Mortal Danger

by Ann Aguirre

  “Maybe that would be safer.”

  “Can’t argue.” She proffered a red umbrella.

  As I stepped under the brim with her, the clouds opened up, spattering my bare legs and soaking my shoes and socks. That fast, it was pouring rain with the wind carrying it along in slanted sheets.

  Davina shivered. “Man, I hate November. You want to come over for a while? We can study together.”

  “If my mom says it’s okay.” It was hard to stay close enough to her not to get drenched while making the call, but I managed, and by the time we got to the station, I had permission to hang out until five.

  On the train, she didn’t say much, but that was a defense mechanism, (best not to attract attention.

  You never knew when pervs would take accidental eye contact as encouragement—and since we were both young and pretty, the danger was twofold.

  Afterward, as we walked to her building, the rain slowed enough for it not to be miserable. Davina led the way and unlocked her front door; nobody was home, which explained why she’d wanted me to come. After the crap at school, I wasn’t on board with cozying up to my own thoughts, either.

  She dumped her backpack by the door, and headed for the kitchen. “I can make tea or hot chocolate, the powder packet kind.”

  “I’m sensing you want a warm beverage.”

  “Hot chocolate,” she decided.

  The kettle took five minutes to whistle, then we mixed the instant chocolate and added marshmallows. Davina’s place was warm and inviting, full of crafty things like handmade pillows and throws. It was obvious that she didn’t come from money, but I felt more at home here than in Jen’s ultramodern mansion. Once we finished our drinks, she beckoned me to her bedroom and shut the door behind us.

  “I might be a little slow, but I’m pretty sure I’ve put the pieces together.”

  “We’re not studying?” Whatever she thought she knew, it wouldn’t be good.

  “You were in full meltdown when we left Cameron’s party. Then, a few days later, we find out that nobody’s seen him since that night. What did you see, Edie?”

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  “Try me.”

  Call me paranoid, but not until I checked something. “Let me see your belly button.”

  Davina raised a brow, but she pushed up her shirt to reveal an innie. “Is this like reading tea leaves or something?”

  I released a nervous chuckle. What the hell. So I filled her in, explaing how Nicole attached Allison, the cut sealed over, and she had no navel—then Mr. Love went nuts on me. I pretended to have no idea how these events related. For her safety, I left out everything related to the game; I was afraid too much information might make her a target, and I only had one favor left. There was no way I could protect everyone as I had Vi, much to my dismay.

  “This shit is full-on crazy,” she said finally. “You mentioned you thought Mr. Love was shady, but this—”

  “I know.”

  “Don’t take this the wrong way, but can I see your belly button?”

  I giggled as I showed it to her, and the situation didn’t seem as grim if we could laugh. Though I couldn’t give her the big picture, the conversation cheered me up. We didn’t come up with any solutions, but I felt less alone. At quarter past four I got up to leave.

  “You know I’ve got your back at school, right?”

  “Yeah. Thanks.”

  “See you tomorrow, unless the place burns down. Which wouldn’t surprise me.”

  I hurried down the sidewalk, trying to get to the station before the rain started up again. If anything, it was darker than it had been, a worse storm on the horizon. There was scant foot traffic in Davina’s neighborhood on the six-block walk to the T station. A few birds nestled on ledges of buildings; even more perched on the wires and they stared as I quickened my pace. Maybe I was imagining it, but they turned their heads almost all the way around, just watching.

  I ran the rest of the way.

  On the train, it was better, until I noticed the shadows following the car, tendrils of darkness slinking along the block walls. Each time we left a station, they swelled and drew closer, only to be driven back by the bright crackle of fluorescent lighting at the next stop. I hopped off a little sooner than I should have. Rain or no, I’d walk home from here.

  The lull in the weather held just long enough for me to get to my street, then the sky dumped buckets on me, not just stinging rain but hail, too. Ice pelted me, raising red welts on my skin, and I was panting when I got to the front stoop. Shoving through to the foyer, I almost ran into Mr. Lewis, who was inexplicably carrying a hammer. He said something about a horseshoe and wind chimes.

