Sara Shepard - Heartless

Mike swiveled around the big kitchen, looking confused. When he faced the pantry, he raised one eyebrow and opened the little door. “Found her!” he crowed. “She’s hanging out with the Rice-A-Roni!”

“Whoa.” Noel appeared behind Mike. “I wish there was Aria in my pantry!”

“Mike!” Aria stepped out of the pantry quickly, as if she hadn’t been hiding. “I told you to say I wasn’t home!”

Mike shrugged. “You told me to say that only if it was someone from the press. Not Noel. ”

Aria gave both of them a sharp look. She still didn’t trust Noel. And she felt ashamed after her behavior at the seance, too. She’d spent several minutes in the occult shop’s little bathroom, staring crazily at the Missing Person flyer. Noel had finally knocked on the door, telling her that the power had gone out and everyone needed to leave.

Noel turned and snickered at the pregnancy exercises Meredith had hung on the fridge. Many were about strengthening the vaginal muscles. “I wanted to talk to you, Aria.” He glanced at Mike. “Alone, if that’s cool.”

“Of course!” Mike boomed loudly. He shot Aria a look that said Don’t screw this up, then headed for the den.

Aria looked in every direction but at Noel’s face. “Um, want a drink?” she asked, feeling awkward.

“Sure,” Noel said. “Water’s fine.”

Aria held the glass to the refrigerator dispenser, her back straight and tense. She could still smell the prenatal kelp-and-pumpkin shake Meredith had made fifteen minutes earlier. After she returned to the table with Noel’s drink, Noel reached into his backpack, produced a gray plastic bag, and thrust it at her. “For you!”

Aria reached inside and pulled out a large packet of what looked like dirt. SUCCESS INCENSE said the label. When Aria pressed it to her nose, her eyes crossed. It smelled like her cat’s litter box. “Oh,” she mumbled, uncertain.

“I bought it from that freaky store,” Noel explained. “It’s supposed to bring you good luck. That warlock dude told me you have to burn it in a magick circle, whatever the hell that is.”

Aria snorted. “Uh, thanks.” She laid the incense on the table and plunged her hand into the pretzel bag. Noel was reaching into the bag at the same time. Their fingers bumped together. “Oops,” Noel said.

“Sorry,” Aria said, yanking her hand away. Her cheeks blazed.

Noel leaned his elbows on the table. “So, you bolted from the séance yesterday. Everything cool?”

Aria shoved the pretzel in her mouth fast so she wouldn’t have to answer.

“That medium guy was bogus,” Noel added. “A total waste of twenty bucks.”

“Uh-huh,” Aria mumbled, crunching pensively. She was very sad, Equinox the medium had said. Maybe he was bogus, but what if that part was true? Mrs. DiLaurentis had insinuated as much the day after Ali went missing. A few unsettling memories about Ali had popped into Aria’s mind over the past twenty-four hours, too. Like the time that, not long after they’d become friends, Ali had invited Aria to go with her and her mom to the family’s new vacation home in the Poconos; her dad and Jason were staying in Rosewood. The house was a big, rambling Cape Cod with a patio, a game room, and a hidden staircase that led from one of the back bedrooms to the kitchen. one morning, when Aria was playing on the secret stairs by herself, she’d heard whispering through the grates.

“I just feel so guilty, ” Ali was saying.

“You shouldn’t,” her mother replied sternly. “This isn’t your fault. You know this is the best thing for our family.”

“But . . . that place.” Ali sounded repulsed. “It’s so . . . sad. ”

At least that was what Aria thought Ali had said. Ali’s voice got very low after that, and Aria couldn’t hear anything else.

According to the logbook Emily found at the Radley, Jason began visiting the hospital right around the time Aria, Ali, and the others became friends. Maybe the place Ali was referring to in that conversation with her mom was the Radley. Perhaps Ali felt guilty that Jason was there. Maybe it had been Ali’s final decision that he go. As much as Aria didn’t want to believe that Ali and Jason had issues, maybe they did.

She felt Noel’s eyes on her, waiting for an answer. This wasn’t worth thinking about now, especially with Noel sitting here. “There’s no such thing as ghosts speaking to us from the afterlife,” she mustered, parroting Spencer’s sentiment.

Noel stared at her indignantly, like Aria had just told him there was no such thing as lacrosse. As he shifted his weight, Aria could smell his spicy, woodsy deodorant. It was surprisingly pleasant. “What if Ali really does have something to tell you? Are you sure you want to give up now?”

Suspicion boiled in Aria’s stomach. Fed up, she slammed her palm on the table. “Why do you care? Did someone put you up to this? Is this some weird lacrosse prank to embarrass me?”

“No!” Noel’s mouth drooped. “Of course not!”

“Then why were you at a seance? Guys like you aren’t into this stuff.”

Noel lowered his chin. “What do you mean, guys like me? ”

Meredith slammed an upstairs door shut, making the whole house shiver. Aria had never actually told anyone that she’d dubbed guys like Noel Typical Rosewood Boys—not her parents, not her friends, and certainly not a Typical Rosewood Boy himself. “You seem so, well, preppy,” she fudged. “Well adjusted.”

Noel rested his elbow on a stack of baby catalogues, his dark hair falling into his face. He breathed in a couple times, as if he was ramping up to say something, and finally looked up. “Okay, it’s true—I don’t go to seances because I like Led Zeppelin.” He shot her a look out of the corner of his eye, then stared into his glass, as if the ice cubes were tea leaves that contained his future. “Ten years ago, when I was six, my brother killed himself.”

Aria blinked, caught off guard. She thought of Noel’s two brothers, Erik and Preston. They were constant fixtures at the Kahns’ house parties, even though they were both in college. “I don’t understand.”

“My brother Jared.” Noel rolled the top catalogue tightly in his hands. “He was a lot older. My parents don’t talk about him much anymore.”

Aria clutched the edge of the worn table. Noel had had another brother? “How did it happen?”

“Well, my parents were out,” Noel explained. “Jared was babysitting me. We were playing Myst, this computer game, but then it got late and I started dozing off. Jared seemed reluctant to put me to bed, but he finally did. When I woke up a while later, something just felt . . . weird. The house was too quiet or something. So I got up and walked to the end of the hall. Jared’s door was closed, and I knocked, but he didn’t answer. So I just went in. And . . .” Noel shrugged and unfurled the catalogue. It flopped open to a page showing a blond, smiling baby in a red bouncy chair. “There he was.”

Having no idea what to say, she touched Noel’s hand. He didn’t pull away.

“He’d . . . you know. Hung himself.” Noel closed his eyes. “I didn’t really understand what I was seeing at first. I thought he was just playing or whatever, maybe punishing me because I hadn’t stayed up to play Myst with him longer. My parents came home then and I don’t remember anything after that.”

“God,” Aria whispered.

“He was going to Cornell the following year.” Noel’s voice cracked. “He was an all-star basketball player. His life seemed . . . awesome. My parents didn’t see it coming either. Neither did my brothers or his girlfriend. No one did.”