Emma surfaced from the river with a gasp. Waves slapped her face, splashing water into her mouth and choking her. She sputtered, gasping in as much air as she could without inhaling water as well. Panic choked at her throat.
The last thing she remembered was Mark jumping back towards the cliff. After that was blackness. A big wave submerged her and Emma fought to pull her head above water again. Her clothes and shoes were heavy with water, they were dragging her down towards the bottom of the river. She could feel herself being rushed along with the current. Who knew how far she was down river now.
In between waves Emma got a glance of the riverbank and furiously began to swim towards it. The rivers current was so strong that she was a good quarter of a mile downstream by the time she reached the shore.
Emma collapsed onto the ground, panting from exertion. The night air was cold, the wind mercilessly sliced through her clothes to her wet skin. Within seconds she was shivering. For a few moments she just lay there, unable to move. She was so tired, she didn’t think she had any strength left in her.
Then like a bolt of lightning the memory of Mark pulling her from the truck and holding her as they fell hit her. Adrenaline pounded through her system, wiring her with energy. Emma scrambled to her feet, frantically searching for Mark.
“Mark!” She screamed. “Mark!”
No yells answered her panicked scream. Tears pricked at her eyes. She didn’t know where to look for him first or if he had even survived their fall. Emma angrily banished that thought from her mind. Of course he had survived, he had to.
Torn between searching up or down the river she hesitated on the bank for a moment, looking back and forth. Finally she decided to find the truck and search downriver from there. Emma took off running, scrambling over rocks and past bushes as she tried to find where they had fallen. It turned out finding it wasn’t difficult. Mark’s truck stuck straight up in the river, the force of the fall lodging it firmly in the riverbed. The headlights were like twin beams that shot straight into the air, illuminating the area around the car.
“Mark!” Emma called out, hoping he was nearby.
Emma didn’t see any sign of him or hear a response. It was difficult to see in the dark, even with the headlights of the truck still on. Emma was just about to move on downstream when she caught sight of a large tree branch that was half in and half out of the water on the other side of the river.
A large boulder just upriver sheltered the area from the harsh current and the bank curved to accommodate a small pool of circling water that was sheltered from the harsh current, which was why the branch hadn’t been washed downstream. She didn’t know what had caught her eye but when she looked back she saw a flash of brown hair floating near the branch.
“Mark!” Emma yelled, diving back into the water. She struggled against the current, fighting to get to the branch. Reaching shore a few feet away from the tree branch she dragged herself out of the water and ran over to it. Mark was there, floating face down in the river. One of his arms had gotten wedged in one of the branches, which was why the river hadn’t dragged him downstream too.
Emma jumped in the water and grabbed him under the arms, dragging him out of the river and onto the bank. He was a lot heavier than she realized. She only managed to drag half of his body out of the river before she fell back in the dirt, exhausted.
Scrambling to her feet she immediately checked for his pulse. Her fingers were so cold that at first she couldn’t feel anything because they were shaking so hard but after blowing on them a few times to warm them up she finally felt his pulse. She sighed in relief when she felt it beating strongly and sagged against him.
“Mark, can you hear me? Please wake up!” Emma said, shaking him by the shoulders. She knew that wasn’t the proper way to handle things but she was too freaked out to do anything else.
Mark jolted upright, gasping for breath, then rolled over as he started coughing up river water.
“Oh thank god you’re alright!” Emma said, throwing herself on him and giving him a hug.
“Ribs.” Mark gasped, wincing in pain.
“Sorry!” Emma apologized, immediately letting go. “I’m just so glad you’re alive! When I saw you floating there I thought you were dead!”
“Not that easy. To kill. Me.” Mark grunted, wincing in pain. He wrapped an arm around his ribs and fell back on the riverbank.
“We need to get you to the hospital.” Emma said. “My phone’s in the truck.” She looked over at the truck, noticing how it was half filled with water. “So the water has probably ruined it.” She groaned.
Mark grabbed her arm to get her attention, half sitting up so he could see her more clearly. “Are you okay?” He asked. His eyes were cloudy from pain but he still focused on her, checking her for any injuries.
Emma paused, considering his question. “Yeah.” She replied in shock. “I’m fine.”
“Fine?” Mark asked as if he couldn’t believe it either.
“I don’t think I’m hurt.” Emma said, looking at her arms and legs as if expecting to find blood or something. “How is that even possible?”
Mark shook his head. “Don’t know.” He grunted, giving up on sitting up and falling onto his back again. He groaned when he hit the ground, his face twisting in pain.
Emma looked at him lying on the bank. He had several cuts on his hands and arms and she could already see some bruising on his face. “We really need to get you help. Can you move?”
“I need to rest a while.” Mark mumbled. His wet hair clung to his head and Emma winced when she saw that the water trickling out of his hair was tinged pink with his blood. “I should be able to move soon.”
“I’m going to try to find my phone and a first aid kit in the truck. I’ll be right back.” Emma promised. Her phone was probably ruined but there was a slight chance it wasn’t and she would try anything right then.
She waded back into the water and swam to the truck, climbing inside through one of the broken windows. She managed to find a first aid kit floating around near the back seats and her purse was still in the front of the truck. Grabbing both she did her best to hold them out of the water as she swam back to Mark.
