Win, Lose, or Die

by Diane Hoh

  Dressing quickly in the jeans, sweater, and sneakers she’d piled on a bench outside the shower cubicle, Nicki carefully made her way through the darkness to her locker, wishing she had accepted Pat’s and Ginnie’s offer to wait for her. But they had said she’d have to hurry because Ginnie wanted to get to the mall, where they were meeting John for dinner. Nicki had told them to go on ahead, that she’d meet them there. Big mistake? she wondered as she felt along the metal lockers for her own. A dark, quiet, deserted locker room was very different from a crowded, noisy, well-lit locker room. Had an entirely different feel to it. Not a good feeling at all.

  Take the people out of a place, she thought, and it dies. Without people, every place must seem dead. Still and silent and cold, yet not really peaceful.

  Because her locker was at the end of the row, directly opposite and below a tall, skinny window, the light from outside made it easier to find. Twenty-three. Right where she’d left it.

  But … different …

  Nicki stopped halfway there. She could see now … the wall of tall, wide khaki-colored lockers bathed in a diffused glow from the window … and there, at the end, number twenty-three …

  Something was hanging on the door.

  What was hanging on her locker door was something she’d seen before. But that time, it had been hanging from the light fixture in her room.

  A shredded tennis racket, its sliced strings splaying outward, leaving a gaping hole in the center.

  Even before she reached the locker, she knew with absolute conviction that this time, the racket was her own.

  Breathing unevenly, she moved forward slowly, her eyes glancing around fearfully for some sign of the vandal who had committed this latest atrocity. She saw no one, heard no telltale sound.

  But he couldn’t have hung the racket until everyone else had left the locker room. That wasn’t more than ten or fifteen minutes ago. He could still be here, hiding.

  If he was here, she shouldn’t be.

  Without touching the racket, Nicki whirled and ran, racing for the door, which seemed to be miles and miles away, at the other end of the locker room.

  And it seemed, too, to take her hours to reach it. Twice, she banged a knee on a bench. She slipped once, on the tile, and almost fell. But she kept going, her hands outstretched in front of her to feel for obstacles in her path.

  When she finally, finally, reached the door, she was breathing hard. Her hand flew out to grasp the curved handle and pull the door open.

  It didn’t open. It didn’t move. Didn’t even edge forward a little to prove that it was just stuck, not locked.

  That was because the door was locked, Nicki realized with a dangerous lurch of her heart when she had pulled and tugged and kicked with all her might, in vain.

  Nicki couldn’t get out of the locker room.

  She was trapped in this cold, dead, silent place.

  Chapter 15

  NICKI, HER HEART FLIP-FLOPPING in her chest, leaned against the door. She hated to leave it. It seemed safer here, so close to freedom. If she could only get the door open. But she couldn’t. She had tried, and tried. It was closed as tightly against her as the door of a bank vault.

  She listened again for any sound that would mean she had company in the locker room, and heard nothing. She breathed a bit easier.

  Her hand moved along the door frame, slid sideways to the wall, exploring, found the light switch, flipped it.

  Nothing happened.

  Someone had done something to the electricity in this room. Someone had seen to it that Nicki would be in the dark. The same someone who had seen to it that she couldn’t open the door and leave.

  If someone had done all of that, wouldn’t they want to hang around and watch her panic? They wouldn’t leave, would they, and miss all the fun?

  She had to clench her jaw to keep from screaming.

  She tilted her head, listening. Nothing. Not even the smallest of sounds to tell her whether or not she was alone. The only noise she heard was the ragged sound of her own breathing.

  But he was in here. She knew it. She wasn’t alone.

  She couldn’t stay by the door. He’d come looking for her here, knowing she would be trying to escape.

  Where could she go? Coach’s office? No, it would be locked. And there was no other exit. Was there?

  Stop it, Nicki told herself. Don’t panic. Think.

  She didn’t remember seeing another door. But the locker room was pretty big to have only one exit. Weren’t there fire laws or something that made the school put at least two exits in a room this size?

