Kami Garcia - Unbreakable

As my bare feet sank into the wet earth, I tried not to think about the dead bodies buried beneath me. I had passed this tiny graveyard a handful of times but never at night, and always outside the boundaries of its peeling iron gates.

I wouldve given anything to be standing outside them now.

In the moonlight, rows of weathered headstones exposed the neat stretch of lawn for what it truly wasthe grassy lid of an enormous coffin.

A branch snapped, and I spun around.

Elvis? I searched for a trace of my cats gray and white ringed tail.

Elvis never ran away, usually content to thread his way between my ankles whenever I opened the dooruntil tonight. He had taken off so fast that I didnt even have time to grab my shoes, and I had chased him eight blocks until I ended up here.

Muffled voices drifted through the trees, and I froze.

On the other side of the gates, a girl wearing blue and gray Georgetown University sweats passed underneath the pale glow of the lamppost. Her friends caught up with her, laughing and stumbling down the sidewalk. They reached one of the academic buildings and disappeared inside.

It was easy to forget that the cemetery was in the middle of a college campus. As I walked deeper into the uneven rows, the lampposts vanished behind the trees, and the clouds plunged the graveyard in and out of shadow. I ignored the whispers in the back of my mind urging me to go home.

Something moved in my peripheral visiona flash of white.

I scanned the stones, now completely bathed in black.

Come on, Elvis. Where are you?

Nothing scared me more than the dark. I liked to see what was coming, and darkness was a place where things could hide.

Think about something else.

The memory closed in before I could stop it.

My mothers face hovering above mine as I blinked myself awake. The panic in her eyes as she pressed a finger over her lips, signaling me to be quiet. The cold floor against my feet as we made our way to her closet, where she pushed aside the dresses.

Someones in the house, she whispered, pulling a board away from the wall to reveal a small opening. Stay here until I come back. Dont make a sound.

I squeezed inside as she worked the board back into place. I had never experienced absolute darkness before. I stared at a spot inches in front of me, where my palm rested on the board. But I couldnt see it.

I closed my eyes against the blackness. There were soundsthe stairs creaking, furniture scraping against the floor, muffled voicesand one thought replaying over and over in my mind.

What if she didnt come back?

Too terrified to see if I could get out from the inside, I kept my hand on the wood. I listened to my ragged breathing, convinced that whoever was in the house could hear it, too.

Eventually, the wood gave beneath my palm and a thin stream of light flooded the space. My mom reached for me, promising the intruders had fled. As she carried me out of her closet, I couldnt hear anything beyond the pounding of my heart, and I couldnt think about anything except the crushing weight of the dark.

I was only five when it happened, but I still remembered every minute in the crawl space. It made the air around me now feel suffocating. Part of me wanted to go home, with or without my cat.

Elvis, get out here!

Something shifted between the chipped headstones in front of me.

Elvis?

A silhouette emerged from behind a stone cross.

I jumped, a tiny gasp escaping my lips. Sorry. My voice wavered. Im looking for my cat.

The stranger didnt say a word.

Sounds intensified at a dizzying ratebranches breaking, leaves rustling, my pulse throbbing. I thought about the hundreds of unsolved crime shows Id watched with my mom that began exactly like thisa girl standing alone somewhere she shouldnt be, staring at the guy who was about to attack her.

I stepped back, thick mud pushing up around my ankles like a hand rooting me to the spot.

Please dont hurt me.

The wind cut through the graveyard, lifting tangles of long hair off the strangers shoulders and the thin fabric of a white dress from her legs.

Her legs.

Relief washed over me. Have you seen a gray and white Siamese cat? Im going to kill him when I find him.

Silence.

Her dress caught the moonlight, and I realized it wasnt a dress at all. She was wearing a nightgown. Who wandered around a cemetery in their nightgown?

Someone crazy.

Or someone sleepwalking.

You arent supposed to wake a sleepwalker, but I couldnt leave her out here alone at night either.

Hey? Can you hear me?

The girl didnt move, gazing at me as if she could see my features in the darkness. An empty feeling unfolded in the pit of my stomach. I wanted to look at something elseanything but her unnerving stare.

My eyes drifted down to the base of the cross.

The girls feet were as bare as mine, and it looked like they werent touching the ground.

I blinked hard, unwilling to consider the other possibility. It had to be an effect of the moonlight and the shadows. I glanced at my own feet, caked in mud, and back to hers.

They were pale and spotless.

A flash of white fur darted in front of her and rushed toward me.

Elvis.

I grabbed him before he could get away. He hissed at me, clawing and twisting violently until I dropped him. My heart hammered in my chest as he darted across the grass and squeezed under the gate.

I looked back at the stone cross.

The girl was gone, the ground nothing but a smooth, untouched layer of mud.

Blood from the scratches trailed down my arm as I crossed the graveyard, trying to reason away the girl in the white nightgown.

Silently reminding myself that I didnt believe in ghosts.

When I stumbled back onto the well-lit sidewalk, there was no sign of Elvis. A guy with a backpack slung over his shoulder walked by and gave me a strange look when he noticed I was barefoot, and covered in mud up to my ankles. He probably thought I was a pledge.

My hands didnt stop shaking until I hit O Street, where the shadows of the campus ended and the lights of the DC traffic began. Tonight, even the tourists posing for pictures at the top of The Exorcist stairs were somehow reassuring.

The cemetery suddenly felt miles away, and I started second-guessing myself.

The girl in the graveyard hadnt been hazy or transparent like the ghosts in movies. She had looked like a regular girl.

Except she was floating.

Wasnt she?

Maybe the moonlight had only made it appear that way. And maybe the girls feet werent muddy because the ground where shed been standing was dry. By the time I reached my block, lined with row houses crushed together like sardines, I convinced myself there were dozens of explanations.

Elvis lounged on our front steps, looking docile and bored. I considered leaving him outside to teach him a lesson, but I loved that stupid cat.

I still remembered the day my mom bought him for me. I came home from school crying because wed made Fathers Day gifts in class, and I was the only kid without a father. Mine had walked away when I was five and never looked back. My mom had wiped my tears and said, I bet youre also the only kid in your class getting a kitten today.