Light as a Feather

by Zoe Aarsen

Mom had put forth an unexpected, uncharacteristic amount of effort and had decorated the front bushes with glimmering white Christmas lights. I fought a swelling of homesickness rising in the pit of my stomach, reminding myself that there was no reason to miss home when I was right there, where I belonged. It was pointless to dwell on the fact that I’d be headed back to Illinois in just ten days. “Nice,” I commented from the front seat of the car as we pulled into the driveway. I meant it. The lights looked really cute, and it was touching to see her getting into the holiday spirit for a change. I couldn’t recall Mom ever even taping up cutouts of Santa in the front windows before. It made my chest ache a little to even think it, but maybe my being sent away had been good for her.

  “They were Glenn’s idea,” she said, blushing a little.

  Somehow, miraculously enough, Mom had struck up a bit of a flirtatious friendship with Maude’s vet in the weeks since I’d been away at boarding school. As it turned out, they had been classmates together at the University of Wisconsin–Sheboygan in the graduate veterinary program, and Glenn was recently divorced. Considering all the many, many laws Trey and I had broken on our little crime spree in November, I had gotten off somewhat lucky when the district judge had sentenced me to attendance at a therapeutic boarding school. My new school was pretty horrific, but even more than the uniforms, bad food, uncomfortable beds, and strict curfew, the worst part was not having any control over my own private communications. Cell phones weren’t permitted on the campus of the Sheridan School for Girls, and neither was unmonitored Internet use. My only communication with Trey had been ten-minute phone calls on Sunday nights on the pay phone in a very public hallway in my dormitory.

  Trey had been sentenced to a military academy way up north. There literally weren’t any programs in the state of Wisconsin for girls who had gotten into as much trouble with the law as I had, so my mom had been given the choice of two schools: one in Illinois and the other in Minnesota. She had begged the judge to reconsider, claiming she had absolutely no explanation for my behavior on that fateful Saturday other than the severe post-traumatic stress of suffering the loss of two close friends in just two months. The judge hadn’t bought her pleas on my behalf, and even worse, the middle-aged male judge had seemed touched by Violet’s overly dramatic, tearful recollection of the events of November fifth. But there was no shortage of military-style behavioral correction facilities for boys in Wisconsin. Trey’s parents had chosen the first on the list provided to them by his attorney, eager to appease the court and move on with their lives.

  There were butterflies in my stomach as I entered the house, knowing it would only be a matter of hours until Trey arrived home the next morning. We had barely had time to hug good-bye before being sent away to our respective schools back in November, neither one of us daring to risk additional contact in the face of more punishment. The house smelled as it always had: faintly like coffee and toast. Maude had grown considerably; her head now almost reached my knees.

  “I bet it’s nice to be home,” Mom said. I hadn’t been completely honest with her about how unpleasant my life at Sheridan was. Many of the other girls were there because they’d gotten pregnant, gotten busted shoplifting, had beaten up their foster brothers and sisters, or had repeatedly run away from home. Before I’d left Willow, Trey had coached me on how to survive the experience, advising me to keep to myself, avoid making friends, and follow orders. Keeping my head down and ignoring girls whose primary thrill in life came from antagonizing others was exhausting. But there wasn’t anything my mom could do to make things easier for me, so there was no point in making her worry more than she already did.

  “So nice,” I agreed.

  “Is there anything special you’d like for dinner?” Mom asked.

  There were a million special things I wanted for dinner, anything other than the bland roast chicken legs and meat loaf served at Sheridan. “Pizza from Federico’s would be awesome. But really, anything would be fine,” I replied. I still felt so guilty about what I’d put her through that I didn’t feel comfortable making any requests.

  “Pizza sounds good,” Mom said. She headed into the kitchen to order from the landline. “Bring in the mail, will you?”

