by Zoe Aarsen
Outside in the driveway, I was numbly focused on setting about this task. The day had been emotionally draining; all I really wanted to do was curl into a ball in my bed and pretend that none of this was happening. But there was no one coming to save me. Although I knew I had my friends, I was going to have to fight for myself if I wanted to live.
So I set down a large sheet of newspaper, placed the brick on it, secured my goggles, and took a swing at the center of the brick with a hammer from the garage, expecting the brick to split in half, or at least crumble.
Instead, a shockingly powerful jolt of pain shot up my arm, surged past my eyes, and throbbed at the very top of my skull, in which it felt like my brain was rattling. I felt the impact of the hammer striking the brick in the very roots of my teeth. White orbs blinked and swirled in front of my eyes, making me truly wonder for a moment if I was dead.
After recovering enough to think straight—and realizing I should have lightly but steadily tapped a corner of the brick instead of striking it with all my might at its strong center—I looked up at the waning gibbous moon in the clear dark sky. Surely, Violet’s evil spirits were having a good laugh at my expense.
Within eleven days, I’d be dead, and there I was, squatting in my driveway, hammering away at a brick in the moonlight, wasting what very well might have been the last Saturday night of my life—while the boy I loved slept across town, his own life endangered by his sinister lineage.
CHAPTER 11
FROM THE MOMENT I STEPPED into the kitchen wearing my black funeral dress, I began to suspect that everything was going to go wrong that day.
First of all, Mom was wearing a black pantsuit at the kitchen table, where she was poking at a plate of scrambled eggs. It wasn’t a common occurrence for Mom to get dressed at all on Sundays, so I immediately knew something was up.
“Are you coming with me to the memorial?” I asked, praying that she would say no.
“Of course,” she said. My stomach soured; there was probably no way I could do everything Mrs. Robinson had said without causing a scene at the memorial—at least a small one—and having my mom present was going to be an issue. “I mean, I feel so terrible, especially after reconnecting with Elena back in January when we had that little fender bender. She was so thoughtful back in those days after the fire.”
Damn it, I thought to myself as I poured myself a glass of orange juice.
“Is Glenn coming?” I asked innocently. I prayed that he would be, and that he’d serve as a distraction.
“He’s working. The clinic’s Easter egg hunt is today, remember?” Mom got up from the table to clear her place. I felt like I’d been punched in the solar plexus. Of course—it was Easter Sunday.
As if on cue, Glenn wandered into the kitchen with an expression of confusion on his face. “This is the darnedest thing. I must have misplaced one of the samples I took from some heifers the other day. I’ll have to go take new ones. I’ve never lost a sample in twenty years of farm visits.”
He joined Mom at the sink and pecked her on the cheek, and she rubbed his upper arm to console him. “Well, you’re under a lot of stress with everything that’s happened in the last week. It’s easy to be distracted when you’re in a new routine.”
With my back to them, I rolled my eyes.
On the drive over to the funeral home, I ran through Mrs. Robinson’s directions repeatedly in my head. My phone buzzed almost constantly inside my bag with texts from Henry and Violet, and they were adding to my anxiety. The rum had to be mixed with the cornmeal. Our bait would have to be positioned near that mixture; Mrs. Robinson claimed that it, like the drums, was appealing to evil spirits and would help to draw them out. We’d have to create a barrier of red brick dust on the ground between our bait and Mischa. That would serve to protect our bait and prevent the spirits from invading her soul. And the drums? Henry would have to start improvising a drumbeat as soon as our bait came within three feet of Mischa.
Everything was going to depend entirely on timing and placement.
And surprise.
I hadn’t mentioned anything to Mischa about Jennie’s theory. Perhaps the spirits inhabiting her soul knew what was coming. But they would have to exert enough power to control her thoughts and body if they wanted her to thwart our plan. That was a gamble I had no choice but to take.
The parking lot at Gundarsson’s was packed that afternoon even though we were arriving relatively early. As Mom parked, I grimly thought to myself that the owners of our town’s small funeral home had to be raking it in that year, with so many unexpected deaths.
