Читать книгу Never Look Back - Robert Ross - Страница 11

The full moon glowed in a cloudless night, giving off almost enough light to make it seem like midday. He trudged through the dunes, looking from side to side. Her note had said she’d be here, but there was no sign of her anywhere.

“She’s playing you for a fool,” went through his mind, and he kicked at the yellow sand in frustration. Why would she meet him? What did he have to offer her other than his love? He was crazy to think she would actually come. It had been a trick, something for her to laugh about with her friends later—the dumb fisherman she’d duped into meeting her at the dunes, who probably waited all night in vain for her to appear. But he couldn’t just take the chance and leave. What if he was wrong, and he missed a chance to see her? To talk to her? To look into her beautiful eyes and hold her in his arms, maybe even kiss her?

No, that was too much to hope for. A girl like her, who could have her choice of men, would never share a kiss with the likes of him. Which was exactly why she wasn’t here. He was a fool to think—

“Hello,” she said as she stepped around into sight. “I didn’t think you would really come.” Her face was smiling.

He gave out a sigh of relief, and gave her his warmest smile. “I was beginning to think you weren’t going to come.”

“It wasn’t easy to get out of the house. They’re watching me like a hawk.” She made a face. “No one can know I’m meeting you.” She stepped forward and took his hand. Hers was moist with sweat, and he brought it to his lips and kissed it. She smiled up at him, and put her arms around him, clinging to him. “I don’t know how much longer I can stand it.”

“We’re together now, that’s all that matters.”

“If he finds out, he’ll kill us both.” She tilted her head back. “I’m frightened, Samuel. Really and truly frightened. There’s something—” She broke off, her eyes wide. “Did you hear that?”

He had heard it, and the goose bumps rose on his arms. Someone was coming.

“We’ve got to hide!” she whispered, her head turning from side to side frantically. But they were out in the open, on the beach—anyone coming through the dunes would see them clearly.

She broke away from him and started to run back through the dunes without waiting for him. With a sigh, he started after her—

—and then he heard an earsplitting scream.

A clap of thunder woke Chris with a start.

He sat up in bed, sweating. Rain pelted against his bedroom window, which rattled in the wind. His heart was pounding. The clock on his nightstand showed just past eight—an hour before his alarm was set to go off. “Just a dream,” he said out loud, “just a dream.”

He took several deep breaths. His heart rate was slowing down. He got up, stretched, and walked into the bathroom. As he brushed his teeth, he tried to remember the dream he’d been having. The vestige of fear he’d felt was starting to drain away as his mind cleared. It hadn’t been as bad as the trampoline dream, but he’d just as soon not have it again.

It’s her fault, he thought as he washed his face. All that nonsense about being possessed—she’s a nutcase for sure.

He hadn’t seen her since. He knew he should just forget about her, but somehow he couldn’t get her out of his mind. You’re being a dork, she said she didn’t want to go out with you, and why would you want to go out with a nutcase anyway? Do you think a nutcase is the only kind of girl who’d go out with you?

He’d spent the rest of the day doing mundane things—helping his father trim the rosebushes, taking out the garbage, cleaning the house—but try as he might, he couldn’t forget the look on Jessie’s face when she’d said those crazy things to him.

After dinner, he went to his room and watched MTV for the rest of the night—they were running a Road Rules marathon—but still he couldn’t get her out of his head. The look in her eyes was so haunting. Finally he signed on to the Internet and did a search for “possession.” As he clicked through the Web sites, he only became more and more convinced she had to be crazy. Demonic possession was just like werewolves, witches, vampires, and ghosts—remnants of a superstitious past when science wasn’t evolved enough to explain the unusual. Finally, he’d given up and gone to bed.

He’d gone back to the library the next day and checked out one of her father’s books—Philip Kaye’s Missing Pieces. So famous they’d actually stuck his name in the title. He took it down to the beach and sat directly on the sand as he started reading it. The protagonist was a teenaged boy who lived at a boarding school and saw ghosts. Chris kept reading, paying no attention to the time. Philip Kaye was a good writer—the young hero reminded him a lot of some of the kids at More Prep. Five hours passed while Chris read, hooked into the story—and his mother had been furious when he got home with the book under his arm.

