The Girl Who Looked Beyond the Stars

by L B Anne

  “Seriously though, just talk to Ariel and stop being mean.”

  “I’m not being mean. I talk with you guys at lunch. I’m just saying I’ve always been here for you and I’ll still be here after she moves.”

  “She’s moving?”

  “No, I was just hoping.”

  “Really? This whole jealousy thing is not a good look for you.”

  “I’m not jealous, and I’m done talking about her. Instead, let’s talk about what’s really going on—your big secret. It’s Theodore, isn’t it? You like him, don’t you?”

  “Teddy? Are you serious? You need to stop overdosing on black licorice.”

  One long piece hung out of her mouth, and she had five more in her hand.

  “We’re friends. That’s it. Period. Case closed. Don’t go there again.”

  “Okay, got it, dang. But there’s something…”

  “Isn’t he with Georgina?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Well, they exchanged numbers. He told me.”

  “Sheesh, he talks too much. Why did he tell you that?”

  “Because that’s what friends do.” My voice trailed off. That’s what friends do, I’d said. Now I felt worse. Friends don’t keep secrets.

  “What’s wrong? Was that the secret?” asked Chana.

  I went back and forth in my head. Tell her-don’t tell her-tell her-she’s your best friend-you’re nuts, don’t tell her-she’ll believe you-tell her...

  We sat facing each other with our legs folded under us. “Okay, this conversation stays right here. I mean you can’t tell anyone at all.”

  “When have I ever? This must be good. Spill…”

  I took a deep breath, started to tell her what happened at the hospital, opened my mouth, and what came out was, “Do you believe in…”

  Chana leaned in toward me, her hand stopped in midair, her mouth open from where she was about to stuff popcorn in with the black licorice. “What? Do I believe in what? Stop stalling.”

  “Aliens?”

  “Aliens? Well...” she said after throwing popcorn in her mouth. “...I believe there is probably life on other planets. I mean, why should we be the only creatures on a planet?”

  “Do you believe in vampires?”

  “Sometimes I wonder, you know, because of all the movies.” She laid back against a pillow and looked up at the ceiling at a distant place only she could see. “Or maybe I wish one would fall in love with me like in the movies.”

  “You’re goofy. That’s like you looking at your licorice and saying, ‘I love you, marry me.’ In real life, they wouldn’t fall in love with their food.”

  “Wow, you really think about that kind of stuff? Was that it?”

  “No.” I was embarrassed to actually say it. “What about…Werewolves, shapeshifters, mermaids, Atlantis, elves, fairies?”

  “No, no, no, maybe, no, and I wish. Your brain has sure been overactive. I think all this monster talk is a cry for help. I’m calling your mom.” She reached for her cellphone and I snatched it away from her. “You need an intervention,” Chana continued. “You’ve got serious issues. I’m just saying.”

  She climbed off her giant floor pillow, took a step forward and stopped as if she’d hit a brick wall. and stood facing the door. Her body stiffened, as if she’d been turned into stone.

  “Chana, what’s wrong?” I asked, but she didn’t respond. I walked around her facing her. Her eyes were focused in front of her and downward like I wasn’t there.

  I grabbed her arms. “Chana!”

  She wasn’t breathing. Black goo ran from her mouth and down onto her chin.

  I almost shrieked. My best friend had just turned into a zombie! I shook her, thinking I could snap her out of it.

  The dribble flowing from her mouth caused her to lose her deathly stare. She looked at me with an empty I-don’t-know-who-you-are kind of expression.

  Slowly, she began to grin.

  I punched her arm. “You make me sick!”

  Chana flinched and laughed while wiping the liquified licorice from her face. “You started it with all your monster talk. I’m still telling your mom.”

  “Believe me, she already knows,” I replied, following her downstairs to the kitchen.

  Chana opened the refrigerator, handed me a couple cans of pop, and pulled out a tray of candied yam cupcakes.

  “We’re OD’ing on sugar tonight? Is that the plan?”

  “That’s always the plan,” she laughed. “Besides, my mom bought all this food and will just be so upset if we eat it all in one night. I can’t take that away from her. But listen, you’re always in the library, did you read something that made you think that stuff exists?” She sounded excited. Maybe it was the sugar rush.

  “No, I just wondered what other people think about that stuff.”

  We grabbed the cold leftover pizza, ice cream, pretzels, and mini candy bars and tiptoed back to Chana’s room in our footed pajamas, looking like two giant toddlers that just robbed a convenience store. Chana held a finger to her lips for us to be quiet as we passed her parents' room.

  Once we were on her bedroom floor under our makeshift tent again, I laid back, looking up through the sheer fabric at the twinkle lights, and asked, “What about angels?”

  “What about them?”

  “Do you believe in angels?”

  “Heck no,” Chana replied while biting into a slice of cold pepperoni pizza.

  “No?” I leaned up on my elbow. “How could you not believe in angels? I would believe in angels before all that other stuff.”

  “If there were angels walking around, don’t you think they would do something to help people? Like with that boy that was in the news that disappeared from Norton Shores a few weeks ago, or like your dad’s accident. And you’d think someone would see an angel at some point, and—Sheena? What’s wrong? Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “I did. I mean I, uh…I think I saw one.”

