by Willow Rose
Jason started falling toward the ground, screaming and kicking in the air and I had to fly insanely fast to catch up with him and grab hold of him again. I threw my arms around his back and flew toward the house where we ended sitting on the roof.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “Are you okay?”
“Sure,” he smiled. “I’m the one who’s sorry. I shouldn’t have surprised you like that.”
I looked at him and froze inside. Was he regretting the kiss? He saw it on my face. Then he leaned over and whispered: “Like a gentleman I should have waited till we had solid ground under both of our feet again.”
I smiled with relief. We sat quietly for awhile until I realized the sun was about to rise behind the mountains in the distance. I got up.
“I have to go,” I said.
I helped him to get back in his room and then I hurried to the bathroom, making sure that no one was awake in the house. I heard nothing so I opened the door to the bathroom. It was empty. Just before I reached the mirror, I heard Jason’s soft voice behind me.
“Will you be back tomorrow?”
I turned around and smiled. Then I nodded.
Chapter 11
All the next day I was really distant in class. Especially in Transitions class in the cellar with Mrs. Ohayashi. We were having a theory lesson on going through windows but my mind was everywhere but the classroom. I couldn’t wait for this day to be over so I could go and visit Jason again. Until then I kept picturing him and me floating in the air, kissing under the stars. I tried to recall the softness of his lips and the warmth in his eyes.
But the dream didn’t last long. I was ripped back to reality by the screeching voice of Mrs. Ohayashi.
“Meghan! Answer me, please!”
I looked up. She was standing in front of my desk. I hadn’t even noticed that she had approached me.
“What?” I said.
“I asked you a question.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t hear it.”
Mrs. Ohayashi snorted.
“I will have to notify Salathiel that you are being inattentive in class, that you are not listening and not doing your homework.”
“Please don’t,” I said, knowing that in the end it was Salathiel who made the decision whether a student was ready to graduate or not. It was a few years from now but a remark in my files could give him reason to doubt, and then I could risk having to spend another year in school. I certainly didn’t want that to happen.
“I will try to be attentive. I just didn’t hear the question. I did study.”
But there was no mercy. Mrs. Ohayashi had made up her mind.
“Get out of this class, immediately,” she said, pointing at the wooden door.
I got up reluctantly and walked toward the door. Portia and Acacia whispered when I passed them. Nigel stared at me with big eyes as if he was expecting to be the next to go. Abhik smiled encouragingly, while the chubby Cornwell twins had a constant smirk upon their faces.
I opened the door, and as I did, Mrs. Ohayashi spoke behind me.
“Consider this a warning. Go to your dormitory and stay there the rest of the day. Next time I will send you to Salathiel. Be certain of that.”
I nodded and closed the door.
I knew I had to get my act together if I wanted to graduate from the Academy. But I just couldn’t stop thinking about Jason. I longed to be with him, but at the same time I was concerned about what was going to happen to him. I was afraid that his step-dad would hurt him again. Or even afraid that Jason might fight him back and end up in deep trouble. Jason had told me earlier that the only way he could ever see himself fighting his step-dad was if he would hurt his mom. Then he would kill him, he had said. That scared me. What if Jason ended up ruining his own life? What if he did something like that and ended up spending the rest of his life in jail? That would just destroy him.
I felt a strong urge to protect him but I didn’t know how. I went to my room. Luckily, Mick came to visit me.
“What’s going on?” He asked when he saw my long face. I sat on my bed staring out the window.
We gave each other a hug. He sat down next to me on the bed.
“You haven’t been down in my kitchen lately. I thought I would check in on you and see if you were okay.”
I forced a smile.
“Well, now I know you are not okay,” he said. “That wasn’t even remotely a real smile.”
“I just have a lot on my mind. And I was thrown out of my Transitions class today.”
“Why?”
“I wasn’t paying attention when Mrs. Ohayashi asked me a question and then she threw me out. Threatening to talk to Salathiel about me.”
Mick nodded.
“I can understand why that would make you sad,” he said.
I looked at him. I’m not sad, I thought. Actually I had butterflies in my stomach, but I was worried. Not about myself, but about Jason. Something inside of me told me he was heading for trouble.
“Do you think it is possible for spirits to fall in love?” I asked.
Mick looked at me a little confused but then he smiled.
“Sure. It happens all the time. Life really isn’t that different in the Afterlife than it was before you died. Some things are very different, but we still move on in our lives, caring about each others, making new friends, falling in love. Spirits are perfectly capable of feeling the same emotions as humans.”
I smiled.
“Now tell me, Meghan, have you fallen in love?” He asked me in a kind of weird way as if he was hoping I would say no. Or was it that he was hoping I would say I was in love with him?
“I don’t know,” I said. And that was really the truth. I felt something for Jason but was it love?
“You will know,” he said. “Eventually. Just take it slowly.”
“Do you think it is possible for a spirit to fall in love with a human?” I asked. I regretted the question as soon as it had left my lips.
Mick’s expression changed completely. He got up from the bed and walked to the window. It was pouring rain outside. He looked out the window for awhile before he spoke. It made me really uncomfortable. Then he looked at me with serious eyes.
