by Carrie Jones
“Caught me, didn’t you?” she asks, smiling back at me.
“Yeah. Nice one, Miss Avery. Going Dr. Phil on me.”
“So, what would you do? If, of course, you were going to try something?”
I think about it. “A few things, I guess. When I burned the sage incense last night, the scratching stopped and she went to sleep. I think we should do a smudging in Aunt Lisa’s house.”
“Smudging?”
“It’s—” I stop and pull back a little to see all of her face. She looks serious, but I feel self-conscious. “You’re okay with this? I mean, it might seem kind of hokey if you don’t believe in it.”
“Alan, I’ve seen my best friend turn into some kind of monster. She threw you—yes, threw you, a great big football player who saved a lot of games for his team in Oklahoma, according to your hometown newspaper—she threw you across the cafeteria today. That was not Courtney Tucker. Yes, I believe.”
“Okay. So we’re on the same page here,” I say. It still takes all of my strength to keep from kissing her. She wriggles around until she’s lying on the tree house floor, her face beneath mine.
“Yes,” she says coyly. “Same page. What is smudging?”
“You take a bundle of dried sage, light it on fire, and you walk through the house with it and fan the smoke around with feathers. I think they have to be owl feathers. And you pray to the Great Spirit, asking him to bless the house and drive away any evil spirits.”
“Is that it? Will that work?”
“I don’t know.” I hang my head a little. “I keep saying that, huh? I don’t know. I really don’t. But I think smudging will not be enough. At best, it might buy us some time, give us a few days for something else. Something more extreme.”
“What?”
“Exorcism.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
She looks up at me in a very serious way, and I wish I could give her some deep philosophical words promising that I can do it and that everyone will be okay afterward, that life will go on like it should. Instead, I can only smile at her like a guy trying to hide the fact that he’s just torn his ACL.
“How do you do that?” she asks.
I can’t bring myself to say “I don’t know” again. I clear my throat. “I’ll have to do some more research. There may be certain prayers that have to be used. I think I have to fast and do a sweat lodge first so that I can be purified.”
She grins up at me. “So you’ll be pure, like new snow? Are you pure, Alan Parson?”
God, she’s beautiful.
“What’s that?” she asks.
We both lie there completely still for a minute. Far away there’s a noise like a truck barreling up the street. But it’s no truck. We both know it. Her hand trembles. My heart hiccups in my chest. Still, we sit up to face it. Looking out the A-frame of the tree house, we can see a cloud of old leaves and dirt moving toward us up the street ahead of a strong and completely unnaturally focused wind.
“We should get down,” I urge. Loose hair lashes across my cheek.
“Not on the ladder.”
I lean over the edge. No, we can’t get caught clinging to the side of the tree. I turn around and lunge for Aimee, grabbing hold of her and covering her as best I can with my body as a wave of leaves and trash crashes into one end of the tree house. She screams beneath me. The wind is so strong I’m afraid it will get under us and throw us out of the tree house.
“Onawa!” I yell into the wind. “Great Spirit, protect us.”
The wind finds a voice. It roars around us, swirling in the tight confines of the tree house so that the wood groans and stretches. Some boards are splintering around the edges. The tree rocks madly, like a frenzied fan at a Slayer concert. Inside my head, the voice of the wind is screaming at me, challenging me.
The tree house echoes with demonic laughter. It fades as the wind rushes out the opposite end from the one it entered and flies off down the slope toward the river. Sticks and pebbles litter the floor. Dry autumn leaves and a ragged bit of newspaper flutter and collapse around us like dying birds.
Under me, Aimee is sobbing. I push myself off her, but pull her close against me. She clings to me, crying. I want to cry, too. That was damn scary.
My cell phone rings. I take my arms from around Aimee and fish it out of my jeans pocket. It’s Mom’s ringtone.
“This is my mom,” I say. “She’ll tell us that Courtney is better. She’s resting.”
