“Tell me about living in a funeral home,” he says, redirecting my attention.
I smile because he doesn’t sound mean or judgy. He just sounds interested.
“It’s ok. It smells like flowers all of the time. The smell gets into my hair and my clothes.”
“Do dead people look like they’re sleeping?”
I snort. “No. They look dead.”
Dare nods. “I figured.”
We’re quiet now, and we walk, and Castor pants. The tiny pebbles tumble under my shoes and I once again wish I were home, on the cliffs of Oregon. But then again, Dare isn’t there, and he interests me.
The wind blows my hair and I raise my hand to shove it behind my ear, and as I do, something moves in the corner of my eye.
I turn, and what I see is the stuff of nightmares.
I see Castor and Pollux, broken and bloody, dragging themselves along the path, their legs broken, blood pouring from their eyes and their noses. Blood trails behind them, it fills the pads of their paws and leaves crimson prints on the ground. There is so much blood that I can smell it, I can taste it.
I scream and try to run to them, but my feet won’t move. They feel like they’ve been glued to the ground and I’m frozen frozen frozen. My heart pounds and pounds, the blood racing through my veins and I can’t move I can’t move I can’t move.
“Castor,” I whimper.
Castor tries to pick his head up, he tries to come to me because he’s obedient, he’s been trained, but his bones his bones his bones are splintered. He can’t walk and he falls to the ground with a loud boom, so loud and hard that it shakes the ground under my feet.
I scream
And scream,
My hands over my mouth.
Dare turns to me calmly, his eyes like lifeless pools, and it’s him, but it’s not him.
“You did this,” he says, his voice dead like a corpse. I try to breathe but I can’t I can’t
I can’t.
I squeeze my eyes closed and fall to my heels, rocking on the path.
“Calla! Calla! Open your eyes! Shh! Everything is fine, it’s fine. What’s wrong?”
A voice is desperate and anxious and I focus on it, trying to come back to my body, trying to hear it.
“Calla!”
I focus on those two syllables, on the voice.
It’s Dare’s and it’s full of life this time, not like before.
I open my eyes and his face is in mine, his dark eyes panicked.
“What’s wrong?” he asks me, his hands closed around my arms. “Are you ok?”
I think he’d been shaking me, trying to get me to focus. But I don’t know.
I shake my head. “What happened to the dogs? Oh my God. What happened?”
Dare cocks his head, quizzical. “What do you mean?”
From behind him, Castor whimpers and I startle, sitting up so I can see.
Castor is sitting a few feet away, staring at me with canine concern, whimpering because I’ve unnerved him, wagging his tail hopefully. His bones are fine. There is no blood.
He’s fine
He’s fine
He’s fine.
I suck in a breath. It wasn’t real. Was it real?
“I thought… Castor was…” my voice trails off, because this is exactly what happened when I thought my brother had died. It wasn’t real.
It clearly wasn’t real.
“I need Finn,” I say finally.
Because Finn will help me understand. Finn is the only one who can know.
“Are you crazy?” Dare asks me as he helps me to my feet. “My step-father said you were.”
“No!” I snap. But I’m not sure. I probably am. “That’s a mean thing to say.”
“My step-father is mean,” Dare answers without apology.
From behind him, my mother rushes down the path, in a robe and her hair standing on end.
“What’s wrong, what’s happened?” she asks as she reaches me, pulling me into her arms. “I heard you scream.”
Finn is behind her, and Sabine. They are all watching me, because they know what I won’t admit.
I’m crazy.