The Year of Shadows Read online

  “And you think this is your anchor?”

  Positive. It reminds me of Tillie. And I never got to give it to—

  That low wail sounded again from the skies, louder this time, louder than thunder.

  “Jax?” I could barely hear myself shouting over the racket. I clamped my hands to my ears, but it didn’t help. The wail turned piercing, shrill.

  Run. Hurry, run! Where’s Tillie?

  In the middle of camp, something exploded. Several shacks shattered. Dirt and rocks rained down on the heads of people running for cover.

  I was one of those people, except I wasn’t running for cover.

  I was running for Tillie. And for Henry.

  Find them, Jax sobbed, as the sky swarmed with black planes. Explosion after explosion rattled the ground, throwing us down into the dirt. But every time, we pulled ourselves back up.

  The half-finished friendship bracelet dangled from my fingers; the twine was turning dark.

  I stared down at myself. Tiny red wounds dotted Jax’s body, but I couldn’t feel them. It was like my body was shutting down.

  Run faster! Jax screamed. Together we ran, pushing aside anything that got in our way. We wouldn’t be able to find her in time. I knew that. That was the point, that was why ghost-Tillie and ghost-Jax couldn’t see or hear each other.

  They hadn’t been able to find each other before they died. They had never been able to give each other their bracelets or say good-bye.

  Tillie? Jax’s fingers were scraping my insides, digging for a way out. Tillie! Where are you? Don’t leave me here!

  In the split second before it happened, I saw a girl with braided hair running straight for us through the smoke. A bracelet dangled from her fist.

  The next instant, the loudest noise I’d ever heard popped my eardrums. The ground between me and Tillie—and Henry—exploded. A red-hot light blinded me.

  It wasn’t like being stabbed to death; I didn’t feel much.

  WHEN WE CAME to, gasping on the floor of the stage, Henry pushed himself to his feet, grabbed his backpack off the floor, and ran away.

  “Henry?” I shook my head, trying to blink the fuzz from my eyes. My skin tingled. I had exploded. I felt sick and torn open. “Henry, where are you going?”

  Igor was licking my neck. Let him go. Meow. I was scared with you sitting there all frozen like that. Meow. I hate these sharing sessions. Look at me, I’m so upset I can’t even speak properly. Meow, meow.

  Tillie and Jax were sad blobs of gray smoke near the back of the stage, but I had just been blown up for them; they could handle themselves for a few minutes. Something had to have been seriously wrong for Henry to just rush out like that.

  So I followed him.

  It was a bad idea. First of all, it was almost one in the morning. Twelve-year-old girls shouldn’t be running around cities at one in the morning, unless maybe they have superpowers, and even then it’s questionable. Second, it was freezing cold, even through my jacket.

  But I had to find Henry. I pushed myself faster than I’d ever run before. My throat burned with the cold, but I didn’t care. I caught the tail end of Henry’s legs racing around the corner onto Tenth Street and pushed myself to run faster. Moonlight shone on the black streets and the white traffic lines and the glassy skyscrapers. Everything was the colors of ghosts—except for Henry’s red hair.

  After running for ages, a stitch pinching my side, I followed Henry onto a smaller, quieter street I didn’t recognize. His backpack jangled. I bet it was that jar he always kept with him, the dirty, rattling one from the séance.

  “Henry!” A car raced by with people yelling out the windows. Henry had turned past a brick stoop and was climbing up a black iron gate. “Henry, wait!”

  He froze, halfway up the gate.

  “Why’d you leave so fast?” I said, bending over to catch my breath. “Are you okay?”

  “You shouldn’t be here.” He jumped to the ground, trying to push me back the way I’d come. His voice sounded strange and closed-off. “Get out of here, Olivia.”

  “But why’d you—?”

  “Leave. Why won’t you listen to me?”

  I stepped back. Henry had never talked to me like that before. Not since we’d become friends, anyway.

