Shuffle [YA Paranormal Romance]

by Avery Bell

  It might have been my imagination, but I thought I could still smell ash in the air.

  I climbed into bed, covering my head with the blankets. It was hot under there, hot like the stifling swelter of the house fire. But I didn't want to smell the smoke. I had this idea that it would choke me.

  My dreams that night all seemed to play through a gray filter. At first I was in a movie theater, watching the fire flicker on the big screen. I could even see myself, down in the corner of the shot. Standing silent. Doing nothing to help. I focused on the oak, waiting for Arbor to appear. But the engines weren't coming. The police weren't there.

  The fire raged on and on, unchecked, until the house burned to the ground. The movie jumped forward and there I was, stalking through the ashes. Charred wood, the remnants of a home once loved and lived in, rose up around me like black, broken teeth. My feet blistered. I saw that I was barefoot, standing on embers still glowing beneath the rubble.

  I saw a body in another room.

  I moved toward it over a cindered joist and a bare piece of electrical wire, stepping through what had recently been a wall.

  The body was laid out. It wasn't burned, but whole. The hair was long, blond. Wavy. I couldn't see her face. A chilling fear splintered my body, holding me rigid. Slowly, I walked forward and knelt beside her.

  I turned her chin gently toward me.

  My mother's green eyes were open, glassy. Her lips still rosy and moist. But the life was gone from her. I glanced down, her belly was open. Blood was seeping out.

  And then she smiled. A grinning death-mask. Her voice bubbled a question like soft spittle at the corners of her mouth.

  “All five?” she asked.

  I held back tears. “Five what, Mom? Five what?”

  She did not answer. She was dead.

  The screen went black and the audience clapped. They stood up and applauded, whooped and hollered and whistled for an encore.

  Everybody yell Go Fight Win

  Go Fight Win

  I screamed. I screamed so loudly I thought my own eardrums would burst.

  And I woke up to suffocation. Drenched in sweat, I was fighting. Fighting and losing. The enemy's strength overwhelmed me; the camera flashed like a strobe, taking picture after picture. I rolled around, squirming desperately under the great weight, trying to free myself.

  Oh God, I'm going to die. I'm going to die.

  My lungs burned for air. My throat was clogged with fuzz, my nose shut off by an unseen hand. I scrabbled and kicked and tried to cry out...

  And then the blanket fell off. I'd been tangled up in it.

  My lungs expanded and a rush of cold air knifed through them, jolting me fully awake.

  I shuddered and exhaled, gulping, panting, pulling more of the sweet night into my chest. I looked around my room, red spots exploding in my vision. Moonbeams fell across the foot of my bed. No one there. No monster. No enemy but my blanket.

  “Oh my lord,” I sighed, slithering back onto the sweat-soaked sheets like a pile of limp spaghetti. All the adrenaline rushes in the past couple of weeks were exhausting me. Not to mention the missed sleep. I breathed slowly, trying to calm my heart rate. When I felt steadier I got up and examined the camera. No harm done, and no evidence of intruders either. I'd apparently snagged one of the cables in my furious battle with the covers and turned the camera around, whereupon it had picked up my thrashing movements and taken picture after picture of what appeared to be a large blue blob.

  “Perfect,” I nodded. “That's exactly what I wanted to happen.”

  I was still tired, so I set everything up again and dropped off to sleep, making a concerted effort to think pleasant thoughts. Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens. Deep, cool forests and peaceful Caribbean beaches.

  Amanda Petrov's face as Vi steps up to be crowned Homecoming Queen.

  Please, universe. I don't ask you for much...

  Chapter Eight

  The day dawned with a splash of chilly, wan light. I got dressed in the semi-dark and made myself breakfast. Callie was reading the paper in our kitchen, which was suffused with yellow warmth from the overhead lamp. A homey and reassuring scene.

  She folded the paper over her fingers as I sat down.

  “Hi ho,” she said, gently. “You okay?”

  I shrugged. “Yesterday was not the best for me.”

  “I'm sorry. I should have just dropped you off; I wasn't thinking.”

