put his head in his hands. "But it looks so stupid!"
"I think it's following us," Beth said. Derek and Melodie turned. Past Beth and Vick's linked hands, a small, red, anthropomorphic peanut wore a football helmet and carried a VHS tape.
"It's not really all that scary," Beth said. "But it is annoying. Maybe we can get rid of it."
Vick walked over to the thing and reached down. His fingers made contact with the football helmet. "Something's pushing my hand away. I can't grab it."
"Let me try," Beth said, and though she could touch the peanut's body, she couldn't pick it up.
"It's taking elements from all of us," Derek said. "Maybe that's why. Now what?"
"How about this—what's the least threatening thing we can think of?" Melodie said.
They stood around the thing for a few seconds. "A jar of pickles," Derek said.
"All at once now," Melodie said.
"I'm afraid of a jar of pickles!"
They looked down. A normal jar of pickles sat in the middle of their small circle. Melodie bent down, picked it up, and lobbed it into the parking lot, where it smashed to bits.
She returned to her dorm building, closed the door, walked down the hallway. The door opened behind her. She glanced over her shoulder.
It revealed red-tinted October night beyond. She paused, frowning, as the door opened farther. Looming beyond, taking up the doorway, a towering letter F radiated electric-red light. It slid forward, dominating her vision, creeping up to her inch by inch.
She looked around, scowling. "What is that? Beth? Is that you?" She returned to the huge red F. "What is this? Some kind of craft project?" The F bumped into her. "Watch it." She looked around the back of it and found nobody. "Who's doing this?" She took a few steps away. "Oh noooo, how scaaaaary. Little Melodie's afraid of the big red F, just because she likes to stuuuuuudyyyyyy."
She waited a few seconds. Still no one appeared. "Okay, you guys have fun!" Melodie turned around and left the huge red F in the hallway.
It remained, spilling hellish light into the darkness.
"Melodie just sent me a really weird text," Beth said, sitting in the Dairy Queen parking lot with her boyfriend. She spooned another bite of Oreo Blizzard into her mouth.
"What's she say?" Vick said. "Want a bit of mine?" he asked, holding it out for her.
"Did you get peanut butter cups?" Beth asked without looking up from her phone. Vick ate the spoonful himself. "How long have we been dating now?"
"Sorry, I just spaced. I've just been thinking about our football game with State next weekend. The team's been doing really well, but how great would it be to beat a state university with our little local college team?" He spent a few seconds shoveling Blizzard into his mouth. "What'd Melodie say?"
"She said 'Very funny.' I asked her what she was talking about." Beth returned to her Blizzard. "Let's go back. It's getting cold in here."
"You were the one who wanted a Blizzard," Vick said, starting the car.
Vick hummed to himself and drummed on the car's steering wheel as Beth scooped up the last of her Blizzard. She chewed on the red plastic spoon as the car glided past skeleton trees and gloomy front lawns decorated with orange and black lights. One lawn had the full haunted-house treatment, with spiderweb gauze, plastic tombstones, inflatable ghosts, and a big, anthropomorphic peanut.
"That was weird," she said, as the lawn passed out of view. "That lawn had a big peanut as part of the decorations."
"What?" Vick asked. "A peanut? Like...a peanut, peanut?"
"Yeah, like the thing I'm allergic to," Beth said. "Weird thing to have in your Halloween decorations." She eyed the bottom of her empty Blizzard cup. "All gone."
"We could turn around and get more if you wanted. Ah, I should have gotten one for Derek. He's been helping me with calc."
"No, I need to do some work," Beth said as she stretched. "If I don't get started on that history paper, I—there's another one!"
"What? Another what?"
"Another giant peanut! Was there a really strange sale at the store or something like that?" Beth shook her head as Vick turned into the college and headed for Beth's dorm. "What a dumb decoration."
Beth thanked Vick for the treat and gave him a quick kiss. He grinned like a fool as he made the short drive to his dorm. Before too long his eyes narrowed and his mind jumped a week ahead, summoning up an army of padded, uniformed players. Their helmets hid their eyes, and muscles bulged everywhere.
