“What’s Seth been doing?”
“Oh, he hung with some of his old school buddies last night. They seem nice.”
“They do?”
“Well, maybe cause I’m pregnant. You know how everybody’s nicer to you when you’re pregnant?”
“Okay,” Jenny said. “But he hasn’t…done anything?”
“Like what?”
“Like hang out with girls, or anything like that?”
“Oh, I don’t think so. Those guys act like pigs. I don’t think any girl would go near them.”
Jenny laughed.
“So, here’s why I’m calling,” Darcy said. “I’ve been feeding Ashleigh’s dog Maybelle, you know? And I forgot to do it last night before we left. So she’s probably really hungry by now.”
“You want me to take care of Ashleigh’s dog?”
“I know you and Ashleigh didn’t get along,” Darcy said. “But it’s not the dog’s fault. She’s not Ashleigh’s dog anymore. She’s just a lonely dog with nobody to take care of her.”
Jenny sighed. “Okay, I’ll feed Maybelle. How do I get in the house?”
“The key’s under a fake rock next to the basement door,” Darcy said. “I know cause I used to do everything when the Goodlings went out of town. Feed the dog, clean the aquarium, mop, dust—”
“Fine,” Jenny said. “Just keep Seth out of trouble, okay?”
“Will do. Cheerios.” Darcy hung up.
Jenny opened the back door. Her dad was in the back yard, rebuilding a window-mounted air conditioning unit for somebody.
“Who was on the phone?” he asked.
“Darcy. She wants me to go feed Ashleigh Goodling’s dog while they’re out of town.”
“Seth liking the school?”
“I guess. I haven’t talked to him.”
Her dad straightened up and rubbed his back. He wiped sweat from his forehead and looked at her. “Jenny, what are you planning to do?”
“Feed that dog, I guess.”
“I mean in the big picture of things.”
“I don’t know. Seth wants me to go to Charleston, but that seems dangerous for me, with all them people. And I know his parents don’t want me with him.”
“What do you want?”
“I don’t know. I want to get out beyond this town, but where I don’t have to worry about the pox. Like that Appalachian Trail. You can go slow and hike it for months. That sounds nice, doesn’t it? Just walking on and on through the woods, seeing new things every day.”
“It does,” he said. “You could do that.”
“I’d have to do it by myself.” Jenny shrugged. “What do you think I should do?”
“Jenny, you done killed half the town,” her dad said. “You are way beyond anything I understand. And that’s the truth.”
His words hurt her feelings, but he was right. Jenny walked back into the house, thinking about the dead bodies she’d left on the town green. Then her dream, the ancient city filled with the sick and dying. She felt ill, and confused, and very alone.
Later, Jenny pulled into the driveway of Ashleigh’s house. The evening shadows were already long and dark.
As soon as she got out of the car, she felt like she was being watched. She looked around the cul-de-sac. It didn’t look like anybody was home at any house, and one even had a FOR SALE sign in the front yard, which had nearly been swallowed by high weeds.
Jenny walked around to the back yard. It was very secluded, surrounded by old trees with sprawling limbs. A big dry crater yawned open where the duck pond used to be. She hated how isolated and alone she felt, along with that feeling of an invisible eye staring at her from somewhere.
Jenny stopped and looked at the empty pond. She had died down there, and Seth had pulled her out and brought her back. Since then, she’d had occasional jumbled memories about past lives, especially in her dreams. They weren’t like normal dreams, where she was participating and affecting what happened. They were more like movies, or reruns.
Seth didn’t seem to be having these dreams, as far as he could remember.
Jenny felt like she and Seth were growing more distant from each other, and that worried her.
She walked to the lower patio, built next to the basement door. It was occupied by a park bench and Dr. Goodling’s gigantic propane-powered grill. She found the big fake rock next to the door, with the key tucked inside a hollow compartment on the bottom.
Jenny held up the key and looked at the basement door. She didn’t really like the idea of going in through the basement, which looked to be mostly underground. She still felt like she was being watched, but there was nobody around, unless someone was watching her from the windows of the house next door. Nobody had ever lived there, though.