When I go to Honey, she turns and wraps both arms around me. Mud and all. And she doesn’t ask any questions. Which is so great. Because I have no clue what just happened. Sweet-N-Low drags himself over to lick at my ankles, and I don’t even bother to shoo him away. I just try to catch my breath while I stare over Honey’s shoulder at that photo frame on the wall. Me in that watermelon sundress. My mom with that one hummingbird hair clip.
And the haunted eyes. Now that I’ve noticed them, they’re all I see.
Later, after dinner, I still feel weird.
Slightly disoriented. Hungover. A shower sounds so good.
I peel off my tank top, then I slip out of my jeans. They make a jingling sound when they hit the bedroom floor. Wrynn’s collection. I fish the shiny little objects out of my pocket so I can toss them in the trash. But then I think about Zale. Those strange eyes of his. The way he watched me. So intense.
Tiny pinpricks on my arms. The back of my neck.
Gives me the frissons, sure.
Evie’s wind chimes kick up in the night breeze. She’s been busy the last few weeks. There must be at least fifteen of them dancing outside her bedroom window now. The tinkling sound of them burrows its way inside my brain. Sometimes I think I hear them ringing, even when there’s no breath of air on the bayou. Like a leftover echo inside my head. The ghost of a song.
Elora had a good luck charm. A little silver Saint Sebastian medal. Case gave it to her as a love token that twelve-year-old summer. His mama had gotten it for him when he made the sixth-grade baseball team at school up in Kinter, because Saint Sebastian is the patron saint of athletes, and I remember the way Elora batted her eyelashes at him when she slipped it into her pocket. From then on, she carried it with her all the time. All the protection she ever thought she needed.
I wish I had a charm of my own now. I reach for the blue pearl around my neck.
But it’s not enough to make me feel safe.
So I count the shiny objects in my palm. Three pennies. Five pop tops. Two bottle caps. And three paper clips.
Exactly thirteen.
Then I lay them out on the windowsill. One by one.
The wind is merciless. It’s like being hit with a two-by-four. Over and over and over. I grab one of the spindly little trees and hang on. But I don’t take my eyes off him. I can’t. Because there’s
nobody else left in the whole world now. It’s
down to just the two of us. Him. And me.
10
The next day, the Mystic Rose is slammed. June is always peak season for day-trippers down from New Orleans. They do way more looking than buying—nobody goes home with that ugly Himalayan salt lamp—but Honey still needs me all day. So I don’t get a chance to see Hart. Or anybody else. And that’s fine with me. I need some time to think through what happened last night.
The whole time I’m working, though, I keep seeing Zale. His eyes, especially.
That strange blue fire.
And I hear the echo of his voice inside my head.
I have a couple flashes, too, while I’m wiping fingerprints off the glass countertop and again while I’m dusting the crystals. I’m looking through Elora’s eyes. I see the storm and the bayou so clear. I feel the force of the wind. But I can’t ever see who it is she’s so terrified of.
What’s the point in having this stupid gift if I never see anything useful?
Honey makes pork chops and gravy that night, and I’m helping her wash the dishes when I finally ask, “Are there any new families around here? Since last summer?”
She gives me a funny look. “Why?”
I shrug. “I saw someone I didn’t know yesterday. Looked like a local. Not a tourist.”
Honey wipes her hands on the dish towel. “What kind of someone?”
“A boy.”
“Oh. Well, let’s see.” She hands me the towel to dry my hands. “Some new people moved in last fall. Bought the old Landry place, out near Blackbird Point. Cormier, I think their name is.” She covers the leftover pork chops with foil and puts the plate in the fridge. “I know they have a couple girls. Seems like they might have a little boy, too.”
“A little boy?”
“Maybe six or seven years old.”
“Oh.” Honey has no idea that when I say a “boy” these days, I don’t really mean a six-year-old. “Anybody else?”
“No. Not that I know of.” She shrugs. “But there’s an awful lot of swamp out there. Plenty of places to hole up and not be bothered, if you’ve a mind to live that way.”
I nod and put the clean silverware in the drawer. Like it’s no big deal.
But I keep thinking about those ice-fire eyes. The burning blue of them.
“You know, tomorrow’s your birthday,” Honey says after a few minutes. “I thought maybe we could get away for the day. Get Bernadette to watch the store. Go up to New Orleans. Do a little shopping. Maybe take Evie and Sera—”
“I don’t wanna do anything.”
“I know it’s hard,” she goes on. “But it’s still your birthday. You deserve—”
“My birthday’s canceled this year.”
Probably forever.
Honey sighs. “You sure that’s what you want, Sugar Bee?”
“Yeah,” I say. “I’m sure.”
Honey turns back toward the sink. She wrings out a wet cloth and wipes crumbs from the countertop. “It might be a nice time for you all to celebrate Elora. To mark that special relationship in some way. Honor her.”
“You mean honor her memory.”
“It might help. That’s all I’m saying.” Honey’s voice is gentle. “It might bring you some peace.”
“I don’t need peace,” I tell her. “I need to know where she is.”
