by Steven James
Honestly, however, it wasn’t those kinds of dreams that were on his mind as much as the hope that he would be able to move past Emily’s death without anything else mysterious or unexplainable happening to him. “Lately, I’ve been having a hard time . . . well, focusing. You know, like my thoughts are getting away from me.”
“Getting away from you?”
“Wandering out of formation. But that’s not a dream, so much, it’s more of—”
Kyle tapped a finger against the air. “Keep that. It’s a good image. Thoughts wandering out of formation. I like that. Write it down.”
Daniel made a note of it.
“So, you’ve got this deal going on with your thoughts wandering out of formation—maybe flying out of formation, something along those lines. Who knows. Any other impressions about what’s happening—something to do with flight?”
“Vultures.”
“Vultures?”
“Yeah, picking them clean.”
“Picking your thoughts clean?”
“Picking clean the carcass of my dreams.” The words just came out.
Kyle stared at him oddly. “You just come up with that?”
“I guess so.”
Where did that even come from? What’s going on with you?
“Write that down, bro. You’re on your way.”
It went like that for the next fifteen minutes—Daniel throwing ideas out, Kyle helping him sort through them. It reminded him a little of how he helped Kyle sometimes with calculus—not giving him the answers, but reviewing the equations so he could find the answers himself.
At last, Kyle said, “Read me what you have so far. I want to see where this thing’s at.”
“Give me a sec.” Daniel drew lines across the page from one idea to another, marked off the phrases he definitely did not want to use, wrote a few transitions, then read,
The boy remembered a time not long ago, when he was in control of his thoughts, when they lined up where he asked them to, with only the usual flutter of spontaneity, with the stray ideas wandering into and out of formation like they’re apt to do.
Back then, like most people, he was able to pull them together, keep them in order, and there was a comfort to that, a sense of saneness and rightness.
“Why’s it in third person?” Kyle asked.
“I don’t know, exactly. It just came out that way.”
“Works for me. Go on.”
But now he sees them, like birds in flight, and they wing into the spaces beyond his understanding. And sometimes vultures land in their place.
Vultures.
Dark birds that feed on the flesh of his dead dreams. Picking them clean until only the bones remain.
White bones, clean in the sun. Bones where his carefully ordered thoughts used to live.
Kyle stared at him. “I’ve never seen you write anything like that before.”
I never have.
“Well, I’m definitely not reading this one in front of everyone. People would think I’m going nuts. I mean, dead dreams being eaten by vultures? That’s pretty depressing. And besides, it’s not really about what I hope to accomplish before I die.”
“I don’t think Teach will have any problem accepting that. It’s implied that you want the vultures to go away. She’ll dig it.” He tossed Daniel the football. “And besides, I know one of your dreams, even if it’s one you don’t want to write about.”
“What’s that?” He tossed the football back.
Kyle went over to the desk, picked up Daniel’s cell phone, and handed it to him.
“What’s this for?”
“Calling Stacy.”
“No, listen, even if I wanted to call her, I—”
“Which you do.”
“Okay, yes, which I do—but I told you, I don’t have her number.”
Kyle pulled out his own phone and before Daniel could stop him, he’d speed-dialed Mia.
Daniel just shook his head and listened to one side of the conversation. “Yeah, no . . .” Kyle said. “I know . . . . Hang on.” He asked Daniel for Stacy’s last name.
“Clern.”
“Clern,” he told Mia. “I don’t know . . . . Seriously? Cool. Okay.”
End call.
“What did she say?” Daniel asked.
“She doesn’t know her, but she’s gonna ask around.” Kyle put his phone away. “So, dead end number one, but that just makes it all the more interesting. I’ll go to Facebook. You Google her, like we were talking about before. Let’s see if we can pull up some way to contact her.”
“I don’t really want to—”
“Of course you do.” Kyle already had his laptop open. “You’re just scared.”
“I’m not scared.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I’m just . . . slightly apprehensive.”
“Which qualifies as scared.” He typed. It took him only a few seconds to do the search. “Huh. Nothing’s really coming up. Tons of Stacys, but nothing for her specifically. You?”
Daniel finished tapping at his keyboard. “No.”
“Do you know where she moved from? Her name could still be under some previous town or school or something, you know, in their class rosters.”
Daniel shook his head. “I’m not sure where she’s from. I’ve . . . well, I’ve never actually talked to her.”
Kyle blinked. “You’ve never actually talked to her.”
“Not exactly, but I’ve come close a few times.”
“Oh, you are seriously snargled over this girl.”
“Snargled?”
“Needed a word, couldn’t think of one, made one up.” Kyle gave his attention to his computer. “Well, still, I’d have to say this is weird. I just can’t believe she doesn’t have a Facebook page.”
