Part 20 (2/2)

He sighs and slinks from the doorway back into the house. Minutes later, a blonde girl pokes her head out.

”Ember, would you please just get your creepy a.s.s in here,” Mackenzie says with a trace of pleading in her tone. ”Before someone figures out I'm here.”

I glance over my shoulder at the silent houses lining the street. I come to the mind-blowing conclusion that I'm probably losing my mind, like certain poets of the past. Or like a Grim Angel. I plod up the path, past Mackenzie and through the entryway. Cameron shuts the door and we go into a living room with red walls and a brick fireplace. The mantle is ornamented with plastic plants and family photos. Above it is a mirror trimmed with a gold frame. The air smells like cinnamon and apples.

”This isn't how I pictured your house,” I remark, sitting down on a striped sofa. Across from the coffee table is a matching sofa, and Cameron and Mackenzie sit down on it. Mackenzie looks like she's wearing Cameron's clothes: an oversized flannel s.h.i.+rt and a pair of boxers. She has leather bands on her wrists and neck, like she's suddenly decided to try a semi-gothic look.

”The cops think I killed you,” I tell her. ”They brought me down to the station a couple of nights ago for questioning.”

”Wow, Killer Girl speaks,” she says snidely. ”You were so quiet at school I thought you were a mute.”

Cameron lays a hand on her bare knee. ”Easy, remember she knows you're here now, so play nice.”

She crosses her arms and says exasperatedly, ”Yeah, but only because you made me let her in. Personally, I don't give a c.r.a.p if she thinks you're lying or not.” Cameron tilts his head at her and she recoils. ”I'm sorry. And I'm sorry too, Ember. Look, it's just that... Well, I was having problems at home. And things were just really bad and I was telling this to Cameron at the lake and he suggested I disappear for a while and take a break.”

”You know everyone is looking for you, right?” I press the severity. ”There are flyers all over the town with your face posted on them. This is really messed up.”

”Messed up?” She laughs, and then starts to cry. ”No, messed up is growing up in a house like I did.”

”A lot of people have bad home lives,” I p.r.o.nounce unsympathetically. ”It doesn't mean we run away.”

”Oh yeah, what's so messed up in your life?” Tears roll down her sun-kissed cheeks and she scratches under the leather band on her neck. ”Did your dad use you to close job deals with old perverted men? I just wanted to get the h.e.l.l away from it for one moment, just breathe. Haven't you ever wanted to just breathe?”

”Every single day of my existence,” I whisper.

Cameron catches my eye and raises his eyebrows, seeking my response.

”So what? You just hid her somewhere and then scattered feathers all over the sh.o.r.e and painted it up with X and an hourgla.s.s?” I ask him.

Cameron's eyebrows knit together. ”I hid her, but I didn't do the feathers and weird paint thing. Why would we do that?”

”To make her disappearance look like the rest of them.”

”As good of an idea as that is, we didn't do that.”

”But that's what the detective said.” I fall back in the couch with my forehead creased. ”Why would she do that?”

”To mess with your head probably, see if you would let something slip.” Kelsey shrugs and rearranges the bands on her wrists. ”It's kind of their M.O.” When Cameron and I gape at her, she adds, ”What? I watch a lot of Law and Order, okay?”

I tap my boot on the floor, bubbling with anxious energy. ”They think I killed you... and they think I killed Laden.”

”No, they don't. They just don't have any other leads.” Cameron's eyes journey down my body. ”Although, if they saw you now, they'd probably lock you up.”

I wrap my arms around myself. ”I had an accident.”

He points over his shoulder. ”Is that why there was an ambulance at your house?”

I focus the interest back on Mackenzie. ”So what am I supposed to do? Just pretend I never saw anything and let them keep investigating me?”

”Would you?” she asks, hopeful. ”That would be really great, at least until I can figure out somewhere else to live. I'll be eighteen in a few weeks, so I'll be good to move out on my own.”

I rub my exhausted eyes. ”I don't mean to sound rude, but can't you just tell someone what's going on?”

She laughs, but it's forced. ”You don't think I've tried? But my mom always sides with my dad, saying I'm doing it to draw attention to myself. And my dad is a big funder of the Hollows Grove Police Department.”

”Is he paying them off?” I ask, flabbergasted, and she gives a subtle nod. I consider the dilemma for a moment, but there isn't much to consider. ”Fine, I'll keep my mouth shut, but please try to figure something else out, before they actually arrest me.”

”Thank you, Ember,” she says gratefully. ”And I'm sorry, you know, for treating you so badly in school.” She gets up and wraps her arms around me.

My eyes widen and I prepare myself. But her death never announces itself.

She retreats for the doorway, telling Cameron, ”I'm going to go lay down, Cam. I'm really tired.”

Once she's gone, I say to Cameron, ”So it still doesn't explain how the cops found out where my car was.”

”That's a question I can't answer for you.” He rests his arms on his legs and intersects his fingers. ”The only thing I can say is that there has to be someone else who knew where your car was.”

Asher. And perhaps the person who was tailgating me that night.

”Did someone save you?” he prods. ”Or did you swim out of the car on your own?”

”I have excellent panic reaction skills.” I get to my feet. ”I should get home. It's late.”

He accompanies me to the door, but pushes it closed when I open it. ”Can I show you something first, before you go?” His nice guy act is back, like when we first met and had that briefly decent moment in his Jeep.

I go with him upstairs into his room. There's a bed, a dresser in the corner, and a door that extends to a small patio with a camping chair. The walls are black and bare except one, a white accent wall with lines and lines of poetry.

”Are they your words?” I ask, amazed, and he nods. I walk up to the wall and read the poem that centers them all. ”In separate fields of black feathers, the birds fly. Four wings, two hearts, but only one soul. They connect in the middle, but are separated by a thin line of ash. It's what brings them together, yet rips their feathers apart. They can never truly be together as light and dark. Unless one makes the ultimate sacrifice, blows out their candle, and joins the other in the dark.”

Cameron watches me with interest. ”So what do you think it means?”

”They could never be together,” I say. ”Unless one died? But why? What makes the other one fly in the land of the dead?”

”That's something you'll have to figure out on your own.” He chips a flake of blood off my s.h.i.+rt. ”You should know that a poet doesn't like to explain the meaning behind his words.”

I bite at my fingernail. ”Yeah, I understand that completely. But you should know that, as a poet, I have a desire to understand words.”

”You know,” he steps closer, ”we never got to go to that poetry slam.”

”That wasn't my fault,” I remind him.

”You're the one that ran away that day.” He places a hand on my wrist and tenderly drags it up to my shoulder. ”I was trying to make you jealous.”

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