Page 2 of Dead End

It was a love-hate relationship that I wished would just disappear. Damn feelings always rushed to the surface and stuck to you like a bad case of a rash.

I chose not to respond. It would only give them more ammunition against me. I’d learned halfway into senior year that the best way to deal with my former best friends was to ignore the jabs until eventually they got bored. Unfortunately, they hadn’t grown bored, but in just a couple more months, I’d never have to see them again. The thought was kind of depressing, and I hated that feeling of wanting something you shouldn’t.

The others laughed. Jason was standing there, too, his steely, cold eyes alight with mischief. Freddy and Norman were right behind them—the devil twins, as I liked to call them. They were the polar opposites of one another. Freddy had shoulder-length golden hair, looking like a sun-kissed surfer, and Norman had cropped black hair, pale as moonlight skin, and razor-sharp cheekbones, but it was their eyes that were the same. A beautiful green that seemed to change different shades depending on their mood.

They’d been the top dogs at our old high school. Popular, loved, and idolized. All of them had been on the varsity basketball team—the team I used to cheer for on the sidelines. Freddy and Norman also happened to live down the street from me in the small town of Sunset Hollow, and we’d been close since we were kids. Close might’ve even been an understatement for what we were. We’d been inseparable for years, and slowly, feelings had started to develop on both sides. Until recently.

I suppose it was sort of my fault for the rift between us. In fact, it would be a bold-faced lie to claim otherwise. The whole thing was my fault. They’d tried to console me after the accident that took my parents. They’d tried to seek me out, but I turned them away every single time. Little did they know what actually happened that night on that lonely country road. It scares me even now. Haunted me. There was a reason I turned my back on them.

They told me I was different now. Weird. Too strange for them to accept. When I showed up at school on the first day of senior year, decked out head to toe in black, with my hair a natural dark red, and my lips painted onyx, they let me know exactly how they felt about it.

Every day of this past year had been a walking nightmare. Taunting jabs, pranks, and horrible cruelty had followed me everywhere, and they’d convinced the rest of the student body to play along. That was my life for a whole year. But it was better than pretending to be a robot. It was better than pretending nothing had happened. That was what people expected me to do—forget that my parents died horrifically right in front of me.

The four of them breezed past us, Norman flipping me off as he went by. I tried not to let their coldness get to me. I tried not to let it hurt, but it did. Every single time, it was like a fresh wound. I watched as Jason and Michael looped their arms around two cheerleaders and weaved into the crowd, forgetting me entirely. My stomach was in knots. Flashes of the days gone by went through my head. There was a time when it would’ve been my shoulders under those toned arms.

Fuck, I’m pathetic.

“I know those broody eyes, and no, you’re not leaving me here stranded,” Maddie said, licking her fingers clean of the sticky candy. She knew I was thinking about bailing and catching an Uber back home. “Please don’t let those skidmarks ruin your one day in the sun.” She stuck out her bottom lip and pouted.

I grinned reluctantly. It was so hard to stay moody around my bestie. She was nearly the literal personification of sunshine, and I needed a little bit of that in all my doom and gloom sometimes. It was why Auntie Pip and Auntie Fe loved it when Mads spent the night and stayed for a while. She basically had her own room in the Hallowell manor. I knew how worried they were. I’d known for a long time, but I ignored it, and they didn’t like to bother me about it.

We spent the next hour roaming the carnival, and the sun was beginning to set in earnest. I breathed in cooler, crisper night air, pretending like it wasn’t tinged with the cloying smell of popcorn. I reluctantly rode the ferris wheel when Mads begged, but I hated it the whole time. I hated heights and the feeling of being trapped. For some reason, the farther away from the dirt and soil beneath my firmly planted feet I got, the more anxious I became. But I’d sweat it out for my best friend and try to enjoy the view from above.

