But unlike Tiernan and Alice, who were constantly coming up with new scenarios and exotic locations for their fantasies, Summer’s dream date with Travis was always the same. She could still remember every detail; she’d lived it so many times in her head. The date started with the two of them meandering down Main Street in Walford, arm in arm, laughing, talking, window-shopping. And at the end of the night they’d wind up back at Summer’s house on her porch swing while Travis serenaded her on guitar. Then after he was done, a kiss. Never a full-on make-out session—just a sweet solitary kiss and a whisper, nose to nose. I love you.
I love you. She and Jace had said it to each other a million times. But never once had it felt like it did in that silly daydream.
Stupid Jace. Summer wanted to believe him. She really did. But she couldn’t get over the feeling that there was something he wasn’t telling her. Some detail he was leaving out. According to Jace, the reason he hadn’t mentioned going to Melanie’s party on graduation night was because he hadn’t wanted to make Summer feel bad about the fact that he was out celebrating their breakup while she was home, crying in her pillow. But for some reason Summer couldn’t shake the aftertaste of her initial doubts. It was like the way a bad dream could ruin her whole day, no matter how many times she told herself it wasn’t true.
Summer pulled her journal from her purse. It was the only chance she had to sort out all the turmoil in her head. She flipped past her diary entries, poems, fragments of poems, and random doodles looking for a blank page. To a stranger, her journal probably looked like the ramblings of a lunatic. But Summer liked the way her mind spilled out onto the page in all its unedited messiness. It didn’t have to be prettied up for anyone but herself.
She wrote feverishly, until her hand hurt, filling ten pages by the time she was done. Most of what she’d written was about Jace. But the lines she liked best were the ones about the girl by the fire.
Her eyes are closed,
But she is open.
Spinning, Smiling, Alive,
Burning as bright as the fire at
her back.
Dancing, just for the joy of dancing.
Dancing for no one but herself.
“Knock, knock,” said a voice from below. Summer peered over the edge of the bunk just as the back door slid open. Outside the van, Tiernan stood next to the motorcycle dude they’d seen back in the parking lot of Lucky’s. A shark-tooth necklace hung off his collarbones. They both had beers in their hands.
“Good. You’re awake,” Tiernan said.
Summer closed her journal and tossed it back in her bag. If Tiernan was hoping to get busy in the Pea Pod, she was sorely mistaken.
“This is Michael. Michael, this is Summer.”
“Hey,” Summer said, sizing him up. She had to hand it to Tiernan, Michael was pretty hot for a biker—skinny but muscular, with broad shoulders and a devilish smile.
“Hey,” Michael said.
“Guess where we’re going?” Tiernan didn’t wait for an answer. “Michael knows about a secret swimming hole a couple miles from here. He says it’s the most pristine water you’ve ever swum in.”
Summer wrinkled her nose.
“Aw, don’t say no, darlin’,” Michael begged. “It’s a night destined to be spent swimming under the stars.” He pointed to the sky—as if Summer didn’t know where the stars were—his eyes lit up in the moonlight.
“What about Alice?” Summer asked. “Is she going?”
“She sure is,” said Phred, ambling up to the Pea Pod, his arm slung around Alice’s shoulder. “We gotta find some way to cool off from this heat.”
Toad trailed behind Alice and Phred, shooting Summer a hopeful smile. In your dreams, kid, Summer thought, quickly extinguishing his grin with an icy stare.
“I think it would be fun for all of us to go for a swim,” Alice said perkily. She and Phred were wearing matching green glow-stick headbands, like halos. “But I don’t think we should leave anyone here by themselves.”
“I don’t mind,” Summer said. “I was just about to go to sleep anyway.”
They probably all thought she was a big old stick-in-the-mud, when in reality it was more like, Been there, done that. Summer and her friends back home partied at the Walford quarry zillions of times. She didn’t need to tag along for amateur hour.
“But you have to come.” Michael frowned at Summer, then Tiernan. “I thought you said this could be our party bus.”
