The Unseen

by Bryan, JL

  Unfortunately, it turned out that Stray slept naked without any covers, so she also saw his chest and large beer belly, both shaggy with dark body hair. His pubic hair was a mountain of dark curls as large as the overgrown beard on his face. This saved Cassidy from seeing too much, but she was still afraid the image would be seared into her mind forever.

  She fled through the wall and found herself in Allie’s room. Allie slept below, nestled between her two boyfriends. Fortunately, a striped sheet covered all three of them.

  Cassidy moved through the dark and quiet house and out onto the wraparound porch. She liked to sit out here in the shade on lazy days, drawing on her big bristol pad, sometimes watching people in the park across the street for inspiration.

  She felt restless. Nothing was happening here. Cassidy thought about checking in on Peyton, and she pictured him in his loft, trying to determine the most direct way to fly there. It would be slightly west and south of her house.

  As she focused on him, the scene around her again dissolved, and Cassidy was transported instantly to Peyton’s dim bedroom.

  Peyton lay across his bed, zonked out, his shirt and pants loosened. She felt a sting of pity at the sight of his rib brace. He looked beautiful and helpless.

  Cassidy drifted down to the bed beside him and reached out her pencil-sketch hand to touch him, but her fingers passed through his shoulder. She wished she had her body with her so she could snuggle up against him and they could lie together, two broken people with nowhere to go. She felt how much she’d been missing him, and not just physically. A psychological and emotional distance seemed to be opening between them, and she didn’t understand why.

  She heard a creak, and a rectangle of light reflected in the thick squares of glass on Peyton’s wall of windows. It was shining from somewhere below, on the first floor, as though somebody had opened a door and let a stream of light into the dark loft.

  Worried and a little afraid for Peyton, Cassidy dropped through the floor down to the spacious first level, which had no interior walls, just some support columns for the second story. Peyton had strung a hammock between two of them. The only way in or out was the front door to the common hallway, but it was closed.

  Cassidy saw the light glowing from a second door, though—the refrigerator door, standing wide open in the far corner.

  The light from the fridge outlined a bob of blond hair and a slender, shapely body. A girl rummaged through Peyton’s refrigerator, wearing a clingy pink tank top and black-string panties that certainly didn’t hide much from behind, especially when she bent over to check the produce drawer.

  Cassidy froze where she was, stunned. She let it gradually sink in that some girl was walking around her boyfriend’s home in her underwear at three in the morning.

  You won’t find much to eat in there, honey, Cassidy thought. She moved closer and was surprised to see a colorful assortment of fresh fruit in the drawer, from which the girl took an apple. It wasn’t like Peyton to fill up his fridge with so much produce.

  Did you buy him groceries? Cassidy thought, feeling hot anger rushing out from her in all directions. Without a body to contain her emotions, her fury swelled to fill the room, like the scorching heat of the sun, flowing outward from her core. Did you buy him fucking groceries? Who the hell are you?

  She roared toward the girl, her anger rocketing her forward. The girl spun around and looked right at Cassidy, her single blue eye going wide. Cassidy froze where she was, about two feet from the girl’s face.

  “Who’s there?” the girl asked, staring at where Cassidy floated.

  The girl appeared to know Cassidy was there, but that wasn’t the reason Cassidy had stopped cold. In fact, part of her mind had thought, Let the bitch see me, I hope I look like an angry ghost.

  She’d stopped because she recognized the girl—Reese. Confusion instantly displaced her anger. Why was Reese back in town after all these years? Why was she at Peyton’s loft? Why was she in her underwear?

  “Come out where I can see you.” Reese advanced on her, scowling now under her black eyepatch. “I’m not scared of you. Show yourself.”

  Reese stopped when she reached Cassidy, her eye fixated on the point in the air where Cassidy seemed to hover. A wicked smile played on Reese’s lips.

  “Come out and play,” Reese whispered. “Unless you’re scared of me.”

