The Game of Boys and Monsters Read Online Free PDF Page B

then we kissed some more.
    I still felt so alive, so full, and to feel that way, in spite of losing Evy . . . well, she made her choice, and doesn’t life go on?
    I don’t know what I’d expected to find on the bridge: Evy’s initials with H. M. or J. M. carved with them? A trace of blood or fur?
    There was nothing solid there, nothing to give me a hint of what she and the Marsh boys got up to at night.
    â€œI’m sorry,” I said to Ben. “I’m really happy to be here with you. But it’s a place that reminds me of Evy. It probably wasn’t the best place to come.”
    â€œYou do what you’ve gotta do,” Ben said. This was a guy I could love.
    â€œI want to do something stupid,” I said. “You don’t have a pocketknife, do you?”
    â€œWe’ve only just begun,” he said, kind of joking, but I put him at ease.
    â€œIt’s not for us. It’s for me and Evy. I just—I want to leave something here.”
    â€œHang on,” he said. “I’ve got a Swiss Army knife in the glove box.”
    He fetched it, and I picked a spot on the wall that hadn’t been touched. On it, I carved, very small, an E. and an L., and I made an infinity symbol looping around them. “Forever,” I whispered, “however long that might be.”
    Not long after that, Evy stopped coming to school.
    The Marsh boys were there, but they didn’t have any answers for me.
    â€œEvy’s fine,” Jack said. “She’s outgrowing this.” He gestured in a wide circle.
    â€œWhat? School?”
    He tilted his head, and it reminded me of the day he had scared me so badly.
    â€œShe’s outgrowing . . . me?”
    â€œWhy didn’t you try harder?” he said.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œEvy asked me and Hap, just the other night. She said, ‘I’m almost grateful. If Les had tried to pull me back, if I thought she needed me, I might have had to stay.’”
    â€œAnd what did you say?”
    â€œI said, ‘Les is changing too.’ I said, ‘Les doesn’t need you. She’s becoming you.’”
    I stood there, not looking at him but at his shirtfront.
    I was not becoming Evy. But I was changing. I was becoming more myself.
    â€œIt’s not too late,” Jack said, “if you want her back. She might listen to you.”
    When I looked back up at him, his smirk told me what he thought of me, of my change.
    I didn’t defend myself. I didn’t argue. I walked away. And all day I thought about what he’d said.
    All day, while the Marsh boys were at school and Evy wasn’t. Where was Evy?
    Maybe she did need me, needed to hear from me that I wanted her here. That I wanted us back how we were.
    But I didn’t. I wanted Evy, my friend—of course I wanted her—but I didn’t want to go back to how I was.
    I’m the witch. I’m the witch, and Evy’s the ghost.
    Almost.
    A hand gripped my shoulder, shaking me, and I stifled a scream. This was school. School was safe.
    It was Ben. Just Ben. He beamed down at me, and I smiled up at him, and I forgot for a little while about Evy.
    That night, Ben and I made pizza at my house. He knew how to toss the dough. We got flour all over the kitchen, but Mom smiled. Dad and Ben talked about all of Dad’s old bands, which he couldn’t believe that Ben knew.
    I thought about calling Evy, but Ben was there, and then it was late, and then, then, she’d be out with Jack and Hap, wouldn’t she? She wouldn’t want to hear from me.
    Those are the things I told myself.
    The next day Evy didn’t show up at school again, and the Marsh boys didn’t come either. With them gone, it was like a dam burst on my worry. I pictured Evy huddling in the dark while the Marsh boys laughed, Evy pale as the moon, her eyes blank and hungering.
    All day, she haunted me.
    Ben found me at a break between classes.