"Bye, old Shep." "See you in heaven, yep?" "This is where my kitty lays." "No more he screams and hollers." "He lived for five and 20 days." "And cost me 50 dollars." "Spot, a good fellow." "We love you." "Finally here." "Yeah." "Yay!" "So?" " What do you think?" " It's gorgeous." "Decided to wake up and see what home looks like, huh?" "Come here." "Mommy!" "Daddy!" "I see a path." "Ellie, be careful." "Ellie!" "Listen to your..." "Mommy!" "Daddy!" "It hurts!" "Mommy!" "Daddy!" "It hurts!" " Are you OK?" " It hurts." " Get rid of this." " I got it, I got it." "Look out." " You OK?" " It's all right." "No, it hurts." "Anyone who can scream that loud isn't ready for intensive care just yet." "Cat." "She's just skinned her knee." "I don't want the stingy stuff, Daddy." "Where's Gage?" "Gage!" "No you don't, my friend." "Not in that road." "Gage!" "I corralled him for you, missus." "Thank you." "Thank you so much." " Thank you." "I'm Louis Creed." " Jud Crandall." "I live just across the road." "You want to watch out for that road." "Them damn trucks go back and forth all day and most of the night." "And who might you be, little miss?" "I'm Ellen Creed." "And your dad's going to be the new doctor at the college, I hear." "I think you're gonna be just as happy as a clam here, Ellen Creed." "Are clams really happy?" "Mr. Crandall, there's a path over there." "Do you know where it goes?" "Yeah, that's a good story." "And a good walk." "I'll take you up there sometime." "Tell you the story, too." "After you get settled in." "Great." "Excuse me, I've got to get this kid changed." " It was nice to meet you." " Same here." "Come on, Ellie." "Give me your hand." "The house has stood empty too long." "It's damn good to see people in it again." "Church!" "You scared the life out of me, Church." "Come here." " That you, Doc?" " Yeah, it's me." "Well, come on up and have a beer." " Need a glass?" " Not at all." "Good for you." "Jesus." "Yeah." "That's one mean road, all right." "You know that path your wife commented on?" "That road and those Orinco trucks are the two main reasons it's there." "Well, where does it lead?" " Pet cemetery." " Pet cemetery." "It's that damn road." "Uses up a lot of animals." " Dogs and cats, mostly." " My little girl's got a cat." "Winston Churchill." "We call him Church for short." "I'd get him fixed if I were you." "A fixed cat don't tend to wander." "If he's all the time crossing back and forth on that road, his luck will run out." "Well, I'll take it under advisement." "Meantime, Doc, here's to your bones." "And your bones." "I'll be going now, Dr. Creed." "All right, Missy." "Thanks." " Hi, Missy." " Hi." "I'll do these up, bring them back next time, Mrs. Creed." "Great." "Can you come on Monday, Missy?" "Always thought it would be lucky to marry a doctor." "Wish I had a doctor around with my stomach pain so bad." "Guess I'll never be lucky." "Hell, I ain't married to anyone." "Bye, Missy." "Mommy, Daddy, come on." "Let's go!" "We're coming!" "All set?" "Let's get on with it." "There's the place." "What's it say, Mommy?" "It says, "Pet sematary," honey." "It's misspelled, but that's what it says." "Ellie, wait a minute!" "I told you it was a bad road, Louis." "It's killed a lot of pets, made a lot of kids unhappy." "At least something good come of it:" "This place." "Couldn't plant nothing but corpses here anyway, I guess." "How can you call it a good thing?" "A graveyard for pets killed in the road, built by brokenhearted children." "Well, they have to learn about death somehow, now, don't they, Mrs. Creed?" "Why?" " Can I have the baby?" " Yeah." "Daddy, look, this one's a goldfishy." "That's right, Ellie." "They wasn't all killed by the road." "Especially the ones from back in my time as a child." "They get older as you go towards the middle." "Harder to read." "Missy Ellen, come over here just a minute." "That's where I buried my dog, Spot, when he died of old age in 1924." "Ellie... do you know what a graveyard really is?" "Well..." "I guess not." "It's a place where the dead speak." "No, not right out loud." "Their stones speak or their markers." "This ain't a scary place, Ellie." "It's a place of rest and speaking." " Can you remember that?" " Yes, sir." "Hi, babe." "Daddy, what if Church dies?" "What if he dies and has to go to the pet sematary?" "Honey, Church will be fine." "No, he