by Daka Hermon
“How do you know?” Mary asks.
Duke rubs his chest, but doesn’t respond to her question.
She sighs and turns away. Is he not talking to her now? This is going to be a problem. We have to work together.
“How do we fight the Seeker?” Quincy asks. “It’s so strong and scary.”
“Some of our supplies helped with the fear attacks. Maybe we can use other stuff we brought against the monster,” I say.
Lyric and I dump out our backpacks. There’s a pile of odd items.
“Glow sticks?” asks Shae. “I used these in one of my dance routines. I was awesome.”
“Looks like a bunch of junk to me,” Carla says. “How’s Silly String, a slingshot, rope, a whistle, a Swiss Army knife, and all that other crazy stuff supposed to take down a monster?”
Duke grabs a flashlight and switches it on and off. “Pepper spray saved Mary.”
Mary snorts. “Glad something helped, since you didn’t.”
I sigh. Okay, here we go.
“Someone is bit-ter,” Shae mumbles.
“You know why I couldn’t help,” Duke says through gritted teeth.
Mary waves off his response. “It doesn’t matter now. You made a decision not to take on my fear, so you should understand why I made a decision not to tell you about my brother and stuff.”
“Drama,” Shae whispers as she chews on a cookie. Her wide eyes are fixed on Mary and Duke like she’s watching a movie play out before her.
“Stuff?! You call aging to the point of possible death ‘stuff’?” Duke asks. “Me knowing about your rat snake fear doesn’t compare to all the secrets you kept.”
Lyric leans close to me and whispers, “Mommy and Daddy are fighting. Make it stop.”
Shae scoots closer, wiping crumbs off her face. “Rat snakes? Are we sharing our feelings and talking about our fears? I’m scared of dolls.”
My head whips around to her. What is happening right now? I’m so confused.
“Dolls?” asks Nia.
Shae nods. “My mom collected them as a kid and thinks I should like them, too. She puts them all over my bedroom. At night, I sleep with the covers over my head so I don’t have to see them staring at me with their creepy marble eyes.”
“What do the dolls do to you here?” I ask.
Shae shudders. “They’re alive and they want to play with me. It’s horrible.” She turns to Carla. “What about you?”
“Girl, please.” Carla snorts. “I’m not tellin’ y’all nothing. My stuff is personal.”
My eyes close briefly. Dread crawls through me. This is actually a conversation we need to have. We probably should have had it earlier.
I massage the back of my neck. “Look, this is not … I don’t want to talk about my fear either, but we have a better chance of surviving and winning if we know everyone’s fears. When they appear, we can help each other.”
There is a moment of hesitation as we all look around. The silence is uncomfortable. We’re a strange group. Only Lyric and Nia are my close friends, and even they don’t know all the personal stuff I deal with. Now I have to share my fears with everyone, for the greater good.
Carla grumbles.
Lyric sighs heavily. “What happens in Nowhere stays in Nowhere, right?”
We all nod in agreement. Rain trickles from the clouds. It’s like the sky is weeping for us.
“And don’t be judgy.” Nia directs that to Carla.
“Whatever,” she says with an eye roll.
“You already heard I’m scared of rats and snakes,” Mary says. “It’s the worst of both animals combined.”
Carla gawks at her.
Shae holds up her hand, like she’s in class and wants the teacher to call on her.
“Yes, Shae?” Quincy says with a huge smile.
“I didn’t tell you everything. Not that it’s a competition, but I want you to know my fear is just as scary as Mary’s. The dolls are the weird antique kind with the porcelain heads and yarn hair. When they touch you, you turn into one.”
“Whaaaaat?” says Lyric.
“That is scary,” says Quincy.
Shae twirls a lock of her hair. “I know, right?”
Carla rolls her eyes.
“I’ll go next,” says Quincy. “I’m scared of bugs.” He gestures at his face. “They bite and sting. It hurts bad.” He turns to Lyric, who sits next to him. “You next.”
A muscle ticks in Lyric’s jaw. “It’s … it’s being alone, no it’s more like …” He glances at me and Nia. “My family is questionable, but I’ve always been able to count on y’all. You always have my back. You’re always there for me. My fear is not having you around, especially when I need you the most. During my fears, I can’t see you or find you.”
