Page 49 of The Narrow

If I go in, I will be safe.

And I might never answer the questions that have been haunting me. That frightens me far more than any ghost.

It is silent. No more footsteps. No more choking.

I have to know. I have to see.

I turn slowly, my heart beating so fast I think my sternum will crack.

The Drowning Girl stands before me, just out of arm’s reach. Her hair hangs dark and wet and ragged around her shoulders. Her skin is mottled with bruises. I have imagined her all this time in a white dress, plucked out of a dozen horror movies, but she’s wearing jeans and a blue tank top, one strap torn, the bra beneath black and lacy. Water flows over her lips. A blood vessel in the white of one eye has burst, leaving a splotch of crimson floating beside her iris, and behind her, blood flows into the air as if into water, dissipating in the dark.

In the darkness of my room, I couldn’t see her face. But now, as my body floods with terror, I see the sharp jaw, the wide mouth, the dark intensity of her eyes.

This is not Grace Carpenter.

“Guh—guh—” she says, each syllable coughing up filthy water from her lungs. One battered hand reaches for me, the fingers crooked and broken. I should be terrified—and I am—but there is no threat in that reaching hand, only a desperate plea, and I hold my ground.

She staggers toward me a step. Everything in me screams to run, but I hold still. Her broken fingers brush against my cheek, leaving cold trails of water across my skin. There’s a sudden pop at the back of my head, like a firecracker going off, and a burst of pain at my lip. As I cry out, she draws in a gurgling, gasping breath. She blinks, and the milky lacerations across her sclera clear, her pupils suddenly focusing.

“Grace,” she chokes out. And then she seems to lose her balance and fall against me—

And I catch her. Hold her up. Her skin is cold but solid beneathmy hands. Her bones move oddly. Broken. But she has substance— a strange substance that seems half a dream.

Her hand flattens against my chest. Over my swift-beating heart. She looks up at me. Her breath still gurgles in her throat, but when she speaks, I understand the words. “Grace? Where have you been?” she asks.

I look at her in baffled horror. “I’m not Grace. I’m not her,” I say, but she doesn’t seem to understand. Her hand steals up behind my neck, and her eyes search mine frantically.

“You weren’t there. I couldn’t find you,” she babbles.

“I’m not Grace,” I say desperately. “My name is Eden White.”

“Not Grace,” she says, and then she wails. She falls back, clutching at her hair, and her whole outline shudders—images superimposed over each other. Drowning, screaming, staring at me with empty eyes.

“Where is Grace?” she yells, lunging toward me. I fall back against the door with a shriek of my own, but there’s nowhere to run. She’s right in front of me, and the rush of water roars around us. “You can’t keep her away from me. I won’t let you.”

Her hand closes around my arm. Pain shoots through it, sudden and brutal, and at last I scream.

“I don’t know where she is! I didn’t do anything!” I cry out, the agony like a knife through my arm. “I’m not who you think I am. Please. I’m just a girl—I’m just Eden—please—” Nonsense tumbles from my mouth, pleas and prayers, and I brace myself for her fury.

But she only lets out a sob. Her grip releases, and her hand, shaking, fluttery, goes to my cheek. She shakes her head rapidly.“I’m sorry. It’s so hard to think—it’s so hard down here in the dark—in the deep—the dark crushes you down and it doesn’t want to let you go. I’ve been down there so long and I can’t—I can’t—” She moans, her eyes rolling back. Then she snaps back to focus on me. “Please. I need to find her. Tell me you’ll help me, please.”

“I’ll help you,” I whisper.

She lets out a cry of relief. Her outline wavers.

“Wait,” I say. “What’s your name? Who are you?”

For an instant, her eyes meet mine, her outline steadying. “Maeve. My name is Maeve,” she says.

And then she is gone.

I stand alone in the dark, and there is no sign that she was ever there except for the cold water trickling down my face.

17

I STAGGER INSIDEshaking. Peel off my clothes. Turn on the shower full blast. I let the water sluice over me—clean, filtered, distilled. Stripped of anything that might hurt me.

My skin is stippled with bruises. The marks of fingers on my arm, bruises on my knees, on my shoulder. Familiar shapes long faded, now returned like stains on my skin. My fingertips prod at my spine and find the tender spot that has now healed twice over.

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