Sing Sweet Nightingale (26 page)

I have Horace call me in late and slip into second hour with a pass. K.T.’s shoulders drop when she sees me. Mariella looks confused.

“Where did you go?” she signs. With her left hand. Her right is tucked away.

“Running,” I sign back. The teacher already glared at me when I came in late. Talking in the back of the class will probably make him want to kick me out of the room.

Her head tilts, and she stares at me. After a few seconds, she fingerspells, “Running?”

“Yes. R-U-N-N-I-N-G.” I fingerspell it back and emphasize each letter.

“Okay.” She signs it, but she keeps watching me as though trying to figure out where I
actually
went. As long as she keeps that hand out of sight, she can stare all she wants. It’s hard enough to keep my calm without looking at the reason I lost it in the first place.

At lunch, we have to try to teach Mariella about her own life. As much as we can. If he’s willing to hurt her like that, we don’t have a lot of time left.

“Are you sure about this?” K.T. whispers as we guide Mariella through the lunch line. “He keeps wiping her mind. If we push him too far, she might not wake up tomorrow.”

“If we don’t do anything, he wins anyway.” I wish I had something more comforting to tell her. “We’ve got nine days. What else are we supposed to do?”

K.T. takes a deep breath and glances at Mariella. “Pray?”

“Yeah, okay.” I pay and grab the tray of food for Mariella and me. “Do that and let me know how it works out.”

We don’t get a chance to talk to Mari. We don’t get a chance to
try
. As soon as we open the scrapbook and step within three feet of her, the light around her flashes, a pulse so bright that the entire world is tinted orange to my eyes. The air is so cold I could convince myself I’m standing next to a glacier.

When it all clears, Mariella is swaying on her feet and looking around like she’s trying to remember what she came into the room for.

“Did her necklace…light up?” K.T. asks.

“You saw that?” I want to look down at her, but taking my eyes off Mari might be a bad idea. Same goes for getting any closer to her right now. Despite the stones in my backpack, touching that light is asking for trouble. I’m not scared—much—but I’m not stupid either.

“It was only for a second, but I swear I saw it glow orange.” K.T. closes the scrapbook and steps closer to Mariella, progressing slowly.

“Yeah. A reminder from her friend that he can get to her when she’s not sleeping.”

I put a hand on K.T.’s arm to slow her down. Probably better if Mariella sees us before we pop up in front of her. And I want time to run in case her demon reaches through again.

Mariella’s eyes meet mine, and she flinches. Yep. She’s forgotten who I am.

I should be getting used to it by now, but it was like the first flinch shoved a pike through my chest and every flinch afterward has driven it deeper. It shouldn’t bother me—I know it’s not her fault—but I don’t want to be forgettable. Not to her.

“Introductions?” I mutter to K.T. as we approach.

She shakes her head at me and smiles. “We can sit here if you want.” K.T. says it like she’s continuing a conversation. “It’s a little closer to the center than you usually pick, Mari, but that’s okay.”

For a second, Mariella hesitates and looks like she’s about to bolt.

“Time to ice your hand again,” K.T. says. Mari freezes, not coming any closer but not disappearing either. “Don’t want it swelling more.”

After setting down her tray, K.T. lifts the bag of ice she talked out of the kitchen staff. Smiling, K.T. pats Mari’s right elbow.

Her eyes wide and uncertain, Mariella lets K.T. guide her into the seat and gently place the bag of ice on her hand. On top of the glove. I can’t see it, but I have no problem remembering what the injury looks like. My heart is ten times heavier than usual, and I grip my tray so hard I hear the plastic crack.

“Here, Mari.” I set the tray down between us and turn it to the side so the sandwich she picked out is closer to her. “Chicken salad sandwich, right?”

She stares at me before she nods and picks the sandwich up with her left hand.

“My name is Hudson.” I sign to her while I talk to remind her that I can. Her eyes bug out of her head. “In case you forgot.”

“I didn’t forget,” she signs as soon as she drops the sandwich to the tray. “I know.”

