Of Starlight (Translucent Book 2)

by Dan Rix

  The car continued to move for a few seconds, and I wasn’t sure she’d heard me. Then she slammed on the brakes, rocking us both forward. “Wait,” she said, “you did what?”

  “I needed to show someone, Megan. It was eating me up inside . . . and I wanted to help him get closure.”

  A car behind us honked. She didn’t budge. “So he knows?”

  I nodded.

  “And he knows we did it?”

  “He doesn’t know we did it.”

  “But he saw the body . . . ?” Her eyes widened. “You mean there is a body?”

  “Right where we left it,” I said, breathing through my fingers. “It was right where we left it, Megan. All rotten and decayed.” I peered sideways at her. “You’re not mad at me, are you?”

  “I don’t . . . I don’t even know how to react,” she said.

  “I’m going to say it was me,” I said quietly.

  Another honk. Megan drove forward again, her eyebrows pinched together. “So last night . . . Ashley Lacroix?”

  “Mm-hmm,” I said.

  “You saw her?”

  “Yep.”

  “And you met her? You actually met her? It wasn’t a prank? Did you touch her? Was she real?”

  “She didn’t eat.”

  “What, like she’s a zombie?”

  “No, not like she’s a zombie, Megan. We just made this pizza, and apparently it was her favorite, and she didn’t eat it, and I thought that was kind of weird. So did her parents.”

  “What did she say to you?”

  “Nothing. She barely said anything. Just hi and, ‘You can come in if you want,’ or something like that. She kept looking at me funny.”

  “You can come in if you want,” Megan repeated slowly. “Wonder what she meant by that . . . You can come in . . . if you want . . .”

  I shook my head and exhaled loudly through my fingers. “I don’t know what’s going on anymore,” I said.

  “Isn’t it obvious?” she said. “You disturbed her remains—you’re never supposed to disturb the remains—and now you’ve unleashed her ghost, you idiot.”

  “Oh, shut up,” I said.

  “I know what happened,” said Megan. “I know exactly what happened. It’s a textbook bait and switch, Leona. It was Ashley, but then she woke up after we dumped her body and went and killed another girl and left her there so it would look like we did it.”

  “That’s not a bait and switch,” I said.

  “She switched the bodies,” she said. “Classic bait and switch.”

  “I don’t care what it is, that’s not what happened.”

  “What’s your theory, genius?”

  “It’s not her,” I muttered. “But it’s like it is her. I don’t get it.”

  “Maybe this means we’re off the hook,” said Megan, glancing hopefully at me. “I mean, we didn’t kill her, right? So maybe we can be normal again. Just normal kids. We’re just kids, Leona.”

  “We still killed a girl.”

  “Maybe we didn’t.”

  “Yeah? Then who’s bloody hairs do I keep finding in my trunk, Megan? Who’s body was that rotting in the woods? We can’t pretend nothing happened. Something happened that night. There was a girl standing in the middle of the street, sleepwalking or whatever, and we hit her. We killed her. She was dead. And we didn’t call the police. We put her in my trunk and dumped her in the woods instead.”

  “She was just standing there,” Megan mumbled.

  Another possibility nagged at the back of my mind, one I hesitated to even voice. But we were running out of ideas. “There’s something else,” I said. “Ashley Lacroix might have been using dark matter.”

  “Whoa . . . really?”

  “There was something sticky on her diary,” I said. “That’s what Emory said. Before all this happened. Something sticky.”

  Megan peered sideways at me. “Maybe she got syrup on it.”

  “Now no one can find the diary.”

  “You know, she could just be another hallucination. Like the other Ashley we saw.”

  “Maybe,” I said, resting my head against the window. “But this one feels different. This Ashley feels real.”

  “You think she’s going to be at school?” she asked.

  “Doubt it.”

  “That’d be weird, going back to school after everyone thought you were dead . . . your boyfriend’s dating another girl, people being all weird about it. I wouldn’t want to go back, either.”

  I looked up. “Did she have a boyfriend?”

  “Just saying. Hypothetically.”

  “Emory’s not going to tell anyone,” I said. “Not until she’s ready. I wonder if he’ll even be at school today.” The red-tiled roofs of Santa Barbara High School loomed in the distance, and a nervous flutter passed through my stomach. Suddenly, the thought of seeing him gave me butterflies. I hadn’t said goodbye to him last night. And I’d meant to thank him for teaching me how to make a pizza. I closed my eyes, trying to go back to yesterday.

  Megan pulled into the school parking lot, and the car engine shuddered to a stop. “I want to see the bones,” she announced.

  “Huh? What?” I said, distracted.

  “Ashley’s bones. I want to see them. You saw them, so I want to see them. Maybe there’s something we missed . . . a clue or something.”

  “Actually, that’s a good idea.” Go see the corpse in broad daylight. Of course. I hadn’t looked closely with Emory. It had been pitch black. Maybe it was a different body. “You want to go after school?”

  “After school,” she agreed.

  I went looking for Emory before second period with a skip to my step. Maybe Megan was right. Ashley was alive, so we hadn’t killed her. Could it really be that simple?