“I knew it! You have to stop seeing him,” he said. “If you don’t I will have to report you.”
I got up from the bed feeling a huge anger rise inside of me.
“You can’t do that! I thought you were my friend.”
He sighed. “I am. I am saying this because I want to protect you.”
“Protect me? From what?”
He took a step toward me. “From hurting yourself. From hurting that human you are visiting through the mirror in the cellar!”
I froze. How did he know that? “What?” I said. ”Have you been following me?”
“Of course I have. What do you want me to do when you tell me you have made a human friend? I know how dangerous it can be to have feelings for humans. I have been here for nearly a hundred years, remember?”
“And I have only been here six months, got that, thank you. But I am not a child, I am perfectly capable of making my own choices and decisions.”
Mick walked toward me and grabbed my arm.
“Are you? Do you have any idea what you are doing?”
“Let go of me,” I yelled, and tried to pull my arm out of his grip. I stared at him intensely until he let me go.
“I can’t deal with this,” he said and started backing up.
“Then leave.”
He stared at me and I felt a pinch in my heart. Then he turned around and a second later he was gone. I threw myself on the bed. I was so angry at him for acting like this. Who did he think he was acting jealous all of a sudden?
Later that same day I went to the hall to get some dinner, but I was not going to eat it with the rest of the school. Not tonight. I just wanted to grab something and bring it to the room. I couldn’t handle seeing Mick again. Not now. And I definitely didn’t care much about seeing
Portia or the other girls. I was way too devastated by Mick’s attack on me to handle them right now. All I wanted was for time to pass so I could go and visit Jason again. I wanted to get away from everything and it could only go too slow. I even considered skipping dinner, but even though Mick had told me we didn’t really need food, I felt incredibly hungry. I wasn’t even sure I believed any of what he had told me anymore. Maybe I just wanted food because I was mad, I don’t know.
When I stepped into to Hornam Hall I immediately regretted going there. All those people made me uncomfortable. All that chatting and talking and laughing. I really didn’t need that right now. So I bowed my head trying to shut the world out and go through the hall unnoticed. I had my eyes fixed on my seat and my plate at the table where the food would emerge in a few seconds.
Abhik waved and approached me.
“Oh no,” I mumbled. This was exactly what I was trying to avoid.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“Why do people keep asking me that?” I said a little too harshly.
“Sorry. I was only trying to be nice.” Abhik turned around and walked away.
“I didn’t mean to …” I tried to say, but he didn’t hear me. What was happening to me? Was I going to lose all of my friends in one day?
I sighed and sat at my chair, waiting for the food. As I did, my eyes caught those of an elderly lady sitting at the table in the middle of the hall. She sat next to Salathiel and Rahmiel. I couldn’t get my eyes of her. I felt my heart beating fast. I knew her from somewhere. But where?
Now Salathiel rose from his chair and everybody was quiet.
“Let us welcome our new students here at the Academy,” he said.
New students? That meant that the people sitting at that table had just recently died. That old woman had just died.
It was as if everything inside of me froze at once. I suddenly remembered where I had seen that lady before. And I suddenly remembered where I had seen Jason before. I started to breathe heavily, trying to calm down my racing heart.
“The book,” I mumbled.
Nigel who was sitting next to me stared at me like I had gone mad.
“What?” he said.
I looked at him and shook my head.
“Nothing. I … I have to go,” I said and got up from my chair. As I did the food arrived at my plate. Luckily it was sandwiches, wrapped to go. It was true that whatever emerged would be what I wanted the most right at this moment. So I grabbed them both in one hand and stormed out of the hall. I flew as fast as I could down the hallway and followed a ladder leading up, but it ended in a blind alley. I floated downwards again and found a new hallway, leading to a smaller one filled with mirrors in which I had no reflection. Then I looked around me and realized I was lost. I cursed myself for not yet being able to walk through thick brick walls.
I flew down the hallway of mirrors and ended up in a small chamber that looked like a giant library. Books lined the shelves from top to bottom. Nice leather chairs invited one to sit read the books. It was all very calm and quiet and I was amazed that I hadn’t been in this chamber before. But again the castle was extremely big.
In the chamber I found one of the moving bells, and I thought about ringing it for a second but then changed my mind. What if someone would ask me where I was going? I wouldn’t know how to answer that.
Suddenly I felt a motion from behind me.
“Who is there?” I said as I turned around.
I looked down. The thinking chair stood in front of me. It moved a bit sideways from one side to the other as if it was shy and wanted to play with me. Then I remembered what Rahmiel had told me. I petted it on the seat and tickled it underneath. It seemed to be almost dancing as I did that. When I thought it was enough, I gently sat down on it. I tried hard to think of the room with the book and hoped the chair was getting where I wanted to go. I really needed to look at that book again.
The chair must have gotten the message because all of a sudden it started moving. It crabbed sideways down a hallway so fast that I had to hold on to its arms in order to not fly off. It took a sharp turn and my body slipped out of the seat, but I still managed to hold on to it and it dragged me further down into a dark passage. It ran though a door and, as it stopped, I flew off and landed in the room with the big book.
