The Hidden

by Jessica Verday

  “You guys,” Sara interrupted. “This is serious.”

  “Silence!”

  We all looked at Cyn. Her eyes were closed, but she had a look of determination on her face. “Someone is at the door. Trying to come through.”

  She lifted her head but kept her eyes closed. When she spoke again, there was something different about the texture of her voice, and she couldn’t seem to get out a complete thought. “… have to warn …,” she said. “Trouble. Coming. Trouble.”

  We all watched, mesmerized, as her body started jerking. Then her head fell forward.

  “Oh, shit,” Beth said, finally breaking our shocked silence. “Is she, like, having a seizure or something?”

  I couldn’t tell if this was all part of the show, or if something really was wrong. Either way, though, it was too much. It had gone on for too long.

  “Cyn?” I managed to get out. “Cyn, are you okay?” I went to put my candle down, and the instant it left my hands, Cyn’s head lifted up. Her eyes opened, and she screamed. A hoarse, terrible scream.

  We all gasped.

  Cyn started weeping. She covered her face with her hands, and then all of a sudden, she pointed at me. “You’re next! You’re next, and he’s coming, and you better be careful. He wants you and he means to have you. You’re next! You’re next! You’re next!”

  I was frozen. She was talking about him. Vincent. Was it Kristen trying to warn me away from her killer? Or was it Cyn just playing me?

  “Whoa, okay,” said Ben. “I think this is enough, Cyn. You scared us all pretty good.” He tried to put a hand on her arm, but she shook him off.

  “If you think what happened before was bad, just wait,” she said. “A little blood is nothing.” She sobbed again. “He will tear you to pieces! He will rip out your heart and soul just as surely as he did mine. Nothing will stand in his way!”

  Cyn reached out to me, bumping the pot so that it was dangerously close to tipping over. Someone dropped their candle, and it rolled across the floor, away from the group. Several heads turned to watch it.

  “Let’s go, Abbey,” Caspian said behind me, standing up. “I don’t know what’s going on, but she’s fucking crazy.”

  I scuttled back a bit. Closer to him, yet helpless to move away any farther. I was desperate not to hear what she was saying, and at the same time I was desperate to hear more.

  Cyn lunged. And then grabbed my face.

  “Abbey, Abbey, can you hear me?” she asked.

  “Kristen?” I whispered. Low enough so that no one else could hear me. “Kris, is it you?”

  She put one hand up against my cheek, and up close I saw her eyes. I would have recognized those eyes anywhere. They weren’t Cyn’s eyes. They were Kristen’s. “I’m sorry,” she said urgently. “Sorry this happened to you. Sorry … because of me …” Her words faded.

  “It’s okay, Kristen. It’s okay. Just stay. Please. Stay—” My voice broke.

  She smiled again. “You were my best—”

  “There’s so much I have to tell you,” I replied. “So much you don’t know. So much to talk about—” I found myself gripping her hands fiercely.

  Her eyes widened. “Be careful, Abbey! Be careful!”

  And then, as if on cue, all the candles went out.

  Someone screamed, and a flare of sudden panic grabbed hold of the room. “Who just touched my ass?” Beth shrieked.

  “Make it stop, make it stop,” Sara was saying in a small voice. Mark yelled for someone to find the damn light switch, and I held very still.

  Cyn’s hands were cold, and she was completely quiet.

  “I got it,” Ben said. The overhead lights flickered on a moment later. “Is everyone okay?”

  I glanced at Cyn. She looked confused. But more importantly, she looked … like her. Her eyes were green again. Not brown.

  “Why am I over here?” she asked. Then she saw our hands. “Did something happen?”

  “What do you remember?” I asked her swiftly. Quietly. “Anything? Do you remember starting the séance?”

  “No. Was it fun?”

  I didn’t know how much to tell her. What had just happened here? So I settled for “Yup. It was fun.”

  The rest of the room was buzzing with quiet conversation. No one was paying any attention to us, but I couldn’t stay. Couldn’t sit there and pretend that nothing had happened, when it felt like my insides were being turned upside down.

