Chapter Three

Chapter Three

Anora and the Confrontation

“Anora! Anora!” It takes me a moment to realize someone’s calling my name. I close my fingers over the coin and emerge from the line of trees, finding Shy looking for me.

He stops a few feet away. “You left your things in class.” He unshoulders my backpack and holds it out to me. I take it from him, hugging the bag to my chest, careful to keep the coin clasped tight in my hand as I slip it into the mesh side pocket.

“Thanks,” I whisper, but I can’t meet his gaze. I’m not sure I can handle those eyes, already familiar because they’ve studied me so much today.

“Do you have panic attacks often?”

Now I can’t help looking at him. “Panic attacks?”

“Yeah. I’m assuming that’s what happened in art…why you ran outside.”

I bite my lip. “No, I don’t have them often.”

We’re silent for a moment, and then I take a quick breath. “I’m guessing this will end up on Roundtable.”

“So you’ve been introduced?” He looks down at his feet and then away across campus. “Let me guess, the ever-so-enlightening Lennon told you?”

I narrow my eyes. “What do you have against her?”

“Nothing. It’s more the app I have a problem with. It’s…ruined people here.”

Not what I want to hear.

“Can’t the administration or someone stop it?”

“Trust me, people have tried. It just resurfaces about a week later with a different look. It’s like someone knows how to work around anything they put up to block it.”

Great.I’ll be under constant threat of having my crazy projected to the entire school.

“We should probably get to class,” Shy says after a moment. “The teachers are really fond of detention.”

Just as we start to walk, a loud caw makes my heart jump in my throat. I spin around to see a large black bird swoop down from the branches of a tree and fly into the bright sky—the only witness to my secret.

“Is that a crow?” I ask Shy, and when I look at him, my heart falls from my throat into my stomach. His expression holds tension and what seems like confusion.

“No.” He shifts his bright-eyed gaze to me. “A raven.”

I swallow hard. Thank God birds can’t talk.

* * *

My last class of the day is physical education. Lennon and I change in the field house and walk to the football field where a black track circles the turf. Even though it’s warm, Lennon wears a baggy, long-sleeved shirt. I wonder why she feels the need to hide her thin frame.

The air around me is punctuated with coaches’ whistles, the crack of helmets and gear, and high-pitched chants from cheerleaders practicing on the sidelines. Apparently in Oklahoma, the athletes have their last period of the day to start practice, while the rest of us have to suffer through PE. Among the cheerleaders is Natalie, who continues her routine while keeping an eye on me—a combination of skills I find equally impressive and annoying.

We merge with the crowd of PE students as Coach David instructs us.

“You know the drill. Run one lap, walk one lap—five sets,” says Coach David, though he doesn’t look like he’s all that invested in our overall wellness. “Anyone who wants extra credit can run two laps and walk one.”

Extra credit? Who needs extra credit in PE?Then Coach David addresses Lennon and me. “Ryder, new girl—” Students turn to stare and move a couple of steps away. Clearly, they heard about my episode in art class. Lennon’s the only one who doesn’t seem to know—or care. “Ten points deducted for tardiness.”

Seriously? Today is the worst.

Coach David places the whistle in his mouth and blows. Lennon and I hang back until most of the crowd disbands.

“By the way,” Lennon says, nudging me with her elbow before we hit our stride running. “He’s number twenty-two.”

“Who?”

“Shy.” Lennon gives me a lopsided grin, and I avoid her gaze, hoping to hide my flushed face. “He’s hard to forget, isn’t he?”

The tone of Lennon’s voice is admiring, and I wonder if she has a crush on Shy, but what I’ve seen of their interactions today told me the feelings definitely aren’t reciprocated. Who has caught Shy’s attention, and how many of those girls has Natalie managed to chase away with her overprotectiveness?

We begin our lap.

“So,” I say, breathing raggedly. “This curfew thing…does anyone actually obey it?”

“Yeah, it’s hard not to.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, the doors lock at ten, and the only exits that work have fire alarms.”

