“I was just a kid when all that happened,” she said quietly. Arty nodded, quick and skittish. Charlie made her face move into a smile. “I have to go meet Jessica,” she lied. I have to get away from you. Arty nodded his head again like a bobblehead doll. She turned and walked away toward the dorm, not looking back.
Charlie blinked into the sunlight. Flashes of what happened last year at Freddy’s were batting at her, snatches of memory plucking at her clothing with cold, iron fingers. The hook above, poised to strike—no escape. A figure looming behind the stage; red matted fur barely concealing the metal bones of the murderous creature. Kneeling in pitch-dark on the cold tile floor of the bathroom, and then—that giant, hard plastic eye glaring through the crack, the hot miasma of lifeless breath on her face. And the other, older memory: the thought that made her ache in ways for which she had no words, sorrow filling her as if it had been wrought into her very bones. She and Sammy, her other self, her twin brother, were playing their quiet games in the familiar warmth of the costume closet. Then the figure appeared in the doorway, looking down on them. Then Sammy was gone, and the world ended for the first time.
Charlie was standing outside her own dorm room, almost without knowing how she’d gotten there. Slowly, she pulled her keys from her pocket and let herself into the room. The lights were off; Jessica was still in class. Charlie shut the door behind her, checking the lock twice, and leaned back against it. She took a deep breath. It’s over now. She straightened decisively and snapped on the overhead light, filling the room with a harsh illumination. The clock beside the bed told Charlie that she still had a little under an hour before John arrived—time to work on her project.
Charlie and Jessica had divided the room with a piece of masking tape after their first week living together. Jessica suggested it jokingly, said she’d seen it in a movie, but Charlie had grinned and helped her measure the room. She knew Jessica was desperate to keep Charlie’s mess off her side. The result was a bedroom that looked like a “before and after” picture advertising either a cleaning service or a nuclear weapon, depending on whose side you looked at first.
On Charlie’s desk there was a pillowcase, draped over two indistinct shapes. She went to her desk and removed it, folding it carefully and placing it on her chair. She looked at her project.
“Hello,” she said softly.
Two mechanical faces were held upright on metal structures and attached to a length of board. Their features were indistinct, like old statues worn away by rain, or new clay not yet fully sculpted. They were made of a malleable plastic, and where the backs of their heads ought to be there were instead networks of casings, microchips, and wires.
Charlie bent down toward them, looking over every millimeter of her design, making sure everything was as she’d left it. She flipped a small black switch and little lights blinked; tiny cooling fans began to whir.
They didn’t move right away, but there was a change. The vague features took on a sense of purpose. Their blind eyes didn’t turn to Charlie: they looked only at each other.
“You,” said the first. Its lips moved to shape the syllable, but never parted. They weren’t made to open.
“I,” the second replied, making the same soft, constrained movement.
“You are,” said the first.
“Am I?” said the second.
Charlie watched, her hand pressed over her mouth. She held her breath, afraid of disturbing them. She waited, but they had apparently finished, and were now simply looking at each other. They can’t see, Charlie reminded herself. She turned them off and pulled the board around so that she could peer into their backs. She reached inside and adjusted a wire.
A key slid into the lock of the door, and Charlie startled at the sound. She snatched the pillowcase and threw it over the faces as Jessica entered the room. Jessica paused in the doorway with a grin.
“What was that?” she asked.
“What?” Charlie said innocently.
“Come on, I know you were working on that thing you never let me see.” She dropped her backpack on the floor, then flopped dramatically back on the bed. “Anyways, I’m exhausted!” she announced. Charlie laughed, and Jessica sat up. “Come talk to me,” she said. “What’s up with you and John?”
Charlie sat down on her own bed, across from Jessica. Despite their different lifestyles, she liked living with the other girl. Jessica was warm and bright, and while her ease as she went about the world still intimidated Charlie a little, now she felt like a part of it. Maybe being Jessica’s friend meant absorbing some of her confidence.
