DDsE, Book 6

By Sue Perry

Being sixteen is Tupac Eminem. Ella has no one to talk to except her new diary, which she has to hide from Ma and Pa Warden, the foster parents she’s stuck with since her family got flattened in a car accident. Now that she lives with the wardens, she has to switch to a new school, where people act like her tragedy is contagious. Her new suburb is just as boring as the last, and offers no hope of secret passageways or magic. But life is not all bad. There’s an interesting boy at the new school – although his family turns out to be impossibly dangerous. And there’s a feral cat, living in the suburb’s only open space, a pitiful excuse for woods. Sometimes the cat invades Ella’s mind. She tells her diary, ‘I’ve gone a special kind of crazy, a split personality. And my other personality is a cat, not a person.’

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sue Perry
• Release date: Dec 27, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370547180

Sue Perry

... Concert stage, dark except for a deep blue spotlight. Singer drops to one knee and his narration evolves from murmur to rant. "This is the story of a man who got what he wanted but he lost what he had. He got what he wanted but he lost what he had. He got –" ...It goes on forever. It's mesmerizing. Uncomfortable. Confessional.Pretty sure this memory is from the time I saw James Brown, decades ago, but the lost identity of the singer isn't the point.I've spent my life gazing across some fence or other, admiring greener grass over yonder. I've acted on so many impulses to jump the fence. No complaints, but it has sure taken me a long time to appreciate where I'm standing right now. And nowadays that blue spotlight chant fills my head whenever I contemplate a new jump.Sometimes I jump back.I was a low–budget television producer until I wrote a psychological thriller, "Was It A Rat I Saw", which Bantam–Doubleday–Dell published in hardcover in 1992. Soon after that I became the mother of twins, jumped into graduate school, and became a disaster scientist. I dabbled in academia, government research, and consulting.I stopped writing fiction for nearly two decades, until I noticed how much I missed it. I resumed writing novels with the literary fiction "Scar Jewelry" about a family with secrets that started in the era of Los Angeles punk and persist for decades. I'm in the midst of a speculative detective series FRAMES, with "Nica of Los Angeles", "Nica of the New Yorks", and "Boredom Fighter" so far. I've just completed a nine-novella series, the young adult paranormal horror romance, "DDsE".Funny. Back in the day, I had a single book idea at a time. Now I'm flooded with them, can't keep up with them, though I write just about every day.I live in southern California. I had to leave for five years to confirm this is where I belong. I live with multiple cats, comfortably close to my twins and granddaughter. Like my life paths, my friends and family are all over the damn place. I like to visit them, spend time at the ocean, explore cities, and go out to hear live music.

Book preview

DDsE

Book 6

Sue Perry

Copyright 2017 Sue Perry

Published by Sue Perry at Smashwords

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Book 6 Table of Contents

Ella's Diary, Entries 218.-259.

Acknowledgements

About Sue Perry and her Novels

Dedication

For Leo.

218.

DD – If only this night would end. Do more bad things happen in the dark or do nights just drag out more? I actually spent time trying to decide, listing bad things that happened, day versus night.

Day. Wars mostly happen in day. Chrissie burned in daylight. Alcatur killed Ms. Benson one morning outside her gym.

Night. In my own life, night wins by a mile. I can't stop remembering Alcatur murdering Ma Warden at her front door. Alcatur escaping after his trial. His followers killing Trevor and Mr. Colvant. Burning Aunt Axi's mini–van, chasing her through the cemetery.

Last but not least, the car crash that killed my family happened at night.

The so–called accident.

From one minute to the next I was sure of it, deep down where I just know. The car crash wasn't an accident. Why who how. It all made zero sense but I knew.

Natalie and Barracuda were involved somehow. And I would find out how! Their expressions as they watched paramedics slide me into the ambulance that night. Not like the other spectators – not surprised or horrified. Not pleased, either.

They might not have caused the crash. But they'd know who did, and I'd get them to tell me. One way or another, I'd get answers.

And maybe revenge. That part was strange. Whoever did this. Even though the faces were fuzzy, I could picture terrible ways of hurting them and those pictures were so satisfying. But the satisfying dissolved to sickening, as though my stomach had filled with blood.

For a minute I could hear Lourdes and Paul, explaining to Lewis why I was so upset. Soon their words stopped making sense.

I was awake but having nightmares. Running as hard as I could to reach my family. The more my feet pounded, the more my family shrank away.

I could have been running, the way my breath gasped. Actually I was riding in the back seat of Lewis' car. It was completely dark but I could feel all five companions, sending their caring and sympathy. Their good feelings reached me through Grayfast, curled in my lap, purring mightily. At last the vibrations blocked my nightmares. – sE

219.

DD – We stopped for gas and I splashed water at my face until my hair dripped. Lourdes got wet too, she stuck that close by me. Paul waited outside the bathroom door.

I'll be okay again, I reassured them.

What snapped me out of my flip–out was Lewis. Back at the car, he said, You can sit in front. I know she's not here. I pretend so I can keep going until she returns.

I'd rather ride back here, but thanks. I climbed in back. Sitting up front would kill his hope.

Where to now? He gave the world's saddest sigh. She might never come back. I know that.

It didn't matter that Lewis was insane where the sirene was concerned, or that the rest of us hoped for what he dreaded, that she was gone forever. His grief was real. He was as lost as I had been right after the crash. I never want anyone to feel that. (Except whoever caused the crash.)

The car idled at the gas station exit. Where to now. Like somebody knew.

Lewis asked Paul, What did you find in the tufa?

Question marks floated in the dark.

Lewis reminded, You kept drawing tufa? Why you came to Mono Lake? To find the tufa in your drawings?

We haven't seen any tufa, Paul realized.

It's only in certain areas, Lewis explained.

Our question marks became exclamation points. We weren’t done with Mono Lake. Turn right at the highway, I directed Lewis toward Franklin’s cabins.

Franklin would help us find Paul's tufa. And maybe he could help Lewis get over the sirene.

Franklin’s cabins always look deserted, so no surprise that the property was dark and empty.

Someone lives here? Lewis sounded slightly less destroyed. He has such a curious nature, any mystery could be good for him!

Come and see, Lourdes said like she realized the same thing.

Two steps from the car, Lewis tripped on the uneven ground.

Paul turned the headlights on, flooding one cabin with light, shoving the others into blackness.

We knocked and knocked. On doors then windows. We called out hellos. No answer.

We shut up. Turned off the headlights. Slipped back in the car and nobody slammed a door.

It was so dark and so quiet.

Probably we were the only people for miles.

Maybe Franklin's out looking for us – where we ran from that lady, Lourdes said.

Barracuda. Her visit to Franklin felt like years, not hours, ago.

We drove down a steep dirt road in the direction of the reeds, where we had run to escape Barracuda. Our blaring headlights burrowed a tunnel into black silence.

It was so dark and creepy that even Lewis noticed. He muttered, Nope. No one disagreed when he turned the car around and took us back to the 24–hour gas station, where it