Feral (22 page)

The worker called out a name—“Get over here,” he shouted.

The old man turned, nodded in compliance, and joined the first worker, squatting beside the lowering device.

The old man works here
, Claire told her thundering heart.
It's okay. Just calm down.

More cemetery workers joined them, the group growing rougher with the device, rattling tools. “Take it off,” the old man said. “We gotta take that casket off so we can fix it. Never did see that happen before.”

The workers raised the casket, took a step to the side, and put it back down on the fake green grass surrounding the grave.

In the distance, car engines revved to life as they began to pull out of the parking lot. The ground fog thickened.

Cemetery workers grumbled in disagreement about whether the crank was stuck or broken. They continued to argue as they disassembled the device completely.

And as the ground fog swelled, swirled, clumped.

Claire took another step backward, deep into the thick fog. The sounds of the cemetery—the muffled voices, the clank of tools and the grunts of the cemetery workers—grew instantly distant, as though Claire had actually stepped inside a vault with a thick door and four walls that separated her from the rest of the graveyard.

“Hello?” she called out. “Hello?”

But no one answered. No one could hear her. She was somehow in the cemetery and
not
in the cemetery, all at the same time.

The fog completely encased her, wrapping her up in its arms.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

..................................................................

T
he fog surrounding Claire didn't drift or float. It
marched
, with the purpose of a line of soldiers heading into battle. A dense patch paused atop a gravesite, drawing out what was unmistakably a pair of arms, a torso, legs. The spirit was absorbed by the thickening mist, before the swirling white collective mass marched to the next closest grave.

Claire shuddered, her breath growing ever quicker, more shallow, as the fog continued to recruit another pair of arms. Elbows. Shoulders. Heads. Each time it absorbed a spirit, it only grew larger, more menacing.

Good God
, Claire thought,
that fog isn't just fog. It's filled with the town dead. Their souls. They're all still here.

“Sereeeena,” the fog called. “Sereeeeenaaaaahhh.” The spirits of the town dead continued to climb from their graves, to become part of the fog, and to call out with a single collective voice as it marched closer to Serena's burial site.

The fog whirled, the spirits mixing to form one single branch.
No
, Claire told herself.
Not a branch. An arm. They've all formed a single arm. And it's reaching for something.

Claire flinched, raising her hand over her face protectively as a fiery streak popped like a bottle rocket straight out of the casket. Through her fingers, she watched it explode in the sky. Sparks formed a ball that zipped about frantically between the tiniest, highest branches of the tree closest to the open grave. Slowly, the sparks began to settle down, to cluster in a single spot in the sky, forming the portrait of a girl's face.

Claire trembled; she'd just seen that face on the easel near the pulpit. It was Serena. And she was smiling at Claire, as she had inside the church.

Claire lowered her arm completely, too shocked to dislodge her feet from the mud. She was staring at Serena's spirit.

“Sereeeeenah,” the fog called out again, in its own unified voice.

Serena's face shifted to an expression of pure fear as she struggled to move, trying to pull herself from her spot near the top of the trees. But it seemed Serena's spirit was stuck to the sky, like a butterfly pinned to a scrapbook.

“Come,” the fog urged. “Come, Serena. Come home.”

The arm reached up higher, its misty grasp rising toward Serena.

Serena frowned and shook her head. Wherever the fog was going wasn't home. Not for Serena. Her home was still here, in Peculiar.

It's heaven
, Claire thought.
That's where the fog wants to take her.
But what kind of place was that, really? Already, death appeared nothing at all like the peaceful state Pastor Ray had just described. He'd said nothing during Serena's funeral about fog and spirits rising up from graves. Heaven might not be the same kind of place they were all promised, either. Heaven just might not suit everyone, the same way not everybody liked Toledo or New Jersey.

Claire's chest heaved with frightened breath as a familiar old calico jumped from the cemetery wall. The cat bearing the gnarled, brittle look of age, with her knotted spine and legs as stiff as crutches—the cat from the Simses' woodpile. She blinked her matted, gummy eyes against the frozen mist, and shook her head, sending droplets flying from her whiskers and the torn tip of a partially missing ear. The calico edged toward Serena's grave, as though wanting to get close enough to pay her respects to the girl.

