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Now I had their undivided attention, and I didn’t know what to do with it.
Where?
And I had no good answer for that, for them. But someone else did.
There was someone else in the room, someone new and not good at this yet—this manifesting thing, this trick by which the dead make themselves solid enough to see. But piece by piece he pulled himself together until he stood in front of the mirror, at the foot of the bed, facing us all.
He looked calm—calmer than I’d ever seen him or known him to be. He looked . . . smart. Wise, might be a better word. Collected, and determined—but he was always determined. That much carried over. That much, at least, went with him.
I’ve got them. Don’t worry, little sister.
Strange. He’d never called me that before. Always by name, like he was afraid that acknowledging the relation would offend or embarrass me.
Come with me, he said to them both; and since neither of them knew what to make of it, or of him, they didn’t move or answer.
A flicker of irritation crossed his face, and it looked familiar. It looked like something I do when I’m annoyed, but not ready to be too vocal about it yet. Jesus, what other ways were we alike?
“Malachi?” I don’t know why I turned it into a question, because of course it was him, and it wasn’t until I said his name that I realized I was crying.
No worries—I’m not sticking around to bother you.
“That’s not what I meant. You can stay. You can stick around and bother me, I don’t mind. ” And even my disclaimer didn’t come out like I meant it.
He grinned.
Pardon me, he said to the girls. But I’m leaving and I think you should probably come with me. I’ll take you where you need to go. Bye, Eden, he added.
Then there was a light behind him so bright that the reflection in the mirror made my head hurt, and it blinded me to everything else in the room. Everything was eaten up by that sharp, brilliant beam of white—and there was silver around the edges, I thought. Silver and something else, something shining on the other side of the room-eating glow.
There was a noise, too—a buzzing, white noise so loud that it erased everything else and all that remained was quiet. And I was there, blinded and deafened by the light and the sound.
I put my hands over my eyes as if it mattered, and I slipped down the wall to sit with my head in my arms, my arms on my knees, and my feet sideways on the ground.
Nothing held me up anymore.
I closed my eyes and buried my face against my thighs; I drew my legs up close and squeezed them.
There was something like falling—a vibration like heavy things dropping, nearby. And pounding things like footsteps. But I didn’t hear them, I only felt them beneath me, coming up from underneath.
Coming up from under the floor like everything else.
20
In the End
The Read House was quarantined; and though I tried to tell everyone it wasn’t necessary, authorities are trying to round up and isolate everyone who was inside when the place was breached by the creeping dead.
I understand the concern. I’ve seen plenty of movies, too. But all this precaution isn’t called for. None of us are tainted from being there; or if we are, it’s only the upper respiratory crud you might expect from people who’ve spent too many days being soaked to the bone.
When they found me in Caroline’s room, I was unresponsive—but it wasn’t because I was sick or injured. I fell asleep, right there. Eyes closed. Ears ringing and muffled from the unearthly noise. I was exhausted. And regardless of whatever the rest of the world thought, I knew I was safe.
If I’d had the good sense or strength to make it all the way to the bed, I don’t think the paramedics would have been so worried. If I hadn’t argued with them so hard, they might not have crammed me into the back of the ambulance on a board with the straps holding my head and neck straight.
If my phone hadn’t been so thoroughly dead, I could have called Lu and Dave. Harry called them for me.
They made it to the hospital before I did. I’d been flown to Erlanger’s branch over at the foot of Signal Mountain, mostly by coincidence, and partly because that’s where they were triag-ing everybody brought in from the hotel.
I ended up on a gurney in a hallway crowded with other gur-neys, and doctors and nurses and various hospital personnel in scrubs coming and going all around me. I was so tired that I slept there anyway. I slept until Lu and Dave were able to track me down and paw me awake.
