by Kate Brian
“That’s intense.” Liam’s brow knit. “How did I die?”
“You drowned, man. Undertow got you.” Fisher gave Liam’s shoulder an awkward pat.
“Please. There’s no way,” Liam said. “I’d never drown.”
“It’s the truth,” Fisher said. “If you hadn’t become a Lifer, I would have been your usher, so I saw the whole thing when I slapped you on the back before.”
“You saw my death?” Liam asked, blanching.
“Just one of the many special powers we Lifers have,” Krista said sourly.
“So how did you die?” Liam asked her.
Krista shifted atop the floral bedspread, tugging the hem of her white dress down further over her thighs. “I did something stupid,” she said, pursing her lips.
Liam looked around at the rest of us. “Like drowning?” he said lightly, clearly trying to put her at ease.
“No.” She glared at him. “I wanted to get my ex-boyfriend’s attention, so I took a bunch of pills, but I didn’t want to die.” Her eyes trailed off to the side as if she couldn’t bare to look anyone in the eye right then. “I just…took too many.”
“Whoa,” Darcy said.
“What about you?” Liam asked Fisher. Darcy and I both turned to look at him, curious.
“It was an accident on the football field,” he said. “I laid a hit on this guy, and bam!” He slapped one fist into a flat hand. “Neck snapped. Done.”
Liam whistled, and I looked Darcy in the eye. He’d just relayed that news like he was going over random stats of a game. Darcy blew out a breath.
“So what happened to him? To Nell?” Darcy asked me.
“You don’t remember?”
“I remember now that he was here…but how did he get here?”
I cleared my throat. “Well…I kind of killed him.”
“What?” she blurted.
“You killed a guy?” Liam asked, sliding to the edge of the bed so that his long legs dangled down. “How?”
His eyes were bright—kind of disturbingly bright considering the subject matter. But he had to be a good person to be a Lifer, right?
I turned my shoulder to him and concentrated on Darcy while I told the story.
“I was…well, basically I was dying.” I paused and took a breath, hating the act of remembering this. “But I got his knife away from him and I…”
I trailed off, unable to find a way to complete the sentence that didn’t sound like something from a bad horror flick. I jammed it into his stomach? No. I gutted him? No. Instead, I stared out Darcy’s window at the house across the street. The gray house I’d been obsessed with when we first moved here, certain that someone was watching us from its windows. And, of course, I had been right. Tristan had been watching me. Keeping tabs on the new potential Lifer. A horrible, sour burning spread through my stomach as I remembered the day he’d taken me there—showed me the spot from where he’d watched. The day I’d first tried to kiss him and he’d rejected me.
The house was still now. Dark. Like everything else on this damn island.
“Wow. Rory, can we just talk for a second about how badass that is?” Darcy exclaimed, her face still shimmering with tears.
I flinched, my skin tightening. There’d been a time, not so long ago, when it had felt badass. When I’d felt proud of myself for ridding the Earth of the man who killed fourteen girls and took my family as his swan song. But now, it no longer felt that way.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Are you kidding me? Just think about the giant favor you did for the world,” Darcy said. “Right now there’s some random girl running around playing soccer or hooking up with her boyfriend or shopping with her mom, and she’s only doing it because you offed the asshole who was coming after her.”
“She’s right, you know,” Krista said. “You’re a hero, Rory.”
I tried to smile, but I realized, as Darcy eyed me proudly, why I felt so conflicted. Because when I took Steven Nell’s life, I hadn’t been thinking about the random girls I was saving or even the girls he already murdered. I’d been thinking about me. I’d been thinking about my family and what he’d done to us. And I’d been pissed. I’d slain the man out of revenge, plain and simple. And there was nothing pure or heroic about that. Did I even deserve to be a Lifer?
“What about Dad?” Darcy asked, wiping her eyes and sucking in a loud breath. “Where’s he?”
And there was the question I’d been dreading the most. She remembered him, now that she was a Lifer. A few days ago, when he’d moved on, I’d mentioned his name and she’d looked at me like I was crazy. Now her eyes were filled with guarded hope. I didn’t want to tell her—didn’t need to tell her just yet—about how wrong things were. I decided to keep my answers short.
“He’s moved on.”
“So Mom and Dad are in the Light.”
She didn’t ask it, just stated it. And I didn’t contradict her. My eyes met Fisher’s. He cocked one brow. I shot him a silencing look that I hoped Krista picked up on.
“We’re never going to see them again?” she asked, her voice breaking.
I cleared my throat. “No.”
She wiped her eyes. “Okay. This is a lot.”
“I know,” I said. “But the good news is, we’re going to be together. Lifers never move on. We’ll never have to say good-bye.”
Darcy’s eyes lit up, and she reached for my hand. “Really?”
I smiled. “Really.”
We sat there, clutching each other’s fingers and looking out at the rain. Back home, before we died, Darcy and I had been estranged for months—a stalemate over a guy I could barely even remember. She used to love stomping around the house, reminding me and my dad about how very soon she was going to graduate and how she’d be “outta here” without looking back. Then, I couldn’t have imagined sitting here with her like this, in peaceful, companionable silence. It was amazing how quickly everything had changed.
