The Hidden (15 page)

A knock came at my door, and I opened it to find Uri standing there. “Morning,” he said.

“Morning.”

“There’s breakfast in the dining room.”

“Okay.” I grabbed my bag. I didn’t want to come back here if I could help it. We walked silently down the hall, but I noticed that Cacey hadn’t joined us yet. “Where’s Cacey?”

“She snuck in the Coke cans last night and drank the rest
of that twenty-four-pack. She’s not feeling too hot.”

I laughed. Then I felt bad. “I hope she’s okay.”

“She’ll be fine in a couple of hours. And then maybe she’ll listen to me next time.”

I shot him a look.

“Yeah, maybe not,” he said wryly.

I was actually kind of relieved that she wasn’t going to be with us. Without her around I might be able to get some answers. “So can I come with you, then?” I asked.

He hesitated. “I thought you might want to stay here with Cacey.”

“Oh, no, that’s okay. I’d much rather go with you.” I didn’t want my enthusiasm to show too much, so I added, “This place really gives me the creeps.”

Uri laughed. “Where we’re going isn’t much better.”

I gave him my best puppy-dog eyes. “Pleeeeeeeeease?”

“All right. Fine.” He sighed heavily.

“Do you mind if we skip breakfast?” I asked as we got closer to the dining room. The smells wafting out of there were revolting. “I’m not hungry.”

“Fine by me. I hate hospital food.”

He pushed open a nearby side door, and we went outside. There was a golf cart with a driver sitting there, waiting for us.
Uri sat down in the back and motioned for me to sit beside him.

We drove down a winding road and up a short hill before finally stopping in front of the middle building. The biggest one.

“Just stay with me, okay?” Uri said. “Nothing will happen, but better to be safe than sorry.”

I nodded solemnly and followed him in.

We were buzzed into an entryway by a nurse who was simultaneously doling out pills into empty cups and entering something into a computer. She came around to get us, and we trailed behind her, walking past peeling walls and poorly lit patient rooms with their doors open. Her thick rubber-soled shoes made a squeaking sound that echoed eerily.

We rounded a corner and passed several more rooms. These all had closed doors.

“Treatment rooms.”

The nurse caught me looking, and it was amazing how fast her head could spin around to say those words and then spin back again.

“Obviously you won’t be seeing the insides of any of those. Strictly for the more severe cases. Although, I suppose a tour
could
be arranged,” she said brightly.

Ah, no
.

Uri must have agreed with me, because he politely declined
for the both of us. We passed an empty nurse’s station and went around another corner, then came to a small room with a sitting area. “Here we are,” the nurse said. “Go ahead and make yourselves comfortable.” She gestured at two cracked brown leather chairs with a round table in between them.

Uri moved one of the chairs closer to me, and I sank down into it. He sat in the other one.

The nurse turned to leave, then stopped and whipped her head back around. “I’m sure both of you already know this, but liability requires us to give you an official warning. Don’t go anywhere unattended, don’t antagonize any of the patients that you may come into contact with, and don’t believe anything they say. They are very sick individuals.”

She didn’t wait for a response, but only nodded her head and then marched back out the door.

I stared after her for a minute, kind of stunned. “What do they think we’re going to do?” I asked Uri, speaking in a hushed tone. “Go around poking the patients with sticks?”

“You’d be surprised,” he said.

I shook my head, and looked around again. “So, what do we do now?”

“Now we wait.”

The whole neighborhood abounds with local tales, haunted spots, and twilight superstitions …

—“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”

S
ettling back into my chair, I gazed around the tiny room. Gray walls, gray ceiling, gray floor. I saw where the facility got its name from. A large picture window, grimy with dust and old age, took up half the wall across from us. Metal bars covered it in square-inch increments. Overall, the aesthetic had all the same pleasing qualities that I’d imagined a police interrogation room might have.

A loud bang echoed from the hall and made me jump out of my seat. I could hear harsh sobbing from someone, but it was quickly silenced. My skin began to crawl.