  Before I could say anything, the porch light turned on, and five people piled out onto the porch. Two grown-ups and three kids. Only the grown-ups looked like each other, and none of them looked a thing like Henry. I realized then that I’d never actually paid much attention to Henry’s parents before. They’d always dropped him off places from the car. I’d never seen them face-to-face.

  Now I knew why.

  They weren’t his real parents.

  “Henry,” the dad said, coming down the stoop stairs, “this sneaking out business has got to stop. We talked about this.” Then he looked at me and smiled a tired smile. “So. Henry’s been sneaking out to see you, has he? I’m Ted Banks.”

  He held out his hand, and I shook it, this numb feeling taking over my body. “Hi. Olivia Stellatella.”

  Mr. Banks’s eyebrows raised. “As in, Stellatella of the City Philharmonic?”

  I flushed. “Yeah. That’s me.”

  “You must know Henry pretty well, then. He’s there constantly.”

  “Yeah.” I risked looking at Henry, but he was just staring at his house. I couldn’t even see his face. “We’re friends, I guess.”

  But were we? He hadn’t told his family about me, he’d been lying when he said they were okay with him staying the night. He hadn’t even told me they weren’t his real parents.

  It was like he was embarrassed to even know me.

  “Ted, can we just go inside?” Henry said.

  Mr. Banks gave me some money and called me a cab, and after I got home and crept backstage, I curled up in my cot with Igor and my ghosts, and tried to ignore the queasy feeling in my stomach.

  Henry knew all of my secrets.

  Why hadn’t he told me his?

  Henry didn’t come to the Hall the next day. He didn’t come for several days. I tried to call his house a couple of times, and I left these sort of coded messages with Mr. Banks. Henry would know they meant I wanted him to come help me search for Tillie and Jax’s friendship bracelets. We’d decided those were their anchors, but we hadn’t been able to find them yet.

  Henry never showed up. I didn’t see him until school started again.

  At lunch the first day back, I sat down at my normal lonely table in the cafeteria and pretended to be incredibly interested in my cheese sandwich. After a few minutes of dedicated chomping, I peeked out from beneath my hair at Mark Everett’s table.

  Sure enough, Henry sat there, laughing at some doofy face Nick Weber was making with his milk straws.

  Joan sat down at her normal seat, way at the end of the table. She looked at me, and at Henry’s empty seat, and scooted along the bench with a very serious expression until she was right across from me. Where Henry should have been.

  “So, what happened with Henry?” Joan asked, but it wasn’t snotty or gossipy or anything. It was solidarity, I think. She patted my arm, and something about that made me spill everything—about the ghosts, about the shades, about Henry and Mr. Banks. She didn’t say a word for a long time, just nodding instead. I liked that she took me seriously. She accepted everything I said like it was something people said any old day.

  I guess that’s why the ghosts decided to trust her and show themselves to her the night of the séance. Joan was the kind of person you trusted, protest posters and all.

  When I was done, Joan said, “You mean you didn’t know Henry lives with foster parents?”

  Her tone made me defensive. “No. How was I supposed to know that?”

  Joan shrugged. “Well, I mean, they come to open house sometimes. And to the baseball games.” She made a face. “My dad loves baseball. He’ll go to any game in town.”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I guess I never paid much
attention.” Maybe I didn’t pay attention to a lot of things like I always thought I had, or at least not to the right things. I started doodling in my sketchpad. That made me feel better.

  “Well.” Joan scooted closer. “Daddy knows everything about everyone in this town, right? I mean, he’s pretty important and all. And I don’t mean that in a snobby way.”

  “Sure, I guess.”

  “He told me, once, about Henry. You know, because Henry’s a good pitcher. Daddy pays attention to him.”

  Henry was a good pitcher? I’d never gone to a single game. I felt myself shrinking down into my seat. I felt like the most awful friend who had ever lived.

  “Anyway, Henry’s dad went overseas a few years ago because he was in the military, and he had to go. But he never came back.”

  “You mean . . . he died?”

