Envy

“All right. Good night.”

Taylor grabbed her favorite fuzzy yellow robe, stuck her feet into her fleece-lined slippers, and padded down the hall. She could hear her dad snoring and the insufferable wall clock ticking. It was after 1:00 a.m. Even though they were twins, Taylor didn’t require as much sleep as her sister. She was a night owl. The darkness, the calming quiet, the sense of being alone resonated in her soul in a way that even Hayley didn’t understand. From the base of the staircase, she looked out the frontdoor window at the bay.

The water was still, glass, and very sad.

Taylor conjured up some memories of Katelyn and the last time she had seen her. They were riding the bus home the Friday before the holiday break. Katelyn sat in the front, her head leaning against the fogged-up window. In the din of the kids yammering about their holiday plans, Taylor remembered how she had tried to say hello to Katelyn but the other kids pushed her past her seat. They had locked eyes for only a second and Katelyn managed a smile.

A sad smile, Taylor remembered just then, though she wondered if her memory had been tainted by what happened on Christmas night. Her father told her that nothing turns a victim into a saint faster than his or her untimely and unexpected demise. After a crime took place, good and evil were always rendered in bold strokes.

She pulled the old, battered Scrabble game from the shelf and sat on the floor. The embers from the fire glowed eerily, and the warmth felt good. She quietly fished out the letters and arranged them on the carpet.

Taylor clamped down her eyelids to shut out the ideas that she’d had about what words could be formed with the Scrabble tiles and what words she believed Katelyn might have wanted her to grasp. She and her sister didn’t consider that they actually spoke to the dead—they merely felt that they could read an imprint of a moment left behind by those who crossed over. Although it was tougher to do, they could sometimes gauge the thoughts and feelings of those who were still among the living. The living were always tougher than the dead. She and her sister didn’t know why for sure, but they agreed that perhaps it was because the breathing still had reason for lies and subterfuge. The dead, well, they just didn’t have anything left to lose.

When Taylor opened her eyes, she found herself drawn to the word SELF. It was as if there was a pulsating energy in the word. The others, not so much. Next, she pushed all the words together and ran her hand across their smooth surfaces, mixing them without rolling them over.

“Talk to me, Katie,” she said softly. “Tell me.”

The Word YOUR pulsed from the mix. She studied the letter tiles spelling out YOURSELF

Taylor closed her eyes again, and without any consideration for what she was doing, she smoothed out the tiles.

Her eyes popped open and the word FAVOR seemed to leap up at her. She set it next to YOURSELF

She shut her eyes and tried again, but nothing. Why is this so hard? She closed her eyes once more, unaware that her sister had just entered the room.

“Taylor?” Hayley asked.

Taylor looked up, startled. “Geez, Hayley! Thanks for the warning.”

“You should have dragged my butt out of bed.”

“Your butt’s too big to drag,” Taylor said.

Hayley sat on the floor, facing her sister. “That means yours is too. We have the same butt, remember?”

“Don’t remind me,” Taylor said. “I see it every time you walk in front of me.”

Hayley dropped the butt talk. She studied the letter tiles spelling out YOURSELF and FAVOR. “That’s all you’ve got?”

“Yeah, I guess that’s why you’re here now. Give it a try.”

Hayley closed her eyes and ran her fingers over the game pieces. When she opened them, she immediately saw the word WORLD

“I feel something about that too,” Taylor said, moving the tiles next to FAVOR and YOURSELF

In the remaining letters—L I K L A H T E D O—Hayley saw the words HATE and KATE, but, while they seemed to play into the events of what happened to Katelyn, they didn’t seem right.

She reached for the last of the wooden tiles and slowly moved them to spell KILL.

Without saying another word, Taylor arranged the remaining game pieces to spell out: DO THE WORLD A FAVOR KILL YOURSELF.

She looked up at Hayley. Even in the dim light of the living room, it was clear to see that the color had left her face.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Taylor asked, tears coming to her eyes. She hated when she reacted like that, but she couldn’t help it.

“You already know I am thinking it,” Hayley said.

Taylor rubbed her eyes dry with the sleeve of her robe.

“Someone wanted Katelyn to kill herself,” she said.

Hayley started to gather up the pieces of the game, a game that would never, ever seem like fun again.

“Who would want that?” Taylor asked.

The sisters started toward the narrow staircase, lowering their voices to a whisper as they walked.

“Someone with a very black heart, that’s for sure,” Hayley said. Taylor nodded. “Someone we’re going to find.”

“And we will make them pay,” Hayley whispered. “Big time.”

It wasn’t a threat, but more of a promise. All lives have a purpose. Taylor and Hayley Ryan knew whatever gifts they’d been given were powerful and they intended to use them for the right side.

For Katie.

chapter 29

THE NEXT MORNING, HAYLEY FOUND THEIR FATHER in his office writing and drinking coffee, which, judging by the dark ring at the mug’s midpoint, she was sure was left over from the previous day. Kevin Ryan was on a don’t-disturb-I’m-in-the-homestretch-of-something-reallyreally-important work jag. It was Groundhog Day, and all indications were that this exact scene would be repeated until he was done.

“Got a minute?” she asked.

Kevin swiveled his office chair to face her. He hadn’t shaved for two days and he was of the age where stubble wasn’t cool, where it looked more bum than stud.

Not that thinking of her father in that way would ever cross Hayley’s mind.

“What up?” he asked.

Hayley hated when he talked like that, but this wasn’t the time for a coaching session on which colloquial phrases were really in and which were used only on beer commercials written by completely unhip advertising copywriters.

“Dad,” Hayley said, framing a lie, a small but necessary one, “I was reading about a case in Nebraska or Nevada about a woman who committed suicide because her husband said she was fat.”

“I haven’t seen that story,” he said, glancing over at his idled keyboard.

“I saw it online,” she went on. “The husband kept calling her names, leaving her bags of food with nasty notes.”

“He sounds like a pig,” he said.

“You don’t know the half of it. Well, I’ve been wondering about him. I mean, can he be held liable for it?”

“I don’t think so.” Kevin slid his computer glasses down the bridge of his nose. “He mostly has to live with himself for being an ass.”

“Isn’t it like someone yelling fire in a crowded theater? You know, and causing someone to get trampled to death?”

“Not really. I mean, even if she were unstable and fat and he merely taunted her, that wouldn’t mean he was responsible. After all, the woman in Nebraska or Nevada—”