‘What’s this?’ she said. ‘A diary? Can I look at it?’ She grinned at him.
‘Hailey, give that back,’ Kyle said tightly. He felt all of the muscles coil and twist between his shoulder blades and his heart stuttered uncomfortably in his chest.
‘Why? What is it?’ She frowned and opened the book before Kyle could snatch it from her hands. The look on her face as he placed the book behind him on the desk told him that she had seen enough. ‘That’s Alice’s book,’ she whispered, her face frozen in disbelief. Her eyes flickered to his wardrobe, where she knew a box was hidden, containing some of Alice’s belongings the Lynams had given to him.
‘Yes, it’s Alice’s book,’ Kyle said quietly. ‘I think Talia sent it to me.’
‘Sent it to you?’ Hailey repeated. Her eyes were wide and worried.
‘Hails, it’s OK,’ he said. ‘It’s not what you think.’ He frowned. ‘Here, you can look at it if you want to.’ He picked up the book and handed it over to her. Hailey accepted it cautiously, staring at him as he paced around awkwardly. He couldn’t decide whether to sit or stand.
‘Are you sure?’ Kyle met her gaze and gave her a jerky nod as he settled back in his chair. Hailey sat down on the bed; she studied the front cover for a brief moment and then opened the book carefully. ‘I thought you kept all of Alice’s things in a box,’ she said as she slowly flipped through the pages.
‘Most things,’ Kyle said. He watched his sister and saw her frown as she came across the second torn page. She didn’t say anything though, just smiled at some of the photos.
‘It’s beautiful,’ she said, finally looking up. ‘Why are there loose pages?’
‘I don’t know,’ Kyle said honestly. ‘One of the pages came with the book, the other I found…’
‘Found?’
‘Yes, in the wall outside Alice’s old house.’ He glanced at the window and in the general direction of next door.
‘In the wall?” Hailey repeated again as doubt creeped into her tone. Kyle hesitated.
‘I know it sounds nuts, but yes…’ He pointed at Alice’s book. ‘I found one of those loose pages, folded up in a plastic bag, behind a brick, in the wall, next door.’
‘Behind a brick?’ Hailey raised an eyebrow sceptically.
‘It had my initials on it. It was one of the loose bricks…’
‘Show me,’ Hailey said, standing up abruptly.
‘What?’
‘I don’t believe you. Show me,’ Hailey said and she walked out of Kyle’s bedroom, not bothering to see if he was following.
Kyle had no choice. Both of them stood on the pavement in the snow, staring at next door’s garden wall. The letter’s ‘K’ and ‘H’ were still there, albeit a little faded now. Hailey said nothing as she crouched down to inspect the brick and Kyle shoved his hands under his armpits and hopped from one foot to the other. Neither of them had bothered to put on a coat, and Kyle was wearing a t-shirt.
‘This is odd,’ Hailey said with a slight frown. She prodded at the brick and pulled it out to inspect it some more. ‘These letters must be recent.’
‘Huh?’
‘It looks like it’s been drawn by a child,’ Hailey said thoughtfully. ‘I would have noticed this.’ Hailey gestured at the brick as she slotted it back into its place.
‘It’s been there since bonfire night at least,’ Kyle said as he watched his breath fog up in front of his face. His arms had turned pink.
‘OK, I didn’t notice it straight away, but I would have noticed eventually,’ Hailey said.
‘Sure,’ Kyle replied. It was his turn to be sceptical.
‘I walk past the Lynam’s old house every day when I go to college, I would have noticed it.’ Hailey said. ‘I would have definitely noticed,’ she added more softly.
‘Can we go inside now?’ Kyle asked; he could feel his back teeth chattering.
‘You said the page was in a plastic bag?’
‘Yes, one of those little ones with the re-sealable edges.’
‘How do you suppose it got there?’ Hailey asked.
‘You believe me now?’
Hailey rolled her eyes.
‘You wouldn’t lie about something like this,’ she said. ‘You wouldn’t lie about Alice. Besides,’ she continued a little loudly as she pointed at the wall. ‘Your bloody initials are on the brick!’
‘Bloody, bloody, bloody,’ a small child’s voice said cheerfully. Hailey’s face paled as she stared back at Kyle, he had a feeling that her shocked features mirrored his own. They turned towards the sound to see a young boy, no older than five, in Alice’s doorway.
‘Kevin, I told you not to say that word,’ an older voice scolded and then the door opened wider to reveal Kevin’s younger sister and their exhausted-looking mother. The children were dressed in puffy jackets, wellies, gloves, scarfs and hats, ready for a day in the snow.
‘Oh, hello Hailey and Kyle,’ their mother said.
‘Hello Mrs Holt,’ Hailey replied with a bright smile. Holt? Kevin? It didn’t take long for Kyle to piece the information together. Kevin Holt, K H.
‘Aren’t you two cold like that?’ Mrs Holt asked as Kevin jumped out into their front garden with his sister tottering close behind.
‘It’s a little bit cold,’ Hailey said. Kevin scooped up a pile of snow and turned towards his sister.
