“A blur,” I scoff. “Fine. Forget it.”
Boldly he catches my sweater as I whirl away from him. “Hey, hey, wait! Why’d you ditch us, anyway? And run for your mommy?”
“You know damn well why.” I pull free and smooth my sweater down. “Oh, and by the way, my candleholder? I spent days working on that thing. Thanks for nothing.”
“I can get it back for you,” he offers, “and we can glue it or something.”
“Right, get it back how?”
“I can hop that fence. I done it before,” he boasts.
Irritably I say, “It must be in a thousand pieces by now.” Funny how I didn’t realize till now how attached to it I was. That candleholder was first thing I’d ever made with my two hands. Lopsided or not, even Mom said she liked it.
“Look, I said I was sorry. I’ll get it back, I swear.” He shoves hair out of his eyes and smiles tentatively. “I really, um, like you, y’know? I guess you figured that out.” His toe scrapes the floor as he avoids my stare. “I mean, I know you’re with Brenner and all. But I keep thinkin’, if he hadn’t gotten to you first, maybe you and me …?” He shrinks at my look and plaintively adds, “I’m not really a jerk, honest. I just like to goof around.”
“Whatever.” Obviously he’s not going to tell me a thing about last night. All he wants is, well, me. Talk about nerve. “Forget it. See you around.”
I stalk off.
Cecilia ignores me both in art and chorus. Does she plan to stay mad forever? Or is she too embarrassed to talk to anyone after she massacred the National Anthem?
I hope it’s number two.
Approaching Dino was a waste of time. It occurs to me maybe I’ll have better luck with Jared—I know he saw what happened—but he’s nowhere around. Is he avoiding me?
And other than an occasional “hi,” Nate’s barely spoken to me since the dance.
At lunch, with the cafeteria humming around me, I rest my chin glumly in one hand. Then I sit back up and sniff my fingers. Lavender?
This is the same hand that skidded through the wax Saturday night. Hot, wet wax, when, as cold as that room was, it should’ve dried the second it hit the floor.
My hand itself looks perfectly normal. I sit there, sniffing suspiciously, while Tasha blabs about the regional diving competition coming up in a couple of weeks. Lacy whines that her head hurts again, and that Chad hasn’t sent her that plane ticket or answered her e-mails. Meg, keeping elbows on the table and her hands over her ears, mumbles occasionally so they’ll think she’s paying attention.
Lacy zeros in on my compulsive sniffing. “What—are—you—doing?”
Cheeks warm, I reach for my Snapple. I’ve taken three baths since Saturday. I wash my hands constantly. How can I still smell the wax on my fingers?
Dismissing my nonreply, Lacy continues, “I hope Chad’s not, you know”—she laughs weakly—“dumping me after all this. We even picked out baby names—Chad Junior for a boy and Chantal for a girl. Or maybe Chandra. What do you guys think? Chantal or Chandra?”
She can name it Osama or Guadalupe for all I care. Slowly my right hand creeps back up. Sniff … sniff. Confused, I frown. Now all I can smell is my pencil and a hint of soap.
No lavender.
“Is anyone listening to me?” Lacy asks petulantly when no one offers an opinion.
Meg massages one ear. “I can’t hear half of what you’re saying over all this buzzing.”
“Well, go see a doctor already! We’re sick of hearing about it.”
Tasha objects, “Speak for yourself. All you talk about is that loser, Chad. I bet he dumped you already and you’re too dumb to see it.”
Time stands still at our private table, while the cafeteria bustles with conversation and activity.
“What did you say?” Lacy asks slowly. Tasha, apparently rethinking the situation, pokes a straw into her milk carton. Lacy’s disbelieving eyes roam the table. “Do you guys really think that?”
Meg scooches her chair closer. “Nobody thinks that! Don’t even listen to her.” She glares at Tasha. Tasha then cocks one eyebrow at me, silently asking: Care to chime in?
I shake my head. I am so staying out of this.
Lacy crumbles. “Oh God. She’s right! Why else would he ignore me?”
She looks so, well, tragic, my resolve to stay mad at her, and the others, dissolves. It doesn’t mean I’m ready to forgive them for that séance prank. But Lacy’s on the verge of a serious wigout. To say nothing of being sixteen and pregnant in a stuffy town, with a preacher for a dad, no less. In the old days they used to write books about this stuff.
So I say, “I think you should e-mail him again and ask him straight out. If he says yes, then you can deal with it, right? It’s the only way to find out, instead of aggravating yourself to death.” And the rest of us, too.
Lacy blinks away tears. “Maybe you’re right.” She surprises me with a grateful smile.
The bell rings and we gather up our stuff. Meg asks Lacy, “Are you gonna be okay?”
Lacy nods. “I guess, if this headache ever goes away.”
