Happy Birthday to You (Birthday Trilogy, Book 3) (26 page)

“We didn’t stay in Whitehawk,” she said,
passing the golf course and taking us down a narrow, sketchy one-lane road. “We
stayed
behind
it.”

The street got even narrower. After a
minute the paved road turned to dirt, and before I knew it, we were traveling
at high speeds up and down small hills, with all sorts of bumps along the road,
while the trees surrounding us became more numerous by the second.

“What… what the hell…” I felt like we
could slam into a tree, or a rock, or a hobo, at any minute.

“Almost there,” Liesel said, as we
continued to bounce up and down, like we were on an annoying rollercoaster
ride.

Soon the dirt turned into small rocks,
and then bigger rocks.

“Leese, you’re gonna blow the
tire—”

“We’re here,” she said, pulling the
steering wheel to the left with all her might, slamming the dumpy truck up
against a tree.

I looked to my right to see a narrow
hiking trail.

“No other cars,” she said, jumping out of
the car. “We’re super early. I don’t think Hannah’s here yet.”

“You’re sure this is the right place?”

“Mmm hmm.”

I tried to open the door, but the tree
beside the car prevented me from opening it. I scooted to the other side and
jumped out.

“Here, grab the bag,” Liesel said,
tossing it to me before I had a chance to react. I managed to grab it though,
for a moment transported back to my high school days when I had to catch a
basketball on a split second’s notice.

Liesel had one of the paintball guns out
of the bags and in her hand—it was the powerful and lethal T16 Paintball
Marker Gun, the one that was going to kill Hannah—and she started making
her way down the hiking path. I ran up and started speed walking beside her.

But Liesel slowed down pretty quickly,
looking confused and upset, as if she was second-guessing the location we were
supposed to meet her sister at. Then she set down the gun, making me even more
nervous.

“Leese… what is it…”

She looked like she was going to throw
up—maybe she was nauseous from the chaotic car ride.

“Leese? Are you all right?”

She bent down and vomited all over the
tree trunk to the side of us. She upchucked three times, before bringing her
arm to her mouth and wiping off the remaining chunks and drool on her chin.

“Oh God,” I said. “Are you all right?”

She nodded. “I’m fine.” She turned to me.
“Just a little morning sickness.”

One of the few privileges I’d had in the
last week and a half of having so much on my mind—gaining the knowledge
that I was a male witch, meeting a long-lost and corrupt new sister of
Liesel’s, outrunning the police, losing people close to me, and struggling to
stop the end of humanity—that my wife’s pregnancy had been at the bottom
of my priorities. I’d thought about it, of course, but she was so newly
pregnant, and the world was so finitely close to destruction, that shopping for
baby clothes and picking baby names hadn’t occurred to me quite yet.

Liesel shook her head, swallowed loudly,
then
continued walking forward again. “Sorry for the
hold-up. Let’s go.”

“
Leese
.”
I grabbed her hand, and she looked at me, a glint of tears in her eyes. “We’re
going to have this baby.”

She nodded. “I know. Now’s not the time.”
She started speeding ahead again, pretending like that little incident hadn’t
just happened. “Let’s be quiet. We don’t want to make ourselves known.”

We didn’t talk much the rest of the way,
as Liesel requested. That long walk, one that I knew had the strong possibility
of being our last, left me with conflicting emotions. On one hand, people were
suffering and dying all over the world, including my own father, who just
passed away with my not getting the chance to say a proper good-bye; I knew
this Hannah bitch needed to die. On the other hand, I didn’t know, when the
time came to face her, if I would have it in me to perform a cold-blooded,
premeditated murder. I couldn’t do it with Yolanda, that adopted sister who
turned out to be on Hannah’s side, and I didn’t know, despite having an inferno
of rage building up inside of me, that I would have it in me this time.

I figured I would have another couple of
hours to consider my predicament, considering that Hannah yesterday said she
wouldn’t be meeting us until noon, but, without warning, our time for
contemplation had come to an abrupt halt.

