Where Silence Gathers (Some Quiet Place #2)(14)

“Honey? What’s wrong?” Mom touches his arm but he shakes her off, muttering. It sounds like he’s saying, “Get off of me.” But Dad would never say anything like that. He lurches again, tripping over a chair. Mom is quick and she catches him, even when he keeps trying to push her away. She whispers something in his ear, something she doesn’t want me to hear. But I do: “Alex.”

Dad lifts his head and focuses red-rimmed eyes on me. “I’m doing this for you,” he says. I tremble and open my mouth to ask Mom what’s wrong with him. Before I can, she’s guiding him out of view, toward their room at the end of the hall. All the while he’s still talking under his breath. I stay where I am and clutch my book so hard the spine creaks. I can’t hear the words. No, I can’t hear any of them but one. He’s repeating it over and over. My name.

Alex. Alex. Alex.

Then the door clicks shut, and everything is quiet.

Lightning flashes again, but this time it does nothing, doesn’t reveal answers to the questions this memory brought to the surface.

I see movement out of the corner of my eye, a familiar flash of red, and I turn. Revenge is sitting on top of a vacant desk, his eyes on me. You knew, I want to say. Maybe not everything, but I must have told him something when I was younger. When I said that I’d never seen the wild, non-perfect side of Dad, he’d asked, Don’t you remember?

I want to force Revenge to tell me what I should remember. I want to leap up and drive ninety miles an hour until I get to Andrew’s office so I can ask him what he knows about any of this.

But Briana is here, her shoulder pressed to mine as if she senses that I’m cracking inside. Georgie says something that I don’t hear, and Briana responds. Then, “Do you want to come over tonight?” she asks me. “I could help you with that essay.” Neither of them seems to have noticed that they lost me for a few seconds.

“Tonight?” I repeat faintly. Tonight I’d planned on going to Nate Foster’s. On watching him through that window and thinking about that gun. Maybe it isn’t such a bad idea to escape everything for a few hours. “Yeah, okay.”

Before Briana can answer, Mr. Kim is stopping beside our table. He surveys our work and of course sees that my clay is still just a square. “What are you making, Alex?” he asks with a smile.

I’m doing this for you. Slowly, I focus on Mr. Kim’s face. His smile begins to fade as the seconds tick by. Georgie waits, Briana waits, Revenge waits. Everyone’s waiting.

To avoid them all, I stare down at the clay. “I haven’t decided yet.”





SIX


It’s still raining as I drive to Briana’s. The driver’s window is stuck open an inch—I keep forgetting to ask Saul to fix it—and drops slip inside, trembling on the ceiling and falling. My hair and clothes stick to me. The windshield wipers do their best to clear the way, hurrying back and forth on the glass. Thump-thump. Thump-thump. The sound makes me think of another rainy day, another car. Mom’s scream echoes through my memory. William!

My hand flies to the radio knob, and I crank it so loud it’s painful. Elvis drowns everything out.

Behind me, another car inches along. Raking my hair out of the way, I frown as I study it in the rearview mirror. Despite the downpour, the color and model are obvious. A brown Taurus. I don’t recognize it, which is strange in Franklin. What’s even stranger is Revenge’s absence; I haven’t seen him since art class. What is he up to? And why hasn’t he ever—

Alexandra.

I stiffen.

Lightning flashes again, and Fear’s face looms in the mirror. He winks at me, tucking a damp curl behind my ear, and then he’s gone again. I slow down, trying to calm my racing heart. The Taurus’s headlights brighten in a signal of irritation. I try to tell myself none of this is real, I’m just imagining things, but it’s not working. I can feel something in the car with me. The air is warmer somehow, and suddenly it’s harder to breathe.

Panicking, I guide my car to the side of the road and stop. I lean my forehead against the steering wheel and concentrate on inhaling and exhaling. Something is wrong with me. This is all in my head. Did this ever happen to Dad? Did he ever go crazy?

I’m doing this for you.

Driven by some instinct, I lift my gaze. The Taurus is still there. I roll the window down further and wave, indicating it should go around. It doesn’t move. “I don’t need help,” I mutter, jerking my hand harder. Rain pelts my skin like needles. “Go around.”

The headlights are blinding, reflecting off all my mirrors so that I can’t see whoever is behind the wheel. They just sit there, the engine rumbling. Watching me. What the hell?

Another Emotion appears in the backseat. I ignore his touch as I reach for the handle and pull. The wind intensifies as the door begins to open.

Suddenly the Taurus lurches forward.

I yank the door shut just in time. The car roars by, and my side view mirror shatters. I scream. The Taurus smirks at me with its red taillights, then it’s spinning onto the dirt turn that will eventually meet the county road.

For a few seconds all I’m capable of is sitting there, panting and staring at the splintered, plastic stub where my mirror used to be. Did that really just happen? After another minute I fumble for my phone and dial the first number that takes no thought or effort. There’s a click, a female voice in my ear. My brain recognizes it. “Briana,” I whimper, pressing a hand to my face just to prove that this is all real.