One Starry Knight: A Scifi Alien Love Story (The Starry Knight Saga Book 1)

by Carrie Lynn Thomas

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry,” she snorts. “It’s ironic. You came here all big-eyed and sad over losing your dad. And I felt for you. Really, really felt. I didn’t know it would cost me my dad though. We were so happy, my mom, my dad, and me. Until you and your mother showed up. And every time I saw you at school, it made me so mad. I wanted you to hurt too.”

  There is no apology in her words and there is no forgiveness in my heart. I exhale. I am tired, and I no longer care.

  “You’re just like her too,” she says. “A guy-stealing slut. After all, you are the reason Lucas and I broke up.”

  “What?”

  “Oh, don’t deny it. You went running to him with your crocodile Brianna-hates-me tears. I only dumped him because he was going to dump me unless I started treating you better. And now he’s dead because of you.” She blots her cheeks, combs her hair with her fingers, and smoothes her dress. The heartbreak on her face is melting into her Brianna-mask.

  “Just go back to where you came from.” She rises from the pew.

  It doesn’t completely hit me until I hear the church door slam behind her. Lucas was going to dump her because of me. Lucas hadn’t abandoned me. He had been my friend all along, and I had made him prove himself over and over.

  I—

  Oh god.

  I—

  On the red-carpeted floor of St Mark’s Catholic Church, my heart shatters and shatters and shatters.

  I shatter with it.

  Chapter Sixty-One

  I haven’t been home since the night Adam left. Not since I found out who Mark was, not since Lucas died. After Stella and I leave the cemetery, I ask her to drop me off at my house. There’s a hint of panic in her eyes that matches mine. We are the only two people alive on earth who are feeling the loss of Adam.

  But I can’t live in her clothes forever, and I should check in on my mom. She’s at the kitchen table in a faded bathrobe when I walk in, puffing on a cigarette and doing a crossword. Her eyes are blood red and the wrinkles hang from her eyes.

  “Where have you been?” she asks.

  “Stella’s.”

  She takes a drag of the cigarette and blows sending circles of dancing smoke into my face.

  I wave it out of the way. “What’s with the smoking?”

  “Mark left me. His stuff is gone.” She waves her hand and I look around, but all I see are cluttered counters and dirty dishes.

  “I’m going out tonight,” she coughs. “So, don’t worry about me for dinner or anything.”

  “I won’t.” I shake my head. Some things never change.

  My room is untouched. My backpack is half-open spilling onto my bed. Lucas’s picture lays where I left it. I cross the room and shove everything to the floor. It crashes, abrupt and loud sending pencils and pens and papers scattering. The picture is face up on the end of my bed, and I reach for it. I curl into a ball on my bed and hold it up to the light.

  Laris and Vin. I hate them.

  I crumple the paper and throw it across the room. I throw it hard. It feels good. So good to crush, throw, and destroy. So good.

  I stand on the bed, ripping stars from my ceiling. I dump clothes from drawers and tear sheets from my bed. I spin around my room crying and screaming and pounding, knocking into my dresser, sending dozens of envelopes flying through the air.

  I collapse on the floor and the tears explode. Down my cheeks. Across my neck. Behind my ears. They keep coming and coming. Across my nose, across my lips. I brush my fingers across my mouth until I taste them.

  Salty and bitter with a hint of something sweet. Freedom. They taste like freedom. I spread my arms across the floor like I’m a bird flying to the stars. Or it’s the winter I first saw snow, and Lucas taught me how to make snow angels.

  Paper sticks to my hand, still damp from my tears, and I pick it up. It’s an envelope, my name and address scrawled in unfamiliar handwriting on the back. The return address is Arizona. The postmark is from three years ago. Where did that come from?

  I rip it open to reveal a pink and white card. Happy Birthday to our precious granddaughter in swirly gold lettering across a muted image of pink flowers graces the front. I open the card and ignore the bill that slips out of it. I skip over the cheesy printed poem to the handwriting at the bottom.