  “I need to go,” I said. “I’m helping … helping my mom out tonight. With a project.”

  “Are you okay?” Caspian asked me. “Love, are you okay?”

  Getting to my feet, I quickly jerked my head at him. “So, yeah. I guess I’ll see you at school, then,” I said to Cyn. “Thanks for inviting me.”

  I headed to the stairs before she could say anything else, calling a quick good-bye to Beth and Ben and leaving them behind as fast as I could. It felt like all of my nerve endings were jangling together and crashing under my skin—like I’d touched a live wire and couldn’t shake the sensation.

  Caspian followed me through the house. When we made it out the front door, he finally spoke. “What the hell was that all about?”

  “I don’t know. I think …” I gestured inarticulately. “I think it was Kristen.”

  “Abbey.” He stopped walking. “It wasn’t her.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because she’s not here. She’s dead.”

  I crossed my arms. “You’re dead. And I can still see you.”

  “That’s different.” He ran a hand through his hair. “You know that’s different.”

  “But it was her, Caspian. I know it! Cyn’s eyes changed and everything. She was channeling Kristen or something, and Kristen was trying to warn me. About Vincent. Why don’t you believe me?”

  He sighed. “I just don’t think it was her. Can we agree to disagree? All I’m worried about is whether or not you’re really okay.” He moved closer and put out a hand near my cheek. The faint hum where his hand would have touched my skin was a welcome distraction.

  “I’m okay,” I said softly. “I am. I’m okay.”

  He looked down at me, green eyes intent. “Then let’s go home?”

  I nodded. I didn’t know if that meant this conversation was over, or if it meant we’d discuss it more once we got there, but I didn’t care. All I wanted was the safety of my own bed. “Yeah. Let’s go home.”

  As soon as I stepped through the front door, Mom pounced. “Where were you?” she asked.

  “At a friend’s house,” I said wearily. “Why?”

  “Because I didn’t know where you were, and I was worried about you.”

  “I was fine, Mom.” I crossed to the fridge to grab an apple.

  “You can’t just—”

  “Just what? Just go hang out with a friend? I didn’t break curfew, so what’s the big deal?”

  Suddenly she came over and wrapped her arms around me. Taken by surprise, I just stood there. “You’re right,” she whispered as she held on tight. “I’m just a mom who worries too much. And I worry because I have something important to ask you.”

  Trying not to let my impatience show, I said, “What is it?”

  “Do you think—” She stopped, and paused. Then started again. “Do you think that it would be possible for you to stay at a friend’s house for Halloween weekend? Maybe Beth’s? Or Cacey’s?”

  “Why?” I said suspiciously.

  “Your father and I would like to go away for a mini vacation. There’s this romantic little B and B in Connecticut that I’ve been dying to stay at for years, and now is the off-season. We’re getting a great rate, plus an automatic upgrade.”

  She looked hopeful, and I felt some of that hope transferring to me. Mom and Dad were going to be out of the house for Halloween weekend? That meant I could have the entire day of November first to be alone with Caspian.

  A touchable Caspian.

  I’m going to get the chance to be wit
h Caspian. Here. Alone! That thought was happy enough to make me forget about what had just happened at Cyn’s.

  “Yeah, Mom,” I said with a slow smile, catching Caspian’s eye. He was smiling too. “I can stay at Beth’s.”

  “Really? That’s great! I’m so glad that works for you, Abbey. I didn’t want to push you too hard with things being so … unsettled.”

  “Unsettled” must be code for the break-in.

  “You and Dad totally deserve a weekend away. I hope you have fun. And enjoy yourselves.” Okay, so that’s a bit much. … But, whatever it takes to get you guys out of the house.

  She beamed at me until eventually I stepped out of the hug. “Okay. I’m going up to bed now. School tomorrow.”

  “Okay, sweetie. Sleep tight. See you in the morning.”

  “Night!” I called, trying to hide the huge grin covering my face. I wasn’t going to “sleep tight” tonight at all. This turn of events was too exciting.

