Damage (16 page)

“Jesse, Rachel’s in the car!” I shout as she lunges for me. She lifts the crowbar in her hand and brings it down inches from my head. I fall to the side, hand instinctively reaching for the door handle. I have to get out. I have to run, to—

Another blow hits the windshield and the air at my neck is suddenly hot enough to make my skin pucker and sting. I can’t go out. I can’t stay in. I’m trapped, and Jesse and I are as good as dead.

Rachel swipes at me again. I jerk away, hitting the back of my skull on the rearview mirror as the iron sweeps past inches from my face. It slams into the passenger’s side window, shattering the glass, giving the dragon a place to reach its claws inside.

I feel the cold air rush in and freeze, watching Rachel recover from the impact in slow motion, seeing her glossy hair spin as she turns back to me. If she doesn’t get me, something else will, something that makes the car bounce as it jumps off the hood.

Bounce. Bounce.
Grrr.

The engine shudders to life just as Rachel lifts the crowbar over her head. Jesse hits the gas and the car leaps forward, throwing her off balance. She tumbles into the tattered seats behind her as I fall into the passenger’s side. I catch myself on the headrest, fisting one hand around the rod that leads down into the seat and bracing myself for a fight.

Jesse and I aren’t going to die. I’m not going to give up, and running away isn’t an option. It’s time to fight back. Long
past
time.

Clinging to the seat, I dive into the back and grab for the tire iron in Rachel’s hand. My fingers curl around the metal just inches above her tiny fist. For a second, we both hold tight. I stare down at her, shocked by how much bigger my fist is than hers. It’s at least two times the size, maybe more, with strong muscles that stand out on the top and not a scrap of baby fat pudging my fingers. I might not be stronger, but I’m definitely bigger, more grown up. No matter how vicious she is, Rachel is still just a kid.

And I’ve outgrown her.

“Give that to me,” I say, in my best big-person voice, the one I use when I’m helping Mina babysit and her brothers start climbing the shelves in the pantry. “Give it to me! Right now!”

Rachel’s eyes narrow, her mouth opens in a silent, bloody scream, and then she does the unthinkable. She
lets go
. She gives me the tire iron, crosses her dimpled arms at her chest, and disappears. Poof. There one minute, vanished the next, a drawing on a dry-erase board smeared into nothingness. Not a fleck of color left behind.

I collapse into the front seat, clutching Rachel’s discarded weapon in my hand, slowly becoming aware that the car is moving. Somehow, Jesse is managing to drive at a semi-reasonable speed through the narrow streets of downtown, though he’s staring at me as much as at the road.

“What happened?” he asks, eyes flicking to the rearview mirror.

“She listened. She gave it to me.” My voice sounds hollow, shell-shocked. But what could be more shocking than this? Than discovering that maybe—just maybe—I’ve had the power to stop Rachel all along.

Jesse

We park at the back of the cafeteria, wedging the car in behind some industrial-sized dumpsters and humming machines working overtime to heat the five-hundred-room hospital. Baptist Memorial isn’t the biggest hospital around, but it’s definitely one of the busiest. It’s a teaching school and a research center and there are always people coming and going. The parking lot out front is jammed. It wouldn’t have been easy finding a spot even if I’d tried.

I didn’t bother. It isn’t like I care if this car is towed. Probably better if it is. Then I can blame someone else for the dragon’s damage. Maybe the hospital will even call Fiorelli’s to lug the damn thing away.

Still, I manage to pull in far enough to hide everything but the bumper behind the dumpsters. We might need the car again, though as a getaway vehicle it has the major downside of taking
forever
to turn over.

The closeness of those last few seconds—when Dani was locked in a staring contest with an invisible girl and the dragon’s bloody muzzle was inching in through the broken window—still makes me shiver. I don’t want to tell Dani how close she came to having her throat ripped out. I don’t want to think about it myself. I’ve never been so afraid. Almost getting killed myself is one thing; watching Dani almost get killed is something else.

Something much, much worse.

“I think we should try to find a disguise,” she says as she squeezes out of the car.

We’re so close to the dumpsters on one side, and to a stained concrete wall on the other, that there’s barely room for either of us to open our door. It takes nearly a minute to slip through the narrow opening, shuffle down to the tail end of the car, and step out into the space where giant vents cough smoke into the air. We won’t be getting back in very quickly, either.

I try to tell myself that it’s okay and that the things hunting us won’t be back for a while, but I don’t really believe it. I’m losing what’s left of my hope that we’re going live through this day.

“I’m sure some of the people at the hospital have seen the news report with our pictures. It would be better if no one recognizes us,” Dani continues, following me around the corner toward what looks like a delivery entrance for the cafeteria. It’s deserted at the moment, but a planter sprouting cigarette butts promises that this concrete slab is a popular hangout. We should hurry.

“We’re going to have to talk to someone anyway,” I say. “When we ask for our records.”

Dani hesitates on the last step, close enough to the butt planter that I can smell the tar and nicotine. “Yeah, I was thinking about that. Maybe we shouldn’t ask. Maybe we should just … take them.”

