Will nodded and sipped his warming coffee again. “I sure hope so. But like you say, at least we know what our enemies look like, now. Who knows...maybe I’ve seen them around myself once or twice and never even knew it was them.”
“You’d know,” Dana assured him. “They reek of evil.”
“I’m afraid for your friend, Sophie, but I don’t think Ethan will kill her. Not yet, anyway. He’s using her to stay close to you. It’s like you said—he had a taste of your soul and he liked it. He wants you. But he’s dancing with you, drawing it out into a seduction. In his own sick way, he probably really does love you, Dana. And he wants to love you to death.”
Dana shivered. “I can’t believe this is happening to me.” She drank more of the ice water she had used to wash down some ibuprofen. “I can’t believe I’m sitting here across from a boy who died a long, long time ago.” She smiled nervously at her guest. “But I’m sure glad you’re here. You’re the only person who would believe me.”
“Can you blame them? You yourself didn’t believe me, a few days ago.”
“I believe you now, Will. Everything you said. I wish it wasn’t true, but it is.”
Will sighed. “I think Sophie is safe for now, like I say. If they killed her, they might be afraid it would push you off the deep end and send you running to the police. Same thing with Mike. But still, we shouldn’t take chances. He might still be in the greatest danger.”
“He’s already in danger. He’s in a coma. If that goes on too long he’ll have brain damage. If he ever wakes up, he’ll never be the same...if that coma doesn’t end soon.”
Rising from the table, Will began to pace the kitchen. “There is a way that we can help him. That I can help him. But it would be very dangerous.”
“Dangerous? To him?”
Will stopped pacing and looked at Dana with a grave expression. “No. Dangerous to me.”
Rising from the table also, Dana reached out and took Will’s hand in both of hers. His hand was warm and firm for the hand of an immortal spirit. “I don’t want you to endanger yourself, Will...but we can’t let Mike lie there and rot, if we can help him. I won’t ask you to help him...but I hope you will.”
A slow smile spread on the boy’s face and he clasped his other hand around Dana’s two. “When your mother comes home, tell her I’m your friend Will from school. And tell her we need a ride to the hospital to visit Mike Costello.”
Dana pulled Will to her and gave him a crushing hug. “Oh Will, thank you!”
“I just hope it works,” he muttered, with some doubt in his voice. He hugged Dana back, her thick tangle of blond hair in his face. “Wow,” he said, “I really had forgotten how good it is to be a human again.”
Dana loosened her embrace and grinned at him. “I’ll give you an even bigger hug if you can help Mike.”
“Will you give me a kiss if I help Mike?” It was funny how his face looked when he asked this. He had stopped smiling, as if it was a very serious question.
A little embarrassed, Dana gave a shrug. The thought of kissing a ghost, a spirit, made a shiver run through her flesh. But he was an awfully cute spirit.
“Okay,” she told him, blushing.
11
“So where do you live in Eastborough, Will?” Anne Tower asked as she drove her daughter and Dana’s friend to the hospital to visit Mike. Although Dana’s mother had not looked happy to come home and find a strange boy in the house—which was against the rules when her parents weren’t home, and against the orders her mother had given her today about letting in strangers—she was being very nice to Will now.
“Oh, down by the swamp,” he replied from the backseat, where he sat beside Dana. “Um, Elm Street.”
“Ooh, Elm Street,” Mrs. Tower repeated in a creepy voice. “I used to have a friend on Elm Street. One time I remember a huge snapping turtle came out of the woods into her backyard, but her father caught it by the tail and dragged it back into the swamp. It was hissing and everything. Scary.”
“There are some dangerous beasts in that swamp,” Will agreed.
“Yeah. I’ve heard reports that there are coyotes back in there, but nobody knows how many. One was shot on Willows Farm, someone told me, and that’s right on the edge of those woods.”
“It’s not a safe place to venture,” Will said. “Who knows what’s lurking around in there, these days.”
