by R. L. Stine
“Well?” Mom demanded, a teardrop running down one cheek.
“A wild-goose chase,” I told her. “Max took us to see the photo of Marissa on the wedding poster in the lobby.”
Mom sank in her chair. The glass tilted in her hand but didn’t spill.
Dad had his hands clasped tightly in front of him. “The police found a running shoe,” he said. “We didn’t recognize it. They found it at the edge of the cliff.” He just blurted it all out in one breath.
Mom and Grandpa Bud both gasped. On the couch, Robby stirred and shifted onto his side but didn’t wake up.
“At the cliff? Do they—do they think it’s Marissa’s?” Mom stammered.
Dad shook his head. “They don’t know. They’ve got helicopters searching the canyon floor.”
“Oh no,” Mom moaned. “Oh no. Oh no.” She buried her head in her hands.
Grandpa Bud reached out to comfort her. “We can’t assume the worst,” he said.
Doug was punching his phone again. “Marissa wouldn’t kill herself,” he said. “Maybe she decided she didn’t want to marry me. But I know she’d never kill herself. That’s just crazy.”
He listened to his phone. “Just voice mail again.” He tossed the phone angrily onto the table. “She didn’t kill herself,” he repeated through gritted teeth. “Trust me. I know her.”
“Doug is right—” I started.
But Doug wasn’t finished. “Marissa just panicked and left. I don’t care what the parking valet says. I know I’m right.” He slammed a fist on the tabletop. “We had words. We had a big argument yesterday. I swear I don’t even remember what it was about. And believe me, it wasn’t anything for Marissa to kill herself over. So let’s just stop thinking that way.”
He was red-faced now and shaking.
“Sit down, Doug,” Dad said. “We know you have to be right. But don’t get yourself in a frenzy.”
“A frenzy?” Doug repeated. But he followed Dad’s instruction. He sat down in a chair beside the table.
Robby made a snorting sound but didn’t wake up. How could he sleep through this whole discussion, through all the tension?
Grandpa Bud burped loudly. He set down his drink and covered his mouth with one hand. “Pardon me. My stomach is doing flip-flops. This is too much for an old man to bear.”
“Do you want to lie down?” Dad asked.
Bud shook his head. “I won’t be able to sleep. I’m too wired to take a nap, and too worried.”
“Why hasn’t she called?” Mom asked. I could see that her eyes weren’t focusing. Mom was in her own world of shock and confusion.
“We all knew this was a cursed place,” Grandpa Bud said. “We all knew about the wedding here in 1924. A member of the Goode family awoke the curse between the two families and—”
“Stop it, Bud!” Mom screamed. “Stop it. Do you really think talking about what happened nearly a hundred years ago is going to do any good today?”
She jumped unsteadily to her feet. “Let’s talk about something else. Is it supposed to be sunny tomorrow? Has anyone seen the baseball scores? Try the TV. There should be a game on this afternoon. I’m sure we can find someone to root for.”
Dad swept his arms around her and guided her back down into the chair. “Shhhhh. Shhhhh.” He whispered some things to her that I couldn’t hear.
Mom shut her eyes. Her shoulders were shaking, but she wasn’t crying. Dad stood silently, a steady hand on her trembling shoulder.
The room grew quiet. We were all having our private thoughts. Sad thoughts. Of course, I had guilty thoughts. Now I felt total guilt for the pranks I had played. . . . The feathers in Uncle Kenny’s mouth . . . the horror-movie stampede of the squirrels in the dark of night.
What was I thinking? Why did I think it would be hilarious to disrupt Marissa’s wedding like that? Of course, I had no way of knowing that she would disappear into thin air.
But still . . .
If something terrible happened to Marissa, would I ever forgive myself? Had I doomed myself to a lifetime of guilt?
A knock on the door made us all sit up alert, even Robby. The blue-uniformed cop with the strange olive eyes stepped into the room.
His expression told it all. His face was set in a tight-lipped frown. His eyes swept the room once, then avoided us, his stare above our heads as if he couldn’t bear the pain of looking at us.
