He wasn’t thinking. He just wanted me home safe.
I blinked away tears. Great. Even examining a corpse couldn’t stop me from worrying about my dad.
What about this guy? Someone had to be concerned about him. If I could contact his ghost, maybe I could relay a message. But I couldn’t risk accidentally summoning him back into his corpse, like I had with the bats.
A tap on my shoulder sent me spinning.
“Sorry,” Simon said. “I thought you heard me coming. I see you found our roomie. Trying to communicate?”
“Trying not to communicate.”
“Looks like he’s been here awhile.” He crouched beside the corpse. “We could play CSI, figure out how long he’s been dead. I don’t see any bugs.”
“Wrong time of year.”
He winced. “Duh, right. It’s still too cold in here. He definitely died a few months ago, meaning no bugs. I should have known that. Derek did a science fair experiment a couple years ago on bugs and decomposition.” He caught my look. “Yeah, gross. Kind of interesting, too, but I wouldn’t ask Derek about it. He was pissed. Only placed second in the city finals.”
“Slacker.” I backed up as he straightened. “I’m done here, though, so I’d better get farther away. Me and corpses don’t mix.” I considered telling him about the bats. I wanted to tell someone, talk it over, get advice, but…“I was just seeing whether I could use my powers to find it.”
“I’m guessing the answer is yes.”
I nodded and we left the room.
“We can find another place to stay,” he said. “Derek’s fine with that. Really.”
“I’m okay. Speaking of Derek, where is he?”
“Still shopping. He sent me back to hang with you.” He leaned down to my ear. “I think he just wanted to spend more time with Tori.”
I laughed. “Want to take bets on who makes it back alive?”
“Derek. No contest. Last I saw, he was ordering her to go find more blankets. By now, he’s probably on his way here, leaving her to find her own way and hoping she doesn’t.”
“How mad is he? About her being with us?”
“Mad? I’d rate it a five. Annoyed? An eleven. He’ll get over it. We all have to. At least until she gets bored and remembers a long-lost aunt in Peoria.”
When we got back to our spot, Simon set out a spread of the best a convenience store had to offer—juice, milk, yogurt, apples, wheat crackers, and cheese slices.
“All the food groups…except one.” He handed me a candy bar. “Dessert.”
“Thanks.”
“Now, if you’ll excuse me a moment, I’ll spare you the sight of blood and needles before dining.”
“It’s okay. That stuff doesn’t bother me.”
He still turned around, to test his blood, then give himself a shot.
“And I thought annual flu shots were bad,” I said. “Do you have to do that every day?”
“Three times for the needle. More for the testing.”
“Three needles?”
He put the pouch away. “I’m used to it. I was diagnosed when I was three, so I don’t ever remember not getting them.”
“And you’ll always have to do that?”
“There’s a pump I can use. Stick it on my leg and it monitors my blood sugar and injects insulin. I got one when I turned thirteen. But…” He shrugged. “I had a deal with my dad, that I could only have one if I didn’t use it as a license to eat whatever I wanted. Too much insulin isn’t good. I screwed up.”
“Too many of these?” I waved the candy bar.
“Nah. Too many carbs in general. I’d go out for pizza with the team, and I wouldn’t want to have only two slices if everyone else was scarfing down six. You get razzed about being on a diet, being such a girl…”
“Now there’s an insult.”
“Hey, I was thirteen. I know it was stupid, but when you’re always the new kid, you just want to fit in. I guess you know what that’s like. You’ve probably been in as many schools as we have.”
“Ten…no, eleven.”
“It’s a tie. Cool.” He took a bite of his apple. “Now that I’m approaching the very mature age of sixteen, though, I’ve gotten over that. Dad and I were negotiating for me to get the pump back again when he disappeared.”
“Simon?” Tori’s voice echoed through the building.
“So much for peace and quiet,” he muttered, then called, “We’re back here.”