  She would have to look. She would have to leave the door, so close to freedom, and dive into the dark depths of the locker room, searching for a way out.

  Nicki peered into the darkness with its shadowy walls of tall, boxy lockers. If he was in there somewhere, waiting for her, she’d be playing right into his hands. He could come at her from the side, from around a corner, even from above, since the lockers didn’t go all the way to the ceiling. He could be hiding up there, lying flat in the dark, stretched out across several lockers, ready to leap down and ambush her as she walked by.

  Maybe if she stayed by the door and began screaming … no, that was too dangerous. He’d know, then, exactly where she was, and maybe no one else would hear her and get there in time to save her.

  Better to be quiet, as quiet as death. Breathing softly, she began to inch away from the door, across the tile, being careful not to bump into the shadowy benches or lockers, listening carefully every second for the tiniest of sounds from somewhere else in the room that would confirm what she knew was true: that she wasn’t alone.

  She heard nothing. But she knew, she knew …

  So she should have been prepared when it happened. But she wasn’t.

  She was almost to her locker again when it came from behind, the thing with its prickly, broken strings smashing down over her head and face, scraping the skin as it was mashed roughly downward to settle around her neck, its smooth wooden handle turned toward the back so that her attacker could pull and tug on it, dragging her backward across the tile.

  She was too startled, and then too terrified, to scream. Her hands went to her throat to pull the painful, scratching, splintered strings away, but he was pulling on it too hard from behind. The soft skin of her throat hurt terribly, and the wooden frame of the racket was digging into her windpipe, making it difficult to breathe.

  “A nice, empty locker,” a voice behind her breathed close to her right ear, “let’s find us a nice, empty locker.”

  She didn’t recognize the voice. But she was so frightened, she didn’t think she would recognize her own mother’s voice. “You’re hurting me,” she whispered. “It hurts.” Her fingers clutched at the wooden rim of the racket, but she couldn’t pull it away from her throat. He was pulling on it too tightly. “Stop, please stop!”

  He didn’t answer. The locker door squeaked as he pulled it open.

  She knew instantly, with a terribly sinking of her heart, whose locker it was. She had seen Barb walk over to it dozens of times, reach in and take out shampoo or a towel.

  Of course, it was empty now.

  Nicki struggled, trying to kick out behind her. But the rim of the racket around her neck was diminishing her oxygen supply. Red and orange spots lit up the darkness, and her body was beginning to feel sluggish, as if she’d just awakened from a long sleep.

  “You do know,” the hoarse, low voice behind her whispered ominously, “that there won’t be enough air in this locker to keep you going all night. I’ve fixed that. But then, that’s the way the tennis ball bounces, right?”

  “Why?” Nicki gasped, still struggling, “why?”

  “Because of what you did,” came the harsh, angry answer. “But you’re not going to get away with it.”

  “I’m sorry!” Nicki cried. The more she struggled, the deeper the splintered strings cut into her skin. “I didn’t mean it.”

  “Ma
ybe not, but you didn’t care, either. That’s what I can’t forgive you for. You didn’t care, Nicole.”

  She never saw his face. He stayed behind her. Wrapping one arm around her waist to keep her in place, he yanked the racket off her head. Then, as she hungrily gulped in fresh air, he grabbed her damp hair, and with a grasp stronger than she would have imagined possible for any human being, lifted her up and thrust her, face first, into the locker.

  The top shelf, on which they all put their make-up kits and hairdryers, had been removed, making it possible for her to stand up straight, her face pressed into the cold metal back of the narrow cubicle.

  Although her mind was numb with fear and shock, some small area of her brain was still alert enough to know that the door to the locker mustn’t close. It. Must. Not. If it closed, and no one came to let her out until morning, she could die.

  If he hadn’t paused to gloat, she would have had no chance at all.

  “You should’ve died. But then I was just going to blind you,” the voice whispered behind her. “I thought that would be fair after all. Just to take something valuable from you, like you did to me. But the paint thinner didn’t do what I wanted it to. I didn’t put enough of it in the paint. This is better, anyway. You’ll have all night to think about what you’ve done. And by the time someone finds you, you won’t be thinking at all. I’m going to close the door now, Nicki. Nightie-night! Sleep tight, don’t let the bedbugs bite.”