“Wait a minute.” Alice looked concerned. “You didn’t say anything about taking the Pea Pod.”
This was the Alice Summer remembered. The girl didn’t let just anyone inside her precious Pea Pod.
“Well, how else are we gonna get six people to the swimmin’ hole, darlin’?” Michael asked. “On the back of my bike?”
Summer’s throat loosened. If Alice shut down Michael’s plan, Summer didn’t have to be the bad guy. And Alice would never agree to pile everyone back into the Pea Pod after she’d spent all night complaining about how sick of driving she was.
“It’s only a couple miles away, right, Michael?” Tiernan asked in that sugary high-pitched voice she used whenever she was trying to get her way. The sad thing was, the girl spent so much time being ornery that people fell all over themselves whenever she showed the tiniest ounce of sweetness.
“Come on, Alice.” Phred gave her a pitiful-looking pout. “You know we’ll have fun.”
“Well . . .” Alice was wavering. “If it’s okay with Summer.”
Now everyone was staring at her, making it impossible to say no without seeming like a total bitch. And even if she did, Tiernan and Alice would probably just overrule her anyway. The dynamic duo had already shut her down once today in the oh-so-democratic vote that had brought them to this hippieville.
“Dude, you’re either on the bus or off the bus,” Toad chimed in. Of course the two stoners of the group were on their side.
“Fine,” Summer said, against her better judgment.
“Alrighty then,” said Tiernan. “Let’s load her up.”
Summer stood on the grass as they piled into the van—Alice behind the wheel, Michael in the passenger’s seat to navigate, Tiernan on a milk crate in the back, which left Summer stuck sitting between Toad and Phred on the bench seat. Joy.
By the time pavement turned to dirt, Summer knew she should have stayed in Walford, where there were streetlights on the roads and cars drove in straight lines instead of twisting and turning in all directions. Her friends had lectured her all afternoon that coming on this trip was a bad idea. But, of course, she’d refused to admit it.
“Are you sure I shouldn’t have taken a left back there?” Alice asked.
“Nope, you’re doing fine.” Michael pointed to some pine trees at the top of a hill. “It should be just down past there.” He sounded so confident, despite the fact that they’d been driving around the woods for the last fifteen minutes and he’d said that exact same thing three times so far.
“Hey, I’ve got an idea,” Tiernan said. “Let’s give ol’ Coach Quigley a try.”
“Who’s Coach Quigley?” Phred asked.
“He’s our GPS,” Tiernan explained. A few miles back, she’d been defending Michael. Now she was trying to overthrow him.
“We don’t need any technology, darlin’. I grew up in these woods.”
Summer couldn’t help but grin watching Tiernan bristle at the word “darlin’.”
“Spent three weeks campin’ out by that swimmin’ hole back when I was your age,” Michael added.
“That must have been fun,” Alice said.
“Not really.” Michael shrugged. “Only reason I did it was ’cause the cops were lookin’ for me.”
“You were a fugitive from the law?” Tiernan gasped with delight, as if someone had told her she’d just won the lottery. “What did you do?”
“I didn’t do nuthin’.” Michael’s voice was suddenly angry, defensive. “But I’ll tell you one thing. Don’
t matter what the truth is. After that, people ’round here ain’t never treated me the same.”
Summer’s breath quickened as she reeled through a list of potential crimes in her head. Was it a drug deal gone wrong? Rape? Kidnapping? Murder! A half hour ago she had been nestled away on the top bunk, perfectly content. Now there was a high probability she was going to die at the hands of this psychopath, with no one to help her but her ex–best friends and two ridiculously named strangers.
“Crap,” said Tiernan. “No signal.” Coach Quigley’s display was TV screen blue, the words “Searching for Satellites” blinking in the center like an error message.
This entire fiasco was Tiernan’s fault. She was the one who’d brought this lunatic into their lives. The one who’d encouraged Alice’s flirtation with that loser Phred. But did anyone ever listen to what Summer wanted? If they did, by now they’d be in an air-conditioned hotel room twenty miles up the road instead of trapped in this hillbilly hell.