won't." "Not in the end." "In the end, he's going to croak, isn't he?" "Lovey..." "Church might still be alive when you're in high school, and that's a very long time." "It doesn't seem long to me." "It seems short." "Well, if it was up to me, I'd let Church live to be 100, but I don't make up the rules." "And who does?" "God, I suppose." "He's not God's cat, he's my cat." "Let God get his own if he wants one." "Not mine." "Not mine." "Yuck!" "Gross!" "I'm scared." "What if school here isn't like in Chicago?" "I'm scared, and I want to go home." "You'll be all right, Ellie." "I don't want Church to get his nuts cut, Daddy." "Good God, where did you hear that?" "Missy Dandridge." "She says it's an operation." "The road is a lot more dangerous than any operation." "Church will be just the same." "Well, almost the same." "And we won't have to worry about him getting run over in the road by trucks." "Church'll be all right, honey." "You promise, Daddy?" "Don't shilly-shally, Louis." "Give the little girl a promise." "Church will be fine." "I promise." "Thank you." "You're very welcome." "But if anything does happen while he's under the gas, now, it's a one in 1,000 shot, but it does happen, you explain it to her." "Church!" "Got to go." " Going to get his..." " Nuts cut." "Yes." "Thank you, Missy, for introducing that colorful phrase" " into my daughter's vocabulary." " Don't mention it." "How's that bellyache of yours?" "No better." "No worse." "You know, I can take a look at that for you." "It'll pass." "They always do." " Missy." " Ma'am." "Still friends, Doc?" "I kissed you." "Have a great first day at school, Doc." " Bye-bye." " Bye-bye." " Did anybody see what happened?" " He got hit by a truck." " God!" " His head." "Hold him gently." "Didn't even stop!" " There's so much blood!" " What the hell's going on?" " Get the door." " Get Dr. Creed!" "What's happened here?" " He got hit by a truck." " Oh, my God." "Dr. Creed!" "Get them all out of here." " Easy." "Easy." " All right." "Everyone out, please." "Let the doctors do their work." "Come on, let's clear the room here." "Come on, everybody clear out!" "Just clear out!" " Ambu bag." "Start a cardiac monitor." " Yes, sir." "Need large bores." "All right, get an ambulance here and get it right now." " He's got to go to EMC." " It won't do any good." "I know it won't, but for God's sake, let's do it by the rules." "OK, now move!" " What's going on?" "Who is it?" " It's Pascow." "I told Rachel not so much as a sprain today, my friend." "The soil... of a man's heart... is stonier..." "Louis." "I'll come... to you." "How did you know my name?" "We've got places to go." "Come on, Doc." "Hey, why are you here?" "I want to help you because..." "Louis?" "Because you tried to help me." "This is the place where the dead speak." "I want to wake up." "I want to wake up." "That's all." "Don't go on, Doc." "No matter how much you may feel you have to, do not go on to the place where the dead walk." "Please." "I just want to wake up." "That's all." "The barrier was not meant to be crossed." "It's not my fault that you died." "You were as good as dead when they brought you in." "The ground beyond... is sour." "You up, Doc?" "Getting there." "Thanks, nurse." "Louis, it's not right." "I don't like to think of you rattling around the house on Thanksgiving Day." "That's supposed to be a family holiday, Louis." "That's why you're going with the kids and without me." "As far as your dad is concerned," "I'm never going to be a member of the family." "But I want you around." "I'll be around plenty when you get back." "Hello." "Louis, afraid you may have a spot of trouble here." "Jud?" "What trouble?" "Well, there's a dead cat over here on the edge of my lawn." " Oh, Jesus." " I think it might be your daughter's." "Yep." "That's Church all right." "I'm sorry." "At least it don't look like he suffered." "Well, Ellie will suffer." "She'll suffer plenty." "Here." "Give me that." "What are you going to do with it?" "Put him in the garage, I guess." "I'll bury him in the morning." "You gonna tell Ellie?" "Well, I'll have to mull that over for a while." "Maybe when they call, I'll just tell her" "I haven't seen the damn cat around, you know?" "I don't want to spoil her holiday." "And Rachel's." "Maybe there's a better way." "So, do we plant him on the outside of the circle or do