The Dark: A Collection (Point Horror) by Linda Cargill Read Free Book Online Page B

the
coffee, then stared her straight in the eye.
    "Kids knew how to
push my buttons. They teased the hell out of me, saying that I would
go up the river like Mike, or claiming that Mike was the Boston
Strangler in disguise. I stayed after school and met the guys who
badmouthed me out in the woods behind the football field. I punched
them out to prove I was better than Mike."
    "What happened?"
    He shrugged.
"Sometimes I won. Sometimes I lost. The teasing never stopped.
Every few days it was another guy or one of the same guys as before.
I was everybody's football. They kicked me around until my leather
was worn off. They had lots of fun. I was miserable, just letting my
guts hang out for everybody to see."
    It touched Bianca
that he was telling her private stuff that must hurt to remember.
He'd seemed such a loner at school. She'd assumed that Harry
hadn't had any feelings since he'd always worn one of those
frozen mugs and had looked like a tough guy.
    She had imagined that
her own private hell was the worst — being the sole surviving
witness to a murder that she couldn't remember, having a killer
hanging out there waiting to waste her as soon as she remembered the
slightest thing. But she couldn't imagine living with the shame of
having a brother or a sister who had gone to jail and wasn't sorry
about it.
    Everyone on St.
Simons Island had heard about Harry's brother, Mike Fellini. He had
gone from petty theft and purse-snatching when he'd been in high
school to armed robbery as soon as he'd dropped out.
    Three years ago Mike
had been holed up in an old, abandoned shack on the far side of the
beach next to the swamp. No respectable employer on the island would
hire Mike to change a tire for fear that he would run away with it.
He'd been spotted at night in various places where no one had good
reason to go — such as the swamps and the lagoons. Some had
gossiped that he'd spent his time hunting for buried treasure left
there by the Spanish several hundred years ago.
    For three years now
he'd been serving a sentence for armed robbery in the Georgia state
penitentiary.
    Bianca had never had
a brother or a sister. But if her mother or father had suddenly taken
to the streets to carry on a life of crime, she would never be able
to hold her head up. It would be a badge of shame.
    Someday the murderer
of Mrs. Ingersoll might be caught and Bianca would be safe. But there
was no chance of living down the horror of having a family member
turn to crime. That person would always be your mother, father,
brother or sister as long as you lived. On an island where everybody
knew everybody else, that was like living in perpetual hell. The real
hell couldn't be any worse.
    "You don't have
such a chip on your shoulder any more," Bianca remarked. "When I
see you at school, you look as if you don't care. Mike doesn't
seem to bother you."
    Harry looked straight
into Bianca's eyes. "I pulled myself together and toughened up.
It hasn't changed Mike. It's just made Mike a helluva lot easier
to put up with."
    Bianca bit her lip.
"I don't think I could do that."
    "Why not?"
    "I'm not that
brave."
    "Somebody like you
who—"
    She clapped her hand
over his mouth.
    "It makes me feel
guilty when people call me a heroine. I — I don't deserve it."
    "If you're not a
heroine, nobody is!" he exclaimed. "Risk your life for a baby?
Man, most people would have run out the door and saved their own
necks when they heard a killer in the house."
    She shook her head
no. "I'm stupid, and I'm a coward." If only Harry could see
what was written all over the mirror in the ladies' lounge!
    Harry put his hand
under her chin and made her look at him. "Hey! Don't put yourself
down. The reason the other kids tease you is that they're afraid of
you."
    "I — I don't
understand. . ."
    "They'd be scared
shitless if they were faced with a killer. They wouldn't have
survived.
    They know it. They're
envious of you and don't want to admit it. It's like you have
some sort of