She snickered. “Let’s just say that I had to get creative with my shopping…and that antique stores aren’t people’s first—or second or third—stop when it comes to scavenging.” She gestured behind us, and both Jason and I turned to see that another long table had been set up beside the barn door, this one holding up a couple bowls and a platter of food. “We’ve got some more stuff coming, but this should get the party started.” She leaned in closer to me, feigning a whisper. “And yes, D, that’s trout, breaded and fried and too damn spicy, just the way you like it.”
“Where—who—”
Zoe smiled. “Jake and Carlos took Annie to the trout farm while you were gone.” She shrugged. “They said there were so many fish they could practically scoop ’em out with their bare hands.” She waved her hands dismissively. “Enough of this, though. It’s time to pop open the Champagne.” She started toward the booze table, calling over her shoulder, “Come on in, guys!”
I looked back at the doorway to watch my friends pour into the barn, feeling happier and luckier and more alive than I’d ever felt before. Grinning, I shot Jason a sideways glance, earning another of his secret smiles, and before our friends could swarm around us, I mouthed, “I love you.”
Jason lowered his head and pressed his lips to mine, and the barn erupted in hoots and cheers, making it sound like there were three times as many people as there actually were. When he broke the kiss, he rested his forehead against mine, and whispered, “I love you, too.”
25
ZOE
MAY 24, 1AE
Bodega Bay, California
“Come, Zoe.” The faceless woman was pulling me, her long fingers wrapped tightly around my wrist.
“No!” I shouted at her, trying to tug my arm away. My heart was beating so wildly I struggled to breathe. “Let go, please!” My little-girl legs were too weak against the strong hold she had on me, and they skittered on the ground as she dragged me along.
I held my breath and, with all the willpower I had in me, tugged my arm free.
The woman froze, turned, and stared down at me, her featureless face somehow menacing. “I said come, now!” She was furious, and I knew, deep in my soul, that she was going to kill me.
“What are you going to do to me?”
She only laughed, an icy, detached sound that sent a wave of dread over me, making my blood turn cold. “I need you…”
I whimpered. “For what?”
“You ask too many questions,” she growled. “Shut up!”
Choking sobs burst from my chest, my throat. “Please don’t hurt me,” I begged. “I’ll be good. I promise. I won’t ask any more questions.”
“It’s too late for that.” With a final tug, the faceless woman flung me into a dark room and slammed the door. The air seemed to thicken, and I grabbed at my throat, gasping. The inky darkness swallowed me. As I flailed, I watched my outline come in and out of view, like I was only partially in existence.
As the dream changed, my little sundress began to glow. My hands tingled, and I held them up in front of my face. They grew before my eyes, my palms getting bigger, my fingers longer.
Suddenly, light was shining all around me, and I was in a white, empty room. I stared down at my adult body, my little sundress exchanged for cargo pants and combat boots. I sighed with relief.
Hearing the clearing of a throat, I glanced up. I was standing in a room with my mom. A decrepit boy stood beside her, a hungry, maniacal gleam in his black eyes. He smiled, his teeth yellowed like his skin.
“Peter,” my mom said. “This is your sister, Zoe. Her blood is going to save you.”
His smile broadened.
“Be a darling and tie her up…”
I felt the color drain from my face. “My blood?”
My mom waved my question away as she glanced down at the clipboard in her hands. “You’re my greatest experiment,” she said, her casualness unnerving. “Peter, please…” my mom gestured to me, and the boy strode toward me.
I tried to step back, but my feet were glued to the ground. My heartbeat quickened. When I looked up, Peter was only inches from me, so I raised my hand to stop him. “Get away from me!”
But he kept coming, emitting a sinister laugh.
“Peter, don’t do this,” I pleaded, but there was nothing I could do, nowhere I could go. Before I knew what was happening, his fingers skewered my chest, and the burning sensation of five sharp blades cutting into my flesh and bone made me scream out in pain.
