Sookie Stackhouse Boxed Set (Books 1-8) - Charlaine Harris [595]
The school took up a whole block in the middle of a residential area. All the houses around were modest homes on modest lots, the kind of neighborhood where there were basketball goals and bicycles, barking dogs, and driveways brightened with sidewalk chalk.
Today every surface was dusted in a light yellow powder; it was the very beginning of pollen time. If you rinsed off your car in town in your driveway, there would be a ring of yellow around the storm drain. Cats’ bellies were tinged yellow, and tall dogs had yellow paws. Every other person you talked to had red eyes and carried a cache of tissues.
I noticed several thrown down around the playground. There were patches of new green grass and patches of hard-packed dirt, in areas where the children congregated the most. A big map of the United States had been painted on the concrete apron right outside the school doors. The name of each state was painted carefully and clearly. Louisiana was the only state colored bright red, and a pelican filled up its outline. The word Louisiana was too long to compete with the pelican, and it had been painted on the pavement right where the Gulf of Mexico would be.
Andy emerged from the rear door, his face set and hard. He looked ten years older.
“How’s Halleigh?” I asked.
“She’s in the school crying her eyes out,” he said. “We have to find this boy.”
“What did Bud say?” I asked. I stepped inside the gate.
“Don’t ask,” he said. “If there’s anything you can do for us, we need all the help we can get.”
“You’re going out on a limb.”
“So are you.”
“Where are the people that were in the school when he ran back in?”
“They’re all in here, except for the principal and the custodian.”
“I saw them outside.”
“I’ll bring them in. All the teachers are in the cafeteria. It has that little stage at one end. Sit behind the curtain there. See if you can get anything.”
“Okay.” I didn’t have a better idea.
Andy set off for the front of the school to gather up the principal and the custodian.
I stepped into the end of the third-grade corridor. There were bright pictures decorating the walls outside every classroom. I stared at the drawings of rudimentary people having picnics and fishing, and tears prickled my eyes. For the first time, I wished I were psychic instead of telepathic.
Then I could envision what had happened to Cody, instead of having to wait for someone to think about it. I’d never met a real psychic, but I understood that it was a very uncertain talent to have, one that was not specific enough at times, and too specific at others. My little quirk was much more reliable, and I made myself believe I could help this child.
As I made my way to the cafeteria, the smell of the school evoked a rush of memories. Most of them were painful; some were pleasant. When I’d been this small, I’d had no control over my telepathy and no idea what was wrong with me. My parents had put me through the mental health mill to try to find out, which had further set me off from my peers. But most of my teachers had been kind. They’d understood that I was doing my best to learn—that somehow I was constantly distracted, but it wasn’t through my own choice. Inhaling the scent of chalk, cleaner, paper, and books brought it all back.
I remembered all the corridors and doorways as if I’d just left. The walls were a peach color now, instead of the off-white I remembered, and the carpet was a sort of speckled gray in place of brown linoleum; but the structure of the school was unchanged. Without hesitation, I slipped through a back door to the little stage, which was at one end of the lunchroom. If I remembered correctly,