“Ah, you know, do you?”
I glance around to see if Ada is by me, but I take in the cracked concrete walls and the stairway sticking its tongue out at me. I’m alone.
“Your father swore he’d keep you out of it. But one cannot stop the inevitable, I suppose. I told him he would one day need a replacement. That is how this system has worked—since your family first purchased this house many years ago. And it seems the replacement must be you, since your brother refused.”
I’m such an idiot. Joel did know what was going on. I should have told him, confided in him. Maybe we could have helped each other.
“Let my brother go,” I demand. Ada said he was well, but she could have been wrong.
Garrett smiles and looks to the darkened room behind him, the room where Todd fell.
“He is contained for now.” He gestures to the contents on the filthy table.
My stomach hurls again, but I have nothing left to puke up. I buckle over and gag, then support myself on the wall with a shaky hand. Joel. He killed my brother. He killed. My. Brother.
The sight only jolts adrenaline and anger into my joints. Tears don’t fall, either. Not this time. I square my jaw and ignore the spear in my side.
“Ada was right—you really are a monster.”
The walls drone as if only one end of the wood is secured down and they’ve just been hit with a baseball bat. Garrett wipes his bloody hands on the apron and rests them on the table. He could butcher me for saying it. Like he did Joel. And Thomas. But after being tormented at school for years, after letting the house toy with me, I’m done holding myself back.
“Why?” I go on. “Why these…mutilations?”
He answers without looking at me, holding a beaker filled with who knows what up to the light. “I suspect you know, since you, like your mother, found my journal.”
My throat thickens at the mention of her. “It’s your fault she’s in prison.”
He pours the beaker into a giant silver pot, and the combination of whatever it is sizzles. “Now, now,” he says. “Let’s not misplace blame. She did, in fact, kill Mr. Morgan, Miss Crenshaw. To keep me from being able to use him. Your father brought the old fool in, but your mother got to him before I could.”
“She was trying to break your time loop thing.”
Garrett dumps another beaker into a larger pot and stirs the substances like he’s making Human Parts Soup. My empty stomach heaves again, and doesn’t stop. Especially not when he dips a ladle in and pours the liquid into an old glass bottle, like the one he shattered when he boarded Ada up. Steam rises from the spout, and it sits on the edge of the table, away from the gore.
“I want to live forever, but since that is not possible, at least I found a way to preserve myself. I live a life parallel to yours, Miss Crenshaw. While yours continues on, mine remains the same. And a man needs his servants, so they are connected to me as well. Ada!” He raises his voice, making me judder. “You may as well come out.”
Ada rattles out from the walls, barely sending a glance in my direction. The slightest change comes over Garrett’s face, like someone undims the light behind his eyes and they take on a different hue. I go back and forth between his look of exultation and her repulsion.
No way. The freak still loves her. My jaw grits like a vice at her dilemma. I don’t get how he can do this to someone he supposedly cares for.
“Well done,” he says, throwing an arm toward the stairs. The basement door slams, jolting my senses and racing terror through me.
“What are you doing?” I ask, spinning around and pleading to the pipes above. They give the same answer Garrett does. Compressing silence. My brain scuffles to figure out what’s going on. But with the door closed, I feel like I’m being strapped with Saran wrap.
“She will do nicely.”
It takes several seconds for his words to register. Me. I will do nicely.
It’s a trap.
“No!” I break the silence and bolt for the door, nearly tripping on every uneven step. Pain bites at my side, but I fight, I move. I don’t know how I can have been so stupid. Ada never said anything about me being the thirteenth piece!
The wooden planks are poor support for my weight. The knob doesn’t give in the slightest—almost like it’s carved from the same wood as the door. I pound with my fists, rip at my stitches as I kick. I slam my whole body against it.
“Help! Somebody!” Todd. Dang it, why did I kick him out?
Panic twines through my veins, stripping against them like it’s laced with poison and too big to fit. “Ada!” I call against the familiar shaking in my frame. “Stand up to him, remember?”
Don’t let him do this. Don’t help him .
