Michael put his arm around me.
“Chilly?” he inquired, drawing me closer.
I shook my head. “Maybe just a bit. But it’s lovely.” I smiled up at him. “All of it—just perfect.”
“It wouldn’t be if you weren’t here.” He tipped my chin up again with the tip of his finger and brushed my lips softly with his.
“Where else would I be?” I teased, snuggling closer so that the buttons of his sports coat bit into the bare skin of my shoulder. “Homecoming is the biggest event of the fall, right?”
He shrugged. “It’s only a big deal for me because you’re here. I’m so glad I could show you everything. Feels like I’ve been waiting years to share it all with you.”
“I’ve had so much fun.” It was the truth; being here, away from King and Marica, made it so much easier to be with Michael. I could pretend that my other life was nothing more than a dream; this was reality.
Abruptly I felt a change in the air, and I began picking up an odd kind of... static. I frowned and shook my head slightly, trying to clear my inner ear.
“Michael? Oh, I thought that was you!” The young woman who approached us was an absolutely breathtaking vision. Her blonde hair was nearly white, piled atop her head in a calculated mess. The deep blue gown she wore set off her eyes, which were almost indigo. The smile that stretched her perfect lips didn’t quite reach those eyes, even though she never glanced away from Michael.
“Hey, Cathryn,” he greeted her. “How’re you doing?” He turned me neatly, keeping his arm firmly about my shoulders. “This is Tasmyn Vaughn.”
“Of course it is.” Cathryn extended her hand. “How nice to meet you. I think Michael might have mentioned you once or twice.” She slanted a quick look sideways at him and then laughed. “I’m only teasing. He talks about you all the time.”
“Cathryn—sorry, Cathryn Whitmore--is the TA for my advanced botany class,” Michael explained as I shook her hand. “She’s a senior here.”
“Where do you go to school, Tasmyn?” Cathryn asked. Only the hint of a challenge in her voice revealed that she already knew the answer.
“I’m still in high school, back in King,” I answered with as much dignity as I could muster. “I’m a senior.”
“Oh, yes, that’s right.” I couldn’t decide which unnerved me more: her smooth beauty or the fact that I couldn’t hear her at all—only that odd crackling noise. I tried to focus a little more, as Marica had been teaching me, but the white noise only grew louder.
Cathryn tilted her head, and I registered a slight flare of surprise in those amazing eyes. Her gaze slid off to the side for a moment, as though she were listening to something. A chill ran down my neck. I was certain that I had worn that expression myself more than once as I had tuned into the thoughts around me.
Michael was looking from Cathryn to me, a small frown playing around his eyes.
“It was good to see you, Cathryn. Tas is a little chilly, so we’re going to head back in and grab something to eat. See you later.” He deftly steered me around her, and we were nearly to the glass doors before I realized that she had neither replied nor moved.
“What was that all about?” Michael demanded once we were back at our small round table.
“What do you mean?” I wanted to know what he had picked up before I said anything.
“She looked at you like—I don’t know, there was just a really odd moment back there. It was almost like you two were talking—but not out loud.”
I sighed heavily. “Not me. I couldn’t even hear anything from her. What’s her story?”
Michael shrugged. “I told you pretty much all I know about her. She’s a senior, botany major, comes from somewhere up north, I think. We’ve talked a few times waiting for class to start. Nothing big. You really couldn’t hear her?”
“No. It always makes me a little uneasy when I don’t get anything from someone.”
“Is it like a black hole? Just a void?” he asked, teasing me a little.
“Sometimes, but not with her. It was like some kind of interference. Really weird.” I shook my head.
Michael took my hand and brought it to his lips. “Forget about it. You never have to see her again. By the time you get up here next year, she’ll have graduated and gone.”
I smiled into his eyes, sinking into the depth of his love. I could feel his longing, and it echoed my own.
With a quick mischievous wink my only warning, Michael scooped me out of the chair and into his lap. “I don’t want to let you out of my arms for even a minute,” he murmured against my lips before kissing me senseless. All thoughts of the mysterious Cathryn were gone, and I was wholly consumed in him.
When we came up for air, I let my head loll against his shoulder, reveling in the intimacy of body and mind. I could hear his every thought, every small sweet murmuring.
“Is this what it’ll be like when I’m up here with you?” I whispered.
He chuckled and tightened his hold on me. “Of course. All the time.”
I laughed, too. “I’ll flunk out then. Hard to do homework or go to class when I don’t want to be even an inch away from you.”
Michael lowered his head and rested his forehead against mine. His smile faded as his eyes bored into me.
“I love you, Tasmyn. Being away from you—it’s like missing a part of my body. I’m only whole when we’re together.”
As always, he robbed me of breath. My heart pounded, and I couldn’t tear my gaze from his.