  Joan nodded gravely. “And after that, Henry’s mom just kind of . . .” Joan looked around to make sure no one was watching us. “Well, she got really depressed and stopped taking care of Henry, and then she had to go to a hospital, and then she never came back either. I think she’s still there, but I don’t know what hospital it is. So Henry lives with foster parents now.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that.

  “Oh, Olivia.” Joan sighed. “You must be so distressed to have Henry abandon you like this.”

  “He didn’t abandon me. He just . . . got mad. Even though I don’t know why.”

  “Well, obviously, sharing with Tillie and Jax, and the whole war thing, reminded him of his real dad. So he got upset and ran away. And also obviously, he’s embarrassed about living with foster parents, although I don’t know why he’s so funny about it. I’ve met Mr. Banks, he’s really nice. So he wasn’t mad at you, just mad that you saw what he didn’t want you to see.”

  “Well, if he hadn’t just run away like that, I wouldn’t have been so worried,” I said, sawing my sandwich into pieces. It felt good to destroy something. “He could have just gone home like normal, and everything would be fine, and he’d be sitting here right now instead of you.”

  “I understand you didn’t mean that to sound as rude as it did, Olivia. I understand that you are under great emotional stress.”

  I stabbed a piece of sandwich and shoved it in my mouth. “Whatever.”

  But the truth is, she was right.

  When Henry finally showed his face at the Hall that night, I nearly jumped on him.

  “Henry, I’m so sorry,” I blurted. “I didn’t mean to follow you home the other night, but I was worried because we had just died with Tillie and Jax, and I thought something was wrong, so I just ran without thinking, and I don’t care that you have foster parents. How could you think that, anyway? I should punch you for thinking that.”

  I stopped to take a breath. “That came out wrong. I just meant that it doesn’t make me like you less, and I don’t think it’s stupid or anything. But I am mad that you didn’t tell me and that you were hiding me from them.” I paused, scuffing the carpet with my shoe. “Sneaking out to come see me. You’re embarrassed about me, aren’t you? Because I live here. That’s why you didn’t tell your foster parents you were visiting me, isn’t it? And please don’t sit with Mark Everett at lunch anymore. That guy’s a jerk. Come back and sit with me. Please? And, I’m so sorry about your dad. And your mom. I really am.”

  Henry stared at me in stony silence, not even moving when Tillie started drifting up underneath his chin with her hands clasped at her throat and this puppy-dog expression on her face. She tried to bat her eyelashes, but she did it so hard her eyes popped out and hung there by ghostly strings.

  That made Henry laugh. “Tillie, you’re disgusting.”

  Tillie hooted in triumph and pushed herself up above our heads.

  I could have slapped her, I was so nervous. “Well?”

  “I’m sorry, Olivia,” Henry said. “I was gonna tell you about everything at some point. It’s just . . . I don’t know, it’s weird. I don’t talk about it with people. And I’m not embarrassed by you. I just thought you wouldn’t want them to know you live at the Hall. Not that I care, but you do. So I didn’t tell them.” Then he grinned. “Besides, it’s kind of fun sneaking out.”

  So he didn’t hate me after all. I could have pushed off the ground and started flying like Tillie. But Henry didn’t need to know that.

  “Well. Okay. Fine, then. But still, you should have told me about your parents sooner,” I said.

  “You didn’t show me your rooms backstage until you absolutely had to,” Henry pointed out.

  “But I had to find out from Joan. She knew more about you than I did.” That hurt, I didn’t say aloud. But it wasn’t all his fault, and that hurt too. I could have paid better attention. I could have paid better attention to a lot of things. I hugged my sketchpad close.

  Henry took the jar out of his bag—that crusty, brown glass jar that was always clanging around in his backpack. The jar from the séance.

  “Would it help if I showed you what was in here?”

  “Is it important to you?”

  “It’s the most important thing in the world to me,” Henry said firmly.

  “Then, yeah. It’d help”

  We went outside into the walking park, the trees purple and soft in the sunset. We sat under a looming black tree beside one of the bug-filled lampposts, and Henry opened the jar.

