by Meg Bonney
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Chapter
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Pandamoon Books
Everly
Book One of the Everly Series
by Meg Bonney
© 2016 by Meg Bonney
This book is a work of creative fiction that uses actual publicly known events, situations, and locations as background for the storyline with fictional embellishments as creative license allows. Although the publisher has made every effort to ensure the grammatical integrity of this book was correct at press time, the publisher does not assume and hereby disclaims any liability to any party for any loss, damage, or disruption caused by errors or omissions, whether such errors or omissions result from negligence, accident, or any other cause. At Pandamoon, we take great pride in producing quality works that accurately reflect the voice of the author. All the words are the author’s alone.
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Pandamoon Publishing. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
www.pandamoonpublishing.com
Jacket design and illustrations © Pandamoon Publishing
Art Direction by Matthew Kramer: Pandamoon Publishing
Illustrations by Ayush Pokharel: Pandamoon Publishing
Editing by Zara Kramer, Rachel Schoenbauer, and Rachel Lee Cherry: Pandamoon Publishing
Pandamoon Publishing and the portrayal of a panda and a moon are registered trademarks of Pandamoon Publishing.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
Edition: 1
Dedication
For my daughters. Keep being weird.
Everly
CHAPTER 1
Nine days. Nine days until I was free. Nine days until I could sit in my room for hours, speaking to absolutely no one. Nine days until high school was over and I could escape the false applause, the empty high fives, and one very stupid nickname.
Nine days.
“Madison Rosewood! How are those legs, Mad Dash?” Mr. Hillman, the husky gym teacher, asked as he checked off something on his clipboard and paced.
I flared my nostrils and forced a smile.
Running. All anyone ever wanted to talk to me about was my running. Not coffee, Frodo Baggins, Joss Whedon shows, or anything else that I actually cared about.
“Great. Pretty anxious to walk the hell out of high school, Mr. Hillman,” I joked as I stared down at the water sloshing in the pool.
“Watch the language, kid.”
“Sorry, sir.”
Mr. Hillman stopped pacing the lineup of my gym class and stood between me and the pool. He always gave me and the other top athletes extra attention, and today was no exception.
“You know, after you win the state championship this weekend, you’ll walk out of here a legend. This school is proud of you,” Mr. Hillman said in a firm voice.
“I just want to walk out of here, period,” I answered under my breath, but Mr. Hillman had already moved on down the line of students.
“You! What’s your name?” Mr. Hillman asked the tall, lanky boy a few people down from me.
“Bryan Mendez,” he answered.
I rolled my eyes. Bryan had been in this class with us all year, but he wasn’t a sporty dude and, therefore, he wasn’t on Mr. Hillman’s radar.
Mr. Hillman nodded and walked to the end of the line. My classmates looked as uncomfortable as I felt. And, like me, they were also sporting horrifically tragic Greenrock High School-issued black swimsuits.
“All right, class. This is the last day of the swimming unit. For those of you who have not completed your swimming skills test, please line up on the deep end of the pool. The rest of you, go the shallow end and have free play. Don’t kill each other,” he bellowed.
The pool house erupted with chatter as nearly everyone hurried past me to the shallow end of the pool, but I did not move. Since starting the swimming unit in gym class, I had skillfully avoided getting into the deep end of the pool, but in order to complete my skills test and pass this stupid unit, I needed to.
I anxiously adjusted a strap of the swimsuit. One of the straps was fine, but the other was super stretched out and wouldn’t stay on my shoulder. Swimming was literally the last thing in the world I wanted to be doing, ever. Unlike most of my fellow Floridians, I couldn’t swim. Every time I had tried, I sank like a rock.
I followed Mr. Hillman to the deep side of the pool.
“Ready, Mad Dash?” Mr. Hillman asked.
“I’m a runner, Mr. Hillman,” I replied. “Not a swimmer.”
Mr. Hillman looked me over and raised his eyebrow. He had to see how nervous I was.
“What do I always say, kid?” Mr. Hillman asked as he rested his hand on the rounded silver pool ladder.
“Always be ready,” I grumbled as I stayed firmly planted about six feet away from him and the deep end of the pool.
“That’s right!” Mr. Hillman exclaimed. His usually unamused eyes lit up. Mr. Hillman never looked happier than when he got to share his “wisdom” with us.
“And when your destiny comes knocking, what do you say?” he asked with a grin.
“Go away?” I replied with one raised eyebrow.
“Nope! You open that door and say, ‘I’m ready!’” Mr. Hillman pumped his fist in the air enthusiastically.
I let out a sigh of defeat and walked to where Mr. Hillman stood by the ladder of doom.
The problem was, I wasn’t ready. I took one more step toward the rippling water below. If swimming was my destiny, then I was for sure not ready.
“Mr. Hillman, I will never need to know this, I promise.” I was desperate now. “And if I ever do find myself submerged in a body of water, it will be a cold day in hell. I don’t go swimming and I don’t plan to.”
