GIRLS LIKE YOU

  Heather Crews

  Girls Like You

  Heather Crews

  © 2017 by Heather Crews

  All rights reserved.

  ALSO BY HEATHER CREWS

  Unchanged

  A Dark-Adapted Eye

  Dreams for the Dead

  Prince of Misery

  Psychopomp: A Novella

  CONTENTS

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  1

  Ten years ago

  The sun beat down on Hugh’s shoulders as he kicked a rock down the sidewalk. Ruby had run off again, and he was supposed to find her. He knew some of her hiding places around town, like the old Slate Creek Campground or the alley behind the bookstore. He’d found her in these places before. But what their mom and dad didn’t understand was that if Ruby didn’t want to be found, she wouldn’t be waiting for him to turn up.

  A cloud drifted over the sun and he blinked, glad for the momentary relief to his squinting eyes. His scowl remained. At fourteen, he had better things to do than run after his sister, like sit around on the computer all afternoon. His parents hated that, of course, but he wasn’t just playing games. He was learning tricks and shortcuts and peeking into all kinds of secret places. They wanted him to go out for football, which held no interest for him.

  Hugh passed the house where Priya, a girl from school, lived with her family. She stood out in the yard, looking at him as he passed. Her dark, coarse hair was pulled back in a messy ponytail, and she held one end of a leash. To his surprise, he saw that it was attached not to a dog but to a big orange cat.

  “Hi, Hugh.” Priya lifted her hand in a casual wave, but she didn’t smile. She smirked. It seemed to be her default expression and made her look like she knew things no one else did.

  “Hi,” he said, his grumble sounding at least halfway polite.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Looking for my sister.”

  “Why?”

  That was another thing about Priya. She was always asking questions.

  He shrugged. “My parents are worried. They had a fight and Ruby ran out of the house. She does it a lot.”

  Priya glanced down at her cat. “Good luck.”

  “Thanks.”

  Moving on, Hugh walked to the end of the block and paused. He’d already checked the laundry place and the donut shop. This was ridiculous. Ruby was four years older than him. She could take care of herself.

  With an annoyed sigh, he gave the rock a hard kick and sent it skittering into the gutter. He turned around and started back home. Priya was no longer outside her house, but her neighbor across the street stared at Hugh as he passed.

  “Will I see you on the field in the fall?” the man called out.

  Too late, Hugh realized the man was the football coach for Breaklands High. The guy really, really wanted Hugh to play football for the school and wouldn’t leave him alone about it, which was annoying and kind of creepy, frankly. Though he was tall with broad shoulders, Hugh wasn’t athletically inclined. He liked computers, but no one seemed to care about that.

  “We’ll see,” he called. Never, he added silently, hurrying on.

  He was almost back to the house, wondering what he was going to tell his parents, when he caught some movement from the corner of his eye. Lifting his head, he looked a few houses down the street and saw a flash of dark blonde hair among the trees. A moment later a girl emerged, walking quickly and crossing the street without checking for cars. Not that Breaklands had much traffic.

  “Ruby!” Hugh called, but his sister obviously hadn’t heard him. She kept walking, head down, looking as if she was trying to put distance between herself and… something. Ruby had always been a little weird, so Hugh wasn’t worried.

  Shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans, he started to follow her. But just then someone else emerged from the trees, feet tracing the same path Ruby’s had. Hugh blinked, slowing his pace, as he tried to recognize the man. Then he realized it was Mr. Graham, the man who was working with Hugh’s dad to develop an app.

  Well, had been working with Hugh’s dad, until his dad lost his job and sold the app and kept the money for himself. It made Hugh uncomfortable to know his dad had cheated someone, even if they had really needed the money.

  And Mr. Graham was not happy about it. He’d been calling the house at all hours, blowing up Hugh’s parents’ phones with messages both irate and apologetic.

  What was he doing in the woods… with Ruby?

  Something uneasy churned in Hugh’s stomach, but he did his best to ignore it. He picked up his pace to go after them.

  It was then he noticed the smoke, a thick black column of it rising from the trees behind the row of homes to his right. The smoke climbed swiftly and spread across the sky. Hugh gaped.

  A fire, he thought numbly. In the forest.

  Some part of him was aware that the fire seemed to be in the same place Ruby and Mr. Graham had just left. But he couldn’t think about that at the moment.

  “Fire!” he screamed, hoping the people in the houses could hear him. “Fire!”

  He tore his gaze away from the smoke and ran home to warn his family. It didn’t take him long to arrive, but in that time the fire had spread to some of the other houses in the neighborhood. It had been a hot, dry summer, and the forestry service had already managed several wildfires in other nearby states. Until now, they’d been lucky in Oregon.

  Coughing up smoke, he burst into the house. “Mom! Dad! Ruby!” He quickly ran through the rooms, but no one was home. Maybe they’d already gotten out.

  Hugh stumbled back outside and wiped at his teary eyes. The street was crowded with neighbors, shouts and screams filling the air. He looked around but couldn’t see his parents or sister among them. Were they supposed to meet somewhere in an emergency and he’d forgotten? What if they thought he was dead? He’d never been in a situation like this before, and he was scared.

