Last Breath (16 page)

It took every ounce of will Cassidy possessed to say in a normal tone of voice, “Of course! Go dance with Ann like a nice date, Travis. I’m going to get one more drink of water.” Her head high, she turned her back on all of them and walked to the sink again. Over the sound of running water, she heard voices muttering in disagreement.

But when she turned around again a few minutes later, the kitchen was empty.

Cassidy leaned against the sink, grateful to find herself alone. She directed a hostile glance toward the Coke can, sitting on the oval wooden table.

It couldn’t have had hot coffee in it, she thought, moving to the table to pick up the can. Not possibly. It’s cold. It was cold when Travis handed it to me, it was cold when I picked it up off the floor, and it’s cold now.

Dr. Bruin had called the imagination a “very powerful tool.” She had even said that in mental illness, many people used that imagination against themselves, sometimes in very bizarre ways. “Some people hear voices, sometimes entire conversations. Others see images that are so real to them, they can describe them down to the tiniest detail.”

Compared to entire conversations and detailed images, hot coffee in a Coke can didn’t seem like such a challenge for a vivid imagination.

What was the proper psychiatric term for someone who believed they had burned their own lips and tongue and throat, actually
felt
the pain, when in fact, they hadn’t done any such thing?

She didn’t want to know what the proper psychiatric term was.

Just to be sure, she would check out her mouth very carefully in the restroom mirror. If, like Ann, she saw absolutely no evidence of any kind that her lips had been burned, she would have to give up and blame her imagination totally.

That was such a scary thought, her knees wobbled. And the pain in her chest increased.

Her fingers closed around the black velvet purse hanging by a golden chain on her left shoulder. She could feel the inhaler inside. Maybe I should use it while I’m in the rest room, she thought as she moved toward a door off to her right boasting a blood-red Salem University sticker. If the doctors are right about stress aggravating asthma, it’s a miracle I’m not already stretched out on the floor tile wheezing like, as Ann would put it, a dying frog.

She pulled the inhaler from her unzipped purse with one hand while the other hand reached out, turned the doorknob, and pulled the stickered door open.

Because her eyes were focused on her purse, she didn’t see that what she was stepping onto was not solid white squares of rest room floor tile, but instead a set of narrow, wooden steps leading downward, flanked by a wall hung with tools on one side and a rickety wooden railing on the other.

Still looking down into her purse, she pulled out the inhaler and was reaching out with her hand to locate a light switch when her foot came down hard. On nothing. Knocked off balance by the misstep, Cassidy pitched forward, headfirst, letting out a small, startled cry as she sailed out into a cold, dark, musty cavern.

A
S CASSIDY SLAMMED INTO
the wall at the foot of the stairs, bounced off, and landed with a painful thud on the hard earthen floor, a sudden breeze sailed in through an open kitchen window and slammed the cellar door shut. The light from the kitchen above vanished abruptly, plunging the cellar into darkness.

After a long moment, Cassidy stirred and tried to pull herself upright. The door at the top of the stairs opened slowly, carefully. Cassidy raised her head, tried to call out, but the fall had knocked the wind out of her, and her voice along with it. She raised a hand in appeal, a silent gesture that clearly said, “Help me.”

The door closed with the click of finality.

Completely disoriented, Cassidy didn’t realize for several moments that she wasn’t breathing normally. And that it wasn’t just from the fall. She was severely allergic to mold and mildew, and she could smell both in this dark, chilly cavern. Still, the coughing took her by surprise when it welled up inside her chest and spilled out into the cellar, one wracking spasm after another, shaking her entire body.

She straightened up, hoping that would help.

It didn’t. The coughing was out of control. She needed her inhaler.

Her hand went to her side in search of her shoulder bag.

It wasn’t there.

The sound that came from Cassidy’s throat was tortured, a loud, rasping sound that echoed throughout the musty space. She had to fight for every breath, as if someone had tightened a metal vise around her chest.

Gasping, unable to shout for help, she got on her hands and knees and began searching frantically in the darkness for the lifesaving inhaler. Above her, so
close
above her, she could hear party sounds…music, laughter, conversation…couldn’t they
hear
the dreadful sounds she was making? So loud, like a power saw scraping across a thick tree limb, so loud, why couldn’t they
hear
?

