Ever

by Shade, Darrin

  From our nature walk, I knew that the center of the tree was blackened—I think it had caught on fire at some point. A small, triangular-shaped hollow was created there and suddenly I was standing inside of it. The roaring in my ears got louder and louder. My hands were shaking, like they were filled with an itch I had no way to scratch. Then my palms started to burn like crazy and I heard myself cry out, but my voice sounded so far away. In desperation, I shoved my hands above my head, connecting with the charred bark of the huge sequoia.

  Everything went black.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  The Crying Girl

  I blinked my eyes several times, but I couldn’t see a thing. I called to Jaren but he didn’t respond. My heart started to pound, the blackness obscuring even the sight of my own hands in front of my face. I groped around but I couldn’t feel the tree at all. I didn’t want to smack into something in the dark so I fell to the ground and hugged my knees into my chest.

  I took a shuddery breath, squeezing my eyes shut tight and praying that when I opened them, everything would be back to normal. No such luck. When I opened my eyes, there was still nothing but blackness. No sounds, no smells. Nothing at all. I was about to panic. Then faintly, the whining noise started back up. It was a haunting sound and as it got louder, a tiny point of light began to form a short distance away. I held my breath, watching a white line appear to part the blackness like it was no more than a thin curtain.

  I stood up gingerly, brushing the dirt from my palms and made my way to the only thing I could see. I had a fleeting thought that maybe I was dead—that I was going toward the light like people do in so many scary movies. I shivered, hesitating as goose bumps rose up on my arms and legs. Then the haunting cry sounded again and this time I recognized the sound. It was the same strange wailing I had been hearing for weeks now. Tentatively, I took a step into the light, leaving the darkness behind me.

  * * *

  For a moment, I froze, unable to process what I was seeing. I took a step forward and felt the gentle pull of an invisible thread. The scent of sandalwood greeted my nose and I knew that even though I couldn’t see him, Jaren was connected to me, somewhere. With more confidence, I walked into the light until the darkness was just a speck in the distance.

  Someone was crying.

  I looked around to find that I had stepped from the middle of a dark forest into a house. I was in the doorway of a bedroom—a girl’s bedroom from what I could tell. Pink gingham bedding and curtains, white high-end furniture, and the oddest thing—a life-sized carousel horse in the corner.

  Weird.

  The haunting wail continued. I spied a girl hunched over a desk. She was scribbling furiously on some paper, her tears making fat, wet splats on her words.

  “Hello?” The girl didn’t respond. “Hello?” I tried again, louder this time.

  Still nothing. It was like I wasn’t even there. I raised one hand to touch the distraught girl on the shoulder. To my horror, my palm passed straight through her like I was made of smoke. I gasped and turned to face the mirror that stood next to a sizable walk-in closet. My reflection stared back at me. I certainly looked real enough. I was still me—not some vapor or a slimy plasma ghost or something. I ran my fingers through my hair and down my body, feeling the warmth of my own skin to reassure myself that I was as real as anyone. I touched the mirror but my hand passed through that, too—like I was a ghost. Oh, God, maybe I had done that thing Jaren had been afraid of, where I left my body and now I was out here—and I had no idea how to get back.

  The door had closed behind me and my hand passed through the knob when I tried to open it. Dread filled me, traveling up from the soles of my feet to lodge in the pit of my stomach. How could I feel nauseous if I was dead? The crying girl hiccupped loudly, drawing my attention.

  A strange sensation brushed the skin near my ear and I almost thought I heard the words,

  “Hear and listen.” I stood stock-still, my ear cocked to one side. Heart pounding, I whirled around, but nobody was there.

  “Sylvia?” I whispered, half-expecting a smiling woman wearing moccasins to appear in front of me, but nothing happened.

  “Okay,” I muttered. “Hear and listen. Not much else I can do here anyway.”

  I spent a few minutes listening to the crying girl. She looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t see her face as she hunched over her diary or journal or whatever she was scribbling in. It seemed like just as I almost got a glimpse of her face, she turned away. Something prevented me from getting too close. I tried yelling, waving my hands, and jumping up and down, to no avail. I paced the pink gingham bedroom, pausing at the carousel horse more than once. What a weird thing to have in your room. And it looked expensive, too, with its garish golden trim.