“Bad news, I’m afraid,” he said, just loud enough for us to hear. He cleared his throat. “Our chopper patrol—”
“NO!” Mom let out a scream and jumped up, knocking over her glass. Grandpa Bud made a grab for her, but she stumbled toward the officer, shaking her head, mouthing the word no.
The cop raised his eyes to Dad, who had frozen beside Mom’s chair and didn’t even seem to realize that Mom was stumbling across the room. “I’m sorry, folks,” he said, and had to clear his throat again. “But the state police found a body at the bottom of the cliff. A girl’s. I mean, a young woman’s body.”
“No no no no.” Mom raised both fists as if she was about to attack the officer for bringing the news.
Dad finally moved. He took Mom’s arms and held her back. Then he spread an arm around her shoulders. He pressed his forehead to her cheek and whispered again.
I glimpsed Grandpa Bud, leaning forward in his chair, very pale, his hand on his chest. I silently prayed the officer’s news wasn’t giving him a heart attack.
Robby sat upright on the couch, blinking hard, stunned from his nap, squinting at the young cop as if trying to decide if it was all part of a dream. Doug collapsed onto a chair at the table and covered his head in his hands.
My mind drifted away. I saw Marissa as a little girl, dressed up for Sunday school. A picture of her in her high school graduation robe flashed into my brain. A crazy jumble of pictures with no reason or pattern.
“We need someone to identify the body,” the cop was saying. “One of you should come with us.” And then he added, thoughtlessly, “The body is crushed but the face is pretty much untouched.”
A detail we really didn’t need. But I guessed we should cut him some slack. The officer looked green, about to vomit. He probably didn’t get too many young girls hauled up from the cliff bottom.
Mom opened her mouth in a deafening animal wail and began to sob, her chest and shoulders heaving. Dad awkwardly reached for her, but she twisted out of his grasp and continued to wail.
“I’ll go with you,” Doug said to the officer. He started to stand up.
“They’d prefer it to be a family member,” the cop said.
Doug made a gurgling sound and slumped back into his chair.
I could see that Dad had his hands full with Mom. Robby was still fighting his way out of his daze. “I’ll go,” I said.
“No—” Dad started to protest. “It should be me.”
Mom picked up her drink glass and heaved it at the wall.
After the shattering sound had stopped echoing through my head, I stepped forward. “I’ll go, Dad. I’ll be okay.”
“Robby, snap out of it,” Dad said. “Take care of your mother. We’ll be right back.”
Dad and I followed the cop out of the room.
I must have been in some kind of dream state. I kept seeing these pictures in my head of Marissa and me when we were little. Building clubhouses out of cardboard boxes. Marissa reading her chapter books to me before I knew how to read myself. My heart was fluttering in my chest. It felt like hummingbird wings. But I didn’t feel the kind of cold dread you would expect.
Not until Dad and I followed the path up from the lodge and I saw the huddle of blue-uniformed officers at the top of the mesa. When I saw them, my breath escaped my body as if I had been punched in the stomach.
Dad must have seen my sudden terror. He gently took my arm and guided me through the tall grass to the circle of cops.
“Let us by,” the cop said in a low voice, and the circle opened up.
I saw a green canvas
tarp on the grass, and I could make out the shape of a body in the bulge at its center. “Oh.” A single word escaped my mouth.
Dad squeezed my hand. I struggled to breathe. But the bird wings had risen from my chest into my mouth. And my legs now felt as if they each weighed five hundred pounds. I couldn’t take another step.
Two officers bent and took the ends of the canvas tarp in their hands.
“We just need you both to take a quick look and identify her.” I struggled to make sense of his words. They suddenly didn’t seem to be in a language I understood.
I couldn’t reply. I just stood there trembling, not breathing, not thinking, the sunlight suddenly blinding, pain pulsing at the sides of my head.
The two cops slowly pulled the tarp back, revealing the pale, pale face.
“NOOOO!” I couldn’t stop the scream that burst from my throat. “NOOOOO! NOOOOOOO!”
