Elyse grabs my arm. “There’s someone in the gazebo,” she whispers. “A tall man. He’s just standing there in the shadows, but I can see the top of his head. He’s wearing feathers in his hair.”
“I don’t see him,” I whisper back, trying to remember the ghost-tour brochure. I have no doubt there’ll be a description of the guy in the ghost tour. “What do you want me to do? We could make a run for the house.” And then I remember she says that woman—the ghost—went after me but couldn’t touch me. I’m about to suggest I get closer to investigate when Elyse screams.
“You didn’t see, right?” she asks. “He’s out in the open, creeping toward the basement window.” I look down at the lightly packed garden trail and suddenly under the porch light I can see footprints appearing on the ground, approaching the window. Goose bumps rise on my arms.
“Did he go through?”
She nods. “No wonder I got mad if she left them open,” she says as if to herself.
We dash inside after the ghost. It’s dark everywhere, except one bedroom at the end of the hall, where a shaft of light shines from under the door. Snoring comes from inside.
Elyse knocks. “Everything okay?” she calls.
No answer. She keeps knocking, over and over. The girl’s determined. Finally I hear footsteps walk to the door, and I duck into the hall.
“What’s wrong, Elyse?” Liz’s voice is groggy.
“Oh, I heard a noise,” she says. “It sounded like someone was hurt or something.”
“What noise? We didn’t hear anything.”
“Sorry to bother you, I . . . you really didn’t hear anything?”
“Everything’s fine, honey,” Liz says. “Go back to bed.”
“No way in hell am I going back to that tower room alone,” she says, so I walk her to her bedroom, praying her father doesn’t wake up and see me there. She searches the room until she’s satisfied it’s ghost free, then closes the window and sinks onto her bed, shoes and all, curling up into a fetal position.
“Don’t go giving up on me,” I say. “You said it yourself, we’re going to get our memories back. We’ve figured out so much already. Tomorrow we’re going to show up at school and see what we can learn from talking to our friends.”
Slowly she uncurls. “You’re right,” she says calmly. “My family’s useless, and your dad is crazy. Maybe our friends are the real key to getting our memories back.”
“We’ll get through this if we stick together,” I say. I tuck her into bed, close the door, and tiptoe down the creaky hallway.
Outside, Jim and Candace are awake again and flirting. “You didn’t happen to hear a loud noise, did you?” I ask. They shake their heads. “Or see anybody come through the backyard?”
“You mean like the innkeeper’s daughter sneaking out to see you?” Jim winks. “Course not, Romeo.”
“Your secret love is safe with us,” Candace adds. She looks younger in cutoff jeans and a baggy T-shirt, or maybe it’s just the relaxed expression on her face. I notice Jim’s unbuttoned his top button.
Discreetly I sniff the air, expecting to pick up the hippie-temple reek of pot smoke. But all I smell is fresh-cut lawn and sweet camellias. The tourists grin at me stupidly. Maybe they’re just high on love.
In the cottage, I toss and turn in the world’s most comfortable king-size bed, surrounded by feather pillows. It’s hot so I’m lying on top of the comforter. And since part of me is terrified that I could wake up with no memory again, and this time I’d like to not be naked, I’m wearing all my clothes. But sleep won’t come. One by one I throw the feather pillows to the floor, before finally giving up and turning on the lamp again.
Sitting at the desk, I open last year’s The Mountain Cat to the juniors’ section. It opens right on a page with her picture. Elyse Alton. She’s radiant in a black-and-white V-neck T-shirt, her hair piled on top of her head, staring straight into the camera with a challenging look.
I spend forty minutes poring over the yearbook, studying it like it’s a new school subject: reality 101. Elyse was a cheerleader last year, but she’s also everywhere in group shots. Looking down from dark sunglasses; glossy lips parted in a sexy, relaxed smile; tan arm thrown around the jock from the fair. No hint of the wide, startled green eyes, the terrified, trembling girl I wanted to comfort earlier. The Elyse in this book is built of sheer confidence.
Or she pretended to be.
Where am I? I’m not in any of the pictures with her. Did I even know her?
