Wide Awake - Academy of the Fallen Series

by Daniele Lanzarotta

  She smiled as she usually did when I called her mom, which wasn’t often.

  “So, how was your appointment?” I asked.

  “Good. Everything is going well, just as it should be. The doctor was able to tell the sex of the baby, but we decided we don’t want to know. We want it to be a surprise.”

  “Cool.” I just never understood people who didn’t want to know that kind of thing, I mean, how can you shop for baby things if you don’t know, right? Oh well, not my decision to make.

  “Your hair looks nice.”

  “Thanks, Kayla. By the way, I saw Emily’s mom at the hair salon. There seems to be a lot of drama going on with Ashley today.”

  “What do you mean? She left school early because she was sick, how much drama could there be?”

  Kelly hesitated. “I think it is better if you hear from her.”

  Last thing I planned on doing was to talk to Ashley, but I knew that if there was drama, Emily and Jessica were sure to know all about it.

  I quickly excused myself saying that I had homework. I grabbed my cell phone and practically ran to my room.

  Since Kelly said she had talked to Emily’s mom, Emily was the one I called.

  “Hey, Emily.”

  “Hi Kayla. I’m so glad you called! Have you heard about Ashley?”

  “Nope… I mean… I heard that there was something going on but not what exactly.”

  “O.M.G. You are never gonna believe what happened!”

  And after that she went on and on, without even giving me a chance to get a word in.

  “So, Ashley’s mom calls over here this afternoon wanting to know how to get a hold of Justin’s parents, right? So, my mom gives her the info, and asks if everything is okay, and Ashley’s mom just bursts in tears on the phone. It turns out that Ashley was feeling sooo sick this morning that her mom took her to the doctor and she is pregnant!!!! Can you believe that?”

  I was speechless, but good thing I didn’t have to say anything because Emily kept going.

  “So, apparently Ashley told her mom that was impossible and she claims to be a virgin, but of course, doctor’s exam, including ultrasound and all… what more proof does she need? So she asks Ashley if Justin is the father, being that they are dating and all, and Ashley says she doesn’t know who the father is. Can you believe it?!”

  “Wow” that was all I managed to say.

  “Yeah, that is one way to put it. So, she was going to try to reach Justin’s parents, she says that if he denies it, she wants a DNA test and all that mess.”

  “So do you think it is Justin’s?” I asked. My voice sounded weird, as if I was afraid to know the answer.

  “Yeah, I mean, who else would it be? I know we say she is a skank and all, but I don’t think she was dating anyone else. She is always with Justin. OMG, are you okay with me talking about all this, Kayla? Sometimes I just completely forget that you two used to date, even if it was like yesterday! … But you seem to be into Hunter now, right?”

  “Oh yeah, I’m good. Just surprised.”

  “No kidding. Hey, I gotta go eat dinner, but we will talk tomorrow, okay?”

  We said our good-byes and hung-up.

  Kelly was calling me down to eat dinner, and although I felt as if I was going to just throw up if I ate anything, I forced myself to go downstairs, grab dinner and eat a few bites. Andrew wasn’t home yet, so we ate in the living room while we watched TV. Good thing, because Kelly was into her show enough not to notice how much I actually ate, and after that I just rushed to my room.

  Trying to get Carolyn back that day had really made me exhausted.

  I walked into my room, got ready for bed, and wondered how long it would be until Hunter got back. I was afraid to fall asleep and have Benjamin show up, and even though it was still only seven, I was just too tired to resist.

  It felt as if I had just closed my eyes, when I woke up with his hand clasped over my mouth.

  TWENTY

  “Miss me?” he asked, without taking his hand away from my mouth. No matter how hard I tried, he would not move.

  “Listen, I have been a little busy lately and will probably be just as busy from now on, but I know that your little friend is trying to find information about your daddy. I don’t like your friend at all. I like nothing about what he is, but he is very useful and when he tells you where your daddy is and how to get to him… well, I just want you to know that I will be around and anxiously waiting for that little piece of information. And just a warning before I go, for the last time, stop trying to get the little ghost girl back, I will just send her away again…and again…and again.”

  He moved his hand away from my mouth and vanished, just as Hunter materialized steps away from where Benjamin had been seconds before.

  I quickly stood up, ran toward Hunter and buried my face in his chest, holding on to him as tight as humanly possible. I was so scared that my entire body was shaking.

  After a few awkward seconds, he finally held me back. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t here. What happened? Were you not able to see him?”

  He tried to pull away, but I just held on to him even tighter. “I – I fell asleep.”

  Hunter kept trying to apologize.

  “It is not your fault.” I told him once again.

