The Evil Within (3 page)

I DIDN’T SLEEP all night. I sat in my bed, breathing too hard, avoiding the dresser mirror. And the bathroom mirror. And any shiny object in our house that might cast a reflection. I didn’t want to see Celia. I didn’t know how the possession worked—if that cold feeling on the back of my neck meant she was taking me over, or if she was somehow inside me all the time. I didn’t know if there were other times she possessed me that I was unaware of. I wondered if other people who got labeled as crazy were actually possessed, like back in the Middle Ages—possessed by ghosts.

The next day I went through the motions of Christmas—the presents, the dinner—forcing myself to stay calm, even though I was becoming more and more afraid that I would do or say something crazy, the way I had in the theater. No one seemed to notice how exhausted and edgy I was. Over the summer, I had knitted CJ and my father matching Aran sweaters—nubby Aran wool, one very petite for CJ, and the other long, with long arms, for my gangly dad—and it struck me how much I used to love to knit, and how I never did it anymore. My redheaded seven-year-old stepbrother Sam was over the moon with the vast additions to his Lego empire. My parents heaved a sigh of relief that Tom, who was nine, very tall, very thin, was content with more games for his Wii—they had been afraid he was going to ask Santa for a new game system.

They’re just things
, I wanted to tell them.
Things won’t keep the monsters away.

Exactly at seven, just as we’d cleared dinner, Troy pulled up in his vintage T-bird. My Dad and CJ had given permission for him to come over; maybe they sensed that my reunion with Heather had not gone very well, and they wanted me to have someone my own age to spend Christmas with.

He must have driven the car down from Lakewood, his private boys’ prep school across the lake from my all-girl school, and it was clean and shiny, like a Christmas ornament; my dad couldn’t keep away from it. CJ was startled by how great-looking Troy was, turning to me when Troy was out of the room, raising her brows and fluttering her lashes. He was tall, with soft, chestnut-brown hair that curled around his ears, and the darkest, deepest blue eyes I had ever seen. He wore a navy blue hoodie, a San Diego Padres T-shirt, and jeans, but even in his regular-person clothes there was something about him, some kind of polish, that revealed just how wealthy he was.

“So you live in La Jolla,” CJ said.

“We have a house there,” Troy replied, and I wondered if CJ understood what he was really saying. How many months out of the year did you have to stay in a house to qualify as “living” in it? How many houses did the Minears own?

“Look at the sweaters Lindsay made for us,” she added, posing a little.

“Nice,” Troy said sincerely. “My mom knits.”

I wasn’t sure if I liked having the same hobby as his mother, but he was so charming when he said it that I decided I didn’t care. I’d thought I would be embarrassed when he saw our little house, but he seemed so happy to see me that I let it go.

“So, that T-bird,” my dad piped up, leaning his elbows on the fake wood counter of our breakfast bar. The overhead lights gleamed on his semi-bald head. Troy’s brown hair was thick and shiny. “Sixty-eight?”

“Yup,” Troy said.

“Floating Caliper brakes?”

Troy nodded, and my dad whistled. “
And
a 390 Special V-8,” Troy added.

“Oh,
man
.” My dad groaned and looked at CJ and me. “Sixtyeight was the last year for the 390.”

“Dang,” I said.

“They were right to stop using it,” Troy said. “My car’s really heavy. My gas mileage is a joke.”

My dad’s face softened, as if he were looking at a younger version of himself. Or at his younger self’s dreams, maybe. “I had big plans for a ’70 Mustang. Got too busy, though.”

Too busy taking care of my mom. I remembered when he’d had the Mustang towed home and he had begun work on it. A year into her illness, he’d sold it to some guy who knew our next-door neighbors, the Hansens.

“Well, I’m sure you two want to catch up,” CJ said, giving my dad a pat. He got the hint and they headed for the living room.

