Sara (17 page)

“Of course I haven't!” Tony laughed mirthlessly. “He'd think I was crazy.”

“And we wouldn't?” Laney looked from Candy to Tony and back again. Candy's face was pale, her mouth open.

“You know I'm right,” he insisted. “Don't you?” He closed his eyes. “She's some kind of witch or something, I don't know what.”

“Tony, do you hear yourself?” Laney sat down in a chair and began playing with her hair.
Maybe if I can talk him out of it, I can talk myself out of believing it.
“Okay, suppose you're right, okay? Why would she pick Glenn, Tony? Out of everyone, if she is some kind of witch, or whatever, why did she pick Glenn? Or our school? Us? I mean, if I was a witch I could think of a better place to put myself than Southern Heights High, out in the middle of Nowhere, Kansas. There's a great big world out there. Why us? Why Glenn?”

“I don't know.” Tony scratched his forehead. “That's the one thing I can't figure out.”

“Have the two of you completely lost your minds?” Candy finally exploded. “What is wrong with the two of you? You're saying that a girl we go to school with is some kind of…of…
demon
.” She walked over to where Laney was sitting.

“What other explanation is there for everything that's happening?” Tony asked quietly.

“I don't know!” Candy spun around, her red hair flying. “But there has to be. There's no such thing as witches. You know that!”

“I don't want to believe it,” Laney replied. She laughed. “Trust me.”

Candy started crying. “I hate all of this! Why can't we just forget about Glenn and Sara?”

“Because of the dreams.” Laney stood up, and walked back to the window. She took a deep breath, and took the plunge. “The one thing that I can't explain is the dreams, Candy. What about the dreams? Tony and I have both had them.”

“You've had them, too, haven't you, Candy?” Tony said, taking her hand.

“I don't know what you're talking about!”

“Candy?”

“Yes,” Candy said so softly that they almost didn't hear her. “Yes, I have.”

Once Candy started talking, the words came pouring out in a torrent. Tony and Laney let her talk, interrupting only occasionally.

“The dreams started on the first day of school,” Candy said, the tears rolling down her cheeks. “I dreamed that night that I was going to school, and everybody was out in the parking lot, laughing and talking and joking around. Everyone was there. And then this big cloud seemed to cover the sun, and it got cold, and everyone began looking up at the cloud, waiting for it to pass, but it just kept getting bigger and bigger and darker and darker, as though it was moving down through the air toward us, like a big dark fog. And it was evil. I could sense it, that it hated us and wanted to hurt us all, every one of us, and people began to get scared, and then it was on us, all around us, so dark and thick that I couldn't see anyone, and it was so cold, and from all around me I could hear people screaming, and then I heard this laughter, and it was horrible, it was so horrible, and I knew that everyone was dying. And then I woke up.”

“Jesus,” Tony breathed.

Candy took a deep breath. “The next night I dreamed I was asleep in my bed. It was so real, that was the thing about all these dreams—they were all so real, like it was really happening. Something woke me up, and I got up out of the bed. There was something scratching at the screen of my window, but there was no moon, and I couldn't see what was out there, so I tried turning on my bedside light, but the lightbulb was blown or something, so it wouldn't come on. Then I heard the sound again, so I wanted to see what it was. The scratching seemed so sad and pathetic, like something was lost and trying to find its way home. I felt sorry for it, whatever it was. It never occurred to me that it might be something bad. I just knew I had to help it, so I went over to the window to see what I could do. When I got to the screen and looked out, I could make out this shape on the lawn, a few feet away from my window. It was shimmering and moving, but it was a dark shape, and I could see the movement, but I still couldn't see what it was. It seemed so, so, sad, I guess. And then it said my name, in a low gravelly sort of voice.

“‘Who are you' I called out to it. ‘What do you want?'

“‘Help me.' I thought I recognized the voice, but I couldn't place it.

“I asked again who it was, and then I heard that same laughter, that same horrible laughter that I had heard in my dream the night before, and then it was gone.” She swallowed. “Does this sound as crazy to you two as it does to me? But after that I didn't dream for a couple days. I almost forgot about the dream until the night of the first game, when I met Sara for the first time.” She inhaled again. “I met her after the game. My mother had told me all about it, and said that Sara would be at the game, and would introduce herself to me, and would I take her to Vista and introduce her around, blah blah blah. I said sure. But I waited all night during the game for someone to come up to me, and no one ever did. I figured she chickened out or she was too scared or shy to introduce herself. But after the game was over and the guys were heading for the locker room, I saw this beautiful girl standing there, watching the guys leave the field. She turned and she looked at me, like I wasn't really there, and then she smiled at me, and when she smiled I didn't think she was so beautiful anymore. It wasn't a very nice smile.

“‘Candy,' she said, and walked toward me. I was terrified! There was something about her, something that was not quite right, you know what I mean? Like, oh, I don't know. ‘I'm Sara Sterling.'

“‘Nice to meet you,' I said, and shook her hand. It was cold as the grave. And we talked for a little while, and she kept asking about Glenn, and you, Tony, and Noah, and Randy, like she was drilling me for answers, like I was taking a test on everyone or something. All the way to Vista, all she did was ask questions. Then we got to Vista, and then we met you and Glenn there, Tony.

“I dreamed again that night. This time it was about Noah. He was on the bed of his truck, naked, having sex with someone. I think, even in the dream I was a little embarrassed about it. Then I heard the laughter again, and then I could see that the girl was Sara! And she had a knife, and started stabbing him in the back, and the blood was flying all over the place. And she was laughing.” She shuddered. “And then she pushed the body off her and started laughing again as she stood there, naked, all covered in his blood. ‘You're dead, Noah.' She started looking around, as though she knew that I could see her. And I wanted to run, to hide, I didn't want her to see me, because I knew that if she did, she would kill me, too. And then the next night Noah was dead.”