  “I have to do this. I’m sorry!” the room’s occupant suddenly cried out, shoving her notebook to the floor and burying her face in her hands. It was a diary, I realized, as it plopped down open, near my feet. Then I realized that there was one more thing I could do in this strange place besides hear and listen.

  I could read.

  Nobody understands me. Nobody ever will. I try my very best, and I’m just not good enough. They don’t love me. Nobody does. Nobody will, I know it. I’m fat, ugly and stupid. No matter how hard I study, I can’t pull a 4.0. I am just a huge disappointment.

  Nobody will miss me when I’m gone.

  The writing looked rushed, like it had poured from the crying girl’s pen onto the page. I didn’t get the fat part. From what I could tell, the crying girl was thin. Maybe a little too thin, actually. Below the sad passage was a doodle that made me do a double take. It was another forty-seven. But it was written with a dash between the numbers.

  4-7.

  Like it was a date.

  I sucked in my breath. Do I even have breath at this point?

  I squinted at the crying girl’s doodle again. Maybe it was a date. April seventh. The more I considered it, the more confidence I had that I was right. The forty-sevens symbolized a date—one that would arrive in a few short weeks. A dark feeling of foreboding came over me then. I was certain that something terrible was going to happen on April seventh.

  At last, she lifted her head, and I could see her wipe her face with the sleeve of her sweater. I recognized the sweater from somewhere. This girl was probably a student at my school. I studied the back of her head as she stared at the pink wall in front of her desk. Blond hair. Thin build. Light skin. Just like most of the kids attending Covecrest. Who was she? The girl took a deep breath and then began to turn toward me.

  Tensely, I waited to see the girl’s face. Just as she turned, there was a harsh tug from somewhere deep within me. I felt my entire body, or whatever I was at the moment, go cold. The roaring returned to my ears and the whispers started back up. Then the pink walls of the crying girl’s room began to blur. I desperately tried to see her face as she bent to pick up her diary but when she looked up, her face was just kind of…not there. She was vanishing before my eyes. I watched helplessly as the room faded around me. The last thing I saw was the crying girl slipping her diary beneath her mattress.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Prelude to a Kiss

  Warm. I was really warm. I felt a smile settle on my face as I luxuriated in the comforting heat. A familiar smell surrounded me. My body felt so heavy. So did my eyelids. I realized I couldn’t open them. I didn’t want to anyhow. What delicious, drugging heat…

  “Mmm,” I murmured. My voice sounded alien to my own ears. It sure was dark. Near my cheek, a steady beat lulled me into a warm puddle of contentment.

  And then I realized I wasn’t alone. Far from it.

  “You’re back,” a husky, relieved voice resonated close to my ear. “Aren’t you? Can you move? Talk?”

  Jaren.

  With shock, I realized that I was lying in his lap. His arms were around me, holding me close to his body. My own arms were slung around his waist in a halfhearted embrace.


  Oh. My. God.

  “What happened?” My tongue was thick in my mouth.

  “Shh. Just take a few minutes,” he murmured, letting out a sigh of what I could only assume was relief.

  As I struggled to process the fact that I was cradled in Jaren Wilder’s arms, images suddenly slammed into my brain. I sat straight up like a shot, bumping his chin with the top of my head.

  “Whoa—!”

  “The crying girl! I have to help her!” I bolted, stumbling in the darkness. My body screamed at me for denying it that heady warmth, but I kept going. I nearly tripped but recovered just as Jaren grasped my arm. More heat danced along my arm at his touch, distracting me. But I couldn’t deny the importance of what had happened—or the urgency. I managed to pull away from him. Larger things were at stake here.

  “I have to go back! I couldn’t see! I didn’t hear enough!” I babbled, my voice breaking.

