“Thanks,” I mumbled, her enthusiasm a little overbearing. “I guess I should go now, before I’m late.”
Istopped at my locker only long enough to drop off my coat. Doing so made me realize why this particular locker was available. I had to put the combination in half a dozen times before it worked. Somehow I managed to make it to homeroom before the bell rang.
The first thing I saw when I stepped into the classroom was the boy with the sky-blue eyes. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to turn away before he swiveled his gaze in my direction. Great.
“Excuse me,” came a voice from behind me. “Miss? Hello?”
I turned around. “Huh?”
A short, older man with round, wire-frame glasses smiled at me. He must be my homeroom teacher. I glanced at my schedule. His name was Mr. Dougherty, and I would also have him for my AP social sciences class.
“Are you always this aloof, Miss…Miss…?”
“I – uh – I’m Emily Bishop.” I thrust my schedule forward. “I think this is my homeroom.”
He reviewed the page. “I’m Mr. Dougherty,” he said, in case I couldn’t read. “You’ll want to get your wits about you by next period,” he said, smiling as though amused by my predicament. “Take a seat.”
This was the crappy part of being new: having to find an empty chair, so you end up looking at everyone and everyone ends up looking at you. I started at the opposite side of the room from where he was sitting. For once, luck was on my side. An empty seat – not as far from him as possible, but far enough that I wouldn’t have to make small talk. Two rows over and a row behind.
I slumped into my chair and took out a sketchpad. Drawing was the one activity I could get lost in. In fact, I would often go into a trance while sketching, though lately the result was always a picture of my mom.
At least I could draw her without worrying death would follow. But sometimes I wondered if I was really cured of drawing people at risk of dying, or if somehow my mom was still in danger.
Before Mom’s death, my drawings all resulted in the same outcome: every person I drew wound up dead. Some of them I knew, some I didn’t. Sometimes they appeared on the news a few nights after I drew them, part of some tragedy – the stuff people like to ignore in favor of celebrity gossip. Things changed only slightly after Mom died all too young of a “heart attack.”
Following her “accident,” my therapist encouraged me to take up drawing again. He said not to think. To let go. Thing was, this thing he called “Hypno-Drawing” wasn’t new to me – I just hadn’t known the name for it. And I certainly hadn’t been doing it all these years on purpose.
When I told the doctor about this, he proposed a new theory: if I did the Hypno-Drawing activity intentionally, the trance drawings would stop happening on accident. And those were the scary ones – the ones that meant someone was going to die.
So I took his suggestion, and it seemed to work. Now Mom was the only one I sketched. It was also the only way I could ever see her.
When the bell signaled the next change of classes, I snapped out of my trance. I stared down at my paper, and my heart jumped to my throat.
Him.
I slammed a notebook on top of the sketchpad, my face burning. I checked over at where he’d been sitting, but he wasn’t there anymore.
“I thought it looked good,” came a voice from behind me.
No.
I didn’t have to turn around to know it was him. My terrible luck had dictated that.
I pulled my notebook and sketchpad to my chest, stood, and walked out of the room without looking back.
For a long time, I thought Hypno-Drawing had fixed me. But now…now I worried all I had done was learn how to control it. That I hadn’t ever made the curse go away, that maybe I just hadn’t been around anyone else at risk.
Until now.
Second period went as expected.
A girl three rows behind me threw a rolled up piece of paper at my head. Then she and a friend giggled. The more I ignored them, the more they tried to get my attention. That was what adults didn’t understand. The whole “ignore them and they’ll stop” thing was a fallacy. I thought if I ignored them hard enough, I could pretend they had stopped, but that didn’t work, either.
By the end of class, I had no idea what the teacher wanted me to know, but the girls sitting behind me were ready to tell me their version. As I stood, they blocked the aisles on both sides of my chair.
“Emily, is it?” asked the one with long, silky blonde hair. She was one of those unfairly beautiful types. She cocked her head to one side and clicked her tongue, then slid to sit half-on, half-off the edge of my desk, supporting her weight on one hand and leaning her face close to mine. “You have some serious nerve talking to Noah. I doubt you could keep his interest for more than a week.”
“If that,” her friend chimed in, cherry red curls shivering. “I don’t know how things work where you’re from, but here, girls don’t throw themselves at the first man who walks by.”
So that was his name. Well, they had it all wrong. “I’m not interested in him. I bumped into him. He showed me how to get to the office. That’s all.”
“Uh-huh,” said Blondie, giving an exaggerated nod and a frightening smile. “Back off, chica. No more ‘bumping into him,’ or I’ll make your life in Hackensack a living hell.”
“It already is,” I said, and I shouldered past her.
Fantastic idea, Dad. Hackensack is awesome.
Turned out Noah shared more than half of my courses, and I found myself rushing to every class to be sure I could get a seat at the front of the room – a row he seemed to avoid – in the event we had yet another course in common. I also kept my sketchpad tucked away where it couldn’t get me into any more trouble.
The day couldn’t end fast enough. As soon as the final bell rang, I hurried outside, fishing through my backpack for my keys. That’s when it hit me. Or I hit it. Or rather, him…again.
