The Dog Days Saga

Autumn

Dog Days #1

Chapter One

If Eloise Whittaker had to narrow down the worst things ever in her life to a list, the top three would go as follows:

3) Uncooked chicken. When it’s all, like, pink in the middle? Gross.

2) Her father dying. Which was really tied for number one with…

1) Moving because her dad died.

She’d honestly rather eat a thousand raw chickens than be stuck in the front of a stupid U-Haul, driving for a million miles with her mom from Fresno to Texas. Texas. It was like moving to Jupiter. She was going from having a life that involved sun and easy access to Starbucks, to living in a town called Poisonfoot.

Poisonfoot.

Seriously, what kind of name was that? It sure sounded like a red-carpet, welcome-wagon kind of place. Welcome to Poisonfoot, Texas. Get out.

Lou propped her bare feet up on the dash of the car and pushed her pink Wayfarer sunglasses onto the top of her head. She’d been struggling for hours to find a comfortable position but was finding it impossible to get into a groove. The seat of the rental moving truck was lumpy, and the air conditioning didn’t work, making her sweaty and miserable.

More miserable than the move alone.

They were barely halfway through Nevada, and already she was missing things. Their house, her used RAV4 they’d had to sell before the move, and all the friends she’d grown up with who would be moving on to their junior year next week without her.

Who was going to veto Priss’s texts when she wanted to tell Bobby Fletcher his hair smelled good? Who would Kel and Anthony turn to for insight into the female mind? And who would Parker Davenport take to junior prom now that she wouldn’t be there?

Everyone promised to keep in touch with texts and Facebook, but Lou knew the reality of her situation. Out of sight, out of mind. Soon enough they’d be saying, Remember Lou? and not long after that, Lou who?

She sighed, bumping her head against the seat.

You okay, sweetie? her mom asked, not looking away from the dusty highway in front of them.

Real answer or smiley answer?

Real answer, of course.

This sucks.

Her mother frowned and tightened her grip on the wheel. Eloise, we’ve talked about this.

"I know, but you said real answer."

I suppose I did. But you know we had to do this. We couldn’t afford that house, not without your dad’s income, and especially not after the hospital bills.

Lou didn’t know all the details. She was only sixteen, which was old enough to drive but not old enough to decide if she got to keep her car. From what she’d gathered listening to her mother’s tense phone conversations with lawyers, her father’s six-month stay in the hospital had very nearly bankrupted them. At least badly enough they’d had to sell the house and didn’t make enough money from it to buy another one.

It wasn’t bad enough her dad had died, she’d had to lose her home and everyone she knew, too.

She was grateful to still have her mom, but sometimes she resented everyone involved with this stupid move. Why didn’t her mom have a real job? Why didn’t they have better insurance—wasn’t that the whole point of insurance? And more than anything, why had some stupid, idiotic, pointless higher power decided to give her dad cancer and not provide him the strength to beat it?

The world sucked.

And now they were moving to Poisonfoot to live with Lou’s grandmother—her father’s mother—who had been kind enough to invite Lou and her mother to live with her. Kind enough was her mom’s phrase for it.

Sounded more like perpetual punishment to Lou.

She hadn’t been to Poisonfoot since she was six. Ten years was a long enough absence she had only the foggiest memories of the place. She recalled sweet tea with lemon and her grandmother making grits—not a fond memory, that one—and the dark, musty staircase she hadn’t been allowed to explore. Everything else was snippets—blue-and-white china wallpaper in the dining room and a stuffed owl over the fireplace—things that didn’t paint a whole picture.

Lou had better memories of Granny Elle—the Eloise she’d been named after—from the visits she’d made out to Fresno. But Granny Elle, like Lou’s memories of Texas, sometimes felt more like a dream than a real thing.

She wasn’t the kind of warm and cuddly grandmother who snuck candies and dollar bills into Lou’s hands while no one was looking. That’s how Grandma J—her mom’s mom—had been before she got Alzheimer’s.

Both her grandfathers had died long before she had a chance to remember anything about them, even fragments. She had a picture of Grandpa Chuck—her mom’s dad—holding her as a baby, but that was it. Granny Elle’s husband, Ronald, was rarely discussed and usually in hushed tones.

Sure, all families were supposed to be crazy in their own way, but Lou got the feeling her dad’s family had been extra nuts. Why else would he have bailed after high school?

Oh, right. Because he’d lived in Poisonfoot.

Lou adjusted again, sitting in a cross-legged yoga pose on the seat, and pulled the elastic out of her hair, untangling the messy bun she’d made that morning. Her hair was getting long—maybe a bit too long now that it fell halfway down her back—and not for the first time she debated the merits of chopping it all off for some bold, edgy pixie cut. Maybe she’d dye it blue or something.

But her father had loved her hair, always doing it in long braids for her as a child and telling her it made her look like an elf from Lord of the Rings. Whenever she considered cutting it, she thought of his last attempts to braid it, when he was so weak he could barely lift his hands off the hospital mattress, and she chickened out.

Like cutting it off would strip away those memories.

Her hair was still damp—both from the morning’s shower and the sweat beading on the back of her neck—so she finger combed it then pulled a Dodgers baseball cap out of her bag and plopped it on her head, cramming a messy ponytail through the hole at the back.

The hat was another link to her father. He’d been a big baseball fan, which was how she wound up with her slightly too boyish nickname. Lou Whittaker had apparently been some impressive, famous baseball player a thousand years earlier, and her father had taken to calling her Lou as a kid. It stuck, and she liked it better than Eloise, so she began using it on herself, and after sixteen years the only people who regularly called her Eloise were her mother and her grandparents.

Can we stop? I’m dying for a Coke.

Her mother started to sigh, then stopped mid-breath, perhaps thinking better of it. I saw a sign for a rest stop. We can pull in there for a break and to check the GPS, make sure we’re on track.

Ten minutes later they pulled into a dusty gas station on the side of the road with honest-to-God tumbleweeds bumping up against a rusted old truck.

