Ephemeral (The Countenance) Read online

  “You’re missing the punch line,” Cooper says. “A red heifer would imply Laken here was of a sacred bloodline, so pure she could perform ritualistic sacrifices reserved only for high priests.”

  “Wow.” I marvel at Cooper and his intellectual superiority. “Thank you.” I didn’t really mean that at all. But I do remember the red heifer from Sunday school—back before Mom’s drinking was bad, when we engaged in life routinely as a family.

  “The point is, you need Cooper,” I nod into Flynn. “He’s the only one who can tell us whether or not Casper has any of that magical blood in her, and, if so, there’s a good possibility she might be alive.”

  “And, if not?” Flynn asks as though he were looking for another viable option other than death. His head drops into a solemn nod. “Where we going to get her blood?”

  “We can use tissue, saliva—hair.” Coop is quick with the solution.

  “There’s tons of hair on her coats,” I offer.

  “What about all those blood drives?” Flynn looks to Coop.

  “What blood drives?” I ask as a tiny kernel of excitement pulsates through me. If there’s blood, there’s hope.

  “Every three months we’re encouraged to give.” Cooper folds his arms low across his chest. He doesn’t take his gaze off Flynn.

  “It’s probably banked somewhere. Cooper, your dad—” I’m interrupted by a hard thump.

  Jen bursts through the door red faced and hiccupping, her body convulsing as she ventures full steam ahead with the ugly cry.

  “Get the hell out!” She screams in hysterics.

  I’ve not yet been privy to Jen’s temper. I guess I would have pegged her more the hissy fit type, and yet here she is going drunk sailor on our asses, wielding her purse through the air like a weapon.

  Flynn and Coop jet out the door, and I follow.

  “I’ll get Casper’s blood myself.” Cooper looks from me to Flynn. “I don’t want to drag my dad into anything.” He rubs the inside of my palm warm with his thumb. Thank you for trusting me.

  Thank you for helping. I give a knowing smile. I like our shared secret, our own private universe. Somehow this new bond turns the rest of the world into white noise, the only things that really exist are Cooper and me.

  We say good night and I head back into my room to deal with the emotional time bomb that is Jen.

  39

  Playing Jax

  I busy myself by stripping the comforter, the covers, and the sheets from my bed while Jen decides to take out her aggression on our bathroom in a fit of insolence. The pipes squeal on and off as they rattle the room with her fury. The toilet flushes at regular intervals as if she’s trying to mask the sound of her sobs by way of a violent whirlpool. A loud series of bangs and pops, followed promptly by a lusty scream so shrill that only unbridled pleasure or stinging grief could trigger.

  Reality had eaten Jen and spit her back out into the cold, cruel world, left her staggering, lost and broken. I feel horrible for her. There is no worse feeling than that of a broken heart.

  I lie back on my bare mattress, stare up at the ceiling, and try to divert my thoughts. I try to digest the fact that Flynn found Casper’s shoe, that this was my new reality—that in contrast to what Wes believed, I was right.

  Part of me wants to find Wes right now, shake him by the shoulders, swat him over the head with Casper’s black wedge, and shove it down his throat once he starts espousing his unorthodox beliefs. The hotbed of lies he unwittingly dispenses are enough to drive me insane. Unfortunately, everything about Wesley Paxton is a lie at the moment. And, if I ever want to be with him, touch his beautiful body, wake him up from the delusions that hold him hostage, I’ll have to pretend I believe his ludicrous version of reality. That’s the sharpest blade this new world has cut me with, the fact I can’t trust Wes. That, in some way, Wesley Parker really is dead.

  Jen bursts back into the room slamming drawers and rattling the windows with her incessant thumping.

  “What happened?” I lean over on my elbow. I mean I know she and Blaine are taking a break, but this seems to be a fresh fracture of her ego, her heart—both.

  Her hair whips around like wet spaghetti. She pauses, long enough to close her eyes and sag in defeat.

  “Kresley and Grayson happened.” She loses steam as she says it.

