Hurt: A Novel (Solitary Tales Series)

Read Hurt: A Novel (Solitary Tales Series) Online

Authors: Travis Thrasher

Tags: #Spiritual Warfare, #Suspense, #High school, #supernatural, #Solitary Tales

BOOK: Hurt: A Novel (Solitary Tales Series)
2.47Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub

Contents

Preface

1. Joyful and Lovely

2. Dark Outside

3. Five Months

4. The Only Battle

5. Concrete

6. Figuring It Out

7. Like a Disney Movie

8. Ray of Light

9. M&Ms

10. When You Smile

11. In the End

12. The Joker

13. Vessel

14. Help

15. A Little Guidance

16. Friday Night

17. Someone Else’s Story

18. Ryan Gosling

19. The Wizard of Oz

20. Sap

21. Ridiculous Timing

22. About Time

23. The Movie I’m In

24. The Bridge

25. Some Kind of Hero

26. A Sliver of Sunlight

27. Whole

28. Faith

29. The Ticking Clock

30. A Gift Returned

31. Totally and Completely

32. The Great Below

33. Not So Good

34. Restlessness

35. Freedom

36. Nothing to Fear

37. The Terrible Beauty of Being a Teen

38. Mounds

39. A Sign

40. My Prayer

41. Hurley’s Numbers

42. Lost for the Moment

43. Drum Song

44. Head Over Heels

45. Broken

46. 1820

47. A Light Blue Nightmare

48. Babysitter

49. Solitary for Starters

50. A Smell, a Taste, a Touch

51. Hundred-Year-Old Grandmother

52. Strong

53. Soon, My Friend

54. More to Say

55. Messed Up

56. Help

57. Armor

58. The Conversation

59. Surprises

60. Strength

61. Serious

62. A Mess

63. The Sun and the Rainfall

64. What Comes Around Goes Around

65. A Brief Lull

66. Bummer

67. Action

68. The Balloon

69. Stuck

70. The Memories You Try to Bury

71. Uh Huh

72. Weird and Surprising

73. Prayers

74. Freeze

75. Nowhere Fast

76. Magical

77. Midnight

78. Heading In

79. A Familiar Face

80. Protection

81. Sweet Dreams

82. Monster Story

83. Peace

84. Lovely

85. The Third Passage

86. Driver’s Test

87. Start of the Breakdown

88. The Wheel Goes Round and Round

89. What Is Imagined and What Is Real

90. Question Marks or Bite Marks?

91. A Night of Romance and Mystery

92. Tightening

93. Return of the Beast

94. What’s Your Deal?

95. Sweet Dreams Part 2

96. Something Else for the Scrapbook

97. Getting Out

98. This Jerk

99. No Light, No Light

100. Sæglópur (Do You Understand?)

101. End Theme

102. The Most Beautiful Song on Your Playlist

103. Now We Are Free

104. My Son

105. How You Carry On

106. Tick of the Clock

107. One Final Postcard

108. Going Away for Good

109. Rabbit Hole

110. Something I Should’ve Done

111. Fixed

112. Come Alive

113. Alone

114. Promise (1)

115. Promise (2)

116. The Thinner the Air

117. New Surroundings

118. Facing the Grave

119. The Pretty Picture in Front of You

120. Again

121. The End

122. All the Difference

123. Life and Death

124. Is Your Love Strong Enough?

125. Maker and Judge

126. Coming Out Party

127. Well, It’s About Time

128. The Road Never Traveled

129. Waiting to Exhale

130. True Faith

131. Triumph

132. Asleep

133. Just Like Heaven

134. The Living Proof

135. Crystal Clear

136. Solitary

137. All Flowers in Time

138. Tornado

139. Somebody

AfterWords

Three Recommended Playlists

Behind the Book: Say Anything

Acknowledgments

Extras

For Timothy

Reach out and touch faith.

—“Personal Jesus”
by Depeche Mode

Preface

That’s no ordinary dog.

It looks more like a sickly and bloated leopard. It doesn’t quite have thick fur but does have something shaggy hanging off it, like dried leaves or clumps of mud. It’s snarling and growling.

That’s the same dog that attacked me on the Staunch property that one time.

I stop, unsure what to do. Keep walking and just ignore it? Put Kelsey down and try to fight it with … with a Zippo lighter? I’m all out of supernatural stuff in my pockets.

Why couldn’t I have found a magical dagger or something?

There’s a howling from behind me that sounds like a dying wolf.

No. No, don’t let there be more.

The demon dog starts walking toward me. Its open mouth is dripping gray spit. Its eyes are glowing, a disturbing kind of glow, not a majestic kind. I smell a rotten odor.

I back up. One step. Two.

I have to get to those woods.

The dog is coming faster, and I know I have only seconds.

Suddenly I hear the wild wolf sound again, but this time it’s ahead of me.

Then I see something coming out of the woods, rushing toward the demon dog.

It’s a wolf.

No, it’s not a wolf. It’s
the
wolf, the one I’ve seen before. The gray wolf that I saw at the creek and also near the barn after Jocelyn died.

I hear its teeth ripping something apart and then hear the high-pitched wailing of the dog. It’s awful and makes me close my eyes.

Another wolf comes out of the woods and attacks from the other side. And I realize—not all animals around here are possessed or evil.