I escape to my bedroom and lie down in the cool air. My mind keeps going back to that drawing of Sander’s. Étranger. The stranger with the missing face.
Someone we don’t know.
It could be Zale. The stranger outside my window. But what if it’s Dempsey Fontenot, come back home to steal another summer girl? Or Case? His familiar features distorted by rage and jealousy.
Or Mackey. Or Hart. Or Evie or Sera or Sander.
Because I know they all must have their own dark corners.
Or what if it’s Elora herself? How well did I really know my best friend?
Or . . . what if it’s me?
Because I’m starting to think that I’m the biggest stranger of all. I’ve been home just over two weeks, without Elora, and I can already feel myself changing. I’m keeping secrets from Hart. And from Honey. Telling half-truths.
And I can’t really even say why.
Later, when I get up, I hear the shower running in Honey’s upstairs bathroom. I head into the kitchen to get some milk. I don’t let myself look at that picture. The one of me and my mom. Instead, I cross to the back window and part the curtains to peek out into the night.
I see the storage shed, and I think about Case again. Crawling around in there on his hands and knees.
I grab a flashlight and head out back. The wind has really kicked up, and Evie’s chimes are singing so loud.
Feels like maybe there’s a storm blowing in.
I push open the door to the shed, then I drop down low and shine my flashlight around the dusty floor. The rough wood bites at my palms and my knees. But I keep looking. I didn’t find anything yesterday. But this time, something tells me not to quit.
So I don’t.
I check every spiderwebbed corner and lift every single box to look underneath. I’m about to give up when something shiny catches my flashlight beam. It’s wedged down in a crack between two of the floorboards. I pry at it with one fingernail, but it’s stuck tight.
I dig a screwdriver out of the toolbox on the counter, and I use that to pry
at it some more. And it eventually comes free.
I hold it in my palm and shine my flashlight on the little silver circle.
Saint Sebastian stares up at me. Patron saint of athletes.
Elora’s good luck charm.
The one she’s carried in her pocket every single day since we were twelve years old.
My hand starts to shake, and it makes it hard to turn the medal over. But I have to. I have to know. For sure.
And there’s Case’s name engraved on the back. So there’s no mistaking what this is. Who it belonged to.
It isn’t the name that stops my heart, though. It’s the dark red smudge across the name. Something dry. The color of rust.
I drop the Saint Sebastian medal like it’s on fire.
I want to scream, but I only gag on my own tongue as I scramble to my feet. There’s no air in the shed. I stand there for a long time with the little silver medal lying on the floor in my flashlight beam. Like I’m hitting it with a spotlight.
Finally, I force myself to pick it up. I choke back vomit as I slip it into my pocket and step out onto the boardwalk. I take a few steps toward the back door.
There’s a flash of lightning. The low rumble of thunder. Clouds roll fast across the black sky, and Evie’s wind chimes cry into the night.
They tell me that I’m not alone. Out here in the dark. Something is moving through the cypress trees. Whispering through the tall grass.
I feel it coming closer.
Breathing.
And waiting.
Watching me.
I try to move toward the kitchen door. Just a few feet away.
But I can’t make my feet work.
Another flash of lightning.
Night becomes day, and I see him clear.
Zale stands in the open as the storm gathers around him. He’s barefoot and shirtless. And his blond hair is blowing in the wind.
When he raises his arms to the sky, more jagged lightning splits the dark in half. Electricity surges through me. My whole body tingles with its power.
He’s at least fifty yards away. But somehow I hear him whisper my name.
And it sounds like a storm on the ocean.
I can’t let him find me. I drop down to my hands and knees in the middle of the storm. In the middle of Li’l Pass. My mouth is barely above the water, and I dig my fingers and toes into the mud
to keep from being swept away.
11
There’s a huge clap of thunder. Loud enough to shake the boardwalk under my feet. And the next thing I know, Honey is grabbing my hands and pulling me into the brightly lit kitchen. As she closes the door behind us, rain comes in huge pounding drops. Thunder rattles the windows, and lightning explodes across the bayou like artillery fire. Sweet-N-Low ducks for cover under a stool.
“Grey.” Honey takes my face in her hands. “What were you doing out there in this weather?” I’m shaking too hard to answer. “You know better than that.”
My great-great-grandfather was electrocuted. He’d sought shelter from a storm in the open doorway of an unlocked church, but the thunderbolt found him anyway.
Lightning got a taste for our family then.
It hunts us, Honey says. So we have to be extra careful.
She takes off her robe and drapes it around my shoulders, then she parks me in a chair at the little kitchen table while she makes me a cup of herbal tea. I take the steaming mug, and Honey sits down across from me with one of her own.
After a few sips of chamomile and lemon, I’m finally able to make my voice work.
“Did you see him?”
Honey gives me a funny look. “See who, Sugar Bee?”
“I thought I saw someone. In the dark.”
She gets up and goes to the window, then peers out into the night and comes back to the table, shaking her head. “I can’t imagine anyone would be out and about with a storm like this comin’ on.”
