Black Feathers (9 page)

Cassie took a long moment to answer. “Yes. It does.”

Ali stood up. “I’ll leave you to it, then. I’ll be back with some more hot chocolate in a bit. You take all the time you need.”

Cassie just smiled. “Thank you.”

Leaning back over her journal, she began to flip through the pages, the echo of Ali’s question still reverberating in her mind.

Yes, it helped. It helped in so many ways. The journal kept her grounded, reminded her of who she was, her true self, no matter how far things drifted.

It was all her, all right there.

She turned to the first page, the first writing in the new journal she had started in the hospital the month before.

She stared at the words, her truth, her self.

November 15, 1997

I killed Daddy last night.

Scientists believe that light can be both wave and particle. Not that light exists in different states at different times, the way that water can be ice or steam with the application or reduction of heat, but that light exists as both a wave and a particle at the same moment. It is not either/or. It is both/and.

This is also true of the Darkness.

It exists not within paradox, but as a paradox itself.

It is both energy and form.

Both without and within.

It moves within us and outside us. Like a man and like the arc of electricity.

I knew this from the moment the Darkness first came to me.

But even that is wrong. The Darkness was always within me. It is always within all of us. But even though it was within me, it came to me too. I could feel it moving over me, brushing across my face and watching through my eyes as I held the kitten in the kitchen sink, as I turned the water on and let the basin fill.

I could feel the Darkness within me, my Darkness, growing as the kitten struggled, and I could feel the Darkness outside looking on, watching me and watching through my eyes.

The Darkness within me grew with every desperate attempt the kitten made to escape. And the Darkness outside fed off the kitten’s death, and from every scratch it inflicted on me, every drop of my blood it spilled in its dying.

The Darkness fed from both of us. And fed. And fed.

As she opened the door from the restaurant, the cold wind was like a slap in the face, stinging and sharp. Cassie took a startled breath that burned all the way down, and stopped short to shift her scarf up over her mouth and nose. It took only seconds for her to feel like she might never be warm again.

And she had been so warm.

It was like waking into a nightmare.

Hunching her shoulders forward, she turned away from the wind, ducking her head. As she scurried past, she caught a glimpse of Ali standing in the window, watching her through the half-steamed glass.

The snow had started to stick, a brittle skiff on the concrete that crunched under her feet. The wind sliced up the gap between her shoes and pants, chilling her lower legs.

The sidewalks were nearly deserted, and none of the people she passed even noticed her. Their own heads were bent, their eyes focused on the snowy ground.

It was getting dark, but unlike the day before, there was already a crowd in the breezeway next to City Hall, small clusters of people hunkered out of the wind, wrapped in threadbare blankets, huddled together for warmth. Standing in the
shadows of Centennial Square, Cassie scanned the area slowly for Skylark. She looked again and again, even as the snow whipped around her.

“Why don’t you come in?”

The voice was soft, but Cassie jumped and turned.

Brother Paul lowered both his hands slowly, palms down. There was something in the simple action that was soothing, and it took Cassie a moment to recognize: it was the same movement the minister at home used to signal the congregation to take their seats.

“You don’t have to stand out here in the cold, you know,” he said.

“I know,” she said. “I was—”

“Waiting for your friend.”

“Yes.”

“Why don’t you come in,” he repeated, opening his arms, gesturing toward the camp with his right, lifting his left as if he meant to guide her with a touch on her back.

Cassie took a half-step away.

“The Outreach van will be here soon. And I’m sure Skylark will be back.” He paused. “Ah …” He nodded toward the breezeway.

The volume of murmuring from the camp rose as Skylark moved from group to group, embracing people, laughing, talking loudly.

“Blessed be, Dorothy,” Brother Paul murmured as he drifted away.

Watching Skylark in the distance, Cassie barely heard him.

She looked distracted and kept glancing around. She would look over the shoulder of whoever she was embracing, and
between groups she deliberately turned around, scanning the breezeway.

Was she looking for Cassie?

She dismissed the thought—Skylark knew everyone. She was probably looking for Brother Paul, or for a friend.

Cassie drifted slowly toward the camp. She didn’t want to seem like she was rushing or trying to make an entrance. She didn’t want to look stupid or—

“Dorothy!”

Skylark turned away from the group she was talking to and almost ran across the breezeway toward her, swooping her into a tight hug without another word.

“How did it go?” she bubbled, stepping back slightly. “Was that a good spot? Did you stay warm enough? What about that snow? Oh, I’ve had a day you wouldn’t believe,” she said without a breath. “Come on,” she said. “We can catch up.”

As they turned, the entire camp seemed to stir. Cassie could dimly pick out the sound of a rough engine as everyone started to move toward the loading zone in front of City Hall.

“Dinner first,” Skylark said, guiding them into the crowd.

Cassie almost walked into the shadow that stopped in front of her, blocking her path.

“Well, look who it is.”

The words stopped her in place.

It was the dreadlocked boy from the McDonald’s, with two of his friends.

“I was hoping I would see you again.”

Even in the half-light she could see the smirk on the boy’s face, the smiles of his friends. “Who’s your friend?” he asked, drawing out the word as he turned to Skylark.

“What the fuck is it to you?” Skylark snarled through a wide smile.

One of the boys snorted.

“Skylark,” Cassie whispered.

Skylark stayed perfectly still, her smile etched on her face, drawn back over her teeth.

The boy with the dreadlocks grinned.

“So, just ‘bitch,’ then?”

The other boys laughed; Skylark didn’t move.

She didn’t flinch when he jerked toward her, snapping his head forward so it was almost touching hers, lingering for a moment before he pulled back and turned away.

