She uses too much strength to pull the front door open and the momentum drags her off balance. Before she can begin to understand what’s happening outside her own mind, a shriek tears out of her as she locks eyes with an unexpected, auburn-haired stranger, his fist still raised to knock against the now-open door. Rachel clamps a hand over her mouth to stifle her cry of surprise. The guy lowers his fist.
He’s tall, towering over Rachel’s five-six, and brawny enough to make her not want to mess with him. He doesn’t appear to be much older than her. She’d wager he’s nineteen or twenty, maybe. His icy blue eyes have a familiarity she can’t seem to pinpoint. It’s as if her fear has rendered her deduction abilities moot, leaving her completely defenseless.
“Ye look lik’ ye have th’ devil chasin’ after ye,” he says, peering around Rachel to study the area behind her. He turns his attention back to her. “Nan asked if ye wanted tae come plant some eggs with us. I’m nae sure hoot th’ auld witch meant.”
“What?” Rachel’s confusion is muffled behind her hand.
“Mah Nan—” He gestures across the street to Mrs. Crenshaw’s house with a thumb over his shoulder.
Rachel slips her hand away from her mouth as her mind connects the dots. “Oh. You’re Mrs. Crenshaw’s grandson?”
“Aye,” he says, sighing. “Are ye comin’ then?”
She steps outside the house and pulls the door shut behind her. Whatever it is Mrs. Crenshaw wants them to do is infinitely better than being alone, especially being alone in a house that’s being watched by ... well, by whatever is inside the forest.
They walk down the porch steps, Rachel leading the way. Silence hangs over them, one full of unasked questions like: ‘What’s your name?’ and ‘Sorry for the freak-out, but did you perchance see someone peeping through my bedroom window on your way over?’ Before she can ask him anything, Rachel spots Mrs. Crenshaw in the distance, near the forest entrance. The old woman sits in a lawn chair, beneath the shade of a faded pink umbrella, her sunhat on her head and the bottle of sunblock within her reach. She looks so tiny these days, so much tinier and more delicate than she was a year ago.
“I’m Rachel,” she says to the herculean guy when they reach the lawn. “Rachel Cleary.”
“Nan said as much.” He pushes one hand through his thick, wavy hair. “Dougal Charles Mackay.” He pronounces his name Doogle Charls Meckeye, melodic vowels and throaty consonants rolling off his tongue.
“Nice name.” Rachel crosses her arms just to do something with her hands. He tilts his head in her direction. The warmth of a blush comes without warning, heating her cheeks. She clears her throat and says, “So, what exactly are we going to do at Mrs. Crenshaw’s?”
He shakes his head, hair falling over his forehead. “I dinnae ken. Somethin’ aboot plantin’ eggs.”
Rachel frowns, struggling to decipher his words. “Planting eggs?”
“Aye.”
“As in, she wants us to dig a hole and put a chicken egg into the ground?”
Dougal purses his lips as his brow furrows before he slowly nods. They reach the sun-bleached asphalt. He looks toward the forest entrance, to where his grandmother sits, before his gaze slips to study the road.
“Weird,” Rachel says. “Mind you, your grandmother always occupied my time with odd activities.”
“What’s taking you so long, Dougal?” Mrs. Crenshaw shouts. She stretches her neck to look over her shoulder. “Stop dawdling and fetch the basket of eggs on the kitchen counter and the shovel at the back door. We have a lot of work to do today.”
“Lord, help me,” Dougal says, speeding up.
Rachel snickers as she watches him go.
“Are you sassing me, boy?” Mrs. Crenshaw asks in a stern voice, the same voice Rachel used to fear as a kid. “Don’t think you’re old enough not to get a paddle to the butt!”
“I wisnae sassing ye, Nan,” he says loud enough for her to hear.
“You’d better not be. Also, you can tone down on the Scots already. I’ve heard you mocking your mother’s accent enough to know you can speak passable English,” Mrs. Crenshaw calls as Rachel hurries to the old woman’s side, glad not to be on the other end of this particular conversation. “When he sulks, I can barely understand him.”
“I was having some trouble in that department myself,” Rachel concurs.
