Siren (20 page)

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the pickup truck in Springfield. My heart lurched as he spoke of Zara now, and I wondered if Justine could hear him.

"Before she left, she said she was sorry that it had taken us so long to have a real conversation. She said she wished we hadn't wasted so much time, but that she was glad we still had so much time to look forward to." Caleb shook his head. "And I didn't tell her about Justine. I didn't even think to mention that I had a girlfriend until hours after she'd left. And Justine was all I ever thought about. She's still ... all I think about."

I'd been watching him but had to look away when the first tear slid down his face.

"But I didn't
know
, you know? I didn't know what would happen after that. If I had, if there was any way I could've ..."

Simon waited for Caleb's jagged breathing to return to normal before speaking. "What happened after that?"

"She was everywhere," he said softly. "Waiting for me before school. After school. Before work. After work. She'd bring me things--video games and comic books. She showed up at the beach when I was there with my friends. And she started stalking them, too, to find out where I was, what I liked, if I ever talked about her. They thought it was funny at first, that Zara Marchand, the most gorgeous girl in Winter Harbor, had picked
me
of all people to pursue. But then she wouldn't stop. I asked her to stop--I begged her to. But she wouldn't."

"And you told her about Justine?" Simon asked.

"Every day. It was the first thing I said the next time I saw her. I told her I'd already met the girl I was going to spend the

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rest of my life with." The mug shook harder in one hand as he wiped his eyes with the other. "But it was like she didn't hear me. Or if she did, she didn't care. Because it went on like that for weeks."

I pictured Zara's scrapbook, the blank pages following the Lighthouse napkin. There were no other mementos of time spent together because, unlike the rest of her targets, Caleb had resisted her.

When he spoke again, his voice was almost a whisper. "I thought it would stop once Justine got here for the summer. I thought she couldn't pretend Justine didn't exist if she was right there in front of her."

I focused on my tea, feeling Simon's eyes on me.

"And I was right. For about fifteen amazing hours, Zara was gone."

Fifteen hours. They hadn't even been reunited a whole day before Justine was gone, too.

As we fell into a long silence, I noticed a light rain had started to fall.

"She was here that night," Caleb said a moment later. "Waiting for me after I got back from the cliffs. She was in my room, on my bed, wearing a long white dress. She didn't say anything, but I knew that somehow, she knew what had happened. And I knew that in her crazy, twisted mind, she thought we were going to be together." He looked at Simon. "So I ran. I hated leaving Mom and Dad. I hated leaving
you
... but I couldn't handle it."

"I know," Simon said.

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"I dyed my hair. I hitchhiked. I did everything I could to get away, but she always found me. And every time she did, something happened--I was drawn to her. I wanted to be near her. I wanted to scream and push her away, too, but those instincts were overpowered by the others." The tears started again, falling faster. "I began hearing things whenever she was around, and it was like my brain just shut off--I couldn't see or hear anything else. I didn't know where I was, or what was going on. All I knew was that Zara was there, trying to take me with her."

I jumped up when the fleece blanket around him began to vibrate like the blankets and tarps in the back of the pickup truck earlier. I took the tea from his shaking hands and put it on the coffee table, then sat next to him on the edge of the couch.

"There's something wrong with her," he said, shaking even harder as he looked at me, then Simon. "Beyond the obvious. That's why I didn't tell you where I was going, or call along the way--I didn't want her to use you to get to me."

Outside, the rain fell faster, louder.

"I think she had something to do with it," Caleb whispered, his eyes flicking around the room like someone besides us might hear him. "With Justine. I think Zara did something to her."

My knee hit the coffee table as a lightning bolt tore through the sky and shook the ground. The force sent Caleb's mug crashing to the floor. "Sorry," I said, scrambling to pick up the ceramic pieces. "I'm sorry."

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Simon stood to help me, but I gathered as much as my hands could hold and hurried into the kitchen. I stopped at the kitchen table, no longer feeling the broken pieces in my hands as my heart pounded and Caleb's words spiraled in my head.

As soon as he'd said it, I realized it was something I'd begun to suspect myself--that in addition to the men who had died that summer, Zara was somehow responsible for Justine's death. But hearing Caleb say it out loud made it real, and I didn't know how that was possible.

I stared at the small mirror hanging over the kitchen table, cupping the broken ceramic pieces as tea dripped through my fingers. I didn't know if Simon and Caleb continued talking after I left the living room. I didn't know if I kept breathing, or if my heart kept beating. All I knew was that at some point, Simon was behind me.

"I'm sorry," I whispered. My fingers relaxed, and the ceramic pieces fell from my hands. They clattered against the table and tile floor, shattering into even smaller bits. I looked down at the mess and reached forward to gather them. "I can fix it," I said, my voice cracking.

But I couldn't see them--there were too many, and my eyes were too watery. Soon, the tears pooling in my eyes spilled onto my cheeks, and I sank to the floor and cried.

Simon didn't try to comfort me; he just sat near me and let me cry. Eventually, when my eyes were dry and my body exhausted, I slid back and joined him against the wall. I hugged my knees to my chest and leaned my head on his shoulder. I

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listened for the question I knew had to be coming and watched the second hand move around the kitchen clock; when it made five rounds and Simon still hadn't asked if I was okay, I turned my head.

His shoulder tensed under my cheek. I lifted my chin, until my mouth was only inches from his neck. I held my breath when his chest rose and fell faster.

We were friends. Really good friends. And maybe I should've been concerned about how that might change if I did what I now had the overwhelming urge to do. Maybe now wasn't the best time or place for it. Maybe he would think my emotional collapse had sent me over the edge--because I, scared-of-her-own-shadow Vanessa Sands, simply didn't
do
things like this.