~~~~~
In the late, foggy morning, with my hair up in a ponytail and the crisp sea breeze nipping at the back of my neck, Jason, Dani, Jake, and I sat atop our horses as they clomped lazily down the highway toward my childhood home. My stomach was in knots; the longing and familiarity I often felt when thinking of home tangled with the increasing ache of grief the closer we drew to my street. Haunting dreams and restless nights hadn’t helped my nerves at all, either.
But I was being good; I clung to what I missed about being home. I focused on the calming, muffled sound of the waves crashing against the cove beyond the cypresses lining the highway and the occasional call of the seabirds perched on the rocky cliffs.
“Are you okay, Zo?” Dani asked as Wings fell into step beside Shadow. The two horses craned their necks slightly to meet the other’s stare, and I wondered what silent conversation transpired between them.
“Yeah, just mixed feelings, you know?”
Dani gave me a quick nod and reached out to squeeze my arm. Her fingernails were just a little bit dirty, and her hands were coarse against my skin, two things the old Dani never would’ve let happen. I couldn’t help but smile.
“What’s so funny?” she asked, her hand dropping back to her leg.
Shaking my head, I smiled. “I’m glad you’re here with me, D.” We’d been through so much over the past few months, and we were finally together. I couldn’t help but think about how lucky I’d been. I’d crossed thousands of miles to be with her and Jason, and now here we were, starting a new chapter in our lives together.
I turned in my saddle and looked back at Jake. He and Jason were strategizing about something; I could tell by the way Jake was nodding and offering a word here and there, while Jason drew shapes in the air. I wouldn’t have made it without Jake.
Facing front again, I couldn’t help the cheeky grin that engulfed my face as I spotted an old pump house through the fog, peeking out from a bramble of overgrown bushes and scraggly trees.
“What?” Dani asked, unable to resist smiling even though she was clueless as to why.
A parade of childhood memories danced through my head. “Remember that place?” I asked, nodding behind her. We’d decorated it as our summertime hangout after fifth grade, our no-bullies, no-boys-allowed fort.
Dani turned in her saddle. After an amused sigh, she said, “Yep. No boys allowed.”
I grinned in a nostalgic haze. “It’s so overgrown now, I can barely even see where it was…oh, what about the hideout we made under Mr. Boogieman’s deck?”
Dani burst into laughter. Our horses spooked at the sound, but only momentarily before they continued around the bend in the road toward my house. “That was short-lived…and not the smartest place to hang out,” she said.
“Yeah, poor Mr. Bergman. I feel sort of bad now. But he was so creepy…” I turned to my brother. “Jason, do you remember Mr. Bergman?”
He scoffed. “That old guy you stalked one summer?”
“Um, he was the boogieman,” Dani said, trying to sound affronted.
“Weren’t you guys like eleven? Who believes in the boogieman when they’re eleven years old?”
“Uh, he was definitely the boogieman, Jason,” I said, mimicking my eleven-year-old self. I remembered that summer so clearly, I nearly laughed again. “Remember the nights he would walk around town all creepy and in the shadows…in a trench coat?” I leaned forward and patted Shadow’s shoulder.
“He was on the town wa
tch,” Jason said from behind me. “You guys knew that, right?”
“Wait…what?” Dani said. “We had a town watch?” We both turned around to see Jason.
He shrugged and averted his eyes. “Yeah, it was pretty much just Bergman.”
“Oh, well…it’s Bodega Bay. We had to do something to keep ourselves busy,” I said, smiling as a wave of memories, of other Zoe-Dani adventures, bloomed to life.
We’d just gotten off at the bus stop and were walking home one afternoon when Kenny Monroe, the boy I had the biggest crush on, ran up and stopped in front of us.
Dani and I turned to one another and exchanged confused expressions for a moment, and when I turned back to Kenny, he kissed my cheek before running ahead, disappearing around a bend in the road. I barely had time to even comprehend what had happened.
Then there was the time in eighth grade, when Grams had to drive all the way to Tomales to pick us up after school. I’d gotten into another fight, and Dani and I had missed the bus home. Grams had been angry, but once she learned that I’d only been protecting Dani from the Nasty Neilson triplets, the gleam in Grams’s eyes contradicted her chiding words, and she offered me a silent nod in gratitude.
