I looked to Gray, “Home? Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
“I’ll send Kisuke and Mayuki with you.” She stood up and smoothened out the wrinkles in her uniform, “I’ll also station a few Joined Pairs around your neighborhood, just to be safe. They’ll stay out of sight and keep an eye out for any disruptions. Jessica may be formidable, but against three other Twined even she won’t be able to touch you.”
“That’s assuming she knows where you live,” Mayuki said in an attempt to put me at ease.
It did. “But what about Albert?”
“We’ll keep him here, make him feel comfortable. Until he’s ready to wake up, that is. After, we’ll send him to you and then the two of you can discuss your plans in private.”
“And… if Jessica is back at school?”
She smiled. “You have the best Tracker in the district right here,” she pointed to herself. “If she steps a foot within those walls, I’ll sense her.”
I stood up as well, but my gaze couldn’t leave Gray’s face. Everything about her screamed to me that she was the same woman I’ve always known. But then everything I couldn’t see screamed to me that she wasn’t, that she never was.
“Ms. Gray?”
“Yes dear?”
“Who are you?”
Kisuke and Mayuki glanced at each other. Gray however only laughed and said, “A woman who used to be married to a Twined. And a woman who wishes to help others in over their heads.” She gave me a smile and a quick hug, “Don’t you worry Avalin. Things will unravel sooner or later. Or maybe they won’t? Such is life and the way it flows. Until we figure that out, however, I still have the Blind Side if you’re interested.”
****
Kisuke and Mayuki took me home in what appeared to be Ms. Gray’s Prius. I sat in the backseat as I toyed with my hair. I looked occasionally out the window and occasionally to Kisuke and Mayuki. I was wondering if they were talking to each other through their minds, like Albert did with me. Then I wondered why Albert was able to read my mind when we weren’t even “Joined” yet. Did it have anything to do with how he had said we were “synchronized”? I had no idea. With thousands of questions but not enough courage to ask Mayuki to answer them, I merely sat quietly in the back of the car.
“Thanks,” was all I could mutter out. “For what you guys did earlier.”
Kisuke turned into my neighborhood as Mayuki said, “Of course, Avalin. We were glad to help.”
“Who is that?” Kisuke asked as we came nearer to my house.
I didn’t know who he was talking about. I assumed maybe he meant my father or my brother. But I found out it wasn’t either. I saw a blonde haired guy standing at my door, a Pinto in my driveway.
“Mayuki, get ready,” Kisuke whispered.
“Be calm Kisuke,” Mayuki looked to me. “Is that a friend of yours?”
I noticed who it was, “Yeah that’s Lyle. He probably wondered what happened to me after I disappeared from school.” I had only just remembered that I practically vanished from the student parking lot with no hint or trace. How was I going to explain that to Lyle and Prajna?
“Are you sure you can trust him?” Kisuke asked.
“Positive,” I said. “I’m safe I promise.”
Kisuke looked to his partner for approval. The Asian girl nodded and Kisuke proceeded to pull into the driveway. Lyle turned around and, when he saw the Prius with me inside, darted down my porch steps and over to us.
I got out of the car and sighed, pulling my button up sweater over my shoulders. Walking to the passenger window I said, “Thanks for the ride.”
“Avalin?” Lyle called to me as he approached.
I turned around, “Lyle…”
He shook his head, “Where have you been? I’ve been worried bat shit sick.” He showed me the bag he had in his hand, “You left this in the parking lot and disappeared. I…” Suddenly he grew quiet, noticing the people in the car, “Oh… I’m sorry.”
Mayuki smiled, “It is no trouble. We were just dropping Avalin off.”
“Oh… all right, well uh… good to meet you,” Lyle waved, “I’m a friend of Avalin’s. Lyle McCormick.”
“Anda Mayuki. Pleasure to make your acquaintance;” she said in her delicate voice. “This is Sarutobi Kisuke. He may not look it, but he’s pleased to meet you as well.”
