For a second, as my eyes adjusted, the shadows in my room seemed to dance. In the corner behind my door, diagonal from my bed, I watched the shadow shapes sway and flicker ever so gently. It had to be the effect of the lava lamp, or maybe a problem with my eyes. I’d never seen them grow and twist that way before; it wasn’t natural.
“Jenna?” I called, pulling the blankets tighter. No answer. No way I was getting out of bed, though.
Instead, I crawled in deeper, and forced my eyes shut until sheer exhaustion pulled me under.
###
I experienced my first altercation with Harlow Briggs in study hall a few days later. The teacher—more like a babysitter—had stepped out to speak with a colleague. I finished my homework and tried to drop into a book, but I couldn’t stop ruminating. My focus was ruined for the time being, since I hadn’t slept well.
Harlow was sitting in the second row. She’d seemed harmless so far; although, she’d already shot up to the top of the social stratosphere. I’d witnessed Lainey Ford guiding her through a tour of the commons a few days prior. Lainey forced her best friend, Madison Taylor, behind them like a servant while Lainey grasped Harlow’s arm.
In study hall, Sarah Abbot, an old friend who I hadn’t interacted with in quite some time, was rushing back to her seat. Her attention was diverted to her phone as she texted. She wasn’t paying any notice to the path of her feet.
It seemed to go down in slow motion; yet, I had no time to speak up. Sarah tripped over Harlow’s bag, which was shoved halfway out into the aisle. All limbs and a horrified expression, she sprawled out on the floor, her phone in a death grip. A few of Harlow’s items, including her wallet, fell out of the purse. I cringed.
Harlow instantly bolted to her feet.
“Watch where you’re going, stupid!” she shrieked. A complete contrast to her formerly placid behavior. “That’s a five hundred dollar purse, and now it has your hoof marks all over it!”
The teacher reappeared in the room, and instantly swooped over to the confrontation. On the floor, Sarah was crouching with Harlow’s wallet in one hand as she tried to replace the items. Her cheeks glowed bright red, and she was biting her lip, holding back tears.
“What’s going on here?” the teacher asked, taking in the girls’ positions.
Harlow bent, snatched her wallet out of Sarah’s hands, then thrust an accusatory finger at her. “This girl was trying to steal my wallet.”
“What?” Sarah asked, her eyes wide and horrified. She got to her feet, but swayed as though she might pass out.
“Is that true?” The teacher glared at Sarah, but appeared not to know what to think.
“Of course it is. Look at her; it’s obvious she bought her clothes at Walmart,” Harlow snarled viciously.
Everyone else in class forced themselves to look elsewhere, not wanting to join in on the situation. I had been trying to control my rashness, since it usually got me into trouble. But I couldn’t let Sarah get punished.
“She didn’t steal anything,” I spoke up. “She tripped on Harlow’s purse in the aisle, and was trying to pick it up. It was an honest mistake.”
Harlow craned her head slowly, creepily, until her dark brown eyes were piercing through mine. Silent anger burned in her pupils. Sarah looked relieved, although her blush hadn’t faded. The teacher shook her head.
“Take your seats please, ladies,” she said, her flat tone revealing she’d already checked out of the situation.
Sarah ran off and slumped at her desk for the rest of the hour. But Harlow continued to freeze my blood with her penetrating glare. I was already on one mean girl’s bad side—Lainey hated me because of our shared past with Henry. I didn’t need any more enemies. Yet I’d just made a dangerous one.
CHAPTER 4
IT DIDN’T TAKE long for Harlow to enact retribution. Monday of the next week, Principal McPherson yanked me out of math class without warning. Harlow stood smugly beside him, her nose tilted up triumphantly.
“What’s going on?” I asked, annoyance creeping into my voice as I looked back and forth between them. I hadn’t said a word to Harlow directly, ever.
McPherson glared at me like I was the one who had interrupted him. His nose was reddened like a tomato and both of his eyes were bloodshot. I wondered if he was coming down with a cold.
