Chapter Thirty-Eight
Max’s arms have quadrupled in size, his grey skin waxy and stretched over the thick layers of muscle. Wide, hulking shoulders heave with every breath he takes, each one sounding more and more like a growl.
Austin Taylor stumbles backwards until we’re standing against the wall with our shoulders pressed together.
‘What happened to him?’ he breathes.
His expression is nothing like the ones I’ve seen in his pictures online, all rich guy bravado mixed with philanthropist smugness. Now, there’s genuine terror in his face, his forehead glistening with sweat.
‘We’re too late,’ I say.
I’m too late.
‘But … but … we have to stop this, we …’ Austin splutters, but the overhead light dims, casting the two of us in shadow.
Max lurches sideways, his mallet-sized fists clenched in front of his stomach.
Two gargantuan fangs jut up from his lower jaw, so long and sharp, they almost reach his bulbous nose.
His body is so huge, he almost fully blocks the light, his now-bald head stooped slightly so it doesn’t scrape the ceiling.
‘Heeeeeeey, Max,’ I say slowly, though he’s nothing like Max any more.
He’s a full-blown beast. I have to tip my head all the way back to see his face.
He seems much more subdued than Tyler, less vicious than Avery.
Maybe even a little scared. ‘There are, like, two hundred people out there, so maybe we could—’
The sound of a fake foghorn blasts through the room, startling all three of us.
‘What’s up, y’all, this is your boy DJ Stevie Steve, and we’re here tonight raising awareness—’
The beast lets out a roar so loud, my teeth rattle in my skull. He swipes me and Austin out of the way before smashing his fists through the door like twin wrecking balls. Wood splinters, dust heavy as a blanket in the air.
‘What the hell is—’ DJ Stevie Steve says into the microphone, but is cut off abruptly by a chorus of screams.
Austin and I scramble to our feet and run out into the main gallery.
‘We can’t let him leave,’ Austin shouts to me over the noise.
He’s right. No one will mistake Max for a dog or an oversized lizard.
‘Are you gonna stop him?’ I ask, gesturing to the beast just as he stomps on table seven. It collapses as easily as if it were made of gingerbread.
Frantic gala guests scatter in every direction, most of them funnelling into the hallways that lead back to the animal enclosures.
Thankfully, the beast – Max, I correct myself, this is Max – ignores them, more preoccupied with tearing down the curtains of twinkle lights that are draped over each window.
When his attention lands on the emergency exit at the back of the room, he trundles towards it with thundering footsteps.
The door is way too small for him, but he rips it straight off its hinges and tosses it towards the DJ booth, crushing the sound system.
Crouching down, Max slips through the opened doorway and into the night.
‘Oh my God, the animals,’ Austin murmurs, just as the same thought occurs to me.
The two of us tear after Max, but all that’s left at the front of the Amazonia building is a crowd of petrified people. Night has fully fallen around the zoo, cloaking everything beyond the twinkle-lit path in solid black.
‘Which way did he go?’ Austin shouts to the nearest person, a man with greying hair and a neatly trimmed moustache.
‘He?’ the man says incredulously. But he points a shaking finger towards the path leading right.
The Kids’ Farm. And beyond that—
‘I know where he’s going,’ I say, relief washing over me. He’ll be safe there for now. ‘You deal with this,’ I gesture to the building behind us, the screaming crowds, ‘and I’ll help Max.’
Austin gives a curt nod, seemingly comforted at having a task. But before he can leave, something occurs to me – I left my clutch in the green room. ‘Wait!’ I shout to him. ‘Can I borrow your phone?’
Five seconds later, I’m dialling the only number besides my mom’s that I have memorised. Sam answers on the first ring.
‘Hello?’
A second wave of relief crashes down on my body at the sound of her voice.
‘It’s me,’ I say, feeling suddenly teary. But I can’t break down. Not yet.
‘Indie?’ Sam says. ‘Why do you sound like that? What’s wrong? Whose phone is this?’
‘Sam, I—’ I start to say, the same fear that has stopped me from coming clean to her every time rearing its head. But I can’t do this without her any more.
For two months, I’ve kept the curse a secret, which felt necessary.
It was terrifying. Too big for anyone else.
Keeping it to myself meant I was keeping it contained.
But telling Max brought a kind of freeing feeling, like I had someone who could help me shoulder the weight.
He barely knew me, and he hadn’t been judgemental, like I’d feared anyone who knew would be. Judgemental, or resentful or scared.
And neither would Sam.
‘Sam,’ I say again. ‘I have … so much to tell you.’
Ten minutes and one very abbreviated version of the story later – though still complete with a million rushed details about the curse, Tyler, Avery, Austin Taylor, my mom, my real reason for befriending Max, finding the spell book – Sam has settled into silence at the other end of the line.
‘So …’ I say nervously. ‘What do you think?’
