Deep Betrayal

Warning. After he warned the viewing public to stay indoors (as if we needed convincing) and away from windows (harder to do), the screen cut away to the news anchors and the scripted stories of the day.
    Mr. Badzin leaned forward and reached for the remote. He turned down the volume just as the picture cut to a young blond reporter. Behind her was a familiar dark lake with spotlights focused on the brambles along the shore. I pulled closer to the flat screen so I could listen.
    “Thanks, Geoff,” said the reporter. “This afternoon, twenty miles north of Ashland, Wisconsin, a young man discovered part of an enormous fish that washed up on the shores of Lake Superior.”
    The studio cut to video of agents from the Department of Natural Resources carrying something bulky and wrapped in a tarp to a waiting truck. They struggled with its weight. I glanced around the room. No one was watching but me, their heads all turned to watch the storm.
    The reporter continued. “DNR officials believe it to be the remains of the largest sturgeon on record. However, one young man has a different theory for us to consider.”
    The studio cut to a prerecorded interview, the camera lens tightly focused on a face I knew too well. Jack Pettit was staring intently at the camera, his dark eyes looking directly at me.
    “It’s pretty big for a fish,” he said, not blinking. “Even a sturgeon. Makes you wonder.”
    The reporter pressed on, capitalizing on the story. “Makes you wonder what?”
    Jack seemed unaware that she was making fun of him with her question. “Whether the legends are true,” he said. “The ones about mermaids in the lake. Anyone who looks at those scales has to wonder. It doesn’t look like any fish I’ve ever seen.”
    The camera cut back live to the studio, and the male anchor laughed warmly. “That kid’s got quite a theory, Lindsay.”
    “Well, he is right about one thing, Geoff. It is a sensational find, and the DNR is investigating it as an unusual specimen, possibly a new species, but not anything mythical. Although I have to admit, that would be a lot more fun.”
    More chuckling between the two anchors, as they cut to footage of the DNR picking over the decomposing remains. The remains of Tallulah White.
    I grabbed my stomach and ran upstairs to the bathroom, vomiting half-digested tuna roll into the toilet. How could this be? Tallulah’s body was supposed to stay hidden forever. What did this mean for Calder? Is this why he’d vanished?
    I rinsed my mouth and staggered to my room. Rain splattered on the window, leaving long-fingered patterns behind. Outside, the sky seemed to pull me from the house, like a black hole, endless and unforgiving.
    There was a flash of lightning, and—happy to do anything that would get my mind off Tallulah—I began to count for the center of the storm. One Mississippi. Two Mississippi. Three Mississippi . At three seconds, the house rattled with thunder. “Three miles away,” I whispered to myself.
    The storm was getting closer and Calder was out there— somewhere . I wanted desperately to reach him, for him to tellme nothing would change, that the discovery of Tallulah meant nothing. That everything would be okay. That he was coming soon.
    I lay my palm flat against the window pane. Down below, something moved in the darkness. I threw open the sash and leaned out into the rain. My hair plastered to my face and shoulders. My vision distorted. I curled my arm across my forehead to shield my eyes. It seemed the whole world was underwater.
    Another flash of lightning illuminated the street in a vibrant blue. I sucked in my breath, certain I must be dreaming, because in that flash I saw him, standing between the parked cars, looking up at me. His sad eyes pleading.
    “Calder!” I called, reaching for him. At the sound of his name in the air, electricity surged not from the sky, but up from where he stood on the street. It blazed through my bloodstream. And everything went dark.

4
CHICKEN
    I didn’t remember getting into bed, but that was where I woke up. In my pajamas, no less, and I didn’t remember putting them on, either. My head pounded, and I reached behind me. An enormous, throbbing egg was growing out of the back of my skull. When did that happen?
    The storm had marched on, leaving shards of bright light streaming through my window. I groaned, rolling away and making my pillow crackle.
    I slipped my hand to the cold side of the pillow and felt a