Soul Screamers, Volume 1

A level below us, two guys in green Eastlake High baseball caps were shoving two tables next to a third, where four girls from our school sat in front of an untouched pile of junk food. The guy on the left was a junior named Nash Hudson, whose pick of the week—Amber something-or-other—was already seated. Showing up at homecoming with Nash would have been all the revenge I could ask for against Toby. But that wasn’t gonna happen. I wasn’t even a blip on Nash Hudson’s social radar.

Next to Amber sat my cousin, Sophie; I would have recognized the back of her head anywhere. After all, that was the part of her I saw most.

“How did Sophie get here?” Emma asked.

“One of the other dancing monkeys picked her up this morning.” She’d been ignoring me consistently—mercifully—since dance-team tryouts a month earlier, when she’d become the only freshman member of the varsity dance team. “Aunt Val’s picking her up in about an hour.”

“I think that’s Doug Fuller across from her. Come on!” Emma’s eyes glittered beneath the huge skylight overhead. “I wanna drive his new car.”

“Em…” But I could only run after her, dodging shoppers hauling bags and small children. I caught up with Emma on the escalator and rode down one step above her. “Hey look.” I nodded toward the group at the food court, where one of the dancers had just switched sides of the table to whisper something into Doug’s ear. “Meredith’s gonna be pissed when she sees you.”

Emma shrugged and stepped off the escalator. “She’ll get over it. Or not.”

But the moment my foot hit the ground, a cold, dark sense of dread gripped me, and I knew I couldn’t go any closer to the food court.

Not unless I wanted to cause a scene.

I was seconds from losing control over the scream building deep inside me, and once it broke free, I wouldn’t be able to make it stop unless I could get away.

Better to leave before that happened.

“Em…” I croaked. One hand went to my throat; it felt like I was being strangled from the inside.

Emma didn’t hear me; she was already strutting toward the cluster of tables.

“Em…” I said again, forcing that single syllable out firmly, ahead of the pressure building in my throat, and that time she heard me.

Emma turned and took one look at my face, and her forehead wrinkled in familiar concern. She glanced longingly toward the food court, then rushed to my side. “Panic attack?” she whispered.

I could only nod, fighting the urge to close my eyes. Sometimes it was worse then, when I saw only darkness. It felt like the world was closing in on me. Like things I couldn’t see were creeping toward me.

Or maybe I watch too many scary movies…

“Okay, let’s go.” Em linked her arm through mine, half holding me up, half dragging me away from the food court, the escalator and whatever had triggered this particular…episode.

“A bad one?” she asked, once we’d put a good two hundred feet behind us.

“It’s getting better.” I sat on the edge of the huge fountain in the center of the mall. The jets of water shot all the way up to the second floor at certain points during its routine, and little droplets pelted us, but there was nowhere else to sit. The benches were all full.

“Maybe you should talk to somebody about these panic attacks.” Emma plopped down beside me with one leg tucked beneath her, trailing her fingers through the rippling water. “It’s weird how they seem to be locked on specific places. My aunt used to get panic attacks, but walking away didn’t help her. The panic went with her.” Emma shrugged and grinned. “And she got really sweaty. You don’t look sweaty.”

“Well, at least there’s a bright side.” I forced a laugh in spite of the dark, almost claustrophobic fear still lurking on the edges of my mind, ready to take over at the first opportunity. It had happened before, but never anywhere so heavily populated as the mall. I shuddered, thinking how close I’d come to humiliating both me and Emma in front of hundreds of people. Including half a dozen classmates. If I freaked out in front of them, the news would be all over school by the tardy bell on Monday morning.

“Still feel like cooking up a little revenge?” Emma grinned.

“Yeah. I just need one more minute.”

Em nodded and dug through her purse for a penny. She couldn’t resist feeding the fountain, despite my certainty that no wish you had to pay for could possibly come true. While she stared at the coin on her palm, eyes squinted in concentration, I steeled myself and turned to face the food court, my jaws clenched tight. Just in case.

The panic was still there—indistinct but threatening, like the remains of a nightmare. But I couldn’t pinpoint the source.

Usually I could put a face on the dark dread looming inside me, but this time the crowd made that impossible. A group wearing our rival school’s colors had taken the table next to Sophie and her friends, and both sides were deeply engaged in a French-fry war. Several families stood in line, some parents pushing strollers, one pushing a small wheelchair. Some kind of moms-’n’-tots group had descended upon the frozen-yogurt place, and couples of all ages shuffled their way through the cattle shoots in front of each restaurant’s counter.