But I sucked it up, and I swore never to go up to the lake ever again ever, and soon we were all safely back in Theo’s car, driving toward Three Peaks and the diner. The safe, dry diner.
By the time we put in our orders, I had two new texts from Leah.
OK, long shot idea time. Can you check something for me?
Back of Heather’s closet door, there should be a manila envelope taped to the back of the mirror. See if it’s still there? See if there’s anything in it?
I frowned at my phone, confused, but replied—Sure—all the same. I had no idea what Leah was getting at, but it was no skin off my back, so whatever.
“Hey, no texting at the table, Rudey McRuderson,” said Brandy. “We’ve got company.”
Sure enough, when I looked up, there was a familiar-looking girl heading our way.
“I invited Corey,” said Theo. “Hope you guys don’t mind.”
Actually, no, I didn’t mind at all; Theo had just given me the perfect way to find out the answer to the how-many-people-know-about-Heather question. So after introductions were made, and after we’d placed our orders, and after Theo and Corey shared a long, sloppy kiss that seemed to happen for the sole purpose of showing off, I spoke up:
“So hey, Corey. Have you lived up here for long?”
“All my life,” she said, dabbing at her lips with her napkin. “Why?”
“Oh!” I said, feigning surprise. “I mean, I was just curious. I’ve been coming up here for years—you know, to visit my family—and I’ve never met you before. So I thought you might be new.”
“Ooh, who’s your family? Anyone I know?”
“The Quicks. Actually, my cousin was our age. Heather?”
“Heather Quick,” said Corey, her brow creasing as she thought about it. “Yeah, that’s ringing a bell. I think she’s a grade below me? Maybe? Or, wait, does she still even go to TPHS?”
And there it was. The answer I needed. If it had been public knowledge that Heather had died, in a tiny town like this, everyone would’ve known her name. So it wasn’t only Leah who didn’t know the truth.
Beside me, Brandy looked mildly horrified—and I immediately realized the flaw in my plan. Whatever weird cover-up shit my family had pulled, I didn’t want my city friends knowing about it. Not until I knew what was going on, at least.
So I just averted my eyes, like I was super uncomfortable talking about this, and said, “No. She doesn’t.” Then I let the ensuing awkward silence go on for just a moment too long before clearing my throat, smiling, and changing the subject.
But for the entire length of dinner, I couldn’t stop thinking about how bizarre it was. I mean, what reason could my family possibly have for covering up Heather’s death? Unless …
Well, unless one of them had killed her. Something stupid like that. But that was out of the question, because, just, obviously. Still. Something was going on, and I wanted to know what it was.
As soon as I’d scarfed down my burger and fries, I pretended to hear my phone buzzing in my pocket. I picked it up and faked answering a phone call, then nodded and said I’d be there as soon as I could.
“Your aunt?” asked Brandy, when I faked hanging up.
“As always,” I replied. “I gotta run. But I’ll see you guys back at the house later, yeah? Good to meet you, Corey!”
“You too, Aspen. Oh! Aspen!” Her face brightened, a little laugh escaping her. “That’s where I’ve heard that name before!”
“Wait, where?” My stomach twisted. Another piece of the puzzle was coming. Corey was about to say something about Heather. I could feel it.
But all she said was, “You’re the one who passed out on my deck at the party!”
Brandy put her hand over her mouth and giggled into it. Theo didn’t bother covering his snort-laugh. Half mortified and half relieved, I said, “Yeah, that was me.”
“Man, I’m sorry I missed that,” said Corey. “Anyway, see you around!”
“See you,” I replied, and headed for the door.
I walked so fast that I made it back to the house in just over ten minutes, instead of my usual fifteen. But when I got there, I discovered … nothing. The lights were off, and nobody was home. I checked the whiteboard on the fridge, in case anyone had left a note, but nope. Then I checked the driveway—and, yeah, Aunt Holly’s car was gone. Apparently I’d missed that on the way in. There was nobody I could ask about the Heather cover-up, which meant I’d ditched my friends early for nothing.
