Can You Keep a Secret? (7 page)

But I was no longer in the mood. And watching the faces around the grave, I didn’t think anyone else was, either.

“My parents are useless in an emergency,” I said. “They just tell us to calm down and not be drama queens. No matter what.” I was telling the truth.

“My mom just passes out the Xanax,” Roxie said. “She thinks it’s the cure for everything.”

“I’m almost finished here,” Eddie said, tossing more dirt on the grave. “I can ride with you.” He glanced around the group. We were all standing very still, watching his work. “Hey, thanks for pitching in, everyone,” he grumbled.

“Cut us some slack,” Riley said. “There was only one shovel.”

I noticed that Danny had gotten very quiet. I saw his eyes follow the shovel as Eddie smoothed the dirt over the grave. I wondered what he was thinking. After a few seconds, he saw me watching him, and he turned abruptly toward the trees.

Eddie tossed the shovel onto the ground. He wiped his hands on the legs of his jeans. “Let’s roll,” he said.

The lights were still on in the office at the back of the cemetery. Squinting hard, I thought I saw a shadow move in the front window. But I was too far away to see clearly.

Eddie slid a hand onto my shoulder as we walked toward the car. “You okay?”

I nodded. “Worried about Sophie.”

Worried about Sophie and about me.

“What a boring night!” Riley exclaimed. That made us all laugh.

“Hey, we’re almost rich,” Eddie said.

“Almost,” Danny repeated. I could hear the bitterness in his voice. I hoped he wasn’t going to cause more trouble.

*   *   *

Sophie was waiting up for me in our room. Her face was sweaty even though a breeze was floating in through the open window, making the curtains dance.

She sat up on her knees on her bed as I came in. Her nightshirt was caught beneath her legs. She tugged it free.

I turned on the ceiling light. Sophie’s cheeks were flushed. Her normally perfect black hair was matted to one side on her head. “I didn’t know if you’d come home or not,” she said softly, her eyes studying me.

“I was worried about you. You sounded so weird,” I said.

“You weren’t at Rachel Martin’s,” Sophie said, frowning. “I tried her house first.”

“You
what
?” I returned her stare. “Why didn’t you just call my cell? You knew I wasn’t at Rachel’s. So you were checking up on me? Why?”

She stuck her chin out. “Mom and Dad think you’re so perfect, and I know you’re not.”

I groaned. “Sophie, please don’t start this. It’s been a long night—”

“Look at your sneakers,” she said, ignoring me. “They’re caked with mud. Where were you, Emmy? Where were you really?”

“I’m sick of you being jealous all the time,” I snapped. I didn’t mean to say it. It just burst out. Now that I’d started, I couldn’t stop. “Sick of you checking up on me, watching me, commenting on everything, always criticizing me, always being angry. Poor Sophie. Poor Sophie. She’s not as popular … not as much fun as Emmy. I’m sick of it! I’ve got my own problems, you know?”

Sophie’s eyes went wide. She wasn’t expecting such an explosion. She raised a finger to her lips.”You’re going to wake up Mom and Dad,” she said.

“I don’t care,” I said.

“You just don’t want to be honest with me,” she said, her chin trembling, like she was getting ready to cry. “You don’t think you can confide in me. Because you think I’m some kind of lower life form. I’m just some kind of larvae, or … no … a leech … some annoying creature you have to pull off your leg.”

Huh? That made me burst out laughing.

After a few seconds, Sophie began to laugh, too. It was such an insane, dopey thing to say. We hadn’t laughed together like that in a long time. We both laughed till we had tears in our eyes.

I dropped down on the edge of her bed and took her hand. “Okay,” I said. “Okay, leech. How about a truce? What do you say?”

She wiped her eyes with her fingers. “Truce?”

“I’ll tell you the truth,” I said, “if you swear not to tell anyone. Can you keep a secret?”

I could see she was thinking about it. “Okay,” she said finally. “Truce.” We bumped knuckles.

So I told her the truth. Actually, it felt good to tell her. “I was with Eddie and a bunch of friends,” I said. “We had this plan to camp out all night in the Fear Street Woods.”

“Oh, wow,” Sophie said. I could see the surprise on her face. “You and Eddie? You haven’t even been going with him that long. I hope you were careful.”

