Kids at Play

Warning for profane language

Usually, Bill found driving at night on long, winding roads pretty creepy. Adding to the creep factor were the Spanish moss draping the old gnarly oaks that loomed over the road and the fine mist that clung to the blacktop. Bill would’ve been feeling the spooky vibe if he weren't so ticked off at the voice in his ear, repeating the same old explanation as to why his insurance will no longer be granted on his meds, and not really answering his questions.

“Yes,” he said, “this is my third time calling for answers, and I get that the restrictions changed, but it doesn't make sense why I'm now paying more for insurance, but it's covering less than it did before. Is there any… possibly reasonable explanation for that?”

He didn't like to sound so bitey with people, but he had his doubts about whether he was even talking to a real person. The line went to static for a moment.

“Due to a change in restrictions—”

Bill cursed, hung up, and tossed the phone on the passenger seat. So much for that. He’d try again in the morning.

Go past this road, and at the next one, turn left. Then your destination will be on your right.

Finally. At least he’d made the nine-hour drive. According to GPS, his Vrbo was precisely three minutes away. For the next four days, he could experience what it was like to live in a house again. No obnoxious upstairs neighbors, no notes slipped under the door complaining about the use of his drumset. He didn’t bring his drums. He wouldn’t be performing at his sister’s wedding, despite polite suggestions from friends and family. But he had brought his waterproof speaker, and he was gonna jam out in the shower till pruny.

Bill hadn’t seen another car for miles, but he flicked on his turn signal anyway and hummed a rock song as he swung into the turn. His headlights had barely caught the road when he slammed the brakes, his seatbelt locking and catching him painfully. He squinted at the figure in the road.

“What in the world…”

The kid had green skin, a red baseball cap, and was holding a flag in the “caution” shade of orange. For a split second, Bill’s tired brain had registered it as an actual kid. He sighed and hoped no one had seen the dramatic display. Thankfully, it didn’t seem like anyone was awake. Not a single light in the neighborhood was on. Not even a porch light. He didn’t think those signs were even allowed on the public road. They were for yards and driveways only. His mom used to have a similar sign in their driveway, one that read SLOW! KIDS AT PLAY! Bill remembered one time when he and his sister were playing in the yard. His middle school arch nemesis had ridden by on their bike, pointing at them and yelling, “Slow kids at play!” He missed those days when unclever bullies were his biggest life problem.

Proceeding toward his Vrbo, Bill frowned. Every driveway had one of those kid alert signs, center-front where the driveway met the road. They weren’t even positioned right. They were supposed to be sideways, facing oncoming traffic. Instead, they faced him directly as he rolled on by. He drove five under what he figured was the fifteen mph limit—no speed limit sign, plus GPS was glitching, so he ended the route. He remembered what the house looked like, anyway.

“Does everyone around here have kids?” he muttered.

It didn’t seem so. Every driveway had a sign, but there was not a toy in sight: no sandboxes, mini trampolines, or kiddie pools. The HOA must’ve been strict: no toys in the yard after 8 pm or something. It must’ve been tough to be a kid around here.

As soon as he saw the empty, sign-free driveway in the distance, he knew it must be his Vrbo. Sure enough, he recognized the pale green roof from the photos. He pulled into the driveway and shoved the gear into park. Stretching his arms above his head, he released a big, wearisome groan, the kind only earned after hours of staring at the road.

He was here. Finally, he could relax for a while. He only had one free day before the wedding stuff started, then it would be go, go, go for three days straight. Just the thought of it utterly drained him. He didn't even feel like bringing in his luggage. He could do that in the morning. His teeth could survive one night without brushing.

Grabbing his phone, Bill dragged himself from the car and limped to the front door, hissing at the pins and needles that shot up his leg with each step. He wasn’t old enough for this.

Though he thought he remembered the entry code, when he typed it into the keypad, it buzzed at him angrily, refusing him entry. Sighing under the weight of the modern world’s problems, he pulled out his phone and opened the Gmail app. He had to stare at the swirly loading thing for a full ten seconds before his emails appeared, then he clicked on Vrbo’s confirmation email. He waited another ten seconds. The connection out here sucked.

As Bill waited for the email to load, he heard what sounded like scraping on asphalt and whirled toward the road, shoulders hitched to his ears.

“Hello?” he called.

Nothing. No one. Not even crickets disturbed the night’s silence.

Frowning, Bill looked back at his phone, which now showed the PIN in large font. He typed it in, the lock whirred as it unlatched, and he stepped inside his vacation house and locked the door behind him. Kicking off his shoes, he headed straight to the bathroom, having skipped the rest stops for the past three hours. The thought of sitting on his own private throne, scrolling through his phone for as long as he wanted, is what had gotten him through the last stretch of the drive.

