No rougarou howling at the moon.
I double-check the window latch before I crawl under the sheets and close my eyes. But when I roll over on my side, I wince, so I sit up and flip on the lamp. Bruises ring my upper arms. Blotchy blue-and-purple fingerprints.
There are things out here in the dark, Greycie.
I turn the lamp back off and lie down again. Evie’s wind chimes whisper through the room like a ghost, and I wonder what Hart is so afraid of.
Exactly what kind of monster is hiding out there in the night?
Something grabs my ankle—cold, wet fingers—and I scream and go down hard. I hit the mud
like it’s concrete, and it forces every bit of
air out of my lungs.
9
Three or four times that night, I jolt awake in a cold sweat, struggling for air, with those disjointed flashes of Elora flickering across my mind like a badly edited movie. I get out of bed and go to the window.
But there’s never anything there.
The next day is Monday. Memorial Day. Honey and I close down the bookstore that morning so we can pay our respects at the cemetery up in Kinter. We open up that afternoon, though. And Honey lights extra candles for the dead.
When night falls, Sera comes by to invite me to a bonfire out at their place. We all pile into their airboat with Sander in the driver’s seat. Me. Sera and Sander. Mackey. Evie. Hart. It’s so close to being right. But none of us can ignore the fact that Elora isn’t with us.
Or Case.
The six of us huddle around the fire together, trying to push back the darkness. But it won’t be held at bay. Mackey plays his guitar. We sway to the music, but nobody sings along. Hart is moody. He drinks too much. Gets moodier. Sera and I sit on a rough plank bench, with Evie smooshed between us, and watch the flames change color. But I keep looking back over my shoulder, scanning the dark for blazing eyes.
When Evie gets up to go pee, I turn toward Sera. “I’m worried about her,” I say. “Evie. Something’s going on with her.” Sander stops poking at the burning logs to turn around and listen.
Sera nods. Her river-sand-and-copper hair hangs in long, loose waves tonight. Glowing and gorgeous. She’s combing it with her fingers. “Evie’s been through a lotta shit this year. That’s all. She’ll be okay.”
“We’ve all been through a lotta shit this year,” Mackey says from the other side of the fire.
“I’ll drink to that,” Sera adds, and she lifts her plastic cup in a toast. Tilts her chin up toward the stars. “This one’s for Elora.”
We all nod and mumble. “For Elora.” Hold up our own cups. On the edge of the circle, Hart lights up a cigarette. Turns his face to the shadows. And I wonder if he’s crying.
Later, back at home—before I crawl beneath the quilts—I find myself drawn to my bedroom window again. But the darkness is empty.
No stranger. No blue eyes blinking back at me like ice on fire in the moonshine.
There’s nothing the next night, either. Or even the night after that. And before I know it, two weeks have melted away in the swampy heat.
Elora is still missing.
And my hope is fading. The cold lump of dread in my stomach feels heavier every day.
Hart keeps watch.
Case keeps his distance.
And Evie keeps making those pretty wind chimes.
Sera whispers to Sander in Creole—even more than usual—while Mackey does his best to pretend like everything’s normal.
And each night, I wait by the window and look for a secret stranger who isn’t there.
The Flower Moon wanes. Still no rougarou.
I dream about those wild blue eyes, though, whenever I manage to fall asleep. And even when I’m awake, I can’t shake the feeling that someone—or something—is just out of sight. Watching me. Sometimes when I’m outside, I feel it so strong that I turn around quick, sure the stranger will be standing right there. Burning me with those fiery eyes.
But there’s only flat, empty bayou stretched out behind me.
I keep having flashes of Elora, too. They come more and more often. Sometimes they hit me out of nowhere and I end up frozen, fighting the wind and water and the mud. The terror. When it passes, I look up to catch Honey studying me.
But I still don’t know who Elora’s running from. Or how it all ends.