“You’ll get used to the accent after a while, but I can’t say the same thing about the bagpipes at five o’clock in the morning. I swear, whenever I go up to Scotland, his father plays those damned bagpipes on purpose just to get on my nerves.”
“Please tell me Dougal doesn’t play bagpipes.”
“That miscreant? Ha. He doesn’t have a musical bone in his body, thank the heavens.” Mrs. Crenshaw glances over her shoulder again. “Dougal, what’s taking you so long?”
Dougal appears on the porch, holding a basket filled with eggs in one hand and a shovel clutched in his other hand. He crosses the distance, sets the basket beside the chair, and plants the shovel’s blade into the earth. He leans on the handle, waiting for direction.
“Now we can plant some eggs.” Mrs. Crenshaw rubs her hands together.
Dougal opens his mouth to protest—or ask a question—and Rachel gestures for him to stop by waving her hands around behind his grandmother’s back. If there’s one thing she’s learned about Mrs. Crenshaw, it’s that when she’s in one of these moods, it’s best to keep quiet and go along with her whims. Dougal shuts his mouth but raises an inquisitive eyebrow at Rachel instead.
“Dougal, you’re going to dig some holes. They need to be about one foot deep and a yard apart. Begin at the edge of the MacCleary property and work your way to the end of mine, past the ACCESS PROHIBITED sign. Rachel, you’re going to carefully put the egg into the hole and cover it with soil. Don’t plant a cracked egg. Be gentle with them.” She claps her hands, signaling the beginning of the workday, one in which she won’t be participating.
Rachel stands, grabs the egg basket, and falls into step beside Mrs. Crenshaw’s sullen grandson.
“Is Nan always lik’ this?” Dougal asks when they’re out of earshot. “Ye ken her better.”
“Not always. She tends to get peculiar around this time of year, but it’s not harmful or malicious—just strange.”
For the most part, the MacCleary land is relatively big but remains unused. The border of the property follows one curve of the mountainous range holding the forest, the rocky terrain steadily becoming a steep cliff looming over the farthest edge of the property. Across Griswold Road, the Fraser land is a mirror image, laid out in an identical way against the other curve. The only difference is the houses’ façades and the additions built in the past to accommodate the growing families. Both families had been large once.
When Rachel and Dougal arrive at the border of the MacCleary property, he tests the ground with the shovel. The blade penetrates the soft soil with ease but stops when it slams against a rock hidden within the earth. He wiggles the shovel around to loosen the rock from its hold, before moving the first bit of ground to the side.
“About eight years ago, around the time my dad died, your grandmother came over with a boxful of saucers and a crate of milk,” Rachel says.
“Whit wey?”
“Huh?”
“Why?” Dougal clarifies.
“Oh. Well, Mrs. Crenshaw doesn’t tell me why we do half the things we do. It’s easier not to ask questions when it comes to her eccentricities. That day, the two of us filled the saucers with milk and lined them up in this exact way. I told her all of Shadow Grove’s stray cats would come over and we’ll never get rid of them again, but she shushed me and told me to get back to work.”
Dougal stops his shoveling, his expression turning concerned rather than curious. “Did th’ cats come?”
“No, but each and every one of those saucers was empty the next morning.” Rachel picks the first egg out of the basket. “That hole looks deep enough.”
“Mah maw—” Dougal begins but stops himself. He clears his throat, cheeks reddening. “Mah maw used this place as a threat when we were weans, tellin’ us if we were naughty, she’d send us tae Nan.”
“Doesn’t sound like much of a threat,” Rachel says. “Granted, you flew across the ocean to plant eggs, so it seems like your mom doesn’t make empty promises.”
His lips curl up into a sheepish smile. “Aye. First time she’s followed through, too. She isnae lik’ Nan.”
“Nobody’s like Mrs. Crenshaw, I assure you. She runs this town.”
“I believe ye. Nan’s th’ only person mah da’s scart of; says th’ fair folk dinnae come near th’ house when she visits.”
Rachel can’t contain her smile as she imagines Mrs. Crenshaw ordering large Scottish men around and having them obey her. If anyone can do it, it’s that tiny, old lady, after all.