“Good ol’ Mr. Bergman.” Dani sighed and shook her head.
“Yeah, he was a trooper,” I said. “I’m sure he knew we were following him around, but he didn’t say anything.”
“Grams put a stop to that adventure real quick,” Dani said, an unmistakable longing in her voice. Out of nowhere, she laughed. “Do you remember how pissed she was? I guess it wasn’t very nice to tell everyone he was an evil monster who ate little kids.”
Laughing, I said, “No, no I guess it wasn’t. Especially because I think Judy and her little sister actually believed it.”
“So,” Jake said, startling me. I hadn’t realized he’d ridden up beside me. “You’ve always been this much trouble?” he said ruefully, his eyebrow arched.
Between Jason’s smirk and Dani’s dying laughter, I couldn’t suppress my own amused chuckle. “Yeah, I guess I have been. That was a fun summer,” I said, trying to catch my breath. My stomach muscles hurt from laughing so much, but my heart felt lighter. It was a great feeling.
Aside from the difficult times I’d had growing up, there were a lot of good times, too. But time was a funny thing; it went by so fast that things changed in the blink of an eye. It seemed I’d already lived three lifetimes—my childhood, my time in Massachusetts, and now.
Dani must’ve lost herself in thought, too, because she and I both grew quiet as we watched the memories from our past disappear in the fog behind us. Jake and Jason’s low chuckles and conversation were all that filled our silence.
My heartbeat quickened as my house came into view through the mist, and even the talk among the men quieted. The house—faded blue and weather-worn—was exactly how I remembered it, if a little more lonely and bleak.
With Dani and me in the lead, we clomped up the driveway, bringing Wings and Shadow to a stop outside the backyard fence. “Well,” I breathed. “Shall we?”
Dismounting, I wiped my clammy palms on my jeans and walked toward the gate, slowly opening it and paying little attention to the others as I walked through. I led Shadow into the yard, and wrapped his reins around his saddle horn so he was free to roam among what little amount of grass and weeds were growing, before looking up at the house.
The others came into the backyard after me, but I was too busy losing myself in a rush of memories. I could almost picture Jason mowing the side lawn, cursing the tire swing for being in his way. I easily imagined Dani and me lying out on the deck, sunbathing in the only corner that wasn’t completely covered in tree shadows, begging the sun god for just a few more minutes, and us eating our lunches at the outside table, music blasting from my stereo.
Stepping up onto the first stair of the deck, I thought of my dream two nights ago, the night I met my mom. The memory stung, but it also reminded me of something. I bent forward, searching beneath the railing for the carving Dani and I had etched into the wood over a decade ago. In a brief moment of panic, I’d worried it wouldn’t be there. “It’s still here,” I said.
When I straightened, a smile pulling at my lips, I found Dani standing beside me, her smile equally as big. “You expected someone to search the entire deck, underside and all, for things to deface?” She scoffed, but merriment brightened her green eyes.
I’d told Dani about my dream meeting with my mom, but I hadn’t thought about the carving until now. “No,” I said a little self-consciously. “I guess not.”
Glancing behind me, I noticed that Jake and Jason were a ways back, giving us our space.
“We’ll be in the shop,” Jason said, leading Jake toward the large shed our dad had built beside the house.
“So…” Dani eyed the sliding glass door. “You ready for this?”
“Yep,” I said on an exhale. Taking Dani’s hand in mine, I opened the door and stepped into my home, a place I never thought I would set foot in again.
The living room was minimally decorated, just as it had been when I’d left for Salem a few years back. A large, black sectional butted up against the left wall, and two matching recliners flanked the rectangular, cedar coffee table my dad had built. Our dusty, big-screen TV sat on the entertainment center against the opposite wall, remnants of my extensive movie collection stacked on either side.
