From Bad to Cursed (7 page)

“Parents are stalking,” I said. “Better get inside. Thanks for driving.”

He turned and looked at me, and his jaw finally relaxed. He reached for my hand and ran his thumb across my palm. “Of course,” he said. “I’m glad we found the dog.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“Oh,” he said. “That girl left her cane in the backseat. Can you give it to Kasey?”

We smiled at each other shyly, like a pair of seventh graders parting after a school dance. I gave him a quick kiss and walked up to the front door, the cane hooked over my arm, thinking that this would all blow over soon. Maybe it already had.

The next morning, I awoke to the sound of the gardeners mowing the grass in the median. The buzz of the leaf blowers and the sun streaming through my window made it impossible to get back to sleep, so I went to the living room. But Kasey was already sprawled out on the couch, watching TV. She moved over to make room for me, but I shook my head and went to the fridge instead, making a mental note to be the first one out to the living room on Saturdays.

Kasey and I hadn’t talked at all about what had happened in the woods.

It wasn’t a conversation I was dying to have, to be honest.

Best-case scenario, Kasey thought what we saw was an animal, and she wanted to hide me from it. Worst-case scenario…I don’t know. I’m sure there was a whole range of mid-grade scenarios, too. But where my sister was concerned, I’d gotten pretty used to the worst.

Finally, after sitting through two hours of cartoons, I gave her a soft kick. “So…”

She stood up. “I need to take a shower.” And then she trudged off down the hall to the bathroom.

After her shower, she locked herself in her room for another hour. I finally gave up and took a shower myself, only to find her door wide open and bedroom deserted when I emerged.

In the kitchen, Mom was shuffling through the mail. “Morning, hon,” she said.

“It’s afternoon,” I said. “Where’s Kasey?”

Mom glanced up at me. “Dad drove her to a friend’s house. The girl you used to hang out with—Lydia?”

“Oh,” I said.

“Didn’t she used to live in Riverbridge? In that big house with the little stream in the front yard?”

“Yeah,” I said. All the yards in Riverbridge had bridges. Imagine that.

“They live over west of Crawford now,” Mom said, making a sympathetic face. “It’s not a very good neighbor- hood. I’m surprised she’s still in the same school district.”

Lydia’s parents had been serious go-getters. Her dad drove a sports car, and her mom owned a high-end salon, which made Lydia’s sloppy home hair-dye jobs all the more offensive. It was hard to imagine them in a dumpy house on the outskirts of town.

I was about to turn and leave when Mom tossed an envelope to me. “Young Visionaries?” she asked. I took it back to the sofa, deliberately ignoring her curiosity.

So this was it. My form rejection, with a request to come collect my portfolio. I slid my finger under the corner of the flap. All week, the contest had been bugging me—the thought of being ranked somewhere in the middle of that giant stack of entrants.

CONGRATULATIONS
! was the first word I saw, and I felt the oddest combination of emotions—happiness and apprehension at the same time. Like my heart inflated and then ran away and hid under the bed.

The letter went on to say that I’d survived the first cut and was now one of twelve semifinalists. At the bottom was a scrawl in a thick, black permanent marker:
Your work stands up well against the competition.—FM

And there was a note about an interview session being conducted the following week.

“What is it?” Mom asked.

“Nothing.” I shoved the letter back inside its envelope. At some point I’d be forced to tell my parents. But for that moment, I wanted it all to myself.

Dad and I arranged the Chinese take-out containers on the counter while Mom got plates and silverware.

“So…” I said. “I have some news.”

In about four milliseconds, bustle turned to dead silence. Dad froze and looked up at me, and Mom came around the counter.

Wow, that worked.

“I’m not pregnant or anything,” I said, and Dad exhaled. “Seriously, Dad? You think that’s how I would tell you?”

“What is it, honey?” Mom asked, setting down the plates.

“That letter I got today,” I said. “It’s for this photography thing. Like a contest. With a scholarship.”

Her eyes lit up. “You’re going to enter?”

“No,” I said. “Well, yeah. I did enter…and I made the semifinals.”

I couldn’t decipher their expressions. Mom looked pensive. Dad looked blank.

“That’s the news,” I said, pulling out a bar stool and reaching for a fried wonton.

I would have given my parents credit for having more self-control, but they immediately started carrying on, Mom hugging me and saying, “I’m so proud of you! I’m so proud of you!” and Dad cuffing me on the arm like an old college buddy.