  Cassidy turned cold and dropped slowly toward the floor, her fear dragging her down. Reese watched her fall. Cassidy felt confused and suddenly lost—she’d assumed she was invisible, but Reese could see her somehow. What truly frightened her, though, was the wicked smile on Reese’s face, her attitude that said she expected a fight and expected to win.

  Questions surrounded Cassidy, spinning her like a gust of high wind.

  “Running away now?” Reese smirked. “I can feel you leaving. Did I scare you, poor thing?”

  The layers of weirdness were piling up too fast, so Cassidy took off, shooting across the living room, over the couch—barely noticing it had been made up with a pillow and blanket—and out through the square panes of thick glass, out into the loft complex’s community garden area, where she sank and felt herself shivering.

  I want to go home, she thought, and she felt again the sensation of a rubber band snapping, pulling her back across town to where her body lay waiting.

  She awoke and reached for her phone to call Peyton. It rang a few times, then she heard his voice:

  “You’ve got my voice mail,” he said. “Leave a message.”

  After the beep, she hesitated, her mouth hanging open. What was she going to say? That she was calling to yell at him about something she’d seen in a dream?

  She hung up without saying a word.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Barb came to visit early Thursday morning, about ten-thirty, with more clothes and pills. It was a sunny day, and they sat out on the balcony together. Cassidy had a great deal to talk about.

  She started by showing Barb the latest drawings in her sketchbook.

  “It’s not just the occasional hallucination anymore,” Cassidy said. “A worm floating aimlessly in the air, a transparent bug....These things are everywhere now. More kinds than I’ve ever seen. In my dreams, I see these huge rotten vulture things.” Cassidy pointed to a sketch of the Atlanta skyline, the skyscrapers like the soaring trees of a primordial forest crawling with half-visible monsters.

  “Are you still astral projecting, too?” Barb asked.

  “That’s what I dream about. I’m flying without my body, and this is what I see. But I’m starting to see them everywhere when I’m awake, until my pills kick in.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes. So tell me what they are. If they’re real, I mean. What would they be?”

  “I’m not sure.” Barb leafed through the sketchbook. “Maybe unquiet spirits?”

  “They don’t look human. They don’t feel human, either.”

  “What do they feel like?”

  “Parasites. I see them feeding on people, only I can’t tell what they’re eating.”

  “Feeding on people.” Barb nodded, as though it made any sense. “They must be sucking out energy. Spiritual energy, if they’re supernatural.”

  “Like psychic mosquitoes?”

  “Or vampire bats, if you want them to sound cooler,” Barb said.

  “You’ve heard of things like this?”

  “Maybe. Little creatures of the astral plane. They’re supposed to be harmless.”

  “They’re not all little.”

  “I’m so jealous.” Barb shook her head. “Do you know how many times I’ve meditated and tried to travel out of body? It’s never worked.”

  “I’m probably just dreaming.”

  “We should test it out!” Barb sat up, excited. “Oh, yeah, let’s do that!”

  “How?”

  “Easy. We go into separate rooms, then I pick something and hold it up. You project into my room and see what I’m holding. If y
ou see the right thing, we’ll know it’s real and not just a dream. This is so exciting!” Barb was already on her feet, pushing on the door to Kieran’s room, which was locked from the inside.

  “That’s not my room anymore,” Cassidy reminded her.

  “Oops. Come on, let’s go!”

  Cassidy sighed and followed on her crutches, almost reluctant to find out the truth. She wasn’t sure whether she preferred to be crazy or to live in a world where invisible creatures were secretly feeding on everyone...and where Peyton had truly had a certain panty-clad house guest the previous night.

  “I’m not sure if I can do it when I want,” Cassidy said. “I usually just pop out without trying.”

  “Just pop out, then.”

  “I’ll go to my room. It might work better if I’m in bed.”

  Cassidy closed the door firmly behind her, then locked it for good measure. She eased her way down to the bed, leaning her crutches against the wall. She lay back and closed her eyes.