  8

  “T

  here’s no way you saw an angel!” Chana yelled, almost choking on her pizza crust.

  “Shh… I did.”

  “Where?”

  “At the hospital.”

  “When your dad was there?”

  I nodded. “Yes, two weeks, one hour, and twenty minutes ago.”

  “Punk!” She exclaimed as she punched me.

  “Ow!”

  “It’s been over two weeks? Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I haven’t told anyone. I didn’t want anyone to think I was crazy.”

  “I’m not just anyone. What did you see? I mean, what did it do?”

  “I think it helped heal my dad. He’s already home from the hospital. That shouldn’t even be possible this soon.”

  “You better not be playing with me right now.”

  “No, I'm serious.”

  “Swear.”

  “You know I don’t swear.”

  “Okay, whatever, just calm down and tell me everything.”

  “Calm down? You’re the one all worked up.” I laughed.

  “Well, why aren’t you?”

  “It was two weeks ago. Things tend to be less dramatic as time passes.”

  I told Chana about the sighting and about the old man. She listened intently, as if I was a hobbit telling the story of my latest adventure.

  And after the whole crazy story, she sat up straight, picked up the pint of ice cream we’d brought to the room, and said, “Sounds like an alien encounter to me,” as if even an alien encounter happened every day.

  “I don’t think so. Yes, a celestial being, but…Something from beyond the stars.”

  “Celestial…Good word. But an angel? Really?”

  “I’ve been researching angels ever since.”

  Chana looked around the room like she was trying to figure something out. “He said you glowed, the old man? Maybe he was seeing things. If it’s true, that would’ve been cool to see.”

  “I thi
nk he was the only one that could see a glow. He’s the only one that mentioned it. Oh, and he said we’re, meaning him and me, the last.”

  “The last what?”

  “I don’t know. That’s why I looked for him at the hospital the next day. I thought maybe I could find out if he was, you know, delusional, or if he could tell me more.”

  “What if he’s not delusional? Are you?”

  “Of course not.”

  "Are you on drugs?"

  “No! Why would I be on drugs?”

  “Hallucinating?”

  “No.”

  “Schizoid?"

  “No.”

  “That means you saw what you saw. You’re certain, right?”

  “Yes. I mean I saw something.”

  “Then we need to find Mr. Tobias…From what he said, that wasn’t the first occurrence. We need to find out what he knows.”

  “We? What do you mean, we?”

  “Since when do I let you go through things alone? This is a miracle.”

  “You really believe me?”

  “Why wouldn’t I? You’re a little loco, chica,” she said with a Spanish accent. “But you’ve never lied to me—to your parents maybe, but not to me. Plus, you’re not the only one that saw it.”

  She turned toward the flat round object on her desk. “Alexa, where are the angels?”

  “The Angels are based in Anaheim, California.”

  We both fell back laughing. “Wait, it is talking about the baseball team, right?”

  As usual, Chana always ran her mouth about how she’s going to stay up all night, crawl onto the roof from the attic window, and watch the sun come up. Not that night. Not any night. She never makes it. Even after what I’d told her, she fell asleep in the middle of the movie we were watching.

  The film was about an angel that decided to become human because he fell in love with a girl. Then she died. Moral of the story, life sucks sometimes.

  I turned off the television and laid back on my pillows, watching drops of rain hit the windows. Hearing the rain made me think of my willow tree at home, but I don’t know why.

  I pictured the branches blowing in the wind, and then I started to remember something, but lighting struck outside Chana’s window.

  I sprung up.

  There was no thunder, but the lighting was getting closer. I could tell because the flash outside the window was growing as if it were heading for the house.

  “Chana!” I kicked at her leg. I needed her to see this too, then I’d know I wasn’t going crazy.

  “Murphin puff,” she mumbled in her sleep. Who knows what that meant.

  “Chana!”

  “Snop gerume.”

  She made no sense at all. Some help she was.

  Another flash.

  My head jerked toward the window. I couldn’t turn away. I felt like it held me captive. The light started below the window and rose higher, getting brighter as it approached.

  No, I don’t want this. I don’t want this! I yelled in my head as I squeezed my eyes shut. Missed opportunity, I heard in my head. That’s what I had told my mom. Who cares? I didn’t want to see whatever it was.

  The room was very still. My heart beat like I’d just run a marathon. I opened my eyes. The only light shone from the twinkle lights overhead.

  Footsteps came from down the hall and stopped outside the door. I pulled a blanket up to my eyes, waiting for whatever was coming.

  The door creaked open. My heart pounded wildly.

  “Are you okay?”

  It was Chana’s dad.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Did I wake you?”

  I shook my head.

  “I just got home. Chana threatened to stay up all night. I’m just checking to see if she made good on that. I see she didn’t make it.”

  “She never does.”

  “I know. Goodnight.”

  The door closed.

  I sunk back into my pillow, feeling so foolish. The light I saw must of come from her dad driving his patrol car up the long drive to the garage behind the house.

  Whew, I was glad Chana hadn’t wakened for that. She wouldn’t be able to hold a straight face when she looked at me for the rest of the month.

