The Girl Who Wasn't There

by Nick Clausen

  “How is your leg?” Rebecca asks.

  Andy bends his knee. “It doesn’t hurt as bad anymore. I don’t think it’s broken after all. It probably just got busted pretty bad when the van hit me.”

  There are still black and blue bruises running up Andy’s calf and thigh, but they are lessening day by day.

  If the leg isn’t broken, that’s great news, and it means Andy will be able to walk again. Unfortunately, his head was less lucky. Rebecca can still recall seeing it bounce off of the asphalt as Andy fell. Already the following morning, he had a huge, red swelling behind his left ear and he started throwing up all the time.

  Rebecca had a concussion once. She was very young. It was the first time her family went skiing. An older boy on a snowboard knocked her to the ground, and she hit her head pretty badly. She’s pretty sure Andy now has a concussion and she remembers how painful it is.

  A low scraping from the door. Rebecca goes to open it, and Doris slips inside, runs across the floor and jumps up into bed.

  The dog has also changed since they tried to run away. Now, it’ll only be with Andy and Rebecca, and it growls whenever it sees the creature.

  Andy picks a piece of bacon out and offers it to the dog. Doris swallows it eagerly.

  “We’ve got to make a plan,” Andy says, looking at Doris.

  Rebecca sighs. “We’ve been over this, Andy. You can’t even walk yet.”

  Andy doesn’t seem to hear her. “Does it go to work?”

  “Work?”

  “Yeah, I mean, does it ever leave for work?”

  “I … don’t think so.”

  “But it leaves sometimes, right? It has to. It needs to buy stuff, groceries and stuff.”

  Rebecca considers it for a moment. “I think it goes to town once a week, maybe, but you know it locks the door before it leaves. And it’s hard to tell how long it’ll be gone; sometimes, it’s only half an hour.”

  Andy gives Doris another piece of bacon. “So it knows about the hole in the roof now, right? It knows how you got out?”

  “Yes. It sealed the roof.”

  “That means we need to find another way out.”

  Andy is still looking at the dog, frowning slightly as he concentrates.

  It’s the first time Rebecca has seen him act like his old self. In one way, it makes her happy—but in another, it’s also heartbreaking, because he looks so determined, so confident. He clearly hasn’t accepted the reality of their situation yet.

  “The windows up here are too high, and there is nothing to climb down,” he goes on. “So either we need to pick the lock to the door, or we have to smash a window downstairs.”

  “Andy, listen. I really don’t think—”

  “It’ll probably take too long to pick the lock,” Andy interrupts. “So I think the better choice is busting a window. Is there anything inside the house heavy enough to smash a window?”

  He finally looks at her.

  Rebecca looks back at him. Even despite her blurry vision, she can tell how adamant he looks.

  “Andy,” she says softly. “It’s not going to work, no matter how we do it.”

  Andy’s frown grows deeper. “Why not?”

  “It won’t allow us to flee again. It just won’t.”

  “Of course it won’t allow it, but it’s not up to it. We decide, Rebecca. We’ll find a way to—”

  “No, Andy. That’s not what I mean. I told you this already. It watches me now. Everything I do. It’s always nearby, listening. Like it’s just waiting to see if I try anything again.”

  “Right,” Andy says, closing his eyes and rubbing his forehead as the pain obviously comes back. “Then we just need to … need to be more clever … we have to outsmart it.”

  “But if we fail …” Rebecca takes his hand and lowers her voice. “If it catches us again, Andy … it will kill us. This time, it won’t be merciful.”

  “Merciful,” Andy repeats, almost sneering. “You think it’s been merciful keeping you here like a prisoner? Was it merciful of it to burn your feet and damage your eyes?”

  “No, but—”

  “So what do you think, we should just stay here for the rest of our lives?”

  “Maybe … maybe someone will come by and find us.”

  “Like who? Some random stranger who the creature will just kill and bury? That’s not going to work.”

  “Then maybe the police.”

  “The police,” Andy scoffs. “They’ve probably already given up. They couldn’t find you, remember? And even if they are still looking for me, how would they find me? They have absolutely nothing to go on. When you disappeared, at least they had a witness—me!” Andy stabs himself in the chest with a thumb. “The problem is, they didn’t listen to me! And now, they have nothing—nothing, Becca!”

  Rebecca doesn’t know what to say. Andy is too upset to listen to reason, and she doesn’t want to argue with him, so she gets up and is about to leave the room, when Andy grabs her wrist and pulls her back down.

  “We need to run away,” he says, talking low, his face close enough for her to smell puke on his breath. “As soon as possible. We can’t give up. And we can’t count on help from the outside. You did it once, and you can do it again. I’ll figure out the plan, but I’m going to need your help. You know this place and you know the wendigo. You need to come up with an idea for a way to escape—however small it seems. When you got something, come to me, and I’ll do the rest. All right? All right, Becca?”

  Rebecca breathes deeply a few times. Andy looks so desperate; she can’t bring herself to say what she thinks. That’s it no use. That they’ll never find a way. That trying to flee is suicide. And that she’s not going to risk their lives.

