Dead Girl Walking

Chapters 1& 2 of a novel about a girl marked for death. Written in 2021.

Chapter 1

Lena Lassus was more a concept than a person, an abstract trail of thoughts and ideas under a surface of dull, quiet stillness. She expressed herself—or the idea she had of herself—more through her slouching expressions than through her mumbled words. With tired eyes and dragging feet, she was known to cast her gaze away from the busy flurries of people that she would come across throughout her day, her sights set on something blurry and far away in nature. 

It wasn’t that Lena was particularly intelligent. If anything, she was just unfocused and bridled with a tendency to muse on useless ideas. Though the air she exuded was wise and contemplative, she scarcely ever finished a thought. One passing idea would shift and morph endlessly, until her train of thought was completely derailed. 

Perhaps her inattentive nature was to blame for her getting lost on this dreary, drizzling Tuesday afternoon. It’d been cloudy when she’d left her home: a simple two-bedroom apartment she shared with her father. The farther she’d walked, however, the heavier the air had gotten. Now, she could barely see ten feet in any direction, the fog thick and a soft mist buzzing around her like tangible static. 

Lena only knew that she was standing in the middle of a construction site. The workers had long since gone home, the coming weather more than enough of a reason for them to pack up and leave. It was silent, save for the sound of wind hitting the trees that were scattered about the area. She knew she should be finding her way back home before it started raining, but she had no means of getting directions—her phone was dead and useless in the back pocket of her jeans. 

A figure stood in the distance, head tilted up at the sheeted sky. Lena could just barely make out the dark outline of a masculine figure against the grayness of the fog. She felt a growing sense of exhaustion at the thought of approaching him, but for lack of a better choice, she called out, “Excuse me, sir?”

The silhouette looked to her for a brief moment. He said nothing, his features still obscured. From his coat, he pulled a flashlight, clicking it on and shining it in her direction before turning the other way. He practically floated as he walked, his feet barely touching the ground as he used the flashlight to guide his way.

Usually, Lena would accept this as a loss. Being ignored was an easy, simple means of rejection. She preferred it to being told off directly, at least. Something was not quite right, though. Something impalpable was tugging her towards the stranger, an invisible force telling her to follow. It was a sense of curiosity brewing beneath a lack of self discipline that caused her to furrow her brow and stare at the stranger’s back.

After a moment’s hesitation, Lena took a few steps forward. “I’m lost. I’m just looking for directions,” she clarified, a touch louder than before.

The stranger’s pace quickened, and soon enough Lena was jogging in an effort to catch up. The hanging mist had shifted into a soft pattering of rain on the slowly darkening dirt below her feet. The smell of petrichor had become more intense, and distant storm clouds were alight with quick flashes of thunder. Wind was pushing Lena’s unruly blonde hair out of her face, causing strands to tangle and tug at each other in her pursuit of the distant figure.

Lena stumbled as the stranger took a sharp turn into one of the unfinished buildings. The moment she regained her balance, she was dashing after him, scrambling up creaking staircases and aluminum ladders. Higher and higher, she chased him until her breaths had become quick and shallow from both the dusty air and her own exhaustion. She paused—only for a moment—hanging her head and running a hand through her dampening hair. When she looked back up, the stranger was out of sight. 

Huffing, Lena glanced over a railing to her left. Though she was squinting as hard as she could in the dim light of the building, she couldn’t make out any sign of the stranger. She felt a tinge of frustration, but took a deep breath and resolved to find her way home on her own. If it came to it, she would stop at a nearby convenience store and use a payphone to call home. Her father would hopefully pick up, but if not she was sure she’d figure something else out.

Just as Lena was about to give up and head back down, her eyes found a door-sized opening just one floor above her. Light leaked in, filtered by the clouds outside and cut into a clearly defined quadrilateral by the shape of the wall. She realized at that moment that she had been reckless to run into an unfinished building in pursuit of a complete stranger.

