Mockingbird by Chuck Wendig Read Free Book Online

manic-depression, bipolar disorder, ADHD, anxiety, oppositional defiant disorder – whatever the hell that is – borderline personality dis–"
      "It's oppositional defiant disorder." It almost startles her it's been so long since Louis has said more than three words to her. "It's a sign of someone who doesn't play well with authority. Doesn't like being told what to do. Angry, resentful, argumentative. Usually in some kind of trouble. Often does the opposite of what they're told just because that's how they are."
      "Ugh." Miriam wrinkles her nose. "Bet those kids are fun to be around. Like hanging out with a cat."
      It's then she sees Louis looking at her. That one eye firing a concentrated laser beam of scrutiny, slicing her apart and inspecting the remains.
      "What?" she asks.
      "Nothing." He goes back to driving.
      "You trying to say something?"
      "I'm not."
      "I know what you're saying." She gets it now.
      "Do you?"
      "I don't have oppositional defiant disorder."
      Grunt.
      "I don't. That's crazy-talk. I was a good girl once. And it's not my fault I'm surrounded by idiots and lunatics half the time. I just go my own way on things. That's what an independent woman does. Right?" She scowls. "Just keep that one eye of yours on the road."
      Then, just to tick him off, she cranks down the window, pops a filterless cigarette in her mouth, and brings a lighter flame to its tip. Puff, puff, puff. She blows a jet of cancer outside.
      She picks a nit of tobacco off her tongue, flicks it out the window just as they pass a highway sign.
     
    SELINSGROVE, 5Mi
    SUNBURY, 7Mi
     
      A hard knot like a calcified clump of hair forms in her throat. "We're in Pennsylvania."
      "You were asleep when we crossed through Philadelphia."
      Susquehanna River Valley. Three counties. All around the river.
      The river is rising, Miriam.
      But it's not that. Or not just that.
      If they're near Selinsgrove, then that means right now, at this very moment, they're only thirty minutes north of where she grew up. Where her high school boyfriend blew the roof of his skull off with a shotgun. Where the boyfriend's mother beat Miriam half to death with a snow shovel. Where her baby died inside her.
      Where her own mother still lives.
      Miriam hasn't seen the woman since she ran away. Almost a decade now.
       Maybe she's dead , Miriam thinks. Once she discovered she had the power to see how people were going to die, she never again touched her mother. By the next morning, she'd already bolted.
      Ghosts, restless and sad, stir inside her.
      It takes all her effort to tamp them down with a hard mental boot.
      She clears her throat.
      "Did Miss Katey get my rider?"
      Louis grunts. An affirmative sound. Miriam already knew the answer to the question. They stopped off at a Kinkos to fax Miriam's handwritten list of rock-star demands to the school for the teacher.
      "Fine," she says. "Good. Great. Let's go to school."
      She flicks the cigarette out the window, half-finished. It just doesn't taste good anymore.

INTERLUDE
    The Phone Call
     
    Rain hammers the phone booth.
      Miriam, sixteen, holds the receiver against her ear. Her jaw shivers.
      It rings and rings. She doesn't want anyone to answer. Go to the answering machine , she thinks. It's like a prayer. A mantra. Go to the answering machine. Go to the answering machine. Go to the answering machine . It starts to sound absurd in the echo chamber of her own head.
      Click.
      "Miriam?" her mother's voice. Small and afraid. She's never afraid. It's like something's been stolen from her. And maybe it has.
      "The baby's dead, mother."
      "I know. I know." Of course she knows. She was there at the hospital. "God will take care of him now."
      "Mother–"
      "Where are you?"
      "God can't be real," Miriam says, throat raw, eyes puffy. Every part of her feels like a tooth that's been cracked in half, the nerve