Return to the Dark House (15 page)

I text Candy next, knowing she has the day off: “Cover for me if Apple calls. I’m at your place today, and btw I stayed there last night too. I’ll explain later. Big thanks.
XOXO.” I power my phone down to conserve the battery, pull out my notebook, and flip open to the page with the instructions.

Route 87 is a two-lane highway that goes on forever. There aren’t many people out this way. Maybe it’s because it’s still early. More likely it’s
because there isn’t anything out here. He’s sending me someplace desolate.

The early morning frost covers the road, making the pavement glisten. I peek in the rearview mirror a couple of times, feeling like I’m being followed, but the only cars on the road with
me are so far back. Am I driving too fast? I look around for a speed limit sign. Sixty-five. My speedometer says eighty. I need to slow down.

More than two hours later and I finally reach exit 4. I take it and go right on Chelsea Avenue, spotting the chocolate factory immediately—a wide abandoned brick building with a crooked
sign over the front entrance that reads C
HALMERS
C
HOCOLATE
, in what once must’ve been pretty red cursive. There’s tagging along the side,
and most of the windows have been boarded up.

I pull into the back lot and park, as instructed, behind the building. Aside from a tiny food market, a gas station/hotdog stand, and a drugstore that advertises check-cashing and lottery
tickets, the area looks vacant.

The bus stop is across the street, just like he said. I peer down the road, able to see a bus in the distance, getting closer. I squint hard, trying to see what bus it is. As if by fate—my
coming here, my doing this—the number 452 comes into view.

I stuff the knife inside my bag, grab my cell phone, and hurry across the street, knowing that I’m much more vulnerable on foot.

The bus doors open with a thwack and I step inside. There are only two other riders, neither of whom makes eye contact. I tell the driver that I’ll be getting off at the Lancaster stop,
hoping that he remembers my face.

I take a seat toward the front, reminding myself that it isn’t too late. I can still call the police. Maybe they can hatch a plan; some undercover person who looks like me could go through
the motions of getting to this very place. But then what if the clues end up being dead ends, once again? Would I get another chance?

I close my eyes, able to hear Detective Thomas’s words darting across my brain, constricting the air in my lungs:
“You’re, what…three weeks out of a mental hospital?
How many times have you called and/or come to see me since then? Fourteen times in five weeks.”

Nearly ninety minutes later, after passing through miles of farm and conservation land, we reach Lancaster Road. I gaze out the window. There’s nothing here.

“Are you sure this is where you want to go?” the driver asks.

“I’m sure,” I say, able to feel the words in my chest—a sharp, jabbing pain.

I exit the bus. The doors fold shut. The air is cold. My breath is visible. The bus drives away, leaving me completely alone. I pull my phone out of my bag and power it back on. I have a bunch
of missed calls from Taylor, not to mention twenty-two percent of my charge left—still plenty of juice to make a call. I look all around, feeling as if I’m being watched. The road is
narrow. Woods border it on one side. On the other side is a grass field, just like the killer said.

Keeping the phone gripped in my hand, I begin across the field, headed for a rock wall, wondering what this area used to be. There’s a dilapidated farmhouse that borders the field; its
windows have all been boarded up. An old, rusted tractor, missing all of its tires, is parked in the driveway. There’s also a windmill in the distance and an old barn.

Finally I get to the rock wall, but there’s another field on the other side of it. I recheck the instructions; there’s no mention of two fields, but still I begin across it. After
about twenty more minutes of walking, I’m finally able to see it.

A lake.

A dock.

A small boat.

I check my phone again. I have twenty percent of charge left, but no bars. There’s no reception. Should I turn back around? My brain tells me yes, but I move to the boat anyway and sit
down inside it.

Using the tip of my knife, I scratch my initials into the wood as evidence that I was here. I should’ve done the same at the bus stop, should’ve left something behind on the
bus…a bracelet, a lip balm.

The wooded land that surrounds the lake is thick and vast. I undock the boat, grab the oar, and start to paddle out, searching for a tree with a yellow scarf, keeping my focus on a grouping of
trees directly across from the dock.

At last, I spot it. A long yellow scarf tied to a low branch. It flaps in the breeze, as if waving me over.

My shoulder aches as I paddle through the water at full speed. The front of the boat smacks into the land, propelling me forward.

I get out, tie the boat to a stump, and move toward the tree, searching for a clue.

