Chapter 3

Claire's POV

Carrie didn't seem particularly phased by the nightmare she had. The next day started out as normal and the knot of tension I'd built up inside worrying that something was going to jump out of nowhere at us was starting to ease up. Shane didn't seem too worried about her dream, and if he was he didn't show it.

While I was making Shane's lunch for the day I watched them run around the kitchen together with water guns that were empty. I wasn't much for rules about what Carrie could and couldn't have in the house, but water while you're running around inside isn't a good idea. Nothing seemed out-of-the-ordinary, so I tried to push any fears I had to the back of my mind. After washing my hands, I looked at the clock on the cooker.

"Right, time to get you to school, sweetie," I said to Carrie.

"But I don't wanna go," Shane said in a slightly mocking voice.

"No, daddy, me not you," Carrie chimed in, giggling.

"She wasn't talking to me?" Shane asked.

"Nope," she replied. Shane gave her his best heartbroken look and Carrie threw her arms around him. "It's okay, daddy. I love you,"

"Love you too, Carebear. I'll see you later. Have a good day," he gave her a kiss before standing up and walking over to me, "and I love you too, don't worry I wouldn't leave you out." He winked at me and leaned in for a kiss.

"Hurry up," Carrie said sounding exasperated.

I broke the kiss off and put Shane's lunch in his hands.

"Have a good day," I said, as he walked out.

Eve's POV

Something felt wrong when I was dropping Sam off at preschool. He kept looking off into the distance and shivering, as if he'd seen something that scared him.

"Hey, Sammy. Everything okay?" I asked warily.

"They're following me," he whispered. I almost didn't hear it, but when I did I had to stop myself from slamming the breaks on in the middle of the road. A car accident was the last thing we needed right now.

"Who are?" I asked, knowing I sounded just as scared has Sam had looked the first night he'd had a nightmare.

"I can't see who they are," he said, "they look like shadows but I can't see their faces."

We pulled into the parking lot of the preschool and I helped Sam get out of the car. He was still staring at… nothing, but I knew it had to be something. I walked him in and after I saw he'd settled down with his friends I left.

I saw Claire walking in with Carrie on my way out. She leaned in close to my ear as she passed and asked me to wait out here for her. She needed to talk to me. I watched Carrie as she turned to wave at me.

She had a bright smile on her face, but, like Sam, seemed a little distant. Like there was something occupying her thoughts. Not that that's out of the ordinary for small children, but this didn't seem like the type of otherwise-occupied small children usually get. It seemed wary.

I didn't realise Claire was standing right in front of me until she shook me a little. I looked up and started to walk back to her car with her. We sat down in the front seats, but neither one of us said anything for a long moment.

"Sam said he can see –," what did he say he could see? He couldn't actually see faces, but he saw something. Like shadows.

"Carrie said she could see their faces," Claire said, sounding really, really shaken. She sounded like she was about to burst into tears.

"God, what are they? Why them; they're kids for Gods sake!" I practically cried, slamming my hand down on the dash.

Claire just stared at me, a million questions in her eyes, but none that I could answer. I thought about calling Shane; Claire seemed like she needed the comfort of him right now, even more than I needed Michael to tell me everything was going to be fine. And I'm usually the one who gets scared enough to need the hug.

"You going to work?" She asked out of the blue.

"Yeah, I guess. Why? Are you?" I replied.

"No. I don't think I could focus on anything even if I did, and I'll be way too pre-occupied. I'm going to try and talk to Amelie," she said, her voice getting more and more shaky with every word.

"Want me to come with you? I'm not sure I'll make any half-decent coffee today. Hell, I'll probably end up putting shots of vodka in instead of caramel or something," I joked, trying to brighten to mood a little. Claire looked like she was trying to smile and force a laugh, but all that came out was a choked sound. Then she was crying. And she was crying hard, tears falling from her eyes. I didn't know what to do or say or think, so I put my arm around her and called the only person I knew she'd want to be with right now. Shane.

I left her in the car while I was on the phone because I'm not sure Shane would've been able to hear anything other than the bone-racking sobs coming from his wife.

"Hello?" he said, picking up on the second ring. He hadn't started work properly yet, thankfully so he could pick his phone up.

"Hey, Shane it's Eve," I said.

"Is everything okay? You sound like you've seen a ghost," as soon as he said that I heard the sound of him putting his hand over his eyes and letting out a small groan, "I shouldn't have said that, sorry."

"It's okay," I said, although I'm not entirely sure it was, "Look, um, Claire is having, like, I don't know, um, a breakdown or something. You need to come talk to her or something because I can't calm her down at all."