She deliberated for a moment. She knew that she’d taken an unwarranted risk by running into a building that was still under construction. On some level, she knew that this was dangerous and not probably worth the effort. On another, much more apparent level, she realized she didn’t want to give up the chase quite yet. There was something ethereal about the air surrounding the stranger that she couldn’t quite put her finger on. Giving up felt sickeningly odd in all the wrong ways. Continuing to look for the stranger felt right—like a reflex or an instinct. 

And then she was pulling herself up the next ladder, one rung at a time. 

The first thing Lena noted when she reached the top was a metal platform that was about six feet going both ways. She leaned her weight on it, testing its durability, before dragging herself onto it completely. The metal beneath her stayed steady, not so much as creaking despite the combined efforts of her weight and the wind whipping past. It was still just barely drizzling, but the rainwater felt like ice on Lena’s bare arms.

It wasn’t until she was standing that she realized exactly how high she’d climbed. She was alone on the platform, looking over the edge to survey the area. The ground seemed centuries away, small and undetailed to her eyes. Lena wasn’t scared of heights, but she had to suck in a deep breath at the sight. There were no railings separating her from the dirt and concrete below, just the sturdy metal platform her feet were planted on. A loss of balance in the wrong direction would result in certain death.

But Lena wasn’t afraid. If anything, she felt awake. She felt more awake than she had in months, staring down this thin line between life and death. She felt more alive at the thought of falling than the thought of turning and heading back down to safety. The expanse of earth beneath her pushed the thoughts of the stranger to the back of her mind, piled under a mixture of adrenaline and fascination.

A small, unhelpful voice in her head told her to jump, to leap into whatever it was that came after life. It was nothing more than an impulsive, intrusive thought. Lena ignored it easily, paying little mind to the passing compulsion. She knew to take a step back from the ledge.

A hand pressed against her back as she did, and she could only let out a curt cry of surprise before her balance was lost.

And instead of stepping backward, she was falling forward.

…

Chapter 2

Lena did not see her life flash before her eyes. She did not see her childhood, or her dead mother, or her overworked father. She didn’t see the breakfast she’d eaten that morning, or even the strange figure she’d followed to this height in the first place. 

No, what Lena saw as she fell was sky.

In her field of vision was a sea of clouds, each one painted in excruciating detail. There were bursts of lightning spreading out among them like spiderwebs in an abandoned home. She could make out every single raindrop, plummeting towards the ground as surely as she was. For a moment, she felt as though she were the rain, just another splash of water to paint the pavement below.

And, for the first time that she could remember, Lena wasn’t thinking. There were no nuanced interpretations or bothersome ponderings fogging up her mind and giving her headaches. What took up the empty space that the thoughts had left was soft emotion, a saturation of relief and acceptance. It was like being a chronic insomniac and finally laying down in bed after a long, exhausting day, then sleeping all the way through the night. 

There wasn’t even a rush of adrenaline as she slipped through the air. In fact, things felt slow and easy—less like plummeting and more like sinking. Inch by inch, she floated down, nothing more than a drifting feather. Her hair flew up, framing her face like a halo.

A smile flitted to her flushed face, and her eyes fluttered shut. She was done with the busy clamor of life and society. Whatever came next was a mystery, and she would most likely have no choice other than facing it. For now, though, she was at rest. She’d never expected that the end would be so peaceful, or that she’d be so ready to let it happen. Regardless, she was grateful for this sense of serenity. 

Then, a hard grab at Lena’s wrist, and everything halted. 

She let out a sharp shout, throat hoarse, as a deafening pop sounded in her ear. When her eyes flew back open, the clouds were gone and she was staring down at the ground spinning far below her. Suspended, she craned her neck up, gritting her teeth at the pain in her shoulder. A man—a stranger—had a steel grip on her wrist. He was the only reason she wasn’t rocketing towards the sidewalk. Lena felt dizzy. “Just let go,” she whispered, her voice not fully her own.

Confusion flashed across the man’s face, but there was no concern, or weariness, or fear in his expression as he muttered back, “I’ll pass.”

Then, he was hauling Lena up like cargo, dropping her back on the platform with him. The wind and rain were dying down, but the skies were still dripping with gray as Lena shook her damp hair out of her reddened face. She could hear her own rush of blood through her body as her heart hammered in her chest. She’d almost died. She hadn’t had a problem with it. She’d welcomed it.