Aimee nods. “I know. We were wrong. It’s like he recharges from her now, gets all his energy out of her and then uses it up doing crazy stuff, and then sucks it all out of her again.”
Not a good thought. I hit the button to accept the call.
“Alan, where are you?” Mom asks.
“I’m at Aimee’s.”
“Who?”
“Aimee. Courtney’s friend.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, Mom.” Almost shaken out of a tree house by an evil spirit, but otherwise fine. “How’s Courtney?”
“She’s resting. Finally.” Mom sounds very tired.
I look at Aimee. She heard and nods at me.
“She settled down all of a sudden, didn’t she?” I ask.
“Ye-es. How did you know?”
“You won’t get mad?” She doesn’t say anything. “Mom, I don’t think Courtney has a tumor, or any kind of disease. I think it’s something else. I think there’s a ghost or something bothering—”
“Alan, please. Please. Just don’t. I’ve let you read what you want, let you pretend you’re some Native American, even let you wear that disgusting bag around your neck, but you can’t … This isn’t about you, Alan.”
Aimee looks very, very sorry and I know she heard every word.
“Okay.” It’s all I can say.
“I swear, Alan,” Mom goes on. “You think, what? She’s possessed? Like in the movies?”
“I guess not.” I swallow down the anger bubbling up my throat.
“Don’t you dare mention that to Lisa. You understand me?”
“Yeah. I understand.”
“If you’re okay, I’m going to stay here for a while,” Mom says. “Lisa is still frantic and almost exhausted. The doctors are talking about giving her a sedative, too. That’s what they did with Courtney. They pumped the poor girl full of tranquilizers. It took a long time for them to work, though.”
“Was she cussing at everyone?”
“Alan,” she warns.
“Just asking.”
“This isn’t a game.”
“I know, Mom. I know it isn’t a game.”
“I don’t know when they’ll let Courtney go home. If they keep her overnight, and I can only imagine they will, Lisa wants to stay here. You might need to come get me.”
“I will. Bye.”
I put the phone back in my pocket.
“Sorry,” Aimee offers. I wave it away like it’s nothing, but she knows. She grabs my hand and holds it tight in both of her little hands. Touching her doesn’t make me feel like I’m getting shocked anymore, or like I’m seeing visions; instead it’s just warmth, a healing kind of warmth. I remember what she told me about dreams that evening we first talked on the phone.
“You see things, don’t you? Things that have happened or that will happen in the future?”
“Sometimes.” There’s fear in her voice. That doesn’t comfort me.
“What do you see for Courtney? How about me? Us?”
She shakes her head. “I can’t. I see bad things, but nothing … nothing solid. Just threats. So far.”
Her eyes look toward the river. She shudders and says, “Let’s go inside.”
“What if we ate it and replaced it with another Cheeto? Do you think they’d notice?” We have homework spread out on the kitchen table, but we’ve barely looked at it. Who can do homework in the presence of such an expensive Cheeto?
Aimee laughs at me and takes the plastic bag out
of my hand as if she were afraid I might actually do it. “I think they have every bump on this Cheeto memorized.”
She looks at the Cheeto, then puts it back on top of her refrigerator. I can’t believe I was just holding a Cheeto that is already worth more than I paid for my truck.
“You can eat dinner with us,” she says.
“Would your dad mind?”
“Of course not.”
I shrug like I’m totally cool and not at all nervous about meeting her dad. Then I remember something else. “How did you know about those newspaper articles about me saving games?” I ask.
“I might have googled you.”
“That sounds dirty.”
“It would really go a long way toward impressing my dad if you helped me with dinner,” she says. “And stayed to eat it with us.”
“I don’t know. If I had a hot daughter like you and I came home from work and found some guy playing house and cooking dinner with her, I’d probably shoot him.”
“I am not hot.”
I can’t help but laugh at her.
“Gramps will be home first. Today’s his day to visit friends at the senior center. Then Benji. Dad’s always late, but he’s been better the last couple of days.”
“Great.”
“What?”
