Whispered Darkness by Jessica Sorensen Page 0,38
as he leans back.
He sits down in the dirt, shaking his head, his hair wet dripping down his face. “I …” He looks at Star, confusion etched into his face. “For how long?”
She shrugs, folding her arms around herself. “For a very long time.”
“She said decades,” I inform him.
When his eyes widen, I decide I probably need to tell him everything, including the reality that he’s probably immortal, too. While I do, I have him and Star help me get Beth’s body out of the swamp, which might be the most disgusting thing I’ve ever experienced.
Every part of her is rotting, and flesh is falling off. And the smell … it’s worse than the scent of roadkill. Star handles it really well, while Kingsley looks a bit green. And me? I dry heave on multiple occasions.
The only positive thing is that the hands don’t reappear, and if what Star believes is correct, they won’t while Kingsley and I are together. She doesn’t know why, however.
“My best guess,” she says after I ask her, “is that it has something to do with you guys’ intertwined souls.”
Giving Beth’s body one last pull and dragging her from the last of the water, I plop down in the dirt, out of breath and tired. “What I don’t get is that you’re saying we can’t die, yet Beth made it sound like we would if I didn’t solve her and the other dead girls’ murders.”
“You said she said your soul would fade,” Star reminds me as she scrubs dirt off her arm with her fingers. “That’s not the same thing as dying. More than likely, you’ll probably end up in the in-between and soulless.”
“With all of those arm things,” I whisper through a shiver.
When Kingsley notices me shivering, he sits down beside me and wraps an arm around me. He hasn’t said much since I told him everything that I found out and Star showed up.
“Are you okay?” I ask him. “You’ve been really quiet.”
He sketches his fingers up and down my back. “I’m just trying to process everything you just told me … The fact that I’m immortal … that my brother is … whatever he is. Star never specified that.”
“That’s because I don’t know what he is,” she says. “None of us do.”
“Who’s all like us in this town?” I wonder, shifting my weight.
My clothes have begun to dry and are crusty and rough against my skin. I smell disgusting and need to go home and shower before I go meet Death, which is in less than an hour.
“I don’t know everyone who’s part of the undead club,” she replies. “There are a lot.”
Kingsley cocks a brow at her. “The undead club?”
She shrugs, picking at the dried dirt on her face. “It’s a place where we all hang out.”
I gape at her. “The first time you said that, I thought you were like talking metaphorically. I didn’t realize there was an actual club.”
“It’s not like a real club,” she explains. “It’s just a place that undead like us can go and be ourselves. You can also get drugs and stuff there that’ll help you tune out all the shit that comes with being one of us. You guys will have to go there sometime. Let me know if you want to.” With that, she stands up, dusting the dirt of her jeans with her hands. “Well, this has been super fun, but I’m about done with this being sober thing.” She turns to leave.
“Wait—you’re not going to help us move the body?” I ask, rising to my feet.
She shakes her head. “Sorry, but I’ve done my part. And the voices are starting to stir in here”—she gestures at her head—“so that’s my cue to go.” With that, she hikes off into the trees.
Sighing, I twist back around toward Kingsley. He’s still sitting in the dirt, staring at the ground.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” I ask.
He blinks up at me. “Just still trying to process everything you guys told me … and the fact that Star has been undead from the moment I met her, yet she never said anything about it.”
“I think she hates what she is,” I tell him. “I think that’s why she gets high.”
“Yeah, I got that from her, too,” he mumbles, standing up, his gaze shifting to Beth’s body lying only feet from us. It’s creepy how neither one of us appear to be freaked out by that fact. “What’re we going to do with her body?”
“I don’t know.”