Fearscape (8 page)

“
Oh, Val, for God's sake. I
looked
at you? How old are you?”

There was a silence.

“
Well, Miss Huffy? What's this boy's name?”

Val didn't answer.

“
Should we call him M&M, for Mystery Man?”

Oh god, the horror. “His name is Gavin. Gavin Mecozzi.”

“
That sounds Italian.”

“
Probably because it is.”

“
I knew an Italian boy growing up,” her mother said thoughtfully. “He was a distant relation of a mafioso. He used to brag about that. It drove the girls crazy — that, and the fact that he looked like a young Eduardo Versategui. He also drove a Harley, as I recall, and wore a Ferragamo leather jacket.”

“
Gavin is
not
in the mafia.”

“
And what does Mr. Mecozzi do, then, in his copious free time?”

This Val could answer, to her relief. “He plays chess. He's a grandmaster.”

“
Well! That's certainly impressive. Your uncle plays chess. Did I ever tell you that? He used to call it 'the intellectual sport.'” The minivan pulled into their driveway. Val hopped out, slinging her backpack over one shoulder. “Your father played, too, though Charles was never as good as Earl.”

“
I remember. Dad tried to teach me when I was younger.”

“
Did he? Oh, yes, I'd quite forgotten. That all seems so long ago.” As she fished in her purse for the keys, she said, casually, “What does Lisa think about this Gavin?”

“
Lisa is dumb. Just like James.”

As soon as her mother got the door open, Val made an
immediate beeline for her room. The first thing she did was
change out of her school clothes and into some flannel pajama pants and a tank top. The second was to wash off her makeup, which was starting to feel stiff and itchy. The third was to go on her computer, where she planned to stay until she was called down for dinner or ended up tired enough to take a nap on her bed.

James had finally decided to send her a message. The header was entitled, simply, “sorry.”
How original.
Val deleted the message without reading it. She knew if she did read it, she would either feel sorry for him or get even more annoyed than she already was, and either one of those things had a high likelihood of making her act stupidly, herself.

Besides, he's probably only apologizing because Lisa made him.

Val had been Lisa's friend first, before Lisa really knew anyone else in the school, and she resented the fact that Lisa had gotten so tight with James lately. Especially since she was fairly sure that the two of them hung out together far more often than they bothered to include her.

Not that she wanted to hang out with such stupid people, but they could have at least offered.

She had another message, aside from James's. Val sat up a
little straighter. It was from that weirdo in the Victorian outfit again.

What do you desire? And how far would you go to get it?

The time stamp was 4:21 AM.

The thought of a man lying awake in the middle of night thinking about her, and what she desired, made her feel sick — sick, and a little thrilled in an odd, frightening way.

Leave me alone
, she wrote.
Why do you keep bothering me?

The response was instantaneous.

Because you fascinate me.

What a freaky thing to say.
I fascinate you?

Among other things.

Val hesitated.
What other things?

A gentleman never tells.

Why are you doing this, then, you freak?

He didn't respond. Val heaved a sigh of relief as she began responding to other notifications from people she actually wanted to talk to. People who weren't freaks. She submitted a comment to one of her friends from track about the next meet, and when the screen refreshed there was another message notification waiting for her.

Because of how beautiful you are when you run — and how much it makes me want to
chase
you.
The red flag flashed up again.
You never answered my question, by the way.

His question? She scrolled back through the conversation, confused, until she hit upon the very first thing he'd sent her. What did she desire, and how far would she go to get it?

She hit the block button and turned away from her laptop.

Right now, her only desire was that her big, stupid life start making a little more sense.

Chapter Five

“
One of the most difficult parts of drawing from life is that you are converting a living, breathing creature into a nonliving, non-breathing format.” As she talked, Ms. Wilcox went around the room and gave each pair of desks a wooden figure. “These are nonliving, non-breathing compatible, but I want you to pretend, for the moment, that they are alive, and draw them in both static — and dynamic — poses.”

Val picked up the doll, adjusting the limbs so that it looked as if it were running. Several of the other students were taking far more explicit liberties with the dolls, James in particular, who shoved the doll's hand between its legs and made noises that had his seatmates in fits.

Gavin, by contrast, was quietly studying the doll he was sharing with a girl whose name Val didn't know. He had folded its limbs into a pose of supplication, the hands thrown skywards. The girl clearly didn't like it, though whether this was because she, like Val, thought it sinister, resented him taking control of the doll, or was just having trouble with the limbs wasn't clear.

Mrs. Vasquez was showing
Titus
in English so after
checking in with the teacher and getting marked as “present” on the roster, Val was sent to the library for one-day study hall. She hadn't been to the school library since the beginning of the year, and the smell of old books was overwhelming. “Hi, Ms. Banner,” she said tentatively to the librarian, “I'm here for — ”

Ms. Banner shushed her, with a look of annoyance, and thrust a stapled bunch of papers at her without bothering to explain them. Val glanced down at the papers with a look of wariness.
Library Rules
the first one was called, with “No Talking” underlined several times. The other three comprised her essay assignment.

Emily Abernathy was already there, seated at one of the far tables with a copy of
Wuthering Heights
in front of her. Her blonde hair was secured back with a barrette and she was wearing one of those dress and turtleneck sets that Val hadn't really seen in person since 1997. She half-wanted to peek under the table and see if she was wearing matched printed leggings.

