Chapter Thirteen

MY BODY SHOT UP. Dean was there at the foot of my bed. I looked at him then instantly at my hands. No blackness, no faces of agony, no Stephanie. If it had really been her.

Dean ran his finger under his nose and nodded to me. I mimicked his motion, but my fingers found blood.

“Nolan, you’ve got to do something about this.”

I used the sleeve of my shirt to soak up the rest of the blood then checked it again with a fresh finger. It was clean. Rising out of my bed, I went to the bathroom, removing my shirt along the way. I knew he was just trying to look out for me, but ever since I’d been warned by Trent and then Kate alluded to something Dean had told her about me, I felt defensive with him. How much could I trust him now?

Using a wet towel from my shower early that morning, I wiped my face again then went to my closet and pulled on a new shirt.

Dean stood in my path to the hallway, unmoving.

“I don’t want to have this conversation right now!” I said.

I went to step around him, and he grabbed my arm.

In a low voice I said, “Let go.”

I tried to pull away, but Dean was bigger and stronger than me, so it didn’t work. Dean had somehow betrayed me to Kate; whether it was about my secret or not, I knew something wasn’t right.

I looked him in his deep-set blue eyes.

“Nolan, don’t you dare go inside there. I told you if you ever wanted to talk to me, we talk face-to-face.” Dean was seriously pissed now, although I wasn’t enjoying this either. I’d never seen him this way.

My body flooded with anger. With my free hand I shoved him back, hard. Dean hadn’t expected this and he released me.

“Look, man, I don’t have to listen to you. So why don’t you back off?” I said.

Dean’s face fell; he was hurt by my words. We’d never fought like this before.

“Hey!” The voice startled me. “You guys ready to eat? We’ve been waiting.” Rick’s voice cut between the two of us. Rick looked at Dean then to me, and then he turned and headed back downstairs. Dean followed suit, but I didn’t move. Even though I’d been hungry ever since the sweet-and-sour chicken smell in Greg’s food court, I didn’t feel much like conversing with Rick and Tracy or, much less, Dean.

I took a breath and closed my eyes. Like a lightning bolt, the image of Stephanie’s crumpled body struck my mind—her eyes staring up at me, her blood-red lips starting to move. I opened my eyes; my breathing quickened. My body felt instantly zapped of energy from the day’s events. I wanted to go back to sleep, although I couldn’t be certain another fiendish nightmare wouldn’t swallow me up.

Closing the door to my room, I made the decision not to eat dinner. It wasn’t the first time. The first few weeks I lived there, Tracy just made me something to eat anytime I asked while the rest of them ate together. I wasn’t worried about it—they all knew what happened to Stephanie. I just needed to lie low for a while.

I threw on some headphones and woke up my laptop from sleep mode. Leaning back in the chair at my desk, I wiped my hands over my face as the trickling guitars of the band Anberlin began to rise in my head.

Then a ping noise sounded over a guitar riff. I arched up and looked at my screen. In my task bar was an instant message alert blinking green. It was from user “MuddyHuddy.” I blew out a sigh and clicked the new message.

MuddyHuddy: Whoa, intense afternoon!!!

I let the cursor sit in the reply box. Kate didn’t often bother me online unless she was all wrapped up in a lead of some sort on a theory or story.

Starting to type, I began to think about how casual she was with her comment. Stephanie Daniels was dead, and for all I knew, it was my fault. I erased my first response to Kate in the reply screen. It was going to be a crack about her insensitivity. Instead I just typed:

UncannyDay: Yeah.

Seconds later, she responded.

MuddyHuddy: I heard they finally got her stable.

Kate’s reply sank in. Wait, did that mean she—

I typed what I was thinking.

UncannyDay: Stephanie is alive?!?

MuddyHuddy: Yep, but they say she suffered massive head trauma and major broken bones.

I didn’t even have to type my next question.

MuddyHuddy: I followed the ambulance to the hospital.

Geez, nothing held her back, but it didn’t surprise me. My mind was overcome with relief as my fingers flew over the keyboard.

UncannyDay: Are you still there? Is she going to be okay?

Kate’s next message took a second to come back.

MuddyHuddy: Just got home. They stopped me from going into the emergency area, but I overheard them saying the word “coma.”

A coma. Stephanie was in a coma? Even when Kate told me that she was still alive, the guilt hadn’t left me. I was glad Stephanie had made it, but a coma was serious. Leave it to Kate to find out first.

UncannyDay: Thanks for the update. I’ve got to tell Dean.

That’s what I typed, and it was the first thought that came to my head. But then the sullen realization of the fight he and I just had sank back in. The feeling sucked. First of all, Dean had no idea what was going on, and I doubted he was in the mood to hear it.

I turned back to the computer, but Kate’s status read “offline.” Great. She was the only person I could talk to at this point. I guessed I could at least update the Mitchells on what was going on—plus, I was ready to eat. Maybe with a meal in my stomach, I could sort things out better, find some answers.

My head was still reeling. Stephanie was alive.