The Forgotten Girl Read online

A kid, like from the tombstone he saw tonight. Who was she? Why was she buried there, of all places, in a deserted spot in the woods? Had she lived around here? What happened to her? He couldn’t imagine his dad being buried in a forgotten spot like that. Daniel felt quite sad for her.

  These questions and thoughts of himself, Daddy, Mama, and even Suga sitting around a dinner table filled his mind and carried him off to sleep.

  “IRIS!”

  She jumped straight up, her limbs and reflexes working together again, so fast her head spun. The girl was gone, and she was looking into the concerned face of her mom.

  “Did you have another nightmare?” she asked, glancing at the night-light and back at Iris.

  “Um … yes,” she admitted, looking around the sun-drenched room. She’d thought she’d seen a girl looking at her through the window last night; that wasn’t even possible. Her room was on the second story. It was just another one of her dreams.

  Everything looked exactly the same as it did when she went to bed the night before, as she expected. Except for one thing.

  The window was open.

  How?

  Her pajamas were soaked with sweat, but she was shivering. Her heart was pounding again.

  I must’ve opened it last night for fresh air, Iris thought. That had to be what happened.

  “You look like you just saw a ghost,” Mama said to her. “And you put your night-light on. You haven’t needed that for a few days.”

  Mama’s eyes wandered around her room until she saw Iris’s tablet lying on her nightstand. “I told you about watching videos on your tablet so close to bedtime. Come on, Daniel’s already downstairs.”

  “I’ll be right down,” Iris said, and her mom turned and left. Iris glanced over at the window again.

  No one.

  “What time is it?”

  “Pancake time!”

  “What time is it?”

  “Pancake time!”

  Mr. Rose did his usual Saturday morning call and response for his usual Saturday morning banana pancakes. Iris loved every bit of it, though; she could always count on herself, her mother, Vashti, Daniel, and even sometimes his mom and Suga, to sit around the table on Saturday morning to a big breakfast made by Daddy—banana pancakes, bacon, eggs, and biscuits. His only rule was that they weren’t allowed to eat unless they did the Pancake Time song.

  Vashti attempted to make a beat on the table with her hands as Daddy came out of the kitchen dancing and carrying stacks of pancakes. Iris joined Vashti in making a beat. But instead of playing off Vashti’s rhythm, Iris accidentally banged the edge of a fork and sent it flying onto the floor.

  She felt off this morning. She was still jumpy from her nightmare. She often had bad dreams, but last night’s was more vivid than ever before.

  Last night. Her thoughts kept bringing her back to the grave marker they’d uncovered. She didn’t understand why she was so affected by it—in the town of Easaw, there were graveyards, marked and unmarked, everywhere: in the churchyards, in the long stretches of land separating some of the bigger houses … She and Daniel visited his father’s grave site regularly. It was always somber, but peaceful.

  The grave marker they saw last night was different. It had made Iris feel very strange and uneasy. Her stomach was swirling. She didn’t even feel hungry.

  Mr. Rose placed a plateful of food in front of Iris with a clatter, pulling her out of her thoughts. A little yelp escaped her mouth.

  “Iris is afraid of pancakes,” Vashti said, laughing.

  “Why are you so jumpy, babygirl?” asked her daddy. “I know my pancakes are scary good, but—”

  “I’m just … nervous about the new combination I’m teaching at step practice next week, that’s all,” Iris said, trying to avoid her mom’s gaze. “It’s … kind of hard.”

  “How can the captain be nervous?” Vashti said, stuffing a big piece of pancake into her mouth, pointing her fork at Iris. “You have to be the bravest. Scaredy-cat.”

  “I’m not scared of anything.” Iris frowned, cutting into her own pancakes. She felt her mom looking at her. Iris didn’t need her saying anything and letting Vashti know that her big sister still needed to use a night-light.

  “You’ll be fine, but you need to eat,” her mom said. “You’ll think a lot better with a full stomach.”

  “You, too, Daniel. You’ve barely touched your pancakes. Eat up,” Mr. Rose said. Daniel obeyed and picked up his fork, loading a fluffy piece of pancake into his mouth.