“Okay, fine. But swimming skills are essential. You live on an island in the Gulf. Water is all around us, so we need to know how to survive it. If not for you, do it for others,” Mr. Hillman replied.
“What do you mean?” I squinted and tried to think of a way that swimming was, in any way, a charitable activity.
“What if someone needs your help, or someday you have kids and one of them falls in a pool?” Mr. Hillman asked.
“Kids are overrated. I’ll adopt cats,” I shot back.
Mr. Hillman sighed.
“Water safety is a must, Rosewood.” He had a knack for giving an explanation that didn’t feel like a lecture.
“Maybe I’ll move somewhere really cold and then all the water will be frozen. Boom, problem solved!”
Mr. Hillman
didn’t answer that one. Instead, he let out a slow sigh.
Just then, Shawn Milton, my lifelong nemesis, knocked into my shoulder and stood next to Mr. Hillman. Gross. I sneered at Shawn and his stupid face. We had hated each other ever since I broke his nose in middle school for lifting up my skirt at lunch. Jerks like him didn’t deserve straight noses and wide nasal passages.
“Damn, Mad Dash, looking good.” He laughed.
I gave him a dirty look but didn’t respond to his taunting. In no universe would Shawn Milton give me an actual compliment—not that I cared.
Shawn made a kissy face at me, and my stomach churned. His eyes scanned me up and down as I balled my fists at my sides.
“Pipe down, Milton. Sorry, Rosewood, you know how boys are,” Mr. Hillman remarked.
“Mr. Hillman, it’s a penis, not a free pass to be a pervert.”
“All right, all right, shut up, both of you. Ladies first.” Mr. Hillman slapped the ladder and his Greenrock High School ring clanged loudly against it.
I swallowed hard and stepped back. “Actually, Mr. Hillman, I’m not feeling so great. Can I go to the nurse?” I covered my stomach with my arms.
“Rosewood…” Mr. Hillman shook his head.
Shawn turned back to me and squinted his stupid, too-close-together eyes at me. “You are so full of sh—”
“Shawn, shut up,” Mr. Hillman interrupted. “Rosewood, if you don’t complete this test, I will have to fail you for this unit. That will pull your whole grade down.”
Normally, who cared? It was just a stupid gym grade. But ever since Principal Grayson had made us sign the Student Athletic Code Agreement, I needed to keep a C or better in each of my classes to compete in any student sporting events. Like the state track championships this Saturday.
“I know the strokes. Can I just show you here…on this impeccably dry land?” I took another step back from the pool. I felt like my heart was going to burst out of my chest as I weighed my options.
Truth was, I didn’t really care about the track meet itself, but I needed to be on that bus on Saturday. The team would get off of Greenrock Island for the whole day, and that was all I needed, whether that meant running in the race or not. And I knew that if I was disqualified from competing in the meet, I was still the team captain, and my coach would still make me attend—although, if Aunt Ruth got wind of me failing this class, I could kiss that bus ride good-bye. She would either ground me or kill me. Both would be detrimental to my plans.
“Rosewood, it’s a swimming unit. You need to get in the water. No more excuses. No more wisecracks.” Mr. Hillman clapped his hands.
“No more wisecracks? I did not consent to that.”
“Now!” Mr. Hillman barked.
“Shawn can go first.” I spun around and walked to the wooden bench next to window.
“Fine. Milton, go,” Mr. Hillman ordered.
I sat with my back to the pool and looked out at the trees as they swayed in the wind. The rustle of the wind in the trees was one of the greatest sounds in the world, if you asked me. I wanted to be out there in the fresh air so badly. Really, I wanted to be anywhere but here.
I thumbed the silver window frame, willing it to open so I could escape, but the windows remained tightly closed. I took a deep breath. The pool house was hot and humid and smelled heavily of chlorine. It made me long for the fresh air even more.
Be calm, Maddy. Be calm.
I exhaled loudly.
I glanced back over to Mr. Hillman and Shawn, but as I did, something out the window caught my eye.
At the edge of the tree line was a guy dressed in all black, standing with his feet shoulder width apart, facing the school. His face was not familiar. Unfamiliar at this school was uncommon.
And it was like he was looking right at me.
“Weird,” I said aloud. This side of school rarely had any traffic. The only people who went into those woods were the potheads.
Just then, a loud ringing noise pierced the air. I flinched and cupped my hands over my ears because it was the kind of sound that almost hurt to hear. I felt like my eardrums were going to burst from the pressure.
Still holding my ears, I turned, expecting to see everyone reacting like me, but nobody else looked bothered by the noise. It got louder and increasingly shrill while they all splashed and played like nothing was happening. I could hear nothing over the ringing noise.
I looked back to the window.
The guy in all black was now at the window, also holding his ears. He was inches from the glass. Inches from me. I jumped in surprise and fell off the bench onto the cold tile floor with a painful thud.
