Paper Dolls (18 page)

Molly was also obsessed with finding answers to what had happened to all of us in the underground.

My mind resisted thinking about the underground. The serpent was fast becoming a nightmare vision, a being I hadn't really seen. I understood now how people could block out a monstrous thing that had happened to them. Some things were too much to bear. Some things were too difficult to even process. Mostly I felt I was standing on the edge of the crazyland abyss and it wouldn’t take much to push me over.

Back in the dollhouse, I’d been the one trying to push Molly when she’d stood at that edge—never realizing what I was doing. I owed it to her to be strong now and find out all we could. And I owed it to Prudence—Prudence who had helped me when I needed help most. But I wasn't strong. And I couldn’t admit to Molly that I didn’t want to find out any more about that world. Night after night, I pretended to help her in her research, hoping she wouldn’t see the truth in my eyes.

Every night, Molly and I poured over things that would have given mom a heart attack if she’d known. We read about shadowy ancient texts and demonic rituals and mythical beings. We tried to find the mirrored tree amongst centuries-old symbols. We studied genealogy sites, trying to glean information about Jessamine’s past. Molly desperately wanted me to find out what I could from Lacey, but when I called the hospital where she was, they wouldn't allow me to talk with her.Aisha joined us on Skype every night—adding whatever knowledge she’d been able to find. It felt as though the clock was forever ticking time away—only we didn’t know it was that what we were racing against.

We tried to bring the ghost of Prudence back. But she didn’t appear.

“I know she wants to,” said Molly sadly, “but I can feel that she’s not able to pass through.”

Some part of my mind felt the insanity of the things I believed in now, but it had also become normal life. And Prudence wasn’t a ghost. She was a real person. I sensed the veil between this life and the next as being whisper-thin. We spent hours looking up records of missing girls, from countries around the world, trying to discover who she was. She eluded us.

The more time I spent with Molly, the more I realized I hadn’t known her at all. I’d seen her as passive in the underground—strong but always so afraid to act. At the end I’d known she’d had no choice but to try to survive and to keep the others alive. I’d never seen Molly as she was now—driven and relentless. She barely slept, staying up until the early hours, researching and learning everything she could. She’d spent five years mostly sleeping, she said, and now she was going to make up for lost time.

I couldn’t wait to see Zach again, and I felt weak and stupid for feeling that way. After all, I’d been with Zach less than two days in total. Maybe it was just the fact that he was so unconnected to the underground that made me want him so much—he was the future I thought I’d never have.

I slipped out while Molly was taking a math class. Zach insisted on sending a cab over to pick me up. The only modes of transport I had open to me were the bus and my bicycle—and so I didn’t argue. He’d wanted to meet somewhere special and had chosen the Vizcaya museum and gardens. I’d been there once when I was around six.

I felt a stab of jealousy as a group of girls dressed in teeny shorts and oversize jumpers strolled by outside the museum. In the Whitsunday Islands back in Australia, Zach had been all mine. Here in Miami, he had endless choices.

I stepped into the ornate marble lobby of the Vizcaya and found my way through to the gardens. Zach stood by the garden maze. His mouth turned up into a grin as he saw me. He bounded over to me before I could say hello, his arms wrapping around me.

“Hello Miss Cassandra,” he murmured close to my ear.

“Zach.” Pulling back, I smiled at him.

His eyes were especially blue today. The cut-off denim shorts had been replaced by a pair of True Religion jeans. The worn t-shirt was replaced with a navy wind cheater. He looked amazing. Up close, he looked different than he had on that vacation to the Whitsundays. Back there, his tanned good looks had kind of blended in with the sunkissed tropical backdrop. But here, his looks were striking.

“Can I hug you again?” he asked. “That felt sooo good.”

Without waiting for an answer, he lifted me off the ground and crushed me to him. “I’m glad you’re finally here.”

We began walking into the round maze, our fingers touching and catching as we threaded our way through. He stopped to kiss me in the center of the maze and my breath caught in my chest.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t get away before now,” I told him.

“I was starting to think you were blowing me off.”

“I would never do that.

“How’s your cousin doing?”