“Whatever,” he muttered. “Fucking dyke bitches.”

The boys were laughing as they drifted toward the food line.

“So, are you hungry?” Skylark asked, turning to Cassie as if nothing had happened.

“Skylark—”

“Because I don’t want to get in line with those guys, and if we wait—”

Without thinking, Cassie threw her arms around Skylark, squeezing her tightly. “Oh, God.”

“What?” Skylark asked, puzzled.

“Those guys—” Cassie started, but Skylark cut her off.

“Those guys? Those guys are bad news. You can tell just looking at them.”

Cassie exhaled heavily.

“The thing with guys like that? They’re just bullies. And bullies are usually weak and they use all this bluster and violence to pump themselves up so nobody notices that. Pick on someone else so you don’t get picked on, right?”

“I guess.”

“So you have to outbluster them. Make them know that you’re more confident than they think you are. Stronger. That way they won’t pick on you. A predator won’t attack something stronger, right?”

She thought of what Mrs. Hepnar had said and how she had tried to stand up to the boys at the McDonald’s. “Yeah.”

“It’s nature. That’s how it usually works. Predators prey on the weak. It’s all instinct.”

Watching the three boys push each other in the line, Cassie wasn’t sure she found that comforting at all.

The Darkness watched the girls from the far side of the line that had formed behind the van, another face in a white blur of faces, of grey breath, of scarves and hats.

They were almost close enough to touch.

He had done it on purpose, positioned himself deliberately. Just close enough, just far away enough, teetering on the cusp of possibility. He hungered, and he savoured the hunger, the desire. Wanting to reach out, to sweep them in, to take them—he could feel his heart race at the thought, at the tension in his muscles. It would be so easy.

It was always so easy.

But there was so much pleasure in the yearning. Holding off, letting the hunger build … That first bite would be ever so sweet.

The Darkness stopped, looked into the crowd. He could feel a pull, a gentle tug, the inviting breath of a door being opened, a door into another world of warmth, another hunger.

Closing his eyes, the Darkness jumped.

When his eyes opened again, he was in a different place,
inside a different vessel, deeper in the crowd, closer to the van, but farther from the girls.

His first reaction was to scan the crowd, to look for the old host. There, closer to the square, eyes taking in the crowd, but returning, always returning, to the girls. The Darkness could see the hunger, the longing.

The Darkness breathed and grew in the new vessel, expanding to fill the space. He flexed his finger, tapped his toes, turned his head, gradually spun the body in an almost complete circle.

The Darkness smiled.

This was a splendid new development. Not a surprise: doors were always opening for the Darkness, it was human nature. But this, this felt familiar. He had felt these hands, tasted this anger.

Oh, yes, the Darkness had been here before.

And he would return.

But right now …

With one last lingering look at the girls, the Darkness jumped again.

He was surprised when he felt the stirring in the pit of his stomach. Usually it took longer. Usually a night like last night was enough to keep the feelings at bay for a good long time. Weeks, sometimes months even.

But maybe it was like a good meal. You stuff yourself at Christmas dinner to the point where you feel like you might explode, and you swear you’ll never eat again, only to wake up on Boxing Day morning hungrier than you’ve ever been in your entire life.

Yes, it was just like that.

Because last night had been a hell of a feast, satisfying him in ways that he had never even imagined.

And yet, here he was.

It was the television’s fault.

The kids had it on while they were playing, some screeching show that set his teeth on edge. And they weren’t even watching—they had it on in the background as they built Lego castles and knocked them down. Build, destroy, build, destroy, and all the time that hellish screeching.

And every time he tried to turn it off or change the channel, the kids had pleaded with him like their lives depended on staying tuned in.

So it wasn’t his fault.

It was that little slut on the TV, that always-smiling, hair-flipping, head-cocking little slut, her tight little body, her knowing eyes.

That’s when the stirring had come back, in one flash of imagination: the way her eyes would widen as he slid the knife into her.

Nothing more than that, and the stirring was back.

He had sat there on the couch as the kids played, as that ridiculous, terrible show screeched on, thinking about the night before, the way that whore had started to scream, the cry bubbling out of her throat in a rush and gout of blood. And that pissy little bitch on the TV—God, he’d leave her throat for the very end, just to hear that screech one last time.

At first, he had hoped for the feeling to go away. No: he actively tried to push it down, to distract himself. He crouched on the floor and started building a castle of his own, laughing as the kids ganged up on him to reduce it to rubble, again and
again. He offered to get the kids ready for bed, to take care of storytime and give Alice a chance to get off her feet. He had lingered over the books, laughing with the kids before snugging the covers up to their necks and kissing them good night.

No matter what he did, his stomach roiled. It was impossible to ignore, impossible to push down.

But there was something about it …

The realization came to him as he sat on the couch next to Alice, her legs draped over his lap as they watched some crappy rerun: he liked it.

He liked the stirring in his stomach. He liked the way it made him feel.

It was like resisting a snack while waiting for a big dinner: the hunger was satisfying in and of itself.

Though not,
he thought to himself, as Alice yawned and started to get ready for bed,
as good as the meal would be.

She lingered in the living room doorway on her way upstairs.

“Are you coming?” she asked. There was a flirtatious tone to her voice, and she leaned forward a little, a small smile on her lips.

He shook his head, putting on a frown. “Not right now,” he said, and her face fell. “I’m sorry,” he hurried. “I should put in a couple of hours …”

She nodded, her smile replaced with a frown of familiar resignation. “Of course.”

“I’m sorry,” he repeated, but she shook her head.