  Turned out, I was right about the not-sleeping part. But it wasn’t because of excitement. It was because of bad dreams.

  My bed was soft and squishy—unnaturally so—and I squirmed around, trying to find a spot that felt better. I tried to throw a hand above my head to readjust my pillow, but my hand stayed put. It wouldn’t move.

  Frowning, I looked down at it. The room was too dark for me to see anything. Shifting my weight, I went to turn over and switch sides. But I bumped into something hard. And cold.

  Fear rode up on me, and I wiggled my shoulders, forcing my hand to move an inch. It jerked to the left, and hit something cold and hard there, too.

  Frowning again, I tried to sit up. Tried to focus.

  I couldn’t move.

  “Help!” I opened my mouth to form the word but no sound came out. My throat flexed and constricted, but there was no voice. “Help!”

  I tried again. Gasped. But still, nothing.

  “No one can hear you, silly,” a voice said in my ear. “It’s just you, me, and the maggots.”

  I clamped my lips shut as revulsion turned my stomach. It’s not her. It’s not Kristen!

  “I’ve been waiting for you,” she said in a singsong voice. “Now we can lie here for an eternity together and keep all our secrets. All of our secrets, forever and ever.”

  I squeezed my eyelids shut, holding them as tightly closed as I could. This is a dream. You’re dreaming. It’s not real. Just open your eyes and you’ll see. This is a dream. It’s all a dream.

  Suddenly there was light behind my closed eyes, and when I opened them, I could see a wooden plank being lifted above my head. A clod of dirt hit my face, landing dangerously close to my mouth, and I could taste the earth.

  Instantly a spray of dirt showered down upon me, and I was hopeless. Surrounded by cold, hard wood. Above my head. Below my feet. At my sides. … I was in a coffin.

  I couldn’t hold back the scream of fear and anguish then. And this time sound came out.

  My hands unclenched, and gripped the edges of my clothes. My beautiful Victorian white dress that I’d been saving for Caspian’s death day. “No!” I screamed, glancing down at it. “No! This isn’t real!”

  A shadow fell over me, and I looked up. Vincent stood there, his dark head blocking out the sunlight.

  “How do you like it?” he asked, his teeth growing monstrously larger with every word. “It’s your new home. I built it special.”

  “Let me out of here!” My voice was working now, and so were my fists. I banged them on the sides of the wood as hard as I could. “Let. Me. Out!”

  “And leave your best friend down there to rot away all by herself?” Vincent laughed. “I couldn’t do that. That would just be … cruel.”

  His laughter filled my head. His voice was so loud that I shoved both fingers into my ears to try to drown him out as a red rose was tossed down upon me.

  “Ashes to ashes,” he said, then tossed another one. “Dust to dust.”

  “Nooooooooo,” I screamed again. “Nooooo!”

  “This is what happens. After.” Kristen’s voice was back again. “This is what happens after you fall in love,” she said. “Just take it from me.”

  A bony hand wrapped around my wrist. With every fiber of my being, I wanted to shake it off. Wanted desperately to climb out of that hole and leave everything behind. But instead I did something worse.

  I turned to look at her.

  She was nothing but a skeleton head, with no skin and only globs of hair. Her jawbone worked with a creaky back and forth hinge motion, and the teeth looked like they were ready to fall free from their sockets.

  My stomach revolted. I was going to be sick.

  “You should have known,” the head cackled. “Look at me. Just look at me!”

  Chapter Nineteen

  TELEPHONE

  … it is a favorite story often told about the neighborhood round the winter evening fire.

  —“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”

  I told Caspian about my dream the next morning, and he was just as unsettled about it as I was. He thought maybe it had something to do with what had happened at the séance, but I wasn’t so sure. Deep down I was worried that it was a whole subconscious metaphor for me being afraid of death and all that.

  I was thinking about it at school on my way to fourth period, when I ran into Cyn. She was coming down the opposite hall, and I turned to go the other way.

  Cyn hurried to catch up as soon as she caught sight of me.