  The Tree! Maybe if I touched it again, I could go back to—to wherever it was I’d been—and figure out who the crying girl was and what she meant to do on the seventh of April. I have to know. I whirled and raced back, hearing Jaren’s muffled curse from somewhere on my right.

  “Ever! Stop!”

  I ignored him. Even though it was pitch black, I ran unerringly back to the low wooden fence. I had one leg slung over it when he reached me.

  “No!” I kicked at him, feeling my sneaker connect with what was probably his stomach.

  “Oof!”

  I felt a twinge of guilt. Jaren didn’t deserve that. But I wasn’t about to let him deter me from my goal. Except that he did. Jaren yanked me bodily from the fence and dragged me away kicking and yelling.

  “Calm down!”

  “Don’t you understand? I have to go back. You took me out, didn’t you?” Somehow, I knew that he was responsible for my vision ending so abruptly. “Why did you do that? I was so close!”

  I managed to free one hand and I used it to push at him. Jaren sank to his knees and the next thing I knew, I was flat on my back—and he was lying on top of me. Although the feel of the long length of him against me set my body on fire, the position only renewed my efforts to free myself. I had to get back to my vision.

  “Get off of m—!”

  This was not how I expected this particular thing to happen. In fact, I had pretty much assumed it would never happen. Not to me. And certainly not with this boy. But it did. In a forest of giant sequoias bathed in moonlight, with stars scattered across an inky black canvas, I had my first kiss.

  Jaren’s mouth came down on mine with rough determination. Dimly, I recognized that he was trying to distract me. It worked. For a moment I wasn’t sure what he was doing. Then the rest of my brain just turned off.

  Oh, the feel of his lips on my own. It was like nothing I had ever experienced. Little bursts of light exploded behind my eyelids as his mouth moved against mine. He tasted like boy and salt and sandalwood.

  My lips parted in surprise and delight as Jaren deepened the kiss, his tongue stroking against my own. I heard myself let out a sound that was so filled with need I could hardly believe it came from my own mouth. I arched against Jaren, feeling the hardness of his chest against me. My hand curled into his hair.

  Something new was happening. A warm ball of energy was swelling low in my belly, seeking…searching for something. Everything in me wanted to get closer to him, to blur the lines that separated his soul from my own. I wriggled with frustration. Fervently, I began to wish that he wasn’t wearing a shirt. My hand crept to the hem of his jacket, my fingers itching to feel the warmth of his skin.

  Abruptly, Jaren tore his mouth away and I cried out in dismay. I lay there panting, as he disentangled himself. My entire body was literally buzzing. I rolled to my side, hugging my knees up to my chest. Oh my God, what was I doing? My first kiss and I was acting like a total…slut! An image of myself, dressed in one of those skimpy dresses the Candy Girls wore flashed through my mind and immediately, a cold ball of shame rose up to punch me square in the stomach. I was pathetic. Jaren had only kissed me to distract me…I was sure of that.

  I crawled to my knees, still trying to catch my breath. I touched a finger to my lips. They felt swollen. I was filled with regret for what had happened—because I knew he didn’t—he couldn’t mean it. He wasn’t into me that way. I mean, how could he be? I wanted to just sink into the forest floor, beneath the dirt. Well, Jaren had accomplished his goal—The Tree and the crying girl were now the last things on my mind.

  I managed to get to my feet. Then I squared my shoulders and stalked back to the golf cart. I tripped a few times, but I made it back to the passenger seat before I did anything else that was totally humiliating. I heard Jaren’s feet taking slow, measured steps down the path. I pulled my hoodie over my face, picturing it cloaking me, masking my energy from him.

  The feet stopped right beside me.

  “Ever.”

  His voice was tinged with regret. Of course it was, I told myself miserably. Tonight had been a totally regrettable experience. I felt like Jaren was trying to read me, in that special way he had, and I tightened my invisible cloak to avoid his energetic perusal.

  “How are you…?” His voice trailed off, and even though I refused to look at him, I could sense Jaren’s shrug. “Okay, then. Let’s go.”

