Vortex

by Julie Cross

  Eileen had said the side effects would be instant. Maybe they were and I’d ignored them … my head throbbing uncontrollably. But things were happening then, too many things to pay attention to pain.

  “Dad, can we just go home?” Courtney asked, tears trembling in her voice. “I don’t understand all this experiment stuff, but let’s just go home and then you can tell me everything.”

  Holly was still staring at my wrist, then back at me. I dropped my arms to my sides, grateful that nobody else had seen the bruises. This wasn’t the time to add more drama.

  “Wait … am I going to be dead if we go back?” Mason asked. “I’m working through the paradox theories and time-travel basics, but it’s not coming out right.”

  Dad let go of Courtney and moved closer to the younger guy and the redheaded woman. They all exchanged a few looks, and then the woman spoke first. “You can’t go back … We tried to stop you from entering, but it was too late.”

  “Entering what?” Mason and I asked at the same time.

  “We call it Misfit Island,” the younger guy said. “Like that Christmas movie The Island of Misfit Toys … except we’re misfit time jumpers.” He laughed a nervous laugh, and then turned it into a cough when he realized no one else had even cracked a smile.

  Mason looked up at the sky, which was spinning around in a circle. “What is it? Some kind of a force field?”

  “Yes,” the red-haired woman said.

  Her words didn’t even sink in with me. I had always been able to go back home … except when I was stuck in 2007 … but I was so far beyond that mental block now. There had to be a way, otherwise why would Healy even send me here to get Dad?

  “And an electromagnetic pulse,” Dad said, his eyes filling with worry and sympathy. “Every day, I hoped you wouldn’t come here and try to find me. I told them there was no way Jackson would attempt anything that risky after everything he’d been through.”

  I was barely listening to Dad. The pain in my head had reached a climactic peak and I wanted to figure this out before I passed out. “We got here—if we jumped to this place, then we can leave. Somehow we got through the—”

  “Try it,” the woman snapped at me. “Walk toward the bottom of the hill.”

  Mason and I were both striding across the grass at the exact same moment. Suddenly a shock ran though my body, paralyzing every muscle. I knew I was falling, but I had no control over it. I tried to force myself forward instead of backward. I ended up flat on my back about twenty feet from the spot that had paralyzed me.

  Mason was right next to me, sitting up and looking just as confused as I felt. Neither of us had felt the force field tossing us backward. We stood up slowly and I stared at Dad, desperate for him to fix this, to tell me there was another way.

  Mason pointed a finger at Emily. “You did this! You tricked us into coming here, didn’t you?”

  Emily burst into tears. “No, no, I didn’t know … I promise.”

  I rested a hand on her shoulder, trying to offer comfort. I didn’t know if she had done this on purpose, but either way, she was just a little kid.

  “I’m sorry, Jackson … I messed everything up,” Emily said.

  My eyes traveled from Courtney to Mason to Holly, absorbing their shock and mine at the same time. Trapped.

  “You were tricked into coming here,” the redheaded woman said, as if reading my thoughts. “Just like the rest of us … It’s what they do with time travelers who don’t conform, don’t offer the agency anything or try to make their alterations. We can guess when a new one is coming based on the weather, and we try to stop them using any means possible, but it almost never works.”

  The grass and the houses and the stream swirled in front of me. Healy … he tricked me … used all my weaknesses against me. Dad, Holly, Adam … The tears in Courtney’s eyes and the ones I knew Holly was fighting to keep hidden hit me right in the gut.

  This was my fault. I should have found Stewart, and talked it through. She wouldn’t have let me screw up like this. The hopelessness swept over me and I closed my eyes, forcing my mind back to 2009.

  Please work … please work.

  The sharpest pain I had ever felt hit me right between the eyes. I fell to my knees, every muscle in my body shaking violently. My breath came out in loud and effort-filled gasps.

  “Jackson!” Dad said, running over to me. He looked up at the redheaded woman with panic as he pushed up my sleeves, revealing the bruises. Just like Cassidy … and the EOT in the basement of the Plaza.