“I don’t know,” she said finally. “Do I really want to live with you forever?”
Fisher chuckled. I cracked up laughing and shoved her shoulder. It was a classic Darcy line, and I was glad to see she still had it in her. I knew that I should tell her what had been happening on the island—that my father and others were suffering needlessly in the Shadowlands and we needed to figure out how to get them to the Light—but I didn’t want to spoil this moment. The truth of her new existence and the news that she would never see our parents again were enough to take in on one day. I didn’t have to scare the crap out of her as well.
For now, I was going to let her process what she’d learned, and I was going to selfishly hold on to this feeling that was sprouting up inside me. This delicate, fluttering white hope that somehow everything was going to be okay.
There was a sudden flash at the corner of my vision—something was moving in the house across the street. I flinched. Then thunder rumbled in the distance, and I unclenched. It had been nothing more than a remote flash of lightning. The storm messing with my head again.
“What I don’t get is, why didn’t you tell me this before?” Darcy asked. “You’ve known for…how long?”
“A week,” I admitted.
“But she couldn’t have told you,” Fisher said. “And you can’t tell any of the visitors. If you do, you damn them to the Shadowlands—and you get sent to Oblivion.”
“Seriously? That’s a bit harsh,” Darcy said, looking over her shoulder at him.
He shrugged. “I don’t make the rules.”
“So, basically, if I want to relegate some asshole to hell I just have to tell him he’s dead?” Liam asked.
Fisher whacked the back of his head so hard his hair stuck up.
“Ow! It was just a joke!” Liam snapped, his face turning bright red.
“We don’t joke a
bout stuff like that,” Krista said seriously. “Especially Oblivion.”
Liam shoved himself up and paced toward the closet. “I just found out I’m dead, okay? Excuse me for trying to lighten the mood.”
“Look, it’s just that there’s some history around here with this stuff. History no one wants to see repeated,” I said. “There was a Lifer named Jessica a while back who decided all the visitors deserved to know what was going on, so she told them. Just went around town, knocking on doors and spilling the truth.”
“So what happened?” Darcy asked.
“She got every last one of them a one-way ticket to the Shadowlands,” Fisher said grimly. “All those innocent people, damned forever.”
“For doing nothing wrong,” I added.
Lightning flashed again, and Darcy and Liam looked pale. Krista was about to say something when heavy footsteps pounded up the stairs, cutting her off. The floorboards in the hallway groaned, and there was a thudding knock on the door.
“Come in,” Darcy said weakly.
Joaquin opened the door, keeping one hand on the knob and one on the doorjamb. “You okay?” he asked her.
“I’ll live,” she said, then gave a quiet ironic laugh.
“Good.” Joaquin’s eyes flicked to me. “Mayor’s called a Lifer meeting at the police station. We gotta go.”
I looked at Darcy, and she endeavored to smile. “Duty calls?”
“Yeah,” I said, my stomach curling into knots. “But there are a few more things I’m gonna have to tell you on the way.”
So much for giving her time.
“Until further notice,” the mayor announced, “the island is on high alert.”
An uneasy murmur passed through the hundred or so Lifers gathered in the open area in front of the police station’s high front counter. As municipal buildings went, it was fairly small, and we were crowded shoulder to shoulder, some sitting in plastic chairs along the walls, others perched atop the marble counter, and still others—the overflow—hanging out around the officers’ desks. I glanced at my friends—Bea, Lauren, Krista, Joaquin, Fisher, and Kevin. No one said it, but we could all feel Tristan’s absence. Across the room, Pete and Cori huddled together near a potted palm. Cori’s dark curls half covered her face, and her gaze darted furtively here and there as if she thought we were here to accuse her of something. Pete glanced at us and did a quick double take, then pulled his baseball cap low on his head and trained his eyes on the ground. Everyone else was intent on the mayor, who stood at the center of the room with a three-foot radius of open space around her.
“What does that mean, exactly?” the man who ran the grocery stand asked.
Darcy shifted next to me, her arm brushing mine. She had changed into a dry black T-shirt and rolled jeans and stood straight and tall, taking everything in with a discerning, if slightly apprehensive, expression. She had dug out the butterfly necklace my mother had given her for her twelfth birthday and clasped it around her neck. Now she toyed with the pendant, sliding it up and down on the chain. For a girl who’d just had her entire life turned upside down, she was handling it surprisingly well.
“As you know, we’ve had a watch posted at the bridge for the past four days.” The mayor nodded to Officer Dorn and Chief Grantz, who began passing around stapled packets of paper. “From now on we will post similar watches in various spots around the island. Everyone will have a shift or two each day. I want you to keep track of the visitors. Where they go, who they’re with, what they’re up to. We need your help to keep track of who’s here and whether they’re ready to move on.”
Dorn handed each of us a schedule. Darcy and Liam flipped through theirs, then locked eyes, mutually overwhelmed. I was glad Darcy wasn’t the only newbie dealing with this situation. It was good to have someone in the same boat with her.
