There were footsteps. My heart was pounding. I was starting to think that this wasn’t a good idea. There was something looking through the window. It was hard to tell what it was. It was big, with a scar marked across his face, and that’s all I saw.

It was a windy night, and we were bored. My friend Sophia came over. We decided to do something fun. We hid behind the gates of a neighbor’s house and started to prank them. While they were away, we covered their house with loads of toilet paper. Then, we started to laugh hysterically. Sophia and I hid in a random closet and waited for them to come home. I could hear their car pull over as it kept on slowing down.

“Madison, I don’t know about this anymore,” Sophia whispered.

“Don’t be such a baby!” I jotted back. We both heard voices that we were blaming on each other. Sophia couldn’t help but to giggle.

“What’s that noise?” one of the neighbors said. All of a sudden, we didn’t know what to do! We had a mini panic in our heads, and suddenly we saw something that didn’t really look like a human. It had hair, or was it fur, all over itself. Its eyes were blue with a glimmer of gold in the middle. Sophia and I didn’t know what it was. Once they approached, something happened, and all I saw were two random people.

“What did you do to our place?!” he screamed out loud. When he was yelling at us for what we did, I wasn’t very focused on him… there was a mark, a mark that was on his neck. I had no idea why it was there and what it meant, but I knew I had to dig deeper and find out.

“I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to contact your parents. You are invading our privacy,” he said at last. After everything got sorted out, I was at home grounded, Sophia was home also grounded, we were never allowed to see those neighbors again, and they never had to see us.

In the morning, I snuck a peek at my phone and quickly texted Sophia that I was going back. Before I did, I went on Google to try and find out what that mark was. There was nothing to see. None of them looked like the one I saw. The one I saw had a star that had a cross in the middle of it, and surrounding it was a circle that was carved into his skin. I could tell that it was old because of the color. For some reason, it kind of looked rusty.

The next day, I snuck out. I knew it wasn’t a good idea, but I had to. I had already called Sophia if she wanted to come along, but it was no use. She kept on making excuses to make me not go, like she was hiding something. Once I got there, I was going to begin my plan. It was to get in, look around, and try to get out. I knew it wasn’t the best plan, but it’s what I had.

Time for step one. I had to get in, but how? I tried to stay undercover, kind of like a spy! Not knowing what to do, I crept behind all the trees in the backyard and silently opened the door. Then, all of a sudden, squeak! That annoying door had to squeak! I was like, just why?! Luckily, no one heard because one of them was taking a shower and one of them was fast asleep. After that, I tiptoed upstairs and went into a room. What room was it? I wasn’t sure.

I quickly heard a voice that said, “Honey? I’m done! Do you mind getting my clothes?” With no one responding, I heard footsteps, getting louder and louder by the second. Then, I heard the door creak open, and all of a sudden it swung open! I ran into the closest thing I could find! And there I was, now stuck in a closet. Now the closet door cracked open, and there was a hand right near my face. I tried my hardest to avoid it, but all I did was make it worse. He was about to grab something, and his hand was pointing towards my face. Did he know I was there? Was he about to take me away? But then, what he did was… take out his clothes! I was soooooo relieved! Thank goodness I was good at hide-and-seek! I heard the door slam again, and that was a good sign. After what just happened, my plan now was to escape! I jumped out of the closet and stormed to the door, then I saw something, something unusual. It was a key. But where did it lead to?

It was finally a new day. I needed to discover more about this key. The key was rusty, and it had dust all over. I blew the dust off, and as it was dusting away, there was a symbol. It looked just like the one that was carved into the neighbor’s skin.

Beep, beep, beep! I turned over on my bed and saw my phone ringing, it was Sophia!

“Hey, Sophia! What did you want to talk about?” I said.

Then, she responded, “We need to talk.”

My voice suddenly trailed off, and she hung up.

I was going to meet her at our favorite private place to go. Then, she arrived.

“You know,” she said.

“What do you m — ”

Then she interrupted my sentence, “I know that you know You stole our key. I know you did.”

“What do you mean ‘our.’” I screamed back. Then, she looked away, and something happened. Her clothes started ripping into pieces and falling onto the floor. She started to grow fur on her body. Her eyes turned blue with a little bit of gold. She turned back around, and I saw a beast, a monster, a werewolf!

“This is who I really am! And you know your neighbors? They’re actually my parents!” Sophia screamed back.

“I was never your friend either.”