White Space

Right. She almost let out a giddy laugh. The cat, I remember that. She was freaked out, that was all. Who wouldn’t be? After the carnage in the cafeteria, where the pimply guy with the dweeb hairnet in the serving line, Victor, suddenly howled and sprouted claws … who wouldn’t be spooked? Worry about this later. Just move, get out!

“Yes,” she said. “Right outside. We better get going.”

“Wait.” The boy was clutching Tania’s shotgun in one hand and now shucked in a shell, the pump making a loud, echoing, ratcheting, insectile sound. “Tania … Tania?” When the girl dragged up her head to look at him, the boy said, “How many shells are in the shotgun? Do you know? How many shots did you take?”

“T-two,” Tania said, then shook her head and moistened her lips. “N-no. Three, I … I th-think. I d-don’t know.”

“All right. It’s okay.” To Rima: “Let me go first, all right? Just in case. You take care of your friend.” Without waiting for her to agree, the boy turned and hurried up the center aisle.

“Come on, Tania. We’re almost out. Just hang on.” Threading an arm around the moaning girl, Rima staggered after the boy. Leaning so heavily against her that Rima was practically carrying her, Tania stumbled along, nearly doubled over with pain. Ahead, at the front entrance, Rima saw the boy put up a hand and then slide to the open front door. “Anything?” she whispered.

“No. Here, she’s too heavy for you. Let me help.” Darting back, the boy grabbed Tania’s other arm and took most of the girl’s weight. “She’ll fall otherwise.”

“Thanks.” And then Rima blurted, “I’m sorry. I don’t know who you are. I don’t remember your name. Isn’t that weird? I think I knew, but now …”

“I’m Casey.” The boy’s voice was calm, which surprised her, because his eyes, their color, were so strange: stormy and indefinite, as if they hadn’t quite settled in his face just yet. “It’s okay, Rima. We’ve had a really rough night so far.”

“Yeah?” Rima tried a shaky smile. “Feels like it’s been pretty bad.”

“And then some.” A brief smile flickered over the boy’s lips. “Come on.”

With Tania lurching between them, they wobbled outside and over the snow in an ungainly jog. At the sight of the blocky orange snowcat only a short distance away, Rima felt the cobwebs of uncertainty in her mind being swept away by relief. I know this. I recognize this. She also knew that there were two distinct parts to the vehicle: a glassed-in, two-seater forward cabin for the driver and a larger passenger cabin just behind that, like a smaller version of a semi-tractor trailer.

Turning to the boy—no, Casey; he’s Casey—she said, “Let’s take Tania around back. There’s a door there and more room for her to lie …”

There came a sudden hard bang, not the blast of a shotgun but the slam of stout wood against brick. With a jump of alarm, Rima turned and saw a dark blur—something with a head and arms, a swirling black torso—storming, insanely fast, from the church. In the blink of an eye and before she even had a chance to pull in a breath, the thing was there, right on top of them, looming over Casey, who was only just now beginning to turn, and there was no time to get to the snowcat, no time!

“Casey!” Rima shouted. “Casey, look out!”

EMMA Find Your Story

“A PIECE.” EMMA stared. “A piece of what?”

“A piece of me,” Lizzie said. “I’ve been trying to pull you closer … gosh, forever. It’s way harder to grab someone who’s popped right off the page than you think.”

“What?” She felt the burn of a scream trapped somewhere in her chest. “You,” she said to the little girl, “are nuts. What are you talking about? That’s just an expression. All I want is to wake up and fall out of this blink into my life. I want you to get House to let me go.” As soon as she said that, she thought, Okay, that sounds pretty crazy, too.

“This isn’t a dream, or even a blink. I wish it were. It would be easier, maybe.” Lizzie looked suddenly … tired? No. For a brief second, her outlines seemed to glimmer, her eyes to actually … smoke, and Emma thought, Oh holy shit. But then the moment passed, and Lizzie was only a little girl with shock-trauma eyes: a kid who’d seen and been through too much. Like Emma, come to think of it. She didn’t like looking at the few pictures of herself before Jasper had the doctors surgerize her brain and repair her head and face. It always felt as if that little girl was a freak, a clay doll badly in need of molding, caught halfway between a formless nothing and something only vaguely human.

“I don’t know any other way to explain it,” Lizzie said, her cobalt eyes so dark and shadowy and haunted, they’d have been at home in an X-Files episode. “You’re a piece. Part of me is in you, like your eyes.”