As Meg and I head off in the same direction, she confides, “Jared’s acting all weird now, like he doesn’t want to be around me. I tried to talk to him but he keeps blowing me off.” Her face falls. “God, if I don’t get back on that squad I don’t know what I’ll do. I’m auditioning for a cheerleading scholarship in April. How’s it gonna look if I’m not on a team anymore? Or if Coach Koenig won’t give me a recommendation?”
“Lacy’ll get kicked off, too,” I remind her. “Sooner or later that coach’ll catch on that she’s”—I drop my voice, taking no chances—“you know what.”
“I know. And I’m worried about her headaches. What if it’s something serious, like a brain tumor?” She rushes on while I examine this ghastly idea. “She says she’s had a migraine every day since we—” She stops, stricken.
I stop, too, ignoring the jostles and rude comments. “What?”
“Remember the day she jumped you in the tunnel? When the air got all funny? That’s when. That’s when my ears started ringing, too.” Meg squeezes her books and starts walking again. “It’s a known fact that weird things happen in that tunnel. It just never happened to me before.” She taps one ear. “Not like this.”
What weird things? Before I can ask, Meg sprints ahead and disappears. I slow down, my brain spinning with improbable ideas. I go into that tunnel, too, sometimes twice a day. If there’s something “wrong” in there, why haven’t I felt it? Why didn’t I notice the funny air? Why didn’t I smell chlorine during that séance and morph into a mannequin?
Unless that chlorine thing was part of the joke, too.
The warning bell rings. I’m practically alone in the hall. I break into a run and reach my English classroom one second before Ms. Rasmussen closes the door.
Maybe it’s all a joke, one they planned from day one. A conspiracy designed to trick Corinne Jacobs into wondering if she’s losing her marbles again.
And, like before, everyone’s in on it. Everyone!
Maybe Mom’s right: maybe my meds aren’t working. Because there’s a word for this. It’s called P-A-R-A-N-O-I-A.
Not that I think anyone’s poisoning my food or following me with a camera. Been there, done that. This is not the same.
So far I’ve come up with three possible scenarios:
1. The séance was a setup. Freaks in this school think it’s funny to pick on the new girl, same way they think it’s funny to stand outside and scream “Can Annaliese come out to play?” This scenario means I’m not paranoid. Only suspicious. For good reason!
2. The séance was not a setup. Everyone did zombie out, but they have no memory of it. Therefore, I’m not paranoid because what happened really happened.
3. The séance was for real and everyone knows it. But they won’t discuss it because
A. they don’t trust me,
B. they don’t like me, or
C.
they’re playing it down because they’re plotting to get me alone after school, duct tape my mouth, and throw me over the fence so Annaliese can rip out my throat with her ghostly teeth.
Okay. Now that’s paranoid.
3 MONTHS + 30 DAYS
Tuesday, November 4
“For the holiday program,” Mr. Chenoweth announces, “I’ll need a couple of soloists.” He smiles ingratiatingly around the room. “You get ten bonus points just for trying out.”
I don’t need the ten points. Hello, it’s chorus?
“Pass,” I say when he calls my name.
“C’mon, Rinn, I know you have a nice voice. And your mom tells me you play the guitar.” I groan inwardly. “Why don’t you bring it in this week? I’ve got an idea.”
Thanks, Mom.
When Cecilia’s turn comes, she also passes. Heads swivel in surprise.
“I need a break,” she explains. “I always end up with a solo, so maybe it’s time”—she kicks my chair—“to give someone else a chance?”
Disappointed, Mr. Chenoweth says, “Well, if you’re sure,” and glances down at his list to bellow out the next name.
I steal a glance over my shoulder.
Cecilia smiles at me.
I catch up with her as she heads toward the sidewalk after school, hunched under a polka-dot umbrella in today’s relentless drizzle. “Why didn’t you try out today?”
She keeps walking. “You were at the game. You saw what happened.”
“But that was a fluke. Even professionals screw up. I mean, that crowd was huge, right? And then you had that problem that day …”
“What day?”
“The day we decorated the gym. When you lost your—” I stop on the sidewalk.
“Voice.” Cecilia stops, too.
Yes, yes—when she lost her voice!
“Crap,” I whisper. I can’t believe the words even as they fall from my lips. “We locked you in the tunnel and you lost your voice!”
“Thanks for saying ‘we’ instead of blaming it all on Lacy. Not that I care,” Cecilia adds, speeding up. “I’m sure it was her idea.”
“Forget that! Listen! Something weird’s going on.”
“You mean aside from you talking to me when I asked you nicely to leave me alone?”
Rainwater splashes my legs as I break into a jog. For a big girl, Cecilia’s fast on her feet. “Wait! I have to tell you something important and I can’t do it here.” I point to Millie’s Boxcar Diner. “Let’s go in. Please,” I beg as she lags back.
Disgruntled, Cecilia agrees. I choose a booth by the front window, away from Millie’s counter. I don’t need her listening in and then blabbing it all to Mom.
Millie slaps down our hot chocolate and, without asking, a plate of her famous onion rings. “Well, I think this is first time you stopped in here without your mom. What’s the occasion?”