“Where have you been?” she demanded. “I was worried sick!” She liked to track his every movement. “You know you’re supposed to call if you’re going to be late.” Her lips were compressed tightly, the lines in her forehead prominent.

“I lost sense of time,” he replied. “I was reading, down at the beach. I don’t see what the big deal is.”

Her mouth opened and closed a few times; then she grabbed the book out from under his arm and examined the jacket. “You were reading this?” Her eyes narrowed. “This is trash, Chris!” She handed him back the book. “How many times have I told you not to read this kind of garbage?”

He stuck out his jaw. “I liked it. Besides, Philip Kaye lives here. I got it from the library.”

She shook her head. “Go to your room and stay there. We’ll talk about this tomorrow when I’m not so angry.” That was one of her rules of good parenting. Arguments were counterproductive and did no one any good. If someone was angry in the Muir family, discussions were to be tabled until everyone had calmed down and could talk rationally.

The following morning, when Chris came down to breakfast, his mother had sat down with him at the table and told him, in a calm, reasonable voice, why he shouldn’t read those kinds of books. He knew what was required—he shut his mind off and didn’t listen to anything other than her vocal inflections, taking her cues to nod and agree when called for.

It was the same old lecture, anyway, the one he always got when he was late, whether it was five minutes or an hour. Kids disappear all the time, Chris, so when you don’t come home when we’re expecting you, we fear the worst. Yes, I know you’re a big boy and you think you can take care of yourself, but that’s probably what all those kids on the milk cartons thought, too. Do you understand me? We gave you a cell phone so you could call us from anywhere, at any time, so we wouldn’t worry. And when you have it turned off and we can’t reach you, well, of course we expect the absolute worst. We don’t want to have to go down to the police morgue and identify your body sometime. You know we worry—do you enjoy making us worry?

And on and on it would go, until she finally wound down. Finally, Chris mumbled an apology and slipped out of the house to the gym. As he went through his workout, he wondered, for maybe the thousandth time that summer, why his parents couldn’t be more normal.

That night, when he was getting ready for bed, his mother stuck her head in his bedroom door. “Your father and I are going into Boston tomorrow, and probably will just stay the night there. Do you want to come in with us?”

Her face was slathered with some green gunk that was supposed to keep her skin young and wrinkle-free; her long blond hair (he suspected she dyed it) was pulled back into a ponytail.

“No. I want to go to the gym in the morning.”

“Chris…” She walked into the room and put her hands on his shoulders. “I’m a little concerned about this”—she fumbled for a moment—“obsession you’re developing about exercise. Your father and I think maybe you shouldn’t go every day—”

“I like going.” He stuck his jaw out firmly. “And besides, it’s not a bad thing to exercise. Isn’t that better than just lying around and getting fat?”

He smiled to himself. He knew his mother was terrified of losing her figure, but would never admit it. That would be admitting she bought into the “patriarchal, impossible standard of female beauty foisted on women by Madison Avenue and Hollywood.” She thought he didn’t know, but she took aerobics classes regularly in Boston. You’re a hypocrite, Mom, he thought. It’s not about me working out, it’s about control—you just want to control my life, and it kills you that you can’t. The older I get, the less control you have, and you just hate it, don’t you?

“It’s not that we think it’s a bad thing, Chris, but anything in excess isn’t good for you. You need more social interaction. You’ve been here all summer and you haven’t made any friends…” Her voice trailed off.

If you’re so worried about me not having any friends, why did you ship me off to boarding school?

Chris bit his lip. No point in bringing up that he’d had a lot of friends in grade school, but after being shipped off to prep school he’d lost touch with them all. And the kids at More Prep—he didn’t have much in common with them. They were all spoiled rich kids who spent their summers in Europe. If he’d known it wouldn’t cause a nuclear blowout, he would’ve told his mother: You sent me to More Prep so I would mix with a better class of people, but they’re worse than any kids from the city. They’re mean, for one thing, and selfish and spoiled and arrogant, and they drink and use drugs and treat girls like dirt—if you could just hear them talking in the locker room, you’d pull me out of there so fucking fast my head would spin. They make fun of me, and surely that can’t be good for the self-esteem you always seem to be so goddamned concerned about.