  Nothing happened. She concentrated, willing herself to get up and out there, but that didn’t work. Then she tried imagining what it had felt like to be out of her body, floating and peeking in wherever she liked. She remembered the feeling of freedom and exhilaration.

  Cassidy barely noticed it had happened until she realized she was looking at the blade of a ceiling fan right in front of her almost nonexistent face.

  She rolled over and looked down, and there she was, lying on her bed, her arms unconsciously crossed like a sleeping vampire’s.

  It took a moment to remember she had a specific purpose for being out of her body this time.

  Okay, Barb, she thought. Let’s see who’s crazy.

  She plunged through the wall, passing through the circuit boards of the television and the glass screen to emerge in the middle of the small living room. Barb stood behind the coffee table, holding up a white porcelain pig with pink spots, one of Cassidy’s mom’s decorations, a look of mock reverence on her face as she bowed her head low as though the pig were a holy relic.

  This feels pretty real, Cassidy thought, and she returned to her body.

  When she opened her eyes, she called out, “Barb, are you worshiping that pig?”

  “Yes! Awesome, it’s real!”

  “Fuck!” Cassidy pounded her fist into the wall.

  “What’s wrong? Are you okay?” Barb asked from the hall. She jiggled the door handle. “Hey, let me in. Are you hurt?”

  “Hold on.” Cassidy eventually regained her feet and hobbled over to unlock the door.

  “Why did you yell?” Barb asked when Cassidy opened it.

  “I didn’t tell you something. Last night in my dream—or I guess it wasn’t a dream—I went over to Peyton’s.”

  “Without your body,” Barb said.

  “Right. There was a girl spending the night there.”

  “What? Who? I’ll cut a bitch.” Barb looked furious. “He doesn’t put you in the hospital and cheat on you in the same week, that’s too much.”

  “It was Reese.”

  “Reese? Not Reese Reese? From high school?”

  Cassidy didn’t say anything. The girl’s name hung the air between them like a lead weight. The closed door to Cassidy’s old room, where the insanity had happened, suddenly seemed threatening, as if something evil crouched on the other side. Something with an unhinged jaw, hot breath, and rows of teeth.

  “What...how?” Barb asked. “I thought she moved away forever or something.”

  “Me, too.”

  “But how does she know Peyton? He didn’t go to our school.”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Does she still wear the eye patch?”

  “Yep.”

  “What exactly did you see her doing?”

  “She was poking around the fridge. Wearing panties and a little sexy top. And she’d bought him groceries. I could tell.”

  “All bad signs,” Barb said. “How could they possibly know each other?”

  “At this point, I’m more interested in how well they’re getting to know each other right now,” Cassidy said. “I should call him. No. I should project over there and spy on him.”

  “Sounds fun,” Barb said. “Wish I could come.”

  “You could try.”

  Barb smiled, then checked the time. “I guess I have a few minutes. What do I do?”

  “I just lie down, close my eyes, and imagine I’m out there.”

  They lay on the bed together, eyes closed, and waited.

  “I forgot to tell you something else,” Cassidy said, opening her eyes. “I’m pretty sure Reese saw me.”

  “What?” Barb’s eyes flew open. “You were out of body and she saw your face?”

  “I don’t know if she knew it was me, but she knew something was there. Maybe she thought it was a ghost.”

  “So you scared her.” Barb gave a satisfied grin.

  “No, that’s what’s even weirder. She challenged me to a fight, and she acted like she really wanted me to attack her. Who sees a ghost and reacts like that?”

  “That’s messed up. So watch out for Reese. Maybe she’s still got a little demon in her.”

  “Exactly.”

  Barb snickered. “That made me think of a dirty joke.”

  “I’m sure it did.”

  They tried again, closing their eyes. Cassidy rose up and out in her pencil-sketch of a body, and she looked down at Barb. If Barb was floating around, Cassidy didn’t sense her in any way.

  After a few minutes, Barb opened her eyes and sat up.

