Bad Girls Don't Die (17 page)

“Not your business,” I said, slamming my locker shut and starting to walk away.

Her voice got louder. “I just thought you cared about him,” she called.

I turned around.

“You know, whether he has friends or not. Whether he fits in.” She stared straight into my eyes. “Whether he’s happy.”

I shook my head. “I have no idea what you’re—”

“My cousin was a senior at All Saints when Carter was there,” she said, her voice hardly louder than a whisper. “She told me what happened.”

I felt like a balloon that someone had let the air out of. “What are you . . . ?” I took a step closer to her. “You know nobody here knows about that. You wouldn’t say anything—”

To Pepper’s credit, she looked truly shocked at the idea. “No!” she cried. “Hello, I have
morals
.”

Right. I fought the urge to roll my eyes. “Then why are you saying this to me like you have something hanging over Carter’s head?”

“Because
you’re
the one with something hanging over his head,” she said, her lips in an almost sneer. “And since you’re clearly too blind to see it, I thought I’d point it out. What do you think his life would be like if he started hanging out with you and your grotesque friends?”

I tried to imagine Carter interacting with the Doom Squad, but just couldn’t form the mental picture. Then I thought of how nice it had been at the park, just the two of us. And then I pictured an endless string of days sitting at the park—just the two of us.

It seemed a little monotonous, to be honest.

“Do you think they’d be nice to him? Wouldn’t it be embarrassing, watching him try to fit in? And then, if you ever break up, do you think his old friends will take him back?” She frowned and leaned closer to me. “Do you think he could handle being as completely alone as you are?”

Up close, Pepper’s skin was a blanket of freckles, her eyes shallow hazel pools that seemed to let light pass right through. Her eyelashes were so pale you could hardly see them.

“I know how meaningless this must sound to someone like you. But I actually do care about Carter.” She stepped back and arranged her bag over her shoulder. “Do you?”

Was it possible that I’d become so much of a loner that I’d never be able to have a boyfriend without feeling smothered? What if I got in over my head—and then discovered that I’d dragged Carter in over his head too? But by then it’d be too late. I’d be over him. And I’d be trapped.

I watched Pepper walk all the way to the end of the hall and through the double doors.

Of all the many thoughts that sprang into my head about her, this was the one that got my attention: She was right.

It was one of those perfect fall afternoons where people can’t stop telling each other what a beautiful day it is.

“Beautiful day,” the crossing guard said helpfully.

The sky stretched huge and dark blue and seemed to press down on the edges of the earth. It was warm in the sunlight, but a cool hint of breeze shook the leaves on the trees. They shimmied and quaked and reminded me of that dance move called “jazz hands,” where you stretch out your hands and wiggle your fingers.

I forced myself to stop thinking about Carter and focused on Kasey instead.

Possessed.

That had to be, like, the stupidest thing I’d ever heard.

I mean, how ridiculous was it to assume that just because Kasey was acting a little crazy, doing a few weird things, that she was actually possessed?

And anyway, Dad’s brake wires hadn’t been cut. That was big, because it proved that Kasey didn’t do it. And that was really important because “not trying to kill someone” ranked a lot lower on the psycho scale than “trying to kill someone.” And that meant that Kasey was maybe only slightly nutso instead of downright padded-room-worthy.

I slowly made my way toward Whitley Street, excuses for my sister’s behavior knitting together in my head. By the time I reached the house I practically had it all rationalized as a figment of my imagination.

But I still felt a spike of dread in my spine as I put my key in the dead bolt.

The front hall was quiet. The whole place was quiet. Surrey Middle didn’t let out until 3:15 p.m., and it was only 3:00. So, according to my fresh, optimistic outlook, I wouldn’t see my sister for a half hour or so.

Which gave me time to snoop around her bedroom. Kasey did still steal those reports. That was worth looking into, right?

First I went to the kitchen, pulled out the phone book, and called the main office of Surrey Middle School. When the secretary answered, I put on my best “adult” voice.

“Hello,” I said. “I’d like to see if one of your students was absent today.”

“I’m sorry,” the woman replied. “We only release that information to family.”