  And they ate, talking and laughing lazily around the table. Iris’s nerves calmed a little as she settled into the familiar taste of the buttery banana pancakes, crispy bacon, and fluffy biscuits. Her appetite came back. She reached to the middle of the table for the last one in the stack, drowning it in maple syrup.

  Vashti reached for the syrup right after Iris, but bumped her plate, knocking her own pancake to the floor.

  “Oh, Vashti,” her mom said, picking up the pancake and taking it to the trash.

  “I’m sorry, Mama!” she said, the threat of tears on her face. Iris looked at Daniel to roll her eyes, but he was giving Vashti a sympathetic look.

  “It’s okay, babygirl. I can whip you up another one,” Daddy said.

  “No, just …” Mama looked around the table. “Iris, let Vashti have that pancake.”

  Iris looked up, incredulous, her knife midair. “Mama!”

  “Iris, do this for your sister,” Mama said, flashing Iris a look. “You’ve already had two pancakes and that was Vashti’s only one.”

  “But you just told me to eat—”

  “Iris Michelle.”

  Iris tried hard not to suck her teeth as she forked her pancake onto Vashti’s plate.

  “Thank you, Sissy,” Vashti said, and reached over to hug her sister. Iris patted her back gingerly.

  “Now, isn’t that sweet?” Daddy said, looking around the table, a twinkle in his eye. “My girls. I’m doing grilled cheese for lunch, Iris, so you’ll have that to look forward to.”

  After breakfast, Iris was still grumpy and wanted to get some space from Vashti. She asked her mom if she could go to Daniel’s house with him. She wanted to talk about what they saw last night, and to tell him about her uneasiness. Was he feeling as weird and jumpy as she was?

  “Yes, but bundle up,” Mama said. “It’s just as cold as it was yesterday.”

  Iris ran upstairs to her room, where her puffer coat was lying on the floor.

  Iris stared at it. Didn’t I put it in the closet last night?

  She shook her head. Probably not. She hadn’t been focused on anything but getting out of the woods.

  “I had another weird dream last night,” Iris breathed, walking outside next to Daniel. Everything looked so much more inviting in the daytime, the whiteness almost blinding, the sun creating sprinkles of rainbow light on the snow. It made last night seem so far away and relaxed Iris’s nerves a little.

  “What was it about?”

  Iris hesitated. Suga always said that you shouldn’t tell a bad dream during daylight if you didn’t want it to come true. But she had to know if Daniel was feeling the same way.

  “After we came back from, you know …” Iris didn’t want to say too much, since neither of them was supposed to be outside last night. “I had a dream that a girl was staring at me through my window.” Iris shivered, wondering if telling her dream under the bright winter sky would make the girl appear again. “Did you feel weird or have any bad dreams last night?”

  “No, I feel fine.” Daniel frowned. “We shouldn’t go back there anyway, Iris. It was way too dark. What if there were animals or something back there?”

  “I know.” Iris hated to agree. “But—”

  Suddenly, Iris stopped in her tracks, her stomach dropping.

  “Daniel! What if—what if it was the spirits of the snow?”

  Daniel groaned. “Iris, you can’t possibly believe that.”

  Iris shrugged. Another one of S
uga’s superstitions was about the spirits of the snow. This one was even stranger than her other ones, because none of the other kids at school had heard of it. It wasn’t commonly known like “step on the crack, break your mama’s back,” the one they’d sing when they jumped over the cracks in the sidewalk on the way to school. This made Daniel believe it was something Suga created to keep them from going outside.

  “It couldn’t have been, right?” Iris went on, trying to convince herself. “The spirits of the snow—they would’ve taken us right away if they saw us last night in the snow?”

  “Maybe they’re warning us to never go back,” he said, the ghost of a smile playing on his lips.

  She glared at him.

  “Last night was kind of … weird, since we saw a grave and everything,” Daniel said, fidgeting with his glasses. “Hey, that’s probably why you dreamed about a girl, Iris. It was just a bad dream.”