Something rushed across the path of his car, and he slammed on the brakes, screeching to a halt in the middle of the street. A huge man, dressed in football pads, pounded through the hedge on the side of the road and disappeared. Vick blinked a few times, shook his head, and made it the rest of his way to his dorm.
"Some weird things happened," he said when he got into his dorm.
Derek, who sat on the couch—a forgotten sheet of notes on the table, and Derek's eyes on the TV—looked over. "Oh boy. Do tell."
A few minutes later, Derek scoffed. "You wanna hear weird, this is weird: I was coming back from the dining hall, and I found a VHS tape of The Ring. I didn't pick it up, of course, because that movie scared the bejeezus out of me when I was a kid and I have no intention of watching it again, but I come around the corner, and there's another VHS! Same movie!"
"Is that weirder than almost hitting a random football player? Beth saw her thing twice too."
"Aha." Derek raised a finger. "But I then found a third tape!"
"You know I've never seen that. Did you pick it up?" Vick said, going into his room.
"No I didn't 'pick it up'! I told you, I don't want to watch it again!"
"I hear it's good!"
"Oh, it's great! It's great at making me wet the bed when I was ten!"
Vick laughed as he untied his shoes. When he threw them into the closet, a battered, half-deflated football bounced out. "Where'd you get this?" he called to Derek.
"Get what?"
"This football." Vick picked it up. "Pretty beat up."
"Football? What football?" Derek looked up. "I don't see a football."
Vick looked down at his hands. They held nothing. He turned them over.
Still nothing. "But I was just...." He looked around. "Maybe I was...."
"You've been thinking about that game too much my guy. Get over here and enjoy a double-feature of Keanu Reeves's finest. It's Speed followed by Speed."
"A big...red...."
"An F. Like a teacher would write at the top of a paper."
Beth and Melodie stood across the entryway from each other. "And it was just standing there?" Beth asked, shucking her coat.
"Well, it moved toward me. It was a little creepy, just because I couldn't see anybody, but I just figure it was you and Vick doing something."
"Wasn't us. We were at Dairy Queen. Maybe Derek did it."
"Why would...." Melodie shook her head. "It was just weird."
"I saw some peanuts on the way home. That was weird too."
Melodie, who had turned away and taken a step toward her bedroom, looked over her shoulder. "I'm sorry? You saw some peanuts?"
"Yeah." Beth held her hands up. "I mean like Halloween decorations. I saw them at two different houses."
Melodie laughed. "Good thing you carry an EpiPen with you, otherwise they might have been scary!"
Beth laughed with her and opened the door to her bedroom.
A peanut sat in the middle of the floor.
"Melodie, what is this?" Beth asked, kicking the peanut into the main room.
Melodie had sat at her desk and opened her biochem textbook. She peeked out around her desk and spotted the peanut on the floor. "You should know what that is by now, Bethany." She stood up. "Don't touch it."
"Did you put it in my room?"
"Of course not. Why would I do that? It's dangerous." Melodie came to Beth and her eyes scanned the floor. "Where'd it go?"
"It's right-" Beth looked down and saw nothing but her tennis shoes. "It was right there."
"We'd better find it," Melodie said, getting onto her hands and knees. "Don't want you running into it getting a midnight snack or something."
"That was one time."
"Hey babe, how's it?" Vick asked, sprawled in a chair in front of Speed. He sat up as he listened, and Derek glanced at him as Vick's expression grew puzzled. "Uh...I guess so." He paused. "No, we're just watching Speed." He paused again. "It's a Keanu Reeves movie." A third pause. "It doesn't matter, I'll be over in a minute."
"What's up?" Derek asked when Vick ended the call.
"Uh...Beth and Melodie found a peanut in Beth's room."
"That's not very nice." Derek waited. "And?"
"And then they...lost it."
"It's not like it can get up and walk away," Derek said as Vick drove them to the girls' apartment. "Unless...what if they found Mr. Peanut?" Vick rolled his eyes as Derek continued. "That would be kinda fun I guess. Always wanted to meet Mr. Peanut. I wonder what his first name is."