“When I was a kid my mother told us a story to keep us out of the swamp. She said this old guy once went into the swamp on the Eastborough side, and tried to cut all the way through to Farmington on the other side. Well, he never came out the other side. No one ever saw him again.”
“Thanks for sharing that cute little story with us, Mom,” Dana said.
By the time they reached the hospital it was already getting dark. Mrs. Tower rode up with Dana and Will in the elevator, asked directions at a nurse’s station, helped them find Mike’s room.
Mrs. Costello was sitting beside his bed, and older sister Mary sat in another chair. Mr. Costello must have been home watching Rosa. The two women were surprised and happy to see the visitors, and Mike’s mother rose from her vigil to embrace Dana’s mother.
But Dana barely noticed the two haggard-looking women. All she could stare at was Mike in his bed, with a tube taped to his face and running into the corner of his mouth. “Ohh, Mike,” she moaned, and took hold of his limp, cold hand. It was like seeing a dear friend lying in state in a coffin, and tears began to blur Dana’s vision.
Mrs. Costello came to Dana’s side and gave her a hug. “I know, honey, I know. He knows you’re here, he can hear us, I’m sure of it.”
Dana wasn’t so sure. How much of his energy, his mind, his soul had the voracious Shadow Beings left in him? Seeing him this way, Dana found it hard to believe there was anything even an immortal being like Will could do for him.
Dana noticed that there were a few cuts on Mike’s cheek. Thin, like scratches. As though some large cat had raked him with its claws.
They all sat together in the room for a while, except for Will, who leaned against the wall by the window, where he gazed at Mike’s silent face. Dana kept glancing back and forth between the two boys. Will seemed almost trance-like. Was he already doing what he had to do, or merely psyching himself up for it?
At last, as Dana had hoped would occur, Mrs. Costello asked Mrs. Tower if she wanted to go to the cafeteria for some coffee. Dana was thankful that her mother accepted. Anne Tower addressed her daughter. “Hon, do you and Will want to come with us?”
“No, Mom, I’d rather stay here with Mike for a while. I...I’d like to be alone with him a bit. I mean, me and Will.”
She hoped Mary would take the hint. She did, rising from her chair. “I’ll come with you guys,” she told her mother. “Do you two want us to bring you back anything?”
Both Dana and Will declined. They watched the three women leave the room.
Dana turned to Will. “How much time do you need?”
“Not much,” he said grimly, pushing himself away from the wall. He came to stand over Mike. Dana let go of her friend’s hand, rose from her chair and dragged it out of Will Garner’s way.
“Pull the curtain shut,” he ordered Dana.
She moved to the curtain that separated Will’s side of the room from the other side, which was thankfully unoccupied. Now no one walking in the hallway could see them, and Dana only hoped that wouldn’t alarm some passing nurse.
“Is there anything I can do?” Dana whispered.
“Shh,” Will told her, staring down at the dark-haired boy. “Just be ready to catch me if I fall.”
“What do you mean?”
Will looked over his shoulder at her, his brows knitted in intensity. “I’m going to help Mike the only way I can, Dana. He had his life force sucked out of him. I’m going to feed him some of mine. As much as I can spare. Let’s just hope it’s enough to heal him...or at least to give him a fighting chance.”
�
�Will!” Dana said. “If your energy level is so low, that could kill you!”
He didn’t so much as blink when he answered, “Yes, it could destroy me. I’m hoping to give him all that he needs, but not all that I need. I’ll have to give it just the right balance.”
“That’s why,” Dana realized with a shudder, “that’s why you want me to kiss you afterwards!”
Will looked uneasy, perhaps guilty. “Yes. After I give Mike my life force, Dana...I’m going to need a little life force back. A transfusion. I’m asking you to give it to me.”
“Oh my...”
“I know. I hate to ask. I hate to even think of it. It’s what they do. But it’s the only way I can think of.”
The idea of having some of her essence drained out of her was terrifying. She had felt the effect of it before, the morning after Ethan had kissed her. She hadn’t known what was happening then, but this time she would know, and it was a frightening concept. Dana couldn’t have been more afraid if Will had asked to suck some of her blood.
