Stalking Shadows (Scary Mary) (18 page)

“Mary?”

She jerked out of her reverie. “Yeah, it couldn't hurt.”

Rachel gave her a tiny glare. Obviously, she’d expected a more ringing endorsement.

 "Well, I'll try that. Like you say, it couldn't hurt," Mrs. Nelson said, though her tone was more placating than accepting.

"It will really help. I promise," Rachel said. Mary worried that Mrs. Nelson would begin to doubt Rachel's mental faculties. Nightlights for coma patients. It sounded stupid.

"Well, we should be going. It was good seeing you. I hope Vicky continues to improve," Mary said. She wanted out of that room. It didn't hold anything for her. It was the beginning of all of this, and she wanted to get to the end.

"What's going on? Why are you here, Mary? You need to be catching the Shadowman, dimwit."

Everyone turned to the bed. Vicky's face scrunched up, and her eyelids fluttered open. Her eyes found Mary first, and if her words hadn't clearly indicated she remembered everything from her coma, her eyes said it all. There was a determination to them. A cool regard. It made Mary want to squirm.

"Oh my God, Vicky, my baby!"

Mrs. Nelson flung herself over her daughter and began sobbing.

"Geez, Mom..." Vicky said in embarrassment, but she put her arms around her and hugged her back. Rachel ducked into the hallway and flagged a nurse to alert the doctors that Vicky was awake. Mary was rooted to the floor. Vicky was awake. It was what she'd been striving for, sort of. Vicky was safe.

A doctor came in and went over to the bed. He gently maneuvered Mrs. Nelson out of the way so he could shine a light into Vicky’s eyes and asked her how she felt.

Rachel tugged on Mary's arm for them to go. She numbly turned to the door. "Mary, wait!"

She turned back. Vicky’s eyes jumped from her mom to the doctor. It was clear that what she wanted to say wasn’t meant for their ears. Dropping her head, Mary went to Vicky's bedside.

Almost choking on her words, she said, “Vicky, I’m so happy you woke up. We’ve been so worried.” And then she bent down and gave her a hug.

She couldn’t see the other girl’s face, but she hoped she didn’t look totally shell-shocked. Mary was at least safely pointed at the wall, so she didn’t have to mask her true discomfort with the physical contact. Vicky was as stiff as a board against her. Mary hoped the hug hadn’t slipped her into catatonia.

She gave Vicky a harsh squeeze and hissed into her ear. “What?”

“God, do you have to be touching me?”

She rolled her eyes. “What did you want to say to me?”

“Is it really gone?”

That was the one question Mary hadn’t wanted Vicky to ask, but she deserved some sort of answer. “It isn’t in the hospital anymore. You should be okay, but sleep with a light on just to be safe.”

“Where’d it go?”

Mary was happy to cut the hug off there. She let go and straightened. “Don’t worry. Everything’s okay.” She gave Mrs. Nelson a wan smile and hustled from the room, dragging Rachel, who looked a little green, along with her.

“Mary, wait!” Vicky called. She stopped dead in the doorway again. Was she ever getting free? She turned back. Vicky was looking better moment by moment. Color was coming back into her cheeks. “Thanks,” she said.

She nodded her head. “See you at school.”

“Yeah, see you.”

She walked to the elevator without stopping. Time to leave. Nothing more to do here. She pressed the call button for the elevator and gritted her teeth as Rachel sputtered behind her. “You--you--you hugged the Hickey! I can’t believe it, and I saw it! How could you do that? Are you okay? Do you need some disinfectant?”

The elevator doors opened, and Mary came face-to-face with Cy. Kyle was behind him like an afterthought. Cy’s lips thinned when he saw her.

She didn’t know what to say. Luckily, Rachel did. “Hey guys, guess what!”

Chapter 12

Secrets Come Out

“Vicky's awake? When?” Cy's eyes widened and left hers to look down the hall. His whole body leaned in that direction. Mary took a step back to get out of his way.

"She just woke up. Her mom and a doctor are in there with her," Rachel answered.

"Thanks, see you at school." And with that, Cy brushed past them and went down the hallway. It surprised her how his dismissal didn’t hurt that much. It was no longer like an ice pick to the heart, more of a glancing punch now. Maybe she was getting over him? Kyle hung back. She turned to him. He had his hands in his pockets, and his eyes on the floor. Another feeling came over her. It wasn't a bad feeling. Kind of warm, in fact.

"Hi Kyle," she said.

He looked up at her and then back at the floor.

"Hey. So you two just happened to be there when she woke up?"

"Yeah, we had nothing to do with it."

"We didn't?" Rachel asked.

Mary shook her head. "No, Vicky woke up on her own."

"So are you two going to keep volunteering?"

"I probably won't, but Rachel might."

"Oh come on, it'll be fun," Rachel whined.

She shook her head. "The hospital is still not a great place for me. Especially not the basement."

"The basement? What's in the basement?" Rachel asked.

"The morgue.”

"You got to go to the morgue? When? Where was I?"

"I took a wrong turn. It was a mistake."

The answer didn’t placate her. "Some wrong turn," she muttered.

"If you take the stairs at the end of the hallway all the way down, you might be able to get in through the mechanical room."

Rachel's eyes lit up. "Wanna go try?"

She shuddered and shook her head. "No, I never want to go down there again."

Understanding drifted across her friend’s face. "Right. Well, you wanna hang here while I go try? Please? I promise not to get super mad at you for not telling me all about your trip."

Her mouth quirked into a smile. "Okay."