  Someone grabbed his arm, and he turned, hopeful. It was Mr. Graham.

  “Have you seen my parents?” Hugh asked immediately.

  Mr. Graham shook his head. “No, but I can help you look for them. Everyone is going to the community center downtown.”

  Though Hugh didn’t want to go anywhere with the man, he spotted Ruby a few yards back, beckoning him anxiously. He started to feel uncertain.

  “This whole area is going to burn if they don’t suppress the fire soon,” Mr. Graham said, glancing around at the black smoke rising above the houses. “We need to get somewhere safe.”

  Reluctantly, Hugh allowed Mr. Graham to lead him toward Ruby. She grabbed his hand and pulled him through a maze of people darting back and forth. Some threw buckets of water at the trees and others dragged suitcases to their cars. Someone backed out of a driveway, nearly running into them. Mr. Graham slammed a hand on the hood of the car and shouted something as it peeled down the street.

  “Not much further,” Ruby assured him.

  “We’re going the wrong way,” he pointed out. “Downtown is back that way.”

  “We’re not going downtown. We can’t stay here anymore.”

  “But he said—”

  Ruby turned on him, exasperated. “Hugh! We can’t stay here! This place is about to burn to the ground!”

  “But…”

  He had no idea what was going on, but he couldn’t let his sister go off alone with Mr. Graham. So he allowed her to lead him along by the hand, trying to think of what he would do once they got wherever they were going. In all the panicked chaos, between bouts of coughing and not being able to see much of anything, he could hardly think beyond the next step. Then they reached Mr. Graham’s car, and he got in the back with Ruby.

  Coughing until his lungs ached, Hugh watched the town slip past his eyes. He could see orange glows through the thick black air. Police cars and fire engines sped by, lights flashing, the sirens fading into the distance. A helicopter circled overhead, appearing briefly through gaps in the smoke.

  “Where are we going?” he finally asked.

  “San Diego,” the man replied.

  Hugh had never been to California, and he didn’t know anyone who lived there. “What for?” He looked at Ruby, puzzled. “Is that where Mom and Dad are going?”

  Mr. Graham turned on the radio—not to news, as Hugh would have expected, but to a classic rock station.

  Ruby put her arm around Hugh. “Mom and Dad are dead.”

  “What? I didn’t even see them in the house—”

  “They’re dead,” she repeated sharply. “Just like everyone else in town. Everyone except us.”

  Disturbed and afraid, Hugh faced forward and fell into contemplative silence. Ruby seemed to know things he didn’t. But how could she know? She’d run out of the forest only seconds before the fire started. And what did Mr. Graham have to do with anything? This was all happening so fast, and no

thing made sense…

  He sniffed, and only then did he realize tears were running down his face.

  A hand smoothed over his hair. Ruby pulled him close in a comforting hug. “Just stay with me, Hughie,” she said softly. “I’ll keep you safe.”

  2

  Now

  Allison North sat up in bed and wiped tears from her eyes. She cried in her sleep almost every night now, and it didn’t bother her anymore. Not really. Swinging her legs over the edge of the bed, she took the shrinker sock off and spent a few minutes massaging her residual limb. This was the beginning of her new morning ritual.

  When she was done, she put the sock back on, then rolled on the gel liner, and finally attached her prosthesis. She sat looking at it for a moment, the 3-D printed creation in a turquoise teardrop pattern. It was beautiful and strange, something she both admired and feared.

  And, if she were being completely honest with herself, hated.

  A physical therapist had been coming to the house twice a week ever since Allison had been released from the hospital, where she’d recuperated for a month from the attack. She’d learned exercises to help her walk and maintain muscle tone, and how to prevent contractures. On those days, there’d hardly been time to think about anything except the task at hand.

  Those were the days she had looked forward to.

  But now the physical therapist wouldn’t be coming anymore and all Allison had to look forward to were weeks suffused with melancholy. Everything she did was part of a dull routine: waking up whenever she felt like, massaging her residual limb, cleaning her gel liner, taking pain meds, and trying to work up an appetite as she halfheartedly exercised. She had no motivation, no desires. At night, plagued by phantom pains, she thought of Tess and how everything had gone horribly wrong in a single moment. The memories of that night fueled her nightmares.

  She picked up her phone off the nightstand to see what day it was, since she hardly kept track anymore. It had been Fourth of July a few days earlier, which she knew because she’d heard, distantly, the booms and crackles of fireworks as everyone celebrated. Every year prior, she and Tess had watched fireworks over Mission Bay and then gone to grab burritos at Roberto’s. This year, Allison had lain in bed, medicated. And Tess was dead.

  Probably the only reason she’d gotten out of bed this morning was because of Jake’s visit yesterday, she reflected. Her boyfriend—no, he was most assuredly her former boyfriend—had just gotten back from his family’s trip to Europe. She’d gotten a few texts from him the day before: What happened? Are you okay? I heard Tess is dead? What the hell HAPPENED?