In the crowded lobby, black fabric had been hung over the two hanging decorative wall mirrors. Candles arranged on a credenza burned brightly. According to Jewish tradition, they were supposed to burn for the entire shiva, or mourning period. They reminded me of the seven-day candle that Kirsten had given Mischa over the winter for protection; Mischa had kept the flame burning continuously that entire week out of fear for her life. There weren’t many Jewish families in Willow, but Gundarsson’s had done their best to honor Jewish tradition. Some guests in attendance helped themselves to black ribbons set out in a basket, which they fastened to their dresses and coat jackets with safety pins as a means of performing the custom of keriah, or tearing one’s clothes during shiva, without actually destroying their outfits.
I scanned the guest book log to see who’d already arrived. Michael Walton, Mr. Dean… so many people from school I hadn’t thought much about since moving to Florida. A stack of cards stood in a crystal dish, and they were printed with Mr. and Mrs. Portnoys’ wedding photo on one side, and a prayer I didn’t recognize, El Maleh Rachamim, on the back.
Mom slipped into the crowd to say hello to a few people, and upon feeling a hand on my shoulder, I turned to find Henry standing behind me, holding a stainless steel water bottle. Standing so closely to him again after having had sex with Trey the day before brought heat to my cheeks, and I prayed I wasn’t blushing. It was stupid to be so self-conscious—it wasn’t like virginity was visible, like a suntan. But I still hoped he didn’t notice anything different about me.
“Hey,” I said as I took a small step away, intent on maintaining the gap of two feet between us. My commitment to Trey had strengthened since the last time I saw Henry in person. If we could successfully pull the evil spirits out of Mischa and trap them that day, then my next priority would be to figure out how keep Trey safe—even if that meant leaving my entire life behind to be with him. I was sure that if I vanished, Henry would be deeply hurt—especially after the kiss we’d shared in his truck. But I would have to worry about that later, once I knew for sure that I had a future to plan.
“Are you ready for this?” Henry asked. He nodded toward the main viewing room, and I followed his eyes to where Violet sat next to Pete in the last row. Henry had taken on the task of filling Violet in on her role in today’s game plan. She half smiled at both of us to acknowledge our presence, and then tilted her head in the direction of the front of the room to where Mischa stood at the center of a small crowd.
I patted my oversize, overstuffed tote bag. If my mom was the kind of person who ever thought about fashion, she might have questioned why I was bringing what was essentially an enormous gym bag to a memorial service. But thankfully, she didn’t notice that kind of stuff, and it was a weird memorial service anyway, since a lot of people were wearing their pastel Easter church outfits. I’d brought one mason jar of red brick dust, another jar, which was empty, a Ziploc bag of cornmeal, two empty coffee cans, and a vial of cow’s blood. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
Two closed caskets were arranged at the far back of the viewing room amid enormous floral arrangements, and Mischa was positioned just a few feet in front of them. She’d brushed her hair since Friday, and looked like she’d showered, too, although her eyes were sunken and her nose was red. I wished with all my heart that circumstances were different, that I could embrace the enormity of Mischa’s loss and dedi
cate myself to comforting her that day. I’d known both of her parents my whole life, and I felt guilty that I wasn’t at their shiva simply to mourn them. With both Olivia and Candace gone, I should have been someone on whom Mischa could rely for emotional support. Instead, I couldn’t even bring myself to look in her eyes.
She was holding hands with Matt, who wore an ill-fitting suit and had his hair gelled down. On Mischa’s other side stood a short but handsome middle-aged man that I instantly realized must have been her infamous uncle Roger, occupant of the Portnoys’ summer home up near Lake Superior. Rows of upholstered chairs were arranged on both sides of a center aisle, down which a girl I didn’t recognize—presumably one of Mischa’s classmates at St. Patrick’s—walked to tearfully greet her.
In bits and pieces of the conversation surrounding us, I heard snippets of gossip that suggested Amanda was recovering, with the voice of Tracy Hartford’s mother cutting through the din as clearly as a church bell. “Her doctors called it a miracle. She woke up out of the clear blue. They’re hopeful she may regain the use of her arms.”
