My glazed donut with sprinkles sits untouched on the plate in front of me. Across the table Jared stares at it practically drooling. He’s already eaten three since we got here, but apparently he’s still got room for more.
“Here.” I slide my plate over in front of him. “You can have it if you want it.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. Turns out I’m not very hungry.”
Jared and I are sitting at our usual table in front of the bay window in Lola’s Café and Bakery. Most of the high school kids like to hang out here after school so right now it’s pretty crowded. A few of them whisper and stare as they pass our table. I shut them out choosing to gaze out the window at the town square instead of dwelling on what it is they could be saying about me. Everyone outside goes about his or her business, going to the bank on the corner, or one of the local shops. Normal people. Normal lives. I want to be one of them.
“Finally,” Kat says with an exaggerated huff. “There you are.” She hugs me fiercely before pulling out a chair. “I have been looking everywhere for you. Are you okay?”
Are you okay?
Three words I wish everyone would stop asking me over and over.
“I’m fine,” I say. Beside me Jared shifts in his chair alerting Kat to his presence.
“Oh, you’re here.” Kat waves her finger in a circular motion pointing at Jared. “You got some donut on your face. Wait…” Jared pauses, his hand resting on a napkin. “You should leave it. It helps hide the ugly.” Nearly knocking over Jared’s latte, she places her Louis Vuitton purse onto the table marking her territory. “Don’t you have somewhere else you can go? Hanna will be just fine with me.”
I kick her chair under the table.
“What?” Kat feigns innocence, but she knows what. “Okay, fine. He can stay.” She shifts in her chair facing me. “So anyway, there are two new kids at school, twins, a brother and sister. The brother’s name is William, but he goes by Will and the sister’s name is Zoe, or is it Chloe? I don’t know. I can’t remember. Anyway, the brother is sooo hot.” Jared rolls his eyes and I suppress my urge to grin. At least I know some things in this world will never change.
Kat talks about the hotness of the new guy for the next hour leaving me well informed about all things Will. I now know that his hair is black, his eyes are blue, and he has a small scar above his left eye. I also know down to the last detail about how good his butt looks in his jeans. I sneak a glance at Jared who now knows every detail too. He looks like he’s about to throw up the four donuts he ate.
“So anyway,” Kat continues, her voice softening. She fidgets with the strap of her purse wrapping and unwrapping it around her finger. “The town is going to have a candlelight vigil this coming Friday for the boy who was murdered, and I was wondering if you wanted to go.” A hole opens up in my chest at the word ‘murdered’, growing bigger and bigger with every word she says. “Everyone is pretty shaken up about what happened,” Kat continues. “There hasn’t been a murder in Lake Haven in nearly fifty years. I don’t think anyone really knew him, but what happened to him was tragic and the town thought it would be nice if we all showed our support for his family.” She looks into my eyes; probably searching for a sign of how broken up I am about it. I was there when he was murdered after all. “But if it’s too hard for you, and you want to skip it, I’ll understand.”
Jared takes my hand in his for support. At seeing this, Kat glares at him and does the same. Even in a time like this they fight over something as simple as holding my hand and for some reason, I find it funny. Maybe it’s because of the heaviness of the situation or maybe I’ve just finally snapped. Whatever the reason, I find myself laughing. And not just a little laugh either, but a full on laughing fit where tears are running down my cheeks and my sides are starting to ache. Both Kat and Jared look at me like I’m a freak though neither one of them lets go of my hand, which only makes me laugh harder.
Everyone in the café is staring at me now like I’m insane. They’re probably right. Here Kat is telling me about a candlelight vigil for a boy I watched die and here I am laughing like a deranged lunatic because she’s competing with Jared over who gets to hold my hand.
Yep. Insanity.
Kat and Jared put their mutual distaste for each other on pause to share a look of concern. Who knows, maybe my craziness will bring them back together and we can all be friends like we used to be. After a minute or so my laughter fades and they turn their attention back to me. “Thanks guys. I needed that.”
“Um, oookaaay.” Kat squeezes my hand quickly then releases it like she might catch my crazy. “That was interesting.”
“I know. I’m sorry. It’s just that with everything that’s happened…and then you guys…and my hands…” I’m not explaining it very well and they look thoroughly confused.