I can’t die. Not like this. If he only needs a piece of me, I wonder which one he’ll take. Please don’t let him take my hands.
My clarinet; Interlochen; my dreams of playing orchestral scores for movies. I beat on the door with these hands—my precious hands.
“Joel! Todd! Somebody!”
I slide down the door, whimpering. Tears drip one after the other, landing salty on my lips. Garrett’s boot lands heavy on the bottom stair, and he glowers up at me between the sideburns on his cheeks.
I push against the crumbling wood with my foot, but the closer he gets, the more imprisoned I am. This isn’t happening. It’s in my head—he’s dead! This is in the past!
“You’re not real!” I shout. I bang hard on the door, but the phone in my pocket buzzes, and I shriek. Thunk, thunk, thunk, his boots climb closer.
“Not real, am I?”
Bloodstained hands reach for me like tyrants, and I push my back against the barrier. The very thought of his hands makes me want to gag.
“No,” I say with a shudder. “Don’t touch me. I’ll come.”
Garrett straightens and cocks his head to one side. The most disgusting part is that the look is an appealing one. In a vicious, I’m-a-murderer kind of way. I try to think of an escape, but he’s making it clear—he’s my only way out.
“Very well.” Garrett turns and backs away.
I hobble down the steps. Ada stares at her fists, and her shoulders lift and lower with purpose, like she’s intentionally staying out of things. My eyes stray to the bottle on the table, and an idea spurts from my brain all down my limbs in a rush. The elixir. That’s the whole reason he’s doing this.
“What’s the point of living on and on when nothing ever changes?” I ask, my voice breaking like I’m a speaker whose batteries are dying. “Don’t you get bored of doing the same things over and over? And plus, you never even go anywhere. You’re always here.” I gesture to the macabre scene of silver hooks and sharp butchering utensils.
Garrett has a twisted smile on his face, and his hands rest behind his back. Like he’s in on some joke that I’m oblivious to.
“I shall make things simple for you, Miss Crenshaw. I need a fresh specimen. One life, each year. That will be your task.”
My task. I have stupid relief that at least he’s not going to chop me up, though it doesn’t ease my qualms in the slightest.
“I’m not my mother,” I say.
Garrett’s eyes harden. “Indeed. You are not foolish enough to try and stop me. I will live on, Miss Crenshaw. And I will have your cooperation.”
I force my feet the slightest inch to the side. Subtle, so hopefully he won’t notice. “Or what? You already killed my brother. What more can you take from me?”
I look to Ada, who steps forward. Her hands are still in fists. “You are mistaken this time, sir,” she says. “Whether you use the girl or not, I’ll not live through this illusion of time for another second.”
Flames rise in Garrett’s eyes, filled with disbelief and disgust. There’s the reaction I’ve been expecting him to give me. “You dare defy me?” he asks, reaching for the knife on the table. I clench at the memory of Ada’s words. He’ll hurt me.
But to my surprise, his hands fade to a ghostly hue, s
lip through the black handle. He stumbles, struggling to catch himself. Panic clouds his face as he lifts his insubstantial hands, flickering in and out of color like a projection, toward the ceiling.
It’s starting. I break for it, cross the cement floor and slam into the table as hard as I can. The bottle of elixir tumbles and shatters to the ground, spilling steaming liquid. The pot of puke-my-guts-out soup tips with a crash. Flesh and goo slop all over the floor, as do a few of the surgical tools. I grab the rusty hacksaw, ready to defend myself in case it doesn’t work. The weapon feels tainted in my hands.
Garrett wheels around, his glance a collection of red, white, and horror. Pieces of his body continue to fade, then flicker back, only to dim once more. “You ignoble little wretch! What have you done?”
I clutch my whining side. “If you can’t drink it, this freak show on repeat ends.” Please let me be right.
Garrett’s nostrils flare, and fury blots its way up until he’s the flustered color of skin and radishes. “Damn you,” he mutters, and then his voice increases. “Damn you!”