The scarf continues to waver. There doesn’t appear to be anything tied to it or written on the underside. I untie it from the branch, suspecting there might be a note hidden beneath the
knot.

But there isn’t. The scarf is clean.

I look down, between my feet. The ground’s uneven. The dirt’s been overturned. There must be something buried.

I crouch down and begin to dig, using a pointed rock. The dirt comes up easily. The muscles in my forearms throb from working furiously.

At last I find something.

The rock makes a clank sound.

There’s a hard metal surface.

I continue to dig, lifting a box out of the ground. It’s about the size of a carton of eggs, about the weight of one too. I jiggle it back and forth, able to hear the slight shifting of
something inside.

My pulse races as I go to open the box, fumbling with the latch. I lift the lid; the hinges squeak.

There’s an envelope inside. My name is scribbled across the front. I pick it up, noticing more envelopes beneath it—a whole stack of them—all with my name, all sealed, and all
with the same handwriting across the fronts: block letters, slightly slanted.

I tear the top one open and pull out a sheet of paper. At first I assume that it’s going to be further instructions.

But it’s not.

It’s a letter.

To me.

I reread the letter, my heart pounding, my body quaking. This seriously can’t be real. It must be part of a setup.

“Ivy?” a voice calls from behind me.

I turn to look, startled to find Taylor.

Still wearing her sweats from last night, she has a confused expression on her face. “What are you…?” Her voice trails off. “You just left. Again.” She stops from
speaking to study my face.

I open my mouth, wanting to answer, desperate to ask my own questions too: What is she doing here? How did she find me? Did she get instructions from the killer as well? But instead of saying
anything, I remain silent, the words stuck in my throat.

Taylor’s eyes move to the metal box, and then to the hole I dug, and finally to the letter in my hand. And that’s when something in her brain clicks. Her eyes soften. The muscles in
her mouth loosen.

She gets it—maybe not the “
it
.” But she gets that something big has happened. And that’s obviously “it” enough.

She comes and wraps her arms around me without another word. Meanwhile, I’m crying so hard now—and not just because of the letter, but also because of her kindness—that I have
virtually no words left.

From the Journal of E.W.

Grade 7, August Preparatory School

I
VY
’
S FACE IS FLUSHED
. Her body’s shaking. There’s a tear-soaked letter clenched in
her hand. I pry it free, more than curious to know what prompted such a reaction.

The letter’s from Parker—
major
reactor. “Do you think it’s real?” I ask, ever the pessimist.

“How did you find me?” she asks, in lieu of an answer.

“Easy. You woke me up. I followed you here.”

“
What?
” She looks confused, like I’m speaking in special code.

“Okay, so maybe it wasn’t
that
easy, now that I think about it. By the time I got out to the parking lot, you were already pulling away. Normally I’d have just turned
around and gone back inside, but let’s face it: you were acting like an escaped mental patient last night—and not in a cute come-eat-Checkers-with-me sort of way; more like in an
I’ve-got-a-fresh-pack-of-razor-blades-at-the-ready kind of way. Bottom line: I couldn’t
not
follow you. You’re just lucky that I happened to have a full tank of
gas.”

“You followed the bus too?”

“I followed the bus, I followed your car.”

“But you didn’t try to stop me?”

“Believe me, it wasn’t for lack of trying. First of all, I called you, like, a bagillion times, but it kept going straight to voicemail. And then you were driving so fast that I
nearly lost you twice. And PS, you ignored my honking. By the time I pulled into Chalmers, you were already boarding the bus, and I was sixty minutes over trying to snag your attention. My
curiosity was way too piqued at that point to interrupt you on your mysterious mission. I was determined to see just
where
you were headed and why. I totally thought I was bagged once you
got off the bus, but I was able to pull in behind an old boarded-up barn. It was kind of exciting, actually. I felt like Veronica Mars.”

“Did you cross the fields?”

“Well, um, yeah.” I feel my eyes grow big. “I’m
here
, aren’t I? Of course, I didn’t go on foot. While you opted to walk, I drove—at least as far
as I could, that is. I ended up taking a road that wrapped around the side of the field, keeping my eye on you the whole time, Ms. I’m So Hyper-focused That I Don’t Even Notice When
People Are Following Me. Not exactly the best quality for someone who claims to have killers after her, FYI. Anyhoo”—I pause for a breath—“I parked my car somewhere around
that rock wall. I was almost tempted to try phoning you then, but I left my cell in my car and didn’t want to risk losing you by going back to get it.”