“It’s not that unusual. A lot of kids are moving off it, you know, because their parents and grandparents are on it.”
“Sure, I get that.”
“Maybe something happened to her at another school—something she doesn’t want the kids at her new school to know about—and she closed it down. It happens.”
“You mean maybe she was embarrassed about something or hurt somehow?”
“Yeah.”
“Or maybe she had something to hide.”
Daniel eyed him. “What would she have to hide?”
“I don’t know. Just throwing it out there.”
Neither of them seemed to know where to take things from there.
Finally, Kyle dug out his U.S. History book. “Man, to do well on this test, I’m gonna have to dust off a part of my brain I haven’t used in a while.”
“Well, let’s start dusting.”
They spent the next hour poring over the chapter summaries and review questions.
Sometimes when Daniel studied with people, it was more just hangout time than anything else, but, despite the fact that Kyle acted like school wasn’t a big deal to him, he took studying seriously, and Daniel could always be sure to get more done with him than with any of his other friends.
The whole time they were reviewing the material, Daniel was wondering if he should bring up anything about what he’d seen at the funeral, or about the weird mark that’d appeared on his arm.
He’d already told Kyle that vultures were picking away at his dead dreams, but the stuff concerning Emily was on a whole different level.
In the end, he decided he didn’t want his best friend to think he was losing it, and kept everything to himself.
Maybe, when the time was right, he’d tell him what was going on, but right now the time did not feel right.
When they’d finished studying, they got some chips and salsa, so Kyle’s mouth was full when he said, “So that was pretty wild, huh, that Ty was picking on Emily’s brother today?�
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“Knowing Ty, it doesn’t surprise me.” Daniel was still curious about what Ty had been referring to when he said he’d heard about Kyle and Emily, but after seeing Kyle’s reaction to his questions earlier about it, he knew better than to bring that up.
Kyle swallowed, then used a mutantly large chip to snag a heaping dollop of salsa.
“That’s a lot of salsa.”
“I’m occasionally prone to excess.”
“Really.”
“I’ve had my moments. Hey, I heard they did go through her locker, you know, like we were talking about at school.”
“Who went through her locker?”
“I don’t know, the school administrators maybe. Or her parents. Or the cops. But supposedly they found a notebook in there that she’d been writing in on the day she died. Could have been the last words she ever wrote. You never know.” He devoured the salsa-laden chip. “Makes you think.”
Given what’d happened the last couple days, Daniel was more than a little curious about what was in that notebook.
Kyle checked the time. “Listen, I gotta fly or my mom’ll kill me.” He gathered his things. “I’ll catch up with you tomorrow.”
“Sure. Yeah.”
After Kyle left, Daniel stood at the window and watched him drive away.
Partly he wished that he’d told him about Emily rising in her casket and grabbing his arm and leaving her handprint behind, but partly he thought that was something he should keep to himself.
For now.
Probably forever.
As long as nothing else like that happened again, he would be alright. Life would go on and eventually he would be able to make sense of it all.
And that’s what he tried to do as he lay down to sleep.
But even if it wasn’t her ghost that had grabbed his arm, he still couldn’t understand how he’d known Emily’s dog was named Trevor.
CHAPTER
ELEVEN
Thursday.
Time whipped by.
The history test seemed to go alright.
Then government. Spanish. Study hall. AP Calculus.
He saw Nicole around, talked to her a little, just in a passing-someone-in-the-halls, how-are-you-doing? sort of way. But he couldn’t help but think of what Kyle had told him about her, that she didn’t have a date for Saturday’s dance. That she liked him.
Since there was a game tomorrow, football practice was pretty light. At least it went better tonight—the guys were more in sync than they’d been the night before, and things were clicking.
Daniel was a little slow getting out of the locker room afterward and was one of the last guys to head to the parking lot.
He was nearly to his car when he saw Stacy emerge from the edge of the woods.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey.”
She hugged her books to her chest. “I don’t know if we ever officially met. I’m Stacy.”
She was waiting for you. She wanted to talk to you!
“I’m Baniel Dyers—Daniel. I’m Daniel Byers.”
Oh, you are such an idiot!
A glimmer of a smile. “I know who you are.”
“I know you too.”
“Really?”
“Uh-huh.”
“How?”
“I’ve seen you around.”
“Oh.”
A long pause.
“So.”
“So,” he replied lamely. “Well, it’s good to meet you. Officially.”
“Good to meet you too.” He had the sense that she would reach out to shake his hand, but instead she stared down at the ground between them for a moment, then back at him. “You played good against Spring Hill.”
“You were there?”
A slight eye roll. “Of course I was there.”
“Not everyone comes to the games.”
“I do.”
“Me too.”
Dude, that was the stupidest thing ever to say!
“Of course you do,” she said lightly.