  So, instead, she forces a smile, then lies to him: “All right, Andy. I’ll come up with an idea. Just give me time.”

  DAY 114

  “Hello?”

  Regan blinks and comes to. For a moment, she has no idea where she is, and she looks around to find herself behind the desk at the library. On the other side is a girl around seventeen, looking at her with mild bemusement.

  “I’m sorry,” Regan mutters and smiles at the girl. “I guess I just drifted off for a moment. What did you say?”

  The girl holds out a book. “I found this book …”

  “Sure, you want to borrow it? Just run it through the terminal over there. Do you need me to show you how—”

  “I don’t want to borrow it,” the girl says. “It was just lying around on the floor, so I didn’t really know what to do with it.”

  “Oh, okay. Thank you,” Regan says, taking the book.

  The girl goes back to browsing the shelves.

  Regan stares at the girl for a while without really seeing her; she’s already lost in thoughts again.

  She can’t stop thinking about Andy. He’s been on her mind ever since they officially reported him missing yesterday—no, even before that. Ever since the first day Andy didn’t show up at the library. Of course, it’s happened before that he skipped a day or two, but Regan still had a weird feeling this time. A feeling that something bad had happened.

  And when Andy didn’t come the day after that, her feeling grew stronger.

  And by the third day, when they began talking about him in the news, she already knew her feeling was right.

  She almost went to the police; had actually gone to her car twice to drive down to the station, but both times she changed her mind. Because what could she tell them? That she had had a hunch Andy would disappear? How would that help them find him?

  She had no idea where Andy was now or what had happened to him. And the police seemed to have no idea either. Their spokesperson on television kept uttering phrases like “ongoing investigation” and “still looking into leads” and “keeping all possibilities open”—and that was exactly what they kept saying when Andy’s sister went missing in the spring.

  It’s so terrible. First Rebecca and now Andy.

&nb
sp; Rumors were already circulating town. She heard a couple of old ladies talk together just yesterday, right here at the library. They were certain that Andy had run away from home because he was still devastated over losing his sister.

  Regan knows better. While it’s true Andy was still sad about the loss of Rebecca, he wasn’t devastated. In fact, he had seemed very eager the last time she spoke with him. Almost like he … like he what?

  “It’s got something to do with Rebecca.”

  Regan has played their last conversation over and over in her mind. Something about it keeps bugging her. Something her brain tries to tell her. It keeps pulling her back to that one thing Andy said.

  “It’s got something to do with Rebecca.”

  The glass doors open as an older gentleman enters the library, the sound pulling Regan out of her thoughts once more, and she decides to get on with what she was actually doing: putting back returned books.

  Perhaps she needs to stop brooding about it. There’s nothing she can do anyway. The thought that Andy is missing makes her deeply sad, and what good is that to anybody? She can’t go on like this, spending the days lost in gloomy thoughts, barely able to function.

  She takes a deep breath and goes to the book cart, when she notices the book still in her hand—the one the girl handed her. She completely forgot about it.

  “It was just lying around on the floor.”

  Regan stares at the faded, anonymous leather cover. She knows this book. It’s The Wendigo—the one Andy spoke so highly about. She’s seen him sit around the library reading it a ton of times.

  The funny thing is … she also picked it up from off the ground yesterday, when she found it lying in front of the shelves, as though someone had taken it out and just dropped it.

  Regan goes to row B, finds the empty slot and is just about to slide in the book, when a strange feeling comes over her. It feels almost like she can sense someone talking to her, but without any sound.

  She looks around discretely to make sure no one actually did talk to her, but finds herself alone in this part of the library.

  Regan bites her lip, considers for a moment, then she opens the book and leafs through the pages, skimming the text, not really sure what she’s looking for.

  Why was Andy so obsessed with this book? He must have read it a hundred times. Is it really that exciting?

  She stops on a random page and reads a bit. The language is fluent and picturesque, and the storyline seems appealing. But it doesn’t tell her anything about what fascinated Andy so much about the book. She closes it again with a sigh, puts it back and turns to go back to the cart.

  She’s only taken three or four steps, however, when there’s a sharp thud behind her.

  Regan stops and turns back around.

  The book is lying on the floor. Regan stares at it.

  How did that happen? I thought I put it in properly.

  Apparently, she didn’t. She must have spaced out again and didn’t push the book all the way in. She goes back and picks it up once more, noticing her heart beating a little too fast. She puts the book back a second time, this time making sure it’s all the way in.

  Then, she takes a few steps back, keeping an eye on the book, like she halfway expects it to fall to the floor again. Of course, it doesn’t.

  Regan shakes her head. I must be really losing it. I need to get a grip.

  She leaves row B and goes back to the cart. Just as she takes the first book, she hears it again. The thud.

  Regan’s heart leaps into her throat, and she needs to swallow hard to force it back down. She puts the book down and goes back to row B.

  The Wendigo is once again lying flat on the floor.

  She just stands there, staring at it. She doesn’t really want to go near it, is almost afraid to do so.

  Must be something about the cover. Maybe the leather is too slippery, or … or maybe the shelf is sloping outwards slightly. But then why wouldn’t the other books fall? It could also be something like static electricity that pushed it out …

  Regan listens to her thoughts’ desperate attempt to come up with a rational explanation, while a deeper part of her knows there isn’t one. That something else entirely is going on here.

