by Келли Криг
Him. She’d seen him.
Oh no, him.
She groaned, a dull ache creeping up from her spine to settle in her chest. Ugh. She didn’t even want to think of his name. She rolled over, squeezing her eyes shut, stuffing her face into her pillow. She wasn’t ready to remember what had happened, to recall the nightmare that had been the day before.
The faint pins-and-needles sensation, still there, buzzed through her like a soft vibration, though the closer she drifted to full consciousness, the faster it seemed to fade.
Isobel’s gaze slipped dazedly to her window, where she watched the half-naked tree limbs quiver and sway, waving in and out of her view, like clawed hands snatching at the sun.
The sun.
“Oh, crap!” she croaked.
Isobel sat up and pulled her alarm clock from the top of her headboard.
“Eleven thirty-five, oh my God!”
She’d slept through the rest of yesterday and into the next morning. She hadn’t set her alarm! She was supposed to be in Mr. Swanson’s class right this very second! Why hadn’t anyone woken her up? Why hadn’t . . . ?
Isobel stared at the clock, clutching it between her hands. Her eyes went slowly unfocused as the memory of last night’s dream struggled to resurface. Why did remembering feel so crucial? The blue numbers of her clock blurred against their black backdrop, burning into her eyes. She thought about the way they had gone haywire when—
“Reynolds,” she whispered.
She dropped the clock. It cracked against the wood of her bed frame, then thudded onto the carpet. Like a jolt of electricity to her brain, the image of her floating things seized her. She sat frozen, clutching the comforter beneath her. Her eyes scanned her room.
She saw her hairbrush, not on the floor but on her dresser, and behind it, her “Number One Flyer” trophy.
“Mom?” Her voice grated in her throat.
She swallowed against the pain and pulled herself out of bed, then padded to her door and opened it.
Isobel went very still, her hand tightening on her door handle. She stared down the length of the empty, silent hall, afraid to turn around. The book. Would it be there if she looked?
Slowly, her grip easing, she turned, her eyes trailing to her nightstand. She saw her dusty photo album of last year’s cheer events. Next to it sat her lamp, the shade trimmed in a skirt of pink and white beaded fringe, and a couple of hair ties.
No book. No Poe.
Realizing she’d been holding her breath, Isobel exhaled in one long rush that turned into a laugh at the tail end.
She stepped out into the hallway and down the stairs, past the collage of family photos. It made her feel silly, the idea that she’d taken something from her subconscious so seriously.
Cold white daylight streamed in through the front-door windows and through the lace curtains in the living room, but around her, the house seemed dim and dead. “Mom?” Isobel called out again, her throat now feeling slightly less like a cat’s scratching post.
One by one, she flicked on light switches as she reached them even though it wasn’t that dark inside. The false light afforded her little comfort. The silence was too thick. Her fingertips brushed the walls as she passed through the hall, moving toward the kitchen, where she knew she could find a cold ginger ale and maybe something to eat. She opened the fridge, opted for a Sprite, and drank half before closing the door again.
Isobel figured her fever last night had probably caused her mother to call the school for her that morning. So where was her mother now?
No school today. She couldn’t say that she wasn’t grateful. There was no way she’d have survived a repeat of the day before.
Isobel shut her eyes, trying to block Varen’s smooth, pale features from forming in her mind, but that only caused him to materialize more vividly. Grasping the handle of the fridge, Isobel rested her forehead against the cool surface. The cold felt so good against her skin. She turned to press her cheek there too. Wake up, Isobel. What’s the deal? Why can’t you get over it already? He’s just some guy. Some guy who’d she’d dreamt was having dreams about her. How completely whacked was that?
Why did he have to be so . . . so . . .
Isobel let out a growl of frustration, pushing off from the fridge. She took a noisy slurp from her Sprite and made a beeline straight for the pantry. She was going to pull a major Danny and find some Chips Ahoy to scarf down for breakfast.
She reached for the cabinet door and stopped.