  Sleep, where are you, I sang in my head. Why couldn’t we have a switch on the side of our heads to shut down our brains when we needed to? I envied Chana being able to fall asleep so easily.

  I have a habit of shaking my legs when I’m sitting or lying down. My teachers don’t like it. My mom makes me stop at the dinner table by placing a hand over my knee, which makes me realize I’m doing it. Now I lay shaking my leg but didn’t realize it until I suddenly stopped. I had a feeling someone was near me, near my feet. My eyes were closed, but I hadn’t heard anyone enter the room. Had Chana’s dad come in to check on her again?

  The hair on my arms stood on end.

  I could hear Chana’s deep, heavy breathing on my left. I slowly opened my eyes.

  Six figures stood in an arc around me and Chana. They were all the same height, but I couldn’t make out what they were—just dark figures. They didn’t move.

  I lifted my head as I looked around and caught a reflection of myself in the mirrored legs of Chana’s vanity table. Circles of fire swirled on my forehead. I gasped and brought my hand up to my head, touching one of the circles. It transformed into writing—more like symbols. I couldn’t understand its meaning, but it quickly transformed into an image. Two women embraced each other, frightened. Then it disappeared.

  I touched another circle, and it, too, went from symbols to an image, and then the third. I didn’t get to touch all the circles before they disappeared.

  One of the figures moved toward me and grabbed me.

  I screamed.

  “Sheena! Sheena!” Chana yelled while holding me in the same place the dark figure had grabbed me.

  “Huh?”

  “You were making crazy sounds in your sleep.”

  I looked around the room. The light was on, and there was no one there but me and Chana. “Crazier than yours?” I replied with a scratchy voice.

  “Whatever. You always say I snore. I don’t. Did you have a bad dream?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t remember,” I lied. I didn’t want to lie to her. I just wanted to process what I dreamed before I discussed it.

  I didn’t want to go back to sleep. I stared at the ceiling, remembering every single thing about the dream. But sleep eventually overtook me. I awoke with my stomach feeling like someone threw darts from the inside toward my navel.

  DING!

  “What’s that sound?” I groaned. We were still on Chana’s floor.

  “Your tablet.”

  I licked my lip. “Wah! What is that? It burns. What’s on my lip?”

  “Wasabi.”

  “Sheesh, grow up.” It was like the spice opened every pore in my face and bore a hole through my nostrils.

  “Breakfast!” Chana’s mom called over the intercom.

  “No, no breakfast. I can’t eat. My stomach feels like a junk food trash heap.” I opened one eye. “What are you doing?”

  “Oh, just watching you sleep with your mouth open.”

  “No, I wasn’t.”

  “Did you know we swallow like a thousand spiders in our lifetime? Do you ever wake up feeling like there’s a hair in your throat? That was probably a spider.”

  I threw a pillow at her head. “It’s too early for this.”

  “It’s not too early for a toothbrush.”

  “Haha, you need one just as much as I do. Your breath smells like hot toe jam.”

  Chana laughed. “That’s gross. How do you know what that smells like?”

  I sat up and removed my satin cap from my head, releasing my curls as I shook my hand through them. How they fell was how they would stay. I didn’t feel like doing anything further to my hair.

  “What are you typing? Homework?”

  “Nope, not homework. I think I found your Mr
. Tobias.”

  “No, you didn’t,” I exclaimed as I maneuvered next to her and squinted at the laptop screen.

  “Yes, I did. I think. I tried those apps where you enter a person’s name and it gives you info on them, but they would only tell me a Tobias family lives in the city. I would have to register for an account and pay to find out more. Then, being the genius that I am, this morning, look what I did…”

  She held her phone up.

  “I texted everyone I know asking if a Mr. Tobias lives on their street.”

  “I don’t understand. Why would you do that?”

  “Most people are all neighborly, so they know just about everyone on the block. I mean, we have block garage sales and parties. Don’t you know the names of most of the families on your block?”

  “Well, yeah, I guess. And, you do know everybody.”

  “That’s right, and guess whose street he lives on?”

  “Whose?”

  “Your boyfriend, Theodore’s. We can ride our bikes over there.”

  “I can’t believe you found him!”

  I rolled over to my backpack, hearing my tablet ding again. “Teddy is not my boyfriend,” I said with an eye-roll, and opened my tablet. I figured since my phone was dead and my texts were coming to my tablet, it was probably just my mom.

  “Chana...” I called, my voice high pitched and soft. I pushed the tablet away.

  “What’s wrong? Give me that.” Chana snatched the tablet from my lap. “What the heck is going—” She fell silent as she read. “Nooooooo…”

  “You see it too, right?”

  “Is this a joke?”

  “It can’t be. Remember, no one knows about this, but you…The angel texted me.”

  9

  “I

  just got chills. There’s no way this is happening,” said Chana.

  She read the message aloud. “'Hello, Gleamer. Do not be afraid. You are chosen. If you lose your life, you will find it. Your guide is coming.'”

  “Chana, it’s going to take me! I’m going to be abducted!”

  “Mom!” Chana yelled.