Three minutes into a Dogs Reacting to Soldiers Coming Home vid, his phone went dark with green and red phone icons.

“Crap,” he muttered. He was pretty well established on the toilet right now. Oh well. Not like it was a video call. He answered the call and put it on speaker. “Hi, Mom.”

“Hey, Billy! Just checking to see where you are. Are you at your Airbnb yet?”

“It’s actually called a Vrbo. Uh, yeah. I just got here several minutes ago. It's pretty nice. How’s Brie doing? Is she excited for her big day?”

“Oh, good. Glad you’re safe. Um, Brie is doing fine. She’s definitely got the pre-wedding jitters, but that’s totally normal. I gave her some Nightquil, and it knocked her right out. I can hear her snoring from over here!”

Bill chuckled. “I wonder if Ryan knows what a loud snorer she is.”

“I’m sure he does, you know, at this point. We were never a Christian family.”

“Mom.”

“Well, I’m just saying. I wish you were staying here with us. The couch has a pullout bed. I know you like your privacy, but it’s kinda scary being in a new place all alone. Did you bring that pepper spray I got you?”

“Mom,” he sighed. “I’m not a little kid.”

“Men can have pepper spray too. By the way, I can tell that you’re watching cartoons, Mr. Man.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re watching cartoons, aren’t you? Is that what I’m hearing?”

“No, it must be…”

Bill paused. The bathroom door was open, and not only could he hear the distant sound effects of a kid’s show, but a square of light shone at the far end of the hall. As he watched, it kept changing colors, accompanied by boings, honks, and other obnoxious sounds. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t noticed it till now.

“Anyway,” said his mom, “I just wanted to make sure you were safe. Maybe you can come over for brunch tomorrow? I’m making hashbrown casserole. I love you so much. Bye!”

She hung up, and the video resumed at the part where a golden retriever leapt into a soldier’s arms. Bill turned off his phone and set it on the sink.

He flushed, spared a few seconds for washing his hands, and took the hand towel with him as he crept into the hall, his phone flashlight leading the way. He hugged the towel to his chest like a security blanket as he flicked on every light switch he passed. He was close enough, now, to make out a nasally voice as it argued with someone with rhotacism. These voices came from the bedroom to the right of the hall. The house had two bedrooms in total, another one to the left. The other bedroom door was closed, but the one with the playing TV was wide open, and he slowly peeked inside.

An old box TV sat on the floor to the right of a queen bed. It stared back at him, playing Looney Tunes at half volume. The entertainment stand stood across from the bed. A dust-free patch marked the spot where the TV belonged. Bill didn't allow himself much time to gawk. He crossed the room in two strides and unplugged the TV as a cross-dressing Bugs Bunny gave a fat kiss to Elmer Fudd’s shiny bald head. Then he got down on all fours and checked under the bed for intruders. His phone flashlight illuminated something—a teddy bear, he realized—when the doorbell rang loudly, making him bump his head on the bed’s metal frame. He heard laughter in the distance. Children’s laughter. Bill got to his feet and jogged to the door, lifting the shades and peering outside.

“Real funny!” he shouted at the window. “Ding-dong-ditching. How original!” He paused as something caught his eyes. “What the…”

An orange flag waved in the wind, peeking out from behind his car in the driveway.

“Don’t even tell me,” Bill muttered, running to the furthest window facing the road. At this angle, he could see it clearly. Someone had put one of those kid alert signs in his driveway behind his car.

He stared at it for several seconds. “What in Jesus’ name is going on?” Then he got to checking that all the windows and doors were locked, closing all the curtains and shutting all the blinds. But when he got to the second bedroom, the door wouldn’t budge.

“What the hell,” he growled, wrestling the knob, shoving his shoulder against the door. “What the hell?”

“No boys allowed!” called a little girl’s voice. Bill screamed and fell backwards onto his rear.

“You’re… you’re a…” He stared at the door, struggling to get his thoughts back in order. His heartbeat pounding in his head didn’t help things. “You’re a kid in there?” he stammered dumbly. “Where’s your parents?”

A period of silence seemed to stretch for hours and hours. Longer than if all the Looney Tunes episodes ever made were combined in one special.

When the child finally responded, she said in a sing-songy voice, “What’s the password?”

Bill shook his head slowly. “No. No, no.” He shoved himself up and made straight for the exit. “Forget this.”

The bedroom door slammed open, making him jump and huddle against the wall. Making him thankful he’d just used the bathroom.

