Page 52 of Requiem & Reverie

She starts the engine and throws the car in reverse.

A hard thump makes both of us jump, and I twist in my seat to see a man standing behind our car, the top of a stroller beside him.

“What the fuck is your problem!” he shouts slamming his palms against the trunk, startling my mom again. “I got a baby here! Why don’t you watch where the hell you’re going?”

My mother’s lip quivers, and she turns away with tears in her eyes, rolling down the window. “I’m so sorry,” she says, and the jerk behind us probably doesn’t know that shaky quality to her voice is how she sounds just before she’s about to cry.

At the sight of her, something dark and violent stirs in my chest. I imagine throwing the car in reverse and slamming on the gas, running the guy over. I can visualize the blood spattered up on the back windows, and the baby screaming in its stroller.

“Barrett?” My mother breaks my musings, tipping her head in my periphery to gain my attention. “Is everything okay, baby?”

“You should’ve run him over with the car.”

Her brows pinch together in a troubled, but expectant, expression. “That man was just protecting his baby. He had every right to be upset.”

“He’s an idiot.” The rage pumping through me burns surprisingly hot, and I curl my hands into tight fists at my sides. “He doesn’t deserve an apology.”

“Barrett …” My mother’s voice is calm and soothing, and when she sets her hand gently on my shoulder, it’s like water to the flames. “You channel that anger toward those who warrant it. Those who hurt people. Not the ones who protect.”

“Like Grandfather and Carl?”

Her eyes flicker as she lowers her hand from my shoulder. “They’re family.”

“But family can sometimes hurt you.”

“You’re right. They absolutely can.”

“Do you think you could ever kill an innocent person?” Nola’s question breaks my thoughts, and I look up to where she’s still sitting at the edge of the bed.

“No. I don’t enjoy it. Just happens to be something I’m good at.”

“I never thought I’d say this, but I’m glad in this case. I want that bastard dead.” She glances back at the bed and backs herself to the headboard. “I think I’m going to lie down, if that’s all right.”

“Of course. I think you should stay here tonight. I don’t trust you going back to your place alone. Not after what he pulled today.”

“Do you think he wants to kill me?”

There isn’t a doubt in my mind, though I never quite understood why Carl chose Nora to keep all those years ago. “Absolutely.”

18

Nola

“Nola, wake up.” The voice doesn’t register as familiar, but I do as it commands, opening my eyes to a blinding light that leaves me desperate to shield myself.

Beyond the boundaries of that light, I can just make out the whites of eyes staring down at me, like an audience standing over me. “Where am I?”

“Whatever Voss told you is a lie. I’ve no interest in killing you.”

It’s then I realize my arms won’t move. They feel weighted down, heavy, along with my legs. An obscure face stares down at me, blank white, without any distinct features. In his hand is a scalpel, and in that very moment, I realize I can’t blink my eyes, which have been pried open. My instincts are screaming with panic, but my body feels numb. Impenetrable.

“It’s okay, Nola. We’re all witnesses.”

“Who? Who is a witness?”

The lights flip on, and the eyes I saw before are the dead bodies of Beth, Harv, Denny and Oliver. All of them on top of me, burying me in what morphs into a casket. I can’t breathe with the weight of them pressing down on me.

“No! I don’t want to be buried! I can’t breathe! I can’t breathe!”