His head snapped back toward a cluster of trees, then he looked at me, his gaze intense once again. “Remember, you promised.” He backed away, his eyes never leaving mine. “I’m sorry about your mother.” He turned and walked off.
I pretended not to hear him over the noise packing my ears, but I watched him under the fringe of my eyelashes while I knelt next to the hole I’d dug. How did he know this was Mom’s grave? Did he work here? Maybe he knew her from somewhere. Though I’m sure Mom would’ve mentioned it if she knew the captain of the I’m Scarier Than You ship, especially if he was kind of beautiful.
Ignoring his threats and my promise, I continued digging.
I’m burying some of your favorite things with you. You don’t have to come back because you’ll already have everything you need.
Soon, I’d dug three holes each about a foot deep.
And don’t be mad, but I’m also going to bury some bricks over you just in case you do wake up. Ancient people used to put rocks over graves to keep their dead in the ground. I can’t remember who it was, though. You know I hate Mr. Lane’s history class.
I dropped her purple gardening gloves and the family picture into the three holes, then gently rested two bricks on top of each item. The first scoop of dirt back into the grave kissed the bricks and Mom’s favorite things with a soft smack.
I love you, Mom, but please don’t come back, please don’t come back, please don’t…
Even though the mouth of the Monroes’ basement wasn’t dark like it usually was, my heart still pounded as I looked down into its depths. When I’d seen Callum’s car parked out front, my stomach had flipped itself inside out. He was never here after school.
I pressed my lips together as Jo flew down the stairs, her skirt swinging wildly. She wanted to continue her recycling crusade with me, and I said I would go because I felt better about Mom staying buried after yesterday’s visit to the graveyard. But I planned to visit the next day just to talk. If Scary Boy happened to be there again, oh well. He could threaten me all he wanted.
Unable to stop my small-yet-anxious smile, I followed Jo at a much slower pace.
There was Callum, on the couch, his entire body twisted around to look at us rather than the TV. When our eyes locked, his mouth lifted into a brilliant grin. My heart grew wings.
“Why aren’t you at baseball practice?” Jo asked.
“Because I’m ineligible today.” He threw a glance at Jo and then looked back at me. “Mr. Mallory thinks I have an attitude problem.”
Jo rolled her eyes and flung her backpack into her bedroom. “No. Really?”
“You play baseball?” I asked.
Callum nodded, his arms and chin resting on the back of the couch.
My heart flew around my chest for a jock? Weird.
Jo turned to me, and I quickly averted my eyes from her brother.
“Food?” she asked.
Trick question. If I said yes, she would leave us alone down here. If I said no, she wouldn’t leave us alone down here. I nodded even though my stomach churned, and she shot up the stairs.
Callum was still looking at me, his brown eyes sparkling with the glow of his smile. “You can come sit down. Elf is willing to share his couch with you.”
He watched while I crossed the space between us and circled around to the front of the couch. I couldn’t hear the television anymore because blood rushed to my brain and roared between my ears. The gray and black striped cat snuggled in the corner of the couch next to Callum. I sat on the other side. Callum’s electric buzz ignited my skin even though no part of us touched.
His grin softened into a flat line, but his eyes were still warm. “How was your day?”Old people asked that question, not high school students. Yet he genuinely seemed curious.
“Fine, I guess. Yours?”
He shrugged. “The people in this town will find something new to be obsessed with soon. Some of the news stations left today. They’ve already moved on to the next big story.”
“Good,” I said, scratching at a snag on the couch cushion.
“Do you think it was Lazarus Syndrome that brought Sarah back?”
Hell no. “I don’t know.”
“People say it’s just like Lazarus from the Bible when he came back from the dead. A miracle.” His eyes searched mine. “You don’t believe it?”
The terrified face of Sarah in the graveyard leaped into my head. That wasn’t the face of someone who’d been miracle-ized. More like she’d made a deal with the devil to come back, and the deal went bad.
I shuddered and pushed the thought away. “No.”
