14. Into the Deep End
INTO THE DEEP END
Iconnect my phone to the mini bluetooth speaker on my desk and tap a playlist I use for studying. A wash of mellow, low-fi beats fills my bedroom, a steady thrum that will keep our voices from slipping under the door and reaching Dad.
Naomi sits on my bed, her head clasped in her hands, as though her brain has cracked in two and she’s trying very hard to hold it together.
I feel bad. Naomi doesn’t believe in the paranormal.
When weird things happen, there’s a logical, scientific explanation.
Her worldview is very similar to Jude’s, before he found out he was a descendant of an angel, his cousin was immortal, and a literal curse had befallen his family.
At least for him, the realization happened in stages—one disturbing discovery at a time.
Poor Naomi has been tossed into the deep end of a freezing cold pool.
Thankfully, she’s no longer hyperventilating.
I shut my bedroom door and hand her a warm cup of chamomile tea.
She takes it between her palms and looks up at us—me and Twig—her dark eyes teaming with panic. “Am I going crazy?”
“No,” I say definitively, hoping my confidence will calm her.
“Then what happened? Where did they go? Why were her eyes glowing like that?”
I look at Twig meaningfully.
Her eyes were glowing because Lainey isn’t Lainey.
“Rafe told the truth,” I say to him.
“Was she wearing contacts?” Naomi continues. “Can contacts even do that?”
“Her eyes weren’t glowing because of contacts.” Twig sits beside her very slowly, as though any sudden movement will send her over the edge and she’ll start hyperventilating again. “You know the things we talk about on our podcast?”
“Of course.”
“You think it’s… ” He searches for the right word.
“Silly,” I say, grabbing it for him.
Naomi tucks a long lock of hair behind her ear. “I don’t think it’s silly, I just—”
“Don’t believe in that kind of stuff,” Twig says.
She nods.
“Well.” He pushes his glasses up his nose. “That kind of stuff is real.”
“What do you mean?”
“You might want to drink some of that tea,” I tell her, perching on the edge of my desk.
I grip the ledge, my fingers digging into wood, like the tighter I hold on, the more likely I’ll stay put.
Pacing wouldn’t be good for Naomi right now, but so much adrenaline is pumping through my veins, staying still makes me feel like I might come out of my skin.
“What happened on Halloween night wasn’t a prank.
And that earthquake everyone felt during the masquerade ball?
It didn’t register on the richter scale because it wasn’t an earthquake. ”
Steam rises from the mug in Naomi’s lap. She sits without drinking, a rapt audience of one.
So I start from the beginning.
I tell her about the portrait, and how it led to so many other discoveries.
Another dimension. Fallen angels. Amulets with supernatural powers.
Prophecies. The curse. And Jude’s immortal cousin—manipulating Lainey so he could use one of those supernatural amulets to open a doorway into this other dimension.
“It’s called the Overlay,” Twig says. “And people like you and me, we can’t see the doorways, or the rifts, when they open.”
“People like you and me,” Naomi repeats.
“Regular humans.”
Her gaze lifts to mine. “But people like Selah…”
“Part angel,” I say.
Naomi blanches. She’s been doing that a lot. I keep thinking the blood will just stay put until it’s safer to re-enter her face, but no. It keeps on trying.
“We can see the rifts.” I pause in case she has more questions, but she’s reverted to silence.
“On Halloween night, we opened the tomb to let Seraphina out so we could destroy the curse once and for all. Seraphina used her onyx to call forth this horrible squid-thing. It pulled Ivy and Lainey into the Overlay and they sort of combusted into flame.”
“It grabbed me, too,” Twig says.
Naomi looks down at his boot—his cooked foot—and somehow, even more color drains from her face.
Unsure how much more she can take, I rush onward. I tell her about the strange creature that coughed up a glowing seed—my attention wandering briefly to the sour cream container in my window—and Lainey’s surprising return.
“But…” The furrow in her brow deepens. “How is she alive if she combusted into flame?”
“She might not be.” I look at Twig.
The idea seems to give him indigestion.
“Rafe warned us. We thought he was being figurative. But what if he was being literal?”
“Rafe?” Naomi’s voice cracks. “But I thought—didn’t he die with Seraphina?
“I don’t know. He could be a ghost. Or maybe he’s trapped like Carol Ann from The Poltergeist.” Stuck in a supernatural limbo. Is this what the Overlay is?
“I’ve never seen The Poltergeist, Selah.”
“Rafe has appeared twice since Halloween,” Twig says.
“And the last time he showed up,” I continue, “he told me Lainey isn’t Lainey.”
“Who is she, then?”
“I don’t know. An evil doppelg?nger?”
Naomi closes her eyes, her knuckles white as she grips the mug. For a second, I think she might be sick.
Twig sets his hand on her back and gives me a look, like slow down, would you?
But I can’t. I’m already going as slow as I can stand. “Or, she could be possessed.”
“By Rafe,” Twig mutters.
“Rafe can’t possess people.”
“He can control them.”
This is true. He’s done it to Lainey before, manipulated her into doing his bidding. We just told Naomi all about it. But something in my gut objects. My mind keeps returning to Mistress Bramble’s words.
You woke a great hunger. Now, it will hunt.
“What if she comes back?” Naomi asks, her voice trembling with panic. “If she’s not really Lainey and she’s being possessed and her eyes were glowing then we have to tell Harper. We have to tell everyone—”
“I don’t think we can tell everyone.” I think of my father downstairs—worrying about me, worrying about Twig, worrying about us all.
“We were going to on our podcast,” Twig says.
“That was before, when Lainey and Ivy were missing and we didn’t think they’d ever come back. If we go public now, our parents will have us in therapy before we can blink. I’m not so sure we want to add that to our plate when we have much bigger fish to fry.”
Like how to stop this hunger from hunting.
“But Harper?” Naomi looks up at me, her eyes filled with fear. Then she turns to Twig, sitting next to her on my bed. “And your sister? Kate and Lainey are friends.”
“You’re right.” Twig nods. “We have to tell Kate. And Harper, too.”
“Tomorrow morning then,” I say. “Before school. We can tell them what’s happening, and hopefully they’ll believe us.”