The Forgotten Girl

by India Hill Brown

  And then … Suga losing her best friend to the snow without being able to apologize was too close of a situation for comfort. He and Iris needed to talk things out.

  “Suga. Wait here. I’ll be right back,” he said.

  “Where are you going?”

  Daniel jumped, shocked at Suga raising her voice.

  Her head snapped to the window, where the snow was coming down even steadier. “Do you see that weather? Do you see that snow, Daniel?”

  “Just to Iris’s, Suga,” he said.

  Suga’s lip trembled. “Be careful,” she said quietly. “Please.”

  “I will, Suga,” he said.

  She nodded, turning back to the window.

  He walked downstairs, out of his house, to Iris’s front door, then rang the doorbell. His heart was pounding in his ears. He couldn’t help but feel that the information he just received was more urgent than even he knew.

  He heard Vashti singing to herself before she came and opened the door. “Hi, Daniel!” She waved cheerfully, and walked back to playing with her dolls on the living room floor.

  Alone.

  “Hi, Vashti? Where’s Iris?” he said, his heart thumping harder in his chest.

  “Oh, she’s not here,” Vashti said casually, still playing with her dolls.

  Daniel’s heart dropped. “Is she with your parents?” he asked. He noticed their car wasn’t outside.

  “No. She left after them.”

  “Where did she go?” Daniel said, his voice shaking.

  “She went somewhere with Avery.”

  Daniel couldn’t have heard Vashti correctly.

  “With … who?” he tried again.

  “Avery. They left together earlier. I think Avery wanted to go swimming.”

  Daniel felt the room spinning like the snowflakes outside. He felt like he was in his own personal blizzard.

  “Iris!” he yelled. He ran upstairs, throwing doors open, despite knowing he wasn’t allowed up there. He opened her parents’ room. Empty. Vashti’s room. Empty, with the light on. Iris’s room. Empty. Dark. The bed unmade. Her window open.

  He ran back downstairs, looked around the kitchen, outside the window to the backyard.

  Nothing.

  He was about to run outside when he skidded to a stop in front of Vashti.

  “Vashti,” he said, breathing heavily. “How do you know Avery? Did Iris tell you that’s where she was going?” Iris had convinced herself Avery was real, so she must’ve said it in her sleep, or before she sleepwalked outside, or—

  Vashti put her dolls down and looked at Daniel, amused by his running around her house. “No! She told me herself. I like Avery. She wears a pink dress and has biiig black eyes,” she said, stretching her arms wide. “She’s like Sissy, but nicer. She played with my dolls with me when Sissy didn’t want to anymore. She comes and has slumber parties with me at night. She looks really scary at first, but she’s a great friend!”

  Daniel’s voice shook. “How did you meet her?”

  “She comes to my room to play all of the time! Through the window!”

  He felt sick. He thought of all the things Iris said to him about Avery. How she looked, how she was staring at her through her window … “When did they leave?”

  “They didn’t leave too long ago. Avery asked me if I minded if she went swimming with Iris.”

  “Swimming!” Daniel exclaimed, his voice shaking. “In this weather?”

  “Avery looooves the snow.” Vashti considered this and frowned. “But she’ll keep Sissy warm, right?”

  Daniel had to go after them. Now.

  “Vashti!” he said, kneeling down and looking her straight in the eye. “Vashti, I’m about to leave. I’m locking the door behind me. Don’t open the door for anyone besides me, Iris, or your parents, okay? If Avery comes back, tell her—to go away.”

  Vashti laughed. “Avery doesn’t come through the front door, silly!”

  Of course she doesn’t.

  “Just stay here.”

  Daniel couldn’t take Vashti with him in this snow. He felt terrible about leaving her, but felt she was safer in here than where he was going.

  Daniel knew what he had to do, but he was nervous.

  It was getting darker.

  Colder.

  The snow was falling heavier.