Well, at least that gave me time to do the favor that Leah had asked of me. Taking the stairs two at a time, I flipped the light on in Heather’s room and made for the closet. I opened the door. The mirror, a thin little thing that only showed my reflection down to the knees, was suspended from the top of the door, not stuck onto the door itself, so it was easy to lift away. Taped onto the back, just as Leah had said, was a large, well-worn manila envelope.
Inside the large envelope was a smaller envelope, this one new-looking. On the front, it said:
For Sherlock’s Eyes Only.
Sherlock. Yeah, because that made sense. But whatever. I sat down on the floor, my back against the door, and opened the envelope. There was a letter inside, written on lined paper that had been torn unevenly out of a notebook. I recognized the handwriting easily, from the datebook on the nightstand and the backs of the photos I’d found in the dresser drawer. It was Heather’s.
February 3
Dear Sherlock,
I think I’m going to die soon.
Super dramatic, right? Haha. But I’m actually serious. That’s why I’m writing this letter to you—because if I do die, I want someone to know what happened to me. Even my mom and Willow don’t know all of it, although I guess they suspect it’s ritual-related (which it is). But I want someone who isn’t family to know, and I want that someone to be you.
If you’re reading this, I imagine I’m dead. You went to my funeral, and you were sad. (You should definitely be sad, but not for too long, okay? You should totally move on and be happy and stuff! Eventually!) And when you asked my mom how I died, she got all weird and wouldn’t tell you … so you, being the world’s greatest detective, decided to investigate for yourself. The first places you checked were our three old hiding spots. There wasn’t anything in your air vent or in the tree on the school playground (because I couldn’t stand up long enough to get there … sorry) but there was something behind my mirror. Congratulations, my dear detective! You did it!
(Am I right so far?)
I also imagine you think I’m dead because of my family, and you want to blame them for it. Please don’t. It’s a little bit Willow’s fault, because she picks the objects from under the May Day tree, but she didn’t know what I was going to do, so don’t be mad at her, okay?
A few days ago, there was a triad ritual. It would’ve been the same deal as usual, except this time Willow picked something of yours from under the tree. It was this little wooden doll thing. I didn’t even know it was yours until I reached inside. I said we should go back and get something else, and that I didn’t want to steal something from you, but Willow wouldn’t listen. She said the Cliff wanted “this energy in particular” and that we couldn’t switch it out for something different. She said the Cliff would collapse if it didn’t get what it wanted. And trust me, the Cliff can NOT be allowed to collapse. I didn’t find out the real reason why until after we stopped being friends, but just … trust me.
So I reached into your wooden doll, like Willow told me to, but instead of reaching into you, I made the path from the doll go back into me instead.
I explained that badly. But I’m not sure how I’m supposed to explain it, because I’m still not sure how it worked. Or why it worked. Or why my mom and Willow couldn’t tell the difference. But the point is, I made it so that when I stole something through the doll, I’d be stealing from myself instead of you, and you would be safe. And if it works like I think it’ll work, you’ll be safe from us fore
ver. Nobody will ever be able to steal from you again.
See? You were wrong about me. I’m not a parasite. Especially not to you, especially not after what happened with Rachel. I didn’t want to do that to you again.
Anyway, I reached in and tried to pull out the color of my hair. (I thought maybe it would leave me with unpigmented hair. Is that even a word? Unpigmented! I thought it would look so cool, and I thought maybe you would think so, too. And maybe you’d start talking to me again. But anyway …)
Anyway anyway anyway. I reached in and I tried to feed the color of my hair to the Cliff. But the Cliff wasn’t interested. It left my hair alone and took something bigger instead. The kind of something where about an hour after the ritual was done, I stopped being able to breathe right. I don’t know why exactly—and get this: I tried fixing myself, and it didn’t work. Like I reached into some random stranger and tried stealing his healthy lungs for myself. My mom did the same thing. It just didn’t work. And the reaching thing always works.
