Nicolae High by Tim Lahaye, Jerry B. Jenkins Page B

It’s me, Vicki.”
    Shelly furrowed her brow and squinted. “No way,” she said. “Vick, what happened to you?”
    “To me?” It was out before Vicki could rein it in. Shelly was the one who didn’t look like herself. Vicki may have been made up differently and dressed differently, but Shelly looked as if someone had punched her in the stomach.
    “It’s really you, Vicki?”
    Vicki nodded. “Shelly, I know what happened. I lost my whole family, and—”
    “I don’t want to talk about it, OK? I really don’t.”
    “But as awful as it was, Shelly, I—”
    “Don’t,” she said, trembling.
    “Leave her alone,” an older girl said, glaring at Vicki. “Don’t you know what happened to her?”
    “No! What happened?”
    “Don’t tell her, Joyce!” Shelly said.
    “You just get to class, Shelly. And don’t let anybody make you say anything you don’t want to say.”
    Shelly looked apologetically at Vicki and moved away. Joyce turned on Vicki. “Are you Byrne?”
    “Yes, Joyce. Just dressing a little different these days.”
    “I’ll say. Your trailer burned, right?”
    Vicki nodded.
    “So where you livin’?”
    “Mount Prospect, with people from my church.”
    “That explains the threads. They makin’ you dress that way?”
    Vicki shook her head.
    “So you didn’t hear Shelly’s story ’cause you haven’t been back to the park?”
    “Right.”
    “She was baby-sitting for the Fischers. You knew them.”
    Vicki nodded, moving toward the girls’ locker room.
    “One of the kids starts crying just when the parents get home. Shelly goes in to check on her, and the kid’s really wailing. She picks her up, and that gets the little guy crying, so she picks him up too. Now she’s got two squalling kids in her arms as the Fischers come in the door. She’s about to explain that they just then woke up when both kids disappear and the parents too. Mom and Dad, poof, clothes in a pile right where they stood. The babies, gone with their pj’s draped over Shelly’s arms.
    “Tell you the truth, it would have scared me to death, Vicki, but I wish I’d have seen it. Well, you know Shelly. She can’t let it go. She’s playing it over and over in her mind. I saw her the next afternoon, wandering through the trailer park, not saying a word to anybody.”
    “I saw her late that morning,” Vicki said. “Same thing.”
    “I finally got her to tell me. Now everybody knows and nobody talks to her, figuring she doesn’t want to talk about it. Which is true. But I think she feels like it was her fault somehow.”
    “Where you headed, Joyce?”
    “Health. Next door here.”
    “You know what happened, don’t you?”
    “The disappearances? Sure. Jesus came back. What else? It’s not like we haven’t heard that all our lives.”
    “You believe that?”
    “Sure, don’t you?”
    “Well, yeah,” Vicki said, “but I didn’t know you did.”
    “Don’t worry, I’m not gonna get saved or anything. But look who went and who was left. Your mom and dad, right? And your little sister. But you were left. So was I. My whole family. How about Eddie? Bet your brother’s still around.”
    “Gone,” Vicki said.
    “No kiddin’? Disappeared?”
    Vicki nodded.
    “That might prove me wrong. He was no Holy Joe, was he?”
    “He became a believer after he got to Mich—”
    “See? I knew it! What else could it be, Vick? Huh?”
    “But that doesn’t make you want to be a Christian?”
    “No way! I still think the whole thing sounds wacky.”
    “Even though you believe it’s true?”
    “Especially because I believe it’s true. Hey, I  know it’s true. If that was God’s idea of how to do things, I want no part of it. How about you?”
    “I believe it too. And I plan to be included when Jesus comes back again.”
    “Well, good for you, girl. You’re not going to set your sights on me, are ya?”
    “Well, I wish you would—”
    “Oh, you are, aren’t you? I’m going to be a project, just