Spooked

by Sharp, Tracy

  Delia sat back in her rocker and let out a long, shuddering breath, her nimble fingers pausing in their quick movements. She nodded slowly. “Yes.”

  The admission was grudging on her part. The acknowledgement of the fact that although the risk to myself was extremely high, not using my talent, for lack of a better word, was just…wrong.

  “Show me how to do it without anyone noticing,” I said to her, my voice almost getting lost amongst the steady, urgent drumming of the rain.

  She looked up at me, her warm eyes now round with fear. “That, my girl, will be a trick.”

  Chapter Four

  “When you steal a secret from someone, you leave a temporary void in them. They will notice that the secret isn’t weighing on them so heavily.”

  I nodded. We still sat in the living room, listening to the intermittent beat of the rain. The storm had slowed.

  Wentworth sipped tea. He was tall and wiry, and his long legs were stretched before him and crossed at the ankles.

  My heart filled as I looked at him, and realized for the first time that what I felt for him was love. His quiet, calm presence had always had a peaceful effect on me, and he’d always been like a father, when my own was lost to me. Or at least a close uncle.

  He caught me watching him and gave me a wink, as if telling me he felt the same affection for me.

  “Now, listen to me. This is really important. How the secret affects you once you steal it from someone depends on how deeply hidden that secret is inside their consciousness, how dark the secret is.” She lifted her cup to her lips and sipped tea. “Do you remember how it felt when you took the secret from that man in the store all those years ago?”

  I thought about it. “Like I’d taken on a weight. I felt sick for a couple of days.”

  Delia nodded. “Yes. You were sick. You had a fever and would barely eat. You wouldn’t speak. I didn’t know how much of the illness had to do with having to leave your parents, though. Do you?”

  My throat tightened around the memory of my mother hugging me, sobbing into my hair, and my father holding me tightly in his arms before he left Delia’s, whispering for me to be a brave girl and that he and my mother loved me more than anything. My eyes filled and I blinked, unable to speak. I shook my head.

  “What about the secrets you took from Wentworth?”

  I took a breath, thinking. Crying wasn’t going to help Eliza. So I gathered myself, forcing courage into my voice. “They were all harmless. I just felt a kind of buzz. No heaviness. I didn’t feel sick.”

  Wentworth grinned. “You just about knocked me out, though. I had to go lie down for a few hours.”

  I smiled, but my lips trembled. All my life I’d felt different, as if I didn’t quite belong, because of this secret of mine. But now that very secret, this gift, might be used to do some good.

  “I’ve always told you not to trust anyone except me and Wentworth, Eliza. But is there anyone at school you think you can try taking secrets from as a test?”

  Only one person came to mind.

  Mick.

  ***

  Mick picked me up in his old Camaro. I told him that I wanted to talk to him about what happened.

  I climbed in and offered a smile. He looked tired, purple rings under his eyes, and he was pale. “Hey,” he said.

  “Are you okay?” I asked him.

  He paused a moment, looking at the road, his brows furrowing. He shook his head. “Not really. You?”

  “No. Not really either.” We rode in silence for a few minutes.

  “Do you want me to pick Kerry up?” He glanced over at me.

  “I thought we could go get coffee or hot chocolate or something, just us.”

  His eyebrows lifted slightly as he looked at me, the shadow of a grin on his mouth. “Yeah?”

  “She kind of stresses me out. You know?”

  “Yeah. I do.”

  We went to Harry’s, a local diner that I love. They have the best chocolate shakes in the universe. But I really wanted something hot inside me. I felt so cold.

  The pretty dark-haired girl seated us at a booth and we both ordered hot chocolate with whipped cream.

  “So how did you come to be friends with Kerry?” I asked him. “You two seem so different from each other. Opposites attract?”

  He chuckled. “No. It’s not like that with us. I was there when they brought her in. She was kind of a mess. Wouldn’t speak for weeks. She’d glare at anyone who came near her. I’d never seen anyone so pissed off.”

  I snickered. “Yeah. Me neither.”

