by Rysa Walker
Daisy turns her head toward the noise. Chase Rey is in the chair next to the window, where he has sat most mornings for the past six weeks, a broken iPad clutched in his hands. His body and the floor around him are bathed in sunlight dappled by the leaves of the oak tree just outside the window.
Chase stares at the tablet intently, like he always does on his bad days. His gone days, as the nurse calls them. Daisy talks to him sometimes, even on his gone days. Tells him the plots of books and movies she likes. Something to help him pass the time until he finds his way back. One of the nurses told her she needn’t bother. And to be fair, Chase really doesn’t seem to hear her. He just stays still except for his eyes and his thumbs, both of which travel restlessly across the screen.
Today, however, his feet—clad as always in the bright-orange sneakers—are moving, too. His heels pat out a simple, repetitive beat: tap-tap-tap, pause, tap-tap-tap.
“Chase,” Daisy whispers. “Hey, can you hear me?”
He doesn’t respond. The tapping sound comes again.
Tap-tap-tap, there’s no place like home, tap-tap-tap…
She wipes away a tear at the corner of her eye, relieved that she can move again. Her arm still feels heavy, but that sense of swimming through lead has passed. Mostly she just feels sad. Empty.
The dream felt more real than this.
True, it had all of the elements of a nightmare—monsters and danger and panic. But she’d been there, in the moment. Even the things that felt surreal, like ants crawling out of the movie screen, were vivid. She’d felt alive.
A flash of black pulls her eyes up to the window, where a crow is perched on the sill. At first, she thinks the sun is playing tricks on her, that the eyes are just a reflection. But then she hears Chase’s heels—tap-tap-tap—and a fragment of the dream comes back. The crow and its white eyes…
Tap-tap-tap.
Her eyes wander away from Chase’s feet, beyond the TV, to the large window that looks into the room from the hallway outside. The guard is there. He’s cute. Nice, too. He sometimes—
Daisy gasps and straightens in the chair.
Tucker. His name is Tucker.
She shouldn’t know that, but she does. Before, she’d thought his name was Vance, which is what’s written on his nametag. He usually stops and speaks to her and to Chase when he has to come into the room. Sometimes she’ll catch him looking at her through the window, and they’ll exchange a smile before quickly glancing away.
Right now, though, his eyes are locked onto hers.
“Tucker,” she whispers. No one in the room hears her over the roar of the Family Feud audience. His eyes widen.
He knows, too. Maybe it wasn’t a dream. Maybe I’m not crazy.
But then Tucker—or maybe his name really is Vance—turns and walks away. She stares at the empty place where he’d stood, closes her eyes, and calls out to him silently.
Please come back. Don’t leave me like this.
“Daisy?”
When Daisy opens her eyes, a thin woman with teased blonde hair straight from the 1980s is smiling down at her. She has a kind smile. Karen. Her name is Karen. She has a son at UT.
The woman’s forehead creases with concern. “Sweetie, what happened to your noggin? We need to get a Band-Aid on that.”
Daisy tries to see around the nurse. To see if Tucker is there again. To see if her mind has somehow managed to conjure him back into place.
“Are you ready to go to your room?” Karen asks.
“Thank God,” Macy says from the sofa. “All that goddamn whimpering. I couldn’t concentrate worth a shit. And take the kid, too. Or at least tie his damn shoelaces to the chair so he quits that noise.”
Karen gives Macy a sharp look over her shoulder and then bends down to help Daisy to her feet. “Let’s get you out of here.”
TAP-TAP.
It’s only two taps this time. Louder, and the noise is coming from the opposite direction.
Daisy looks over Karen’s shoulder. Tucker is at the window again. His eyes are as confused and worried as she feels, but he gives her his best smile. The smile that has made her heart skip a beat since she was in middle school.
He places his palm against the window, holding up a sheet of white paper with black letters scrawled across the middle.
The air whooshes from Daisy’s lungs, and the room tilts. But her eyes stay locked on Tucker as she takes in the two words written on the paper.
I REMEMBER.
COMING SOON
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
First, a big thank you to Stephen King, Shirley Jackson, Ray Bradbury, Wes Craven, Tobe Hooper, Alfred Hitchcock, and all of the other writers and directors who have kept Rysa imagining what might be lurking in the dark and who have given Caleb far too many ideas for novel and gruesome ways to kill people. (Figuratively speaking, of course.) We had a blast tipping the hat to so many of our favorites. At some point, we’ll put together a definitive list of many dozens of Easter eggs in As the Crow Flies. If any of you have suggestions for additions in the next two books, hit us up on social media.