  She goes and picks up the book. Brings it back to the desk, places it on the table and stares at it.

  What are you trying to tell me?

  Andy. It has definitely got something to do with Andy. She can sense it. Sense something buzzing around just outside the reach of her mind. Like when you hear a fly but you can’t see it.

  “It’s got something to do with Rebecca.”

  Why would Andy say that? What could he have meant? What was he trying to do? To find Rebecca? How could a nonfiction book about the human eye have anything to do with Andy’s sister disappearing?

  And then it finally hits home.

  It wasn’t the book Andy was interested in. It was the last person who borrowed it. And Regan helped him find it. She broke the rules because Andy asked her so urgently. Like it was absolutely crucial that he got that name.

  But why? What did he need that name for? He didn’t say anything, he just stared at the name for a minute, then thanked her and went back to reading The Wendigo. Like it wasn’t a big deal after all. But now, thinking back, Regan can tell he was only playing cool so as to not draw any more attention to himself.

  You clever little rascal … what did that name tell you?

  Did the person know anything about Rebecca’s disappearance? That was too far a stretch. If the person really had some information about Rebecca, the police would have been here a long time ago, asking to have a look in the system. Andy is thirteen years old. Could he have unraveled a mysterious disappearance that the police had given up on? Of course not. Things like that only happened in movies. Or in books.

  But the timing …

  Andy went missing that same night. Could it just be a coincidence? What if he didn’t get kidnapped, and he didn’t run away either; what if he went out voluntarily to look for Rebecca? What if he really believed the person behind that name she helped him find had something to do with it? And what if he was right?

  It actually made sense. Except it was ludicrous.

  But what if it wasn’t?

  What if this was a chance to find Andy—maybe the only chance there would ever be? Regan’s mind is trying to tell her it’s all make-believe, a shot in the dark at best, but her gut keeps insisting she’s onto something.

  Two girls at around Andy’s age enter through the glass doors. They’re wearing schoolbags, and don’t even look at Regan as they pass by the desk, since they’re wrapped up in a whispering conversation. Regan catches a few lines.

  “Think they’ll find him?”

  “No. They never found his sister.”

  Then the girls are gone between the shelves, and Regan is left with a sinking feeling in her stomach.

  She looks at the book still in her hand. The book that keeps falling to the floor on its own accord.

  And she turns to the computer and begins typing.

  DAY 115

  Andy is at the library, and he’s all alone. He has come to talk with Lisa—there’s something vital he needs to tell her, although he’s not really sure what exactly it is.

  He finds The Wendigo and begins talking to the book, but Lisa doesn’t answer him.

  He leafs through the pages, faster and faster, back and forth, searching desperately for a line from her, but finds nothing. With rising panic he grabs another book from the shelf and looks through it, then, still finding nothing, drops it and takes a new one.

  He shouts for Lisa, pleading for her to answer him, and when he looks up, he finds the shelves have grown high as towers, too high for him to even see the tops. And suddenly, the books start coming down over him, hundreds of them, thousands even, hitting him over the head, on his shoulders, and he tries to get away, but he’s already up to his waist in books, and they just keep coming, hitting his he
ad again, and it’s really painful, his head is throbbing now, throbbing badly, more books hit him, and the pain is causing him nausea, and it feels like he’s about to …

  Andy barely has time to roll over on his side before breakfast comes bubbling up through his throat and spills down into the tub next to the bed. He pukes for a few seconds while an avalanche of pain rumbles away inside his skull.

  He spits one last time, then wipes his mouth on his sleeve, which is already crusty from the many previous throw-ups. He really needs a shower; he reeks of old sweat and vomit, and his skin and his hair are all greasy.

  He rolls onto his back, sighing with relief as the headache subsides. It wasn’t as bad this time, and it didn’t last as long, either. That’s a good sign.

  He reaches out and finds his glasses, puts them on, then blinks and glances towards the window and can tell it’s still daytime from the light seeping in. Rebecca will probably soon come with lunch, or maybe dinner—he’s not sure what time of day it is.

  He isn’t sure how many days have gone by, either. Five, maybe, or six. It feels like a month to Andy.

  When he first woke up here in this bed, he was very confused and couldn’t remember anything of what had happened. He only vaguely recalled the van chasing them. Then there was a dream where he spoke to Lisa, and then Rebecca was lying on top of him, screaming.

  Once he started coming a little more to his senses, Rebecca explained everything to him; how the van had hit him and almost killed him, how the creature had wanted to murder him with the shovel, and how she bargained to save his life.

  What a great rescue, an unpleasant voice in his head says. Not only did you not save Rebecca, you also managed to get yourself caught, and you got a nice big concussion to go with the failure. Nice work, Andy.

  The voice sounds like Sheila used to talk, mixed with a taint of the icy cold tone of New Mom. Andy hates the voice and tries not to listen to it. It has haunted him ever since he came here.

  He tries instead to tell himself that all hope is not lost yet. That at least he found Rebecca, and now they can figure out a way to escape together.