Ada stands with her chin high. A triumphant look of gloating rides every inch of her pretty face. She seems taller than before.
Garrett’s glance crawls all over his body, frantic. He diminishes to the flimsy, supernatural vapor Thomas holds, as well as Ada at times, until a deafening boom racks the house, shaking straight to my bones. I squeal and slam my lids shut. And when I open them, Garrett is gone.
Finally .
An eerie silence pillows the room. I wait for the rickety sounds of the house to give some warning, for the walls to collapse, tumble into Garrett’s mess and trap me here as punishment for my indiscretion—well, for ending a spell that’s preserved it for the last 137 years.
But nothing happens. The tables, the mess of fluids, the rotting stench, even the hooks—they’re all here. I half expected and hoped it would all vanish.
I glance around for Ada, for any sign, really. For something concrete to say, Good job, Piper, or Way to go, you killed the evil guy. But I guess the vast silence is confirmation enough. It’s strange, but at this moment I wish I could talk to Ada, to wish her luck or something. I didn’t realize how invested I’d become in her story. But it’s over now. She’s free to be with Thomas. I won’t have to worry about my house acting up, about anyone else getting hurt. I relish in the feel of me, of my limbs intact, my jagged breathing and stuttering heartbeats. He’s gone. This is done.
Except worry filters through the holes in my resolve. It’s not completely over.
“Joel,” I say, gearing myself to cross the room. I will my gaze to look only where it needs to.
“Joel?” I call out louder, peering back into the connecting space where Todd had landed after falling through my floor. I steel myself and run full circle around the piles of garbage bags. No sign of him.
“Where else could he be?” I say, feeling the panic rise like bile in my throat. This doesn’t make sense. Ada said he was down here. Even Garrett implied he was in here.
I wheel around, waiting for a flash of inspiration, for some kind of answer to magically appear. I could look through my entire house, but I already did that. I’m sure nothing has changed. Joel, where is Joel?
I wish I could ask Ada. But it’s better this way. The dead should be dead. Leave the living alone.
A person can’t just disappear like this. I don’t know where else he could be.
Or don’t I?
He wouldn’t run off. And leave his cell phone, his clothes, everything? Joel wouldn’t just abandon me, or his internship. He wouldn’t run away from his life, no matter what my dad was trying to get him to do.
No, there’s one more place I haven’t checked.
Todd taps his fingers on the grand piano in the Warren’s posh home. The fixtures and furniture are all squared off in a very modern style that makes Todd get the same feeling he always does here, like he’s not allowed to touch anything.
Jordan kneels over Sierra on the tile, tilting her chin up to feel for a pulse. Sierra’s brown hair is frazzled; her body lies as if wilted, though Todd catches movement in her fingertips and a slight rise and fall of her chest. At least she’s not dead.
He’s been pacing, skimming through Garrett’s journal, hoping for elaboration—maybe something on relativity or the madman’s ideas on laws of nature, perhaps. He sees a section of Garrett’s notes that touches on conservation of energy, but none of it holds Todd’s interest for long. He can’t keep his glance away from Piper’s, or get Sierra’s words out of his head. She’d mentioned other stuff. Had something more than skin-switching happened?
And what happened there to create such a volt of electricity? He’s not sure if the house did it just to ward off Sierra’s presence, or if something else—or someone else—caused it. It can’t have all been to keep Sierra out. He’s seen people come and go there for years and the house has never done a thing.
Then again, he didn’t know it could.
His brain tries to flick back to its factory-setting of denial. But after having Piper’s room turn upside down on him one minute and then ripping the floor right out from under his feet the next—no, it isn’t too much to expect the house to go to these measures just to keep one girl away.
Still, Piper is in there. And he’s wasting time.
“Is she okay?” Todd asks, trying not to sound impatient. All impatience fades, though, when he lowers the journal and notices Jordan pumping against Sierra’s chest, stopping to breathe air into her mouth. “Dude, what are you doing?”
Jordan stops long enough to pump against her chest again in a poor imitation of movie-scene rescues. “CPR, genius. What does it look like?” He bends to place his mouth over hers again.
