Final Girl by Michelle Schusterman (beach books .TXT) 📕

Grandma took a deep breath. “You published it last night, yes.”

“No, I didn’t.” I sat back on my heels. “I didn’t, I hit save, then I called Jamie . . .” But there was no use defending myself. Apparently, the Thing wanted its post and video out there. Swallowing, I looked at Grandma. “Were Dad and Lidia mad?”

“No, sweetie. Not mad.” Grandma reached out, brushing a strand of hair off my forehead. “Just . . . concerned.”

“Because of the . . . my doppelganger.” I was wide awake now. What did the fans think? Were they saying even worse stuff about Dad? “I know what Mi Jin says about doppelgangers, but I don’t think I’m actually going to die, I shouldn’t have said that, I . . .” I took a deep breath and sat up straighter. This was it. Time to tell the truth. Grandma watched me, her eyes filled with worry.

“It’s not a doppelganger. It’s an artificial ghost,” I told her. “Like Brunilda Cano, the ghost of a possessed nun that Professor Guzmán created. And Roland! He made one when he was a boy, the ghost of a librarian who was never real—his brother made up the whole thing. And mine, the one in the video, it’s . . .” I wanted to say it. I was going to say it. “It’s . . .”

“Kat,” Grandma whispered. “Sweetheart. There’s no ghost in this video.”

I blinked. “What? Of course there is.”

Pursing her lips, Grandma reached out and touched the trackpad, moving the arrow over to the play button. She hesitated for just a moment before clicking.

On the screen, I saw the Korean horror movie playing on the TV. I saw the desk, the laptop, the dashboard for my blog. I saw the mirror, and I saw my reflection, holding the camera, staring at an empty chair.

Numbness spread through my limbs. “No, that’s not . . .” I squeezed my eyes closed briefly, then stared hard at the screen, willing the Thing to appear. “It was there. I watched this video last night; it was there. You could see it in the mirror.”

Before Grandma could respond, I quickly scrambled off the bed and paused the video. Then I scrolled up to the top of the post. It was all there, all the Save yourselves, and my message underneath it. My message that made me sound like a complete, certifiable nutjob. Because now it looked like I had typed up this whole nonsensical post, then added a video of my own reflection watching an empty chair through my camera.

There were 168 comments so far. I couldn’t even bring myself to read them.

“Everyone thinks I’m crazy,” I said dully. “Don’t they.”

“Oh, sweetheart.” Grandma placed a finger under my chin, tilting my head back and looking me in the eyes. “No one thinks you’re crazy. But I won’t pretend we aren’t . . . confused. Your father says he’s tried to talk to you about your actions lately. Ripping up his contract, leaving those comments on your mother’s Facebook—”

“I didn’t do any of that!” I cried. “It was the Thing. Wait—I can prove it.”

Grandma’s brows furrowed as I flew off the bed and across the room, grabbing my backpack off the couch. After dumping the contents on the floor, I frantically dug through the mess until I found it: the flash drive.

“Ha,” I said triumphantly, marching back over to the laptop. “Remember when I e-mailed you about being camera shy? You told me to practice getting comfortable on camera by myself. So I did.” I inserted the flash drive as I spoke, then opened the video. “Watch the mirror.”

“No one’s going to see this. Ever.”

I crossed my arms, staring at myself standing in the hotel room back in Salvador. Grandma sat perfectly still next to me. My heart pounded faster and my palms started to sweat as the clip got closer to the part where the Thing first appeared. I hadn’t known that’s what it was at first, but it was there. A blurry shape in the mirror. I leaned forward in anticipation.

“Just. Freaking. Relax.”

The video ended, frozen on a frame of my hand grabbing the camera. I couldn’t believe my eyes.

Nothing.

No.

Thing.

“No, it was there,” I hissed, clicking back to play the final few seconds again. I glared at the mirror, willing the blur to happen, praying I’d missed it somehow the first time. But there was absolutely no movement behind video-me.

I’d never shown anyone this video because I was too embarrassed. But now I wish I’d just gotten over it. Because the Thing had been there. And now it wasn’t.

“Kat, honey,” Grandma was saying, but I ignored her. This was like . . . like the opposite of thoughtography. Instead of projecting a ghost onto a video, I’d removed one. Two, actually. But I sure as hell hadn’t done it on purpose. The world’s first accidental reverse psychic photographer, I thought, and almost laughed out loud.

Only I didn’t really believe that. No, this was the Thing’s doing. It must have been. It was trying to make me look crazy so that Dad would leave the show and we’d go back to Chelsea. And every time I asked for help or tried to tell someone the truth—Grandma, Dad, the entire Passport to Paranormal fandom—I just looked crazier.

Enough of that. If I was going to beat the Thing, I had to do it on my own.

“Never mind,” I told Grandma, getting to my feet abruptly and pocketing the flash drive. “Wrong video. And the blog post . . . it was supposed to be a joke. I was tired, seemed like a good idea. I’ll apologize to the crew.” Grandma opened her mouth, but I continued. “Meet you downstairs for breakfast, okay? I’m gonna go back to my room and take a shower.”

And I grabbed my bag and left the room without looking back at her.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN THE TRUTH ISN’T OUT THERE

Post: Ryang Jeongsin Byeong-won (Ryang Psychiatric Hospital)

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Hi, everyone! This is Oscar, temporarily taking over Kat’s blog. She’s fine, she’s just taking a break from the Internet for a while.

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