“Then you’re on my side.”
“What’s your side?”
“The side that doesn’t think it was Lazarus Syndrome.” His tongue slid across his bottom lip. “The right side.”
“Oh,” I said, and my gaze shifted from his eyes to his mouth and back again.
“Just don’t announce that in the middle of a grief counseling Kumbaya class. Mr. Mallory will think you have an attitude problem.”
He was making it hard to concentrate. “What?”
“The seniors and anyone else who wanted to are taking a grief counseling class after Sarah’s suicide. The school doesn’t want us to get all depressed like she was. But now she’s back, and we’re still in the class.” He sighed and stroked Elf.
“Oh.” I nodded. Elf flipped over on the couch for a belly rub under Callum’s gentle touch. “So what do you think it was if it wasn’t Lazarus Syndrome?”
Callum shrugged. “Maybe she was never dead to begin with. She was never embalmed since her mom’s allergic to the chemicals. If she wasn’t dead, she would be after an embalming. Or maybe something else woke her up.”
“Maybe.” But what could make the dead wake up? Why would someone want to do that? What if they decided to wake up Mom? My palms grew sweaty so I wiped them on my pants.
Elf’s eyelids drifted closed while he lay belly-up. Callum gave him one last rub and looked back at me.
I cleared my throat. “So you don’t think it was a miracle either. Are you always right?”
“Yes.” His smile touched his eyes, and I decided that should be the natural state of his face.
The phone rang, making me jump.
“I’ll get it,” Jo yelled from upstairs.
I glanced up at the ceiling and silently thanked Jo for more time alone with her brother.
Callum must’ve sensed my thoughts because he leaned into me a few inches. The heat between us connected our bodies, even though we still weren’t touching. His eyes danced with what I guessed was longing as he inched his head forward a little more.
Roaring blood, booming heart, and zero oxygen. This is what it felt like to be almost kissed. At least, I thought that’s what he was going to do. I could barely breathe, but I didn’t care. Callum wanted to kiss me, and I needed him to do it.
He skimmed the side of my cheek with a fingertip, then blazed a trail of heat across my lower lip. “Crumb.”
His breath rippled cinnamon warmth through me. My breath was shallow, barely there, and I parted my lips for more air. “Oh.”
He took his finger away with a smile, and leaned forward a bit more.
Then Jo thundered down the stairs.
I flung myself off the couch and stood in the doorway of her bedroom, gasping for air for some reason even though we didn’t do anything.
She appeared at the bottom of the stairs. “Are you…okay?” Her eyes ticked between Callum’s enormous grin and my struggle to look cool. Suspicion was written all over her face.
“Fine.” I dodged to her side. “Ready?”
“Yeah.” She was still ticking. “Since you’re home, Cal, can I borrow your car?” Tick. Tick. “Or do you want to come with us?”
“I better behave myself and stay here,” he said through his grin. “I’ve got homework to do so I can be eligible to play a few more games before I graduate. Maybe you’ll come see me play sometime, Lei
gh.”
“Maybe,” I mumbled while I studied the light’s reflection off my ring.
“Keys,” Jo said.
“If you wreck it, I’ll wreck your face,” Callum said as he tossed his keys to her.
As soon as she caught them, Jo grabbed my elbow and pushed me upstairs. With a plastic bag of food and a clipboard under one arm, she escorted me outside with a look that suggested I should prepare for an inquisition.
Once we were inside the car, she opened the plastic bag and dropped it between us. A striped scarf hugged her head, and dark sunglasses perched on top. She studied me while she chomped an apple slice. Ignoring her, I grabbed one too and stared straight out the window.
“Leigh Baxton, what did my brother do to you?” she finally asked.
My face warmed before she even finished the question.
“You’re blushing.”
“I am not.” Stupid blush.
Jo chewed another apple slice. “Do you like him?”
I couldn’t help but smile. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
Jo laughed, threw her dark sunglasses on, and started the car. “It’s so weird. My brother and my best friend.”