A glint of gold on black caught her eye.
She looked, and the Sprite slid out of her grasp. It thumped onto the floor, and soda spread across the tiles with a quiet hiss.
There, on the kitchen table, sat the large, familiar black book, autumn sunlight gleaming off the gold-lined pages and the embossed title that read The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe.
“No!”
She grabbed the book and swept it from the table. It hit the floor, falling open on the kitchen tile.
Isobel drew back, her arms huddled against her body, her fists balled into tight knots beneath her chin. She could feel herself shaking. This couldn’t be for real, she thought. This couldn’t be happening. She’d thrown it away. She’d gotten rid of it. Last night had been a dream.
She stared down at the book. She watched a trickle of soda crawl across the floor toward it, and despite everything in her being telling her not to, she inched forward. Her shadow settled over a picture in the open book, a large black-and-white image of a pale-faced, sunken-eyed man.
A neatly tied cravat laced his neck like a fancy noose. A rumpled jacket, so black it nearly blended into the portrait’s background, was fastened in the middle by a solitary button. The man’s wide forehead gave way to sorrowful, downward-slanted brows. And then there were the eyes themselves. Dark wells.
Crouching, Isobel lifted the book out of the soda, which had begun to pool at its edge. She found herself at once entrapped by those eyes, transfixed because they seemed to stare right back at her, pleading with her in earnest for . . . for what?
Her gaze trailed down to the caption: “Ultima Thule” daguerreotype of Poe taken November 9, 1848, less than a year before the poet’s mysterious death.
Ultima Thule. Why did that sound familiar?
Isobel stared once again into his eyes. There was something about them, the way they pulled her in, the way they only dimly reflected the light, the way they resembled two black, coin-size holes.
She slammed the book shut.
17
Dead Air
Isobel sat staring vacantly at the video game images that flashed in front of her eyes. She hadn’t the slightest idea what she was watching—some overdramatic vampire slayer game Danny had switched on when he’d gotten home from school. Blades swiped, blood splashed, and zombies screamed.
She’d spent the better part of the day right there on the couch. She’d turned on the TV initially for the noise, for some kind of normal sound to surround her until her mom returned from the grocery store. That, and she’d needed something to ground her, to let her know she was really awake and not still asleep—that she wasn’t locked in some perpetual dream within a dream.
But she hadn’t found much comfort in knowing that she was, indeed, awake and in the real world. Not given what had happened, what she’d seen in her dream—what she’d found in the kitchen.
“Isobel!”
She jolted, looking up to see her mother standing behind the couch, holding a hand over the mouthpiece of their portable phone. “Isobel,” she said, lowering her voice, her brows knitting. “Did you really not hear me calling you?”
Isobel stared up at her mother.
“I said, ‘Telephone.’ Isobel, are you sure you don’t need to go to the doctor? Ever since yesterday you’ve been acting like you’re on some other planet.”
“I’m fine, Mom,” she muttered, reaching out for the handset. “Just tired is all.”
Isobel held the phone to her
ear, staring blankly at her mother’s back as she disappeared once more into the kitchen. “’Lo?”
“Don’t hang up.”
Her insides flared.
Maybe it was because he’d told her not to, or maybe it was because she couldn’t bear the sound of his voice so close in her ear. She hung up.
For a moment she stared at the phone in her hand, impressed with herself yet shocked at her own gall. It was like hanging up on Dracula. At the same time, an intense regret coursed through her. Why did she wish more than anything that she could tell him (of all people!) about everything that had been happening to her?
Maybe because Reynolds said he was involved. Or maybe because that freaky book had been his to begin with.
The phone rang again, its little red light flickering in urgency. Isobel stared down at the caller ID screen until a name popped up on the display. DESSERT ISLAND it read, with the phone number listed below.
Her thumb twitched toward the talk button.
Why was he even calling her? Surely he hadn’t expected her to show up for their planned meeting at the ice cream shop. He was arrogant and callous, but he wasn’t dense.