  “Yeah,” she muttered, kicking the snow with her boots.

  But she couldn’t help feeling like it was something more.

  They approached Daniel’s back door. He reached for the knob.

  “No! Don’t go in there!” Iris heard Suga yell from inside.

  Daniel hesitated for a second. Iris looked at him.

  Oh no.

  What was going on?

  Daniel just shook his head as they walked through the back door of his house, through the kitchen, into the living room, where Mrs. Stone sat with Suga. Mrs. Stone was curled up on the couch, typing on her laptop, while Suga yelled at the TV.

  “Ugh, so stupid—Oh, hey, babies!”

  Where Daniel thought his grandmother was weird and impractical, Iris revered her. She was a little strange with all her superstitions, but Iris always thought they were so interesting, like relics of Suga’s past. They had to come from somewhere.

  Daniel, though, was slightly embarrassed of Suga. She was also very protective of Daniel, which was understandable, after everything with Daniel’s father. But she was still such a peculiar woman.

  They each went to hug Suga and Mrs. Stone. She closed her laptop.

  “I’m sorry we couldn’t make it for pancakes this morning, I had to catch up on work. I’m heading over in a few to talk to your mama, though, Iris.” Iris’s and Daniel’s families were so close, Iris sometimes wished they just all lived in the same house to make things easier. Mrs. Stone looked at Suga. “You should come, too, Suga.”

  Suga looked outside and frowned. “Now, you know I don’t go outside during fresh snowfall! I never go out during fresh snowfall.” She crossed her arms. “I’m not too old to be snatched up by the spirits of the snow.”

  Daniel’s mother smiled warmly. “I’m sorry, Suga. How could I forget?”

  Iris took her chance. “Suga,” she said. “Can you—can you tell me about the spirits of the snow again?” It probably was just a bad dream, but Iris wanted to make sure.

  Daniel sucked his teeth, then apologized when his mom eyed him for it.

  Suga turned her head slowly and stared at Iris for a second too long, and Iris shivered. It seemed like she was staring straight through her to a time from her past.

  “They’re the reason that I tell y’all to not play outside in the snow by yourselves, especially at night.” Iris struggled to keep Suga’s gaze, not giving anything away about how they did exactly that last night. “They find children and take them away with them, never to be seen again.”

  She told the tale, her voice low and shaky:

  When you hear the winter wind

  that’s the sound of their screaming.

  That’s when you’ll know

  spirits of the snow

  are ready for their feeding.

  Wandering children are their prey

  lonely in the night.

  They take the children in the snow

  feeding on their fright.

  “It’s better to stay in the house, where you’re safe and sound,” Suga concluded matter-of-factly. Daniel nodded at that.

  “But, say you go outside in the snow and they don’t take you?” Iris asked, her heart pounding. The wind was whistling last night. Did that mean the spirits had been with them?

  Suga laughed, a light little chuckle. “Winter is just beginning, child. Do you think they’d give up after one time?”

  Iris’s stomach sank.

  “Now, don’t scare these kids with that talk, Suga!” Daniel’s mom said. “I’m headed out now. I’ll be back soon!” She walked out, leaving the silence of Suga’s words behind her.

  They all sat for a second and watched whatever show Suga was watching on TV. She was yelling, groaning, and talking back to the TV. Iris could tell she was embarrassing Daniel.

  They both looked at Daniel’s grandmother as she drifted off to sleep. She was mumbling, whining. Iris wondered if the spirits of the snow had been after her all these years, and that’s why she’d never go outside in the snow again. Maybe the spirits were trying to catch Suga in her dreams.

  The thought scared Iris, and Daniel’s house was getting much too dark for her liking.

  Snow was falling.

  Suga was still mumbling.

  “Let’s go back to my house. Um, I don’t want to wake her up,” Iris suggested, and Daniel quickly agreed. They walked to the front door and heard a loud clank.

  Daniel and Iris jumped.

  Suga yelled, jolting out of her sleep.

  “What was that?” Iris heard her say, not wanting to turn around. Daniel sighed a little under his breath and walked back to the living room.