“I haven’t seen him yet. I have to leave in …” She peered over Jessica’s shoulder at the clock. “Fifteen minutes.”
“Are you excited?” Jessica asked.
Charlie shrugged. “I think so,” she said.
Jessica laughed. “You’re not sure?”
“I’m excited,” Charlie admitted. “It’s just been a long time.”
“Not that long,” Jessica pointed out. Then she looked thoughtful. “I guess it sort of has been, though. Everything is so different since the last time we saw him.”
Charlie cleared her throat. “So you really want to see my project?” she asked, surprising herself.
“Yes!” Jessica declared, springing up from the bed. She followed Charlie to her desk. Charlie switched on the power then flung off the pillowcase like a magician. Jessica gasped and took an involuntary step back. “What is it?” she asked, her voice cautious. But before Charlie could answer, the first face spoke.
“Me,” it said.
“You,” the other replied, and they both fell silent again. Charlie looked at Jessica. Her friend had a pinched expression, like she was holding something tightly inside.
“I,” the second face said.
Charlie hurried to switch them off. “Why do you have that look on your face?” she said.
Jessica took a deep breath and smiled at her. “I just haven’t had lunch yet,” she said, but something lingered in her eyes.
Jessica watched as Charlie replaced the pillowcase lovingly over the faces, as if she were tucking a child into bed. She looked uncomfortably around the room. Charlie’s half was a disaster: clothes and books were strewn everywhere, but there were also the wires and computer parts, tools, screws, and pieces of plastic and metal Jessica didn’t recognize, all jumbled up together. It wasn’t just a mess; it was a chaotic tangle where you could lose anything. Or hide anything, she realized, with a pang of guilt at the thought. Jessica turned her attention back to Charlie.
“What are you programming them to do?” she asked, and Charlie smiled proudly.
“I’m not exactly programming them to do anything. I’m helping them learn on their own.”
“Right, of course. Obviously,” Jessica said slowly. As she did, something caught her eye: a pair of shiny plastic eyes and long floppy ears were peering out from a pile of dirty laundry.
“Hey, I never noticed you brought Theodore, your little robo-rabbit!” she exclaimed, pleased to have remembered the name of Charlie’s childhood toy. Before Charlie could respond, she picked the stuffed animal up by his ears—and came away with only his head.
Jessica let out a shriek and dropped it, clapping a hand over her mouth.
“I’m sorry!” Charlie said, hastily grabbing the rabbit’s head off the floor. “I took him apart to study; I’m using some of his parts in my project.” She gestured at the thing on her desk.
“Oh,” Jessica said, trying to hide her dismay. She glanced around the room and suddenly realized that the rabbit’s parts were everywhere. His cotton-ball tail was on Charlie’s pillow, and a leg hung off the lamp above her desk. His torso lay in the corner, almost out of sight, ripped open savagely. Jessica looked at her friend’s round, cheerful face, and frizzy shoulder-length brown hair. Jessica closed her eyes for a long moment.
Oh, Charlie, what’s wrong with you?
“Jessica?” Charlie said. The girl’s eyes were cl
osed, her expression pained. “Jessica?” This time she opened her eyes and gave Charlie a sudden, bright smile, turning on cheer like a faucet. It was disconcerting, but Charlie had gotten used to it.
Jessica blinked hard, like she was resetting her brain. “So, are you nervous about seeing John?” she asked. Charlie thought for a moment.
“No. I mean, why should I be? It’s just John, right?” Charlie tried to laugh, but gave up. “Jessica, I don’t know what to talk about!” she burst out suddenly.
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know what to talk about with him!” Charlie said. “If we don’t have something to talk about, then we’ll start talking about … what happened last year. And I just can’t.”
“Right.” Jessica looked thoughtful. “Maybe he won’t bring it up,” she offered.
Charlie sighed, glancing back at her covered experiment with longing. “Of course he will. It’s all we have in common.” She sat down heavily on her bed and slumped over.
