The Watchers

by Lynnie Purcell

  He ignored me. I shook the jacket at him to get his attention, but his eyes were on the thick woods behind my house.

  “Daniel?”

  “I want you to promise me something.”

  I was taken aback by his tone. It was familiar, yet intense. He had thrown aside all the awkwardness between strangers with that one phrase, making us friends.

  “What?”

  “Stay out of the woods.”

  “Why?”

  He didn’t answer. He simply waited, looking at me seriously, until I agreed. I did so knowing I wouldn’t go wandering around anyway, not knowing the terrain. I wasn’t stupid.

  “I promise.”

  He nodded once then turned with a stiff back and walked away without another word.

  “Hey! You forgot your jacket!” I called after him.

  He didn’t turn back or answer; he just kept walking, his head bowed against the wind, and the bag in his hand created a creaking accompaniment to his hasty retreat. I looked at the woods then to his retreating form, trying to understand. The jacket felt heavy in my hands as if he had left some of his gravity with me. The dark trees swayed with the cold wind, adding emphasis to that gravity. Chills that had nothing to do with the wind went down my spine. A prickle on the back of my neck told me I was being watched. Was it the neighbors? Slightly creeped out, I hurried across the lawn and into the house. I bolted the door behind me, checking it twice.

  Ellen was watching television in the living room, but I ran up the stairs before she could speak to me. She would notice the state I was in; she always did. I locked my door to make sure I had privacy, and headed straight for my window seat in order to think. I kicked off my shoes and sat down, curling my knees to my chest against the dark night. As an after-thought, I threw Daniel’s warm jacket across my knees.

  The house groaned and popped again, but it didn’t bring to mind ghosts of the past. Instead, my thoughts were on our strange walk together – the way Daniel had brushed aside all the anger I had been feeling, and the worry in his voice when he had warned me to stay out of the woods. Even his warning was secondary to the emotions I was feeling.

  I slowly drifted to sleep on my window seat, not bothering with my nightly routine, too mentally exhausted after such a long day to care or to move.

  Chapter 5

  My neck was cramped, and my body sore, from sleeping on the window seat all night, but when I awoke the next morning I felt good. Daniel’s jacket was still wrapped around me in a soft blanket. Unable to stop the first impulse, I lifted it to my face and smelled it. It smelled good, like cologne and flowers after a summer storm. I pushed the jacket away and shook my head in irritation when I realized what I was doing.

  I was being stupid.

  I knew from long experience I had to be careful with my emotions. I couldn’t expect too much from his actions, because he would somehow end up disappointing me. Men couldn’t be trusted. What my father had done to my mother was proof of that.

  I got ready for school in a haze of fevered activity, excited, despite my rational thoughts about not getting involved. I knew I would end up at school early again.

  When classes started, my hopes of seeing Daniel, and my curiosity to know if he would be as kind around the others as when we were alone, were dashed. The crowd in the gym was focused around three figures, not four.

  “Clare!” Jennifer waved as soon as she saw me.

  “Hey, guys,” I said talking over the hum of thoughts.

  Mark gave me a huge grin as I sat, and Jennifer scowled. Does he like her? How could he find her attractive? I’m, like, ten times prettier!

  I kept my eyes on the boy’s locker room as the others talked, but Daniel didn’t materialize as he had the night before. I felt depression creep up, the voices and thoughts of the others swirling steady around my emotions. It was just because I wanted to give him his jacket back, I told myself stubbornly. I didn’t want to have to lug it around in my bag all day and have someone see it. Plus, it was taking up book room.

  A thought interrupted my excuses: It’s unbelievable. They’ve known me since we were in diapers, yet they fawn over the new girl and ignore me. Why can’t they at least act like I exist? Was it so long ago we were friends? Images of Jennifer and Michelle when they were younger materialized in my mind.