"What happened?" he asked. I could hear the worry in his voice and the sound of a chair scraping back on the floor. Guess he was already on his way.
"Nothing! Nothing happened, she's fine. I mean she's not fine because I've never seen anybody cry like this, but she – you just need to be here. Please," I added the please in a whisper.

"I'm on my way," he said. I heard a car engine start up – his I'm guessing, "wait, where are you?"
"We're at the preschool," I said.

After he hung up, I climbed back into the car and tried to soothe my best friend. She was still crying, and it hadn't calmed down one bit.

"Shane's on his way. It's going to be okay, Claire. We'll sort this," I said. I'm not sure if I believed it, but I had to, for Claire, for me, for Sam and Carrie.

A few minutes later my phone went off. It was a text from Michael; apparently Shane had called him and told him everything I said.

I'll be there in 10.

It was a short message, but it meant everything. I didn't even ask Michael to come, but part of me felt almost relieved enough to cry like Claire that he was coming.

I thought about maybe getting off the preschool parking lot, but then I remembered both Claire and me had a car here, and she was in no fit state to drive. I'm not sure I was in a fit state to drive, and I was in a much better state than Claire.

After another five minutes or so, Shane pulled up beside us. The parking lot was almost empty now as most of the kids had arrived and the parents were leaving.

I saw him jump out of the car and jog over to us. I opened the door and got out so he could get in. I went to sit in my own car and wait for Michael.

Shane's POV

Claire was worse than I'd gathered from what Eve had told me. I'd never, ever seen her like this, and it was scaring me.

"Hey, Claire," I said, moving some of her tear-soaked hair back from her face, "What happened?"

I guessed she couldn't really speak very well, so I put my arms around her and rocked her gently from side to side like I do with Carrie when she's upset. I realised Carrie was inside the preschool, and found myself staring into one of the windows.

From what I could see, which wasn't a lot because Claire had parked quite far away, they were sat on the floor and the teacher was reading to them. I smiled to myself after I thought about what Carrie would be thinking – or saying, knowing her – about the story. About what the characters were doing which wasn't possible, or how although she doesn't think animals can talk, she believes in magic and fairies and unicorns and Santa.

Then I was drawn back into the real world when I realised she was probably not thinking about any of those things, and she was probably thinking about all the nightmares she'd been having. It killed me knowing she was in there, maybe upset, and I couldn't do anything about it.

I looked down at Claire as she sniffled and wiped her eyes on the back of her hand. She looked like she was trying to stop crying, but not really succeeding. I just held her closer and rested my cheek on the top of her head.

"It's okay, Claire. It's all okay," I whispered. There was no reason for me to whisper it, but it felt like something that needed to be kept private, just between the two of us.

"No it's not," she said. "God, Shane, it's anything but okay. Carrie is in there, probably ignoring everything like she does, and trying to ignore the ghost faces whatever the hell they are, and we're out here and we don't even know what she's talking about."

"Hey, Claire, look at me," I held her face in both hands and looked her right in the eye. She looked right back. "It is okay. We can't let this get to us, okay? Getting worked up about this is Carrie's job, not mine, not yours, not Eve's or Michael's, got it? How do you think Carrie would feel if she saw you like this right now? As far as she's concerned, everything it going to be fine because that's what we've told her. It might be a lie, but right now, we don't know that. This could be nothing. This could be absolutely nothing. But crying like this about it isn't going to fix anything. We need to go talk to someone who can give us answers, and I can tell you now we're not going to find those people in a parking lot."

She stared at me and for a moment I was scared she was going to start yelling at me and throw me out of the car, but she nodded and wiped her eyes again. The tears had stopped, finally.

"Yeah, you're right. Sorry, I just… I'm just scared, you know? I know we've been up against things bigger than this, maybe. I mean, we fought Bishop and the draug and Kim and I mean I've died, for God's sake. I died. But this is just – she's our daughter, Shane. She's a kid. She doesn't know what's going on in any of this, like you said as far as she's concerned it's all going to be fine and go away because we're not going to let anything hurt her. She doesn't know -," I cut her off there.

"She does know. Of course she knows; she's smart, she's your daughter. She knows that it's not normal to see, what did you say she was seeing? Faces? She knows that's not normal, but she knows that we've told her it will be okay, so we have to make this okay," Claire nodded. "I need to go into work and coach this one lot of high school kids because they've got a competition coming up and I can't let them down, but I'll be back by eleven, and we're going to fix this. Me, you, Michael and Eve, just like old times. We're going to kick some ass. Nothing messes with our kids and gets away with it. Nothing."

She smiled at that and nodded her head in agreement. I kissed her, she tasted like salty tears, and I wiped the remaining drops from her face before getting back into my car.

