Towering - By Alex Flinn Page 0,81

That it grew when I needed it?

I heard a sound, a car flying past. Was it Mama? Or someone else, looking for me? No, it was gone; it was nothing. But the car had created a wind, which bit into my arms, my shoulders. I gathered my hair around me. I hoped Mama would come soon!

I remembered something else. When my hair first began to grow, that was when I first began to dream about Wyatt, had first sensed he was coming. That was why I had made the rope, to allow myself to escape. That was also when he had, he said, begun to hear me singing.

Did my hair do that?

Only one way to find out.

I looked around, to make certain no one was there, that no one was coming, looking for me.

Then, I opened my mouth and yelled with all my voice.

“Wyatt!”

“Rachel!” His voice. It was coming to me on the wind.

“Wyatt?” Still, I could not believe it was him.

“Call Mama,” his voice said.

I answered him. “She is coming. But where are you?”

“The Red Fox Inn. In Gatskill.”

The Red Fox Inn! I remembered him mentioning that. I was shivering so hard, but through my chattering teeth, I heard him say, “Rachel.”

It was so soft I could barely hear it. But I whispered back, “Yes, love?”

“You have to get the key.”

The key? Had he said the key? What key? “I don’t understand.”

But suddenly, the wind was frantic, furious, blowing snow up around me, whipping it into my face. And then, another car, a red one, big. What I thought might be called a truck. Yes, truck. It was huge, and it was slowing, stopping near me. Oh, no. Was it someone, someone come to take me? I tried to crouch as low as I could, hide behind the snow-banked bushes, but I knew that if someone were looking for me, he would find me.

49

Wyatt

The key! I remembered, now, the key in the hairbrush. Danielle had shown me. Or was it a dream? Still it might be important.

“Rachel,” I said, “you have to get the key.”

A pause. “I don’t understand.”

“The key. The key! It’s in my car, outside the Red Fox. It’s inside the hairbrush on the front seat. I think it opens the door or something here. You have to get it. Or, better yet, go to the police with it.” Because, even as I said it, I knew I didn’t want her coming here. If they’d locked me up, what would they do to her?

“Rachel?”

No answer. But even though I was inside, trapped, I heard a whistle of wind in trees. Nothing else.

“Rachel?”

I wondered if the brothers were outside, if they could hear me. But if they could, they would probably think I was some idiot, babbling to myself. Still, I lowered my voice.

“Rachel?”

No answer. And then, I sensed that the reason she wasn’t answering was because her attention had turned to something else.

50

Rachel

The truck came closer. It was huge, and it was terrifying. I knew it would swoop down upon me, like a falcon or owl, and carry me away. I huddled under my hair, digging deeper, deeper into the snowbank.

“Rachel!”

“Mama!”

She ran toward me, slipping on the snow, arms outstretched. I rose to meet her. When she came closer, she gasped, stopped. Staring at me.

“That coat! It’s . . .”

“Danielle’s—my mother’s. I know. I’m sorry! Wyatt gave it to me. I shouldn’t have snuck out with him, but I didn’t know, didn’t know it would cause so much trouble!”

And part of me was sorry, but part was not because it had to happen. It had to. Everything couldn’t just stay the same.

She was staring at me as if I had grown a second head. “Your hair?”

“It just started growing.” I clutched it around me.

“Today?”

“No. I mean, not only. Weeks ago, when I asked you for the scissors. That was when Wyatt came. I made a rope for him to climb. And then, it stopped, but it started again today. I don’t know why. It’s like it grows when I need it. I wondered why I needed it today.”

On the road, another car roared by. Mama and I both started and crouched down. It passed. She grabbed my hand. “No time for this now. We must go—now, before anyone finds you!”

I tried to run, even walk, to her car, but my hair was caught on something. A branch. I yelped, and reached to untangle it. Mama helped me and then, her holding my hair, we walked to the