THIS BOOK WILL KILL YOU

20_lick_

It's there until the first fingers of sunlight push through the window and scrub it away. The day rouses me, even though I don't think I've really been asleep. My body aches from sitting upright, my eyes ache from never closing. My mind is straight-jacket tight, padded and vague. The cannonball of terror still sits on my diaphragm, but it's lighter now for the sound of the birds. They're in full flow outside, but the one lying on the floor in front of the window hasn't moved once. It's never going to sing again.

I haul myself off the sofa, everything cracking as I bend down and pick the bird up by its feet. How can something weigh so little? Its eyes are still open, its neck bent at right angles.

"I'm sorry," I say, carrying it through to the kitchen. I lift the paper towel, toss it on top of the teeth, covering the whole still-life-in-madness up with more towel. Tanner's stain stares at me from the wall. My cell is dead but there's a charger in here and I plug it in. Then I clean the coffee filter and make a fresh pot, doing my best to ignore the lump of fingertip that has returned to the sink. Seeing it makes my own hand ache, my right middle finger throbbing in sympathy.

Upstairs, Donnie still shouts at his Xbox from behind a closed door. I open it but he has his back to me, and when I call his name he doesn't respond. I'm too afraid to see what he looks like when he turns around so I leave him, walking past mom's room to the bathroom. I'm pretty sure I've never taken a leak so quickly, but there are no squeaks and splashes, no nests of hair sitting on the bottom of the bath.

There's nobody in my room, but my laptop sits open on the bed and there's still music coming out of the headphones. I wrench the curtains open, switch on the lights, place my chair in front of the door to stop it from clicking closed. Wrapping mom's robe around me I climb under my covers, then climb out of them again because I'm thinking about Cara's photo. I sit cross-legged on the bed and pull my computer onto my lap and jab the space bar until it comes back to life.

I'm surprised to see my Facebook page open. There's a whole bunch of notifications and I click them—all likes and comments for a photo.

What's wrong, Tommi?

Shit dude you look STONED. Been hanging out with Flint again?

Tommi?

This last one from Flint. She's sent a message too, but I ignore it and click on the photo that I have no memory of posting.

Of course I have no memory of it.

It's a photo of me, sitting on the sofa in the living room dressed in mom's bath robe. I'm awake, and staring almost but not quite right at the camera. And there's a look on my face of... I can't describe it, it's like terror, but something more, something more profound than terror.

My shadow is drawn on the wall behind me, merged with my hair. There's no gap between the wall and the sofa but right there, inside the darkness of my shadow, I can see her. I can see that red-flecked eye, that yellow grin.

"You bitch," I say, clicking the window closed. "You fucking bitch."

I load up another tab, finding creeepy.com. Cara's profile is still there, nothing has changed. Those highlighted stories stare back at me and the comments make a hell of a lot more sense now. I click on the only one that I haven't read yet: _thetubegame_. It's still a dead link.

If Tanner was right, and let's face it, that's a big if, then I need to get hold of it, and of any other story that might be able to help. I Google the title but there's just cached links to the site, none of which work. I check on Cara's Facebook page too, in case she linked to anything from there. No luck. The image that's on all of her photos is a little clearer now, I think, a little more in focus, but I still can't tell what it is.