Michael had shown up at some point, and it looked like he was comforting Eve. I didn't want to interrupt anything, so I texted Michael before driving back to work.

You working today?

He texted back a few seconds later.

Supposed to, but thinking otherwise at the moment. You?

I replied with

Got to coach 1 class but will be back by 11. If you're not working can you do me a favour and go home with Claire. I don't want her to be by herself.

He looked at me through the car window and gave me a thumbs-up. I nodded my thanks before driving off.

Michael's POV

I did what Shane asked and went back to the Collins' house with Claire and Eve. As soon as we got in Claire went upstairs. I sat with Eve for a few minutes, but she fell asleep on the couch, so I got up to find Claire.

I found her tidying up Carrie's room. She was picking up her pyjamas when I walked in. I watched as she made the bed, picked up a few other clothes from the floor to put in the laundry basket and open the curtains.

She looked like she'd been crying again, but I don't know if that was just that she'd been crying earlier and still had blotchy cheeks.

After she'd opened the curtains she looked at me for a long ten seconds before sitting down on the bed. It was more like she collapsed onto the bed if I'm honest. I sat down next to her and she leaned into my side for comfort. I put my arm around her.

We sat there like that for about twenty minutes. She wasn't crying, but she was shaking. Neither of us said anything for a long time. When we finally did, she spoke first.

"Thanks for coming back here," she said to me.

"You think I'd let you be alone right now?" I asked.

"I think Shane wouldn't let you let me be alone right now," she replied, and then frowned, "I don't know if that made sense, sorry."

I laughed and found myself stood up looking out the window.

There was a swing set in the backyard that Shane and me had spent a weekend building a few months ago. We had one exactly same at the Glass house. The kids loved them. There was a picture on the chest of drawers in front of Carrie's bedroom window. It was of her and Shane after we'd built the set. The sound of Claire coming to stand next to me snapped me out of my thoughts.

"She's a sweet kid, Claire," I told her, "we're gonna fix this. I can't let Shane go through any kind of loss ever again, and I'll be damned if I let anything happen to Carrie."

"Thank you, Michael," Claire said softly. I could see a smile finally making it's way onto her face as she looked at some of the other pictures on top of the drawers. A lot of them were of Carrie and Shane.

"She looks a lot like you, you know," I surprised myself with that, and I could tell Claire was taken back because she stared at me like I was crazy for a split second.

"You think? Everyone says she looks like Shane," she replied.

"Yeah. She's got your nose and you're eyes," Claire actually frowned at tilted her head a little at that.

"Are you sure? I mean, look at them," she picked up one of the pictures. It was Carrie and Shane at his birthday this year. They both had huge grins on their faces. "Look at them. They're like the same person."

I pulled my wallet out of my pocket and sorted through the stash of photos I had in there. One of them was of Shane and me when we were around fourteen. I'll admit it's not the best picture or either of us, but Alyssa is in the background.

I showed Claire the picture and she took it, and when she caught sight of Lyssa she let out a small gasp.

"Does Shane know you have this?" she asked. Honestly, I didn't know, so I shrugged my shoulders in reply. I knew it was one of the only pictures of Alyssa that had survived the fire, mainly because it hadn't been in the fire; it had been taped to the refrigerator in my mom and dad's kitchen.

As much as I honestly thought Carrie looked like Claire, I thought she looked like Alyssa a lot more. I think Claire sensed this because she kept looking between the two photos she had in her hand.

"No wonder Shane calls her Alyssa sometimes," she said quietly.

"He does?" I hadn't known that.

"Yeah. Not very often, but it happens from time to time. I figured it was just because… well I don't really know. I call Sam, Michael sometimes, you know? I figured it was just like that," she smiled a little. "You want anything to eat or drink?"

I shook my head and turned around to see Eve stood in the doorway, smiling at us.

"What?" Claire and me asked at the same time.

"Nothing. I was just thinking about how the hell we're all still alive, you know? And how we're all still friends," she said. Claire pulled a face at her.

"That's so cliché, Eve," she said with a wink. It sounded like she was saying it in a voice intended to mock Monica. Then I realised it was probably some inside joke that, as a male, I'd never understand.

We heard the front door open and close.
"Shane's home," Eve said.

"Ready to go kick some ass to get some answers?" Claire asked, and walked out of the room to meet Shane.

A/N: I probably won't get to update every day, but I felt like I needed to add a new one quickly so the story starts to get going for you guys. I can't actually remember what chapter it does start to get better, so please hang in there with me! Thank you if you decided to read it – I really struggled to think of a summary for it, so thanks for giving it a go. I really appreciate it.

To clairebear97 – THANK YOU for reviewing. I really appreciate it!