Possessions (27 page)

They life-flighted
Kiyoko’s body out of Marlwood. She was still fully dressed in warm clothing, carrying her purse. Her cell phone was missing. I heard that blocks of ice chipped off as they loaded her into the stretcher. She had fallen into the lake, and possibly frozen to death before she actually drowned. We were unclear on the details. All we knew for sure was that she was dead. I remembered with pain what a terrible swimmer she’d been. Why would she have gone anywhere near the lake, let alone in it?

She knew what was happening. She was trying to escape.

All through that horrible night, Mandy sobbed and played some weird Eurotrash music that never let up with the pounding beat. Ms. Meyerson didn’t say a word, didn’t tell her to turn it down. Between songs, I heard her in the bathroom, throwing up. The other Jessel girls cried, too, and their tears seemed so real I began to doubt myself. I had lost time. I came to wandering along the lake.

Had I dreamed what I thought I’d seen in the turret room? It was locked. It was always locked.

December 4

Dawn came. Phone calls. Ms. Meyerson announced that Dr. Ehrlenbach was coming to see us with some police officials and Dr. Melton, our school counselor. She told us not to talk to the media if anyone got through on the phone.

“Are you . . .
okay?
” Ida asked me. Claire, Leslie, and April gathered behind her, looking afraid of me. Their eyes were wide, their smiles . . . careful. It was obvious to me that Mandy had told everyone about my breakdown. Unless Julie had. But everyone knew, and they were treating me like someone who might explode into babbling hysterics at any moment.

“You found her,” Claire said. She trailed off, as if she wanted me to give them details. Tell them what Kiyoko had looked like. I would never do that, ever.

“It must have been a nightmare.” Sangeeta added, drifting past me, as we gathered in the living room for our meeting with Dr. Ehrlenbach.

“We’re all shaken,” Ms. Krige said, passing out tea and hot chocolate, offering some to the police captain of San Covino—we were under their jurisdiction—and Dr. Melton, who kept looking at me.

“It was a terrible, unfortunate accident,” Dr. Ehrlenbach agreed. I had the feeling she was teaching us the official school explanation that we were to recite whenever possible, to keep from getting sued or losing students.

“Dr. Ehrlenbach,” I said.

Heads swiveled toward me. Mandy gave me a long, measured look. Dr. Melton looked alert.

I wanted to shout, “Why didn’t you take better care of her? You saw her every day. You saw how skinny and scared she was.” But I knew I couldn’t look crazy. Or sound crazy. I hadn’t had any sleep and I was a mess.

“Yes, Lindsay?” she asked with chilly calm.

I shook my head. “Nothing, sorry.”

Mandy kept staring at me.

I didn’t make it up. I didn’t imagine it.

But I lost time. What if I had something to do with her death?

Dr. Melton sipped his tea.

By midafternoon
, the Jessel landline service was restored, and I used it to call Troy. The power had been restored at Grose and everyone was busily packing to go back. For a few minutes, I had the kitchen to myself.

“Lindsay, what’s going on over there?” he asked. “I was so worried about you I rowed over. And then I found . . . ” His voice trailed off. “For a second, I thought it was
you
.”

I started to cry. I wanted him. Needed him. What could I tell him? What
should
I tell him?

“We need to meet. We need to talk. I have to
see
you.”

“Me . . . me, too,” I said.

“I’ll row over as soon as I can.”

“Okay.”

I hung up. Walked out of the kitchen.

My heart turned to ice. Mandy was halfway down the stairs, glaring at me. I should have told Troy not to come.

“They’re going to let Miles come home,” she said. “Our family should be together . . . now . . . now that I’m . . . she . . . ” Her face broke, and she threw her head back; she began to wail like an animal. “Oh, God, Kiyoko, Oh, God!”

I licked my lips and went out the front door. I sagged against the porch and cried.

It was freezing
on the porch. After a while, I went back inside. Mandy was nowhere to be seen . . . or heard. The coast was clear.

I hurried into Alis and Sangeeta’s room and put my few things back in my overnight bag. Rose poked her head in, saw that I was alone, and bustled in. I tried not to show my fear.

