Authors: Lisa Roecker
Last Fall
The night of the Spiritus bonfire felt electric with energy. The air was thick with the smell of burning wood, and students crowded around the enormous bonfire in clumps—showing off new clothes, gossiping about each other, and waiting for something to happen.
The low sun cast an orange glow over Founder’s Field, and Grace’s eyes seemed to dance in the flames.
“I’ve got a secret,” she taunted.
“You can’t keep a secret to save your life,” I laughed, running my fingers through my perfectly blown-out, brown hair. Grace had convinced me to wear it down, and I was a little self-conscious without my ponytail. The three of us had spent hours carefully selecting what we’d wear—denim skirts revealing tanned legs, dark jeans that hugged curves we wished we had, tank tops that only Maddie could fill out.
“Hey, that’s not true. She never told anyone about that time in seventh grade when I split my jeans at the school dance. Not even you.” Maddie jabbed me in the ribs.
Grace and I exchanged a knowing look and burst out laughing.
“You told? You bitch!” Maddie crossed her arms but smirked a little. “Well, yeah, then. You totally can’t keep a secret. Spill.”
“I promise I’ll tell you guys everything after tonight, but for now my lips are sealed.”
I laughed, but it sounded a little hollow, even to my own ears. I had a secret tonight too. My fingers wandered to the invitation still in my back pocket. Part of me hoped it was Grace’s secret too, that we’d see each other at the chapel and squeal with delight.
There were probably only ten more minutes of daylight left. My stomach flipped. I wasn’t sure what was going to be waiting for me at the chapel, but I couldn’t wait to find out. I looked down at my phone, nervous. I wished the invitation had given an exact time.
Dusk was such a broad term. It might be dusk right now, for all I knew. Not to mention the fact that I was supposed to enter through some kind of seal. What could that possibly mean? The way I figured it, there was about a 99 percent chance that I would completely mess this up.
The thought that I might be missing whatever was happening at the chapel got me moving.
“Hey, guys, I’ve got to…”
I turned toward Maddie and Grace, but they were gone. I saw Maddie a few steps away hanging on to Alistair Reynolds’s every word, but Grace was nowhere to be seen. Maybe we shared the same secret after all.
I started to casually make my way to the path in the surrounding woods that led to Station 11, the Pemberly chapel.
Ad vitam aeternam
. “To eternal life.” The chapel was a relic from back when Pemberly Brown was an all-girls school. The old building hadn’t been used in years, and all the entrances were supposedly sealed, which added to my nervousness about finding a way in.
I was almost to the edge of the woods when I heard footsteps behind me. Was someone following me? Grace? I came to a quick stop, spun around, and was face-to-face with Bradley Farrow.
My heart stopped. I know it’s cheesy and cliché, but when I turned around to find my face inches from Bradley’s, my lips just a breath away from his, my heart stood still for just a second.
“Hey, Kate.” He smiled his lazy smile and ran a hand over his head.
He knew my name. He actually knew my name.
“Uh…hi, Bradley.” The boy I dreamed about at night and accessorized for in the morning was talking to me, and all I could say was “Uh…hi?”
Shoot me. Shoot me now
.
“What are you doing out here by yourself?” He glanced in the direction of the chapel and then looked right at me. I noticed that his eyes were so dark you couldn’t even make out the pupils. The kind of eyes you could get lost in. “It’s dangerous out here.”
I couldn’t be sure if he was joking or not, so I laughed, but it came out like a choked snort.
Nice work, Kate. I’ve heard guys just love a good snort.
“I was just…um…walking?” I followed this riveting piece of conversation with a high-pitched giggle, which I unsuccessfully attempted to stifle with my hand. Who was this girl who could barely string two words together, snorting and cackling like a lunatic?
“Well, you shouldn’t be by yourself.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and actually looked a little shy. “Wanna take a walk with me?”
My entire body tingled with the possibility of a walk with Bradley Farrow. In fact, I’m fairly sure that if my body could talk, it would have screamed “
Yes!
” or more likely a completely inappropriate line from one of my mom’s trashy romance novels like “Take me, Bradley. Take me
now!
