Chapter 17

The smell of bacon frying made Karen nauseous. Suddenly she knew she couldn’t stay home today. She had to be with people, not be alone.

She showered, dressed, stopped to brush her hair and pin it back. Her keys were in a heap on her dresser. One was lying loose. She picked it up and studied it. Why was it off her key ring? A pink dab of fingernail polish identified it as the key to Alysia’s house. She should return it. Not today, but soon. Why wasn’t it with her other keys, though? She turned it over and over, the brass-colored metal hard and slightly greasy in her fingers. Someone had entered Alysia’s house while they slept. The door hadn’t been forced. Someone must have had a key. Her key?

An insane thought entered her mind, dangled there for a second. She pushed it down, dropped the key into the bottom of her purse, and separated out the key for her mother’s car.

Downstairs, she paused long enough to see her mother and father eating breakfast together, an unusual sight.

“I’m going to school.”

“Eat some breakfast, Karen.” Her mother started to get up. “I’ll—”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Karen, what—”

“Talk to you later.” She dashed out, pulling her coat close as the cold air assaulted her.

The normal sounds of people entering the school building failed to make her feel any better. She stood just inside the building, letting people hurry past her in the halls. Biting her bottom lip, she joined the river of kids, letting it sweep her to her locker. She fumbled with the combination lock.

“Karen, I haven’t seen you lately.” Bill stood beside her. “Cut first period class. Let’s go get a cup of coffee.”

It’s not safe to be around me, Bill. My friends get killed. “I—I—”

“Karen, there you are.” Kerr skidded to a stop beside her. “Get lost, Jergens.”

Bill looked at Karen. She noticed the dark circles under his eyes. Maybe he needed to talk, but not now. “I’ll catch you later, Bill. Thanks.”

“I thought you needed me.” Kerr took her arm, held it too tightly.

“How’d you know that?”

“You sent me a message. We used to do that, remember?”

“Yes. Where were you last night?”

“I went out.”

“Out where?”

“Just out. You don’t need to know everything I do. You want us to be separate people, didn’t you say that?”

“I needed you last night. I’m going to classes today.” She turned her back on him, shuffled through books and papers, the mess in her locker. She and Alysia used to tease each other about who’d break down and clean a locker first.

He kept standing there behind her.

Slamming the locker door, she hugged the stack of books in her arms. “And Kerr, thanks for returning the key.”

“What key?”

She tried to read his mind. It was closed off. There was darkness, a wall. “Alysia’s key.” She started down the hall. It was almost empty. A few stragglers ran to beat the tardy bell. He let her go.

She knew she went to classes all day. She realized a few people tried to talk to her. She didn’t register anything anyone said. Except the police report relayed from the principal, who told them Dr. McArthur wouldn’t be continuing his classes.

Someone had tampered with McArthur’s brakes. The accident wasn’t an accident. Who told her that? The principal? She couldn’t remember.

“The police will want to talk to each of you sometime this week. Meanwhile you can go on home early.”

Karen stumbled to her locker. Kerr was right behind her. “Want to go skating?”

“Kerr, I don’t think it’s right just to leave here and go skating as if nothing has happened. One of our teachers died. It—it doesn’t show any respect for him.”

Kerr shrugged. “We can’t do anything about it. It’s a great day to go skating. Come on, Karen. I don’t want to go without you.”

“Well, I’m not coming with you. I’m going home.”

“Jeez, you’re not much fun anymore, Karen.”

“Well, what do you expect, Kerr? I don’t feel like having fun. What’s been happening in my life has not been fun. It doesn’t seem to bother you, but it bothers me. I feel all—all—” Without meaning to, she started crying. She leaned against her locker, burying her head in the crook of her arm.

She felt Kerr’s hand on her back. Only for a moment; then he left her there. Taking deep breaths, she got control of her emotions, slammed the metal door, and headed for the car.

She felt so alone. When she was seated in the cold car, she put her head down on her folded arms. There was a darkness inside her. Her mind seemed dark, cold, frozen like the lake where Kerr wanted them to go.

She had to drive past the lake to get home. With no plan, she turned into the driveway that led to the parking lot and the warming hut. A crowd of people was out there. The sun was low, but it still hit the tops of the trees on the east side of the rink, sparking the snow-laden branches of the pines and spruces.

