“No, thanks.” I take a deep breath and rip the page out of the notebook. I fold it up into a tight little ball—as small as I can get it.
“What are you doing?” Amber asks.
“Making the fear more manageable.” I grab a piece of cheesecloth, a bottle of dried thyme, and a stick of sandalwood incense from my spell drawer. I drop the paper ball into the center of the cloth and then sprinkle the thyme on it—until I feel my fear retreat, until I feel confident I can overpower it. The green and brown bits of thyme, like the tiniest dried-out twigs, form a heap over the paper ball. I wrap it all up in the cloth and secure it with a rubber band.
“It’s a courage sachet,” I say, holding it up for Amber. “For tonight.”
“Maybe pepper spray would work better,” Amber says, stuffing the tissue back into her bra.
“Very funny.” I light the incense and then charge the sachet by passing it three times through the smoke, the sweet woodsy smell helping to ease my nerves even more.
“Okay,” I say, finally. “I’m ready.”
• • •
Against Drea’s better judgment, Amber and I make our way over to the Hangman by ourselves. It just seems easier this way, rather than getting other people involved. Plus, if whoever sent that e-mail message sees me trudging over with an entourage in tow, campus police included, I can be fairly certain he’ll make himself scarce. Who wouldn’t?
And so, the courage sachet in hand, Amber and I schlep our way across campus, walking between buildings to avoid open areas, doing our best to avoid campus police cruisers navigating the area. We even end up taking a detour by the library, making it the longest route possible—anything to avoid having to pass by the O’Brian building at night.
“I can’t believe how cold it is tonight,” Amber says, breaking the tension. She stuffs her hands into her pockets.
“We’re almost there,” I tell her.
The Onstage Café, better known amongst students as “the Hangman,” is just ahead of us. A cream-colored houselike building with a pointed roof, it once served as the school theater. But after that girl hung herself, it’s become the campus coffee shop/study lounge—sort of a bleak thought.
“Do you think they’re still serving hot cocoa?” Amber asks.
“Not if they’re closed,” I say.
“Maybe whoever sent the e-mail works there and can get us in. Maybe he already has some cocoa made up for us.”
I ignore Amber’s wishful thinking and continue toward the main glass doors. I can see there are lights on in the back, by the cash register, but it’s completely dark in the seating areas, both the elevated stage section and the lower audience part.
“Should we knock?” Amber whispers.
“He might not even be inside.” I look over my shoulder toward the path where we walked.
“That would be, like, so completely cruel,” Amber says. “Tempting us here with the thought of hot cocoa and biscotti, only to make us rot out in the cold.”
“Are you for real?” I whisper back. “Did you forget why we’re here?”
Amber rolls her eyes. “It’s called trying to make the best of the situation.” She moves closer to the door and knocks.
“No!” I mouth.
“Why? I don’t have all night to wait for this dork.” She continues to pound at the door, the faux-fur body of her leopard-print coat bundled tightly around her.
“No!” I repeat. “You’ll draw attention to us.”
“Look, Stacey,” Amber presses the light of her ladybug watch to illuminate the time and holds it out for me to see. “It’s after 11:30. Either this geek comes out and gets serious, or I’m outta here. I think my tongue is icing over.”
I’ll have to admit, she’s right about the weather. I think it’s the coldest November we’ve ever had. But that doesn’t mean I’m willing to get caught out here after curfew.
“Okay,” I say, squeezing my sachet of courage. “Let’s make a deal. How about you stop knocking and wait here to see if anyone comes. I’ll go check out the area around the building. If we don’t see anything, we’ll leave.” I pull a flashlight from my backpack.
“Fine,” Amber agrees.
I move over to the side of the building and aim the flashlight over shrubbery, among trees scattered about the lawn, and toward the brick walkway that loops back to the main buildings. But it just looks vacant. So maybe Drea was right. Maybe this is just one huge prank. Maybe the anniversary of what happened last year is really bringing out the worst in people—maybe even bringing out the worst in my nightmares.
I turn to move back toward the front of the building. That’s when I notice two thick bands of light moving forward along the ground, like the beams of large flashlights. I peek around the side of the building and see Amber, obviously trying to explain herself to two campus police officers.
“I think I left my sweater in there,” I hear her say. “It’s my favorite. A Stella McCartney original. I can’t just let it sit in there. Someone will thief it for sure.”
“Are you out here alone?”
“Yup.” She looks over her shoulder in my direction. “All alone.”
Unfortunately, her bogus attempt at lying tips them off. One of the officers shines his light in my direction just moments before I’m able to duck my head.
Great.
Instead of succumbing to the humiliation of having him drag me out to the front of the building, I go willingly.
“Sorry,” I say to the bigger of the two. “My friend forgot her sweater inside, and I just came along so she wouldn’t have to be out alone.”
“Then what were you doing at the side of the building?” he asks.
A good question. “I was trying to peek into the side windows to see if I could see it.”
The younger officer, the one who looks like he just walked off the pages of an Abercrombie & Fitch catalog—tanned face, broad chest, dark wavy hair that dangles over a set of the most deliciously chocolate-brown eyes—shines his mother-of-a-flashlight into the building, illuminating a face.