“
Hey.” Emily looked up, fixing her with a shy smile that made Val feel bad about her uncharitable thought. “You're not watching the movie, either?”

“
I guess not.” She looked at
Wuthering Heights
. “Is that for this class? I thought we weren't reading that for another week or two.”

“
I'm using it in my essay,” Emily said. “I'm doing my topic on revenge and betrayal within families and how the disrupting of that critical foundation of the home poisons everything. I already talked to Mrs. Vasquez, and she said it would be okay.”

I'm sure she did
. Val shook away that thought, appalled by her own bitchiness. “That sounds really … interesting. I'm sure you'll get an A,” she tacked on hastily.

“
I hope so. It's going to be hard, since I don't really like this play.” Emily frowned down at her copy of
Titus Andronicus
. “What are you doing your paper on, Val?”

“
I don't know. I haven't really thought about it.”

And then she jumped as Ms. Banner, steadily creeping up on them this whole time, shushed.

Val grudgingly redirected her efforts into the playbook, wishing Emily hadn't said what her idea was. Now, all Val could think about was revenge — which, in turn, made her wonder if her stalker's sudden interest might be a kind of revenge on its own. But from whom? And for what? Or was she over-analyzing this?

No. There was a connection there between her own situation and the play. She pondered it on the track field, tuning out Rachel's and Lindsay's excited chatter about the French club's upcoming trip to Paris.
Titus Andronicus
was about revenge as Emily had said, but something else, too. Mrs. Vasquez had mentioned it in class, though as more of a footnote, really.

“
You're so quiet today,” said Lindsay. “Thinking of a certain someone?”

“
Don't encourage her,” Rachel said.

“
I'm just trying to take an interest.”

“
If by 'trying to take an interest,' you mean 'nosing for information.'”

“
Val, tell her that I'm only looking out for you,” Lindsay protested.

“
No, tell her that she's a nosier than Pinocchio with a head cold.”

“
Val, tell her — ”

“
I'm thinking about my essay,” Val informed them both. “That's what I'm thinking about.”

Lindsay and Rachel both exchanged a look. “Still want to take an interest?” Rachel asked.

“
No, I think I'm good,” Lindsay said. “I already know more than I'd like to about essays.”

Blissfully, the two of them went back to their conversation, which made Val remember the lecture topic which had fled her mind.

The castration of women.

Mrs. Vasquez had said that Lavinia's rape and mutilation symbolized complete and utter impotence as Lavinia was prevented from speaking for herself in the most frighteningly literal sense. She had ceased to be a person, and had instead become an object. Voiceless. Helpless.

The first time they had read that passage in class, Val became so nauseated that she begged for the bathroom pass. Instead of going to the bathrooms, however, she stood in the breezeway between her building and the next, trying to will such gruesome imagery from her head as the wind chilled the sweat on her skin. It would have been better if it were fantasy, if people were incapable of being so sick and cruel and violent, but it wasn't fantasy and it did happen — and that made vicious psychopaths far more chilling than any monster.

Val remembered this, in particular, when she opened her locker and a cascade of rose petals poured out, the fetid stink of their sweetness nearly suffocating in its potency. Red petals, salted with the star-shaped blossoms of white jasmine. “Oh god,” she breathed, staring at the flowers in horror. Her locker had been just that — locked.

Quickly, she began grabbing them by the fistful and throwing them in the trashcan, noticing as she did that the petals were fresh and hadn't even begun to wilt. An observation that made goosebumps erupt up and down her arms. She stared into the darkness, terrified that she would see nothing and even more terrified that she wouldn't.

And then she heard a metallic sound, which made her start, jerkily, back towards her locker. It was just the squeak of the door's hinges as it swung open a little further from her frenzied gestures. But that wasn't what commanded her attention. Her eyes were riveted on the inside of the door — or, more specifically, what was carved there.

Gouged into the metal, by a cruel blade and a crueler hand, was one word. One word, and yet its connotations numbered in the thousands.

MINE.

It was with a trembling hand she traced the 'E.' The metal edges were ragged and sliced open her finger, leaving a bead of blood on the letter's bottom bar. The pain shattered the dissociation and the dreaminess Val felt, and all at once she was no longer removed from the situation. This wasn't fantasy; this was real — and it had just turned deadly.

Val closed her fingers into a fist, hiding the blood, and screamed as loud as she could, “Mrs. Freeman!”

▪▫▪▫▪▫▪

Coach Freeman was sympathetic but there was not much she could do. For obvious reasons, no security cameras were permitted in the locker rooms, though there were some facing the two outer doors. She employed the first-aid kit for the cut on Val's hand and offered her a new locker and combination, but apart from that Val found herself pretty much on her own.

Which was unpleasant but not unexpected. If he was devious enough to get into her locker, she saw no reason why he shouldn't be devious enough to escape being caught.

Had he been watching her reaction? Savoring it? The answered seemed to be yes, because when Val got home, frazzled and a little sweaty from the walk from the bus stop, there was another message waiting for her.

That wasn't very polite.

It had been sent mere minutes before.

What wasn't?
She typed, knowing it was foolish but unable to help herself.

Disposing of my gift so callously
.