“And when were you going to tell us about this boy?” Mrs. Collins asked angrily.
“We haven’t even met. We were just chatting. It was no big deal.”
“Apparently, it was,” her mother said. “The police were here. You didn’t even bother to tell us you’d broken up with Dale.”
“So?” Mandy asked. “What does that have to do with anything?”
Her mother shot a quick glance at her father, who had said little up to that point. His sturdy round face wore an expression of disappointment and disgust, and Mrs. Collins gave him the floor.
“Mandy,” he said, scratching the day’s growth of stubble on his chin. “If we don’t know what’s going on in your life, we can’t really do our jobs. I’d say we’ve given you plenty of room. We don’t ask a lot of questions or make a lot of rules. But that’s going to have to change now.”
“Dad,” Mandy said. “Dale and I are supposed to…”
“I’m speaking,” he warned, his voice low and controlled. “You’re nearly an adult. Pretty soon, you’ll be out on your own making a lot of the same mistakes your mother and I did when we were your age. But until then, it is our job to protect you, which means knowing what’s going on in your life. After dinner, I want you to run up and get me your cell phone. I’m going to have to change the number anyway, apparently. You’ll get it back in two weeks. Until then, you’re grounded.”
“Dad!” Mandy said. “You can’t punish me for being a victim.”
“You’re not a victim, and we aren’t going to let you be one,” her mother said, nearly in tears. “We are not going to go through what Nicolette’s parents went through. We are not going to wait while the police search for your body. We are not going to stand up on a stage and cry our hearts out because we were so afraid our little girl would hate us that we didn’t protect her. I don’t want you on that cell phone, and I don’t want you online.”
“So, I’m just supposed to ignore my friends for two weeks?”
“They can visit you here,” her father said. “You can use the house phone. That’s it.”
“I don’t believe this.”
“After dinner, I’m going to call Officer Romero and see if there are any other precautions we should be taking. I’m pretty pissed off she didn’t bother to call us. Also, if you have a picture of this man, we want to see it.”
“…and, it’s like I already turned the phone off and shut the computer down,” Mandy told Laurel over the clunky plastic phone her dad installed in her room. “I’m not stupid, but God, to forbid me from going online for two weeks? I’ll have like a billion e-mails.”
“Don’t tell my dad, or we’ll both be land-locked.”
“They’d better catch this ass.”
“Did he really say he was going to cut you?”
“Yes.”
“And he mentioned Nicki?”
“Yes.”
“Then you better do what you’re told,” Laurel said. “And I’m thinking that after my target practice tomorrow, I ought to swing by your place with a present.”
“The gun?”
“That’s right.”
“No way,” Mandy said. “I don’t even know how to work one.”
“It’s easy. You shoot the fast thing into the slow thing.”
“Uh…no. Thanks. My dad’s already been climbing up Officer Romero’s butt, so now we have a police car cruising our block.”
“Are they hotties?”
“Laurel!”
“I’m just playin’. Look, five-oh has this guy’s stats. These days, it takes like two minutes to trace that kind of info. It’s probably just some clown with a tiny unit looking for giggles, but you just don’t know, right? I’m not usually down with parental guidance. This time, I say let ’em lead. Lie low. It’ll probably all be over tomorrow.”
“I hope so.”
14
Mandy didn’t sleep well. How could she? As she lay in bed, her mind was filled with rambling voices and frightening lines of text.
What if I want 2 hurt u?…When I slice open your belly and stick my hands inside, I’m sure you’ll feel very warm. Nicki didn’t think so either, but I think it’s hilarious. Hahaha…CUL8R.
She pictured the Witchman, threats spilling from his thin lips like a black cloud. His cackling laugh cut through her mind. Kyle appeared, looking older and cruel, saluting her with a palm stretched over wild animal eyes. Every car that rolled down the street, every rustle of bush and whisper of wind outside was Kyle coming for her. A board creaked in the hallway, and Mandy’s heart leaped into her throat before she heard her mother’s voice, speaking quietly to her father. When sleep came, she dreamed of the terrible wooded place where the Witchman stalked her and kids sat at misty computers, typing, always typing. Then he was in her room. He crouched like a gargoyle on the end of her bed, his black coat pooling over her comforter like a bloodstain. Motionless, he hunched on the covers with his beaklike nose and his pointed chin. His eyes were as narrow as slits.
Mandy thought she woke up then, but the monitor of her computer glowed like a ghostly window. It must be part of the dream. It had to be. Mandy squeezed her eyes closed in terror. When she opened them again, the screen was dark.
She was awake when the dawn came. Grim light filtered through her bedroom window, which suddenly reminded her of a giant computer screen. Groggy, she rolled over and stared at the nightstand, the clunky phone atop it.
Mandy began to cry. The tears came out of nowhere, scaring her with their intensity. She felt totally cut off and alone. She covered her face and let the tears come, let the stinging tears burn her eyes and cheeks. This wasn’t real. She hadn’t done anything wrong.
“I didn’t do anything,” she whimpered into her palms. Then something Laurel said pounded loudly in her head.
Life couldn’t be that random, Mandy thought. It just couldn’t. If it were, then she would never be safe, not truly safe. And again, Laurel’s words were there to knock away her protest with a harsh philosophy, one directed at Drew during Nicki’s candlelight vigil.
“No, it’s not,” Mandy said, sniffling loudly. She took her hands from her eyes, wiped the tears away. She wasn’t going to be just another victim, another yearbook photo for the nightly news anchor to pretend to care about. Determined to protect herself, Mandy scrubbed the remainder of her tears away and sat up in the bed.
Across the room, her monitor glowed. Suddenly, icons began to pop up on her wallpaper.
“Oh God,” she whispered before running from the room.
Mandy sat with a cup of coffee, her back to the only wall in the kitchen that didn’t have windows. When she heard her parents walking down the stairs, she lifted the knife from the table and returned it to the holder on the counter. She thought of the gun Laurel had offered, wishing she’d said yes, but knew the knife would have to do for now. She’d sneak it upstairs later once her parents were busy. Her parents greeted her with sleepy “mornings” and