“All right, that’s enough,” I said, peeling away. “It’s not that big of a deal. There are twelve semifinalists.”

“But Alexis, this is wonderful!” Mom said. “It
is
a big deal. Wait until Kasey hears!”

I looked around. “What time is she coming home, anyway?”

“Not until tomorrow,” Mom said. “She’s sleeping over. I guess they all are. Since she had to miss the party last night, I thought it would be all right. I actually have to take her some clothes.”

“I’ll take them,” I said.

“Really?” Mom asked.

“Yeah,” I said, forcing a smile. A chance to drop in on Kasey and her friends, possibly learn more about these “meetings” they were holding? I couldn’t pass it up. “I can tell her about the contest.”

Right on Crawford, left on Morrison, right on Baker.

This was an older section of the city, a grid of tiny houses packed together like eggs in a carton, not a fancy subdivision in sight. Lydia’s house must have been cute once, but its glory days were long gone. The siding peeled like a bad sunburn, showing multiple layers of old paint, and the upstairs window was blacked out with aluminum foil. In the driveway was her father’s red sports car, his baby. But the whole length of the driver’s side was dented, and the bumper seemed to be hanging on for dear life.

I grabbed Kasey’s overnight bag and Adrienne’s cane from the passenger seat and made my way up the weed-covered sidewalk. The doorbell was broken, so I knocked.

A few seconds later, Adrienne opened the door. “Oh, hi!” she said. “Come on in!”

“Here,” I said, holding out the cane. She took it and bounced through the house, without even using it. She was as hippity-hoppy as a toddler.

As we entered the kitchen, all activity stopped. The four of them were sitting around a small breakfast table with arts and crafts supplies strewn everywhere. Each girl worked on her own poster board. To my left was a stack of yellow flyers.

I reached for one.

WANT TO DEVELOP YOUR CHARM AND INNER BEAUTY
?

JOIN THE SUNSHINE CLUB
!

There was a big cartoonish drawing of a grinning sun with flirty eyelashes, and underneath that was a phone number—not ours, thank goodness—and an e-mail address, [email protected].

“What’s this?” I asked.

“The Sunshine Club,” Adrienne began, like she’d rehearsed it a billion times, “is a self-improvement club for young women who—”

“Why just women?” I asked, ignoring my sister’s warning glower.

“Because it’s only for girls!” Adrienne chirped, as if that answered my question. “For young women who want to nurture their inner beauty as well as their outer beauty. You should join, Alexis. You’d have so much fun.”

“Well, thanks,” I said. “But I’m kind of busy this year.”

“We’re going to do really cool stuff!” she said. “Like study groups. And makeovers.”

I basically had to bite a hole in my tongue to keep from reacting. If Adrienne thought making people over in her image was a good idea, she was highly misguided.

But then I looked at her, and noticed that her outfit wasn’t as wacky as usual. She wore a pair of jeans and a nice shirt. Nothing fancy, but a huge improvement over her typical ensemble.

I mean, look. I’m not going to win any awards for personal style. Some people, like Megan, could look at a closet full of clothes and put together a great outfit without even trying. Even Kasey was pretty good at it—she’d only been home a week, but she was already the more stylish sister.

I admired Adrienne for the fearless way she put herself out there. But she was more like me. Her pants were always too long or too short; her shirts were too baggy or just a little too tight. Any time I ever went out of my way to try to look cool, I ended up feeling like some celebrity’s dressed-up Chihuahua.

While Adrienne chattered on about all of the wonderful things the Sunshine Club would learn and experience together, I glanced at the other girls. Kasey glared at me while Tashi glued glitter to her poster. And Lydia—well, let’s just say that cheerful self-improvement definitely wasn’t on Lydia’s to-do list. I expected her to be rolling her eyes or snickering. So it was a pleasant surprise—heavy on the surprise—to see her politely following along.

When the pitch was finished, they all looked at me.

“Um, great,” I said.

“We’re going to put flyers up at school on Monday,” Adrienne said. “And Tashi goes to All Saints, so she’s going to put them up there. New members, here we come!”

Surrey High didn’t have metal detectors or anything, but it wasn’t really the type of place where kids are on the lookout for the next wholesome activity to devote their afternoons to. I felt bad, thinking how disappointing it would be when nobody joined.