  I finally pulled away from him, “Did you find what you were looking for?”

  “No, not yet, but I will go back and look again. Look... Don’t worry about that. You are tired… just go to sleep. I will be here.”

  Without saying another word, I went to bed and lay down, staring at the wall for what seemed like forever until I finally fell asleep.

  Hunter woke me up in the morning. In a low, soft voice he said that he had to go and he would see me at school.

  I didn’t even want him to leave at all. How pathetic?

  After he left, I just got up, got dressed super fast, and went downstairs. It was so early that Andrew and Kelly hadn’t even left for work yet. Andrew looked away from his newspaper and glanced at me with a suspicious look, and then looked at Kelly.

  “Huh. I can’t believe she is up this early. Maybe you are right, the boy may just be a good influence on Kayla.”

  I rolled my eyes at them both and went into the kitchen with the intention of grabbing some much needed caffeine, until Kelly intervened and said I should probably get some orange juice instead.

  It was way too early to argue or even disagree at all.

  I grabbed the orange juice and sat in front of the TV until it was time to go.

  ***

  When I got to school I saw Emily and Jess both sitting on each side of Ashley, who looked like she had been crying for hours. In a way, I felt bad for her, because I knew that Emily and Jess were in no way just trying to be good friends, they were just trying to find out what all happened.

  Hunter snuck up behind me. “What is going on over there?”

  I told him the whole story, well, what I knew up to that point.

  “I guess that explains Justin cutting class. I just saw him drive off.”

  “Guess so.”

  We walked toward the school’s main entrance, each going our separate ways once we entered the building.

  My first class of the day was P.E., Jess was in my class, and she was eager to tell me the new and improved details that she had just found out.

  She was so excited about the gossip that she didn’t even mention me hanging out with Hunter.

  That day we were breaking into pairs to play tennis. While Jess and me waited for our turn, she told me that Justin broke up with Ashley that morning. He had accused her of sleeping around on him, talking about how hypocritical she was to be telling him that she wanted to ‘wait’, while in the meantime she was doing some other guy… or as he put it ‘guys’ because she clearly didn’t know who the baby’s daddy was and that he was certainly not going to be dragged down into this.

  “So, who is the guy?” I asked.

  Jessica shrugged. “W
ish I knew. Maybe Justin is right with the whole ‘sleeping around’ comment. Come on now, she claims that she doesn’t know how that could have happened.”

  “Maybe she is trying to protect someone?”

  “Right! You know she would be the first one to name the guy and make sure he gets the blame instead of her.”

  “True…”

  ***

  That day, after school, I suggested that we go to Hunter’s house instead. I just didn’t feel like listening to Kelly and Andrew’s speculations as to what, if anything was happening between Hunter and me.

  Hunter refused. He said that in order to summon Carolyn we needed to be in a place that was familiar to her. His reasoning made sense and all, but I just couldn’t get it off my mind that he was hiding something.

  We went to my house. Kelly and Andrew were not home yet, so we went straight to my room… we had given up on the basement idea entirely.

  I was eager to get started. Hunter had looked up some meditation rituals and we hoped that would help getting to Carolyn faster.

  I was however, worried about one thing. I asked Hunter what would happen if we did bring her back, telling him that Benjamin had threatened to just send her back again. Hunter said we would pretty much have to take a chance and hope for the best. He assured me that he would be able to keep an eye on her, being that he was at least able to see her with no problems…at least until we figured out what to do. But that led to another problem. If he was so focused on her, Benjamin was bound to get to me at some point or another and that fear was enough to destroy any chance I had to being able to focus on summoning Carolyn.

  After a while, we…well, I stopped trying to get to Carolyn and Hunter said he was going to go back to the adoption agency to try and find out about my biological parents, when I interrupted him.

  “You know, I’m not sure that is such a good idea…. Giving Benjamin what he wants… I think we just need to find a way to get rid of him.”

  “Well, that is what I’m hoping for. That your… umm dad… well, that I can find information to be used against Benjamin.”

  I sighed. “I think it is a waste of time.”

  “Well, do you have a better suggestion?” he asked, clearly frustrated at the entire situation.

  “What about the guy who helped you? Maybe he knows what we should do.”

  “I suppose I can try to reach him. I just need to find a way to do that without going myself… and then I have to figure out a way of asking without him knowing exactly what is happening.”

  “But if he is your mentor, why do you have to pretty much lie and hide your way into what we need?”

  “Because there is no way I’m going back to the Academy, and I have to make sure they don’t get to you.”

  I looked at him, puzzled.

  “Remember what I told you? If you are there, you are likely not to leave… Besides, you don’t need to be mixed up with those… beings.”