we start a new one?" "The place we're going... is on the other side of that." "We can't climb over that." "We'll break our necks." "No, we won't." "I've climbed it a time or two before." "I know all the places to step." "Just follow me." "Move easy." "Don't look down and don't stop." "If you stop, you'll crash through for sure." "Just don't stop, and..." "And don't look down." "Right." "Louis, you all right?" "Yeah." "I guess I just lost my happy thoughts there for a second." "Not much farther now." "Jud, what's that?" "Just a loon." "That's all." "Here we go." "Won't be much longer now." "Just down here a little ways." "Almost there, Louis." "You keep saying that." "This time, I mean it." "What is this place?" "This was their burial ground." "Whose burial ground?" "Micmac Indians." "I brought you here to bury Ellen's cat." "Why, for God's sake?" "I said why, Jud?" "I had my reasons." "The soil's thin, but you'll manage." "I'm going to sit over yonder and have a smoke." "I'd help you, but you got to do it yourself." "Each buries his own." "Shit." "Louis?" " Louis?" " Yeah." "When you talk to them, not one word about what we done tonight." "What did we do tonight, Jud?" "What we did, Louis, was a secret thing." "Women are supposed to be the ones who are good at keeping secrets." "But any woman who knows anything at all will tell you she's never seen into a man's heart." "The soil of a man's heart, Louis, is stonier... like the soil up there in the old Micmac burying ground." "Goldman residence." "Hi, Dory." "It's Louis." "You want to talk to your daughter?" "Yeah." "That would be real fine." "Hi, Daddy." "Hi, baby." "How's everything in Chicago land?" "Grandma and Grandpa gave me all sorts of neat things." "How's Church, Daddy?" "Does he miss me?" "Well..." "I guess he's just fine, Ellie." "I haven't seen him this evening, but..." "Well, make sure you put him down in the cellar before you go to bed so he won't run out in the road." "And... and kiss him good night for me." "Yuck." "Kiss your own cat." "Want to talk to Gage?" "Yeah." "Here." "Hi, Daddy." "I love you." "Jesus." "Church." "Food, Church." "Food." "Come on, Church." "Chow down." "Come on, Church." "Christ." "I don't believe this." "Oh, you stink, Church." "Hold on a second." "God, he chewed his way out." "Jesus, boy." "Christ." "Damn it." "I'm trying to tell myself that I buried him alive." "I'm not a vet." "It was dark." "Sure, it was dark." "But his head swiveled on his neck like it was full of ball bearings." "When you moved him, he pulled out of the frost, Louis." "Sounded like a piece of Tickitape coming off a letter." "Live things don't do that." "You only stop melting the frost under where you're laying when you're dead." "Well, I feel like I'm going crazy." "It was the ragman who told me about the place." "He was half Micmac himself." "He knew how I felt about my dog, Spot." "Spot had got caught in barbed wire that infected." "When he died, I thought I was gonna die." "The ragman did for me what I did for you last night." "Only I wasn't alone when Spot came back." "My mother was with me." "You could still see the barbed wire marks on him." "Jud, come and get your dog!" "He stinks of the ground you buried him in!" "Jud!" " Spot came back, all right." " Spot!" "He was never quite the same dog that I knew." "Spot." "When he died peacefully in the night that second time," "I buried him up there in the pet sematary, where, as you saw, his bones still lie." "A man doesn't always know why he does things, Louis." "I think I did it 'cause your daughter ain't ready for her favourite pet to die." "Maybe with more time she'll learn what death really is, which is where the pain stops  the good memories begin." "Has anyone ever buried a person up there?" "Christ on his throne, no." "And who ever would?" "Shit." "How the hell did you get in here?" "Out!" "Bye-bye, Ellie." "Watch your step now." "There you go." " Daddy!" " Hi, sugar." "Come here." "Hi, Daddy." "Daddy, is Church all right?" "Yes." "I guess so." "He was asleep on the porch when I left." "There you go." "Because I had a dream about him." "I dreamed he got hit by a car, and you and Mr. Crandall buried him in the pet sematary." "That was a silly dream, wasn't it?" "Is he really all right?" "Yes." " Hi, honey." " You want to take your son, Doc?" "You smell bad." "Can cats have shampoos?" "Yes, but