  Years of racing around tennis courts had given Nicki strong leg muscles. Now that the tennis racket wasn’t cutting off her air supply, she didn’t feel quite as weak. Still, she forced · herself to wait until, while he was still talking, she heard the squeak of the locker door closing. Then she kicked backward with her left leg, her sneakered foot slamming into the door with all the force of a mule’s kick. She connected just as the door was about to close. He had to have been standing directly behind it, because when it flew backward in response to her kick, a pained shout told her the door had hit its target.

  Nicki whirled, jumping from the locker and running down the aisle without stopping to see who was behind the door.

  Ignoring the infuriated cursing behind her, she raced around a corner and there it was. A back door. If it was locked, she was dead. If he’d been angry at her before, he’d be a lot angrier now. He was shouting her name now, sounding wild with fury. If he caught her …

  The door was unlocked.

  Nicki yanked it open, and ran for her life.

  Chapter 16

  NICKI RAN BLINDLY, OUT OF the locker room, out of the dome, out into a cold, dark night, legs pumping, arms waving wildly. Her throat throbbed painfully, and when she put a hand up, her fingers came away sticky. The jagged, cut strings had left deep, bloody scratches.

  Had he followed? Was he behind her, maybe only steps away? How hard had the locker door slammed into him?

  She didn’t know where to go. To her room? Would she be safe there? Or to the security guard office, to gasp out her story and get help?

  Nicki looked around wildly. Help. She needed help. Where … where to get it?

  Too frightened to think clearly, she kept running, staying close to the protection of buildings, until she reached, without thought, the security office. She hadn’t even known she was headed in that direction.

  It was closed. The lights inside were on, but when she tried the doorknob, it didn’t turn. Locked. Office empty, door locked. Out on an emergency, maybe.

  Freezing … hadn’t grabbed her jacket … no gloves, and her hair was still wet. Pneumonia, her mother would say, “You’re going to get pneumonia.”

  Better to die of pneumonia in a nice, clean hospital bed than to suffocate in a dark, narrow, metal locker.

  She wasn’t safe out here. She had to find safety.

  She whirled away from the empty office, and raced back to Devereaux, to her room where she slammed and locked the door and, for added measure, thrust her desk chair up underneath the doorknob.

  Then she hurried to her bed and collapsed on the bedspread.

  Of course he knew where she lived. Had to. He’d hung the racket from the ceiling. But if he came now, he wouldn’t be able to get in. She was safe, for the moment.

  She should call someone. But who? Who was it exactly that she trusted at this moment? Who did she know who would never, never have entered the locker room, hidden until the door was locked, and then attacked her?

  She couldn’t be sure. Anyone could have done that. Anyone.

  The phone rang.

  She stared at it.

  It rang again.

  She reached out and picked it up, but said nothing.

  “Nicki?” Deacon’s voice. “Nicki, is that you? Where have you been? I’ve been calling. You were supposed to meet Mel and me, remember? At Vinnie’s. Have you seen her?”

  Nicki had forgotten. She remembered now. Deacon and Mel had been complaining that she’d been spending too much time with “the tennis crowd,” so she’d promised to have dinner with them tonight. She’d forgotten, even before she stepped into the shower. No wonder they were both angry with her.

  “Have I seen Mel? No. Isn’t she with you?”

  “Nicki. If Mel were with me, would I be asking if you’d seen her?”

  Nicki almost responded angrily, “How can I be expected to think clearly after what I’ve been through?” She bit the words back because … because why? Because she couldn’t be sure that Deacon, nice, funny, Deacon, hadn’t been in that locker room with her. Couldn’t. Be. Sure.

  “Sorry. But I haven’t seen her. Maybe she’s at the library.” That, too, was a dumb thing to say. Mel only went to the library to pore over art books, and she didn’t do that very often. She preferred, to “come up with my own ideas; that way I know they’re totally original.”