Maybe when the Cliff takes something, it can’t be replaced. I can’t think why that’d be true, but it’s the only theory I’ve got. Either way, this is just … not good. Incredibly, stupidly, OMGWTF not good. The kind of not good where you should go back and read the super dramatic but 100% true sentence that began this letter.
But see? That’s why I wanted you to know. Maybe it’s selfish, because now I know you’ll feel all guilty, but DO NOT WORRY YOU ARE NOT THE REASON I AM DEAD THIS IS WHAT I SAY THEREFORE IT IS TRUE. Plus I don’t blame you, so you are not allowed to blame yourself. Okay? OKAY?
If I’m right about my funeral being the reason you found this letter, then I hope we got to talk one more time before I passed into the great beyond. No big deal if we didn’t, I guess. But I hope we did.
Anyway, I just wanted you to know the truth: that I’m still so so so sorry about Rachel, and that I wish we could’ve stayed friends, and I’m even a little sorry about saying no to the Jesse thing—but most of all, that I tried to protect you from the Cliff.
I hope it worked.
Love always,
Dr. W
P.S. If it didn’t work … good luck with your brand-new white hair! Haha!
BEFORE
When Heather got back from her summer vacation last year, she dragged her suitcase up to her room without even stopping to say hello. I remember feeling kind of annoyed—I mean, I’d been covering her role in the triad ritual for three whole weeks, and she couldn’t even say hi?—so obviously, I followed her upstairs. The door to her room was open, and she’d already started unpacking. Except the stuff she was unpacking definitely didn’t look like regular vacation stuff.
“What’s all that?” I asked, apparently suddenly enough to make Heather jump. I snickered as she pressed her palm to her chest, like an old lady clutching her pearls.
“Creeper,” she said, lifting a hat out of her suitcase. It was a tricornered one. The kind favored by movie pirates. She inspected it quickly and, apparently satisfied, set it down on the floor beside a fancy cup thing. “What are you doing in my room?”
“I’m not in your room. I’m in the hallway. See?” I pointed to the floor, where the line between the bedroom carpet and the hallway carpet was very apparent.
Heather rolled her eyes and kept unpacking. A shiny flask. A whole bunch of jewelry. And … whoa …
“Is that a sword?” I said, crossing the carpet line and kneeling down to touch the hilt.
“It’s a dagger. Swords are bigger, duh.” She snatched it out of my reach. “And get out of my room.”
Ignoring her order, I followed the dagger with my eyes. “It’s so cool. Did you get that in Hawaii?”
She shrugged. “There was a guy making replicas there. This one’s Frodo’s dagger from Lord of the Rings. It’s called Sting.”
“Nerd.”
“Moron.”
“How’d you get that past security, anyway?”
Heather grinned. “Same way I got it out of the store. Well, not exactly the same. With the store, I took away the guy’s memory of letting me hold it. At the airport, I took away the security guy’s sight.”
“You what?” I gaped at her. Dad would kill me if I ever did anything like that.
She laughed. “I’m kidding. Totally kidding. I just took away his knowledge that sharp objects weren’t allowed past security.”
“That’s … kind of terrible,” I said, impressed.
Heather just shrugged.
“Did you steal all the rest of that stuff, too?” I asked, pointing at the jewelry and the cup and the pirate hat.
“What are you gonna do?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “Tell my mom? Because she already knows.”
But before I could reply, Aunt Holly’s voice rang out from downstairs: “Heather, honey! There’s a fault in the stone!”
Heather’s whole body seemed to sag. “Mom, come on, I’m all jet-lagged! Make Aspen do it!”
I heard a chuckle from downstairs. My dad. He and I had been staying here for the past three weeks while Heather and Aunt Holly had been snorkeling with dolphins or skydiving off volcanoes or whatever people do in Hawaii.
Then, Aunt Holly’s voice again: “Aspen, honey? You up for one more triad before you leave?”
