Мелисса де ла Круз - Keys to the Repository

But Hannah liked the winters, liked watching the ferry cross the icy river, how the quiet snow covered everything like a fairy blanket. She would walk alone on the windswept beach, where the slushy sound of her boots scuffing the damp sand was the only sound for miles. People always threatened to quit the island during the winter. They’d had enough of the brutal snowstorms that raged in the night, the wind howling like a crazed banshee against the windows. They complained of the loneliness, the isolation. Some people didn’t like the sound of quiet, but Hannah reveled in it. Only then could she hear herself think.

Hannah and her mother had started out as summer people.

Once upon a time, when her parents were still together, the family would vacation in one of the big Colonial mansions by the beach, near where the yachts docked by the Sunset Beach hotel. But things were different after the divorce. Hannah understood that their lives had been lessened by the split, that she and her mother were lesser people now, in some way.

Objects of pity ever since her dad ran off with his art dealer.

Not that Hannah cared very much what other people thought. She liked the house they lived in, a comfortable, ramshackle Cape Cod with a wraparound porch and six bedrooms tucked away in its corners—one up in the attic, three on the ground floor, and two in the basement. There were antique nautical prints of the island and its surrounding waters, framed in the wood-paneled living room. The house belonged to a family who never used it, and the caretaker didn’t mind renting it to a single mother.

At first, she and her mother had moved around the vast space like two marbles lost on a pinball table. But over time they adjusted and the house felt cozy and warm. Hannah never felt lonely or scared. She always felt safe.

Still, the next night, at three o’clock in the morning, when the lights blinked on and the door whooshed open with a bang, it startled Hannah and she sat up immediately, looking around.

Where had the wind come from? The windows were all stormproofed and she hadn’t felt a draft. With a start, she noticed a shadow lingering by the doorway.

“Who’s there?” she called out in a firm, no-nonsense voice.

It was the kind of voice she used when she worked as a cashier at the marked-up grocery store during the summers and the city folk complained about the price of arugula.

She wasn’t scared. Just curious. What would cause the lights to blink on and off and the door to bang open like that?

“Nobody,” someone answered.

Hannah turned around.

There was a boy sitting in the chair in the corner.

Hannah almost screamed. She had been expecting a cat, maybe a lost squirrel of some sort, but a boy? She was fast approaching her sweet-sixteen-and-never-been-kissed milestone. It was awful how some girls made such a big deal out of it, but even more awful that Hannah agreed with them.

“Who are you? What are you doing here?” Hannah said, trying to feel braver than she felt.

“This is my home,” the boy said calmly. He was her age, she could tell, maybe a bit older. He had dark shaggy hair that fell in his eyes, and he was wearing torn jeans and a dirty Tshirt. He was very handsome, but he looked pensive and pained. There was an ugly cut on his neck.

Hannah pulled up the covers to her chin, if only to hide her pajamas, which were flannel and printed with pictures of sushi.

How had he gotten into her room without her noticing? What did he want with her? Should she cry out? Let her mother know?

That wound on his neck—it looked ravaged. Something awful had happened to him, and Hannah felt her skin prickle with goose bumps.

“Who are you?” the boy asked, suddenly turning the tables.

“I’m Hannah,” she said in a small voice. Why had she told him her real name? Did it matter?

“Do you live here?”

“Yes.”

“How strange,” the boy said thoughtfully. “Well,” he said, “nice meeting you, Hannah.” Then he walked out of her room and closed the door. Soon after, the light blinked off.

Hannah lay in her bed, wide awake, for a very long time, her heart galloping in her chest. The next morning, she didn’t tell her mom about the boy in her room. She convinced herself it was just a dream. That was it. She had just made him up. Especially the part about him looking like a younger Johnny Depp. She’d been wanting a boyfriend so much, she’d made one appear.

Not that he would be her boyfriend. But if she was ever going to have a boyfriend, she would like him to look like that. Not that boys who looked like that ever looked at girls like her. Hannah knew what she looked like. Small. Average. Quiet. Her nicest feature were her eyes: sea-glass green framed with lush dark lashes. But they were hidden behind her eyeglasses most of the time.

Her mother always accused her of having an overactive imagination, and maybe that was all this was. She had finally let the winter crazies get to her. It was all in her mind.

But then he returned the next evening, wandering into her room as if he belonged there. She gaped at him, too frightened to say a word, and he gave her a courtly bow before disappearing. The next night, she didn’t fall asleep. Instead, she waited.

Three in the morning.

The lights blazed on. Was it just Hannah’s imagination, or was the light actually growing stronger? The door banged. This time, Hannah was awake and had expected it. She saw the boy appear in front of her closet, materializing out of nowhere. She blinked her eyes, blood roaring in her ears, trying to fight the panic welling up inside. Whatever he was . . . he wasn’t human.

“You again,” she called, trying to feel brave.

He turned around. He was wearing the same clothes as the two nights prior. He gave her a sad, wistful smile. “Yes.”

“Who are you? What are you?” she demanded.

“Me?” He looked puzzled for a moment, and then stretched his neck. She could see the wound just underneath his chin more clearly this time. Two punctures. Scabby and . . . blue.

They were a deep indigo color, not the brown-ish-red she had been expecting. “I think I’m what you call a vampire.”

“A vampire?” Hannah recoiled. If he were a ghost, it would be a different story. Hannah’s aunt had told her all about ghosts —she had gone through a Wiccan phase, as well as a spiritguide phase. Hannah wasn’t afraid of ghosts. Ghosts couldn’t harm you, unless it was a poltergeist. Ghosts were vapors, spectral images, maybe even just a trick of the light.

But vampires . . . there was a Shelter Island legend about a family of vampires who had terrorized the island a long time ago. Blood-sucking monsters, pale and undead, cold and clammy to the touch, creatures of the night that could turn into bats, or rats, or worse. She shivered and looked around the room, wondering how fast she could jump out of bed and out the door. If there was even time to escape, could you outrun a vampire?

“Don’t worry, I’m not that kind of vampire,” he said soothingly, as if he’d read her mind.

“What kind would that be?”

“Oh you know, chomping on people without warning. All that

Dracula nonsense. Growing horns out of my head like your sad vampires on T.V.” He shrugged. “For one thing, we’re not ugly.”

Hannah wanted to laugh but felt it would be rude. Her fright was slowly abating.

“Why are you here?”

“We live here,” he said simply.

“No one lived here for years before us,” Hannah said. “John

Carter—the caretaker, he said it’s been empty forever.”

“Huh.” The boy shrugged. He took the corner seat across from her bed.

Hannah glanced at him warily, wondering if she should let him get that close. If he was a vampire, he didn’t look cold and clammy. He looked tired. Exhausted. There were dark circles under his eyes. He didn’t look like a cold-blooded killer. But what did she know? Could she trust him? He had visited her twice already, after all. If he’d wanted to drain her blood, he could have at any time. There was something about him—he was almost too cute to be scared of.