Spree (YA Paranormal) (13 page)

“What for?”

“To feel better.”

“I can
never
feel better, not after this,” Steph said. “Why can’t you people just mind your own business?”

“You are our business,” Mrs. Cowell said. “We care about you, Steph. We want to help.”

“Well, you can’t.”

“Can you let us try?”

Steph took a step back, hardened her eyes.

“I know what you’re trying to do. It won’t work. This shirt isn’t coming off,” Steph said. “And I will
not
leave this room.”

Steph sat down, staging a one-girl sit-in to make her point.

“Okay. Fair enough,” Mrs. Cowell said.

Mrs. Cowell, old as she looked, came in, sat down right next to Steph.

“We’ll talk here,” Mrs. Cowell said.

“I don’t want to talk,” Steph said.

“Then we’ll just sit,” Mrs Cowell said.

“Why?!” Steph asked.

Her voice sounded more like a whimper than an outcry.

“Because we want to be here for you,” Mrs. Cowell said. “All of us.”

Mr. Higgins’s entire class, starting with Alex, came and sat down by Steph. Alex hugged Steph, gently, like he might a sister. Steph pulled away, though her eyes had a reddish tinge from forcing back the tears. The other students sat around Steph, reaching out, grabbing a hand, patting a shoulder, calling out her name in encouragement. Finally, Mr. Higgins came. Far too big for the circle, he teetered, then sat in the doorway.

“Someone has to be the anchor,” he said.

It was a stupid comment, out of place, without meaning, but the portly man trying to find room for a seat and barely fitting in the doorway gave the kids a laugh they sorely needed.

“I can’t take off the shirt, not yet,” Steph said after the laughter died down.

“Then keep it on,” Mr. Higgins said. “Until you’re ready.”

Mr. Higgins knew he’d receive phone calls from parents over his words, but he didn’t interfere. He just sat there. His entire class did, until Steph was able to get up, wipe the dirt off the back of her jeans, and walk out at the bell, as if nothing, and everything, had happened.

* * *

John Chatterly to the office
, the intercom sounded out.

It was unusual to hear Zipper’s real name, and I’d never once heard it over the intercom in all my years at Burgundy Hill High.

Zipper never heard his name called either.

He jolted in his seat near the end of Mrs. Walters’s English class.

The class heard Mrs. Walters’s poem after sharing one of their own. It was entitled “Lost Colors.”

She had compared Steve and all of her friends to different colors from the rainbow. Corny, yes, but a more peaceful way of presenting what she had to say to already traumatized kids.

Zipper stood up in the middle of the poem, putting on his backpack right when Mrs. Walters said something like:

To lose a friend young

is to lose a color

Never before painted

A life never breaking from the clouds

Zipper stood there, looking at Mrs. Walters, and she looked back.

“I have to go,” Zipper said.

“You won’t need your backpack,” Mrs. Walters told him.

“Five minutes left of class,” Zipper said.

“Go ahead,” Mrs. Walters replied.

She turned her attention back to her poem, back to the ghosts of twelve years ago.

Zipper began sweating heavily. He walked briskly, thinking back to last night, to his painting of the soccer lines, to the explosive that detonated, that could’ve ignited others and blown him up with the entire field. I read deeper into his aura. He wondered how he could be sure everything was set, how he could be sure the school kids would truly get blown away as his little legs carried him to the office door. He wondered what, exactly, the administration knew.

The moment Zipper stepped in the office, Mr. Buckley, the principal, stood waiting for him, a cop to his right.

Zipper’s aura leapt; the Takers around him swirled in animosity. He did all he could not to go for his gun.

“John,” Mr. Buckley said, calling him over.

Zipper stepped right up to the counter, still sweating.

“I have a message for you, John,” Mr. Buckley said.

He handed Zipper a paper from Mr. Peterson.

“Need you out right at 2:30 to paint the fields again. Let Mr. Buckley know if you can stay.”

“What happened?” John asked.

He kept his eyes on the cop.

“A few kids trespassed last night,” Mr. Buckley said. “They damaged some of the lines. I sent Mr. Peterson to fix the fields, but he asked me to hand you a note.”