Cory’s face.
“Computer dork!” Amber exclaims.
He’s wearing an apron, like he actually works here. He pulls a key ring from his pocket to unlock the door. “What’s going on?” he asks, focusing a moment on the ghosts still liplinered on Amber’s face. “I was just cleaning up out back.”
“Where’s Mr. Gunther?” Mr. Abercrombie & Fitch asks. “Isn’t he in charge of closing up the café?”
Mr. Gunther is Hillcrest’s suspender-wearing, knuckle-cracking, way-too-much-cologne-wearing algebra teacher.
“He wasn’t feeling well tonight and had to leave early.” Cory grimaces, like he just got Gunther in trouble.
Officer Abercrombie jots the detail down in his notepad before focusing back on Cory. “Is anyone coming to close up for him?”
“No,” Cory says. “I mean, it’s no big deal. All I have to do is shut off the lights and lock the door. Gunther knows I’m responsible.”
The officer nods, I think, mulling over whether or not to buy the story.
“Brrr . . .” Amber folds her arms in front. “I could sure use an extra coat.” She eyes Officer Abercrombie’s jacket. “Or maybe we should all go inside and discuss this over hot cocoa. I know I’ve got time.” She pouts her lips, supermodel-style, arches her eyebrows approvingly at his puffed-out chest, and then looks him in the eye. But that still fails to nab his attention, which prompts her next desperate attempt. She starts doing this ridiculous little dance to show just how cold she really is—feet tapping, head bobbing from side to side, arms flapping like chicken wings.
“Did you happen to find a sweater in there while you were cleaning?” the officer, obviously completely immune to Amber’s idea of seduction, asks Cory.
Cory shakes his head and makes a face—cheeks sagging and mouth all droopy—as though he’s completely baffled by this whole scene.
“Fine,” the officer says. “Are you almost done?”
Cory nods. “Yeah, I’m just finishing up.”
“Well, I’ll wait while you finish and then give you a ride back to your dorm.”
Amber’s face drops. And I know exactly why. It isn’t because it could possibly be Cory who sent me that e-mail. Nor is it because it was he who forced me to let him read the e-mail in the first place, who knew all along we would show up here at this exact time. It’s because Mr. Hunky-Abercrombie-&-Fitch police officer is going to hang around and wait to give Cory a ride back to the dorm while we get escorted by the dad-looking one.
I shoot her my most disgusted look, but she just nods in agreement, like we’re on the same wavelength, like I’m just as disappointed as she is by this turn of events.
And so, as we walk down the main path toward the set of police cruisers, I hold myself back from throttling her silly and take one last look back toward the Hangman. It appears as though the police officer has gone inside to avoid the chilly weather. I stuff my hands into my pockets and am just about to turn back around when I see him—the guy I’ve come to meet. I stop. A weird, tingling sensation runs down the length of my spine, warms up my blood—like fiery pins and needles beneath my skin. I know it’s him. I can feel it, can sense it all over me.
He’s standing by the side of the building, dressed in darkness, just the tiny, narrow glow of a flashlight beam aimed toward his face. I strain my eyes to make out his features, to try and identify who it is.
“Stacey . . .” Amber calls from the police cruiser. “Hurry up. I need hot cocoa.”
I turn to look back at her, to see if she can see him as well. But she’s too busy doing that foot-tapping, head-bobbing, chicken-wing dance again to focus on anything.
“Amber—” I murmur, not wanting to say anything more, not wanting to distract the officer’s attention from his CB.
“What?” She stops bobbing.
I turn to look back at the side of the building. But this time, no one’s there.
When we get back to the room, Drea is cuddled up in bed, the phone pressed lovingly against her ear. She laughs at whatever the caller is saying—a huge, bubbly giggle that lights up her face. But then she notices us and her demeanor changes. “Oh, hi,” she says in our direction. She sits up and drapes the covers over her bare legs.
“Um, yeah,” she says into the receiver. “They’re back. Do you want to talk to her?”
She presses the mute button and holds the phone out to me. “It’s Chad. He’s been calling here all night looking for you.”
“Can you tell him I’ll call him back?” I sigh, thinking how I can’t even remember the last time Chad and I laughed like that.
Drea twists a strand of hair around her finger, the telltale sign that she’s about to lie, and then tells Chad that I just ran into the bathroom and will have to call him back. “He’s not happy.” She clicks the phone off and sits up in bed.
“Yeah, well, he’s not the only one,” I snap.
“What happened?” Drea asks, seemingly oblivious to my frustration.
“Happened?” Amber pipes up. “Nothing. It was a total bust. Geek-boy Cory closing shop. No one else in sight. We didn’t even get a measly scone after hauling our asses over there in, like, fifty-below weather. The best part of the whole evening was meeting this cutie-pie officer who didn’t even offer to give us a lift back.”
“I saw him,” I say, my heart thumping away inside my chest at the mere mention of it—of him.
“What are you talking about?” Amber rolls her eyes. “We both saw him. Tall, dark, boyishly beautiful.”
“Not the officer,” I say. “I saw the guy from the boiler room. The one who e-mailed me.”