“Danny,” she said, rising, the phone ringing for the third time now. She tossed the handset to the floor beside where her brother lay on his stomach. “Five bucks says this is the wrong number.”
“Eez-oh-bel?” he said in a corny fake Spanish accent. “I don know no Eez-oh-bel.”
She turned and moved quickly into the kitchen, where her mother stood in front of the stove fixing dinner. She ignored, as best she could, Danny’s leisurely “Heeelllooo?” from the next room.
One look at the Poe book sitting where she’d left it on the kitchen table, however, had her turning straight back around.
“Isobel,” her mother said, stopping her. “You’re not mad at me, are you?” Her tone was curious, probing.
“No, why?”
“Oh, well.” Stirring what Isobel thought smelled like mushroom rice (one of her favorites), her mom shrugged. “I thought you might be upset that I cleaned your room this morning while you were still sleeping.”
“What?”
“I just picked up the floor a little. I didn’t think you’d mind, since you were still asleep. You must have been tired. You didn’t even wake up when I took your shoes off. But I was just making sure,” she chattered on. “I didn’t know if I’d put something back the wrong way. Oh, and I hope you don’t mind that I borrowed the book from your nightstand. Where did you get it? I didn’t see a library bar code. Dad said you were reading Poe for school.”
Isobel couldn’t register the question. Her gaze drifted again to the Poe book. Rushing forward, she snatched it off the table, then marched out of the kitchen and back into the hall, fixing her sights on the stairs. It had to be the book, she thought. Nothing freaky had happened until after she’d set eyes on it, and now she had to get rid of it. She couldn’t throw it away again, of course. Maybe if she dug a hole and buried it? Or would she have to burn it? Then again, Reynolds had told her to keep it, that it was important. But who, or what, was Reynolds in the first place?
What would happen if she just . . . gave it back?
Danny’s voice floated out to her from the living room. “Yeah, but the original Transylvania Wars is kind of old-school, don’t you think?”
Isobel paused outside the living room archway, her head turning slowly to see Danny cradling the phone between his shoulder and ear, his thumbs flying over the controller, a digital vampire slayer executing an elaborate string of sword blows to a group of manic undead.
“Okay, so I’m at the Nosferatu Dungeon door,” she heard Danny say. “Now how do you get Gothica’s Gate to open again?”
Isobel felt her clenched jaw fall slack. No way. She stalked into the living room and glared at the back of her brother’s head. “Who are you talking to?”
“Hold on.” He tossed the words at her from over his shoulder, scooting in closer to the TV, close enough for his nose to touch the screen. “Ohhh,” he said, “I see it now! Jeez! How did you ever figure that out?”
“Danny, give me the phone.” Isobel thrust her hand out for the receiver. “And you can forget the five bucks.”
“I was only gonna charge you three-fifty anyway,” he said, holding the phone just out of her reach. “He knew he hadn’t dialed the wrong number, so I had to tell him you were on the crapper.”
“What? Danny! Oh my God.” Isobel lashed out, wrenching the phone from his hand, her face scalding. Storming out of the living room, she contemplated hanging up again, this time on the grounds of mortification. But then she realized she couldn’t avoid him much longer and lifted the receiver to her ear. “What?” she growled. With the Poe book tucked under one arm, Isobel mounted the stairs and stomped each one as she climbed. She headed for the last place she wanted to be but the only one in which she’d find herself alone—her room.
“Your brother,” the soft voice said, a hint of laughter behind it.
“Is a little jerk,” she snarled. “Now what do you want?”
“Would you relax for a second?”
The hand holding the phone quivered in fury. “No!” she seethed, “I will not relax!”
“I need to—”
“You need to just drop dead, okay?”
“Isobel, listen—”
Could this really be the first time he’d ever used her name? She shoved the thought aside. “No!” she shouted, “you listen! You are such a hypocrite.”
Silence. Was he even still there?