  “That's all right. I'm sort of glad I tagged along. Saw what you have to deal with every day.”

  She raised her eyebrows, scanning the sports section. “Thankfully not every day. Is it true that the Minutemen are underdogs against Boulder?”

  “I dunno.”

  “It says here that Jim Holness, junior quarterback, is having some issues with his wrist. Know anything about that?”

  Callie will make a casual bet on just about anything. The number of jellybeans in a jar, the weight of a heavy book. High school sports. Thank goodness we don't have a race track in this town. I could already see the over-under wheels turning in her head.

  “I really don't know. I've barely even met him.”

  “He's in your class.”

  “Yeah. That doesn't mean anything. You know I don't hang out with jocks.”

  She held up her hands in surrender. “Okay, okay... I just thought I saw him out with Ellen a couple of weeks ago, that's all. Maybe I was wrong.”

  I didn't confirm or deny, just munched on my cereal. Callie had to drop me off early because she had a lot of work down at the station relating to the fire. Apparently the coordination of an arson investigation is no small task.

  “There are like fifty forms I have to fill out, and interviews with all the family members. And don't get me started on the Fire Marshal...” Her complaining was a welcome distraction from my own muddled thoughts. When she waved and pulled away from the curb of the student drop-off zone, the silence returned.

  Well, I suppose some birds were twittering. The ones that hadn't flown south yet.

  All alone, I trudged up the hill to school.

  There were some kids hanging out in the quiet, early morning cafeteria. A few were frantically trying to finish their homework before the first bell. Most were sitting around on the tables, gossiping. I felt their eyes on me. The hushed tones and snickering glances. I sat down and cracked my Math book. I was actually thankful for it – the difficult trig problems really forced me to concentrate. The world disappeared for a while and I was stuck in numbers and angles and logic. By the time the bell rang, I'd been absorbed into the sea of students. Just another girl with a story. I walked up to Latin.

  Arbor met me at the door.

  “Salve,” I said. I wondered if he'd heard about the rumors. I decided he probably had – he seemed to know everything about everyone.

  “Hello,” he replied. He was cordial. But blank. A mystery.

  I wanted to break through his calm veneer, shock him a little and let him know that I wasn't some victim who would just collapse in the face of a few bullying comments. “So, I really enjoyed that pretend sex we had. Up for some more?”

  His lips dipped in a puzzled frown. “I'm not sure to what you are referring.”

  “Everyone's talking about it. You, me. P in the V.” Now my voice was getting sarcastic and bitter, but I couldn't help it. “Amanda's been spreading it around.”

  “Ah.” His face didn't change.

  Other students began to wander into class, some of them staring openly. A freshman girl looked me over and giggled nervously, turning to a friend to whisper in her ear.

  “Well, what are you going to do?”

  “I can't control what people say.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I'm not asking you to. Just stay away from me, okay? And maybe tell Amanda off a little when you see her.”

  “I don't want to stay away from you.” He stepped forward and blocked me as I tried to walk to my seat. We were closer than I'd have liked. Too
close for comfort, just close enough for my body to thrill. He took my hand, skin hot as fire. I wanted to kiss him.

  “Come with me to Denver tonight,” he said.

  I scoffed and twisted my hand away, pushing him aside so that I could take my seat. “No way.”

  “Why?” He fixed his eyes on me, sitting down fluidly and hunching over so that our heads were still close. One of his hands was on my desk, fiddling with the loose wire in my notebook.

  “It's an hour away. On a school night. Even if I wanted to go, my sister would never let me.”

  “Do what I do,” he said.

  The bell rang and he broke his spell, turning around to pay attention to Quentin's lecture.

  Do what I do. What, lie? Lie to Callie? Fear chilled my stomach. I thought of myself as kind of rebellious, dabbling in the metal scene and safety-pins-through-the-nose punk, but I'd never sneaked out or run off with anyone. Hell, I hadn't even been on a date! Sure, there were things I glossed over with my big sister, but she always knew what city I was in.