Twenty-one
DEREK RETURNED BEARING SHOPPING bags and cash. I’d given him my bank card and PIN, and he’d found an ATM without a camera. My card still worked. He’d withdrawn my limit of four hundred dollars. We couldn’t do this again—every time I used it, the bank would know I was still in Buffalo, and Derek was afraid the Edison Group might be able to find that out.
He handed me the cash and receipt, discreetly folded. Tori snatched the receipt and opened it.
“My God, is this your bank account or college fund?”
I took it back. “My dad direct-deposits my allowance. After fifteen years, it adds up.”
“And he just lets you access it?”
“Why wouldn’t he?”
“Um, because you could spend it. No, wait. Let me guess. You’re too responsible for that.”
“She’s smart,” Simon said.
“Is that what you call it? I was thinking more…” She yawned.
My cheeks heated.
“Enough,” Derek growled.
“Yeah, don’t forget who gave you money for this.” Simon nudged Tori’s shopping bag.
Tori’s jaw twitched. “It was twenty bucks for food and a blanket, and I’m keeping tabs. I’ll pay her back. I’m responsible, too. Just not”—she waved at my receipt—“disgustingly responsible.”
I took my bag from Derek. “So what did I get?” I reached inside. “A backpack. Two sweaters. Thank—”
The sweaters unrolled, and Tori choked on her mouthful of soda, laughing.
I turned, slowly and calmly, to her. “Your choices?”
She lifted her hands. “Uh-uh. I offered to pick something out, but Derek insisted.” She turned to him. “No wonder you were gone so long. Must have had a hard time finding ones that ugly.”
He’d bought me two identical gray hooded sweatshirts, made from the tacky polyester found only in the cheapest discount stores, the kind that shimmers like plastic and picks at your skin.
“What?” Derek said.
“They’re fine. Thanks.”
Tori reached out and caught the tag, then laughed. “I thought so. They’re boys’. Size twelve boys.”
“So? The women’s cost more. I figured it wouldn’t make a difference with Chloe.”
Tori looked at me. Then she looked at my chest and started to laugh.
“What?” Derek said.
“Nothing,” Tori sputtered. “You’re just being honest, right?”
“Tori?” Simon said. “Shut up. Chloe, we’ll grab something else for you tomorrow.”
“No, Derek’s right. These will fit. Thanks.” Cheeks burning, I mumbled something about trying them on and fled the room.
When dusk began to fall, we settled in for the night. It was only eight o’clock and Tori complained bitterly. Derek told her she was free to stay awake, as long as she didn’t use the lantern batteries and could still wake up at dawn. We weren’t living in a world of light switches anymore. We had to use the sun when we could and sleep when we couldn’t.
That was fine by me. I wasn’t in the mood for a slumber party. Simon had tried cheering me up, but that only brought me down all the more. I didn’t want to need to be cheered. I wanted to roll with the punches, bounce back smiling.
I couldn’t stop thinking about Aunt Lauren. I thought of Rae, too, and my dad, but most of all I thought of Aunt Lauren. I could tell myself Dad and Rae were safe for now. The Edison Group wouldn’t bother my father as long as he knew nothing about them. And Rae was well on her way to “rehabilitation,” according to that file. But with Aunt Lauren, I could find no such rationalization for the Edison Group to keep her alive. Every time I opened my eyes, I expected to see her ghost standing in front of me.
Even when I managed to force myself not to worry, the only alternative was more mundane concerns and a general feeling of disappointment.
I’d found the guys. I’d brought Simon his insulin. I’d single-handedly uncovered the secrets of the Edison Group. My reward? Having Tori take potshots at me every chance she got, trying to make me look bad in front of Simon.
If there was any point in my life when I should have been anything but dull and boring, it was now. I could talk to the dead. I could raise the dead. In the last week, I’d plotted and schemed enough to win a spot on Survivor.
Yet all I could picture was Tori yawning.
It was nice having Simon defend me, but it wasn’t any more than he might do for a little sister. I kept thinking of that—the way he’d come to my defense, the way he’d squeeze my hand, the way he’d lean in and whisper to me—and I wanted to read more into it. But I couldn’t.