Nia’s chin trembles. “We’re always here. Even when you don’t see us.”
Lyric pushes his hair off his forehead. “Yeah, but it’s also that I know you’re in trouble and I can’t get to you. I’m useless.”
I’ve always known our friendship was special, but Lyric’s words hit me hard. I open my mouth to respond, but he shakes his head.
“You know how I feel about big emotional moments.” He fake shudders. “Let’s move on.”
“I’ll go.” Duke rubs his palms over his thin pants. “Besides the Seeker, I’m afraid of lots of things because of all the kids I’ve touched. Eleven fears total. I think it’s eleven. Fire, dogs, heights, the dark, lightning, crows, flying, dentists, shadows—”
“Shadows? Who’s afraid of a shadow?” Carla asks.
“One boy I met was apparently afraid of his own shadow.” Duke swipes at the sweat trickling down his cheek. “It would come alive and attack him.”
“Is that what attacked you in the amphitheater?” I saw him take a punch, double over, and fall.
“Yeah,” he says.
Lyric shakes his head in disbelief. “Man, that takes shadow boxing to another level.”
“Spiderwebs scare me the most, though,” Duke says. “I hate that you don’t see them until it’s too late and then they stick to you. Here, the webs wrap me up in a human cocoon. It’s dark, hard to breathe … I’m trapped and spiders crawl all over me.”
“Daaaaang,” says Lyric.
Out of all the fears Duke mentioned, I wonder if dying is now his biggest. I want to ask him how he feels about everything, but it seems wrong to question him about it. If I’m having a hard time imagining what will happen, it has to be a hundred times worse for him.
As if he feels my eyes on him, he glances in my direction. Sadness and determination shine bright.
Carla crosses her arms and mumbles something.
“What?” asks Mary.
She huffs. “Myself. That’s my fear. I see myself, but different, okay? I’m not nice.”
“Wait. I don’t get it,” says Lyric. “You’re not nice now. How is that a fear?”
She glares at him. “I am nice, just not to you. And I have friends. People like me. The other me is really mean. I’m not that person.”
Nia rubs her temples. “So, you’re afraid of not being liked, being a meaner version of yourself?”
“Say something about it and I’ll beat your face in,” says Carla.
Lyric’s jaw drops. “Whoa, meaner than this? Yeah, okay. That’s terrifying.”
“Next!” Carla says.
Nia hugs her knees. “My fear is forgetting stuff like my grandma.”
Nia’s head is filled with a lot of information and those facts give her confidence since she’s not so good with regular schoolwork. Forgetting stuff, not knowing … I understand how that is scary to her.
I lean close, so only she can hear me. “All you need to remember is that you’re one of my best friends. We got this.”
“So, what about you?” Carla asks me. “You haven’t said.”
I chew on the inside of my cheek as I try to get the words out. Mary knows. She saw.
“It’s my mom. When she was
sick and, uh, died.”
“Dude …” Lyric says.
I stare at the ground. I feel everyone’s eyes on me.
“You see your dead mom?” asks Carla.
“It’s the worst and scariest version of her,” I whisper.
“I’m sorry, Justin,” says Nia.
There’s a long moment of awkward silence.
Carla tosses her trash over her shoulder. “Okay, so we know what everyone is afraid of.”
My head pops up. No snide comment or insults?
She grabs her inhaler and gives it a hard shake before inhaling deeply. “What now?” she asks, her eyes surprisingly sympathetic. “I’m getting the feeling y’all don’t know what to do next.”
“Someone might,” I say carefully.
“Who?” asks Mary. “My brother wouldn’t—”
“Not him. Zee,” I say.
Carla groans. “We’re done for.”
“Hyde sensed that we were around even though he couldn’t see us,” I say.
Lyric nods. “I see where you’re going with this. Maybe Zee would know we are there and help us somehow like he did before.”
“He could tell us something that will help destroy the monster,” Nia says.
I climb to my feet, suddenly anxious to see Zee.