Especially not these wolves.

I hear gnawing and biting and growling and wailing, and then it seems like the air around us gets sucked in and the lights go out for the moment and I feel a chilling breeze

death

blow past Kelsey and me and then it’s done.

The dog and the smell are gone.

The wolves are sniffing the ground where it was standing and seem as puzzled as I am about the disappearance.

They turn and face me, and I look at them. I want to say thanks or toss them a hamburger or something. I’m not sure what to do.

The gray wolf bolts into the trees and is followed by the darker one. The path ahead is empty now. Empty and safe.

I just hope that it’s not too late for Kelsey.

1. Joyful and Lovely

The first thing I see when I unlock the front door to the cabin and turn on the light is Lily.

I freeze and clutch Midnight a bit too tight.

Lily is dead. I saw her die with my own eyes. I can still close them and picture her body in the woods after the car she was driving took a sharp turn over a mountainside and ejected her. I still feel fortunate I was wearing a seat belt, but when I think of Lily, that word doesn’t come to mind.

Regret is more like it.

I shut my eyes as I hear Mr. Page’s truck backing out of the driveway and heading back home. I know I’m just seeing things. It’s just the stress of having flown back from Chicago with Kelsey and somehow managing to keep the truth from both her and my father. It’s knowing they’ve taken Mom, of knowing she’s not here, of knowing that I’ll open my eyes and Lily won’t be anywhere—

The golden-haired goddess gives me a flirty smile as she stands.

No.

This is not happening. Not now.

It’s too soon.

I just got back to Solitary. We need a little warm-up, folks.

We can’t get the dead girl waving in the opening scene, can we?

“Welcome home, Chris.”

Something about the way she says my name isn’t quite right.

I stop breathing.

Midnight jumps out of my hands and scampers into my mom’s bedroom. She’s probably going under the bed.

I wonder if she can see what I’m seeing.

Lily flips her long curly hair over her shoulder and grins. “I won’t bite. At least not today.”

I have a weird case of déjà vu as I swallow and then shut the door, knowing this is one of those things. I’m still not sure what to call them. Episodes. Visions. Occurrences.

Somehow I’m the chosen one to see faces of the dead like this.

I’ve already been seeing weird things since leaving Chicago. Perhaps these are all signs that tell me I should’ve stayed there. But I had no choice. I had to come back or Mom would be hurt. Or worse.

“Do you want to play a game, Chris?”

There it is again. The thing with the name.

Did she say Chris or Chrissssssss?

I start to back up.

“You still want me, don’t you, my dear little boy?”

She starts to laugh in a weird way I don’t remember ever hearing.

This is just a dream just a bad spooky thing to start my stay back in Scary I mean Solitary, North Carolina.

As she smiles, I see her face suddenly become hard, as if the makeup has dried up and is starting to crack and flake and fall off.

“It’s time to see behind the mask, Chrissie-pooo,” Lily says.

But of course it’s not Lily and I know this and I’m about to open the front door when the lights go off.

I expect a cold, dead hand to touch me, grab me. But instead I hear the shuffling of footsteps upstairs.

My body is shivering. I can’t tell if it’s from the cold January night or from this cold greeting inside.

Suddenly my stereo is blasting upstairs. No, strike that. Uncle Robert’s stereo is blasting. I recognize the song but can’t really think of the title or the group because I’m about to pass out.

I’ve got to get out of here but I know this is just a dream or a vision and it can’t hurt me. Right?

The droning singer upstairs calls out, and I know this is a message. Perhaps this is something I need to know for the battle ahead. Or for the ongoing war.

The song grows louder with each step I take. The light is on, and I know it wasn’t on when I first stepped into the cabin. When I reach the bedroom, I don’t see Lily or the Lily-thing anywhere. I just see the familiar record player turning and a record sleeve on the bed.

I pick it up and see the image of a stone angel lying on her back with one arm outstretched and her other hand covering her face. Above the image is the song title.

“Love Will Tear Us Apart.”

I know the Joy Division song. There’s nothing joyful or lovely about it or the image.

So I wonder why the ghost of Lily wanted to share this joyous song with me as I scan the room and see the outline underneath the blanket on my bed.

Just get out of here do what Midnight did and scramble for the closest dark corner and hide do it Chris come on!

But as the song continues on, I move toward the head of my narrow bed and then pull back the comforter, squinting because I’m unsure what I’ll see.

I jerk back, and the blanket pulls back with me.

The lifeless figure on the bed is not … it’s not human.

For a minute I just stare, wondering if it’s going to move. I’m shaking. The song ends, but I hear the record continuing to turn and the crackling through the speakers.

I’m standing in my room, staring at a mannequin. But this isn’t just any mannequin.

It’s wearing the same thing that
thing
was just wearing. A shirt and a black jacket and jeans.

And the face and the hair actually resemble Lily.

I take a deep breath and walk over and touch it. It’s hard and cold.

My heart is racing.

I shiver as I take in the blank look staring back at me.

I’m back in good old Solitary, and this is how it begins.

Wonderful.

Other books

Dianthe's Awakening by J.B. Miller
Juggler of Worlds by Larry Niven and Edward M. Lerner
Lake in the Clouds by Sara Donati