So by the middle of June, I’m no closer to knowing what happened to my twin flame than I was that first morning I stepped off the mail boat.
Elora and I were born on June 16. We’re just two days away from turning seventeen. So far, nobody’s mentioned my birthday, though. Our birthday. And that’s fine with me. The thought of blowing out candles alone gives me a pain so deep in my chest that I’m sure my lungs have imploded.
It’s early evening when Honey sends me out back to the storage shed. She needs an extension cord for the Himalayan salt lamp she wants to show off in the bookstore window.
But when I step outside, the shed door is cracked open and boot prints stain the white paint of the boardwalk. They remind me of the muddy track that cottonmouth left. The one that ended up dead on the end of a frog gig. And it makes me uneasy. Because I know someone’s been in the little storage building. Maybe is in there now.
I hold my breath and creep toward the door. When I put one eye to the crack, I see someone crawling around on his hands and knees inside the shed, looking for something on the dusty floor. From my angle, all I can see are jeans and a worn pair of boots. It could be anybody in Plaquemines Parish.
But then I get a glimpse of dark red hair.
“Fuck.” The word comes out in a low growl. Whatever Case is looking for, I guess he didn’t find it.
I turn and head back into the kitchen as quickly and quietly as I can. Sweet-N-Low is passed out on his pillow in the corner. Snoring. Some watchdog. Case could be robbing us blind, for all he cares.
I peek through the curtains and keep an eye on the shed. It’s only a few minutes before Case comes sneaking out. He eases the door closed behind him, then he hops down from the boardwalk and takes off through the mud in the direction of his house, like somebody lit his feet on fire.
I think about the summer we were all twelve. Case taught Elora and me how to play baseball. I can still see him sidling up behind her with a big grin on his face, arms reaching around her middle to show her how to hold the bat. I’d been so jealous of the easy way she’d flirted, even back then.
Then she popped the very first ball he tossed in her direction. And that’s when it hit me.
Bam!
Like the crack of the bat.
Exactly where things were headed between the two of them. I never saw it ending up here, though.
I only wait a minute before I head straight back to the shed. I leave the door wide open, to let in all the light, and I drop down to my hands and knees to feel around on the floor. Like Case was doing. I look in the corners. Under the edges of boxes. But I come up empty-handed, so I grab the extension cord for Honey and pull the door closed behind me.
I drop the extension cord on the kitchen table before I head back out again to pull on my boots. I take the wooden steps down into the wet grass, and I feel the familiar squelch of mud beneath my feet.
I didn’t find any answers in the dark corners of Honey’s storage shed, but maybe I’ll find some in the last place anybody saw Elora.
Back at Li’l Pass.
In between the place where the La Cachette boardwalk rises out of the muck at the river’s edge and the vast wetlands that lie beyond, there’s a long, narrow strip of high, solid ground. Lil’ Pass runs right behind it. It’s not much of a waterway. Way too small and shallow to navigate, even in a kayak. Or a pirogue. We played back there all the time when we were kids. Jumping across the water and chasing each other. I’ve been avoiding going out ther
e, since I got home this summer. To the place Elora disappeared. Tonight, though, it’s almost like the spot is calling to me.
It used to seem like a long way, but now it takes me less than ten minutes to cover the distance. Clumps of skinny trees are scattered across the landscape. Patches of tall grass here and there. A few things people have dumped. An old clothes dryer with the door half off. A molding living room recliner. A flatbed trailer with no wheels.
This is where they were that night.
I look around, and that strange feeling comes over me again. That feeling of being watched. I tell myself I’m being ridiculous. Maybe there never was anyone outside my window. Maybe I imagined my stranger.
The way Wrynn imagined her rougarou.
I crawl up on the old dryer to stand on top and take it all in, like some kind of animal in a documentary about the savanna.
And I don’t see a damn thing.
I don’t know what I expected. I could get down and comb through the grass. But I still wouldn’t turn up anything. Hart said the searchers went over this whole area with a fine-tooth comb. If there’d been a clue here, they would have found it.