A few seconds pass before Sam swallows and says, ‘I think, that if you’re actually telling me that magic is real …’
My heart beats wildly in my chest. This was a bad idea. An incredibly stupid idea. I can’t just expect Sam to accept that there’s a whole different side of our reality we don’t even understand, existing right under our noses. She probably—
‘… we can finally fix climate change!’
Her voice is so shrill and excited, my ears are left ringing. ‘Do you think this means we can go back in time too? We could convince Louisa May Alcott to make Laurie and Jo end up together.’
‘I – um – maybe,’ I stutter. ‘But you … you believe me?’
‘I mean, is it a lot? Obviously,’ Sam says. ‘But it also makes sense, why you suddenly got so weird about Flirty Fridays, and Tyler, and then you, like, bent over backwards to act like you didn’t like Max, when you clearly did.’
‘It wasn’t that clear,’ I mumble.
‘It actually was,’ Sam says. ‘Honestly, Indie, this is, like, the most sense you’ve made in months. Minus the Avery thing. That was unhinged. But not more unhinged than Austin Taylor. Are you saying he turned his own kid into a monster?’
‘I – I don’t know,’ I say, remembering Austin’s horrified expression as he took in the giant that was Max. ‘He says it’s not him any more, and I think – I think I might believe him? Which means my mom – and, and … my dad.’
They can be together. They could’ve been together this whole time.
‘Okay, yes, that is a major thing,’ Sam says. ‘But let’s just try and focus on one issue at a time, and the big one right now is finding out who put together this stupid curse so we can fix Tyler, Avery and Max. If it wasn’t Austin Taylor, then who?’
Her voice has a steadying effect. She’s right.
‘I don’t know.’ I rest my free arm on top of my head. My hair is caked with a layer of dust. ‘Maybe the curse isn’t on me after all.’
‘Then why would people around you keep changing? That doesn’t make sense.’
‘But Tyler and Avery turning when I don’t love them doesn’t make sense either.’
If Sam notices that I left Max out of this statement, she doesn’t mention it.
‘But you have to be related,’ she says. ‘Otherwise that’s a pretty big freaking coincidence.
Unless there are two curses? Like, the normal one on Max and then a different one for Tyler and Avery.
Did Austin’s spell book mention anything about cursed situationships?
I mean, I guess that’s kind of all situationships, but still … ’
I suck in my cheeks, letting her voice fade into the hum of worry in my brain.
She’s right again, it would be a crazy coincidence if all three people I’ve had crushes on in the last few months just randomly transformed into some version of a fairy tale nightmare.
But I don’t know anyone else who even knows magic is real, much less anyone that would know how to use it to obliterate my love life.
‘Whoever did this would have to know about the original curse on your mom, right?’ Sam asks, reading my mind. ‘Otherwise that’s way too random for some other mystery person to just put an almost identical one on you.’
‘Yeah, you’re right,’ I say. Since I’ve been talking to Sam, seven cop cars have arrived at the Amazonia, with new ones appearing every few minutes.
I jog away from them, one hand covering the bottom half of my phone so Sam can hear me.
‘But the only people who knew about it when it started happening to me were Austin, my mom and Laura.’
‘Nobody else? You’re sure? They couldn’t have overheard something?’
‘I mean, I don’t think so,’ I say, slowing to a walk once I’m far enough away from the noise. ‘We’ve always been careful. I’ve only started talking to my mom and Laura about it in the last year, and we always do it at home.’
Sam makes a considering noise. ‘Okay. So, they need to have known about the original curse somehow and also know you.’
‘And …’ I press my lips together. And want me to be alone. And want to hurt people I care about. And want me to be miserable.
‘And hate me,’ I finish.
‘What about Avery? You said she used to come to your house – maybe you accidentally said something to your mom about the curse and she heard?’
‘But Tyler had already started changing by then,’ I say. I guess technically Avery could’ve been watching me before we were partnered up for American lit, but there’s something about the theory that doesn’t feel right. ‘And besides, why would she make herself turn?’
There’s a flurry of tinny voices, as though Sam’s TV is playing in the background.
The Kids’ Farm comes into view, still somehow quiet, the fences and barn intact.
There are no alpacas roaming the field beside it, no donkeys braying mournfully.
The only trace of the beast is an overturned trash can, its contents strewn across the pathway.
‘You said the person that put the curse on you has to hate you,’ Sam says slowly, as though she’s unpicking something in her head. ‘But what if they did it for the opposite reason – because they like you.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Think about it,’ Sam continues. ‘They clearly don’t want you to be in love. It’s like Austin with your mom. What if this person is trying to make sure you don’t end up with anyone but—’
Sam cuts off abruptly at the same time my feet stutter to a stop on the path.
‘Oh my God,’ we shout at the same time, identical conclusions materialising in our heads.
Who would’ve been close enough to hear about the curse, to know about all three of my crushes? And like me enough to not want me to end up with any of them?
‘Oh my God,’ I say again. Standing there in the darkness, a sudden silence fills my skull. The only sound I register is a distant moo. ‘I know who’s doing this.’