This place is more like a prison than I imagined. No wonder Shy’s glad he doesn’t live here.

“Apparently, there were talks about lifting it, but then about fifty years back, a girl snuck out after curfew and hung herself in front of Emerson Hall. Left a suicide note and everything.”

Well, that explains a few things. Though it doesn’t explain what she wanted from me.

“But why keep curfew for the whole county?”

She shrugs. “I guess they think it controls crime. Lots of people on Roundtable have speculated about it, but it’s all woo-woo stuff about cults and mind control and rumors about ghosts from the old asylum cursing the whole town. None of it makes sense.”

I have a feeling the curfew has to do with the dead. They have a tendency to disrupt things, especially after dark.

“You’re not thinking about breaking curfew, are you?” Lennon asks.

There is only one reason I want outside after midnight, and it has nothing to do with the dead. It has nothing to do with boys. It has everything to do with my dreams.

“No.”

Lennon sounds relieved. “Good. You won’t like it anyway.”

“Why?”

Lennon starts to slow her pace and hesitates. “It’s just…things are different after midnight. The air feels…heavy and all the lights flicker. Sometimes I swear the wind moans.”

Maybe Lennon believes some of the woo-woo stuff after all. “So you’ve been out past curfew?”

It takes Lennon a moment to answer. “Once.”

It’s the only word she offers, but the way she delivers it—so light, like a feather coming to rest on a still lake—ripples through me, and I know whatever she saw after midnight is something she doesn’t want to remember. Tension builds between us—the push and pull of my wish for answers and her resistance—but I don’t want to press her, because I need at least one friend so I can prove to Mom I’m trying.

We slow to a walk after running two laps. I look to see if Coach David is watching—he isn’t. Then I glance toward the field and find Shy looking back at me. He has his helmet cradled in his arm; his blond hair sticks to his forehead. I catch his stare before he has a chance to hide his narrow eyes and tight lips. He tries to recover, smiling brightly and waving. I wave back, but his expression makes me think what happened in art has left him both curious and suspicious of me.

“It’s almost unfair,” Lennon says.

“What is?”

“The way he’s making you a target with his attention.”

I’m about to say how ridiculous that is when a ball comes speeding through the air directly at my face. I snatch it quickly with one hand before it can hit me, and the momentum nearly throws me off-balance. Lennon looks at me as if I’ve grown two heads. I had been so caught up in the moment, I’d let instinct take over. I quickly drop the ball, but everyone’s still staring, and no one moves to retrieve the ball at my feet.

“That was awesome,” she says. “How did you do that?”

“It was nothing.” I try downplaying what she saw, but Lennon isn’t having it.

“I don’t know many people who have reflexes like that.”

I try not to move that fast usually. This is the problem with not keeping my skills in check—everyone wants to exaggerate them if they see something slightly off. Tomorrow I’ll be the freak who moves at the speed of light.

“I’m pretty sure you’re exaggerating. I just got lucky.”

Lennon folds her arms over her chest. “You don’t have to hide the fact that you’re a badass. Everyone will know after today anyway, and they will be even more curious about you.”

I frown. “You don’t think people will get bored of speculating about the new girl?”

“You just snatched a ball out of the air like a ninja,” Lennon says as a way of answering.

After PE, Lennon and I head back to Emerson Hall, and I retrieve my bag from my locker. Before Lennon heads to her dorm, she turns to face me.

“See you tomorrow?”

“If you still want to hang out with me.”

She looks confused. “Why wouldn’t I?”

“I’m pretty sure everything I did today will end up on Roundtable.”

She laughs. “Oh, trust me—something far more interesting will overshadow your incident by tomorrow.”

Her words raise the hair on my arms. That’s a strange thing to say, but I shake the feeling off and manage a smile before Lennon heads inside, leaving me to wait for Mom.

I let my backpack slide from my shoulders, heavy, reminding me that I’ve broken all my rules and I haven’t even been at this school for twenty-four hours. That can’t be a good omen. My eyes travel upward, toward the third floor where a limp noose dangles, free of weight—free of the soul I captured. Unease crowds my mind, pricking my scalp.

