So I got the rags, and I set the fire . . . and I pounded on the door shouting, “Who locked it? Who locked it?”
But it wasn’t locked.
I only pretended that it was, and I couldn’t help but laugh as the flames caught Belle’s gown; but as Lydia died, I was a bit sad—
—And then I pulled the door open—
—And then David appeared on the threshold. He was shouting, “Belle! Belle!” And when I tried to run out of the blazing room, he pushed me back in!
He pushed me back in!
He pushed me back in!
He pushed me out of the way so that he could save her, precious, rich Belle, but I swung at him, and I knocked him to his knees. Then I ran through the door—
—Too late! The flames had caught me then! My hair was on fire! My shift, on fire, as I ran through the snow, across and into the forest; on fire as I burst down the lane, fire streaming behind me, running, ablaze!
“I killed them! I killed them all and I would do it again! Because he was mine!” I shrieked.
Troy pushed himself away from me, stumbling backwards, and I felt for the hammer. Clutching it in one hand and the pick in the other, I whirled in a circle so they would all stay away. I was burning up. Sweat poured down my face.
“Linz, stop,” Mandy said, as they surrounded me. And something glinted against her coat. She was wearing . . .
She was wearing—
“My locket!” I screamed, holding my weapons over my as I ran at her. “Mine! That is mine!” I came at her and as she backed away, she tripped and fell.
I was back at the shore, by the lake house, when her eyes were black—
—And her eyes were black now, blazing with hatred, and fear—
“Fear of me,” Celia crowed. “At last.”
And I got ready to hit her.
“Kill her kill her kill her,” Celia commanded me. But she wasn’t afraid; she was gleeful; she wanted this not to save herself, or me, or anyone. She wanted it because she was . . .
One by one, I killed them all. First it was the birds. And then it was the cats. And then it was Leticia.
“I smothered her to keep her from the cold.
“And then it was—
“Oh my God, no!” I wailed, dropping the pick and the hammer. Celia was the crazy one; Celia was the evil one. My dybbuk, her unfinished business—murder.
I kept screaming. I got the high heels and threw them at someone, at everyone, as I screamed.
As my world burned away, into cinders.
AFTERMATH
No man chooses evil because it is evil; he only mistakes it for happiness, the good he seeks.
—Mary Wollstonecraft
A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it.
—Oscar Wilde
THIRTY-ONE
February 18
possessions: me
how can I live with myself? how can I stand this guilt?
possessions: them
ignorance. and, oh, God, how i envy them
possessions: mandy
“there are different kinds of love, but they all have the same aim: possession.”
—unknown
possessions: troy
his backbone
my heart
Take care of the worst ones, the ones who will try to escape. . . .
I WAS BACK in the infirmary, and everyone was waiting for my high fever to break. I thought it had happened, but I was pretending to be asleep, because I just couldn’t face them. What did I say? What did I do?
What did I really see?
All my insanity had been excused—Dr. Steinberg, our campus physician, said I’d been delirious, raving, due to exposure. Running around in the snowstorm that night, I really did get very sick. My fever spiked so high they talked about life-flighting me out.
They life-flighted Kiyoko’s body out, after she drowned.
I couldn’t accept that I might have pushed her in. But I was the one who found her. Or that I hurt those birds, or the cats . . .
I still didn’t believe that I’d done it, even when Celia was in control of me. Crazy, evil Celia, more evil by far than Mandy and her sick clique. . . .
I’m possessed by a madwoman.
When Troy and Miles carried me out of the operating theater, I heard myself “raving.” After they brought me to the infirmary, I felt Dr. Steinberg and Ms. Simonet taking care of me. Swaddling me; there were drugs. I was so cold. I was on fire.
Troy came, with Julie. His arm was in a sling from when I’d hit him with the hammer. And even though they both assumed that I was unconscious, Troy sat beside me, holding my hand, and told me that he had gone back to the lake house that night to see Mandy, to break up with her. But as usual, he had lost his nerve, which was why nobody saw him.
When we’d come back from break, Mandy had asked to wear his ID bracelet, and he’d given it to her. He’d thought she wanted it to reassure herself that he was still hers.
Now he wondered if Mandy herself had found Julie’s skirt after Julie’s attack. Maybe she’d planted the bracelet on it—for reasons he couldn’t understand—to have power over me—but he swore to me that he had not touched Julie.
Julie backed him up, saying that she thought she must have seen him wandering on the shore after he didn’t go back to the party. She apologized, both to him, and to me, adding that Spider had also made friends with Troy again. She was earnest, contrite, and so very sweet. No one was sure what had truly happened the night of her attack. I wondered if we’d ever know. I was so tired and drifting so badly by then that I held onto the sound of their voices—loving me, wanting to spare me any pain. I heard their sincerity, and their innocence.
The Grose clan came for a group visit, but Ms. Simonet told them they had to wait to see me, because I was too sick. Marica felt especially bad, assuming responsibility for my wandering all over campus in the snow. They left flowers and balloons--and belated birthday cards, since they’d found out they’d missed my birthday, and Marica kissed my forehead.
Miles made an appearance, discussing the sordid history of Marlwood with Dr. Steinberg. He knew about the lobotomies—after all, he had been researching the history of his family’s new investment. Miles had tracked down Dr. David Abernathy, who’d survived the fire, gone on to perform many more lobotomies, and had died in Boulder, Colorado, at the age of seventy.
But the seven “last” girls—the last Marlwood inmates scheduled for the brain-destroying procedure—died the night of the fire—six in the operating theater; while the charred bones of Celia Reaves were found on the road, exactly where Troy had seen her burning ghost the night we drove back to Marlwood.
As Miles lingered beside my bed, I smelled his clove scent. I felt him wrap something around my wrist. Thread. Heard him say softly, “You can come out now. I know you’re there.”
It was the same thing he’d said when I hid from him in the shadows outside my dorm. I wasn’t sure what he meant . . . or whom he meant it for.
Dr. Ehrlenbach and Dr. Melton came, discussing my prognosis with Dr. Steinberg. They left conferring about how to catch me back up, since I’d probably be out for the rest of the week. There was much to be done to get their little barracuda ready for Harvard, or Yale, or Brown.
“Oberlin. Maybe Vassar,” Dr. Melton said.
Mandy didn’t come. She stayed well away.
But in the night, in the dark, Troy came again, by himself.
“Get better soon,” he whispered in my ear. “I . . . I love you.” And then, he laid his head down beside mine, and dozed.
I still didn’t know why he had sung that horrible song, but his warm breath melted a few of the layers of the ice around my heart.
Eventually, Ms. Simonet shooed Troy out and I was alone, with Julie’s stuffed Corgi, Panda, tucked in beside me, with nightmares, memories, and questions.
If I wake up now, I thought, will Celia be gone? Will I be free?
How can I ever b
e free?
A line from somewhere kept playing in my mind: Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. Was Celia in hell? Reunited at last with David Abernathy?
I felt the sun on my face as the day began; and a warm tear slid across my temple.
“Hey, sweetie.”
It was Julie, squeezing my hand.
“Welcome back.”
I began to open my eyes.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS:
Sincere thanks to my Razorbill team: my fantastic editor, Lexa Hillyer; publisher, Ben Shrank; and publicist, Casey McIntyre. My gratitude to my agent and friend, Howard Morhaim, and Katie Menick, his assistant. To my Facebook nation and tweeps, I truly appreciate your collective wit and support, especially on those dark nights of the soul. Hugz to friends and family, most especially the awesome Chumash Woman, a.k.a. my daughter, Belle.
Nancy Holder, The Evil Within
Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.Net Share this book with friends