Part Four
Thirty-One
My brain reeling, the sunlight pulsing in my eyes, I stared at the dead girl’s face. Taylor. Taylor Mancuso. Marissa’s maid of honor. Marissa’s best friend.
Her blue eyes were open, glassy but lifeless. Gazing up at me as if trying to see me. Her mouth had a layer of coral lipstick, still fresh and smooth. Her lips were parted slightly and her tongue fell limply through her teeth.
She must have landed on the back of her head because her face seemed almost untouched. I could see that her skull was crushed, and her blond hair was caked with dark dried blood.
“It’s . . . not.” My father choked on the words.
“It’s Taylor Mancuso,” I cried out. “Not Marissa. It’s not Marissa.”
Dad wrapped his arms around me. I could feel him trembling. He tried to speak but no sound came out.
The officers slid the tarp back over her face. But I could still see her. Still see her glassy eyes . . . her open lips . . . her pretty face. Taylor’s pretty face . . .
I heard her voice. I heard her laugh. I pictured Taylor and Marissa in our den, music thumping, dancing, practicing new dance moves. Laughing, always laughing. Taylor and Marissa, like twittering birds. Like . . . birds of a feather.
Crazy thoughts.
Dad gripped my shoulders. He still hadn’t spoken.
“Can I help you back to the lodge?” The cop leaned into the dazzling sunlight, a shadow in front of my face.
I turned to him. “Do you have a name?” Why did that question burst out of me?
“Sergeant Grady,” he said.
“Help us back, Sergeant.”
He took my arm. Dad held on to my other arm. “I . . . I don’t believe it.” He finally found his voice.
“Was she pushed?” I asked.
Sergeant Grady pointed to the dirt at the cliff edge. “I really can’t say. But there’s no sign of a struggle.”
We walked a few steps along the path to the lodge. “Do you think someone had a reason to push her?” he asked, brushing a horsefly off my forehead.
“Of course not,” I snapped.
“Just asking. We have to ask the questions, you know. How well did you know her?”
I shrugged. “She was Marissa’s best friend.”
“She wasn’t depressed or anything, was she?” Grady turned his olive eyes on me, studying me. “She didn’t act strange at the wedding rehearsal?”
“Taylor never acted strange,” I said. My voice cracked. I hated thinking about her in the past tense. “She was totally normal, a good girl. You know?”
He nodded.
We walked on. He had a thoughtful look frozen on his face. “So . . . you’re saying she wouldn’t jump.”
“No,” I murmured.
Then I noticed the roar in my ears. I turned and saw a black helicopter rising over the side of the mesa. Dad squeezed my hand. He saw it, too.
“They’re still looking?” I asked Grady.
He nodded. “Maybe your sister fell with her.”
“Huh? Fell?”
“Maybe they were together. In the morning. Maybe they were kidding around. Before the wedding. And maybe one of them started to fall and the other one tried to save her and—”
I shuddered.
“Just trying to think of everything,” he said, avoiding my stare. “The state guys have been in the air a long time now, and they haven’t found anyone else down there. So maybe . . .”
“Maybe Marissa decided she didn’t want to marry Doug, and she took off. Escaped. Early this morning,” Dad said.
Grady nodded. “Better a missing person case than a homicide or an accident. We can’t declare her missing until she’s been gone for twenty-four hours. But you should check her credit cards and bank accounts. Look for any unusual charges or withdrawals.”
Was I supposed to play detective now?
I couldn’t. I wanted to shout and cry and scream and wail and throw myself on the grass and pound the dirt till my fists bled. I wanted the world to see how much I wanted my sister, and wanted her back now. But instead I kept walking between Dad and Grady.
We were nearly back at the lodge now. The roar of the helicopter over the mesa had faded to a distant hum in my ears. I crossed my fingers on both hands and silently prayed they wouldn’t find Marissa sprawled and broken on the cliff bottom.
Sergeant Grady pulled open the entrance door for us. I pictured the scene in my parents’ room. And I imagined the horror—and the relief—everyone in there was about to feel.