"I feel like we’re about to drive into a bad sequel for The Hills Have Eyes," Lou muttered, kicking her feet into well-worn flip-flops before climbing out of the U-Haul.

Which one was that?

Mutants who kidnapped tourists to make them into, like, baby-making machines.

"Eloise. Who let you watch that?"

Auntie Roan. Lou smiled, knowing her mother shouldn’t be shocked. Auntie Roan was Lou’s only aunt and her mother’s younger sister. She had a bad habit of treating Lou more like a buddy than a child, so it should have come as no surprise she’d let teenage Lou watch horror movies.

The stuff she watched by herself on Netflix was ten times worse, but she didn’t bother pointing that out to her mom, lest the parental controls be enabled.

I need to pee, I’ll be right back.

Don’t go too far, her mother warned. I’ll gas up and get us some drinks. Coke?

Diet Coke. And Twizzlers. Oh, and maybe a magazine? Lou was already halfway around the back of the building, so she didn’t hear any of her mother’s protests.

Blessedly, the women’s washroom was unlocked, but the space within was the most dismal, disgusting restroom she’d encountered yet on their trip. Discarded wads of toilet paper stuck to the filthy floor tiles, and the two sinks were stained reddish brown with rust from the leaky faucets. An overhead fluorescent bulb flickered on and off like a strobe light, swinging faintly from two chains on the ceiling.

"Ugh."

At times like this she was jealous of boys and their ability to pee standing up. If the outer area was any indication, the toilets weren’t going to be terribly inviting to sit on.

She tiptoed over the mess, her feet sticking to the floor in places, causing loud squelching noises when she tried to move forward.

Pee fast and get out, she told herself, angling into one of the stalls. As expected it was disgusting, with broken white tiles on the back wall and a large dent on the inside of the metal door like someone had kicked it with a lot of force.

Weird.

Lou did her business in a hurry and got out of the stall, touching as few things as possible. As she was washing her hands, the overhead light began to flicker more erratically before shutting off completely. Lou froze, the water in her sink still running, and wasn’t sure if she should keep washing or just get the hell out.

The metallic shriek of the stall door swinging settled it for her. There was no breeze or air conditioning in the bathroom, so the only thing that could set the doors swinging was someone else.

Since she’d been alone the whole time, she didn’t want to know who—or what—could have snuck in without her noticing.

Lou pivoted to grab the outside door, but when her hand touched the metal knob, the overhead fluorescents snapped back on, flooding the room with light. This time they were brighter than ever, painting the walls in a sickly green hue.

Unable to resist the pull of her curiosity, Lou looked back.

Empty.

You’re being ridiculous, she scolded herself.

She stepped back to the sink to finish washing her hands, making a mental promise she’d run like hell if the lights went off again, and splashed some cold water on her face.

Maybe she’d been stuck in the car too long and was starting to get a bit stir crazy. That was a thing, right?

She looked up and screamed.

Her father—her very, very dead father—was standing right behind her.

Chapter Two

Lou jerked her head around, but the space behind her was empty, and when she turned back to the mirror, he had vanished there as well.

Her heart was hammering, and her hands trembled violently. She took one last look over her shoulder, but he was gone. A figment of her imagination, perhaps, but a cruel one.

She knew for a fact her father was dead. She’d been sitting next to him at the hospital when the machine that monitored his heartbeats had stopped making its sad mechanical beeps and settled into a flat line.

Flatline.

One green measure that signified the distance between life and death, and she’d seen her father succumb to it. She’d been holding his hand when he simply ceased to be.

So there was no doubt in her mind he’d passed. She didn’t harbor any fantasies that he’d be walking back into her life. Yet she’d just seen him standing with her, and that had felt as real to her as his passing had.

She staggered out of the bathroom and into the too-bright sunshine of the Nevada afternoon, blinking away her tears by staring right at the sun. Her hands were still damp because she’d been in too much of a hurry to flee to bother with a paper towel.

Wiping her hands on her pants, she turned back to look at the unassuming wood door with a Ladies sign on the outside, half-expecting her father’s ghost to burst out and start howling at her.

Nothing happened.

This had to be a sure sign she was losing her mind. Leaving Fresno had been the last straw, and her fragile psyche had decided to abandon ship. That was a totally valid explanation.

I was starting to worry you’d fallen in, her mother called out, leaning against the hood of the U-Haul and inspecting their new GPS.

Lou plodded towards her, still too shaken up to manage a quippy retort. Sorry.

Can you read this thing? The only thing I managed to do was change the voice setting so now it’s William Shatner. Her mother grinned, squinting at the small screen as if it was written in a different language. For all Lou knew it was, since her mother had once accidentally switched it to Mandarin.

Taking the small box from her mother, she tapped the screen to zoom out so they could have a better look at the road ahead.

Another sixty miles, then we start going south, Lou translated.

Thanks, baby. Her mother placed a kiss on Lou’s cheek and climbed back into the truck, reattaching the GPS to the dashboard mount. Captain Kirk told them to turn right as soon as possible.

When she opened the door, a plastic bag was waiting on Lou’s seat containing a bottle of Diet Coke, a big bag of Twizzlers, some sugar-free gummy bears and a new issue of National Geographic. Normally Lou might have sneered at the magazine and asked why her mother hadn’t gotten her Cosmo, but she took it gladly, without argument. There was an article on a lost tribe of villagers in Borneo that sounded like just the thing to distract her from what had happened in the bathroom.

She kicked off her shoes, propped her feet on the dash then tore into the plastic package with the Twizzlers, handing her mother one before popping a second in her own mouth and gnawing on the artificial strawberry sweetness.

You good?

Lou wondered if her shaky fear was evident on her face, and tried to focus harder on the magazine. Sure, why wouldn’t I be?

Well…you didn’t complain about the reading material, and you offered me candy without my having to ask. Since you are still a teenager—last I checked—this might be a sign of serious head trauma. So again, are you okay?

Lou shifted uncomfortably under the new scrutiny. She hadn’t argued about the magazine because she hadn’t wanted to talk. Now that plan had backfired by arousing her mother’s suspicions.