  He’d told Suga he was only going to Iris’s. Now he was about to go somewhere he had no business being. He was about to do the very thing that got Avery killed in the first place. He knew that he should go inside and maybe call a grown-up. Do things the right way. But who would believe him? Besides Suga, and she would never agree to come out.

  “Are you leaving now?” Vashti said.

  “Yes, Vashti. I’m getting my best friend back.”

  Every logical part of Daniel’s body was telling him to run to his house and call his mother. He couldn’t believe Avery was real. After all this time, she was truly haunting his friend.

  He hoped they were still friends. Hoped this situation wouldn’t become like Suga and Avery’s. Where she’d never gotten to apologize.

  Stop this, Daniel told himself. You’re not going to lose someone else you care about. Not like this.

  The storm seemed to be moving in faster than everyone predicted. It was dangerous for him to be out here by himself.

  Which way should he choose? The careful way, or the brave one?

  Why did he follow the rules so fiercely?

  To stay safe.

  Alive.

  To respect the adults.

  With every rule he broke, he saw the prospect of all three things leaving him. But Iris was not a rule follower, and she was out there somewhere. Maybe she was unconscious. Or cold. Or worse. By the time the adults got there and he told them where she was, it could be too late.

  They were swimming, Vashti said. From what Suga told him, they had to be back at the pond.

  He looked in the direction of his house, wondering if Suga was peeping out of the front door.

  He needed to stay out of her line of sight. If he cut through the back of the house with all the Christmas lights, she wouldn’t be able to see him leave. The only window facing this side of the street was the one in his bedroom. He could cut through the woods—the back way the other kids talked about that led to the school. And the pond.

  He didn’t let himself think the worst.

  But he was worried.

  His worry turned to anger as he thought of Avery, playing dolls with Vashti, leading Iris to danger, waiting for her parents to be gone to strike. She was evil, and he wouldn’t be convinced otherwise.

  Crunch.

  Crunch.

  Crunch.

  Each step turned into a stomp. He was almost there, almost to the woods.

  “Hey! Where do you think you’re going?”

  The voice yanked Daniel out of his thoughts, and he stopped in his tracks and looked around. A sheriff was leaning out of his car window as he drove slowly into the cul-de-sac, snowflakes sparkling in the beams of the headlights. He pulled the car to a stop just a few feet in front of Daniel.

  Daniel sighed. This was just what he needed. He wanted to ignore him, to keep running toward Iris, but he knew that would only make things worse.

  He stood still, saying nothing.

  “Did you hear me? Where do you think you’re going?” the sheriff repeated, his head sticking straight out of the window.

  Act natural.

  “I—” What should he say? He needed to hurry up. Every second counted for Iris.

  “I’m going to my friend’s house until my mom gets back from work.”

  It took everything in him not to grimace at his own lie. It wasn’t a big lie, but he didn’t like to lie and wasn’t very good at it.

  “In this weather?” the sheriff asked, raising his eyebrows. “This storm is picking up, you know.”

  Should he tell the officer the truth and have him look for Iris with him? Handcuffs and a gun were no match f
or a ghost, but maybe having an adult there would really make Avery leave Iris alone for good.

  “Sir—actually, could you help me—”

  “You wouldn’t happen to know who’s been messing around by that house, would you?” the sheriff asked Daniel.

  Daniel blinked. “Excuse me? What house?”

  “That one.” The sheriff pulled his car even closer toward Daniel, pointing to the house with the lights. “We got a call that there were footprints back there. It could be an animal, but it could also be … a trespasser.” He eyed Daniel. “You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”

  Daniel’s heart sank. It didn’t seem like the sheriff would want to help Daniel. In fact, it almost seemed like he was blaming Daniel.

  “No, sir,” he said. “I don’t know anything about it.”

  “Hmm,” was all he said. “Well, the storm is picking up. You might want to go inside.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  And with that, the sheriff pulled off, leaving Daniel all by himself.