“Damn it!” I said.
Noah raised both his hands. “Funny running into you again.” He smiled widely. For the first time, I took in all the details of his face. His golden-brown hair curled at the ends, gracing his temples. His nose was perfectly chiseled, his face handsomely symmetrical, save for the dimple on his left cheek. I could see why Blondie was so protective over him, and it was all the more reason to keep my distance.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, though I hardly meant it. I just wanted to get home. I brushed past him on my way to my car, but he followed. I spun around, my back to the driver’s side door. “It’s better if you stay away from me.”
His brow furrowed. “You’re probably right,” he said. “But I was hoping you caught the homework assignment for Trig.”
Of course. Not like he would engage me for any reason outside of academic necessity. I laughed inwardly. I wouldn’t get the guy, but I would still get harassed for talking to him.
I dug out my Trig notebook, opened to my assignments page, and waited while he jotted everything down.
“Thanks a mil,” he said, handing the notebook back to me. I tried not to stare at how good his backside looked in his shorts as he jogged off. When I reviewed my notes, there was a message scribbled at the bottom.
I’M IN TROUBLE, AND YOU’RE THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN HELP. CALL ME.
My heart sank. Please don’t tell me whatever trouble he was in was why I’d drawn his picture. Not when all I wanted was for it to be the subconscious product of a crush.
I looked up again, but he was already gone, so I read the note again.
His number scrawled beneath his words, and right then, I knew two things: I was going to call him, and Blondie would make me pay for it.
2
DON’T LET THE IT GIRLS GET TO YOU
When I got home from my school, Dad was waiting in the kitchen. He wouldn’t start his new j
ob until the following week, but he was already sporting one of his work shirts – the one with “Joe” embroidered where the pocket should have been.
“What do you think your other name would have been?” I asked as I set my backpack on the linoleum-tiled floor by the kitchen table.
“Not that again!” He turned from the counter with two steaming mugs in his hands. “Hot chocolate?”
“For sure.” I plopped into one of the cushioned chairs and eased the steaming beverage from his hands. He sat across from me, and I sipped the cocoa. “Come on, Pops, play along.”
He quirked his eyebrow over his own mug, then set the drink down. “Pops? Okay, Squirrel, I’ll play. Hank…or Fred.”
He hated when I called him Pops. Probably more than I hated him calling me Squirrel, which truthfully, was not at all. “Why?” I asked. “Are those good plumber names or something?”
He shrugged. “Would I still be a plumber?”
“Touché.” I gave him an approving nod. “Would I still have to go to school?”
He leaned back, crossed his arms, and pushed out his bottom lip. “What’s this about, Squirrel?”
“Don’t call me that,” I deflected.
“Come on, Em. It was your first day. Things couldn’t have gotten that bad in one day.”
“Dun, dun, dun! Or could they?”
“Tell me what happened.”
We had always been close, so I told him everything.
“Sounds like that boy is into you,” he said when I finished.
“Better polish Old Faithful,” I mumbled. Leave it to Dad to be more concerned over a guy giving me his number than over some girls harassing me.
He rested both elbows on the table, clasping his hands together and posting his chin there. “Do you want me to talk to the principal?”
“God, no. Please, don’t do that, Dad. Promise me you won’t do that.”
He lifted his palms. “Say no more. But what do you want me to do?”
“You already did it,” I said, finishing my cocoa and taking the dishes to rinse in the sink. I flipped on the faucet. “Just listen. That’s all.” I cleaned out the mug and put it in the rack. “And next time, don’t worry about the boy, okay? That’s so lame. Seriously, no one’s dad worries about boys these days.”
Before he could say another word, I kissed him on the cheek, grabbed my backpack, and thundered up the stairs.
I wanted to call Noah – assuming that was his name and the girls didn’t share my penchant for lying – but Dad would be expecting that. And bless his heart, he would eavesdrop same as any good father would. Besides, I needed to do something with this room of mine first.
I tapped my lip with a coral-painted fingernail, debating if the same color would be overkill on the walls. I settled for light blue. Couldn’t go wrong with sky blue.
I shook my head, trying to clear Noah’s eyes from my mind.
Don’t go there, Emily.
I snatched up my keys and messenger bag and headed out the door, waving something like a quick farewell to my dad. Of course he asked where I was going.
“The paint store.”
Who would be there?
“Me, other customers, and whoever else works there…how should I know?”
And when I would be home?
“In however long it takes me to drive there, buy paint, and make my way back.”
Maybe some kids were annoyed by their parents asking such questions, but I appreciated him pretending I had a social life worth stressing over.
Turns out, the final answers to my father’s questions were: a tattooed man with a goatee and home within an hour, thanks to a phone app that located a paint store ten minutes from the house. Which, coincidentally, happened to be right next to a Target, resulting in the purchase of a new quilt for the bed as well.
After my mini shopping spree, I checked my bank account from my phone. Depressing, but looking for a job willing to hire a seventeen-year-old in this economy didn’t rank at the top of my to-do list. I would have to be more careful with my funds. Or hit up Dad for some cash.