Zipper breathed heavily, then calmed himself.

“I can stay,” he said to Mr. Buckley.

“Thanks, John. I’ll let Mr. Peterson know,” Mr. Buckley said. “One more thing. Was anyone on the fields when you left?”

Zipper shook his head.

“Thanks,” Mr. Buckley said. “You can go back to class now.”

Zipper turned and left.

As Zipper walked down the hall, the quiet of class time was interrupted again.

Tom Harrington to the office
, the intercom said.

Tom came right down, passing Zipper in the hall as he walked in.

Zipper smirked. Tom caught the smile.

“What?” he asked.

“Cop’s waiting,” Zipper told him. “Better walk in a straight line.”

Tom fought to think of a put down, but he was too nervous.

“They’ll still let me play,” was all he could think of to say.

He’d be right.

* * *

I still felt the party alive in the air.

The Taker in me could feel the loss of control.

I’d been blinded by Steph’s rage, but the party was nearly as intense.

Not a week after my death, my friends threw a kegger right in the middle of the fields where they said they’d be champions in no time at all.

“For Fay,” Tom screamed, standing on the top of his red Ford F-150 as he skidded around the fields.

I shook my head as Alex hung back, drinking just enough to be bitter.

Sue was there, swinging her hips provocatively, acting like the party girl I always strove to be.

How stupid she looked, like some dumb, desperate girl who couldn’t get a real guy interested any other way.

How sad
, I thought, reliving the moments in Tom’s aura as he stepped through the office door.
I’m not dead a week and already these drunks throw a party
.

The night was sacred to partiers; nothing ever interfered with the pre-game festivities.

“Just don’t get behind the wheel,” a drunken Tom joked.

“I bet you,” Sue said, staggering closer. “I bet you I can drive drunk better than Fay. I can hold my liquor.”

Tom signaled his friends; one, Bus, a big linebacker, threw her the keys.

“Prove it,” Tom said.

“Tom,” Alex called out drunkenly. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Winning some money. Fifty says you can’t do it.”

“Make it a hundred and you’ve got a bet,” Sue said.

Tom nodded.

Sue got in, barely put her hands on the wheel as the tires screeched over the fresh field paint and she sped into the goal post.

Lights in the houses just opposite the fields went on. Tom called out a swear, pulled Sue from the wheel. She was giggling as the kids got in and Tom sped off.

I sensed all those thoughts in Tom’s aura, yet, looking right at the cop, Officer Deriega, Tom said: “No. I know nothing of last night.”

“Mr. Harold across the street said he saw you,” Officer Deriega insisted. “He took down the plates.”

“Well, he was wrong,” Tom said.

“You were out last night, weren’t you?” Officer Deriega asked.

“I know my rights; I want a lawyer,” Tom said.

The principal smirked. “No one’s accusing you of anything,” he said. “We just want the truth.”

“I let a friend borrow my car,” Tom said. “I trusted her.”

A few minutes later, the intercom called out again.

Sue Preston to the office
.

I shook my head. I just knew she’d take the heat for her sometime lover.

“I have half a mind to cancel the game,” Mr. Buckley said as he waited for Sue to arrive.

If only he did.

Judging from the text Tom sent Sue without even pulling the phone from his pocket, the game, and the shooting, were still on.

* * *

My mother sat by the phone, number in hand.

She hadn’t spoken to Aliya’s mom since the accident. Her lawyer advised her against it. But my mom was a lifelong friend of Mrs. Bilki and hated to let bad blood fester.

The phone rang and rang. I thought Mrs. Bilki recognized the number and wouldn’t pick up.

To my surprise, she did.

“Helen?” Mrs. Bilki asked.

There was a pause, a long one.

“It’s me,” Mom said. “I just wanted to call to say how sorry I am at the way everything’s turned out.”

“I have nothing to say to you,” Mrs. Bilki said.

“Both our girls made a terrible decision that night,” Mom said.

“But only one was behind the wheel,” Mrs. Bilki told her.

“It could have been any of the girls.”

“But it wasn’t. And now Aliya may never walk again.”

“But at least Aliya’s alive,” Mom said.