  Daniel waited for the sheriff to finally turn around and drive off. Once the coast was clear, he carefully walked behind the neighbor’s house with all the Christmas lights. He headed toward the clearing, just in case Iris and Avery were there, nervous about what he might find.

  He arrived at the small clearing where Avery’s grave and the others were buried under the snow.

  This was the graveyard. Forgotten.

  He looked around, anxious—half expecting to see a ghost pop out at him at any minute.

  But there was no sign of Avery. Or Iris.

  His heart sank. Then a flash of color caught his eye, and he spotted Iris’s purple jacket, laid on top of Avery’s grave.

  He shivered and bent down to pick it up, to shake the falling snow from it.

  “Iris?” he called out.

  Nothing.

  Why would her jacket be here if Vashti said she was going swimming? Shouldn’t she be by the pond? Did they stop here first? Did Avery take her … beyond?

  Daniel’s fear turned into determination as he marched through the woods along the beaten path that some kids would take to school.

  He was not about to lose his best friend to a ghost.

  It was steadily getting darker, colder; the snow was falling so fast and hard into his glasses he debated just taking them off.

  The wind whistled in his ears—it almost sounded like someone talking, yelling, screaming.

  It was a short walk through the woods to the school, but the conditions made it impossible to see where he was going. He kept wiping his glasses with every step, his hood over his head. The leafless trees swayed, their gray branches looking like a million hands trying to grab him. His boots crunched on the snow, sticking to the ground, and he looked forward, behind him, up, and down as he walked. He shivered again as he tried his best to keep track of where he was, so he wouldn’t get lost and meet the same fate as Avery.

  Finally, he walked out of the woods, past Nelson’s Pond Middle, straight to the pond itself.

  Aside from the snow falling, there was no sign of life.

  “Iris!” Daniel called out, wiping his glasses and squinting into the snow. He couldn’t see a thing with or without them. “Iris!”

  Where could she be if not here? “Iris!” he yelled again, running, stopping, looking. Please let her be alive, he prayed silently. He couldn’t lose someone else. Not again.

  “Iris,” he said weakly.

  He took a long, shuddering breath and ran toward the pond.

  Then he saw it—saw her.

  Iris’s head broke the surface of the pond, her mouth open to take a loud gasp of breath, before she was pulled back underwater.

  His eyes adjusted, letting him see the shimmering shadow of a girl forcing Iris’s head back under, the face he’d only seen in pictures.

  The face of Avery Moore.

  He ran faster toward the pond, seeing Iris break the surface again, sputtering, coughing, trying to take another breath.

  “Iris!” he exclaimed.

  Iris and the ghost both turned to look at Daniel, Avery’s black eyes causing him to yelp.

  He made eye contact with Iris before Avery dunked her underwater again, longer.

  This time, she didn’t come back up.

  Avery wanted to kill Iris.

  That was her big idea.

  Because if Iris died, here, in this pond … when people would look for her, they’d first find the coat she left behind, leading them to Avery’s grave.

  Never mind that Iris had told Avery they were doing a big project on her, had planned to tell the school all the big things she did and restore the grave of Avery and the others.

  Because this way, Avery told her, not only would she be remembered, but she really would have a forever friend. They could be ghosts together and do things together in a way that they couldn’t with Iris still alive.

  It wouldn’t be so bad, Avery was trying to tell her as she fought against Iris, leading her to the pond. It would be fun.

  But Iris knew better. Knew it was better to be alive, to present her project, no matter if she got the recognition she wanted or not. Because she would’ve done her part in getting history out there, the graveyard restored.

  Knew it was better to argue with Vashti than have Vashti deal with losing her big sister. Knew it was better to play dolls with her. Knew the step team girls cared about her. Her parents, her friends, Daniel, even though they’d just argued.

  But Avery wouldn’t listen.