you have to take them to someone who grooms animals, though, and I think it's pretty expensive." "I don't care." "I'll save up my allowance and pay for it." "Church smells bad." "I'll cough up the money, Ellen." "I hate that smell." "Yes." "I hate it, too." " And a red balloon..." " This is the yellow one." ""And now, may the Lord bless you and keep you."" "May the Lord make his face to shine upon you and comfort you and lift you up..." ""...and give you peace."" " Amen." " Amen." "Rachel not feeling well?" "Well, just a touch of the flu." "She's in bed." "She's been throwing up ever since Mrs. Rogers called and said Mrs. Dandridge..." "That's enough, Ellie." "Hop in." "Poor Missy." "I don't know why God'd take someone like her who should still have a bunch of years left in front of her and lets an old fart like me just go on and on." "My father used to have a saying, Jud." ""God sees the truth, but waits."" "Yeah." "How's your cat, Louis?" "It's Ellie's cat." "No." "It's your cat now." "Possibly more Atlantic white-sided dolphins have beached or stranded themselves along the eastern Maine coast, and scientists don't know why." "What's up, sugar?" "Daddy, do you think Missy Dandridge went to heaven?" "Do you want to talk about it?" "Is Missy in heaven, do you think?" "I don't know, honey." "Different people believe all sorts of different things." "Some believe in heaven or hell." "Some think we come back as little children, and some think we just wink out... like a candle flame when the wind blows hard." "Do you believe that?" "No." "I think we go on." "Yeah." "I have faith in that." "You believe in it." "Give me a kiss." "What do you want to watch?" "I heard you and Ellie tonight." "I thought you might have." "I know you don't approve of the subject." "I just get scared." "And you know me." "When I get scared, I get defensive." "Scared of what?" "Dying?" "My sister, Zelda..." "I know, she died." "Spinal meningitis." "She was in the back bedroom like a dirty secret." "My sister died in the back bedroom, and that's what she was:" "A dirty secret." "I had to..." "I had to feed her sometimes." "I hated it, but I did it." "We wanted her to die." "We wished for her to be dead." "It wasn't just so she wouldn't feel any more pain." "It was so we wouldn't feel any more pain." "It was because she started to look like this monster." "Even now, I wake up and I think..." ""Is Zelda dead yet?"" ""Is she?"" "My parents were gone when she died." "Rachel!" "She started to..." "She started to convulse, and I thought..." "I thought, "Oh my God, she's choking."" "Zelda's choking!" "And they'll come home, and they'll say I murdered her by choking." "They'll say, 'You hated her, Rachel, ' and that was true." "And they'll say, 'You wanted her to be dead, '" ""and that was true, too."" "And then she died." "And I started to scream." "I ran out of the house screaming," ""Zelda's dead!" "Zelda's dead!" "Zelda's dead!"" "And the neighbors, they came out, and they looked." "They thought I was crying." "But you know something?" "I think maybe..." "I was laughing." "If you were, I salute you for it." "And if I ever needed another reason not to like your mother and father," "I have one now." "You should never have been left alone with her, Rachel." "Never." "Where was her nurse?" "They actually went out and left an eight-year-old kid in charge of her dying sister, who was probably clinically insane by then." " Where are you going?" " I'm going to get you a Valium." "But you know I don't take..." "Tonight, you do." "Look!" "He pulled." "Daddy's flying a kite." " Mommy, look!" " Watch him!" " There it goes." " That's it, Louis." "Go, Daddy." "Higher, higher." "We want it higher." "Louis, let Gage do it." "Here you go, buddy." "You're flying it." " There's the kite!" " You got it." "Gage is flying it." "You got it." "Can I fly it now?" "In a minute, honey." "Let Gage finish his turn." " We gotted it." " You got it." " Look high goes." " Now farther." "Go ahead." "Go ahead." "Run, buddy." "Run." "Gage is flying it." "I'm flying it." "That kite's getting up there." "It got away from him, that numb shit." "Ellen Creed!" "Oh, I dropped it." "Daddy, can I fly it now?" " OK, in just a minute." " Louis, I want to fly it." "Daddy, Daddy, it's my turn now." "All right." "Just a minute." "Don't let him go in the road, Louis!" "Get him, Louis!" "Get