It was bad, this attack, the worst ever. Without the inhaler, she could die. That had been explained to her, more than once.

She knew it was true.

“Somebody help me,” she tried to whisper, but the only sound she uttered was another loud, hoarse rasp.

Refusing to give up, she scrambled on hands and knees along the cold, earthen floor, her hands frantically sweeping its surface for the missing shoulder bag.

Above her, Travis and Ann entered the kitchen, leaving the party sounds behind. He went straight to the refrigerator for ice. “So, where’d you go?” he asked as he collected ice cubes.

“When?”

“A few minutes ago. I thought you were right there behind me, but when I turned to say something, you weren’t there.” Then he added drily, “That seems to be happening to me a lot lately.”

“Oh, I was talking to Sophie about the dance. You know, the dance you haven’t asked me to yet? We’re a little worried about the decorations. I mean, the way Cassidy’s been lately…”

“What was that noise?” Travis interrupted when he’d dropped the cubes into his cup.

Ann straightened the collar of her blue blouse. “What?”

“That noise. Didn’t you hear it? Like a car with a bad battery. From the cellar?”

Ann laughed. “I didn’t hear anything. Like there’d be a car in the basement, Trav. What’s in your drink, anyway?”

Travis frowned. “No, I mean it. Listen!”

Smiling tolerantly, Ann obeyed. And her smile disappeared. “I hear it. God, what is it?” She listened more intently. “It sounds like…” She looked at Travis with wide eyes. “Travis, where’s Cassidy?” she asked sharply.

“What?”

“She never came back inside, did she? And that sound coming from the cellar, it’s horrible, but. I’ve heard it before. I’ll never forget it. I heard it for the first time that night Cassidy had her asthma attack at the Quad. Travis, that’s the same sound.”

Travis dropped his drink and ran to the cellar door, yanking it open. The rasping sound filled the staircase, echoing up and out into the kitchen. He reached out and flipped the light switch at the top of the stairs.

Cassidy was on her knees, her hands on the dirt floor. Her mouth was open and her lips, when she turned her face upward, had a faint bluish tinge.

“Call an ambulance!” Travis barked at Ann, and took the stairs three at a time.

Cassidy was unable to speak, but when Travis reached her, she gestured with her hands toward her shoulder bag, lying underneath the wooden stairs.

Travis grabbed it, pulled the inhaler out, and thrust it at Cassidy. “That’s not going to do the trick,” he said grimly, gently cradling her head on his shoulder as she put the inhaler to her mouth. “Not this time.”

But it did. At least, enough to put an end to the agonized rasping. Enough to enable Cassidy to speak.

“This was supposed to be a restroom,” she whispered as the agony in her chest eased. “There was a sticker, like Ann said. I checked first. It was there.”

But she wasn’t surprised at all when the ambulance attendants brought her up the stairs and into the kitchen in front of a curious, anxious crowd and she glanced at the cellar door as it closed. There was no Salem University sticker on the door. No sticker anywhere on it.

Oh, God, she thought, too exhausted to dwell on the missing sticker, it’s happened again!

She was aware of comments swirling around her as she was taken from Nightmare Hall. “What’s she doing with Travis?” she heard someone say as Travis remained beside the stretcher. “I thought she was with Sawyer Duncan.” And Talia’s voice, saying, “Oh, no, is she sick again?” And then Sawyer’s voice, “Okay, McVey, I’ll take over now. You can go back to your own date.”

And then Sawyer was walking beside her, not Travis, and Cassidy was vaguely conscious of a twinge of disappointment. She remembered how safe she’d felt with her head against Travis’s shoulder, and how he hadn’t accused her of imagining the sticker on the cellar door.

She was only in the infirmary overnight. And grateful to be, because she didn’t want to face her friends back at the Quad. Travis had probably already told them that she thought she’d seen a sticker on the cellar door. She had gone to the party to prove that she was A-OK, and had proved instead exactly the opposite.

How had that happened?