‘Kevin, don’t…’ Mrs Holt cried, but it was too late. The boy flung the snow at his sister’s face, and she began to cry, loudly. ‘Kevin!’ Mrs Holt said angrily as she marched out into the snow. She picked up the girl, scolded her son and forced him to apologise.
‘We were just wondering who drew these lovely letters on your wall,’ Hailey said casting, a sneaky glance at Kyle, once Kevin’s sister had calmed down. Mrs Holt smiled and rolled her eyes.
‘Yes, Kevin learnt his letters a few months ago, and he also took a fancy to drawing on the walls.’
‘Oh,’ Hailey said.
‘Yes, oh.’ Mrs Holt replied. ‘He drew all over the walls in the dining room, and he even drew on the wall behind the sofa in the lounge.’ She shook her head as Kevin’s sister squirmed in her arms. ‘Heaven knows where he got a marker pen from, his father probably left it out.’ She tutted and set Kevin’s sister down. ‘I’m glad I was able to stop him before he added the entire alphabet.’ She looked at Kevin with a friendly scowl.
‘My wall,’ Kevin said proudly with his hands on his hips. Kyle and Hailey laughed.
‘We’ve been talking about rebuilding this wall for years now, but we never seem to have any time anymore.’ She sighed again and glanced quickly at her children. ‘You’ll catch a cold stood out here like that,’ Mrs Holt said as she looked at Kyle.
‘Ah, my brother is not well known for his sense,’ Hailey said. Kyle shot her a scowl and turned to head inside. ‘I hope you had a good Christmas,’ Hailey added as she followed her brother and waved.
‘Yes, you too Hailey, say hello to your mother for me,’ Mrs Holt said and waved back.
‘Will do,’ Hailey replied as she stepped into their house and shut the front door. Hailey took off her shoes and then ran up the stairs two at a time to Kyle’s bedroom. She was already looking at Alice’s book by the time Kyle caught up with her. ‘So?’ Kyle said.
‘The page must have been in the wall years before Kevin wrote on it,’ Hailey said. ‘There’s no logical reason for Kevin to have the page, he didn’t know Alice and he’s five years old for god’s sake.’
‘OK…’
‘What I’m saying is, the page was already there for whatever reason. Kevin drawing his initials on the brick was a coincidence, a really, really, creepy coincidence I must admit, but still a coincidence. What I don’t understand is why?’
‘I don’t know,’ Kyle sighed as he sat ba
ck down in his desk chair. ‘I think there’s a third missing page though.’
‘What? Where?’ Hailey asked as she flipped through the book.
‘Between the eighth and tenth of June,’ Kyle said as he stifled another yawn. Hailey found the page and her eyes widened as she traced her finger along the torn edge.
‘A third page…’ Hailey murmured. ‘What does this mean? Did she leave a paper trail?’
‘Your guess is as good as mine, but I don’t know how she would do it.’
‘Alice wasn’t like this, she was never cryptic.’
‘It’s probably nothing,’ Kyle replied. ‘A creepy coincidence, just like you said.’
‘That doesn’t explain how one of these pages got into the wall next door, especially since Talia has been in Australia with this book for most of the time.’
‘So it was put there before they moved,’ Kyle shrugged. ‘I don’t know, and the only person who would know is no longer around.’
‘This is exciting,’ Hailey said. ‘This would make a great book don’t you think?’ she didn’t stop to hear his thoughts. ‘A tragic love story and clues left behind by a long lost lover.’
‘You’re being dramatic.’ Kyle sighed as he squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘It’s confusing and infuriating.’
‘Well I think it’s exciting. Wait till I tell Tank…’
‘No,’ Kyle said abruptly. ‘I mean… Tank is OK, but no one else can know, Hailey, especially not our parents. They already think that I’m struggling; they will really question my sanity if I talk about books and missing pages. Dad would…’
‘Dad would freak out I know,’ Hailey finished for him. ‘I guess you’re right, I’ll keep it a secret.’
‘Thanks.’
‘What are you going to do now?’
‘Revision.’
‘Seriously? You’re going to revise?’ Hailey asked.
‘I have to. I need to get my degree and then it’s on to the real world,’ Kyle said. He didn’t have time anymore to think about what a seventeen-year-old Alice may or may not have done. He could feel those memories threatening to break him, and he pushed them firmly behind their doors. Hailey frowned at him, but whatever thoughts were passing through her mind she didn’t speak them aloud.
‘I’m going to email Talia, maybe she knows something,’ Hailey said and then she walked out.
Twenty
Ahrl stood within the garden again; his ancient mind had selected memories and thoughts in order to create this reality. He could erase it and construct a completely different reality instantly if he wanted to. Soft, grassy hills stretched out around him towards the horizon where they broke against a deep blue sky. Tiny golden and purple flowers dotted the ground and he stooped down to pluck one from the grass. The garden was more like an infinite meadow, though no animals roamed here and they never would. Ahrl straightened up; Alice had vanished and the rest of The Thirteen had reluctantly deemed their plans as void. There was nothing they could do now; it had been unlikely that Kyle would have found the correct path in the first place, but now it was surely impossible.