“But that was an accident,” Laney said softly.

“Do you really think so?” Candy looked at her, and her voice and face were tired. “I don't know what to believe anymore.”

“Did you dream about Zack, too?” Tony took a drink from his Coke. His hand was shaking.

“Yes.” Candy shuddered, and tears began falling out of her eyes again, but that was her only outward show of emotion. “I dreamed about Zack the night he died. I was in the bathroom, looking out through the closet door. Zack was in the bed, naked, and he was with Sara, too. I could see that hair of hers. No one else on earth has hair like that. They were laughing, and he had bandages on his nose, and moaning, and making all sorts of noise—it was horrible. Why was I having these pornographic dreams? And then she got out of the bed, and she told him to get on his stomach, and she pulled out a rope and slipped it around his neck and began choking him, and he was trying to call out, and get her off him, but she kept pulling tighter and tighter on the rope, and then I heard this horrible cracking sound that somehow I knew was his neck breaking, and then she made the rope into a noose and threw it over one of the beams and pulled his body up, and she was laughing. Then she stopped, as though she knew that someone was watching her, and she started looking around, and she had that horrible smile on her face that I knew from when I met her, and it turned my blood to ice, and then I woke up.” She smiled weakly. “And that's the story of Candy's crazy dreams.”

“My God.” Laney's face was white. “Your dreams are as bad as mine.”

“I think,” Tony put his glass down, “that it's time we told each other about our dreams.”

*

“Oh my God.” Candy looked back and forth between the two of them. “What is going on around here?”

“I don't know.” Tony scratched his head, grimacing as he lifted his arm. “But I think we need to find out, and before anyone else gets hurt.”

“Everything that has happened revolves around Sara,” Laney said.

“No, Laney, everything that has happened revolves around Glenn.” Tony rubbed his eyes. “Glenn hated Noah, and Noah died. Glenn and Zack had a fight, Glenn broke his nose, and that night Zack died.”

“But you didn't make him mad in any way, did you?” Candy stood up and walked over to his bed. “You're his best friend.”

“It's me,” Laney said suddenly. “It's because of me that you were hurt. Glenn has always known that we saw each other for a while, and this was a kind of warning to you. Noah dated me, and Zack and Glenn fought because of me.”

“The person Glenn was mad at the day of the accident wasn't me, it was Randy Froelich.” Tony shook his head. “What happened to me doesn't make any sense.”

“Stop trying to make sense out of this!” Candy exploded. “There is no sense to any of this! We've all had some bad dreams, and some people have died, and Glenn wouldn't hurt anybody!”

“Don't you think it is strange that the two people who died were people Glenn was pissed off at?” Laney said again. “It seems like a bit much of a coincidence to me.”

“So you think Glenn killed them?”

“No,” Laney said slowly. “I think Sara killed them
for
Glenn.”

I opened my eyes.

The girls had stayed for another hour or so, leaving when I'd gotten groggy. I'd turned the TV to the Notre Dame–Michigan game as soon as they left, and must have dozed off almost immediately. It was getting dark outside, and
Wheel of Fortune
was on. I picked up the remote and switched it over to ESPN, where USC was playing Fresno State—and beating them pretty badly.

I pushed the button to raise my bed so I could look more directly at the TV without having to strain my neck. I let my head fall back against my pillow and closed my eyes again, replaying the girls' visit over again in my head.

Without the two of them there with me, the whole thing seemed crazy, like somehow we'd lost our minds.

I swallowed and my stomach growled. I called the nurse's station. According to the clock on the nightstand, it was almost seven o'clock. “Did I miss dinner?” I asked the nurse who answered the phone.

“You were asleep,” she replied. “I'll call down and get something sent up for you.”

“Thanks.” I put the phone down. I should have asked the girls to bring me something from Vista or McDonald's. I was really getting sick of hospital food, which always seemed lukewarm and tasteless. I refilled my plastic cup from the pitcher of ice water—most of the ice had melted—and took a sip.

Had we really sat around and seriously discussed the possibility that Glenn—or Sara Sterling—was killing our classmates?

It seemed absurd, like an old episode of
Buffy the Vampire Slayer—
and not one of the better ones, either.

But the death rate at Southern Heights High School
had
gone way up in the last week.

“And your accident,” Laney had pointed out with a grim look on her face, “could just as easily have been attempted murder.”

“Glenn would never try to hurt Tony,” Candy had replied sharply. “And I don't believe for a minute that Glenn would ever do anything to hurt anyone. Not the Glenn I know.” She made a face. “You of all people should know better than that, Laney.” She folded her arms.

“Who else would want to hurt both Zack and Noah?” Laney replied, a stubborn look on her face.

“We don't even know that either one of them was murdered,” I replied. “All we're going on is these dreams we're all having.”

“That can actually be explained away, too,” Candy went on. “It's called mass hypnosis or something. I saw some show about it the other day.” She looked from me to Candy and back again. “What you two are suggesting?” She shook her head. “There's no such things as ghosts, or whatever it is you think is going on.” She got up from her chair and walked over to the window, looking out into the parking lot. “Noah was killed in a car accident—there's nothing weird about that. And Zack killed himself.” She hugged herself. “How could anyone have caused that to happen?”

Neither one of us had a response to that, but I just had this
feeling.

The girls didn't stay much longer after that, and Laney didn't really say much of anything else. She had a look on her face I'd never seen before—she seemed distracted, lost in thought. But when I started yawning, they both left, Candy promising to come by after church the next day. Once the door shut behind them I turned off the light and took a nap.