by Katie Clark
She gasped. This was the dream—her dream!
“Pardon me, miss. Are you lost?”
Skye started. Was the boy talking to her? He could see her? She was still in the sandy place, and he wore tattered robes.
The dark skin on the boy’s face parted, revealing a smile of already yellowing teeth. “You’ve been standing in front of Papa’s fruit stand for many minutes. You seem lost to me.” His voice squeaked, and his eyes sparkled with the bright sunlight.
Skye glanced around nervously. He wasn’t speaking English—it sounded more like the language she’d been studying with Mr. Kilpatrick—yet she could understand him just fine. How?
Tents lined a narrow, dusty street.
She shielded her eyes from the blinding sun. “I’m not at Stonehenge anymore, am I?”
The boy laughed and shook his head. “Silly girl.” Then his eyes turned curious, and he cocked his head. “Why don’t you cover up? You will get in trouble.”
Skye glanced at her black, lacey tunic, then the robes and face veils the other women wore. Right. She didn’t exactly fit in. “Will you tell on me?”
The boy looked around then shook his head. “I guess not, but if Mawmaw returns, she will swat at you.” He made a swishing motion with his hands, grinning and saying, “Shoo! Shoo!”
Skye managed a nervous smile. “I understand. Thank you for your help.”
“I am Abdul. What is your name?”
“I’m Skye.”
The boy glanced up. “Skye?” Then his eyes widened, and he gasped. “You are she! Hebat!”
Now Skye frowned. “Who?”
The boy pointed at something behind her, and she turned slowly. The skeleton of a tower rose in the distance.
“Hebat. Lady of the skies. We build your temple!”
Skye’s frown deepened, and her stomach started its familiar twisting. “No.”
“Hebat!” he danced around her, laughing excitedly.
“No, I’m just Skye.” She tried to quiet him. “What did you say I am?”
“Hebat! Hebat!”
“No, it’s Skye.” She shook her head, hoping to convince him, but he continued dancing and laughing.
People began to stare.
“Skye? Skye! Are you OK?” A different voice came from somewhere.
She shook her head again then blinked.
The boy and the sand were gone. Philip stood in front of her, shaking her arm. “Skye, they’re ready to go.”
She trembled and glanced around. “What? Who?”
“The tour bus. Are you OK?” He watched her, his head tilted to the side.
Like the boy.
Skye looked around again. The sand was gone, and so was the tower. In its place was Stonehenge, tourists, and Philip. And he’d said they were ready to go? How long had she been out of it?
“Are you ready?” He drew his eyebrows together.
Skye took a shaky breath. Whatever had happened was the creepiest thing she’d ever been through. She pushed away from the giant rock. “Yeah, I’m ready. Let’s go.”
4
Philip watched Skye closely. She still faced the bus window, biting her lower lip, as she stared at the barren fields on their drive back toward London.
What was up with her? She’d been acting so offended at his presence earlier, but now she seemed—confused? Worry twisted in his gut. She wasn’t actually his problem, but they were in a foreign country together. She didn’t know anyone else, so if something bad had happened… He cleared his throat. “Did something happen? Did someone hurt you or say something to you?”
She turned to him and blinked a few times. “What?”
His cheeks burned, and he ground his teeth. His worry was making him feel like an idiot. “I asked if something happened back there. Did someone hurt you?”
She blinked again, her frown back in place. “Of course not.”
A piece of blond hair fell across her eyes. She quickly brushed it away then went back to staring out the window.
“Skye,” he tried again. He gently pulled her shoulders around to face him. “You’re weirding me out. What’s going on?” Touching her felt wrong, and he quickly dropped his hands.
“Do you ever have dreams?”
Dreams? “I don’t know. I don’t think so.”
She bit her lip, something she’d done even when they were kids. “I do. And I think one just came true. Or maybe I dreamt it while I was awake?” She shook her head and turned back to the window.
He’d gotten so used to seeing her as the tough one, the one no one could shake, that seeing her out of kilter actually threw him off. “I don’t understand what you mean.”
“I don’t know, Philip,” she snapped. “I don’t understand it myself.” Her tone was a relief. This was the Skye he knew how to deal with.
“Maybe you need a shrink.”
She glared at him. “Why are you sitting here?”
He shifted in his seat and glanced at the front of the bus where the tour guide flirted with a new guy. “You were acting really weird. I was afraid someone had done something to you. Put you in shock or something.”
“And you thought you would come to my rescue?”
Her sarcasm crossed a line. “Whatever, Skye. Forget it.”
She turned away from him as though his suggestion was the best she’d ever heard. Philip ground his teeth again and looked straight ahead. If she wanted to be left alone, he’d give her exactly what she wanted.
But if he was supposed to be recreating his image, whatever God there was, sure wasn’t making it easy on him.
They finally reached the hotel, and Philip bolted from his seat without waiting for Skye.
Skye unloaded behind him, but her mean, sarcastic face was gone, replaced with the confused, innocent face again.
Something had happened at Stonehenge.
They ended up on the same elevator, but it was full of other tourists, and he didn’t have to speak to her. Once they reached their floor, he breezed out and hurried to his room without looking back. She passed his room as he closed the door.
