I chewed on my lip absently and looked above. I had more of this place to see. I wasn"t going to give up yet. After all, I was here. And even though the monsters were hidden behind veils of prescription, I was still the same boy as I was back in New York. They still wanted me, even if I couldn"t see them.
My pride would be the death of me one day.
THUD.
A loud clatter sounded out from the floor below. It sounded hard, like something had toppled over from a great height.
I froze, feeling just a little spooked. I walked across the room and paused near the staircase, waiting for more.
From downstairs came a scurrying noise, like a very large rat was poking around. I carefully turned off the camera light and waited. My ears listened hard, trying to figure out just what the h.e.l.l it was. From what I remembered, ghosts didn"t usually make much noise. They didn"t move around like they were trying to be quiet and failing at it. Rats didn"t move like that either, especially not on the West Coast.
I picked up another sound now. Footsteps. Then a metallic jangling.
It was definitely a person.
I was definitely f.u.c.ked.
I took in a deep breath and ignored all the possible scenarios that waited for me below. What was the point in figuring out who it was, or what was going to happen? If I got out of there without them seeing me, then worrying was fruitless.
I made my way down the stairs, pausing every other step to keep track, until I reached the bottom floor. I could hear tiny gasps of ragged breath coupled with a whimpering sound. I could see only darkness, except for weak light that spilled in through one of the rooms. There was a window where there hadn"t been a window before.
You need move your a.s.s now, I thought to myself. But before I could do anything, I felt this...this...I don"t know what the h.e.l.l it was, like a magnetic pull, like the air before a thunder-storm. An energy rolled toward me like a freight train. It made me stop, stunned and still.
There was another whimper, almost like a sigh, then feet slapping the damp ground.
Before I had chance to process that the footsteps were coming toward me, something collided straight into my chest. There was a scream, a girlish shriek (not my own), and I was shoved backward by something small and solid. The ground smashed into my shoulder, then my head, but it didn"t matter. The CRASH of my camera was the most painful thing of all.
I groaned and rolled over, feeling for the machine.
Oh please, please, please, please, please, I thought in a panic. I can"t afford this, I can"t afford this!
I heard the other person, the beast that hit me, stirring and moaning, then they hit the ground again with a thump that sounded painful. Part of me didn"t give two s.h.i.ts about the a.s.shole that might have ruined the most important thing in my life. The other part of me felt kind of bad, especially when it became apparent that the a.s.shole was some f.u.c.king chick. She was making little terrified squeaks.
Then she made no noise at all.
Motherf.u.c.ker. Now I had a broken camera and some trespa.s.sing broad who was either dead or unconscious.
I hoped she wasn"t a cop.
My hand made contact with the camera, and from the initial feel I was copping, it didn"t seem like much damage was done to the outside. My fingers instinctively found the light and switched it on. I let out a breath of relief as the darkness was violently illuminated.
As was the girl, lying on the ground beside me. Her eyes were closed and she wasn"t moving.
s.h.i.t, s.h.i.t, s.h.i.t.
I got on my knees and placed my hand on her neck, feeling for a pulse. She stirred a little and moaned, which meant she was at least partially alive. Not dead. I hadn"t killed her. So I had that going for me.
I couldn"t see her properly in the competing darkness and blinding glare, but she seemed d.a.m.n young. She was small, with a round face that glowed ghostly pale. A camera hung from her neck and onto the floor. Without thinking, I reached up and brushed a strand of black hair off of her forehead. She was warm, almost feverish. Still not dead.
At my touched she moved a little and tried to open her eyes, raising her arm up to block out the light.
"Don"t move," I said, my voice coming out broken and hoa.r.s.e. The last thing I needed was for her to wreck herself even further. Just because she was alive, didn"t mean she was well.
She dropped her hand reluctantly and I took the light away from her face, placing the camera down on the ground beside her head. It created crazy shadows along the planes of her face. Her pert nose turned into a beak. If I let my imagination run away with me, there were a million things she could have morphed into. I was lucky I hadn"t skipped my pills earlier, like I had been thinking about doing.