  Dear Sage,

  Can’t believe you’re about to be fourteen. I bet you’re so grownup now. I keep picturing your dad at that age, trying to act so mature yet with so much to learn. He asked for a CD player that year…imagine that. I think of you often, wondering what you’re dreaming of for your birthday this year. I hope whatever it is, that this money will help you buy it. Please know we’re always here for you, if you ever need us, just call.

  Love Always,

  Grandma and Grandpa.

  I sit up on my elbows and scan my floor. There’s the money I dropped. Green, crisp, and the image of Ben Franklin in the center. One hundred dollars. My grandparents sent me one hundred dollars. And there’s more envelopes. Scattered white and brown and pink envelopes. All with the same handwriting. Postmarked this year and last year and the year before. I pick another one up and tear into it. And another.

  They’re all full of letters and cards and money. Hundreds of them. All from my dad’s parents, my grandparents. Some to me. Some to my mom. We are so sorry. Thinking of you all the time. Do you need anything? Happy Birthday. Please call us. Please visit. Please let us know you’re okay. Please let us see our granddaughter. Please. Please. Please.

  Opened, but unanswered.

  Look for the signs, Sage.

  Oh, Adam, could this be it? Did you know about these letters? Are you the reason they’re here?

  And where had these been? Why didn’t I ever get them? My mom. Did she know about these? I grab as many as I can into my hands and haul them into the kitchen, where my mom still sits, another cigarette between her fingers.

  “What is this? Did you know about these? Did you hide these from me?”

  Her lids are heavy, and her eyes mere slits, but they widen when she sees the handwriting. “Where did you find those?”

  “On my dresser.”

  “No, they wer—”

  “I don’t care how they got there,” I scream. “Just tell me if you knew about them.”

  “Now Sage, before you get upset, let me explain.”

  “You did. You hid them. You told me Dad’s parents were dead.”

  “Please, I can explain.”

  “Fine.” I put a hand on my hip. “I’m listening.”

  “Your dad’s parents didn’t like me. They didn’t think I was good enough for their son. So, they fought with your dad and when he chose me, they chose to cut him out of their lives.”

  “You told me they were dead.”

  “That was a decision your dad and I made together. They hurt him so bad, and we didn’t want it to hurt you.”

  “You told me they were dead,” I scream.

  “Yeah,” she says standing up until her face is level with mine. “It was your dad’s idea. He didn’t want you to get hurt.”

  “These letters started after his death. There’s nearly one a week. And they all say the same thing.” I pick up one of the letters and point to the words. “They say ‘we’re sorry.’ They beg for your forgiveness. They wanted to help us. If dad was alive, I can’t believe he wouldn’t have answered them, that he would’ve kept this hidden.”

  “I didn’t know how to tell you. I mean, your dad had died and I didn’t know how to tell you. And they hated me.” She falls back into her chair and clutches her face in her hand. Her shoulders shake and soft sobs escape from her. There’s a slight pathetic whine to her tears, I shake my head in disgust.

  “Don’t you think it might’ve helped? I have grandparents. Grandparents. People left who knew Dad and loved Dad. Don’t you think that would’ve helped?” I pound the table and tears sprinkle from my eyes.

  “I-I-I don’t know.” She’s wiping tears
away from her cheeks. “I can’t deal with this today though. I mean, Mark left me. Do you know what it’s like to lose somebody?”

  I bite my lips together and slam my fists against the table again. Dozens of letters shoot off in every direction. Sobs break from her throat, and her face falls into her hands.

  But I don’t care anymore.

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  My mom leaves about an hour later. I watch the sun set in my room. How the light fades from the window and the walls grow shadowed and dusky. Sometime around midnight, I get up and clean the letters from my grandparents off the kitchen floor. Grandparents. I roll the word around in my mind, trying it out in my head and then on my lips.

  I have grandparents.

  I bring the pile of letters back to my room and set them on my dresser. And that’s when I notice the unfamiliar box, wrapped in brown paper and secured with string. Where did that come from? I lift it from my dresser, curling my fingers around the paper corners. The size of a shoebox, I rock it back and forth, feeling its contents shift inside. The white envelope taped to the top bears my name scrawled in familiar handwriting.

