Hot, rancid breath assaults my nostrils. I panic. I don't remember hearing the door open, but there is someone in my room. His weight settles on the bed, and I try to turn over, but then a sharp pain lances my side. I gasp at the force of the blow to my stomach and for a second I can't tell if the person on the bed hit me or if it's Mary getting hit. A feeling of helplessness overwhelms me. I want to just give up, to beg for death in that moment. Mary, its Mary that wants to give up. She's in so much pain. She's been hurt so badly, she wants to die.

"So pretty," he whispers and big beefy hands start to stroke my hair. My own reality leaks back in with the touch of those hands on me. The thought of getting raped on my own bed snaps whatever bond I share with Mary. Her pain goes away and my head clears. The helplessness vanishes and my fighting instincts kick in. Oh, no you don't you freak! I roll, pull my legs up and in, then hit him squarely in the chest with both feet, all the while screaming at the top of my lungs. He falls backward and hits the floor. I jump to the other side, so that the bed is between us. The only weapon I can grab is the bedside lamp. Not much, but it'll do.

My door bursts open to reveal Officer Dan and Mrs. O.

"Mattie?" Mrs. Olson stares at me, alarmed.  Then her eyes fall on my attacker in the floor.  "Stevie?"

Stevie?

"Stevie, are you okay?" Mrs. Olson actually bends down and helps him up. What?

"Him?" I shout. "He's the one who attacked me!"

"Attacked you? What are you talking about, Mattie? Stevie wouldn't hurt anyone."

"Really?  Then why did he just attack me?"

"Everybody, let's just calm down," Officer Dan says. "Mattie, what happened?"

"This, this person came into my room and attacked me!"

"I just wanted to help," Stevie piped in. "You were crying."

"Help me?" I shriek. "You were touching me! Nobody touches me!"

"Pretty hair." Stevie smiles at me. That's when I get a good look at him and I understand why Mrs. Olson is not reacting the way I am. Stevie has Down syndrome. I calm down, but only slightly.

"Stevie, honey, go on to your room now." When he shuffles out, she turns to me. "Mattie, that boy doesn't have a mean bone in his body. I'm sure he wasn't trying to hurt you. He's special."

"I can see that, Mrs. O. Anyone who looks at him knows that, but it doesn't give him the right to come into my room and TOUCH me! He comes near me again, and I swear he won't walk away with hands attached."

"Of course it doesn't, honey," Mrs. Olson soothes. "I'm sure he was only trying to help. Why were you crying?"

"I wasn't," I deny. "I never cry." It had been more whimpering, definitely not crying. I'm a tough girl, crying isn't in my genetic makeup. Usually.

Mrs. Olson sighs heavily and I interrupt before she can try to expound upon the whole tears issues. I turn my attention to Officer Dan.

"Just what are you doing here, Officer Dan?" The sarcasm drips heavily. I'm still pissed at him.

"I know we already did a follow up interview on Sally, but I wanted to come by to check on you," he says and eyes me nervously. He'd better be nervous, the jerk.

"You have time to come and check on me but not return my calls?"

"Mrs. Olson, may I talk to Mattie for a few minutes alone?" Officer Dan asks and gives her those warm friendly eyes. She smiles.

"Of course.  I'll go make us all some lunch."

"Thanks," he says and closes the door behind her.

I eye the closed door with disbelief. Huh. Does she think just because he's a cop he can be trusted? No way would she let any other guy close the door. Trust me, I've tried. She's like a hawk circling the field watching for the mouse to pop up whenever Jake comes over. Last time I tried closing the door, she lectured me for an hour. Irritating as it had been, it'd still been kind of nice. No one's ever cared enough before to lecture me on my virtue.

Still, just because he has a badge doesn't make him trustworthy. No wonder there's so much police corruption. Everyone thinks they're infallible. They're the police right? Protect and serve. Hah. Protect and serve themselves. Granted, the bulk of police aren't crooked, but there are more than a few who are and I've met my fair share of them.

Come to think of it, Officer Dan is the least cop-like cop I've ever met. He doesn't react like one and he doesn't sound like one either. He has the whole deadpan face down, but I think he more or less mastered that before he became a cop. I can do the same thing. Dealing with social workers taught me to show no emotion when necessary. Sometimes they just shut up when you do that and you can ride to the new foster home in peace and quiet.