Dumping her purse upside down on the riverbank she snatched her phone up, letting out a cheer when it still worked. The heavy-duty protective case Mark had given her when she got her phone because of how accident prone she was had protected the phone from water damage. Emma called 9-1-1 as she ripped open the first aid kit and started cleaning Mark’s wounds as best as she could. She told the operator what had happened and where they were, hanging up when the operator told her that someone was on the way.
Emma wrapped Mark in the thermal blanket she had found and settled his head in her lap, stroking his hair.
“We’re going to be okay Mark.” She whispered. “We’re going to be okay.”
The doctors said it was a miracle that Emma and Mark survived the crash. The fact that Emma walked away without a scratch was impossible. They wanted to examine her more, figure out how she had escaped such a terrible crash without an injury but Steve absolutely forbade it.
After making her stay under observation for 24 hours Emma was released, but not before Steve had made each of the doctors who had heard the story sign a confidentiality agreement. Neither Steve nor Mark wanted to have the story on the news. Steve said that because of the traumatic nature of the accident he thought it would be better if no one found out about it so that Emma could move on without being constantly reminded of what had happened. Mark had agreed. No one had asked Emma.
Mark had to stay in the hospital for a few days. His injuries weren’t severe, again much to the doctor’s shock, but he did have a cracked rib and his body had gone through extreme shock so the doctor thought it would be best to keep him under observation. Mark wasn’t happy about the situation but he was still too weak to argue with the doctor about it.
Before Emma left the hospital she stopped into Mark’s roo
m to see him.
“Hey.” She murmured, walking over to the side of his hospital bed.
Wires dangled from his bed and connected to monitors. Mark’s head was wrapped in a bandage and his ribs had been stabilized. The doctors told her he was recovering very well. They expected him to make a full recovery in no time.
“Hey.” Mark’s voice was gravelly. He tried to push himself up in the bed but winced and fell back.
“Careful, your ribs are going to need a lot of time to heal. You may want to take it easy on them.” Emma cautioned him. She sat down in the chair angled next to his bed while Mark carefully eased himself into a sitting position.
“Yeah, that’s what the doctor’s have been telling me. I keep hoping they are wrong though.” Mark replied with a grimace. “So are you getting out of here today?” He looked at Emma’s outfit and the purse she held clutched in her hand.
“Yep, Kathryn is waiting for me in the lobby. I just wanted to come check on you before I left.” Emma told him.
Mark nodded. “I’m glad you’re okay.”
Emma was quiet for a moment. Then she looked up at Mark’s battered face and her eyebrows slanted downwards as she struggled to phrase a question that had been bugging her all day.
“Mark?”
“Yes, Em?”
“Do you remember what happened that night?”
Mark was silent. He stared down at his hands and then looked at her. Emma began talking again, filling the awkward silence. “I just don’t remember much. There was the crash, then the truck hit a tree. I could have sworn I heard you talking to someone out there. Then the car started rolling again and once we fell off the cliff…nothing. It’s just black for me.”
Mark shook his head slowly. “I wasn’t talking to anyone.” He told her. “Once I got thrown out of the truck I was knocked unconscious. I only woke up just in time to see the truck start rolling again. I ran after it to try to pull you out, and I tried to jump back onto the cliff but I was too late. I vaguely remember falling and wishing I could have saved you. Then that’s it.”
Emma nodded silently, staring down at her hands as she thought of what he had said. Guilt for not telling her she was the reason they had survived plucked at him but he pushed it aside. He didn’t know what had happened or how she had done what she did. When he figured it out then he would tell her.
“Okay, well I should be going. Kathryn is waiting for me.” Emma stood up and smiled down at Mark.
“I don’t know how we survived, but I’m glad we did.” She said, patting him on the arm.
Mark nodded and gave her a slight wave as she walked out, a troubled expression on his face.
The accident didn’t keep Kathryn and Steve from grounding Emma once they found out she had gotten another detention. Aside from school and work Emma wasn’t allowed to go anywhere or hang out with anyone. With Mark in the hospital Emma didn’t have any reason to go to the coffee shop after school anyways. Besides, the one thing she was really interested was at home.
Once she had gotten over the shock of the accident Emma had refocused on the mystery bracelet. Or more accurately, how to get it off of her. She had found the bracelet in the box of things she had found so maybe there was something in there that could explain what it was. The most likely source of information seemed to be the diary she had found so Emma spent the week pouring through the diary, trying to find any mention of the bracelet.
Before she could find anything about the bracelet she stumbled across something even more confusing.
March 22, 1990
Dear Diary,
The things I can do now scare me. I don’t want this ability. I can’t even tell my brothers what is happening. If they knew that I am a Secret Stealer they would never speak to me again. But I am so scared of what I’m turning into. The stories I’ve heard of Secret Stealers, none of them are good. They are terrible people, and most of them end up going crazy. I don’t want that to be me but I can’t change what I am.
So far there has only been one good thing about being a Secret Stealer. Today I met Ryker Forgeron, a boy just two years older than me. He is so lost and confused, he doesn’t even know what’s real anymore. He was standing on the cliffs about to jump when he saw me walking by the river. I was so lost in my own thoughts I didn’t notice that there was a man following me. I didn’t even realize I was about to be attacked until it was too late. The man pulled a knife on me and then out of nowhere Ryker appeared and fought him off.
Afterwards when we talked I discovered what he had been about to do. I told him I could help, and for the first time I saw a glimmer of hope in his eyes. We make an interesting pair. The boy who can change reality and the girl who always sees the truth. And yet, he understands me better than anyone else.
The Forgeron Legacy Page 12