  Latin passed in a blur. We were reading a medieval text about some lame monk who walked up a mountain every day as a penance for his sins. One day he came to the summit and saw an angel standing in front of him. The angel had a flammeus gladius, a flaming sword that flashed and danced, turning deadly circles through the air.

  “Where am I?” asked the monk.

  “Eden,” the angel replied.

  “How did Eden come to be here? I've been struggling up this mountain every day for years.”

  “I am always at the top of every mountain,” said the angel, “but it takes a perfect faith to see me.”

  Quentin's voice rumbled through my bones as he finished the translation. “Then the angel slew him and led his soul into Paradise, for by perfect he meant completed.”

  I shivered.

  After class, I noticed that George stayed behind. He'd made a joke on his way out and now he and Quentin were talking and laughing, discussing something excitedly. I only caught part of it – sounded like some sort of strategy for the football game. Huh. Quentin didn't exactly strike me as the football type.

  It was only the second week of school, but already it felt like a familiar grind. I was basically living for lunch, when I'd get to see Ellen and tell her about Arbor's weird Denver proposition. Denver! He didn't even say what he wanted to do with me there. I focused on my schoolwork, and tried to make the morning go by as fast as possible.

  “Oh, oh, oh! To touch and feel very green vegetables. Ah!”

  “I'm sorry, what?”

  Ellen and Shelby were sitting at our lunch table, apparently on acid. They glanced up at me, and then Shelby replied, “Some say marry money.”

  “Do they?” I leaned over and whispered with pretend concern. “Can you see them now?”

  Ellen chimed in. “But my brother says big blessings matter more!”

  They dissolved into giggles and I set down my tray, plastic bracelets jingling. I picked up my fork and poked at the Salisbury steak that a lunch lady had slopped on my plate seconds before. It was already congealing into a disturbing, rubbery, blue-gray mass.

  “You'd think they would want to avoid tired cliches,” I murmured. “But no. Classic high school mystery meat.”

  “On old Olympus's towering top, a Finn and German viewed a hop,” said Ellen. “That's for if you want to use the name acoustic instead of vestibulocochlear for number eight.” Shelby nodded as if this meant something.

  “Okay, what's the deal?”

  “It's a mnemonic. We're learning the cranial nerves,” said Ellen. “Olfactory, optic, oculomotor...”

  “...Trochlear, trigeminal, abducens...”

  “...Facial, vestibulocochlear, glossopharyngeal...”

  “...Vagus, accessory, hypoglossal!”

  I stared at them, and then put my hand up to my ear. “This is Eagle calling Houston. Come in, Houston. I've finally managed to track the mysterious life-readings to their source, and have made a startling discovery. This planet appears to be entirely populated by huge nerds!”

  Ellen punched me. “You are such an idiot.”

  “Ow! Hey, did you say one of those nerve-y thingies was named vagus?”

  “Yup.”

  “That means 'wanderer' in Latin.”

  Ellen smiled as she cracked open her carton of skim milk. “Fancy.”

  Britta sat down with more than her usual oomph. She nudged me in the ribs and pointed to the far corner of the cafeteria, where Vi was in line for food (or should I say 'sustenance of indeterminate origin'). “Watch this, ladies.”

  “What?”

  Vi was just standing there. Twirling her pretty curly hair, the sort of vacant look look on her face that we all have when we're stuck waiting in line.

  “In a few minutes, Luke Ofori is going to come through the doors of the fieldhouse, all sweaty from the extra practices they've been doing this week, and he's going to ask her to the Homecoming dance.”

  “And you know this... how?” asked Ellen.

  Britta smiled secretively. “I have my ways.”

  We sat and stared. Nothing happened. Well, except for Vi shuffling forward five feet or so, tapping her fingernails on her empty tray.

  “Any second now.”

  Shelby made her voice low and furtive, like a narrator on the National Geographic Channel. “This rare footage of a female high school student was captured deep in the wild realms of her natural habitat, which is rapidly being destroyed by deforestation. See the magnificent mane, enhanced by salon quality conditioners! Also note the brilliant blue-and-white 'loyalty plumage' typical of the autumn sports contests in which groups of high school students seek to dominate each other through superior displays of aggression and agility.”