“Mayuki…” her partner sighed.
She giggled a bit and looked back at me. “We won’t keep you, Avalin.” She reached her hand out and gave me a pink origami crane. I assumed it was meant for me, so I took it and cusped it between my fingers. “Let us know if you need anything else.”
With that Kisuke pulled the Prius out of my driveway. Mayuki waved and I returned the motion as they sped out of our neighborhood. Even to this moment I wondered what their game was, what they got from helping me. I guess I wouldn’t be finding out anytime soon.
Lyle watched with me as the car sped out of sight. He crossed his arms and sighed as his gaze wandered to me. “Mind telling me what all that was about?”
I blinked a few times, “Hmm? What was about what now?”
“Why’d you disappear on us Avalin?” He turned to me fully. “Prajna and I were worried sick. You should have seen her, she was near catatonic.”
I shrugged, “I was… out and about.”
“I’m not stupid Avalin.”
“That sounds like a confession,” I muttered blankly without even thinking. My mind was still wandering in other places.
He turned angry. Lyle turned angry, “I’m not playing your games. You don’t want to tell me where you went, fine. But I know something’s up.”
I sighed. I really wasn’t trying to be a smartass. I was too busy figuring out what in the world I was going to say to him. “No, Lyle… I’m sorry. I don’t mean to… it’s a defense mechanism. Sarcasm’s my bulletproof vest… you know that.”
His expression turned sympathetic, “Well then please realize I’m not packing and fill me in. Why did you just run off school property and ditch us? Did something happen?” He pointed to the road, “And who the hell was that?”
I moaned, “It’s complicated Lyle.”
“Do you know how worried I was?” he asked me, volume rising. “You, a young eighteen year old girl, disappearing from her school parking lot leaving only her bag behind. Do you know what that spelled out to me?”
I never even thought about it that way. “I didn’t mean to worry you… I really didn’t. Something came up.”
He laughed bitterly. “Something came up? What the hell does that even mean?” He rubbed his head, frustrated. “Can you please give me a piece of information I don’t have to decode?”
He was legitimately angry with me for the first time in my life. I shook my head. It figures the first time I disappointed Lyle would be the only time I really didn’t have a way to tell him where I’d been. I didn’t like that I’d upset Lyle. It bothered me a lot more than I imagined it would’ve.
He shrugged, “I get it. You know if you don’t want to tell me, don’t tell me.” He handed me my bag and looked at my sweater. As I reached out to grab my bag, he yanked it back. “Avalin… what’s on your sweater?”
I flinched as I looked down to my sweater. It was stained with a large dark patch on the navy blue fabric. “Uh… it’s…”
He lifted my unbuttoned sweater. He then saw the white bandages around my shoulder and the small cuts on my neck and chest. He shook his head and took a step back, looking at me like I just grew another head.
“What did you do?”
I shook my head. “It’s…” all I could do was repeat what I said before, “It’s complicated.”
He sighed, “No, Casper. How you managed to disappear while right in front of me is ‘complicated’. This…” he bit his lip, “
This is something entirely different.”
After setting my bag down on the ground, Lyle walked away and left me standing in my driveway. To my surprise my chest felt heavy. I was feeling guilty… I was feeling sad. I can’t believe that making Lyle angry had such an impact on me. I called his name but he merely waved me away and walked over to his car, getting inside and starting it.
“Lyle, come on,” I pleaded, emotions rising. “Don’t hate me over something like this!”
He stuck his head out of the window. “Why would I ever hate you, Avalin? You’re safe. That’s all that matters.”
I sensed how bitter he was through that statement. He pulled out of my driveway and his tires screeched as he left the neighborhood with nothing remotely resembling a goodbye. I was exhausted now mentally as well as physically. Lyle was always looking after me, always urging me to do the right thing. And now I had acted like an idiot and pissed him off. Should I have just told him? Should I have let him know I faced down a Shadow Lynx with a Twined who apparently couldn’t join with me? I contemplated this as I opened the door to my house with the key from my newly retrieved bag. It didn’t take any more time than the lock opening for me to realize that Lyle wouldn’t have believed a word I said, had I told him about Albert and Jessica.