"But I will expect full details when I get back." Mary nodded. With a quick wave at both of them, Rachel headed to the stairwell. Mary wondered if she should've told her. What if the Shadowman had come back? Rachel had seemed almost bouncy as she left. There was no way she could call her back. She shook her head and decided that she wouldn’t worry. If Rachel didn't come back in thirty minutes, then she'd have a meltdown. Kyle was still standing with her outside the elevators.

"Don't you want to catch up with Cy?"

"No, I'm just his ride. I'm glad Vicky's awake and all, but I didn't really want to come here."

"But you used to like Vicky, right?"

"I thought she was hot, but I’m not really interested in her type anymore."

"What type are you interested in now?" Her voice cracked on “now”. She could feel herself turning pink. She couldn’t believe she’d asked that question.

"I like girls who know how to do stuff. Who don't care what other people think. Who don’t pander to anyone and who know they’re special anyway."

Everything sort of slowed down as he repeated her words back to her. She had said that to him when she'd confronted him at school while he was possessed. Having him quote her, when describing the type of girl he liked, gave her goose bumps.

“Oh,” she said.

He gave her a sort of shy smile and ducked his head. “So now you know,” he said.

"Yeah.” She didn’t know what else to say. She reached blindly for anything to talk about. “So you remember everything from when Ricky possessed you?" she asked.

"Yep," he said with a heavy sigh.

"I'm sorry, Kyle. I can't imagine how awful or strange that must be."

He nodded his head. She wanted to reach out and comfort him in some way, but she couldn't muster the courage. "I'm also sorry for how I was when you came to talk to me the other day. I was a real jerk."

"You were?" he asked with a wry grin.

"Yeah, I was," she said sincerely. "I seem to be that way a lot with you."

"I don't think so."

She didn't know what to say to that. He liked her. She'd never run into this situation before. She’d skirted it a bit with Cy, and, oh God, he was Cy's brother. Did she not know how to branch out?

"Something was attacking Vicky. Rachel and I were trying to get rid of it."

"A ghost?"

"No, not exactly." She winced and looked at him out of the corner of her eye. He might be able to handle ghosts, but what about other weirdness?

"What was it?"

Now she wasn't sure if she should've told him anything. "It's called a Shadowman."

"What'd you do to it?"

Invited it home to terrorize her? Mary didn't know what to say. She felt like she hadn't done anything and didn't know what to do. They were taking stabs in the dark or rather at the dark but not getting anywhere. And she realized with a little start that she'd taken too long to answer. The pieces were clearly falling into place for Kyle.

"The thing's still out there?"

"But it's not threatening Vicky anymore," she was quick to point out.

Kyle, for all his bullishness, was pretty intuitive. "But it's threatening you?"

The quiver of her chin belied the lie she was quick to offer. "No, of course not. It wouldn't think of bothering me or Gran. That'd be like suicidal."

"Mary, are you safe?"

"I'm okay. Really."

He didn't look like he believed her. Rachel appeared around the corner. She didn't look so bouncy anymore. Mary figured seeing real dead people might have woken her up to how not fun being a coroner would be.

"Come on Mary, we have to go. Maintenance totally busted me in the mechanical room. They said if I wasn't out in fifteen minutes, security would get me."

"Was this on your way to or from the morgue?" Kyle asked.

"To! I didn't get to see a single toe tag. It's such a bummer."

Mary rolled her eyes. She really didn’t understand Rachel’s fascination with dead people.

"Mary, if you need help or anything, give me a call, okay? I mean it," Kyle said.

She nodded her head and got on the elevator. "Thanks, Kyle. I will if anything comes up."

"Bye, Kyle. Good seeing you," Rachel said as the doors closed.

"What floor, please?"

Mary snorted to herself.

"What?" Rachel asked.

She shook her head. "We're going to the lobby."

"What? Oh! Is it the elevator ghost?"

"It's gone."

"Yeah, it's no longer at the hospital."

"Good."

"No, it's not good! It's still out there, and it's going to hurt other people."

"Get rid of it."

"How?!"

The ghost was quiet. God, he was useless. She shook her head and stared at the floor.

"So you, Gran, and Mr. White still don't know how to get rid of the Shadowman?"

"Mr. White thinks we can use a ghost, but I don't know how."

"Chowder?" Rachel sounded worried for the spectral dog.

"No, someone else. He likes to be called Max. Anyway, he's supposed to help get rid of the Shadowman, but no one knows how that's supposed to work. I mean the Shadowman hung out in a hospital that's full of ghosts. If ghosts are so dangerous to it, why stay here?"

"Stayed away."

"What?"

"Stayed away from us. Didn't come near."

"Do you know how a ghost would defeat a Shadowman?"

There was no reply. Mary was seriously beginning to wonder if the ghost was trying to drive her crazy. Maybe it was an evil spirit who enjoyed infuriating people until they saw red.

"What's he saying?" Rachel asked.

Her look must have communicated the lack of communication because Rachel stepped back and looked down.

"I don't know why I bother. I tried to do the right thing. No, I DID the right thing, and I'm getting punished."

"Light hurts it. It flees. If it can't flee, light will kill it."

"How can we keep it from fleeing? It's a shadow. It can slip through vents and cracks."

"No, it can't."

"Yes, it can!"

The ghost didn't argue back, but her mind was already churning over his denial, trying to figure out why he had said that. She flashed on her window. It had been raised a few inches. She'd known the Shadowman had raised it, but why would it have had to raise it? It wasn't air tight. There was a seam, though small. And at the morgue, it was pushing the door open, not slipping through the crack.

"You know, this is as annoying as listening to someone talk on a cell phone."

"He said that the Shadowman can't slip through small cracks, and it can't go through doors. It can be trapped."