For a few minutes, Honey just sits across from me in her nightgown, watching me sip my tea. Finally she says, “Troubles are always heavier when you carry them alone, Grey.”
I don’t meet her eyes. I’m busy counting the tiny pink flowers on the white tablecloth.
She sighs. “Maybe it’s too hard on you, being here this summer.”
I jerk my head up. “No. I need to be here.”
“Then you need to be honest with me.” Honey’s voice is firm. But also familiar and warm. Like the old pink robe draped around my shoulders. “You’ve been seeing Elora, haven’t you?”
It seems pointless to keep lying, so I nod.
Honey takes a deep breath and leans back in her chair. But she doesn’t look surprised.
“Tell me about it,” she says. And suddenly, I want to.
“It’s not really that I’m seeing her. More like I am her.” I struggle for the right words to explain it. “Like I’m seeing what she saw that night. But it’s just bits and pieces. I can’t make any sense of it.”
“How long has this been going on?” Honey asks, and I shrug.
“A little while.”
“Since you got here?”
I shake my head. “It started before that.”
“Oh, Grey.” Honey reaches for my hand. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I don’t know. I wasn’t sure, I guess. And I didn’t want it to be real. I was hoping it would go away.”
Honey nods like she understands. “Clairvoyance. The ability to see beyond eyesight. Your great-grandmother was clairvoyant. Sometimes she couldn’t say exactly whether she saw things or just felt them clear enough that it was like she saw them.”
“Is that how it is for you, too?” I ask.
“No.” Honey shakes her head. “I’m a medium, not a see-er. I relay information from those who have crossed over. That’s all I can do. I only know what the spirits choose to share with me. But clairvoyants are different. They just know things—about the past or the future—all on their own.”
The rain beats down on the roof, and thunder rumbles long and low.
“I don’t want to know things.”
“You can ignore it, but that won’t make it stop.” Honey takes a sip of her tea. “Our gifts can be heavy burdens to bear.”
“Seems more like a curse than a gift,” I mumble.
“It’s a hard way to go through life. Being different. Having power that doesn’t come with any instruction book.” Honey glances toward the picture frame on the wall. The one with the photo of my mom and me. “Too hard, sometimes. For some people.”
I want to ask her what she means. What it has to do with my mother. But I’m afraid she won’t tell me.
Or that she will.
“I’ve never had the gift before,” I say. “Why now?”
“Oh, you’ve always had it, Sugar Bee.” Honey gives me a little smile. “Everyone has some kind of psychic gift. It’s just that some people are able to unwrap their gifts more easily than others. It’s like singing. Everyone is born with the ability to sing, but not everyone joins the church choir.”
“So why is it coming out now?”
“Because now you need to know what happened to Elora. And sometimes, when everything else fails us, we have to rely on those gifts we’ve kept buried deep inside ourselves.” She squeezes my hand. “It doesn’t surprise me. You two have always been so connected.”
Hurt washes over me like the rain running off the roof outside the kitchen window.
“It wasn’t like that anymore. The way it used to be. Between Elora and me.” I swallow the lump in my throat. “Something happened last summer.”
Honey shakes her head. “Twin-flame relationships are magnetic,” she says. “They’re pure white-hot energy. Push and pull. Attract and repel. They can be explosive. Dangerous, even.”
I’ve hear
d all this before, but I don’t have the will to interrupt.
“Sometimes things get too intense for one of you to handle. So one of you runs. Or pushes the other one away. But you can’t stay apart long. Twin flames will always feel that hard pull toward each other.” She gives my hand another squeeze. “It’s fate. You and Elora were meant to be together. You’re two halves of a whole. Two flames—”
“Lit from the same match,” I finish, and Honey nods.
There are hot tears on my cheeks, and I reach up to brush them away. I blink hard, but I can’t stop them falling.
“I don’t know how to be me without her.”
“She’s still with you, Grey.” Honey leans in closer. “Whether she’s dead or alive, Elora is part of you. Don’t give up on that.”
When I don’t say anything, Honey offers to make me a bedtime snack. But I shake my head. “I just need to go to sleep.”
I stand up to leave, but she puts a hand on my arm. “Having great ability isn’t something to be afraid of, Sugar Bee. But it is something to be careful with.”
I’m not sure what she means at first, but then I remember Sera’s words.
Your mama had deep power.
I feel the pull of my mother’s haunted eyes. But I don’t let myself look in their direction.
“Don’t allow what you can do to change who you are,” Honey warns me as she picks up our mugs and carries them to the sink. “That’s the most important thing to remember.”
In my room, I pause at the window to search the darkness. But nobody stares back at me from the pouring rain.
Evie’s wind chimes sing out loud and clear in the storm. They clink and clank against each other with a ringing fury that carries over the wind and the water. Not even the constant rumble of thunder drowns out their strange music.
I take Case’s bloodstained medal out of my pocket and wrap it in a tissue. I know I should give it to someone. Turn it over to the sheriff or something. And I will.
Dark and Shallow Lies Page 9