“It’s cool.” Jared winks flashing a grin. “I also laugh hysterically at random times.”
I smile. He always knows the right things to say.
Leaning back in her chair Kat rolls her eyes. “So anyway, if you want to go Friday I thought maybe we could go together.”
“Yeah, that would be nice.” Part of me doesn’t want to go, but a bigger part of me knows that I need to.
Kat flips a lock of dark curls over her shoulder. She looks straight at Jared in contempt then turning to me says, “Did I tell you how hot the new guy looked sitting on his motorcycle in the school parking lot?”
Jared sighs loudly as he lowers his blue ball cap hiding his eyes.
***
I hug Kat good-bye before climbing into Jared’s bright yellow Jeep Wrangler. I sink into the leather seats with a yawn. It’s been a long day. I can’t wait to get home so I can bury myself beneath the covers of my bed and hopefully sleep without terrifying nightmares of Blondie attacking me.
“Do you want to ride to school together tomorrow?” Jared asks, as he fiddles with the radio until he finds a station he likes.
“I’m not sure if I’m ready to go back yet. I think I might wait until Monday.”
“I can skip tomorrow if you want. We can hang out, watch movies all day. Your pick.”
“You don’t have to skip for me. I’ll be fine. I just need some rest.”
His green eyes linger on my face making me want to reconsider his offer of skipping, especially when he’s smiling at me the way he is now—all mischievous like. “If you change your mind, or get lonely, I have no problem walking out of class for you.”
“I know, and I love you for it.”
“What are best friends for?” He pats me on the leg then backs out of the parking spot.
Stopping at an intersection he takes off his cap and sits it on the dash. His hair is flattened except for a ring of curls where the edge of his cap used to be. Before I can stop myself I run my fingers through his hair fluffing it up a bit. He looks at me from the corner of his eye, his lips curving into a grin.
“Sorry,” I mutter a little embarrassed. “I couldn’t help it.”
The clock on the dash reads 9:02pm as we pull into his driveway, but it may as well be midnight for as tired as I feel. Jared gets out first then comes around to my side to open the door. He helps me out and as soon as my feet hit the ground he pulls me in for a hug. “Get some sleep and I’ll see you tomorrow after school. Unless of course you’ve changed your mind and want me to skip.”
I smile into his shirt not wanting the hug to ever end. I feel safe in his arms like nothing bad can happen to me here. But eventually he lets go and so do I.
“I’m right across the street if you need anything. Even if it’s three in the morning,” Jared calls, before disappearing into his house.
The wind picks up blowing strands of blonde and blue hair into my face. All the lights are off at my house and Adam’s truck is gone. I’ve gotten used to it being just Adam and I after Mom and Dad…but right now, right now I’d give anything to have my parents standing on the other side of the front door. I’d come in, they’d smile, I’d smile, and then they’d ask me about my day just like they used to.
But those days are gone and the house is nothing but empty and dark when I come in. I don’t turn on the lights because what would be the point. I know where everything is having grown up here. I take three steps before I hear movement upstairs.
Someone’s in the house.
Thoughts of soulless black eyes overtake my mind leaving me frozen in place. My heart slams repeatedly into my ribs with enough force I’m pretty sure whoever’s upstairs can hear it. I rip my frozen feet from the floor long enough to grab the big green umbrella by the front door.
Light dances across the wall at the top of the landing. They’re in my room. A small voice in the back of my mind pushes its way to the front warning me to stay put. And like a crazy person I ignore it lifting the heavy bricks that are supposed to be my feet up the stairs. I grip the umbrella like a baseball bat until my knuckles turn white.
CREAK.
Crap, I forgot about the squeaky step. A beam of light shoots out from my room roaming back and forth. I drop to the ground half lying on the stairs until the light disappears back inside. While my heart resumes beating I try to slow my breathing before I completely succumb to hyperventilation. What the hell am I doing? Anyone could be up there. What if it’s Blondie? What if he’s waiting for me? What if the darkness in his black eyes never let me go?
More ruffling sounds spill out of the door to my room followed by the sound of wood scrapping against wood. I hold my position barely breathing until all I hear is silence. I’m pretty sure whoever was here is gone now, but for just in case, I stay put straining my ears to listen awhile longer. The house is deathly quiet. Somewhere outside a dog barks at the sound of a revving motorcycle. Time drags on and minutes pass until the dog is no longer barking and the motorcycle is dying off in the distance.
