“What are you two doing?” her mom said. Her arms remained folded. She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, eyeing them both. “Somebody better tell me what’s going on out here.”
Isobel’s numb gawk shifted away from her brother, to her mother, and back to her brother.
“It’s all good, Mom,” Danny assured her as he drew the huge trash can to sit right next to the mailbox, grunting and puffing. He patted the lid. “Just taking out the trash. Thought we’d do it before dinner so we wouldn’t have to in the morning.” He beamed.
“Isobel?” Her mom’s voice sounded as though it were coming from inside a bottle.
Isobel tried to work her mouth, feeling like a fish that had flopped out of its tank.
“She’s helping me,” Danny answered for her.
Isobel found it easier to nod than to talk.
“And,” Danny continued, “that stupid raccoon came back again. Damn raccoon! ” he shouted, his voice echoing through the neighborhood.
“Danny!”
“Sorry, Mom. Darn raccoon!” he yelled.
“Both of you,” her mom snapped, “get in here. Right now. You can finish taking out the trash after dinner, Danny. Not you, Isobel. You look like death warmed over. Get inside before you get sick.”
When their mother turned away to open the screen door for them, Isobel felt Danny’s elbow shoot into her side, causing her to jump with a residual jolt of adrenaline. Where the hell were you? he mouthed. But he didn’t wait for an answer. Instead he scowled and, shaking his head, hustled into the house and past their mom. Isobel drifted toward the open door and her worried mother. She wiped her nose on her sleeve again, sniffing.
“I hope you two weren’t out here fighting,” her mom said, leaning down to brush the chalky dirt from the knees of Isobel’s jeans. “You’re both getting too old for that. You especially, Isobel.”
Stepping in, Isobel glanced over her shoulder and into the darkness one last time.
Perched in the branches of Mrs. Finley’s oak, she noticed a single black bird, swiveling its head around. Its gaze seemed to stop on her.
They had turkey and mashed potatoes for dinner, but Isobel hadn’t been able to force down more than a few bites. Between her dad repeatedly asking her if she felt all right and her mom reaching over every three seconds to feel her forehead, Isobel couldn’t concentrate on her food anyway. Eventually she excused herself and went to take a shower.
There was something about warm water and being alone that made it easier to think.
Isobel could feel the tension slide off her shoulders and swirl down the drain with the grime and the sweat. Her muscles relaxed, and closed up in the small warm space, she felt safe.
Shutting the water off and stepping out of the shower, she wrapped her hair in a towel and pulled on the fluffy pink robe her mom had given her last Christmas.
She guessed she had Danny to thank for not getting in trouble. The raccoon story had been pretty swift, since something had been coming around and knocking over the trash cans at night. Of course, she knew the reason he’d come to her rescue had nothing to do with any brotherly sense of duty, but because of the pact they’d made. If she didn’t get a car in the spring, then he didn’t get a chauffeur.
Isobel gathered up her dirty, sweat-stained clothes. She left the steamy, warm bathroom, huddling into her robe as she passed through the frigid hallway and made the ten-foot trek to her room. She shut her bedroom door behind her and, looking around, noticed that Danny hadn’t bothered to close the curtains like she’d told him to do after she’d left. With a grunt, she dropped her clothes in her hamper and went to draw the shade down. She stopped, peering into the night. That bird. It was still there, still sitting on the same branch of the knot-limbed oak across the street. It seemed to be staring right at her.
Isobel pulled her shade and yanked the lace curtains closed.
Sitting on the edge of her bed, she unwrapped her hair from the towel-turban and patted it to soak up the extra moisture. She set the towel aside and reached for the metallic green hair dryer on her nightstand (which she seldom unplugged or put away) and flicked it on to the lowest setting. She turned her head to one side, idly waving the blow dryer back and forth through her hair. With her free hand, she picked up her cell from the bedside table where she’d left it to charge. She flipped it open and checked for missed calls. None. She checked for texts. Again, none.
She sighed. All things considered, it didn’t surprise her.
She stared at the wall, and her eyes went unfocused. The warm air felt good against her scalp, and combined with the low drone, it began to make her drowsy. She wouldn’t have guessed she’d be able to sleep tonight, but now that she was home, surrounded by normalcy, the memory of her terror began to subside, as though it had been something that had happened a month ago, and not an hour.
Like she’d done a dozen times already, she replayed the run in her head. If she hadn’t been so scared, so completely out of it, she might have seen who it was. But she hadn’t wanted to stop long enough to wait for someone to appear. While the thought had made sense outside, when she’d been swinging a stick at nothing, she now tried to come to terms with the idea that she’d been chased by someone who knew her. And if that was the case, then more than anything, it had probably all been just a sick joke, right?
She frowned, knowing that it didn’t make much sense. In fact, nothing about it made sense. It didn’t seem likely that Brad or any of the others would do something like that. She couldn’t picture it. Besides, Brad would have to have followed her to the bookstore, then waited for her outside. And while she could picture him spying, something about the idea of him chasing her through the park at dusk just didn’t add up. He was too straightforward for that. Not to mention too proud.
No, even if he had been anywhere around, even if he’d been spying, she thought she knew him well enough to say that he would never try to scare her so badly. In fact, even if he had followed her, breakup or not, she knew he wouldn’t have let her go into the park by herself to begin with. It had been a stupid move—she knew that now. He was always getting after her for doing stupid, impulsive things.
Isobel bit her lip. Her hand tightened on her phone as she battled the sudden wave of longing to dial Brad’s number. She wanted to call him, to tell him what had happened.
But she knew what he would say. First, he’d be smug because she’d called him, because she’d caved after only a day. Then he’d ask all sorts of reasonable-sounding questions. Then, finally, he’d say it was Varen and go into an all-out “I told you so” blowup. And then . . . then what? Do more of what he had already shown himself capable of?
Isobel scowled at the thought. There was something about the memory of Brad slamming Varen around that made her whole body wince, like someone breaking a Ming vase just to prove that they could.
Then again, she thought, pausing—what about Varen?
Could he have followed right behind her after she’d left the bookstore? It would have been easy to do. But why would he? To play a joke on her? Prove some morbid point? She had heard voices upstairs after going back to get the Poe book. Was it something he’d planned? Revenge for the ice cream shop? With some of the dark stuff he said sometimes, she didn’t know if she would put it past him.
Over the whir of the hair dryer, she thought she heard a quiet tap, a knock on her door.
Isobel shut off the hair dryer. Glancing at her door, she gathered her still damp hair in one hand and said, “Come in.”
Her door remained shut. She stared at it, waiting. “Mom?” she said. “Dad?”