  I looked down and saw the girl from yesterday, the one on the fringes of the group, her mousy brown hair pulled back in a ponytail. Her back was to me, but I knew it had been her thoughts; the tenor was identical to what I had heard yesterday. Only her body language, out of all the kids around me, matched the depressed thoughts. I stared at her in compassionate empathy, understanding her emotions. I wondered if Ellen had been right, and the girl was using my parentage as an excuse to hate me. Another excuse to hate me, I should say. She obviously didn’t like how easily I was fitting in. The fact Ellen had me at seventeen was an easy out for that hatred – if she was a staunch religious nut.

  Coach ambled out of his office, trying to pull down his too small shirt as he walked. With a sharp blast of his whistle, he called the class to order and told us to find a partner for tennis again. One of the girls sitting close to me offered to be my partner, thinking our match would make for a good story. I agreed, and let her score a couple of shots, so her story could be more entertaining. With each awkward serve she sent my way, I found myself longing for my previous partner. He would make this class into a challenge. He would make the time fly instead of me noticing every stupid second.

  *

  “I heard you and Daniel went on a walk last night,” Alex said, surprising me. I hadn’t heard her thinking about it. We were at the same bench at lunch, hiding in our little nook as we ate our salads.

  “Where’d you hear that?” I asked carefully.

  “A boy in my math class was driving his dad’s car last night…he was telling the whole class about it. He said he saw you two on Reed Street.”

  “Does this boy’s dad have a sports car?” I asked belligerently.

  “Yeah, he bought it from Mark’s dad last fall.”

  “I oughta kill him! That ass almost hit me! What’s his name? Do you have his address?”

  “You were out with Daniel, then?”

  “I wasn’t out, out, with him,” I explained, “I just ran into him at the pharmacy. He insisted on walking with me.” For over an hour. In circles. Which was ridiculously fun.

  I looked at Alex thoughtfully. She seemed to know about people; she could figure them out better than I could. Maybe she understood some of Daniel’s mystery. I couldn’t see the harm in asking the question burning on my tongue.

  “What’s his deal?”

  “His deal?”

  “Well, he was being nice.”

  She started laughing, the force of it rattling the bench. “Oh, God! Not…not…NICE!”

  I made a face at her. “I know you’re nice, but I’m not used to people being so…you know?”

  “I know…but King’s Cross isn’t like other towns. Everyone has their idiosyncrasies and their petty concerns, but people care about one another here. We’re all ‘nice’. You’ll see eventually.”

  “That was an evasion,” I said.

  Would she believe me if I told her that he was just a good guy? “He doesn’t have a deal. He’s just Daniel.”

  I accepted her word as truth. “You see a lot about people, don’t you?” I asked.

  She shifted uncomfortably. “I just pay attention.”

  “I don’t lie, you pay attention. We could fight crime if we wanted to.”

  She giggled.

  Fight crime! Bah! She’s the evil that walks the earth. She’s a plague on mortals. She shouldn’t live, she doesn’t deserve to live. If only I could kill her now!

  I jumped, spilling my tray of food.

  “What?!” I yelled at Alex.

  She looked at me, her laughter fading. “What?”

  “What did you say?”

  “I didn’t say anything
!”

  She was right. The voice I’d heard had been in my mind. I bent down and started picking up the food I had spilt, feeling like an idiot for reacting so forcefully.

  “I could have sworn I just heard someone call me fat,” I said in a poor attempt at covering my reaction.

  I struggled to keep my eyes on the floor and not search the hallway. I realized this person, whoever they were, could still hear me, even though the trail of thought had died away. I could feel them watching me.

  Alex started giggling again. “Who would call you fat? You’re a bean!”

  “Thanks?” I replied dryly.

  “Sure.”

  My throat felt dry. My body coursed with adrenaline I was finding hard to control. As calmly as I could manage I started toward the lunchroom on the pretense of dumping my food. But the whole way back to the cafeteria I felt that strange sense of being watched. It was a pervasive feeling not easily ignored. I scoured the corridor nervously, but it was absolutely, and oddly, deserted. Perhaps, hearing people’s thoughts all the time was making me hear voices when there weren’t any. Going crazy would fit in nicely with my expectations for my life.