I’d never worried about capturing souls until I discovered there were people who look for answers to their disappearance. People I don’t want to think about.

“What are you staring at?”

I find Thane Treadway standing behind me. He is like a dark slash in the bright day.

“I was just…admiring the architecture.” That is believable—most of the buildings on campus are impressive in size and composition.

When I look back at Thane, he’s studying the building. I take this moment to examine him. He’s tall and thin, and his hair looks messier than it did this morning, like he ran his fingers through it over and over. Maybe it’s a nervous tic.

“You’re Thane Treadway,” I say.

His gaze meets mine, and I wish he wouldn’t look at me. It’s not the same feeling I get when Shy looks at me; this is darker, scarier. Like beetles crawling under my skin. I scrunch my nose as Thane pulls out a cigarette and lighter. I’m pretty sure he isn’t allowed to smoke on campus.

“Lennon tell you about me?”

“Only what she knows.” I take a step away from him. His gaze is steady as he brings the cigarette to his lips. Smoke escapes from his mouth in one heavy blast.

“That sounds a little accusatory. You think there’s more than what she’s told you?”

“Well, it’s not like she knows everything about everyone, is it?”

Thane stares, scrutinizing me from head to toe before turning away and taking another drag from the cigarette.

“Are you sure you should be smoking?”

“Absolutely.”

I frown. Gross.

“Unless, of course, it’s bothering you.”

“You don’t seem like the kind of person who cares about that.”

Thane glances at the cigarette, poised between his thumb and forefinger, and then puts it out against the school’s white stone, leaving a smear of ash.

“I guess you don’t know me very well, then.” He blows the remainder of the smoke from his mouth and nostrils and nods toward the driveway. “Is that your mom?”

My heart picks up speed. Sure enough, when I look, she’s there. I glance at Thane, wondering if she saw him smoking. She might assume I’ve fallen in with the wrong crowd, and on the first day too.

“Well, it was…nice…talking to you.”

A smirk cracks Thane’s lips. It does strange things to his eyes, and by strange, I mean they suddenly seem almost friendly.

“I look forward to getting to know you, Anora.”

I hurry away from him. As I approach the car, I can’t make out the expression on my mother’s face, and I feel a sense of dread as I open the passenger side door and slide into the seat.

Damage control, I remind myself.

“Hey, Mom!” My voice sounds unnatural and high-pitched. “How was the interview?”

A tactical move—this question keeps Mom from asking about my day and about Thane and his stupid cigarettes. I bow my head, sniffing the collar of my blazer. I hope I don’t smell like them.

“It went great.” She smiles, and I straighten a bit. “I got the job. It’s a bit of a step back since it’s a different field, but I like my new boss. I start tomorrow.”

“So soon?”

“I’ll admit we won’t be able to get the house in order until this weekend, but…we should be thankful it was this easy. It’s not like I had as many options here as we did in New York.”

Her voice changes—sharpens—and it feels more like an accusation than a statement. It’s something Mom—whether she admits it or not—was doing even before we came here, and each comment is like a stab to my gut. During her good times, she’s a good mom. But when things are bad—and they have definitely been bad since I admitted to seeing dead people—my mom doesn’t really parent. It’s like it’s all too much for her. What confidence I gained from her initial smile evaporates immediately, and I shift my gaze forward.

“Well, I’m happy for you, Mom.”

She doesn’t respond, but I feel her eyes on me.

“So who was the boy?”

I look at her. “The boy?”

She narrows her eyes. “The boy you were talking to just now.”

“Oh.” I can feel guilt like a damp cloth on the back of my neck. “No one I know, really.”

The silence strains against my ears, and the air feels solid as Mom puts the car in gear and drives away. Since coming here, she’s been more demanding when it comes to how I answer her questions, and I guess she has the right. I’ve been lying to her for a really long time.

As we leave, I look in the mirror and spot Thane staring up at the empty noose, swinging over the doors of Emerson Hall.