Chapter Thirteen
Thirteen
Somehow I go back to sleep—a fitful, uncomfortable slumber that’s never long and never, ever peaceful. Still, it’s enough that when I wake just before dawn, my memories of the previous night are hazy. Like a dream that fades the moment you open your eyes.
Part of me thinks what happened was exactly that.
I didn’t see my dead sister outside the window, dripping wet.
I didn’t huddle under the covers, terrified.
I didn’t slide out of bed, creep outside, crouch at the spot where she stood on the porch, and touch a lukewarm puddle.
It was all just a nightmare, no doubt spurred by being stranded on an island that’s been stuck in time for the past century.
Yes, the water I’d felt on the porch was real, but that could have been caused by anything.
A leak. A rainstorm that came and went while I intermittently slept.
Maybe it had been there all along, unnoticed amid the drama of the previous day.
A stretch? Yes. But it’s more logical than thinking Molly has returned after twenty years. Because that means she was there in the first place, back when I was a scared little girl.
And she wasn’t.
She couldn’t have been.
And she wasn’t here last night, which is what I tell myself on repeat as I swap the nightgown for the dress. By now, it’s second nature. As is heading to the main house at the break of dawn to make breakfast, which is what I do next.
On the porch, I pause at the same spot I touched last night. It’s still wet. Then again, so is the rest of the porch, which is slick with morning dew. Maybe that’s what I felt during the night.
I dry my hand on my dress and move off the porch, stopping a moment at the oak. It’s so old—so battered by time and the elements and, according to Daisy’s diary, at least one lightning strike—that I’m shocked it’s still standing, still casting its ominous shadow on the cottage walls.
I eye a low-hanging branch, the cluster of foliage at its tip verdant and heavy, bending it slightly downward. It’s possible that I saw a similar one last night at the window, making me think it was Molly. This island, I’m starting to realize, plays tricks on your brain. At least it does to mine.
I’m so busy trying to convince myself it’s what happened that I don’t immediately notice something else in the massive oak. It’s high up, near the top, hidden so thoroughly by leaves that I need to back up, tilt my head, examine the tree anew. Only then do I realize what’s there.
Clothes.
Dangling from a branch.
My mouth goes dry. Those shouldn’t be there. Nothing should. Yet there they are. Cream-colored top. Maroon skirt. Satin trim.
While all of us here are in costume, only one person on New Avalon has clothes that match what’s now hanging in the tree.
Susie Hutchinson.
Staring at her outfit, I can only think of the séance, the whisper in the dark, and the words Susie claimed to have been told.
You will be first.