Once home, I scrubbed up, blasted some Florence and the Machine, and got to painting. Dad wouldn’t mind. We’d always been a thick-skinned family, and he wasn’t about to get upset his teen daughter didn’t like his decorating sense.
After I finished, I flopped back on my new, plain white comforter and stared at the ceiling. There. A light blue room officially too bland for anyone to have an opinion about – just the way I liked it.
Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the stack of papers waiting next to my laptop on my mother’s vintage desk. Ugh. There was homework…and there was calling Noah.
No way. I couldn’t call him. Me calling a boy for any reason made homework seem like the preferable idea. Eleven at night probably wasn’t the best time to call anyway.
I pulled out my trig notebook and got to work. I completed the assignment faster than expected and decided to do a little drawing to unwind. After the day I’d had, I needed a break.
When I opened the notebook, the drawing of Noah stared back at me, his careful curls tumbling over his forehead. Thick, dark eyelashes, chiseled nose, dimple on one cheek. I traced a finger along the contour of his strong, squared jaw, my heart skipping a beat. Those eyes…so intense that they were beautiful and terrifying all at once.
It wasn’t the first time I’d drawn something I couldn’t know about yet, but I refused to believe that was starting again. It couldn’t. Not if it meant what it had all those times before Mom died. Not if this boy was in danger.
The next day, Noah’s absence from homeroom left me equal parts relieved and disappointed. Maybe I’d gotten lucky and witness protection had relocated him, too. But then he showed up in third period English.
There went that idea.
Also in third period was the first new friend I’d made since grade school. Her name was Heather, and yesterday she’d complimented my coral nail polish. Her brown hair fell in thick, brown, unkempt waves past her shoulders, and she had a cute smattering of freckles across her nose and cheeks. But the most remarkable thing about her was her ’50s-style red glasses with tiny rhinestones on the wings.
Making a more memorable impression, however, was Noah, with his broad chest filling out an Abercrombie T-shirt the same color as his eyes.
About midway through class, Heather handed me a folded up piece of paper. I opened it.
NOAH KEEPS CHECKING YOU OUT.
He was probably wondering why I hadn’t called. It was better I ignore him. High school romances never worked out – if that’s what this was even about. But where romances didn’t last, grudges did. And I was already on Blondie’s radar. At the same time, what if there was more to that note he wrote? He said he was in trouble, and maybe I could help. Did he mean trouble with his schoolwork, or something else?
A warning dinged in my head. If he needed help, no way was I the one to give it to him. Even if the picture I drew meant something – even if he somehow knew about my weird talent – my “help” was useless. Knowing my mom was in danger hadn’t helped me save her, had it?
I wrote Heather back, blowing off the comment about Noah.
WHAT PERIOD DO YOU HAVE LUNCH?
I added my phone number at the bottom of the note so she could text me instead of passing around a scrap of paper that might as well have said, “Hey, teacher, look at us not paying any attention to your class.”
Turned out we both had lunch sixth period, as did Noah, according to Heather’s messages – which reverted back to boy talk every chance she got. I would need to stay busy talking to someone else if I wanted to put off him approaching me; so far, that seemed to be all it took to keep him away. Heather would do.
We made plans to meet up, and she held to her promise, waiting for me when I arrived at the cafeteria doo
rs.
“Want to skip out?” I asked.
She grinned. “No way. I want to see if Noah Caldwell eats his chicken sandwich or spends all of lunch staring at you.”
“Well, I don’t.” Truth was, I despised school cafeterias. Mainly because of social reasons – they were a hierarchy of the highest order – but also because, no matter what was on the menu, they always smelled like rotten onions.
“Come on.” She took my hand. “This is the perfect opportunity to teach you everything you need to know about this place.” She tugged me into the cafeteria and over to an empty table. From her bag, she pulled out something resembling a sandwich, though it seemed kind of floppy. “You gonna eat?”
I shrugged. “At my old school, you could trade lunch for another class,” I lied. “I don’t eat until I get home.”
She smiled around a bite of what appeared to be turkey smushed between bread. “Hmmm. Okay. Don’t do that here. I finally don’t have to eat alone.” She nodded toward a table in the far right corner. “You see that girl with glasses like mine?”
The girl she was referring to wore black-and-white plaid pants, a light pink dress skirt, and a gray sweater-vest over top. Her blonde hair was pulled back in some kind of ponytail that made parts of her hair stick up. Her glasses were in fact like Heather’s, only black, not red.
Before I confirmed the sighting, Heather continued: “Her name’s Cassie. She lost her dad to cancer. That’s why she wears gray. Not just today, either. Every day, and she always has this gray ribbon pinned to her bag.”
“Oh,” I said, a bit stunned. The subject matter was a little heavy for a lunch conversation.
“I’m sorry,” Heather said. “I thought you’d want to know someone else who lost a parent. Ya know, because of your mom…”
My eyebrows shot up. “My mom?”
Heather frowned. “She…she died…right?”
“I didn’t realize anyone knew that,” I said flatly.
Something like Voodoo Page 2