  “It’s not happening,” Barb told Cassidy’s slumped body. “Hey, Cassidy, you there?” Barb looked around the room, trying to see Cassidy but unable to do it. “Are you out there?”

  Cassidy dropped back into her body.

  “Nothing?” Cassidy asked, opening her eyes.

  “Nah, it never works for me. I have to run, okay? You go spy on your boy and call me with the details. Promise?”

  “Promise,” Cassidy said. “Thanks for helping me with this, Barb.”

  “Of course.” Barb hugged her before leaving.

  Cassidy stayed in the bed. She lifted up from her body and visualized Peyton.

  She didn’t find herself in his loft, though, but trailing behind him like a balloon as he browsed the record store Wax ’n’ Facts, always searching for obscure vintage sounds. Cassidy rose up near the ceiling and orbited the cluttered store slowly, but saw no sign of Reese.

  After pretending to turn up his nose at the selection, then dropping two hundred dollars on rare old vinyl, he walked next door to Savage Pizza, a place literally wallpapered in comic books.

  Cassidy felt a flush of anger as he ordered slices for himself, jealous that he was eating at one of their special places, right in her own neighborhood, while she was away. He hadn’t even called or texted her today, and he must have noticed her four a.m. phone call.

  She glowered invisibly at him while he ate. The thick slice with pepperoni and olives, dripping red sauce and mozzarella, looked so good that she was almost tempted to return to her body so she could eat.

  It was clear Reese wasn’t spending the day with Peyton, but Cassidy very much wanted to know what the girl was doing at the moment. She pictured Reese in her mind, trying to imagine her just as she looked the previous night.

  The pizza parlor dissolved around her.

  Cassidy stared at a wall. Bricks of rough black stone, cut and fitted to each other like puzzle pieces, stared mutely back at her.

  The wall stretched up farther than she could see, seeming to fade into a far, misty horizon. She looked down and saw that it stretched impossibly far beneath her sketch-outline feet, too, and extended away forever to her right and to her left.

  There was no sound, no movement, just dimness and the wall. The sudden absolute silence, replacing the chattering voices and clinking glasses of Savage Pizza, unnerved her. She floated in a lightless place, staring at a wall that had no doors, no windows, and n
o end in any direction.

  Cassidy had made a wrong turn somehow. Her location was nowhere that could exist on earth, a hand-made stone wall miles wide and miles high, and this frightened her.

  Steady, concentrate, she told herself. Reese. I was trying to find Reese.

  She again conjured the mental image of Reese, concentrating more carefully, trying to imagine every physical detail of her—which didn’t take much imagination, considering the outfit Reese had been wearing in Peyton’s kitchen.

  She heard a shuddering sound, like stone grinding on stone grinding on a million tons of rusty iron. The sound echoed like a deep, wordless voice, like the bellow of an angry giant, the sound vibrations shaking her to her core.

  She felt she’d angered the wall somehow.

  Cassidy decided to forget about Reese and settle for escaping back to her own body.

  She pictured her body lying on the bed, waiting for her return, but nothing happened. The rubber-band sensation didn’t whip her back home.

  She imagined herself trapped in this strange dark purgatory-place forever, unable to find the way back to her body, and bright green panic swirled around her.

  She calmed herself by imagining she was taking a deep breath. As she did, her sketch of a body became just slightly more visible, its pencil-outline shape just a little darker.

  There’s no place like home, she whispered, and some tiny back part of her mind couldn’t help bubbling with the feeling of laughter. She drew on it for warmth and light, and she pictured her body as clearly as she could.

  There was a long moment when nothing happened, and she thought she really was stuck somehow. Then she felt a painful lurch, and she was back in her room.

  Cassidy grabbed her phone and called Peyton. You’d better pick up, fucker, Cassidy said. I know you’re not busy.

  “What’s up?” Peyton answered.

  “You tell me,” she said. “What are you up to lately?”

  “Just getting out in the sunlight. Shopping for sounds.”

  “Anything else happening?”