I’m alone.
I think.
I hope.
I roll over onto my back stretching out over the stairs, the edges digging into my body. The front door swings open, blinding light forces my eyes shut.
“Hanna? What are you doing? Why are you laying in the dark on the stairs?” Adam tosses his keys into the little green bowl on the foyer table. “And what’s with the umbrella?”
I pick myself up off the stairs rubbing the kinks out of my neck. “I heard someone in the house.”
“So you lay on the stairs with an umbrella?” Adam digs around in his pocket, pulls out his phone. “Did you at least call the police?”
“No. I thought…” I stare at the umbrella still tightly grasped in my hand. What was I thinking? That I would charge into my room shouting en garde and whoever was in there would scurry away. I let the umbrella drop, where it topples end over end until it hits the bottom. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”
Adam starts to pace like he always does when something is upsetting him. He runs a hand over the top of his short blonde hair, worry etched in his features. “Well, did you see who it was? Did they take anything?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know if you saw any one or you don’t know if anything was taken?”
“I don’t know if anything was taken and I didn’t see who it was. I never got past the stairs.”
He resumes pacing for a few long seconds then stops. “Then this is what we’ll do. I’ll call the police while you look upstairs and I look down here.” I nod and turn to continue up the stairs. “No wait. I should look upstairs because that’s where you heard whoever it was that was in the house. What if whoever it was is still here?”
“I’m pretty sure whoever it was is gone,” I say. “But for just in case, maybe we should look together.” He agrees and we begin searching from room-to-room on the main level while Adam calls the Lake Haven Police Department. Everything appears okay so we move to the upper level.
We check every room upstairs leaving Mom and Dad’s room for last.
“You don’t have to go in here with me if you don’t want to,” Adam says, his hand resting on the doorknob. I don’t say anything so he goes in alone returning a moment later. “All clear,” he announces. “What kind of thief breaks in and doesn’t take anything?”
If it was a thief, I think to myself. “I don’t know. Maybe I scared whoever it was off before they could.”
“Maybe. I’m going to go downstairs and wait for the cops to get here. You coming?”
“No. I want to look over my room again. Yell for me when they get here?”
“Sure,” Adam says as he bounds down the stairs.
Nothing looks immediately out of place. My bed is still made, my drawers haven’t been gone though—I don’t think. My closet looks just like I left it, none of my books have been moved on the shelf. Nothing looks out of the ordinary except…
“This is not where I left you.” I pick up a picture frame from my computer desk containing a photo of my Mom and Dad and Adam and I. We’d taken it on the beach during the last day of our family vacation. We look so happy.
Mom and Dad died a week later.
I sit the picture back down on my nightstand where I normally keep it. Why would someone break in and only move a picture?
“Hey.”
I spin around nearly jumping out of my skin. My hand bumps the photo knocking it to the floor shattering the glass.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” Adam crosses the room and kneels down to pick up the broken pieces scattered all over the hardwood floor.
I flip the photo over assessing the damage. Most of the glass is gone except a large shard still attached to the bottom of the frame. The jagged edge points to my neck in the picture like some bad omen yet to come. I pull it out throwing it away.
“I think I got all of it.” Adam tosses a handful of glass in the wastebasket then dusts his hands off on his jeans. “Can I see that?” I hand him the photo. The left side of his mouth curves in a half smile. “I remember that day. Dad made an entire sand village.” He carefully places the photo back onto the stand, takes a look around my room. “Did you find anything out of place on your second look through?”
“No,” I lie. I don’t want to tell him about the photo being moved. “I thought you were going to wait downstairs for the cops?”
“I was, but then I started getting creeped out being down there by myself so I came back up here.”
I laugh. “Big bad Adam got scared.”
“I did not say I was scared.” He punches me lightly on the shoulder. “I said I got creeped out. There’s a difference.”
“Uh-huh.”
Adam’s phone rings. Pulling it out of his pocket he looks at the caller ID. “I need to take this.” He pauses at my doorway looking back; he nods his head toward the window. “You might want to close that it’s supposed to rain.”
“Yeah, okay.” I cross my room to close the window knowing full well that it was closed when I left earlier today. The wood scraping over wood sound that I heard earlier must have been my window opening. Whoever was in here must have gone out this way.