The blush on her cheeks calls her a liar.

I point at K.T. and introduce her, too. I’m getting tired of doing this. Gotta hand it to K.T. for being willing to go through introductions after years of being forgotten. Each time, it grates on my nerves. I usually don’t mind it when people wipe me out of their heads—it’s happened to me more than once. But with Mariella? It bugs the goddamn hell out of me.

Mari’s twitchy, but she manages to choke down half of her sandwich before she drops the rest to the tray and signs, “Excuse me. Restroom.”

Climbing off the bench—and taking the bag of ice with her—she heads toward a set of doors. The wrong set of doors. Those lead out to the track. The ones to the rest of the school and the bathrooms are on the other side of the room.

“Mari?”

She turns. I keep my eyes locked with hers as I sign, “wrong way,” and point to the other doors. Better to sign than say it and embarrass her.

Mari closes her eyes and turns, striding out of the cafeteria and toward the bathrooms.

As soon as she’s gone, K.T. runs her hands over her hair and sighs. “She’s getting worse.”

“And we’re running out of time.”

K.T. bites her lip. “Look, I think we have to strike before he can,” she whispers, leaning closer so her voice won’t carry to the rest of the table.

“Meaning…?” She might be on the same train as me, but I need to make sure.

“It’s like he knows what’s going on here, right? Her… whatever?”

She glances around the table, and I know she has trouble saying “demon” where it might be overheard. I nod when she looks at me. He knew exactly when we were about to approach. How is he watching her that closely?

One of my broken memories surfaces, the ones that come with a whiff of honey.

The pendant she’s wearing is the final gift before the victim’s eighteenth birthday. The last days are so crucial to the process that the demons always worry something will go wrong. They start spying on your waking moments as well as your sleeping ones, monitoring your conversations and your actions to make sure you don’t come within a mile of breaking whatever promises you made. The pendant is a convenient place for a bug. A spy.

“Her nightingale necklace,” I mutter. “He can hear and see everything happening around her when she has that damn thing on.”

“What are you guys talking about?” a girl sitting nearby asks, her eyebrows pulling together.

My mind blanks, and my tongue locks to the roof of my mouth. K.T. doesn’t even blink when she looks at the girl and says, “Developmental neurology, cognitive disorders, and the rise of mental instability in children.”

“Oh.” She doesn’t look any less confused. “Sure. Okay.”

She turns away, and I raise my eyebrows at K.T. “Do you know what that means?”

“Yes. Guarantee she doesn’t, though.”

K.T. picks up her tray and stands. Just as Danny, her
not
-boyfriend, steps up behind her.

She doesn’t see him, I don’t warn her soon enough, and he can’t get out of the way. When she bumps into him, her drink tips off the tray. I grab the scrapbook off the table before it gets covered in soda. The impact knocks her backpack off her shoulder. Danny catches it before it hits the floor, but not before the strap hits the crook of her arm and makes her drop her tray.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” Her face is red, and her jeans are splashed with catsup and soda.

“Oh, shit. K, I’m so sorry!”

Danny’s face is as red as his hair as he grabs napkins off someone else’s tray to give to K.T. Her eyes pop open when the napkins are pressed into her hand, but she sighs and sags back when she sees me holding the scrapbook.

“I was coming over to sit down and suddenly you were getting up and—”

“It’s fine, Danny.” She shrugs. “I was on my way to the bathroom anyway.”

Danny tries to pick up her backpack to hand it to her and almost drops it, his face going from tomato to rice paper in a flash. “Whoa. What do you have in here—rocks?”

“Actually, yes. I’m starting a collection.” She unzips the top and shows him the amethyst geodes and other stones we carefully packed inside yesterday. “Do you mind cleaning this stuff up? I have to go before I get all sticky.”

Without waiting for him to answer, she turns to me. “I’ll bring her back here if I can.”

And then she’s jogging out of the cafeteria, her backpack swinging from one hand.