“Oh my God,” Liesel said, bringing her
weapon not up to fire, but down to her side. “I should’ve known you’d be here.”

I looked forward to see not Hannah, but
Yolanda, standing still in the center of a circular campground, dressed all in
black, her hair up in a bun, and her legs blocking a figure behind her.

“Where’s Hannah?” Liesel asked.

“Don’t take another step,” Yolanda said.

“Or what? You gonna
talk
us to death?”
       

Yolanda laughed. None of the humanity
this girl had originally emanated existed within her anymore. She was Hannah
the 2nd, a young girl who had been brainwashed from the get-go by a maniac. “I
like your paintball guns there, Leese. You gonna
pelt
me to death?” She took a step forward. “I mean, didn’t you get
the memo? This isn’t a game we’re playing here.”

When Yolanda revealed her handgun,
pointing it straight at Liesel’s belly, my first instinct was to run in front
of my wife, which I did. I shielded her, only for a second, before Liesel emerged
behind me and started walking toward her.

“What?” Liesel said, her lips quivering,
her face reddening. “You gonna
shoot
me, Yolanda? You gonna shoot my unborn
child
?”

“Ah, ah, ah,” she said, taking a step
back. “Don’t come any closer.”

Liesel reluctantly stopped and looked
back at me, briefly, before bringing her attention back toward her adopted
sister. “Yeah? Or what?”

“Or I’ll shoot your little friend here,”
Yolanda said. “I’ll shoot him right between the eyes.”

Yolanda stepped to her right, revealing a
terrified, trembling Wesley, covered in blood, duct tape over his mouth, his
hands tied behind a tree. He was trying to talk through the tape.

He also looked fifty years old.

“Oh my God,” I said. “WES!”

“Don’t!” Liesel shouted. She jumped
forward, but Yolanda pointed the gun back at her.

“Not one step further,” Yolanda said.
“One more step, and I swear to God, I’ll do it.”

Liesel stared at her with angry eyes.
“Where… is Hannah?”

Yolanda chuckled. “Taking the one other
thing more important to Cameron than Wesley.”

What?

Wesley caught sight of me, and he sighed,
happily, as if he was grateful to see me.

“Put the gun down, Yolanda,” I said. “
Please
.” I dropped the bag of paintball
guns to the side. I knew there was nothing they could do for me now.

“Don’t be the hero,” Yolanda said. “Your
dad’s dead.
And now your mom.
If your best friend
Wesley goes, I have no idea what—”

My
mom?

“My mom?”

Yolanda nodded, and smiled.

“What did you say?” I shouted.

I marched right toward her. I didn’t care
anymore. I felt my pulse quickening, my blood boiling. I could feel the warmth
speeding toward the palms of my hands.

“Don’t make me do it, Cameron!” Yolanda
shouted, as I made my way past Liesel. “Goddammit, Cameron, I’ll do it!”

She kept pointing the gun at Wesley, but
finally, as I got even closer, she pointed the gun at me.

“I said,
stop
!” She fired the gun, and the bullet grazed my right leg.

“Owww!” I screamed.

“I said, not to come any—”

I could feel the heat in every morsel of
my body. I saw the green light rise from my right palm, and I darted my eyes to
Yolanda. A look of fear grazed her face as I pummeled my arm forward and shot a
streak of light at Yolanda’s legs, knocking her off her feet and onto her back.

“Liesel!” I screamed. “Get the gun!”

I didn’t need to shout it. Liesel had
already thought it. She leapt over me and jumped onto Yolanda, and the two
girls started fighting over the gun. I watched with anticipation, and Wesley
watched with trepidation, as Liesel grabbed the gun, then Yolanda, then Liesel
again.

Oh
please God,
I thought.
Please, please, please, please.

“Let it go!” Liesel screamed.

