Deadly Little Games (16 page)

DOCTOR:
What do you have there?

PATIENT:
What does it look like?

DOCTOR:
A pen. Some paper.

PATIENT:
Let me guess: did you graduate with honors?

DOCTOR:
High honors, if you must know. What are you writing?

PATIENT:
Soon.

DOCTOR:
Soon what?

PATIENT:
Soon, I’ll get what I want. Soon, things will be as they should.

DOCTOR:
What
do
you want? How
should
they be?

PATIENT:
(Patient doesn’t respond.)

DOCTOR:
Can I see your notebook?

PATIENT:
(No response.)

DOCTOR:
Is that a crossword puzzle you’re doing? See, I knew you liked puzzles. And how are you doing at finding the answers?

PATIENT:
Great. Really, really great.

A
FTER BEN LEAVES
, I head back upstairs to my room, only to find Dad in the kitchen. He has his back toward me, sneaking a bag of Bugles from one of the baskets above the cabinets.

“Caught you,” I say, switching on the light, making him jump.

“Shouldn’t you be in bed?” he asks, keeping his voice low.

“Shouldn’t you?” I give him a pointed look.

“Probably, but your mom actually fell asleep tonight—probably the first night all week. Meanwhile, I’m too hungry to nod off.”

“So, where does that leave us?” I ask, eyeing his bag of Bugles.

“Can you be trusted?”

“That depends. Are you willing to share?” I smile. “Good hiding spot, by the way. Nobody ever uses those baskets.”

“That’s what
you
think.” He gazes down the hall to make sure the coast is clear and then snags a bag of Hershey’s Kisses from one of the other four overhead baskets.

We park ourselves at the kitchen island and rip both bags open. Five full minutes of lusty devouring pass before either of us speaks.

“I wanted to talk to you about earlier,” he says. “About Aunt Alexia. Apparently, her treatment isn’t working so well.”

I pop a Kiss-stuffed Bugle into my mouth. “That facility isn’t the right place for her. I’ve even told Mom so.”

Dad stops chewing and studies my face, curious, maybe, as to why I’m so convinced. “Aunt Alexia got into some trouble tonight,” he tells me. “Shortly after you left for Wes’s, Mom got a call from the director of the facility. Alexia stole a nurse’s cell phone and tried to make a call.”

I close my eyes, thinking about the phone call I got earlier. “Do you know the nurse’s name?”

Dad resumes eating as he thinks about it a moment. “Haven,” he says, between chews.

“Haven,” I repeat, standing up from the stool. My face gets hot, and my mind starts to scramble. I replay the voice-mail recording in my head, sure now that it was Alexia who called me earlier tonight.

“Is something wrong?” Dad asks, reaching out to touch my arm.

I shake my head and sit back down.

“According to your mom,” Dad continues, “Alexia feels different somehow—misunderstood and at the same time more intuitive than anyone else around her.”

“Intuitive?”

He nods and continues to study me. “She says she’s able to sense things about the future. Can you imagine what that must be like?”

My eyes betray me by filling with tears. I look away, down into my palms, suddenly feeling as if it’s me who’s going crazy.

Dad gives my forearm a squeeze and asks again if something’s wrong.

But I honestly have no words.

Tears course down the sides of my face, and yet I have no idea what I’m crying about anymore—if it’s for Aunt Alexia, or my relationship with Ben, if it’s for everything that Kimmie and Wes are going through with their parents…Maybe it’s just for me.

Dad allows me to crumple up in his arms. He holds me for several minutes before escorting me to my bedroom and tucking me into bed. “Is there anything you want to talk about?” he asks.

“I’m tired,” I whisper, rolling away so he can’t see my face.

“You’ll feel better after some rest,” he says, kissing me on the temple. “And don’t you worry about your aunt. Everything will work out fine in the end. It always does.” He moves her journal from my pillow, placing it on my bedside table without so much as asking where it came from. Without so much as a hint of surprise that it even exists.

I
LIE IN BED
, my head full of questions; the word
SOON
is lit up behind my eyes, making my head ache. I glance over at Aunt Alexia’s journal, noting how the pages are yellowed; how the cover’s been torn, patched over, and torn again; and how Alexia’s name is emblazoned across the front in thick black marker.

Is it possible that Dad didn’t notice what it was?

Unable to fall asleep, I grab my cell phone to get Kimmie’s take on things, including my recent blowout with Ben, but before I can even dial, it rings.

“Hey,” Adam says when I answer. “I’m sorry to call so late.”

I check the clock. It’s a little before midnight. “Is everything okay?” I catch my reflection in the dresser mirror, noticing right away how tired I look. The skin beneath my eyes is bluish gray, and my hair looks matted and dull.

“I got another one,” he says.

“Where?” I ask. My head throbs.

“On my windshield. I was at the library for a couple hours. When I got back out to my car, it was there, folded up in an envelope.”

“And what did it say?” I ask, almost expecting to hear him tell me, “
Soon
.”

“Check the bed.” His voice cracks saying the words.

“Excuse me?”

“That’s what it said.”

“And what’s it supposed to mean?”

“Call me crazy, but I think it might mean that I should check my bed.”

“Not funny.”

“Who’s laughing? I’m paranoid about going home now. I’m having major flashbacks to summer camp. You know, itching powder in the bedsheets, snakes under the pillow, getting your hand dipped into a bowl full of water while you sleep—”

“You’ve started locking your door, right?”

“Yeah. I mean, mostly.”