  Inside was a whole lot of junk—crumpled-up pieces of paper, tags that I knew meant something military, some weird-looking coins, an ancient music tape with the name rubbed off it, photos so old they folded up like fabric. Strange jewelry made of stones and wood.

  “This is my parents,” Henry said, wiping some grit off his hands. “It’s all I have left of them.”

  As I sorted through everything, Henry explained. The crumpled pieces of paper were old concert tickets and concert programs. The weird-looking coins were foreign money that Henry’s mom used to collect when she was a little girl and her parents traveled with the army. That’s how his parents had met. The photos were of them—and Henry, when he was little.

  “You were a fat baby,” I said.

  “You know, if you’re not gonna be serious, then—”

  “Fat, but cute.”

  Henry ducked down to stack the photos back together. “Thanks.”

  “And this jewelry?”

  “My mom always wore it. She got it when they were on base somewhere. Like in Africa or something. I don’t remember.”

  “What’s this of?” I held up the cassette tape. “I didn’t even know they made these anymore.”

  “They don’t. It’s super old. It doesn’t even play. But I have a new copy. Hold on.”

  And then Henry pulled some headphones out of his bag and played the music for me. I knew it immediately—Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony, second movement.

  “It was one of my parents’ favorites,” Henry said quietly. “They were big music people. All kinds, not just classical stuff. This one always made me feel like, I don’t know, bigger than I actually am.”

  I closed my eyes, nodding along with the music. After a while, Henry pulled the headphones off me.

  “That’s why I like it here,” he said. “Music reminds me of them. I remember the good days, and then I remember the bad days too. After Dad died, Mom would just sit there and stare at nothing. She wouldn’t even look at me when I played music for her. That’s why I study so much. There wasn’t much else to do. And good grades are important, you know. For college and all that. I’ve gotta get scholarships.”

  My cheeks burned as I watched him bundle everything away. I should have said something meaningful about his parents, but all I could say was, “I don’t make good grades.”

  “Yeah, but there’s still high school. Plus, you can draw. You could go to art school or something.”

  “You really think that?”

  “Sure! You’re talented, Olivia.” He yawned and leaned back against the tree. “Everyone knows that.”
<
br />   “They do?”

  “It’s totally obvious.”

  I leaned back against the same tree, right next to Henry, and closed my eyes. This tiny happy feeling was buzzing around in my chest, and I didn’t want to lose it.

  It was still buzzing around when the sun went down and Henry and I headed inside. His backpack jingled with that jar, and I bet he’d never showed anyone before—only me.

  My chest was going to explode, but in a good way. I threw back my head and laughed into the dark. I was happy.

  Then we entered the Hall, and everything changed.

  MR. WORTHINGTON MET us in the west lobby, wringing his hat in his hands. It reminded me of Nonnie.

  “Nnngh,” he moaned. “Nnngh.”

  I was in too good a mood for this. I slapped my hands on my knees. “Come on, boy! Who’s a good ghost? Show me what’s wrong! Can you show me what’s wrong?”

  Mr. Worthington frowned and pointed at one of the doors leading into the main Hall.

  “That was kind of rude,” Henry said.

  “Sorry, Mr. Worthington. What is it?”

  He led us inside. Mr. Rue was there, and the Maestro, and someone else I didn’t recognize—a tall man in a nice suit. They were walking around the Hall, and Mr. Rue had a bunch of papers in his hands. A group of ghosts floated behind them. They always liked spying on new people.

  “Oh, man.” Henry pulled me down behind the seats. “That’s Mayor Pitter!”

  Tillie and Jax zoomed up behind us. “What’s he doing here?”

  “Nnnnnngh!” Mr. Worthington said, pointing at the mayor.

  We followed them, creeping through the seats as close as we dared.

  “You have to understand, Otto,” Mayor Pitter was saying, “I didn’t want to have to do this. But I’m under enormous pressure from City Council. The fact is, your orchestra’s a dying business, and Emerson Hall sits on a huge patch of land. I can’t just let it sit here, taking up space and losing money, while so many people are out of work. I could build shops here, apartment buildings! Businesses that would actually make money.”