Chapter FIFTEEN
The snowy trees rushed by the train window, a blurred palette of grays and whites and browns. Gazing at the blue sky behind the trees, and the ocean hidden beyond them, Em was mesmerized, silent. She willed away thoughts of Zach and Gabby and love and jealousy and focused only on the landscape. Her journal was sitting open on her lap, resting against her thighs and her new dark jeans—a Christmas present from her mom. The pen had slipped from her fingers into the crevice of the bind-ing. She’d tried to write, but no words came.
It was Saturday morning, New Year’s Eve. Tonight Em’s and JD’s parents were going to some kind of lefty political party in York—mostly doctors and lawyers—and Em and JD
had decided to go to Boston and celebrate First Night. She’d ignored calls from some other friends, just like she’d been ignoring them all break—they had to know something was up by now—and had pointedly deleted the one text she’d received from Zach: a plaintive, pathetic Hi?
JD pawned Melissa off on a freshman babysitter, told his
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filmmaking friends he was headed for Beantown, and had taken the morning train down to have brunch with his aunt Sophie. Em had met her a few times. Sophie Downs had never married, was as smart as a whip, and had an antique writing desk that looked out over the sardine-packed brownstones of Beacon Hill. Sometimes Em thought she had more in common with Aunt Sophie than with her own relatives.
She and JD had agreed to meet at five o’clock in Harvard Square; the train ride was about two hours long and scheduled to get into North Station around two thirty. That would give her just enough time to stop at Maintenance and pick out a really nice gift for Gabs.
Em shifted in her seat, closing the journal and depositing it in her bag. She’d write later, once she had a chance to gather her thoughts. Out of the corner of her eye, she thought she saw someone staring at her, and when she turned to look, she sharply drew in her breath.
Sitting diagonally across the aisle was a blond-haired girl that looked remarkably—freakishly—similar to the one she’d been dreaming about or hallucinating or whatever. The one she’d seen in JD’s window last night. Em realized she was gaping, smiled perfunctorily at the girl, and whipped back around.
It had to be a coincidence.
“I like your bag.” All of a sudden the girl was standing over her. “And the flower.”
Em had pinned the red orchid to her bag a few days ago—
after the sleepy afternoon in Zach’s bed. And even after their blowout, Em had not been able to bring herself to get rid of it.
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Even though she knew Zach had played her, she almost had to keep it. It was a gift from him, and one of the only symbols that he had liked her, at least. It was the one small token reminding her that she hadn’t imagined the whole thing.
“Um, thanks,” Em said, wishing she were holding a book that she could pretend to be reading. The girl was model pretty, but Em couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something off about her.
“I’m Ali.” The girl was holding out her hand for Em to shake. Em hesitated before reaching out and quickly clasping the girl’s hand, which was freezing.
“Hi. I’m Em.” Em noted with relief that the train was pulling into North Station. She made a show of gathering her things, looking down to rearrange the items in her purse.
“Have a great evening, Em,” the girl said with a laugh, as though she’d just told a joke. She floated toward the doors. Em didn’t even leave her seat until she saw the girl step off the train and get swallowed by the crowd.
It was nothing, she told herself, over and over. Just a strange interaction.
But she couldn’t get rid of the coldness that snaked into her from Ali’s icy grip.
As soon as Em was out in the street, she felt better. In fact, she’d changed her mind completely about the orchid now. The fresh air made her realize that it really didn’t matter anymore what had happened versus what had simply been in her head. The point was that, either way, it was over.
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She ripped the flower off her bag and threw it on the train tracks.
Purse under one arm, hot Dunkin’ Donuts coffee in the other (procured the moment she got off the Amtrak), Em proudly navigated the T from North Station to Newbury Street without once consulting the subway map. She made a mental note to tell JD, who constantly teased her for having no sense of direction. Aboveground, the sidewalks were f lecked with slush and salt, and holiday lights twinkled in the trees. There was an electricity in the air: Girls wrapped in thick scarves ran by with their cell phones pressed to their ears; parents tugged at bundled-up children who were hypnotized by lights and sounds and window displays. Em smiled, looked up at the big buildings, the library, the sun setting over the brownstones. She couldn’t wait for the fireworks.
