Fear Games

9. Connect the Dots

THE FOLLOWING DAY, Esme and I got ready as quickly as possible. After a final night of peace, we knew everything was about to change. I could feel it. I tried not to worry, but the truth was, anxiety was crippling me. Did we really want to do this?

We came up with our plan last night. If Noah was alive, there was a good chance his family knew. It sounded crazy, but I had to believe it was true. He loved his family. If Noah was alive, it would make sense that they'd be helping him. None of us went to his funeral. It was very private.

None of the others seemed to buy it except for Esme, who offered to come with me to Noah's family's house today. So when she called and asked her parents to stay the night, they obliged. It was a pretty decent sleepover, except I think we both expected Noah to burst in any moment and slaughter us in our sleep. Nothing would ever be the same once it was all over if we survived.

"You ready to go?" I asked Esme.

"Almost," she called from the bathroom. "I just figured I'd look decent, you know? I'm pretty sure they're not my biggest fan."

"They don't hate you," I said. "Just like they don't hate me. The only reason we weren't invited to his funeral was because they claimed they wanted to keep it private. They mostly hate Elijah and Isaiah, because I'm pretty sure Noah mentioned them once or twice."

"But if he's alive, do you think he's mentioned us?" Esme asked.

I snorted. "Oh yeah, because I'm sure he'd tell his family he wants to murder us in a giant house. If anything, he's alive and they're unaware of what he's doing. We're just going to make sure he's not there."

"And if he has been living there?" Esme said, turning off the bathroom light and closing the door. "What are we supposed to do then?"

I hadn't really thought that far ahead. "Let's just go. We'll figure it out once we know for sure."

***

The drive to Noah's old house was fairly short. When we pulled up in the driveway, I saw only one car. I assumed that both of his parents were home considering they'd only ever had one car in the past, unless that changed.

The house was pretty big, but not as big as the Fear Games house was. It was two stories and pretty wide, but only half of it had a second floor. That's where all the bedrooms were. I remembered coming here a lot when I was seeing him. Noah always seemed so sweet and harmless. Knowing what he could have turned into made my stomach churn.

"Rachel?" Esme said. "You sure you want to do this?"

I shook my head but opened my door anyway. "What other choice do we really have?"

The two of us walked up to the porch, and just when I went to ring the doorbell, the front door swung open to reveal Noah's mother. Her long black hair fell down to the bottom of her back. She looked pretty decent for a grieving mother, although it had been three years. It seemed like everyone else was able to get over it except me.

Unless Noah wasn't really dead, of course.

"Rachel!" Melinda said, smiling at me. "How have you been?"

"I've been, uh, pretty good," I lied. "Are you leaving?"

"Yes, Daryl and I were just on our way out of town for a few days. What brings you to this neck of the woods?" She was acting pretty cheerful. Despite that, something about it felt wrong.

"Well, we just wanted to check up on you to see how you were," I said, trying to find the right words to say. "We actually wanted to talk to you about Noah."