“This hasn’t been the greatest experience for you, has it?” Uri said.

“Not exactly.”

“Sorry about that.”

His words surprised me. The Revs didn’t seem like the type to project the warm and fuzzy. Except for the whole mind mojo thing. That was definitely fuzzy. “Can I ask you something?” I said.

“Sure.”

“Do you like being a Revenant?”

Uri stretched his legs out in front of him. “I don’t have a choice. I am what I am.”

“And what is that, exactly?”

His look told me that he “couldn’t say” but I gave him an
Oh, come on
, look in return. Glancing over at the open door, Uri said, “It’s hard to explain. Don’t take this the wrong way, but most humans don’t really get it.” Then he said, “Do you like being a Shade’s other half?”

I used his words and added a shrug. “I don’t have a choice. I am what I am.” Then I thought about it. “Or do I?”

“Abbey, I—”

“Come on, Uri. I’m not asking a whole lot here. Just talk to
me. You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to, but … but I can guess, right? How about that? I’ll just throw some stuff out there, and you can nod or shake your head. That way you’re not
technically
telling me.”

“I can’t. Acacia will kill me.”

“Acacia?” My ears perked up.

“Cacey.” He clarified. “I mean Cacey.” He scrubbed one hand over his face with the long-suffering look of someone who’d realized he’d just opened a can of worms.

“Acacia,” I mused. “‘Cacey’ for short. Which means that ‘Uri’ could be short for something. We can start there.”

He stayed silent.

“So if ‘Cacey’ is a nickname, and ‘Uri’ is a nickname, odds are ‘Kame’ and ‘Sophie’ are nicknames too.”

“Not ‘Kame,’” he finally admitted. “But ‘Sophie’ is short for ‘Sophiel.’ And I’m Uriel.”

Now we’re getting somewhere. I just have to keep him talking.
“Why do you use nicknames instead of your full names?”

“We were given proper names at the ceremony when we became Revenants. But they aren’t exactly traditional names. Modern people like easy, so it’s what we do when we’re here. It’s easier to fit in that way.”

He gave me a pointed look, and I held up two fingers. “I
won’t tell anyone, I swear. Scouts’ honor. Besides, I’m going to die soon. Who am I going to tell?”

He looked uncertain, but I pressed on. “How come no one will tell me when my exact death day will be?”

“That’s the rule.”

“Rule? There are rules?”

“Not ‘rules’ specifically. Guidelines. Humans don’t know when they are going to die. That can’t be altered.”

“Yeah, but can’t you make an exception here? I’m not the norm. I already know about you guys. I know about Vincent. I know about Shades.”

Uri shook his head. “When the time comes, it will be revealed.”

Well
that
was a frustratingly unhelpful thing to say. I couldn’t let it distract me, though. “You keep saying ‘humans.’ Like we’re something different. What exactly are
you
? I mean, beyond the helpers that come to make sure a Shade can be completed or move on?”

“We’re not human,” he said. “If you couldn’t guess that already.”

I nodded. “Vincent said he was a ‘what’ not a ‘who.’ I don’t know if that means you’re angels, or demons, or what.”

“We’re not any of those things. We’re …” He held out his hands like he was trying to contain something. “We’re like … energy.”

“Okay.”

“That’s the best way to describe it.”

“But where do you live? What about your car?”

“We have cars and houses only when we have an assignment here.”

“Here? As in Sleepy Hollow here, or here as in Earth?”

“Earth.”

Oh.
“So … where are you when you’re
not
here? On Earth, I mean.”

“When we’re not here, we’re in this space that’s sort of in between.”

“Heaven?”

“No.”

“Hell?”

He laughed. “Definitely not. Again, hard to explain. It’s a place where there’s nothing but energy and white light. No physical forms, no manifestations. Just pure energy.”

“Okay, a little boring, but it’s a Zen type place. I get it,” I said.