I find myself scanning through every page for pictures of myself. The candids. The theater productions. Clubs. Judging from the amount of space it’s given, athletics is obviously the big thing here. There’s a Summer Falls high school football team, and I’m not on it. There’s also a basketball team, which I’m also not on, and a baseball team, which—guess what? Other than that one lame class picture, I’m nowhere. Not even the science-fiction-and-fantasy club.
According to this yearbook, I am less than a loser. I’m a nobody. Invisible as one of Elyse’s ghosts. My chest aches. By the laws of high school, she shouldn’t even be talking to me, let alone talking about skipping town with me.
My eyes travel down the signatures scrawled across the end pages. No spot is left blank. People have crowded in their words in corners, in every possible color of ink. But the signatures don’t give much information. They’re shallow, generic. Not quite “Have a great summer!” generic but close. Joking about shared classes and activities. Too many hearts and exclamation points. I can’t find my own signature. Over the varsity football team photo someone’s written in grease pen:
Hi, beautiful. It feels weird to be writing this in your yearbook when I know I can tell you these things anytime. You know I love you. You know you’re the one for me. My Prom Queen, the only girl I’d ever let drive my car. To me you are perfect. This year has been amazing because I’ve spent so many hours with you, laughing, talking, and . . . hiking. ☺ I live for our hikes.
Love forever,
Dan.
Gee, I’m sure no one reading this could ever guess what “hiking” is code for. Why not just write, I live to fuck you. ☺
Feeling a sick twisting in my stomach, I flip back through the juniors till I find his photo. But I already know what he’s going to look like. Daniel Bellingham. The Mountain Cat is crammed with comically impressive photos of him: touchdown, sliding into home plate, in a singlet sitting on top of a cringing, faceless competitor. How could he do both football and wrestling? Two fall sports. I quickly learn to adjust my expectations. Dan can do anything. The captions below his inane grinning mug gush like his mom wrote them: Dan Saves the Day Again! Dan Leads the Rays to Victory in the Big Game!
Okay, discovering that Elyse’s boyfriend is the school stud shouldn’t be a shock. Even if I wasn’t so busy desperately trying to figure out what the hell’s happened to me, I’d have no right to be jealous. Or would I?
Elyse’s bunny slippers are still sitting on the chair; I pick one up and fit it onto my hand. The inside’s lined with satin. Who cares if I have a right? I am jealous. “I live for our hikes.” Bastard. You don’t even know her. That’s obvious from the generic clichés in his stupid yearbook entry. My face feels hot and my stomach feels so queasy that I have to concentrate on keeping down that blue cotton candy from the fair.
But at the same time, the Dan thing just doesn’t feel real to me. I can’t reconcile what he’s written here with the obvious connection Elyse and I are feeling. Whatever he was in her old life, all Elyse and I have is each other. I fall asleep imagining her blond hair gently drifting up and down with my breathing.
I wake up in a cold sweat in the darkness. I’ve been dreaming the same dream. Once again, I dive under the cold water and sink down to the eerie calm of the underwater graveyard. Once again I know I’m going to die here. But that, somehow, my death will allow others to live. I’m saving people by sacrificing myself. And so, somehow, again, it feels all right.
ELYSE
I grab on to my limo driver’s outstretched hand and step out to face the waiting crowd—my crowd. All around me cameras flash as the paparazzi vie for a clear picture of my blue velvet evening gown. They surround me like sharks, begging questions: “Tell us who designed your gown?” “Do you think you’ll win this year?” But my personal assistants wave them off, so I can glide past. It all feels so natural, so right for me to be here that I can’t stop smiling, and I know my smile is mesmerizing to the crowd.
But a tiny voice in my head wonders, Why does this feel right to me, to be stared at? Why do I deserve to be famous? Why did I even want this?
I turn away from the cameras, hitch up the bottom of my leg-constricting mermaid-style gown, and find that I’m wearing running shoes.
—
Someone’s leaning over the side of my bed, smelling like flowery lotion and biscuit batter.
“Rise and sparkle, honey bun.” Liz’s chirpy voice grates like nails on a chalkboard.