Or maybe she was overreacting. After all, this wouldn’t be the first time Summer let her imagination get the best of her. She glanced over at Toad and Phred, hoping their mellow, glazed-over expressions might offer a bit of reassurance. But the looks of sheer terror on their faces only fanned the flames of Summer’s fears. Either all that pot they’d smoked was making Toad and Phred paranoid, or coming out here with Michael Crazy-Eyes was starting to seem like a really bad idea.
“I think we ought to just turn around,” Alice said, her usual self-assured tone betrayed by only the slightest quaver.
Summer looked out the window into the blackness. Next to her, Toad was shaking his head back and forth, as if to say, Not good, not good at all.
“Hey, Michael,” Tiernan said, trying desperately to keep her voice light and airy. “You’re not, like, taking us out to the woods to, like, kill us or anything, are you?” Then she gave a short chuckle just to show everyone that she wasn’t genuinely scared or anything, that she was just being her usual brash, irreverent self.
Michael spun around to the back, his mouth stretched in a wide skeletal smile. “I ain’t gonna kill ya.” He laughed, his sharp collarbones heaving up and down under his tank top. “In fact, I’m probably the safest guy you could be out here with.”
He twisted his torso some more, pointing to the tattoo on his right bicep. “You see that?” Summer leaned in to see an image of a winged man with a sword in his hand hovering over the devil. “I got it when I was in jail. That’s me—Michael the Archangel. Prince of Light.”
Well, Summer thought to herself, that makes me feel so much better. As if the nasty prison tattoo wasn’t bad enough, it was now obvious to everyone that the man was certifiably insane.
Summer was in the midst of trying to figure out if it were possible to lean over, open the passenger’s side door, and push Michael out of the van while it was still moving when the swimming hole came into view.
“Look!” Summer shouted, even though they were all within three feet of each other. “There it is!”
A wave of relief flooded through her body as she noticed the silhouettes of at least a dozen other cars parked along the road, and further on down the hill the glimmer of their headlights in the water. Summer had no clue where they were, but in all of her life, she couldn’t recall a moment she’d been happier to arrive at a place that she’d never wanted to be.
“TIME, TRAVEL”
WE WENT TO ANCIENT ROME AND 3018
IN MY BROKEN TIME MACHINE.
THE LANDSCAPE CHANGES
BUT THE PAST STAYS THE PAST
THE FUTURE’S MECHANICS
SAY MY PROBLEMS WON’T LAST.
BUT I KNOW MY TIME MACHINE IS BROKEN
’CAUSE I SEEM TO BE STUCK IN RIGHT NOW.
—from Level3’s second CD, Rough & Tumble
Chapter Nine
ALICE JAMMED ON THE BRAKES, FLUNG OPEN HER DOOR, AND leaped out of the Pea Pod, landing smack in the middle of a pricker bush. Compared to the heart attack she’d been having for the past ten minutes, a few minor scrapes were nothing. Her brain screamed directions at her body like it was shouting through a megaphone: Keep moving forward. Get away from the archangel. There’s nothing to see here, people. Just go! Go! Go!
How had she let this happen? How had she ended up in Lord Knows Where, West Virginia, with a man who at best was a known criminal, and at worst—well, she didn’t want to go there.
She took off down the hill after Summer, Tiernan, Toad, and Phred—all of whom had bolted from the van before it was even in park. Gee, guys, thanks for waiting up. But Alice was too scared to bother staying mad. She just wanted to get to the swimming hole. Alive.
“It’s only me,” Alice whispered, the sound of her footsteps joining Summer’s and Tiernan’s in the darkness. She could just make out Toad’s and Phred’s bodies running away in the shadows ahead.
“Hurry up,” Summer hissed.
“No need to rush!” Michael’s voice made Alice jump. “That swimming hole ain’t goin’ nowhere.” From the sound of it, Michael wasn’t right behind them, but he was getting close.
“We’ll meet you there!” Summer called back. She sounded polite, even cheerful. It was a strange gift she had—making everything seem fine no matter how un-fine things actually were.