“It’s like two practice runs before your dad gets here. If your grandpa doesn’t throw me out and I survive the wicked glare of your little brother, then I get to face off against your suspicious father.”
“What would he be suspicious of ?”
“My intentions toward his daughter.”
“And what are your intentions?” She smiles a teasing smile and again I want to lunge across the table and kiss her.
“You’re the psychic on this exorcism team,” I say. “I suspect you know my intentions.”
• 15 •
AIMEE
Gramps tromps through the door and doesn’t even pause when he sees Alan at the table doing homework with his giant long limbs sprawling everywhere. He just puts his hat on the coat hook, takes his shoes off, and slides on his bright yellow Crocs, which are hideously ugly. Then he Croc-walks over to me, kisses the top of my head, and says, “Well, who do we have here?”
Alan stands up, hitting the table with his thigh. Papers jiggle. He reaches out his hand. “Alan Parson, sir.”
I half want to laugh but the other half of me is so proud that he’s polite.
Gramps takes his hand and shakes it. “Good to meet you. I’d ask if you were tutoring Aimee, but I know she doesn’t need a tutor. Is she tutoring you?”
“No, sir … I …” Alan looks to me for help.
“We’re just hanging out,” I say.
Gramps nods. “What happened to the other one?”
“He turned out to be a racist,” I finally admit.
Gramps digests that pretty quickly and nods at Alan. “And you’re the race he was ist against, huh? You Native American?”
Alan’s fingers twitch a little. “Part. Navajo.”
“Good. Good. This place is too damn white anyway.” Gramps heads toward the fridge.
Alan’s smiling this ridiculously large smile and just watching him. It’s pretty obvious he likes Gramps.
“He’s Court’s cousin. He and his mom just moved here from Oklahoma,” I explain, then feel like a total jerk. “I’m sorry. I’m talking about you in the third person.”
Alan just smiles even bigger and shrugs.
“Aimee tell you about our Cheeto? Looks just like Marilyn Monroe.” Gramps whirls around. “You do know who Marilyn Monroe is?”
“I know.” Alan sits back down at the table. He stretches out his legs beneath it. His calves are on either side of my legs. “I think it’s amazing what people will pay for it.”
“I’ll tell you what’s amazing.” Gramps makes us wait for it, pouring some water. “What’s amazing is that we even had a bag of Cheetos in this house in the first place, with Little Miss Health Nut here.” He gestures to me.
Alan clears his throat. “She can’t be that bad if you’re having hamburgers for dinner.”
“You staying?” Gramps asks.
Nodding, Alan looks to me for verification. “If that’s okay.”
“It’s okay.” Gramps asks me, “You tell him what we’re having?”
“Burgers,” I say innocently.
“Not hamburgers. Veggie burgers. You ever have veggie burgers?”
“Uh … no. I’m from Oklahoma. If it doesn’t bleed, we don’t eat it.”
“Exactly.” Gramps claps him on the back. “Man after my own heart. Your brother home yet?”
It takes me a second to realize that he’s talking to me again. “Benji? No … I think the Vachons are dropping him off.”
Gramps snorts. “He’ll put you through the wringer. Don’t let him bully you. He’s all of four foot eight, but he’s one intimidating little son of a gun.”
“I won’t,” Alan says.
The door flies open and there’s Benji. He stands there gaping and then points at Alan. “It’s him!”
Nobody says anything.
Benj rushes over to Alan. “You are freaking huge. Your hair is like eight feet long. Do you have split ends? Aimee’s always whining about her split ends.”
“Benj,” Gramps interrupts. “Why don’t you go change into some clean clothes?”
“What? And leave the lovebirds alone?” Benji singsongs.
“Yes.” Gramps smiles and pushes him toward the living room and the stairs. “Exactly. Notice the lovebirds doing their homework. Maybe you should do the same.”
At that moment I don’t think I’ve ever loved anyone more than I love Gramps.
We eat. Alan even swallows the veggie burger. Dad works late, doesn’t show up, and then it’s time for Alan to go. I walk him to the truck.