"Look, Mattie, I know you're mad..."

"Mad?" I laugh. Yup, very non-cop-ish. "Question for you, Officer Dan. Just how long have you been a cop?"

He goes from nervous to extremely nervous. "Why does that matter?"

"Just answer the question."

"Technically, eight weeks."

"Technically?"

"Six weeks at the academy and two weeks on the job."

Great, just great. He's a rookie. No wonder he didn't seem like a cop to me the last time I'd met him. I'd trusted him because he'd sounded more like me than a real cop. Kids identify with kids and even though he has the title "adult" attached to him, he's still pretty much a kid at the ripe old age of twenty. It has nothing to do with his eyes, I tell myself. I must have been pretty drugged to imagine his eyes made me trust him. Not that I trust him anymore mind you, he did blow me off.

"Well, that explains a lot." I put my lamp back down and then fall down on the bed.

"Hey, I'm the only one who's listening to you!" he says defensively.

"Really, Officer Dan? I left you like three voice mails and you never once called me back!"

He runs a hand through his hair and sighs. "Yeah, about that, I'm sorry."

So totally a teenage boy's answer. "It doesn't matter anyway."

"Look, Mattie, it was a lot to take in, okay? It took me a while to believe it, or at least believe you believe it."

"So you think I'm crazy now do you?" I laugh. Sometimes I think I'm crazy so I can't fault him for thinking the same thing. Not that I'll tell him that of course.

"No, you're not crazy Mattie. Can I sit?"

"Whatever."

He rolls his eyes at me and then takes a seat on the foot of the bed, tucking his feet under him to mirror me. "Wanna talk about what just happened?"

What I did was a gut reaction. Hit first and ask questions later. It's a rule I learned to live by when I got dumped into the foster care system. I spent years going from one foster home to another, watching my back every second of every day. Years and years of seeing kids that have been traumatized by their parents, left homeless because of deaths, and just plain messed up for no good reason.

I'm sure there are good places out there, places where people honestly care about the kids they are supposed to be looking after, but I hadn't found one yet. The ones I ended up with only cared about the checks that came from taking us in. My first set of foster parents kept the fridge and the pantry door padlocked to make sure we only ate when we were supposed to. We got a bath twice a week so that we wouldn't run up the water bill. We did get fed. Grits every morning, a piece of bread and water for lunch, and then dinner was beans and cornbread. We got fed just the minimal to keep us alive. Real nice folks.

The Olsons aren't so bad though. They are by far the best foster parents I've been placed with. They aren't nosy, they feed me, and they make sure I have the stuff I need: a hot bath, clean clothes, and a warm place to sleep every night. I know it doesn't sound like much to most people, but to me, it's the best thing since I discovered Dove chocolate. They don't pester me about where I'm going and they leave me alone for the most part. They get their check and I get a decent roof over my head. The other foster kids that live here, six in total, feel the same. It's not a bad place. Doesn't mean it's great either. It has its ups and downs. They can be a little odd sometimes. One minute they are nice as pie and the next, they can scream at you for not moving fast enough. Just weird.

"Mattie?" Dan prompts when I don't answer right away.

"I really don't want to discuss it," I tell him.

"That's not a normal reaction, Mattie," he says patiently. 

No, I guess a normal person wouldn't react like that, but I'm not normal. I'm a kid that grew up in the system, fighting off one thing or another, including the men I call Mr. Feely Hands. I was six the first time I came across one of them. I was on my third foster home. He came into my room about an hour after all the kids went to bed. There were eight of us and I was the only one who had my own room. I didn't know what it meant at that age, but I learned fast.

I was almost asleep when I heard the door open and then he shuffled over to my bed. Before I could ask what he was doing, he clamped his big beefy hand over my nose and mouth. I can still remember the stench of the liquor on him. He was all sweaty and his brown eyes were bright. They reminded me of a rat's eyes, small and shiny. He told me to be quiet if I didn't want to get hurt.