I touched her face again, just to make sure she was still a person. She was. She was still soft, and warm, and alive.
Was I being creepy?
Her eyes fluttered open and I could barely make out a shade of blue in them before panic tore them wider and she tried to jerk away.
I pressed her shoulder down to the ground to keep her still.
"Seriously," I told her. "You might be really hurt. Please don"t move."
She obeyed and lay back down.
"I"m OK," she said through dry lips. Her voice was light and scared. But she didn"t sound like she was in any trauma. Her eyes searched my face without really seeing me.
I still had one hand on her shoulder and the other on her face.
I was definitely being creepy.
I took my hands away and inched back a bit to give her s.p.a.ce to breathe - and me s.p.a.ce to run. She looked no older than 20, so she obviously wasn"t a cop but she was here, in a place I had no right to be. I eyed the hall in the darkness, wondering if getting out of the building was going to be as hard as getting in. I hoped she wasn"t about to call for help. Or press charges.
She eased herself up and looked warily around the darkness, her eyes focusing on the cam-era. I could see the wheels turning behind those shadowed eyes, wondering what the f.u.c.k was going on.
"I"m so sorry," I said. Even though she technically ran into me, I had to placate things before they escalated.
"I was upstairs and I heard this crazy clatter from down here," I explained, my voice speeding up as my heart raced. There was too much adrenaline in my system and the medication was s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g around with it. "And I thought maybe it was the cops or something. I didn"t know what the f.u.c.k to do. I thought I could get out of the way I came in, but I saw you there, and then I saw the window probably at the same time you saw the window and I"m...I"m so sorry if...well, you"re obviously OK."
There was a pause. She didn"t seem to buy any of that.
"Who are you?"
The million dollar question. What would my answer be today?
"That depends on who you are," I said honestly.
In the shadows I saw her c.o.c.k her brow.
"I asked you first."
Why did I have to run into the most questioning people? I exhaled and reached back into my pocket. My new business cards were printed just last week she"d be the first person to have one.
Whoever she was.
She took it from her hands, hesitant, like I was handing her poison. So suspicious. Tsk, tsk.
I picked up the camera and aimed it at the card. It gleamed under the light. So did the chipped polish on her gothy-looking fingernails.
She read it out loud and flipped it over, then looked up at me, somehow even more confused. The light lit up her face better.
"Are you from West Coast Living or something?"
I let out a small laugh. "f.u.c.k no."
I started to rock back on forth on my feet, needing an outlet for the energy that was rumbling inside my bones. She was a curious little thing, but something about her made me nervous. Wary. Like she could be even more dubious than I was. Like she had a million secrets to tell and I would never hear any of them.
Whoever she was.
"Well, Dex Foray, I have a feeling that whatever you guys are doing here tonight, you"re doing so without the permission of my uncle, who owns the lighthouse."
s.h.i.t. f.u.c.k. s.h.i.t.
Her uncle owned the lighthouse. I felt the routes in my brain rewire as they prepared for the extra adrenaline, the gallop of my heart.
But...wait...
"There"s no one else here," I said. "It"s just me."
She laughed, clearly not believing me.
"Look, I don"t care," she said and there was just enough ease in her voice to make it true. "I"m not going to report you. I shouldn"t even be here myself. Just get your crew together or whatever and get out of here before you do get in trouble."
I stopped rocking. What the h.e.l.l was she going on about? My crew?
"It"s just me," I told her again. "Did you see someone else here?"
She frowned but kept her gaze on mine. "Yes. I heard you upstairs, and I was going to go out the window, but I saw the shadow of someone pa.s.s by. Outside."
A shudder ran down my spine and roll of nausea waved through me. I skid a bit closer to her, my pants dragging on the damp ground.
"Are you sure you saw something?"
