The monster’s breath brushes over the nape of my neck.
And then it’s gone.
Catharsis comes at great risk. What if you escape what has been keeping you trapped? What if you’re no longer able to ignore the role you take in your own life? There will be no excuses to hide behind. Only your own culpability.
You put yourself at great peril by crawling from your shell, naked and vulnerable, with the hope of achieving your highest potential.
We see you, we acknowledge you, and we accept you.
Ascent Initiation Script
CHAPTER 15
Emma is throwing up.
I know because I can hear her, but I can’t open my eyes. I can’t look at what I’ve done. I can’t face how Emma looks at me now that she’s seen me kill a person. Hands shaking, I feel along Leah’s side until I touch the outline of a phone in her pocket. I take it and move away so I don’t have to see when I open my eyes.
I laugh when the phone lights up and opens when I swipe the screen. Lucky.
My eyes hurt from straining to focus on the phone. There’s something wrong with me.
It takes hours, years, a century to make the phone work. When I do, I laugh again, triumphant.
I can do this. I candothis.
What am I trying to do?
I have to call someone.
I have to call my mom.
No, no, I can’t. But why not? I don’t remember.
“Lou, the phone.” Emma’s voice is wet and choked.
I see my index finger dialing her number. It’s a path pressed into the earth that I could follow in pitch black. I know it better than my own.
It’s too hard to hold the phone up, so I curl on my side and cradle it on my cheek. It rings. The sound lights a stuttering flame of hope in my chest. Emma says my name again. I ignore her. I’m getting help; she doesn’t need to worry.
It’s good I’m calling my mom now. She’ll know what to do.
The line rings and rings and rings and in the background Emma asks for the phone, but I can’t give it to her because this will save us, I know it will. The mechanical voice asking if you want to leave a message comes on.
That’s fine. She’s probably asleep. Bleary-eyed and slow to get her glasses on. It’s late. It’s so late.
I redial. It rings and rings and then the message again. My heart thumps hard.
One more time. It’s the third call. It’ll work. She’ll answer.
Her voicemail message is an echo, an endless ripple in my head. I want to call again, but my fingers are numb.
Why wouldn’t she answer? Why wouldn’t she pick up the phone? After it rang once and she didn’t know the number, maybe not. But three times? Even from another phone she knows what it means. Sheknowsit means I need help.
She always answers or calls me back right away. If she’s alive she’d find a way to answer, to get in contact, to—
Oh.
Oh.