And so what? With everything that was going on, was I really feeling sorry for myself because a cute guy wasn’t interested in me “that way”? That made me worse than boring. It made me the silly twit Derek seemed to think I was.
Speaking of Derek…and I’d really rather not…had I forgotten what he could be like? No, I’d just forgotten what it felt like to be on the receiving end. Between him and Tori, at least I’d come out of this with a thicker skin. Or lose every ounce of self-confidence I had.
A night for tossing and turning, lost in nightmares of Aunt Lauren and my dad and Rae. I kept waking up, gasping and sweating, everyone around me sound asleep. I’d gulp cold air and calm down enough to join them only to have the nightmares return.
Finally my sleeping brain found a distraction in the same place my waking brain had: thoughts of the dead body in the other room. No objective, sympathetic examination of his situation this time, though. I dreamed of dragging that poor spirit back to his shell, screaming and cursing me.
Then the dream changed and I was back in the crawl space. The musty, awful stench of death surrounded me. I felt Derek behind me, the heat of his body radiating, as he whispered, “Chloe, come on.”
Come where? I was trapped in the crawl space, with those horrors crawling toward me, cold skeletal fingers touching me, the stink of them making my stomach churn.
Derek shook me, and I tried to push him away, tell him he wasn’t helping—
“Chloe!”
I jerked awake, the dream evaporating. Above me, green eyes glinted in the darkness.
“Derek? What—?”
He clamped his hand over my mouth. His lips moved to my ear. “Are you awake now? I need you to do something for me.”
The urgency in his voice knocked any sleepiness from my head. I squinted at him in the darkness. Were his eyes feverish? Or was that just their usual weird glow, like a cat’s in the dark?
I pulled his hand away. “Are you Changing again?”
“What? No. I’m fine. Just listen, okay? Remember the body in the other room?” He spoke slowly, carefully.
I nodded.
“You’re going to think about that body for me, okay? About the spirit that was in it. You need to release the—”
“Release? I—I didn’t summon—”
“Shhh. Just concentrate on releasing it without waking the others. Can you do that?”
I nodded. Then I tried to sit up. Something heavy held my legs to the floor. I pushed onto my elbows. Derek lunged so fast all I saw was his dark form coming down on me, hands going to my shoulders, slamming me back into the ground, pinning me down.
I freaked. I didn’t stop to wonder what he was doing. My brain just registered a guy on top of me in the middle of the night, and instinct kicked in. I lashed out, arms and legs flailing. My nails caught his cheek, and he fell back with a grunt of pain.
I scrambled up, legs still weighted down…and now I saw why. A corpse was crawling up me.
It was the one from the next room, little more than a skeleton, covered in clothing and strips of leathery flesh. Greasy hanks of hair patchworked its skull. Its eyes were empty pits. Its lips were long gone, leaving a skull’s permanent grin of rotted teeth.
When I let out a whimper, it stopped and tried to hold its head upright, skull swaying from side to side, eye sockets searching blindly, jaws opening with a guttural gah-gah-gah.
I let out a bona fide “Scream Queen” shriek that rang through the room.
I kicked and fought, trying to get out from under the thing. Derek grabbed me by the armpits and yanked me out. He slapped his hand over my mouth, but I could still hear my scream, echoing around me. He growled for me to shut up and as I tried to obey, I realized it wasn’t me screaming now.
“What is that?” Tori shrieked. “What is that?”
The flick of a flashlight. A beam shining in our eyes. And then she really screamed, loud enough to make my ears ring. The corpse reared up, mouth opening, screaming back, a high-pitched wail.
Simon woke up, too. When he saw the corpse, he let out a string of profanity.
“Shut her up!” Derek snarled to Simon, jabbing a finger at Tori. “Chloe! Calm down. You need to calm down.”
I nodded, gaze fixed on that thing. I tried to remind myself it wasn’t a “thing” but a person, yet all I could see was a skeleton held together by bits of flesh, that eyeless head swaying, those teeth clicking—