We had lived in Fitzroy, one of the most hipster suburbs of Melbourne, Australia, for almost eight months. Our moves hadn’t been quite as frequent for the past few years. I was a teenager—moody, hormonal, and antisocial—which made it easier for my mother to prevent me from getting too close to anyone.
It’s so much easier to make a friend at six than it is at sixteen. Want to be my friend? OK!—done deal. By the time you’re in your teens, people have established friendships and years of shared experiences, and you’re more aware of what others think of you. No one wants to disturb the delicate balance of their already angst-ridden existence by befriending the new girl.
Also, I had given up. With our next move always around the corner, I’d learned to make superficial conversation, seem friendly with a few people, but never truly get to know anyone.
Imagine my surprise when I not only made friends in Fitzroy but also got a boyfriend.
Somehow, Harvey Blackburn and his sister managed to weave their way into my solitary life. It happened slowly, over many weeks—sitting together in class, then at lunch, then chatting online. Then, somehow, Harvey and I were “a thing.” I’d been on a few secret dates before, but none had gotten as close as Harvey. Harvey was the first of many things for me.
But even with the very first friends I’d ever made, I never spoke about our strange lifestyle in any detail, and I changed the topic when asked directly. I never invited them over. I rarely met with them outside of school, and then only when I was sure my mother was at work. I had to be careful. I burned to tell my mom about my first boyfriend, but I kept my mouth shut.
I’d been good at keeping my two lives separate, until earlier today.
Harvey, knowing he wouldn’t be seeing me on my actual birthday, had pulled me around the corner of the English classroom and presented me with a small gift box, his warm chocolate eyes sparkling with excitement. Inside was a charm bracelet with a heart charm attached.
I had never been given a gift from anyone but my mother. I was elated, and I slipped.
I forgot to take the bracelet off and hide it before going home. As if she was looking for evidence of my treachery, my mother spotted it as soon as I walked into the house. She came out of the kitchen, her eyes homing in on the offending jewelry.
I replayed the scene in my mind—my mother wiping her hands on a tea towel, her greeting catching in her throat as the smile fell from her face, the cold look in her eyes, the fear in her voice as she quietly asked, “What have you done, Evelyn?”
“Miss?”
We’d reached the front of the line. The attendant was looking at me expectantly, her palm outstretched. My mom nudged me.
I shook her hand off my shoulder and darted forward, passport and boarding pass in hand. “Sorry,” I muttered.
The lady gave me a tight smile, scanned the boarding pass, and checked my fake passport with the efficiency of an often-repeated task. She didn’t even hesitate before handing them back, and my heart sank yet again. A big part of me had hoped she would notice it was a fake and we would be forced to stay. The forgery was very good though; she had no idea. No one ever did.
I didn’t return her smile as I moved past. Pausing as she repeated the process with my mother, I looked longingly back in the direction of the exit. I imagined myself pushing past the remaining passengers waiting to board and making a run for it, catching a taxi straight to Harvey’s house.
It was a stupid fantasy.
With a shuddering breath, I followed my mother as she took the lead up the narrow corridor toward the aircraft. There was no going back for us—we never returned to any place we had previously lived in.
When I was younger, I used to cry and ask why I didn’t have friends and why I didn’t have a dad. As I got older, my questions became more specific. I asked why we couldn’t stay anywhere for longer than a few months, why we couldn’t use our real names, what or who we were running from in the first place.
My mother did her best to explain things to me without actually giving me any answers. It always came back to her fervent declarations that everything she ever did was for me. Her vague explanations just weren’t enough for me anymore.
We trudged up the narrow aisle of the plane to our seats. I settled into the window seat, buckled my seatbelt, and turned away as my mother lowered herself into the seat beside me.
She sighed deeply and leaned over me, but she didn’t touch me. “I’m so sorry, Evie . . .”
At least, for once, she wasn’t making excuses. I glued my attention to the people in safety vests bustling about on the ground below. She had said those same words, but with a decidedly less gentle tone, only hours before.
We had spent the evening fighting, crying, and packing. As she’d yanked open drawers and shoved clothes into a bag, my mother had admonished me again. “How could you be so careless, Evelyn?”
“Careless?” I was sitting in the middle of the bed, refusing to participate in the packing. “I made some friends and got a boyfriend. And I didn’t tell them anything!” I almost screeched in frustration, angry tears rolling down my red cheeks.
“I’m sorry, but that’s just not good enough,” she spat, not sounding sorry at all. She held her hands out, a bundle of clothing in each one, before letting them flop to her sides. “It would only be a matter of time before you slipped. That’s what getting close to people does—it makes you let your guard down, and you tell them things about yourself. Deep, important things.”
“What things?” I yelled as she resumed stuffing our belongings haphazardly into bags. “How could I tell them anything when I don’t know anything?”
“We do not have time to have this argument again. We’re leaving in twenty minutes. Anything you don’t pack will be left behind.”
We stared each other down, both of us breathing hard, both of us stubborn in our silence.
Finally, her shoulders slumped. “Please, Evie,” she said quietly. Her wide eyes were pleading, and her hands had begun to shake. She was no longer mad at me; now she was just scared.
