One Bloody Thing After Another Read Online Free PDF Page A

is a bedroom and a kitchen and a living room and a basement with a pool table all lined up. People stand in one part and pretend there are walls, and on camera it looks separate. But it isn’t really. Jackie is sitting right on the couch, but the cameras are all pointed at the dining room table. Nobody can see her.
    The cop is pushing open the doors to the stalls, one by one. She’s not behind the doors, though. She’s behind the camera. She’s invisible.
    He kneels down and looks for her sneakers under the stall. Then he opens the door. Door number one, no Jackie. Door number two, no Jackie. There’s only one more door. Jackie can hear the scratching already. Her mother’s breathing sounds like scratching. It’s the only thing Jackie can hear in the whole bathroom.
    The floor is shiny. Under the door Jackie sees wet blue light. When the cop opens the stall door, it floods into the room. He doesn’t see anything. He says something Jackie can’t hear into his radio and he runs out.
    Jackie can see her, though. It is her mother’s ghost, in a stained hospital gown, kneeling in front of the toilet, waiting for more vomit to come, head down. Her shoulders jerk up, and she makes a sound in her throat, but she doesn’t vomit.
    â€œJackie,” she says, “go to bed.” The ghost dry heaves. Then dry heaves again. She will vomit, though. She’ll be up all night. There is always more vomit.
    â€œJackie, I am okay.”
    The bathroom tiles look cold in the blue light. Jackie can step outside of things, some kind of magic that makes her invisible, but it’s never easy. It isn’t like waving a wand. It costs.
    â€œI didn’t mean to wake you, baby.” Somewhere the police run around the building trying to find Jackie. She’s escaped! They don’t know how, but she’s escaped. Jackie sits down on the floor next to her mother, and she rubs the ghost’s back through the gown. Her mother doesn’t look up from the toilet. She squeezes the rim with her fingers. “Go back to sleep, Jackie,” she says. “I’m okay.”
    miss
13
    Jackie’s father is still at work when she gets home. Her mouth tastes like hospitals. Jackie has a map in her room, showing all of her trees. It’s huge on the wall. There is a green pin for each tree. She pulls the pin out of Number 10 Osborne Street. There is no tree there now. The first-kiss tree. Goodbye Carl. Goodbye Carl’s mom and Carl’s dog. She puts the pin back in the box where it came from and she picks out a black one. It is the first black pin on the map.
    Tomorrow will be different. Jackie won’t let her worries overwhelm her. She knows what to say to Ann. And this time she’ll say it: “Would you like to go on a date with me?”
    Jackie puts the box of pins back in the drawer, and sits on her bed. She pushes the pillow aside and lies flat on her back.
    Maybe she could tell Ann about her mother’s ghost. Jackie hasn’t told anyone. She hasn’t wanted to tell anyone. But maybe it would help Ann understand her. Help them get closer. Probably, though, it would just freak her out.
    Outside the window, the leaves are moving a bit in the wind. No. Keep it simple: “Will you go out on a date with me, Ann?”
    her
14
    This is their daily ritual. The ghost leads Charlie and Mitchie down the long hallway. The hallways on this floor are more quaint than the ones upstairs. There’s a potted plant on the table there. The tablecloth is cream-colored lace. The ghost stops in front of Mrs. Richards’ door and waits. Room 135 . Every day. Charlie knocks. The door opens, and here comes Mrs. Richards, laundry basket in hand.
    â€œCharles,” Mrs. Richards says, “that dog of yours was barking again last night.”
    The ghost is staring up at her, its face expressionless. It lifts its head under one arm, and raises its other hand to point. Now,