“It wasn’t like that,” I told her. “Eddie has this thing about camping … being outdoors. He says we spend too much time cramped up indoors. He says he can’t breathe indoors. So he came up with the idea. And … we all thought it would be an adventure.”

No way I planned to tell Sophie about the briefcase of money or burying it in the pet cemetery. I wasn’t used to confiding in her. I decided I’d better go slow. See if she could be trusted. This was a good test. If she went running to my parents with this info, I’d know for sure that I couldn’t trust her with any secrets.

“So … what happened?” Sophie asked, settling her back against the wall, straightening the hem of her nightshirt. “Why’d you come home?”

“Because of your call,” I said. It wasn’t a total lie. “You sounded so frightened and…” My voice trailed off. I suddenly remembered what happened to me after Sophie called. The whole world fading away … becoming a blur … and the overwhelming animal urge to howl.

Sophie’s blue eyes locked on mine. “So I spoiled your night?”

“No. No way,” I said. “It wasn’t a good plan. The others weren’t in the mood and … and I came home. We all went home.” I stood up. I started to pace back and forth between our two beds. “So you’ll keep my secret?”

“Of course,” she said.

“Change of subject,” I said. I had to ask her. I had to learn more. I couldn’t stop thinking about my strange wolf dreams … the weird feelings I kept having. I wondered if Sophie could help me.

She straightened her legs over the bed, stuck out her arms, and leaning forward, stretched her hands over her bare feet. Sophie runs track, and she’s also on the tennis team. She’s an athlete. Something I’m not. And she’s always stretching. Keeping loose. Testing her body.

I stopped pacing and stood over her. “Sophie, do you remember anything at all about when we flew to Prague when we were little and visited Great Aunt Marta?”

She stopped stretching. She narrowed her eyes at me. “That again?”

I nodded. “Yes. I know you told Mom you couldn’t remember anything. But—”

“Hmmmmmm.” Sophie scrunched her face up and shut her eyes. She does that when she’s thinking hard about something. “Well…” She opened her eyes. “All I remember is that Aunt Marta was nearly blind, and she liked you better than me—even though she had trouble telling us apart.”

Sophie smiled. “And I remember those weird little pies she made that tasted like sour meat and were totally gross.”

I crossed my arms in front of me. “So you
do
remember a little bit.”

“Well…”

“Do you remember anything about me being bitten by an animal? A dog or something that jumped out of the woods and attacked me?”

Sophie scrunched up her face again. “No. Not really. I don’t remember that. Was I there when it happened?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I can’t remember it, either. But mom swears it happened.”

“Was Mom there?” Sophie asked.

“No. Aunt Marta told her about it. Mom was visiting someone in the next town when it happened. But wouldn’t I remember something as frightening as that?”

Sophie shrugged. “Emmy, are you coming to watch my track meet Monday after school? Mom and Dad can’t make it.”

“I’m really sorry. I can’t either,” I told her. “I have to pick up Eddie after his job. And then I’m having dinner at his house.”

“But you
promised
.” Sophie’s voice became shrill. She pounded the bedspread with both fists. “You promised you’d come, Emmy.”

“I wish I could,” I said. “Really. I—”

“How come I always come last?” Sophie demanded.

“Hey, I thought we had a truce,” I said. “I’m sorry. I really am.”

Sure, I felt guilty. I had promised to come. Sophie’s track meets were very important to her. It was the only thing she was into, except for hanging out at the library and reading and studying all the time.

But then Eddie needed me to pick him up. And invited me to dinner.

I knew I should support Sophie more. But what could I do? I had a busy life. I had a boyfriend. I mean, I had friends to see and my own stuff to do after school. And frankly, track meets are way boring. Waiting two hours to watch your sister run in a thirty-second race? Yawn.

So, I apologized to Sophie a dozen more times. But she wouldn’t remove her pouty face. She turned to the wall and pulled the covers up over her head.

I got undressed quickly, pulled on a wrinkled-up pair of pajamas I’d stuffed in a dresser drawer, turned off the light, and climbed into my bed across the room.

It took a while to get to sleep. I kept running the scenes of the evening over and over in my head, like one of those six-second Vines that just won’t stop. The campfire … the gun … our names carved on the tree … the brown leather briefcase of money …

When I finally fell asleep, I had another wolf dream.