“I won’t take too much,” Will assured her. “Just enough so that I won’t be totally drained. I can only ask you to do it, Dana, I can’t force you. But whatever you decide, you have to decide fast before the others come back or someone else comes in here.”
Shame reddened Dana’s cheeks. How could she even hesitate? Will was willing to risk his very existence to save Mike’s life. The least Dana could do was to heal Will the same way he intended to heal Mike.
“I’ll do it,” she said firmly. “Hurry up—go for it.”
Giving a little nod, Will returned his burning gaze to the face of the sleeping boy before him.
A doctor was paged over the public address system. A cart was pushed by in the corridor outside. Nervously Dana flinched and peeked around the edge of the curtain partition. She didn’t see anyone out there. She turned back to watch Will, and flinched a second time. Will had already begun the transfusion, and what Dana saw made the flesh of her scalp prickle.
Though there was no sound, bright white arcs of energy like lightning were flickering out of Will Garner’s eyes. The twisting forks of electricity touched the closed eyelids of Mike Costello, and the energy seemed to flood his entire body: Dana could see flashes of Mike’s skull through his skin for a second now and then, and the bones of his hands as well. It was like he was being X-rayed from the inside out.
For a moment she forgot that what Will was doing was for Mike’s own good. For a moment, she either wanted to push Will away from her friend or just simply scream her head off.
Will began to tremble violently, as if he was being electrocuted. A low moan started from his mouth. Now Dana’s concern switched from Mike to Will.
“Will?” she said. “Enough, Will, that’s enough.”
He wouldn’t stop. Maybe he couldn’t. He began to shake more dramatically, almost going into a standing convulsion. His moan grew louder.
“Will! That’s enough!” Dana took a chance, believing that Will’s transfusion was out of his control. She rushed at him, pushed him roughly with both hands. The contact was disconnected. The flow of lightning ceased.
Will collapsed to the floor, his eyelids fluttering shut. Dana crouched down over him and he desperately seized her by the arm.
“Kiss me,” he whispered. “Dana—kiss me.”
She needed no more encouragement. Dana lifted Will’s back onto her knees, bent over him and pressed her mouth over his, as if to give him mouth to mouth resuscitation.
Will’s mouth was open, but this was no attempt to French kiss her. Instead, Dana experienced a strange vacuuming effect, as Will hungrily sucked some of her life’s essence from her body. His hands came up around her in an embrace.
The sensation wasn’t unpleasant physically, but Dana was still dizzy with terror. Will hadn’t been able to break off the link with Mike; what if he couldn’t break off the link with her? What if he drained her to the point of coma, too? Or worse?
But despite her intense fear, Dana felt something else. She wrapped her arms more tightly around the handsome young man. With one hand she cupped the back of his head. The longer they kissed, the stronger the feeling became, until gooseflesh as hard as pebbles covered her arms. Even though he wasn’t doing it, Dana had the urge to French kiss him...but fought off the impulse, afraid that it might disrupt the transfusion process. She had never felt so lost in emotion before in her life. Even at the risk of losing all of her life force, Dana now wished that their deep kiss—their mingling of souls—would never end.
But it did, and it was a good thing it was Will who put a stop to it, because Dana was too engrossed in the sensation. At last, he broke his mouth from hers and opened his eyes, gazing up at her, panting like a man saved from drowning. A smile slowly came to his face.
“Wow,” he said.
Dana was thoroughly light-headed. “Are you okay?”
“Fine. Are you okay?”
She was disappointed that they had stopped, but too embarrassed to say so. “A little faint. Can you help me into a chair?”
Getting to his feet, Will helped hoist Dana up with him and guided her into a chair. “I’m sorry, Dana. Really I am.”
“Don’t be sorry.” She smiled to reassure him, her eyelids feeling like they were weighted with lead. “It wasn’t so bad.” He had taken more than Ethan had at the library, and she thought she might pass out, and yet a warmth coursed pleasantly through her limbs.