Instead I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled his lips back to mine.
**Smashwords edition**
Restless
Copyright © 2012 Tawdra Kandle
Published by Hayson Publishing
St. Augustine, Florida
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
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When I was eight years old, my parents took me to a magic show. I remember it very clearly, because it was so unusual for us to do something like that. I think it was a sort of bribe; we had just moved again, the third time in two years, and I was feeling very lonely. We were living in Virginia, in a suburb of Washington, D.C., and the show was at a local theater.
Within a few minutes, I was thoroughly bored. The magician was plodding and methodical, and he thought through each trick as he did it...which meant that I knew very easily how it was accomplished. I could hear him plan his moves, and I watched his hands, saw the cards slip deftly between his fingers.
About midway through the show, the magician announced that he needed a volunteer from the audience for his next trick. Immediately a ripple ran through the crowd, as people murmured in anticipation. The magician cast his eyes over all of us, and although I had dropped my gaze to the ground, I knew the moment he had decided to choose me.
Cute kid. The audience will eat her up.
Alarmed, I looked over at my smiling parents as the magician’s assistant appeared next to me and took me by the hand. I tried to prote
st, dragging my feet, but somehow I found myself on the stage, blinking in the bright lights.
“So, little lady.” The magician looked me up and down. I felt the sense of resignation and boredom beneath the thin veneer of jollity. He wasn’t having any more fun than I was. I managed a weak smile.
“Would you like to tell everyone your name?” The assistant held a microphone below my chin and suddenly I could hear my own breath, echoing around the theatre.
“Tasmyn,” I answered, and my voice sounded thin and high.
“That’s a very unique name. Are you a unique little girl?” He smirked at me.
You have no idea, I thought.
“Okay, let’s do some magic, shall we?” The magician rubbed his hands together. “Can you guess what sort of prestidigitation we’re going to perform next?”
It was a rhetorical question, but I didn’t hear that. Instead I listened carefully to what he was thinking.
“Yes! You’re going to make me hold a bunch of little sponge ducks, and then they’ll jump from one hand to the other, and then they’ll all disappear.”
Surprise flickered across the magician’s face, but he covered it with a laugh. “Oh, so you’ve seen this show before, haven’t you? Hear that, folks? Seems like I have a real live groupie here, a big fan!”
I shook my head, but he ignored me. I could hear him running through his repertoire of volunteer-involving tricks, trying to decide which one he should use now.
In the end, he performed a simple sleight of hand card trick that I very nearly ruined by hearing each step before he did it.
After the show, as my wary parents tried to hustle me out of the theatre, the magician stopped us.
“That was quite a trick you performed up there, little lady. How many times have you seen this show?”
I replied before my parents could intercede. “I’ve never seen it. We just moved here.”
He looked at me suspiciously. “Then how did you know all that up on stage?”
For just a moment I was at a loss. Then I heard the pleading thoughts in my father’s head, and I met the magician’s eyes in a steady gaze.
“I guess it was magic.”
The magician snorted and rolled his eyes. He looked down at me in pitying condescension.
“Kid, don’t you know there’s no such thing as magic?”
I was miserable.
I should have been supremely happy. It was Christmas in Florida, and just chilly enough to be seasonal, although of course there wasn’t any snow on the ground and the sun shone brightly through the rustling palm fronds. King High School, where I was a senior, was closed for the holiday, and our teachers had mercifully assigned nothing over the break.
Best of all, Michael was home. His classes had ended in early December, and I’d had him to myself for two weeks already. He would return to Perriman College after the new year began, but that was still two more weeks away. It was a slow time at the nursery that his family owned—and where I worked part time—so we had hours of uninterrupted time to walk, talk...to be together.
And I was miserable.
Oh, I did a good job of hiding it. When I was with Michael, I was the epitome of the perfect girlfriend. We laughed and talked about silly, inconsequential things. Part of me was simply resting in the peace of being with him.
But another part of me was constantly distracted. I wondered what Marica was doing, and I itched to stretch my newfound muscles of power and concentration. I was torn in two pieces: the old Tasmyn who only really lived when Michael was near, and this new and foreign Tasmyn who was somehow able to manage a double life. I floundered between the two halves, unable to find peace with either one.
My former chemistry teacher and current mentor, Marica Lacusta, had suggested this break during the Christmas holidays. She knew that with Michael home, I would have very little opportunity to spend time working with her. At first, I had been relieved, as I had been wondering how I would manage to explain huge chunks of missing time to Michael. But now I was restless, unable to stop thinking about her.
“Where are you?’ As if sensing my preoccupation, Michael reached over and squeezed my shoulder. “Earth to Tasmyn...”
I forced a smile and shook my head to clear it. “Sorry. Just...I don’t know. A thousand miles away.”