I took Troy to the backyard for some privacy. We bounded into the darkness, me avoiding the pool, and threw our arms around each other. We kissed, hard, and it was like body surfing at high tide—shocking and wonderful, thrilling, a little scary. My knees gave way but he held me so tightly he wouldn’t have been able to tell. He was alive. And he was here. I rode the waves of joy and relief, pressing myself against him. We clung to each other, fingers moving tentatively, exploring, believing. I wanted to kiss him for years.

“Oh, Troy,” I said, and then I was sobbing, hard, and he reached around the back of my head and eased my face against his chest. He leaned his chin on the crown of my head and stroked my hair, soothing me, letting me finally get it out. I’d had no one to talk to, no one to hold me while I cried until I couldn’t cry anymore.

Finally, I shuddered against his chest, and pulled away slightly. He tipped back my head and studied my face.

“Sorry,” I gritted. “I actually
am
glad to see you.”

“I’ve had nightmares, too,” he said, smiling sadly.

I widened my swollen eyes. “You
have
?”

He nodded. “I keep seeing Kiyoko. The way we found her.” He had found me wandering in my pajamas on the shore; I had lost time, and I still wondered if I had seen Kiyoko die.

He took my hand and led me to the chaise lounge beside the pool. I glanced in, but Celia wasn’t there. Maybe she was gone. Or just dormant, like a volcano. Maybe I would survive all this—at least it was a good sign that my snarky side seemed to be rising from the dead.

“You must be a wreck,” he said, as we both sat down. “First semester at boarding school, and seeing her like that . . . ” He trailed off. “Julie said you were going through some tough times.”

From the way he said it, I was pretty sure he knew I’d had a nervous breakdown before I’d gone to Marlwood. But I wasn’t positive, so I didn’t respond, just let the warmth of his body heat seep into my fear. He began playing with my fingers, pushing against the tips of them with the tips of his, and I smiled a little.

“Your dad’s a car freak. Like me.”

“Cars are cars,” I retorted.

“Not my T-bird.” He pushed harder on my fingers. “You should know. You’ve ridden in it.” The way he said it sounded very sexy. A bunch of us had crammed into his car after Julie hurt herself during one of Mandy Winters’ stupid pranks. Troy had offered to get us back to our dorm in the same car.

I was
not
going to think about Mandy tonight.

“Maybe I was a little distracted,” I allowed.

“You need to give it another shot.” He blinked, and grinned. “Drive back with me to Marlwood.”

Whoa.
I couldn’t even breathe now.

“We deserve it,” he said, “after what we’ve been through.” He leaned toward me and raised his brows. His smile was sweet, cute.

The porch light flicked on and the sliding glass door opened. My dad poked out his head. “Hey, kids, we’re going to play Monopoly. Want to join us?”

I knew that was my dad’s subtle way of asking me to be with the family again. Troy moved his shoulders
what the heck?
and nodded.

“I’m in,” Troy said.

“Sure,” I called to my father. Then to Troy, I said, “My parents would probably say no.” To driving back to Marlwood with him, I meant.

“We have some time to convince them,” Troy replied, smiling his model-charming smile.

TROY CAME OVER the next day, and he made himself at home. Everyone liked him. It was as if he’d been around for a long time, as if he had absorbed our daily routine by osmosis—he got CJ a cup of coffee and he watched cartoons with my little stepbrothers. CJ told him a little bit about her divorce—things I’d never heard—and my dad yakked on about his computer engineering job until I got embarrassed by his obsessiveness and tried to change the subject. But Troy wanted to hear more, as if Java applets were his life.

Everyone started teasing me as soon as he left. Tom started doing the K-I-S-S-I-N-G chant and Sam mimicked him, screeching with demonic glee because at seven, you think anything that rhymes and makes your stepsister blush is hysterical. My father kept calling Troy “Linz’s beau.” CJ told me Troy had great manners.

The day after that, Troy came much earlier, bearing late Christmas gifts for us—some homemade peanut brittle and the San Diego version of Monopoly. When we were alone, he handed me a beautiful card of a full moon trimming the waves of the ocean with silver.

Dear Lindsay,

A donation has been made in your honor to the Surfrider Foundation
.