  Instead, she’d pushed Iris into the pond and held her under. Iris tried to fight her, but couldn’t, her arms going right through her instead. Avery used the same wind she’d used to make the snowballs to hold Iris down, the icy cold water shocking her body every single time she went under. She’d had to bite her tongue to hold in her scream. Get ready to breathe every time she was able to force her way out of Avery’s grip.

  She was getting tired, feeling numb.

  But she’d heard her name.

  “Iris!”

  Someone was here.

  She’d forced her way to the surface once more, barely making it this time, water getting into her mouth, making her cough.

  It was Daniel!

  She was plunged back down again.

  Avery must’ve seen him, too, because she held Iris tighter … longer …

  Until her vision went black.

  “Iris!”

  Daniel slid on ice as he ran as fast as he could toward the ghost, to where his best friend was just dunked underwater.

  Iris hadn’t come back up yet.

  Somewhere in the back of his mind, he was afraid. Afraid that he was going to be Avery’s next victim. Afraid for Iris. Afraid to get caught.

  He ran anyway.

  Without a second thought, he threw off his jacket and his glasses and jumped into the pond.

  The cold stung. Burned. Every part of him wanted to jump out and run back to the warmth and safety of his home.

  But he couldn’t do that without Iris.

  He found her, swimming to the surface, fighting the invisible force that was holding her down, but he could tell she was getting weaker.

  He swam toward her, his muscles tightening against his will. He grabbed her hand—yanked her from the force pulling her back, out of her trance—and they swam away, to another side of the pond.

  Together, they broke free to the surface and tried frantically to swim to the edge of the pond, when Daniel felt a heavy push, and his head was shoved under the water. His lungs burned as he swallowed an icy mouthful. He flailed his arms and legs, not sure if he was bumping into Avery or Iris, but a moment later he was able to burst through the surface.

  Only to hear Iris shriek as Avery pulled her back under.

  Avery couldn’t keep them both down at the same time, but she wasn’t giving up.

  So back and forth they went, Avery trying her hardest to hold down Iris, missing and holding down Daniel, giving Iri
s a chance to take another breath, until the two of them finally reached the edge of the pond, coughing, sputtering, heaving for air.

  “Are you okay?” he asked his friend between coughs. It looked like her brown skin was tinted a shade of blue.

  Iris just nodded. She was shivering uncontrollably.

  He grabbed their coats, his glasses. “Iris, let’s get out of here—”

  “Who are you?” he heard a girl’s voice behind him.

  He was afraid to turn around, but willed himself to.

  When he did, his eyes shook, his heart skipped a beat. A yell caught in his throat.

  He was looking into eyes that were nothing. A transparent body that wasn’t moving. Yet she spoke to him.

  He was face to face with the ghost of Avery Moore.

  He took in her shimmering figure, her stillness, the eyes Iris and Vashti described. He couldn’t believe his own eyes.

  But he needed to be brave.

  “I’m Iris’s best friend. Why are you t-trying to kill her?” he said loudly, his teeth chattered as he tried to gain the strength, the courage …

  “She’s my best friend now. Not yours.”

  “We got into an argument, but she’s still my best friend!” Daniel yelled.

  “NO!” Avery yelled back, her voice getting deeper. “She’s my forever friend! No one will ever forget us again!”

  Iris shook her head, still shaking, unable to speak from the near drowning she’d just endured for who knows how long.

  Daniel narrowed his eyes. “Not if I can help it!”

  Avery looked at him, her eye sockets growing bigger and bigger. He wanted to cover his eyes, but he didn’t want her to know just how afraid he was.

  She shrieked out of frustration. He flinched. She was just trying to scare him, trying to make him run away without Iris.

  He wouldn’t fall for it.

  His heart was beating.

  He quickly thought of what Suga told him earlier.

  They’re hoping that person will guide them. In some rare cases, they can find what they’re looking for and guide themselves.

  “Avery! I have what you want … what you really want! But you just have to leave Iris alone!” He didn’t even know if that was true, but he was desperate. He walked closer to Avery, trying to lead her away from Iris.