by Shaye Easton
Rand laughs. “Theory? Sweetheart, it’s no theory. It’s a fact.”
Doubtful, I think. I’ve been around for seventeen years. People have theories about my disease. They don’t have facts. “Then what is it?”
“Aren’t you eager?” he says and stands up. “Would you like anything to drink?”
“No thanks.”
“I’ll get you some water.”
As soon as he’s gone, I turn to Caden. “How do you live with this person? He’s impossible.”
He shrugs. “You get used to it.”
Rand returns a minute later with three glasses of water. He places them on the dark wood coffee table between us and returns to his seat.
“The truth is,” he says, continuing the conversation, “your so-called disease is a side effect.” And I think, Great, another side effect. “It came as a result of switching bodies with Sara.”
“Right… That makes no sense at all.”
“Of course not. Allow me to enlighten you.” He takes a sip of his water and places it back down on the table. “Spirits and ghosts, as I’m sure you’re aware of by now, are naturally cold. It’s a particular sort of cold that we call a cold fire; if you get too close, you get burned. Our bodies act as a container for this cold, and they are each uniquely designed to fit your soul and yours alone. So when two souls are swapped and placed in different bodies, the cold is not as effectively contained.
“Over the years, it seeps out into your body, hence your cold skin. Ordinarily, this would kill you. But luckily our souls are designed to survive. As a defence mechanism, your soul has been drawing in heat to keep your body functioning as normal. Of course, the longer you’re swapped, the more heat it requires to keep you alive because the cold has had more time to seep into your body. This is why, as you’ve gotten older, your surroundings have been growing much colder, faster.”
It takes a moment to understand all he’s said, and even then I can’t fully comprehend it. I’m almost tempted to give my ears a tap to make sure I’m hearing him correctly. This kind of explanation just doesn’t belong in this world.
“Does it slow down?” I ask. “Does it ever stabilise?”
Rand stares at me for a moment, reading my emotions. Then he slowly shakes his head. “No. It doesn’t ever slow down. Not until you’re dead.”
“Okay, great. So I’m stuck with it for the rest of my life.”
Caden shifts uncomfortably beside me. “Not exactly.”
“What do you mean?”
“He means,” Rand answers, “that there will come a day when your soul cannot draw in enough heat to keep your body from freezing. And on that day, you’ll die.”
I can’t quite bring myself to freak out. It’s like all this information is coming at me from the other side of a thick pain of translucent glass. It’s murky and muted. Feels dreamlike, unreal. Surely nothing they say actually applies to me?
I ask my next question anyway, though I’m sure the objectivity of my curiosity is more than evident in my tone. “How long do I have then?”
“Wow, don’t get too freaked out,” Caden comments sarcastically.
“This hasn’t happened too many times before, but from what we know, a person can only survive a decade in someone else’s body.”
“But you said I was swapped when I was four,” I reply, looking at Caden. “I’m seventeen.”
“Exactly.” Rand nods. “You’re already running on borrowed time.”
Chapter Eight
After a quick bathroom break—during which I splash water on my face repeatedly until I can actually feel it, until I feel real and solid and breathing—I return to the living room and we continue the conversation.
I take a breath. Release it. This is crazy. “What about everything else?” I ask, and I can’t believe myself. They’re insane. Why am I going along with this?
“Everything else?”
“I can’t feel pain or temperature.”
“Ah,” Rand says, waving a hand. No big deal, the action says, which is a little shocking considering how big of a deal it’s been my entire life. “That’s just what happens when you’re in a different body. You’re not in tune with it. You don’t connect properly.”
“And the healing?”
“Healing?” Rand appears surprised. I can almost hear his brain click and grind as he thinks.
“She’s regenerative,” Caden says.
“Of course,” Rand exclaims. “That’s how she’s lived this long. It would have slowed down the process, given her more time. She could have another two years—maybe even more.”
I fold my arms. “She would like to know what you’re talking about.”
Caden smirks. “This ought to be good.”
Rand narrows his eyes at him, then turns to me. “Don’t freak out,” he says, “but you have abilities.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Abilities?”
“Powers. Superpowers. Supernatural capabilities. Whatever you want to call them, that’s what you’ve got.”
“Like that guy in the carpark,” Caden agrees. “The one who fucked up my car.”
I look back and forth between the two of them. They’re dead serious. But this is a joke. It has to be. “So…what? I can fly? I’m super strong?”
“Of course not, that’d be ridiculous.” Oh yeah, that’s what’s ridiculous, duh. “No, you’re regenerative in nature.”
“She’s telekinetic as well,” Caden adds. “And aerokinetic, like her mother.”
Rand sits a little straighter, surprised by the news—and strangely happy to hear it. “Three abilities? Are you sure?”
“She smashed a window in class without touching it, and the air seems to be affected by her emotions.”
Rand nods. “Makes sense.”
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “No, it definitely does not make sense. Explain.”
Rand leans forward in his seat, resting his elbows on his knees. “What we’ve gathered so far is that you have three abilities. Regeneration, which I’m sure you’re already very familiar with. Telekinesis, which is the mental manipulation of matter. And aerokinesis, a form of elemental control over air.”
