rattling old lock behind her.
After she flushed, she turned the shower as hot as it would go, until steam clouds roiled through the narrow room. Stinging spray pounded the chill from her flesh. Her limbs grew heavy as the last of the mania wore off, joints aching.
Minutes later she heard the front door close again and sighed. Rae scrubbed her long tangled hair and tried to ignore the guilt she felt at that relief.
LIZ DREAMED OF a dark forest, of a stone road nearly swallowed by trees and earth. A canopy of branches held the ground in a perpetual twilight that smelled of moss and loam and decay. Weeds cracked the paving stones, and roots thrust them aside. The underbrush was alive with sounds—skittering feet, slithering bodies, huffing breath. Shadows shifted around her and wind hissed through the treetops.
She knew this road, though she hadn’t walked it in years. It had never been so dark and overgrown before. If she kept going the forest would end soon, giving way to hills and fields and the city.
“Welcome back, Lizzie.”
Liz jumped, throat closing. She looked up to see a girl sitting on a tree limb, feet dangling. Her striped stockings were torn, and mud and leaf-litter clung to the soles of her patent leather Mary Janes. Water dripped from her skirts, a puddle spreading across the cracked stones below.
“It’s been a long time,” Alice said. A thread of water ran between her bloodless lips, splashing her already-soaked pinafore.
Liz shuddered but didn’t look away. She’d never seen Alice after she died; the casket had been closed. Her friend’s puffy white face and bruised-violet eyelids were her own invention. “You don’t belong here,” she whispered.
“That isn’t very nice. You used to tell me all about your dreams. You said you wished I could see them too. I remember your stories— the stairs, the city of cats.”
“What are you doing here?” Liz said.
“I was going to ask you the same thing. Trying to save someone else?” The dead girl smiled. Her eyes were black wells. “Maybe you’ll have better luck this time.”
“Alice—” Her voice broke.
Alice shook her head, flinging water. “I’m sorry. That wasn’t fair. I know you tried. But you’re down the rabbit hole now. Beware the King.”
“Don’t you mean the Queen?”
But the dream slipped out from under her. Wakefulness returned in layers: cold, stale air; the vibration of engines; a dizzying sensation of movement. A hand on her arm, a gentle shake. She blinked and lifted her head from Alex’s bony shoulder, rubbing the pebbled, cable-knit imprint his sweater left in her cheek.
“We’re landing,” he said, pulling off his headphones. He sat folded like a marionette, knees brushing the tray table in front of him despite the airline’s alleged six inches of extra leg-room. Over ten hours in transit had left his hair lank and tangled, and a film of oil and dried sweat clung to Liz’s skin and itched at the nape of her neck.
The day after she’d made her decision and bought plane tickets, Liz had slept, deep and dark and dreamless. She’d known it wouldn’t last, but Alice’s white face hanging behind her eyes made her stomach clench.
The plane banked and turned with a rumble. Leaning across Alex’s lap, she saw the last violet and apricot glow fading in the west, and airport lights bright against the black water of the Pacific. She stretched, kneading a knot in her neck.
Alex adjusted his glasses, glancing at her out of the corner of one eye. “Do you feel better now that we’re here?”
“No,” she said, her voice nearly lost in the low hum of the plane. Action may have bought her a night of rest, but had done nothing to dislodge the feeling of wrong that stuck like a bone in her throat. “But thank you for coming with me.”
He shrugged. “I’ve already turned in my lesson plans for the spring. And it’s better than going home to see my parents.” His fingers tightened around hers, belying the lightness of his words. Liz held his hand as the Fasten Seatbelt light blinked on and they spiraled down and down.
THE SKY HUNG low across Vancouver, spitting rain and veiling the night in grey haze. Liz’s eyelids sagged as Alex drove the rental car downtown. She stared through her reflection in the window and tried not to think about how tired and lost she looked.
Fog clung to the streets, turning wet asphalt and trees into something distant and otherworldly. Christmas lights glowed through the