YA Spooktacular: Story 2

Welcome to another stop for the second annual YASpooktacular, hosted by Frenzy of Noise and Wicked Awesome Books.

This year, there are three stories written by some of your favorite authors that will be posted throughout the week. Each story is a choose your adventure, where you get to decide what path to send the character down. Sometimes you live, sometimes you die, and sometimes you fall into a pit of no return.

There are also some TRICKS or TREATS scattered throughout the story, where you can enter to win prizes and get bonus points toward the prize packs. The prize pack for 2 will be up tomorrow! On Halloween day, the grand prize pack will be posted. You can click the banner above to see a full list of the YASpooktacular prize packs!

About the Author
Gretchen McNeil writes YA urban fantasy, paranormal and historical fiction. Gretchen is a former coloratura soprano, the voice of Mary on G4's Code Monkeys and currently sings with the LA-based circus troupe Cirque Berzerk. She’s a founding member of vlog group the YARebels where she can be seen as "Monday" and an active member of both The Enchanted Inkpot, a group blog of YA and middle grade fantasy writers, and The Apocalypsies, a group blog of 2012 (oops) children's book debuts. Her debut YA horror/paranormal POSSESS was published by Balzer and Bray for HarperCollins in August 2011.

You can find Gretchen on Twitter, on her blog, and on Goodreads. You can order her books at the following places: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, The Book Depository.

To start the story from the beginning, click on this image!

Without opening your eyes, you answer your phone. “What?” you snap. “Des, if this is your idea of a joke I’m going to—“

“Things are about to get…scary.” It’s the same pseudo-male voice as before, whispering and speaking extra slowly so you don’t miss a word. “And you’ll have choices to make.”

“I don’t know who this is,” you say, trying to sound braver than you feel. “But I don’t appreciate the prank calls, okay?”

“Good luck,” the voice says. The phone goes dead.

You stare at the phone in your hand, trying to make sense of what the caller told you. Things will get scary? You’ll have to make choices? Before you can even process, your phone screams again. This time you recognize the phone number.

“Stace!” you say. “Finally.”

You hear your best friend sobbing on the other end, calling your name.

“Stace?” you said. “Stace, what’s wrong?”

“I don’t know where I am.” Her voice high and shrill with panic. “Help me. Help me!”

Holy shit, is this a joke? Stace couldn’t act her way out of a box and her terror sounds so real it sends a chill down your spine.

“Are you there?” she sobs.

“Stace,” you say quickly. “What happened? Where are you?”

“I don’t know!” she screams. “Someone was in my car. Grabbed me when I was coming to your party. I woke up here and…” Her voice trails off. Despite the static on the line, you can clearly hear heavy footsteps coming through the phone. “Oh my God,” Stace whispers. “He’s here. He’s—“ Stace pauses then screams.

The phone cuts out, but you realize you can still hear Stace screaming. And it’s coming from inside the house.

You run down the hall, following the scream, cursing the ridiculously high heels you’re wearing with your Zombie French Maid costume. It dies out just as you reach the stairs leading to the basement. Oh my God, is Stace okay? You pick up your phone to call 911 but when you push the green button, you accidentally answer an incoming call.

This time, you hear Michael’s shaky voice on the other end, saying your name. “Michael, I need your help,” you blurt out. “I need you to call Stace’s phone. I think something’s happened.”

“Listen very carefully,” Michael says. He’s speaking slowly, just like the anonymous caller, and even though he’s not crying like Stace had been, you realize immediately that something is very, very wrong.

“Are you there?” Michael says. This time, his voice cracks. “Are you listening?”

“Yeah,” you say. Your heart is pounding again. Your mind is racing and you have no idea what’s going on, but you force yourself to focus on what Michael says.

“Where are you?” you ask.

“I don’t know how I got here, but… there’s gasoline everywhere. I can smell it. I can’t move. I woke up with my phone and there’s a note that said I had to call you and say you had to make a choice.”

“A choice?” Your mouth goes dry. “What kind of a choice?”

“There’s a candle burning and if it burns too low I think…” His voice trails off and once again, you hear heavy footsteps on the other line. “What are you doing?” Michael says. His calm demeanor has vanished and you can hear the panic in his voice. “Who are you? What are you—“

The phone goes dead. Out of the corner of your eye, through the large window in the dining room, you see a bright orange glow.

The garage is on fire.

---

If you run to the garage, go to Red House Books. If you run downstairs into the basement, go to The Book Cellar.

Make sure you visit Lisa M. Potts tomorrow and enter to win the prize pack for story 2!

And visit Frenzy of Noise or Wicked Awesome Books. on October 31^st to enter the GRAND PRIZE GIVEAWAY for a ton of books and a ton of swag!!

Treat

Fill out the form by clicking on the image above or clicking here to be entered to win an ARC of Shifting by Bethany Wiggins and an ARC of Between by Jessica Warman.