“Ms. Briggs claims that you vandalized her locker,” McPherson said testily. “There was red spray paint all over it.”
Harlow smirked at me from McPherson’s shoulder. No one had ever told her no; I was convinced of it.
“She’s lying,” I said, rolling my eyes. “A bad lie, too. Couldn’t you come up with anything better than that?”
Harlow didn’t speak, but her smile faltered. She didn’t look as confident anymore.
“She’s just trying to get back at me for something in study hall last week.” I turned back to McPherson. “Don’t you have any more pressing issues than girl-on-girl drama?”
Harlow’s nostrils flared, her hands meeting her slim hips. She came around, pushing me out of the way so that McPherson was looking directly at her.
“You aren’t going to listen to her, are you?” she asked in a high, girlish voice, batting her fake eyelashes. “I’m the innocent one here. I don’t even know this girl and she already has a grudge against me.”
McPherson sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. He mumbled under his breath, but I couldn’t make out the words. I thought quickly about the day he’d been discussing school funds with his assistant, which up until then I’d forgotten about. He appeared to be under deep stress. When he looked up again, his angry glare settled on me.
“You’re a troublemaker, Ariel Donovan,” he growled. “That fact has been well established during the years I’ve had the displeasure of being the principal of this trash heap. But there’s not much I can do for punishment in this situation. And Harlow, I can see the red paint on your hands.”
I’d never heard him talk like that about Hawthorne before; he was always flush with school spirit. His words about me flushed me full of anger, but I also felt a tiny, begrudging spark of awe. Normally, popular kids got away with murder. Harlow looked furious, her hands making fists against her elbows, like she might throw a tantrum.
“I’m going back to class,” I said flippantly to her. “If you want to stand here wasting your time, you’re welcome to.”
“I don’t much care for your attitude!” McPherson thundered. My head snapped back in his direction, shocked at the sudden outburst out of the blue.
“I didn’t mean—” I began, but then lost my words.
I saw the pupils of his bulging eyes flicker rapidly back and forth. They evened out but his face remained bright red. “I am not a pup! You can’t restrain my actions! Put that leash back!”
Harlow gawked at him like he was crazy and took a step back, slack-jawed.
“Are you okay?” I asked McPherson.
He held up his hand. “Detention. Tomorrow.”
“You can’t—”
“I can. I just did.” His gums were showing, yellowed teeth on display. “Maybe you will think twice next time when you think of talking back to me.”
I wanted to explain that I wasn’t talking back to him, that my anger lay with Harlow. He didn’t give me a chance, and I was too freaked out by his creepy behavior and appearance. He whipped back around. Harlow followed him hesitantly, but rushed away from him as soon as she got the chance.
I watched him mutter to himself; he was dragging his left foot a little.
Something was wrong with him. He wasn’t as harmless as I’d assumed.
###
“That was it, he just gave you detention for walking away?” Henry asked from beside me.
“That was it. Completely random. He thought I was smartmouthing him.”
“What do you think is wrong with him?”
“I don’t know. But it’s affecting him a great deal.”
It was late, almost eleven. We we
re in the deserted parking lot of the bowling alley, lounging on a blanket draped over the hood of his BMW. My parents thought I was at Theo’s. Theo was not aware of this.
Stars glowed distantly above us, glittering against the dark blue sky. There was still snow on the ground and the air was frigid, but I felt warm being beside Henry. The vapor of our breath rose up and faded away.
“Maybe there really is crazy in the water,” he said. “I always suspected it.”
“Well, I did have kind of a nasty attitude,” I admitted. “I’ve been developing one lately, I guess.”
“I don’t think that’s possible.”
I almost told him that was what Jenna said, but of course he had no idea I still spoke with my dead friend.
“Oh, really?” I asked instead. I maneuvered my head so I could look at him, his wide brown eyes gazing at me with amusement. “How about when we first met?”
“You had your reasons. Not like I know what they were, but you had them.” He chuckled. “McPherson’s just a tool.”