  We agreed on that. Hunter was still concerned about Kelly giving birth and having Benjamin hanging around. I needed to stay exactly where I was. Whatever Benjamin wanted, just had to be with my biological father. Either way, we had time. Kelly was only in her second trimester, so we decided we had time to come up with a better plan. Hunter even agreed to stop looking into my family’s history.

  TWENTY-ONE

  When Hunter suggested that we stop trying to get through to Carolyn for a while, I didn’t argue. Really, we weren’t getting anywhere with that.

  It wasn’t long until that ‘while’ turned into weeks, and things just started getting back to normal in a way.

  Hunter still hadn’t been able to reach out to his mentor, the one who helped him understand his powers, but he kept trying. Benjamin hadn’t shown up, but Hunter still stayed at my house at nights. Matter of fact, I spent a lot of time just hanging out with Hunter, and only hanging out was no longer so stressful or based on need for protection. We just got used to being around each other, having someone to talk to about anything…. And no, aside from what everyone believed, including Kelly, we were not dating.

  Kelly and Andrew, up to that point, still loved Hunter. They thought he was a great influence on me.

  Oh, and Ashley had now distanced herself from everyone, and was still denying that Justin had anything to do with her being pregnant. I even felt bad for her. Last I heard her parents were having problems because her dad wanted her to keep the baby, but her mom, well, her mom had a whole different view on the subject. It didn’t even seem that Ashley’s opinion mattered.

  That evening started out no different than any other. I did my homework, ate dinner and then went up to my room.

  Hunter was already there, listening to his iPod and reading a book…as usual.

  I couldn’t believe that had never crossed my mind before, but I asked him if he wasn’t afraid his parents would notice that he was gone one of these nights.

  He shrugged. “Very unlikely,” he said in a sad tone.

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “There is not much to it. You know ever since my brother was accused of neglect and as far as they know, I almost died, things just got bad. Dad is always away from home on business trips and mom is just distant.”

  I hate those moments when you are never too sure what to say… “I’m sorry—“

  He put his hand up, “Please don’t.”

  “Okay.” After an awkward silence I asked if he had any luck in searching for his mentor that day.

  He shook his head, clearly looking concerned.

  “Kelly will be officially in her third trimester in a few weeks…”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  That turned into one of those nights when everything just felt off… nothing either one of us said was right, or felt right. Eventually, I suggested we watch a movie, we both started out sitting on the floor, but I quickly got tired and went to my bed where I fell asleep in a matter of minutes.

  That nightmare, started out with me in a place that looked like a castle. I had been taken there against my will, and locked in a room… a plain room with a bed and a window that overlooked a large field and the front gates to the place. Hunter was on the other side of the gate, trying to get in… yelling at one of the guards. Almost as if I was viewing him with a camera that I could zoom in and out, I got a very close look at the guard.

  Although his back was to me, I could see that he was tall, strong and just… mesmerizing. I also could not help but to notice the scars on his back. Two thin scars, one on each side, and then I looked at the girl standing next to him and I understood why he had those scars. He was one of the fallen, and once he fell, he had been punished by having taken away one of the main things that made him who he was. Unlike him, the girl had her wings, but they were nothing like I would have imagined. Her wings were dark; it looked as if they didn’t belong.

  Once she spoke, Hunter turned around and left, leaving me trapped in that place.

  I then had a vision of Benjamin watching everyone and everything. He wasn’t gone. He was still around, and he had an agenda, whatever that was. Then I had another vision, him at school, laughing at Justin for being blamed for Ashley’s pregnancy. He walked toward her, warning her to take care of that child, but his expression was so cold, his intentions unknown. The only thing certain was that he was not happy about the way Ashley was handling things, almost as if he was upset that she was hurting that child. Then the vision changed again, almost as if I was flipping the channels on the TV. This time, he watched Kelly sleeping, and he looked pleased. That part of the nightmare was what left me terrified the most. Terrified to the point where I woke up screaming.

  Hunter was by my side within seconds.

  “Shhh. You are gonna wake up your parents,” he whispered.

  I took a few deep breaths, but I was still sobbing and I couldn’t stop.

  “Everything will be okay,” he whispered. He pulled me into a hug, but the sobbing didn’t stop for a while.

&nb
sp; When I finally did stop crying, he slowly pulled me away, and I’m not even sure what led us to this but he got even closer, his lips had barely touched mine.

  “I shouldn’t,” he said under his breath.

  I didn’t care. He made no effort to move… our lips still barely touching; I leaned closer and kissed him.

  That was when Andrew opened my bedroom door.

  TWENTY-TWO