I whip a random book out of my bag. “We have homework to discuss.” The second she’s out of earshot, I lean forward eagerly. “Tell me what happened when you were locked in the tunnel.”
Cecilia frowns. “Why?”
“You tell me first. Then I’ll explain it.”
“Forget it. I don’t trust you.”
“I know,” I say miserably. “I wouldn’t trust me either if I were you.” Relief rushes through me when Cecilia grins at my statement. “I apologized and I meant it. And if it makes you feel any better, Lacy’s not too thrilled with me for sticking up for you.”
Her grin vanishes. “You want a medal for that? Or just a pat on the head?” I wait patiently. She sighs. “I told you, I’m claustrophobic. What do you think happened?” She dunks the whipped cream down into her cocoa with a spoon. “You don’t know what I go through. I can’t shut my bedroom door. I can’t walk into a closet. I can’t even pee at school because of the stalls.” She ducks to take a sip. “You have no clue.”
Do I tell her? Do I dare? If she doesn’t trust me, how can I trust her?
“I get it,” I assure her. “Just tell me what happened in the tunnel.”
Beads of perspiration dot Cecilia’s wide forehead. She swipes them away with her crumbled napkin. “She slammed the door and I couldn’t get it open. I heard you guys laughing. At first, all I wanted was to get out of there so I could kick your asses! Then I panicked. It—it’s hard to describe,” she fumbles. “At first I can’t breathe. I’m sure I’m gonna die. But after that passes, it’s like I end up on this higher plane. I’m kinda out of myself, but not quite, you know? I still know what’s going on.” She crunches an onion ring. “There’s a name for that, um …”
“Depersonalization,” I recite.
She doesn’t ask how I know this. “Anyway, it usually happens on its own. But that time it didn’t. I couldn’t stop screaming. At least not until—” She bites her lip.
“Till what?”
“Till the air got in my mouth.”
For a minute I listen to the clatter of silverware and china. Millie’s joking with Edna, the lady who helps her out here. A jukebox plays Reba McEntire. The canvas awning outside thumps erratically in the wind.
It all seems so normal.
“Greasy air,” Cecilia clarifies. “Thick. Like Crisco or something.”
“What did it smell like?” I whisper.
“Bleach.”
My lips grow numb. “That’s when you lost your voice.”
She nods. “I couldn’t scream anymore. My whole throat closed up. I can’t remember what happened next, except I somehow got out and …” Cecilia strips the breading off an onion ring, rendering it naked. “Well, my voice came back, but it’s not the same. I—I’m tone deaf or something. I can’t sing anymore.”
“That’s why you messed up at the game. And why you didn’t try out for a solo today.” I add, more awestruck than afraid, “It stole your voice, Cecilia.”
“What?”
“The tunnel.”
“Annaliese, you mean?” Cecilia throws down her napkin. “Oh, give me a break.”
“But Meg says weird things happen in there …”
“Yeah, stupid things that happen to stupid people.” Ignoring my protests, Cecilia stands, wriggles into her roomy coat, and jerks her chin at the leftover onion rings. “It’s on you.”
Later, unable to sleep, I get up to make another list:
1. Lacy got headaches after she went into the tunnel. Plus she went Rambo on me.
2. Meg’s ears started ringing after she went into the tunnel. She fell on the ground in front of hundreds of spectators doing a stunt she’s done a thousand times.
3. Cecilia lost her voice after she went into the tunnel.
Laid out in front of me, it’s not much evidence. Three coincidences, all with explanations. Lacy’s headaches could be from stress or hormones. Meg’s ringing ears might be a medical thing. Maybe none of this has anything to do with the tunnel.
But Cecilia’s voice baffles me. How do you turn tone deaf overnight? It makes no sense.
What also makes no sense is that people use that tunnel every day. Has anything bad happened to anyone else? Nate might know. I bite my thumbnail, undecided—is he hugely mad at me, or just a teeny bit irritated?—and then dial his number without thinking any further.
“You know what time it is?” he asks sleepily.
“Sorry. I just want to know one thing: why is everyone so afraid of that tunnel?”
“What do you do? Lie awake at night and think of this stuff?”
“Seriously. You should see them after gym, banding together like buffalo. Do the boys do that, too?” I guess his silence means yes. “Meg said some weird things have happened to people in that tunnel. Is that true?”
“Flukes. Coincidences.”
“Oh, really? Like what?”
Nate yawns. “Oh, like a kid’ll come out of the tunnel and, I dunno … get sick all of a sudden. Or have an asthma attack. Or lose a report or a library book. Or punch his girlfriend, say, for no reason at all.”
“Yeah, well.” He sounds more awake now. “One teacher we had last year, he went into the tunnel to break up a fight. He had a drinking problem, I heard, but he’d been sober for years. He stopped at a bar after school, got drunk, and ran his car into a storefront.”
The Unquiet Page 13