Sanctum (8 page)

“We spent a day digging up old stuff in the library when we were putting this whole thing together. Camford tried to throw them out, but the college allowed it, so they started setting up on the campus every year. I guess Student Affairs thought it might be fun to bring back the tradition.”

“The twenties?” Dan asked. “The nineteen twenties?” He shot a look to Abby and Jordan, making sure they were catching this.

“Yeah,” Micah replied, squinting. “The nineteen twenties. Why? You big on old carnivals or something?”

“Just . . . interested in local history is all.” Dan felt Abby’s sharp elbow work its way into his ribs. That was a familiar feeling by now. “We’ll definitely have to check it out for ourselves.”

“God, no thank you. I’ll call them back later.” It was Cal. Across from Jordan, he took out his mobile and watched it vibrate and chime in his palm. With his free hand he flopped the reddish-brown fringe of hair out of his eyes and then tucked the phone away. “It’s the counselor’s office. Probably about Doug. Poor little dude.”

“How is he doing?” Abby asked politely.

After swallowing a mouthful of spinach, Cal dabbed his mouth with a napkin, folded it into a precise square, tucked it onto his lap, and said, “He’s a good kid. Just under too much pressure, I think. Grades’ll make anyone crack. But he’ll be all right once he sees his parents. And the college takes this kind of thing very seriously. They’ll make sure he’s safe until they can cart him out of here and back home.” Cal spoke with his hands, and a huge class ring flashed on his middle finger as he did.

“Did he . . .” Abby cleared her throat, then spoke up more clearly. “Did you find out anything about why he might have homed in on Dan like that?”

“No clue,” Cal said casually, turning back to his salad. “Was kinda spooky though, right? Daniel Crawford! Daniel Craaaawford . . .” He stuck his arms straight out like a wandering zombie. Snorting, he shook his head, laughing at his own joke. Then he paused, frowning and glancing up from his food. “Say . . . Crawford? Dan Crawford? Like Daniel Crawford the old Brookline warden?”

Dan felt a cold stone sink to the bottom of his gut. “No relation,” he choked out.

“That’s good, that’s good. Guy was a piece of work.” Cal chuckled, forking down another helping of spinach.

“Who is this?” Lara asked absently.

“Yes, pray tell,” Jordan said shrilly, “who
is
that?”

“Some genius who ran the old Brookline asylum back in its glory days. He had some pretty radical ideas but he was working with some of the most insane criminals in the country, so you have to give the guy credit for trying.” This time when Cal laughed, Dan wanted to smack him. “Learned all about him in seminar this semester. Professor Reyes made us write like ten papers on the dude. Major overkill, but better than busywork, I guess.”

“You don’t and shouldn’t have to give the guy
credit
.” Unbelievable. Professor Reyes was teaching students that the warden was some kind of misunderstood genius. Dan’s face felt hot, sweat breaking out at his temples. Next to him, he saw Abby go rigid with fear.

“Excuse me?” Cal finally put down his fork.

Dan felt a tremor start in his leg. “Did you know he based his experiments off of eugenics and exceptionalism? You can’t give him a pass just because he was working with the criminally insane. That doesn’t excuse anything.”

“I think you have to acknowledge the gray area here . . . ,” Cal started, but he wasn’t allowed to finish.

“What do you know about it?” Dan interrupted, smacking his hand on the table.

“Uh, probably more than you, man. And no offense, but I’m not going to sit here arguing with a
prospie
.”

“Who’d like some air?” Micah said suddenly, standing and knocking his tray halfway off the table. He caught it just before it fell. “I should show Dan where he’ll be staying for the weekend. You two should do the same.”

“Yeah,” Cal said with a shrug. “Yeah, whatever. See ya.”

Dan got to his feet, but not before turning to his friends. While Cal concentrated on his food, Jordan mouthed “economics major” and then “boat shoes.”

“I’ll text you guys soon,” Dan said quickly.

“I don’t like us getting separated,” Abby whispered, a little frantic.

“We’ll meet back up right after this,” he replied. “I promise.”

Outside, the same light rain fell, and Micah pulled out an umbrella that looked big enough to be a backup tent for the carnival. Dan kept his eyes averted from Brookline as they left the Commons, unable to shake the fear that discussing the warden had been enough to wake his presence, like some kind of urban legend. Who was he kidding? If the nightmares were any indication, the warden had never really gone away.

“Ignore Cal,” Micah said, walking briskly next to him. “He was just showing off. Probably trying to impress your friend.”

“My . . . ?” Dan frowned. “You mean Jordan? God, I hope not. Jordan deserves way better.”

“Oh.” Micah laughed, maybe with sudden clarity. “I’m sure your friend can fend for himself then.”

“If Cal’s such a jerkbag, why are you friends with him?”

Micah just shrugged. “Good question.”

They traveled along the paved path that snaked across the quad. Brookline now loomed behind them, and Micah cut through the wet grass diagonally, taking them back to Erickson. Micah held up his plastic ID card to the sensor outside the door and it swung open, allowing them inside.

“There’s a temporary one in your folder,” Micah explained. “It only works on some of the buildings, but just let me know if you want to see the gym or anything like that.”

Dan followed Micah to the elevators in the dorm lobby. Micah turned to face him, looking like he had something important to say.

“Listen, Dan, Cal’s not always a bad guy,” he explained. “He was one of the first people I ever met on campus. We were fast friends back in freshman year and even roomies for second year, but people change. I mean . . .” He shrugged, crossing his arms and leaning against the carpeted wall in the elevator as it pulled them up to the third floor. “What if one of your buddies changed? Would you just drop them?”