I shrugged awkwardly. “She’s okay. It was hard for her to leave her whole family behind in that cult, but she’s coping pretty well.” I hated lying to Zach. But I wasn’t allowed to tell anyone the truth about Molly.

His eyes grew serious. “And more importantly, how are
you
doing? You know, I watched the clock the whole day you were at court, waiting for you to get home and call me. It must have been hell.”

I nodded. “It was. But incredibly good to hear your voice at the end of that day.”

“Are you hungry?”

“Not too much. Mom cooked a big breakfast.”

“Okay then, I know what we’ll have.” He smiled, taking my hand and leading me to the café. He ordered fresh scones, cream and jam. I almost felt weird with him watching me eat, now that he knew what I’d been through in the dollhouse. It was almost like a badge of shame. I hated having people know that I’d been forced to dress like a doll and eat old scraps of food. I suddenly wanted to flee, go home, hide. I understood a small fraction of how Molly felt while out amongst crowds of people.

The pool below glittered in the noon sun, streaming through open arches into the interior of the historic mansion. I finished my scones quickly, trying to smile as Zach talked on about a funny event that had happened at school earlier that week.

“I’d better go,” I told him. “I have lessons this afternoon.”

Zach gazed at me with his beautiful eyes. “But it’s Sunday?”

“I know. I’ve missed too much school. It’s been seven months since I was last at school. I really need to do some heavy catching up.”

He sighed. “Come sailing with Emerson and I next weekend.”

“Sounds fun. But I don’t want to leave Molandah on her own.”

“You’d come? Bring your cousin too. Does she like sailing?”

“I’m not sure. But I’ll ask her.”

Zach called a taxi for my trip home and then ducked his head to kiss me. “I’ll miss you for the next five days.”

I woke dreaming about Prudence and the underwater tree again.

Molly sat cross-legged on her bed, staring out the window into the garden. Tears tracked down the silvery planes of her cheeks.

“Molly…?”

“Sorry if I woke you.”

“You didn’t wake me. I had… dreams.”

“Yeah. I have them too. They haunt me every night.”

“Is that why you’re crying? A dream?”

Her hair hung over her face like a curtain. "Cassie… I've missed out on so much. I've been locked away... almost my whole life. Even when I lived with my uncle—that was just a different kind of being locked up. I don't even feel like a whole person. I'm just… half of someone's idea of what I am."

I sat, drawing my knees up to my chin. "You have to stop thinking that crap. You’re more real than anyone I know. And in that place, you were the person who kept me sane. You're the person who kept all of us sane. Maybe you gave too much of yourself for too long.”

“That was the thing. In the dollhouse, I had people to care for. Before that, no one needed me. No one even saw me or noticed I was around. Little Philly and Sophronia, they needed me. At least, I had a reason for being, a reason to be alive. I could be there for them.”

I didn’t know what to say to her. A thought burned at the back of my mind, a thought so terrifying, I immediately banished it from my mind.

Maybe
everyone in the world needed Molly Parkes right now—they just didn’t know it.

“Mmm, what is it about girls and suds?” said Emerson.

Molly blushed a deep pink.

They had someone else in the back seat—Zach introduced him as Parker. He had that clean-cut college-boy look, with intelligent gray eyes beneath short black hair. Parker jumped from the car, extending a hand to me and then to Molly.

“I don't think I've ever seen hair quite the shade of red that yours is. Stunning,” he said to Molly.

Molly mumbled a thanks. I couldn’t help but think that if he’d seen her hair the color it was before, he’d have been even more impressed.

Zach grabbed me around the middle from behind and kissed my temple. “Maybe the girls can come wash our boat. What do you think Emerson? We can sit back with some cold drinks and watch these two do their thing.”

“Cut it out,” I said. I introduced him and Emerson to Molly.

Molly looked like she was ready to run. This was probably the closest she’d been to boys in the past five years—with the exception of Ethan.

“Sorry—I’ll consider myself chastised,” said Zach. “Sadly, the yacht’s already clean—dad made me and Emerson clean it last weekend. It’s all ready for another sail out on the water. We thought we’d see if you two would like to come out with us.”