Frustration filled him. Dad’s approval, contingent on his hanging out with Skye for a month, wasn’t fair. What kind of deciding factor was that? Besides, Dad was planning on edging Mrs. Guthrie out of this deal. Why did Philip have to be nice to her daughter in order to get a new car?
Of course, that was what the old Philip would think. He didn’t want to be that guy anymore, did he?
He didn’t know what he wanted.
He kicked off his shoes beside the bed and fell into a heap on the freshly turned down comforter.
Grabbing his phone, he tried pulling up his dream car’s picture. He needed a reminder as to why this was worth it—but his phone was dead. The charger was still stuffed in a bag somewhere, so he dug through the suitcase until he found it in a side pocket. Then he used an adapter and plugged the phone in, rolled back into bed, and let himself fall asleep.
Knocking woke him. He squinted at the clock. Seven PM. What time did that make it at home?
Dad still wasn’t back from work, so he dragged himself out of bed and answered the door.
Skye stood in the hallway, the confused look back on her face. “Is your dad back yet?”
“No.” He kept himself from saying anything else. Why give her more ammunition?
She bit her lip and stared up at him.
Gosh, why did she have to stare at him with her big doe eyes?
“Will you come look at something in my room?”
A half dozen comebacks raced through his mind, but he pushed them all away. She wasn’t kidding around. Something bothered her, and it had to be whatever had happened on the tour.
“Let me grab my shoes.”
He laced up, grabbed his room key, and followed her to her room.
Inside it, his eyes were drawn to the laptop she had set up on one of the beds.
“Skye, what’s going on in here?”
“It’s my pictures
from today.” She moved toward the laptop and gestured him over. “I took these while we were at Stonehenge today.” Curiosity flew through him. Had she captured a crime on camera? “Can I see them?” Blood thundered through his veins, excitement building. This was what had her all weirded out. It had to be big.
She scooted the computer closer to him.
Philip picked up the laptop and clicked through the files. The first was of a giant stone. Then several of the stones from a distance. The place where two stones came together. The open fields around Stonehenge.
“I don’t see anything,” he said, irritated.
She stepped closer, and the smell of strawberries hit him. She reached across him to enlarge the pictures. She pointed. “Look harder. Do you see that field? What do you see in the distance?”
He shook his head. “A farmhouse?”
“There were no houses around, and that’s not a house. Look again.”
He studied the hazy object in the background. Out of focus. The structure almost looked like a building made of mud stones. “OK, you got me. What is it?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. Look at the others.”
He flipped to the shot of Stonehenge from a slight distance.
“There.” She reached across him to point out a haze in the background.
This one was more obvious once he knew it was there. A tower.
“That definitely wasn’t there,” she said.
Goose bumps pricked his arms, and the hair on the back of his neck stood out. He glanced at her. What was he supposed to say?
“That’s why you were so upset on the bus?”
“No.”
She left the word hanging, and he held back a shudder. There was more?
“I took the pictures as I touched the stone. And I didn’t see those things when I was taking the pictures, but I did see something later. At least, I think I did.”
He remembered she’d said something about a dream. He swallowed hard. Maybe he didn’t want to hear what she saw. Maybe she really did need a shrink.
But his curiosity won out. “What was it?”
She glanced at him, uncertainty dancing in her eyes. “There was a boy. He kept calling me Hebat. Lady of the—”
“Skies,” Philip finished. “Mr. Kilpatrick’s lessons?”
Her eyes widened, and he chuckled. “What? You’re surprised I listen?”
She shook her head. “No. I’m surprised I didn’t remember that.” She frowned. “Do you think I imagined it then? Maybe I got hot and blacked out. But I don’t remember being hot.” She said it absently, moving past him and sitting on an overstuffed armchair.
“But if that’s all it was,” she said, “what about the pictures?”
He glanced at the evidence. He could definitely see the hazy images, and he flipped through the rest. Picking out the other hazes was easy once he knew what to look for. He shook his head. “I don’t know what to say.”
She watched him closely then turned away and stared at the carpet. “Thank you for coming to see them. I thought I was seriously crazy.”
“Your mom’s not back yet?” he asked. He didn’t know why he kept trying, except she wasn’t being her normal hateful self. And maybe he did want to change after all. Maybe he wasn’t as horrible a person as Mari had said.
“No,” Skye said. “I guess they’re working long hours, as usual.”
He’d almost forgotten that their parents worked together, and the way Dad ignored him was probably the way Mrs. Guthrie ignored Skye. “Do you want to grab something to eat?”
Skye stared at him, looking as she had when they were twelve and still hadn’t been kicked around by life yet. “I guess.” But she didn’t stand from her seat.
“Do you need help cleaning this up?”
“No. Mom doesn’t care. I just—I don’t want her to see the pictures. Let me put them in my backpack.” She finally moved from the chair, gently slid the laptop inside her black backpack, and then slung the backpack over her shoulder. “OK, let’s go.”
Skye didn’t speak as he led her from the hotel and to a pub on the corner. The sun had set, but streetlights lit the city, giving it a lively, festive feel. They found a table, ordered their meals, and waited.