Without a word, all three of them quickened their stride, entering a dark, thickly wooded area where the treetops blocked all the moonlight.
“Shoot!” Alice cried out, stumbling over something on the trail—a rock or a root. Prince of Light. What they needed was a Prince of Flashlight. That, and an exit strategy.
“Here’s my plan,” she whispered. “I say we go down to the swimming hole, grab Toad and Phred, then, when Michael’s not looking, the five of us hop in the Pea Pod and cruise on out of here.”
“I’m down with that,” Tiernan agreed.
Summer was about to answer when Michael’s voice leaped out of the darkness. “Last one in’s a rotten egg!”
Alice didn’t turn to look, but she could feel Michael gaining on them—his towering frame looming behind her, those stringy, muscular arms of his swinging apelike at his side. The guy gave off so much crazy energy, Alice wouldn’t be surprised to hear a sizzle when he touched the water.
“Darn it.” Tiernan slowed her pace as she spoke. “We forgot our bathing suits. We’re just gonna run back and get—”
But there was no point in finishing her sentence. The swimming hole emerged out of the darkness like a silvery oasis. And from the looks of things, the only suit you needed to wear here was the one you’d been born in.
“Water’s nice and warm tonight,” a completely nude man called out from a rock in the middle of the pond. He was in his sixties, white hair, full white beard, and a twinkle in his eye. It was Naked Santa Claus, and his stocking was most definitely hung. Well, that just ruined Christmas forever, Alice thought to herself as Naked Santa did a swan dive into the water.
Alice looked at Tiernan and Summer. Must flee now, she said telepathically. She was pretty sure they’d understood her message but she kept her eyes on theirs, the one view in the entire place guaranteed to be free of saggy man butt.
Michael didn’t seem to notice or care that it appeared to be Senior’s Day at the swimming hole, happily undressing not two feet from them, without even the slightest bit of self-consciousness.
Alice pretended to pick at a hangnail as she listened to the clink of his belt buckle, then his jeans crumpling to the grass. She didn’t dare look up again until she heard the sloshing noise of Michael’s legs hitting the water.
“Water’s nice and warm, ladies,” Michael called out when he was up to his knees (it was just a quick peek, but the guy was definitely no Santa). Then he was gone.
“Let’s get out of here,” Summer whispered, turning back toward the van.
“Wait.” Alice pulled Summer’s arm. “What about Phred and Toad?”
“They’re way over there.” Tiernan pointed to the opposite side of th
e pond. “By the time we go get them, Michael could come back.”
Summer nodded. “I say we bolt without them. They’re big boys.”
“And personally”—Tiernan leveled Alice with a look—“I think you can do better.”
“What are you talking about?” Alice asked. “Phred and I are only friends, and we—”
Alice was about to list the many reasons why saving Toad and Phred was the right thing to do (none of which had anything to do with the fact that Phred had been hanging all over her) when Michael emerged from underwater, howling like a coyote and pounding his chest. That was all the convincing it took for her to turn tail and run—across the wet spongy grass, through the low brush, then back inside the dark cover of the woods. Man, was she out of shape. But she kept on running, even as Summer and Tiernan overtook her, trying her best to ignore the burning feeling in her hamstrings and focus on the noise of her shoes against the slippery gravel, the rhythm of her own labored breath, the blood whooshing through her veins. And then the one sound she was hoping never to hear again.
“Wait up!” Michael called out. Or was she imagining it? There was no way Alice could have heard him from all the way back at the water. But that would mean—could it even be possible?—that Michael the Archangel was chasing them through the woods. Naked?
Alice’s heart pounded in her chest, in her throat. Don’t turn around. You’re just imagining it. Why were Summer and Tiernan so much faster than she was? She did power yoga three times a week. Okay, maybe two. Don’t think about that. Just concentrate on running. Alice reached into her pocket, digging her keys into the palm of her hand.
The Pea Pod was finally in sight. Alice’s lungs were on fire, her eyes blurry with sweat. They were so close she could almost touch it.
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