Past the shock, Lena felt a flash of muted anger. “What is wrong with you,” she breathed, barely loud enough for her to hear herself.

“Excuse me?”

Her eyes darted up to him. “You just pushed me off a building, watched me tumble off the side, and then you ripped me back up.” She rubbed at the pulsing pain centered in her shoulder. “So, let me repeat myself: what the hell is wrong with you?!”

“I didn’t push you. You jumped.” There was a slight roll of his eyes as he said this.

Lena fell quiet, face scrunched up at him. She aloofly noted that he was wearing a nice, black suit and a shiny metal watch. 

It only took a minute for him to start talking again. “Want a picture? I’ve found they last longer.”

“Oh? I wouldn’t mind getting a picture, actually. After all, I’m just trying to memorize your face so that when I’m filing a police report, I’ll have my facts straight.” She scooted farther away from the edge of the platform as she spoke. “Attempted murder is a serious crime.”

She wanted to put more distance between herself and the man, but he was between her and the door. A step away from him meant a step back toward tumbling off the side. Lena tried to shrug off the tenseness that had rocketed through her moments ago, but she was met with a searing pain in her shoulder. She had to bite back a yelp, too cautious to let this assailant know that she was injured.

Scoffing, he bent down so he was eye level with her. “Hey, I just saved your life. How about a little thank you?”

“I followed you all the way up this building, hoping you’d stop and give me directions.” She shakily stood. This was the most she’d talked in days. “I get out on this platform, and next thing I know somebody shoves me, and I’m falling. Then, I get ripped out of midair and my arm just about gets torn off. I’m not thanking you.”

“You couldn’t have even been following me.” He reached out a hand, but quickly withdrew it when he saw her wince in response. “I only came up here because I saw somebody about to jump.”

Lena scowled at the exasperation in his voice. “I don’t believe you.”

She seriously doubted his story, but if what he said was true, the actual culprit was still out there. Either way, the smartest thing to do would be to get back down to ground level and go home. She’d call the police when she got there. Or maybe she wouldn’t. She wasn’t sure how she’d explain her reasoning behind following a stranger and trespassing on a construction site in the first place. 

Not to mention the fact that this guy was starting to make her question her sanity. 

Miraculously, he stepped aside and gestured to the door. “You should probably get down.” His mouth twisted into an uneasy grin. “Using the ladder this time, not by leaping off a ledge.”

If her aggravation wasn’t apparent in her expression before, it was now. Still, she took the opportunity to push past him, back into the building. Her head was starting to spin with confusion and stress, and she wanted to get back to the ground level as soon as humanly possible.

But when Lena got back to the ladder, she was honestly tempted to walk back outside and actually jump.

“What? Not going to climb down?” The finely-dressed stranger offered a cold grin. “Since I popped your shoulder out of place, I might consider carrying you to the first floor—if you ask nicely, that is.”

Lena turned and narrowed her eyes at him. It seemed that he knew about the injury he’d inflicted from the start. 

And yet, he hadn’t made a move to hurt her since she’d been pulled back onto the platform. He’d been annoying and coy but not necessarily ill-intentioned. Perhaps he really hadn’t been the one to push her. 

He leaned against the wall, an insufferably smug look on his face. Despite the rainy weather, he wasn’t even wet. His suit was still finely pressed, his thick dark hair was still gelled back, and there wasn’t a speck of mud or sawdust on him. Lena felt herself scowl. He looked like money and corporate greed. 

There was no chance in hell she’d want him to touch her, let alone carry her. “That sounds even more painful.”

He glanced back toward the platform before walking past her and stepping down onto the ladder. “Better start climbing, then.”

Lena reluctantly followed him, stifling the sharp pain radiating in her shoulder. Even as she grimaced and held back groans, she preferred it to the humility of being carried down. She was still uneasy about this whole situation, and at least partially suspicious of the smug stranger that was so insistent of his innocence. 

“What’s your name, kid?” he called from below.

