“I pass by Dunkin’ on my way back from bio,” James said. Lee wished he would sit down. He hated how James was looming over him, how his shadow fell over Lee’s textbook. “I heard you talking on the phone in Japanese?”
“My stepmom is Japanese,” Lee said quickly, sure that James had already decided he was some hentai pervert. But James only nodded like he’d expected this answer.
“I was thinking of signing up for Japanese 101,” he said. “Maybe you could help me out?”
“You don’t need to buy me coffee for that,” Lee said. “I’m not fluent, but I can help.”
“Awesome,” James said, his grin so bright, tight across his face, like it didn’t fit.He’s lying, Lee realized. About what, he wasn’t sure. Taking Japanese? Passing by Dunkin’? They all seemed like such unimportant things to lie about.
“I’ll see you around,” James said after a moment, heading to his room and reappearing with more books under his arm before leaving once more.
Lee took some more Benadryl, went to his room, and tried to think about supernovas instead of secrets. He pretended not to notice when an itch bloomed just beneath his skin.
Lee read the text message over and over again, then he wanted to stop reading it, but he couldn’t close his eyes, couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. He felt like electricity had surged through him, leaving him a scorched skeleton. He was trapped inside the cage of his bones with his heartbeat thundering inside him, his pulse so loud in his ears.Was this what it felt like inside the suitcase?
Let me out, Lee.
In a renewed surge of panic, Lee bolted upright and cast his phone into the corner of his room, where the darkness inhaledit. He scrambled back, as if the words would crawl out of the shadows and bite him.
It must have been a wrong number. Lee had put James’s phone number into his contacts as a formality in case one of them ever got locked out, but he couldn’t remember ever texting James, so maybe he’d typed the number incorrectly. It had to be someone else, because there was no way it could be James. The way that Lee had left him... there was no way he was still alive.
Where is James Baldridge?
Lee curled up against the wall farthest from his phone, under a pale square of moonlight beaming from the window. He pinched the skin of his elbow, which was covered in red scratches as if he’d been itching at it in his sleep.
His phone beeped again.
Lee jumped to his feet and shoved open the doors to his room, hurrying into the hallway, as if there was any distance on earth he could put between him and what he’d done.
He shoved open the door to the north porch and wind screamed in his face, forcing him back into the house. Far in the distance, the sea had retreated into the horizon. The wind ripped clouds of white sand into the air, like the shore was swarming with sandflies. Another strong breeze sent some of Lee’s father’s papers spilling off the kitchen table, so Lee slammed the door shut and locked it.
He pressed his back against the door and let out a breath. Maybe if he checked his phone again, the text would have mysteriously disappeared. Lee was still detoxing from years of sedatives, after all. Vivid nightmares weren’t unheard of, given the circumstances.
He headed back toward his room, his every footstep creaking as he moved through the house.
But as he stepped into the hallway, instead of a soft tatami mat, his foot splashed in a warm pool of liquid.
He lifted his foot up and examined it. A dark substance had soaked through the bandage on his foot, staining the hems of his pajama pants. More of it flowed from the doorway to his room.
Slowly, he slid the door open.
His whole floor was a pool of black. The glossy surface reflected his own petrified face back up at him. He took a step forward and slipped onto his forearms, sparks of hot liquid landing on his face, salt on his lips.
Lee Turner knew the taste of blood.
At once, he was back in the stairwell, holding what remained of James Baldridge, tasting death on his lips.Where am I, Lee?
Lee clenched his teeth and tried to ground himself in the present, in this house, in this room, in this pool of scalding blood. Where had it come from? As the ripples settled and his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he realized the blood was spilling from beneath his closet door.
Sen.
Lee rushed forward but his hands slipped and his chin hit the floor, the impact jarring his skull. He spit and crawled the rest of the way to the door, pawing at the paper with slippery fingers.
Sen wasn’t supposed to die for three more days. She hadn’t even begun helping him yet. Lee was supposed to have more time to figure out how her world worked.
He thought of Sen lying dead on the floor, melting into a pool of blood only a few feet away from him. He thought of her eyes, which didn’t flinch when she looked at him, how he’d never been able to study anyone’s eyes like hers because no one else would meet his gaze.
He managed to grip the edge of the door and slide it open, surging forward...