“Oh,” I said, in my normal voice. “Well, it’s my sister.”

“What’s the name?”

“Kasey Warren.”

A pause, the clicking of keys on a keyboard. “Your sister is listed as ‘present.’”

“Great, thanks.”

I hung up and climbed the stairs, feeling even better.

I set my stuff down outside my door and hovered for a moment outside Kasey’s bedroom.

“Stop being a wimp,” I said out loud.

The sound of my voice gave me a burst of courage. I put my hand on the knob and turned, pushing the door open and stepping inside in one motion.

Kasey was sitting on her bed, looking out the window.

Fear flooded over me when I saw her, and I was about to say something in my own defense, when I suddenly realized she hadn’t even turned around.

I stood very still and watched her. Her eyes were wide open and she sat with her legs crossed, her long hair pulled back with barrettes, her fuzzy peach sweater glowing in the sun.

She didn’t seem to see or hear me at all.

I cleared my throat.

Nothing.

“Kase,” I whispered.

She didn’t move.

Fear seized me so fiercely that tears sprang into my eyes. I took a step backward toward the hall.

“Why are you leaving?” Her voice was flat, cold.

I stopped. My fists curled so tightly that my fingernails dug into my palm.

“I just wanted to see if you were home,” I said.

“But the secretary told you I was in school, didn’t she?”

Tell me about it.

“I thought I heard something,” I said.

“You’re lying.”

“Kasey . . .” I said. “What exactly are you doing?”

She still didn’t look at me. “I’m thinking,” she answered.

“About what?”

“About something someone offered me.”

“Who?”

She didn’t answer.

“Do you mean drugs?” I found myself hoping it was that easy, but with every silent second that passed as I waited for an answer, my highly precarious sunny outlook grew cloudier.

“You don’t have any friends,” Kasey said, as if the thought had just occurred to her.

“I have a few.”

“I didn’t have any friends either.”

She turned away from the window, and her eyes searched the shelves of dolls.

“I do now, though, Lexi,” she said. “I have a new friend. She says I’m . . . special.”

I moved a halting step closer to the bed. “I’ve always been your friend, Kasey.” I moved forward and put my hand on her shoulder, but she yanked her body away as if I’d burned her.

“Don’t touch me!” she cried.

I didn’t want her to see my trembling hands, so I stuffed them into my pockets.

“Who is she, Kasey?” I asked. “Where did you meet her?”

She looked at me for the first time, her face in shadow. All I could see of her eyes was the light glinting off them from the window.

Did I even want to know what color they were?

Suddenly my sister was off the bed and right in front of me, holding on to my forearm so tightly that the skin around her fingers was turning white.

“I don’t know what to do,” she said. Her voice was small and scared.

“I’ll help you,” I said. “Kasey, maybe your new friend isn’t . . . nice. Maybe it’s not a good idea to take . . . whatever she’s offering.”

“But you don’t understand,” she said. “When I do what she tells me to, it’s like magic. Nothing is scary. Even if people are mean to me, I don’t care. And everyone does what I say.”

Magic.
My heart sank back in my chest.

“What do you mean . . . they do what you say?”

My baby sister was possessed.

She seemed to have forgotten that she was holding my arm. The pressure slowly increased as she spoke. “I mean I can tell people things, and they just want to listen to me. They believe me. Like the attendance lady at school. I called, Lexi, and I told her to mark me as present. And she did.”

“Who . . . who else have you done that to?”

“Officer Dunbar,” she said.

Oh no.

“I went to talk to him this morning about the car,” she said. “I told him he was wrong, what he wrote on that form about the brakes—so he changed it.”

“Oh . . . Kasey,” I said.

She let go of my arm and went back to the window. There were no cuts or burns this time.

“I did it for you, Alexis. They were going to arrest you.”

“So it was true—the brakes . . . ?” The “attempted murder” threat this morning—she was going to somehow pin the whole thing on me.

Kasey ducked her head and turned away.

“No, oh no, Kasey,
please
,” I said.

“It wasn’t
me
, Alexis,” she said. “I didn’t cut the brake wires.”

“But you know who did?”