I walked into my dimly lit house as the sun began to go down. I sighed in frustration of the entire day, but then remembered to take off my sweater and shove it in my bag before anyone became the wiser. I heard the T.V. blaring further in and I walked over to the family room. My little brother Josh was watching television with his feet kicked up on the table. At the sound of me entering he turned around.
“Oh, it’s just you,” we both said in unison. I however sounded much more relieved.
“Jinx,” Josh said as he turned back to the T.V. I noticed now that he was playing a video game, not watching any shows.
I went around and sat on the couch next to him. “What it is, squirt? How was school?”
“Cool classes, stupid kids. You?” he asked without looking at me.
“Oh you know… just the usual,” I lied. “What are you playing?”
“CoD,” he said.
“Like the fish?”
“Hilarious, Avalin,” Josh quipped, yet smiled. “Call of Duty.”
“Ugh, that war game? Why don’t you play one of those RPG’s you like so much? I mean at least they have some story to them.”
“RPG? You mean like the anti tank weapon?”
It took me a second to get that. RPG, role playing game, rocket propelled grenade. I got it. “Cute.”
“I will after this. I promised Travis I’d play a game with him real quick. You know how needy he is for attention.”
Sometimes with Josh’s maturity I had to remind myself I was talking to an eleven year old. “You’d be an excellent bosom nanny.”
He’d heard that term from me before. Bosom nanny was something I called people who went out of their way to suffer just so they didn’t hurt someone else’s feelings. And with how much Travis annoyed my brother, Josh was the queen of the bosoms for dealing with the kid. Especially considering all Travis did was make fun of Josh for something or another. I don’t know how my brother could stand him.
“Yeah well right now I’m an excellent no scope sniper.” He got up and turned the game off, searching for one that would prove more amusing. I guess Travis would have to find someone else to play with.
“Play that space role playing game, the one where you can get with that blue chick.”
Josh laughed, “You just hate CoD because you get off on going against what’s popular.”
“Not true,” I said. “I just don’t want to watch a video game that I can see on the news.”
“Okay, I’ll give you that one.”
I laughed and kicked off my shoes, glad to come back to normality. “Where’s dad?”
“He went to get Nick back from the vet’s,” Josh said.
My dog, Nick, had a seizure earlier yesterday. He gets them every once in a while, but we always let him stay a night in the vet’s after he has them, just to make sure he’s alright.
Josh walked back and sat down next to me. He gave me a strange look and sort of cocked his head, “What is up with you?”
“What?”
“Something’s bugging you,” he said.
I shrugged, “How do you figure?”
“Your face,” he looked at me strangely, “it has emotion. You’re emoting. You never emote.”
I guess he had a point. It’s nice to know my face always looked about as emotional as a stone wall. But something was indeed bothering me. And for some reason it came spilling out. “I… I pissed off Lyle today.”
“You pissed off Lyle?”
I looked at him with a pathetic gaze, “Shocking, right?”
“I didn’t think he was emotionally capable of anger.”
“Yeah, well… he drove like he was enraged.”
Josh raised his eyebrows, “You must have been a real shithead.”
“Hey, it was justified.”
He gave me that ‘yeah right’ look and I sighed.
“Okay… okay it wasn’t. I don’t know. It’s complicated.”
“With you? Everything is.”
‘It’s complicated’ seemed to be my go to answer today. But my vagueness really was justified… sort of. Mind you I could have been a little less of a snarky ass, but that was just habit. I really didn’t mean to keep anything from him. But no matter how I played that talk with him through my head, I couldn’t think of any way I could have done it right. Nothing short of telling him that Ms. Gray saved my life from a Shadow Lynx and that Kisuke and Mayuki were part of a symbiotic blood pact. That wouldn’t be any good.