But he knew better than to say anything to her. His mother never changed her mind once she’d made it up. She knew what was best for everyone. Her whole life was predicated on being right.

The silence grew more pointed, until finally she threw up her hands and walked out of the room, muttering to herself. He knew she’d complain about him to his father, and Joe would just listen to her, the way he always did. Dad had obviously learned early in their marriage that there wasn’t much point in disagreeing with her.

Chris washed his face and pulled on a pair of crimson sweatpants with BOSTON COLLEGE in gold lettering running up the left leg. His parents had already left. The house was silent, other than the sound of the rain. There was another loud crack of thunder. He switched on the kitchen light and started a pot of coffee. There was a note on the refrigerator from his mother, in her scrawling script: Chris, honey, didn’t want to wake you up, we probably won’t be back until tomorrow morning, Love, Lois.

He sighed. Why can’t I have normal parents who just want me to call them Mom and Dad, like everyone else?

Joe and Lois considered themselves to be “enlightened parents”—which meant he’d always been able to call them by their first names since he turned ten. The rule about yelling was just another example. Nothing he ever did was “bad,” either—nothing was bad. Things were merely “inappropriate.” Once, when he was seven, he’d taken his crayons and started doodling on his bedroom wall. Rather than screaming at him—like other kids’ parents would have—they merely sat him down and reasoned with him. We don’t want to interfere with your need to express yourself creatively, Lois had said, it’s just inappropriate to color on the walls. Crayons are for use on paper, not walls—that’s the appropriate way to express your artistry. That way you can show your art to other people so they can appreciate it.

Of course, the “appropriate” punishment for him was to paint over it so the walls all matched again, but she’d given him a sketchbook. All the same, Chris never used his crayons again.

Lois also wanted him to be self-sufficient as an adult, so he always had chores. He knew how to do the laundry, how to cook, how to iron, how to dust and vacuum. “We’re a team,” Lois was fond of saying. “Joe and I make the money and provide a nice home for you, and you keep the house going for us so we don’t have to worry about that.”

Of course, when he was in the wilds of rural Connecticut at Thomas More Prep they had a maid come into the town house in Back Bay. Chris suspected Lois just didn’t want to be bothered with doing her own housekeeping. That’s what his grandmother thought: Why do you make him do all the housework, Lois? He’s just a child, let him have some fun! Chris had never seen his mother turn quite that shade of purple before, but rather than yelling she’d merely taken a few breaths and started mouthing her mantra about teaching him “responsibility.”

He walked into the living room while the coffee brewed and pulled the curtains on the big picture window to let in some more light. He started to turn away, when he saw something out of the corner of his eye that drew him back to the window.

“What the hell?”

He wiped some of the fog off the window to get a better look.

A figure was standing across the street in the pouring rain, staring at the house.

He opened the front door and stared through the rain.

“Jessie?”

It was her.

She crossed the street, came up the walk, and stood on the porch, shivering and dripping.

“Are you crazy?” Chris shook his head. “Get inside! How long you been standing out there?”

He shut the door behind her. She was dripping water on the carpet. “Come on, get into the kitchen.” There were dry towels in the dryer, he remembered, and hurried to get her one.

She accepted the big green towel from him. “Thanks.” Her teeth were chattering as she began rubbing her hair.

“You’d better get out of those clothes—I’ll get you something.” He went back up the stairs.

She’s crazy. She’s like so totally and completely crazy! Why the fuck did I let her in the house? What kind of weirdo stands around in the pouring rain like that!

He pulled a sweatshirt from his drawer and found another pair of sweatpants in his closet. He headed back down to the kitchen.