“I’m not a kid,” Lena retorted. “I’m probably about your age.”

“Trust me when I say that I’m older than I look.” Not waiting for her to ask him for his name, he continued. “I’m James.”

Lena’s frown deepened as she stepped down onto the solid floor and followed him to the next set of ladders and stairs. “Lena. My name’s Lena.”

“You don’t have a last name?”

“You don’t?”

“Touché.”

They fell silent. Lena almost wished James would just keep talking. Better yet, she wished he would climb down a bit faster and leave her to her own devices. This passing stranger was either a potential murderer or an unfamiliar person expecting her to push the conversation forward, and she couldn’t tell which possibility made her more uneasy. She couldn’t stand the stiff, awkward air that seemed to seep into the majority of her one-on-one interactions, even ones that take place under such strange circumstances

“So,” James hummed, looking everywhere but at Lena as they descended, “come here often?”

“Oh, all the time,” she affirmed sarcastically. “I absolutely adore the view. Something about the way the sky looks around here.” Briefly, she recalled how it had looked to her not even ten minutes before. She took a wavering breath and her heart seemed to stutter for a few beats. The sky really had looked nicer the faster she seemed to fall away from it.

James tore her from her thoughts. “At the very least, you seem like the type to make a habit out of getting lost in dangerous areas.”

“Not really.” Lena heaved a sigh of relief once her feet finally made contact with the cement lining the building’s ground level. “Apparently I’ve made a habit out of talking to strangers, though.”

“Strangers? We’re on a first name basis, Lena.”

“Part of me suspects you of attempted murder.”

“If that’s the case, I guess even you think you know me well.” He leaned against a wooden beam and grinned. “So, we’re in agreement: not strangers. Newfound friends perhaps?”

“Acquaintances, at the very most,” she corrected. “I’d say partial enemies, but you’re too shady for me to really get a grasp of your intentions.”

“I see this more as a ‘lady-in-distress and her brave hero’ kind of relationship. What with me saving your life and all.” He paused in thought, tugging the cuff of his sleeve to straighten some imaginary wrinkle. “Oh, and I’m still waiting on that thank you.”

“I hope you have an immense amount of patience. You’re going to be waiting until the day you die.” Lena wasn’t usually this aggressive in her wording, but there was something frustrating about this egotistical . . . acquaintance.

He only chuckled at her abrasiveness. “Are you at least going to thank me when I help you find your way home?”

She turned away from him dismissively. “Why would I let you walk me home?”

“Who said I was going to?” There was a mocking lilt to his voice, a touch of lightness to the hard tone it had taken on throughout their conversation. “You know what? I was going to open my GPS app and point you in the right direction, but I like your idea better.”

Lena ignored him and continued walking, blaming her awful luck for the fact that out of all people, somebody this insufferable had to be her only means of finding a way home. When she made her way out of the building, she saw a shadowy figure on the sidewalk ahead of her. Lena had to squint just to make out its outline.

“No clever insult? If I didn’t know any better I’d think you were starting to tolerate me—”

“Shut up.” She squinted harder. 

“You really have to work on your manners, especially since—”

“That’s him,” she interrupted sharply, gesturing wildly towards the silhouette. “That’s the person I was following. That’s the person who pushed me.”

James’s eyes darted in the direction Lena was pointing. He stared at the figure silently, his fists tightened and his posture rigid. With his shoulders squared and his jaw clenched, Lena thought he might take off in the direction of the stranger and confront him, but he simply closed his eyes and took in a deep breath. “We should deal with your shoulder before anything else,” he asserted in a hushed voice.

“And let him get away?” Lena questioned incredulously. “What if he has something against me and comes back for me?”

“He won’t be coming back for you. I promise.”

“How do you know that?” Lena backed away as James reached out to examine her arm. 

He gave her a halfhearted grin. “I’ve only known you for a few several minutes, but I get the impression you’re pretty great at making people not want to have anything to do with you. That, and he probably noticed that somebody as physically imposing as me is here to defend you.” 

Lena fell quiet as James moved again to lift up her arm. She was amazed that James could toss in such narcissistic jokes in such a potentially dangerous situation. It left her speechless, and all she could do was watch as the figure cast a look over its shoulder and walked off into the distance.