the baby!" "Get the baby!" "Gage!" "Look out!" "Stop!" "Stop!" "Gage!" "No!" "Sedative finally took hold." "Rachel's asleep." "I want to go back to my own room." "I can't sleep with Mommy." "She keeps stealing the covers." "Ellie, what you got there?" "What you got there?" "Let me see." "Can I see?" "Ain't that real nice?" "You pulling him in the wagon." "Bet he liked that, didn't he?" "I'm going to carry this picture, Mr. Crandall, until God lets Gage come back." "Ellie, God doesn't do things like that." "He can if he wants to." "I have to keep his things waiting for him." "That's what I think." "I've got his picture, and I'm gonna sit in his chair..." "Ellie." "Louis, take care of your little girl." "She needs you." "I knew something like this would happen." "I told her when you were first married you'll have all the grief you can stand and more, I said." "Now, look at this." "I hope you rot in hell!" "Where were you when he was playing in the road?" "You stinking shit!" "You killer of children!" " Daddy!" " Ellie!" "Stop it!" "You son of a bitch!" "No!" "Oh, God." " No!" " No!" " No!" " Louis!" "Son of a bitch!" "You had no right!" "What's wrong with you?" "It's your son's funeral." "Get a hold of yourself, please." "Good night, Ellie." "Good night, Daddy." "Daddy?" "God could take it back if he wanted to, couldn't he?" "If he really, really wanted to." "Can I have faith in that?" "Yes." "I suppose you can." "Good night, Ellie." "Fuck off, hairball!" "Jud, I buried my son today." "I'm very tired." "I wonder if we could just..." "You're thinking thoughts best not thought of, Louis." "I'm thinking about going to bed." "I'm responsible for more pain in your heart than you should have tonight." "For all I know, I may even be responsible for the death of your son." "What?" "Jud, you're talking crazy." "You are thinking of putting him up there." "Don't deny the thought hadn't crossed your mind, Louis." "Louis... you asked me... if anyone had ever buried a person up there in the Micmac grounds." "I lied to you when I said no." "It's been done." "What you've been thinking of has been done." "He was a local boy." "It was towards the end of the Second World War." "His name was Timmy Baterman." "He was killed on his way home from the Second World War." "His father, Bill Baterman, was grief-struck." "He was so grief-struck, he buried his son up there before he ever had a chance to get to the bottom of the truth." "I'll bite, Jud." "What's the bottom of the truth?" "Well, sometimes dead is better." "The person you put up there ain't the person that comes back." "It may look like that person, but it ain't that person." "It was four or five days after Timmy's funeral... that Margie Washburn seen Timmy, walking up the road towards Yorkie's Livery." "As time went by, lots of folks saw Timmy walking back and forth." "But it was Margie who finally came to some of us menfolks and said it had to be stopped." "She knew it was an abomination." "So us men sat down and talked it out." "Then we got into my car and went over to the Baterman place to take care of it." "He's dead!" "He ain't natural!" "One way or the other." "Yeah, there's no other way." "He's got to burn!" "You're wrecking my house!" "Stop it!" " Timmy, stop it!" " Daddy." "The place is going up!" "Go away!" "Get out while you still can, Bill." " Bring out the cans." " I got them." "Wait a minute, fellows." "Wait a minute." "He's a monster, Bill." "Leave us alone!" "He's my son!" " Come, Timmy." "Let's get out." " Love Dad!" "Hate living!" "Come on, son!" "No, Timmy!" "No!" "Love Dad!" "Hate living." "Louis, sometimes dead is better." "The Indians knew that." "They stopped using that burial ground when the ground went sour." "Don't think about doing it, Louis." "The place gets a hold of you, but the place is evil." "Sometimes dead is better." "You see, Louis, what I'm getting at here?" "You understand?" "You're telling me that place knew Gage was going to die?" "I'm saying... that place might have made Gage die because I introduced you to the power." "I may have murdered your son, Louis." "This could be the beginning of patching things up with your folks." "If something good doesn't come from Gage's death, I think..." "I don't want to go to Chicago, Grandma Dory." "Why not, darling?" "I had a bad dream last night." "About what?" "About Daddy and Gage... and