In this dream, I was in a house I didn’t recognize. In a brightly lit living room filled with red furniture. Everything red. I felt puzzled. Where was I? How did I get there?

In the dream, I wanted to figure everything out. I was frightened by my confusion. But before I could get clear on anything, I saw the wolf across the room.

Tall and powerful-looking, standing stiff and alert. The black wolf, gazing at me with those intelligent blue eyes. Ears straight up, jaw open just enough to reveal yellow, curled teeth.

My confusion gave way to fear. A terrifying staring match, the wolf and I. Neither of us blinked. Neither of us moved a muscle.

Studying each other. Testing each other.

And then suddenly, in my sleep, in my dream, I’m asking myself a frightening question:

Is the wolf watching me? Or am I the wolf?

16.

When I picked up Eddie at the pet cemetery the next afternoon, Mac Stanton stood with him near the gate. Mac had a white paper shopping bag in one hand and was shaking it in front of Eddie.

“Do you believe this?” Mac greeted me. “People dump their dead dogs over the fence in the middle of the night and expect me to take care of them.”

Something thumped heavily in the bag as Mac shook it. I assumed it was a dead dog.

“That’s terrible,” I said. I didn’t know what else to say. I could see that Mac was really angry.

“Do you know what the rent on this property is?” he demanded. He didn’t expect an answer. He was just ranting. “It’s sky high. So why do these idiots think I’m going to bury their dogs for nothing?”

I glanced at Eddie. He looked embarrassed.

“People are upset when their pet dies,” I said. “I guess they’re just not thinking clearly at the time.”

Mac scowled at me. His gold tooth caught the sunlight. His face was bright red. “Well,
I’m
thinking clearly. I’ll tell you that.” He pointed up to a tree limb overhanging a row of graves. “See that? That’s a security camera. I put them up all over the grounds. Next time someone comes in here at night to dump a dead dog, I’ll know who it is.”

He gazed up at the camera. “And don’t think I won’t come after them.”

Swinging the shopping bag at his side, he spun around and stormed toward the office.

I stepped close to Eddie. “Wow. Is he always like this?” I whispered.

Mac slammed the office door behind him.

“He has a temper,” Eddie said, shaking his head. “Sometimes he’s a little out-of-control. But then a few seconds later, he’s his usual grouchy self.”

We both laughed. We climbed into the car, and I drove toward Eddie’s house in the Old Village. It was a hot day, hazy and wet, the kind of day that made your skin prickle at the back of your neck, made you wish you were at the beach.

The air-conditioner in Mom’s Corolla always takes twenty minutes to get cold. I smelled something sour, like rotted meat.

Eddie saw me sniffing the air. “It’s me,” he said. “The smell from the cemetery, it sticks to my clothes … to my skin. I can’t figure out why it smells so bad there.”

“Is it the crematorium?” I asked, turning onto Village Road.

“I don’t think so,” Eddie said. “Mac hasn’t fried any animals since I’ve been working there.”

I stopped for a light. My phone buzzed and vibrated. I pulled it out and gazed at the screen. A text from Sophie: “Finished second. Thanks for your support.”

“What’s that?” Eddie asked.

“My sister being bitter,” I said. I tucked the phone back into my bag. “Sophie’s feeling neglected these days.”

“How come?” he asked.

“Because I’ve been neglecting her?”

We both laughed again. But I cut my laughter short. “She’s going through a hard time. I’m not really sure why. We don’t confide in each other a lot.”

Eddie nodded. Traffic was moving slowly. Cars always got backed up around the Division Street Mall. Passing the mall made me think of some tees I wanted to buy at the Old Navy store. And that made me think about money. And
that
made me think about the briefcase full of money.

“Did Mac notice the filled-in grave?” I asked.

Eddie blinked. My question caught him by surprise. He shook his head. “No. He walked right past the grave. He was so steamed about the dog being heaved over the fence, he didn’t notice anything.”

“So you really think the money is safe there?”

“Sure,” he said. “There are a bunch of recently dug graves. Mac won’t notice anything.” He swept a hand back through his dark hair. “It’ll be safe there. But I’d love to dig it up and hand everyone their shares.”

I shivered. It was one thing to see all that money and bury it at night. It was all kind of dreamlike. It was definitely the kind of thing that would happen in a dream.

But talking about it in the daylight made it seem so much more real.