With the exception of a few of my landscape drawings, there was no artwork on the walls, there were no family pictures. Although it had bothered me growing up, I understood now that it was probably a safety precaution taken by Dad, since he’d known why my mom had to leave…since he’d known about General Herodson’s threats. It had been better—safer—if we weren’t able to recognize her.
I shook my head at the husk of a life I’d lived, at the lies I’d thought were memories of my childhood—they were memories, but they were skewed and shadowed with more lies than I’d probably ever fully understand.
Dani was watching me, her face a careful, cautious mask that did little to hide the gentle waves of anticipation I could feel resonating around her. “It’s weird, huh? Like it’s the same, but different, too…”
Peering around the room, I realized that was exactly how it felt: everything was just as it had been when I’d left years ago, like absolutely nothing had changed. Only I saw things differently now, and the months I’d spent traversing the country with my friends had felt more like home than the dreary house I was standing in.
I headed toward the kitchen, poking my head through the doorway to find nothing out of place, except… “Someone’s been here,” I said with a mixture of dread and hope as I stared at the dirty plates in the sink.
“Jason and me—those are from the last time we were here.”
My heart sank a little, but I shrugged and gave Dani a weak smile. Nudging her arm with mine, I turned and walked up the stairs toward my bedroom, each step bringing me closer to an impending clash of pre-Ending Zoe and new Zoe.
As I stepped into the hallway, I noticed my dad’s bedroom door was closed, giving the hall an ominous feeling that made me slightly uncomfortable. I opened my mind completely, letting my feelers wander through the house in search of my dad’s mind, but there was no one there but the four of us. I wasn’t surprised. He’s gone, Zoe.
Stopping in the hallway between Jason’s room and mine, I stared through his open doorway. His room was a complete mess; clothes were strewn all around, the contents of his closet were spilling out onto the carpet, and his bedding was rumpled.
Recalling the dishes in the sink, I eyed Dani skeptically, hoping I wasn’t looking at the aftermath of one of their sexcapades.
Dani rolled her eyes and raised her right hand. “On my honor as your best friend, I swear we’ve never done anything here. This is just the aftermath of hurricane Jason, when he was going through his stuff, figuring out what he wanted to take with him.”
With a snort, I shook my he
ad, ecstatic that I could easily block out those memories that I didn’t want to see, and stepped into my bedroom. It seemed just as I’d left it; my queen-size bed was covered with my favorite purple and green comforter, a mountain of pillows were tossed messily at the head, and my cluttered desk seemed untouched against the wall across from it.
I vaguely registered Dani sitting down on my bed as I walked up to the corkboard hanging above my desk. I stared at the photos and drawings and notes I’d stuck to its surface over the years.
“There are so many memories,” I thought aloud. “It’s easy to forget about the good times.” I wasn’t sure which memories to hold onto…which keepsakes to take with me. Squinting, I stared at one particular picture, then pulled it from the board. It was the single photo I had of Jason and my dad, working in the woodshop.
I handed it to Dani. “Remember how upset my dad was when we took this?”
I heard the bedsprings creak as Dani stood. She drew closer to my side and linked her arm with mine. “I guess his aversion to having his picture taken sort of makes sense now…”
Nodding, I gently pulled my arm from Dani’s and crouched down to open the bottom drawer of my desk. I needed to get the items I wanted to take with me and get the hell out of the house. It felt too strange being there, too much like a bad dream.
The woodcarving kit I’d had since I was nine years old lay rolled up in the drawer, exactly where I’d left it. “This might come in handy,” I said, setting it on the floor beside me. Prepared to close the drawer, I noticed the large, black canvas scrapbook I’d been putting together for Dani before she left for Washington, one that I’d obviously neglected in my rushed decision to move to Salem.
“I forgot about this,” I said, pleasantly surprised, and handed it to Dani. “I’d meant it to be a project to work on when I came home to visit, since all my collage stuff is here. I guess I hadn’t come back as often as I’d planned.” I cringed, feeling a little guilty as I realized how absent a best friend I’d been over the past couple years.
The Ending Series: The Complete Series Page 118