She was sitting at the table with a steaming coffee mug clutched in her hands. He noticed her nails were bitten down to the quick, and the skin around them looked chewed. “I helped myself,” she said. Her teeth were still chattering.

He handed her the sweats. “Here. Go change. The bathroom’s through that door.”

She gave him a ghost of a smile and disappeared into the bathroom. He poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down at the table. When she came back out, he looked at her. Her face was a blank.

“Don’t you have enough sense to get out of the rain?” he asked, fretting just a little that he was sounding like Lois.

She sat down and brushed a lock of wet hair out of her face. “I needed to talk to you.”

“How did you know where I lived?”

“Truro’s a small place. All I had to do was get off the shuttle at the post office and ask where the two profs from Boston College lived.”

“Why?” Chris looked at her. “Why did you come all the way out here to find me?”

“Chris—” she said, biting her lip.

“What?”

“Like it or not, you’re a part of this now.”

The hair on the back of his neck stood up. “A part of what?”

“All of this.” She looked at him. “Chris, I know you’ve been watching me all summer.” She scratched her arm absently. “I didn’t know why—I just figured you had really weird taste in girls or something. I didn’t think you were a perv or anything like that.” She gave him another ghostly smile. “I’ve been thinking about it since the other day, and I realized that you’re here to help me, somehow.”

“Help you?” He scratched his head. “With what? You aren’t making any sense, Jessie.”

“You think I’m crazy, don’t you?” Her voice sounded defeated, and she seemed to literally shrink in front of him. “Everyone thinks I’m crazy. Even my shrink did.” She looked out the window and sipped her coffee. “But I’m not, Chris, you have to believe me—I’m not crazy! Strange things are happening, weird things, and I don’t know what to do. You’ve got to help me!”

“You think you’re possessed, I know.” He looked at her. She was pretty, he thought. If she wore makeup and did something about that wild tangle of hair, she’d be beautiful. He reached across the table and took her hand. “But there’s no such thing as possession, Jessie.”

“I thought I was crazy, too.” She got up, removing her hand from his and walking across the kitchen. She refilled her coffee. “Do you believe in ghosts?”

“There’s no such thing as ghosts either.” He crossed his arms.

“And how do you know that? For sure?”

“I—” He stopped. “I guess I don’t know. Everyone says that.” She’s crazy. I need to get her out of here. I should maybe call the police or something….

“Two years ago, my mother committed suicide.” Jessie sat back down, sipping her coffee while keeping her dark eyes trained on Chris. “It was on a day like this. I was in my room, reading. I heard something—a noise that didn’t make any sense, you know? I got up and went to see what it was—and she was hanging from the ceiling. Her eyes—” Jessie shivered. “Her eyes were open and her tongue was sticking out.”

“Jessie, look—”

“I just started screaming and screaming—I guess one of the neighbors heard me and called the police.” She shrugged. “Dad was gone—he’s always gone, you know—and he had to fly right back home.” She laughed bitterly. “He acted like it was this huge inconvenience to him, you know? He had to cancel some appearances. Like his wife dying might lose him some book sales.”

“You don’t really think that.”

“He’s an asshole,” Jessie said vehemently. “He doesn’t care about me, he never cared about Mom…he won’t admit it now, but I think he was going to divorce her. I think that’s why she did it.” She shuddered and wiped at her eyes. “It was so fucking weird, Chris, I mean, she made me lunch that day like nothing was wrong. Two hours later she was dead. Everything was fine…and then—” She closed her eyes again and took a deep breath. “And then of course dear Daddy decided I needed therapy.”

Chris couldn’t think of anything to say. He just kept staring at her.

“And that’s, you know, when the dreams started.”

“The dreams?”

“I thought they were dreams, anyway.” The girl took a deep breath. “I kept seeing my mom. She was trying to tell me something, to warn me…” She finished her coffee. “And I made the mistake of telling my shrink about it. She thought I was crazy. And she told my dad…I was this close to being committed.” She held her index finger and thumb about a centimeter apart. “And that’s when I knew I couldn’t tell them anything. So I started lying to them both. Dad pulled me out of school and hired Alice to homeschool me. Which is fine.” She laughed. “School sucked, anyway. You know how well I get along with other kids.”