“Charlie, you don’t have to talk about anything you don’t want to talk about,” Jessica said gently. “You can always just cancel on him. But I don’t think John’s going to put you on the spot. He cares about you. I doubt what happened in Hurricane is what’s on his mind.”
“What does that mean?”
“I just mean …” Jessica gingerly pushed aside a pile of laundry and sat next to Charlie, placing a hand on her knee. “I just mean that maybe it’s time that you both move past that. And I think John is trying to.”
Charlie looked away and stared fixedly at Theodore’s head, facedown on the floor. You mean, get over it? How do I even begin?
Jessica’s voice softened. “This can’t be your whole life anymore.”
“I know.” Charlie sighed. She decided to change the subject. “How was your class, anyway?” Charlie wiped her eyes, hoping Jessica would take the hint.
“Awesome.” Jessica stood and stretched, bending over to touch her toes and incidentally giving Charlie a chance to compose herself. When Jessica stood again, she was smiling brilliantly, back in character. “Did you know that corpses can be preserved in peat bogs like mummies?”
Charlie wrinkled her nose. “I do now. So is that what you’re gonna do when you graduate? Crawl around in peat bogs looking for bodies?”
Jessica shrugged. “Maybe.”
“I’ll get you a hazmat suit for your graduation gift,” Charlie joked. She looked at her watch. “Time to go! Wish me luck.” She brushed her hair back with her hands, peering into the mirror that hung on the back of the door. “I feel like a mess.”
“You look great.” Jessica gave her an encouraging nod.
“I’ve been doing sit-ups,” Charlie said awkwardly.
“Huh?”
“Forget it.” Charlie grabbed her backpack and headed for the door.
“Go knock his socks off!” Jessica called as Charlie left.
“I don’t know what that means!” Charlie replied, letting the door swing closed before she’d finished speaking.
* * *
Charlie spotted him as she approached the main entrance to the campus. John was leaning on the wall, reading a book. His brown hair was as messy as ever, and he was wearing a blue T-shirt and jeans, dressed more casually than the last time she’d seen him.
“John!” she called, her reluctance falling away as soon as she saw him. He put away his book, grinning widely, and hurried to her.
“Hey, Charlie,” he said. They stood there awkwardly, then Charlie extended her arms to hug him. He held her tightly for a moment then abruptly released her.
“You got taller,” she said accusingly, and he laughed.
“I did,” he admitted. He gave her a searching look. “You look exactly the same, though,” he said with a puzzled smile.
“I cut my hair!” Charlie said in mock-outrage. She ran her fingers through it, demonstrating.
“Oh yeah!” he said. “I like it. I just mean, you’re the same girl I remember.”
“I’ve been doing sit-ups,” Charlie said with a rising panic.
“Huh?” John gave her a confused look.
“Never mind. Are you hungry?” Charlie asked. “I have about an hour before my next class. We could get a burger. There’s a dining hall not far from here.”
“Yeah, that would be great,” John said. Charlie pointed across the quad.
“That way, come on.”
* * *
“So what are you doing here?” Charlie asked as they sat down with their trays. “Sorry,” she added. “Did that sound rude?”
“Not rude at all, although I would have also accepted, ‘John, to what circumstance do I owe the pleasure of this delightful reunion?’”
“Yeah, that sounds like me,” Charlie said drily. “But seriously, what are you doing here?”
“Got a job.”
“In St. George?” she asked. “Why?”
“In Hurricane, actually,” he said, his voice self-consciously casual.
“Aren’t you in school somewhere?” Charlie asked.
John blushed, looking down at his plate for a moment. “I was going to, but … it’s a lot of money to read books when a library card is free, you know? My cousin got me a job in construction, and I’m working on my writing when I can. I figured even if I’m gonna be an artist, I don’t have to be a starving one.” He took an illustrative bite of his hamburger, and Charlie grinned.
“So why here?” she insisted, and he held up a finger as he finished chewing.
