Page 54 of Starve
Even though Cairo is usually lurking around enough that I wouldn’t be alone, even without my dog. With a few more polite words to my therapist, I edge out of the room at last once she’s again looking at her phone instead of at me.
I’m grateful for it, and I let out a sigh of relief while taking the stairs quickly, nearly tripping down them. Once I’m out the door, I glance at the diner, giving a few stray thoughts about ordering something. But with leftovers in the fridge, I decide itisn’t worth it. I really should just go home and be a responsible adult who eats what’s still in her kitchen.
“Could’ve gotten a shake,” I grumble to myself, meandering down the sidewalk back toward the parking lot on the other side of the old brick building. “Could’ve gotten a fried bologna sandwich and a shake, and I would’ve been so?—”
The moment I turn the corner, something grabs me, shoving me hard enough into the brick wall that I drop my keys to the ground and yelp out a sound of pain and surprise. “What—” For a terrifying moment, I’m sure that it’s Tyler. This would be the perfect place to kill me, after all, when Agatha and Cairo are nowhere in sight.
But it’sHattie. She leans in, shoulders shaking, with her hands knotted in my shirt and trembling.“Shhh,”she croons, stepping so close our bodies are pressed together. “Shhh,Fern, don’t yell. Don’t scream, just…” She shudders again and buries her face against my shoulder, unmoving for so long I wonder wildly if she’s fallen asleep.
“…Hattie?” My hand comes up, but my voice is enough to jerk her out of whatever trance she was in. She stands up straight with her gaze on mine, and then I notice the dark circles under her eyes are so bad that she looks like she has a pair of black eyes.
“Oh,fuck.”I drop my hand and lean against the wall behind me as my stomach knots itself tightly. “Oh,fuck,Hattie.” I don’t know what else to say.
“I won’t hurt you,” she’s quick to promise. Her hands tense, gripping my sleeves more tightly. “Fern, I’d never hurt you. Not when you were nice to me.” But she trails off and inhales deeply, her eyes sliding shut. She’s perfectly still until a shiver goes through her, and her eyes open again.
“But Fern.” Again she leans against me, embracing me like I’m the one that needs comfort instead of the one whodesperately wants to get out of this situation. Clouds roll over the sun and a breeze picks up in the absence of a clear sky. It makes it hard to hear what she says, but somehow, I make it out anyway.
“I’m just so hungry.”
Fuck.
The words repeat in my head, and I force myself not to run or push her away. I don’t know that I could get away from her if she’s as strong as Cairo is. And I don’t want to upset her with any sudden movements. On the other hand, I know I need to get away from her before she hurts me. Or worse.
“Okay. Umm. I-I want to help you,” I stammer, with my heart racing like a rabbit’s in a snare. “Hattie—” Suddenly one of her hands moves and she presses her palm to my chest while locking her wide, dark eyes on mine.
She sucks in a breath, then lets it out. Hattie does it again, breathing in shaky, uneven motions that cause her whole body to jerk, like a marionette with an unsteady puppeteer. “You’re afraid of me,” she says at last, and it’s like an unexpected revelation as the words leave her mouth in a breathy whisper. “You think I’m going to hurt you.”
I think she’s going toeat me,but I’m not about to say that out loud. So I take a few deep breaths to steady myself, hoping to maybe influence her gasps into something calmer and less panicked. But it doesn’t help. “You have me pinned against a wall, Hattie,” I point out softly. “You just startled me. I want to help you.”
Hattie shakes her head and looks away, frustration on her face. “No…no, I didn’t come here for your help,” the redhead tells me, like she’s confused and trying to remember exactly why she came here in the first place. “No, I came to helpyou.”
I don’t know what she could help me with, when she’s clearly the more unwell of the two of us. But I’m not about to say thateither. “What are you trying to help me with?” I ask her very slowly, like I’m afraid of spooking a wild animal.
Her sudden, broken laugh seems desperate, and I flinch at the unexpected sound. All at once, Hattie lunges to cradle my face in her hands, and her wide, dark eyes hold mine as she comes close enough for me to feel her breath on my lips, intimate like a lover’s.
“Don’t let him do this to you, Fern,” Hattie whispers. “Don’t let him make you likeus.”
“What?” My brain is struggling to put the words together in a way that fits. Cairo certainly hasn’t tried to make me into anything. Carefully, I bring up my shaking hands to curl my fingers around Hattie’s delicate wrists. “What did Tyler do to you, Hattie?” I ask in as steady a voice as I can manage.
But all she does is shudder, then smile while inclining her head, until our foreheads press together and I can feel the cool clamminess of her skin. “He told me I’d feel better, Fern. He said the hunger isn’t so bad…that everything else is worth it.” She gives another full-body shiver, and her nails scrape against my face, causing me to gasp and wince away from the sharp, sudden pain.
“But I’m just sohungry.And I don’t think he loves me like I love him. Don’t let Cairo do this to you. Don’t let him change you, okay? Promise me.” Her grip tightens, drawing a soft sound of pain from me as I try to pry her off, increasing my struggle to get free.
“Hattie, stop!” I whine, writhing. “You’re hurting me!”
“Promise me, Fern!”Her voice isn’t hers any longer. It’s mine. An eerie replica that sounds so spot on, it’s like listening to a perfect recording of myself.
Finally, I whisper, trying not to scream, “Yes, I promise! I promise! I won’t let him?—”
She releases me suddenly, and I crumple to my knees, hitting the sidewalk without noticing the rough scrape of it on my skin. When I look up, Hattie is gone, and the clouds roll away from the sun like none of it ever happened. Leaving me alone on the ground with my keys, only steps from my car.
Chapter 22
“Cairo?”My voice echoes through my empty house, and when Moro meets me at the door, tail wagging and whining softly, I realize he isn’t here.
With my heart still racing from my encounter with Hattie, I can’t help thinking that he’s picked a really shitty time to vanish. But I sigh and slide down against the closed door, allowing Moro to sniff and lick my face while doing her inspection of me. “Thanks,” I breathe, reaching up to rub her ears. “At least I always have you.”
But what if I didn’t?