She raised her hand to her mouth and started nibbling on her fingernails, then shrugged.

“Kasey, Dad could have been killed.”

“I know!” she said. “But that was an accident. It was just supposed to be a joke.”

“But you didn’t do it?”

She shook her head emphatically.

“Then . . . who did?”

“My friend.”

None of this made sense. I felt like I was talking to the Cheshire cat.

“Kase, who is this person?”

My sister’s voice went squeaky, and she covered her face with her hands as if she was embarrassed. “She’s just someone I met.”

“Can I . . . meet her?”

Her fingers fell away from her face. “Maybe.” A puzzled frown pressed her lips into a pout. “I mean . . . maybe you already have.”

“I don’t understand,” I said.

But I was beginning to.

In the hallway the other day, with the dirty socks.

“Kasey,” I said, “do you remember coming into my room last night?”

She flushed pink. “Yeah,” she said in a tiny voice.

“How’d you get that bruise on your face?”

Now her eyes flashed and she raised her chin defiantly. “You threw a book at me.”

“No,” I said. “That’s not what happened.”

She started chewing on her fingernails again.

“You don’t remember,” I said. “Because it was your friend in my room. And it was your friend in the hallway with the dirty socks. And stealing the reports from school, right?”

“I guess,” Kasey said slowly.

“Listen to me!” I said. “You got that bruise because you hit yourself in the face.”

“You’re lying!” she cried.

“I never take off my rings,” I said, holding up my hand so she could see them. “If I had hit you, you would have scratches on your face.”

She touched her face, and her fingers traced the smooth skin of the bruise.

“Kase,
there is no friend
.” A thought dawned on me. “You have, like, multiple personalities. You just need to see a doctor and get some pills or something.”

She walked over to the window and put the palms of her hands flat against the glass.

“I know you’re lonely,” I said. “But
I’ll
be your friend.”

Not that schizophrenia was so great, but at least it was a medical condition. It had symptoms and a diagnosis and treatments.

She rested her head against the glass, then backed away from the window and turned to me.

“You fool,” she said. Her voice was low and hard and angry. “You cannot chase me away.
I like it here
.”

Then she dashed toward me, lifted her hand and gave me a shove that sent me flying across the room. I crashed into Kasey’s dresser and fell to the floor, the air completely knocked out of my lungs.

Her strength wasn’t the strength of an angry thirteen-year-old.

It wasn’t . . . human.

But that was impossible.

“Kasey—” I croaked.

“You are just jealous,” she snapped. Her voice grew thin and rasping.

I looked up into her burning green eyes.

“I want to talk to Kasey,” I said, trying to remember something,
anything
from the TV movies I’d seen about people with split personalities. “I want to talk to my sister. I know she’s still here.”

“You do not know
anything
.” But she turned away and rubbed her eyes with her balled-up hands. Her shoulders slumped, and her face relaxed into its usual pout.

Kasey was back. “Lexi . . . why are you down there?”

I stared up at her, unable to stop my body from shying closer to the floor. “You
pushed
me.”

“No I didn’t.”

Was it possible that she really didn’t remember? “. . . Your
friend
pushed me.”

She looked around the room, like I’d been talking about a real person. Then her eyes got a faraway look. “Oh,” she said.

“Who is she?” I asked. “
What
is she?”

Kasey hugged herself tightly and turned away.

“Please,” I begged. “Make her leave us alone.”

I saw the muscles in Kasey’s jaw clench up, then relax, then clench up again.

“Just tell her to go away,” I said. “She’s your friend, right? She’ll do what you want?”

She thought about it for a few seconds. Then she lifted a hand and studied her fingernails. “I like it, Lexi,” she said.

She
liked
it? Liked messing with brake wires and stealing things from school and pushing people so hard they flew across the room?

“But . . .” My voice wavered. “I’m still your sister, right?”

She shrugged. “Yeah.”

“So we can . . . we can . . .” We can what? I didn’t know. If only there had been a poster in the clinic: HOW TO TELL IF YOUR SIBLING IS POSSESSED BY THE DEVIL OR JUST COMPLETELY MENTAL!