“And if he can’t or won’t help?” asks Mary with a weary sigh.
“We’ll lose and the Seeker will win?” Quincy asks.
“Never that,” says Lyric. “Zee will help us. I’m sure of it. Then we’ll have a plan to get some payback.” He rubs his palms together. “Time for Mission Seek and Destroy the Seeker.”
Duke’s hands ball into fists. “Game on.”
I stand in a familiar spot—on the sidewalk in front of Zee’s house. The sky is filled with fat, gray clouds, just like everywhere else in Nowhere. Streaks of dirt cover all the windows, making it impossible to peek in. The welcome home decorations—wilted blue balloons and torn crinkled streamers—are a reminder of what went so wrong.
Zee came back changed from this place.
“I just got hit with a scary sense of déjà vu,” says Nia.
How will the memories of Nowhere affect us?
“Dude.” That’s all Lyric says, but the one word is more than a thousand. He understands how big this moment is.
“Are we going in or what?” asks Carla. “Y’all are moving slowwwwww.”
“And it’s creepy out here,” says Quincy.
He’s not lying. It’s dark, but not completely and the air crackles with this strange vibe that puts me on edge. The lights from within Zee’s house cast an eerie glow that only adds to the spookiness.
Breathe. It should be automatic, but I keep forgetting how to. The lack of oxygen to my brain is making me shaky.
“We should—”
Duke is interrupted by the sound of bells ringing. Startled, I turn and see two little girls, on pink bikes, riding toward us. They’re wearing black princess dresses with lots of lace and bows.
“Is anyone else seeing this?” Lyric says, his voice low. “Or am I losin’ it?”
“I see them,” Nia says. Her voice shakes.
I blink rapidly, hoping it’s just my imagination. The girls have elongated heads and eyes the size of baseballs. Their skin is gray with dark veins clearly visible, like spider webs, all over their face. They smirk as they draw near.
In high-pitched cheery voices, the girls chant, “The Seeker is coming! The Seeker is coming! Four hundred is its final number to wake it from its prison of slumber.”
The hairs on my arms lift. We all shuffle back onto Zee’s front lawn.
“What, the nightmare is happening now?” Lyric asks with wide eyes.
The girls giggle as they ride past us and continue to chant, “The Seeker is coming! The Seeker is coming! There’s nowhere safe, get ready to run. The Seeker is about to have some fun!”
Quincy covers his ears with his hands.
We watch as they reach the end of the block. A shimmering light appears. It pulsates like a beating heart. The creepy girls peek over their shoulders, giggle, then disappear inside the bright vortex.
“Where’d they go?” Shae cries.
Duke spins toward me. “You say your friend can help. Well, we need to find out if you’re right. Now!”
I gulp and glance at Zee’s house. “Okay. Let’s go, but not through the front.” I don’t want to walk inside like that. It feels wrong. Shifting my backpack on my shoulders, I circle the house and we enter through the backyard fence. I stop abruptly, causing a traffic jam.
Zee stands on the back porch. It’s almost as if he was waiting for us to arrive. He hits his head with his fist. “My fault. Sorry. My fault. All alone. Couldn’t stay. The falling. So high. Kept falling,” Zee mutters.
Carla sighs. “Yep. We’re done for.”
“What’s Zee talking about?” asks Quincy as we file inside the backyard.
“Look, he’s holding the harmonica that I gave him,” Lyric whispers.
I rub my chest, but it doesn’t ease the pain. Zee seems worse than when we left him.
“Didn’t mean it. Didn’t mean it,” Zee says. His voice cracks. “Had to take it. Had to leave. So scared. Always falling. Sorry. So sorry.”
“I don’t understand. Is he apologizing for attacking us?” Nia steps around an overturned table from the party.
Maybe, but with everything that’s gone down, I’m not so sure now. My legs tremble as I move closer.
“Falling?” I swallow hard. Once when we were riding a roller coaster, Zee’s safety bar didn’t lock all the way. He almost fell off the ride. He’s been super afraid of heights and roller coasters ever since. Is that what he experienced in Nowhere?