“Good luck,” I said. “It sounds really fun.”
And really pathetic
, I didn’t say.

But you can probably imagine how much I was thinking it.

The next Friday night, we celebrated Megan’s ungrounding with a much smaller version of the party she’d planned the previous week—just her, me and Carter, Pepper Laird, and a couple of other cheerleaders. We sprawled out on the leather sectional in the family room.

Megan’s house was like a cross between a hunting lodge and a corporate boardroom. Heavy wood furniture held cutting-edge electronics. An iron candelabra kept watch over Mrs. Wiley’s three cell phones at their charging station.

Megan’s grandmother was the CFO of an investment brokerage. She was queen of all she surveyed, and she demanded perfection and faultless obedience—from her interior decor, her two secretaries, and her granddaughter.

Mrs. Wiley adopted Megan after her mom died. And she was among the scariest people I’d ever met in my life. You just didn’t mess with the woman. And everyone—Megan included—knew it.

Our conversation had been doddering along when Pepper turned to me. “I forgot to tell you,” she said. “Did you know our sisters are totally friends again?”

“Really?” I waited for a sarcastic smile or something, some signal that she was joking.

“Yeah,” she said. “Weird, right?”

Forgetting even the broken arm and the cafeteria incident on Kasey’s first day, Kasey and Pepper’s sister were as incompatible as…well, as a drill team dancer and a person who ate lunch with Lydia.

I turned away, studying the seam of the armrest. Carter took my hand and bent my fingers like they were poseable toys.

I mean, yes. Kasey having friends was a good thing. A couple of weeks ago, if you’d told me the most popular girl in ninth grade wanted to hang out with her, I would have been thrilled.

But my sister, goofy Adrienne, beautiful Tashi, hostile Lydia, and now Mimi Laird? It didn’t add up. I mean, sure, life isn’t like an 80s movie where everyone’s locked inside their perfectly defined boxes, but our school wasn’t quite progressive enough for a mix that diverse.

Or maybe it was. What did I know? I was a former Doom Squad member with a prep boyfriend and a cheerleader best friend.

I felt a tapping on my leg. “Oh! I forgot to tell you!” Megan said, her eyes wide. “Earlier, when I said I thought Emily had a doctor’s appointment? She didn’t. She ate lunch with your sister and Lydia.”

“With the
Sunshine Club
,” Pepper said.

“That’s your sister?” Carter asked, his nostrils flaring like he’d smelled something bad. “I’ve seen their pos- ters…I thought it was a campaign stunt.”

“Emily likes everybody,” Pepper said, waving it off. “She gets around.”

“Not at lunch,” I said, feeling oddly territorial. “Is she with them tonight?”

“Maybe,” Megan said. “She never texted me back.”

There was an unsettled silence. For Pepper and the other girls, it was probably more about the unexpected mixing of the social groups than anything else.

Carter’s chest heaved with a sigh, and he let go of my hand. Megan was staring at the ceiling fan, chewing her tongue like it was a piece of gum. Her fingers lightly drummed on the coffee table.

As for me, I was trying to scold myself back into a rational line of thinking.

So my sister was making friends across the established boundaries. That wasn’t cause for alarm. All it said about her was that she was open-minded, friendly. What did it say about
me
that I instantly jumped to the conclusion that she was mixed up in something bad?

But the more I tried to talk myself out of it, the more convinced I was that there must be something going on under the surface. To make a single friend in eighth grade, Kasey had to befriend a horrific vengeful spirit. Then she hits high school and immediately rounds up a posse of BFFs—by poaching
my
friends?

Look on the bright side, I told myself. It might not be ghosts. Maybe it was just drugs. Or blackmail.

But ghosts? It couldn’t be.

Because Kasey knew better than to go flirting with the dark side again.

Immediately, a pair of twin headaches blossomed at the back corners of my jaw.

After last year’s episode, we’d been visited by a woman in a nondescript gray suit driving a nondescript car (the woman, not the suit) and looking like she worked for a nondescript insurance company. But her name was Agent Hasan, and I don’t mean “insurance agent” Hasan. I still have no idea who she works for, because her business card only lists her name and a single phone number. But she took care of talking to the police, getting Kasey booked into Harmony Valley, and getting us moved out of the old house. She combed through the rubble and left with a thin, sealed envelope.