Try Not to Breathe by Jennifer R. Hubbard Read Free Book Online

a shadow, a mist, a stirring in the air. Nothing.
    Nicki exhaled. She blinked, tears gathering on her lashes, and I willed her not to believe so soon, not to jump into the pool without checking for water. She said, “Um—yes, does he—remember me?”
    Silence. Then Andrea smiled. “Yes, of course. You’re his daughter; he would never forget you.” She chuckled. “He’s laughing a little that you think he would forget—but underneath it he’s sad. Sad that you didn’t have more time together.”
    Nicki dug her nails into her palms, leaving purple marks. “Ask him why he did it.”
    A pause. “‘Why he did it,’” Andrea repeated.
    Yeah , I thought. Not many clues in that, are there, Andrea? Now what are you going to make up?
    “Yes,” Nicki said, her voice firm.
    Andrea’s voice faltered. “He doesn’t think—he can explain it. He wishes . . . It’s complicated, and he’s not sure you would understand . . .”
    “I don’t understand. That’s why I’m here.” Nicki drew one hand across her cheek, where the tears had spilled over.
    “He wants you to know he loves you.”
    “Yeah, I know that! I know that. I need to know why he—” I stepped on Nicki’s toe before she could give away any more clues. She glared at me. Her face had gone blotchy, her eyes pink. “I need to know why he did what he did.”
    Andrea kept wrinkling her forehead, as if she could squeeze an answer from the air by pure concentration. “He’s sorry,” she said.
    “That doesn’t tell me anything!” Nicki’s voice broke on the last word; the jagged edge of it seemed to cut me. I’d been wanting her to see how useless this was, to see that Andrea was a fake. But now I was willing Andrea to find Nicki’s father, or at least to come up with something convincing. I focused on Andrea’s face, trying to beam thought waves at her.
    “He—his voice isn’t clear now. Let me see if I can get him coming in stronger.”
    Yeah, you’d better, I thought. Come on, Andrea.
    The air conditioner clanked and groaned. Nicki sniffled. My legs twitched; I wanted to jump off this couch and run.
    “Daddy,” Nicki said.
    That’s when I opened my mouth.
    “Ask him if maybe he didn’t mean to go so far,” I said.
    Andrea hesitated.
    “Ask him if he—didn’t see any other way out at the time.”
    After a beat, Andrea nodded. “It’s something like that, he says.”
    Nicki sucked in her breath.
    “Like, maybe he didn’t think he could tell anyone else what was going on,” I added. How much longer would it take for Andrea to pick up her cue? Weren’t psychics supposed to be good at reading people?
    “He was wrapped up in the pain of the moment,” Andrea said, finally catching the huge softball I’d thrown her. “He didn’t see the future, the consequences.”
    I couldn’t seem to shut up, now that I’d started. “Ask him, did he just not know what else to do.”
    “He would go back and do it differently if he could.”
    Nicki watched us, her head swinging back and forth. “Oh my God,” she said.
    I’d overplayed, and I knew it. I’d talked too much, made the cue too obvious. But I knew there was something true in what I had said. Hey, maybe her father was speaking through me instead of Andrea. Wasn’t that what Nicki had wanted? Wasn’t that what she’d asked me for?
    • • • • •

    Nicki waited until we were out on the sidewalk again to pound my arm with her fist. “Are you happy now?”
    “What?”
    “Don’t act dumb.”
    “Nicki—”
    “So you were right, she was a fake. Does that make you feel better?” She kicked an empty beer can into the brick wall of a house.
    “What makes you say she was a fake?”
    “Oh, come on! It was so obvious. You fed her everything.”
    “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” But I heard the lie in my own voice.
    “Were you making fun of me?”
    “No.”
    She sobbed. I sat her down on a low crumbling wall in front of a warehouse.
    “She was so bad I