  Suddenly I feel a teensy bit responsible for what I’m about to hear.

  “They came in.” She sits down on her bed. “They started talking about, I don’t know what, I wasn’t listening, then they backtracked and began practically screaming that Blaine left his sweater in their car, from when he was there with Jax.”

  There it is. If everyone on campus knew about his indiscretions then, according to the rules of trickle down social economics, the gossip had to eventually leak its way to Jen. But did it have to be delivered in such a cruel manner by way of Kresley and the white witch, Grayson? It’s finally come to pass that I simultaneously feel like shit and the world’s lousiest fake sister.

  “So? They’re probably just trying to piss you off. It’s probably not even true.” What am I saying? Obviously not only am I’m vying for the lamest sister award—I’m jockeying for all-around asshole, too. Maybe that was the silver lining, the real reason I was removed from Lacey’s life, so I couldn’t cause any psychological trauma by way of a wayward boyfriend I was too inept to report. Although, I’m sure Lacey would fiercely protest the fact I could ever be a lousy sister. She loved me with an undying affection. I could fail to report bigger traumas, and she’d still love me.

  “I called him on it.” She throws her hands in the air. “And he said ‘maybe.’”

  “Maybe?”

  “Maybe.” She nods. “It’s his way of admitting it without really copping to the fact he’s been driving around with another girl.”

  God, I hope Jen isn’t under the delusion that all Blaine was doing was sitting in a moving vehicle with Jax. Judging by the all-out trauma she’s inflicted on our poor room, I think if she knew the truth, there’s no telling where that kind of violence might lead—prison, the morgue—both.

  “Driving around, huh?” I stoke the fire.

  “I guess they’ve been together.”

  Still somehow I doubt she means physically.

  “If he wants to see her, then who am I to stand in his way?” A fresh surge of tears stream down her cheeks. “You know, I really thought he was going to propose Christmas Eve.” She shakes her head. “If Blaine and I don’t work out”—she pauses to engage in some serious tissue honking—“you’re going to have to break up with Wesley.” She says it as fact.

  “What? Why?”

  “Collateral damage.” She takes in a lungful of air. “That will teach the Paxtons to mess with us Anderson girls.”

  I roll off the mattress and gently kick the contents of my bedding into a ball.

  “That’s highly unlikely,” I inform her. What I really want to say is I didn’t suffer through Wes’s death, then inadvertently indulge in a death of my own, and somehow miraculously find my way back to him again, only to dump him over some relational malfeasance that isn’t even our own.

  So? The fraud that parades around as his brother is prone to wander. I don’t see why I should fashion a noose and hang our love from the first tree I see.

  “Besides, Wes isn’t like that.” I hitch a strand of hair behind my ear. “He would never do anything like that to me.” An image of my lips pressed up against Cooper’s throat sears my mind. That was different—it was necessary. If I can somehow prove to Wes that I, heck, that we once existed as different people, that the Counts are the bastards who are running this three-ring necrotic circus, then maybe I could get old Wes back. Every unorthodox thing I’m doing—I’m doing it for us.

  “Jen, where do they keep the clean sheets?” I hate to be rude and change the subject, but despite the tattered state of her love life, I will eventually need to sleep.

  “You’re not supposed to do that. Th
ey change linens on Friday’s while you’re in class.”

  “I had an accident.” Great. She’s going to think on top of everything else I’ve taken to bedwetting.

  “Basement.” She flicks a finger in the air. “Just so you know, I’m not going to the blood bonding tomorrow night.”

  “Why?” The prospect of not having Jen there is frightening. Suddenly I need more security than just Wes could offer, especially since it seems like Wes is driving the bandwagon to the Celestra slaughterhouse himself.

  “Because,” she says, fluffing her pillow with a strangulating motion, “I don’t plan on going anywhere ever again.”

  “There’s one place you should go. And if you want, I’ll go with you.”

  “Where’s that?” She looks up, bored by the offer before the idea has a chance to fully form.