  In the afternoon, as she’d been dozing in and out while watching videos on her phone, she’d heard his voice drifting upstairs. Instantly alert, she’d hastily released her hair from its ponytail and hoped the strands didn’t look too limp and greasy. There was nothing to be done about her sallow, dreary face, but Jake wouldn’t care what she looked like. He’d be glad she was okay.

  It was clear, when he’d stepped inside, that he hadn’t expected to find her in bed with a broken right arm and bruises that were still healing because they’d been so bad to begin with. The shock was apparent on his face.

  “Shit, Al,” he mumbled. “You weren’t returning my texts, but I didn’t think… What happened?”

  “My mom didn’t tell you when you came in?”

  “She said something about an attack, but…”

  Allison sighed. “Yeah. I was out with Tess. Some guys jumped us.” She didn’t tell him the details. Even this much was more than she wanted to remember.

  “Sorry. That sucks.”

  Yeah. It really sucked.

  “So, Tess…?”

  She couldn’t speak, so she just nodded. He got the idea.

  His eyes drifted down the length of her bed, his gaze puzzled and slightly repulsed. He was noticing how one of her legs beneath the covers was visibly shorter than the other, ending just below the knee. Her prosthesis rested against the nightstand. It was only a matter of time before he noticed that too.

  “Anyway,” he said, “I’ve gotta go. A bunch of us are supposed to go out on Ryan’s boat. I just wanted to talk to you first. I’ll come by again in a couple of days and see how you’re doing.”

  “Sure,” Allison said.

  She wasn’t holding her breath for that.

  Shaking off the memory, she stood and went downstairs to try to force some breakfast down. It was almost noon.

  “It’s about time you’re up,” her mom said as she entered the kitchen. Anna was fully dressed, her makeup applied to perfection. “I hope you’re not going to continue to keep these wretched hours.”

  Shrugging, Allison opened the pantry and reached for a box of cereal.

  “I do have things to do,” Anna went on obliviously. “There are luncheons to plan, benefits to attend. I can’t be your babysitter indefinitely.”

  “So don’t babysit me. I’m eighteen, and I can walk on my own. As soon as I get my cast off, I’ll be good as new.” Allison barely recognized her own voice, bitter and hopeless.

  “Maybe you can call Jake. How did it go yesterday?”

  “I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want to see me anymore.”

  A crease appeared between Anna’s eyebrows. “Well, if you looked like that when he was here, it’s no wonder. When was the last time you washed your hair?”

  “Yesterday, after he left.”

  “Hmm.” Anna raised her eyebrows to show what she thought of this, though she chose not to comment. “We do need to talk about your plans, by the way. I think it would be best if you put off going to college until next fall. It’s not ideal, of course, but everyone will understand.”

  Allison felt a flare of anger mixed with panic. “Don’t talk to people about me!”

  Anna blinked. “Of course not.” She picked up her purse, heels clicking on the tile as she headed for the front door. “Are you sure you’ll be okay by yourself?”

  “Yes. Fine.”

  “All right then! I’ll be back before dinner. Maybe we can get Chinese.”

  As the front door closed, Allison’s appetite fled. She put the cereal box back in the pantry, sighing. She wanted to actually do something today, but she didn’t know what.

  She’d spent several hours online lurking in support groups, especially those specific to people with transtibial amputations, like hers. Day after day she’d devoured threads detailing the lives people led post-amputation. Much of what she read made her feel better, and she learned she wouldn’t have to change much about her daily life. The hardest part was over.

  Even so, her despondency was persistent. Eventually she would get used to this, she hoped. Not yet. But today she would start; it was as good a day as any.

  She glanced across the living room at the big glass doors that opened onto the balcony. Past the palm trees and rooftops, a calm blue stretch of ocean was visible beneath the clear sky. Since getting out of the hospital, she hadn’t been to the beach at all. The summer was nearly half over, her tan was fading, and all she wanted was to go back to bed.

  Though she hadn’t bothered keeping in touch with her old friends, they had heard a few details about what had happened that night. Maybe Jake had told them more by now, but Allison didn’t care. None of them had seemed to matter after losing Tess, though she longed for someone to talk to.

  Suddenly she was overwhelmed, wondering how she was going to manage this leg for the rest of her life.

  It’s still early, she told herself, taking a deep breath. This is still new. I’ll learn.

  That would be her mantra from now on, even if she didn’t believe it. Eventually it would be true.

  Ignoring the urge to go back to bed, Allison grabbed a pair of shoes and left the house. It was a beautiful day, and the water called to her. A light breeze slipped through the streets as she walked, eliciting the smallest of smiles from her as it caressed her face. This felt good. She should have left the house days ago.

  It was just that she’d never dreaded people staring at her, and now she did. Despite the beauty of the prosthesis, she’d pulled on jeans so no one would know. For now, this was hers. When she was ready, she would let people see.

  Maybe.

  On her way to the beach, her hunger returned, and she stopped to buy a smoothie. She could hear the ocean, a dull and consistent roar, and quickened her pace to reach it. Kids shrieked as they played in the park, and balls thwacked on nearby tennis courts. People sat beneath umbrellas on the sand. Impossibly far out in the water she could see surfers sitting on their boards, sunlight glinting on the water in an ever-shifting pattern.

 

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