“Why didn’t you mention he played baseball?”
“Because you never asked. You never showed the slightest interest in him before. So what happened?”
“I don’t know.” I brushed the lilacs on my ring with my thumb and shrugged. “The day after Mom’s funeral, he was…there. And he cared. And he makes the pain a little less…heavy.” The weight in my chest would always be there, but Callum seemed to carry some of the load for me.
Jo tried to look at the road and me at the same time. “Oh, Leigh. That’s the sweetest thing I’ve heard all day. And after the phone call I had earlier, that’s saying a lot.”
“Who was it?”
Jo turned the car onto a side street while her huge grin dripped into her voice. “Miguel from Spanish class.”
‘From Spanish Class’ was Miguel’s last name and must be connected to his first name at all times. According to Jo, that prevented any confusion to any other Miguels in school who were less crush-worthy.
“He asked you to marry him?”
“No. But he did ask me to a party this Friday.”
“Start your razors. You could make a hat from your leg hair for him.”
Jo laughed, which made me chuckle, too.
“You said yes, right?” I asked.
“I said I’d have to talk to you first.”
I looked down my nose at her. Was she serious? “I’m not your keeper.”
Jo winced at the road. “The party’s at the cemetery. Kids are going to sneak in and try to wake the dead.”
A chill coiled through my bones, and I wrapped my arms around myself to fight off a teeth-rattling shiver. “Why would they want to do that?”
“Because they’re crazed idiots who’ve latched on to the latest big drama.” She glanced at me and squirmed in her seat. “If you feel even a little weird about me going, I won’t.”
She wouldn’t, either, and she wouldn’t make me feel guilty about it. But I would feel guilty anyway if she didn’t go.
“It’s Miguel from Spanish class. You’re going.”
“Now I’m a crazed idiot who’s latched on to the latest big drama. Will you forgive me?”
I forced a smile. “Probably not.”
“If I go, I can make sure no one even thinks about waking the dead. I’ll bring my nun chucks to help them see why that’s not a good idea.”
“Where are we going for the petition today?” I asked, abruptly changing the subject.
“The far east side of town,” she said and squinted at the side of the road. “Hey…”
I followed her gaze. Further up the street, a group of junior high kids clustered in a yard, and sticks and rocks flew from their hands at the house in front of them.
As we drove closer, fear pricked the roots of every hair on my body. The grass the kids stood on was as black as my boots. The skeleton of a large tree in the yard looked just as grim as the lawn. Every leaf was gone.
Deep, bone-shaking shudders rolled through me. I’d never been to the house before, but I knew who lived there.
“What happened?” Jo whispered and stopped the car in front of a neighboring house.
I didn’t answer. The kids on the lawn were laughing and hollering while they chucked rocks at a large draped window on the first floor. Shattered glass sparkled in the sunlight, a sharp contrast to the dead grass underneath it.
A slow boil coursed through my blood until my hands became fists. They had no right to pelt Sarah’s house with their stupidity. I pushed the car door open and stomped up the sidewalk, ignoring Jo’s questions behind me.
As I neared the nightmare yard, a horrible stink nearly turned me back. The air smelled like rotten meat in a nasty gas station bathroom. My boiling blood propelled me forward in spite of the smell.
One kid’s hand coiled behind his head, about to launch another rock. “Your house smells like shit! Go back into the ground where you belong!”
The black, dead grass crunched under my feet as I approached him. I snatched the rock from his hand and twisted his arm behind his back.
The kid’s cry got the attention of the others.
“This kid says it’s time to go home. Right, kid?” I smiled down at him, daring him to disagree.
He nodded and whimpered.
“He also says you should never come back here. Right?”
Another nod and whimper.
I shoved him away, and he led the rest of the kids in a race down the street.
My gaze flicked to the dead tree, and shivers pebbled my skin. As I turned to run back to the car, something flickered in a second-story window. I didn’t want to look, but my head turned anyway.
