Dead River - By Cyn Balog Page 0,51

being the enemy. About how nothing Jack tells me is true. And so a small part of me wants to push him away, say no thank you, and be on my way. But the larger part of me is screaming, Get closer! It’s not that I’ve forgotten how to say no. It’s just that with Jack, the word has ceased to exist in my vocabulary. I find myself nodding in agreement, whispering, “Anything.”

He laughs, breaking me out of my trance. Whoa. I’m a total goofball. What is happening to me?

“Something to eat?” He holds out a granola bar, the kind they sell at the Outfitters. “Now you cannot accuse me of ignoring the unique needs of the living.”

I take the bar from him. It’s crushed like a pancake but I hold it like it’s a precious gem. Lannie watches us intently, her expression lost between amusement and questioning. She sweeps her dark, pretty hair over her shoulder and scratches her neck. For the first time I see there are horrible bruises there, as if someone choked her. I recall how we used to play hide-and-seek on the river in New Jersey, and how I’d run in and out among the trees, lost and confused, only to find her hanging from a tree by her neck. She always did things like that, shocking things. She said it was only in fun, because everything else was so boring. I start to say something, but she notices me looking and brings her hair forward quickly and anxiously, concealing the bruises once more.

A little girl steps out from among the trees, smoothing the skirt of her pink party dress, despite the fact that it’s covered in mud. As is her entire chin. Mud is oozing from her mouth. She’s staring at me curiously. When she is only an arm’s length away, she stoops, reaches out, and tugs on a lock of my hair. She pulls again and again, like she’s ringing a bell, her head tilted in question. Her expression, inquisitive yet forlorn, does not change.

“Um, hi,” I say to her.

Jack looks at her and rolls his eyes. He explains, “Vi doesn’t talk. She’s Lannie’s sister.”

Lannie puts a protective arm around her sister and begins to massage her small shoulder as the three of them beam at me like I’m a long-lost relative, here for a visit. “It’s so nice to have you here,” Lannie says. “I’ve missed you, Kiandra. I’ve missed our talks. Where have you been all this time?”

I nod. I’ve missed her, too. Even though I only saw her in the visions I had during those two years I lived on the river, I feel close to her, like she grew up with me. Actually, no, she was always older, always more mature, and she never changed. Her hair was always long, and chestnut brown, and she was never in anything other than that white dress. From what I remember, the last time we’d talked, it was about normal seven-year-old things. She liked tubing, fishing, and hopscotch, and all the things I liked, yet she always looked older. “My mother died, and we moved away,” I say.

She makes a tsk-tsk noise. “Shame. But you know your mother is here, yes?”

I nod. “So I’ve heard.”

“You were very fond of her?”

I shrug. “I was seven. Seven-year-old girls are always fond of their mothers, aren’t they?”

“I suppose. But now you’re not?”

“I don’t know her anymore,” I sigh. “She left me. To come here, I guess. I guess this place was more important to her than her family.”

“I understand. So you don’t want to see her, then?”

“I do,” I say immediately. “But the one guy who’s supposed to take me there is under orders not to.”

“You mean Trey Vance?” she asks, pursing her lips. “That’s shortsighted of your mother. Her powers are fading, but she denies it.”

“They are?”

She laughs so unexpectedly and loudly that I throw back my head, banging it hard against the tree trunk behind me. She looks at Jack, who has been leaning against a tree trunk, examining his fingernails, but suddenly springs to attention when her eyes fall on him. Then she touches my hand. Her hand is so cold, clammy. Instantly I think of my mother. “Kiandra, we need you.” She motions behind her. “Jack will explain things to you.”

“Wait,” I say as I realize what she is about to do. “Don’t leave me with—”

I stop because, at the same time, I want to be left alone with him. She