“Are you all right? Are you sick?” The other boy’s voice was an echo in my ears. I waved him off.
“I—I need to talk to you.” It took every ounce of strength for me to open my eyes and look at the boy I recognized in my soul as my tormentor. Circus Master, the name came to me like a memory. Like the hiss of a snake. “You remember me,” I said.
One corner of his mouth lifted and his chin snapped back. “Oh. That kind of talk.” He snapped his bike lock into place and slung a backpack over one shoulder. He narrowed his eyes to a cocky squint. “Well, face doesn’t ring a bell.” He waved good-bye to the other boy and moved to pass me. “Excuse me.”
“Wait—” I turned and trotted several steps after him. “I … I have to warn you. You must recog—”
He shook his head. “Look,” he said, talking over his shoulder as he rounded the steps to the dining hall. “I’m sorry if we, like, talked at a party and I forgot to call or whatever. But you got the wrong idea. Trust me, I’m not really looking for anything right now.”
My legs stopped working. My mouth turned into an o. He didn’t recognize me. This boy had no idea who I was. To him, I was nothing. It was nothing. Another night. Another party. Another girl. The force of gravity seemed to double. Was it possible that the same night and the same set of events had been two completely different things for us? Was he not even the villain in his version of the story? Or did he just not care?
The distance between me and the back of his head increased and I couldn’t get myself to close it. I felt as powerless as I had that night. And the snake voice wrapped around me. Let him go. Leave. Run. Lead flooded my veins and weighed down my ankles like I was sinking below the surface.
Tears stung my eyes. I watched him disappear into the dining hall behind the reflective glass that bounced back what I could already see and hid what was inside. I slid the back of my hand under my eyelids and wiped it on my jeans.
“Hey, hey, hold up a sec.” I felt my shoulders raise up like I was ducking into a tortoiseshell. I jerked away when a hand softly touched my elbow. I glanced up at the boy from the bike rack. His sandy blond hair seemed to be made of down and it fluttered in the breeze. “Sorry about him. Tate can be kind of an asshole.” Tate. “Okay, I don’t know why I said kind of. Totally an asshole.” Why was this guy talking to me? “We got paired together for an econ project. Otherwise, no affiliation.” He swiped his hand through the air for emphasis. “Swear. Can I walk you to your dorm or something?”
The boy’s eyes were green and mossy like the woods. There was a freckle on his left temple and matching dimples on both cheeks. There were no hard edges to his voice, no inside jokes lurking underneath the surface of his words waiting to come out and bite me.
But when I looked up at him, I could find nothing to say to him—to anyone—but no.
That night I got dressed in my pajamas. I washed my face, braided my hair, and slathered lotion on my hands and feet. Standing in front of my vanity mirror, I selected a lipstick from one of my many makeup bags. I removed the cap and twisted the base until the dark red hue was exposed. My hand hovered over the glass.
And then I wrote a message.
TWENTY
Marcy
I came into consciousness to find words on a mirror. Pleading, pathetic words. Only their color—red—made them appear angry. Otherwise they were as weak as skim milk and watered-down coffee.
They read: You have to stop this. You’re going to destroy us both. Please!!
I saw them and laughed. I didn’t know where I went during the times when I wasn’t here, only that I would eventually return.
Besides, my time was getting longer, I’d noticed, and this was good.
I hated Cassidy. She was spineless. A joke. She knew nothing but how to be a nice girl. That above all else was why I despised her.
When I spotted her feeble attempt to stop me I ran the side of my fist through it and smeared the words until the glass looked like it’d been covered in fresh blood.
I then chose my own color—pink. Maybe Cassidy would understand pink. It was a nice girl color, after all. And I wrote my own message for her to find, words written across the mirror.
A warning? No, more like a promise.
When I was finished, the violent pink read in all caps: HIDE AND SEEK, HIDE AND SEEK, IN THE DARK, THEY ALL WILL SHRIEK.
I stood back, studied the words, and smiled just for a moment before leaving. Try to stop me, Cassidy. I dare you.
*
I MADE ONE pit stop into the shed that sat on the side of the house. I rummaged through it until I found what I was looking for. A couple cans of spray paint. One orange. One white. I shook each and tested them on a workbench cluttered with toolboxes and spare fishing lures.