A joint thank-you to our beta readers, several of whom gave feedback on multiple versions of the story: Karen Stansbury, Billy Thomas, Chris Fried, Karen Benson, Fred Douglis, Becca Porter, Kristen Ashenfelter, Dori Gray, Jen Gonzalez, John Scafidi, Emiliy Marino, Nicole Tarife, Heather Jones, Mikka McClain, Cheyenne Chambers, Alexa Huggins, Mark Chappell, Devi Reynolds, Tracy Johnson, Ian Walniuk, Peter Walniuk, and the long-suffering person(s) we’ve almost certainly forgotten.
Thanks to Crystal Watanabe and Pikko’s House for finding our missing words, typos, and other glitches. Any errors that remain are totally on us, and mostly on Rysa, since she did the final pass.
For the many readers whose first questions are always whether it will be on Audible and whether Kate Rudd will be narrating—the delay is totally our fault. We got rolling a bit late, and Kate has been a champ to work us into her schedule. We have absolutely no question that the end result will be fabulous, as always.
And now for some individual words of thanks. Caleb leads off because this is his first book. (Insert applause.)
Caleb would like to thank:
Rysa Walker for being the best partner in crime an author could hope to have. When I get lost, I can always trust her advice and instincts to shine a light.
Shannon Sain—because she believed in me first, always takes my phone calls, and is the best friend that I will ever have in this world.
Ann Whitman—the first person to ever put a book in my hands and teach me the power of words.
Angie Kelsey—my mother and the greatest cheerleader on this planet. I love you, Mom.
Hannah Johnson—sister and “manager” extraordinaire. Always in my corner, always honest, and a role model for the human I hope to be.
Special thanks to all my friends who listened, read, and helped along the way: Zac Johnson, Eric Eldridge, Justin Adams, Quinn Webb, Stephanie Nuss, Dillon Mason, and everyone else that I know I’m probably forgetting. I’m sorry, guys… I’m already thinking about the next story.
Also, special thanks to Jake, Bridget, and Tucker.
Thank you to everyone who commented, shared, and conversed with me on social media. If you’re reading this, thank you, too. I hope you enjoyed the ride.
Rysa would like to thank:
Caleb Amsel for planting the vivid imagery that brought the town of Haddonwood to life in my head and made me want to join him in uncovering the story. He’s been very patient with my tendency to kill his darlings in the rewrite stage.
Huge thanks to my family, as always, for putting up with my crankiness when I’ve been up writing all night, for bringing me tea and coffee and conversation, and helping in so many other ways. That goes double for the past year, because we all know I bit off way, way more than I could comfortably chew. You guys are my world.
Mary Freeman has my unending gratitude for her document services. I owe you many margaritas and beach we
eks.
Griffin—thank you for snuggles on the couch while I edited this and for reminding me that all work and no play make Rysa go crazy.
Thanks to friends on social media for listening to me when I need to vent and an extra thank-you to the CHRONOS Repo Agents, who are always up for a snap poll on which cover option is best.
Finally, we’d both like to thank the readers, including fans of the CHRONOS Files and the Delphi Trilogy, who took a chance on a new co-authored series. Book Two is coming soon.
And you might want to buckle up, because all hell is about to bust loose in the South.
Also by Rysa Walker
The CHRONOS Files
Timebound
Time’s Edge
Time’s Divide
The Delphi Trilogy
The Delphi Effect
The Delphi Resistance
The Delphi Revolution
Novellas
Time’s Echo (A CHRONOS Novella)
Time’s Mirror (A CHRONOS Novella)
Simon Says (A CHRONOS Novella)
The Abandoned (A Delphi Novella)
Graphic Novels
Time Trial (The CHRONOS Files)
Short Stories
“The Gambit” in The Time Travel Chronicles
“Whack Job” in Alt. History 102
“2092” in Dark Beyond the Stars
“Splinter” in CLONES: The Anthology
About the Author: Rysa Walker
RYSA WALKER is the author of the Delphi Trilogy and the bestselling CHRONOS Files series. Timebound, the first book in that series, was the Young Adult and Grand Prize winner in the 2013 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards. The CHRONOS Files has sold more than half a million copies since 2013 and has been translated into fourteen languages.
Rysa currently resides in North Carolina with her husband, two youngest sons, and a hyperactive golden retriever. When not working on the next installment in her CHRONOS Files universe, she watches shows where travelers boldly go to galaxies far away, or reads about magical creatures and superheroes from alternate timelines. She has neither the time nor the patience for reality TV.
About the Author: Caleb Amsel
CALEB AMSEL grew up in the mountains of Tennessee, where folklore and superstition are traded as truth and ghosts are very real. Raised on a healthy diet of John Carpenter, Wes Craven, Shirley Jackson, and Stephen King, Amsel has been telling himself stories for decades. He thinks it's time to tell them to someone else. AS THE CROW FLIES is his first novel.