Chapter 2
The drive to Tustin doesn’t take long, and with the windows cracked and Paxton humming along to some Disney-themed playlist on her phone, the Prius practically floats down the darkened streets. Silent as cat’s feet.
Shortly, I stop in front of a brightly lit home.
“This it?” asks Pax.
“Yep,” I murmur, eyeing the house, suddenly unsure of myself.
I mean, I’m only an investigator-in-training.
An intern, basically. By California law, I can’t conduct a real investigation until I’m a licensed private eye.
I can, however, work a case Mom is hired for.
Pretty sure, this won’t go down as an official case, or a case at all.
They might just slam the door in my face.
I step out of the car, as does Pax. She quick-steps around my car and takes my hand. We both look up at the big two-story home.
It’s a well-kept with a wide porch and carefully trimmed hedges. A row of solar-powered garden lights flickers softly. But it’s the industrial-grade floodlights illuminating the front yard that grab my attention. They’re way too bright for a fairly safe suburban neighborhood like this.
“Guess someone’s not taking chances with the dark,” I mutter, leading the way up the walkway to the front door.
“They’re scared of something,” says Paxton.
“You can feel it?”
“Oh, yes,” says my kid sister. Everyone inside is scared. There are four people. Four different types of fear. The girl is the most scared. The dad is mostly mad. Mom feels helpless. The kid brother is just confused.
“Hopefully, we’ll get to the bottom of it,” I say. “I hope.”
“I hope so too. They need a lot of help!”
As we walk, Paxton’s shoes flash brightly with each step.
Her knapsack hangs askew. I pause and straighten her out, brush back her hair with my fingers.
I take her hand again and we walk up to the front door.
There, I give myself a once-over, too, smoothing my shirt and fluffing out my hair.
I brush the front of my black jeans. Finally, I dig out a business card from my purse.
It’s fairly new. Mom got them a few weeks ago for me.
It’s got my picture on the front with the words: “Tammy Moon, junior detective” above the words “Moon Investigations.”
“You got this,” Paxton whispers, offering a little thumbs-up, sensing my nerves. The kid is a natural empath, which, not surprisingly, fits right along with our weird family.
I smile nervously, nod, and step up to the door. My index finger hovers over the doorbell for a second as I question everything leading up to this point. No, I finally tell myself. They need help. Most importantly, the tooth fair needs help, too.
And yes, I happen to know she’s real.
Finally, I press the doorbell.
A few seconds pass. Then the sound of footsteps. The peephole darkens, and the porch light flares to life above us. A woman in her late thirties opens the door part way. There’s a chain stopping it. She blinks suspiciously; I don’t blame her.
“Yes?” she asks, surprisingly pleasantly.
“Hi,” I say, offering a small, polite smile. “I’m sorry to bother you so late. My name’s Tammy Moon, and I’m a junior private investigator with Moon Investigations.”
I hold out my business card like a badge, doing my best to look competent, professional and non-threatening.
Pretty sure I couldn’t look threatening if I tried, not with ‘My Little Pony’ standing next to me, her shoes blinking away.
The woman looks from me to the card, then to Paxton, who gives a tiny wave and a smile straight out of a Disney cartoon.
“I’m looking into the recent... sleep disturbances mentioned in the Orange County Register,” I say. “Your daughter Emma was quoted as to having lost a tooth and having nightmares?”
Her expression tightens. “We already talked to the reporter and the local news station. We really don’t want to—”
“I understand,” I say quickly. “But I’m not with the press. This is something I’m investigating privately. I think I might be able to help you.”
The woman hesitates. Her gaze flicks down to my notepad and pen, to my awkward stance, and then to Paxton, who’s currently balancing on one foot like she’s trying to impersonate a bird.
“Please,” I add. “It’ll just take a few minutes.”
Another pause.
Finally, the woman sighs and unlatches the chain, opens the door wider. “All right. Come in. But let’s make it quick. It’s kinda late.”
“Thank you,” I breathe, stepping inside, with Paxton trailing close behind.
The house smells like lavender and freshly baked cookies. Comfort food, surely. A wide staircase winds upward to our right. On our left, a long couch faces a flat-screen TV. Family photos line the walls—there’s Emma at the beach, Emma at Halloween missing her two front teeth.
I make a mental note to ask how recent the Halloween photo was.
The woman, Karen according to the article, leads us into the living room and gestures toward the couch. Paxton and I sit obediently.
“You said you’re a private eye?”
“In training,” I clarify. I rest my notepad on my knee and tuck my pen behind my ear. Then I nod toward the business card she’s holding but not looking at. “It’s my mom’s agency. She’s the actual PI. I’m studying criminology and helping out with her cases.”
Karen seems skeptical, but nods. A man steps into the room and stands listening. I’m assuming this is Dad.
“I read your quotes in the article,” I continue, opening to a fresh page in my notebook. “But I was hoping you could clarify a few things.” I flash an encouraging grin.