I start to push it down when something catches my eye. I step out through my window onto the roof of the porch. At the edge is a tall tree with long overhanging branches that I used to use to sneak in and out of the house with when Mom and Dad were still alive. Now that they’re gone I haven’t had the need to use it since Adam pretty much lets me come and go as I please.
Inching closer, the object that caught my eye sways in the wind as it hangs from one of the branches. Taking it down I study the black braided leather bracelet. It must have gotten caught and ripped off when whoever was in my room fled. Turning it over, I notice a small piece of metal with a symbol carved into the surface at its center. It’s different than the symbol on my wrist, yet I can’t help but feel like they’re connected somehow.
Red and blue lights cascade through the branches of the tree as a Lake Haven Police patrol car pulls up in front of my house. I shove the bracelet into my pocket as I climb back into my room making sure to close and lock the window behind me. I make it to the bottom of the stairs just as Adam opens the door to reveal Officer Jensen.
Officer Jensen looks first at Adam then settles his dark blue eyes on me. The heaviness of his gaze is unnerving and after a few more seconds of our weird stare off he looks away to address Adam. “Are you Adam Harper?” Adam nods. “Dispatch reported that you called about a possible break in at this address.”
“Yeah.” Staring at Officer Jensen with his eyebrows gathered together, Adam moves to the side allowing him entrance. “I think we’ve met before.” He tilts his head to the side then snaps his fingers. “Now I remember. You were with the detective at the hospital when he was questioning my sister Hanna about the incident at The Iron Knife.”
“Right,” Officer Jensen says nodding his head as if he doesn’t already know who we are. He knows exactly who we are, who I am. He gazes at me while taking out a notepad and pen. “How are you doing Hanna? Have you remembered anything else about that night?”
“No.”
His eyes lower to my wrist. I’m pretty sure he doesn’t believe me. Just like I’m pretty sure he knows what this symbol on my wrist is. I move my hands behind my back as nonchalantly as possible. I don’t know if I can trust him yet. His gaze returns to mine, but he doesn’t press further. Instead he turns back to my brother.
“Did you see who broke in?” Officer Jensen asks Adam.
“No. I wasn’t here when it happened, but Hanna was,” Adam says looking over at me.
On the spot I inform Officer Jensen about what happened. There’s not much to tell given that the only thing I really saw was the light from a flashlight. He jots down notes anyway encouraging me to remember as much as I can.
“And you’re sure you didn’t see the perpetrator?” Officer Jensen asks again. His dark blue eyes peer at me with such intensity, I feel like I’m under a microscope.
“No.”
His shoulders subtly relax. A small sigh escapes past his lips like he’s relieved. Why would he be relieved?
I study him closely without being overly obvious. Is he relieved?
“And nothing was taken or out of place?” Officer Jensen asks startling me.
“Nope. Not a thing,” Adam answers. His hands are deep in his pockets fidgeting with loose change.
“What about you Hanna. Are you sure nothing is missing or out of place?” Officer Jensen studies me in much the same way I’m studying him—with suspicion. I think he’s hiding something and I think he thinks I’m hiding something.
And he’d be right.
The bracelet in my pocket suddenly feels like it weighs a ton, but there’s no way I’m going to tell him about it until I figure out what his role is in all of this. I put on my best innocent face. “Nope. Not a thing. Just like Adam said.” His eyes linger making me feel like I’ve just been caught with my hand in the cookie jar. I’m a horrible liar and something tells me he’s very aware of that fact, still, I keep my mouth shut.
“Mind if I take a look around?” Officer Jensen asks finally breaking eye contact. Thank God, because if he had kept staring at me like that I probably would have caved and told him everything whether I wanted to or not.
Adam leads him around the house while I wait in the foyer. Once the inspection is over Adam walks Officer Jensen to the door.
“It’s not likely that the perpetrator will come back, but being that it’s just the two of you living here, it might not be a bad idea to get a home security system.”
“Thanks Officer. I’ll look into that.” Adam holds out his hand and as Officer Jensen takes it his sleeve pulls up a fraction. My heart ceases to beat, my lungs shrivel up; the ground under my feet no longer exists because around his wrist is a black braided leather bracelet brandishing the same symbol as the one in my pocket.