someone named Paxcow." "You guys better get going, or you're gonna miss the boat." "Louis, I am sorry." "What can I say?" "I lost my mind." "We all lost our minds, Irwin." "You take care of your mother, darling." "Come with us, Daddy." "Please come with us." "I'll be there in three days, four at the most." "Please, Daddy, I'm scared." "Everything's going to be all right, Ellie." "Do you swear?" "I swear." "Come on, Ellie." "Let's go." "Mommy." "Mommy." "Mommy!" "Mommy." "Mommy!" "Mommy!" "Honey, you just had a bad dream, that's all." "You know that, don't you?" "It wasn't a dream." "It was Paxcow." "Paxcow says Daddy's gonna do something really bad." "Who is this Paxcow?" "Is he like the bogeyman?" "He's a ghost." "He's a good ghost." "He says he was sent to warn us." "He says he was near Daddy because they were together when his soul was dis..." "Dis..." "I can't remember." "Listen to me." "There are no ghosts, Ellie." "There are no ghosts." "Now, I want you to go to sleep and forget all this nonsense." "Do you hear me?" "Will you at least call and make sure Daddy's OK?" "Of course, I will." "He was trying to help me because Daddy was helping him when his soul dis, dis..." "Discorporate." "I'm going to bust you out, son." "He's not home." "Probably went out for a hamburger or a chicken dinner, dear." "You know how men are when they're alone." " Hello?" " Hello, Jud." "It's Rachel Creed." "I'm calling from Chicago." "Chicago?" "Is Louis with you?" "No." "We're going to be here a while, and he needed a few days to close things up back there." "I just wondered if he was with you." "No." "But if he drops by, I'll tell him to call you." "Don't bother, Jud." "I'm coming home." "Rachel, no." "You don't want to do that." "I have to do it, Jud." "Goodbye." "Rachel!" "Rachel!" "You've done it, you stupid old man." "Now you got to undo it." "Oh, Gage." "It's going to be all right." "I swear it's going to be all right." "I'm coming for you, Rachel." "And this time..." "I'll get you." "Gage and I... will get you... for letting us die!" "Good evening again, ladies and gentlemen." "We've had a strong tailwind, and we expect to arrive at Boston's Logan Airport almost on time." "Excuse me." "Sorry." "Excuse me." "Excuse me." "Excuse me." "Excuse me." "Excuse me." "Excuse me!" " Make it wait." " I can't." "All right, I'll call the pilot." "I'm not going to stop, Gage." "I'm not going to look down." "Come back to me, Gage." "Come back to us." "Who's here?" "Let's play hide and go seek." "Gage?" "You the one playing games?" "Gage?" "Come on out." "I brought you something." "Where did you..." "Church?" "Jud?" "Jud, are you up there?" "Rachel." "Rachel, is that you?" "I finally came back for you, Rachel." "I'm going to twist your back like mine so you'll never get out of bed again." "Never get out of bed again." "Never get out of bed again!" "Oh, Gage." "I brought you something, Mommy." "Gage." "I brought you something, Mommy." "Gage." "Gage." "I brought you something, Mommy." "Oh, Christ." "Gage." "Oh, my God." "Gage?" "Hello." "Hello, Louis." "It's Irwin." "I just wanted to be sure Rachel got back all right." "Louis?" "Are you there?" "Yes, I'm here." "Did she get back all right?" "Yes." "She's fine." "Well, put her on at that end, and I'll put Ellie on this one." "Ellie's very worried about her mother." "She's almost in hysterics." "She's..." "Rachel's asleep." "Then, I suggest you wake her up." "Ellie had a dream that her mother was dead." "Irwin, I can't talk to you right now." "Irwin, I told you I can't talk to you right now." "I'm at Jud's, Daddy." "Will you come over and play with me?" "First, I played with Jud." "Then Mommy came, and I played with Mommy." "We played, Daddy." "Now I want to play with you." "What did you do?" "Hi, Church." "Want some grub, Church?" "Church." "Don't mind me." "Eat it while you can." "That's right." "Today is Thanksgiving Day for cats." "But only... if they came back from the dead." "Go on." "Lie down." "Play dead." "Be dead!" "Gage?" "Gage, what have you done?" "Rachel!" " Gage?" " Hi, Daddy." "Now I want to play with you." "All right, Gage." "Let's play." "Daddy." "Come here." "No fair." "No fair, no fair." "We'll be all right, Rachel." "I promise." "Darling." "The soil of a man's heart is stonier..." "Because what you buy is what you own." "And what you own always comes home to you."