Dan didn’t have an answer for that. It wasn’t like Jordan or Abby could ever become as nauseatingly vapid as Cal, who’d parroted what Professor Reyes told him without questioning it. Dan grimaced. Professor Reyes. He’d known he was going to have to confront her sooner or later.

“And not to pry,” Micah continued, stopping Dan from answering what he now assumed was a rhetorical question, “but how do you know so much about Brookline just from staying there? Most prospies get here and they don’t know thing one about this school, but you seem like some sort of expert.”

The elevator doors opened, allowing Dan a moment to think up a clever enough response. After having a strange kid scream in his face and nearly jump out of a window, Dan wasn’t exactly
keen
to cozy up to anyone on campus.

“I’m not most kids,” Dan said. He followed Micah out through the common room—not the same one from before, luckily—and into a corridor. They turned right and then stopped outside a door marked 312. “I mean, besides staying in Brookline this summer, I’ve also just been looking forward to college since I can remember. I’ve been taking the whole search seriously.”

“Like me, then?” Micah smiled crookedly at him and unlocked the door. It swung open to reveal a shoe box of a room, cramped but extremely tidy. An air mattress was already set up next to the window. Micah wandered in that direction. “I couldn’t wait to get the hell out of high school. Small town. Small minds. Scattered family. Good people, sure, but I was ready for a change.”

“I know the feeling,” Dan said absently.

A soft knock came at the door behind him. Micah went to answer, and Dan heard his luggage being dropped off by another host student. He took the moment to gaze around the room, spotting two acoustic guitars in the corner, a desk with the biggest computer he had ever seen, and walls choked with posters for sci-fi movies. On the dresser, a row of martial arts trophies was lined up underneath a huge map of Louisiana. Dan leaned in close to the map, looking at the red Sharpie circle around one city.

“Cata . . . Cata . . .” He couldn’t get his mouth around the word.

“Catahoula?”

“
Gesundheit
,” Dan said with a smirk. “Is that home?”

Micah set down Dan’s bag next to the air mattress and stretched, then nodded. “For a little while, it was, then Shreveport, then Baton Rouge.”

Dan circled the room, picking up other little details as he went—the dean’s list taped above Micah’s computer, commendations from the Biological Sciences and Philosophy Departments, a few photos of what he assumed was family back home, and a whole line of miniature
Star Wars
figurines underneath his monitor. A row of frames hung near his academic accolades, black-and-white photos showing an old plantation house with a tall oak on the right and what looked like a stream behind it. A formal family portrait filled the next frame, in which a woman in a frilly dress sat in the middle of a herd of befrocked children, all of them staring out at the camera with that old-timey, dead-eyed stare.

“Family?” Dan asked, leaning in closer to the photos. He bumped one of the
Star Wars
figurines and hurried to right it.

“Mom’s side of the family. That’s the old Arnaud Plantation house. Just my grandmother lives there now but she never liked me much. The place is falling down—haunted too. The way my grandma tells it, that’s a badge of honor.” Micah chuckled and joined Dan near the desk. “You mentioned wanting to major in psych—you analyzing me now?”

“Sorry, I guess I’m being pushy,” Dan replied, a little sheepish. “Social stuff isn’t my strong suit.”

“Don’t worry, Dan, I was kidding. ’Sides, you seem social enough. I don’t think I talked to anyone I didn’t have to the first week I was here.” Micah sat down at his desk, watching as Dan circled back to the window and the air mattress. “I’d spent some time in juvie for stealing, and I straightened myself out after that. My uncle went to NHC, and it was his big idea to get me to work hard and apply. No tearful good-byes with family; nobody really gave a damn that I was going except my uncle. Cal was one of the first people to pull me out of my shell. Guess that’s why we’re still buddies, even if he can be an asshole.”

Juvie? That gave Dan pause, not because he was judging, but because he felt some newfound respect at the way Micah had been able to turn his life around after something like that.

Dan moved to look out the window. Through the mist rising between buildings, he could make out another window across the way, where the rough shape of a human being watched back. Squinting, Dan leaned in closer to the glass and then felt a cold finger trace up his spine;
Doug, poor Doug
, was staring back at him.

“What the hell . . . ,” he murmured. “Is that—what building is that?”

Micah joined him at the window, bounding there in two big steps. “Oh, Goddamn it. That’s the health center. You’d think they woulda had that kid out of here by now.”

Dan couldn’t look away, not when he could tell, even from this distance, that Doug was shouting “DANIEL CRAWFORD” at the window. Someone appeared over Doug’s shoulder then and dragged him away. The last thing Dan saw of him were pale fingers knotted into claws, pawing at the foggy glass.

“You okay?”

Dan nodded. He leaned onto the dresser pushed under the window, then straightened his elbows and stood up tall. A little disoriented, he wavered, grabbing the dresser again and knocking over a candle. He steadied it, turning it over in his hand. It was red wax and half-melted, but what was left of it looked like the base of a crimson skull.

When he refocused his eyes he could see his own frightened reflection in the glass.

“Fine. Yeah . . . Fine.”

“Have you thought about what classes you want to sit in on? A few professors are having special sessions over the weekend so you guys can check out what kind of discussion and workload you can expect.”

Only half listening, Dan felt his head go up and down, up and down. Nod . . . Nod . . . The fear inside him transforming, slowly, but transforming nonetheless.