Panic(66)

“It’s okay,” she whispered. “I’m here.” But Nat didn’t seem to hear her.

“The rules are simple,” Diggin said. Even though he was speaking at a normal volume, to Heather it sounded like he was shouting. She began praying the tigers wouldn’t wake up. They still hadn’t even lifted their heads. She noticed a bit of the steak she’d given them earlier was still untouched, buzzing with flies, and couldn’t decide if that was a good thing or not. “You go into the pen, you stand with the tigers for ten seconds, you get out.” He emphasized this last part just slightly.

“How close?” Nat said.

“What?”

“How close do I have to get?” she asked, turning to him.

Diggin shrugged. “Just inside, I guess.”

Nat pushed out a small breath. Heather smiled at her encouragingly, even though she felt like her skin was made of clay about to crack. But if the tigers slept, Nat would have no problem. They were a full forty feet away from the gate. Nat wouldn’t even have to go near them.

“I’ll time you,” Diggin said. Then: “Who has the key to the gate?”

“I do.” Heather stepped forward. She heard a slight rustle, as everyone turned to stare at her; she felt the heat of all those eyes on her skin. The air was leaden, totally still.

Heather fumbled in her pocket for the key to the padlock. Nat’s breathing was rapid and shallow, like an injured animal’s. For a second, Heather couldn’t feel the key and didn’t know whether to be relieved; then her fingers closed around metal.

In the silence and the stillness, the click of the padlock seemed as loud as a rifle report. She unlooped the heavy chain carefully and laid it on the ground, then slid the metal latches back, one by one, desperately trying to stall, trying to give Nat a few more seconds.

As the final latch clanged open, both tigers lifted their heads in unison, as though sensing that something was coming.

The whole group inhaled as one. Nat let out a whimper.

“It’s okay,” Heather told her, gripping Nat by the shoulders. She could feel Nat trembling under her hands. “Ten seconds. You just have to step inside the gate. It’ll be done before you know it.”

People had started buzzing, giggling nervously, shifting. Now the stillness was replaced with an electric energy. And as Nat took one halting step toward the gate, and then another, the tigers, too, stood up—twisting onto their feet, stretching, yawning their enormous jaws so their teeth glistened in the floodlights—as though they had decided to perform.

Nat paused with a hand on the gate. Then her other hand. Then both hands. Her mouth was moving, and Heather wondered if she was counting or praying, whether for Nat they were the same thing. Dwarfed by the gate, silhouetted against the sharp, unnatural light, she looked unreal, one-dimensional, like a cardboard cutout.

“You don’t have to do it.” Dodge’s voice was loud, and so unexpected that everyone turned to stare. Nat turned too, and Heather saw her frown.

Then she pulled open the gate and stepped inside.

“Start the timer,” Heather cried out. She saw Diggin fumbling for his phone. “Now.”

“Okay, okay,” Diggin said. “Time!”

It was too late. The tigers had started to move. Slowly, their massive heads swinging between their shoulder blades like some awful clock pendulum . . . tick, tick, tick. But still they were too close, already too close; three strides and they covered five yards, mouths open, grinning.

“Three seconds!” Diggin announced.

Impossible. Surely Nat had been in the pen for ten minutes, for half an hour, forever. Heather’s heart was bursting out of her throat. No one spoke. No one moved. Everything was a black sea, dim and featureless: everything but the bright circle of white light, and the cardboard-cutout Nat, and the long shadow of the tigers. Nat was shaking now, and whimpering, too. Heather feared for a second that she would collapse.

Then what? Would the tigers pounce? Would she, Heather, be brave enough to try to stop them?

She knew she wouldn’t. Her legs were water, and she could hardly breathe.

“Seven seconds!” Diggin’s voice was shrill, like an alarm.

The tigers were less than eight feet from Nat. They would be on top of her in two more paces. Heather could hear them breathing, see their whiskers twitching, tasting the air. Nat had started to cry. But she still held herself there, rigid. Maybe she was too scared to move. Maybe their eyes, like deep black pools, had transfixed her.

“Eight seconds!”

Then one of the tigers twitched; a muscle flexed, and Heather knew it was getting ready to pounce, felt it, knew it would jump on Natalie and tear her apart and they would all stand, watching, helpless. And just as she was trying to scream Run but couldn’t, because her throat was too thick with terror, Nat did run. Maybe someone else screamed it. There was noise suddenly—people shouting—and Nat was out of the gate and slamming it shut, leaning back, crying.

Just as the tiger, the one Heather had been sure was moving to spring, lay down again.

“Nine seconds,” Diggin said above the sudden roar of sound. Heather registered a small burst of triumph—Nat was out of the game—and then a stronger pull of shame. She pushed over to Nat and drew her into a hug.

“You were amazing,” she said into the top of Nat’s hair.