Their conversation continues, the topics leaning toward the mundane. The almost rhythmic dig-plant-cover-repeat soothes Rachel’s worries from earlier, back when she’d been alone in her bedroom, and slowly Dougal becomes chattier. Sweat trickles between her shoulder blades as the sun reaches its apex, her muscles ache from the unnatural exercise of having to plant eggs along the invisible border.
When they reach the ACCESS PROHIBITED sign, around one o’clock in the afternoon, Mrs. Crenshaw is nowhere to be seen. In her place sits a tray, though—a jug of lemonade and two tall glasses, along with a plate stacked with sandwiches.
“Time fer a wee break.” Dougal’s relief is evident. He stabs the shovel’s blade into the ground and holds a hand out for Rachel. She contemplates his offer, studying his calloused palm, before accepting the help. He pulls her to her feet, looking deep into her eyes, and says, “I understand wey Nan’s fond o’ ye.”
Rachel swallows hard. “It’s probably because she helped raise me.”
Dougal releases her hand, and she moves toward the lawn chair. “Yer nae whit I expected, Rachel Cleary. I thought ye might be one of them spoilt American lasses that talk too much and do little else.”
“That’s mildly racist,” Rachel says.
“Only mildly? Och! I’m already losin’ mah touch.”
She laughs as she pulls the insect net off the tray, picks up the lemonade, and pours them both a drink. He accepts a glass and takes a seat on the grassy lawn, stretching out beneath the umbrella’s shade.
“So, how long are you staying?”
“Nan didnae tell ye?”
“I didn’t even know Mrs. Crenshaw had kids or grandkids until yesterday.”
Dougal exhales loudly through his nose. “I got lifted fer stealin’ a car.”
“I only understood about seventy percent of that sentence. Try again.”
He rolls his eyes. “I went out tae th’ pub, got really wasted, stole a car, and wrapped it ‘round a tree,” he explains slowly, his brogue still there but his enunciation better suited to the untrained ear. “Maw decided then and there I wasnae gonnae end up lik’ mah cousin, who’s servin’ time in a Texas prison fer somethin’ or other. So, she bought me a one-way ticket tae Shadow Grove and said I was gonnae finish high school here, under Nan’s keen eye.”
“Wait, you’re still in high school?”
“Aye, I’m seventeen,” he answers. “Ye thought I was older?”
“Yeah.”
Dougal shrugs and reaches for a sandwich.
“Was it bad? The accident, I mean.”
“Aye,” is all he says.
She takes a sip of her lemonade, enjoying the sweet coolness running down her dry throat, hoping it’ll keep her from being rude and blurting out the questions she’s dying to ask.
Their respite is interrupted by a rustle—no more than a dry whisper of foliage moving around, but it’s enough to catch them both off guard. A sudden gust of wind rushes from the forest’s entrance, chilling the sweat clinging to Rachel’s body. With the wind comes the sound of laughing children. Ethereal echoes blow onto Griswold Road. Rachel snaps her attention toward the fleeting shadow, moving from one tree to the next, hiding. She searches for whatever lurks just beyond her sight, scans the edge of the wood for a trace of any kids who might’ve snuck inside the infernal place to play.
Rachel stands from her perch on the lawn chair’s armrest, ignoring the way her bones click from misuse. Her muscles scream for mercy as she takes a step forward, examining the trees ahead and the spaces between them.
Dougal is by her side a moment later, staring into the dense woodlands where the sun barely penetrates through the thick canopy of leaves.
“Did you hear that?” she asks.
“Sounded lik’ weans playin’,” Dougal says. “Did ye feel it?”
First the faint scream yesterday, and now this? She doesn’t want to admit the truth, not to a person she’s only met, but she can’t deny her unease anymore either. The way her hair stands on end, how her adrenaline spikes.
Her fear increases.
“Yes.”
Without looking her way, his tone too casual under the circumstances, he asks, “If ye dinnae mind me askin’, wey did ye look so scart earlier?”
“There’s something wrong with the forest,” she whispers. “It’s waking up.”