“Can I come along?” His face was close to mine, lips hovering inches from my ear.
“Of course. Actually, I was thinking about—college. Next year,” I lied and that old Tasmyn was appalled. I never lied to Michael. Keeping secrets from him as I’d been forced to do earlier this fall had almost crushed me. Yet now I was smoothly telling him total fabrications without blinking.
We were sitting in the swing on the deck at his parents’ house, enjoying the warmth of the sunshine and the cool of the late afternoon air. Michael had his arm draped around my shoulders as we lazily moved the swing back and forth.
He brushed hair away from my face with his free hand. “You aren’t worried, are you? I think you’re going to love Perriman.”
“No, not really. I liked what I saw last month, and I think it’ll be a good fit for me academically.”
“Then what? You have that frown, that crinkled brow. I know something’s bothering you.”
I shrugged. “It’s just change. The unknown, I guess.”
Here we go again. Something’s wrong. She’s shutting me out and...now I bet she’s hearing me.
I averted my eyes so that he couldn’t read the pain there. It was almost impossible for me to avoid hearing Michael’s thoughts. Somehow my connection to him was stronger than to anyone else I’d ever met. Even Marica...when she lowered her guard and allowed me to hear her, I still had to make a concerted effort to listen carefully. With Michael, it was as though his thoughts were my own.
“Hey.” He pulled away and sat up, tipping my chin up with his fingers so that I couldn’t hide my eyes. “What’s going on? I know you just heard me.”
“I’m sorry,” I apologized and hated that I had to do it.
“What are your sorry for? For shutting me out, or for hearing me think about it?”
I leaned away, scooting to the other corner of the swing. “Both, I guess.”
Michael dropped his hand away from my face and sighed. “You know you don’t have to worry about hearing me. I’m used to it. I expect it. But you have to understand how frustrating it is that you don’t have to guess what’s going on in my mind while I don’t have that same advantage.”
“I tell you everything,” I protested feebly and—to my own ears, at least—somewhat unconvincingly.
“Maybe you do, most of the time,” Michael allowed. “But sometimes I think—I worry—that you justify hiding things because you think you’re protecting me. Like you did with your parents, when you first moved here and everything was happening with Nell. Like you did with me, this past fall.”
“I can’t believe you’re bringing that up again!” Close to tears, I jumped up and stalked across the deck to the railing. “I thought we were over that.”
“It never really crossed my mind again until these past few days, when you’ve felt so...distant. So removed from me. It makes me wonder what I don’t know this time.”
“So you’re saying you can’t trust me?” I could barely choke out the words over the lump in my throat, and tears were trickling down my cheeks.
Michael was silent. I could feel the turmoil coming from him, but I didn’t turn around.
Then I heard him.
I don’t know if I can. I never thought—after all we’ve gone through—but now it feels like she’s not really here with me, not totally...
And fleetingly, so softly below the surface of his conscious thoughts, almost lost among the confused jumble of his subconscious, I heard what I’d always somehow dreaded hearing from him.
Was I wrong? To push her, to pursue her? Is THIS wrong? Are we not really meant to be?
I gripped the wooden railing until the splinters dug into
my palms. My heart pounded in my ears, drowning out anything else from Michael’s mind. For a moment the world spun, and I couldn’t breathe.
Michael came up behind me, apparently oblivious to my anguish. He threaded his arms under mine and pulled me back against him, holding me close. My fingers, still tight on the railing, stung as they scraped across the wood.
“Of course I can trust you,” he whispered, answering my earlier question. “We’re both dealing with a lot of change, with me being away and everything that happened this fall with the Pryces. We knew there’d be adjustments. I don’t want you to think there’s anything you can’t tell me, anything that I won’t understand.”
Oh, I’d like to test that theory, the new and brash Tasmyn thought wryly. The old me was still too stunned and shaken to take in anything Michael was saying.
I forced myself to relax against him, laying my head on his chest and feeling his chin rub softly on the top of my hair. He took that as agreement, and I didn’t have to say a word.
But I already knew what I had to do.
That night I lay in bed, waiting for the tears. An awful, aching emptiness fell on me, but somehow I couldn’t cry. The pain was too deep and immense for the simplicity of tears.
I kept hearing Michael’s thought, playing over and over again in an endless, horrible loop. Are we really not meant to be? Was I wrong?
That practical, removed part of me was already resigned to what had to happen next. I always knew that it was too wonderful to last, that it happened too fast to be real. Someday he was going to realize that things like love at first sight don’t really exist.
But he DOES love me! The hurting, bleeding part of me cried. He didn’t say he didn’t. He didn’t even think that.
The new and unruffled Tasmyn rolled her eyes. Just because he’s lying to himself doesn’t mean I have to wait around for him to realize it. Better to make the break now. Better for me to be the one to do it.
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