To my surprise, Karen laughs and nods. “Sure. What would you like to know?”
“When did your daughter’s nightmares begin?”
“Let’s see... Emma lost her tooth last Friday.
That night, we did what we always do: we put it under her pillow.
The next morning, the tooth was gone, but there was no money in its place.
She said something had been scratching at her window all night, but it might’ve just been a dream. She’s not sure.”
“How long before that had she lost a tooth?” I ask.
“It’s been a few months since her last one.”
“Were there any issues then?”
“None. It was a normal tooth fairy transaction. Put the tooth under her pillow, tooth is gone the next morning, to be replaced by a crisp five-dollar bill. Used to be a one-dollar bill back when I was a kid.”
“Two dollars for me,” I say.
“Emma said it got in a few nights ago,” says Karen. “She said it finally worked her window open enough for it to slip in, where it proceeded to crawl along the wall to her bed and straight into her dreams. She’s afraid to go to bed now.”
I didn’t say anything, but I sure as heck didn’t blame Emma. I would be afraid to sleep, too. And I’ve had legit demons come after me!
I finish my notes, look up and ask, “Would it be okay if I spoke to Emma?”
They hesitate, then Karen sighs and heads for the stairs. “She’s probably watching TV.”
“Or on YouTube,” says her dad, sounding none too pleased.
Karen stops halfway up the stairs. Leans down and looks at me. “May I ask what you think it is you can do to help?”
“My family specializes in the occult, the weird.”
“Monsters,” Paxton chimes in.
“Those, too,” I say. “We’re pretty good at cleaning up the garbage out there.”
“Something like this nightmare shadow thing doesn’t scare you?” asks Jim, sipping loudly from his tea. He winces when he burns himself.
“We’ve tackled a lot worse, though, admittedly, nothing quite like this.”
“May I ask what could be worse than this?”
“Demons,” says Paxton, jumping in. “And the devil, too. Our mom is a badass. And Tammy isn’t so bad either.”
“Thanks, kiddo,” I say, winking at my adopted sister.
“Well, I’m convinced... of something,” says Karen, shaking her head and giving us a smile.
“When you say the devil...” begins Jim, looking at me from over his mug.
“The devil incarnate, protected by a horde of demons.”
“How on earth did your mother kill the devil?” he asks. “I thought he was going to be thrown into the lake of fire at the end of time.”
“He is,” I say. “Or, at least, a version of him. Another devil quickly replaced the devil Mom killed.”
“Weird.”
“Tell me about it.”
He sets his teacup down and joins his wife who is walking up the stairs.
While we wait, Paxton leans toward me and whispers in my ear: “You’re doing pretty good.”
“Thanks, kiddo. But I think we need to keep some family secrets to ourselves.”
“Well, he asked.”
“I know. But we both kind of said too much.”
“Maybe Mom can come back tomorrow and wipe their memories?”
“Maybe,” I say. “For now, let’s not spill all the beans on our first case.”
“Our first case,” says Paxton, clapping. “There’s gonna be more?”
“I don’t know. Now, shh, they’re coming back.”
Indeed, I hear footsteps descending the stairs. Emma appears from the shadows. She’s small and serious in her Frozen pajamas, despite her bouncing pigtails. She’s clutching a stuffed koala so tightly I’m amazed it hasn’t burst. Her eyes are round and wary.
“Hi, Emma,” I say gently, crouching to her level when she reaches the first floor. “I’m Tammy. Your mom said it would be okay for us to talk a little about your bad dreams.”
She nods solemnly.
“I heard it started after your lost a tooth?”
She nods again. “It first started with scratches on my window.” She makes a clawing motion with her little hand. “Then it came into my room. But it didn’t walk. It crawled on the walls.”
“What did it look like?”
“A black blob with red eyes.”
I glance up at the parents. They both look stunned to hear this description. Maybe they hadn’t asked for a description.
I flip a page in my notepad, trying not to let my hands shake. “Emma, when you woke up… was your tooth still there under the pillow?”
She shakes her head slowly. “No. It was gone.”
I glance at her mom. She shrugs, pressing her lips together before saying, “We checked, too. The tooth was missing. We didn’t take the tooth.”
“You said there was no money, either.”
“Right. No tooth and no money. Just a nightmare.”
Emma sits on the couch. “It was cold when I woke up. My breath was making smoke.”
I glance at Paxton beside me. Her eyebrows shoot up.
The tooth was taken. No money was left. The whole magical process went haywire.
Something intervened.
I consult my notes. “You said it crawled and had red eyes?”
Emma nods enthusiastically.
“Could you draw it?” I ask, turning to a blank page and holding out my pen.
Emma bites her lip, then nods. “No pen. Let me get some crayons.”
When she trots off toward the kitchen, skipping, Paxton whispers in my ear: “Red eyes. That’s nightmare fuel.”
Yeah. A monster or worse. Maybe even a demon.
I keep that last part to myself.