“All right. Well I think I’m going to get to bed.”
Josh looked at me, “Now?”
“Yeah,” I said as I grabbed my bag. “Horrible day. I was neck deep in pussycat.”
“Uh… all right. You’re not going to watch me play?”
I walked out of the family room. “Just… romance that alien with the sexy voice.”
Taking my bag and my hidden bloody sweater upstairs, the trek up the staircase was a long one. Much longer than what I had preferred. I finally reached my door, opened it, and threw my bag down near my dresser. I only wanted to flop down onto my bed and fade to sleep.
And that’s exactly what I did.
CHAPTER 7: SLEEPING TIGHT, GONE TONIGHT
I was having a dream, a wicked, awful dream. I was dreaming that I was in a room with Lyle and Prajna. I was talking to them, screaming at them. But their backs were turned to me. And they were ignoring me no matter how much I shouted. My throat began to swell up, I couldn’t even talk.
Then I was in a city. It was big, like Tokyo big. Lyle and Prajna were still standing in front of me. I looked around as lights and people passed me by. Everyone who walked by me took a second to stare in my direction, yet they still acted like I didn’t exist. And that’s when it happened.
Buildings crumpled around me. Glass shattered asunder and bodies flew through the air as the city began to crumble, as if it was being stepped on by a giant. Lyle and Prajna looked back at me, pleading with their eyes for me to save them. And I felt a fear so terrible, so horrible, that I started crying right there. I reached out my hand so far, so damn far… but I couldn’t get to them. I couldn’t save them.
And Albert’s voice came to me, “Accept me. Make me a part of you and you will become a part of me. Twined with my soul, Avalin, I will set you free.”
I tried, please believe me when I say that I tried as hard as I could. I closed my eyes and somehow knew that the only way to save Lyle and Prajna from the collapsing buildings was to make myself vulnerable. To offer myself to Albert’s voice. My eyes shut
so hard my cheeks burned, and I stretched my arm out as far as possible. But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t let my guard down. Something weighed in my chest, suffocating me. It was this that held me back.
Unable to accept Albert’s voice and the bond he offered me, I could only watch as Lyle and Prajna were crushed under the weight of the falling rubble.
I’ve never screamed so hard in all my life.
****
My eyes opened. I didn’t lurch forward after that nightmare, but I did wake up. I was colder than I thought I’d be. So cold, in fact, that I needed to grab at the covers to pull them over me. I reached my hand up and tried to find something that would make me warmer. But my hand hit something frigid, something that felt like gravel.
The nightmare was still fresh in my mind. It was burned behind my eyeballs like a slowly fading memory. I lifted my cheek up, sore, and I felt a pebble sticking to it. I rubbed my face and sat up. It was dark all around me. The wind was blowing and I heard cars beeping, echoing in the night. I didn’t know what was going on. There were no blankets, no pillows… no room.
I wasn’t in my room.
Slowly realizing that, I gasped and stood to my feet in a panic. I turned to look around and saw street signs, lights and buildings. I recognized that I was on a main street downtown. I was on a main street outside at night. I yelled out some unrecognizable word at a high volume, my heart beating faster and faster. Was this the dream? Was I still dreaming? No. No I knew that I was awake, fully awake now.
It had happened again. Once every couple of weeks this would happen to me. I’d wake up outside my room, ending up somewhere on God’s green creation. I’d have a horrible dream, wake up and find myself in downtown Flushing or maybe Detroit. At first I thought, maybe by a long shot, I was a sleepwalker. I thought that maybe I had some kind of night walking condition. At least I wanted to believe that. That is until I ended up one night alone… in the city of Baltimore, a twelve hour drive away.
But I’d always fall back asleep somehow. I’d be wandering aimlessly and just like that, I’d fall asleep and end up in my room. It couldn’t be a dream. Where I was right now felt so real, so vivid, that I knew I was fully awake. Trust me… I’d much rather be dreaming this.
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