  We drove back to the campsite in silence. I struggled to contain my sobs the entire way. When we parked the golf cart, I jumped out without saying a word. I took off like a wild animal, careening through the woods until I was back inside my tent, listening to the other girls snore. Jaren didn’t try to follow me, and I was glad.

  Naomi’s soft whisper startled me. “Where were you?”

  “I had to pee,” I whispered back, trying to force the huge lump from my throat. I rustled inside my sleeping bag on the squeaky, metal-framed cot, trying to find some comfort.

  Sleep didn’t come. Not for a long time.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  What Should We Do Now?

  The ride home was awful. I had ensured that I was already ensconced in one of the back rows with Naomi before Jaren appeared. The last thing I needed was to be sitting in front of him, wondering if he was looking my way. Or not looking. I didn’t have to feign illness because I felt sick to my stomach the entire way back. I alternated between staring out the window and pretending to be asleep, while maintaining the visualization of my energy shield. I wanted to hide from everybody. Especially Jaren Wilder.

  My mom was waiting to pick me up. I mumbled my goodbyes to Val, Naomi, and Dara and hopped into the car.

  “Was it all you expected?” my mom asked.

  “It was…educational,” I replied, feeling my cheeks heat. “What did you do while I was gone?” I had no idea what my mom did when she wasn’t at work, other than bake amazing sugary treats. It was strange to think of my mom as a person with her own interests apart from just being my mom. But once, she was just like me.

  Or maybe not.

  “I picked up a few extra shifts at the office. Other than that, I was a little bored,” my mom admitted, smiling at me in the rearview mirror. “Any chance you’d be interested in a game of Kings’ Corners?”

  The card game had been my favorite when I was a kid. Lately, I had turned down cards with my mom in favor of holing up in my room. She was at work most of the time, anyway. Then hanging out with Val, Naomi and Dara had taken precedence over time with her. I felt a little guilty. After all she had done for me, I had shut my mom out after Gram passed. It wasn’t exactly a conscious choice, but nothing had seemed normal anymore without Gram, and I guess I just didn’t know how to function in my family anymore. Now, I needed my mom more than ever.

  I smiled back, grateful that she hadn’t given up on me. “Sure. Once I clean up.”

  As steam began to emanate from the shower, my thoughts returned to Jaren. What were his parents like? It sounded like they knew a lot about the energy stuff. Did his brother know about it, too? My fingers wen
t to my mouth and my pulse began to race as the memory of his lips on mine bubbled to the surface.

  Jaren Wilder kissed me. Really kissed me. There was no denying my embarrassing response, either—I had grabbed the guy’s hair and practically groped him. Jaren had broken the kiss the second I had started to respond, like he couldn’t get away from me fast enough.

  Jaren had only kissed me to distract me from getting back to The Tree. Actually, it was kind of a low down thing to do. I mean, what right did he have to steal my first kiss to prevent me from doing something I really wanted to do? The more I thought about it, the angrier I got. I was done feeling embarrassed and sorry for myself and I wanted to fight with him about it, but he wasn’t here. With great effort, I managed to let my feelings of anger and painful humiliation slip away, for the time being. A hot shower, some food, and a game of cards proved to be enough to turn my thoughts from Jaren. I anticipated a long, dreamless sleep.

  But as it turned out, restful sleep was not in the cards for me that evening.

  * * *

  Tap—tap—tap.

  Someone was knocking at our front door. I rolled over in bed and covered my head with my pillow.

  Tap—tap—tap.

  Why didn’t whoever it was just ring the doorbell? And where was my mom? The noise continued until I shoved my covers off with an exasperated groan, rousing Bear, who was warm against me. I looked at the clock and was not surprised to see that it was 2:47 a.m.

  Another freaking forty-seven.

  I groaned and sat up, slipping my feet into my flip-flops. I was sore from sleeping on a creaky cot with old, rusty springs. I rubbed my hand against my lower back where my tank top had ridden up. Stretching, I was about to take a step toward my bedroom door when I heard the tapping sound again. Bear poked her head up and oriented toward the sound. My heart leapt into my throat as I realized that the noise wasn’t coming from our front door.