Nevermore

probably using a cordless handset, she realized, and it made her wonder if he even owned a cell. “I don’t have to explain myself to you, of all people. Aside from the fact that you wouldn’t get it, you—”

“Hey,” she cut in. She’d had enough of his more-competent-than-thou condescending crap. If anyone went around thinking themselves superior, it was him. “Just because I live in the sunlight, enjoy being blond, and wear a cheerleading uniform, that doesn’t mean I’m stupid. I’m so sick of that.”

“Just because I wear black and keep a private journal, that doesn’t mean I’m going to blow up the school. Or terrorize mindless cheerleaders, for that matter.”

“You’re so mean.”

“Like you care.”

“What if I do?”

Isobel immediately covered her mouth with one hand; she could feel her cheeks growing hot beneath her palm. Where had that come from?

“You don’t,” he assured her. “You care about your fluffy pink ego.”

“That’s not true,” she said, walking to plop back down on the corner of her bed, frowning at the hem of her fluffy pink robe. She shut her eyes and ground her fingers into her forehead.

When had this gone all screwy? Hadn’t they been fine in the attic? What about the ice cream shop? Didn’t that count for something? “I didn’t know how else to tell you, is all.”

“Tell me what?”

“About the park.” She sighed, raking a hand through her damp hair. “Just—never mind. I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t really think it was you. I just didn’t want you to think I was crazy or something.”

“By telling me that someone chased you through the park and that I should confess? Crazy? No. Experiencing visions of grandeur? It’s possible.”

“I just thought it might be your idea of a joke or something. I couldn’t see them, whoever it was,” she said, her voice going small and weak, her conviction having since curled under like a withering plant.

“Well, as rousing as that sounds,” he said, “I was still at the bookshop an hour after you left. I should also let you know, by the way, that I pawned my invisibility cloak last week. You might want to check with the shop to see if someone bought it.”

“I just,” she began softly, “I just needed to tell somebody.”

The line went quiet again. She heard a crackle of movement. His voice lowered as he said, “Are you sure you didn’t just imagine it? I mean, you were reading right before you left.”

Did he think she was in kindergarten? “I know the difference between a story and reality. Besides, I heard voices, and the gate rattling behind me after I got out of the park.”

“And aside from the obvious choice that is me, you can’t think of anyone else?” His tone dripped sarcasm, and she didn’t have to guess to know who he meant.

“He wouldn’t,” she said.

“I can see there’s a lot you assume he wouldn’t do.”

To this, she remained silent.

“You didn’t see who it was at all?” he asked.

“No, that’s just the thing—”

“Hold on,” he said.

Isobel went quiet and listened. She could hear him moving around on the other end again, a door opening, and then a man’s voice.

“Varen, it’s nine,” the voice said. “No phone after nine. You know that.”

Uh, say what? He had a phone curfew? Horrors.

“Who is that? Who are you talking to?” asked the voice.

Isobel heard Varen mumble some kind of a response, though she couldn’t hear what he said because it sounded like the phone had been wrapped in cloth.

“Well, time to say good-bye,” the man’s voice said. “Tell them you’ll talk tomorrow.”

Isobel heard the shuffle of movement again, and then Varen’s voice returned.

“I gotta go,” he said.

“Okay. . . . Uh, I’ll see you at school tomorrow?”

Silence.

“Hello?”

“Yeah,” he said. “Sure.”

13 Watched

Isobel sat at the kitchen table, staring down into the floating bits of cereal in her breakfast bowl, feeling not unlike day-old roadkill—soggy, drained, and flattened. She was achy and congested, too; like little magic bunnies had visited her sometime during the whole four hours she’d slept and stuffed her head full of wet cotton. Every noise—the clank of dishes in the kitchen sink, the shuffle of footsteps in the hall, the crinkle of her dad’s newspaper—sounded as though it was coming from somewhere deep underground.

She glanced up from the table, chewing, and squinted down the hallway, to where Danny’s backpack lay beside the umbrella stand. Vaguely she wondered what she’d done with her own. Then she remembered.

Isobel dropped her spoon. It clanged loudly against her bowl.

She launched up from her seat.

“Isobel?” her dad asked from the other end of the table. She didn’t bother to answer. She raced down the hall, then burst through the front door.

The morning air hit her cold, its moisture flooding her lungs, reawakening all the pangs from last night. A deep ache seeped from her bones and resurfaced in her muscles as she forced herself to move. Wet grass whipped at the hems of her jeans.

Oh, please, be okay. Please be okay!

In the grass—it was still there. Thank God.

Isobel ran to crouch beside her backpack. It was covered in a spray of dew, the nylon wet but not drenched. Fingers anxious and fumbling, Isobel pulled open the zippers, pried the bag open. Fixing her hands on The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe, she drew the book carefully out, turning it over in her grasp, feeling along the spine. She inspected the pages. It felt dry. It felt whole. She breathed a sigh of relief.

Isobel jerked the zippers closed. That was when she noticed the glittery goop on the front of the bag, right under her embroidered initials. Her eyes narrowed, following the trail of glitter that led up to her heart-shaped key- chain watch.

“Oh, no,” she moaned, picking the silver watch up with her fingertips. The glass in the middle, right over the face of the watch, had shattered, leaking decorative pink glitter goo from inside onto the face of the watch and down the front of her bag, like fairy guts. She must have broken it when she’d slammed her bag down last night, the weight of the book crushing her watch.

Isobel unclipped the watch from her bag and held it in her palm.

She stood, pulling her backpack onto one shoulder with her free arm while staring down at the broken trinket in her hand. She walked slowly back inside the house and dumped her bag by the front door, then wandered into the kitchen, where she slumped once more into her chair.

“What’ve you got there?” her dad asked, not bothering to fold down his paper.

“My watch. It’s broken.”

“Ohhh,” he said, “I’m sorry, sweetheart.”

“Yeah,” she muttered, setting the watch aside on her place mat. She picked up her spoon and prodded her cereal.

“Well,” Danny said from his end of the table, half the milk in his spoonful of Lucky Charms sloshing back into