The moon was full tonight. Full, close, and round. It was tinged ever so slightly orange, which was odd since I didn’t believe it was a harvest moon, but it was beautiful against a backdrop of stars. I kept my eyes on it as we went around a few times, grateful for the distraction. Maddie was having a good time, taking as many selfies as was humanly possible. That girl was a handful, but I loved her.

I was grateful she hadn’t ditched me. I wouldn’t have blamed her. In fact, I’d worried for a while that she’d get tired of my moodiness and my new take on life after the accident. But Mads wasn’t like that. Yes, she was the queen bee, and she was literally every stereotypical thing a cheerleader was expected to be, but she was kind, and she was like a sister to me. She’d mourned my mom and dad just as deeply as I had. They were practically her second set of parents.

“Oh, hell yeah,” I heard her whisper as she dragged me to a stop a half-hour later. “Oh my god, we are so going in there.” She pointed a finger that was wiggling in her excitement.

We stood in front of a black and purple tent. It was small, worn-down-looking, and had a curtain of multicolored beads hanging across the entrance. Above it was a rough wooden sign that looked like it was hand-carved. It read, Palm Reader. I smiled. Now this looked like something I’d actually enjoy. We ducked inside the tent and were immediately smacked in the face with the thick scent of pumpkin and cinnamon, which was a relief after the sticky carnival air that would still be in my hair later.

There were candles everywhere, probably a fire hazard, but the ambiance was worth it. It was downright spooky. Shining fabrics hung everywhere, draped along the walls of the tent, and beads hung from the ceiling in curtains. Little metallic bowls of what looked like crystals and herbs were scattered around on various surfaces, and in the center of the room was a round wooden table with an honest-to-god crystal ball on the top.

“Do you think it’s the real thing?” Maddie asked with an excited chuckle, clutching my arm in a death grip as she stared at the all-seeing crystal.

“Well, the sign on the wall says a palm reading costs only three dollars, and a chakra alignment is free on the side, so I sincerely doubt it.” I shook my head. I loved carnival psychics, but everyone knew they were just a scam to take your money.

“Bah humbug,” Maddie said, pouting in disappointment. She ran her finger along the edge of a pewter bowl, making it ring through the quiet. “Maybe she’s a witch or something. Maybe she’s—”

She was cut off when we heard the rattle of beads from the other side of the tent. To our surprise, a man walked out, clad in a purple velvet suit with a lime green tie. He wore a matching top hat, and his ears stuck out through the curtain of his long white hair. He was a short man, even shorter than me, and at five feet two, that was saying something. He was older, maybe in his late sixties, and had a seriously impressive handlebar mustache I wanted to touch.

“Okay, not what I was expecting,” Maddie murmured out of the corner of her mouth.

I snorted and shoved her lightly to get her to shut up before he heard her.

“Come for a reading, I’m guessing?” He asked in a gruff, raspy voice that reminded me of a smoker. He sounded kind and welcoming, at least.

“Shouldn’t you have known that already?” Maddie retorted cheekily, raising a sarcastic brow at him.

I elbowed her again, rolling my eyes as she mouthed ouch. “Rude—”

“Indeed.” He clicked his tongue, making his way over to a plush red velvet wingback chair at the small table and settling down to get comfortable. “Well?” He gestured to the stools opposite him.

We wasted no time taking our seats, scooting the stools closer in wonder at the unknown, even though it could’ve been a joke. On the table was just the crystal ball, which was larger than my head, and a deck of tarot cards. But he reached for neither. He was looking at me silently. His watery blue eyes ran over my face, and a look of what I could only describe as recognition passed over his wrinkled features, but he wiped it away before I could think too much about it.

I felt something weird then. The oddest sensation simmered in my belly like an empty tingle. It was one of those feelings that you get every once in a while, like the feeling of walking into a room and forgetting what you’d gone in there to do. Or that feeling when you pass a stranger on the street and could have sworn you knew them from somewhere before.

He cleared his throat with a small smile, the crow's feet at the corner of his eyes more pronounced. “You may call me Frank.”

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