Dad stayed at the lodge. He said that someone had to stay in case the local police came up with anything. Robby and I took Mom and Grandpa Bud to the airport.
We put Bud on a flight back to Cincinnati. “Promise me . . . ,” he started.
“I promise we’ll call you as soon as we hear anything,” I told him.
At the gate, he leaned close as if to kiss me good-bye. But instead, he whispered, “When you stir the pot, unexpected things emerge. No more tricks, Harmony. None.”
“Of course not,” I whispered back.
But he started me thinking. Was there a spell to bring Marissa back? Was there some kind of magic in those old books in our attic to reveal to me where Marissa was?
If she is dead, could I bring her back? Is the Fear magic that powerful? Am I?
Probably not.
Weird thoughts, for sure. But I couldn’t control them. And, actually, I didn’t want to.
“Where’s Douglas?” Mom asked as we waited at gate 12 to board our plane. Mom was still in a fog. She hadn’t seemed at all relieved when I told her that it wasn’t Marissa at the bottom of the canyon. It was as if her mind just couldn’t bear all that had happened. She hadn’t snapped or anything. It was just like she was half asleep. Her body was going through the motions, her mind still lingering in some kind of dream.
“Doug went on an earlier plane,” Robby said.
Mom nodded. She folded her hands over the pocketbook in her lap.
Robby had his thumbs moving over the keyboard on his phone. I knew he had to be texting Nikki, telling her we were on our way back to Shadyside.
I had a gnawing hunger. Maybe because I hadn’t eaten a real meal since Marissa disappeared before the wedding. I’d bought a giant Snickers bar at one of the airport stores, and I devoured the whole thing in ten seconds.
I could see that Robby was watching me. “Are you okay?”
“Not really,” I said. What should I say? That I was just fine?
“Maybe Marissa will be home waiting for us when we get there,” Mom said. She had a strange, dreamy smile on her face.
“Maybe,” Robby said, glancing at me.
“Mom,” I said. “She hasn’t called, and she doesn’t answer her phone. If she is home . . .” My voice trailed off. I didn’t know how to finish my sentence.
Mom nodded. She had a copy of Food & Wine magazine rolled up between her hands, but she made no attempt to look at it. Robby and I stared at our phones until it was time to board the plane.
“What’s new with Nikki?” I asked, just t
o be saying something.
He shrugged. “Not much.”
I had a short text conversation with my friend Sophie back in Shadyside. She was excited about some new shoe store at the mall. Sophie is a shoe freak, although she can’t afford any of the shoes she likes.
I was desperate to tell her about what happened at the wedding and how Marissa had disappeared, but it just didn’t seem like the kind of thing to spring on someone in a text message.
On the plane, Robby and I sat together. Mom was at the far end of the row. I couldn’t hold it in any longer. I pushed Robby’s phone away from his face, tugged his earbuds from his ears, and told him I had to talk to him.
He rolled his eyes. “Are you going to tell me some kind of conspiracy theory about the wedding?”
“It’s not a theory,” I said. “It’s what happened to me. Shut up and listen. I saw Aiden Murray at the lodge.”
That got my brother’s attention.
I was so desperate to share the story with someone, I blurted it out in a breathless wave of words. I told Robby how I saw Aiden park his red sports car and go into the lodge. How I spoke with him at the door to his room but he wouldn’t tell me why he was there.
“I know he has something to do with Marissa disappearing,” I said. “I know he does.”
Robby narrowed his eyes at me. “Harmony, are you kidding me? Why didn’t you tell anyone about this before? Why didn’t you tell Mom or Dad—or the police?”
I took a breath. “Because the story gets all mixed up,” I said. “I tried to find Aiden after Marissa vanished, but he wasn’t in his room. Another couple was in there, and they said they had been in the room for a week.”
“You had the wrong room?” Robby asked.
“No. I had the right room,” I insisted. “So I tried to track Aiden down with the desk clerk and the parking valet. But they weren’t the same. They were different people. And they didn’t know the men I had talked to.”
I saw my brother’s expression.
“I’m not making sense—am I?”
