Scratching an itch on my collarbone, I remembered my necklace was still in the plastic bag the hospital had put it in. Fishing my pencil out of my notebook, I began another round of homework catch-up. After half an hour, my back ached from bending over my book and my head throbbed from conjugating Spanish verbs.
“Knock, knock,” Brent called, rapping his knuckles on the wooden post.
“Hey, Brent.”
“I was going to ask if you wanted to study for the Bio exam together,” he said, pointing to the textbook in his hand.
“Oh. Um, sure.” I chewed on my bottom lip. “How did you know I was here?”
Brent ducked his head, seeming suddenly shy. “I saw you head into the groves, and followed when I had a chance.”
“Any particular reason?”
“I’m pretty sure you know why,” he said, leaning against the gazebo and giving me a confident smile.
My books slipped off my lap and clattered onto the wooden floor. He knelt beside me as I bent to pick them up, and his pant leg pulled up, revealing a black cloud-shaped scar. I’d seen one like it before and yet I couldn’t place it. I was so focused on the scar, I almost missed him leaning in close, staring at my lips. He’s going to kiss me. My palms were suddenly clammy. His new cologne surrounded me, a fusion of spearmint, ginger, and another scent that made me queasy. The troubling underlying odor smelled like . . . chlorine. A riptide of wrongness pulled me back from Brent’s parted lips.
SMACK.
Something whacked me in the forehead, knocking me off balance, landing me on my butt, as an orange rolled past my feet. Feeling dizzy from the blow, I glanced up and saw a blurry Brent in double vision. I closed my eyes, rubbing them with my fists as I shook my head, trying to dislodge the visual abnormality, but when I opened them again they were both still there: one Brent inside the gazebo kneeling next to me and the other standing just over his left shoulder in the groves, mouthing angrily, “He isn’t me.”
In a mind-numbing, earth-tilting, stomach-heaving rush, everything I had forgotten came back. My fingers splayed over my temples and my head fell forward as I absorbed the fact that I had been murdered, Brent and I had been trapped on campus, and I had been brought back to life while the mist had been chasing Brent. My body went cold, black dots danced in front of my eyes, and my fingers tingled.
A strong arm went around my shoulders and I flinched. “Are you okay? What happened?”
He was an imposter— not Brent, but Thomas. He had killed me once already and here I was, alone in his embrace. I bit down hard on my lip hoping that would stop my hands from shaking. A sliver of wood impaled itself into my hand as I scooted away from Thomas, freeing myself. Teetering to my feet I leaned against the wooden railing of the gazebo, my eyes sliding toward where Brent had retreated into the trees.
Thomas came up behind me and placed his hands on my hips, resting his chin on my shoulder.
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” he whispered into my ear. It could have been an off-hand statement, but there was an undercurrent of suspicion in it that sprouted panic in my gut.
My toes curled hard, fighting to keep me standing. I wheeled toward him and leaned heavily against the wood behind me. It was beyond important that I didn’t let him know my memory had returned. I had to convince him I still believed he was Brent. More than just my life depended on it.
Stretching up on my toes I planted a very chaste kiss on his lips that tasted sickly of chlorine. My stomach rolled, wanting to heave as I threw my arms around him, holding him tight.
“I do want to study for Bio with you, but I forgot I have a study group. I better get back to my room so I can get my notes.”
“I’ll walk you back,” he said, grinning and taking my hand in his. The pressure of his palm stabbed the sliver deeper into my skin, drawing blood.
****
Brent was waiting for me in my room. The difference between Thomas masquerading in Brent’s body and Brent himself was undeniable. Thomas might be just as good looking when he was pretending to be Brent, but he was a poor, sloppy version of him. He lacked, and couldn’t fake, the part of Brent that truly made him so appealing, so . . . beautiful: his essence. Brent was more than handsome— he had a warmth and goodness in his soul that couldn’t be duplicated.
