THIS BOOK WILL KILL YOU

27_thetubegame_

You know I don't have a choice, right? You know it's not really up to me?

Because going home isn't an option. My house is contaminated, mom and Donnie are infected. Going back there means dropping into madness, it's a fast and violent death and at the end of it the witch wins. I don't know what she wins, I don't even know what she wants from me, not really. But she wins.

There might be a fast and violent death this way too, but I'm going to take her with me if I can.

I reach into my bag again, feeling for the knife again, reassuring myself again. It's sticky with my blood, it's going to be sticky with her blood too. Down in the subway the world feels a little more normal because I can't see the sky, and under the yellow lights everyone looks half dead whether they're half dead or not. A river of people flows past me, all heading up to the street. Most have faces, but there are some that don't, hollow-headed men and women and even children, the meaty smell of them filling the corridors. I ignore them but they don't ignore me, they stare at me through the empty bowls of their heads as I trot to the subway map, as I run my finger up it until I find the station at the top. Cara had already done the work for me, it's written right there on the story: Holler Street and 241st.

I head down, riding the escalator until I hit the Red Line. There are fewer people down here but enough to make me feel safe—tourists heading north to see the old World Fair site, office workers on their way to Fairfax and Celeste. I watch a couple of them throw coins into the hat of a beggar without a face, then the train's here and we're bustling onto it together. I don't sit, I worry that if I do I'll black out. I stand by the door, staring at myself in the window, wondering why I can see a silhouette of night right over my shoulder, a silhouette with a moon-yellow grin. Nobody talks to me, even though I'm covered in blood, even though my finger is dripping again, even though I'm tear-stained and tattooed with dirt. Nobody asks me if I'm okay. Maybe they can see the shadow over my shoulder too.

It takes longer than I thought, nearly twenty minutes before the train squeals and hisses to a halt at Holler Street Station and the recorded voice states that it's the end of the line. I've read the story seven times by now and I know the rules, but I'm not sure if I need to reset before beginning, so I hop off with a handful of people and stand on the platform staring at posters of vacations and health insurance and corporate investments. People mill around me checking their cell phones. They're talking to each other but it's like they've discovered a new language, a new language I can't hope to understand. Even the quality of their voices sounds wrong, as if I'm listening to them from underwater. I look at the story instead, I don't want to get it wrong.

- you can get on by yourself, or with another person. I don't think it matters. But know this, if you get on with another person you know, then what happens next is worse.

The doors beep, slide open, and I climb inside, finding a seat in the middle of the carriage. There's maybe a dozen people in here with me and they all keep their distance. They all have their faces, too, which is a huge relief. I check my cell as we pull away. There's no signal down here and I wonder if I should have texted mom, told her goodbye, told her to give Donnie a hug from me.

And suddenly I don't know what I'm doing here, suddenly none of it feels possible. How was it that just days ago I woke up an ordinary girl, in an ordinary life?

Stop the train, I'm close to screaming, and I grip the back of the seat in front so hard my missing finger pulses supernova bright.

It's the conductor's voice that settles me. There's a junction stop coming up.

- take the train to the first interchange. You have to get off here, and take the line that goes east or south.

Half the carriage gets off with me and I follow them down an escalator to the eastbound line that runs from here. I hear the train rumbling around the bend, brakes squealing. There's a sudden flash of lights in the tunnel, a wave of hot air. A thought hits me with the force a train would—the idea that I could end it all here. Five steps, a jump. I wouldn't know a thing about it. And isn't that a hand on my shoulder? Bony fingers in my skin, pushing me, pushing me. I take a step, another, then dig my heels in because I don't want to do it, I don't want to let her win. I look back, nobody there, but I can feel the echo of her touch on my shoulder bone, like her fingertips have detached and are worrying themselves beneath my skin.