“No. You don’t. But that’s okay.”

“So one day you’re just in this Zen lovey-dovey white energy space, and then the next you’re zapped back to Earth to help a Shade or their other half be completed or pass over? How do you know what to do? Where to go? Do you get a Post-it note or something?”

“We work in teams, only two of us at a time. And when it’s our
turn, yes, we do sort of wake up here and then get our assignment.”

“That’s why Nikolas said it was a problem that there are five of you here,” I replied. “There’s only supposed to be two. He said that, too, but I don’t think I really understood it.”

Uri agreed. “Although we may occasionally have simultaneous assignments—which is rare, but it does happen—we are never in the same place at once. There is no need.”

“So Vincent must have really screwed you all up, then, huh?”

“You could say that.”

“How come everyone can see you and Sophie and Cacey and Kame, but they can’t see Nikolas and Katy? Nikolas and Katy are different from me and Caspian because they’ve been completed, right?”

He nodded. “Humans can see us while we’re here on Earth because, for all intents and purposes, we
are
human while we’re here. Caspian is different because he’s dead, and Nikolas and Katy are different because they’ve been completed.”

I must have looked confused, because he said, “The easiest way to think about it is like blood types. Caspian is a certain type of ghost, say AB negative, while Nikolas and Katy are O positive. Both types are still blood, a.k.a. Shades, but if Caspian is completed, by you, he’ll become O positive, like Nikolas and Katy.”

“
If
he’s completed? Why wouldn’t I complete him?”

Uri glanced away. “Sometimes things … happen.”

“Oh, you mean like with Washington Irving? Nikolas told me that he was a Shade, but he wasn’t completed by his other half. She moved on.”

Uri nodded.

“Why do Shades even need to be completed?” I asked. “No one’s ever told me the reason why.”

He wanted to hedge. It was written all over his face, so I tried a different tactic. “What about other Shades that need help crossing over?”

He took a moment to answer but finally said, “For now things are being handled. But this matter needs to be resolved soon. For everyone’s sake.”

“Okay, so you come down here, get your assignment, and then poof? You have a house and a car and clothes? What about ID? Credit scores?”

“We get what’s given to us, in terms of houses and cars and clothes. Sometimes it’s a Jetta, sometimes it’s an apartment in a back alley, and sometimes it’s Gucci. If we need an ID, that’s available to us too. They can come in handy.”

I remembered what he’d been wearing when I first saw him, in the cemetery after the bridge dedication. “You were given a mishmash of clothes this time, huh? You have this Goth meets
prep meets skater boy vibe going on. Kind of weird. And the khakis? Not a good look.”

“Most of the clothes are already there waiting for us, wherever we’re staying. But Cacey loves to go shopping, and she drags me with her.” Now he looked a bit embarrassed. “Sometimes it takes a while to figure out what century we’re in.”

“You guys need a built-in stylist-for-a-day when you get your assignments,” I said. “That would solve everything. Oh, and a hairdresser, too.”

Uri laughed again and touched his hair. It was longer than it had been in the cemetery. Instead of a fauxhawk he had mini dreads. “I think I’m a pretty good hairdresser.”

I cocked my head. “Maybe for a boy.” He smiled. “Do the other Revenants dye their hair?” I asked. “Sophie’s always looks like it’s not quite done right. Like she’s a natural blonde and the red can’t cover all of it up. And you all have eyes that are completely clear.”

“Our coloring is the same because in the white space there’s no pigmentation. That’s why we all have pale eyes, pale hair, and pale skin. When we come to Earth, we can wear contacts, get a tan, and, yes, dye our hair. It’s the only chance we have to live like mortals. Cacey likes to take full advantage. That’s why she likes Coca-Cola so much.”

“How long do you generally get to live like mortals? Before your assignment is up?”

“It varies.”

“Like …? Two days? Two years? Two months? What?”

“It just … varies.” His mouth tightened around the edges.