  I opened the front door and reached into the mailbox to grab the envelopes inside. It looked like the usual assortment of stuff, including a weekly flyer from the grocery store, a water bill, Mom’s credit card statement, and two Christmas cards in red envelopes. But lastly, at the bottom of the stack, there was a slightly oversize beige envelope addressed to me. I came across it as I entered the kitchen with Maude following behind me and wondered who had sent it.

  Mom asked, “Mushrooms and spinach?”

  I was so intrigued by the envelope that I’d barely heard her question. My name on the envelope had been written as “Miss McKenna Brady,” and no one I knew referred to me as “miss.” Although the return address in the top left corner of the envelope was in Willow, I didn’t recognize the name of the street—which was weird. The postmark was from Willow too. With her hand over the mouthpiece of the phone, Mom was waiting for my answer. “Oh. Yeah, sure,” I replied.

  I set the mail down on the kitchen table and carried my bags and the strange envelope addressed to me down the hall to my room. Once in my bedroom, I sighed with relief at the familiarity of my own bed, my books, and my desk. Nothing looked different, although a lot had changed in Willow since I’d left. Mischa had been transferred at her own insistence to St. Patrick’s, and she had been writing me letters detailing her painful adjustment to life under the rule of nuns. Amanda was still at Willow, since she was only one semester away from graduation, but I had a feeling she limited how much information she shared with Mischa about school gossip. Cheryl sent me long, handwritten letters covered in stickers and illustrations of things going on at the high school, but she didn’t concern herself with the lives of the popular people. She had started dating Dan Marshall, and most of her letters were about their dates and how much she liked him.

  I sat down at my desk and inspected the envelope, having no idea who could have sent it. Everything related to my court case was always sent to my mom, and I didn’t think anyone in Willow aside from the Emorys, Mischa, and Cheryl even knew I was being allowed home for Christmas. Since there had been quite a bit of local news coverage about the car chase, I guessed the letter might have been from someone who wanted to threaten me or voice their support for Violet. I probably should have brought the envelope to my mom’s attention before I tore it open. But curiosity got the better of me.

  Inside was a printout of a calendar that detailed the phases of the moon. It was fastened with a paper clip to several printouts of news articles from the Internet.

  At first glance, I wondered if someone had sent me my astrological birth chart or something related to astrology. Two dates were circled on the lunar calendar in red ballpoint pen—September 13, which was positioned under the “Full Moon” column, and October 27, which was positioned in the first column on the left side of the chart beneath the headline of NEW MOON. Next to this red circle, someone had written Oct. 23.

  I shivered. This was the date on which Candace’s text messages from Hawaii had stopped. The day her half brothers had watched her walk straight into the Pacific Ocean. What I’d been sent wasn’t some kind of horoscope. It was some kind of a clue.

  The first article clipped beneath the calendar was about the accident in which Olivia had died, printed out from the Willow Gazette website. On it, the date of the accident, September 13, had been circled in red pen. The second article, also from the Willow Gazette, was about Candace’s disappearance in Hawaii, giving the date of her death as October 23. I referenced the lunar chart again, trying to understand what was being implied by the numbers. Both Olivia and Candace had died about six weeks apart. Olivia had died fifteen days before the new moon, which had occurred on September 28. Candace had died on October 23, four days before the next new moon, on October 27. What could
that possibly mean?

  The other pages in the packet were from the Lake Forester section of the Chicago Tribune website. They were obituaries of four teenagers with the dates of their deaths also circled in red ink. The first two names, I recognized: Rebecca Shermer and Josh Loomis. All four of the kids who had died in Lake Forest a year ago had died within four consecutive months, and all also shortly before new moons.

  Breathing heavily as if I’d just awakened from an intense nightmare, I tossed the papers down on my bed, not even wanting to touch them. Who would have sent me a puzzle like this? Who would have known I’d be home for Christmas break, and that the deaths of kids in Lake Forest were related to the deaths of kids in Willow? If whoever had sent me this was implying that there was an order to what Violet did, a pattern to it, I didn’t want to know. Mischa hadn’t died before the new moon in November; we’d saved her. The last thing I wanted was to get tangled up in Violet’s lies again and land myself in even more trouble.