”
So, yeah, I wanted to take a walk with Bradley more than just about anything in the entire world. The sky was pink and orange, the sun low on the horizon, and the smell of burning leaves tickled my nose. It felt like a night when anything could happen, a night made for long walks with cute boys.
But I was supposed to be at the chapel.
I stole a quick glance back at the path and figured that whatever was waiting for me could wait a little longer. It wasn’t dark yet. Surely, whoever had sent the invitation wouldn’t notice if I was just a few minutes late.
I looked up at Bradley, the last of the setting sun casting a warm glow over his entire face. His eyelashes picked up the light, and I realized I was close enough to see every. single. one.
“Sure, I can take a quick walk,” I said, breathlessly.
He began to lead the way but slowed down so I could fall into step beside him. As we were walking, practically bumping shoulders, I felt his fingers slide down my arm and grasp my hand. I hoped he couldn’t feel the goose bumps that had spread across my skin the moment he touched me or see the dorky smile on my face.
As we drifted farther away from the bonfire, I saw someone running toward the forest. When I saw the pearls bouncing around her neck, I knew without a doubt that it was Grace.
Present Day
The text came late at night. Cameron was finally ready to talk. The thought of getting into a car alone with him scared the crap out of me, but after so many unanswered texts, I didn’t really have a choice. I had to ask him about the drawing and Grace. If I was going to figure out what had really happened to her, I needed answers, and Cameron was the only person who seemed to have them.
And that’s how I found myself scribbling a note to my parents about studying for a Chem test at Naomi Farrow’s house. Yeah, she’s Bradley’s younger sister, but she was also on the tennis team with me and someone my mom remembered as “that nice girl with the gorgeous eyes.”
If I got caught, this would probably end with my parents putting me under house arrest and forcing Dr. Prozac to move in to provide one-on-one coaching. Celebs might look cool rocking those ankle bracelets, but one of those things would totally clash with my wardrobe.
I sat in the formal living room we never used and waited for Cameron’s car to turn into my driveway. I found myself wishing I didn’t have to do this alone. Not only had he transformed from a recreational drug user into a flat-out addict in less than a year, but it was looking more and more like he knew something about what had happened to Grace that night.
This was definitely not what my parents would call “a smart decision.” Probably safe to add “smart decisions” to the long list of things that I’d lost over the past year. I hadn’t made one of those in a long time.
I twisted the pearls that had permanently taken residence around my neck. Grace was my best friend. I hadn’t been there the night she needed me most. But I was here now. And I owed it to her to find out the truth. She had said it herself:
Find Cameron. He knows.
Plus what did it matter? The worst had already happened.
Headlights swung across the living room, illuminating the stuffy furniture. I set the house alarm, pushed the button to the garage door, and expertly slid under, pearls bouncing as I jogged to his car.
“Hey,” I said, climbing into his SUV. “Thanks for picking me up.”
When Cameron didn’t answer, I turned and was shocked at the sight of him. His light brown hair was matted and greasy-looking. Angry circles darkened his eyes, and his mouth hung slightly open.
I thought about getting out of the car—my hand even brushed the handle of the door—but before I could make a move, I heard the muffled click of the locks and Cameron threw the car in reverse, barreling down my driveway. Tires squealed as the Range Rover backed into the street.
What was I thinking? The car was suddenly too warm and too small. My pulse raced, and I started to panic.
“Maybe we could talk inside,” I suggested. “Let’s go back up to the house.”
Silence from Cameron.
Instead of turning back into the driveway, Cameron put the car in drive and hit the gas pedal. Hard. We sped around the corner and came inches away from taking down a mailbox. My heart raced, and my whole body tingled with adrenaline.
“Cameron?” My voice sounded tiny. “Slow down…please.”
The stoplight in front of us turned yellow, and I felt the car speed up instead of slow down. Yellow turned to red, and at the last moment, Cameron slammed on the brakes. We skidded to a stop, the rear of the car pulling to the side after the sudden loss of momentum.
A beer bottle rolled out from beneath my seat and hit my right foot. Cigarette butts littered the floor. And, oh God, was that a joint? Drugs, alcohol, and cigarettes—the car was like a rolling trifecta of substance abuse.
“What were you doing in my locker?” Cameron’s question cut through the silence. He ran his fingers through his greasy hair and turned to face me.