I’m fine. Just stir crazy, I guess.

I hope you had a decent stretch. I want to get a good long way before we take another break. Her mom started up the U-Haul and made a big show of carefully backing away from the pumps, still not all that comfortable with the giant vehicle.

I’ve got this now. Lou waved the yellow magazine and continued to chew on her licorice. She rifled through her messenger bag and wrestled her iPod out, untangling the veritable string theory her headphones had transformed into. Popping the white buds into her ears before her mother had an opportunity to complain, she cranked the volume up just loud enough she could claim to be ignorant of anything said around her.

Before she’d moved, Priss had made her a playlist with enough songs to last the whole trip. Everything from sixties-era pop songs to eighties hair metal, with a bit of Jack Johnson and sad-boy-with-guitar songs mixed in to create a perfect sort of chaos.

As they pulled onto the highway, Motley Crue sang Kickstart My Heart, but Lou didn’t think she needed any extra assistance getting her blood pumping.

She closed her eyes and saw her father’s face in the mirror, his cheeks hollowed from the ravages of disease and his skin an ashen shade that marked him somewhere between the living and the dead. It was how she remembered seeing him last when he’d still been alive.

In the bathroom his mouth had opened as if to speak, a black gaping hole that might well contain the answers to all the questions plaguing her.

Why did he die? Why were they moving to Texas? Why hadn’t he fought harder?

But she hadn’t stayed long enough to hear what he might tell her.

If he had been real and not a sign she was losing her mind, then she’d missed possibly her only chance to say whatever it was she needed to say, and to hear what he had to offer. Instead of listening, she ran.

Maybe that’s what her life was going to be now, a long series of events she was simply going to flee from.

She turned the volume up and let Vince Neil’s high-pitched voice distract her as she counted telephone poles and tried to imagine what hell was waiting for her at the end of the road.

Chapter Three

Earthquake.

It was the first semi-rational thought to come into Cooper Reynolds’s mind when his bed began to bounce violently. Instead of getting up to hide in a doorframe or protect himself in any logical manner, he threw his pillow over his head and closed his eyes, hoping the trembling earth would respect his five more minutes policy.

"Get up, you lazy jerk. Up, up, up." His sister Mia’s voice was distinctive even through the muffled mass of fabric and feathers blocking his ears. She was only fifteen but had the husky tone of a sixty-year-old jazz singer, all raspy and a bit too deep for her tiny frame.

Screw off, Mia, I’m sleeping.

She continued to bounce, and her bare feet against his calf were freezing. Cooper sat up and whacked her with his pillow.

"I said, screw off, Mia."

You’re up now, may as well come have breakfast. She hopped down, sticking the landing nimbly, and dashed into the hall before he could hit her again.

For a moment Cooper considered rolling over and going back to bed, but he was upright, and he did smell a little foul. Maybe a shower and a good breakfast wasn’t such a bad idea.

Once he was clean-ish and his dark brown hair wasn’t in such a state of disarray, he lumbered down to the kitchen and pulled up a chair at the island. Saturday was one of the rare days his mom didn’t have to work, so it was nice to look forward to a breakfast that wasn’t cold cereal.

Mia was scrounging through the fridge, her nearly black hair pulled away from her face in a messy bun, and she was still wearing her penguin-print pajama pants and her volleyball shirt from the previous season. She handed their mother a bottle of milk and a carton of eggs.

Pancakes? Cooper asked hopefully, rubbing some stubborn sleep from his eyes.

French toast. His mom smiled at him over her shoulder, her short dark hair perfectly styled in spite of the early hour. Is that okay?

He shrugged. All tastes the same with syrup on it.

Your enthusiasm is touching. She laid strips of bacon onto a cookie sheet and put it in the oven, trading it for another sheet of already crispy meat. When the oven door opened, the kitchen was filled with the salty, delicious fragrance of bacon, and Cooper’s stomach growled audibly.

Here. She dabbed the tops of the strips with a paper towel then dumped them onto a plate, placing it in front of him. You two dig in.

He saw the way her mouth curved into a frown when she said two and knew without a doubt she was thinking about Jeremy. He didn’t mention his brother’s name because it had become second nature to pretend Jer hadn’t existed, but seeing the way her face momentarily let the pain show through, Cooper knew she hadn’t forgotten.

Mia snatched the first piece of bacon off the plate and climbed up on the kitchen counter, reaching into the spice cupboard to hand their mother cinnamon and the family French toast secret—cardamom.

The other guys on the team might tease him for knowing what went into baking, but that would have required them to spend any time with him outside school.

When the first piece of soggy bread hit the skillet, a satisfying hiss swam through the air and with it the sweet, satisfying scent of bread. Since Mia was up on the counter, Cooper moved to the fridge to find the syrup and grabbed a half-full carton of OJ while he was at it.

Extra pulp.

Gross.

He put it back on the shelf and closed the door, plunking the syrup down next to the bacon plate.

Are you guys getting excited for school next week?

Cooper’s gaze wandered to the family calendar on the fridge door where First Day of School was written in big red marker on September third. He wasn’t sure if Mom had written it that big because she was excited to be rid of them, or so she wouldn’t forget. It could have gone either way.

Meh, Mia said, her fifteen-year-old grasp on linguistics managing to summarize both their feelings in one syllable.

Technically, Cooper had already been back for a couple of weeks. Team practices started in the height of August heat because the football team had to be ready for games when school began. If there was one thing his school took seriously, it was the pride of their athletics department.

A football season in Texas was no laughing matter.

Cooper crunched on his bacon until he realized his mother was staring at him, waiting for his response. Oh. Yeah, sure. I guess.

She turned back to the skillet, sighing, My son, the wordsmith.

It was Cooper’s senior year, so perhaps she was expecting more jubilance, but it was hard to be psyched about going to school when no one really talked to him.

He’d done what he could to fit in, joined the right teams, did well in class—but not so well he’d be branded a nerd—and avoided stepping on toes, but sometimes he felt his mere presence was a problem for those around him.