“When? Where?”
“I tried to tell you, but I couldn’t with the cop there. On our way to the patrol car, I took a second glance back. He was there.”
“What did he look like?” Drea moves to the edge of her bed.
“I don’t know. I couldn’t really see his face,” I say. “It was too dark. And then he was gone.”
Amber pulls her makeshift bookmark—a long, thin stick of strawberry taffy—from the middle of one of her textbooks. She peels the wrapper down and stretches off a big chunk. “If you couldn’t see his face, then how do you know it was him?”
“I just know. I could feel it.”
“Are you sure it wasn’t Cory?” Drea asks.
“It couldn’t have been,” I say. “He and the officer went inside the Hangman as soon as we turned away. This other guy was at the side of the building.”
“So, you saw them both go inside?” Drea asks.
“Well, no.”
“I don’t know,” Amber garbles between taffy chews. “I didn’t see any of this.”
“So? What does that mean—you don’t believe me?”
Amber lets out a long and exaggerated sigh. “It just means I wish you would’ve said something. Maybe we could’ve done something—distracted the copper, maybe. Now, it’s too late.”
I slump back on my bed and burrow my face in my covers.
“I told Chad you’d call him right back,” Drea reminds me.
I bury my face a little deeper, gathering a thick mound of comforter over my head, imagining myself wearing one of those giant dunce caps. It annoys me that Drea is so obviously concerned about Chad’s feelings right now. I mean, I know Chad and I were supposed to talk tonight. I was going to call him after his hockey game to find out how he did, but with everything going on, it must have just zapped from my mind—like not going to Lecklider’s detention, and not remembering to finish my English homework, for which I received a big fat zero.
“And your mother called,” Drea adds.
Great. I crawl free from the covers and dial Chad’s number, readying myself to serve up a hefty dish of apology stew.
“Are you okay?” he asks.
“It’s sort of a long story.”
“I was hoping to talk to you tonight,” he says. “After hockey.”
“I know,” I say. “I’m sorry. There’s just been more weird stuff going on. How was the game, anyway?”
“Wait,” he says. “What weird stuff?”
I turn to glance at Drea, hanging on my every word. I get up and peek out our door to see if the common area is free. But, unfortunately, Trish Cabone has camped herself out on the vinyl couch. She smiles when she spots me—a huge, bright, I-just-got-my-teeth-whitened kind of smile. And if that isn’t enough, she starts waving her arms around like she hasn’t seen me in months.
I respond by closing the door.
“Stacey?” Chad asks.
“Yeah?” I say.
“What weird stuff?” he repeats.
“It was just this weird e-mail from some guy—at least, I’m pretty sure it’s a guy. As a matter of fact, I think it might be the same guy who was in our boiler room that night you and PJ stopped by.”
I look to Drea, now writing away in her journal, and
decide to retreat to the semi-privacy of my bed covers to tell him everything—all about the nightmares and the puking, the e-mail message, the letter postmarked right here in Hanover, and, lastly, about tonight’s trip to the Hangman Café.
Chad doesn’t say anything, and for several awkward seconds we just sort of hang on the phone, listening to each other breathe.
“Well,” I say, finally, “say something.”
“Like what?”
“Like, that it’ll all work out. That everything will be okay.”
“I just can’t believe this is happening again,” he says.
“Neither can I.”
“Do you think there’s any way there could be some explanation for all this?” he asks.
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know,” he says. “I just think it seems really weird.”
“You don’t believe me?”
“No, of course I believe you,” he says.
“Then what?” I take out my growing aggression on a wad of comforter, squeezing and resqueezing until my knuckles hurt.
“Just what I said, I think it’s weird this stuff is happening again. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was just somebody’s idea of a good time.”
“Are you serious?” I flip the covers from my head and sit up straight.
“Stacey, relax,” he says.
“Relax? How am I supposed to relax? After everything that’s happened, don’t you believe I can sense things? Don’t you think I’d know if this was all a hoax? I’m puking my brains out for god’s sake. I’m dreaming about dead people.”
“I know,” he says, his voice all soft, like he’s trying to coax me from a ledge. “I do believe you can sense things, and I know you haven’t been feeling well. But a lot’s gone on, and being back here, at this time of the year . . . it can’t be easy for you.”
“I can’t believe this,” I say. “You sound like the school shrink.”
“Stacey—” he pleads.
“I gotta go. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” I hang up, feeling completely frustrated and utterly hurt by the sting of his doubt, by his not being able to believe in me . . . when I need so much right now to believe in myself.
“Trouble in paradise?” Amber asks. “I don’t know, Stace, you two have seemed pretty bumpy lately . . . and not in a good way.”
I look over at Drea, thinking how the tone of my conversation with Chad sounded so much different than hers. She holds the pen tip midair over her diary page, awaiting my response to Amber’s comment. But, since I don’t feel quite capable of answering to either of them at the moment, I grab the white candle from my night table and press my fingertips against the wax, wanting more than anything to light it, to feel that magical moment my grandmother was talking about, even though the idea of anything remotely magical seems so far away now. I wipe the few stray tears that fall from my eyes, flip the covers back over my head, and pretend to be alone.