Day after day after day goes by in black and white for Kendall now. She puts herself in a mind-numbing routine of school, farm, homework, sleep. She rides silently in the pickup to and from school with Jacián and Marlena, making small talk but not remembering any of it. Sitting quietly at her desk, moving automatically through the days, just getting by, and doing whatever her OCD tells her to do, no more, no less.
There is no more visiting Hector’s ranch once Marlena comes back to school. Marlena starts hanging out with the other tenth graders, who begin to get to know her, help her out when she needs it.
There’s no more soccer with Jacián either. Kendall’s parents need her desperately on the farm. It’s the height of harvest, and Kendall has work to do. Everything is one dull event after another now. She plunges her hands into freezing water, pulling leaves and bad potatoes off a belt for hours every day after school, and all she can do is think.
The thing is, for Kendall it just doesn’t matter. Nico is gone. Juilliard is no longer a goal. There’s no future with either one of her two favorite things — both dreams shattered within a matter of days. What else is there to think about? The truth is that Kendall might be tough on the outside. She can take a hit, and she can stand up for herself. But inside, in her scared heart and in her stupid, unstoppable brain, Kendall knows that she will stay in Cryer’s Cross forever. She will work on this farm until she inherits it someday. She will probably marry somebody like Eli Greenwood or Travis Shank and have children who play soccer on a too-small team until they graduate.
Or maybe not. Maybe she’ll shake up the town and stay single, adopt a baby or two, and just hide out at the farm.
And wait.
Wait for Nico to come back.
Sapped. Our energy drained, only to be manhandled away. The rage! Oh, but the touch. . It’s there. It’s near, within reach. We must become stronger. Draw Our next victim to Us from afar.
We simmer, day after day, hoarding what strength remains.
And We wait.
By mid-October, Kendall is stuck in a loop of depressing thoughts that won’t leave her. Lost without a goal, lost without her best friend, lost in a thousand acres of potatoes. There is no meaning, no plan. No sense in anything. All she can do is just plod through it. Get the work done so she can get up again the next day and start over. Go to bed before eleven so the missing phone call doesn’t hurt so much. Get to school early so she can do what she has to do, her OCD ball and chain dictating her every waking hour.
Every night she stands by the upstairs window and looks out toward the Cruz farm. She doesn’t know why. It’s just. . for memory’s sake. And every night it is a dark and lonely view. “I’ll say I’m your girlfriend if you just come back,” she says, her breath fogging up the window. “I promise.”
Tonight she sees a vehicle go down the gravel road slowly, and she watches its brake lights flicker as it navigates potholes. When it’s gone from view, the world is dark again except for the stars and the harvest moon that casts an orange glow over the fields. “I know you can see this moon too, Nico,” she whispers. “Somewhere.”
Just as she turns away from the window, something moving halfway down the driveway catches her eye. She squints and makes out a figure standing there. Her heart jumps. Could it be Nico? She stares harder. It can’t be! In a daze she moves down the stairs, telling herself it’s not him. Someone would have called with the news. By the time she reaches the door, she’s growing scared. If it’s not Nico, then who is standing in their driveway at this hour?
Kendall stops short of flying through the door to gather her senses. Maybe it’s the abductor, ready to grab her. She sucks in a breath and slowly pushes aside the curtain of the window next to the front door and she peers out, trying to get her eyes to adjust to the darkness again.
But there’s no one there. No one that she can see, anyway. Not with so many places to hide. . long grass, trees, barns, tractors to hide behind. She spins around and runs back upstairs to the window. And from there she sees a figure — a man, she’s sure — running away, cutting the corner of the front field.
She flies over to her phone and dials Eli Greenwood’s number. Sheriff Greenwood answers. “Hello.”
“I just saw a man watching my house.” She’s breathless.
“Mrs. Fletcher?”
“No, it’s Kendall. There was a man standing halfway down our driveway just a couple minutes ago, and I thought it might be Nico, but then he turned and ran away when I went downstairs for a closer look.”
Sheriff Greenwood is quiet. “I’ll head out. Can you give me any description? Do you think it really was
Nico?”
Kendall hesitates. “I did at first, but that was probably because I was thinking about him. If it was Nico, I’m sure he would have come to the door. So it couldn’t be.” Could it? She’s so confused.
“I’ll take a look. Could be somebody out for a walk. Just lock up tight, all right? Your parents home?”
“Yes. They’re sleeping.”
“You try to get some sleep too now. Hear?”
“Yes, sir.”
They hang up.
Kendall rechecks all the door locks and windows and goes back upstairs to her room. She lies in bed but knows there’s no sleeping now. She thinks about waking her parents, but in the middle of harvest they are exhausted. Besides, what could they do? The guy ran away.
Her heart is in her throat and she can’t stop getting up to check her bedroom window over and over.
Because the way it works in her brain, if somebody breaks in, it’ll be her fault for not checking the lock enough times.
When she finally falls into a troubled sleep, she dreams about Nico.
Kidnapping and stabbing her to death.
In the morning the ride to school is awkward and silent. After Kendall does her school rituals, Jacián pulls her aside.
“Can I talk to you for a minute?” He looks troubled.
“Sure,” Kendall says, without enthusiasm. She’s tired from lack of sleep and paranoid about the kidnapper on the loose.
They step outside and around to the back of the school as students begin arriving.
“What’s so important that you can’t say it in the classroom?”
Jacián presses his lips together, and then he says, “Look. I don’t know how to say this without you freaking out at me. Can I just ask you to listen until I’m through?”
Kendall shifts and narrows her eyes. “What? Why would I freak out?”
“Last night. . that was me in your driveway. Sheriff Greenwood told me I could explain it myself, and he’s going to call you this evening.”
“What? What were you doing watching me? God!”
“Please. .”
Kendall is quiet, but her brain is on fire with new fearful thoughts.
“I was out for a walk. I couldn’t sleep, and I had a really shitty evening, and the sky was awesome and, well, yeah. I went past your house and saw the upstairs all lit up from the road. On my way back it was darker, but I could see your silhouette in the window, just standing there. And, I don’t know. . I just started walking down your driveway for some insane reason. I was feeling bad, and I figured you were too, and so I thought maybe you’d want to. . I don’t know. Talk or something. It was stupid.” His eyes are hard and he looks off toward the parking lot.
Kendall stares at him.
“Then I saw you disappear and I sort of came to my senses, realized how late it was, and how you can’t stand me anyway so why the hell would you want to talk, and I got scared and took off running. I swear that’s the truth.” His jaw is set. “Greenwood picked me up five minutes later and questioned me for more than an hour. Then he told me he believed me and drove me home. He said he wanted me to tell you it was me. And that he’s going to call you after school to make sure I told you. And that. .” He pauses. “And that you can press charges for trespassing if you want.”
Kendall doesn’t know what to say.
Jacián shoves one hand in his pocket and rakes through his hair with the other, leaving it standing up wildly. “I just figured you were hurting. I mean, after the way you’ve been acting the last few weeks. And thought. . well. Fuck it. Never mind. It was a stupid thing to do.” He sighs. “I’m sorry, Kendall. Okay? I didn’t mean to scare you. Hell.”