  I threw an arm across my ribs, clutching them to relieve the pain. Holly stood next to me, hands covering her mouth. My eyes locked with hers and there was something there … something I hadn’t seen from this Holly. Something that stole my breath and made me forget everything else. Like a magnet, I pulled her closer with my eyes. One step inside my world … the one that had included me and her.

  Just keep looking at me like that and I’ll be okay. My hand brushed across the side of my face and I was mildly aware of the sticky substance between my fingers. I waved my hand in front of my face, breaking my eye contact with Holly and letting the cold draft of reality blow in.

  “Oh, no,” Dad moaned. “Oh, no, Jackson … is it too late?”

  “No,” the redheaded woman said firmly. “Blake … go … get help!”

  Blake? The ponytail kid?

  “Mason, go with him,” Dad shouted.

  The world was already fading before me … losing all of its clarity. The redheaded lady’s hair and face blurred and blended with Dad’s. Courtney was right beside him, panic written all over her face, but all I could see was the recognition. Just like I had known, when she had slipped away from me so many years ago, I knew she felt this. The pain faded, and in this case I knew that wasn’t a good sign. But I welcomed it, so much. Just let it be quick … let me close my eyes and just sleep …

  The sound of Courtney sobbing gave me a brief, five-second electric shock to the heart. I felt the pain again for several seconds and then it drifted. As I focused all my attention on Courtney’s face, I wondered if this was what she had fought, this exhausting battle to hold on, when letting go was so much easier. Would she fight it all over again? Would she feel the emptiness that I had felt when she died? I wished I had told Dad or Adam or my Holly what had happened to me … I knew it was real … it had to be.

  I had written a poem … in 2009 … not intentionally, more like subconscious thoughts that had vomited themselves onto my computer and then into the hands of an overly dramatic teacher. Voices echoed around me, from a distant tunnel, as I recalled those words I wrote about Courtney in another life … as another person,

  I shared a womb with someone … does that mean we shared a soul?

  Maybe half my soul is buried, deep under the ground, and I’ll never get it back.

  I’m cold when it isn’t. I hear storms that aren’t there. There’s space in me I can’t fill.

  Empty. Cold. Storms. And then I smell the carpet, hear deep breaths that aren’t mine.

  When I open my eyes, she’s still gone.

  But I didn’t feel like that anymore … I was whole again. Because of Holly. And now she was here with me. Somehow, she had managed to pull my arm out of my sweatshirt and had the sleeve pressed against my ear, trying to stop the bleeding. Was I sitting up or lying down?

  Sitting … sort of. I felt my body swaying, falling into her, our foreheads crashing together as she attempted to hold me up. Images flashed through my head at high speed, but I saw each and every one of them: Courtney and me in the snow on Christmas Eve … me, standing over Courtney’s casket, squeezing my eyes shut, not letting myself see her for more than half a second … me and Dad tipping the sailboat on purpose, splashing Courtney with ocean water … and Holly, kissing me that first time … the very first time … I could taste her, smell her, feel her arms around me still. Holly asleep in my bed, the two of us breathing in rhythm. Different but always in sync.

&nbs
p; I shook my head, zooming in on her face, the one right in front of me and not the one etched in my memories. This was the last image I wanted to see. Not the grief and panic on Dad’s, Courtney’s, and Emily’s faces. Holly … just Holly.

  “We have to get him inside!” someone shouted.

  “If his brain was bleeding he’d be screaming from the pressure.” Another voice, one I didn’t know.

  “Let him go,” someone said, leaning over Holly.

  I felt my hand lifting up to touch her face, or at least that was what I wanted it to do. My forehead still rested against hers. This is it … this is all I get. Her eyes were closed now and it made me feel the world around me again. I didn’t want that pain. Not ever.

  “Hol?” I whispered, not sure if any sound had actually come out. “Look at me.”

  She opened her eyes and I started seeing two of her, but relief washed over me in an instant. My head slumped over, leaning against her shoulder. I couldn’t hold it up … only a few more seconds and I’d fall over completely. My face made contact with the side of her neck as I succeeded in turning my head. “Hol?”

  “What?” she whispered back, as if I were about to tell her some great escape plan before dying.