  I thought about it, silence creeping between Alex and me. No, the malice I’d felt was way too real. I couldn’t make that up. And that voice! I felt as if I was hearing it everywhere. I shivered and followed Alex into the lunchroom, the thoughts being thrown at me as I entered a distraction from the fear and hatred I had heard. Not a welcome distraction, but a distraction all the same.

  The rest of the week passed faster than I thought a week could. I didn’t hear the nasty thoughts again, even though I started searching for the owner in earnest. I wanted to understand what they meant, or why whoever it was would hate me so vehemently. Was I found? Should I run? Twice I lingered in the hall during lunch with the sole purpose of trying to hear the mystery voice. The corridor remained empty, my search fruitless. How could I find what wasn’t there?

  Going against our normal policy of absolute truthfulness, I didn’t tell Ellen about the voice. I tried a couple of times, but couldn’t bring myself to bring it up. She was hoping beyond hope this place would work out, and we could stay. She was searching for a close to her past. It was a search I didn’t want to interrupt.

  I was curious, though, to the point of obsession. Whoever was having these thoughts knew things about me; I just wanted to even the playing field. Was it a kid at school? If not, who was it, and why were they hanging around? Why had they been at my house? Why were they so serious about killing me?

  It didn’t help that Daniel didn’t show up for the rest of the week. It just increased my worry. I was worried he had gotten the flu or was otherwise sick, because I had taken his jacket. The added worry just made me irritable. Would calling him be too weird? Even to check up on him? How would I get his phone number? Why was I so worried about a stranger?

  On Friday, after a week of trying to downplay the desire to see him again, even if it was just to argue with him, I asked Alex if she had heard anything, needing an answer to one of my questions. No one had given his disappearance a thought, something I found peculiar and frustrating. Surely, people didn’t just stop coming to school and no one cared? I had fought against the impulse to ask her all day, but finally caved in on our way to chorus.

  “He goes on trips with his parents for their work. He has permission to go whenever he needs to as long as he keeps up with his homework, which, of course, he does, being the brilliant child of scientists and all,” Alex explained.

  “He’s brilliant?” I asked dryly, skeptically.

  “Yep. Apparently, intelligence is genetic,” she said with a laugh. “Ask Mrs. Heart. She had Daniel take an I.Q test. It was off the charts. I heard her talking to another teacher about it.”

  “Oh yeah?” I said curiously.

  “Why do you ask?” she asked just as curious.

  We walked into the chorus room, and the teacher chided us for being late, cutting our discussion short. I was grateful. I wasn’t sure if I could honestly answer Alex’s question. Not in a way that would prevent lots of blushing and internal scolding.

  When the final bell rang, I was the first one out of the door. I kept my head down and hurried out the front to avoid the kids hanging out by their cars in back, knowing they would stand there and talk for an hour, maybe longer. I knew, too, if I didn’t flee Alex would badger me until she got a reply that satisfied her. I wasn’t eager for that either.

  As the sunlight hit me, I decided to walk around despite the chilly air. I hadn’t explored the town any since my walk with Daniel, centering my time between school and home. It was a tactic that kept the thoughts out, but it was depressing. I was getting cabin fever…bad. I could do with some exploration. Maybe, like last time, this exploration would come with a distraction.

  I started up the street, giving most of the brick shops cursory glances as I passed, not interested in knick-knacks for tourists to prove they’d visited the awesomeness of King’s Cross. Wanting to get off the main road, I turned and walked onto a back street in search of the beautiful houses that were everywhere here, remembering the road from my last walk. As I walked, the depression from earlier in the week crept back into my brain.

  Fitting in was nice, despite the fact that most people were still carrying around horrible stereotypes about me, but I missed Savannah. I missed the city and the shops. I missed the music stores and reading in the afternoons in one of the numerous parks downtown, while musicians played nearby. I even missed the bums and the panhandlers. I missed…I stopped walking in stunned disbelief. Speaking of music stores!