“So you’ve finally come to the conclusion that I didn’t climb up that building to try and murder you?” James asked.

“You could be partner-in-crime,” she responded reluctantly, not giving much attention to the conversation at hand. She felt uneasy that the stranger had wandered out of her sight before she could measure how much of a threat he posed to her. Admittedly, it at the very least eased her suspicions of James.

He tugged at her arm and pushed it back at a sharp angle, prompting an abrupt scream from Lena. He apologized aloofly. “It was dislocated,” he explained past the sound of her groaning and accusatory complaining. 

She drew away from him. “And what did you just do? Double dislocate it?”

“What?” He furrowed his brow in confusion. “No, I fixed it. No pain killers needed.”

“That’s a matter of opinion,” she hissed. Not only had James dislocated her shoulder, but he’d just made her feel a burst of pain ten times worse than the initial dislocation. She certainly wouldn’t have minded taking something to numb the pain first. Preferably in a hospital with trained medical professionals. “How did you know it was even dislocated? How do I know you didn’t just make it worse?”

“Let's just say I’ve spent a lot of time working in hospitals.”

“As what?” she scoffed. “A janitor?”

“Let’s not get sucked into the pedantics of it all.” His gaze turned upward as the street light between them flickered to life.

Lena let her thoughts fall away from her aching shoulder and her doubts about James’s credibility. She’d certainly think more about it later, when she would be trying (and failing) to fall asleep. For now, though, she was more focused on how dusk was stretching across the sky. She thought about the chance that her father might be home worrying right now, and then she thought about the chance he was just passed-out on the couch after a long day of work, paperwork and cigarette packs scattered across the floor. 

James gave her a knowing look. “We should probably get you home.”

“Please.” Lena nodded. “I live by Saint Michael's Church.” She wasn’t sure how she felt about giving him that much information, let alone her address.

“You do have manners,” James observed with a slight note of teasing to his voice.

She followed slightly behind him as he started walking. Paying no mind to his comment, she let her eyes trail along the cracks in the sidewalk. “You really know where you’re going?”

He considered his answer for a few seconds before speaking. “I think I’ve lived here long enough to be familiar with the area.” The slight frown that tugged at his lips was somewhat stifled by what she assumed with his own will.

“That’s the explanation you’re sticking with? You don’t sound so convinced yourself.” 

“Take it or leave it.” He glanced over at her. “Also, did you know there was a time where—and I know this sounds crazy—people had to find their way around without a GPS?”

“Well, my apartment isn’t exactly in the middle of town,” she said as she glanced over to him. “And you should know that you’re coming across less like a navigation enthusiast and more like a stalker.”

“Maybe I give tours of the city in my free time.”

Lena wasn’t one to roll eyes, considering she rarely had the energy to pay attention to what other people were doing, but this was a special circumstance. So, she did indeed roll her eyes. Unfortunately, eye rolling is a soundless action, and it did not contribute anything to the conversation. Thus, she was left with nothing more than awkward silence once again.

James didn’t seem particularly bothered, but he was still fairly quick to break through the quiet. “Why did you tell me to let go?”

“What do you mean?”

“When you fell and I grabbed your wrist.” He looked down at her, intent on getting an answer. “Oh, maybe not when you fell. I mean when you got pushed. Or when you jumped. Whatever that was. Why did you tell me to let you go?”

She had told him to let her go, hadn’t she? Lena stared down at her own feet. Even awkward silence would’ve been better than coming up with an explanation for that trainwreck of a situation. She couldn’t really even explain it to herself, let alone him. “I didn’t jump. You saw the person who pushed me, remember?”

“I saw you accuse a passerby of attempted murder.” He gave her a pointed look. “What I didn’t see was that person coming down from the building on my way up to you. In fact, I didn’t see anybody at all coming down. Either you jumped or this stranger has superpowers that carried him to that spot.” As he finished the last sentence, his expression almost made him look like he was considering the possibility.

