Malia Read online

  Thinking practically about the matter didn’t make it happen, of course. Not until nearly three, when the feeling of being watched, thankfully, finally faded. Then, a bit fitfully, she slept. A thing filled with dreams. Nothing she was going to remember later, though. She decided that on waking up. They hadn’t been nightmares, exactly, but she was left feeling anxious and tense as soon as her alarm went off. Shaking still, if not as intensely as before. Also like she’d barely rested at all. Given that was more or less just the truth, she didn’t bother whining about it. Not even to herself.

  Showering again, even if it was hours before she actually had to do anything for the day, she made herself ready. That meant applying makeup, doing her hair and dressing nicely enough that if she’d lived anywhere other than Elroy, at least one guy would have been hitting on her that day. If she went out into public that was. It was tempting not to, but it didn’t really matter if she left the house or not. Her imagination was going to be following her wherever she went, anyway.

  It always did.

  Not that it had ever provided floating naked werewolf creatures for her amusement before. Normally it was just the flashbacks, and seeing Malia behind her in the mirror. The whole evening had been different that way, the night before. Intensely real, which was the same as the other things, but more menacing, at the same time. When Mal showed up, it was always friendly seeming. At least the feeling of it was more or less that way. The girl didn’t smile or anything. Most of the time she didn’t even wave back. She also didn’t speak, which was probably due to the fact that talking to a ghost or even imagined pal was a lot different than hallucinating something like that at a remove.

  The creature at her window was sort of breaking those rules.

  Making her way to the kitchen meant finding her mother, who smiled at her happily enough.

  “Good morning, Sweetie. Would you like me to fix you something for breakfast?”

  Jessica had to fight an eye roll at the words, even if they were meant well. Mainly due to the fact that food sounded like a horrible idea, just then. It was the lack of sleep, mainly, instead of her mom’s cooking. She was better than decent that way, after all.

  “Um, coffee? I didn’t sleep much.” She nearly didn’t mention why, then sighed and did. After all, if she was really losing her mind, she was going to need her parents to know about it, before she killed people or did something insane like that.

  “I… Had a weird dream. I woke up, feeling watched and shaking, like I was freezing, only it wasn’t that. Then when I turned the light on, there was this… Thing, outside. Kind of hovering in the air. I mean, I was standing and actually awake, but it was there for nearly two minutes, before it finally vanished. Some kind of waking dream or something, I guess.” Grinning, she shook her head. “I know, floating hairless dogmen aren’t real. Still, it was freaky looking enough that I pretty much didn’t sleep after that for a few hours. It’s like I’m a five-year-old or something. Ohh, I had a bad dream, mommy!”

  That last line got a chuckle, if one filled with sympathy.

  “That’s a thing. I had a dream not too long ago about being watched too. It was strange. It turned out that Howard from work was hiding in the bathroom. In the dream. Given he’s sweet and not the kind to put spy cams all over the place, I have to think it’s about something else.”

  A white ceramic mug, one of the plain ones, was brought out then. Coffee, which was probably a French roast, was poured, the vessel being settled at the table, indicating that Jessica was supposed to sit and not just run off. Even if she was busy that early, which wasn’t the case.

  Taking her normal place, the one with her back to the far wall, she nodded, pulled the cup across the table and sipped at it for a while.

  Then she shrugged.

  “You know, I’m ready for this bullshit to be over. Way past that, to be honest. I don’t need stupid dreams like that and I’m not going to live my life terrified all the time. I can’t help the flashbacks, maybe, but I’m not going to let them define me.” She shook her head then, sipping at the warm cup again. It was bitter and black. She liked the taste.

  Even as she recalled that the only people who honestly did were psychopaths. Others drank it that way, due to diet, or convenience, but people with that specific disorder actually enjoyed the bitter sting of it. Across from her, her mom put almond milk in hers, along with a carcinogenic sweetener.

  So at least one of them wasn’t a future serial killer.

