The Key to Anchor Lake ✓

20 : Blaire

B L A I R E

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I've barely slept since I crept back to my room after Elizabeth left me downstairs. My heart has been pounding since sometime between one and two a.m., my thoughts too full to contemplate resting my head on my pillow and falling back to sleep, so I have spent the past six hours tossing and turning and trying to lose myself in Sukie's and Oli's voices.

But it's harder know, knowing that Oli's gone and that somewhere down the hall, Elizabeth has the one thing I need.

I need that book.

I also need to get out of this house. I can't bear to sleep under this roof for another night, can't bear the idea of another string of exhausted hours when I can't relax, and as soon as it hits eight o'clock, I throw on fresh leggings and a clean top and I leave.

The sun rose a couple of hours ago, but it might as well have stayed in bed because the sky is a dingy, cloudy grey, and there's a mean chill in the air that whips through my bones as I cycle down that long road to town. When a car overtakes me, I'm convinced it's Elizabeth, that she's going to slam on her brakes and force me home, but the muddy truck sails on by.

When a car veers over the lines as it barrels towards me, I hold my breath and wait to be struck, flung over the handlebars and down the rocky verge. The bike wobbles, but I maintain balance and let out a ragged breath, vowing to learn how to drive and get a car. If I'm going to be stuck in Anchor Lake for much longer, I'm going to need a way to escape every now and then.

When I reach the café, it's still in those sleepy early-morning minutes of having just opened, and I'm the first customer through the door ten minutes after it's unlocked. I'm out of breath and my hair's a wild mess, the wind wreaking havoc on already tangled tresses, and the moment I collapse onto a chair to compose myself before I order, Sukie's right in front of me.

"Blaire? Are you okay?" She crouches down next to me, one hand on my arm and the other on my cheek. "Did something happen?"

"I have a bad feeling about Elizabeth." My words come out strangled and gravelly. I desperately need a drink, and eight hours of sleep.

"What do you mean?" Sukie asks, then stands and pulls my elbow. "Wait, come over here."

She leads me back to the table we sat at last time I came here, tucked into a corner away from the prying eyes and ears of whoever else might rock up this early, and she plants me on a stool.

"First of all, are you okay? Because no offense, but you don't look okay." She scoots a second stool over, wooden feet whining against the floor.

"I haven't slept much," I admit, "but I'm fine."

"Do you want to talk first? Or do you want me to get you a drink first? I know both of those things are gonna happen so the order's up to you."

"Um. Coffee, I think. Sorry, Sukie."

"Sorry for what?" She slips off her seat and round to the other side of the counter, taking the cash I slide across the table. "It's literally my job as a barista to make coffee, and it's my job as your friend to understand why you're upset."

How is she so freaking nice? I don't know what I did to deserve her, what magic must have been at play to make her take the slightest interest when I spewed word vomit at her the first time we met, but already I can't bear to let go of her.

She's swift at the machine and it isn't long before she plants a vanilla latte in front of me and hops onto her stool.

"Talk to me, Blaire." She tucks her hair behind her ears, exposing earrings in the shape of tiny glittering suns. "Did you and Elizabeth fight or something?"