REAPING INNOCENCE ◦ STILINSKI [3]

xx.

    Was she like Raeven, now? She must've been. And now, for the rest of her like, for the rest of her existence, she would have to feed as Raeven did. She would have to...

    She sank to her knees, pressing her forehead against the wood of a wall. I can't, she thought. Oh, please, be wrong. I can't be what she is; I can't.

    She had never been very religious. But from that deep place inside, her terror was welling up, and every particle of her being joined in the cry for aid. Oh, please, she thought. Oh, please, please, help me. She didn't ask for anything specific; she couldn't gather her thoughts that far. Only: Oh, please, help me, oh, please, please...

    She had to find Stiles and Scott. If there was any help for her, they would know of it. And if there wasn't...well, she needed them all the more. There was nowhere else she wanted to be except with them. She shut the door to the attic carefully behind her as she went out. Whoever lived in that house mustn't discover her hiding place. On the wall, she saw a calendar with the days up to March 28th crossed off. Four days since the accident. She'd slept for four days—or had she been dead for four days?

    When she reached the front door, she cringed from the daylight outside. It hurt. Even though the sky was so overcast that rain looked imminent, it hurt her eyes. She had to force herself to leave the safety of the house, and then she felt a gnawing paranoia about being out in the open. She slunk along beside fences, staying close to trees, ready to melt into the shadows. She felt like a shadow herself—or a ghost. She would certainly frighten the wits out of anyone who saw her.

    But all her circumspection seemed to be wasted. There was no one on the streets to see her; the town might have been abandoned. She went by seemingly deserted houses, forsaken yards, closed stores. Presently she saw parked cars lining the street, but they were empty, too.

    And then she saw a shape against the sky that stopped her in her tracks. A steeple, white against the thick dark clouds. Carter's legs trembled as she made herself creep closer to the building. She'd known this church all her life; she'd seen the cross inscribed on that wall a thousand times before the fire. But now she edged toward it as if it were a caged animal that might break loose and bite her. She pressed one hand to the stone wall and slid it nearer and nearer to the carved symbol.

    When her outspread fingers touched the arm of the cross, her eyes filled and her throat ached. She let her hand glide along it until it gently covered the engraving. Then she leaned against the wall and let the tears come. I'm not evil, she thought. I did things I shouldn't have. I cheated on my boyfriend with his best friend; I never thanked Derek for all he did for me over the years. I should have spent more time with Allison and been nicer to Malia. But I'm not evil. I'm not damned—I realize that now.

    When she could see again, she looked up at the building. Sheriff Stilinski had said something about the church. Was it this one he meant? She avoided the front of the church and the main doorway. There was a side door that led to the choir loft, and she slipped up the stairs noiselessly and looked down from the gallery.

    She saw at once why the streets had been so empty. It seemed as if everyone in Beacon Hills was here, every seat in every pew filled, and the back of the church packed solid with people standing. Staring at the front rows, Carter realized that she recognized every face; they were members of the junior class, and neighbors, and old family friends. Derek was there, too, wearing the black dress shirt she had bought him a few months back before he left with Braeden; before she died.

    "...share our remembrances of this very special girl," he said, and he moved aside.

    Carter watched what happened after with the unearthly feeling that she had a loge seat at a play. She was not at all involved in the events down there on stage; she was only a spectator, but it was her life she was watching.