Cruel Cravings (Midnight Society #3)

1. Jael

My Horror - Santigold

“ C ongratulations on your special day.”

Nurse Big Bird smiles at me from behind the nurse’s station where all the ladies in white keep their refrigerated lunches and pictures of their kids and dogs. She’s tall and broad for a woman, with feathered blonde hair and the kind of benevolent smile that’s almost patronizing. Her real name is Sandy or Susan or something else that starts with an S.

But I’m bad with names so Big Bird is what stuck.

“Jael,” she says in a tone that’s almost motherly. “Are you listening to me?”

I snap out of my thoughts and back to the present. “Hmmm?”

Big Bird taps the blue folder on the desk counter. She wears her nails long. Talons that are painted a deep emerald green today. “Your post inpatient care plan. It’s all in the folder. Do you remember where to go to check your next appointment with Dr. Wolford?”

I think for a second. “Inside the folder.”

“ Where inside the folder?” she presses.

I tap my foot, looking anywhere but at her. “The calendar.”

“On page three. Right at the front. It’s also programmed in your phone. And where are you headed next?”

“Old Northam.”

Her smile falters for knitted brow concern. “But where in Old Northam?”

“My grandmother’s.”

“Good girl,” she says. “We’ll be checking in with you in a few days to make sure you’re following the plan. But you can reach out at any time using the emergency numbers listed. If you start seeing him again, you need to reach out immediately.”

I nod enough times to placate her and then gather all my things into my arms. It’s surprising the amount of things you can accumulate without even realizing it, but I won’t leave a single thing behind. Not even Thorny, my hedgehog cactus plant that I won during the white elephant Christmas party. Not even the origami paper stars we made during arts and crafts hour.

All of it is precious and I know what it’s like to be thrown away like nothing.

Grandma Opal used to laugh and say I had a problem letting things go. I never liked leaving stuff behind. The rattiest teddy bear was mine forever.

My arms shake hauling my backpack, heavy duffle bag, and box of assorted things outside all at once. The November air is crisp and cool on my skin. The sun is warm on my face. The street is so busy and noisy that it’s instant sensory overload.

I almost turn to go back inside the hospital, then I take a deep breath and remind myself this is a new chapter of my life.

A brand new chance to get myself together and act right.

This time will be different from the other times.

I have the blue folder. I have the calendar reminders and the emergency contact numbers. Big Bird believes in me.

The ride share car rumbles from the curb of the sidewalk. A stout man waves his arm out the window to signal he’s waiting on me. I return his gesture with a smile until I notice a different man.

The one lurking from across the street.

He’s enough out of view so that only I see him. Only I’m aware he’s watching.

But what else is new?

I’m always the only one who knows about him. Everyone else just seems oblivious.

Inside Brighter Days, they claimed he wasn’t real. The shadow man, as I’ve called him, was just a figment of my imagination. Standing at well over six feet tall, his massive frame and minotaur head were all things I’ve dreamed up.

I’ve invented him, which is why no one else ever sees him. Which is why he follows me everywhere I go, truly like a shadow would.

Fear fills me up as I pause on the sidewalk outside the hospital, and for a second time in minutes, consider going back inside.

But what’s the point when Dr. Wolford and Nurse Big Bird and everyone else were never able to protect me from him?

Maybe it’s time I try protecting myself.

I break out into a little trot toward the ride share car, bobbing along with my many things ’til I’m sliding into the backseat.

The driver eyes me in the rearview mirror, his nose shaped like my cactus. “Address still the same? 5672 Rodham Street in Old Northam?”

I glance at the hospital building, then at the shadow man lurking in the distance, skin prickling with gooseflesh, then shake my head. “Change of plans. We’re going somewhere else.”

“Well, let me tell ya, Jacqueline, I wish you nothing but the best on your recovery.”

I smile from the backseat. “Thanks, Marv. That means a lot.”

“I had a brother-in-law that tore his ACL and it was hell recovering. I say had ’cuz my sister divorced his ass on a whim,” he cackles. “She’s a regular ol’ Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. You never know what side of her you’re going to get. Love her to bits and pieces, but it’s the truth. But now she’s still single while he’s engaged. Funny how that works out, isn’t it?”

“Mhmmm,” I hum along.

I’m barely listening. We’ve pulled up outside the squat brick building that was once an industrial warehouse but has since been converted into urban apartments.

“This is you, right?” Marvin asks.

It’s been a long journey from the hospital to the heart of Easton, but we’re finally here and that’s all that matters.

“Your card was declined,” he goes on. “You got another?”

“Oh. Hmmm. Here’s one.” I dig around my duffle bag and produce a different card.

He snatches it out of my hand and his unibrow tics up. “Susan Hinkley?”

“You can add a twenty-five percent tip.”

That seems to distract him long enough to run the card and hand it back.

I thank him for being so helpful and get out of his car after checking for the shadow man. He’s nowhere in sight, which brings me an instant sense of relief.

Now it’s time to turn the page to chapter two. Officially begin my life over.

It’s been years since I last saw my sister. So many years I’m not even sure the exact number. She might not remember either. She’s forgotten a lot of things, just like I have. Her promise to write me every week. Her vow she would find a way for us to be together again.

She owes me at least five or six years’ worth of presents. Birthdays and Christmases.

I head upstairs clutching everything I own.

Apartment 5E.

I repeat it over and over again in my head on my way up.

