Thirty-eight
WE ALL SHOWERED. HAVING two bathrooms made that quick. While I was waiting, I tried to tie a knot in my necklace chain—I didn’t like keeping the pendant in my pocket. When that didn’t work, I looked for string and instead found a piece of ribbon and tied it on that.
After the showers, we ate. Andrew had a lot of convenience food—his housekeeping skills didn’t seem to extend to cooking. We found decent frozen meals, cooked them in the microwave, and they tasted so good—better than any gourmet dinner.
Simon organized our watch shifts as we ate. Derek insisted on taking the first, and the rest of us headed to bed, with Tori and me sharing the spare room and Simon on the office futon. No one felt right sleeping in Andrew’s bed.
I made a bathroom stop first. When I came out, I saw the photos along the hall, and stopped at a shot of Simon and Derek. Maybe twelve, they were roasting marshmallows over a campfire. Simon looked like Simon, with his spiked dark-blond hair and big grin as he showed off his flaming marshmallow for the camera.
Derek looked different. The picture had been taken before puberty hit. His skin was clear and he had a shock of black hair, still falling into his eyes. He was taller than Simon, but not as much, and he was thinner—he hadn’t started filling out yet. He still wasn’t magazine cover material, but he was the kind of guy that, at that age myself, I might have stolen a glance at across the classroom and thought he was kind of cute, with really nice eyes.
“That was taken out back here.”
I jumped. Simon laughed and shook his head.
“Yes,” I said. “I’m still jumpy. So this was here?” I pointed at the picture.
He nodded. “The summer before Dad and Andrew had their fight, I think. There’s a clearing where Derek and I camped out.” He paused, thinking. “I wonder if Andrew kept all that gear. I’m sure Tori isn’t the backpacking type, but …”
“If it means no more sleeping in rat-infested buildings, she’ll go for it.”
“I’ll talk Derek into giving us time to look for the camping gear tomorrow. I know you’re exhausted, so I won’t keep you up chatting, but you will tell me about the adventures I missed this time?”
I managed a tired smile. “Sure.” I started to turn away, then stopped. “You’ve got your watch alarm set, right? You’ll get me up after your shift?”
“I doubt either of us will be taking a turn. Derek only let me organize shifts because he wasn’t in the mood to argue. I’ll go out at three, but he won’t give up his post.”
“He needs sleep, too.”
“Agreed, and I will hassle him. But he doesn’t like us being here and there’s no way he’ll let someone without superhero strength and senses stand guard. The best thing we can do is find those tents and sleeping bags in the morning, get him to the nearest campsite, and let him sleep then.”
I got a few steps away before he said, “Chloe?”
I turned. The hall was dark, lit only by the living room light behind him, throwing his face into shadow.
“Was Derek … okay with you today? I know he was getting up in your face before we left Buffalo and I was worried. You guys seem fine now….”
“We are.”
When he said nothing, I said, “Really. We got along great, actually. A nice change.”
I couldn’t see his expression, but could feel his gaze on me; then he said softly, “Good.” A pause and a more emphatic, “That’s good. I’ll see you tomorrow then. We’ll talk.”
We headed for the bedrooms.
Once again, sleep and I weren’t on speaking terms. My brain was too busy playing in the land of nightmares.
I kept thinking of the woods surrounding the house. I’d hear a branch scrape the window and leap up, certain it was a bat and, of course, then start thinking of zombie bats, trapped in their crushed bodies….
After a Disneyfied dream of prancing through the forest, leading a singing trail of undead critters, I bolted awake, sweating, and decided it was time to give up the ghost … so to speak. I got out of bed and checked the clock. It was almost five, meaning Simon had been right about Derek not letting us take a turn. I got up, grabbed a coat from the front closet, and headed for the kitchen.
“Chloe,” Derek’s growl vibrated from the forest long before I could see him. “I told Simon I want you guys to sleep—”
He stopped as the smell of sausages drifted his way. I could imagine him sniffing the air, stomach rumbling, and I tried not to laugh.
I found him sitting on the grass in a clearing. I held out a lawn chair and a plate of sausages in buns.
“I know you won’t come in, so you might as well be comfortable. Unless you aren’t hungry …”
He took the sausages. I pulled a bottle of Coke from my pocket, then shucked the coat and passed them over.
“You should be sleeping,” he said.
“Sure you can. Just close your eyes and …” He studied me, then grunted, “What’s up?”
I looked out over the forest. The air smelled very faintly of woodsmoke, reminding me of the photo.
“I saw a picture of you and Simon. He said you guys had a camping spot out here. Is this it?”
“So we’re changing the subject?” He shook his head, set up the chair, sat, and looked at me expectantly for a moment, “Yeah. This is the spot.”
“It smells like someone else had a campfire going earlier tonight. Someone burning leaves? Or kids getting a jumpstart on summer?”
“So we’re definitely changing the subject?”
I paused, then lowered myself to the grass. “It’s just … this.” I waved at the forest. “I’m worried that I’m going to, you know, in my sleep …”
“Raise another corpse?”
I nodded.
“That’s why you couldn’t sleep last night, isn’t it? I thought about that later, on the bus. You were afraid she was buried out there—the girl you saw get killed.”
I nodded. “I was worried that if I drifted off, I’d keep thinking about her, about summoning her, like with the homeless guy. I can’t control my dreams. And I figured there was a good chance she was buried out there, never found.”
“So if you did raise her, and we left her body there to be found, that wouldn’t be such a bad thing, would it?”
“Maybe … if I knew I could safely raise her and release her quickly. But what if I … What if she didn’t dig her way out and I never realized I’d raised her and …”
I turned to look into the forest again.
“I’ll get you a chair, too,” he said.
I protested that I wasn’t staying, but he just kept going. When he returned, he came around the other way.
“I circled the house,” he said. “If there was a body on the property, I would have smelled it. The wind’s good tonight. You’re safe.”
“It’s not … it’s not just people I’m worried about.”
I finally told him about raising the bats in the warehouse.
“I didn’t summon them,” I said. “I didn’t even know I could do that with animals, that they had a soul, ghost, spirit, whatever. If I go to sleep and dream of any kind of summoning, there’s got to be a dead animal somewhere nearby. I could raise it and never know. I’d just walk away and leave it trapped in its corpse for—” I took a deep breath. “Okay, I’m freaking out, I know.”
“You’ve got a reason to.”
“It’s not like I’d do it intentionally, and maybe that should make a difference but …”
“It’s still not something you want to do.”
I nodded.
He took a gulp of the Coke, then capped it, stuck it into his pocket, and stood. “Let’s go.”
“Where?”
“I’ll hear anyone who comes near the property. So there’s no need to sit here doing nothing. We might as well hunt up some dead animals for you.”
I scowled. “That’s not funny.”
“I’m not being funny, Chloe. You’re worried because you don’t understand why it’s happening and how it works and how to stop it. We can experiment and get some answers. It’s not like either of us has anything better to do for the next couple of hours.”