If she had seen something, and it obviously was not me, then I was hooped up the a.s.s. Maybe she was too, but I just couldn"t get a proper reading on her. That weird energy slinked off of her in bursts and messed with my head a little bit.
"Yes, I saw someone," she said with a tinge of doubt. "Someone walked past the window, swear to G.o.d."
I wasn"t sure if her G.o.d was one I could hold truth to.
"Where did you come from? Did anyone come with you?"
Like your uncle...or the cops...or your 250-pound MMA boyfriend.
She shook her head. I placed the light closer to her face, feeling like I needed to do a bit of interrogating to get to the bottom of this. She winced at the glare.
"Sorry," I mumbled. "I...well, nevermind."
"Nevermind?" she spat out. Her eyes narrowed and not from the light. "You just broke into my uncle"s lighthouse. Don"t you tell me to nevermind."
Whoa. All I was going to do was apologize again for doing exactly that. Well, f.u.c.k. Forget it. I was done. I was out of here.
With a grunt, I got to my feet and stretched up into the moonlight that was now creeping from the nearby window. It would be an easy escape. I picked up my foot to go, but I stopped.
I couldn"t leave like this.
She looked so helpless at my feet. And I did have manners somewhere.
I reached for her hand. She eventually took it, feeling all too tiny in mine, and I brought her to her feet. She staggered a bit, almost keeling over, her camera swinging, and all I could think about was maybe she fell a lot harder than I thought. Maybe she wasn"t really "all there" and we"d need an ambulance after all.
I put my hands on the sides of her arms and stepped closer to her, trying to keep her from faltering. She was short as h.e.l.l and that was saying a lot since I wasn"t very tall to begin with.
"You OK?" I asked, already knowing she was the type who"d say she was fine even if her limbs were chopped off. I saw a flash of something hope? - in her eyes before she twisted us around and I was illuminated and her face was hidden in the dark. I searched out her features but couldn"t get them. It was unnerving to not see the round pale face and watchful eyes.
"Just a bit dizzy," she said. The fact that she admitted that much didn"t sound very good. I began to think where the nearest hospital was, whether I could get her there in the Highlander, if I would need to call her uncle first. Who would then slap me with some trespa.s.sing charges and a possible a.s.sault charge, because men were d.i.c.ks and no one would believe a girl could run into me, especially not one pixie-sized.
"Good," I said, trying to look into her eyes, trying to keep things light. I smiled, thinking it might help my cause. "Promise not to sue?"
"I won"t. Can"t speak for my uncle, though."
d.a.m.n it! Just where was he anyway? Why was she exploring a lighthouse in the dark with-out him?
"Why are you here?" I asked, more and more curious about this little goth girl.
She dropped her gaze to the ground, even though I couldn"t see her anyway.
"We"re having a bonfire at the beach," she said. Her voice went higher, younger, and I got the distinct impression that she was feeling guilty about something. "I got sick of hanging around teenagers and wanted to come here. My uncle never let me come here when I was younger. I didn"t tell anyone, I just left. I was hoping to film stuff."
Hoping to film some stuff? As if she couldn"t get any more intriguing. What kind of stuff, exactly. What had she heard about the lighthouse?
She let out a small gasp and started fiddling with something. Her camera. I picked up mine and shone the light on her and while she was squinting uncomfortably at the glare, I took her SLR in my hand and peered it over. Aside from scratches that were probably there before, there was no damage.
"It"s fine," I told her, trying to sound rea.s.suring. "I thought you wrecked the s.h.i.t out of mine when you ran into me."
I patted my camera which made the light bob against her face. She didn"t look very impressed. Who could blame her.
"You"re right," I said, before she could. "Who cares? I probably deserve to have this camera smashed."
Even though it would put me back at square one. I couldn"t think about that.
Thump.
I froze. The sound had come from upstairs. Where I had just been. Where nothing else had been. Unless...
I looked at her, putting the light closer to her face. It was Bad Cop time again.
"You sure you came alone?" I whispered.