Had someone really opened the cellar door, seen her in agony, and then closed the door again without helping her? Or had she imagined that, too?

With the help of medication, Cassidy slept a deep, dreamless sleep all night.

And she slept all day Sunday, when she got back to her room. Mostly to avoid questions. If someone asked her why she had stepped into the cellar, she wouldn’t have known what to say. The truth wouldn’t work. “I thought I saw a sticker on the door”? That would be admitting out loud that she didn’t know
what
she was seeing these days.

Easier to sleep and avoid everything.

But on Monday, she dressed and went to all of her classes, then to a dance committee meeting, a Hike and Bike Club meeting, and made a trip to the bookstore to buy notebooks. Her motions were automatic, her mind numb. Throughout the day, people asked her with what seemed like genuine concern how she was feeling, and she told them she was feeling fine. Look! she wanted to say, look how well I’m functioning, just like a normal person. But she couldn’t eat, and she couldn’t concentrate, and she was just going through the motions.

She knew she needed help. How much of her mind was left? How long would it take to lose the rest of it? Then what would she be? When the last of the real Cassidy Kirk had disappeared forever, where would they put the empty shell that was left? In the kind of hospital where Talia’s mother worked?

The thought made her physically ill.

But while she was still functioning, she could at least pretend she was normal, and that meant finishing up the business of the decorations. Ann and Talia and Sophie had all asked her that morning, innocently enough, if everything was “taken care of,” and she’d been asked again by others at the committee meeting. She knew they were all worried that she’d forgotten something.

She didn’t think she had. But how could she be sure? The only way to know was to go to the mall and pick up the order.

Since she couldn’t carry all of the supplies on her bike and it would be awkward on the shuttle, she drove. It felt good for a change. Driving was a competent act that required concentration. She seemed to be doing it okay. Hadn’t driven off the road or crashed into another car. That was a good sign, wasn’t it?

It was twilight by the time she pulled out of the campus parking lot, and already beginning to grow dark when she parked in front of the mall. She should have left school earlier. Ever since she’d nearly hit a deer driving home one night shortly after she got her license, she had hated driving in the dark.

But collecting the supplies was important. It would be worth a little night driving to see the expressions on everyone’s faces when she dropped the decorations on her bed.

The mall was uncrowded, the rental-supply store empty but for the clerk.

When Cassidy told the woman why she was there, the clerk nodded, excused herself, and was back in minutes carrying two shopping bags filled to the brim, the surfaces covered with tissue paper.

“Could I just see the tablecloths, please?” Cassidy asked.

“Of course. I’m sure you’ll love them.” Bending, the woman pulled one tissue-wrapped parcel from the bag, laid it on the counter, and unfolded the covering. “There!” she said, “isn’t that pretty!”

It was pretty. It was very pretty. The only problem was, the folded tablecloth Cassidy was staring at wasn’t black.

It was royal blue.

“It’s blue,” she said in a dull voice. “That tablecloth is blue.”

The woman looked up. “Well, yes, of course it is. They all are.”

“I ordered black.”

“Well, that was the first time,” the clerk said patiently. “But then you called and changed the order to blue and orange. And I must say, the order was much easier to fill than the black and silver would have been.”

Cassidy’s stomach rolled over. Blue and orange? Those weren’t even Salem’s colors. “What are you talking about?” she asked, her voice rising. “I never changed the order.”

The woman’s smile disappeared. She reached into the bag and pulled out a slip of paper. “Here it is, right here,” she said, her tone of voice decidedly less friendly. “You called a week ago and changed the order. I have your student I.D. number right here on the slip.”

“But I
didn’t
!” Cassidy cried. “I never called you! We wanted black and silver, and that’s what I ordered. That’s what I have to have! I
have
to!” She remembered then with sickening clarity that blue and orange were the school colors of their archrival, State University. How could she go back to campus with bags filled with blue and orange? “I can’t
take
this stuff, I can’t!”

“Well,” the woman said coolly, rewrapping the offending blue in its tissue paper, “I just don’t see any way that I could locate the black and silver at this late date.”

Cassidy leaned forward over the glass case. “You have to! Oh, God, you
have
to!”