  Not that Jessica was going to do that either. If you wanted to kill people, you needed to be larger and stronger than they were, as a rule. That or have access to the right tools. Guns, bombs and poisons. Technically, she could have gotten some of those things, if she tried hard enough. Getting explosives would set off alarms, no doubt. The FBI kept a database to track large purchases of certain chemicals, even, just in case.

  A gun was doable, though one legally purchased could be traced. Making her own from a kit was an option. She didn’t have the skills and would need a drill press, but it had been something she’d looked up, a few months before. The truth was that people like her, the crazy ones, just didn’t need that kind of thing.

  After all, she’d shoot a lot of people if she had one on her. Mainly for just being slightly annoying. Plus, even if that had been a thing, the night before she could have emptied a full magazine through her window and never harmed her imagined foe at all. Claiming that she needed that kind of thing to protect herself against rapists and muggers in Elroy was nonsense, as well. Rape might have been her biggest fear, but the truth was she’d probably die of boredom long before anyone tried that kind of thing with her.

  No, the only reason she needed anything like that would be in order to make herself feel strong in a world where she simply wasn’t. Not on a level that would leave her feeling safe. Then again, strength wasn’t all about being able to lift heavy objects. Sometimes, maybe a lot of the time, it was about not giving in to fear. She was sort of good at that one.

  You also didn’t defend yourself with bombs or poisons. That she’d even looked all of that up probably meant she was on half a dozen government watch lists already. If she wasn’t, just for killing that one man, years before.

  Mark Close.

  Thankfully he’d been a bad guy for a long time, before that. It wasn’t a good thing, really. If he’d been just a nice guy, looking to pick up a sixteen-year-old, then it still would have been decently creeptastic. Legal there, but not a great thing for a man his age, being over twice that old.

  Still, when the police had come, they’d first tried to blame Debbie for the death, then her parents. Even if the wounds had all matched the idea of things being inflicted by a very small person. One who was incredibly strong. That wasn’t really her, of course.

  Good old Mark though, had been in and out of prison for years. Never for rape or murder, but bad enough things that, when his records had been pulled, the story seemed to make sense to everyone. That he’d gone serial killer and was trying for Debbie when something had taken him out. How he died didn’t but no one was going to defend the man, or seek justice for him, so it hadn’t really mattered at the time.

  When her mother spoke, her brown hair, which was in a bob, bouncing a bit as she sat across the table, Jess realized that she’d lost track of the conversation. She sipped her coffee, listening and trying to recall what she’d spoken on last.

  Her mother seemed sympathetic again. She often had to be around her daughter. That part probably sucked, really. Still, she tried to make it seem genuine, which was nice of her. Jess could just tell that it was, in part, acting. A thing faked up to placate the weird girl who was having hallucinations about wolfmen, or demon creatures, in the night.

  “I hear that one, Honey. You really do deserve a break. From all of it. We don’t talk about that much. What happened when you were a child… What do you remember about it?” She seemed diffident, as if it were a sensitive topic. She’d always done that, even thou
gh it had been spoken of each time without a lot of reluctance. It was just a thing that had terrified her, for her entire life, that was all.

  Jessica shrugged.

  “Just the flashback, which is the same each time. You know that one. If anything else happened… Well, then I don’t know about it at all. I…” Finally, she sighed. “You know, for a long time, about thirteen years, I guess, I haven’t mentioned Malia. I know that weirds you and dad out. How my imaginary friend took over for me like that. I was thinking though, really, I have been for a long time and… I see her. In the mirror. She doesn’t say anything, but…” She stopped and sipped again, the cup half gone already. Then she shrugged, her nice powder blue blouse tugging at her breasts a bit. She wasn’t large that way, thankfully. Big enough to show she was an adult, small enough that if she ever took up jogging her nipples weren’t going to be in constant agony. Not unless it was cold out, at any rate.

  Her mother wasn’t huge that way either, so it was probably genetic, rather than the fact that she didn’t eat enough. Even if that was more or less true, as well. Food had just never been her thing.