“Couldn’t do it. Couldn’t do it.” Zee paces back and forth along the porch, clutching his head. “Best friends. No deal. No deal.”
“Why is he acting like this?” asks Shae.
Mary watches Zee closely. “He has that look in his eyes. The same one my brother had.”
“Some bad stuff must have happened to him,” Carla says, as if she now understands Zee a little better.
“It’s guilt,” Mary says. “My brother was off for a while, too, but then he got over it. Zee hasn’t.”
“Hold up. What are you saying?” Lyric’s eyes flash a warning.
That seed of uncertainty inside me sprouts, planting deep, painful roots.
Nia shakes her head. “Zee is not like Hyde.”
“Are you sure?” Mary asks. “No one escapes Nowhere.”
“Wait. You think he … ?” Lyric shakes his head. “No, no way! He’d never do that.”
“What are you talking about?” Shae asks, her head whipping back and forth between us.
I reach into my pocket and hold the puzzle piece tight. “Mary thinks Zee betrayed us. That the Seeker sent him back to trick us like Hyde. She … she believes he took a deal, like her brother.”
“Well, she’s wrong.” Lyric’s nostrils flare as he glares at her. “He’s innocent.”
“He … he wouldn’t …” Nia’s bright eyes plead with me to agree.
I turn away, unable to look at Zee. My heart seizes and I struggle to catch my breath. Inhale. Exhale. The air is thin. I feel light-headed.
Lyric growls. “We can trust him! He’s our friend. He warned us.”
He did. He did warn us, but …
“I didn’t wanna believe my brother could betray me either,” Mary says. “But he did.” She turns to Duke. “I didn’t tell you because I was scared you would think I could be like him and you wouldn’t help me.”
Duke stares at her for a moment, then shakes his head. “The truth. I deserved the truth.”
There hasn’t been much I can count on in the past couple of years, but no matter what happened, even when things were the worst, I had Zee. I believed in Zee.
“It came because of me. Because of me,” he mumbles. “My fault.”
I exhale a shaky breath. Is Zee sa
ying the Seeker targeted us because he backed out of the deal? The Seeker wanted revenge? My chest tightens as I think back on everything that has happened, all of Zee’s ramblings, the Seeker’s taunts … We were its endgame all along.
“It’s cold,” says Shae, shivering. “Why is it so cold now?” Her breath clouds out in front of her.
“Justin, what do we do now?” Quincy asks.
I told him and everyone else that we were going home. I made them believe. Why did I do that?
Black dots. Inhale. Exhale. Breathe. I grit my teeth. Pull it together, Justin. Breathe.
“I’m leaving,” Carla says, reaching for her brother. “C’mon, Quincy. We can find another way home.”
“But … but …” he stutters. “The supplies. The monster—”
“You can’t go,” says Nia. “We have to work as a team.”
Carla stares at the ground, then back at Nia. “I’ve never been on your team. You don’t even like me.”
Shae hugs herself tight. “I want to leave, too. I don’t want to be here.”
“Wait! We came this far. We can’t give up now. I can’t just go back,” says Duke.
All their noise builds until I think my head will explode. I fight my way out of the bubble of doubt, fear, and confusion that has surrounded me.
“Zee,” I blurt out. “Zee!” My voice is louder this time.
The noise around me stops. Everyone stares at me like I’ve lost my mind.
I approach him and stand at the bottom of the porch steps. “It’s okay. If you were sent back to …” I’m out of breath, like I’ve been running a marathon. “You were alone and scared. I’m sorry you didn’t have anyone there to help you.” I blink back tears. “Even if you took the deal at first, what matters is that you didn’t do what the Seeker wanted. You weren’t the reason we played the game. That’s not on you. And in your own way, you tried to help us. That counts more than anything else. You hear me?!”
Nia makes her way to my side. “Maybe that’s why he’s like this. All the pressure was too much. It broke him.”
“Don’t ask me to believe that,” says Lyric, his eyes bright.
I rub my aching chest. “We’re the Fantastic Four, right? Nothing can change that. No mistakes. No monster.”
Lyric stares at Zee, who is mumbling to himself as he paces the porch.