Danny watches her go until I start to clean up the mess K.T. left behind.

“I got it,” he mutters, his face flushing red again.

I try to help, but he grabs everything up like he doesn’t want me touching it. Backing off, I drum my fingers on the scrapbook, waiting for Mariella to reappear. I never thought I’d wish for co-ed bathrooms, but now they seem like a
really
good idea.

Danny piles the last of the sopping wet napkins onto K.T.’s tray and turns toward the trash. Before he gets more than a step away, he spins around, his blue eyes overly bright. My attention is on the doors K.T. disappeared through, so for a second, I think he’s staring at the girl a couple seats down from me.

“If you hurt her, I’ll make you wish you hadn’t.”

I blink and turn toward him. My eyes are a little wider than usual, and I don’t think he’s really seen them in daylight before. He twitches, his hands shaking so bad one of the pieces of plastic on the tray flutters off the side and onto the floor.

“Who?” I ask, pretending I don’t know what he’s talking about. “Mari?”

“
Who
?” He blinks. Is he that shocked by my eyes that he forgot what he asked, or does he honestly not remember Mariella’s name? “Oh, no. What?”

Jesus. He barely remembers her existence. They’ve probably been in the same school since kindergarten, and he doesn’t remember her. Gripping the scrapbook to keep myself from punching him, I turn my attention toward the door.

“Oh, you mean K.T.?”

“Of course I mean K.” He says it as though there is no one else, no other option anyone could find remotely interesting. I grip the scrapbook tighter. And then realize it’d make a nice, solid projectile.

“Don’t worry, dude. She’s playing matchmaker.”

Mariella walks into the room, K.T. a step behind her, and a little of my tension eases away. Mari’s looking at K.T. as K.T. whispers something into her ear. She smiles a little.

“A tip?” I say as Danny starts to turn. His expression is hesitant and wary, but he stops. “Stop treating K.T. like she’s a toy you’re afraid to lose and you might stand a better chance.”

He stalks off as K.T. and Mari make it back to the table. K.T.’s eyes follow him, but she sits down next to Mari.

“She has a headache,” K.T. says. “But a little more food should help, right?”

“Yep.” I offer Mari the rest of her sandwich—luckily it didn’t get soaked by the soda spill—and Mari’s smile grows.

“Thank you,” she signs.

K.T. and I make small talk for the rest of lunch, but my hand stays locked around the scrapbook. We have to counteract that necklace, or nothing I can say or do will matter.

My phone buzzes, and I take it out to see a missed call from Dawn. Finally, I smile for real. I think Mariella’s crystal collection is going to grow tomorrow.

Twenty-Four

Mariella

Thursday, September 4 – 11:23 AM

I stare at the pages of pictures and fight against the burning in my eyes and the bell-like ringing in my ears. In my hands are pictures of people I don’t recognize and moments I don’t remember. This must be what going mad feels like.

It was horrible to get shoved into a school day unprepared, but being faced with people I don’t remember meeting, a contract I don’t remember signing, and a life I don’t remember living?

Hudson and K.T. crowd in on either side of me, their bodies and three heavy bags holding me in place. Too much has hit me today. I’m an empty shell. I have nothing left.

My
alarm
woke me up. I slept for seven hours, and my eyes want to droop shut. I don’t even remember my time with Orane last night…if I had time with Orane last night.

The tears burning my eyes spill over, running down my cheeks.

Why didn’t he come to get me? Or do I not remember?

Taking a single deep breath is impossible. It’s like something is wrapped around my lungs, keeping them from filling up and clearing the woozy, foggy feeling that’s plagued me since this morning. I bite my lip, and my hands tighten on the scrapbook, the edges digging into my palms. My blurry eyes are locked on a picture of my eight-year-old self on stage dressed as Santa Claus.

I’m missing such a huge chunk of time. More than I realized this morning. An entire
life
. If Mother finds out, she’ll take me back to the neurologists and psychologists and they’ll poke and prod at me like a science experiment and I’ll be—