He felt like he wanted to hide somewhere—anywhere—but when she spoke again she just did so matter-of-factly and not the least bit in a way to make him feel more put on the spot. “Um, I just wanted to wish you luck on the game. I mean, the one tomorrow night.”
“Thanks.”
She waited.
Ask her to the dance on Saturday—at least get her number.
“Um . . .” He repositioned his feet. “Say, I was wondering . . .”
“Yes?”
“About the game.”
No, not the game, the dance—
“Yes?”
He took a deep breath. “So, I was . . .”
Go on!
“Um . . . So maybe I’ll see you there. At the game.”
“Oh. Sure. So, good luck,” she repeated.
“Right.”
Ask her for her number.
But he didn’t.
And then she was saying good-bye and he was fumbling out a reply. “See you around, Stacy.”
“See you around, Baniel,” she replied good-naturedly.
As she stepped away he opened his mouth to call her back, but nothing came out.
And then she was gone.
But at least he’d talked to her.
You can’t be expected to ask a girl out or get her number the first time you officially meet her, can you?
Um, yeah.
He climbed into his car and leaned his forehead against the steering wheel.
Man, you sounded like a moron!
Well, talk to her tomorrow. You can still ask her.
The dance was Saturday night, but at least that gave him one more day.
Before starting the car, he saw a text from Kyle asking what he was up to tonight, and he texted back that he was going to be at home finishing up his homework and then head to bed early to get a good night’s sleep before game day.
He didn’t bring up anything about the conversation with Stacy. It would have only made him more embarrassed if Kyle knew how he’d failed to sound like even a halfway intelligent human being talking with her.
Imagine that. Daniel Byers not knowing how to talk to a girl.
What else is new?
That night back in his bedroom, it took him a while to write his second blog entry, the one he was going to have to read in front of Teach’s class tomorrow.
Without Kyle there to help him, he felt like a guy stuck on a boat in the middle of the ocean with no idea which direction to row toward land.
Eventually he got something out, this time about hoping to send the vultures away, but it wasn’t nearly as good as if he’d had Kyle brainstorming with him.
Then he went to bed, but his thoughts of Stacy kept him awake.
Talk to her tomorrow at school, or at least before the game.
But he also found that, just before falling asleep, his thoughts were drifting toward Nicole as well.
CHAPTER
TWELVE
The next day before class, he kept an eye out for Stacy but glimpsed her for only a moment in a crowd at the end of the hall. In English, when he saw Nicole taking a seat, he felt conflicted. Truthfully, he was interested in them both, but in different ways.
He’d known Nicole since fifth grade, so there was this history they had together, but Stacy was new, so there was a mysterious, alluring air about her that he found intriguing.
A few days ago if you would have asked him, he would’ve said he was sure he wanted to go with Stacy—that is until Kyle told him that Nicole liked him. That, along with the fact that Stacy had waited around after school to meet him, just made everything more confusing.
Miss Flynn got things rolling and began calling on students to get up and read their
blog assignments about dreams and death.
When it was Nicole’s turn, she said to Miss Flynn, “I wrote mine as a prayer.”
“A prayer?”
“Yes.”
Of course, they were at a public school, a place where it was okay to utter God’s name as a swear word but not in a prayer—something that even Daniel, who wasn’t overly religious, found ridiculous.
“Well.” Miss Flynn sounded vaguely uncomfortable. “Go ahead. Let’s hear it.”
Nicole read:
God, I thought I should probably let you know that a demon showed up at my doorstep yesterday. He was returning my shadow-clothes. I must have left them at his place when I stopped by for a visit last week, and he was just being kind enough to return them.
So, to make sure they hadn’t shrunk, I tried them on and found that they fit just as snugly as ever.
I’m telling you this because I noticed the outfit you set out for me on my bed. And I’m curious, are you trying to get me to revamp my wardrobe?
Truth is, I’m pretty comfortable with the clothes I already have.
Just let me know what you’re up to and then I can decide whether or not to try on those glowing clothes waiting for me in my room.
When she finished, there was a long stretch of silence before Miss Flynn finally asked, “And how is that your dream, Nicole?”
“My dream is to be wearing the right outfit when it matters most.”
“When you die.”
“Yes.”
Everyone stared at Miss Flynn to gauge her reaction. “I think that’s the most admirable dream of all,” she said at last. Then she went on to the next person.
And the next.
Right around the room.
Daniel wasn’t excited about the second blog entry of his, but he didn’t want to read the first one either, so the closer it came to his turn, the more unsure he became about which one would be the best to read.
Brad Talbot read his, the briefest one so far: “I dream of being rich and famous.”
Miss Flynn waited. “And?”
“That’s it.”
“Well, thank you for not wasting our time with unnecessary verbiage.”