  For a long time they both sat and drank coffee, her mother finally giving her a slightly exasperated look.

  “You’ve been thinking? About… Malia?” She didn’t pretend not to recognize the name.

  That got a nod.

  “Right. Well, I don’t have MPD, Dissociative Personality Disorder or anything like that. Not that I can tell. Except that I do black out, when I have the flashbacks. Only for about ten to twenty minutes each time and I just stand there, with my eyes closed, when that happens.” At least that was all anyone had ever told her about. She’d seen video of it from one of her therapists, once. “Even if I did have that, and Malia was one of the personalities, being a multiple doesn’t give you super-powers. No five-year-old could have survived that fight, much less killed that monster. It… It wasn’t really me. I know that it was, at the same time, but… That doesn’t make sense, does it? Little kids don’t become super ninjas like that.”

  There was a slow nod from across the table.

  Her mother took a sip, clearly buying herself time.

  “I agree.”

  That was a new thing, her mom just being on her side like that, without acting as if Jess might be losing it, so she blinked a few times, then went on.

  “Which… Okay, if someone else came in and saved me, I don’t know about it. I remember, very, very vividly, fighting the man. I wasn’t in control of myself, but… I couldn’t have done it, which means someone, or something else did. Which gets into crazy talk areas. I mean… Okay, I don’t know this is true and really don’t believe it, but… Could it have been something sort of…”

  She stopped then, not really wanting to be put in an institution for having wacky beliefs. Plus, as she’d just mentioned, she really didn’t think it could be the case. She also did, at the same point and knew that about herself. Still, if a doctor asked her about it, she was insisting that only the observable, physical world was real. Doing anything else would end her up in hot water. It could, anyway.

  There was a single, rather slow, nod.

  “That Malia was real… and that what you recall was supernatural, at least in part?”

  There was a wariness from her mom then. As if the whole thing was too insane to be spoken about out loud.

  “I did tell you it was crazy talk. Only, I mean, yeah. I know that Malia was just my imaginary friend, only, she’d been so real to me. I actually saw her. I still do, about once every few weeks. I have the whole time, since I was little. Blue dress, one made of velvet. A black bow in her curly brown hair. Little white socks and shiny black, buckled shoes.” It was silly, of course. “I always wondered why I imagined that. I mean, why wasn’t my friend a unicorn or Wonder Woman or something? Even if I lacked imagination as a kid, wouldn’t I have picked a cartoon character or something from a movie?”

  Malia certainly hadn’t been that at all.

  Sipping at her coffee for a while, there was, finally, a slow exhalation from across the expanse of smooth glass.

  “I guess you’re old enough to hear this. Um… Well, back then, I saw her too. Not all the time or anything, but twice. I walked in on you playing with her, once. Your father had as well. Seen her with you, just for a moment. We didn’t really know what to make of it, so tried to get you not to need an imaginary friend. Clearly, that… Well. If we all saw her, even for a moment, then she was probably real. We couldn’t tell anyone that. Not even you. We didn’t want to scare you.”

  For a second Jessica glared, then let that fade.

  “I get that one. If you’d tried, it would have probably made it seem like you’d killed the man, or dad did. Both of you, maybe. It could have even been a trap. You got Debbie to lure him over, with the promise of some cute teenage lovin’, then you and your buddies jumped him. Why you’d blame it on the five-year-old, instead of just burying him in the woods I don’t know. It can’t be that hard to make a man vanish, if he doesn’t have a lot of ties and you have a friend with a truck and a shovel, right?” She grinned at the idea.

  After all, that made a lot more sense than Malia having done it.

  It was strange, but her mother simply sat there for a minute, panting slightly. As if she couldn’t quite catch her breath at all. Then, rather frightened seeming, she nodded.

  “That… That’s the thing… That monster, Mark Close, he’d been raping and killing women in a fifty mile region for months. We thought it was him. Really, it probably was, given everything. Debbie had volunteered to be the bait. Her father was the Sheriff. Joe Walsh. I don’t know if you remember that part?”