I was still mad at her, but I caved in and reluctantly got ready to leave. Again.
I didn’t even get to say goodbye to my friends, to hug them tightly and say I’d never forget them. I’d tried to send a quick message to Harvey before my mother had burst into the room and confiscated my phone, wiping it clean and destroying the sim card.
The pilot’s voice coming through the intercom as we taxied snapped me back into the present. “Welcome aboard flight QF83. My name is Bob Wheeler, and I’ll be your captain today. Sitting next to me is Andy Cox, your copilot. Andy is a Variant with an ability to control the weather, so I’m pleased to let you know that we can guarantee a turbulence-free flight tonight.”
He continued to deliver the usual speech introducing the flight crew, but my mind was momentarily distracted, even from my ire at my mom. I had never met a Variant with an ability to control the weather, and I itched to research the science behind how it was possible, the impact it might have on weather patterns, the physics behind it all.
Science still didn’t fully understand the Light—the energy that fueled Variant abilities and made it possible for people to control the weather, run faster than a Maserati, or read minds. It was a fascinating area of study. All sense of social propriety went out the window whenever I realized I was speaking to a Variant, and I would start firing all kinds of inappropriate and intrusive questions, my curiosity getting the better of me. I burned to ask the copilot how his ability worked, but I was strapped into an economy seat and had no way of making that happen. My mind returned to my previous miserable thoughts, and I slumped back with a sigh.
“That’s an interesting Variant ability,” Joyce piped up beside me.
I grunted and went back to looking out the window. She was making an effort, but I wasn’t ready to let go of my resentment.
The plane took off, and everyone settled into the routine of a long-haul flight. My mother attempted to make conv
ersation with me a few more times before finally giving up with a frustrated huff. I was determined to maintain my simmering outrage at how she had ruined my life, and I sulked, staring out at the pitch-black sky, forty thousand feet above the ground.
We were halfway across the Pacific Ocean when the plane crashed.
There was no warning—no time for anyone to wonder what was happening, get scared, hold each other. One minute we were gliding through the air, the next there was a loud bang, the plane lurched sideways, and we were plummeting.
I reached for my mother at the same time she reached for me, and we grasped each other’s hands as our eyes met, wide with fear. There was no opportunity to say anything. No time to tell her the two simple things that actually needed to be said—I’m sorry. I love you.
A terrible metallic sound scraped against my ears, and then her hand was violently ripped out of mine, her mouth forming an O as she disappeared into darkness. The back of the plane had completely separated from the rest of it, as if a giant had torn it apart like a loaf of bread.
I stared at the emptiness next to my seat. There was the floor of the plane, there was my foot in my DNA sock (the shoe was gone), and there was the jagged line where the metal and wires and fabric had come apart, right between her seat and mine.
Beyond that there was nothing. Darkness.
We were still falling. People were screaming over the deafening whistle of rushing air as various items flew by me and out of the gaping hole through which my mother had disappeared. I focused on the jagged, torn edge of the plane, a piece of the carpet flapping furiously in the wind. My mother, my only family, was gone—probably dead. My mind couldn’t process it, so instead, it helpfully supplied relevant statistics.
Statistically speaking, flying is the safest mode of transport.
The odds of a plane crashing are one in 1.2 million.
The odds of actually dying in a plane crash are closer to one in eleven million.
By comparison, the odds of dying in a car accident are about one in five thousand.
Just my luck that I would be on that one in 1.2 million flights.
As we plunged through the dark, I considered another number—2,130. The last time I had checked the in-flight information screen, that’s about how many miles we were from Hawaii. I had calculated the distance, as it was the nearest land with things like hospitals and emergency response teams. Assuming the pilot had sent a distress call, it would be hours before anyone could get to us—if I even survived the crash in the first place.
I don’t remember hitting the water. I remember the flapping piece of carpet by my feet, and I remember that useless information running through my head, but I have no recollection of the impact. After that is just disjointed flashes of memory.
The water was freezing cold. It felt like spikes of ice, all piercing my skin at the same time in a million different spots. People were shouting. Not many—nowhere near as many as were on the plane. I wore a life jacket. When had I put that on? Something was burning furious and bright nearby. I wanted to go closer to the heat, but I couldn’t move. I couldn’t do anything but shiver.
The fire was still there, but it had calmed down significantly. Like the embers of a campfire. No one was shouting anymore. The water rippled gently in front of me, calm and black like tar—impenetrable. I couldn’t see even an inch past its surface. I couldn’t feel my arms or my legs.
A light. Was it the fire? No, that had gone out a long time ago. It tinged the darkness. Violet. Dawn was coming. But that wasn’t right either. This light was sharp, focused, and moving. There was a sound too—a loud whooshing from above. The water in front of my face rippled from the wind created by the helicopter blades. Helicopter! I had to look up, shout, wave, do something so they didn’t leave.
I was being lifted into the light, but I was still cold and wet and I still couldn’t feel my legs. The light wasn’t warm and welcoming. It was harsh and bright, and the loud whooshing overwhelmed me. Someone lifted me from behind. An arm wrapped around my middle, holding me steady. The water seemed really far away now.
