The Unquiet (45 page)

I know it’s not Nana. But how can she seem so, so
real
?

Real enough for me to smell the scent of her favorite soap.

Real enough for me to notice the missing button on her robe.

Real enough for me feel her grandmotherly warmth as she smiles at me with the light of a thousand stars.

But you’re not real. YOU’RE NOT REAL!

“She tells me you did it on purpose, Corinne.” Nana bobs her head toward the black abyss of the pool, as if indicating a lurking Annaliese. “I don’t believe her. ‘My granddaughter,’ I said, ‘would never do that. She’d never lock her door, set a fire, and leave me alone to die.’”

Tears roll off my chin to fizzle in the lingering mist.

“Did you watch from a distance?” she asks.

Mute, I stare.

“Did you call for help?”

I know it’s not Nana because the voice isn’t quite right; I hear Annaliese’s cruel undertones creeping insidiously to the surface. Still, I whip my head back and forth in denial.

“Did you hear my screams?”

You never screamed. You died from smoke inhalation. You never felt a thing. Mom promised!

Unless she lied to me. Unless she’d wanted me to think Nana died peacefully, not screaming in agony while the flames roasted her alive.

She’s screwing with your mind. She did it with Mom and now she’s doing it with Nana.

Nana approaches, holding out hands that look exactly like I remember. Her wedding ring, loose on a bony finger.
Bulging blue veins. Dirt caked around her nails like she’s been gardening again …
gardening in Heaven
.

I stare hard at those hands, groping for the words. “It wasn’t my fault.”

She stops.

“It wasn’t my fault,” I repeat. “IT WASN’T MY FAULT!”

Something peculiar charges the air. My hair blows in an unfelt breeze and the floor shakes harder under my shoes. My arm hairs stand on end again, zapped with an electricity that can’t possibly exist in this void.

Nana raises her palms, fingers spread. “I miss you, Rinnie.”

It’s
her
voice this time, not Annaliese’s.

And she called me Rinnie, not Corinne.

Only Nana calls me Rinnie.

Vapor rises around us, crackling with fury. Before I can react, Nana steps briskly out of the fog to yank me away from the sinister swirl. She hugs me hard, and no, it’s no trick—
I recognize this hug!
I sob out loud at the familiar contours of her body. Even her hair’s the same, all heavy and smooth against my cheek.

“I miss you, too,” I whisper, ignoring the swelling mist, the sparkling embers. I’m too overwhelmed to feel frightened, and it makes no attempt to come closer. “I love you so much! And I’m sorry, really sorry—”

“There’s nothing to be sorry for.” Nana strokes my hair. “And you
know
I love you, too.”

Behind her, the column of vapor spins upward. Intermittent flashes of Annaliese’s features mingle with a black
O
that forms in the mist, mutating at last into a tremendous mouth. “
You don’t belong here!
” it shrills.
“Go away! GO AWAY!”

Walls shudder with volcanic force. The tiny windows blow out, shooting glass through the air like crystalline daggers. Chips of the ceiling hammer down, followed by torrents of what I imagine to be ice. Distantly I’m aware of
some
kind of pain, but I’m too safe, too comfortable in Nana’s arms, to care.

She rubs my back. “Don’t be afraid. It’s over.
You
have the strength now, Rinnie.”

“What do you—?”

Another thunderous crash cuts me off. I hang on to Nana as Annaliese, enraged, flares toward the ceiling like a luminescent tornado. Sparks rain down, burning like dry ice—

—and then the suction begins to drag me backward again. I watch, powerless, as my fingers slide through Nana’s … away … away … till I have no choice but to let go.

Whirling on Annaliese, unafraid of her towering mass, I throw myself forward. Slivers of light grip my hands with monstrous force. I squeeze her back, shocked I can touch her, that she feels like a mixture of ice, fire, and flesh. With every ounce of energy I have left, I drag her down close to me, pulling harder … harder …!

As the vapor consumes me, Annaliese’s hideous black mouth widens, in terror this time.
My
pull, she knows, is far more powerful than hers. She writhes under my ferocious pants like I’m exhaling pure fire.

“Leave me alone!” I scream. Clouds of my breath swirl in and around those awful, empty eye sockets. “Go back where you came from and
leave me alone!
”

My toes fly up the ground as Annaliese shrieks with fury. For one sickening instant I can’t think, can’t move, and all I can see is white. My own screams echo hers as I realize we’re
fused together
, that I’m trapped in this violent whirlpool of ice. Weightless, scrambling for my safety plane, I watch the sparkling colors mushroom up from below us and consume the vicious, spinning mist that is Annaliese.

In excruciating slow motion, Annaliese shrinks, absorbing the colors. Her form darkens to yellow from that infinitely painful white, and then to amber, scattering dull sparks. Her hideous eyes shrink to pinpoints, while her black mouth stretches into a monstrous cavern, growing bigger … bigger … till it devours what’s left of her.

First, darkness and silence.

Next, an earth-shattering explosion.

“
Nana!
” I scream.