News that Amanda was not only still alive, but thriving, made my heart beat faster. An improvement in her condition meant that the sacrifice I’d made (even if it was unintentional) had served its purpose. It also probably meant that the spirits were already counting on my death occurring in exchange for Amanda’s.
I’d been to enough memorial services in the last year to know that this would probably be the routine for the next two or three hours, whether it was Jewish tradition or not. Guests would arrive, sign the book, and walk down the main aisle to greet Mischa before lingering in front of the closed caskets for a few moments and then taking seats. This was what I’d expected, but observing it with my own eyes made the complexity of what I was going to have to pull off at any second more difficult. If Mischa stepped away to get a cup of coffee or to use the restroom for a few minutes, that might throw off the whole plan. I visually measured a length of about three feet from Mischa’s body on the floor, and noted where I’d have to pour the rum-and-cornmeal mixture on the rug.
I reached into my bag and handed the cornmeal, which I’d wrapped in a plastic grocery bag in an attempt to be somewhat covert, to Henry. “Like a watery paste,” I reminded him. He nodded, took one more look at Mischa, and vanished to the men’s bathroom.
In Henry’s absence, I felt self-conscious and was reminded of my status as a person of intrigue around town. People from Willow High School—some of whom had cheered when Mischa and I had been tossed out of Violet’s New Year’s party, but who’d still shown up to pay their respects—stared at me and whispered behind hands cupped over their mouths. From across the room, Mrs. Gomez, my former Spanish teacher, smiled weakly at me but made no attempt to walk over and say hello. Tracy Hartford glared at me from over the top of her Styrofoam coffee cup, and then giggled when Michael Walton whispered in her ear.
Tracy Hartford. I’d risked my life to save hers, not that I had expected her to appreciate it.
Once upon a time I’d loved this town. I’d considered our community tight-knit because of the way everyone had come together to support my family after the fire, because of the way that everyone’s parents would buy chocolate or cookies during school fund-raisers, and because everyone knew their neighbors. Now I could see how easy it had been for them to kick me out of the circle, and it made me sad to realize how badly I wanted to be welcomed back in.
I took a quick peek at my phone. It was two fifteen. Cheryl had been done with her shift at the juice bar for an hour and fifteen minutes, which I had assumed when plotting my timeline to be just about as long as it would take for her to drive home, change into a black outfit, drive over to her boyfriend, Dan Marshall’s, house to pick him up, and then arrive at Gundarsson’s. It was—terrifyingly—showtime. At any second now, we could expect her to appear in the wide double doorway with Dan, and we’d have to be ready for action.
Sweet, unassuming Cheryl. I bit into my lower lip and felt a flash of hesitance about doing this to her. Candace’s parting advice for me was to use Cheryl as bait if I flat out refused to consider Henry. On one hand, Cheryl wasn’t someone I would think could easily talk victims into requesting their own deaths. Not the way that Violet had been able to do at Olivia’s party, or even in the festive way she’d predicted deaths at her New Year’s party. What had made Violet so skillful in managing her curse was that people always wanted to cozy up to her, earn her admiration.
Plus, Cheryl was too kindhearted to ever intentionally hurt another person. But what Cheryl had going for her was her eagerness to please others. Her genuine willingness to be a good friend. No one would ever suspect Cheryl of having evil intentions… and that was exactly why she’d be an irresistible conduit for the spirits’ soul-reaping.
The only reason I’d settled on Cheryl after ruling out Henry was that Mrs. Robinson had seemed so confident that I would pull this off, lure the spirits out and trap them without ever endangering Cheryl. I wasn’t so naïve as to think I could conduct this ceremony without Cheryl having any idea what I was doing. She’d definitely know I was doing something weird. But if I could dare to hope that I’d capture the five evil spirits in a mason jar and seal them off from the world, what was the harm in hoping Cheryl might not be too mad at me?