The hand of fog continued to climb higher into the sky, to inch closer to Serena, the fingers curling, readying to grasp her soul. To pluck her—like a wayward strand of hair. A wave of renewed terror flashed over Serena's face—and at the very moment the fog touched her, her terror fired, shooting her spirit high into the sky—high enough to surely see the top of the Peculiar water tower below her.

Serena paused at the top of her ascent, her face tipped forward, and she fell in a lurch—while the fog struggled to catch up, to grab her.

The calico at the side of the casket turned her face to the sky only to see Serena speeding toward her—only to fear being crushed by Serena's fall, with no time to dart out of the way.

Serena fell through the fingers of the fog, nose-diving into the earth.

The fall made a noise like a sonic boom that left Claire's ears ringing and silver sparks of light traveling across her eyes.

Claire could hear no distant screams of shock coming from anyone left in the cemetery. No stampeding feet. Nothing. Were they all too far away? How was it that no one saw or heard this—only Claire?

She blinked against the January mist, the savage winter air, letting the scene she'd just witnessed sink in.

Serena had fallen on top of that awful old calico, knocking the poor creature off her feet. The cat lay, looking every bit as lifeless as Serena had when Claire had first seen her, buried beneath the fallen limb.

The persistent fog peeled back, like a curtain.

The cat raised her head, slowly arched her back, and pushed herself from the ground. She raised a paw, peeked down at it, as if seeing it for the first time.

Claire was rooted as she watched wisps of color float across the surface of the cat's face. The cat's face grew hazy, disappearing just long enough to let the image of a girl's face peek through.

Serena
, Claire thought, the realization hitting her with the brutal force of a club.
She didn't just fall
on
the cat—she fell
inside
her.

The persistent fog continued to swirl above the old calico, like a funnel cloud—as if it, too, knew that Serena was inside.

“Come,” the fog demanded. “You need to come home.”

The old calico took a step forward. The fog swirled back and forth above her, bouncing against her body. The cat's living body was keeping the fog out.

Blue eyes replaced the cat's feline yellow eyes. A happy purr trickled out from behind her mangy fur.

Claire reeled, arms forward, trying to find a way through the mist that cascaded, that swelled, that pushed itself in front of her face, as thick as velvet curtains.

Muffled voices cried out behind her, calling her name. “Claire!” she heard. “Claire, wait!” But she was trying—couldn't they all see she was trying to get away from the cat, Serena, the fog—the horrible visions of what happened here in Peculiar? She was trying to get to them, but she was all turned around. Which way was the gate? The fog was too dense, suddenly, to make sense of everything.

Serena's in the old cat
, she wanted to shout. It sounded crazy—she knew that. But she also knew what she had just seen.

She staggered, until a hiss made her stop moving completely.

Claire glanced down, only to look straight into the calico's mangled face. Claire balled her hands into fists.

The cat yowled. A bit of hazy light bouncing off the gold cameo at the base of Claire's throat reflected back onto the pink, raw spots on the cat's face. The cat rose up onto her back legs, and pawed at the air, attempting, it seemed, to get closer to her. Or, more likely, closer to something that Claire had on her body.

Claire gasped. Serena wanted her necklace back. The necklace that was stuck hanging from Claire's throat.
Why wouldn't she?
Claire asked herself.
It belongs to her.

Claire threw her foot forward, stomping to scare the old cat away.

The cat spread her mouth, hissed again, and pounced. She took a swipe at Claire's ankle, exposed now beneath the hem of her black slacks. She scratched Claire, cutting into her skin with her dirty, disease-laden claws.

Claire squealed in pain. The squeal turned to a groan of disgust as she stared at a pair of swiveling, jagged, bleeding scratches that burned, tingled, pinched, all at the same time. She swung her arms, hoping to frighten the old cat while at the same time moving in the direction of the muffled voices.

