The Death Game She Made Us Play on New Year's Eve

During the New Year holiday, Grandma Callowaywho'd been bedridden for monthssuddenly rallied. Color flooded back into her cheeks, and she insisted, with more energy than any of us had seen in weeks, that the whole family play hide-and-seek together.

We all went along with it. Of course we did. We wanted to make her happy, to let her enjoy herself while she still could. But Grandma was adamant about one thing: she wanted to be "it." The one who hunted.

"Heh heh... found you."

Every time her raspy voice echoed through the house, it was followed by a relative's piercing scream.

My little brother River Abbott and I thought it was thrilling. We exchanged an excited glance, grinning at each other in the dark.

But we'd been crammed inside the rice bin in the kitchen for so long that our eyelids were starting to droop, and still Grandma hadn't found us.

"Maybe the rice bin is too hard to find," I whispered. "Should we move somewhere else?"

I was just lifting the lid, ready to climb out with River, when a voice I couldn't quite placeyet somehow deeply familiarrang out in the empty kitchen.

"The Kitchen God is standing watch tonight. That filthy thing out there doesn't dare come in here."

"You two foolish children, get back in that rice bin and stay hidden!"

Aunt Lorraine Calloway was the first one Grandma found. She'd been hiding in the east room.

Then Uncle Neil Preston, in the west room.

But after each of their screams, the housewhich had been so warm and noisy just minutes agowent dead silent.

River started squirming toward the edge of the bin. "Hope Abbott, there's a whole house full of people out there. How come it's so quiet?"

River and I had a mother and a father, technically. But they'd dumped us at Grandma's house in the countryside like we were orphans, and none of our relatives wanted anything to do with us.

Only Grandma loved us. Truly loved us.

Whenever she got her hands on anything good to eat, she'd hide it away in the back of the cupboardlet it rot before she'd touch a bite herselfsaving every last morsel for the two of us.

So even if that voice in the kitchen wasn't just my imagination, I refused to believe Grandma would ever hurt us.

Out in the courtyard, Grandma's voice ground through the air again, low and grating, like a millstone turning.

"Five more. Just five more to go."

"Grandma's been searching so hard. Where are you all hiding?"

Bridget Calloway's sweet voice rang out from somewhere in the house. "Grandma! I'll come out on my own so you don't have to tire yourself!"

Grandma let out a strange, croaking laugh at the sight of Bridget walking out to show her devotion.

"Good girl."

The next instant, Bridget released a scream so shrill and agonized it didn't sound human.

"You're not Grandma!"

River and I stared at each other, wide-eyed with terror.

This was the old woman who had raised us since we were babies. If she wasn't Grandma, then who was she?

We clung to each other in the darkness of the bin. River's small body trembled against mine.

"Hope, Bridget went out on her own. Grandma didn't even catch her. So why did she scream like that?"

My mind was a tangle of static. I couldn't form a single coherent thought. Then that mysterious voice spoke again, answering River's question for me.

"You two are lucky you have more fortune than sense. You climbed into this bin right when that thing started hunting for substitutes."

"The Kitchen God is on duty tonight. That filthy creature won't dare set foot in the kitchen. And the five grains are sacred things of heaven and eartha natural barrier that purifies and wards off evil."

"As long as you stay inside this rice bin, she won't be able to smell you. Not for a while."

This time, even River heard it clearly.

"Hope, who's talking?"

I clamped my hand over his mouth and pulled him back down into a crouch inside the bin.

But his foot slipped, and he landed hard on the bottom with a dull thud that echoed off the ceramic walls.

The sound of slippers shuffling across the ground drifted closer. Closer. My heart hammered so violently I could feel it in my throat.

Grandma's face appeared at the kitchen window. She peered in at us and let out a low, rattling laugh.

"Found you."

I slapped both hands over our mouthsone on mine, one on River'sand shoved our screams back down our throats.

Silence. Absolute, suffocating silence.

Then Grandma let out a long, disappointed sigh.

"Oh. Just a mouse."

Before River and I could even exhale, something heavy slammed into the ground outside.

The next moment, Grandma let out a pained groan.

"Oh, my aching back. When you get old, you can't even pick yourself up off the ground."

River's clear eyes brimmed with tears. He pulled my hand down and mouthed silently: It's Grandma.

Thinking of the grandmother who had raised us, who had been our whole world since we were small, two hot lines of tears streaked down my own face.

If belief alone could reshape reality, I wished more than anything that this was a dream, or some terrible prank.

But the stench of dead rats clinging to her body wouldn't fade.

It forced me to believe the mysterious voice.

Something was truly wrong with her.

When neither of us moved, Grandma's voice turned shrill.

"River! Hope! I've doted on you two for all these years, and you won't even come out to help your grandmother up?!"

"Thank goodness I held on until today and was still testing you. I almost went soft and left the old house and all the land to you two. You've truly disappointed me!"

Before, we could hide behind the excuse of the game, pretending we were just playing along with hide-and-seek.

But now that she'd called us out by name, River and I were squirming like we were sitting on hot coals.

Just then, Aunt Deirdre Calloway's gloating voice drifted in from the courtyard.

"Mom, if you want to test the children, just test them. No need to scare everyone half to death on a holiday."

"I've always told you, Hope and her brother are just like their mother. Ungrateful little ingrates, every last one of them!"

"Just say the word, and tomorrow I'll marry Hope off to the village chief's idiot son for a bride price!"

The moment Deirdre's words landed, the same flash of panic shot through both my eyes and River's.

If this really was Grandma testing our devotion...

Then after Deirdre's poisonous meddling, we might lose our last protector in this world.

Our hearts hammered like war drums. Our palms were slick with sweat.

