“I can row,” I tell him. “It’s getting dark.”
He just shrugs at that, seemingly unbothered. Or maybe he’s just excited about this prospective camping trip. I watch as hecarefully arranges his backpack and sleeping bag and the bag of snacks in the back of the boat. Then he holds out his hands for my backpack. I give it to him. It feels like he knows exactly what to do.
Still, I think it’s better for me to row; the boat is definitely heavier than what he’s used to. I push off into the dark lake, my thoughts churning around.
“I didn’t see your parents’ car in the drive,” I say when we’re about halfway across. Night’s falling fast; I can just barely make out the peninsula, and that’s only because of the thin, orangey-pink line of sunlight limning across the trees.
“My brother had a game,” Oliver signs. I have to squint to see his hand movements in the dark.
“And you didn’t want to go?”
Oliver doesn’t answer, just stares out at the lake. His early excitement seems to have dampened a bit, and I don’t want to pry. I’m going to have to come up with a story, I realize. Something to explain why I stole their son away for the night. Something that doesn’t involve an undead killer.
I let the boat run aground on the shore with a thump. The trees crowd up close, dark and foreboding, and I hear Penelope’s voice again.He’s dangerous. You can’t trust him.
“Do you have a flashlight?” I turn toward Oliver, but he’s already catapulting himself off the boat, landing in the waves with a splash. He waves his arms around wildly, then turns to me and signs, “Shout at him that we’re here.”
“Um, okay.” I swallow and stand up, the boat rocking beneath the waves. “We’re here!” I call out, the wind swallowing up my voice. It makes me think of the night Theo first kissed me, how I called out to him from my patio.
This time, though, I get a response. A few yards down the shore, there’s a soft rustle in the underbrush. A second later,Theo steps out, looking very much like the monster in a ghost story. Big and dark and foreboding. Wreathed in shadow.
Oliver doesn’t care, though. He takes off running down the beach and then, somewhat to my surprise, flings his arms around Theo’s waist. It seems to surprise Theo, too. Even in the gloomy dusklight, I can see him startle a little, and he lifts his arms awkwardly, like he doesn’t know where to put them. Then he pats Theo softly on the back.
I shoulder my backpack and grab what I can of Oliver’s supplies, then carefully step out of the boat. A light blinks off down the beach; Theo, it seems, has a lantern, and it casts a small yellow circle around him and Oliver. He lifts a single hand in greeting, the other still pressed on Oliver’s back, since Oliver’s still squeezing his hips like he doesn’t want to let go.
God, I hope this isn’t a huge fucking mistake.
19
THEO
Isit on an old log, watching Chloe and Oliver through the flicker of firelight. My heart feels light and fluttery and strange, but at least any traces of the killing moon have vanished. All I feel is… excitement.
Yes. I think that’s what it is.
Oliver took longer than I expected to collect Chloe, even with the invitation he made me write for her. It worked out, though, because it gave me time to set up our camping site: two big tents that I collected from victims, both clean of any blood. Sleeping bags, too, although Oliver did tell me he didn’t need one. And the fire, currently crackling in a circle of big grey stones.
Both of them are happy. I sense it, but I can see it, too. Oliver is beaming, his mouth sticky from melted marshmallows. Chloe smiles down at him, the firelight making her skin seem to glow in the darkness. She’s roasting the marshmallows for Oliver because he kept burning them, turning them into blackened, smoking coals. “See?” she says, pulling her stick out of the fire. “This is what they’re supposed to look like.”
She has three on the stick, all a perfect golden-brown. Oliver grabs for one. “Careful,” she says gently. “You don’t want to burn yourself.”
Oliver snatches the marshmallow anyway, hissing before he pops the whole thing in his mouth. Then he moans and falls on his back and kicks his legs around, which just makes Chloe laugh, that sweet twinkling sound that chimes like the stars.
I’m on the opposite side of the fire from them, and the flames feel like a wall separating us. Even so, I’m much closer than I usually am in these kinds of situations. Usually, when I watch people roast marshmallows and laugh, I’m in the trees, and I’m planning how to kill them.
I don’t feel that now, though. If anything, I want to freeze this moment so I can look at it for the rest of my long and violent life.
“Do you want one?” Chloe asks. I think at first she’s talking to Oliver, but then I feel her eyes on me in the dark. She stands up, the flames illuminating her bare legs, and holds out the stick. “I made three.” A shy, faltering smile. “One for each of us.”
She’s happy, but she’s also scared. Well,scaredis perhaps too strong a word. It’s certainly not the terror I’m used to feeling from humans. But there’s some trepidation in the way she looks at me, along with a kind of hopefulness. Like she’s happy, and she’s worried I’m going to make her not-happy.
I don’t want her to be not-happy.
I nod yes, and Chloe walks around the fire, crossing that boundary I thought of as impassable. Then she sits down on the log I’m using as a chair and offers me the stick.
I pull off the marshmallow and take a bite. Suddenly, I understand why Oliver reacted the way he did.
“It’s good,” I sign, my fingers flashing in the firelight. “Very well toasted.” I don’t know what else to say.