“I don’t want you to leave,” I say.
He touches the side of my face with his fingers and the whole world spins out of control in this crazy-good way. I think he’s going to kiss me, but he doesn’t. His fingers drop and I almost think I imagined it. He says, “I know.”
“You’ll be safe, right?” I pull in a big breath. “Nothing will happen, right?”
“Nothing will happen.” He folds me into a hug, but it isn’t long because it’s so obvious that Benji’s watching from the window. “You call if you need me.”
“You, too.” I hate pulling away. I hate how it’s suddenly so cold without him. “Tell me if you hear anything about Courtney. Deal?”
“Deal.”
He drives away, and suddenly the night seems a whole lot darker and a whole lot more sinister. A twig snaps in the woods. Wind blows a leaf across my foot. I hurry inside, but honestly, I don’t know if it’s any safer in there.
Dad comes home, making apologies and explaining that Courtney seems a little bit calmer, although they’re keeping her sedated overnight at least. I warm him up some food, go upstairs, and paint for a while. I can’t focus, though, so I do the horrible obsessed girlfriend thing and google Alan again. I pull up picture after picture of him on the football team making play after play.
I know nothing about football. I really know nothing about Alan. What if he’s playing me? What if Courtney has a brain tumor? What if those dust storms were just dust storms? A cold wind blows through my window. I shiver and leap over my bed to shut it. Something is on my windowsill. It’s a rock. There’s a word painted in yellow on it: MOM.
My right hand whispers down. My finger touches the rock. It’s cold and gray, round, and about half the size of my palm. My finger moves toward the word, the bright stain of it against the stone.
The paint is still wet.
“Dad!” I scream-shriek it. I stare at the tip of my finger. A dot of yellow stains it. “DAD!”
He thunders up the stairs, but Benji gets there first. He stands at my door, pajama-boy with crazy-wild hair. “Aimee?” He rubs at his sleepy eyes.
My dad bullets past him, leap
s on my bed, pulls me into his arms. “Honey? What is it?” He rocks me into him, rocks us back and forth like a lullaby movement can make it all better. I stare into the gray T-shirt he always wears to bed.
“Aimee?” Gramps’s voice finds me. “You have a nightmare?”
I pull away from Dad, making big eyes so Gramps knows I’m lying. “Yeah.”
He looks at Benji, nods at me, puts his hand on Benji’s shoulder, and says, “Off to bed, kiddo. Nothing to see here.”
“I get nightmares all the time,” Benji mumbles. “I don’t wake up the whole house.”
“Benji!” Gramps warns.
My dad pulls me in to him again. He’s warm from being asleep under the covers. “I am so worried about you, kiddo.”
His voice is a broken rocking horse trying to rest, trying to find something solid for balance.
I lean away from him. “I went to shut my window and I found that on the sill.”
I point to the rock.
“A rock? You screamed about a rock?”
“I didn’t put it there.”
“Maybe Benji?”
“Look at it, Dad. It’s got paint on it. It says …”
He leans his long trunk across my comforter and peers at it. “Did you paint that on, Aimee?”
I yank my knees to my chest. “Dad! No.”
“She didn’t do this,” Gramps says. I’m not sure when he came back in the room. He crosses his arms in front of his chest. “You know that.”
“Dad! Did you or did you not see a knife spinning on our stove the other day? I am not the kind of genius who can do stuff like that. And did we or did we not all hear freaking footsteps upstairs? They sounded like Mom! You know they did!” I push myself far, far away from them, against my bed. “I know you think I’m crazy like her, but I’m not!”
Even I can hear that it’s like I’m trying to convince myself.
Silence.
My dad whispers, “Your mother was not crazy.”
“Son—” Gramps starts.
“She wasn’t!” Dad lunges off the bed, lumbering toward him like some sort of angry grizzly bear. “Don’t start with that, Dad.”
“That’s not the point,” I interrupt. “The point is that there is a freaking rock on my windowsill and I did not put it there.”