Fear mixed with something else, overwhelming and warm, flooded me. “Ben?” I called. I bent, then lowered to my knees, the way I had always done for him, to be on his level. “Ben? Honey?”
His footsteps were just out of reach. I leaned forward, my arms out in the dark.
“Ben, come here,” I said. I heard the pleading note in my voice, and I didn’t care.
“You have to find me.”
His voice was so clear, so normal. Right there. Ben, a few feet away.
I wasn’t in this dark hallway anymore. I wasn’t chasing my daughter or chasing ghosts. I was fifteen again, and the world wasn’t all right, but it was more all right than it would ever be again. I hadn’t known how little time I had, that the next time, or the next, would be the last time I’d see my little brother.
Ben’s feet moved as he came closer. I could make out the shape of him, the familiar outline of his face just out of reach. I could see his eyes. He was looking at me, and his expression was sweet and sad.
“Annie is angry,” he said.
I flinched, because the mention of Sister could still do that to me, even now. “I know. It’s my fault.”
“She says I ruined everything,” Ben said. “She couldn’t get married because of me. What does that mean, Violet?”
“I don’t know, Ben,” I said softly. “You didn’t do anything wrong. Not ever. Come here.” I moved forward on my knees, but he took a step back.
“I told her I was sorry,” he said.
“You have nothing to be sorry about,” I told him. “Come here. Please. Please.”
He didn’t move. I wanted to get closer, but I didn’t want to chase him away. He was as fragile as a wisp of smoke, barely here at all. In the shadows, I watched him frown, thinking. Then he smiled.
“Violet,” he said, “you’re my big sister.”
“Yeah, honey,” I replied. “I am.”
He turned and ran, and I didn’t have time to call after him, to get up and run, because in the dark I heard a familiar clicking sound and a low hiss that made terror beat its wings inside my skull.
Sister was here.
I felt her before she kicked me. I had shifted my weight when she caught me on the left side of my rib cage, sending me off-balance. I rolled and she kicked me again in the kidneys, making me bark with pain. My head smacked against the wall.
“Get out,” she hissed, an angry voice that scraped my brain. “Get out.”
I felt for something, anything to hit her with. I could see only a shadow in the dark, the familiar figure that had stood at the foot of my bed when I was a child. On the edge of my perception, I heard a shout.
Lisette,I thought.
I kicked at Sister as hard as I could. My foot hit something unrecognizable, cold and soaking wet. Water splattered to the floor.
I was screaming, the sound coming out of me by instinct, unfiltered. I kicked at Sister again and missed, then missed again. Hot tears ran down my face. Her foot swung at me and I rolled away, just out of reach.
As I scrambled to get my feet under me, an icy hand gripped the back of my neck. I went still. The sound died in my throat.
There was nothing but yawning darkness, frostbite cold, spiraling inside my mind.
I fought it. I made my voice work, even though my body wouldn’t move. “I hate you so much,” I whispered to the ghost who wouldn’t leave me alone.
Sister hissed in a breath. Her fingers dug in, merciless on my tendons, my nerves, the bones in my neck. She was going to break me. She had infinite strength. More water dropped to the floor.
“I hate you, too,” she said in my head, and one of us screamed. Maybe it was me.
A light came on. Its yellow glow on the floor surprised me, and then Sister’s grip vanished from my neck. I looked up.
