Page 94 of The Narrow

I don’t dare sleep. I don’t want my mind to rest and shutter itself and risk Eden waking up in my place.

When morning comes, I find myself moving through Eden’s routine as if it is my own. I’m up before anyone else, and I pad down the carpeted hall to the bathroom and turn on the shower. I’m not sure until I extend my hand beneath the droplets whether it will have the same deadly effect on me as it does on Delphine, but the water flows harmlessly over my hand.

I know what I am. The river has never left me. Maybe that is enough protection, for now, against the Narrow’s pull.

I undress, taking a moment to examine myself in the mirror—this unfamiliar body. Shorter and stockier than mine, with a curved belly, larger breasts.Pretty girl, I think. But I liked her better when I was a ghost and she was the bright living thing that drew me like a moth to a candle flame. Except I’m the one that burned her, of course.

I step into the shower. The water patters against my back, my shoulders, my hair. Just like the rain.

The rain that night

Pattering against my shoulders

The rain, cold, sliding down my back, droplets in my eyelashes.

I gasp, bracing a hand against the wall. The cool, hard tile brings me back to the present, and I twist the faucet quickly, cutting off the water.

The shower was hot, but I’m shivering as I towel myself off quickly. Grace subsumed herself in Delphine. Forgot everything she was. And still she had to go to extremes to stay alive. How long will I last?

I look at myself in the mirror again. There’s a single red pinprick in the white of my eye.

Not long.

I dress quickly. Outside, the others are stirring. I don’t want to know their names. They’re annoyances, things I have to deal with to get to my goal, but even unbidden, Eden’s mind supplies me with details. That’s Zoya, stretching as she comes out of her room. She looks like she’d snap in two if you blew on her. The fat one with the pimples is Ruth.

“What the hell happened last night?” Ruth asks, scratching the back of her head. “Where were you two?”

Veronica leans against the doorframe of her room, arms crossed. She looks at me as if waiting for me to supply an explanation.

“None of your business,” I say testily.

“Eden decided it was a super-brilliant idea to go commune with the ghost by herself. At the Narrow,” Veronica says.

“What?” Ruth squawks. “Do you have a death wish, girl?”

“Why would you do that?” Zoya demands.

They’re all in my way. A gauntlet of teenage girls. I might have died at nineteen, but I was never like this, fluttering around and screeching in worry. That’s why I noticed Grace. Quiet, serious. Not like these chattering birds.

“It doesn’t matter now,” I say.

“The Drowning Girl would have killed her if Oster wasn’t there,” Veronica says, still glaring at me.

I hate that name. The Drowning Girl. Reducing me to my death. “I didn’t die. So why are we still talking about this?” I ask.

“And get this—it turns out Maeve wasn’t some lovelorn lesbian; she was an abusive piece of shit. Grace was trying to getawayfrom her,” Veronica says.

“That’s not true,” I snarl. They all look at me, startled, and I put my hand to my forehead. “I mean... We don’t know exactly what happened, and I’d really rather not talk about it right now.”

Veronica straightens. “We’re going to have to talk about it, because Oster wants us to go to his office in half an hour.”

“No thanks,” I say dismissively.

“We don’t have a choice,” Veronica says. “Unless you want to get kicked out of school.”

What I want is to rake my nails down that perfect face, liven up its topography. But I need to be Eden. For a little while longer, at least. So I sigh and shake my wet hair back from my face. “Right, I know. I’m sorry. I’m just exhausted, and last night was...”

“It was a lot,” Veronica supplies.

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