I closed the door and paused, holding tight to the doorknob as I leaned back against it, my feet shuffling beneath me. Brent lounged against the window, his thumbs tucked into his pant pockets. I closed my eyes and breathed in the comforting musky smell of him, his scent pushing me past my momentary shyness, I ran toward him to throw my arms around him but missed. Actually, I didn’t so much miss as fall through him, headfirst into my desk, my body quaking with the cold the whole way.
“Are you okay?” He laughed quietly, looking over his shoulder at the heap of me.
“Ow!” I said, rubbing my head where it had made contact with the corner of the desk. “I should have known that would happen,” I grumbled. I stood up, wiping my hands and holding them up as proof that I was undamaged. “Nothing harmed but my pride.”
“Still throwing yourself at me I see.”
“At least I wasn’t trying to hit you.” I wrapped my arms around myself. “Are you always so cold?”
“You know, you really shouldn’t be touching me in such an intimate manner. I might get the wrong idea.” Brent dropped down to the edge of my mattress and his eyes swept over our room, stopping occasionally to study a poster or picture.
“Right, I’ll try not to defile your innocent spirit anymore,” I said with a grin.
“Thank you. I wouldn’t want my reputation tarnished.”
I laughed and sat down next to Brent, positioning myself to face him, bringing my pillow across my lap. “I guess I’m a full-fledged Waker now, because I can totally see and hear you.”
“I was getting worried. I’ve been trying to contact you since your accident but you couldn’t see me. I turned on the radio to our song and everything. What happened?”
“I got my memory back. I guess you should have pelted me with an orange earlier.”
We exchanged grins. Curiously, I reached out and tried to touch his face, feeling nothing more than cold air. He placed his hand over mine, tickling my fingers with a soft frosty breeze. “I can almost feel you. Or rather, I can feel a chill, letting me know where you should be.” My spine sagged with my heart and the corners of his lips twitched south. “This is unacceptable.” I left my body, grabbed him, and hugged him fiercely. “That’s better.”
A laugh rumbled through him as held me close. “Did you really think you could get rid of me so easily?”
I burrowed my face into the crook of his neck, breathing in his citrusy, musky scent, as his arms tightened around my waist.
“Could you please get back in your body, though?” He asked, pulling back without releasing me. “It’s making me nervous.”
“I want to be able to touch you, to make sure you’re real.” He pinched me and I scowled at him, making him laugh again as he shooed me back toward my body. I reentered, shivering at the rush of cold that trampled through me.
“Put on your necklace too, please.” He said, pointing toward the plastic bag on my chest of drawers. “And never take it off again,”
With an apologetic smile I pulled it from the bag and clasped it around my neck. I became conscious of his intense brown eyes focusing on me. A blush spread across my face that deepened till I thought my cheeks might sunburn from the inside out. When he finally looked away, I chanced a look in his direction, letting my eyes caress his features. I noticed the corners of his mouth curve up and I knew that he had caught me, like a child with her hand in the cookie jar.
“I missed you.”
Brent laughed without a trace of mirth. “Funny, I was thinking you had forgotten me.”
Not wanting to meet his eyes I dropped my gaze and studied the sunlight whispering through the window, gliding across the carpet. “I had, but some part of me rem
embered. My last thought before I woke up in the hospital was worry for you. I was afraid Thomas had captured you.”
Brent raked his fingers through his hair a few times, standing up suddenly and pacing around my small room. “You kissed him.”
“I did it to save my life, you idiot.” I stood up, my hands on my hips, shoulders squared. “Yours, too.”
“I know,” he said, frowning, his fingernails hovering close to his lips, trying to fight the urge.
I tried to not smile at him. “You’re not jealous, are you?”
Brent forced a chuckle. “No.”
“For your information,” I said, wagging my finger at him, “I was leaning away from him before you hit me with that orange. I wasn’t going to kiss him.”
Brent had the decency to look a little bit repentant. “I didn’t know that until the last second.” Brent gave in and started chewing on one of his nails again. “How did you know it wasn’t me?”