  “She got sick. Had to go to the urgent care clinic. She wouldn’t let anyone near her except me. I brought her there, and from then on we developed kind of an oddball friendship.”

  I watched his fingers move over his mug as he spoke. Long and thoughtful fingers. I wanted to reach out and touch them with mine.

  He thought for a moment, memory taking him back. “She acts like a badass but I think she’s just scared.”

  “I can see that. What happened to her?”

  “She doesn’t talk about it,” he said. “And I don’t ask. I really don’t know.”

  “This secret we have with her is getting to me, Mick. I feel as if we should go to the police about Irene but I don’t want to get Kerry into trouble.”

  “I hear that. It’s the last thing she needs.”

  I tilted my head a little to the side. “Why did you go along with this, knowing that it could get her kicked out of the group home? I mean, she could go to juvie.”

  He shook his head and shrugged. “I know. She has a way of getting people to do things for her, Lore. She makes you think it’s a good idea, and the next thing you know, you’re going along with shit that you definitely shouldn’t be. And you know you shouldn’t be, but you do it anyway.”

  I watched his face. The line of his jaw and curve of his lips. Hazel eyes. He was a looker, but not the kind you notice right away. He was handsome in a subtle way.

  “Right?” he asked. “I mean, here you are, right along with me, trying to figure out what the hell we’ve gotten ourselves into.”

  “Mick, what if we just kept Kerry out of it? What if we say we found Irene out there? You and I were parking and found her, and decided to hang her up as a joke?”

  He thought about it. “Maybe. We might get away with it.”

  I put my head in my hands and let out a breath. “It’s still a lie. It’ll still eat me up.”

  I felt Mick’s hand on my arm. “Well, it’s either that or just keep our mouths shut. There’s really no other option without sending Kerry to juvie hall.”

  “Man,” I said. “What should we do?”

  “Honestly? I think we should just keep our mouths shut. We draw attention to ourselves now and it might get worse for us. Suddenly they’ll be looking at us with a magnifying glass.”

  Just then a hulking figure blocked the light. We looked up to see Sheriff Will Malloy standing over us. He was big and tall, and looked like a grizzly bear. He seemed to always be smiling, but he wasn’t smiling today. He hadn’t been smiling since the disappearance of Eliza.

  “Hi Sheriff,” Mick and I said in unison.

  “Kids. Listen, you guys stay within sight, okay? No going off on your own where nobody can see you. You understand?”

  “Yes, sir,” I said.

  “Sure, Sheriff,” Mick said.

  “Lorelei, don’t you be by yourself, okay? Not under any circumstances. You hear me?” The sheriff’s dark eyes were serious, and they penetrated mine. He wanted to be sure I got the point.

  I nodded. “Yes, sir. I won’t be alone.”

  He nodded once, as if he approved, and then patted Mick on the shoulder, lumbering off to the counter, where Maryann brought him a large slice of apple pie and a cup of steaming coffee.

  Mick and I watched as Sheriff Will sat, and then Mick looked back at me.

  I continued our conversation where we’d left off. “I don’t have anything t
o hide.”

  “Neither do I, but it’ll be a giant-size pain in the ass. And if they don’t catch this sicko? People will always wonder whether we were involved in Eliza’s disappearance. Let’s face it, Lorelei. Eliza wasn’t exactly a sweet girl. She was mean to just about everyone in school, unless they could do something for her.”

  He was right. “I guess everyone’s a suspect, when you look at it like that.”

  He nodded. “Right. Let’s not make ourselves stand out on that list.”

  “Okay. We keep our mouths shut.”

  “Deal.” He held his hand out to shake on it.

  I took it, looked into his eyes and mentally reached out, psychic fingers probing.

  You can feel around for secrets without stealing them, Delia had told me earlier. People will be less likely to notice then, and I wouldn’t get sick.

  So I reached and gently felt around inside his mind. I felt my way into the darkest places. In the shadows.

  And within seconds, wished I hadn’t.

  Chapter Five

  I saw a deep dark wish inside him. I saw that he wished his father dead.