“Oh, my God, this is horrible,” she said, wiping her eyes. “I can’t wait to get out of here.”

“Rose,” I began. I wanted to make her talk to me, tell me what was going on. She looked at me, her face blotchy from weeping. “I went up to check the attic. To see how my camouflage job is holding up. The door’s locked.”

My mouth dropped open. “I . . . I . . . ” I couldn’t speak. Did she remember what had happened? Had she really been in the turret room with them?

She sniffled. “No one’s going to care about that now,” she said, sobbing.

“Rose,” I said. “Mandy—”

“We were wrong about her,” Rose cut in. “Okay, she’s crazy in love with her own brother, but she’s not big D dangerous. Her heart is broken. Poor Mandy.”

I knew then that I really couldn’t trust her. I had no one to talk to.

Except Troy.

The Jessel girls lined up to wave goodbye to us. I studied each one in turn: Alis, Sangeeta, Lara, Mandy. Rose, too, although she was going back to her own dorm. Mandy, as she made Caspi kiss Julie’s cheek, then placed him in Julie’s arms.

No skulls, no eye sockets.

No evil secrets, no plots?

The snow poured down
on us. I called Troy on our landline. No more worrying about cell phone coverage. I was past that. He hadn’t been able to leave Lakewood—the windy road between Lakewood and Marlwood was shut down, and the lake was too dangerous.

“I’m going to break up with her,” he promised. “I’ll do it as soon as I can, Lindsay, but I should do it face-to-face.”

“Please, wait.” I held on tightly to the phone. “Wait for the break.” I couldn’t tell him why. I was so very afraid. What would she do to him if he dumped her? What would she do to me?

Or to Number Seven?

“But . . . ”

“Please.”

“Okay.” He took a breath. “But I’ll try to get there soon. If I can’t drive over, I’ll get a boat as soon as I can.”

“Don’t row,” I begged him. “Please, Troy.” And then I cried some more.

“It’s okay, Lindsay. It’s going to be okay,” he promised.

But I didn’t see him. He didn’t come. I waited, watched. Some mornings, I woke up panting, dreaming that he had rowed out on the lake, and the wind had pushed his boat over on its side; he tumbled out and sank.

Down.

Down.

Down.

“God,” I would whisper, jerking awake. I would stare at the head, and Julie, sleeping. I would wonder what Troy would think, if he knew what I knew. If he knew about my breakdown. Mandy must have told him. I hoped she had; because if she had, it must not matter to him. And if she hadn’t, I would have to.

thirty-one

The days went by
in an awful blur of grief counsel ing and study sessions. Most teachers had given their students permission to take finals at the beginning of next semester, after a mourning period. Some classes were held; some were cancelled. Some people attended; some stayed in their rooms, staring out the window at the bleak weather, the dancing firs in the cold wind.

I told Julie what had happened—or rather, what I
thought
might have happened. She would have none of it. None. She didn’t want to hear it, much less discuss it. As the days froze together, one after the other, and nothing more happened, the lack of drama seemed to confirm her suspicions that my reality was not the same as hers.

“They’ve just been waiting for a good time,” I said. But over a week had gone by, and nothing else bad had happened. Kiyoko was gone. Everyone was in shock. But there had been no further plots. Maybe Kiyoko had been Number Seven. Or maybe I really had lost it completely.

And the face? I stopped looking in windows and mirrors. I couldn’t have told anyone if it was there or not.

Dr. Ehrlenbach had decreed that we would indeed follow through with our Midwinter celebration. She said the dinner and bonfire would be a way to lift the school’s spirits.
Ha, spirits
. I wondered what Ehrlen-stein
wouldn’t
do to bury the nasty secrets of this place, to make it seem like everything was normal, when it was anything but.

December 16

It was the last day of term and we were preparing for our formal dinner. Julie said to me, “Well, time is up. We’re going home for break.” She gave me a look and picked up Caspi. Her long red plaid skirt reached the tips of her black boots. Her white ruffled blouse completed her outfit for our formal dinner—Midwinter. It was the last meal we would share as a school before the end of the term. A lot of girls were leaving tonight, since another possible snowstorm was predicted. Julie was one of those. Others would skip breakfast, and eat on the road with their parents.