Lena wondered if he was acting this stupid to ease her suspicions, or if he was naturally like this. “Or you’re the murderer.”

“We’re really going back to this?” James shook his head. “You know what? It doesn’t matter. You’re avoiding my original question.”

“You’re one to talk, Mr. hospital-janitor-turned-tour-guide.”

“I said I’m not—” He resisted the urge to argue. “Just let me be secretive enough for the both of us.”

Lena scoffed, looking past him to gaze at the darkening sky. For the first time since James had overwhelmed her with his annoyingly demanding presence, she took in the scenery. More than just seeing what was around her, she could feel the warm and heavy quality of the post-rain air, and she could taste her own tiredness on the tip of her tongue. Shadows swam around her ankles, a rich dark indigo color setting into the sky.

“It’s almost otherworldly, isn’t it?” James hummed.

Lena glanced over to him. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t agree?”

“No, that’s not what I mean. I mean . . . I don’t know why I told you to let go.”

“Oh.”

“It didn’t feel like me,” she said. 

There was a soft quiet between them, and Lena sighed in relief as she began to recognize her surroundings. They were less than five minutes from her apartment. 

“How do you not know?” he pressed.

“I don’t know,” she offered in response.

“You don’t know how you don’t know?”

Lena huffed in frustration. “Listen, ninety percent of the time I have no reason for doing the things I do. I just don’t pay enough attention to what’s happening to put any thought into my actions. Asking me to explain why I do or say something is asking the impossible of me.”

“So, you’re like a five-year-old or something?”

“Or something,” she grumbled, picking up the pace.

James followed suit. “What’s the hurry?”
“It’s late, it’s dark, and I still don’t trust you.”

 “I’m hurt. I really am,” he hummed dramatically. 

 Lena stepped in front of James, turning on her heels and giving him a hard stare. “I don’t know you, James. Even if you aren’t the person who pushed me, you’re a stranger. You could be associated with the perpetrator. Hell, you could even have your own dark motives.” She crossed her arms and sarcasm seeped into her words. “I mean, somehow finding a secluded teenage girl and walking her home after sundown isn’t suspicious at all, now is it?”

A beat of silence hit.

And then he laughed in her face. “Trust me when I say I have zero attraction to you whatsoever. And no ulterior motives, either.”

Lena’s face flushed red, and she narrowed her eyes.

James abruptly stopped laughing. “Oh, I didn’t mean that you’re not . . .”

“I don’t care about that,” she snapped.

“You’re just a bit young for me. I tend to like women who are much, much older.” He adjusted his watch as he spoke.

Lena almost gagged. “I didn’t need to know that! The point is, I don’t feel safe around you. I want to go home. I want to be as far away from all of this insanity as possible.” Lena’s shoulders felt as heavy as her eyelids. “Away from getting lost and trespassing and possible murder attempts. Away from every foul thing that’s come my way today.” She cast a sullen look at James. “Away from you, too.”

“Fair enough.” His response was understanding, but terse.

A few seconds of simple silence passed. “This is my street.” Lena glanced up to him in an unspoken request for him to let them part ways.

James met her eyes and reached into his pocket, pulling out a small business card. “What happened today, regardless of whether you jumped or you were pushed,” he said, handing her the card, “was scary. And it’s okay to feel scared.”

“I wasn’t scared.”

Measured, he held up a hand to quiet her. “It was scary. If this mystery man shows up again, or if maybe you feel like jumping off a tall building, or putting your life at risk in any other way . . .”

“You think I’m suicidal,” she accused. She wanted to crumple the card up and throw it back in his face. 

“I think you need somebody to reach out to if something happens.” He sounded tired as he said this. “Just in case.”

She shoved the card into her back pocket, knowing it’d likely just end up going through the wash and getting ruined. “I have friends and family.” Mentioning friends, plural, was a liberal way to phrase it, but she was telling the truth.

“I meant somebody reliable. Somebody relatively unattached.”

She stared at him, unsure of how she was supposed to respond to that. Eventually, she breathed out a sigh. “Goodnight, James.”

“Goodnight, Lena.” He straightened his posture ever so slightly. “Take care.”

…