  “Abbey, wait!” she called.

  I was tempted to ignore her. I couldn’t stop thinking about that dream, and it felt like dark clouds were hanging over me with every step I took. I really wasn’t in the mood to talk about what had happened with her and Kristen. But I stopped anyway.

  “What is it, Cyn?” I said slowly.

  She looked around us and pulled me over to a section of empty lockers. “I wanted to talk to you about last night. Are you pissed at me?”

  I shifted my books. “No. It’s not you. I’m just in a bad mood.”

  “Is it because you heard?”

  “Heard what?”

  “It’s stupid.”

  “What is it?” I demanded. “What’s stupid?”

  She glanced down at the floor. “God, I could use a cigarette.” Then she glanced up at me. “Trying to quit.”

  She was wearing some type of bangle bracelets, and they all clanked back and forth as she fidgeted. It was an explosion of sound that felt like nails on a chalkboard.

  I wanted to shake her as she stalled. “Just tell me, Cyn,” I finally said.

  “It’s douche bag Mark. He told a couple of people about what happened at the séance.”

  What do they know? What did they hear? “Told people what?”

  “About the lights going out. He said that you got scared and bailed. I told him he was an asshole, and then I keyed the side of his car to make sure he got the point.”

  “Thanks?”

  I tried to look serious, but I couldn’t help but laugh. He was spreading rumors about me being afraid of the dark, and Cyn thought that would upset me? It was like that game we used to play in elementary school, telephone. God only knew what the rumor had morphed into now. Talk about funny.

  “Why are you laughing?” she asked.

  I choked back another giggle. “Because,” I said. “That’s pretty much the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Compared to the things they were saying about me when Kristen died …” I shook my head. “It would take a lot more than that to upset me.”

  “Yeah, okay. Glad you find it funny,” Cyn said.

  “I do find it funny. But thanks for sticking up for me. I really appreciate that.”

  She gazed at me with a mix of humor and disbelief on her face. Then her expression turned serious. “Abbey, did I say anything to you at the séance? About being careful?”

  Now it was my turn to fidget. I ground the heel of my shoe into the wooden floors and stubbed my toe against the bottom of the
locker doors. “I don’t remember. Maybe. Why?”

  “It’s just this feeling I have. Sometimes I get these … I don’t know how to word it. They’re just … feelings. But this one’s telling me you should be careful. I know you warned me to watch out, but I’m thinking maybe you should too. Okay?”

  The second bell rang. Now I was technically late for class.

  “Yeah, I will,” I said nonchalantly, turning away from her.

  “We cool?” she asked.

  “Absolutely. Catch you later.”

  I peeked back at her only once as I walked away. She was still standing by the lockers, frowning, playing absentmindedly with the bracelets on her arm. I didn’t know what was going on with her, or what it meant, but somehow, or some way, Cyn had channeled Kristen.

  Now I just wondered how long it would take for her to realize it.

  I didn’t wait for Caspian to come pick me up after school, but started home right away.

  When I got there, I found a note from Mom saying that she would be out for the evening taking real estate classes with Sophie.

  “Not a problem,” I said out loud to the note. I just wanted to see Caspian.

  As soon as I thought his name, I paused. Where is Caspian? Is he still up in my room?

  I took the stairs two at a time, knowing, just knowing, what I was going to find. Please, don’t let him be asleep. Just let him be busy. Drawing.

  My book bag fell out of my grasp and landed on the floor with a thud when I saw him. He was asleep again, but he wasn’t on the bed this time. Instead, he was slumped over in my desk chair. His pad and pencils lay on the desk in front of him.

  It didn’t look comfortable, and his face … His face was the worst part. It was contorted in agony, in a grimace that must have happened right before he fell asleep, fell into that dark place. It looked like his dreams were haunting him.

  I rushed over and knelt beside him, putting out a hand.

  It went right though without the familiar tingle. I couldn’t do anything. Couldn’t move him, or smooth back his hair. Couldn’t wake him up and tell him it was all going to get better.