“I didn’t. I just knew something was wrong.” I kicked off my shoes and tucked my feet under me as I sat down on Cherie’s bed, across from Brent.
“I guess that’s something,” he said.
“He has the scar on his ankle that you got from the mist.”
“Interesting.”
My neighbor in the room beside mine turned on her radio so loud it shook the wall. Brent plugged his ears at her off-key vocal accompaniment of the emo lyrics floating into the room. “It’s even worse without your body.”
“Why is he trying to romance me?” I asked over the music, trying to get back on topic.
“Besides the fact that you’re beautiful?”
My head snapped toward him. “What?”
Brent had the look of an escaping prisoner caught in the searchlight. “Nothing. He’s just trying to keep an eye on you, making sure you don’t remember anything.”
My heart bounced merrily in my chest and I leaned toward Brent. In turn he bent toward me, elbows on his knees. “It’s weird to see you wearing something besides that formal dress.”
“Is it?”
Brent nodded. “Yeah. I’m beyond jealous that you just took off your shoes.”
I stretched out my socked feet and wiggled my toes. “It does feel good. Those heels were killer.”
Brent’s eyes lingered on my toes with envy, then traveled slowly up my body to my face. “You were right from the start. Things could be fixed.”
“We haven’t fixed everything yet, though,” I said, my voice tinged with disappointment. “How are we going to get your body back?”
Brent shrugged. “It doesn’t matter.”
I grabbed his hand or would have if it didn’t slide right through mine. I projected again so I could hold his hand. “It does matter. It matters a lot.”
He didn’t answer right away and I held my breath looking up at my popcorn ceiling. Brent’s emotions started to leak out in a chilly gust of wind that twirled around us, sending my curls flying around my face.
“Keeping you safe from Thomas is more important than getting my body back.” He paused for a second tucking a few of the loose strands of my hair behind my ears, letting his hand trail softly down my neck to my shoulder. My body hummed like a well-played cello where he touched me. He leaned in closer and I found myself lost in the fire of his dark eyes. I felt the small gap of air separating us blistering with things unsaid, of chances missed. I couldn’t breathe as he closed the space separating us, my heartbeat a frantic rhythm. The moment was perfect, as if scripted for a movie, and I strained to hear a smooth jazz swirl around us, the romantic music that informed the audience that the girl and the handsome boy were about to kiss. My eyes fluttered closed.
I waited hopefully, expectantly but was caught off guard by the friendly kiss planted on my cheek. The jazz screeched to a halt on a sour note and my eyes snapped open as I abruptly pulled back. The electrically-charged atmosphere effectively sputtered and died as if a bucketful of ice water had been thrown over it.
“Probably not the best idea,” he said, his eyes still smoldering as he retreated to the window ledge. Did he mean the near kiss or getting his body back? Confused, I let my hair fall in front of my beet-red face to veil it from him, while hunching my shoulders.
“Me coming back to life is only the opening act,” I said, trying desperately not to seem flustered. “The grand finale will be getting your body back, defeating Thomas, and freeing the others. We just need a good plan.”
Brent’s eyes sparkled with a devilish glint. “I have a few ideas.”
Chapter 16
“That isn’t a plan!” I yelled at Brent as I followed him into the tree line. He had dropped the bomb that he planned to just leave things the way they were, and then retreated out the window. Still being cautious, I had slid back into my body before storming after him. He had been waiting for me, but when I got close enough for him to hear my angry comments, he started walking again.
“Yes, it is,” he answered over his shoulder vanishing behind a row of trees.
“Letting him get away with it?” I tried to say but the words tangled in my throat.
“It’s the safest—”
“I don’t care about tha—”
“I know you’ve got a lot of passion and courage, but you’re not using your head.”
I stopped dead in my tracks. “Really? Calling me stupid is your way to get me to agree with you?”