“The storm,” he said. Charlie nodded. The storm had hit Hurricane before Charlie came to St. George, and people talked about it in capital letters: The Storm. It wasn’t the worst the area had ever seen, but it was close. A tornado had risen up from nowhere and ripped through whole towns, razing one house to the ground with sinister precision, while leaving the one next to it untouched. There hadn’t been much damage in St. George, but Hurricane had seen real destruction.
“How bad is it?” Charlie asked, keeping her tone light.
“You haven’t been?” John said incredulously, and it was Charlie’s turn to look awkwardly away. She shook her head. “It’s bad in places,” he said. “Mostly on the outskirts of town. Charlie … I assumed you’d been.” He bit his lip.
“What?” Something about his expression was worrying her.
“Your dad’s house, it was one of the ones that got hit,” he said.
“Oh.” Something leaden was growing in Charlie’s chest. “I didn’t know.”
“You really didn’t even go back to check?”
“I didn’t think of it,” Charlie said. That’s not true. She’d thought a thousand times of going back to her father’s house. But it had never occurred to her that the house might have been hit in the storm. In her mind, it was impregnable, unchanging. It would always be there, just as her father had left it. She closed her eyes and pictured it. The front steps sagged in disrepair, but the house itself stood like a fortress, protecting what was inside. “Is it—gone?” Charlie asked, the words faint.
“No,” John said quickly. “No, it’s still there, just damaged. I don’t know how much; I just drove by. I didn’t think I should go there without you.”
Charlie nodded, only half listening. She felt far away. She could see John, hear him, but there was a layer of something between them, between her and everything else, everything but the house itself.
“I would have thought—didn’t your aunt tell you what happened?” John asked.
“I have to get to class,” Charlie said. “It’s that way.” She gestured vaguely.
“Charlie, have you been okay?” She didn’t look at him, and he placed his hand over hers. She still couldn’t look up. She didn’t want him to see her face.
“Okay,” she repeated, then slipped her hand out from under his and shrugged her shoulders up and down, like she was trying to get something off her back. “I had my birthday,” she offered, and she finally leveled her gaze to meet his.
“I’m sorry I missed it,” John said.
“No, no, that’s not …” She tipped her head from side to side, as if she could level out her thoughts, too. “Do you remember how I had a twin?”
“What?” John sounded puzzled. “Of course I do. I’m sorry, Charlie, is that what you meant about your birthday?” She nodded, making tiny motions. John held out his hand again, and she took it. She could feel his pulse through his thumb.
“Ever since we left Hurricane … You know how twins are supposed to be connected, have some kind of special bond?”
“Sure,” he said.
“Ever since we left—ever since I found out he was real—I’ve felt like he was there with me. I know he’s not. He’s dead, but for that whole year, I didn’t feel alone anymore.”
“Charlie.” John’s hand tightened on hers. “You know you’re not alone.”
“No, I mean really not alone. Like I have another self: someone who’s a part of me and is always with me. I’ve had these feelings before, but they came and went, and I didn’t pay much attention to them. I didn’t know they meant something. Then when I learned the truth, and those memories started coming back to me—John, I felt whole in a way I don’t even know how to describe.” Her eyes began to fill with tears and she pulled her hand back to brush them away.
“Hey,” he said softly. “It’s okay. That’s great, Charlie. I’m glad you have that.”
“No. No, that’s the thing. I don’t!” She met his eyes, desperate for him to understand what she was so awkwardly trying to say. “He’s disappeared. That sense of completeness is gone.”
“What?”
“It happened on my birthday. I woke up and I just felt—” She sighed, searching. There wasn’t a word for it.
“Alone?” John said.
“Incomplete.” She took a deep breath, pulling herself back together. “But the thing is, it’s not just loss. It’s—it’s like he’s trapped somewhere. I have these dreams where I can feel him on the other side of something, like he’s so close to me, but he’s stuck somewhere. Like he’s in a box, or I’m in a box. I can’t tell.”
The Twisted Ones Page 2