We watched the calm, twinkling field of stars again, trying to pick out constellations. A song on the radio drifted out of the open car window. Suddenly, a stream of static broke through the song, making the fillings in my teeth ache. I shot up and looked around. For a moment, the atmosphere seemed heavy, pushing against me. Then the static stopped and the heaviness dissolved.
“That was weird,” I muttered under my breath.
“Just satellites interfering with each other,” Henry said, shrugging. He changed the subject. “You know, I’ve been thinking. If your mom does get into Thornhill, maybe it might make things smoother for us.”
“I’m worried we need to be even more cautious,” I admitted, clasping my hands together. I scraped my mud-spotted boots together, kicking off flecks of melting snow. “Claire is pretty good at telling when I’m being dishonest, and I’m pretty bad at lying.”
“Yeah, you kind of are. That’s much better than being good at lying, though.” He swallowed hard, and I sensed he felt like he was talking about himself. Unwelcome memories—of him dating Lainey because his father told him to, of the strange way he’d acted when he’d pulled away from me—nagged at my attention. I pushed them away, focusing on the present.
“I wish I could slow time down,” I said, turning my head towards him. He smiled up at the sky.
“I don’t think it would ever slow down enough. You’d still want certain moments to last forever.”
He gazed at me, both of our heads back against the hood. His eyes were full of unspoken feelings. I suddenly found it harder to breathe. Leaning over me, his lips pressed against mine, and I wrapped my arms around him, pulling him closer.
I shut my eyes and surrendered to the moment, just him and me. Then I thought I heard a faint sound from off on the road. My eyes flashed open and I stretched back. A glow lit up the snow banks at the far end of the lot. Henry’s car was the only one parked here, but the light was growing stronger.
“I think there might be a car coming,” I whispered, sliding out from beneath him. The whir of a motor followed, cementing my suspicion. We watched the headlights become bigger and brighter against the snow. Henry tensed up beside me, and I could feel worry running off of him. Instead of passing us on the road, the car was going to come into the lot.
Henry and I scrambled off of the hood, on opposite sides. He snatched the checkered blanket that had been beneath us and rushed into his car through the driver’s side after me.
I hunched down, watching a beaten-up old Dodge slide into the parking lot. We both held our breath, tension filling the cab. The Dodge spun out in two donuts, then shot right back onto the road again with its tires skidding.
“Drunk driver,” Henry said, exhaling. We exchanged a nervous laugh.
“That was a close one,” I said.
“We don’t even know if that was anyone important,” Henry countered, as if to convince himself.
But our little unofficial date was over. He started up the engine and I buckled my seat belt, feeling morose and angry. As he drove out of the parking lot, I stared out of the window. Shadow shapes darkened the area around the forest. As I looked closer, the shadows weren’t shifting or waving like those cast by the trees. Instead of graceful movements, they seemed to twitch and jerk unnaturally. The hair on my arms stood up stiffly in response.
It was just my paranoia giving form to the shadows. At least that’s what I told myself, once we’d left them safely behind. But my own worried eyes in the mirror didn’t believe me.
###
The orphanage is creating the fire. Not being hurt by it.
I realized this standing at the base of the split staircase, heat screaming against my face. My hair flew around me in all directions. The building should have been reduced to cinders by now; however, the orange flames continued to crackle and snap. There was no indication that the building was going to fall or even break.
The orphanage’s siren call was luring me in. It took a strong dose of willpower to hold me still.
“You’ve got to wonder what Dexter is made out of,” Ambrose said beside me.
I jumped, not realizing he’d joined me. He was watching the fire with reverence, severe shadows etched across his face. He was one of the many exceptions to the rule that beauty can’t be evil.
“I was just thinking about that, actually,” I said. “Are you going inside with me?”
“Nope, not me.” Ambrose shoved his hands in the tuxedo pockets and rocked forward on his wingtips. “That’s all your rodeo. I have no interest in this old haunt—never really did. I was along for the ride.”