I hadn’t told Henry that Cheryl would be our bait that day, which meant that Violet also had no idea. While it was better that way—even if only so that neither of them could make me feel guiltier than I already did—it meant that I was solely responsible for getting the timing correct.
Just as Henry returned to the viewing room, Mischa began sobbing loudly enough to catch our attention. He handed me the water bottle, and we both watched as an enormous man with a buzz cut—easily twice the size of Mischa, with shoulders as wide as a refrigerator—walked down the aisle toward her. He practically lifted Mischa into the air when he reached her. The mere sight of him seemed to break Mischa out of whatever shell had been repressing her emotion since we’d arrived, and now the floodgates were open as he rocked her in his arms.
“That must be her gymnastics coach,” I told Henry. Amanda and Mischa had been training with the same coach in Ortonville since they were both toddlers. Mischa had told me that Coach Armoudian was kind of like a second father to them. The moment that thought occurred to me, it was followed by my hope that nothing bad would happen to him. Mischa had lost more than any of us now. It just wouldn’t be fair for her to have to say good-bye to another loved one.
As Henry and I watched Mischa and her coach, Mom appeared at my side holding a cup of coffee for me. “How are you holding up?” she asked me, assuming that I was torn up about the deaths of Mischa’s parents. I mean, I was upset. But I was also a little preoccupied with wanting to prevent my own tragic death. I reluctantly took the cup from her, planning to ditch it at the first opportunity. I needed to keep my hands free, and glanced nervously at the entrance to the viewing room in search of Cheryl.
“I’m okay,” I replied.
Henry nudged me in the side with his elbow. Mischa’s coach was leading her out of the room with a strong arm wound around her shoulders. Panic surged through my veins. I turned to Mom and mumbled something about going to check on Mischa to see if she was okay, and then race-walked out of the room with Henry following me.
The lobby of the funeral home was crowded, and it took a moment for me to find Mischa in the sea of bobbing heads. Or rather, I saw her coach’s buzz cut towering over everyone else, and realized that he was escorting her outside to get some air.
Even though it was a sunny afternoon, conducting this process outside was unpredictable. Outside was not the plan.
I set down the coffee Mom had given me on a side table, and Henry and I wormed our way through the crowd to reach the front doors. Outside, a cluster of people were smoking cigarettes. I spotted Mischa’s coach walking her along the sidewalk that ran in front of the funeral home toward the garden on the side of the building
.
“Where are they going?”
Turning in unison, Henry and I saw that Violet had followed us outside. She looked distressed, and I wondered if maybe she was more invested in helping break the curse than I’d originally assumed. Neither of us answered, but all three of us watched with bated breath as Mischa and her coach rounded the corner of the building and disappeared around the brick wall. I knew what they’d find there: two cement benches, a trellis that was covered with bougainvillea in the summer, and a fountain that was dry because the temperature was still freezing at night. The fountain had been dry the afternoon of Jennie’s memorial too.
“Will this work outside?” Violet asked in a panicky voice.
“There’s no reason why it wouldn’t work,” I said. “But it’s going to be a lot trickier—”
Without any warning, my scalp broke out into a fit of hot tingles. It was like Jennie was suddenly back in full force, desperate for me to notice something happening at that very moment. I wondered if Mrs. Robinson had been able to restore our connection. But before I could even consider calling her or asking my pendulum—
“Hey, guys. How’s Mischa?”
Cheryl had arrived. She wore a black sheath dress that looked like it would have been appropriate for a job interview. How typically and adorably Cheryl, always looking older and wiser than a teenager. Dan Marshall stood behind her in a blazer and a pair of khakis.
My heart was racing. This was not how Cheryl was supposed to arrive. It was not where she was supposed to greet and embrace Mischa. They were supposed to be inside, facing each other in a narrow aisle, where it would be easier for us to crowd around them as Cheryl hugged Mischa to prevent her from backing away too far. But this was it—our only chance. If Cheryl and Dan entered the funeral home before Mischa went back inside, it was possible that Cheryl would skip greeting her altogether. Then I’d be boarding a flight bound for Tampa on Tuesday, certain to die before April twenty-second.