The inside of the building matches the outside. Exposed brick walls and visible metal piping everywhere. The ceiling lights are dim and few and far between, allowing for shadows at every corner. I count the doors as I wander down the hall of her floor and then excitement pings through me when I finally reach it.

My sister’s apartment. Is she home? Is she waiting for me inside?

Setting my things down by the door, I find my way in.

The doorknob happens to turn when I try it and the door falls open. She’s left it unlocked for me. Probably because she heard from Grandma Opal that I was being discharged.

My sister has always been thoughtful. When we were kids, she let me lick the cake batter off the spoon when we used to bake.

I step into the apartment to find stacks and stacks of boxes in the living room. A frown crawls onto my face as I step over and read the labels.

“Taviar,” I mumble. “Is that your boyfriend?”

She was never popular with boys. I never was either.

We were never popular with anyone.

But at least we had each other.

I move on from the boxes that make the apartment feel like a warehouse more than ever, to the kitchen area, where I find unwashed dishes and a trashcan that needs to be emptied. My tongue clicks as I shake my head and then pry open the fridge.

Takeout containers and more takeout containers.

We’ll have to figure out a chore system. Or maybe this Taviar can learn to clean up after himself.

The apartment’s spacious and big. Almost too much room.

I make it to the hallway and discover there’s three bedrooms. One door’s locked and the second bedroom’s entirely empty.

The third’s cordoned off with neon yellow caution tape. I stop just outside and peer into the room at the unmade bed and mood board hanging on the wall.

This is it. This is her room.

I’d recognize it anywhere. Pick it out of a police-style lineup.

I know my sister better than anyone. Even this Taviar she lives with or the girl that’s plastered in many of the photos in her room.

“Imani,” I read aloud.

She’s never told me anything about someone named Imani. I’m her sister. Her best friend.

Moving onto the rest of the room, I admire all the eclectic things that make me smile and remind me of how similar we can be. She has a stack of self-help books that she uses as a perch for snacks. Oreos and Hot Cheetos are still some of her favorites.

There’s a strange leather cat mask on her desk but I ignore it in favor of the fading stickers on the back of her laptop.

My sister was always the more creative of the two of us. She was a musical genius from the time we were young. I can still hear the trill of the piano in my mind when I close my eyes and concentrate on the past.

Our mother used to make her practice for five, six hours a day.

Sometimes my sister wound up in tears, begging for it to end. I did my best to keep her company. I tried to make her laugh. If our mother didn’t shoo me away first.

Musicians needed to practice, she said. Musicians didn’t need nosy little girls butting in where they didn’t belong.

I wasn’t like them. I wasn’t a musician.

So I learned to watch from afar, fascinated by every note that rang through our home.

My arms stretch out and scoop the laptop with the stickers off her desk. Hugging the device to my chest brings an instant warm shot of comfort. I’m not sure why other than maybe the keys remind me of her piano. Her fast-moving fingers.

Always practically a blur.

Why couldn’t I move mine like that? Why couldn’t I play pretty songs?

“Who the hell are you?”

The voice cuts my unraveling thoughts short. My eyes snap open. I turn around with the laptop still hugged to my chest, my expression vacant.

The man who stands in the door wears an angry one. It’s clenched onto his face, his thick brows knitted. He’s clutching his iPhone like he’s about to call the police.

“Did you hear me?” he asks when silence drags on between us. “Who the fuck are you and how the fuck did you get into my apartment?”

This must be Taviar.

My voice escapes me. My belly quakes. I blink and blink at him, so startled I can’t function.

Nurse Big Bird used to call these my freeze ups.

Whenever it happened, she said to count backward slowly from ten. Allow time to work through what’s overloaded me. Then piece each word together to express myself.

“I’m…” I start off in a nervous stammer. “I’m… looking…”

“Get the fuck out!” he barks, and I jump. “Get out before I call the police!”

“I’m Jael,” I try again.

A flicker of something I can’t figure out passes over his face. For a brief second, his anger dissolves for… confusion? Shock? Distress? Some muddled blend of all three?

“You think you’re funny?” he asks. “This some kind of sick joke?”

What is he talking about? Why is he so mad at me? Did my sister not tell him I was coming by?

“She invited me,” I squeak out. “My sister…”

“Your sister ?” he spits, then his eyes narrow. “You don’t know?”

His features twist in disturbed fashion. He lets a long moment pass between us where the only thing that takes up more space than the tense silence is the glaring neon yellow caution tape sprawled across the floor.

The same tape I broke to enter my sister’s room.

I swallow against the uncertainty filling me up and cast one last glance around the room.

“Um,” I mumble. “I’ll go. My sister’s not home right now.”

He doesn’t stop me as I move to leave. He presses himself back against the door like he’ll catch cooties if he comes into contact with me.

Story of my life.

People reacting like this when I’m around.

I make it to the front door and notice the broken lock hanging off the hinges, but I only stop when he calls out to me from the living room.

“She always mentioned you,” he says, his tone puzzled. “I guess I just… I never thought you were real. Lyra could be a little…”

He trails off there as if he can’t find the words, or maybe he doesn’t want to offend me.

Her sister.

“I am,” I answer, feeling strangely empty. Yet I cling to my sister’s laptop like it’s my newest possession I’ll never dream of letting go. “I am real.”

I leave the apartment behind, unsure of where to go or what to do.

I’m not sure of anything anymore.