“You don’t have a choice.” He pulled out his phone, tapped the screen, and turned it toward her. It was a video of Megan’s bedroom window, taken from outside. In the video, a tiny ink squirrel leaped from her desk, scampered across her pillow, and dissolved into a puddle.
He left, and Megan was alone with her raven drawing. The raven’s head turned, its beak opening in a silent caw. It knew she was scared.
He strolled in, hands in his letterman jacket pockets. “I’ve been watching you. The way your pen moves. The way you stare at your paper like it owes you money.” He stopped at her table. “I know what you can do.” megan inky
Lucas paled. “You—”
Megan’s blood turned to ice water. “I don’t know what you’re—” “You don’t have a choice
Lucas’s face went white. He hadn’t expected it to actually work . “I—I wish for—”
Now, at seventeen, Megan had embraced the moniker. She wore ink-stained jeans like a badge of honor, and her favorite hoodie—once gray, now a constellation of faded blotches—was her uniform. But the ink wasn’t just a cosmetic issue anymore. Megan had a secret. He left, and Megan was alone with her raven drawing
Megan stared at the notebook. A cold dread pooled in her stomach. “Why do you care?”
Megan took a deep breath. She wasn’t going to draw The Hollow . Not exactly. She had other plans. Midnight. The school was a tomb of shadows and humming fluorescent lights. Lucas was waiting in the art room with the notebook. Megan brought her best dip pen, a bottle of India ink so dark it seemed to drink the light, and a fresh sheet of heavyweight paper.
Megan looked from the creepy drawing to Lucas’s earnest, hungry face. “That’s insane. I’m not drawing some nightmare monster for your family’s creepy wish-granting fantasy.”