“Three abilities,” I say, the second half of his response knocked to the back of my mind where I don’t have to think or freak out about it. “How many is normal?”
“Spectres are only meant to have one.”
“Then why the hell do I have three? What’s wrong with me?”
Rand laughs. “We’re actually expecting you to have more than three. Being swapped doesn’t just dull your ability to feel pain or temperature, it dulls your powers too. Usually to the point of remission, where you can’t access them at all. You’ll probably run across one or two others in time.”
“If they’re dulled to the point of remission, how can I use them at all?”
“It seems you have a good deal of strength.”
“Is this why Caden’s been harassing me—”
“I wouldn’t call it harassing,” he murmurs.
“—Because I have multiple abilities?”
“That’s one of the reasons, yes.”
“What are the others?”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”
“How is that getting ahead of ourselves? You’ve told me all these crazy things and when I ask why, that’s when you want to draw the line?”
“There’s a lot you don’t understand yet, Melissa. A lot you still need to understand. But these things take time. If we were to tell it all at once, you wouldn’t take it well.”
“Try me.”
“We already have. Caden’s been testing your reaction to unbelievable truths for weeks. You always act the same way: with humour and denial. You’re not gullible, which means you don’t trust easily. If you want to know more, you need to start by accepting more.”
“Accepting more? You’ve just told me I’ve grown up in the wrong body and have all these magical powers—”
“Magical
is an improper description. They’re supernatural, preternatural, otherworldly. But not magical.”
“Do I look like I care? What you’ve said is crazy! No sane person in the world would accept it.”
“Melissa, you’re proving my point.”
“You can at least tell me how this all happened.”
“You mean how you were swapped?”
I nod.
“You went missing one afternoon as a child. It was about…six hours, I think, that you were gone.” He turns to Caden. “Six?”
Caden shrugs. “That’s what Davion said.”
Rand shakes his head and continues. “When you came back, well… You weren’t you. I think it took a few years before Michael and Kathryn realised you’d been swapped, and by then both families had moved away.”
“I’m sorry, Michael and Kathryn?”
“Your biological parents,” Caden says. “Michael and Kathryn Falconer.”
Sara’s parents. My parents, I think to myself, and it doesn’t feel right at all. I take a deep breath then release it slowly, attempting to orient myself to reality. Nothing makes sense anymore.
But I’m still processing everything else they told me, and the gibberish fails to register. “I lived on a neighbouring farm to Sara’s,” I say. “You’re telling me we both went missing one afternoon, someone swapped us around, and then returned us, free of charge?”
Rand leans back. “That’s a pleasant way of putting it.”
Out of nowhere, I remember my nightmare, one from a week ago: a dark room; a man with a smooth voice; a cold, hard object; and excruciating pain. It was a memory. And the moment I think it, I know I’m right. It was a memory of being pulled out of my own body.
It’s too much. I stand up. “I have to go back to school. I left my bag in my locker and I need it. I have homework.”
Rand says plainly, “You’re not going anywhere.”
“I left my phone. You can’t keep me here.”
“Oh, he can,” Caden says. He looks up at me apologetically. “You should sit down.”
“The thing is, Melissa,” Rand says as I reluctantly retake my seat, “the school’s no longer safe. They’ve clearly found you, and there’s no one to stop them from—”
“I’m sorry,” I interrupt. “Who are we talking about again?”
Caden turns to me and says, “The people who swapped you in the first place.”
“What? It wasn’t enough to shove me in my friend’s body? Now they have to come after me as well?”
Sympathetically, Rand explains, “You’re important to them. Your family has managed to keep you fairly well hidden without knowing it by moving you from city to city, country to country. But Corven Lake is different. The danger is greater here.”
“How is it different?”
“It’s the capital.”
“Whose capital?”
“We can’t say. But know that they are dangerous. And they’re extremely present here.”
“And so you wait for six months after I’ve moved here to tell me this?”
“It’s complicated.”
I throw up my hands. “Of course it is.” I get to my feet, determined this time not to be sat back down again. “I have homework to do. If I’m in imminent danger, I’ll call you.”
“On what?” Caden asks.
“Oh, shove it, ghost boy.”
I make it to the hallway when I realise I have no car and no clue how to get home. But I’m annoyed and it fuels my movements, keeps me headed for the door. Back in the living room, I hear Rand say, “No. Let her go.”
Caden replies, “She doesn’t have a ride or a phone.”
I’m at the door. I throw it open, emerge into the dreary gun-metal afternoon like a bullet. Shot from a pathetic toy gun it would seem, because I trip over my own feet on the way to the gate, and then have to wrestle with it to get it open. I give up and jump the stupid two-foot wall instead.
They’re psychopaths, anyway. It’s all a joke. Powers. Swapping bodies. A mysterious assemblage of people who are keeping tabs on my whereabouts. Well, I’m right here, whoever you are! Come get me!
I’ve walked a block. I’ve walked two. I come to a dead end, turn left, turn right. I have no idea where I am and I don’t care.