  “Don’t give up … It’s worth it, I swear. You’re worth it, Holly. I was wrong before … so wrong.”

  And finally, I let my eyes close. The hot, wet tears that splashed the side of my neck were the last sensation I felt.

  Holly’s tears. Maybe she was just overwhelmed by the moment, or maybe she truly felt my words … heard the truth behind them and knew that she had someone. She wasn’t alone.

  Someone was prying us apart and the desperate fight for life sprang up again. My fingers curled around the back of her neck and I whispered, as loud as I possibly could, “I love you.”

  Then my back hit the grass and I stared up at the clouds, my body relaxing, shutting down. I struggled against the darkness, trying to sit up and being pushed back down. I opened my mouth, but no sound came out.

  The echoing voices turned to silence … and I was being sucked into a black tunnel … maybe forever …

  Stay tuned for the next book in the Tempest series, available in early 2014 wherever books are sold.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I have to keep this much, much shorter than the Tempest acknowledgments. I won’t get away with another five pages of thanking people.

  Tempest Launch Event on January 21, 2012

  First off, I want to thank all my family and friends, my community—the super-awesome Champaign-Urbana, Illinois—for following my journey from the beginning and being there for the release of Tempest. Also, Betsy Su and the Champaign Public Library for hosting my launch event and making it such an amazing day. Suzie Townsend, for being there. My editor, Brendan Deneen, for wishing he could be there.

  Also Beth Revis, Megan Miranda, Maureen Lipinski, and Carrie Ryan for joining me on January 17, 2012—the official Tempest release day—at Books of Wonder in New York City.

  St. Martin’s Press/Thomas Dunne Books/Macmillan Folks

  Those with big offices make big dreams come true—Tom Dunne, Matthew Shear, Anne Marie Tallberg, and Pete Wolverton.

  Two amazing ladies who have worked hard to get Tempest out in the world and are so fun to hang out with—Brittney Kleinfelter and Eileen Rothschild.

  The guy I pester almost daily for marketing and social media advice and who answers all my questions with patience and humor—Joe Goldschein. It’s been so fun to work with you!

  Nicole Sohl—for all your behind-the-scenes work.

  Also publicity folks—Rachel Ekstrom and Jessica Preeg.

  And last, but not least, the guy behind the curtain who sees all my writing way, way before the final version and still believes in me—my editor, Brendan Deneen—someone I can tell just about anything to and know that he won’t lose faith in my ability to finish this trilogy, and make it the awesome series he and I both envisioned way back in April 2010.

  Other Equally Important People in Smaller Groups

  The amazing UK folks at Macmillan Children’s—Sally Opiant and Ruth Kristin Nelson and the amazing Nelson Literary Agency crew.Alltimes.

  Writer friends and inspiring authors—Roni Loren, Kari Olson, John Green, Veronica Roth, Courtney Summer, Ally Carter, Erika O’Rourke, Kody Keplinger.

  Vortex cover models—Mark Perini and Scarlett Benchley, thanks for bringing Jackson and Holly to life.

  The Perfect 10, my amazing teen panel, teamTEENauthor, all the book bloggers.

  Librarians everywhere, YALSA, and ALA—amazing organizations that get books into people’s hands for the sole purpose of helping others fall in love with reading.

  And superspecial thanks to Every. Single. Fan for your support, reviews, and honest thoughtful words. You are the ones who have truly kept my butt in the writing chair and made words continue to appear on the page. I hope this sequel is everything you wanted it to be. I have thought of every one of you as I poured my energy into creating this story.

  ALSO BY JULIE CROSS

  Tempest

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  JULIE CROSS lives in central Illinois with her husband and three children. She never considered writing professionally until May of 2009. Since then, she hasn’t gone a day without writing.

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.

  An imprint of St. Martin’s Press.

  VORTEX. Copyright © 2012 by Julie Cross. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

  www.thomasdunnebooks.com

  www.stmartins.com

  Cover photograph of people © Herman Estevez

  ISBN 978-0-312-56890-0 (hardcover)

  ISBN 9781250020727 (e-book)

  First Edition: January 2013