  “Daniel, wait—” Iris began.

  “It’s just your fork, Suga,” Daniel said, picking up the silverware and the empty plate on the table beside it. “I’ll put it in the dishwasher for you.”

  Iris breathed a quick sigh of relief. She was jumpy for no reason. But Suga’s face still looked troubled.

  “What’s wrong?” Iris asked her.

  “You know what that means when you drop a fork,” Suga said, her voice getting lower.

  Iris swallowed “No. What?”

  “We’ll be getting an unexpected visitor soon.”

  “I already know what you’re going to say,” Daniel mumbled as they walked across the lawn. He pushed his glasses up his nose. His cheeks were cold, his deep brown skin concealing his blush. “But the unexpected visitor is not one of the spirits of the snow. Suga’s always dropping silverware and we haven’t had an unexpected visitor yet.”

  Iris wasn’t convinced. What were the odds of Suga saying that to Iris just hours after she played outside in the snow and felt like she brought something home with her?

  “Suga’s just … being Suga,” he added, kicking the snow.

  “I don’t know why you’re always so mean to her. You’re the only boy in her life now. She just wants to protect you,” Iris said, pushing open her own front door. She was greeted by Vashti, who hugged her around her knees.

  “I have an idea for your step show, Iris! I made up a step! See?” Vashti did a simple stomp clap, stomp clap beat.

  When Daniel applauded her, Iris couldn’t help feeling a little jealous.

  “That’s cool, ’Ti,” Daniel said to her sister, giving Vashti a high five that made her blush and giggle. Iris rolled her eyes.

  “Iris! I’m glad you’re back. Come look at this, quick.” Iris, Daniel, and Vashti walked to the living room, where Mrs. Stone and Iris’s mother and father were sitting. Her mother had a frown on her face as she watched what looked like the news.

  “Yes, Mama?”

  “Look. Did you know about this?”

  Iris turned to the TV, where she saw footage of her school, Nelson’s Pond Middle.

  “Hey,” Iris said, pointing, but her mom shushed her.

  The screen flashed to an auditorium where some kids Iris’s age were being handed awards on a stage. Some of them were Iris’s classmates.

  “The Young Captains Award Ceremony is held to congratulate and honor students who hol
d some type of leadership position in extracurricular activities around their school …” the reporter was saying.

  Iris’s mom looked at her at the same moment the thought flashed in Iris’s head.

  “Were you invited, as captain of the step team? Look, there’s the captain of the dance team, the captain of the mathletes club …”

  Iris’s stomach sank. “I—I didn’t know about it.”

  “They didn’t tell you, did they? I even looked through my phone, my email to see if they told me …”

  Not again, Iris thought, scrunching up her face in anger. She hated this. Everyone, teachers and students, were always “forgetting” to tell her things, to include her.

  Just like Heather forgot to invite her to the slumber party she invited every other girl in her class to.

  Just like the Beta Club “forgot” to tell her about the group picture that made the front page of the school newspaper.

  It was like they didn’t want her to be a part of anything.

  She knew she was the only Black girl in a lot of her classes, but … in elementary school it had been different. No one cared what race she was. She was always treated fairly.

  Iris looked at the TV again. Every captain who was representing her school at the Young Captains ceremony was White.

  Her mom gave Mrs. Stone a knowing look. “I’m going to the principal’s office first thing on Monday morning to hear their explanation for this.”

  Iris knew what the principal would tell her mom. That the email went out to all the parents but somehow hers got “lost.” Iris shook the thought out of her mind. She didn’t feel like thinking about that right now.

  Mama and Mrs. Stone were talking about it animatedly, while Daniel put a hand on Iris’s back. “It’s okay,” he said quietly. “We know you’re a great captain. You eat, sleep, and dream step team.”

  It was still early afternoon when Mrs. Stone and Daniel walked back to their house. Iris was still upset about how she and her step team were forgotten, again. She loved step team and the fun all the girls had together, laughing and teaching one another steps after school. They’d even competed and won awards, and had a huge competition coming up next semester.