As he stared down the hall toward the bedrooms, a playball rolled into the open, slowing to a stop in the middle of the hall. Bill wanted to move, to run, but he was frozen. He used to get sleep paralysis as a kid. This was just like that, but upright.

A hand shot out of nowhere, dragging the ball out of sight, and a full-body flinch broke him out of his trance.

“Shit on a stick!” Bill shouted, then he sprinted for the door.

He left the front door open and his shoes in the entryway and was in his locked car in less than three seconds after leaving the Vrbo from Hell.

Starting his car, he shifted into reverse. He didn’t care about backing over that stupid sign. But when the backup cam appeared on the screen, the sign was suddenly missing. He craned to look past the headrest. The feed wasn’t lying. It had totally disappeared.

“Where did it—” Bill’s words cut off in a scream when he looked ahead, at the kid alert sign now propped on his hood.

He slammed on the gas and flew out of the driveway, ramming straight into the neighbor’s mailbox and driving it into the ground. The mailbox wedged beneath his tire kept him in place, his front tires spinning until he came to his senses enough to let off.

Bill sat there, car idling, and stared at the children surrounding his car. They sat cross-legged on the ground, holding hands, heads bowed. All except for one girl in a tattered pink outfit that looked straight from the early 2000s. Her long, unkempt hair covered her face as she slowly circled his car on the outside of the ring of children. She placed her hand on their heads one by one, and even with his windows rolled up, he could hear her clear as day as she whispered, “Duck… duck… duck… duck… duck…”

Bill trembled, closing his eyes as she walked into his blind spot, her whispers fading away. Slowly, he peeled one sweaty hand from the steering wheel and lowered it into the pocket of his door. He curled his fingers around the gift from his mom. She was always so overprotective of him. He thought it was infantilizing. But she insisted…

A hand squeezed his shoulder. “Goose,” whispered the girl in his ear.

With a war cry, Bill whipped around and emptied the canister of pepper spray into her face. The girl, no, the thing thrashed and screamed and clawed at its eyes, and as it flailed about in his backseat, he cried his mom’s words of wisdom at it: “MEN CAN HAVE PEPPER SPRAY TOO, BITCH!”

He chucked the canister at it for good measure, then he stumbled from his car and sprinted down the empty road, leaving everything else to the past.

​

The woman checking him in stood as far behind the front desk as possible.

“Are you currently a student?” she asked, staring at him with big eyes.

Bill regarded her for a long second, feeling as though he had aged ten years in the last hour.

He had trekked through the tropical humidity in socks, following his GPS to the nearest hotel. He hadn’t wanted to give his mother a heart attack before his sister’s wedding. Not with everything they were already dealing with. They could find him a nice, cozy psyche ward once the wedding was done.

“Not currently, no,” Bill answered at last.

The woman extended her arm as far as it could reach to tap the touchscreen. As she continued through the list of standard questions, he eyed the swimming shorts in the hotel’s miniature gift shop. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d swam in a pool. He used to go swimming all the time as a kid. His mom put up the above-ground pool every summer. He remembered how he and his sister would drag the trampoline next to the pool, plunging into it from as high a jump as they could physically manage. Those were good times.

“Sir? What name should I list for the reservation? Sir?”

He returned his gaze to her, perhaps a little too quickly, for she flinched and looked ready to bolt.

“Is the pool still open?” he asked.

The woman stared at him. Her shoulders settled an inch.

“It’s adults only till midnight,” she replied.

Bill glanced at his phone. 11:30.

​

The pool area was empty, stirring an old, yet familiar thrill in him. As a child, he used to fantasize about having a whole hotel to himself, where he could sleep in any bed, eat the entire breakfast bar by himself, and watch whatever movies he wanted (so long as they were available on pay-per-view). There were times when he missed the mind he had when he dreamed those silly dreams, back when he lived in a simpler reality.

Standing on the lip of the pool, Bill backed up enough for a running start, then cannonballed into the deep end with a splash that would’ve made his younger self proud. He resurfaced in time to hear the kid screaming. His heart leapt into his throat as he scrubbed the chlorine from his eyes, blinking toward the door leading into the hall. A child in a bathing suit had their face pressed into the glass, begging to be let inside. Their mother dragged them away down the hall, and Bill’s heart settled back into his chest.

He chuckled and reclined against the side of the pool, resting his arms on the pool deck.

“Thank God I don’t have kids.”

He closed his eyes and leaned back his head, revelling in the perfectly temperature-controlled coolness. He didn't notice it when, a little ways ahead of him, the rubber duck popped out from the water. It bobbed upon the ripples, an innocent smile on its beak.