Page 55 of Waysider
“Cass,” he said again. She hunched her shoulders and kept going.
This time, Cal didn’t follow her.
Cass’s mind churned the entire walk back to House Wayside. Headmistress Crane knew about her brother. What did this mean for them? Was Cal in danger? Should she pack up her shit and leave? Suddenly Cass longed to call Teresa. She’d always been able to talk to her about anything, but the nondisclosure agreement had been very clear. Teresa didn’t know the truth about the ghosts, anyway, Cass reminded herself. Even without the agreement, she couldn’t confide in her oldest friend.
Cass arrived at a familiar mailbox and turned right, starting down the front walkway. Every move was automatic, instinctual. She barely registered any of it. More questions buzzed through Cass’s head like cicadas. That was all she ever seemed to get at Else & Bellows—an endless stream of questions, and never any answers. Frustration simmered in her gut.
Shouts and music flew at Cass the moment she stepped inside. Her head tilted in curiosity, and she followed the noise, stopping in one of the doorways. When Cass saw the scene in the living room, her eyebrows shot up, and she completely forgot about the conversation with Headmistress Crane.
Her roommates were playing Twister.
All of them were there, contorted and balanced on the plastic sheet. Finch, Bradley, Candice, Tammy. Even Justin had deigned to join. Finch was half-draped over Bradley in order to touch the yellow circle on his other side, and the boy beneath her looked like he was on the verge of passing out. Justin and Tammy were also locked together, but Justin kept getting hit in the face by her knobby knee. Candice displayed startling flexibility as she reached around Justin and planted her palm on a red dot, her leg stretched out on his other side.
Around them, cups were scattered throughout the room. On the tables, the floor. A couple must’ve been bumped in the chaos, because the cups were tipped over, small puddles gleaming beneath them. Cass suspected they were partly to blame for what was happening in front of her.
“Hey, Cass!” Finch said, her face scrunched with laughter. “Care to join?”
To Cass’s surprise, she found herself tempted to say yes. But she smiled and shook her head, raising her voice to say, “Next time!”
Finch opened her mouth to respond, but half a second later, Tammy lost her balance. All of Cass’s roommates collapsed like a stack of cards. She walked away to the sound of Justin’s muffled, “Fuck!” and another burst of laughter. Smiling at the sound, Cass grabbed hold of the banister and started up the stairs. She took them two at a time, her backpack thumping against her spine. She reached the door to her room and flung it open, expecting it to be empty.
But Michael stood next to the window, outlined in fading daylight.
Cass faltered at the sight of him. Her hand tightened on the doorknob. Michael’s dark eyes studied her, and she resisted the urge to hunch her shoulders again. Why did it feel like he saw everything she was trying so hard to hide?
His timing couldn’t be more perfect, though. Schooling her features, Cass cleared her throat and stepped inside the room. “Hey,” she said.
There was a beat of silence, as if Michael had been expecting a different reaction. “Hey,” he echoed.
Cass kicked the door shut and set her backpack down before she moved to join Michael at the window. She crossed her arms over her chest and followed his gaze, looking out at the shadowed yard. There wasn’t much to see—just the browning grass, the trees, and the hedge wall beyond those—but the end of the front path was also visible. Once in a while, someone walked past House Wayside, or clusters of students whose voices rang out. Small but constant reminders that, no matter how still and quiet it felt up in this room, life was still happening out there.
“Your name is Michael de Leon,” Cass said quietly. She looked him, but Michael kept his dark eyes turned away. “I showed the photo to a history professor, and she knew who you were. She’s studied the previous classes at Else & Bellows, I guess.”
Cass stopped, waiting for Michael to say something. She hadn’t even gotten to the part about his death yet. With every second that passed, her confusion grew. Just as she was about to demand what Michael’s glitch was, he met her gaze and said, “It doesn’t matter.”
Cass wasn’t sure she’d heard him correctly. “What?”
Michael’s mouth tightened, as if he were stopping himself from saying something. Another silence fell between them. His voice was clipped when he eventually said, “It doesn’t matter anymore. If you look into this, you could get hurt. Just let it go, Miss Ryan.”
Oh, they were back to “Miss Ryan”, were they? Cass stared back at Michael and felt a surge of rebellion. She didn’t like being told what to do, and the thought of leaving things as they were felt… wrong. “I can’t,” she said.
Michael searched her expression. Though he hadn’t moved, it seemed as if he’d gone still, and the intensity of his brown eyes made Cass’s heart quicken. “Why?” he asked softly.
“I don’t know.” It was the truth. Cass felt another nervous flutter inside of her, and she swallowed. She glanced out at the yard again, trying to hide how Michael affected her. Her voice was soft, too, as she asked, “Don’t you want to find out more about your past?”
A second passed. Then another. A storm raged in Michael’s dark eyes. Cass didn’t try to end the silence, or ask him more questions. She just waited, her pulse trapped in her throat like a hummingbird. When he finally spoke, Michael’s voice was low and heated. “I’m afraid because—”
A gentle knock cut him off. Cass jumped, and her head jerked toward the door. Panic sluiced through her. “Yeah?” she called.
“I just wanted to make sure that you’re okay. After the meeting with Headmistress Crane.”
It was Finch, of course. Cass desperately wanted to keep talking to Michael, but she couldn’t bring herself to give her roommate the brush off. She went over to the door and opened it just enough to show her face, carefully shielding the room behind her. For a moment, Cass couldn’t even remember what Finch just said. Right, the meeting with Crane.
“Oh, yeah, I’m fine,” she said. Truth be told, Cass had half-forgotten about her disastrous conversation with the headmistress. Now the memory came crashing back, and she felt a rush of hot anxiety as the realization struck her all over again.
A powerful voyant knew about her brother.
Cass must’ve tensed or flinched, because Finch stayed where she was, her forehead wrinkled with concern. “It’s okay if you’re not. Fine, I mean. Sometimes I’m not fine,” she said.
