Just months before I start medical school in Boston, I decide to let loose for one night. A dark club, a loud band, strong drinks--and the attention of a dangerous-looking man who says he's in the city for only a week.
I know exactly what he is: a...
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FEBRUARY 21, 1986/Boston, Massachusetts
I'm silent as I watch Kerri smoke. We're standing outside on Beacon Street, waiting for the taxi that will take us to the club. We're a few steps from the entrance to our seven-story dorm that takes up an entire city block. It's a cool, spooky-looking old building, built back in 1901 as a hotel on the edge of Boston Common.
Supposedly it's haunted, but Kerri and I haven't seen any evidence of this. Trust me, we've looked. We've bribed one RA to unlock the door to the basement, found the secret passageway to the staircase on the fourth floor, and have held countless Ouija board sessions.
If we haven't conjured the dead in our four years living in the Charlesgate dorm at Boston University, the dead simply don't exist. Or they want nothing to do with us, which is also a possibility.
"Okay, what's wrong?" Kerri blows a stream of smoke out of her mouth, which is coated in black lipstick. The scent of her clove cigarette mingles with the icy air, creating a unique sweet and spicy smell that I'll probably remember for the rest of my life. I hate smoking, but love the smell of those damned cigarettes.
I shiver and shove my hands inside the sleeves of my black wool coat, wishing I'd worn gloves. "Do I have time to go back upstairs? My hands are freezing."
Kerri sticks the cigarette in the corner of her mouth and fishes around in one of the inside pockets of her black leather jacket. Somehow she's stuffed a pair of gloves in there, and she holds them out. "Here. Now what's going on? You've barely said a word since you took that call from your mom."
I tug on the black leather gloves. They're a little tight on me, because Kerri's so small. "Nothing worth talking about."
"Bullshit. What did Gabrielle Laurentiu Ransom have to say tonight?" Kerri's as skeptical of Mom as Mom is of her. She yawns, as if to say, whatever your mother says is boring as hell.
I angle my body along the stone wall of our dorm building and let out a pained breath. "Mom was calling to tell me about a girl who was found murdered in Maine."
This perks Kerri up. "Did you know her?"
"Vaguely. She's a few years younger than me. But here's the thing." I pause and chew on my bottom lip for a second, wondering what it was like the moment Amy was...taken. Was she afraid? Did she know the power she was about to achieve? Was she ecstatic?
"What? Spit it out, Evan." Kerri has zero patience.
"Her name was Amy, and her body was found by a river, and, uh, you're sure you want to hear this?"
Kerri arches one perfectly groomed black eyebrow. "Do you think I can't handle it?"
I snort out a laugh. "Well, obviously you can."
She takes out another clove cigarette and offers it to me. I shake my head. She lights the cigarette with the one she's smoking, then flicks the old one to the ground.