She stopped the car, but didn’t get out. Sitting there, she watched until she caught sight of Kerr. Sure enough, he had come over here alone. He was skating alone, slowly circling the rink, around and around and around. Dressed all in black, he was in sharp contrast to the colorful knit hats and parkas circling the ice with him. He looked lonely. She realized he often looked lonely to her. Her heart went out to him, but not enough to get out, find his car where she kept her skates, and join him. It didn’t seem right. Maybe it was right for Kerr. Maybe he was more bothered than he’d admit, and this was the way he worked out his feelings. But he couldn’t expect her to be with him always.

And now she had more questions inside her head, pounding at her, making her feel she was surely wrong, surely—no, no, it wasn’t possible. She shivered, shook her head, turned the key in the ignition, and pulled out of the lot.

Her sleepless night was catching up with her. She got into the house and up to her room with no one stopping her. The house was so warm, cozy. The bed looked so inviting. No, no, she couldn’t sleep. No way was she going to sleep. Her yellow spread rippled, like sunlight dancing across a meadow. There was an almost magnetic pull. Tossing back the covers, she sat down. She’d just rest a minute.

She was asleep instantly.

He grins at her, his dark eyes teasing. Reaching out his hand, he invites her to skate. She takes it. They pump and glide, pump and glide, gathering speed. She reaches her right hand over to his, and they partner skate.

Around and around and around.

It is cold, cold as a gravestone in winter, cold as the shadowed dead waiting to enter the frozen ground. She looks up. Watching them, their frozen smiles approving, are all her friends. Jesse and Alysia are surrounded with a white radiance, not unlike fresh snow sparkling in the morning’s light. How strange to see them together. They are dressed all in white, and wear white wreaths of hoarfrost around their heads.

She stops to talk to them. “What are you doing here?” she asks, puzzled by their presence.

“We came for Kerr,” Alysia replies.

“But he can’t go with you, Alysia. Don’t be silly. You’re dead.”

“He can’t stay with you now, Karen, now that you know.” Jesse smiles at her. There are blue shadows in his cheeks and around his eyes, and his face has a translucent look to it. He isn’t the same Jesse she knew, but she still loves him.

“But—but, that’s not possible. I can’t let him go, I won’t let him go with you. He belongs to me, Jesse. He’s my brother. That just isn’t possible. I’m sorry.”

She skates away quickly, looks for Kerr and grabs his hands again. Twice they spin in a circle, then race away across the glistening lake.

Spinning so fast that her problems drop away, along with the idea of Alysia and Jesse wanting Kerr to come with them, waiting for him, she tosses back her head and laughs. Her voice echoes through the little trees, and comes back to her as frost crystals shattering in icy showers of mist.

He is happy because she is happy. He knows her moods and reflects them back as a mirror reflects the sun rays of daybreak. She feels the power of two souls filling her, but leaving him empty and alone. She sucks in his life breath, warming the silver smoke as it travels from him to her, through the icy air.

On the third circle, marked each time by passing their friends, she looks up at him. He is growing fainter, like a shadow skater, like fog dancing along the top of the frozen lake.

When her hands are empty, she stares at them, unbelieving. She opens and closes her fists, as if marveling at the void she finds there.

From all across the lake, people stop, turn to snow sculptures. Only their eyes remain alive, staring like glassy, hollow pebbles, stained by the colors of winter woods.

She turns, looks in the direction that holds their interest.

The ice cracks, sending brittle music across the rink, replacing the skater’s waltz. Slowly, slowly, slowly he slides, slipping into the shadow hole as the fissure opens, revealing the dark water beneath.

An icy dagger pierces her chest. One silver blade catches the edge of a jagged tear in the lake, and she stumbles. She is strong enough to keep her balance, jump and glide toward him.

She must help him. He reaches out one hand, long, gray fingers bony like a frozen limb.

Sprawling on the ice, she stretches out her hand to him. It is so far. He has moved so far away. Almost out of her reach, almost too far to return to her. She must grasp his hand and pull. She is strong, much stronger than he. She is strong enough to pull him back. Cold penetrates her clothing as she lies spread-eagled on the hard, icy skin. She ignores it.

She reaches, stretches, reaches, reaches.

Sitting up, she screamed. “No, no, no! Kerr, no! Come back to me. Come back. I can reach you, I know I can. I’m strong. I can save you. I have to save you. Help me. You aren’t trying—reach for my hand. Come back to me. Please Kerr, come back to me.”