“She ain’t out here.”
“Jesus!” I almost jump right out of my clothes, but it’s only Wrynn. “You scared me half to death.”
She’s wearing shorts. Mud splashed all up her skinny legs. No shoes. And she’s eating CheeWees right out of the bag. Her fingers are stained orange from the fake cheese dust.
“You’re lookin’ in da wrong place,” she says.
“I’m not looking for anything,” I tell her, sitting down cross-legged on top of the clothes dryer.
“This ain’t where it happened.” She offers me a CheeWee, but I shake my head. Wrynn shivers hard. “Gives me the frissons, sure, thinkin’ about dat ol’ rougarou.” Her eyes are huge. She takes her thumb and one bright orange finger and rubs at something hanging around her neck. A silver dime with a little hole drilled in it for the string. It’s a talisman to ward off evil. Lots of folks down here still hold with the old superstitions.
“Wrynn—” I start.
“You need to be lookin’ over dat way.” She licks CheeWee dust off her index finger and points. “Not way out here.”
I follow Wrynn’s finger with my eyes. The boardwalk glimmers bright white, like the sun-bleached ribs of a snake stretched out along the river.
“Elora was on the boardwalk that night?”
“Yep. Dat’s where he kilt her at.” I see the tiny red hairs standing straight up on her pale arms. “And you best watch out, Grey, or he’ll get you, too.”
She reaches into the pocket of her shorts and brings out a handful of little objects. “Take ’em,” Wrynn tells me, and I hold out my hand. Polished pennies. Pop tops. Bottle caps. Paper clips. It’s an odd little collection.
“Scatter ’em on your windowsill,” she explains. “For protection. Dat rougarou, he’ll have to stop and count ’em, see? Cain’t help hisself. And he ain’t too bright. Cain’t count no higher than twelve, dey say. So every time he comes to thirteen, he gets all confused. Has to start over. He’ll stand dere stuck. Countin’ all night long. And then when daylight comes up, he’ll have to hightail it home.”
“Little Bird!” Case’s voice makes us both jump. “Time to be gittin’ on in.” He’s standing not five feet away. I wonder how long he’s been there. And where he came from. “Dark’s comin’ on soon.”
Wrynn gives me one last look—like she has more she wants to say—but I expect she knows better than to argue with Case, so she turns and takes off toward home.
Case stands there staring at me for a few seconds, then he takes a step in my direction. “You scared of me?” he asks, and I shake my head. Case smirks, then he turns his head to spit into the grass before he starts off after Wrynn in the direction of their house. “You git on inside now, chere,” he calls back over one shoulder. “It ain’t safe out here come nightfall.”
I shove Wrynn’s little collection into my pocket. The sun is sinking toward the river, and the mosquitoes are eating me alive. Case isn’t wrong. I need to head home.
But suddenly, one of those flashes hits me hard. Elora’s fear jams my frequencies, and my brain starts to short-circuit. I close my eyes tight, but that doesn’t stop me seeing what she saw.
Or feeling what she felt.
I stumble again when I hit the water, but I don’t go down. Li’l Pass isn’t so little anymore. There’s no jumping it now. The water is up to my knees, and I fight the current to stay on my feet.
I see the bounce of his flashlight beam, and I hear him yelling my name again. Over the wind and the rain and the rushing water. And I’m not completely sure if I’m hearing him outside my head. Or inside.
And that’s it.
I try to hang on to that little bit of Elora, like reaching for her hand, but she’s already gone again.
My eyes fly open, and I suck in air so hard I choke.
Then I freeze.
I feel it. The air has changed. It’s electric. It pulses and dances around me.
I’m not alone. Someone is watching me from behind one of those skinny trees. A glint of light-colored hair and a flash of movement. That’s all I catch.
“Evie? Is that you?”