  Adam’s handwriting.

  I’m suddenly dizzy with questions and answers. The box. The letters from my grandparents. Mark disappearing. They connect like dots in a puzzle.

  It’s him. It has to be. A sinkhole opens up inside of me, dark and hollow and painful. I shake and shake and shake. Tears dribble across my nose and my chin and I let them drip. I can’t wipe them away. I don’t want to wipe them away. I touch the box and close my eyes. He must’ve been here in my room. But when? When did he leave the letters and the box?

  The front door opens, and I hear my mom’s giggle. A deep voice I don’t recognize laughs with her. Boyfriend number eleven. How can she replace them so easily? My dad. Mark.

  I’ll never replace Adam.

  I hate her. Hate her, hate her, hate her. Hate her for forgetting my dad and me. I hate her for not being the mom I needed. The mom I need.

  I can’t take it anymore. Anger explodes inside of me, tearing and destroying. Taking hold of me. I can’t breathe. I need air. I need freedom.

  I run.

  From my room, from my house, from my mom, from the box, from the ghosts that remind me of what will never be. I run through the woods where Lucas died. I run the path that always led me to him.

  I run to where we met. Where he saved me.

  I run until I fall to my knees, inches from a lake that holds too many of my tears. There’s a thick layer of clouds beginning to separate me from the stars. Separating me from him. I don’t want to be on this side anymore. I want to be with them. With Lucas, with my dad, with him.

  I slip off my shoes and tiptoe into the water. Coils of ice shoot through me, and I can’t breathe. But I keep walking. It bites and scorches and stings my flesh and my bones shiver. But I keep walking.

  It’s like the day I met Adam.

  I hear Brianna in my head. Just until you can’t touch the bottom anymore. My mind numbs. And my frozen feet keep moving. The wind picks up, and I go deeper and deeper and deeper.

  Until it finds me.

  The current pulls like the Nexian’s powers. It sucks and stretches and tears me from where I swim. It drags me into the cold, deep depths. I don’t fight it. It doesn’t hurt. It doesn’t scare me. It pulls and pulls, taking me beneath the water.

  I begin to grow numb until I can no longer distinguish between me and the water. I am becoming part of the lake on my way to the stars. This is where it ends and where it begins. In the cold, in the silence, in the nothing.

  My eyes are closed and my lungs fill with water, but I’m not afraid. The next thing I see, the next breath I take, it will be with him.

  It’s quiet and I drift as if I’m a cloud. Weightless. Free.

  Voices. Loud voices. They break through the water and cold.

  Be Strong. Somebody out there is going to love you. Somebody out there already does.

  My dad’s voice. Adam’s voice. Their words snake and curl inside of me. I see the bride on Mackinac Island. I taste the fudge and smell the woods.

  I see stars. I’m staring at the stars.

  Like hot coals being slung through my paralyzed body, the images and voices wake me until I can feel the lake around me. My frozen limbs shake, and I open my eyes to the black water.

  I’m not ready to be a part of this lake. I’m not ready to leave.

  I kick my legs, fighting my way to the surface. My body moves, twists, fights. And then I find the air, the sweet air. I gulp greedily filling my burning lungs. Although I’m above the water now, the current beneath still surges. It’s fierce, the pressure tearing and shredding at me, and I’m tired and numb and tempted to let it drag me back under again.

  But I hear him calling me. Like he did that day so many years ago.

  He guides me. The same instructions that pulled me from the current so many years ago. Swim sideways, parallel to the beach. Swim until you’re out of the current. Then swim for shore. My legs and arms are heavy and aching and screaming to stop.

  But his voice says go. Louder, clearer. He’s with me.

  Swim. Swim until you’re out of the current.

  I feel the moment it releases me.

  Then swim for shore.

  When I reach the beach, I drop to the sand and close my eyes. My heart and my muscles quiver and shake. Cold, dizzy, aching, exhausted.