It was loud inside the helicopter. I was being jostled where I lay, tied down with something over my chest and hips. I couldn’t see. My eyes were closed, and I didn’t know how to open them. Voices shouted over the helicopter engine, only snippets of conversation.
“. . . only survivors? Are you positive?”
“Yes.” A firm “yes.” His voice was clear, close. Strong and masculine, but smooth like warm honey. “We searched the whole area. Only her and the copilot. I don’t know how she even survived. She was in the water so long.”
Then a sliding sound and a third voice, farther away. “. . . in touch with her people . . . never got on the flight . . . last minute change of schedule . . . good intel, but can’t predict . . .”
A hand landed on my calf. The man with the honey voice. I knew it belonged to him, but I didn’t know how. It was good that I could feel my legs again.
~
When I woke up in the hospital, I had been asleep for nearly two days, but I didn’t know it at the time. They told me all of it later. Nurses and doctors piled into my room, marveling at the lack of permanent injury and my fast recovery. Variants were more resilient against injury and faster to recover, but I, as someone who was only human, was lucky to have survived, or so the doctors kept saying. I didn’t feel lucky.
No. When I first woke up, it was only for a few moments. The sounds came first: the soft thrum of machines, a quiet beeping, muffled voices. Then I felt the soft blankets and pillows under me.
I managed to lift my heavy eyelids and found myself looking up at those corkboard squares that make up the ceilings of hospitals and office buildings. The fluorescent light was off, but it was still very bright in the room. It must have been morning.
I angled my head down and scanned the space. There was a door on my left and a window on my right, a hospital tray on wheels under it. In the corner, next to the window, was a chair. A man was sitting in it.
I could tell it was a man by the broad set of his shoulders, the muscles in his tattooed forearms. His elbows rested on his knees, and his head was in his hands. He had dark hair and a buzz cut. His fingers were digging into his scalp; I had a feeling that if he had more hair, he would be pulling at it. He was dressed in black: black boots planted firmly on the floor, black pants, and a black T-shirt.
I tried to speak, but all I managed was a straggled inhale. It was enough to get his attention anyway. His head snapped up. He looked young, maybe in his twenties, but the look in his intense eyes gave me the impression that he had lived a thousand lifetimes while he’d sat in that ugly hospital chair. He had a five o’clock shadow covering his strong jaw and shocking ice-blue eyes. They pierced me, as the frigid water had pierced me.
“You’re awake.” I don’t think he meant to say it out loud. It just came out on a breath. And then he was on his feet and next to my bed, leaning over me.
He reached a hand out as if to touch me and then pulled it back sharply. “I’ll get a doctor.” It was the man with the honey voice.
I was asleep again before he’d even left the room. The ice in his eyes was making me remember, and I couldn’t handle it yet.
~
The next time I woke up, it didn’t take me as long to gain consciousness.
I opened my eyes and lifted myself into a more comfortable position. I felt so much stronger than the first time, as if I didn’t need to be in the hospital at all. It was dusk, the window on the right still letting in the fading light.
My eyes immediately went to the chair in the corner, but the room was empty, and for a second I wondered if I had hallucinated the man with the ice-blue eyes. Then I heard the tap turn on in the bathroom, and a moment later he walked out of it. He was still dressed in all black, but this time he wore a long-sleeved T-shirt, fitted enough to hint at the strong torso underneath. He was tall, his head nearly reaching the top of the doorframe.
&nbs
p; As he turned, closing the door behind him, our eyes met. He paused for a second and then stepped up to the foot of my bed, resting one hand on the railing. He watched me with a neutral expression on his face. I watched him back, not feeling at all awkward about maintaining eye contact with a complete stranger for so long. A scar cut through the middle of his right eyebrow, and a black-and-gray tattoo was peeking out of the black fabric at his neck.
“How you feeling?” His voice was firm, forceful, but it still felt like honey washing over me.
My own voice was groggy, though clear enough in the silent room. “You pulled me out of the water.” I didn’t bother answering his question. It wasn’t important at that moment.
“No. My colleague did. I pulled you into the chopper.”
He wasn’t going to insist I focus on my health, on getting better, on getting my strength up—all those empty things people insisted when they were trying to avoid speaking about the difficult things. The important things. Good.
“You sat with me. I could hear your voice. Even over the engine.”
“Yes . . .” He looked away briefly before meeting my gaze again, letting the word trail off. As if he was going to add more but decided not to.
“Only the copilot and I made it. There were no other survivors?” I had to be sure. I had to hear someone say it.
“No.” His answer was definitive, but his eyes narrowed slightly, wondering whom I was asking about. Whom I had lost.
I screwed my eyes shut, fisting the hospital sheets in my weak fingers.
My mother . . .
My mother was on the plane with me.
There were no other survivors.
She was not a survivor. She was . . . she . . .
“My mother.” I opened my eyes as I said it.
His face fell when the two words left my mouth. He lifted his other hand to the railing of my bed and leaned heavily on the utilitarian gray plastic, hanging his head. He swore under his breath and started breathing hard.
It Started With a Sleigh Page 15