FREAK AVENUE-MONSTERS’ STREET

Freak Avenue. That was the name of the place where we were moving to. No kidding. I mean, Freak Avenue. Why would anyone call a place that? Anyways, it also has many intertwining lanes and streets that have equally lovely names, like Monsters’ Street.

I had hated the idea entirely, from the start. But . . . I guess parents have a kind of veto power that they use at least a hundred times a day. So we’re going to Monsters’ Street, where we got a horror house (sorry, villa) called Banshee Bungalow.

We reached the villa, a crumbling old place with the “Conjuring” effect, you know, a black and white filter, where you can expect a reincarnated dead body (that’s a zombie, folks. I’m just using big words to cover space) to jump out at any point of time.

The place had five separate rooms and a main hall and, yes, a creaky staircase and a guillotine (maybe the last one wasn’t there. Okay. No it wasn’t.)

“Give this place a couple of mauled and mutilated bodies . . .” I said.

“Danny!” said my mom. “You keep quiet while your father signs the papers and gives it to the owner of this . . . uh . . . beautiful –“

She stopped and looked at me. I was rolling on the floor and laughing, “Oh my God . . . this is one that’ll never get old, oh . . . HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”

She glared at me, and I stopped immediately. Did I mention the veto power that parents have?

The owner of the house was a short man, with short hair and two teeth sticking out of his mouth. I could say that he was a rat who transformed into a human, to trick us into buying this house, all the while, not revealing the horrors inside. He didn’t talk much, and when dad signed the papers, he looked at me and smiled, and I could swear that he had fangs with dried blood on them. But, then again, I have a vivid imagination. I can still remember one time back in third grade, when there was a Halloween party at school and I didn’t know it . . .

We started moving stuff into separate rooms, vessels in the kitchen, books on the shelves and clothes in the closets and I noticed a shadow to my left. I turned around, fast, and appeared to crick my neck.

Nothing.  There was nothing behind me. Then . . . the shadow?

Clearly I was freaked . . . and that is making me hallucinate . . .

I assured myself that I was indeed hallucinating, and hoped I wouldn’t encounter whatever I just did again.

I shuddered, and walked outside, to see how monstrous the neighbors were.

They were, to my surprise, completely normal and humane. They had formed a group and were discussing something very seriously. A tall boy noticed me and said to the others, “Hey, people, look. It’s the new neighbor.” He turned to me,” It’s good to meet you. My name is Travis.”

“Danny.” I said.

“No. my name is Travis.” Said the boy.

“And my name is Danny” I said.

“Oh, right.”

“Danny, meet John, Kevin, Bob and Ron. You can hang out with us.”

“But now that you’re here, I think you should know the rumor that surrounds this place.”

“It is said that on the full moon night of every month, all monsters, vampires, zombies and ghosts will rise again to terrorize the people living here.”

“The full moon is today, right?” asked the boy named Bob.

“Yes. And on the full moon will come the—

I couldn’t take it anymore. I took a step back, and Kevin noticed. I broke into a run, but no one chased me. They just kept looking on.

I went back home and had dinner and slept.

It was a full moon night, and the moonlight filtered into my room. The ray of light hit my face, and I awoke. I walked downstairs (the stairs and floorboards creaked) and up to the door and looked outside. Zombies were walking around. I pressed my nose against the window to get a better look. Suddenly the rotting face of a zombie showed up in front of me. I wasn’t afraid. I asked him,” Is it time?”

He nodded and I smiled.

I changed into my true form—an ogre, with a demonic smile, blood red, and opened the door and walked out.

I left the door open—give the departed souls a treat—and left out to terrorize the people of Freak Avenue.

My name is Danny Traddings, and I’m an ogre.