  I open my eyes.

  You’re okay now.

  I blink. The blue eyes fade into the night sky, and there are thousands of stars smiling at me.

  Yes, I am okay.

  Chapter Sixty-Three

  I’m at the kitchen table when my mom wakes up. My backpack and suitcase rest at my feet. Receipts and post-its with scribbled notes are piled in front of me.

  I have been up all night. Several hours were spent on a phone conversation with my grandparents, who alternated between crying and gushing. Then I spent nearly two hours packing, where I struggled to decide what clothes to bring and what to leave behind. Would I need long underwear in Arizona? In the end, I packed relatively light, filling up a tan suitcase with a broken zipper with several pairs of jeans and t-shirts. The Harry Potter book and Adam’s box took up most of the space in my backpack. The remainder of the night I spent in bed staring at my empty ceiling.

  “Morning.” My mom rubs her head. “God, I need coffee.” Her eyes are cloudy, and her hair is frizzy and she wears a stained bathrobe. With hands stretched in front of her, she bumps against the counters and cupboards, attempting to fill the coffee pot. Sounds of shattering glass mixes with her favorite swear words.

  It’s hard not to run to her.

  She picks up the pieces, swearing again when she cuts herself. Sucking on her finger, she looks at me.

  “You’re up early.” Her voice is husky with sleep and smoke and a hangover.

  “We need to talk,” I say in a steady and calm voice. I’ve had hours to prepare for this moment. Maybe even years. There is no storm raging inside of me, just quiet. Quiet and empty. A sad hollow shell holding the fragile memory of what was, and the grudging acceptance of what is.

  “Can’t this wait for the coffee?” She yawns as she speaks, covering her mouth and closing her eyes. I glance at the clock on the microwave.

  “No, it can’t.”

  She groans and slams a cupboard door. Dropping into the chair across from me, she rests her elbows on the table and her hands against her temples. “What is so important that it can’t wait for coffee?”

  “Saying our goodbyes.”

  “Huh?” She rubs more sleep from her eyes and blinks. Her eyes scan the suitcase, the backpack, the shoes on my feet. Her pupils widen and her mouth gapes. Flashes of hurt cross her face and my breath catches as I fight against the guilt.

  Closing my eyes, I swallow and exhale. “I’m leaving.” The words cut through the air like broken glass. They scream and shatter and leave us in silence. Long, long sil
ence.

  Coffee aroma fills the air and for a moment, I hurtle backwards. I’m at the diner. I’m at Stella’s. I’m in my childhood home and my mom and dad are making eggs and french toast. And they’re laughing and giggling and he’s wrapping his arms around her and kissing her neck.

  And then I’m here at this table, sitting across from my broken mother who shakes her head. “Don’t be ridiculous. You can’t leave. You’re still a minor and I’m your parent. I’m your mother.”

  “My mother?” I planned for this moment. I rehearsed in my head over and over how I would respond. Something calm and cool and mature. But the arrogance in her voice hurts, and fireworks explode inside of me.

  “How can you say that?” I jump to my feet and lean across the table. “How can you say that you’re my mother? How can you sit there and say that?”

  “Sage—”

  “Do you know where I was yesterday? Do you have any clue? I was at a funeral saying goodbye to the last friend I have in this town. And do you know why I have no friends? Do you? It’s you. Because of you and your need to sleep with every guy in this town, even the married ones.” She opens her mouth like she’s going to argue, but nothing comes out. There is nothing to defend. Nothing to say. Her face drops into her hands, and I sink back in my chair.

  She’s crying. Loud sobs, gasping heaves, dripping face. Guilt simmers and boils and plays with the edges of my heart, but it doesn’t consume me.

  “Adam left,” I say. “He left and I’m never going to see him again. Like you lost Dad. And I get it. The hollowness. The pain. Feeling like nothing’s ever going to be okay again. I get it.”

  She looks up at me, her face red and purple and wet. “Where are you going to go?” she asks through a sniffle.

  “Arizona. Dad’s parents.”