  “She’s not at the library. And she’s not in her room, and no one’s seen her.”

  “You sound … worried.” That seemed silly to Nicki. If anyone could take care of herself, Melanie Hayden could. It was Nicki Bledsoe that Deacon should be worried about.

  “I am worried. Mel gets in these moods …”

  “She’s an artist. She’s supposed to be moody. Comes with the territory, doesn’t it?”

  Deacon sighed impatiently. “I mean real moods, Nicki. When she won’t talk and she doesn’t sleep and she can’t eat. She goes off by herself and broods, sometimes for days at a time. Doesn’t care about school, doesn’t care about anything. I don’t like it, and I think that might be what she’s doing now.”

  “Why does she do it?” Nicki asked bluntly. She had almost been killed tonight, and here came Deacon, expecting her to be as worried as he was about a high-strung, melodramatic friend. She just didn’t have the emotional energy to spend on Mel.

  “She never said. Hinted that something happened to her a long time ago, but never gave me the details. Said it gets to her sometimes, and she can’t stand it, so she hides out to deal with it.”

  Nicki’s heart turned over. Something had happened to Mel a long time ago?

  Mel didn’t play tennis. She had said she never had. But she might have lied. If she was a murderer, lying would be a piece of cake. And she had turned completely around in the hall that night when Deacon called her name. As if she wasn’t able to simply glance over her shoulder.

  “Where is she from?” Nicki asked. “Where did Mel go to high school?”

  “In New Jersey. Fairlawn. Why?”

  New Jersey. So if Mel had played tennis when she was twelve, and if she was any good, she could have been in the Tri-State tournament that year. And it could have been Mel who talked Deacon into making friends with Nicole Bledsoe. Maybe Melanie was her middle name, and her first name was really Theresa. Last name, Gideon. She’d changed it, of course.

  “Help me look for her?” Deacon asked.

  Oh, god, she couldn’t, not now, not tonight. She still hadn’t done anything about the brutal scratches and cuts on her neck from the splintered t
ennis racket strings. And she should call security and tell them what had happened.

  But something kept her from telling Deacon the whole story. If Mel was the adult Gideon child, Deacon could be in on the plan for revenge, too.

  In fact, Nicki thought, her eyes widening, maybe this phone call was a trap. Maybe Mel had put him up to it. Mel could be standing right there with Deacon, listening to see if Nicki fell for the ruse.

  “I’m sorry, Deacon,” she said stiffly, “but I can’t help you out now. I’m not feeling very well. I’m sure Mel’s fine. She can take care of herself.”

  There was a long silence on the other end of the line. “You’re not going to help me look for her?” he asked, sounding stunned. “Nicki, Mel is missing.”

  “You don’t know that. You said yourself that she likes to go off alone. Hasn’t she always surfaced after a while?”

  “Yes, but …”

  “There, you see! She’ll pop up any minute.” If she hasn’t already, Nicki thought angrily.

  Another silence, and then Deacon said in a cold voice, “Sorry I bothered you. You must be exhausted after hours of hitting tennis balls across a net. Sleep well.”

  The click of his receiver hanging up was even colder than his voice.

  The conversation left Nicki very uneasy. On the one hand, if Deacon had been laying a trap for her, wouldn’t he have insisted more strongly that she join him? He wouldn’t have given up so easily, would he?

  Unless … hadn’t she just told him exactly where she was and that she wasn’t planning on leaving? She’d practically handed him an engraved invitation. Maybe that was why he’d given up so easily. He and Mel could be on their way over right now.

  Nicki jumped off the bed, grabbed her sleeping bag out of the closet, and ran from the room.

  She went upstairs to Pat and Ginnie’s room, praying as she took the fire stairs two at a time that they’d be there.

  They were. Pat was in her robe, studying at her desk, and Ginnie was in bed, reading.

  “Nicki!” Pat cried when Nicki burst in without knocking, “what’s wrong? And what on earth happened to your neck?”