  “What?”

  “I can’t find one,” he told me. “An old one is best, one that’s grown rusty and strong over the years. I put up wind chimes, but the building manager made me take them down.”

  “Wind chimes?”

  “To keep the old ones out,” he reminded me impatiently.

  “Why can you see them?” Nobody else could who wasn’t part of the game.

  “Those who are close to death can see beyond the mortal caul.” That didn’t help a whole lot, and I guessed he read that in my expression. So he clarified, “Stage-four lung cancer. I don’t have long.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He shrugged, as if that were the least of his problems. “I’ve got a mezuzah here. Don’t know if it’ll do the job. The rabbi at the synagogue might’ve been humoring me.”

  “Thank you for trying to keep us safe.”

  The old man smiled at me. “What else do I have to do?”

  As I headed upstairs, he hung the scroll case, muttering about the need for precision. My mom was home since it was her turn to stand guard over me. I got in just before five, proving I could be trusted. She smiled at me, setting down her pencil. From what I could tell, she was truly trying to build a better relationship with me, and I loved her for the effort.

  “How was school?”

  If I don’t tell her, she’ll find out from Blackbriar. So I said, “Scary,” and then told her how an obsessed student assaulted another girl over a cute teacher. Her eyes widened and she pulled off her glasses, absently polishing them on her sweater as she listened. I concluded, “So that’s why there’s blood on my jacket. It’s not mine.”

  “How horrible! This term has just been … tragic. What’s changed, I wonder?” From her expression, she was half a step from launching an experiment with control groups to determine why Blackbriar was no longer the safe haven she paid for.

  “I wish I knew.” That wasn’t entirely a lie.

  “Are you all right? Do you need to talk to someone?” How ironic she kept asking me that this year.

  “I’m okay,” I said.

  Then I fled to my room, supposedly to work on assignments. She must’ve filled my dad in because he was especially solicitous when I came out for dinner. They were both trying so hard to be more emotionally available; it didn’t come easy since their natural state was to be completely absorbed in whatever research had captured their attention, and I basked in the surety that they did love me, even if they sometimes sucked at showing it.

  As soon as I thought that, my wrist blazed. So it’s better if I think my parents don’t care? Why that would influence my future, I had no idea. As always, I had on a hoodie in the house. Since my parents preferred to keep the heating bill low, they didn’t question it. Summer might offer problems in that regard.

  Later, I didn’t feel like talking to Vi, so I e-mailed her instead of signing on for our usual chat. I went to bed early, disturbed by the heat in my right arm. The feeling was similar to when Davina and I went to New Hampshire. Eventually, I fell into a fitful sleep, plagued by nightmares of the thin man.

  I woke with a start, but I wasn’t in my bed. Instead, I stood in the kitchen, a knife in my right hand. A thin trickle of blood spilled from my abdomen, a clean slice through my pajama top. With a stifl
ed cry, I dropped the blade in the sink, ran water over it, and then bolted, aware I needed help, but there was no one to save me. If I called Kian, he’d try to bargain for my safety, and I couldn’t bear for him to sacrifice anything else for my sake.

  I am alone.

  In the bathroom, I raised my shirt to inspect the slice. Not deep. Shallow, like I’m a cutter. The implication scared me more than the actual wound. It’s a warning. They can get to you. It took all my composure to tend the wound and tape some gauze over it. Remembering the girl in the mirror, I didn’t linger there for fear of what I’d see. Retreating to my bedroom didn’t make me feel safer—only trapped, with nowhere to run.

  Teeth chattering, I turned up the heat, which steamed up the room. Trickles of moisture ran down the foggy panes like tears, and then one by one, handprints appeared on my windows, like something lurked beyond my sight, waiting to get in. I imagined it watching me as I slept. A whimper escaped me as I crept closer, expecting to see the little girl-thing, but there was only mist. I touched the cool glass and discovered what I feared most to be true.

  The palm prints were on the outside.