By the time Em arrived, the salesgirls in Maintenance were dying to get out for the night, Em could tell. And who wouldn’t be? But she took her time going through the store, touching scarves and holding sweaters up to her chest. She needed to find the perfect present, one that would make up for everything she’d done over the past week. One that proved that she knew Gabby, that she cared about her, that she wanted things to go back to normal.
She saw it on a mannequin before she saw it on a rack—a cornflower-blue silk scarf with silvery lace woven into the fab-ric. The scarf Gabby wanted. In the display, the scarf was paired with a soft, thin sweater of the dustiest pink—like something 201
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from a Civil War–era attic. It was a beautiful combination, and it was one Em knew Gabby would love.
The scarf was fifty dollars; the sweater was missing a price tag.
“How much is this sweater?” Em asked, holding out a sleeve.
“It’s one twenty-five,” a sullen clerk told her.
So, almost two hundred dollars, all together. That was exactly how much money Em had in her purse, and her parents would slaughter her if she used her credit card for something other than an emergency. She hesitated, but only for a moment.
“I’ll take them both,” she said. “Extra small.” She watched as they wrapped Gabby’s gifts in lacy tissue paper and gold ribbon.
The clock on her phone told Em that she was going to be late to meet JD. She had to take the Red Line from Park Street outbound through Cambridge. She repeated the directions like a mantra; the last thing she needed was to get lost. Juggling her bags and the T pass, she hurried down to the Park Street platform. She pulled out her phone to text JD and tell him she was running a little late, but stopped short when she saw the girl again—the blond one, Ali. She was standing on the opposite platform and staring at Em. The girl had the strangest smile on her face, like she knew a really good secret. As a train rushed by on Em’s side of the tracks, the girl’s hair blew all around her face like a lion’s mane.
Em’s stomach did a little flip. Was this girl stalking her?
She entered the train and sat down with a sigh of relief as 202
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it started moving. The car was full but not cramped, and the air smelled like wet wool. The train went past one stop, then another, and Em sat quietly, watching everyone around her, wondering what it would be like to live in a big city, where everyone had their own lives and not the ones prescribed by parents or best friends.
She was in the middle of transferring Gabby’s present to her shoulder bag when she heard someone cough.
“Excuse me. Does this train stop at Kendall Square?”
Em looked up, about to point to the T map above their heads, when her heart stopped beating for at least five seconds.
Standing there, in front of her, on this train—despite the fact that just moments earlier, Em had seen her on the other platform, headed in the opposite direction—was the girl. Ali. It was impossible.
“You—you’re following me,” Em gasped out.
The girl shrugged, not offering any explanation, just cock-ing her head with that same psycho smile.
Em felt her throat go dry. She tried to swallow, or cough, and her saliva seemed to choke her right below her tonsils. She jumped up just as the train started to slow down for the next station. Then she bolted toward the train’s sliding doors.
“Excuse me, I need to get by,” Em croaked at the passengers, aware of how frantic she sounded. “Excuse me!”
By the time she reached the doors, the announcer was ringing the bell. Please stand clear of the closing doors. She slipped through just as the doors started to clamp shut.
But she wasn’t all the way out. Her huge shoulder bag got 203
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cinched in the closing doors—and her arm was still entangled in its strap.
As the train chugged to a start, Em had to walk faster and faster, panic building inside of her, struggling to extricate her arm.
“Stop! Stop! ” she shouted, and the people inside motioned to her as though trying to convey some crucial information, but the train did not slow down. She tripped as the train started moving faster than she could run. She fell to her knees, and in doing so, wrenched her arm free of the bag’s strap. She watched as her bag, and the train, and the girl, disappeared into the blackened tunnel.
Em climbed to her feet, trembling. She began to whimper. She was stuck now, with no bag, no phone, no wallet . . . and no idea what to do. At least she was at Central Square—only one stop away from Harvard Square, where she was supposed to be meeting JD. She didn’t want to risk getting back on the T, so she made her way up to the street. She’d walk westward along Mas-sachusetts Avenue. Luckily it was a straight shot between Central and Harvard. But judging from how many people were below-ground, it would be mayhem once she emerged on the street.