Sarah. Her thin face was bone white. Her hairline had receded to the top of her skull from which a few stringy chunks of white hair hung to her shoulders. The ocean blue of her eyes was the same as it’d always been, but they were the worst feature of all. They were filled with such fear that I knew they would haunt me forever.
Her black lips opened as if she wanted to speak. Inside her mouth was the same horrible darkness that took over her lawn. It grew in intensity as her mouth opened wider. She might’ve been screaming, but I couldn’t hear a thing.
I stepped on the back of my boot in my hurry to get away from her, but caught myself before I fell on the dead grass.
She raised her hand, and I thought for a moment she was going to wave. Her forearm pushed against the glass. The deep cut along her wrist blazed red against the paleness of her skin. She brought her thumb and pinky together, leaving three fingertips pressed against the window.
I didn’t want to know what Sarah was trying to tell me. I choked back a scream and ran to Jo.
“Drive!” I shouted before my feet were in the car.
Jo took off.
I didn’t look back to see if Sarah was still in the window.
Staccato piano notes jarred me awake the next morning. It’s not like I was asleep, though—not with the image of Sarah in her window pounding against the walls of my head.
Who the hell was playing the piano? The sound shook my eardrums and vibrated through me. I pressed the sides of my pillow to my ears, but I could still hear it. The sun barely peeked through the closed blinds, so I knew it couldn’t be Darby. She was harder to wake up in the morning than me. Dad didn’t even know where to place his hands to make notes, so I knew it couldn’t be him, either.
A tremble of dread bolted me upright. I recognized the short, choppy notes of a song. The same Ramones song Mom used to play to wake Darby and me up every morning.
I pictured Mom hunched over the piano, dripping mud from her tattered dress, skeletal fingers pecking at the keys. Her black mouth was open in a silent scream as if she was trying to sing. Please, please, please, that couldn’t be real.
I was sure burying some of Mom’s fav
orite things would prevent her from coming back, but now that certainty poured out with my sweat.
After slipping out of bed, I crept to the door. My hand shook as I turned the doorknob and pulled. I peered out but didn’t see anything except the hallway wall, covered in family photos. My heart hammered my ribs ten times as fast as the pulse of each note. On silent feet, I edged down the hallway and stopped.
Please don’t let it be real.
My eyes fell shut while I gathered myself for a peek around the hallway wall. Trembling from head to toe, I opened them and dared a look.
There was Darby, squinting at the music in front of her through her glasses and hunting for each key.
I tore around the corner and slammed the piano lid closed. Darby withdrew her fingers just in time.
“What are you doing?” I yelled.
Darby stared at me, wide-eyed. “I was just trying to wake you up.”
“Don’t ever play that song!”
Darby opened her mouth as if to say something more, but then she covered her face with her hands. In that moment, I saw the graveyard’s little girl statue in my sister, trying to hide her grief in plain sight.
Anger flared through me. I snatched the music, but Mom’s glass with the rotten banana-looking seed pods inside it got in my way. All of them tumbled to the carpet.
I turned to stomp back to my room, but the pictures on top of the fireplace caught my eye. I grabbed every picture frame on the mantel, the glass, wood, and metal of each one clanking together loudly.
Dad came into the living room, rubbing his eyes. “I heard yelling. What happened?”
Instead of answering, I rushed by him.
“I wish Mom would come back!” Darby sobbed. “Sarah Henderson did, so why can’t Mom?”
I stopped as if I’d hit a wall.
“Darby…no,” I pleaded, turning to face her.
The rest of my words died in my throat when I saw Dad’s expression. His face was a mess of emotions, but the one that was most prominent, the one that rattled me to the core, was hope.
Did he really want Mom to come back like Sarah? Did he know what she looked like? Did he know about her terrifying front lawn?
I didn’t have time to explain to him how horrible it would be if Mom returned like that. Besides, Darby didn’t need to hear any of it. I hurried to my room, dumped everything into my backpack, and changed into school clothes.
The Grave Winner Page 4