  “You need to confront Jax.” That’s exactly what I did just before I decided to rip Tucker a new orifice. I would have buried his head in it if fate hadn’t jumped in the way. I’m a big believer in confirmation before confrontation.

  “Okay,” she whispers, “just not tonight.”

  “And Jen? When you do…” A sense of familial duty surges through me. “I’ll be right there with you.”

  The commons room downstairs is almost void of life. I see Fallon and her dark hair swooped over a book in the corner. Fallon always manages to look pissed off at the world in general, to be more specific, me. Maybe because she’s picked up on the fact I’m trying to steal her best friend. Well, not really, but the female species as a rule, is prone to exclusivity and cliques. I’ll make an effort to get to know her better sometime. We’re both in cheer, so it’s inevitable we’ll be friends sooner or later. I’m betting on later.

  I turn the corner to the kitchen and bump square into Grayson and her flesh-covered hubcaps.

  “Going somewhere?” She blinks her thick lashes like the long wings of a butterfly. “Or maybe you have a bad case of the I-just-did-two-guys-up-in-my-bedroom munchies?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I saw Coop and Flynn take off.” The words drip off her tongue like acid.

  “So? What’s the matter?” I’m not sure enticing her to anger is the right decision, but I’m willing to dip my toe in that septic pool to find out. “Jealous much?”

  She tips her face up and lets out a breathy grunt of disapproval. I can’t help but note how alarmingly sexual it looks, how everything about her oozes the exact recipe of what most guys clamor for. She’s the living version of every boy’s fantasy. I don’t know what makes me think Coop wouldn’t want to take her on, especially compared to someone who spells out average, like me.

  “Looks like you’re trying to reenact your role from Rycroft.” Her lips curve into the perfect pout. “I’ve got news for you, Cooper doesn’t waste time with little girls.” She cinches her white silk robe against her body. Her pale skin rivals the fabric in hue and texture. “He prefers women who would respect him enough to give him one hundred percent of their attention. And, according to your history, that wouldn’t be you.” She takes off toward the staircase and leaves me stuck on her words like an engine grinding, unable to start.

  Grayson is right. Cooper does deserve to have someone one hundred percent devoted to him, and it breaks my heart that it can’t be me.

  I follow a service door in through the kitchen and down the stairwell to the basement. A long, barren corridor is walled in with bricks that are laid sloppily over one another with cement gushing through the seams. I have a feeling walking around the bowels of Austen House isn’t exactly going to help with that mountain of homework waiting upstairs.

  The dank walls bleed out endlessly with frail rows of exposed pipes streaming overhead. They tunnel on forever with their corroded joints, their long stretched necks in vivid shades of green. A thick film of calcium is crystallized beneath each one, white as snow, and the scent of mold lights up my senses. A utility cart sits at the end of the hall filled with spray bottles and discarded towels, clueing me in on the fact I’m headed in the right direction.

  The buzzing sound of hushed voices drifts from somewhere in the distance. I take careful, quiet steps, in the event I’ve accidentally stumbled upon Jax and Blaine’s love nest. Thank God I’ve got my phone. I’ll gladly snap digital evidence of Blaine rounding out the bases. Morons like him are best left to their own devices, and the hell away from my fake sister.

  God—I didn’t have Jen tested. What if she really is my sister?

  The voices magnify.

  Sounds more like two girls. The calm soothing rhythm alludes to a practical conversation, nothing melodic like you would get with gossip, nothing pressured with panic or passion.

  A small doorway crops into view just around the corner. The temperature spikes. It’s markedly warmer in this part of the basement, downright tropical with the undeniable humidity you would find in the shower or the gym.

  The buzzing increases, thick as a swarm of bees.

  I hear words out of sequence—the names, Hattie and Amelia echo in rotation like some nefarious chant.

  I peer inside a tiny dirty room. Walls drip with black oil. A tangle of large, fat pipes, snake throughout the room, obscuring my vision.

  “Hello?” My voice echoes unnaturally. “I’m looking for the laundry room,” I call.

  The voices break out into a full-blown cackle—the conversation goes on without ceasing.