Mia had taken a different route. After Jeremy left, she’d dyed her hair black, gotten rid of any color in her wardrobe and started spending her time with Max Dawson and his clan of weirdo goth kids. It seemed to work okay for her. She had people to sit with at lunch, and Max always had spare eyeliner for her to borrow.

They ate breakfast in relative silence, since Mom seemed to understand she wasn’t going to get too much out of them as far as chitchat went. She was out of practice with them, considering they only saw her once or twice a week when there wasn’t some emergency situation at the Poisonfoot Sheriff’s office.

"Oh, she exclaimed, taken by a sudden thought. Do you guys need school supplies?"

Mom, we’re not seven, Mia said. We don’t need new colored pencils.

But new binders? I don’t even know what you might need. Pens?

We have pens, Cooper assured her.

It didn’t matter. She was on her feet and looking in her purse before they could convince her they were fine using last year’s binders and calculators. When she returned to the table, she was holding her wallet. Cooper, take your sister shopping.

"Mom," Mia protested, clearly horrified by the idea of being at the mall with her brother. For Cooper, his only complaint was missing an afternoon watching baseball when the Rangers were playing the Yankees. He didn’t much care who saw him out shopping with Mia.

Their mother handed Cooper her credit card. "Don’t go too crazy, but get some new notebooks, and pick out some new clothes. Something with a little color," she added pointedly to Mia.

Black is a color.

Black is the absence of color, Cooper corrected. Don’t they teach you anything in science anymore?

Mia stuck out her tongue. "Why does he get the credit card?"

"Because he won’t spend it getting something pierced," their mother replied.

Mall was a polite term for what Poisonfoot had. The closest real shopping was in Laredo, and that was too much of a drive on a normal day, let alone one Cooper hoped to salvage in some way. He so rarely got a break from practice, all he wanted to do was sit on the couch, snarf Doritos and watch baseball.

The mall had a Walmart—quite a scandalous addition when it had moved in three years earlier—a hair salon, a grocery store, and a handful of specialty clothing and goods stores. The local video rental place had closed earlier that summer, meaning if Cooper wanted any new Xbox games, he now had to part with allowance money to buy them.

He’d wanted to get a job, but his football schedule didn’t leave enough time for one.

Mia had her phone out the whole drive over and didn’t let up texting once they were inside.

Who are you talking to? he asked, not bothering to mask his annoyance.

Max.

Is he telling you what kind of nail polish would look best with your complexion? Cooper teased.

Mia didn’t look amused. "Gay jokes? Could you be more Texas cliché, Coop? Next thing I know you’ll be joining the NRA and voting Republican." She slipped her phone into her purse and shook her head so her long black bangs covered her eyes.

Jesus, Mia. I was joking. And besides, it wasn’t a gay joke. It was an observation that your boyfriend wears more makeup than you do.

She huffed.

What’s wrong with the NRA? I remember you shooting guns with me and Dad when you were little.

He knew he’d made a mistake the second the D word left his mouth. Much like the Reynolds family’s ban against discussing Jer, they also didn’t bring up their absentee patriarch.

The men in their family had a long-standing tradition of bailing, and the ones left behind were well-practiced in the art of pretending it never happened.

Cooper quickly covered his ass by adding, And shouldn’t your Democrats be happy there’s a society that labels gun owners?

"Your Democrats? Mia snapped, and Cooper let out a sigh of relief. Playing the political card had been a good call. How can you be so ignorant?"

Politics was a hot-button issue for Mia. At fifteen she fancied herself quite liberal, and by extension determined anyone who wasn’t had to be a Republican. Being Republican, in Mia’s opinion, was about as evil as being a Satanist. Cooper reminded her, I’m seventeen, Mia. I don’t vote.

And in a year, when you can? Are you still going to be stupid about it?

Cooper wanted to point out it would be at least three years before he’d have to vote in a major national election, but he’d probably get a list of all local elections he’d be expected to participate in before then.

Mia would need a bigger purse if she was going to carry her soapbox with her wherever she went.

I’m not trying to pick a fight with you, he said, trying to take the high road. Look, why don’t we go to Walmart and get some new school stuff, and when we’re done there, I’ll take you to that thrift store in Collinwood you like.

Mia stared at him thoughtfully. He knew it wasn’t in her nature to back down from an argument, but he also knew she had no way to drive to Collinwood to buy flowy skirts and black tops that made her look like a witch or a reject from a Fleetwood Mac album cover.

You’re not going to make me buy notebooks with flowers or dolphins on the cover, are you?

"What the hell do I care what kind of notebooks you buy? I’m not mom. And do you think she cares if your binder is girlie? She carries a gun, for crying out loud."

"But she does have pink handcuffs."

Cooper rolled his eyes. "Let’s just get the stuff and go. It’s a twenty-minute drive to Collinwood. I’ll be lucky to catch the last four innings, and that’s if you don’t try on a million things."

They worked their way down to the Walmart with only a brief sidetrack to the Orange Julius counter so Mia could get an enormous mocha-something smoothie, and Cooper purchased a bottle of Coke. Mia held the shopping basket when they got to the store and surprise, surprise, loaded it up with all-black goodies. Cooper was pretty sure most of his stuff from the previous year was still in passable shape, but the presence of his mother’s credit card in his wallet made him feel obligated to buy something.

The sports-themed notebooks he used to favor seemed a little juvenile for his senior year of high school, so he opted for a few basic colored ones and some fancy pens he’d probably lose by Homecoming.

He was investigating a graphing calculator when a familiar voice asked, Hey, Reynolds.

Twisting his neck, he peered over his shoulder to see the football team’s starting defenseman, Lyndon Fletcher, staring at him. Lyndon looked as if he’d just staggered out of the stone ages. He was a big guy for any age, well over Cooper’s six-foot height, and pushing three hundred pounds. He had a broad, flat nose and a Cro-Magnon sloped forehead that made him look permanently puzzled. Which was pretty accurate, all things considered. His hair was shoulder length and stringy, and he always smelled like Slim Jims.

