Free The Book of Living and Dying by Natale Ghent Page B

voice. “How did you get this tape of me?”
    Michael moved toward her, catching her wrists as her fists flew up to his face, beating wildly. “Listen to me. It isn’t real.”
    “Get away from me!” she screamed. She fell away from him, grabbed her bag and shoved past him, through the door and into the living room, where the masks loomed.
    “Sarah, please let me explain!”
    Struggling with the lock, she flung the door open and ran into the night. Her knees gave way as she slipped on the wet grass and stumbled down the hill. Without looking back, she picked herself up and continued to run, her hair whipping around her face, the tears stinging her eyes. She could hear him at the top of the hill, calling her name through the dark.

CHAPTER FIVE
    T he oak tree shimmered with yellow and gold leaves. She had been walking toward it when she registered a sound, creeping into her slumbering consciousness, barely brushing the edge of audibility. It started low, like it was coming from somewhere in the bowels of the house, then working its way up through the damp concrete foundation and into the floorboards. It found its way into her room and, miraculously, to the receptors in her dreaming ears, forcing her awake. It grew gradually louder and more urgent.
The cry of a baby.
Where was it coming from? Someone had left their infant outside, obviously. Outside in the cold. Sarah eyed the rug over the trap door fearfully. She willed the parents to pick the baby up, to stop it from crying. But when its wails grew louder and more wrenching still, she covered her ears with her hands. Someone should do something.
Someone should make it stop.
And then it did, the wails reduced to a muffled whimpering as if someone had pushed a pillow over the child’s red little face.
    Sarah wasn’t at all comfortable. Sitting on the couch, wedged between two men she didn’t know, a drink clasped desperately in her hands, the ice melting in clear, limpid spirals into the rust-coloured brandy in her glass. Who were these guys, anyway? Too old to be at some high school party, that was clear. Lest they think she was interested, Sarah stared straight ahead, careful not to engage them with so much as a glance. Donna danced wildly in front of her, surrounded by a group of admirers, enjoying the attention.
    Sarah gulped her drink, her stomach bucking with the kick of nausea. But no matter how much she drank or how sick she felt, she couldn’t stop thinking about Michael, about the video she’d seen. Tilting her glass back recklessly, she spilled the brandy down her chin and onto her shirt.
    “Drink much?” the guy beside her yelled over the music.
    Sarah didn’t flinch, didn’t so much as look at him.
To look into an insane man’s eyes is to share his insanity.
Isn’t that what Donna was always saying? She wiped her chin with her sleeve and stared into her glass. Somehow last night had become tonight. She had blurred through the entire day and into this evening. Had she even sobered up from the night before? She couldn’t remember much of anything except fumbling toward sleep and narrowly missing it, her mind staggering in and out of consciousness, the oak tree looming in her dozing state. And the baby crying. She remembered that. Now she was here, at Peter’s party. He’d looked happy to see her when she arrived, even though she’d run out on him. “A bad trip,” she’d said. He seemed to accept that. Certainly, it had nothing to do with him.
    The worst part, the part that kept her drinking, was that she really liked Michael—and that Donna was apparently right. Maybe he was just a wanker. But what had he meantwhen he’d said the video wasn’t real? She drained her glass, then stood up shakily and moved into the crowd. Donna pulled her into the throbbing dance.
    “It’s Nirvana, it’s ‘Breed’,” she shouted.
    “I know,” Sarah shouted back. She danced half-heartedly, Donna’s face inches from her own, laughing maniacally. One of