Echoes by Marissa Lete (best books for students to read txt) 📕

When we enter the house, I leave my shoes at the door. At my own house, I wouldn’t bother to remove my shoes until plopping onto the couch or heading up to my room, but at Grace’s, it feels like a requirement to enter.

The cute downtown house was built in the early 1900s, complete with high ceilings, wide and spacious rooms, and massive paned windows. Even though it’s old, Grace’s parents have done a good job at modernizing the inside. The kitchen features sleek black countertops and stainless steel appliances, the living room includes a wall-mounted seventy-five-inch TV, and all of the windows are fixed with motorized drapes that open and close at preset times of the day. And because of a housekeeper that comes twice a week, the place is usually spic and span. It’s the kind of place that demands the respect of bare feet when you step inside.

The first time I’d come to Grace’s house and seen how old it was, I’d worried that the echoes inside would be unbearable. But apparently, the house had sat empty for a long time before Grace and her family moved in a few years ago, and despite them living there for that time, the place is usually eerily quiet. Grace’s parents work long hours, and Grace and her younger sister often spent most of their time out of the house. So only occasionally do I overhear a family conversation at dinner from last year, or a short conversation from two years ago, which is nice.

When we walk into the dining room, a note and two twenty-dollar bills are lying on the table.

Grace,

Dad and I have to work late tonight. Big project this week. We won’t be back until 8 or 9. Order some dinner with this, and keep an eye on Briana for me. Love you,

                            —Mom

“Pizza?” Grace asks when we both finish reading the note.

“Do you have to ask?” I reply with a grin.

“Now, or later?”

“Do you have to ask?” I ask, and she responds by picking up her phone.

We spend the rest of the afternoon doing bits of our homework while flipping through TV channels and munching on cheesy breadsticks. Grace’s younger sister Briana gets dropped off by the bus about an hour after we get home, but she gets busy with her own homework and isn’t much of a bother.

Grace seems to have either forgotten about or completely ignored Andy’s voicemail from earlier, which is strange for her. I start to wonder if maybe she finally sees that he’s no good for her, and has decided to let go. I can only hope.

✽✽✽✽✽

When I step outside later in the evening to head home, the air has cooled down quite a bit, and I crank up the heater in the car. Almost all traces of daylight have faded except for a soft glow around the horizon as I pull out and drive down the street. When I round the first corner, I notice a black Suburban that looks eerily similar to the one from earlier parked on the side of the street between a couple of houses. After passing it, I check my rearview mirror to get a better look, and as I do, I see the headlights pop on.

I try to shrug off the twitch of unease running through me, hoping that it’s all just a weird coincidence, but when I turn left onto the main road, the Suburban does as well. Except, this time it hangs back between a few cars, keeping its distance instead of driving right up behind me like before.

My heart rate quickens, and I keep an eye on the car as I drive. When it follows me at the next turn, I start to get anxious. Are they following me? Who could it be? And why? I can’t think of anyone or any reason, so I decide to test something just to be sure. I turn off onto the next road I see, one I’ve never been on in my life. I keep a tight watch on the rearview mirror and follow the movements of the Suburban as it turns down the road ten seconds later. When I look back forward, I catch a glimpse of a “Dead End” sign right as I pass it.

“Shoot,” I mutter under my breath.

Looking ahead at where the road curves, I think fast, pulling into a random driveway next to an old red truck just after rounding the curve, hoping the house’s occupants won’t come out to question me. I turn the car off and slouch down in my seat so I won’t be seen. Seconds later, the sound of the Suburban’s engine reaches earshot, and the headlights pass by my car. I wait in dead silence as the Suburban goes to the end of the street and turns around. When it comes back, it slows for a moment behind my car, the brakes squealing as it rolls to a complete stop. I hold my breath.

Eight, nine, ten seconds pass. Then, finally, the driver hits the gas and the Suburban speeds off into the distance.

I wait for several minutes before shakily starting my car back up and pulling out of the stranger’s driveway. I don’t know who was in that Suburban, or why they were there, but one thing is undeniably clear: they were following me.

As I drive home, a million scenarios are blazing through my head. None of them are good. I circle the block three times before pulling up in the driveway, just to make sure. I arrive twenty minutes after curfew, so Dad asks why I’m late, but I brush it off by saying that Grace and I got carried away with our homework. My parents trust me enough to let it go, and I quickly go