There’s no answer, and every muscle in my body tenses. I wait, but there’s nothing. A breeze whispers through the long grass. The blades bend and sway and murmur to be careful.
I slip off the clothes dryer, and when my feet hit the ground, my legs feel like Jell-O. I take a cautious step toward the trees.
“Evie?”
Nothing.
“Quit playing around, Evie.”
I glance over my shoulder toward the boardwalk. How long would it take me to run that distance? If I needed to.
If I had to.
Something moves behind the trees again.
“Who’s there?”
Shit.
This is all wrong.
I start to back away, but my foot ends up in a muskrat hole and I go down hard on my backside.
And that’s when he steps out from the shadows. He must have been there the whole time. Watching me.
I hold my breath and brace for something terrible.
Fangs and claws. Or worse.
But he’s not a monster. Or at least he doesn’t look like one. He’s ordinary. About my age. Tall and slender. Faded jeans and an old green T-shirt. No shoes. Blond hair the color of dirty sunshine. It hangs down in the front, hiding his face.
And I don’t recognize him.
Not until he lifts his chin and tosses that hair out of his eyes.
And those eyes are anything but ordinary. They shine bright blue, like ice that’s lit up from the inside.
Like ice on fire.
Étranger. The stranger outside my window.
He smiles at me then. And I should try to run. Scream for help.
But I don’t. I can’t.
I’m frozen.
Hypnotized by those eyes.
And that smile.
He offers me his hand, but I don’t take it.
“I didn’t mean to scare you, Grey.” His voice is like the ocean, and I feel myself relax a little, against my will. I try to fight it. I need to get away. I need to put some distance between myself and this stranger.
I need to—
But I don’t.
The wet air crackles with electricity.
It hums.
Pops and sizzles.
“How do you know my name?”
The sun slips lower. I’m losing the light.
“Elora told me.”
His eyes never stray from mine.
“Elora.”
I’m not sure if I said her name that time. Or if he did.
I’m still
sprawled on the ground. He holds his hand out to me a second time. My head feels fuzzy. Like it’s full of cotton. I can’t think of the right questions.
I can’t think of anything.
“Who are you?”
“Zale,” he says, and I search my memory. But that name doesn’t mean anything to me.
“How did you know Elora?”
Something sad crosses his face. Those eyes darken a little.
“She was a friend of mine,” he says.
Was.
Everything feels so strange. Off-kilter.
Sideways.
“I won’t hurt you, Grey. I promise. I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”
He takes a step toward me, and I scramble backward until my spine is pressed against the old clothes dryer. The touch of metal against skin shocks me. Just a sharp zap of static electricity. But it wakes me up, and it’s like I come back to myself. Whatever spell he’s got me under, I don’t like it.
I don’t trust it.
I don’t trust him.
“I have to go,” I tell him, and I push myself to my feet.
Surely this is where he steps in front of me. Blocks my path. Bares his teeth and eats me alive.
Only he doesn’t. He just nods and says, “I’m glad to finally meet you, Grey.”
I don’t say anything back. I just turn and start for the boardwalk off in the distance. But I don’t let myself run for home. Everybody knows you don’t run from a wolf. You move slow and easy.
So I count my steps and keep going.
And when I glance back over my shoulder, he’s gone.
The closer I get to the boardwalk, the harder it gets to slog through the mud. It sucks and pulls at my boots. I almost lose one. I have to stop and play tug-of-war with the soggy ground. But I win. There’s a sickening sound when the mud lets go.
I hit the wooden steps just as the light dies. The white paint is peeling. Turning gray. Curling up and pulling away at the edges of the boards. I hadn’t noticed it before. Rot and mold peek through.
Decomposition.
But the wood holds.
At home, I push open the back door and slip off my muddy boots. Honey looks up from the stove, where she’s working on dinner. I’m grateful for the light and the clean kitchen. For the artificially cool air and the smell of red beans and rice.
Dark and Shallow Lies Page 8