  ANTICIPATION OF EVIL

  The next day, state employees descended on Blackbriar and interviewed a bunch of us, but in the end, they concluded Nicole was unstable, and it wasn’t the school’s fault. Allison wore a bandage for a few days, and only I knew that she didn’t need one. Three days after the incident, the headmaster announced that Mr. Love had resigned his position, though not due to wrongdoing. We were encouraged to send farewell cards, which would be forwarded to him.

  A retired teacher took his place and she paid more attention to the ball of yarn in her tote bag than she did us. That was fine with me; I could use another free period. Administration promised there would be a permanent replacement when winter break ended. I hoped he or she was human; that seemed like a reasonable expectation in an educator.

  By the time Thanksgiving rolled around, I was ready for a four-day weekend. Kian picked me up; I waved at Davina as I got into the car. It occurred to me that I’d gotten my revenge—the Teflon crew was wrecked. As it turned out, Allison literally wasn’t human, and the rest were dead or missing. The weight of it hit me all over again. Be careful what you wish for. It might come true. And I hated that I could forget my culpability, even for a moment.

  “You look upset,” Kian said, starting the car. He listened to what I had to say, then he shook his head. “Don’t blame yourself. Nothing you did caused this.”

  “Is that better? If I had died—”

  “Don’t say that. Don’t you dare.”

  “What?”

  “Talk like you’re nothing. For me, the world would be unbearable without you.”

  His certainty smoothed over the guilt like a balm.

  “That’s how I feel about you,” I said softly.

  And that made his secrets more painful, since he seemed so distant, committed to protecting me rather than being with me.

  A smile curved his mouth that I’d best describe as blissful. “As long as you do, I can stand anything.”

  “You shouldn’t have to.”

  He ignored that, weaving through traffic toward our neighborhood. Since he lived in the area, too, I felt less guilty about using him for transportation. I mean, it wasn’t like he had business near Blackbriar, but I enjoyed the way other girls looked when they saw him waiting. Sometimes I feared he was an illusion or a hallucination from which I must inevitably awake. Of course, that meant all of the horrible things, all the demons and monsters were bad dreams, too? Maybe I could live with losing Kian.

  Maybe.

  My heart hurt just thinking about it. As if he sensed it, he reached over and covered my hand with his. On impulse, I raised his palm and kissed it. His fingers closed convulsively, and he cut me a sharp look.

  “While I’m driving? Really?” God, that look curled my toes.

  “Sorry. I’ll be good.” I cast around for a topic that wouldn’t distract him. “What’s your favorite color?”

  “That was random. Why do you want to know?”

  “Just tell me.”

  “Blue.”

  That answer made me smile. “Mine too.”

  When he parked outside our brownstone, he leaned over for a kiss that broke all records for hotness and threatened to set my uniform on fire. Maybe he’s part djinn, I thought dizzily, as he tunneled his hands into my hair. He tasted sweet and fresh, everything I wanted wrapped up in one person, and I could’ve crawled on top of him then and there. Bad hormones, bad. Intellectually I understood that our pheromones were shaking hands and that our chemical compositions must be compatible—and that was all. On a pure girl level, I just wanted him. So I told my brain to shut up and we kissed for ten minutes, until he was breathing hard, and I was trembling.

  “Can I come up?”

  The question elated me. Maybe there was still hope for us, together.

  “My mom’s probably home,” I warned.

  Rueful smile. “That’s fine. Just … give me a minute.”

  Oh. Wow. It was impossible for me to restrain a smirk. “No problem.”

  Five minutes later, we got out of the car and headed into the foyer. Right away, I noticed the mezuzah was gone. Like before, only the nail remained. A shiver went through me as I trotted up the stairs, Kian close behind me. He set a hand in the small of my back while I dug for my keys, but—

  The door stood open, half an inch.

  My blood chilled.

  “Let me go in first.” Kian tried to push past me but I shook my head.

  “We’ll go in together or not at all. Maybe she just got home.”

  “My mom used to leave the door ajar if she was carrying groceries.” By his tone he knew that was unlikely.