  Maybe the murder had been erased.

  Like, actually erased.

  By the time I rounded the corner toward Emory’s first class, I was feeling positively giddy. I’d never killed anyone, it had never happened, the mistake had been undone.

  I had been absolved of sins.

  Was it dark matter?

  In a way, it made complete sense. Dark matter had been drawn to my guilt. Only by wearing it had I been able to witness the pain I’d caused her family, and through that experience it had gotten me to confess—I’d led Emory to her body. I had even avenged Ashley’s murder by preventing a rape. Maybe I had finally learned my lesson and paid for it, and now the guilt was being washed away.

  Maybe dark matter was God?

  Yes, Leona.

  “Thank you,” I whispered. “Thank you, thank you, thank you . . .”

  Emory emerged from his classroom and fumbled in his letterman jacket, pulled out his aviators and a pack of cigarettes, and I barely resisted running to him. Act cool.

  Leaning over, he lit the cig and took a long drag.

  Really? He was going to light up in broad daylight? Didn’t we have a tobacco-free campus?

  He glanced my way. Suddenly giddy, I opened my mouth to say hi.

  Before I could, he veered the other direction and yanked the jacket tight across his shoulders.

  I froze, snubbed. Huh?

  He must not have seen me. His eyes had been hidden behind sunglasses, I couldn’t tell. I took a hesitant step forward, then reconsidered. Was he avoiding me? At the thought, my insides curled into a nervous little ball, followed by a rush of heat to my face.

  I was new to this. I’d sort of dated a guy for a few months sophomore year, but he’d asked me out. And we were always more like friends. I’d never had to deal with actually really liking a guy before. What about last night? What about having me taste the pizza sauce? Didn’t that mean something?

  Stupid. I was re
ading into things that weren’t there.

  Feeling confused and hurt, I trudged back the way I’d come, seeking out Megan instead.

  Wait.

  I stopped again.

  All I wanted to do was thank him for dinner. I was allowed to thank someone for dinner, wasn’t I? In fact, it would be impolite not to. I turned on my heels and ran to catch up with him.

  “Emory!”

  He ignored me and kept walking.

  I fell into step beside him, feeling stupid now. “Hey, I wanted to thank you for dinner last night.”

  He took another drag, and his jaw tightened as if he was chewing on something bitter.

  “Okay, now you’re just being rude,” I said.

  “What do you want, Leona?” he said.

  “Ohhh-kay . . . you’re not being weird or anything.”

  “I’m busy.”

  Uh-oh. My gaze slid to the scuffed concrete, and I choked down a swallow. He wasn’t just brushing me off. He hated me. My eyes began to sting, only adding to my shame, and I wiped them angrily. “Did . . . did Ashley say something about me?”

  His posture stiffened, but he kept walking, heading out into the parking lot. “You have fun last night?”

  “Maybe.” I kept pace with him. “Yeah, I did actually.”

  “Shouldn’t have invited you over,” he said.

  My heart scampered back into its little cave. “What’s going on?” I said quietly. “You seem different.”

  “Very perceptive.” He took another pull from the cigarette and tapped out the ashes. “Go back to class.”

  “What did I do?” I whispered.

  “It’s not you. It’s her.” We arrived at his convertible, and he flicked the cigarette butt onto the ground and reached for the door.

  “Wait—” I grabbed his arm. “Emory, what did she say? What happened? Is she okay?”

  “No,” he said, finally meeting my gaze. “She’s not okay. She’s definitely not okay.”

  “What . . . what do you mean?”

  He rubbed the back of his neck. “She seems . . . I don’t know, it’s just not like her.”

  I felt a twinge of fear. “You mean she’s acting weird?”

  He stared at me another moment before he climbed into his car. “Go back to class, Leona.”

  “A rotting corpse, huh?” Megan stepped into the empty clearing between spiky clumps of chaparral, releasing a fistful of thorny stalks that whipped back and slapped my face.

  I swatted my way into the clearing, and my jaw fell open. “It was here. I swear it was here.”

  There was nothing here.

  “I’m telling you, she got up,” said Megan.

  “Megan, it was right here.”

  “Sure, Leona.”

  I charged through the leaves and dug through the surrounding brush, but came up short. No sign of a body. I stood, skin prickling. The cool, fusty scent of damp earth slipped in ragged breaths into my sore lungs. But scarcely a week ago I’d led Emory here. She’d been right here, right where we left her.

  “This was the spot,” I said.

  “Yeah, I remember,” said Megan. “We were both there.”

  “Megan, I saw her. Her body. It was right here.”

  “Maybe it was another hallucination.”

  “It wasn’t.” Panting now, I circled the clearing in search of clues. We’d hiked back up Rattlesnake Canyon Trail after school. I’d been silent most of the way, replaying that terrible conversation I’d had with Emory over and over again in my head—divided between crazy speculations about Ashley and feeling hurt that he’d brushed me off.

  But now the missing body took first priority.

  It had been right here.

  If the murder had been erased, then the body would be gone, right? That should have been good news, but right now it certainly didn’t feel like good news. If anything, it only made the whole thing feel more sinister.