“Which one is it, yeah or mostly?”

Adam lets out a sigh, making the answer pretty obvious.

“I just don’t get it,” I tell him. I mean, if he’s so concerned about his safety, if he’s really as nervous as he’s making himself out to be, he’d be locking his door. Every time.

“Say something.”

“Were you alone at the library?” I ask.

“Initially, but then I saw Tray and Janet. Melissa was there, too. We all just sort of bumped into one another.”

“And did
they
see the crossword puzzle? Have you even asked any of them if they’ve been receiving these puzzles, too?”

“I asked Piper.”

“And?”

“And she had no idea what I was talking about,” he says.

“So, where are you now?”

“Driving around, talking to you. I just passed the Press & Grind. God, I wish they were open right now.”

“Come and get me.”

“Camelia—no. It’s way too late. I’m sorry I even bothered you.”

“Come now,” I insist, pulling on my coat. The word
SOON
still flashes before my eyes. “We don’t have much time.”

I
CRAWL OUT OF MY
bedroom window and meet Adam at the end of my street.

“I hope I’m not getting you in trouble,” he says, once I’m inside his car.

“Is that the puzzle?” I ask, ignoring his comment, eager to get down to business. I grab the envelope from the dashboard and unfold the paper inside. Adam’s filled in the letter blocks; the words
CHECK THE BED
scream up at me in bold black letters.

Adam turns toward me. His eyes are wide, and his face looks slightly sweaty. “So, what do you think?”

“I think we’d better go check your bed.”

He swallows hard, seemingly surprised. “For real?”

I nod, and he reluctantly puts the car in drive, pulls away from the curb, and heads toward his apartment.

“Did you tell anyone that you were coming out with me?” he asks.

“Of course,” I lie, feeling like an idiot for failing to tell a single soul, especially since he’s duped me in the past. “I called Kimmie and Ben.”

“And what did they say?”

“That they’re giving me an hour, tops, before they come looking for me and/or calling the police.”

“That’s a pretty protective posse you’ve got there.”

“It is,” I agree, gazing out at the street. I rest my hand on the cell phone in my pocket, relieved to know it’s there.

About fifteen minutes later, Adam pulls into the parking lot at the back of his apartment building. But instead of going around to the front, he leads us down a narrow alley, insisting that we use the side entrance.

“It’s quicker,” he says, opening the door for me.

The entryway is almost completely unlit except for one low-watt bulb that hangs down from the center of the ceiling, illuminating a dank and tiny space.

“Are you sure this is the way?” I ask, startled by how dark it is.

“I live here, remember?” He smiles and opens the stairwell door, sticking close by my side.

We climb the two flights to his floor and then stand outside his apartment. Adam looks more nervous than I’ve ever seen him before. He fumbles for the right key.

“What’s wrong?” I ask, aware that he’s stalling. I look at my watch. It’s well past midnight now.

“I just don’t know what I’m doing,” he says.

“Why? What do you mean?”

He shrugs. His jaw is visibly clenched. And he looks almost as fragile as I did a few months ago. “I shouldn’t have brought you here,” he whispers.

At the same moment, there’s a creaking sound, like someone’s walking nearby on the floor. I peer down the hall, but I don’t see anyone.

“I mean, what the hell am I doing bringing someone I really care about into a messed-up situation like this?” he continues.

“I care about you, too,” I say, reaching out to touch his hand. “That’s
why
I’m here.”

Adam clasps my fingers, but he doesn’t quite look me in the eye now. “I should’ve called Tray. It’s just…I don’t know. It’s like I don’t know who I can trust anymore.”

I nod, knowing exactly how he feels. “You can trust
me
,” I say, almost able to hear Kimmie’s cynical voice inside my head, telling me that this is Adam’s ploy—that he’s acting all vulnerable just to gain my trust and sympathy, and that I’d be better off walking away.

But instead I squeeze his hand tighter and remind him that the police are just a phone call away. “They could escort us inside. We could turn everything over to them right here. Right now.”

“Not yet.”

“Then when?”

Adam shrugs again. “I don’t know. I don’t have all the answers.”

“Hence the puzzle,” I say, trying to make him smile.

It works. His face brightens slightly, but still…He looks almost as remorseful as that night about a month ago, when he told me how much he cared about me. When he realized what a big mistake he’d made by seeking me out as a way to get revenge on Ben.

“I should take you home,” he says.

“No,” I say, pulling him closer to the door. I try the knob, relieved when it doesn’t turn.

Adam unlocks the door; it makes a deep clicking sound that cuts right through my core. A moment later, I hear more creaking noises from down the hall. I turn to look just as Adam ushers me inside the apartment and locks the door behind us.

“When was the last time you were here?” I ask.

“Around dinnertime. I went to the library after that.”

“Did you see Piper?”

“Just for a second,” he says, looking toward his bedroom. “Oh, right, she mentioned you’d stopped by.”

Instead of asking me what I’d wanted, he moves in the direction of his open bedroom door. “I might as well get this over with, right?” he asks. “Like ripping off a Band-Aid?”

I follow close behind him, my cell phone clenched in my hand. From just inside the doorway, his room looks completely normal. I move to the foot of the bed.

“So what now?” Adam asks before venturing toward his bed pillows. With shaking hands, he checks beneath them. “Nothing,” he says with a smile of relief.

I smile, too.

Adam takes a deep breath and grabs a corner of the comforter. He pulls it off in one quick motion. The word
SOON
is painted across his bedsheet in bloodred letters.