But in her attempt to get away, Claire felt herself Htumbling—falling, just as Serena had fallen. Her mind spun until her back struck the earth, the blow ricocheting inside her like a hundred tiny pieces of shrapnel. She moaned, wanting to push herself up, but finding that her hands didn't even feel attached anymore.

“Claire,” a faint voice cried out—the tone so soft, it had to belong to someone standing a mile away.

“Claire,” the voice called again, louder this time.

As she opened her eyes, Rich's face emerged—he was calling her name, his expression riddled with worry. “Can you hear me?” he asked.

Claire realized her father was here, too. And the old man from 'Bout Out. And Pastor Ray. All of them staring down on her in fear, through thick billows of fog.

Claire raised her head, slowly dislodging it from the earth, which felt soft, slightly muddy beneath her. She put her hand out, feeling a cool wall of earth beside her. Another wall of earth on her other side. Walls at her head and feet.

She was in Serena's grave.

Claire opened her mouth and began to scream.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

..................................................................

“J
ust raise your arms over your head,” Rich said, his knees pressed into the cold mud at the edge of Serena's grave.

“No!” Claire shook her head adamantly. Her throat still burned from her scream. Her arms would burn, too, she knew, if she let him grab onto her recently healed wrists and yank her out.

Besides, she was weak from what she had seen and from her fall—she'd never get a solid hold on Rich's hands, not if she could only barely stand. “You're just as likely to fall in here with me,” she argued, even though it was impossible, given Rich's size, his undeniable strength. But she could not stop shaking. She didn't want anyone to see her like this, so shaken and confused by what had just played out in front of her eyes.

“Use your feet,” Rich said. “When I pull you up, just use your feet to help me. You climb, I pull. Okay?”

“But—”

“Claire, you can't stay in there. Please,” Rich begged.

Claire relented, only because everyone up top continued to stare at her, and no one else seemed willing to offer another option. She raised her arms, letting Rich wrap his hands around her wrists as she wrapped her own trembling fingers around his. “Okay,” she called, when she felt their hands were locked around each other. She bit down on her lip as he started to tug.

It hurt every bit as much as she'd expected it to—her fingers throbbed, her arms pulsed as her newly mended fractures were tugged in two different directions: up to the edge of the grave by Rich, and back down to the depths of the earth by the weight of Claire's body. Her feet scrambled to get a toehold in the smooth wall of Serena's grave, and she suppressed another scream, even as she swore her breaks were being ripped back apart.

Mercifully, the tugging ended as Claire's hips hit the top of the grave. Rich let go. Claire pressed the palms of her hands on something cold and hard at the head of Serena's burial place as she struggled to hoist her legs out on her own.

She panted, moving her hands to find out that a rather elaborate temporary marker had already been placed at the grave—whoever had purchased all those lilies had also provided for a metal sign, pressed flat against the earth, bearing Serena's name.

Claire could see herself in the marker—her terror-stricken face seeming to plead for help.

“Claire,” her father said, rushing to her side. “Claire,” he repeated, helping her to her feet when all she wanted to do was just rest a minute, let the awful torturous ringing in her body settle down.

“You didn't hit your head on any rocks down there, did you?” he asked, looking into her eyes.

But it wasn't the fall that bothered Claire—it was what had preceded it. “The crazy fog,” she grumbled, scrambling for any explanation. “I just—I couldn't see where I was going.”

“The fog?” her dad asked, the pitch of his voice climbing up the scale.

She glanced out at the cemetery, finding the fog far lighter now than it had ever been since their arrival in Peculiar. Barely a wisp at all, she realized, glancing out among the broken limbs, piled on the opposite side of the cemetery. Tombstones shone out clearly—as did the old general store across the street. The world around her glistened brightly in the mid-morning sun, obscured by nothing. Even the stone wall—Claire swore she could see its most minute details, every different particle of color in the rocks. The world dripped, wet, melting. Muddy. As clear as Dr. Cain always swore the world looked behind a new pair of eyeglasses.