Even at the tender age of six, I wasn't stupid. My mom had some pretty seedy boyfriends and she'd told me exactly what I was supposed to do if any of them ever scared me. Scream my head off. If I couldn't scream then I was supposed to fight, bite, scratch and kick until I could scream. That's exactly what I did. He went away bloody and I was hustled off to the ER. That was the only good thing my Mom ever did for me. She taught me to fight.

"Just drop it, Dan, okay?" I sound tired.  Feel tired. I don't want to have a heartfelt talk about my past.

He nods and changes the subject. "So, I checked out your story about your friend Mary..."

"OHMYGOD MARY!" I shoot straight up, how can I have forgotten Mary? The whole being fondled incident, duh. "She's alive."

"What?" Officer Dan frowns at me.  "How do you know that? I thought you only saw ghosts?"

"I don't know, but she is alive. I think. You said you did some digging?"

"Yeah.  I found a girl named Mary Cross that went missing about a week ago in Meyer's Park. Her mother said she woke up and Mary was gone. Her bike was missing too."

"Was her boyfriend's name, Jimmie?"

"James Mason," he says.

"Still think I'm making it up?"

"I don't know what to believe. It's... slightly insane."

"She's alive. You have to help me find her."

He gives me one of those deep, probing looks I've only ever read about. It's the kind of look that goes straight through you, like he's trying to see my soul or some such nonsense, but instead of making me nervous, it makes me more resolved than ever. I need him even if he's a jerk and he doesn't believe me. He has access to things I don't. Rookie he might be, but he can use the police resources available to him and not me.

"Can I ask you a question, Mattie?"

"Sure."

"Why did you throw such a fit over finding Sally? From what Mrs. Olson said the two of you weren't even that close. You barely knew her, but you're talking to ghosts for her?"

"I'm not sure you'd understand, Dan. You grew up in a good home with parents that love you, right?"

He nods.

"We didn't. Mostly the foster parents are just about the check they get every month. We're a means to an end for them. The only people we have to rely on are each other. If we don't take care of each other, then no one else will. Sally and I weren't that close, but we kind-of are too."

I take off my shoe and hand it to him. "See the marks there, on the bottom? Each one represents a home we've been in. All of us do it, it's an old tradition. It binds us together, something we can share and always relate to. Sally had five marks. Each of the homes she'd been in had been pretty horrible, until this one. The Olsons aren't bad and actually seem to take an interest, care even. Sally liked it here. I didn't want anyone thinking that she was just another statistic, another runaway. She's more than that. She's family. I don't know if you can understand that or not, Dan."

"More than you know, Mattie. My older brother Cameron and I are adopted. Mom and Dad found him in a home for boys when he was ten. They adopted me a few years later. I grew up knowing I was adopted and it doesn't bother me. Cam, though, he didn't grow up with loving parents all his life. So, I do understand a little what you're going through. He doesn't talk much about his life before he came to live with us, but sometimes he gets this look on his face when he watches something on TV or just sees something that sparks a memory. He has a family of his own now. He's happy, but he remembers. I think it was hard on him back then and it's not something he can shake."

How about that? "I don't know if you can ever shake it off," I tell him softly.  "Growing up knowing no one loves you or even cares about you is one of the hardest things you can ever imagine."

"I'm sorry, Mattie."

"No worries, Officer Dan. I'm fine. Now, back to Sally. She deserves some justice. Plus, I think she was murdered by a serial killer."

"Serial killer?"

He sounds skeptical. I can't blame him. So I tell him about everything that has happened, starting with the kid in the bathroom and ending with Mary's last episode.

"A ghost put you in the hospital?"

"Hey, don't look at me. I'm just as shocked as you. How was I supposed to know they could hurt me?"

"Because you're the ghost girl?"

I snort.  "Right. You're talking to the girl who's spent the last ten years pretending they don't exist. I know zilch about ghosts except they are creepy little buggers that have a nasty habit of scaring the bejeezus out of you when you least expect it."

"You're weird."

"Thank you." I give him my best cheeky grin. "It would be so totally boring to be normal."

