The Follower by Kate Doughty (ebook reader with built in dictionary TXT) 📕

a couple weeks ago. He knows that she won’t be as bad as he remembers, but . . . he can’t stop thinking about it. And it’s not just the visceral horror of that night. The time in the hospital has hollowed Cecily out; her skin is blotchy and pallid, her posture slumped, her hair dull and lifeless. She smells like medicine. She looks less alive than the sister he knew.

Until Cecily enters her room for the first time and screams.

She jumps, yanking him back. He pulls free and darts forward, ready to confront the mysterious shadow, but her room is empty except for one uninvited guest: the doll from their livestream has been placed on Cecily’s bed.

He and Amber swear to Cecily that they didn’t do it, and she believes them. She’s so clearly distressed, but when they insist that they should tell their parents immediately, Cecily refuses.

“Look, I’ve caused everyone enough stress,” Cecily says. Rudy can barely stand how desperate she sounds. “Please, just let it go. I’m sure Mom must have put it there, and she’s going to freak out if she finds out it upset me so much. Please . . .”

Rudy and Amber’s eyes meet, and he knows they are in agreement. They won’t tell their parents about this.

Rudy needs to get the doll out of the house, so while Cecily settles into her room, he puts it on the curb for the garbage pickup. That evening, he goes back to where the doll is sitting on the curb. The sight of it makes him so angry that, without thinking about it, he picks it up and roughly rips its head off, slamming the porcelain orb onto the pavement. He tears the fabric body into several pieces, ripping off each limb and throwing them onto the pavement among the shards of broken porcelain. When he finishes, he stands over the mess he created, panting and frightened by how easy it was to lose control.

This is how Amber finds him when she returns, hot and sweaty and exhausted from one of her runs. They both exchange a wordless look. They have different ways of dealing with stress. Of dealing with what has happened to Cecily.

Rudy tells himself that having her home will help, will fix things. But as he pictures Cecily sitting in her room as the house is constructed around her, he can’t shake the heavy, lingering sense of dread.

When he walks back upstairs to his room, Cecily is there. “I saw what you did.”

Rudy cringes, imagining Cecily in the window, watching him smash the doll. “Sorry, I just—”

“It freaked me out, too,” Cecily says, sitting down on his bed. “But it got me thinking. Have you found anything new, while I was . . . away?”

Rudy sits down in his desk chair and spins to face her. “I was going to wait until later to get you up to speed, but . . . we found Frank Glenarm.” He gives her a quick recap of their visit to Upstate Medical. “Other than that, it’s only bits and pieces, people that Bella thinks could have some kind of connection to all of this.”

“Like who?”

Rudy ticks them off on his fingers. “Miles has parents that used to work at Glenarm’s assisted living facility. Bella said that people have seen Steve photographing the house. Apparently Alicia said that she overheard Trent bad-mouthing the account. Things like that.”

Cecily shakes her head and says what they’re both thinking. “None of that is enough to really implicate anyone.”

“No,” Rudy agrees. “We’ll have to keep looking.”

Cecily nods, picking at her cuticles. Rudy finds himself fixated on the movement. Her nails used to be so immaculate. Finally, she looks up.

“Have you been online lately?”

Rudy knows what she’s talking about, but he dodges the question. “Honestly, no. Mom gave me my admin stuff back, but . . . I haven’t really wanted to. Doesn’t make sense to talk to our followers when they all think we’re making up this nightmare for money.” He tries to stop bitterness from tinging the words. He can’t. “Besides, I have bigger things to worry about. Research to do,” he says, trying to keep his tone light even as he feels urgency rise inside of him. He needs to learn more about the Glen-arms, about their daughter. He needs to find the follower before the open house. Before they can do whatever they meant when they posted Looking forward to it.

“I meant more . . . about Amber.” Cecily says. Rudy tenses. Cecily is staring at her nails. “She’s doing really well.”

Rudy answers carefully. “She is,” he says. “She’s really stepped up, and I know it can’t have been easy. A lot of sponsors really like the whole body-positive thing she’s doing—sure, others don’t, but at least we’re getting some.”

Cecily shoots him a small, sad smile. “I imagine that surprised Mom.”

“A little,” Rudy admits. His mom had been surprised yet thrilled that Amber may actually be able to replace Cecily—at least, popularity-wise. “But she’s been really supportive, which has been nice.”

Cecily nods. As the silence stretches on, Rudy finds him grasping for conversation topics, but he can’t think of anything except the follower mystery and all the work they’ve been doing around the clock to prepare the house for exhibition day. The longer the quiet lasts, the more desperate he gets to break it. He’s just about to start talking about the progress on the renovation, of all things, when Cecily starts speaking again.

“I’m not mad,” Cecily says finally with a half laugh. “Like, I’m sad that it can’t be me anymore, but I’m not, like, mad at Amber or anything—you guys know that, right?”

Rudy feels himself relax. He hadn’t quite known how Cecily would react to Amber’s rise in popularity. “I mean, we didn’t think—” He stumbles before correcting himself. “I know Amber will be glad to hear that. She’s actually kind of got a following of her own now—I haven’t seen her this excited about social media in a long time.”

“Do you think that excitement is over social