“Okay.” I’m all about
not
interacting with anyone in this place. Just looking at the big red-brick building as we drove through the evergreens and up the tree-smothered drive made me want to smash something. I’ve never felt more small and helpless and out of control than I did in this place. Not even when Mom left Jamie and me. “But how will we know where to—”

“I remember where they keep the charts on the ninth floor,” she says. “But I bet our records won’t be there. They probably store the old records somewhere in the basement or something. But I’m sure they scan them into the hospital database first. I’m pretty good with computers. If I can get to one, I can probably find us.”

“So we need disguises that will get us into a place with computers.”

“Or just get us through the lower floors and up to the ninth floor. I know where everything is there.” She swallows. “Rachel and I used to explore the hospital together, before she … before I knew what she really was.” Her gaze meets mine, questions swimming in her eyes. “Was the dragon ever your friend?”

“Never.”

“Not even in the very beginning?”

I shake my head, fighting the urge to grind my teeth. “No. The first time I saw it, it ripped all the needles out of my arm. It took the nurses forever to stop the bleeding.” I close my eyes and see the nurses’ angry, frustrated faces again. “They thought I did it to myself. They strapped my hands down for the rest of the night. When the Thing came back, I had to fight it with my feet.”

Dani’s hand smoothes my back. “Don’t be afraid,” she whispers. “We’re going to find a way to stop this. I really, really believe that now.”

I nod. I don’t want her to know that I seriously doubt her story about Rachel obeying her command. The little bitch probably just ran out of juice and is off wherever the imaginary enemies go to rest up for their next attack. I wish I could believe with Dani, but fear still tears at my insides like dragon claws. I fought the Thing for years and it never listened when I begged it to stop. It isn’t going to listen now, and it isn’t going to stop until it has what it’s come for.

“Come on. We should get in and get out,” I say. “I’m sure those people are still looking for us, and they might come here. A hospital’s a good place for people who have just lived through a wreck to end up.”

“Right.” She files silently in behind me as I crack the door and step into what looks like a break room. Humming soft drink and chip machines sit against one wall and scarred brown tables and chairs sit at odd angles in each corner. Thankfully, there’s no one around to observe as we hustle across the scuffed tile to the double doors on the other side.

Dani peeks through the door this time, turning to look both ways before whispering, “There are some people working in the kitchen over to the right. But they look like they’re cleaning up. We should be able to get across the room without them noticing. The doors to the cafeteria are almost straight across from here. I didn’t see any uniforms or anything hanging around so I guess—”

“What about stairs?” I lean in, peering through the crack in the door. “If we can avoid the main floor and the elevators I don’t think we’ll need a disguise.”

“What about
that
elevator?” Dani asks, pointing to the dull silver door on our far left. “Do you think it goes to the ninth floor?”

“If it’s for delivering meal trays I bet it does.” I take her hand, and a part of me relaxes for the first time since the latest attack. Touching her is … good. “Let’s go.”

We slip through the door and rush soundlessly to the elevator. Dani walks as fast on tiptoe as I do on flat feet. I bet she’s a hell of a dancer. As I jam the red button by the door and take a quick glance over my shoulder to see if the people in the kitchen have noticed us, I silently promise to do whatever it takes to make sure she keeps dancing. Even if it means splitting up when we leave the hospital.

The Thing is bigger and stronger than ever and it’s breathing fire, for God’s sake. There’s no way I can fight it and win. But if Dani
has
found some way to control Rachel, then maybe … maybe it would be best …

I can’t even finish the thought.

The doors open with a much louder ding than I’d like, but it doesn’t look like the sound carried. The guy mopping the brown stone at the far end of the kitchen doesn’t turn around and the woman with her hand in a vat of coleslaw keeps kneading cabbage and mayo. Dani and I duck inside and around the corner, hiding behind the long panel of numbers. I hit the number nine and the doors rattle closed. In another second we’re moving, gliding up to that little piece of hell I never wanted to set foot in again.

“I’m glad we’re out of there. The smell was making me sick.” Dani sounds about as excited to be returning to the Baptist children’s ward as I am.

“Yeah. The food here was even worse than the stuff I’d burn for me and my sister at home.”

“I can’t even smell broth or Sprite without feeling things jabbing into the top of my hand,” she says. “It always took the nurses forever to find a vein.”

“Not me. I have good veins, I guess.”

Dani pulls her lip in on the right side and bites down. Her thinking face. I’m starting to recognize it. It makes me want to kiss her. I probably already know her better than any of the girls I’ve been with. Dani makes me pay attention, makes me want to collect pieces of her like I used to collect hood ornaments off the cars in the neighborhood when I was twelve.

“You had good veins,” she says.

“Yeah.”

“Did you feel sick before? Before they took you to the hospital and found the cancer?”

I take a second, search my memory. “No. I didn’t feel great. Jamie and I had been living on dry cereal for a while at that point, but I didn’t feel sick until I got here and they started the treatments.”

“And the dragon came after.” The elevator doors ding and we step out into a narrow hallway. A small, brown woman with black-marble eyes stands near the elevator separating the trash and the recycling. She glances up at us for a moment, but looks down almost immediately. She doesn’t seem interested and I’m glad of it. The less attention we attract up here, the better.

I turn back to Dani as we walk, and keep talking. It’s always better to act like you aren’t doing anything wrong. Especially when you are. “The dragon came a few weeks later. After I’d been in the hospital for about a month.”

“After you were feeling bad.”

“Yeah.”

“And the dragon tried to kill you right away.”