  Jess got where the conversation was going, but shook her head.

  “I mean, I know that’s the case, having looked it up, but I don’t think I did then. So, you all were waiting outside? That was a bit slow, then. Getting there to help, I mean.”

  She nodded, looking down at her cup, not drinking from it.

  “I know. We all did. We’d set up down the street, out of sight, then, when things started to happen, the radio went dead. We didn’t realize it meant anything at first, just that there was no talking. I’d figured that Debbie was just making out with him, to be honest. He was kind of cute, after a fashion. We shouldn’t have risked you being there. We shouldn’t have risked Debbie, either. No one was certain that the man from online was the right one though. It was illegal, but too many people had been hurt and killed, so we had to try something. We set up a trap for him and then he’d walked into it. Perfectly. Just like we’d been promised he would.”

  It explained why they’d let the asshole in, at least. That they’d left their five-year-old there, well, that was insane. Even if it was the perfect cover. A teen girl inviting the inappropriate man over, not to her own home, where mom and dad might have watched them, but to a house where she was working as a babysitter. One with understanding people who weren’t going to stop a sixteen-year-old from getting some, if that was her thing. Good parents didn’t do things like that. She didn’t even bother to ask about it, deciding to leave that part for later.

  “So, um, you all came in and saved me, after he tried to kill us, then I… Made up a story, or some kind of false memory thing? I know that can be done. I’ve read up on the topic, a lot. You tell me that Malia did it for a while and then I remember it that way? Kids aren’t hard to mislead, from what I’ve read. They even say that false memories like that are the strongest ones. I guess it makes sense.”

  For half a second, it was almost nice to hear. Oh, there would be a screaming fight or ten over the years of mental abuse that she’d been put through, but that she wasn’t a murderer or insane was refreshing to hear about on a level that nearly had her grinning, even if there had been some rather serious conversation going on at the moment.

  It was one thing for a bad guy to come to rape and kill the babysitter and probably the baby. Quite another for her parents and their friends to have se
t it up in the first place. Even if they hadn’t been certain about the whole thing.

  Her mother just sat for a bit then shook her head.

  “No. We all got there about half a minute after we realized the transmitter Debbie had on was down. The men went in first. Joe, Debbie’s dad, two of his Deputies, your father and… some people from a club that we belonged to back then. They found you, passed out on top of that… Thing. Cut, with broken bones. The knife still in your hand. One of my good carving set. It, there was no way it wasn’t you, Honey. We had to hide most of that. Even now, I’m not certain that the statute of limitations is up. We’d intended to murder him, after all. At least if he was the right one. Only…” She shook then.

  Actually shuddering, her breath sobbing, as if she were trying to cry, but no tears would come.

  For a long time they both simply sat there, as if waiting for something to happen.

  When she spoke again, the older woman seemed tired. Frightened as well.

  “That club… it was more of a coven, really. Ceremonial magic, not witchcraft or anything that lame. We were never that religious, for one thing. We only bothered with things that actually worked. When the women started to be killed, after being raped, a lot of them were pretty young, we’d tried using magic. First to find the attacker, then, when that didn’t seem to work fast enough, to call on something to help protect us. The city, I mean. Everyone.”

  She sipped her coffee again, then looked in her cup and got up to make another one. Jessica drank the rest of hers in a few bitter swallows. She didn’t normally do a lot of caffeine, so didn’t strictly need any more, for the moment. Even if the night before had been sleepless. As it was, she was probably going to end up wired for the day. Not that extra energy was a bad thing in her world.

  She grinned then.

  “Um, bullshit?” She waited, since her mother was good with a joke, when she wanted to be. It was pretty much a family trait. Her dad was like that, too. Making things up for a lark would be totally in line that way. Not about what had happened, like she was doing at the moment, of course but that made more sense than her mother and father practicing magic.