It did seem that everyone in Boston was taking advantage of the weather. Mass Ave was a madhouse, and once she got closer, she could see that Harvard Square was clotted with students, jugglers, tourists, shoppers, singing drunkards, and couples making out in public. Street vendors lined the Pit, where per-formers danced with fire. She nervously looked around. JD
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hadn’t given her an exact meet-up spot. They’d agreed to text when she arrived at the square.
Em had to find a pay phone—did pay phones even exist anymore? She made several full circles before heading down a street lined with bars. If worse came to worst, she would just ask a stranger to borrow their phone. Em couldn’t help but think of her parents and how worried she knew they would be if they knew what was going on.
And then her eyes fell on one of the craft tables, where a woman was selling chunky cable-knit sweaters—Irish and thick—like the one Zach held up the other day. Em felt like her heart would break.
“You forgot something,” she heard from behind her. Em whirled around, and there she was. The girl. Still smiling that grotesque smile. Holding her bag, with a red orchid pinned to it. It made no sense—Em specifically remembered taking off the flower, throwing it onto the tracks. Her whole body went to ice.
“What do you want from me?” Em choked out.
The girl’s smile grew even wider, until it seemed to stretch across her whole face. “Just doing my job as a Good Samaritan,”
she said, still holding out the bag.
“Leave me alone.” Em wrenched her bag from the girl’s hands. Her voice was high-pitched, hysterical. “Okay? Are you listening? Leave. Me. Alone.” Then she turned and sprinted through the crowd.
It was like a maze, or a sick fun house. Loud, colorful, distorted, scary. Em darted this way and that, rummaging around in her bag as she ran, digging for her cell phone. When she 205
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found it, she read the text from JD: Meet me in front of Au Bon Pain. Okay. She knew how to get there. With a deep breath, Em consciously tried to slow her steps, but she was still walking like her heels were on fire. Crossing the street between the Pit and Au Bon Pain, she felt a swish of air around her calves as a cab screeched to a halt just inches from her body.
“Watch it, girlie!” the cabbie yelled.
Em couldn’t even scream back. She just ducked her head and scurried forward, furiously fighting back tears.
Hands clamped down on her shoulders, and then Em did scream.
“Hey, hey, Em! It’s okay. It’s just me!”
Em turned to see JD, forehead crinkled, concerned. He smoothed her hair back from her eyes. His long, navy-blue sailor’s coat and chartreuse scarf made her want to sob; she wanted to wrap herself up in the familiar garments.
“You okay?” JD had to bend his knees to peer searchingly into her eyes. “You looked like you were being chased.”
For a moment she considered telling him about the girl, the dreams, the visions. But it was New Year’s Eve—she didn’t want him to think she was crazy. She would deal with her own psycho ghost hallucinations without dragging JD into it. She shook her head. What the hell was wrong with her?
“I’m okay. Just a little jumpy today, I guess.”
“Yeah. It’s wild out here tonight.” JD slung his arm around her shoulders, and Em leaned into him without thinking about it. “Sophie told me that the best place to watch the fireworks is from this bridge down here—come on. I’ll show you.”
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Em gratefully let him grab her hand and lead her through the crowd. She snuck one glance behind her.
“You sure you’re not on the run, James Bond?” JD squeezed her hand, watching her eyes as they scanned the people behind them.
“I thought I saw someone I knew,” Em said vaguely.
“Don’t worry. If we run into someone from Ascension, I’ll drop your hand like it’s diseased.”
“That’s not what I meant, and you know it.” Em whacked him with her purse, watching with satisfaction as one of the new orchid’s petals fell to the salt-pocked sidewalk. Slowly, her heartbeat was returning to normal.
The view from the John W. Weeks Bridge was lovely and expansive, and JD wrangled them into a spot right up against the railing, with nothing between them and the water but a few inches of carved concrete. As the fireworks began—slowly at first, then expanding in color and magnitude—Em forgot all about the events of the past week and the creepy girl with her weirdo smile. For the first time in a long time, she felt totally safe and secure. Like nothing could go wrong. She let herself lean back into JD, let her ear touch his cheek. The fireworks boomed and exploded and wrote themselves across the sky, while music and laughter drifted through the crowd, across the water.