  Yet I couldn’t help but cling to hope. Silently I counted to three before nudging the door wide. The way the apartment was laid out, I had a clear view through the living room to the kitchen, where I saw my mother’s feet, motionless on the tile floor. Kian tried to hold me back, but I yanked free and ran to her, my breath a tight and silent shriek in my chest. Recycled fabric bags were spilled all around her, broken eggs and bottles of juice mingling with the blood—oh my God, so much blood—I crumpled. Kian caught me. When he carried me out of the apartment, I didn’t fight. Inside my skull, the screams echoed in endless loop.

  He took her. The bag man came. He took her head.

  I was only half aware of Kian banging on Mr. Lewis’s door and asking him to call 911. The old man complied at once, and Kian carried me out of the building, cradling me on his lap on the front steps. He rocked me, and I held on, but I couldn’t cry. Everything was tight and dry; my mind simmered with the madness of it. The bag man will have your brains for his soup, your skull for his bowl, and he’ll drink you dry. Mr. Lewis brought a blanket out for me, and Kian wrapped me in it. The fleece did nothing to banish the cold.

  I didn’t respond. I couldn’t. Across the street, I saw the old man with the bag, and it bulged with a new and hideous weight. Beside him stood the two black-eyed children. The girl-thing’s pinafore was smeared with blood. I fought free and jumped up, racing toward them. They vanished before my eyes as the screech of car brakes yanked my attention to the street. Kian hauled me back to the stoop, shaking, while the driver shouted out his window at me.

  “That was…” Kian tightened his arms on me.

  I wasn’t listening. “Kian … did you see them?”

  He glanced around my shoulder. “Who?”

  “Never mind.” My head was a mess; I couldn’t think.

  “What’s your dad’s number, Edie?”

  I shrugged, dazed and shivering.

  Kian was gentle in plucking the backpack from my shoulder. Silently, he rummaged in the front zip pocket until he found my phone. A few clicks, and he was talking to my dad. His voice was a low rumble but I couldn’t make out the words. Buzz, buzz, buzz, go away. I don’t believe this is real. I won’t. This isn’
t my life.

  “I’m ready to give you up.” There was some sadness in the admission, but if keeping Kian meant living this, then the nightmare had to end. “The dream is over now. I need to wake up.”

  No more coma dream. Back to reality. Back to being an ugly girl with no friends, no boyfriend. But I’ll still have my mom.

  “God, Edie,” he whispered.

  I’m sorry, the wind whispered. I felt a sad, familiar presence all around me, raising the hair on my arms. Through dry eyes, I stared hard at the street I had lived on all my life. “Cameron?”

  But there was only a stained newspaper tumbling down the sidewalk. And Kian was still here, holding me, with a face like an angel and a dark shadow in his eyes. In the distance, sirens screamed toward us.

  When I said I wanted this to stop, I anticipated sitting up in a hospital bed, IV in my arm, both of my parents at my bedside. You tried to kill yourself. You failed. You’re in a coma. Wake up, now. Wake up.

  “She’s in shock,” Mr. Lewis said.

  “Could you make her some hot tea? Plenty of sugar.”

  “Of course.” The old man moved off.

  A few minutes later, or maybe hours, Kian put a warm mug in my hand. I drank the tea because it was there. I couldn’t wake up; there was no exit from this that didn’t end in policemen putting tape on my front door. Two officers showed up and then an ambulance, but it was oh-my-God too late. They carted away her body, covered in a sheet.

  “We have to ask you some questions,” the older cop said gently.

  I stared up at him. There was no tinnitus. Allison hadn’t registered on my faulty ears, either. The irrational desire possessed me to demand to inspect all of their belly buttons. Another death, and I can’t tell the truth. Or maybe I can. Maybe it doesn’t matter anymore. I opened my mouth, but Kian squeezed my hand. He warned me with his eyes not to open that can of crazy and upend it all over the nice humans. I understood now why he said it like that; it was what you called people who walked around with blinders on. I might’ve started life that way, but I didn’t feel part of the collective anymore.