It all comes back to me: I’m in my all-pink bedroom at Preston House. I still have no memory of anything before yesterday. And yesterday was no picnic, between ghosts, window jumps, asylums, squad cars, and relentlessly chipper yet clueless parents. I don’t want to be here, but I don’t want to be a celeb in a fancy dress having strangers take my photo either. That dream was so shallow and stupid, I actually feel like booing my subconscious.
The unfamiliar smell of Liz’s lotion so close to me is making me nauseous. I’m worried she’s going to kiss my forehead and am relieved when she pokes at my side instead. “Come on, it’s almost breakfast time for the guests.”
“Not hungry,” I mutter into my pillow, but she just pokes me harder. “Please let me sleep. Maybe it’ll help my brain reset or something. . . .”
“There’s nothing the matter with your brain, you just have to keep your mouth shut and keep busy,” she hisses. “Wash up and dress nice for breakfast. Make the guests feel right at home.”
“But it’s not their home,” I say. She’s already scurrying back down the stairs in her scary heels and doesn’t hear me. She’d better be careful running around in those, or she’ll end up as Summer Falls’s latest ghost. And what will her little graphic emblem be, a feather duster?
The guests. It’s like the tourists are this mythical beast Liz and Jeffry Alton worship, loathe, and prey upon all at the same time. Without them, I suppose they couldn’t afford to keep living in Preston House. But as long as they keep it, they’re slaves to them. And so, apparently, am I.
I take a hot shower in the lavender bathroom. Lavender is a sickening color to see first thing in the morning, and the tub floor being padded with three lavender mats is just perplexing. Am I that much of a klutz? The body wash reeks of “white daffodils” so I snap it shut after one sniff and wash with mint shampoo instead.
In the closet I scrounge together the least body-hugging outfit I can: loose cutoffs and a baggy white hoodie. The hoodie feels uncomfortably warm by the time I’ve finished tying the laces of my worn running shoes, but I’m willing to steam-cook for the sake of modesty.
I spot a light blue backpack in the corner, open it up, and stare at the binder with class notes and doodles. The divider tabs follow my schedule: Red is “Per 1 Math,” orange is “Per 2 History,” yellow is “Per 3 PE,” and it’s blank inside except for a handout on nutrition on which I’ve written, This is stupid. I startle at my own handwriting. It’s spare, angular, and so hard on the page it leaves a Braille embossment on the other side. I’d expected i’s dotted with open circles. Instead my writing is the first thing I’ve found in this place that feel like it’s mine.
I feel a tingling in my fingers, a warmth that spreads up my arms to my chest. It’s not a memory, exactly, but it’s a clear sign of . . . something.
What if the thing that’ll finally jog my memory isn’t here in Preston House but at school? Maybe school is the key to finding more about myself. The address was in The Mountain Cat, 1500 Main Street. I swing the backpack over my right shoulder and lug it downstairs.
The table’s half full, with Liz hovering around in her frilly pink apron, refilling coffee mugs and teacups, while Jeffry beams at her from his patriarchal throne at the head of the table. Marshall catches my eye from his seat by the back door.
“Nice of you to join us, princess.” Jeffry’s voice booms over the din of guests chattering, and everyone chuckles, I guess at his chastising me for being late.
“Hiking clothes?” Liz frowns at me. “That’s what you’re wearing to school?” She’s more worried about my frumpy outfit than my amnesia.
I love being shoehorned into the role of headstrong, surly teen when all I freaking did was get dressed and walk downstairs.
I ignore both my “parents” and sit next to Marshall.
Jeffry rips into one of the three buttered biscuits on his plate and starts methodically loading his fork with scrambled eggs.
Liz, clearly in an attempt to get conversation rolling, addresses the table at large. “So, who’s going to the fair again tonight?”
“We are, for sure.” Lucia Bishop reaches across the chalky-looking smoothie in front of her to take her husband’s hand.
“I don’t know; it’s my last night,” Candace says, throwing a regretful glance in Jim’s direction. “Summer classes at UC Irvine start Monday.”
