April Henry - The Girl Who Was Supposed to Die

“Please, Cady, you’re the only chance we have to find my sister. To find your family. Janie and Patrick must be holed up someplace, not sure whom they can trust. I know people who could help them. But that can’t happen unless we find them or unless we can find evidence that proves what Z-Biotech is doing. And we can’t let the company get to them or that information first.”

“But I don’t know anything.” If only my head didn’t hurt so much! My thoughts are muddled and slow. Everything my aunt says has set off echoes in me, but they’re so faint and fleeting I can’t grab hold of a single thought.

She stands up. I tilt my head to look at her. It feels like a stainless steel spike is being driven through my temple. “You know how I know you know something?”

“How?” I look past her at the fluffy white bed. If only I could climb under the covers and pull the pillows over my head. Block out the light, go to sleep, and forget the pain in my body and my mind.

“Because your parents prepared you. Look at how you knew how to disable this man, this Michael Brenner. The typical sixteen-year-old girl wouldn’t know kung fu or karate or whatever you used.”

“That just came out of nowhere,” I say. It’s still horrifying to think I killed a man. Killed him like I was on autopilot. “I didn’t even know I knew how to do that until suddenly I was doing it.”

“The same thing might happen with your mind. Maybe if you can get in the right space for it, you’ll remember whatever it was they so desperately wanted to know.” Liz nods, as if she has made a decision. “We should go to your house. Once you’re in a familiar environment, things could come back to you.”

“But seeing you didn’t help,” I point out. “It didn’t change anything.”

She frowns. “Yes, but it’s not like we saw each other in person more than once every year or two. Being back in your house, the place where you lived with your family, the place where these men captured you—that could jog your memory. Maybe you’d even figure out where your parents might hide something.”

Ty says, “But you said Z-Biotech already questioned Cady, and she didn’t know anything then.”

“But she was determined not to answer because she wanted to protect them. So determined she managed to lock everything away. I don’t think Cady threw away the key. It’s like Tyler said, Cady.” She points at my head. “It’s all still in there, someplace.”

“Yeah, well, speaking of keys, I don’t even have a key to my house.” I think Liz is wrong. I think my memories are gone forever.

From the pocket of her jeans, she produces a silver house key. “I have one from when I house-sat for you while your family went on vacation in Hawaii.” But after Ty gets to his feet, she says, “You should probably stay here, Ty. If anyone catches us, we could all end up in jail. Cady is a suspect in her parents’ disappearance. At a minimum, you would be charged with aiding and abetting.”

“I’ve come this far.” Ty sets his jaw. I haven’t even known him for a full day, but looking at his expression I know he won’t be dissuaded. “I’m not leaving Cady, not now.”

“But you’re the one who stole the car in Bend,” Liz points out. “That’s a felony.”

He walks over to me and puts his hand under my elbow. “That doesn’t matter. I’m not leaving Cady.”

Liz’s car, a sleek dark blue Avalon, is parked not far from where we left the Subaru. I sit in front with my hood pulled up. Ty sits behind me.

At first, I try to recognize landmarks, the signs and buildings and businesses in the center of the city, even though I hadn’t when we first drove into town. I rest my forehead against the cool glass and ignore my pounding head. Everyone is quiet, and the radio isn’t on, so I don’t have to worry about hearing my name. The sole sound in the car is the swish-swish of the wipers.

It’s only after I give up, after Liz turns the car in to a neighborhood of older two-story houses with porches and yards and the occasional basketball hoop that something begins to stir in the back of my mind.

Am I imagining it, or do things look familiar? Or maybe every city has a neighborhood that looks like this. My index finger is pressed into my temple, providing a counterpoint to the pain inside.

Lost in my own thoughts, I’m startled when Liz pulls over and parks. “Your house is just up the block,” she says. “We’ll go in the back. Quickly, in case one of the neighbors thinks you really are some sociopathic killer.” She surveys the empty street before she gets out of the car. The rain is now coming down hard enough to discourage anyone from being outside.

We run through the downpour toward a two-story green house with solar panels on the roof. The house sits silent and dark. Yellow crime scene tape crosses the front door. Three brick steps lead to the porch. On the top one, a pumpkin sits to one side, grinning.

Wait. That pumpkin. I know there’s a fat white candle inside of it, surrounded by a puddle of blackened wax. Or do I know that? Am I just imagining it? And if there really is a candle, what does that prove? It would be easy enough to guess. We dart around the side of the house, past a white-curtained window, then two panes set higher, as if over a sink, each with a window box full of herbs. The herbs are being bruised by the rain, and their green scent hangs in the air.

Liz puts her key into the lock of the back door, also crisscrossed by crime scene tape. Ty touches my arm, and I jump. Does anything seem familiar? I feel like I’m seeing double, what’s here now layered over a fainter image of what used to be. Liz pushes the door open, and we duck under the crime scene tape. We’re in the kitchen, but it’s been trashed.

A piece of pink paper pinned on the refrigerator catches my eye. I know I’ve seen it before. That it was important to me. I walk over to it, my feet crunching over cereal, flour, coffee grounds, and shards of broken glass.

“Cady?” Ty says. I don’t turn around.

It’s a poster. In the middle is a photo of a stack of mattresses. Standing next to the stack is a guy dressed like a king, wearing a silver crown and a long robe with black-spotted white fur cuffs and collar. On top of the mattresses sits a girl, cross-legged. She’s leaning over to rest her chin on the top of the king’s head. She’s got a crown, too, but it looks cartoonish, and her hair is divided into two very nonroyal pigtails. Across the top it says, “Wilson High Presents: Once Upon a Mattress .”

The girl is me.

I’m an actress.

Don’t act. Be.

And now I can put a face with those words that have been echoing in my head for the past two days. In my memory, I see a middle-aged man with a clipboard sitting in an otherwise empty auditorium, looking up at me on a stage. I can’t remember anything else he said, or whether I was alone or not. But I remember how his words resonated.

My head hurts so much I have to close my left eye. I turn in a circle, looking at the rest of the house without seeing it, not the drawers emptied and thrown on the floor, not the ripped-up carpet, the scattered papers, the sliced upholstery.

“What is it, Cady?” Liz asks eagerly. “Are you remembering something?”

“I’m not sure.”

She steps closer and grips my wrist. “What do you think those men wanted? What did they think you knew?”

I feel like I’m going to fly apart. “I don’t know.”

“Do you think your parents could have hidden the information here in the house? If we can find it, we would have a bargaining chip to get Z-Biotech to leave them alone. There must be something you know. A hiding place where they might keep a safe-deposit box key or a flash drive. I know your parents told you something, Cady, but until you tell me what it was we can’t help them.”