“No!” Yolanda shouted. “You let it go,
you bitch! You’re the one who’s supposed to die—”

When the gun fired a second time, I
brought my arm out again, this time not to unleash my powers, but to reach for
my wife.

“Liesel!”
 

She had her face turned from me, and I
couldn’t see Yolanda either. I looked at Wesley, who turned to me, a blank
expression on his face. I couldn’t tell if he was happy or sad.

But then Liesel made her way up to her
feet, and Yolanda slumped down to the ground.

Liesel turned to me, the gun in her hand.
“She pulled…” I thought my wife had been desensitized to violence at this
point, but her noticeable shaking showed me she was anything but. “She pulled
the trigger… she pulled it herself…”

It hurt to stand, and I looked down to
see a nasty bleeding wound on my right leg, but I limped forward anyway,
ignoring the pain, wanting to reach out to Liesel with my left arm, and Wesley
with my right. I hugged Liesel, briefly.

“Oh thank God,” I said, before stating
the obvious: “Let’s get Wes.”

“Of course,” she said, and she kneeled
down to untie the ropes behind Wesley’s back.

I ripped off Wesley’s duct tape first
thing.

“Owww!” he shouted.

“Oh, sorry.”

He took a deep breath and smiled. I could
see tears in his eyes. I never thought I would see my best friend again, and
the sight of him so happy to see me made me teary-eyed, too.

“What took you so long?” he asked. “It’s
taken you a few
decades
to get here.”

“You’re alive,” I said. “I’m so happy
you’re alive.”

“Of course I am,” he said with a big
smile. “Who else is gonna make your life a living Hell?”

Liesel got his wrists untied and he fell
forward, into my arms.

I held him there for a moment, a man who
physically looked like a fifty-five-year-old stranger, but someone I knew to be
the real thing, the best friend a guy could ever ask for. It was odd to see him
looking so ancient, but by now I felt grateful to have had the chance to even
see
him again.

Liesel dragged us both up to our feet. I
needed some assistance to walk, and Wesley helped.

“Hurry up, guys,” she said.

“Where’s Hannah?” I asked.

“Do you think I know? I have no idea. I’m
gonna
check my phone when we get to car. That’s the
only thing I can think—”

“I know what she’s doing, and I know
where she’s going,” Wesley said.

Liesel and I stopped
,
the car just yards
away
.

“What did you say?” I asked.

“What did she tell you?” Liesel added.

“This whole thing… it was just a decoy… a
distraction, to buy her more time.”

“More time for what?” I asked.

“She told me,” Wesley continued, “that
when the clock strikes noon today, everybody in the world is going to start
aging… not a year with every day… or a year with every hour…”

“No,” Liesel said.

“NO!” I shouted.

“…
but
a year
with every
minute
.”

I brought my hands to my face. I didn’t
know whether to cry about the sudden streak of violence that just took place,
or seeing my best friend again, or hearing that my mom was dead, or knowing
that, inevitably, this world was going to end, and that there was going to be
nothing we could do to stop it.

“It gets worse, Cam,” Wesley said.

My jaw dropped. “How could it get worse?”

“She’s taking Kimber,” he said. “And she
said she’s going to love seeing the look on your face when you realize you were
too late to save her.”

HANNAH

They ran and they screamed and they
begged and they pleaded, but there was nothing anybody could do. As Hannah
Foxwell swept through the cities, from Los Angeles to San Francisco, from
Sacramento to Reno, she annihilated everything, and everyone, in her path.

By the time she started speeding her way
through Reno, wearing a low-cut red dress, her curly black hair falling down
below her shoulders, she had already murdered over 500 people. And that didn’t
include everyone around the world she had set her diabolical curse on. Hannah
was just getting warmed up. And as she started heading up the hill toward the
Caughlin Ranch neighborhood, she giggled to herself, knowing that after the
clock struck noon, the misery and suffering and destruction in every city, in
every country, would officially begin. The end was near. And the world was
about to be hers.