She plowed on, not caring. “What?” she said. “Shocked that the dumb blond cheerleader actually has a vocabulary beyond ‘Go team’?”
He came back with a note of defense. “I never—”
“You have done nothing but condescend to me. I stuck up for you! And after what you did yesterday, you think you can just leave me little notes and call me up and be all, ‘Hey, we need to talk,’ and expect me just to say, ‘Hey, okay’? What kind of acid are you dropping?”
“Isobel—”
“No, Varen. Don’t call me again. You can just take the stupid project and do it yourself.”
“I didn’t call you because of the project.”
“Well, I’m flattered,” she said, unable to keep the waver out of her voice. Hesitating for a fraction of a second, she jammed her thumb on the end button, severing their connection.
18
The Other Half
Isobel came downstairs for dinner, but only for her mother’s sake. She was not hungry in the least, and even felt a slight pang of nausea. Under her parents’ scrutiny, however, she lifted her fork, took another bite of rice, chewed.
“Feeling any better?” her dad asked, finally breaking the silence. Isobel saw her mother shoot him a wary look. Apparently, they’d been discussing whether or not to commit her while she’d been wallowing upstairs in her room. “Yeah,” she said, “a little.”
Her mom rose from the table. “You finished, honey?” she asked, her hand pausing on Isobel’s plate. Grateful, Isobel nodded and set her fork down.
“Think you’ll go back to school tomorrow?” asked her dad in that tone that expected a yes. Sports geek that he was, he didn’t like her to miss cheer practice. Too bad she was going to anyway. Isobel nodded in response. She slumped in her chair, mulling over how to tell her parents she’d quit the squad.
“Well, that’s good,” her dad said, dragging his fork through the wilting leaves of his salad. Isobel glanced down to the empty place mat in front of her and traced the floral imprint with the tip of her finger. She opened her mouth and drew in a breath, deciding it would be better just to blurt it out now and get it over with. They’d have to go easy on her since she’d been sick, right?
In the kitchen, the phone rang.
Isobel’s back shot into a straight line. “Hello?” her mother answered.
She sat rigid in her chair, hoping it was a wrong number, or Danny’s troop leader, or her da
d’s boss—or hell, even Coach Anne.
“Expecting a call?” asked her father.
Isobel’s attention snapped back to her dad, who sat eyeing her curiously, an odd smile on his face. Oh God, she thought, knowing exactly what that expression meant. He thought he had this all figured out, that this all must be over Brad.
“Isobel,” her mother said, and poked her head out of the kitchen. She held out the cordless handset. “Phone.”
He wouldn’t dare, she thought. She rose, took the receiver, and retreated with it into the kitchen. Her back to her mother, she answered with a quiet and warning, “Hello?”
“Oh, good,” a girl’s blunt, clipped voice said, “you’re not dead.”
“What? Who is this?”
“It’s Gwen.”
“Gwen? Gwen who?”
“Gwen Daniels. Our lockers are next to each other? Let me guess, you never knew my name to begin with, did you? Again, I fail to be surprised.”
“Uh, how did you get my number?”
“I looked you up online.”
“You can do that?” Isobel asked with a twinge of unease.
“Internet White Pages. Duh. What the heck is going on with you? Are you okay? Half the school thinks you’ve killed yourself.” There was a pause before Gwen added, “The other half thinks you and Varen eloped.”
“What?”
“Wait . . . Nobody told you what happened?”
“Happened? No. What happened?” Who exactly did Gwen think would tell her? Hello, news flash. Had she not witnessed firsthand her social demise in the lunchroom?
“Hold on,” Isobel murmured. Quickly she left the kitchen and went up the stairs. In her room, door closed, Isobel didn’t have to prompt Gwen to continue.
“So did you know your boyfriend knows your locker combination?”
“You mean Brad? We broke up. I thought that was obvious.” It irked her that people at school might still think they were together, or worse, just on the fritz.
“Oh, you know what I meant. That’s not the point. Did you really tell him your combination?”