  Vi inched forward, nodding to the beat of some song that was stuck in her head.

  “She stalks her prey slowly,” said Ellen, “so as not to upset the herd.”

  “Shut up,” hissed Britta. “Here comes Luke!”

  “The male high school student approaches the female. He is about to engage in a traditional mating ritual peculiar to this species. Naturalists have dubbed it the 'awkwardly asking if, um, uh, er, you wanna maybe go-to-the-dance-with-me' maneuver.”

  Britta turned her head away from the riveting action for a moment to scowl at us. “Look, he's cutting in line.”

  “How romantic,” I said, wryly.

  They started talking, both with hopeful smiles on their faces. I was afraid Vi's finger would get caught in one of her ringlets – she was twirling faster and faster, clearly nervous.

  “Aww,” sighed Britta. “They're gonna go to the dance and fall in love and go to the same college and get married and change their last name to Oforiberg and have babies...”

  “Don't you have a Livejournal or something you could be using to document this train of thought?” asked Ellen. “Instead of my brain cells?”

  “... and then their babies will grow up and they'll go to college and get married and have more babies...”

  “... and humanity will evolve a way to tune out ridiculous statements made by other humans.”

  Just then Vi squealed and bounced up and down. We saw her mouth open to form an enthusiastic 'Yes!' and she gave Luke a hug. Her hands were shaking. I noticed the wobble of her tray as she finally set it down on the counter and received a gloppy piece of Salisbury steak.

  “The Cinderella of our times,” I declared.

  Luke got ambushed by a couple of his teammates. Apparently all week the football players were eating lunch together in solidarity, no outsiders allowed. So Vi came over to us, face flushed with pleasure.

  “Guess what?”

  “We know!” squealed Britta. “Good job.”

  “Did I look cool?” There was a manic, dazed gleam in Vi's eyes.

  “Super cool.”

  She sat down, staring off into the distance, as though she were looking into her own future and seeing the end of every Disney princ
ess movie all at once. “I'm so excited.” She brought a piece of steak up to her mouth, chewed on it absentmindedly. “Mmm.”

  “Ew.” I pushed mine into the corner of my tray, stabbing it with my fork as though it were some small rodent I'd just fought off.

  “So Viiii,” said Britta, snapping her fingers in front of Vi's face and breaking her dreamy gaze. “Are you going to try to kiss him?”

  She shrugged. “I don't know. If he tries to kiss me, I'll totally let him.”

  “What kind of kiss?” asked Britta. “Tongue? No tongue? We need, like, a rating system or something.”

  “Max tongue,” said Shelby.

  “Yuck!” Vi grinned at her. “I would like a tasteful, medium amount of tongue, please.”

  “Oh come on,” said Ellen. “Life is short. Go for max tongue.”

  Flashback hit me, suddenly. The pale arm emerging from the window. Dead children. A devastated father. Life is short.

  The bell rang. “Hey Ellen, can I talk to you?”

  I snagged her elbow as we walked to gym. “Something weird happened in Latin. With Arbor.” I went into an explanation, but quickly found that I wasn't sure exactly how to characterize Arbor's proposal.

  “So he just said, like, come with me to Denver after school? And do what?”

  “I don't know. I guess I kind of assumed he was asking me on a date or something.”

  “A date is going to Newman's Mini Putt-Putt and stuffing pine cones in the clown's mouth on hole 17. Not driving an hour to Denver for who knows what reason. You're not going, right?”

  “No, of course not.”

  Life is short.

  “I just wanted to hear what you thought about it.”

  “Well, I think he's either a pervert or a psychopath, and you shouldn't have anything to do with him either way.”

  We reached the locker room and changed quickly into Peaks High Athletics tees and our gym shorts. We were starting a new unit this week. Softball. The teacher handed us each a cruddy, broken down old glove out of a plastic bin and we traipsed outside to the diamond.

  “A through M over here,” growled Ms. Martz. “Team one. N through Z over here. Team two. Congratulations, you're all first round draft picks. Signing bonus: one beautiful fall afternoon playing the greatest game on Earth.”