Lyndon, Cooper replied. He didn’t feel like chatting with the other guy for too long, but it would have been rude to just walk away. Not that Lyndon was too big on social graces.

You getting your school shit?

Cooper glanced down at the calculator in his hands. Mia had wandered off down one of the other aisles—which probably meant she was actually in cosmetics—leaving him no easy escape route from the conversation.

Yeah, helping my sister get some stuff, figured I’d grab a few things. You?

Lyndon stared into the basket in his hands as if he’d only then realized he was carrying it. A case of Red Bull and a bag of sour cream and onion chips were partially covered by a single spiral-bound notebook.

Sure. Ever the scintillating conversationalist.

Well, good to see you. Cooper turned back to the shelf and replaced the calculator, then pretended to study another one.

Hey, you hear the news?

For a moment Cooper considered acting as if he hadn’t heard the question, but it seemed unlikely to deter the course Lyndon was on, so instead Cooper asked, What news?

Libby took a summer job at the school office to add some sort of, like, volunteer bullshit to her college applications or whatever. Libby Tanner was Lyndon’s on-and-off-and-on-and-off girlfriend. Last Cooper had heard they were off, but apparently that didn’t stop Libby from talking to her ex. Anyway, she said yesterday they got a new transcript.

Okay. Cooper had no idea what the point of this was, and it hardly qualified as news.

New transcript means new student, Lyndon explained, like Cooper was the slow one of the two of them.

That was news. Did Libby get a name? The last time they’d had a new student had been in middle school, and in spite of four years passing since Malik had come to them from Pittsburgh, he was still called the new kid. That was how rarely new students came to Poisonfoot.

Eloise something.

Eloise? Cooper wrinkled up his nose, conjuring a mental image of a chubby girl with pigtails and Coke-bottle glasses. For some reason his mental Eloise also had a French beret. He blamed Mia’s childhood storybooks for that one. That doesn’t sound too promising.

Lyndon shrugged. I dunno, man. It’s just a name. Doesn’t mean she can’t be a hottie.

There were scarce pickings at their school to begin with, and those girls were ones Cooper had spent his whole life around. It barely mattered that he’d known them almost since the womb, because none of them spoke more than five words a week to him.

If there was a new girl, it might not make a difference if she had six eyes and a mustache. If she was willing to talk to him, she’d already be an improvement.

She’s a junior. Coming from California.

California? Why in God’s name would someone leave California to come to Poisonfoot? Why? was all Cooper managed to verbalize.

Libby said there was something in the transcript about counseling for bereve…um, ber…you know. When someone croaks?

Bereavement? Cooper offered.

Yeah, that.

So this mystery Eloise was coming here because someone she knew had died. Awesome. A broken chick with an ugly name.

At least Malik wouldn’t have to be the new kid anymore.

Chapter Four

The sun seemed to vanish the moment Lou and her mom crossed into Texas. It was still midafternoon, but a wall of clouds met them at the border and kept following them the whole way through the state. They’d spent the night in a dive motel just off the highway, and Lou’s body was still aching from the lumpy mattress. She might not be thrilled about moving, but at least tonight she’d get to sleep in a real bed.

Hon, before we get there, I need to tell you something about your grandma.

I already know not to play my music loud and to be polite.

Her mother gave a thin smile. And while I appreciate that, it isn’t what I meant.

Lou pivoted in her seat, pulling both ear buds out. Her mother’s grim expression brought a wave of anxiety crashing over Lou that made it difficult for her to breathe.

Is she dying? It was now Lou’s greatest fear that the people in her life were suddenly going to expire. Hadn’t her father seemed healthy enough until the cancer took him? Granny Elle was old. What if she was about to find out her grandmother’s days were numbered?

What? No. Oh, honey, no. Her mom took her hand and gave it a squeeze. I’m sorry. Nothing like that. It’s just your grandma, is…well, she’s a bit weird.

Aren’t most old people?

Mom laughed. Yes, that’s true. But Elle…she has some strange superstitions, and she was raised a lot differently than you or me. If she says anything that seems crazy to you, just go with it, okay?

Like what? Now that death was no longer a concern, Lou wanted to know what kind of kooky madness she was moving in with. Plus she got a kick out of adults gossiping about each other.

Oh, I don’t know. She thought we ought to have moved home when your dad got sick. She was convinced coming to Poisonfoot would save him. She shrugged. Power of prayer or something? Anyway, I just wanted to warn you about it so she wouldn’t upset you if she brought it up. She’s quite into the herbal healing and holistic stuff.

Are you calling Granny Elle a witch?

Her mom snorted and held her hand out for a handful of Cheetos. Pretend I didn’t laugh at that.

Then I’ll pretend you didn’t imply it.

When they finally pulled into Granny Elle’s driveway, it was near sundown on Saturday night. The house was situated on the outskirts of town and set back in the woods, so it was impossible to see the road from the house and vice versa. When they wound up the gravel path, Lou was sure there should be flashes of lightning in the background and a howling, moody soundtrack on the radio.

The place looked like it had fallen out of a Gothic horror novel and been transplanted into West Texas.

It was Victorian in style with a big wraparound porch that was at complete odds with the two turrets on either side of the house’s front wall. The turrets rose to points, with pristine green shingles blending into the color of the surrounding trees. One roof had a weather vane shaped like a howling wolf, and the other had a tall spire sticking up into the air.

Juxtaposed with the old architecture was the satellite dish mounted under a window on the turret wall.

The white paint had faded to a gray shade over the years, but it didn’t appear to be peeling. Considering the house was owned by a woman in her eighties it was in remarkably good shape.

Lou swung her messenger bag over her shoulder and tucked her hair into her Dodgers cap. She followed her mom from the truck up to the front porch, but before either of them could knock, the screen door swung open and the familiar figure of Granny Elle filled the frame.

Well ahn’t you two dahlings a sight for sore eyes, she drawled, drawing them in for a tight hug, showing surprising might for someone of her stature. Granny Elle was short and plump, her white hair framing her face in quintessential grandma curls. She hadn’t yet started using glasses, claiming her eyesight was still perfect. But otherwise she might as well have been the photo in the dictionary next to grandmother.