Three
Lie In Wait
It takes a lot of persuading to get Dougal out of his grandmother’s house. A lot of pleading—It’ll be social suicide if he doesn’t come tonight—explaining—A barn bash is just a little get-together to kick the summer off, and it’s the perfect time for Dougal to get acquainted with people from Ridge Crest High—and promises—I’ll make sure he’s home by midnight, Mrs. Crenshaw, I swear—were involved. Mrs. Crenshaw relented after a while, but only because Rachel timed her nagging to the old woman’s favorite TV show.
By the time they leave, the darkness is absolute. Vantablack replaces the starry backdrop; the moon is no more than a sliver of gray in the night sky. An uncanny quiet surrounds the car as it passes the Eerie Creek Bridge, and a heavy silence fills the space inside. Rachel keeps her car steady on Griswold Road, the headlights brightening the long, white line on the asphalt. Beside her, Dougal stares out the passenger window, studying the abyss rushing parallel to the road. His pensive expression reflects in the window, while he taps his fingertips against his temple in rhythm to an unheard song. He smells nice—his woody aromatic cologne wafts through the air and fills the interior of the car. His freshly washed hair is tousled, brushed up, collapsing slightly to one side. He’s dressed simply, too: a black tee, just tight enough to show off an athletic physique underneath his clothes, and a pair of loose-fitting jeans. It’s more than enough to make a good impression at the first barn bash of the summer.
The girls of Ridge Crest High won’t be able to keep their eyes or hands off him.
Rachel shifts in her seat, attention returning to the road.
There are at least six barn bashes every summer, and none are small affairs. It’s the only way for Shadow Grove’s teenagers to unwind after the long year and the only way to have some fun in this dreary small town without having to go into the city.
This particular barn bash is hosted by the affable Eddie Roberts.
“Do you play any sports?” she asks, shattering the silence.
Dougal turns away from the window and says, “Rugby. It’s lik’ American fitba, but wi’oot the paddin’ and helmets.”
“I know what rugby is,” Rachel says, smiling. “We don’t have it at Ridge Crest High, though. How do you feel about trying out for football next year instead?”
“Naw. I wilnae live it down if mah mates hear I’m playin’ shite fitba.”
Rachel removes a hand from the steering wheel to sc
ratch her cheek, thoughtful. “Okay, how do you feel about lacrosse?” She glimpses him raising an eyebrow in her peripheral vision. “Never mind.”
She flips the indicator and slacks off as they come up to the Roberts’ farm.
“I get it. You’re anxious, but you don’t have to be. People around here are generally nice, sometimes painfully so,” Rachel says. “You’re clearly used to a certain degree of popularity, which is why I’m going to give you a few tips. Firstly, I suggest you don’t call football ‘shite’ in public. Secondly, don’t tell anyone about the weird chores your grandmother makes us do. Neither of those things will win you any points at Ridge Crest High, believe me.”
“Nan’s streenge, I ken,” he mutters. “Whit else?”
“I’m not going to stop you from getting wasted or high, but I’m going to ask you to please not overdo it. If you throw up in my car, you’re paying to get it detailed. Also, there’s some mouthwash, gum, and hand sanitizer in the glove compartment if you need to freshen up on the way home.”
“Och! Yer makin’ me sound lik’ an alcoholic.” He chuckles under his breath, shaking his head.
“That’s not what I meant—”
“Aye, I ken, Rachel.”
She clears her throat, pulls her lips into a thin line as she searches for the gravelly turnoff. “There’s one last thing. After I’ve introduced you to some people, ditch me. It’ll be in your best interest.”
“Whit wey?”
Rachel sighs. She spots the barn in the distance, centered in a corona of artificial light, which casts a glow across the multitude of vehicles parked near the massive sliding door. She maneuvers the car off the asphalt, gravel crunching beneath the tires.
After another long moment, she finally says, “Let’s just say people like me enough to invite me to their parties, but they’d prefer it if I don’t show up. Do you understand?”
Dougal shrugs. “I s’pose.”
“I like it better this way, too, okay? I’m friends with everyone and no one. It keeps my socializing to a minimum, which means I can focus on getting into my dream college and as far away from this town as I can.”
The Night Weaver Page 2