I eyed Molly apologetically. I’d already told her about Zach’s invitation to go out yachting, and she’d politely declined. I hadn’t expected him to just turn up like this. And she hadn’t even met him before.

As if Zach suddenly tuned into my words, his eyes softened. “Please? Molandah, I’ve heard so much about you from Cassie. She thinks a lot of you. I know you don’t know Miami well—I was hoping for a chance to show it to you from the water.” He hung his head like a sorrowful choirboy. “And Cassie’s so attached to you she won’t come unless you do.”

Molly nodded hesitantly. “Okay… I’ll come.”

"Cool!” Parker grinned at Molly.

The sky was a burnished blue—almost a coppery blue as we stepped onto the yacht.

Miami became a long strip of golden beach with slightly misted highrises behind.

“Wow, we’re a long way out already,” I said to Zach.

His eyes smiled. “This is a cruiser-racer. Sacrifices a few comforts for greater speed. Doesn’t go quite as fast as dad’s racing yacht but she’s a great little boat.”

Molly tied her long hair up into a loose knot.

Parker folded his arms. “Here I was hoping to see that lovely hair blowing in the wind.”

Molly’s full mouth turned up slightly at the corners. She wasn’t used to the way boys their age spoke and teased. I nudged her arm, and we moved up to the bow and sat on the bench. The boys steered the yacht along the shoreline for the next hour, past the Biscayne National Park.

“Beautiful,” said Molly. She’d relaxed in the last half hour, wanting to know everything about where we were and what we were looking at. Parker was more than happy to oblige, acting as her personal tour guide.

“This whole area is an aquatic park,” said Parker. He bent close to her, pointing over her shoulder to the shore. “That way is Key Largo—you know, like in the Beach Boys song—and if you keep going, you’ll hit Cuba. And that way are the Bahamas. I’ll take you there one day if you’ll let me.” He pointed left over the broad ocean.

Molly frowned and smiled, seeming to not know what to make of Parker.

The boys went to adjust the rigging, turning the sail slightly. The yacht picked up speed. Wind blustered past with a growing chill, despite the warmth of the day. Molly zipped her jacket. I went down to the cabin to fetch my windcheater. The boys had warned us about the wind out on the water but I hadn’t realized it would be quite so cold.

Zach dropped down to the cabin, swinging straight from a ceiling rail to the floor. “Too cold up there?”

“Just getting my jumper.”

He took the opportunity to cuddle me. “I’ll warm you up.”

I smiled at him. “It’s amazing out there today.”

“It’s amazing out there every day.” His eyes lit up. “Even in foul weather. I love it.” A grave look entered his eyes. “If I could live my life out here on the water, I would.”

“Maybe you can run your own Miami yacht tour company when you’re older.”

He gave a sad laugh. “My father expects me and Emerson to follow after him into the family business. I already feel the noose around my neck.”

“Surely he’d understand if you wanted to do something else. He wouldn’t want you unhappy.”

“You don’t understand. Just being born into my family means already being in too deep. I’m in over my head. Drowning.”

I dropped my arms down to hold his hands.

“What would happen if you cut just loose, did your own thing?”

“My father would never let that happen. Whatever I do, whatever steps I take—it’s all orchestrated. Not a note out of place.”

“What about me? He doesn’t seem to mind you being around me. Surely I can’t be what your father had in mind for you. I’m from the wrong end of town, so to speak.”

His hands tightened on mine. “Cassie, just know this. My father is going to continue to make decisions for me. And there’s nothing I can do about it.”

I turned away, biting into my lip. He’d been clear enough. I didn’t need to ask more. Zach’s father was allowing him a bit of fun before he found a real girlfriend, and Zach was warning me. I was fifteen. I shouldn’t expect that the first boy I fell in love with would be the one I’d be with forever. I didn’t even know how I really felt about Zach. But still, his words stung.

A deeper voice inside told me that there had been a boy I’d known for sure I’d fallen in love with.
Ethan—the boy who didn’t deserve anyone’s love
.

Zach’s phone buzzed and he took the call. He held the phone away for a moment. “Mom wants to invite you and your cousin out to dinner tonight.”