  Panicked, I withdrew all at once, like a flame leaping back into the fire when it reaches out too far. I blinked.

  He moved a thumb over my fingers and then closed his eyes tightly. “Wow.”

  “What’s wrong?” I asked him. I leaned forward, my head swimming. I felt weak and fuzzy.

  “I have a headache.” He moved a hand over his forehead.

  “It’s all the stress of the last couple of days catching up with you.”

  “I guess so,” he said, squinting at me.

  “Let’s go get you something for it. The drugstore around the corner.”

  He nodded. “Right.”

  We left the diner, leaving the waitress a dollar tip. Not bad for a two dollar order.

  As we walked out into the parking lot we must’ve looked up at the same time, because we both slowed our pace in the same moment.

  Kerry leaned against the hood of the Camaro, arms crossed. “What’s up?”

  “Hey Kerry,” I said. “How you doing?”

  “Not so good right now. My two best friends are meeting without me. Makes me a little jittery.” She eyed me from behind black bangs. "You know?”

  “It’s not what you think, Kerry,” Mick said.

  “No? Why is it that when people say that, it’s usually exactly what you think?”

  “Well, what do you think we were doing in the diner? Plotting against you?” I asked her.

  She gave me a cold stare. “Yes. I do.”

  “We weren’t. We were trying to figure out how to keep you from getting into trouble.”

  Her face hardened. “Why would I get into trouble?”

  I stared back at her, momentarily confused and taken aback by the waves of hostility coming off her. “You won’t.”

  “No, you won’t,” Mick said. “Nobody’s going to say anything.”

  Kerry turned on Mick. “Then why didn’t you invite me along to your little meeting at the diner? If I have nothing to worry about, why didn’t you bring me with you?”

  “Because I asked him not to,” I said. “I wanted to see what he thought without the pressure of having you around. You tend to take things over, Kerry. You can be a little bossy.”

  “Yeah?” Her eyes narrowed as she looked at me. “I can be a little vengeful, too. Especially when my friends turn on me.”

  “We haven’t turned on you,” Mick said.

  “I can see that I can’t trust either of you now,” she said, pushing off the hood of the Camaro. “I’m not stupid.”

  “Kerry, wait,” I said, reaching out for her arm.

  She flinched away from me. “I guess I’m on my own. As usual.”

  She walked away from us, and it was the last time we saw her.

  ***

  Feeling around for Mick’s secrets had left me tired and nervous. I couldn’t seem to shake the heaviness in my head.

  “So the test went well, then,” Delia said, placing a bowl of mashed potatoes in front of me. She’d made a small chicken in the slow cooker, surrounded by vegetables, and it smelled unbelievable.

  “I guess. I didn’t find anything about Eliza, except that a long time ago he had a secret crush on her. But then, I’m sure so do most of the guys in school. Some of the girls, too. And some teachers.”

  “She is a pretty girl.” Delia placed a couple of juicy chicken slices onto my plate.

  “Not so pretty inside, though,” I said, and then wished I hadn’t. It didn’t seem right, saying negative things about a missing girl.

  “Really? Or is that a bit of envy talking?” She eyed me as she slid the plate to me.

  I shrugged. “Maybe a little. I’ll never be that pretty or popular. But she seemed…all wrapped up in herself and her friends. I don’t think she cares about other people all that much.”

  Delia sat in her chair and pulled it forward. “You are plenty pretty, Lorelei. You don’t need to be popular. You don’t need that kind of attention.” She cut a bit of chicken and chewed it thoughtfully. “I think Eliza may outgrow the self-centered trait. She’s still young.”

  If she were ever found. Alive.

  I shuddered inwardly.

  “I guess.”

  We ate in silence for a few minutes. I wondered whether I should tell Delia about Mick’s death wish for his father.

  “Spit it out, Lorelei,” she said. “Not the chicken. I mean whatever it is you’re not telling me.”

  “Mick wishes his father dead,” I said slowly.

