young lady.” When she stared at me for a full five seconds without saying anything, I asked about the party, and she looked really confused. She stared at me like I was the Minotaur, and then Naida comes up and says, “Gotta go!” and steers Carly away without a word. It seemed odd that she’d protect you from me when we were at the party together. It wasn’t normal. I knew something was wrong. Different.
This raises all kinds of questions about the nature of reality, the nature of self, the idea of souls, the idea of the afterlife, questions about genetics, the mind—
You do realize you’re a regular science project?
Ari
PS—Thank you for your confession. I promise to keep it locked away as long as you like. But you should know that I really like you exactly like this. Exactly as you are. Kaitlyn.
I love your name.
From: RealxChick
To: AriHait558
Date: 7 November 2004
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Confession
I am very, very aware of the fact that I’m a science project—gone wrong. I seriously can’t believe you haven’t gone running for the hills.
K
From: AriHait558
To: RealxChick
Date: 7 November 2004
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Confession
I don’t scare easily, though I expect others do? It’s fine if you don’t want to talk about it.
Come to the booth. I want to see you. I have questions. No cookies today—don’t want to make Carly fat without her permission. Doesn’t seem fair.
A
From: RealxChick
To: AriHait558
Date: 7 November 2004
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Confession
Oh, clever. We have a sense of humor.
Be there in 10.
K
37
[The following entry was pasted into the journal.]
Diary of Kaitlyn Johnson
Friday, 12 November 2004, 8:00 pm
Dorm
I’m going to do something stupid. I—what’s happening to me??
At first it was dark. Not so dark that I couldn’t see, but dark enough that shapes had no meaning. I was outside standing in a blanket of mist. I could hear the ocean, and I shivered. The taste of a changeable storm hung on the air. As soon as I thought this, the clouds above me, which seemed alive and full of malevolent depth, moving fast like a stop-motion film, gave a deep rumbling groan—and ceased. Just froze in the sky.
I stumbled forward and tripped on an ancient step, which led to an enormous house towering above me, three stories high.
Dee, I felt that house stare down at me.
The windows gazed across the landscape, each fringed by the crumbling slate roof like eyelids. Even the console brackets had the sunken, eroded texture of all things that have succumbed to the oppressive passage of time. The weather vane, too, stood rusted and old, no longer a thing of pride, but a creaking slice of metal warped into no definite shape by years of long corrosion.
I reached for the handle and gave a push, and the door creaked forward with an eerie whine that echoed around the room. The house was bare, unfurnished and covered with a film of dust, velvety thick. Desolate leaves—the remnant of an autumn long past—breezed their lonely way along the floor, carried by the dank, rotten air. A giant chandelier in the wide entryway hung on an ominously rusty chain, draped with cobwebs that even the spiders had long abandoned. There was a looming sense of emptiness about the place. Even the mildew smell seemed oddly distant and weak, like the remembrance of a scent.
And yet… somehow I sensed I wasn’t alone.
I climbed the rickety stairs to the first floor, feeling more vulnerable and naked than I had outside, each foot tentative on the warping, decayed wood. I was momentarily afraid I’d fall through the floor into some pitch-dark basement with no doors.
The second story was just as gray and foggy as outside, and I half-expected to hear thunder rumbling through the ceiling. It was oppressively small, with long, narrow corridors that seemed endless and labyrinthine, punctuated by ancient and blackened candle sconces.
I felt a sudden yearning for Carly, so powerful that it hit me like physical pain. I called her name. “Carly? Are you here?”
I wanted her to answer. I was terrified when she didn’t.
I was so alone. Too alone.
Something subtle seemed to move behind the wall, and I stepped hesitantly closer, not entirely sure I wanted to look.
It wasn’t a wall at all, but a mirror covered in a coating of dust so thick that it looked like wallpaper. A smoggy version of my face stared back at me, wide-eyed. I wiped away the dust, leaving a gleaming streak of polished silver in the wake