Dress her in red and white fur and she could have easily passed for Mrs. Claus.

Are y’all hungry? I wasn’t sure when you’d arrive, so I’ve just been cooking all day. She chuckled and wiped her spotless hands on the apron she had strung around her waist. Oh my, Miss Eloise. Take off that nasty cap and let Granny Elle have a good look at you.

Lou obliged, removing the hat and shaking her hair loose so it tumbled around her shoulders.

My my my. Granny Elle looked her over, pinching her chin so Lou was forced to turn her head side to side. She felt like one of the dogs at those silly exhibitions on TV. Like she was a pug whose full name was Lady Princess Whittington Rosebud Arabesque the Fifth or something. She smiled politely at her grandma. Well, you’ve become a beautiful young woman, you know. She said beautiful as bee-oooo-tiful.

Thank you, Granny Elle.

The smell of fresh bread wafted out from the kitchen, and Lou’s stomach growled.

Mary Anne, haven’t you been feeding this girl? Granny Elle scolded.

More often than you could possibly imagine, Lou’s mother countered, mirroring Lou’s patient smile.

Well come on in, ladies. Food’s ready. We’ll unload you once we’ve eaten. I asked some of the gents in town to stop by in the morning to help with the furniture. It simply wouldn’t do to have us girls doing heavy lifting. She clucked her tongue at the very idea. "And Miss Eloise, don’t you worry. I called that new school of yours to make sure your records came through, and they ahh just so excited to have you. I made sure the nurse knew what to expect."

Lou frowned. She knew Granny Elle meant well, but she didn’t like the idea of her grandmother discussing her health with a total stranger. Provided she took good care of herself, the nurse never needed to be involved in the situation, so why was Granny Elle making such a big deal out of it?

Elle, you didn’t need to do that. I’d already confirmed the transfer weeks ago, and I spoke to the nurse about her medical needs. Lou’s mom was trying to keep her composure—Lou recognized the strain around her mouth—but if Granny Elle noticed the annoyance, she didn’t acknowledge it.

Thanks, Lou said again, hoping to diffuse the pressure brewing between her mother and grandma.

After Granny Elle had stuffed them with homemade buttermilk biscuits and pulled pork—and her grandma had applauded her for not being one of those vegetarian hippies—they started hauling bags and small boxes off the U-Haul. Or, more specifically, Lou and her mom unloaded bags and boxes while Granny Elle offered them suggestions on how to best use their knees when lifting.

Since it was already getting dark, they focused primarily on boxes labeled Necessity, and the rest could wait until Granny Elle’s manly assistants arrived in the morning.

The big house was three stories tall and contained dozens of rooms, so Lou was grateful to learn she and her mother wouldn’t be staying in side-by-side bedrooms. Her mother’s suite was on the second floor at the top of the stairs and had its own small bathroom. She helped her mom dump some duffle bags and small boxes inside the door but was too anxious to see her own space for her to focus on what the décor looked like.

Eloise, I thought—seeing as you’re a teenager and all—you might want a little privacy from us silly old ladies. Granny Elle was redeeming herself by the minute. I had Russell put up some drywall in the attic. Made sort of a loft space. That’s still hip, right? Her grandmother winked and started up the stairs. At the back of the main hall on the third floor was a small, narrow wooden door. Granny Elle cracked it open to reveal a wrought-iron spiral staircase.

She stepped back and let Lou go up first.

Lou jogged up the steps, each footfall ringing against the metal, until she emerged in the attic. The stairs were built into one of the two turrets, and someone had done a remarkable job remodeling the space to keep it from looking too much like an attic.

The walls were newly painted in an off-white color that reminded Lou of the inside of fresh bread, and along the inner the curve of the turret, a window seat had been built with a bookshelf underneath it and a stunning view of the woods surrounding Granny Elle’s home.

Oh, Elle, are you sure this space isn’t too big for her? Mom asked, surveying the room.

Nonsense. I have so much room, and she deserves a space of her own. Besides, I had Russell install an intercom system, so we can holler on up whenever we need her.

Easily half of the existing attic had been used, meaning the room ran the entire front length of the house, giving Lou not one but two turret views—the second had a big, overstuffed armchair in it facing out to focus on the woods. There were built-in shelves and dressers, and in the center of the room, under a bank of windows, was a brand-new queen-size bed in a wrought-iron frame, just like the stairs.

For someone who had spent her entire life sleeping on a twin, the bed was the most inviting thing in the whole room. Lou had no idea how someone had gotten a mattress that size up here, but she didn’t care. It was hers now.

Lou flopped facedown on the bed, breathing in the smell of line-dried cotton sheets, and for the first time this trip she thought, Maybe this will all be okay.

The next day while her mom and grandmother caught up over coffee, Lou started hauling more of her boxes from the truck up the three flights of stairs to her new room. By the time Granny Elle left for church at noon—giving them a pass just this once—Lou was already dirty, sweaty and winded.

She was also seeing things. Whenever she passed the mirror in the stairwell up to her bedroom she swore she caught a glimpse of someone in the glass. Every time it happened, her heart leapt to her throat and scared the crap out of her. But when she stopped to check, it was just her own dust-smeared face.

After her encounter in the rest stop bathroom, she was probably letting her already overactive imagination get the best of her. But all the same, she figured it couldn’t hurt to take the mirror down.

Lou hid the mirror in her grandmother’s craft room and spent another hour dragging most of her clothing boxes upstairs. She got the majority of it into drawers before her grandmother arrived home with a group of big men still in their Sunday best from church.

Granny Elle introduced Lou and her mother to several of the nicest, most respected men in Poisonfoot and showed the men to the U-Haul. She explained that Mary Anne’s items would go in the green bedroom while anything marked Lou belonged in the attic. She gave Lou a scornful look when she saw the nickname scrawled over half the boxes.

As far as Lou was concerned it was still better than Wheezy, which was what her middle-school crush Brian Fowler had called her when he learned her real first name. Needless to say she didn’t have a crush on him for long after that.

