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my face broke into a grin too, the kind with teeth and
everything. A real, live grin.
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fourteen
I stood outside of Ella s door and tried to breathe.
But forcing breath into my lungs pinched, like they
were already filled up and sagging with lead, and my whole
body was too heavy for even one more breath of air.
When Grant drove me home yesterday, I tried to listen
to everything he was saying about working in the police
station, and how he could go through any files he wanted,
and how he d found out that Catie Spencer had gotten
arrested for a DUI right out of high school. But mostly I
just heard the timbre of his voice, the way it rolled over the
vowels like honey smothering biscuits. And his scent made
the whole car fill up with soap and wet earth. He smelled
clean and dirty at the same time.
But I did remember one thing he said to me.
When we pulled into the driveway, Grant turned to
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me and shifted his seatbelt.  When you go into her room,
look back the furthest you can, too, he d said.
 What do you mean?
 I just mean that sometimes you find clues from
when you knew her when she was little, and other ones
from when she was older. And then you can kind of stitch
them together. That s how most investigations work. The
successful ones, at least. He turned again and stared out
the windshield.  It s strange, but I think most people know
what s going to happen to their lives, right from the begin-
ning.
I thought about what Grant said as I touched Ella s
doorknob.
Had I known what was going to happen to my life,
right from the beginning?
In a way, I guess I always had. I d told Ella from the
time she was five that I was going to move to New York
one day, that I d have to leave her but I d come back to visit
sometimes.
I d kept my promise. I d come back. She was the one
that didn t stay.
I clutched the knob and reminded myself why I was
here.
I was here to find Ella.
I had to start in her room.
I sucked in a breath and pushed the door open.
When I opened my eyes, my heart slowed and my
body relaxed. I don t know what I d expected to find in
here, but it definitely wasn t anything like this.
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Paper stars and lightning bolts pinwheeled on their
wires above me, just like they used to every time I barged
through Ella s door. Rainbow twinkle lights still slithered
around the window, and Ella s gnarled afghan still sat in
a ball in the middle of her bed. It was like I d stepped
through a time warp and I was magically fifteen again, and
I didn t drink vodka in the corners of Manhattan, and I
used to spend my free time drawing in my sketchbook in
the cornfield.
But there were things that were different, too.
Between prints and drawings of dresses I d given Ella, a
bunch of new posters had cropped up. Some of these were
replicas of what I d drawn, except with quivering lines and
dress models with crooked smiles. Drawing was never Ella s
thing.
There were other ones, too. There was a map of Amble
tacked to her cork board, its edges yellow and fraying. And
next to that was a picture of Ella and a boy with shaggy
blonde hair that curled around his ears, and eyelids that
drooped over his eyes, like he was sleepy. He looked at
the camera out of the corner of his eye while he kissed her
temple. Ella still had the same twinkle in her eyes that I
remembered, but her smile was different. It wasn t a real
smile with teeth. What was left of her lips pressed together
in a line, with the corners turned up just a hitch. A shiny
pink scar tore across her face and crawled down her neck.
My stomach lurched.
Something pinged at the back of my brain and I
remembered: Ella s infectious giggle and mittens pressed
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against her lips and a boy this boy whispering in her
ear the night of the party. The night she was attacked.
I ran my finger over Ella s scarred mouth. What words
did she say to him about that night? What words could she
say to him?
I opened my palm and stared at the scar that cut across
my own skin. We both got our scars from someone else:
mine from Rae s selfishness, and hers from my mistake. It
always seems to work out like that, anyway; all the scars
we get are because someone hurt us enough to give them
to us.
Across from Ella s bed was another cork board, one
that I recognized from my old room. This one had a pic-
ture of a few stone-colored buildings littered across it, and
block letters that read  Welcome to Madison, Wisconsin!
And around the postcard, Ella had pinned a dozen knitted
birds, just like the one she d given me. They were all differ-
ent colors, some chocolate and some a splattering of reds
and purples, and another one that was black. But none of
them were periwinkle.
I turned and looked around the room. It reeked of
Ella, down to the half-painted wall behind her headboard,
probably because she d changed her mind halfway through.
But none of it felt any more special than it had two years
ago. Everything seemed zipped up tight, like Ella s cro-
cheted birds and faded photos would never tell me where
she was.
I left and the door clicked shut behind me.
Grant had said to start from the beginning, but it s
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hard to know where the beginning is when everything
orbits around you in circles.
I moved down the hallway and hopped over the loose
floorboard that always creaked. The last thing I wanted
was for Dad to think I was creeping around Ella s room,
looking for evidence of wolves. It d be just one more rea-
son for him to make a case to Mom to buy me a one-way
ticket back to New York.
I lay down on my bed and stared up at the faded ceil-
ing. How was I supposed to find a girl that didn t leave any
clues behind? No other notes, no messages.
There was a part of me that wondered if Ella would
have even told me about her trouble with the wolves, even
if she could. After all, I was in New York and hadn t been
invited back to visit. But if the wolves were still watching
her, hunting her, Ella would have wanted to tell someone.
Or at least, someone that believed her. But Rae was miss-
ing and I was absent, and she was stuck here, alone and
scared for her life. .
I sat up in bed and moved my hands over my eyes.
 I m so sorry, Ell, I choked.  I m listening now.
I waited. But, of course, nothing happened. Ella was
too far from Amble to hear me anymore. I smashed the
heels of my palms into my eyes to force back the tears col-
lecting there.
When I opened my eyes, I was looking at my old jew-
elry box.
Something tingled in my chest, and Ella s face flashed
in my mind. I saw her standing in front of me, breath hot
130
and curdling in the cold, her eyes filled with moonlight.
I m going through your jewelry, she said. And your make up. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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