“I…I don’t know what you’re talking about.” The shakiness after my initial adrenaline rush reminded me that I was not out of danger. Not by a long shot. My legs twitched, preparing to jump out of the car at a moment’s notice, and my heart pounded in my chest, warning me not to get too comfortable.
“Cut the shit, Kate.” He threw something that landed in my lap. When I picked it up, I realized it was my silver monogrammed bracelet. It must have fallen off while I was rummaging through Cameron’s locker. The worst part was that I hadn’t even noticed it was missing. How could I have been so stupid?
“I know you went through my locker. Did you find what you were looking for?”
He’d caught me, and I had no idea what to say. “Cameron, I just want to go home. Please. I think I might be sick,” I begged.
As hard as I fought them, I couldn’t avoid the tears. They fell quickly, leaving salty trails down my cheeks.
The light turned green, and Cameron hit the gas pedal with so much force that his entire body shifted and my head hit the back of the seat. The beer bottle rolled back to its original hiding place.
“That drawing you stole is important. You have no idea what you’re getting into. You ruined everything. Things with me and Grace were supposed to be different.” Cameron was gripping the steering wheel so tightly that his knuckles were almost as white as mine clutching the sides of the seat.
His words cut through me.
I
was the one who ruined everything between him and Grace?
If
he
wasn’t such a psycho,
we
wouldn’t even be having this conversation. My fear was replaced with anger…well, most of it.
“I know you were there that night,” I whispered. My entire body began to shake when I heard the words escape my mouth. “It wasn’t just some random accident, was it?”
For a second, I wondered if he hadn’t heard me. And then Cameron swerved the car onto the shoulder and came to a screeching halt.
For what felt like hours, neither of us said a word. The exhausted motor hummed in the background, and Cameron held his face in his hands.
A few minutes later, he lifted his head, reached over, and grabbed me roughly by the shoulders. If this were a movie, all fifteen years of my life would have flashed right before my eyes.
“You have no idea who you’re dealing with, Kate.” His voice was slow, controlled. “You snooped around, found some stuff you don’t understand, and now you think you’ve got it all figured out.” He slammed his fist down on the dashboard so hard that the entire car quivered beneath me.
“News flash, Kate!” A vein on his forehead pulsed in sync with my pounding heart. He reached over and gripped my upper arm. “You don’t know anything!”
Wrong. I did know one thing: I needed to get the hell out of that car.
I clawed at his arm with my nonexistent nails, and he released his grip as though he’d woken up and didn’t know where he was.
“Kate, wait…”
I fumbled around for the door lock, grabbed at the car handle, and practically fell out of the car and onto someone’s front lawn. The second my feet hit the ground I took off down the sidewalk.
I heard Cameron open his door, but I’d already put a respectable distance between the two of us.
“Wait! You don’t understand. Let me explain.” He let out a howl filled with rage, pain, and grief. The noise was almost inhuman.
I had to get away from him.
I must have looked ridiculous sprinting down the street, because I earned myself quite a few honks and more than one “Yeah, baby!”
Just as I was congratulating myself on my impressive endurance, one of the straps of my flip-flops broke and left me limping down the sidewalk. A halo of tangled fuchsia hair framed my face, I could feel the makeup melting off my eyes, and I was carrying one of my shoes.
But at that moment, I wasn’t really thinking about how I looked. Instead I obsessively looked over my shoulder for Cameron and his Range Rover. The memory of his fingers wrapped around my arm forced me to pick up my pace despite my broken shoe.
And then, like a mirage, it appeared before me. The caffeine-fueled haven where nothing bad could ever happen. The white letters on the green sign spelled out “Starbucks,” but it should have said, “Safety.”
I hobbled inside, thankful that I’d stuffed the twenty dollars my parents had left for takeout into my pocket before I left the house. Maybe if I had a venti Frap and calmed down a little, I could call someone for a ride home.
Of course, nothing ever goes the way you plan it. It’s like Newton’s Law or something. Or wait—maybe it’s Isaac’s Law? Whatever. It’s that law where some guy basically says that the worst-case scenario almost always happens. And that night when I stumbled into Starbucks, I was like a walking hypothesis doomed to prove his theory absolutely, unequivocally right.