“Sorry.” I pushed up on my elbows and gave her a look, one that spoke far more than any words ever could. Realization immediately dawned on herface.
“It’s the asshole,” she said, matter-of-factly. “He finallysnapped.”
I blew out a heavy sigh. “It was like he’d transformed into a beast. He punched a hole in the wall and then threatened to do the same to myface.”
She let out a low whistle. “So youleft.”
“So I left.” I gave her a sad smile. “Though it was my mom’s idea. I saw a flicker of something in her tonight. It gives me hope that maybe she’s finally seeing him for who he really is, but that’s scary in its own way. I don’t want him to hurther.”
“Maybe we should call the police and tell them what’s happened,” Bree said. “They might be able to charge him withsomething.”
I groaned, closed my eyes, and flopped back onto the bed. “Oh, god. The police. For two precious seconds there, I’d forgotten about thepolice.”
“What are you talkingabout?”
With my eyes still shut tight, I said, “It’s a long, long, long story that is going to sound absolutely insane. Like, even more insane than the time I told you that a stranger who cornered me in the bathroom held all the answers to my panicattacks.”
“You mean that time that was lastnight.”
“That’s theone.”
“Alright. Scooch over. Sounds like I’m going to need to be sitting down for thisone.”
With a laugh, I moved over and the two of us packed tight into her bed. It reminded me of when we’d been younger, and Bree would stay over at my apartment every Friday night without fail. We grabbed pizza from the corner shop and settled in for a movie marathon. There’d be talk of boys and crushes, but mostly we liked to talk about our dreams, about where we wanted our lives to take us. Bree had always wanted to leave Manhattan while I’d always wanted to stay. To her, this wasn’t the concrete jungle made of dreams. She’d always thought there was more to the world than this tiny island. Sometimes, I thought she might beright.
So, I told her my story. I started out slow, unsure of myself at first. I was more than a little worried what her reaction might be. I was basically admitting to imagining a beastly monster killing people in alleys. The police thought of me as a suspect. My step-dad (and maybe my mom) thought of me as a suspect,too.
Would Bree think of me that way? I didn’t know what I would do if the only person I had left in the world turned her back onme.
But when I was done telling my crazy tale, she wrapped her arms around me and pulled me close, the scent of lavender and roses swirling aroundus.
“Well, that is one shit-tastic day. I think this calls for a pizza from Tony’s and some Ben & Jerry’s RockyRoad.”
“Wait a minute.” I pulled back to meet her eyes. “You believe me? You don’t think I’m akiller?”
She snorted. “Norah, you’re pretty much the opposite of a killer. Remember that I’ve seen you save spiders from your step-dad. Sneaking them out the window so he doesn’t have the chance to squashthem.”
“Okay, but there’s still the whole wolf monster in an alleything.”
“I’m not going to lie. I have no idea what to think about that.” She plopped back onto the pillows and shrugged. “It doesn’t make much sense. People don’t go around seeing wolf monsters attacking people in alleys. So, honestly? I don’t know what happened there. But what I do know is that you’re not responsible. You saw something and that something killed Lars. Notyou.”
I loosed a breath, and my heart throbbed painfully in my chest. It felt so good to hear her say that, even though I knew I shouldn’t have doubted her. We’d been best friends for so long that I couldn’t remember a time when Bree wasn’t in my life. Her family felt like my family. Sometimes, they felt even more like my family than my own flesh and blooddid.
“Don’t look so worried, Norah.” She gave me a smile. “I’m on your side. Forever and always. You can stay here for as long as you need to. In fact, I insist upon it. I don’t want you going back to that apartment as long as your step-dad is still in it. This is your new home, for as long as you need it tobe.”
And with that, I let out a heavy sigh and did my best to feel relieved. I had somewhere to stay. I had someone who loved me, no matter what kind of crazy things I said I saw. But beneath the tiny taste of relief, something darker lurked. My strange panic attack. The four eerie guys who were following me around, wielding swords. The wolf I’d seen in the alley. All thatblood.
And that strange unsettling sensation that I was being watched. Even rightnow.
* * *
The next day,I showed up to work fifteen minutes early. I was feeling a bit jittery to say the least, and I wasn’t entirely sure that the show would go on, so to speak. No one had called to tell me if the theatre was closed today, so I figured I’d better show up anyway. It was hard to imagine it being opened after what had happened, but I felt like I needed to be there. Just incase.
The lights were off, but I could see Rachel through the glass door. She was scrubbing at the walls so hard that paint flecks were raining down on the floor. I knocked, and she jumped almost ten feet in the air. When she saw it was me, I expected her shoulders to relax. Instead, they tensed up evenmore.
“What are you doing here?” she asked when she opened the door. Now that the light was shining on her face, I couldn’t help but notice the dark circles under her eyes and the frizzy hair that said she hadn’t bothered to go through her regular hair care routine. Rachel used at least five different types of conditioning products in her hair every morning. So, that was sayingsomething.
“I wasn’t sure if we were closedtoday.”