  Delia looked at me, frowning. “Really? Did you find out why?”

  I shook my head. “No. It freaked me out so much I just withdrew from his mind.”

  “I don’t blame you. Strange. His father seems like a nice man. He does so much for the youth in this town. He and Mick work the soup kitchen each holiday. But then, we don’t know what goes on behind closed doors.”

  “Delia, do you have any…talents of your own?”

  Delia looked up from her mashed potatoes, her face surprised. “Why do you ask that?”

  “I’ve just always had a feeling that you do have your own gifts but you never use them.”

  She slowly moved her fork around her potatoes. “I can find the dead, Lorelei.”

  I blinked at her. “You can?”

  “Yes. I hear whispering when the body of a deceased person is near.”

  Whispering. Like the child I heard whisper in my ear. I watched her, my eyes wide with shock. “Delia, you didn’t hear whispering yesterday in the woods, when we were searching for Eliza?”

  She paused. “I heard whispering but not for Eliza.”

  “Who was the whispering for?”

  She shook her head sadly. “A child, I think. No. I’m sure. It was a child. But she died decades ago.”

  I stared at her, feeling like a goose had walked over my grave.

  “Delia,” I began. “I heard her, too.”

  ***

  Tapping. The sound of intermittent tapping penetrated my sleep. Even in the midst of a fog-like dream, I was trying to make sense of the sound. In the dream I floated up and glided toward the window, lifting the filmy curtain to one side.

  Someone hovered on the other side of it. I almost didn’t notice her there, because she wore her normal garb. Black clothes. Black combat boots. She was dressed the way she had been the last time I’d seen her. Black mini-skirt, torn black stockings. Black t-shirt under a black leather jacket. I looked down, my forehead touching the window glass, to see the toes of her boots barely scraping against the brick below the windowpane.

  Kerry, you’ll ruin your boots.

  Yeah. And these are real leather, too. Sucks. Her voice was soft in my head, like a memory.

  What are you doing out there? I looked at her face, so pale it seemed to hold a bluish hue.

  She looked at me sadly and gave me a closed-lipped smile. Be careful, Lorelei.

&
nbsp; Where have you been? I asked her.

  But she was floating backward now, the fingers of one hand moving in a farewell motion.

  Kerry. Wait.

  And another tap sounded. And another.

  I opened my eyes, my heart thudding against my chest. The tapping was something hitting the window glass. I blinked the dream away, but felt an intense sense of déjà vu as it faded.

  Another tap against the window.

  I slowly pulled the thick quilt back and swung my feet onto the cold hardwood floor. As I walked toward the window, I felt goose bumps lift on my skin.

  Tap. Pause. Tap. Pause.

  Holy shit. Please don’t be Kerry, dead. Please, please, please…

  I reached out and lifted the curtain with trembling fingers.

  Nothing. Blackness beyond the large old maple tree out front.

  Tap.

  I jumped, stepped forward and looked down, my forehead pressing against the cold glass.

  Mick stood on the ground, waving at me, his dark curls lifting in the wind. He looked up at me, his face made pale under the moonlight.

  I lifted the window, the autumn chill hitting me in the face like a brick. “What are you doing down there?”

  “I need to talk to you.” His whisper was almost carried away by the wind.

  “Now?”

  He nodded. “Right now.”

  I hesitated, watched him for a moment. He stood still, looking up at me, his hands shoved into the pockets of his windbreaker.

  I sighed and closed the window, getting out of the flannel pajamas I wore and pulling on a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt. I wore thick socks to bed because my feet get cold easily, so I only had to slip my feet into my slipper booties.

  Grabbing a hoodie from where I’d thrown it earlier, I made my way quietly down the stairs and out the front door, closing it gently behind me.

  The hysterical thought that Mick might be the one who had abducted Eliza flashed through my mind. What if I vanished next? Delia would get up and I wouldn’t come out of my room because I wouldn’t be there. I’d have simply disappeared.

  I pushed my arms through the hoodie, wrapped my arms around myself and stood on the front steps, hesitant to move from them.