Deirdre was still running her mouth. "When you really can't move anymore, it'll be our family taking care of you"

But before she could finish, another scream tore through the night.

Grandma let out that strange, low chuckle again.

"Three left. Just three more."

My heart dropped like a stone.

Now it was only Uncle Garrett Calloway, River, and me.

So that was her goal all alongto drag every last one of us out?

I didn't understand. Why would Grandma do this to her own flesh and blood?

Bridget's final, hysterical scream kept circling through my mind: You're not Grandma!

If the old woman outside truly wasn't our grandmother...

Then the real Grandma might have already been gone, back when she'd taken that turn for the worse.

The thing outside was an unknown terror.

But at least the kitchen and the rice bin were the safest places in this house. That much I knew.

Out in the courtyard, Grandma's footsteps gradually faded, disappearing into some distant room.

A fragile thread of hope rose again in my chest.

As long as we stayed hidden, this game had to end eventually. Didn't it?

But the very next moment, a burst of frantic footsteps shattered that hope to pieces.

Garrett's face was twisted into something barely human. His massive hands seized us without mercy and wrenched us out of the rice bin.

"You little brats. Hiding in the rice bin this whole time."

"No wonder the kitchen door was wide open and the old hag never came looking for you."

I shielded River with one arm and grabbed Garrett's sleeve with the other, dropping my voice to a desperate whisper.

"Uncle Garrett, please. He's just a kid."

"It's too dangerous out there. I'm begging you, give us a chance to live."

Garrett didn't flinch. He hurled us both to the ground.

Our faces twisted in agony, but neither of us dared cry out.

I knew I couldn't overpower Uncle Garrett. I grabbed fistfuls of his pant leg and begged.

"Uncle Garrett, I'll leave right now."

"Just let my brother stay in the rice bin with you. Please."

But he snatched the cleaver off the cutting board, murder blazing in his eyes.

"That bin's barely big enough for one person. I'm cramped in there as it is!"

"The old hag's coming out any second. Get lost, or I'll kill you both!"

My bottom line was simple: I could go, but River had to stay.

I'd even been prepared to dig in and threaten him with mutually assured destruction.

But he was more ruthless and more inhuman than I'd imagined.

Just as despair closed in, the mysterious voice spoke again.

"Stop wasting time with him. Find somewhere else to hide."

"The Kitchen God's shift ends at sundown. In five minutes, this kitchen won't be safe anymore."

"This is the one room that thing hasn't searched yet. Once it does, it'll tear this place apart!"

River and I froze in shock.

But Uncle Garrett still looked nothing but impatient, as though he couldn't hear the voice at all.

Before he could react, I'd already grabbed River's hand and bolted out of the kitchen.

The courtyard had four rooms north, south, east, west but we'd been sealed inside the rice bin the entire time. I had no idea which room Grandma had gone into.

And if we stood in the open yard deliberating, we might run straight into her on her way out.

My heart hammered up into my throat. I gritted my teeth and pulled River into the nearest door the south room, the one used for storage.

The door swung open to an empty room. Relief hit me so hard my knees nearly buckled.

I flipped a large bamboo basket upside down over the two of us and had barely settled into our hiding spot when footsteps echoed across the courtyard.

"The kitchen and the south room are good places for hide-and-seek. Time for a thorough look."

I held River tight, silently begging that the mysterious voice had told the truth.

If Grandma went to the kitchen first and found Uncle Garrett, River and I might still have a chance to slip out of the south room and find a new hiding place.

Mercifully, a bloodcurdling scream erupted from the kitchen next door.

"Mom, don't! It's me, Mom!"

After she found Uncle Garrett, the thing wearing Grandma's skin let out a satisfied sigh, like a beast settling after a full meal.

"Three left. Almost done. Almost."

Uncle Garrett was gone. That left only me and River.

But she'd said three. Why was there one extra?

There was no time to think it through. Every second counted. I threw the basket off us, grabbed River, and ran for the east room the bedroom where Grandma had lived for decades.

The moment we pushed open the door, a large hand clamped over both our mouths from behind.

"Hope. River. Don't scream. It's me!"

The familiar voice hit us like a shockwave.

Finding our father in the most dangerous moment of our lives was like drowning and catching hold of driftwood.

Tears poured down our faces before we could stop them.

But Wade Calloway made no move to comfort us. His expression was all cold calculation and sharp authority.

"We don't have much time, so I'll make this quick."

"Every time that thing enters a room and catches someone, it leaves. It doesn't keep searching."

"That means if all three of us hide in the same room, even if one gets caught, the other two survive."

Grandma's words slammed back into me. Three left.

She'd known all along that our father had snuck back. She'd already counted the extra person.

The realization hit me like a bolt of lightning. "I know who did this to Grandma. The one responsible is right here with us!"

"No matter how hard we try, there's no escaping it."

Dad squeezed my shoulders hard. "Hope, I know I haven't been much of a father."

"All these years I never checked in on you and your brother. This is the first time I've come back, just to sneak a look at you two during the holidays."

"But you have to trust me completely. I will protect you. I promise."

The panic that had been clawing at my chest finally eased. I nodded firmly.

He leaned in close, his voice low and deliberate. "I've watched your grandma hunt. She's old. She can't bend down. She never searches low. You and your brother will be safest under the altar table."

By then, Grandma had already finished searching the south room. Her footsteps were heading our way.

At Dad's signal, I pulled River under the altar table without a second thought.

A red cloth hung all the way to the floor, hiding us completely.

The room went so quiet I could hear nothing but our hammering hearts and the slow shuffle of Grandma pushing the door open.

Then the mysterious voice sighed.

"Your father told you to hide under the table. But he climbed on top of the wardrobe."

"He's using you two as decoys. That thing crawls along the ground."