He was softening toward her. Maybe she wasn’t crazy. Just lonely. Weird, but harmless…

“Look, I don’t get along with other kids my age any better. They call me Ichabod Crane.” And Beanpole, he thought. And Jolly Green Giant. And…

“I don’t care about them,” Jessie said. “They’re all idiots anyway.”

“Jessie, why are you here?”

“You don’t believe me, do you?” She stood up. “I don’t know why I thought you would. You’re just like everyone else.”

There was so much despair in her voice, such sadness and defeat that he couldn’t help himself. “Okay.” He stood, looking up at her. “I believe you.” He wasn’t sure that he did, but it was the right thing to say.

She sat back down. “You have no clue how awful it is….”

He stood, walking around her and placing his hand awkwardly on her shoulder. Her narrow shoulders shook. She stood once more, turning into him, placing her cold face against his bare chest. He slid his arms around her.

“It’s okay,” he heard himself saying.

You are so lame, Chris Muir. Here’s a pretty girl crying in your arms, and all you can do is hold her and say stupid things. No wonder you’re still a virgin. Lame, lame, lame.

She pulled out of his embrace, wiping her face. “Sorry.” She gave him a weak smile. “You still want to help me?”

“Sure.” If it means I get to put my arms around you again.

“Well, I should warn you. It’s worse now.”

“What do you mean?”

“I know they aren’t dreams, Chris.” Jessie sighed. “It’s the house. There’s something living in that house. And I don’t mean people.”

“Then what do you mean?”

“Do you promise to help me?”

“Jessie, I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“Unless you help me, I won’t be able to stop them.”

“Stop them from what?”

She put her fists up to her ears in frustration, scrunching up her face. She turned away, then looked back at Chris. “Have you ever heard of Lettie Hatch?” she asked.

Lettie Hatchet took a butcher knife, and with it took her father’s life….

“Yeah,” Chris said. “Everyone has. She killed her parents.”

“I live in her house, Chris. Lettie Hatch’s mother killed herself. And two years later her father got remarried to this young bitch and then Lettie killed her father and her stepmother.” She walked over to the window where the rain was still pounding the earth. “And my dad just got married again…to a girl way younger than he is. Are you starting to follow my line of reasoning?”

“Uh, yeah…”

“It’s going to all happen again, Chris, I know it is. I dream about it. I dream about the knife and the blood. And last night—”

Gooseflesh crawled up Chris’s arms. “What happened last night?”

“Last night I dreamed about killing her.” Jessie laughed. Almost a funny ha-ha kind of laugh, but Chris knew she wasn’t joking. “I dreamed I went into the kitchen and got the knife and went into her bedroom and started stabbing…and it felt so good!”

She looked over at him with wild dark eyes.

“It’s Lettie, Chris. She’s still in the house, somehow. She’s in my mind. Unless I stop her, unless I can do something, she’s going to do it again. She’s going to make me do it.”

“Whoa.” Chris’s mind raced. “Let’s just take a breather here, okay?”

She’s nuts, she has to be, she’s telling you she’s going to kill her parents, this is all so fucking crazy, get her out of here, she’s not stable, Lois and Joe are going to come home and find me carved up…

“You have to believe me, Chris.”

Something about her eyes, wild as they were, made Chris keep looking into them.

“I don’t want to do this. That’s why you’ve got to help me.”

Humor her, Chris, tell her what she wants to hear, but get her out of here.

“Okay. What do you want me to do?”

“I don’t know.” Jessie buried her face in her hands. “I don’t know what to do.”

“Maybe…” He hesitated. “Maybe you should go back to your therapist.”

“That would be totally brainless, Chris. If I told her—anyone else—they’d just lock me up somewhere, medicate me—and that won’t change anything!” She looked at him sadly. “It’s not that simple!”