I checked my watch. My dad had said he wanted to be on the road by six. It was almost five already. I didn’t really feel like doing a ritual right now—it hadn’t even been twenty-four hours since the last one—but I knew that when I was back home, stewing in Brooklyn’s rancid August humidity, I’d miss this. I’d miss being up here, doing something I was good at.
“Coming!” I shouted. “Guess I’ll see you next year, Heather.”
“At least hug me before you go,” she said. “God, didn’t your parents teach you any manners?”
“No, they didn’t. I’m basically a caveman.” But I leaned over and gave her a hug anyway.
“Go forth, caveman,” she said. “Build mighty fire. Make rocks not fall down.”
“Oh, shut up,” I replied. Heather laughed as she went back to unpacking her stash.
That was the last time I ever saw her.
One floor below me, the front door opened, then shut again. Someone was home. God, I hoped it wasn’t Brandy yet. I’d barely had any time to process Heather’s letter.
“Hello?” I called, in the general direction of the stairwell.
“Hi, honey!” Grandma called back.
Letting out a breath of relief, I went downstairs to meet her—but not before tucking Heather’s letter back into its hiding spot. She and Aunt Holly were in the kitchen, unloading groceries from plastic bags.
“I didn’t see Theo’s car.” Grandma rubbed her hands together, like she was trying to warm them. “Are your friends still out?”
“Yeah, I just didn’t feel like …” But I trailed off. This wasn’t the time for made-up excuses. So I sat down at the kitchen table and asked the question I wanted to ask:
“How did Heather really die?”
Silence. The too-loud thud of something falling to the floor. Aunt Holly, slack-jawed and wide-eyed, staring at me like I’d just killed Heather all over again. Staring, and staring, and then turning around and stomping out of the room. A few seconds later, her bedroom door slammed.
Grandma stooped and picked up what Aunt Holly had dropped. A tub of butter.
“Aspen,” she said.
“… Sorry?”
“She’s still grieving.”
“No kidding, Captain Obvious.”
“Aspen.”
I sighed. “Sorry,” I said again, and meant it this time. “But I still want to know.”
“We all do,” said Grandma, resting her hands on the countertop. “But nothing has changed since the last time you asked. I told you I would let you know if we found out anything more, and I meant it. There’s been no more progress.” She smiled sadly. “And given what we had to do to her doctors’ memories, it seems unlikely there’ll ever be.”
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“Her doctors?” But no, that wasn’t even the most confusing thing Grandma had just said. “Wait … what do you mean, the last time I asked?”
Her eyebrows shot up. With a dry huff of laughter, she started piling things into the fridge. “After the funeral, Aspen dear. Don’t you remember?”
I stayed quiet, because no. I didn’t remember. Rubbing at my increasingly tense neck, I waited for Grandma to keep talking.
“You said her cause of death was too ‘vague’”—she used finger-quotes to emphasize the word—“to sound real. You wanted to know if there was a supernatural origin instead of a medical one. I told you what I knew, of course: that Heather’s doctors had been just as perplexed as you were, and they’d been unable to diagnose her with any certainty before she passed.”
I remembered nothing of this conversation. Nothing at all.
“The doctors’ memories?” I asked. “What’d you mean by that?”
“We had to wipe them,” said Grandma, giving me a hard look. “You know that.”
“I do?” I said.
“Aspen, sweetheart, are you all right? You look … unwell.”
I felt pretty unwell, too. I slumped a little in my chair, which only deepened her frown.
Abandoning the groceries, Grandma came over and put her hand on my cheek. Her fingers vibrated against my skin. I jerked away.
“What is it?” she asked, alarmed. But then she saw me eyeing her hand, and she shook her head. “Ah. A small tremor of the hands. Old age. You understand.”
Sure, whatever.
“Why’d you wipe their memories?” I asked.
Grandma sat down in the chair opposite mine. “Aspen,” she said delicately. “Is something wrong?”
Oh, so many things were wrong.
“You said we talked about this stuff at the funeral. I don’t remember that.”
Rocks Fall Everyone Dies Page 13