And then the noise stopped.
“Oh, crap. Rosewood, are you okay over there?” Mr. Hillman called over to me. I looked around the pool house. Everyone in the shallow end was still playing and splashing around. Shawn was doing the butterfly in the deep end.
Nobody else had noticed me or my fall, thankfully.
I hopped to my feet and adjusted the strap of the swimsuit before it slid down my shoulder again. Because that was all I needed to end my high school career—a nip slip.
I stood up and turned back to the window.
Gone. The guy was gone.
I took a step closer to the window and leaned over the bench as I searched the area for the person. I looked to the woods, to the left and right. Nothing.
“Rosewood?” I heard Mr. Hillman ask again.
“Yes, I’m fine,” I answered.
“No, it’s your turn, Rosewood. Come here, please.”
“Oh, what?” I snapped back into reality.
“Your turn,” Mr. Hillman replied.
Shawn climbed the ladder out of the pool and pushed the water out of his stupid hair. He twirled his goggles on his index finger.
“Milton, you passed. Go ahead down to free play.” Mr. Hillman wrote something on the clipboard.
I gave Shawn another evil glance as he adjusted his swim trunks. He puckered his lips at me and walked past me to join the lucky folks in the shallow end of the pool.
“Eat it, Shawn,” I replied with disdain. I quickly adjusted my focus back to the looming horror of the swimming pool in front of me. Hating Shawn Milton would have to wait. This was it. I walked to the edge of the pool and lined my unpolished toes up to the edge of the tile.
Okay, I was out of jokes. I was out of quips.
Hello, paralyzing fear! It’s me, Madison.
I took a half step back.
Maybe if I explained everything to Mr. Hillman, he wouldn’t make me get in the water. Or I could tell him that today was my birthday. That alone deserved a pass out of gym class swimming, right? He seemed like a nice enough guy. I couldn’t be the only person in the history of time who didn’t want to get in the deep end.
Just then, without warning, I felt two hands hit me sharply in the back and thrust me toward the water below. I flailed my arms to catch something but had no such luck. Into the water I went with a hard splash.
This is it. This is how I am going to die.
I kicked my legs wildly and thrashed my arms as fast as I could, but it didn’t help. Sinking to the bottom like a rock in a pond, I opened my eyes. Somebody help me! On the shallow side of the pool, I could see the legs of the other students just as my own feet hit the bottom.
I could hear the noises of everyone yelling and playing in an echoed, distorted way. The water above me was unmoved. Nobody was coming to save me, but it didn’t matter. I couldn’t hold my breath any longer, and I sucked in a bit of water.
My lungs burned and I squeezed my eyes and mouth shut. My panic faded and I felt almost tranquil for a moment as I thought of Jason, my best friend. My only friend. I heard his laugh and saw his smile.
This is it.
Just then, I felt a hand on my arm, and I was rapidly pulled from the pool’s floor. My head breached the surface and I began coughing violently. Somebody’s arms w
ere around me and I was being pulled to the side of the pool. I tried to breathe. My throat ached and I began coughing up water.
“Rosewood, can you hear me?” Mr. Hillman’s voice called out over the chatter of my peers. “Watch your step, there’s glass on the ground!”
More chatter.
I kept my eyes shut as I was lifted out of the water and plopped onto the tile floor. It felt like my lungs were filled with rocks and acid.
I couldn’t stop coughing as the water and air bubbles escaped my throat.
“You there—who are you? Somebody call the nurse!” Mr. Hillman hollered. “Get the Principal in here, we need to go on lock down, now.”
Everything sounded like it was really far away, at the end of an endless tunnel or something.
I blinked a few times and opened my chlorine-stung eyes to see someone right in front of me. It was the guy from the window. He was hunched over me, and the only things that weren’t blurry were his vibrantly green eyes.
“You―you,” I sputtered with an aching throat.
I flinched as a sharp pain shot through my arm. My rescuer reached down and tugged something out of my arm, just above my elbow. I moved my arm to escape his touch as he held up a piece of glass covered in my blood and tossed it away from me. It skittered across the tile.
“Ah, crap. She’s bleeding. Where is the damn nurse?” Mr. Hillman hollered.
I didn’t look at Mr. Hillman or the chaos around me; I kept my eyes on the boy who pulled me from the water. He leaned closer to my face as drops of water fell from his nose onto me. “The noise. You heard it, too,” he said. It was less of a question and more of a statement.
I narrowed my eyes at him and nodded a little. “What are―” I started to ask, but I was overcome by the violent coughing again.
My rescuer smiled softly and stood up.
The glass beneath Mr. Hillman’s shoes crunched as he directed students to leave the pool house. I squeezed my eyes shut. It felt like I had razor blades in my throat. I took a weak breath and opened my eyes just in time to see the green-eyed boy jump out through the broken window that I had been sitting near a few minutes ago.