  I take measured steps down aisle after aisle of rusted out pipes, in this, the pit of the boiler room.

  The voices escalate in both pitch and volume. One last aisle of metal cylinders obstructs my view.

  My heart rate picks up, my pulse quickens. A sharp spike of fear rattles through me. My legs keep moving—my body won’t turn. It’s as if they’re calling me, drawing me in with their never-ending chatter, their haunted voices that hold a reverberation that exceeds anything human.

  I wish I never came. I would sleep on a bare mattress for the rest of my life if I could motivate my feet to sprint in the other direction.

  Echoing laughter, another explosion of pressured conversation. It goes on like this only louder—more intense with each step I take.

  “Excuse me?” I say, leaning around the corner.

  Silence fills the air, leaving nothing but my heartbeat pulsating through my ears.

  I look past the pipes and see them.

  I let out a scream that rattles on for miles.

  40

  Taking up Space

  A thin rail of a girl gapes back at me—hair the color of rust, tattered and balding, dark circles frame her eyes like bruises—knobby elbows and knees, fingers like that of a skeleton. She turns just enough, exposing another girl from behind, a doppelganger, one more grotesque than the last with grey flesh, bones that define themselves in detail through paper-thin skin, both outfitted in dirty muslin sheaths.

  The first one breaks out into a demented grimace. Her lips pull back too far, exposing a necrotic gum line—stained teeth with dark outlines.

  I let out another short-lived scream that scalds my throat, and it inspires them to disappear in tandem.

  “Shit!” I pant at the void in their wake.

  My entire person demands I flee, but the thin seam of light from beneath a wood-planked door beckons otherwise.

  I speed over and jiggle the knob.

  Locked.

  I struggle with the door much longer than I’m able to stave off my fear and give one last push with my shoulder before giving up. Then, without a struggle, it opens, light as a feather.

  A white glossy hall stretches before me, identical to the one I found myself in the other night with Cooper—the night he seared me with a kiss I’ll never forget.

  I step inside and head down the over-bright corridor. Cooper works here, well, disposes of Spectators, here. It’s so cold, so isolative—the entire facility is illuminated with an unearthly sterile cast. My footsteps echo unnaturally as I make my way deeper in the facility.
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br />   Coop said this was the Transfer—what the hell is this place anyway?

  A soft blue glow emanates from a room down a carpeted alcove, and I hug the wall before peering inside. Long glass tubes stretch from floor to ceiling. A blue liquid swirls inside with what looks like hair and fingers pressed against the glass. It’s not until I’m upon an entire row of the oversized capsules that I see clearly what’s floating inside—bodies.

  I suck in a scream and run like hell down the pathway from where I came.

  I don’t stop until I land safe in my bed next to Jen.

  I don’t know what kind of hell exists beneath Austen House. I don’t know why Cooper works at the zombie collection agency or why there are bodies floating in giant glorified fish tanks.

  The most horrifying part is I’m pretty damn sure I’m going to find out.

  In the crisp, dull morning, clouds as dark as overcoats hover above Ephemeral. The air is saturated with the tenuous scent of ozone, damp earth, and bleach rolled into one. I like it like this, a storm on the horizon, a knit scarf keeping me warm, my undead boyfriend dutifully by my side.

  Wes walks me to my first class, and I hold his hand, expecting to decode the basic intrinsic evils concerning all things Countenance. Instead, he lingers on my thoughts. Mulls over my words like reciting poetry. I return the favor by thinking of the ways I love him—how he’s still the boy I’ve always known, sweet, always protecting, always seeking out what’s best for me even if it puts him in peril because deep down inside we both know it damn well will.

  “I’d take a bullet for you.” It seems to come out of nowhere when he says it, but I know Wes is reassuring me—that he’d love me to the end of his days if he had to.

  I pull him under an olive tree with its tiny paper leaves, sage on one side, chalk on the other. The multitude of blades look cheery against the grey expanse, like confetti frozen in time—its branches spread wide like an eagle in flight.