Even through several layers of thick winter clothing, Em thought she could feel JD’s heartbeat. It was solid and steady, like it was creating a rhythm with her own. For one crazy moment, she felt the wild urge to run her fingers through his 207
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hair, to kiss him. She was acutely aware of every place on their bodies that was touching. She wanted to grab him, right there, on the bridge, in front of everyone. She wondered what his mouth felt like, how his lips would move if they touched hers.
A sense of rightness washed through her.
And then it was the fireworks finale—a great spectacle of blues and reds and whites, right as the clock struck twelve. Em wondered how many times they’d had to practice to get the timing just right. JD squeezed her shoulders, bent down to shout “Happy New Year!” in her ear. They hugged—a lingering hug. But the moment passed, and he ruffled her hair as they pulled away.
“Pretty awesome, right?” She didn’t even need to look at him to know that he’d be looking at her like he always did—
like an old, old friend.
“Yeah, it was. It was beautiful,” Em said, gazing toward the city skyline as though it contained an answer to a question she had yet to ask.
By the time they reached North Station, Em was exhausted. Her fingers were frozen even beneath her mittens, and she was sick of lugging around her bag—every time she looked at it, a shiver went through her as she remembered the girl on the train.
“I’m gonna get some hot chocolate,” she told JD, motioning toward a cart in the corner.
“I’ll buy our tickets,” he responded. “Meet me by the kiosk over there.”
She nodded and went off into the crowd, bumping into people and being bumped, secretly praying that she wouldn’t 208
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see that girl’s vacant eyes and wan smile staring out of the mass of people. Since she’d used all her cash, she paid for the drinks on her mom’s credit card: The whole day had been one big emergency, as far as she was concerned. The hot chocolate was thick and steamy, and she took a big gulp, not caring that it scalded the back of her throat as it went down.
She fought her way back over to the platform, holding the hot chocolates carefully and craning her neck to see JD’s bright scarf.
There he was, over by the ticket window. Was he talking to someone? Em squinted to see. Yes, he was talking to a girl.
Her heart dropped all the way to her toes. JD was talking to the girl, who was twirling a piece of her pale blond hair around her pointer finger.
No. No no no no no.
Em started moving faster, as fast as she could in the packed mass of people. The hot chocolate sloshed on her hands and wrists, burning at first and then becoming ice-cold. She tried to keep them in her view, but it was impossible, and by the time she got to JD, the girl was gone.
“Who were you just talking to?” Em asked, breathless and wide-eyed. “Who was that?”
“That girl?” JD looked at her quizzically and grabbed a cup of the cocoa. “Nice job keeping it all in the cup, dude.”
“Do you know her?”
“Hey, hey, hey,” JD said with mock defiance. “You’re the one who didn’t want to be seen with me in public. She was just asking for directions.”
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“JD, I’m serious. You’ve never seen her before?”
“Only in my dreams, babe. . . . Kidding! Kidding!” JD
backpedaled and Em knew her face had gone white. “I’ve never seen her, and she was just asking if this train goes to Providence.
I told her it didn’t. That was that.”
“Okay. Okay.” Em exhaled. “I’m sorry about the hot chocolate.”
“It’s fine. I didn’t want all of it anyway. Jeez. I’ll have to remember—no talking to other females, or risk the wrath of the Emerly.”
“Very funny.”
As they boarded the train, JD handed Em her return ticket and she slid it into her bag, next to the petals of tissue paper and the stuff she’d bought for Gabby. She’d blown her Christmas savings, but it was worth it. Gabby was coming home tomorrow, and Em vowed to come clean as soon as possible. It would be painful, she knew that. More than painful. It was going to be ugly. But they’d get through it. They had to—they’d been friends forever. Right? Friends understood that other friends made mistakes.
JD had given Em the window seat, but rather than lean on the cold glass, she bent toward him. Right now, the comforting, familiar smell of that weird sailor’s coat—like a woodstove, old and piney—was the only thing keeping her from totally collapsing. As she started to drift off on his shoulder, a whisper ran through her dreams: You forgot something . . . You forgot something . . . You forgot something.
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