I smiled and petted the chair.
“Thank you,” I said.
I sighed and looked at the book with the “meant-to-be” pictures. I really wanted this to not be the truth.
“Tell me I am wrong,” I mumbled as I approached it. It was already open on a page. I had seen that picture before. It was that woman in the hospital, dying on the operating table. Now her picture was the first one in the book.
Does that mean she is next to die? I asked myself.
I took in a deep breath and exhaled before I flipped a couple of pages. I closed my eyes, wishing this was not going to be true. I had a horrible feeling in my stomach.
I turned another page and found the one with the young man. He was still lying on the floor in a pool of blood. A man was bent over him and was repeatedly beating him with a baseball bat. I felt tears in my eyes and my hands were shaking.
It was Jason.
I immediately recognized his shirt. It was the same gray one that he had worn when we had been flying … and kissing. And even though he was curled up on the floor and I couldn’t see his face, I just knew in my heart that it was him. And the man with the baseball bat was his step-dad.
Chapter 12
I flew to my room and threw myself on my bed crying. I just couldn’t bear it. Knowing he was about to die and that it was going to be in that cruel way was horrible. How was I supposed to keep a secret like that? How was I supposed to face him without telling him what I knew? Of course I could stop visiting him, I thought. But I really loved seeing him and spending time with him. I wasn’t sure I would be able to just let him go. And was I supposed to just let him be beaten to death like that without interfering? How could I? Some tiny part of me was happy that he would soon come to the Academy and then we could be together all the time, but that was a very selfish part of me. And would he even be able to remember me, if he did?
The part of me that really loved Jason wanted me to stop it—to interfere and save him from the beating, save him from his step-dad.
But how could I do that? It was in the book, in the “meant-to-be” pictures. I couldn’t change his destiny. Not without anyone noticing it, that was for sure. They would surely figure it out when he didn’t die and didn’t get on the boat.
So what was I supposed to do? Just lie on my bed and wait for him to come here? Just pretend I didn’t know?
I looked at the date when he was supposed to die. It was only three months from now.
Abhik came to me after dinner and sat on my bed. I didn’t want to talk to anyone, and I think he sensed that, because he didn’t say a word. He just sat there quietly for a long time. It was kind of nice. Most of the time I just stared at the ceiling. Pictures of me and Jason kept appearing before my eyes.
The emotional pain was horrible. My heart felt like it had been torn to pieces. And I had no idea how to fix it.
“So do you want to go for a fly?” Abhik finally asked. He knew that I loved that and it would always cheer me up. But not today. I shook my head and saw the disappointment on his face.
“I’m sorry, I’m not in the mood for anything right now,” I said.
Abhik smiled and got up from the bed.
“It’s all right. Just let me know, when you’re in the mood again,” he said and left the dormitory.
“Three months!” I kept mumbling to myself. That was three months of our time, and much more of his. Three whole months of knowing and doing nothing. I couldn’t go and visit him, not without telling him what I knew. So I was looking at three months without getting to see Jason and when I finally would see him, he would be dead and probably never remember me. What before had seemed like a great pla
ce to be, the Academy had suddenly become the worst place in the world. The worst part was that Mick had been right. I hated to admit it, but he had warned me. I shouldn’t have peeked in that book and I shouldn’t have broken the rules by leaving the Academy. If I hadn’t done any of all that I wouldn’t be in this situation, I thought to myself.
The next couple of days I went to class as usual but I didn’t pay much attention to what any of the teachers said. I tried, I really did, but I felt horrible inside. Mick stopped coming to my table when I was eating and I stopped visiting him in the kitchen. I felt badly; I really missed hanging out with him. I missed having him as a friend and asking him for advice. Especially now when I really needed a friend to talk to. But Mick had made his point of view very clear to me and there was no way I could ever talk to him about Jason again.
As the days passed, I became isolated and lonely. People would come up and talk to me but I wouldn’t even hear what they were saying. It all became so distant to me. Everything became so indifferent.
When the first week had gone by I was a total mess. I couldn’t fall asleep at night, I stopped eating and I didn’t talk to anyone, not even Abhik. I think he just wanted to leave me alone. Some days he came to me with my plate of food and put it on the floor next to my bed without a word. Other days he just smiled at me if our eyes accidentally met. I sensed he hoped I would snap out of this eventually, but I didn’t. Every day I felt worse. I would picture Jason in bed waiting for me, or staring at the bathroom mirror, not understanding why I hadn’t come back to visit him yet. Maybe he would even blame himself. He would think it was the kiss, that he had overstepped a boundary, and I didn’t want to see him again. Maybe he would even think I didn’t like the kiss. But I did. He must have felt that. I liked it a lot.
I tried to keep busy, but nothing seemed to make me feel better. I went to the stables next to the school and volunteered to feed the Pegasuses that we were supposed to learn how to ride in the second year of school. It took my mind off Jason for a couple of days, but didn’t make me feel any better.