The Night House Read Online Free PDF Page A

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Bianca
     
    I try to find a street sign; instead, I find a boy. He’s across the street, sitting on the ground. Panting heavily. I think he’s panicking. I feel so sad for him. That he doesn’t feel the way I do. Poor thing. Maybe I can help.
    So I cross the street. He is slightly dazed but also slightly terrified. Boring brown hair and a little zip-up and jeans. He’s attractive, but he clearly doesn’t know what to do with himself. I see my bag on the sidewalk next to me. It slid off my arm while I was staring.
    “You look so sad.”
    “It…it’s okay,” he stutters.
    Then I remember Micah. I’m wasting time. But I can’t just leave this boy here. He’s clearly human, and this is a bad area for him to be in. I wonder if he’s homeless. Immediately, I am stricken with grief for him. I squat down.
    “It’s not safe here,” I try to tell him, so he knows he has to leave. I make the mistake of staring into his eyes.
    They are like the ocean at night. Deep, dark, infinite blue. But there’s something magnetic about his gaze. I can’t stop staring. His hands begin to tremble. He lets out a gasp of pain, and I let go of him.
    “I’m. I’m no good at this.” I want to explain that I’m not used to helping people. I didn’t mean to freak him out.
    He’s making my wrist hurt—the one Jeremiah just paid for. It aches. And it’s because of the boy, I know somehow. The pain radiates, and I visualize it like a red light glowing under my skin, growing hotter and hotter. I realize it’s exposed. I was so high, I forgot to wrap the wound. The skin is bruised. The bite mark is still weeping blood.
    “You’re in pain,” the boy says quietly. “How are you alive?”
    How am I alive? He’s the one who isn’t living. He’s the one who doesn’t feel this way. The one who’s sad and lost and hurt. I touch his face, because I think I’ve found the person I can help.
    I whisper my secret to him: “I can feel everything.”
    And I kiss him, because that’s what people do in fairy tales and Jane Austen novels.
    Then Micah comes back into my head. So I stand up, take my bag, and tell the boy, “I have to go help my friend.”
    And I walk away.

James
     
    The girl is still walking away, and every one of her movements causes more pain to shoot through my body. As she gets farther, my awareness returns. As soon as the girl is out of view, I text Ally. She says she’s coming. I don’t have the energy to try to meet Ally. I close my eyes and try to feel my own body. But the girl is still there.
    It’s not supposed to work like this. I have to have an emotional connection with someone before I feel every little thing that they do. With strangers, I always just get little passing glimpses into them. I get whatever is most prominent. This emotional connection has never happened with a stranger.
    That girl hit me like a wrecking ball.
    There are scars all over me. I feel them like scabs that itch so slightly. My wrists and neck are burning with this awful desire to be hurt. My vision blurs as I try and work it out. Some kind of drug rushes through me like ice water. I feel everything. So much to feel. I’m not strong enough to take it all. This pain is going to kill me if I don’t stop now.
    “Jesus Christmas, James,” Ally’s voice is a welcome, yet high-pitched, distraction. “What is wrong with you?” she asks.
    I can’t tell if she’s asking out of concern or because I pulled her away from the party. This is the first time I don’t know exactly what Ally is feeling.
    “Nothing,” I say.
    “Bullshit.” This time I can hear the concern. She can see something is wrong with me.
    “There was a girl…She was on some kind of drug, I think.”
    Street lights ebb into view, and I shield my eyes.
    Ally’s face is twisted in fear. “What the hell just happened?”
    I hold up my hands, to make sure they’re mine.
    Ally nudges my shoulder. “James?”
    “I’m fine.” I rub my face. “That girl was