  My mother knocked on my doorframe, surprising me so badly that I flinched. “I thought you might appreciate having this back while you’re home,” she said. She stepped into my room and handed me my phone, hesitating for a second and then adding, “No more trouble, McKenna. I need you to promise me.”

  “I promise,” I said solemnly, meaning it.

  As soon as Mom left, I called Mischa. I needed to hear her voice and know that she was safe. She answered on the first ring. “Oh my God! Are you home?”

  “Yeah,” I replied. “This might sound like an odd question, but did you send me an envelope full of freaky moon stuff?”

  “Moon stuff? No. But I’m so glad you’re back because you’re never going to believe this. Amanda told me that Violet’s been doing tarot card readings during study hall, and she’s been telling people how they’re going to die.”

  On unsteady legs I rose from my bed and walked to my window. I looked across the snowy patch of land between my house and Trey’s. His blinds were closed, and I wasn’t sure if we’d be permitted to see each other when he arrived home the next morning.

  The faint melody of “It’s a Small World” trickled out from under my closet door, and my blood ran cold. I’d packed up all my music boxes and stashed them in the closet in the fall. There was no way any of them had been wound up in weeks. A sense of dread washed over me. Trey and I had failed. Violet was still playing games, and Olivia’s spirit was not pleased.

  *GOOD BYE*

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Although the list of people I need to thank for inspiring and assisting me on this project is very long, I should begin by thanking Courtney Greenstein for inviting me to her Halloween party in the fifth grade. It was the first time I’d ever played Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board, and obviously the experience made a lasting impression on me.

  I owe great thanks to the entire team at Wattpad for their invaluable support. Allen, Eva, and Ivan have created a platform for community and expression that has added a new dimension to the experience of consuming fiction and has connected me with readers eager for ghostly thrills. My Wattpad fans, who crack me up with their comments and amaze me with their fan art. Ashleigh Gardner, Caitlin O’Hanlon, I-Yana Tucker, Abby Ho, Alysha D’Souza, Kelly Steen, and so many more Wattpad staffers (past and present) have accompanied me on this journey since the very first chapter. Special thanks to Monica Pacheco, who encouraged me to return to Willow after I’d spent a long time away. Also, a giant shout-out to Aron Levitz and Eric Lehrman for overseeing this project’s development in Hollywood, and to Kelsey Grammer for his commitment to this story and his enormous generosity in shepherding it along.

  I don’t know where to begin thanking Jessica Smith, Rebecca Vitkus, and everyone at Simon Pulse for their dedication, collaborative enthusiasm, appreciation for the idiosyncrasies of small Midwestern towns, and willingness to deal with my overuse of prepositions.

  My wonderful friend Robin Epstein, for being the world’s best listener in addition to being a great storyteller herself.

  And, of course, Jenny.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ZOE AARSEN is a graphic designer and copywriter originally from the Midwest. She is pretty convinced that her apartment is haunted by the ghosts of every cat and hamster she’s ever owned. Visit Zoe Aarsen’s blog at www.zoeaarsen.com. Follow Zoe on Twitter @ZoeAarsen.

  SIMON PULSE

  SIMON & SCHUSTER, NEW YORK

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  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  SIMON PULSE

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

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  First Simon Pulse edition October 2018

  Text copyright © 2013 by Zoe Aarsen

  Originally published in 2013 by Lovestruck Literary as Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board

  Cover photograph copyright © 2018 by Awesomeness, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

  “Hulu” is a trademark of Hulu, LLC. Title design copyright © 2018 by Hulu, LLC. All rights reserved.

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  Cover designed by Sarah Creech

  Interior designed by Tiara Iandiorio

  This book has been cataloged with the Library of Congress.

  ISBN 978-1-5344-4403-4 (hc)

  ISBN 978-1-5344-4402-7 (pbk)

  ISBN 978-1-5344-4404-1 (eBook)