Part 13 (1/2)
Each time her bare foot made contact with a stair, she forced herself to breathe, a long, whoos.h.i.+ng in and out like she had learned in yoga cla.s.s. It was supposed to nourish and steady the mind, but it was making her light-headed. When she was on the last step, a gust of wind tore through the house. Avery shuddered. Whoever was in the house must have left the door open, probably for a quick escape.
With thoughtless rage tearing through her, Avery clicked on the Maglite and shone the bright beam into the living room screaming, ”My dad is the chief of police. You better start running, a.s.shole!”
Avery sucked in a shaky breath. ”Oh my G.o.d.”
The lamp from the end table was on the floor, its bulb shattered. The half-dozen family pictures were on the ground too. Another gust of wind snapped the pages of the magazines she and her dad had on the coffee table-a catalog for police gear, an out-of-date CosmoGirl, a circular from the grocery store. But the destruction wasn't what was terrifying to Avery.
It was the windows.
Every single one, the whole bank lining the wall, was wide open, with curtains billowing like ghosts in the wind and wet leaves sticking to the screens like hands trying to claw their way into the house.
Eighteen.
”You sound just like my dad,” Avery snapped.
Fletcher had been awake and out the door early, the world heavy with that weird sense of eerie renewal that always happened after a storm. Avery was mad at him, stomping ahead.
”I'm only saying it was possible,” he said, trying to make his voice light.
Avery rolled her eyes as they entered the school together. ”I guess it could have been a dream,” she said finally. ”But it felt so real. I know I walked down the stairs. I know I saw all those windows open. I felt the wind on my face.”
”But didn't you call your dad? And then you said you went downstairs...”
Avery rolled her eyes and picked at the seam on her jeans. ”Yeah. I went downstairs and waited for him.”
”And?”
”Everything was fine down there. As if it never happened.”
”Maybe because it never did.”
Avery's eyes flashed and Fletcher flinched. ”But it was real. I can't believe you don't believe me. We know that someone is out there, someone who attacked you and killed Adam. Maybe that person is lurking around town.”
Fletcher didn't want to think that whoever had come after him and Adam would go after Avery. If Avery got hurt, it would be all his fault. Just like what happened to Adam...
”So did your dad check around or something?”
”He didn't find anything. Outside or inside. He thinks...”-Avery looked away, then glanced back at Fletcher-”that I am probably just freaked out, that I had a bad dream.”
Her cheeks flushed pink. Fletcher liked it.
”But the lamp was missing,” she hurried on. ”The one that was broken on the floor? It was missing when I got up this morning.”
”Did you tell your dad that?”
”Yeah. Only...”
”Only?”
Avery looked slightly annoyed but fidgeted with the strap of her backpack like she might be nervous. ”I told my dad about the lamp, and he said it hadn't been there in weeks. He said he broke it awhile ago and got rid of it.”
Fletcher wanted to say something to comfort her, something to let her know that he knew that batty, paranoid feeling she was describing.
”You know how it is when there is a detail you know that you're missing, but you just can't get to it?”
Fletcher stiffened and Avery apologized. ”I mean...sorry. Of course you do. You-I just-”
Fletcher shook his head and shook off the comment.
”It's just weird...” she said, her words trailing off. ”It was just really weird.”
Fletcher grimaced. He had spent the night before trying to fall asleep, but he kept thinking about Avery, about how she'd mentioned hypnosis just before the phone died. What if he could remember what happened after he and Adam were attacked?
What if I don't want to?
The voice in his head came out of nowhere, but it shot ice water through his veins.
Adam was my friend, he repeated to himself, his teeth gritted so hard that his jaw ached.
”What's with you?” Avery asked.
Fletcher snapped back to the here and now. ”It's nothing. I was just... Yeah, I know what you mean about forgetting-”
He stopped in the hallway, his words dying in his mouth. ”Oh, oh my G.o.d.”
Avery saw it too.
As had the large group of teens who had congregated off to the side, whispering and staring at Fletcher's locker. ”KILLER” was scrawled across the metal in thick, red ink.
Fletcher felt the piece of toast he had eaten for breakfast pus.h.i.+ng its way up his throat. He knew Avery was talking to him. He knew he should respond, but he could only stare at the word: KILLER.
Fletcher turned, only aware that Avery had her hand on his arm when he shook it off to ran for the bathroom. He went for the nearest stall, bent over, and dry heaved, tears clouding his vision, snot running from his nose.
He was a killer.
He hadn't been able to save Adam in the woods. And so the kids at school had branded him a killer. A murderer.
He heaved again, then flushed the toilet, leaning against the wall of the bathroom stall.
Why couldn't he just remember?
Lately, the visions were all the same. Adam calling out to him, then a flash of sunlight so bright it burned, then that sickening, overwhelming smell of blood. He heard Adam screaming for him: ”Fletcher! Fletcher!” His shoulders screamed, his forearms burning as he swung blindly, going for something or someone who, in his memory, was nothing but a hazy blur. That blur killed Adam and tried to kill Fletcher too.
Avery stood in the hallway, stunned, as Fletcher strode away from the gathering crowd. ”That dude is crazy,” someone murmured.