It was the same thing that happened to Lainey.
But Lainey isn’t dead.
Dad takes my arm.
I jump, startled by his proximity.
He looks at me, his eyes a storm. I can see eachconflicting emotion in the soft brown of his irises. Relief, because it wasn’t me. I’m here. I’m alive. Grief, because someone else’s daughter isn’t. And worry, because a classmate of mine has died and I have yet to make a sound.
Words well inside me—an avalanche of them.
Everyone thinks it’s over. Conclusions are already being drawn. I heard the whispers at Willowmere Park. Ivy ran from the party at night in the dark, probably under the influence of alcohol. She slipped and fell into the river. It was a horrible, tragic accident. But there was no foul play. In the court of public opinion, the case has been closed.
I look at my dad—my very concerned dad—and I want to tell him everything. Ivy didn’t run from the party and drown in the river anymore than Lainey left town with Rafe. But saying those words, explaining what really happened, would only make him worry more.
My eyes burn.
Tears well.
Dad pulls me into a hug.
I squeeze him back. I tell him I’m okay. He doesn’t have to worry. I’m just sad, and tired. I give him a brave smile and a kiss on the cheek. Then I head upstairs to my room, where the sour cream container mocks me.
I placed it in my window, thinking the sunlight would help.
But nothing has happened.
Because maybe, glowing seeds from a different dimension don’t require sunlight and water. Maybe, it wants blood and darkness. A shudder ripples up my spine. I shake the thought away, take the sour cream container in hand, dig my fingers into the soil, and pull up the seed. The ordinariness of it makes me want to scream.
It looks like a large, regular seed.
I stare down at it, the vision it gave me playing through my mind. Me, chasing my mother through the woods. It won’t stop haunting my dreams. I sink onto the window seat as snow flurries dance in the dark outside.
I didn’t get to speak with Mistress Bramble.
I didn’t get to tell Jude about Rafe’s second appearance or his confusing words.
And now, Ivy is dead.
I return the seed to the soil and set the container on the sill. With a heavy exhale, I pull out my phone and check my email, expecting the same thing I’ve seen all week long.
A big fat nothing.
But this time, my inbox isn’t empty.
This time, there’s a message.
A reply from Megan Carlisle.
I surge to my feet, heart pounding as I read her email.
Dear Selah,
I would like this to stay off the record. Honestly, I’ve done my best to put the whole ordeal behind me and move on with my life. To this day, I don’t understand what happened that night. All I know is that I wasn’t high. Dylan was. But I didn’t take anything.
We trespassed onto the property because we were bored and it was a dare. We were never going to break into the home. We just wanted to see what the property looked like on the other side of the gate. We went into the hedge maze, and that’s when everything changed. I don’t know how to explain it, other than to say our surroundings got really scary and disorienting. We got turned around. Then we heard howling. So we ran inside.
The police were there, calling our names. Looking for us. Only somehow, they couldn’t see us. We had no idea what wasgoing on. We lost track of time. Then, suddenly, everything went back to normal. When the police found us, they said we’d been missing for two days.