There was another pause.

“Is that why you’ve called? To tell me how lucky I am?”

“I called to say how sorry I was. I wished I had thought to get Fay treatment. I didn’t.”

“And now my Aliya will pay for it.”

“Lacey, how long have we known each other?” Mom asked, using Mrs. Bilki’s old nickname. “How long have we been friends? Let us work this out together.”

“That’s for the courts to decide,” Mrs. Bilki said.

“But why?”

“I need to do what’s best for my daughter,” she said.

Mrs. Bilki breathed heavily as she turned over her next point.

“I know you did your best with Fay,” she said. “I did my best with Aliya and look how it turned out. This is about accountability. Someone took my daughter’s life away from her, and somebody needs to pay for that.”

Mom started crying.

“Don’t call again,” Mrs. Bilki said. “Let the lawyers handle it.”

Mrs. Bilki hung up. My mother was left eating the silence on the other end of the line.

* * *

The Takers swirled over the fields, keeping watch on the explosives so that no more went off until the hour was at hand.

Scenes of torn limbs, of rivulets of blood, filled the sky.

They were planning.

I wasn’t quite one of them. I couldn’t quite hear everything, but from what I gathered they were positioning Zipper to be the one who kept watch on the fields during the game. This would give him access and make his targets that much easier to kill. He could get in enough shots to torment the parents who’d see their children slaughtered before their eyes. Then he’d trigger the explosives in a mass homicide and suicide that would be talked about for decades to come. Everyone would know the name of John Chatterly. Everyone would wear his blood.

The pain that surrounded the images overwhelmed me when I felt myself in the presence of a Keeper.

“Belinda, is that you?” I asked.

The light felt warmer, like a small taste of light. I knew that warmth; it was the openness of my grandparents’ love. I only knew them when I was very young, but I could feel them there.

“What was that?” I asked.

“Heaven,” Belinda said.

“Why show me now?” I asked.

“To give you strength,” Belinda told me.

I could almost picture a crystal white shore with sparkling waters, an endless color-filled crest of trees and sands.

For me, the sands were empty.

“Save them while you still can,” another Keeper voice said.

But I could see nothing more.

Takers swarmed around the images of flying limbs.

I could see only a wayward smile, sitting jaggedly on the ghostly pale face of Crazy T.

“All will die,” he said.

“Over my dead body,” I protested.

“That’s already been arranged, now hasn’t it?” he said.

He did have a point.

* * *

Last night, before the planned shooting I tried to give Zipper one last innocent dream.

We were tiny kids then, all of us running along the Burgundy Sea Bike Path. We had just gotten out of school and still had a few old notebooks we threw into the sea. Zipper and I threw ours in at the same time as everyone else, turned, and smiled. Tom was there. Alex. Sue. Jessica. Cindy. We were friends once, long before words like
popularity
mattered. There was simply cobalt water, smooth sand, and a golden light around everything.

“Quick,” I said, tossing in my notebook. “If you hold onto the books long enough, school will suck you back in!”

Zipper and I laughed like the nine-year-olds we were as we tossed away the books.

He turned, caught my smile. Even at that young age he liked me.

“They were your friends once,” I said, stepping forward.

My black mists swirled around my silver radiance as I attempted to materialize in Zipper’s head.

“Let them live,” I said. “Let yourself live.”

If I attempted to calm the sleeping Zipper, to soothe him, my dream only served to wake him up.

Zipper got out of his basement bed, took his picture of me, and went over to the drawer where he hid the guns he’d stolen from his father’s gun cabinet.

I was at a loss until another Taker, Preggers, materialized before me.

Her smirk told me that she’d taken my peaceful vision, manipulated it. I shook my ghostly head, aware only too late that I’d played right into her hands.

At the end of that moment, the tossing of our books, Zipper stumbled, nearly fell into the ocean.

The other nine-year-olds laughed at him. I laughed at him. Zipper was many things, but a joke wasn’t one of them. He respirated so loudly he woke himself up, determined that I’d know just how tough he truly was.

He sat with his gun, much as a man might sit with a drink. He stroked the barrel, checked that it was loaded.