Then I’m falling again.

They have to dig me out.

Flat on a table under a glaring light, I hear words like “hypothermia” and “right Colles’ fracture.” Then more familiar terms—
delusional, psychosis
—spoken in skeptical, secretive tones.

Mom and Frank hover. My arm’s on fire. I can’t stop babbling.

Mom says, “Rinn,
please
settle down and let the medication work.”

Frank says, “Oh, Christ, let her come out of this.”

Then Nana says sternly, “
Hush now, Rinnie. Do you WANT them to think you’re crazy?
”

That’s when I shut up.

Blood tests show my drug levels are “therapeutic,” proving to the powers that be I’ve been taking my meds. A temporary psychosis, the doctor claims, brought on by a concussion. The pool room roof, buried under tons of ice and snow, collapsed in the brutal fifty-mile-an-hour wind.

On the ride back to River Hills, Mom doesn’t once light up. The ashtray looks as pristine as the day Frank drove the SUV home from the dealer.

I sniff discreetly. “Did you quit smoking again?”

“Yes. And buckle your seat belt,” Mom adds snappishly. “I don’t want my last memory of you to be with your bloody head sticking through a windshield.”

I obey. “Is Frank still here?”

“No, he flew back this morning. We
told
you he was leaving.”

I know. But I’d hoped the cast on my arm and my gauze
turban might persuade him to hang around till Christmas. “Do you … do you think you guys’ll get back together?”

Mom exhales. “I don’t know. I kind of
like
being on my own. I can’t make any promises.” My stab of disappointment fades a bit when she adds, “He wants you to stay with him next summer. Though I’m still not sure that’s a great idea.”

I steel myself. “Why not?”

“Because I’d
miss
you, Rinn.” She takes one hand off the wheel to reach for mine—the one minus the cast. “Oh, honey. When we couldn’t find you after the power failure, I was out of my mind! Then when that roof caved in, and we didn’t know where you were …” She squeezes my fingers. “I am never letting you out of my sight again!”

Somehow I don’t think she’s joking.

I watch the scenery for a while, absently picking at my cast. Okay, I know Nana warned me not to bring Annaliese up. But, as usual, I can’t keep quiet.

“I tore up the pictures,” I blurt out.

“What pictures?”

“Millie’s pictures.”

The pictures that never existed.
After Millie told Mom what happened, did she tell her about the pictures? That for some sick, twisted reason she’d hung on to them all these years? Probably. She’d already admitted the worst.

Mom’s hand tightens on the wheel. She stares directly ahead. “I know what happened to Annaliese,” I say softly. “Just don’t ask me
how
I know.”

Mom replies, just as softly, “Thank you, Rinn.”

I find the broken wall in my room repaired and repainted. Nate did it, Mom said, over the weekend. My room is tidy. My guitar is safe and sound.

I’m so glad it’s winter break. My arm hurts. I’d take a pain pill, but it might knock me out, and no way do I want to let my guard down tonight. With my iPod plugged to my ears, I stare at the Hanging Beam as David Gilmour sings about how
there’s no way out of here.
That, once you’re in, you’re in for good.

I think I’m safe.

I think Annaliese is gone.

It’s funny how I feel, well,
grateful
to her. Grateful that she let me have Nana back for a minute, never mind that she tried to trick me at first. I’m just happy I got to see her. To touch her. To let her know one last time how much I love her.

So thank you, Annaliese. Even though you’re an evil, conniving, homicidal bi——

I jump when Nate drops down beside me. “Your mom said I could hang out a while.”

I drag my earbuds off. “You mean she decided you’re not an imminent threat to me?”

“Depends on how you define ‘threat.’” He studies my face. “Poor Rinn. You look like a
roof
caved in on you.”

I bat the one eye I can see out of. “Smart-ass.”

“Can I sign it?” he asks, thoughtfully rubbing my cast.

“Yeah, if you write something mushy.”

Nate rummages through my desk till he finds a red Magic Marker. With exaggerated intent, he draws a big heart and writes inside it:
Heal fast! I love you. Nate.

I pluck the marker away and toss it aside. “Why, thanks, farmer boy.”

“Shucks.” He crawls under my covers. “My pleasure, surfer girl.”

He nuzzles my neck with teasing kisses. I kiss him back, not teasing at all. I feel his heat, and his weight, and how much he loves me.

“Hey, in case you forgot,” I tell him. “I love you, too.”

He sneaks back out before Mom has the presence of mind to check up on us. Gently I trace the message he wrote on my cast. Funny how, in spite of my throbbing arm, my black eye, the stitches in my scalp, and my shattered nerves, I feel so completely and positively
wonderful
.

Downstairs, Mom begins to play Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 1. The notes float up through the vent, each one lovely and perfect.

Yes, my mom’s back. My whole
life
is back.

Now that I think about it, I owe Annaliese an apology. What I said to her about her grandmother not wanting her? That was just plain cruel.

“Sorry,” I say into the air. “I take it back. And I really do hope you find her.”