Charred shingles from the roof tumbled down and crashed to the ground like rocks.
“Why are you following me, then?” I asked.
“I have no idea,” Ambrose said, sounding put upon. “You’re spinning this web, I just got caught in your thread.”
Enlightenment crossed his face. Ambrose reached out and bumped my shoulder with his fist. I was taken aback by the sudden contact, a little frightened that he could touch me.
“Do me a favor,” he said.
“Why would I ever do you a favor?” I asked. “Especially after what you did to Jenna? Twelve years of torture doesn’t make you my ally.”
“Hey now, there’s no need to be a bitch about it. And I never tortured you, you friggin’ drama queen. You’re not that important.” For a moment, I saw tendrils of smoke twirling out of his nose. I blinked and they were gone, maybe an illusion of the fire. He continued, “I was just asking whether you could—”
He paused, glancing back up at the orphanage.
“What are you doing?” I asked, irritated by his insane mood shifts.
He put one finger to his lips. “Shut up and listen. The phone’s for you.”
I listened very closely over the roaring of the flames. A dog was barking faintly from somewhere inside.
“You should answer it,” Ambrose said. I didn’t like the way his pale eyes fixed on me, the calm intensity of his stare. I turned back and listened to the dog.
“Hey, what favor did you—” I began, but Ambrose was gone. Gray space stretched on for miles behind me. Dark shapes moved and twisted in the fog, making me nervous. There was no way back.
I was still wearing the binding white dress, but like hell would I go into the fire with it. It was too heavy and it would slow me down if I had to get away. I reached down and ripped and tore at the seemingly endless layers. I finally pulled what was left off of me and dropped it on the ground.
Taking a deep, sobering breath, I took one final step forward. The fire went out as if I’d blown out a match, plunging the building into darkness. A smoking husk was all that remained, negative sunbursts of soot marring the stone.
My heart lurched in one painful beat, like I’d suffered a blow to the chest. My breath filtered out in icy whorls. The ground was now coated in gray snow, and ashes floated down like dingy flakes. A few ebony crow feathers were mixed in,
too. I reached out and caught a feather gently by its quill, twirling it around.
I jumped up the obviously unsafe stairs. The porch sagged under my weight, buckling from years of rot and termites as I grasped the doorknob. I felt the beaten wood begin to give way. Slamming open the door, I lunged inside. The entire porch collapsed into a black hole below with a loud crash.
Ghostly light emanated from deeper inside. The dog continued complaining to itself. The interior didn’t appear burnt at all; in fact, it looked more like what it must have in its heyday. The decorating was spartan and tidy with paintings of trees on top of rusty red wallpaper.
I didn’t like looking at the paintings; the sight of the black, emaciated trees produced a funny buzzing inside my ears.
Hesitating for the briefest moment of self-preservation, I moved on. The floor creaked as I went down the hall and around the corner. A barking dog wasn’t a welcome mat. It might very well attack me, but I couldn’t ignore the pull the dog had on me, as though I was holding its leash. Or the other way around.
The canine’s shadow was thrown up huge on the wall. The dog stood just out of sight, but I knew I’d seen it before—a mixed breed lacking identification, capable of becoming one of the shadows.
The dog stopped barking. I was about to call out, but it took off, paws beating against the wood. I gave chase, adrenaline racing through me to feed my limbs.
Follow, follow, my brain chanted. Let it lead you.
CHAPTER 5
I WOKE UP tangled in a mass of sheets and blankets. I’d pulled them all down with me when I’d fallen out of bed. The back of my head ached steadily and I rubbed my skull. Ow.
“You hit it on your desk when you fell down,” Jenna said, startling me since I didn’t realize she was in the room. “Kind of funny.”
I rubbed my head again, feeling irritated, and gathered the lump of blankets. I shoved them untidily back on the bed, sitting on top. “Shut up.”
Luminosity (Gravity Series #3) (The Gravity Series) Page 4