The Hidden

Chapter Fifteen. MORE THAN FEAR

The common people regarded it with a mixture of respect and superstition … -“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”

Caspian still hadn’t woken up by the time I had to go to school the next morning, and I hated leaving him behind. I made a quick call to Sophie, and she assured me that she’d stop over to chat with Mom and keep an eye on things. I felt a little bit of relief knowing that at least she’d be there if he woke up.

I spent most of the day thinking about Abbey’s Hollow, and the fact that I’d been handed my dreams on a silver platter, yet I wasn’t going to live long enough to see them come true. It wasn’t until Mrs. Marks called on me in English class to read part of a poem that I was jerked out of my contemplative mood.

I stood up, clearing my throat. As my eyes filtered over the page in front of me, bits and pieces started to assemble themselves into images inside my brain, and I noticed the beautiful flow and rhythm the poem had. Then I really began to notice the words.

We are the hidden people

lost and in between.

So much of none

yet still, begun.

Shadows draped upon our walls.

We are the hidden people,

and when you think the end has come

you’ll turn and see.

There are none.

We are the hidden.

People.

All one.

For hidden you will become.

Something more than fear,

it resides here.

As Mrs. Marks asked the class questions about who the poet might have been talking about, all I could hear were the words “We are the hidden people,” and I thought about what that meant. Thought about it in a whole new way.

The poem was about me. About what I was going to become.

Shades were the hidden people. The other half. Living in the shadows. Part of this world and the next. Here, but not here. And I understood that, in a way no one else could.

As the bell rang, I couldn’t get it out of my head. Something more than fear, it resides here.

Was I afraid? Yes. And no. But I was special. Unique. My gift was to be one of the hidden people.

It was who I was meant to be.

Beth caught up with me after class and pulled me back into the present. “You ready to do this thing?” she called, coming down the hallway from the opposite direction. “I have my mom’s car.”

“What thing?”

“Shopping? For the Hollow Ball? Today’s Wednesday.”

“Um, yeah.” I wasn’t crazy about the idea of not going home to be with Caspian, but Sophie still hadn’t called my cell. Which meant that he hadn’t woken up yet. “Sure. Just let me dump my books off at my locker. I don’t have any homework that can’t wait until tomorrow.”

She came over and waited beside me.

“Any ideas where we should go?” I asked.

“There’s this specialty dress store in Jersey,” she said, giving me an arched look. “I know. Jersey, right? But I have a friend who swears by it. Says they have the best designer stuff for half the price. They probably get it after it falls off a truck, but, hey. I’m not going to complain.”

“We’ll probably be gone all afternoon, right?”

“Uh, yeah. Why? Do you have an afternoon curfew?” Beth laughed.

I smiled weakly at her. “No, no. Just want to make sure my mom doesn’t call and bug me about it, like, a million times. No big.”

“Okay. Let’s go, then.” She clapped her hands together.

I crammed my books into my locker and then followed her outside. A dusty blue Chevy was sitting by the curb, and we got in. Beth turned up the heat as we drove away from the school, and she started talking about Lewis right away.

We headed away from Sleepy Hollow and across the Tappan Zee Bridge. I stretched my legs out in front of me and shifted in my seat. Already I was wondering if Caspian was okay. What if he was asleep for too long? What if this time he didn’t wake up?

“… and then he said that I should just go with Grant if that made me happy. Ugh. Boys.”

Beth glanced over at me, waiting for me to say something.

But I’d zoned out completely.

“Are you daydreaming, Abbey?” she said with a little smile. “You know, there’s a cure for that. … A hot boy. I mean, a hot guy. Forget boys. Who needs ’em?”

I smiled back.

“Do we need to go cruising for some hotties?” she asked. “We can still crash the beach house for a weekend. Granted, it’s the off-season, but you never know when a cute lifeguard in training might show up or something.”

I laughed. “No. We don’t need to go pick up a lifeguard hottie. Although, I appreciate your willingness to help me out on that one.”

“It’s the thought that counts.”

I remembered those words coming from someone else. Caspian had said them to me once. I glanced away, out the window. A pickup truck passed us on the right, with two guys in the front seat. They were keeping pace with us, and Beth noticed.

“That driver is kind of cute,” she said. Leaning over, she smiled flirtatiously at them. The driver honked his horn, and his passenger did some sort of hand motion that either meant Call me or Give me more. I couldn’t tell which.

“Keep us on the road, Beth,” I said with a grin when she kept looking at them.

“You never know. Those could be our Hollow Ball dates.”

The truck edged forward, the driver holding up a sheet of paper next to his window with a phone number scribbled on it. Hey, hotie, textt me, it said.

I burst out laughing as Beth made a face. “At least we know they can spell,” I said to her. She stepped on the gas, blowing past them with a smile, and her laughter filled the car.

“Oh, well. Guess neither one of them was Prince Charming after all.”

We came to a ramp and slowed down, pulling off at exit twenty-four. The road went through a little town with a speed limit of thirty-five, which Beth had a hard time staying at, and we bumped along the way. The town was one giant pothole.

“We’re looking for Denim Street,” Beth said, keeping an eye on street signs. “How fitting.”