Page 4 of If Anything Happens To Me

I was holding my breath, like I was in my own private horror movie, and I forced myself to breathe. I had to get back to the girl. I shoved the charm into my pocket, grabbed my backpack, and raced toward the barn.

The door’s rusty hinges creaked when I pushed it open, and as I stepped into the horse stall, I heard a terrified shriek. The girl was standing there with wild eyes, holding the pitchfork waist-height, thrusting it forward.

“Hey!” I said, jumping back.

“Sorry,” she said, lowering the pitchfork. She wiped her sweaty forehead with the back of her hand. “I wasn’t sure who it was.”

I was completely freaked out by the sight of those long, sharp, curved tines pointed straight at me. I fumbled inside the outer pocket of my backpack and pulled out my phone, ready to call the police.

The girl had the speed of a feral barn cat and leapt toward me, yanking the phone from my hand. Her violence shocked me.

“Don’t you listen?” she asked. “You arenotgoing to call anyone.”

“You’re not thinking straight,” I said, taking a step back to get away from her rage. “This is an emergency. You get that, right? You were buried alive. Who did this to you? You could have died!”

“I know,” she said, her tone dropping a few notches. She shook her head, and her expression softened. She reluctantly handed me my phone. “I’m sorry.”

“So am I,” I said. “Listen. My sister—she was found in that exact same spot where I found you. Her body. She was killed.”

“Sister,” the girl whispered, and as soon as she said the word, she began to shake uncontrollably.

“Eloise,” I said. “That’s my sister’s name.”

The girl didn’t reply, just stood there.

I stepped toward her, put a hand on her shoulder, wanting to help her stop trembling. “You’re okay now,” I said. “You’re safe.”

“I don’t think that’s true,” she said.

I took a deep breath. “If you’re not safe, that’s all the more reason to call the police,” I explained. “They’ve been trying to find out who killed my sister.” I held out some hope that this horrible situation could breathe life into my sister’s cold case. “And not only that, we should get you to the emergency room—”

She interrupted me midsentence. “Have you ever had something that’s not really a memory? Just a picture in your mind, and you’re not even sure where you saw it before, but you know you did? Because I can see two words, just the words, like in a black-and-white photograph.”

“What words?” I asked, thinking of that name that kept shimmering in my mind.

“No Police,”the girl said, gazing down, as if reading it from an invisible page. She wrapped her arms around herself, like she was trying to keep from breaking into pieces.

“Who told you that?” I asked. “Who said ‘no police’?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “But you’re not calling them.” She sounded angry and glared up at me. “Got it, Eloise’s sister? What’s your name, anyway?”

“Oli Parrish,” I said. “What’s yours?”

No answer. She just held herself tighter. She looked away again, frowning, staring at the ground. Her silence felt rude.

“I rescued you, remember?” I asked a little harshly. “You can tell me.”

“Remember?” she asked, and laughed slightly, in a high, shrill tone.

“That’s what I said. You were in that hole? I pulled you out?” I asked. “A few minutes ago? Did you forget that?”

“No, I didn’t forget that,” she said. “What a miracle.”

“A miracle? That I rescued you?”

“No. That I remember.” Now she wasn’t just shaking—she was wobbling. I thought she might fall over or pass out, so I put my arm around her shoulders and eased her back down onto the bale of hay.

“Put your head down, between your knees,” I said, remembering that old direction from my therapist, Dr. Hirsch. She had told me to do that when I got really upset and started to hyperventilate. “Take deep breaths.”

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