Can he not tell she’s alive? Todd had only said as much when he told Jord not to call 911.
“Looks like you’re trying to make out with her Lloyd Christmas style. Oh come on, Dumb and Dumber? Don’t tell me you’ve never seen it.”
“I’ll kill you,” Jordan mutters in reply, pumping her chest once more. “If she dies, I swear I’ll kill you.”
Here we go again, Todd thinks, remembering the last few conversations he’s had with Jordan, laced with threats and declarations of betrayal. Jordan knew how Todd felt about Piper, and he still had the nerve to do what he did. Some friend he was, to go and vandalize her house. Most of all Todd remembers the confrontation afterward where he’d sounded off with a fist in Jordan’s eye after finding an axe in his hand and Piper bleeding on the ground.
“I told you,” Todd says, annoyed. He closes the journal. “I didn’t do anything. In fact, she landed on me—I probably saved her life.” He nurses his shoulder, still feeling the car’s metal against his back. “Besides, she’s breathing, man.”
Jordan pauses and looks right at Todd. A bruise leers below Jordan’s left eye, purpled and black. “Then what the hell happened?”
Sierra gasps for breath, her eyes popping open wide. She grapples, scraping her fingers along the tile. Jordan cradles her in his arms.
“Sierra, baby, you okay?”
As realization strikes, she loses her composure. Her full lips mush up like prunes. Tears streak down her face. Jordan pulls her into his arms, matting down her hair. Todd notices where Jordan used to stroke her face before, he avoids touching her pimpled skin now.
The crying had been one thing that surprised Todd the most about Sierra. Like the day of Piper’s audition. She’d cried to him after Piper had stood up for herself, even after Sierra had antagonized Pipes about her mom. Yeah, the phrase, “being able to dish it out but unable to take it,” applies like a stamp to Sierra Thompson.
Sierra pulls away, eyes on her lap as she coughs and gasps a few more times. “I want my skin back!” she cries. “I want my own memories, my head, my body, my LIFE. And I know she can make it stop!”
“Uhhh—” Todd grunts, not knowing what to say. Then again, who knows when it comes to Sierra. Jordan looks dumbstruck
and keeps rubbing her back like that will make it all better, although the movement isn’t so much soothing as it is like he’s trying to sand down a table.
“And what’s with these memories?” she goes on, ranting to the floor. “I’ve never moved. I’ve gone to Cedarvale my whole life, so why should I care when someone is scared to come to a new school? I don’t care—I don’t, I don’t!”
“Doesn’t sound that way to me,” Todd wants to say, but instead kneels beside her as she trembles on Jordan’s lap. No, Sierra would never be scared of going to a new school. But he knows someone who would be.
“You’re seeing Piper, aren’t you?” he asks softly.
She snorts a long sniff while her burnished brown eyes trudge their way up to meet his. She doesn’t say a word, but that’s confirmation enough for him.
Todd sinks to the floor and runs a hand through his curls. “Holy crap,” he mumbles. Then, a different thought occurs. He shakes Sierra like an Etch-a-Sketch. “Are you seeing Piper? Are you seeing her right now?”
Her head bobbles. Jordan shoves Todd off. “Dude, back off. Sierra? What’s going on this time?”
This time?
Sierra keeps her gaze on Todd. “What—is with Piper Crenshaw’s house?”
Todd shakes his head. This cannot be happening.
“I told you I was sorry,” Jordan says, still cradling Sierra, who is becoming more composed by the second. “I was pissed about what you said when I helped Si with that profile, and about how secretive Piper is about her house when I was there and something happened, something she tried to cover up. And I lost it. I only meant to, you know, taunt her a bit, not hurt her. Come on, man,” he exchanges a glance with Sierra, “we know something is up.”
Todd glances across the street again. He’s running out of time. He doesn’t know what’s going on in there, only that it’s got to be bad. And who knows if he’ll see Piper alive again, not with some egotistical Jack the Ripper scientist haunting her basement.
Phobic Page 22