“Isn’t it? Come on, Jessie—maybe you’re wrong. Maybe—maybe the…” He cast about in his head for the right words. “Maybe your mom’s death—”

“Unhinged me? Made me crazy?” She sighed. “Chris, crazy people don’t think they’re crazy. They don’t even wonder about it. And I do. Every day.” She sank back into her chair. “Every fucking day I wonder if I’m crazy. But what if I’m not, Chris? What if I’m not?”

He looked down at her, not knowing what to do, what to say. How had he gotten into this mess?

“You do think I’m crazy. I can see it in your face.”

She ran into the bathroom and got her wet clothes. “Don’t worry,” she called, slinging them over her shoulder. “I’ll mail these sweats back to you. I won’t ever darken your doorstep again. I won’t bother you anymore!” And she ran into the front room.

“Hey!” He went after her. The front door slammed shut behind her and within a few seconds he had it open again. She’d reached the gate.

“Lettie! Don’t go!” he shouted.

She stopped and stared back at him, the rain pouring down her face. “What did you call me?”

“I—uh—”

“You called me Lettie.” She stepped back onto the porch. “Why did you do that?”

“I—I don’t know.” He really didn’t know. He knew her name was Jessie. His head started to hurt. Everything started to spin. “I don’t feel right—”

“Chris!” he heard her shout, and then everything went black.

He opened his eyes.

She was looking down at him, her face lined with concern. But she wasn’t Jessie anymore. Oh, sure, she was about the same age, and looked like Jessie, but she was different somehow. The hair—it was the hair. Jessie’s hair was shoulder-length; now it was hanging down her back. And it wasn’t raining anymore: the sun was shining and he could feel the sweat on his forehead and under his arms.

“Are you all right, Samuel?”

“I—” He struggled to get up to his knees, but the dizziness came back. He closed his eyes and took some deep breaths. He heard a horse clopping by and shook his head. The air was different somehow. Everything was the same but somehow different.

“Samuel, talk to me!”

“I don’t know what came over me,” he managed to say, opening his eyes and looking at her again.

“You scared me.” Her voice was small, and shook with every word. He felt her lips press against his forehead. “Are you sure you are fine? Should I get you some water?”

“I’ll be fine.” He smiled at her, and she smiled back. God, he loved her. He thought about her every waking moment, and dreamed about her as well. The pretty face, the delicious figure, the sweetness in her eyes, the gentle way she molded her body into his when they kissed, the taste of her mouth, the swell of her breasts…

“Chris?”

He blinked a couple of times as he looked at her.

“Are you okay? Do you need me to get help?”

He sat up. The rain continued to pound down. A car went by. They sat there in the mud staring at each other, breathing hard.

“Let’s get inside,” he said.

“What happened to you just now?” Jessie asked, helping him stand.

“I—I don’t know.” He shook his head.

“You’re white as a ghost.”

“I feel a little dizzy, that’s all.”

She pressed her knuckles into her mouth and started shaking. “It’s happening to you, too, isn’t it?”

He walked away from her, up the steps and into the house. He sat down on the couch, mindless of how wet and muddy he was.

Jessie followed and knelt down on the floor in front of him. “Chris, talk to me. Tell me what happened.”

He didn’t answer. He couldn’t. His mind was all jumbled. He looked at her and she was Jessie—the tangled wet black hair, the big brown eyes. “You”—he swallowed—“you weren’t—”

“I wasn’t what?”

“You weren’t you.” He swallowed. “You weren’t you anymore.” It sounded crazy, even to himself, but he couldn’t think of any other way to say it.

Jessie looked at him intensely. “Was I her?”

“I—”

“Oh God.” She got up and walked across the room.

“And I wasn’t me, either.” Chris took some deep breaths. Calm down, everything’s fine, deep calming breaths, in with the good air, out with the bad, get a hold of yourself, you’re in control. He looked over at Jessie. “Is this—is this what has happened to you?”

She nodded. “And it’s happening more and more, Chris.” She walked over and sat on the couch, taking his hand. “Now do you understand, Chris?”

He swallowed and nodded. “What—what is happening?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Jessie asked. “Lettie Hatch wants to live again.”