Paying the Piper

Four: Looking Busy

He didn't make it a habit to post personal information out on the world wide web. But this was a special circumstance—he wondered if he were risking more by sharing personal information on the web or not asking others if they had any idea about the darkness around Faye.

Or so he debated to himself silently during his never-ending trudge home from school.

Not that he lived far. In good weather, Quentin sometimes preferred to mosey home, thinking. It was no mistake that many old estates had labyrinths fashioned within them; something about the art of walking and thinking helped you find conclusions.

Today, however, he reached no answers. And every footstep seemed to take triple the usual amount of time when he had plans to find out the solution to The Faye Conundrum tonight at home.

"Could I be overreacting to her? Maybe I should listen to Rhia." Maybe this was all in Quentin's head.

The squirrel that raced across his path and then whipped its tail at him from safe in an oak tree did not seem to agree. Maybe it was right: no matter how minor, a threat was a threat and had to be taken seriously.

And Faye was most certainly a threat.

He finally reached home, a whole thirty minutes after leaving the school. Without the cerebral palsy slowing him down, he knew he could've made it in ten minutes or so. His brother sometimes ran it in six minutes flat. But thinking those things led nowhere at all, so he focused on the problem he could solve: Faye Wulfgaar.

He unlocked the front door and slipped inside. Within, everything was so still and quiet that he could sense the just-out-of-hearing buzz of the den computer on sleep. He checked the calendar and noted that his dad wasn't due back until Saturday of next week.

Ramen sufficed for a quick dinner, then Quentin headed up to the second story to his bedroom. He gave his lizard, Smaug, a quick hello and a cricket and received the usual reaction to both: haughty aloofness and then a loss of pride to snatch up the insect.

"Anything happen while I was away?" he asked, just because being home alone made him want to talk aloud more often than he normally did. He missed Marietta's presence. She had been their nanny from when Quentin was about nine to when he was sixteen and their dad decided nannies were no longer required.

He turned on his computer, the hum and whir of the fans a soothing balm to his stressed heart. He opened his internet browser and clicked on his first bookmark: The Woods Are Lonely, Dark and Deep. The forum was for those who had experienced (or claimed to) hauntings, poltergeists, demonic possession, Satanic rituals, etc. Anything dark and inexplicable was the focus, and it was supposed to only be for true experiences, but he was pretty sure 90% of it was made-up crap.

However, he'd joined it a few years ago when he was less internet-wise, made some friends there, and they still kept up with each other on a couple of threads that seemed the least bogus. He started a new conversation, knowing his username would draw in the appropriate readers—as well as the inevitable cruel, rude, and stupid readers.

So there's a new girl at my school, and something about her makes me feel sick every time I look at her. It's like something bad is going to happen and her aura makes me physically nauseous. Sometimes from the corner of my eye, I catch a shadow hovering around her. Anyone ever experience anything like this? What happened?

He reread his words, not liking what little justice they did to what he felt, but mentally shrugged. He couldn't explain it any better, and at least his friends wouldn't make fun of him for the question. He submitted the post and stretched.

Faint clanking coming through the vent meant his brother had returned home. From the sounds in the kitchen, he hadn't been satisfied with ramen like Quentin had. Quentin's room was above the kitchen, and the vent carried more of the sounds than was excusable in a house that cost as much as this one did. But Quentin didn't mind. He liked knowing he wasn't home alone all the time.