He sighed. Everyone had many paths through life; doors opened and closed all the time, from the moment you were born to the moment you died. The only difference was that some people were highlighted in the fountain, and others were not. Ahrl’s sapphire eyes darkened as they flickered to his left and gazed upon a small rise in the distance. The fountain stood there, their only guide for the future of mankind.
The soul who had created the fountain had been lost long ago, along with billions of others from their world. The creator’s mind had been great, powerful beyond anything their species had ever known or seen and, because of this, no one had listened to him. No one had paid any attention to the creator’s warnings; they had written the soul off as a crank, a crazy person, a person whose voice was better left unheard. How wrong they had all been, and how many had now slipped from existence because of their ignorance. Everyone’s voice held importance; it had taken the total destruction of their world, the complete annihilation of their species, and uncountable years for Ahrl and the rest of The Thirteen to realise this. Ahrl remembered the wars, the fighting, the chaos. He remembered how his planet had been ripped apart by forces that were out of their control. The signs had been there for a while, their greatest scientists and mathematicians had predicted it, but their leaders had ignored them. They had been too absorbed by power and greed, only caring about their own lifespans and not about the generations that would follow. Desperation had formed wedges between their people, the fight for survival overriding compassion and logic. The last few souls from their home world had been doomed before they had even had a chance.
Ahrl opened his eyes as he rotated the tiny golden flower between his thumb and forefinger. Thin tear tracks like liquid diamonds made pathways down his long face. Humanity was heading for the same fate at an impossibly fast rate. Mankind had learned so much in such a short space of time. Their technology had advanced faster than the technology from Ahrl’s world, though they were not quite as advanced, at least not yet. But they were young, they had barely existed for a few seconds on the universe’s clock and already they were heading for destruction. There had been both Positive and Negative souls on Earth throughout the centuries, people who had changed the course of human history with a single decision, simply because they had been in a particular place at a particular time. They hadn’t done it alone either. Their friends, family, strangers, even children had unknowingly guided these individuals with their own decisions.
The majority of people would never make history-changing decisions, but just because they weren’t a catalyst for change, didn’t mean that their decisions didn’t mean anything. Even the slightest decision could have great or disastrous effects on the future. It may be that someone would do something as innocent as smile, which would brighten someone’s day, which in turn could lead that person to give good advice, which would then work its way up through a chain of people until it reached someone who held a position of power, who would then execute that advice and, as a result, something Positive would happen in the world. It was as simple as that, but the balance was fine; similarly, it could happen in reverse and it often did. An ill-timed hateful gesture or an angry word could cause a Negative result. A combination of different scenarios could lead to peace or war, and often the biggest decisions were not made at the best of times.
Ahrl felt a crushing sadness against his soul and he had to fight to control his emotions. They didn’t know why Alice had vanished and they feared the worst fate had befallen her. The timelines had jumped forwards and the fountain now focussed on new souls, people who hadn’t even been born yet. However, even if the deceased souls could help these new souls to make positive decisions, their decisions would not prevent the devastation to mankind in the way Kyle’s and Alice’s would have. They would merely delay the inevitable. It would be a repeat of what happened to their world, only this time they would be watching it unfold before them as opposed to being wrapped in the middle of it. There would be mass panic and the afterlife would lose all connections to Earth, causing them to drift aimlessly through space in search of another planet with conscious life. They had been lucky once, the fountain had guided them, but he wasn’t sure they would be so lucky again.
He became aware of a flutter in his soul, accompanied by the warm gentle heat of Positive energy. Ahrl’s ancient consciousness prickled and all of his seven senses stretched out beyond his soul, and beyond the confines of his imagined body. Something small had disturbed the timelines again, sending a ripple through the dimensions of time and causing the balance to waver along the dividing line. This was unexpected, yet desperately needed. Instantly, he placed himself next to the fountain, and then gazed down into the pool. He let out a low, long breath as he slowed down his thoughts to the gentle pace of a tr
ickling stream. Colours formed and blended together across the fountain’s surface, Alice, Kyle. The tremors of clarity wracked through his soul. He reached for her immediately, sending out the energy from his core through the pathways in his mind, and then outwards from the shell of his body and into the universe beyond. He guided his energy with a mere suggestion and found her quickly; she was amongst the stars. He could see her in his mind and he focussed all of his will and intent on her, wrapping the lines of energy around her and forming a net, then he pulled her back from the edge. Alice still existed.
She appeared before him suddenly and fell to his ground with a thud; her body stuttered wildly as she faded in and out of existence. She groaned and rolled on to her back and stared up at the sky through cracked eyelids. Her hair pooled out around her head like a halo, glinting bronze in the light. He saw Negative darkness in her slowly dissipating and lifting from her body like smoke trails.
‘Alice?’ Ahrl said as he stood above her. She opened her eyes and sat up quickly.
‘Where am I?’ she asked as she whipped her head from side to side and then groaned and clutched her forehead.
‘You’re in the garden,’ Ahrl replied smoothly. He had never heard of a soul being claimed by Negative and then making it back to Positive before. He realised she must have been teetering on the fine line between the two, bouncing back and forth too quickly to be claimed by either side.
‘I thought I was dead,’ she said slowly. ‘Like real dead, not just afterlife dead.’
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