“Ah, college.” Frank Bishop swirls his orange juice glass with a nostalgic air. “You think your life’s tough now, but when you’re out in the real world . . . you’ll think of this as the good old days.”
“Personally,” I say, “I look forward to seeing the real world.”
Half the table laughs as if I’ve said something ridiculous.
“Just wait, honey.” Lucia Bishop stirs her smoothie. “You don’t know how good you have it growing up in a beautiful, clean, quiet place like this.”
“I know, it’s like paradise,” Candace says with a jealous sigh.
“Then you move here,” I say, and Liz smiles ferociously at me to shut up. I shrug and scoop a double helping of grapefruit-kiwi fruit salad onto my plate. It’s bad enough being forced to hide my memory problem. I’m not going to fake being jolly to make things perfect for the tourists. I’m not scenery.
When Jim and Candace stand and announce they’re heading downtown, I grab an apple muffin and my backpack and offer to walk with them. Marshall stands without a word and follows us. My parents look relieved to see me go.
Every step of the walk, the tourists stop to ooh and aah at something. First the pretty lake, then the pretty trees, then the pretty waterfall.
“I’m hiking the trails this afternoon,” Candace vows. “Jim, you in?”
Jim stretches his arms, yawns. “What were we talking about?”
“You sound like a local.” Candace shoves him and giggles, then glances at me. “Sorry.”
“No, that’s fair. He does sound like an idiot.” I have no investment in defending the locals, even if I am one.
I’m relieved when Candace spots an “adorable” necklace in the window of the antique store and drags Jim in to look at it with her. Leaving us to walk the rest of the way to school in peace. As we cross the threshold onto campus, Marshall asks, “Ever think about how schools are like prisons for the young?”
I laugh. “You’re really not a schoolboy, are you?”
“That should be clear from my report card.” He shakes his head at the ivy-covered office wall. “Maybe me coming here was stupid. Fuck, I don’t even know my schedule. . . . I’m probably in remedial everything.”
“We’re here for clues,” I remind him. “Not A-pluses. There’s something in that building that’s going to give us valuable information. I bet just talking to people—”
He freezes. “Promise me something.”
“Name it.”
“Promise you won’t tell anyone else you meet about our memories.”
“Who said I would tel
l people?”
“You’re compulsively honest.”
I take a step back from him. “You make it sound like a disease.”
“I just don’t trust these people.”
“You think I trust them? The only person I trust is you.”
He crosses his arms. He’s waiting for me to say it.
“Fine, I promise not to tell anyone.”
“Okay, good.”
“What about you?”
His brow furrows in confusion. “I kind of already know your secret.”
“No . . .” God, he’s so arrogant sometimes. “I mean, aren’t you going to promise me the same thing?”
“Oh, that.” He laughs. “Like there was ever any chance of me wanting to open up to someone in this town—other than you . . . but sure, if you want.” He mimes signing his name over his heart. “I promise.”
The bell rings, and I feel a funny nervousness in my stomach. “I have to go to Language Arts.”
“And I have to go to the principal’s office.” He hugs me good-bye. “See you in the cafeteria.”
Chapter 18
MARSHALL
Miss Niffenhauer—according to her gold nameplate—looks like an aging Tinker Bell, swimming in a dark green suit that might fit a linebacker. When I enter her office, she groans and starts kneading her face rhythmically in a slow circle. I’m mesmerized by her hands, alternately hiding and emerging like turtle heads from within the suit jacket’s sleeves.
“Uh, Miss Niffenhauer?” I begin in a respectful tone, but the principal cuts me off.
“Save it.” She points to the sign over her desk and recites it like a mantra: “‘No excuses. No drama. No bull.’”
Just clichés. Got it. “All I want is a copy of my schedule.”
Miss Niffenhauer stops kneading her face and pulls her glasses halfway down her nose. “It’s the end of May,” she says. “There are nine days left in the school year, Mr. . . . Mr. . . . Hold on, I’m blanking on your name.” Stumped, she stands, then sits, then stands again. “Well, son of a gun. The old memory’s not what it used to be.”
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