“Thanks,” I said. “This is amazing. No one’s ever done anything like that for me.”

“And . . . ” He reached into his pocket and handed me a small box. Jewelry, I knew. I opened it. It was a black crocheted silk necklace decorated with a silver crescent moon.

“Oh, it’s so beautiful,” I murmured. My cheeks went hot. Jewelry from a guy was so special and personal. Jewelry from Troy was beyond anything I had ever received. I hadn’t bought him anything. I would make it up to him some other way.

“I hope it’s not too goth,” he said.

“No, I love it.” And I did. It was different, kind of edgy. I wondered if he had picked it out because the crocheted silk reminded him of my knitting.

“Let me put it on you. Lift your hair.”

I put the silk chain up to my neck, then lowered my head and closed my eyes as he fastened the clasp. His fingertips lingered on the nape of my neck and then he bent down and kissed me there, once; and then he kissed my earlobe.

“It looks good on you,” he said. “Really good. Merry Christmas, Lindsay.”

“Merry Christmas, Troy.” And I kissed him to show him that I meant it.

By ten at night, my parents had agreed to let us drive back to school together. They were actually relieved; our Subaru was in need of major repairs and CJ’s old pre-marriage Camry was in even worse shape. They told me that they trusted Troy and me. It would take eight to ten hours straight to drive depending on traffic, then at least two more up the winding road to my school. Alone all that time . . . were they nuts?

I was amazed, but Troy wasn’t. “Parents like me,” he said. He wasn’t bragging or being devious. It was a statement of fact. Some people have charisma like that. Jane had it. Mandy Winters had it too.

I promised myself I wasn’t going to think about Mandy anymore for the rest of the break. I touched my necklace to remind myself that Troy had spent Christmas with me, not her. She was his ex. I was his current . . . or so I hoped.

The fourth day after Christmas, my true love’s family left to spend New Year’s in Cabo San Lucas, down in Mexico, and I was by myself with my family again, and my loneliness . . . and Celia.

It was almost as if as soon as Troy was gone, Celia got back to the business of making my life miserable. The next eight nights were filled with a mind-crushing mash-up of her nightmares and my own night terrors: I was sharing the bad dreams of a ghost. And I would keep sharing them unless I went to Marlwood, and got rid of her. How, I didn’t know. Yet. In these nightmares it was never clear what I had to do exactly in order to help Celia, to free her, but I knew I had to put her to rest somehow. As soon as I figured it out, I’d make sure my Marlwood friends were safe, too; and then leave again, and never go back to Marlwood, ever. That was the promise I made to myself, to stop from completely losing my mind.

I talked to Julie on my cell a couple of times, and texted a few more. It was obvious that she didn’t remember a thing about the night I had almost died. She thought all the bruises and scratches she’d found on her arms and legs the morning after were from getting way too drunk—a blackout binge she had no memory of. In her fifteen-year-old world, blackout drinking should have been cause for significantly more alarm than I heard in her voice. Marlwood had changed her, too, and not for the better.

I was so sleep-deprived by the end of vacation that I slogged through each hour as if I were dragging Celia’s body around, like she was part of the jumble of things I was cramming into my luggage. I cried silently as I packed, holding back a confession as my stepmother got another suitcase out of the garage to hold all my new loot.
It was crazy there. It was evil
, I wanted to tell her.
I tried to stop it, but I failed.

Heather didn’t call. Neither did Riley.

I wanted to hate Celia for possessing me. But I had pulled her into myself by accident, on my very first day at Marlwood; and now that she was here, she couldn’t leave, not until she was at peace. Not until we had returned to Marlwood, and put her to rest.

On the last evening of break, I finished packing all my Christmas clothes, pretending to my family that I couldn’t wait to leave. But watching the clock the next morning, I felt like a condemned criminal, counting off the minutes and seconds until it was seven thirty, and time to go. I played with my crescent moon as if it were a magic amulet that could ward off evil. It was a reminder that good things could happen.