“No, I’m just hoping you’ll stop for a moment and understand that I don’t want you to risk dying again. If he gets even the smallest inkling of you not trusting him, he’ll act.”
“You really think he’s going to just leave me alone?”
“No,” Brent finally admitted, yanking at his collar, trying to loosen it. “That doesn’t mean you should put yourself in harm’s way, though.”
“Brent,” I started, trying to sound reasonable. “How can you expect me to just leave things? He’s going to keep coming after us and we’re going to have to keep fighting him off. Haven’t you heard the best defense is a good offense?”
“Yara, please remember, for the last few months I’ve watched you die before my eyes every single night and I was powerless to do anything about it.” He laced his fingers together behind his head, his Adam’s apple wobbling as he cleared his throat. “Please don’t risk letting that happen again. You said you were willing to die for me,” Brent reminded me, his voice barely a whisper. “Why shouldn’t I be allowed to make the same sacrifice for you?”
“The circumstances are totally different,” I argued. “I was already dead.”
“So am I,” Brent threw back at me.
“No, you’re just bodily challenged.”
Brent snickered for a second, his shoulders shaking. “Make it as PC as you want, but I’m dead. I will not let you do anything that would put you in danger.”
“Is that so?” My eyebrows drew together and my eyes narrowed at him. “You can’t stop me.”
He held up his finger telling me to be quiet. “I’m warning you, if you try something stupid—”
“Are you threatening me?” I asked, throwing my hands in the air. “If you think you can tell me what to do—”
He gave me a menacing look. “I will stop you by any means necessary.”
I collected my anger, hugging it tight to me, pretending it was gone. “You’re right,” I said opening my eyes wide, trying to appear and sound innocent. “It’s stupid of me to mess with this. I’ll let it go.”
“Yeah right” Brent said, eyeing me suspiciously. “I don’t trust you for a second.”
“What? Why?” I sputtered, my anger unfurling around me.
He rolled his eyes at my question like it wasn’t worth the air to answer it. “I don’t trust you because I know you.” Brent brought his fingers to his lips and shushed me. “Someone’s coming.”
The soft fall of footsteps drawing near to us had me holding my breath, my heart beating rapidly. The tension melted quickly when a vaguely familiar boy with straw
berry blond hair and big gray eyes turned the corner. I was pretty sure I had a class with him, but I couldn’t remember which one.
“Hey, Yara,” he said with a slight southern drawl. “You gave me start. I thought I was alone.”
“Hey . . .” I trailed off lamely, not having any idea of his name.
His cheeks grew two red spots. “Dallin.”
“Right, Dallin,” I gushed, hoping my enthusiasm would make up for my name ignorance.
He dropped his gaze to study his shoes. “We have Calculus together.”
“Oh right. How did you do on that test?”
“I failed it.” He sighed. “Rumor has it you got the highest grade.”
I nodded, kicking the dirt. “Yeah.”
Dallin took off the school uniform’s pullover sweater and tossed it over his arm. Brent sighed in envy.
“I was actually hoping you might be willing to tutor me.”
“Oh man, this is painful to watch.” Brent broke out in laughter. “You do realize he’s trying to ask you out, right?”
I glared at Brent before answering. “Sure.”
“You better warn him about your habit of using that book as a weapon,” Brent said.
“Only on you,” I said under my breath.
“Only me what?” Dallin asked, not catching all of my words.
“I don’t usually tutor people but I’ll make an exception only for you,” I lied easily.
Brent openly gaped at me. “Do you have any idea how that just sounded?”
Dallin drew himself up taller. “Great. Maybe tomorrow, right after school?”
“Sure? In the commons building?”
“Yep,” he said. He took a deep breath, his cheeks puffing out. “Are you seeing Brent?”
I coughed back a laugh but my eyes still danced as I looked at Brent. “Not in the way you’re thinking.”
“I figured,” Dallin said. “You know, with him not into the long term dating thing.”
“Really?” My eyebrows raised under my bangs.
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