To make her grandmother tone down the evil eye she quietly said, Lou was what Dad called me.

Granny Elle’s expression softened immediately. It’s not terribly ladylike, she commented, but said nothing else. Granny Elle wouldn’t be calling her Lou any time soon, but perhaps now she wouldn’t look like she was sucking on a lemon whenever someone else said it.

Several hours later the U-Haul was empty and the boxes had all been stowed in their designated spaces. Lou’s bedroom looked like a cardboard fort, and she marveled at how she’d managed to accumulate so much stuff in only sixteen years of living.

She stared at the piles of boxes and felt all her motivation from earlier vanish. Just so she could claim she did something, she dragged a box of books over to the window seat and started sorting them onto the shelves below.

Outside, the early evening sky had clouded over, and a light rain pattered against the windows. So much for her idea to walk into town. When the last book was out of the box, she climbed into the seat, loving the squishy cushions Granny Elle had chosen, and looked into the surrounding woods.

Lou was half lost in her absent thoughts of Fresno—she would need to email Priss photos of her new room—when something on the ground outside caught her eye.

At first she thought she was imagining it because of the way the raindrops were sliding down the pane. She didn’t think any larger animals would wander so close to the yard. Lou leaned nearer to the window until she fogged the glass with her breath. Frustrated, she unlatched the lock and opened the window, letting the frame swing in towards her.

Raindrops dampened her face and hair, plopping loudly on the cushions. She squinted to see through the sheets of raindrops pummeling the dirt with increasing ferocity. Lou was almost willing to admit she’d imagined the whole thing, when a small brownish-gray creature emerged from the tree line and glanced upwards.

A wolf, she thought first.

But this animal was too small to be a wolf. It was more slight of build, looking a lot more like a pet dog gone wild.

Coyote, her brain offered.

Yes, that seemed more accurate, though she couldn’t recall ever seeing one in person before. The coyote looked up at her, and for a second Lou was positive it was staring at her, judging her, if such a thing were possible.

"Get, bellowed Granny Elle from the porch. You know you ain’t allowed here."

The coyote shifted its attention from Lou to her grandmother, and raised its lip in a sort of half-threatening dismissive sneer. Lou had never seen an animal act so human before.

The sound of a rifle being loaded made the animal’s ears flatten, and once again Granny Elle warned, You go on now. Get out of here and don’t you come back. She fired a shot into the ground near its feet, showing it she meant business.

Growling at her, the coyote took off running into the woods.

Lou watched it go, her face wet with rain. She waited until she heard Granny Elle retreat from the porch and shut the door, waited until the last traces of the coyote were gone and Lou was just staring at the swaying trees.

She’d heard people yell at wild animals before, but never with such anger. And why had her grandmother said the coyote wasn’t allowed here?

What the hell was going on?

A dark path unfolded before her, and Lou followed it without much thought. Her bare feet sank into the spongy moss and peat along the forest floor as she wandered along beneath the moonlight. The forest gave way to a small clearing, and Lou stopped in her tracks.

There in the tall grass was a woman wearing an old-fashioned purple dress, her dark brown hair wound in a crown around her head. Her eyes shone with tears, and cradled in her arms was a young boy, maybe fourteen or fifteen, his pale face still and the front of his shirt coated in blood.

The woman was sobbing, shaking the boy gently, and he lolled in her arms but made no sign of responding.

He was very clearly dead.

Lou sucked in a breath, the cool dew of the grass feeling like shards of ice under the pads of her feet.

The woman buried her face against the boy. When she sat back, wailing, her cheeks were smeared with the child’s blood, giving her a feral, inhuman look.

When Lou jerked awake in the safety of her bedroom, she could still see that wild, half-mad expression like a hazy memory imprinted on the inside of her eyelids.

Chapter Five

It won’t be so bad, Lou told herself, parked in front of the brick edifice of Poisonfoot High School. Students were milling around on the front lawn. Granny Elle had explain that PHS served as the main high school for several surrounding small towns, so some of the students might not have seen each other for months.

Lou shifted nervously in the front seat of her grandmother’s Oldsmobile. They weren’t sure when she or her mother would get a car, and the Cutlass was in pristine condition since Granny Elle rarely used it. For the time being it would serve as a family car.

A very short time being, Lou hoped.

She wanted her own car again. She knew it was selfish, and she understood why she’d had to give it up, but she missed the freedom of being able to move around on her own.

Though Poisonfoot was so small, a bike would probably serve that purpose just as well.

It wasn’t like she had any friends to pick up.

Her mom patted her knee for comfort. You have your insulin? she asked.

Lou rolled her eyes. Yes.

And test strips?

"Mom."

"I wouldn’t be a very good mother if I didn’t ask, Eloise."

You’re a very good mother, Lou replied. And yes, insulin, test strips, and even a granola bar. I’m good, I promise.

Her mom kissed her cheek. That’s my girl. Have fun today.

"That’s highly improbable."

Well, at least try.

Lou climbed out of the car, hugging her messenger bag to her stomach. She’d tried leaving the house with her Dodgers cap on, but Granny Elle had put a kibosh on that plan before she was through the kitchen.

Young ladies don’t wear ball caps. And they most certainly don’t wear ball caps for non-Texas teams, she’d scolded.

Lou would root for the Astros or Rangers over her dead body, so she’d left the hat at home and allowed her grandmother to remove her ponytail holder as well. Her hair hung down to her lower back in waves, and she felt the urge to tie it up. Or braid it. Anything to make it less obvious.

But Lou was pretty sure no matter what she did with her hair, she was going to stick out like a sore thumb.

Her mom had just pulled away from the curb when the first person noticed her. She saw the awareness spread like a ripple until the entire population of the school currently on the lawn was staring at her and doing a poor job of pretending they weren’t.

She was about ready to lower her head and make a dash for the entrance when a tall girl—really tall, like pushing six feet in flats—emerged from the group and blocked her path.

New girl, the giantess commented, as though this was Lou’s new name. You’re Elle Whittaker’s granddaughter, right?