He glanced around, taking it in.
“What are you thinking?” she asked.
What had he been thinking? “Well, I was thinking about this place, and their health score. Do you see how dirty it is? Do they have health scores in England?”
She gave him a blank stare and then burst into laughter. “I tell you I’m having visions, then show you the proof of something totally weird going on, and you’re worried about health scores?”
He let a smile creep across his face. “Yeah, I guess so. So then, what are you thinking about?”
“I want to go back.”
His eyebrows stretched upward. “To Stonehenge? Why?”
“I want to see if it happens again.”
He thought for a moment. “What did you do to make it happen?”
Skye looked at the table and fingered her napkin. “I don’t know. I was thinking about being in England, and then I wasn’t in England anymore.”
“Whoa, wait. You weren’t in England anymore? You only said you saw a boy.” This story kept getting weirder.
The waiter brought their food, and Skye sighed. “I don’t know what happened. That’s why I want to go back.” She paused, a French fry—or a chip—halfway to her mouth. “Will you go with me?”
Something inside him twisted. His stomach? His heart? Who knew? But he swallowed hard. “Yeah. Whatever. We can go tomorrow.”
Her worry and confusion melted away, and the doe eyes were back. “Thanks.” She dug into her food without another word.
Philip watched her eat for a few seconds. When was the last time he’d done something nice for someone just because they’d asked? Or hadn’t asked, for that matter?
He was looking forward to tomorrow. Besides, he’d seen the pictures for himself. If something creepy was going on, he wanted in on it.
They ate in silence, but he watched Skye. She seemed much happier and more relaxed.
When they finished, he led the way back to the hotel. Once he’d said good night and he returned to his own empty hotel room, he had to admit maybe the creepy factor wasn’t the only reason he wanted to return to Stonehenge.
5
Nerves twisted Skye’s stomach as the bus rumbled closer to Stonehenge. Mom hadn’t understood why they’d wanted to return, but Philip’s dad didn’t seem to care one way or the other. In the end, Mom had agreed without too many questions. She never had many questions, at least not where Skye was concerned.
Philip sat beside her on the bus, staring at his phone and texting his friends. Glancing around, she made sure no one was watching her.
They weren’t.
She pulled the laptop from her pack and loaded yesterday’s pictures. Philip glanced at them and quickly shoved the phone inside his pocket. He leaned closer to her, and her cheeks burned.
He was putting her dilemma ahead of his friends? That had to count for something, didn’t it? A tiny sliver of hope for their friendship wormed its way inside her heart. Probably a stupid thing to let fester, but she was optimistic.
“I was thinking I could try taking pictures with my phone when we get there,” he said. “See if the hazes show up.”
“There were a lot of people doing that. It seems like it obviously doesn’t work because wouldn’t everyone be weirded out instead of only us?” She spoke quietly so no one would hear them.
“True.” He looked from the pictures to her. “So what’s the plan?”
The plan? Good question. “I’m not exactly sure, except I want to take more pictures. I want to go back to the place where I saw the boy, too.”
He seemed to study her. “Can you tell me about that?” he whispered. “You said you weren’t in England anymore.”
Her cheeks burned again, and she p
ulled away from him. When they were little, she’d talked to him about everything. They’d been totally comfortable around each other. Now? He had to be thinking she was nuts.
Taking a deep breath, she pushed away her embarrassment and let the memories come. The sand, the heat, the clothes.
“I got really dizzy. Then there were these people. They were dressed in turbans and robes. Like, I was in the desert or something. And the boy spoke with an accent and kept calling me Hebat.”
“So maybe you were in some ancient time, like Mr. Kilpatrick’s lessons.”
She bit her lip. Her vision had been exactly like Mr. Kilpatrick’s lessons. Still, Philip’s suggestion was way too bizarre. “How could I have been in an ancient time period?”
He glanced back to the pictures in her lap. “I don’t know, but what’s this?”
She stared at the hazy tower in the background of the Stonehenge picture. She didn’t know the answer.
They sat in silence a few more moments, until Philip sighed. “I guess time travel isn’t exactly possible. Is it?”
“Why are you asking me?”
“You’re smarter than me. And didn’t you study one-on-one with Kilpatrick?”
How did he know about that?
She shook her head. “I don’t think time travel is possible. I must have blanked out or something. It doesn’t explain the pictures, but I saw a report on the Discovery Channel once, where a man projected his thoughts onto film. It was kind of freaky, but maybe something like that happened.”
Philip studied the pictures again. “So what are you saying? You were thinking thoughts about our history lessons and the camera picked up on them? They must have been some pretty powerful thoughts.”
She shrugged, frustration filling her as she shoved the laptop back into her bag. “I don’t know what I’m saying. What’s more feasible? Time travel or projecting thoughts onto film?”
He scrunched up his face. “Good point. But time travel sounds much more interesting.”
She managed a small smile. “You’re such a guy.”
He grinned back as the bus began to slow. Stonehenge rose in the distance, and the jitters returned to Skye’s stomach. The huge stones filled the horizon and took her breath away. They’d arrived at the moment of truth. “Thanks for coming with me.”