“You’ll see we’ve also put some of you in charge of the children,” the mayor continued. “As of last count, we have eight kids under the age of twelve on the island. They are staying at my house up on the hill, the better to keep them out of danger. Krista has managed to scrounge up some toys and video games from the relic room, and we’re planning to set up a playroom in one of our parlors. We need to keep these young souls as innocent as they were the day they arrived here, so if you’re in their presence, please, no mention of the unpleasantness we’re experiencing.”
The chief returned to her side and leaned in to whisper in her ear. Her jaw set, her expression darkened, and she nodded.
“Chief Grantz would also like me to remind you of our other special visitors,” the mayor continued. “It has been five days since we’ve moved anyone off this island. We’ve been concerned about those destined for the Light who might end up in the Shadowlands, but there are also those souls who belong in the Shadowlands—souls who committed heinous crimes in their lifetimes who should have been moved immediately to their final destinations. Those souls are now roaming free among us. We cannot usher them as hastily as we normally would, because we can’t risk them mistakenly ending up in the Light.”
She scanned the room slowly, and the murmur rose up again, louder and more urgent this time. I thought of Ray Wagner mocking the survivors this morning and shuddered.
“We must prevent these souls from harming our innocents and ourselves,” the mayor said darkly. “To that end, I would like everyone to stay after this meeting and register the names of any soul you are certain was destined for the Shadowlands, so that the rest of us may keep a close watch on them. When we finally rectify the issues we’ve been having, they will be the first to cross over.”
“Why not just lock them up in the jail?” someone shouted.
“We don’t have the space,” Chief Grantz replied. “Plus we don’t want to arouse suspicions by plucking people off the street and locking them up. This is a small island. Word would get around.”
“We can control the situation if we stay vigilant,” the mayor added.
Darcy turned to me, her eyes wide. “Nell? He’s gone, right?”
I grasped her wrist. “Long gone.”
She blew out a sigh but didn’t look comforted. I couldn’t blame her.
Out of nowhere, Joaquin stepped forward to share the circle with the mayor.
“There is some positive news today!” he announced loudly, his voice ricocheting around the room. “Two new souls have proved themselves worthy of being Lifers. Everyone, we’d like you to meet Darcy Thayer and Liam Murtry!”
There was a smattering of applause, which, at Joaquin’s cheerleader-type gestures, grew into a rousing ovation as Darcy and Liam waved awkwardly.
“We’ll be initiating them tonight, at midnight, at my place,” Joaquin continued. “I realize with the new schedule it will be a smaller group than usual, but if you can make it, it’d be good to have you there.”
He stepped back next to me again.
“Not the cove?” I whispered.
“In this weather? Personally I’d like to be dry for more than fifteen minutes in a row,” he replied under his breath.
I nodded. “Good point. Where exactly is your—?”
The mayor cleared her throat, staring us down. I stopped whispering. “Thank you for that interruption, Mr. Marquez,” she said acerbically. “Now, our last but certainly most pressing order of business is to locate Tristan and Nadia and bring them back here for questioning.”
The entire atmosphere of the room shifted, and from the pained looks on the faces of those around me, everyone felt it. Tristan was this island’s Golden Boy and had been for generations, but by now everyone knew what he’d done. The sense of betrayal was so thick it was suffocating.
“Please check your schedule. If you’ve been assigned to one of tonight’s search parties, see Chief Grantz, who has kindly separated a map of the island into quadrants and will assign one to each party.” She paused as papers fluttered and
people compared schedules. “If we stick together and do this in an orderly fashion, they will be found and we’ll get to the bottom of this mess.” She took a deep breath. “Are there any questions?”
The double doors opened suddenly, and a howling wind tore through the station. It was those creepy twins from the clinic. They each wore clear plastic ponchos and had slicked their white-blond hair down and to the side, with opposite parts, so that they looked to be mirror images as they stepped toward the mayor. Their eyes slid left and right, taking in their surroundings. They stayed so close to each other that I assumed they were holding hands, but once they were clear of the crowd I saw this wasn’t the case. The backs of their knuckles were merely touching between them.
“Can I help you?” the mayor demanded.
Their scanning eyes snapped forward at the same time and focused on her. “Yes,” they said in unison. They lifted their hands to remove their hoods with such perfect timing it looked rehearsed.
Lifers around the room exchanged disturbed glances. Good. I wasn’t the only one who was completely wigged out by these two.
“I’m Selma Tse and this is my brother, Sebastian,” the girl said in a reedy voice. “There’s no Internet, and we can’t get cell service, even though our phones were protected inside our bags.”
“We just walked through town, and the place is pretty much deserted,” Sebastian added. They turned their heads in opposite directions, sliding their suspicious eyes around the room.
“It seems as if everyone is…here,” Selma said. “Together. The entire town.”
“What’s the deal with this place?” Sebastian added. “It’s not normal.”
Thunder rumbled outside. The pendant lights overhead flickered and half the room gasped. I instinctively grabbed Joaquin’s arm. Silence.
“I’m sorry, was there a question in there somewhere?” the mayor asked impatiently.
“Yes,” Sebastian began, taking a step forward. “Who are you people? How did we get here when neither one of us remembers even deciding to leave home? And what the hell is Juniper Landing?”