Yeah.

The girl offered her a hand, which was something Lou was more accustomed to adults doing when they introduced themselves. I’m Marnie Jackson.

Oh. Lou shook her hand firmly, remembering her father’s wisdom to never give a limp handshake. I think your dad helped move some of my boxes on Sunday.

Marnie nodded enthusiastically. The implausibly named Jackson Jackson. He probably said his name was Jake.

And I’d thought Jake Jackson was bad, Lou replied, hoping it wasn’t the wrong thing to say.

Marnie was pretty in a nonstandard way, and looked more like an athlete than a typical Texas pageant girl. Or at least what Lou had imagined a pageant girl to look like. Admittedly most of Lou’s notions about Texas were from TV and movies, so she wasn’t sure what to expect from anyone.

With straight, white-blonde hair and big blue eyes, the only thing that kept Marnie from being stereotypical were her hard features. She had broad shoulders and a strong nose and chin, making her look tough instead of dainty.

Her handshake would have done Lou’s dad proud.

Do you have a name, New Girl?

Oh, yeah, sorry. I’m Lou.

"Lou?"

It’s short for Eloise.

Ahhh, now Lou makes more sense. Well, Lou Whittaker. Welcome to your new school. Don’t mind the gawkers, they should get used to you at some point before graduation.

Lou noticed with Marnie’s arrival people had stopped staring so boldly and were now casting surreptitious glances at her while whispering.

Marnie looped an arm around Lou’s shoulder and guided them both towards the entrance of the school, waving to the group she’d been standing with prior to this surreal interaction.

Tell me about yourself, Lou-not-Eloise.

Um, I’m a junior?

Samesies! Marnie said with an over-exaggerated wink. Lou still couldn’t decide if the girl was trying to be her friend or was setting her up for some horrible first-day initiation prank.

Lou really didn’t know what to tell Marnie about herself. She didn’t want to lead with the diabetes thing. It came up in due course whenever she had to jab herself with a needle at lunch, but she’d rather not start by listing her weaknesses.

This was high school, after all—people would figure out her flaws soon enough.

Play any sports? Marnie asked.

Not really. I was on the swim team back in California, but I wasn’t that amazing.

No swim team here, sadly. That would imply the school was willing to divert funding from football to pay for a pool. I play volleyball. As if that was a surprise given her height.

Cool.

Let’s see your class schedule. Marnie held out her hand, and Lou passed over the folded sheet of paper she’d received in the mail via Granny Elle. Marnie reviewed it, then stared at Lou. Are you a super genius?

No? Lou wasn’t sure why her schedule would imply that.

You’re taking, like, all advanced classes.

Yeah, I guess I am.

So, you’re a super genius.

No, I’m just… I dunno. She took her schedule back and looked at it again, trying to see it as Marnie had. AP Chemistry, AP Biology, AP English, Spanish, Gym, Home Ec and regular math. I’m not good at math, Lou offered.

If you were, we couldn’t be friends. Marnie laughed and continued to walk with Lou down the hall. This is the office. Mrs. Downes will tell you where to find your locker. We’re in the same Spanish class, and it’s right before lunch. Maybe by then you’ll have figured out some fun Lou facts to tell me about yourself, deal?

Deal, Lou replied, and then Hurricane Marnie was gone, leaving Lou alone at the entrance of the office.

After getting her welcome lecture from the school’s secretary Mrs. Downes, Lou got a small photocopied map of the school and a slip of paper with her locker number and combo on it. Mrs. Downes also gave her a note to pass along to her first-period teacher since she’d be arriving in class a few minutes late and no one would know who she was.

Bypassing her locker entirely—there was nothing in it and she’d have time to fight with a combination later—she followed the map to the second floor where her chemistry class was located. Upon entering the lab, the entire room fell silent.

Her new teacher, a bespectacled middle-aged man with a tidy beard, stopped his lecture and stared at her. Everyone was staring at her.

Sorry, Lou mumbled, and handed the teacher Mrs. Downes’s note. I’m new.

"You’re also late." On the whiteboard behind him in severe red marker was that name Mr. Price. Mr. Price was not a fan of tardiness, apparently.

He looked at the note and his glower lessened but didn’t fade entirely. Judging by the deep crease between his eyebrows, Lou was pretty sure frowning was a default for him.

Class, this is El—

Lou, she interrupted hastily. Just Lou.

This is Just Lou Whittaker. Can someone kindly tell Lou what the punishment in my classroom is for being late?

A few people snickered and whispered amongst themselves, and one girl with short black hair and eyes so big they overwhelmed the rest of her face raised a hand.

She has to wear the goggles.

The…what? Lou asked. I didn’t mean to be late. It’s my first day. She pointed at the note he was holding, hoping to remind him she was supposed to get a free pass on her first day.

"I don’t accept excuses, Miss Whittaker. Any excuses. And after today you’ll never be late again." Mr. Price walked to a large metal cabinet beside the door and withdrew a slightly yellowing pair of plastic lab goggles, tossing them to Lou.

You expect me to wear these?

"You will wear them if you plan to stay in this class."

For how long?

Until the bell goes. Now take a seat next to Cooper, please.

Before she could ask who Cooper was, a tall boy with broad shoulders and a crop of unruly brown hair raised his hand from the back of the room and gave her a little wave. She shouldered her backpack and slipped on the goggles as Mr. Price watched. She wondered if it was too late to ask about homeschooling.

Hey, she greeted as she climbed onto the rickety metal stool next to her new lab partner.

Hey. He looked down at his notebook, barely meeting her gaze. She wasn’t sure if he was trying to pretend she wasn’t there, or if this was the only way he could keep from laughing at her.

I want everyone to look beside them, Mr. Price directed. Say hello to your lab partners for the remainder of this year. Some people clapped and high-fived, a few others groaned with disappointment. Nobody moves, nobody complains. I will not accept any changes to these partnerships, so get used to it.

Lou could already tell Mr. Price was going to be her favorite teacher.

I’m Lou, she said, trying to lure her