  I read the sign to my right, which claimed the yellow house behind it was my typical place of worship. The small house looked more like someone’s grandmother’s house rather than an honest, wholesome, music store. Could it really be? It was irresistible…I had to check it out.

  I walked up the stone path, and crossed the porch to the front door thinking I should knock on the pretty door. Instead, feeling awkward, like I was being bad, I pushed it open slightly and checked to see if anyone was around. A tall, skinny woman with short silver hair smiled at me from behind a tiny counter which was squished between sheet music and musical instruments. Her eyes were curious but kind.

  “Hello, dear. Can I help you find something?”

  Her thoughts were soft, but I could hear them as she played the guessing game she played with all strangers: I bet she listens to jazz and blues with a splash of rock thrown in. Those dark clothes don’t fool me. I know a jazz lover when I see one.

  I stepped further into the shop, encouraged by her voice and her thoughts. “No, thank you. I’m just looking.”

  She smiled. “Let me know if you need anything.”

  I nodded, and she went back to reading her book. My eyes strayed around hungrily as I walked past her into the shop proper. The shop was perfect, the way a music store should look: messy, overflowing, and full of curiosities. I spied several expensive guitars hanging on the wall, and I went over to survey them. One, a beautiful acoustic, stained a rich mahogany color, stood out from the others. I walked around the center aisle, so I could be closer to it, and touched it wistfully. I dared not play it. The price tag told me I could never afford it. I was saving my money for a car, and this guitar was the price of a used car. Even with those thoughts, I stood poised next to it for a moment fighting against the urge to play it.

  A bell chimed I hadn’t heard when I first entered the tiny shop, breaking the hypnosis the guitar had put me in. I took away the hand I had placed there, not wanting to get caught looking so helplessly in love with a guitar. Turning towards the row of CDs which made up the middle of the small shop, I purposefully didn’t look to see who had come in. I didn’t want the attention or the thoughts, though I knew the thoughts were inevitable. The woman asked the person same thing she had asked me.

  “I know what I’m looking for, thank you,” a ridiculously melodic voice answered.

  Doub
ting myself, I looked up to be sure. Daniel stood on the other side of the CD aisle as if he had never walked off, leaving me with his coat and a crap load of questions. He had a boyish smile plastered on his face, and his hands were jammed in his pockets in cool confidence. We looked at each other for a moment, and I noticed he seemed different. His face was more open and free, as if he’d found the key to a prison he had been walking around in.

  “I think you’re stalking me,” I told him, trying to ignore the butterflies in my stomach.

  He’s a stranger, Clare, I reminded myself firmly. A stranger whose thoughts you can’t read…don’t act so natural around him.

  His grin spread further. “What if I am?”

  “I’d have to wonder at your tastes. Surely, there are people more fun to stalk? People who go to more places than just home and school?”

  “And to music stores apparently.”

  “I couldn’t resist.”

  “You’re a fan of music?”

  “You like breathing?”

  “I suppose…”

  Daniel started down the opposite side of the CD aisle, running his fingers lightly across the titles as he went. He was wearing blue jeans and a red t-shirt with a strange logo. His hair was a different array of messiness but still dashing. His face maintained an expression of happy confidence. What was he thinking? My eyes narrowed in aggravation at his impossible silence. I wanted to know where he had gone this past week, what his warning had meant – I’d take anything, even a malicious thought.

  “How’s your week been?” he asked playfully. His eyes sparkled with the light pouring in through the narrow windows. Dust swirled in the light making everything hazy and dream-like.

  Besides hunting down someone who wanted me dead? Wondering where you were? And being frustrated at your cryptic warnings and mysterious ways? “Fine.” I bit my lip and looked at him. “Why’d you tell me not to go in the woods?”

  “Did I?”

  I raised an eyebrow. “You’re going to go there?”

  “I’ll tell you later.”