2. I told them!

Meanwhile, back outside the gate.

Twenty minutes had passed and Mark and Sadie weren't back yet.

"What's taking them so long?" The blabbermouth, who was now sitting in the front passenger seat, started to whine in utter boredom. They weren't supposed to take more than five minutes.

"Maybe something happened to them?" Nelly spoke up after staying quiet since the couple left the car.

"Or maybe they're making out real hard in there." Peter smiled at his own idea of what they were doing. Knowing Mark and Sadie, it was one hundred and five percent possible.

"I agree with him." Luke pointed his fore finger in his direction, though his eyes were on the person in the opposite direction.

"For real? Should we go check on them?" He shot up in his seat looking back from both Luke to Nelly.

"No. No, you can't go checking on people making out." Luke answered him with a weird expression. Like who does that?

"Err... have you guys forgotten why we're here? The mission?"

"Adventure."

"Yeah, whatever you say big dawg... So?" He rose a brow, waiting for their response.

"He's right babe, we need to go check on them." Luke faced Nelly this time.

"No, no, no! What's if we don't come back too? What if something happens to us?!" Fear was written all over her face.

"What if you're just being paranoid?" Peter poked in.

"What if I'm not?" She replied almost immediately.

"Err... no, you are. Those two are definitely making out in there-"

"Okay! Okay!" Luke interrupted their 'what if' banter. "Peter, can you please just give us a minute?"

He looked at both of them, "One minute." He indicated with his fore finger outstretched upwards before alighting from the car.

"I... I didn't actually mean one minute! And he's gone." The car door was shut close in between Luke's words.

He faced Nelly again, looking calm with a light smile on those delicious lips of his and eyes that sparkled like shining stars.

"Hey. Babe, we would be fine."

"I'm just..." She kept mouthing unreadable words.

"Scared. I know. It's a haunted house. Who in his or her right balls wouldn't be?" His smile widened.

She looked at him for a couple of seconds before tilting her head and knotting her brows, "Females don't have balls."

"There we go! That's my Nelly!" He bear hugged her before letting her go seconds later. She ended up smiling a bit but it didn't last a second. That feeling was still there. Deep down within her.

"I'm still scared, Luke." She voiced out again leaving Luke sighing.

"Okay, how about we do this. You stay here in the car, Peter and I would go look for them and once we find them and they are safe, I'd come pick you myself. How about that?"

She looked him in the eye, "What if you don't come back?"

"You mean if I take too long?"

"No. You just don't come out."

They both stared at each other for a long period of time when suddenly there was a bang on the window right behind Nelly making them both jump in shock.

"Hey!" It was Peter and he was mouthing his frustration as the window was closed.

"You know, one minute is a equivalent to 60 seconds, right? What are you dip twits even talking about, huh?" His hands were at akimbo.

"Did... did he just call us dip twits?" Luke's head tilted slightly trying to figure out if it was 'dip twits' or 'sweethearts' he heard - or so to speak, saw - him say.

"Anyways," He faced Nelly who was also looking at their friend and wondering the same thing. "Just call the cops. Don't come looking for us, okay?" He paused, "I love you." He kissed her forehead and opened the door, alighting from the truck.

"Wait! I-"

"Stay in the car, okay?" He said finally before closing the door.

She watched them from where she sat at the back seat as they walked towards the gate. They got in just like Mark and Sadie and continued to walk in - slowly - towards the porch.

As they went further, their figures began to fade. Their flashlights were the only thing she could use to identify them from where she was.

Soon, they had entered the door and they were... gone. It was supposed to be the 'gone' that would end up coming back, but she just...

She sighed and decided to stop having negative thoughts and just wait for them. They would come back. They had to. They just had to.

Five minutes gone... Her fingers began to shake.

"C'mon. It's just five minutes." She sighed again.

Fifteen minutes... She looked at the screen of her phone laying beside her. No calls. No texts. Nothing.

"Breathe, Nelly. Breathe." They weren't supposed to call anyways. They were to come back.

Thirty minutes and she began to panic. She picked the phone and dialed Luke's number. He wasn't answering.

She dialed and dialed up to ten times but it was still the same result.

She tried Peter's but it was switched off. Mark and Sadie's went to voicemail.

That was it! She had eventually lost it.

She came out of the car having no idea what to do, she went around the car, ten footsteps from the car and back... She was already going insane!

"I told them! I told them! I told them!!!" She screamed out her lungs, holding her hair and scraping her scalp with her fingers in frustration, confusion and fear.

She didn't know what to- The cops. They... They could help!

She picked her phone and just as she was about to dial 911, the name she saved Luke's number with appeared on the screen. He was... He was calling her?! That means he's safe!

She picked before the third ring. She couldn't afford to miss it.

"Luke? Are you-"

"Help me-" He cut her off but couldn't complete his statement as the line went off.

"Hello? Luke? Hello?! Are you there?! Luke!!" She began to imagine different things. What if he...

"No, no, no!" She tried dialing it again but it went straight to voicemail.

"Damn it!" He asked her to help him, but how would she-

She looked at the truck and then at the gate and then back and forth, coming up with an idea.

She went into the driver's side, dropped her phone on the seat beside her and started the engine. If she could just get closer to the house, she would go in, bring them out - whoever was still alive, especially her Luke - and rush into the car with them and zoom off. It would be easier than running because the distance was just... something.

She held the steering wheel and looked at the gate. She didn't have the luxury of time or strength to open it all by herself, so driving into it was her only option.

As she stepped on the accelerator hard, the gate... began to... open...?!

She slammed the brakes immediately in shock. What the??

Shockingly again, immediately she stopped, the gate stopped its movement as well.

She bent closer to have a good view of the gate through the windshield. It indeed stopped. She stepped on the accelerator again and as she moved closer, the gate opened wider. She pressed the brakes again and it stopped.

"Wow!" She didn't have the time for this. Her friends needed her right now and she wouldn't hesitate to help them even if she still had that strong feeling inside of her telling her it was a very bad idea!

She stepped on the accelerator and this time kept her foot pressed on it not minding the strange thing still happening.

Unknown to her, as she drove in, the car tracks began to disappear.

She drove in and stopped about a foot away from the porch. Holding her flashlight, she came down steadily but hastily and moved immediately.

Her shoes made quite a noise even as she made slight contacts with the porch as everywhere had gone eerily quiet.

As she got to the door, she saw the same thing the others had seen, held the knob and pushed the door open. She walked in and the door shut close!

Immediately, the gate started to go back to its initial position as droplets of rain began to drop on the dusty ground increasing every second to a heavy and thunderous downpour.

The pickup truck was the only thing left outside the house as something unexpected and shocking began to happen.

The ground began to turn sticky and moist and then the car started to... sink.

The ground had turned into a sinking sand wormhole as the truck went in slowly and slowly and just as half of it had been sunk in, Nelly's phone's screen on the front passenger's seat lit up, "Nelly... Hello? Honey.? It's mom. You've passed your curfew. Get home now, you have school tomorrow. And why aren't you saying anything? Nelly? Nelly?!-"

Her words were cut off as the whole truck was swallowed up by the sudden sinking sand. Immediately after, the rain abruptly stopped and it was like nothing ever happened there.