Dan smiles and I realize what a nice smile he has. He's really cute when he grins like that. How did I not see this before? Because I was irritated, that's why. I stare a little harder, but I get no butterflies like I do when I'm with Jake. Huh. Maybe Jake's making more of an impression on my heart than I thought. I can't even appreciate Officer Dan's nice smile. Dang it.

"So what do you think?" I ask him. "Could they have all been killed by the same person?"

"It's unlikely, Mattie, but the same wound could be a pattern. I wish we had something more to go on."

"How about pictures?"

"Pictures?"  He frowns at me.

"While you were trying to figure out if I was insane or not, I at least, was productive." I jump up and grab my bag I'd put down beside the door when I came home.  I hand Dan my sketchbook.  "Will these work?"

Dan leafs through the images. I drew them exactly as I'd seen them, bullet wounds, smashed faces, and even Mirror Boy held a place in my book. I wanted to make sure I didn't forget anything so I drew them all.

"These are..."

"Weird?" I laugh self-consciously. I don't normally show my work to anyone.

"Brilliant. You have a real gift, Mattie. I might be able to find some of these kids if they were reported missing based on these. They're amazing."

Warmth and pride floods me. He likes them. They are creepy and scary as all get out, but he likes them! I let out a little breath I don't realize I'm holding, and then I frown. Why should I care what he thinks of my stuff anyway? I already admitted I don't like him that way, so why should it matter to me? Dan is like a riddle that has me going round and round in circles. He makes me madder than I've ever been, but yet what he thinks of me is important. I don't understand it.

"So you believe me?" I ask softly.

He looks me right in the eyes and those brown ones of his are full of comfort. Not sympathy or regret, or even hesitation. His eyes make me think of home. I feel at home with him. I've never felt that before, not even when my mom was still alive. She loved me, but never made me feel the warmth and comfort of a real home, but Officer Dan can.

"Mattie. I don't believe in any of that, but I'm willing to take a chance, to believe in you."

"Really?"

"Yeah, really, but no one at the station is going to believe any of this, so I'm going to have to do most of the work by myself when I can. They have me doing a lot of stuff to get me up to speed. You learn a lot in the academy, but you don't really learn the real stuff until you get out there on the streets, and learn to apply the lessons. It's been a busy couple days or I would have called sooner."

"You were trippin', Officer Dan. Admit it."

He sighs.  "Yeah, I was trippin'. It's not every day someone tells me they can see ghosts."

"It's not every day I tell someone I can see ghosts," I whisper. "You're the first person I trusted enough to tell."

"I'm glad you trust me."

"But I don't know why I do, trust you I mean. I never wanted to tell you, it just sorta slipped out, well blurted out."

He gives me another one of those soul searching stares and I fidget. He starts to say something, but then Mrs. Olson opens the door and pops her head in.

"Lunch is ready."  She tells us then sees my sketchpad in Dan's hands. "What's that?"

"Mattie was showing me some of her work," Dan says. "She's really good. I'm going to show them to a few people who might be very interested in them."

"Well, now, that is wonderful," Mrs. Olson says, beaming at Dan. I think she has a crush on him the way she's grinning. I almost giggle, but manage to hold it back. "Did you say thank you, Mattie?"

"Thank you, Officer Dan."

"Mattie Louise!" Mrs. Olson looks mortified at my sarcastic response.

"What?" I ask innocently.  "I said thank you."

"It's okay, Mrs. Olson," Dan tells her. "I need to get back to the station and check on a few things. If we hear anything new on Sally, we'll call."

Twenty minutes and two ham sandwiches later, I'm putting my plate in the dishwasher when I hear one of the upstairs doors slam then, "MATTIE LOUISE!"

Uh-oh, what did I do now? I leave the kitchen to find Mrs. Olson stomping down the stairs.

"Why is this house so filthy?" she asks me.

"I'm not sure," I say.  "I just got home from the hospital, Mrs. O."

"Is that any excuse for a dirty house?"

"No, ma'am."

"Get it clean, NOW!"

Sighing, I head to the laundry room where the mop and broom are. I swear that woman is bipolar, she runs so hot and cold, but at least it's a decent place here. I can put up with her crazy mood swings for that.

I glare at the broom. Man, I hate cleaning other people's messes. I hope Dan is having better luck than me.