Will cupped her face in one hand. “That was very brave of you, Dana Tower.”
“That was very brave of you, Will Garner.”
They heard a little groan behind them. They both looked over at the bed.
“Where am I?” Mike Costello mumbled the ultimate cliché, his words all but indecipherable. “And what’s this thing stuck in my mouth?”
Dana and Will looked at each other with great big grins painted on their faces.
12
“Shh. In here,” Dana whispered.
Will ducked his head and climbed down into the basement of the Tower house. Dana had opened the outside bulkhead door for him, and now she locked it again. He looked over at her father’s pool table, and then peeked into the dark laundry area. “Are you sure no one will come down here tonight?”
“I sure hope not—my mother would skin me alive. She’s, how would you say it, overprotective of me.”
Will furrowed his brow. “I wouldn’t want to get you in trouble.”
“Don’t worry, just hide in this closet if you hear anyone coming.” Dana opened a closet in the laundry area and moved around some detergent and other items inside to make room for the boy if need be. “It’ll be a lot warmer sleeping down here tonight than in some storage shed, or the woods.”
After Mike had awakened at the hospital Will had gone to the cafeteria and fetched the women. Mrs. Costello and Mary were shocked and ecstatic to see Mike had regained consciousness. The doctors who came in a few minutes later were shocked, too. Mike was disoriented and groggy, and after a little while he drifted off to sleep again, but his coma was over. Before he drifted off, however, his sister asked him, “Mike...who attacked you?”
“Attacked?” he mumbled.
“Didn’t someone attack you, Michael?”
“Two girls,” he slurred, his eyes slowly closing. “Two girls...”
“What?” his mother said. “What did they do to you?”
A big dopey smile came to Mike’s face. “Two girls came out of the woods. Started...kissing...me.”
Dana and Will looked at each other, then.
After they left the hospital, Mrs. Tower dropped Will off in front of a house on Elm Street that he’d said was his house. When the car was gone he began walking back to the Tower house.
Now, here he was, and Dana could finally go to bed. She yawned. “I can hardly keep my eyes open. Good thing for you I didn’t doze off while you were heading back here or you’d be sleeping in the yard.”
“Are you sure you’re okay?�
�� He still sounded guilty about what he had done at the hospital.
“I’ll be fine, with a little rest. How about you?”
“Weak, but I’m still here.”
“I better get back upstairs before my parents notice I’m gone. Thanks again, Will.”
He smiled. “Thank you.”
Dana leaned towards the boy and kissed him lightly on the cheek. Then she quickly turned away and padded upstairs into her house.
Still smiling, Will touched the spot on his cheek where she had kissed him.
* * *
It was Saturday morning so Dana’s parents slept later than usual, which worked out fine for her. She sneaked down into the basement to see how Will was doing.
He was gone.
She was disappointed, and a little mad. Where had he gone off to? To search for the Shadow Beings on his own? But then she noticed the bulkhead door was still locked. Of course. She went into the laundry area and opened the closet, and there he was inside, looking panicked. But he smiled in relief when he saw it was her.
“I heard the steps creaking so I ducked in here,” he whispered.
“Did you get any sleep last night?”
“I rested. I don’t really sleep. It’s more like a meditation.”
“I love to sleep, personally.”
“It’s a waste of precious life, I think.”
“Are you hungry?”
“I don’t need food, remember?”
“I know that, but do you want to eat, anyway, just to taste it?”
“No thanks.”
“Man...being dead doesn’t sound like much fun.”
“Dana, you’re so profound,” he teased.
She slapped his arm. He flinched, so she had obviously hurt him. “Well, at least you’re alive enough to feel pain.”
“I felt you kiss me goodnight, last night, too.”
A hot blush spread through the skin of Dana’s face. She turned her head shyly and glanced around the laundry area. “So what’s next, Will? You know about them and they know about you. Will they come after you?”
Lost in Darkness Page 8