But in spite of that--or perhaps because of it--I did it anyway.

I closed my eyes and pressed my lips to his neck.

He trembled. I pulled back and waited for him to ask what I was doing, or to move away. When he did neither, I kissed the same spot, then the soft hollow under his jaw.

He turned his head and pressed his face in my hair.

I kissed his neck again, feeling his pulse quicken each time my mouth grazed his Adam's apple. I kissed him faster, stronger. I kept my eyes closed and focused on his breathing, the warmth of his skin, the way my heart raced like I was being chased through the woods even though I wasn't scared at all.

After several minutes, he pulled me into his lap. It was my

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turn to tremble when he touched my face, and his fingers brushed my forehead, my cheeks, my chin.

"Vanessa ..."

I opened my eyes. His face was so close to mine I could feel his breath warm against my mouth. He looked like he wanted to say something else, maybe to ask finally if I was okay, if I was sure I wanted to be doing what we were doing.

I answered by pressing my lips to his.

The jolt shot from the top of my head to my toes. His hands traveled from my face to my back, grabbing at my hair along the way. I put my arms around his neck and pulled my body closer, until I could feel his heart beating against my chest.

Eventually, that wasn't close enough.

"Is Caleb ...?"

"Probably sleeping," Simon whispered. "Probably for days."

I held my eyes to his, then took his hands and stood. Catching our reflection in the mirror hanging over the kitchen table, I hesitated. It wasn't that I didn't look like me that threw me off--it was that I looked like someone I didn't know I could be. My skin was flushed, my eyes were bright. My hair hung down my back in loose waves. I even seemed to stand up taller, straighter. I didn't look like a nervous little girl; I looked confident. Excited. Alive. And standing behind me, watching me like he almost didn't know what I'd do next, Simon saw it, too.

I led him out of the kitchen and upstairs. I knew every corner of the Carmichael house almost as well as I knew the lake house, but it felt different--still warm and comfortable, but

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also like I'd never been there before. When we were in Simon's room with the door closed, I was happy to see the familiar periodic table of elements and world map hanging on the walls, but also felt like I was seeing them for the first time.

It was the same when I turned to him. He was still Simon, the same boy I used to race down the Slip 'n Slide. The one who always lagged behind with me when Justine and Caleb ran ahead on hiking trails, who made sure whatever movies we watched didn't exceed my quota of blood, guts, and gore. He was still the one looking out for me and making sure I was okay. Even standing before me now, he was watching, waiting, not wanting to do anything that would make me uncomfortable.

But now, for the first time, he didn't look entirely calm. He didn't look like he believed that there was nothing to be scared of, and that he could assure me of the same.

"Are you okay?" I asked, stepping closer.

"Vanessa ..."

Even my name sounded different.

"I just ... I don't know ... Are you ...?" He closed his eyes, like he was trying to piece together his fragmented thoughts.

I stepped as close as I could without our bodies touching. "Is this okay?" I kissed his cheek.

He nodded, his eyes still closed.

"And this?" I kissed his other cheek.

He nodded again.

"And this?" My lips pressed against his chin, his jaw.

He closed his eyes tighter and nodded again.

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"And--"

My mouth hadn't yet touched his when he took me by the waist and pulled me to him. He kissed me like his heart might stop if he didn't, and he kept his arms around me as I moved back, toward the other side of the room. I turned when we reached the bed so that he lay down first, then crawled on top of him. His hands were stronger, more sure, as they traveled down my back and pulled me closer. My skin felt like it burned through my clothes as our bodies pressed together.

"It's okay," I whispered as his hands slid, then paused, under the back of my T-shirt. When he still didn't seem sure, I pulled it over my head and tossed it to the floor, then helped him take off his sweatshirt.

His lingering uncertainty seemed to disappear when I lay back down. He kissed me harder and grabbed every part of me he could reach--my face, my hair, my shoulders, my waist, my hips. It felt so good, so natural, as if for seventeen years my body had just been hanging on in anticipation of this very moment. When he slipped his fingers between my bare skin and the button of my jeans, I nodded without hesitating and kept kissing him.

He paused only once more, when lightning struck the ground nearby and his desk lamp went out.

"I can get candles...." He lifted my face away from his until our eyes met.

The dark. It was night, a storm raged outside, and the only light in the room came in fleeting flashes though the window.

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This was normally when I would've grabbed a flashlight and hidden under the blankets until the power came back on. But it didn't bother me now.

"It's fine. But thank you." I went to kiss him again, but he pressed his head back, into the pillow. "What? What's wrong?"

He lifted a loose strand of hair away from my face and behind my shoulder. "Nothing ...," he said, looking at me thoughtfully. "It's just that, right now ... in this light ... your eyes look almost silver."

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CHAPTER 15

I SHOT UP in bed the next morning, my heart hammering and my head spiraling. I closed my eyes and braced for the usual image of me standing by the ocean's edge, or the more recent one of Justine reaching for me with bruised arms. They were always the first things I saw each morning, since they were all I saw each time I managed to sleep.

"Hey."

I opened my eyes.

"You okay?"

I registered the globe in the corner of the room, the periodic table of elements hanging on the opposite wall ... and Simon, pressing his lips to my bare shoulder. "What time is it?"

"Nine," he said gently. "And I could stay here all day, but we should probably clean the kitchen before Caleb wakes up."

I nodded as he slid out of bed, and I tried to process what had happened. Surprisingly, I wasn't thrown by the fact that we'd leapt across the formerly solid, unwavering line between