Maybe ten minutes later, a black sedan pulls up beside me, trails me as I walk. I don’t even have to look to know who it is. I can feel the eyes roll from here.
“Melissa, get in the car,” Caden says with a tone of exasperation.
“I don’t need your charity. I have legs. I’m using them.”
“You’re going to walk all the way to school from here?”
“Exactly.”
I come to a corner. Caden turns the car in front of me, blocking the path ahead. I stop and watch him sitting there with an unimpressed look on his face. I want to scrape it off. It’s infuriating.
“You’re going in the wrong direction,” he says, matter-of-factly.
“Then I’ll go the other way.” I spin on my heels and stride back the way I came.
“For god’s sake. Melissa!” There’s the telltale clunk as he opens the driver side door. I heave a sigh and turn back around. “Please. Let me drive you. I’ll take you to the school. You can get your stuff. Then you can go home. I promise. I won’t drag you back here.”
“What’s the catch?”
He exhales, looks up at the sky, then looks back down. “There’s more we haven’t told you. There’s still so much you need to know. Just…” He raises his hands, palms forward like I’m some dangerous creature he’s trying to calm down. “Just tell me you’ll listen. It doesn’t have to be today. In fact, I promise it won’t be today. Just tell me, when the time comes, you’ll listen to what we have to say.”
“No tricks?”
“No tricks.”
I stand, hands on hips, immobile for a moment longer. Then I march around to the other side of the car and get in. Caden slides in beside me and drives off down the road. I keep my eyes on the view out the passenger side window, aggravated. I can feel him smiling. He knows the tally. I know it too, and it’s dismal.
Psychopaths: one. Melissa: zero.
We drive.
Chapter Nine
Caden follows me down the halls of the school, to my locker, like my own personal body guard or guard keeper. He doesn’t breathe a word.
“Are we going to talk about stuff,” I ask as I drag out my backpack, “or are you just going to keep breathing down my neck like a creep?”
He doesn’t laugh. “Option two sounds good.”
“Fantastic.”
I shut my locker door and turn to find he’s leaning against the wall, his arm placed strategically in my path. “I promised I wouldn’t push this any further, and I’m not going to. I don’t go back on my word.”
I nod. “Good to know.”
He still doesn’t move. I feel myself start to shrivel under his intense gaze, eyes diving into mine and scrutinising my soul. “Melissa, I’m risking a lot by trusting you on this. I need to know you’ll stick to the deal.”
“I don’t see how I couldn’t. You can always just ambush me at some point. I’m not going to run away.”
“This is serious, Melissa.”
“Yeah, so it would seem! I’m not me and I’ve got powers and I’m in danger of being—what? Being killed or kidnapped or something? But who cares, right? Because I’m gonna be dead soon, anyway!”
“You’re freaking out.”
“I’m not freaking out! I’ve just got a lot of crazy shit going on in my head right now and I need some space to deal with it. You know, like, without you hovering behind me like I’m some delicate flower that needs to be protected. I’ve managed seventeen years quite alright on my own, dealing with this damned disease and all the shit that accompany it. The last thing I need is for some weird teenage boy to come in, tell me my life’s a lie and then suffocate me with his presence because he thinks I’m going to break, leaving me with no alo
ne time to think things through or to just shut it all off for a while, and—”
“Melissa, breathe.”
“Don’t tell me to breathe . . . I know how to breathe, okay? See, look, this is me breathing. I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. You’ve just been told something that’s going to alter your entire existence and your mind is going through the stages of dealing with it. First denial, now panic.”
“What’s next, chopping off your head with an axe? Because I could really go for that right now.”
“Anger. Definitely anger.”
“Stop psychoanalysing me!”
“It’s not psychoanalysis, it’s just an observa—”
“I don’t care! Oh god, I don’t care. Just let me breathe.”
He watches me for a moment before nodding. “Alright, I’ll wait by the car.” And then he’s gone, and I’m alone, save for my thoughts. Which isn’t really like being alone at all, more like being in a crowded room and everyone there is yelling at me.
It just makes too much damn sense! All the crazy aside, everything adds up. Rand’s explanation fits and it’s terrifying. Because if I accept just one thing he’s told me, it’ll be an avalanche. Everything I’m denying will become undeniable, and I’ll have to come to terms with the fact that I’m not Melissa Croft.
And I’m going to die.
I guess this all means that the fourth stage of coping is fear.
***
The sun is setting by the time I get home, colouring the clouds on the horizon a purple-pink.
“I’ll see you on Monday,” Caden says as I slide numbly out of the car.
I don’t feel much of anything on a good day, but this afternoon I’m even more disconnected from the world. Sensations are dull, details are blurry, colours are dismal; it may as well be a dream. Or a nightmare.
“Yeah, Monday.” I shut the door and turn up the path to my house, Caden’s car still humming softly behind me. Why isn’t he going anywhere? Can’t he just leave me alone?
“Melissa,” he calls, rolling down the passenger side window. I stare blankly at him. “I won’t pretend to understand what you’re going through right now, but know that it will get better.”