  What was it about Ashley that had bothered Emory so much?

  He’d been so happy the other day.

  “So . . . no body,” said Megan. “We’re definitely off the hook.”

  A hint of decay lingered in the air. I flared my nostrils, drawing it deep into my lungs. Decomposing vegetation? Or a fouler smell? My eyes narrowed at something on the ground. Trampled grass.

  “The ground’s all disturbed . . . recently disturbed.” I scanned the rest of the site, noticing other clues. Scuffs in the dirt, the cracked stalks of chaparral, and there, fluttering on a barbed branch a tiny yellow scrap of—I peered closer—police caution tape.

  I whacked my forehead. Duh! “Megan, he went to the police. The police took the body, obviously! Look—” I plucked off the caution tape and thrust it under her nose.

  She took it, and while she examined it, I knelt at a black, burnt-looking patch on the ground and took a sniff. Putrid fumes swept up into my sinuses, making me instantly dizzy. I recoiled and staggered backward into Megan, coughing. “Ew, ew . . . there.” I pointed. “She was laying right there.”

  Megan leaned over me and took a hesitant sniff herself, and her nose scrunched up. She turned away and dragged the top of her shirt over her mouth.

  “There’s no point,” I said. “If the police have already been here, they’ll have collected all the clues.”

  “Leona?” Megan said softly.

  “Yeah?”

  “Are we going to go to jail?”

  I chewed my lip, also realizing the significance. If the police had found the body, then how long before they found us?

  “I don’t know,” I said.

  “If they have the body, they’re going to find our fingerprints. They’re going to know we did it.”

  “It’s been three months,” I said. “Maybe our prints have washed away by now.”

  Maybe they haven’t.

  “They’re going to find us,” said Megan.

  “Look, it’s not Ashley, right? Ashley’s alive, and Ashley was the one people cared about, and now she’s back at home with her family where she belongs. Whoever this other girl was, no one’s going to make a fuss about her. No one even knew she was missing. They’re probably just going to store her body in a huge freezer somewhere and not even do anything.”

  Megan glanced at me and whispered hoarsely, “Ashley’s really alive? You saw her?”

  “I saw her. She’s alive.”

  She nodded slowly.

  Unless that wasn’t really Ashley.

  On the hike back to the trailhead, we fell into a brooding silence, and my mind circled back to Emory and what he’d said at school.

  She’s not okay.

  She’s definitely not okay.

  What had he meant by that? Not okay, as in, she’d changed in the last three months? As in, she was an angsty teenager? Or not okay, as in, she didn’t even seem like his sister anymore?

  She’d been playing with dark matter.

  An imposter.

  One unnerving thought after another crept through my brain. By the time we reached Megan’s car, my entire body had become a trembling ball of nerves.

  Two days ago, a girl had shown up out of thin air who should have been dead.

  I had to know.

  I had to figure out what happened to her—whether it was her standing in the middle of the road that night, whether she’d actually gone to South Carolina . . . whether she was even Ashley.

  There was only one way to find out.

  Locked.

  The back door into the laundry room was locked. I let go of the knob and peered around Emory’s shadowy backyard, and a shiver slipped through my naked, invisible body. Cut into a hedge behind me, a rickety gate slumped on its hinges—a staircase leading down to the p
ounding surf. I could taste the ocean it was so close. Dark matter tingled my skin, charging it with a nervous electricity.

  How else could I get inside?

  I knew why they’d locked it. Now that Ashley was back—and presumably still sleepwalking—they weren’t going to take any chances. This time around, she wasn’t getting out.

  Which probably meant I wasn’t getting in, either.

  Teeth chattering, I crept over to the first window, wedging myself behind a fern. I gave the frame a shove. Locked. They weren’t stupid. I darted to the next window. Also locked. My gaze climbed the wall to the second story, a balcony.

  Emory’s balcony?

  There had to be a way.

  An icy gust of wind sent violent tremors through my limbs, which I quelled through sheer will power.

  Forget spying. If I didn’t get inside soon, I would die of hypothermia.

  Last I’d checked, it was almost ten, too late to expect them to leave the house.

  So we were doing this old school.

  I backed up so I could peer over the balcony, where I made out the sliding glass door into Emory’s bedroom, brightly lit.

  It was worth a shot.

  Now how to get up there . . .

  My gaze flicked to a stepladder leaning against the garage. Too short. I circled the house, arms crossed tightly over my chest as I rubbed the chill out of my shoulders, noting things I might use to climb or stack up—a recycling bin, a flimsy trellis overgrown with vines, a shovel.

  On this side of the house, the roof slanted down to a single story, which would be easier to scale. A large bush grew up against the wall, just brushing the gutter.

  Not ideal, but it would do.

  I plunged my leg into the bush, probing the jagged knot of thorny branches for a toehold. My arm grabbed a fistful of twigs and leaves, and I kicked off the ground and seized a higher branch, pulling myself up. Razor-sharp leaves scratched at my stomach and thighs. The bush rustled and swayed, showering my face with twigs and dead leaves, and I turned away blinking and spitting. My fingers closed around something squishy, which oozed between my fingers . . . a slug.