A minute later all four of them hunted around Beth and Melodie's apartment—Beth wore gloves. "I'm just being careful," she said when Derek pointed out she was only allergic to eating them. "Don't you think I know more about my allergy than you do?"
"I was just asking!"
Vick pushed his head against the floor, scanning under the couch. He reached under, and pulled out a VHS tape. He glanced at the cover, snickered, and slid it across the floor. It cracked Derek, who had been looking under a sideboard radiator, in the head.
"Ah! What-" Derek put a hand to his head and looked up. "Oh, a VHS of The Ring. Really funny. Too funny, in fact!" He flopped to the floor. "A grievous wound I have been dealt! Oh, the pain!" Derek pushed the VHS away. "Where did you get them all, Vick? Was someone selling three VHS copies of The Ring online?"
"I had nothing to do with the other other three," Vick said. "That one was just under the couch."
"What was under the—did you guys see that?" Melodie said. She pointed out the window. "Somebody in football pads just ran by."
"Football pads?" Vick said, sitting up.
They sat in a rough circle in the main room of Beth and Melodie's apartment. The girls had the couch, and the boys sat on the floor.
"Football player," Vick said, pointing at himself.
"The Ring VHS tape," Derek jabbed his thumb at his chest.
"Peanut," Beth said, arms crossed in front of her.
They looked at Melodie. "Big red F," Melodie said.
Beth scowled. "You haven't seen it since the first time, have you?"
Melodie shook her head, then tilted it to the side. She grew a little grin, and hopped up from her seat. She walked to the short hall, Beth's bedroom on the left, Melodie's on the right, and the cramped bathroom at the end. She grabbed the bathroom door's handle and swung it shut. Without taking her hand off the handle, she announced: "I, Melodie Matthews, am afraid of getting an F!" She pushed the door open again.
The huge red F spilled murky red light, like a blood-filled neon light. Melodie stood in front of it, looking it up and down, and smacked her lips.
"That?" Beth said. "That's what you saw earlier?"
"Where'd it come from?" Vick asked.
Melodie shut the bathroom door, waited a second, and opened it again. The F remained.
"It's our worst fears," Derek said. "Or...sort of? Are you really afraid of big, red F's, Melodie?"
"I'm definitely afraid of getting them on assignments," Melodie said. She pushed the red F; it tipped back and forth but didn't fall over. "What do we do?"
"Stab it with an EpiPen?" Vick said.
"Let's just take a walk," Melodie said, closing the bathroom door again. Red light pouring into the hallway snapped off. "It's a nice night. And it's a Friday. Maybe it'll find someone else to pester."
"I cannot believe you," Derek said. "It goes against every piece of physics!" He pointed a finger at Melodie. "You of all people!"
"But that's why it's so effective," Melodie said. Behind them, Beth and Vick walked hand-in-hand. They strolled through the small campus's quiet quad. "The bus shouldn't be able to make the jump, but it does anyway! It might not make sense, but it's good film making!"
"I!...It!...." Derek put his head in his hands. "But it looks so stupid!"
"I think it's following us," Beth said. Derek and Melodie turned. Past Beth and Vick's linked hands, a small, red, anthropomorphic peanut wore a football helmet and carried a VHS tape.
"It's not really all that scary," Beth said. "But it is annoying. Maybe we can get rid of it."
Vick walked over to the thing and reached down. His fingers made contact with the football helmet. "Something's pushing my hand away. I can't grab it."
"Let me try," Beth said, and though she could touch the peanut's body, she couldn't pick it up.
"It's taking elements from all of us," Derek said. "Maybe that's why. Now what?"
"How about this—what's the least threatening thing we can think of?" Melodie said.
They stood around the thing for a few seconds. "A jar of pickles," Derek said.
"All at once now," Melodie said.
"I'm afraid of a jar of pickles!"
They looked down. A normal jar of pickles sat in the middle of their small circle. Melodie bent down, picked it up, and lobbed it into the parking lot, where it smashed to bits.