by Alicia Rades
“I guess I can try, but I don’t know if she’ll say yes.”
“Thank you, Robin! Asher’s parents won’t mind?”
“No, they’re pretty cool.”
“Okay. Do you know much about Sage? I mean, does it seem like she’s in danger?”
“Not that I’ve picked up on,” he admitted. “We talk a little in class, but she mostly keeps to herself. I’ll let you know if I notice anything, though.”
“Thank you, Robin.”
I hung up only for Emma to immediately jump into her inquisition. “What was that about? It sounded like he knows Sage? Did he say ‘I love you?’ Why didn’t you say it back?”
I shoved her lightheartedly, mostly to hide the blush rising to my cheeks. “No, he didn’t because neither of us have said it yet. It’s not like you and Derek have, either.”
“I’m waiting for him to say it first,” she defended.
“Maybe I’m doing the same thing.”
We both immediately dropped the subject because neither of us wanted to discuss the fact that even after five months, for both of our relationships, the “L” word still hadn’t come up once.
“Anyway,” I said, “Robin does know Sage. He’s going to ask her to come to his practice on Tuesday.”
“And I suppose you want me to drive you there,” Emma said.
Emma had her driver’s license, and I had only recently got my learner’s permit. I nodded.
“Okay,” she answered. “Derek’s invited, too, right?”
“Yeah. As long as Asher’s parents are okay with so many people coming along.”
When I asked Mom about going to Asher’s on Tuesday, she insisted I call to make sure his parents would be home. Mom was always more like a best friend to me than a mother, but ever since I started dating, she’d been getting more protective. The rule was that I couldn’t hang out with Robin unless an adult was present or we were in public. I explained to her about Sage and her connection with Robin, and then she seemed more accepting of letting me go. She still made me call as a courtesy.
I wasn’t exactly great friends with Asher yet, but we’d met a few months back after Robin and I started dating, so I had his number programmed into my phone. The good news was that Asher didn’t care if we tagged along, and his mom was going to be there. Apparently, his family had this “the more, the merrier” policy.
I couldn’t wait. That night, I lay in bed wide awake as Emma snored lightly on the fold-up cot next to me. I could usually get little bits of information about people just by focusing on them, but it never seemed to work when I was sent to save them. It’s like the universe didn’t think the little things were important when I knew fully well that they were.
I fell asleep without learning anything new about Sage Anderson.
5
I woke Sunday morning to Emma’s ringtone. She shifted on the cot and reached for her phone in her overnight bag on the floor. The sunlight seeped through my curtains, casting a sliver of light across my bed. I checked my clock and found it was already 8:00. I stretched, thinking about how well I’d slept, and then the memory of everything that happened the day before came flooding back to me. Suddenly, I felt guilty for sleeping so well when a girl’s life depended on me. But honestly, I had no idea what to do next.
“Derek wants us to hang out with him after he comes home from church,” Emma told me.
What I really wanted to do was talk with Sage. I reached for my own phone on my nightstand and spun it around in my hands. I didn’t even realize what I was doing until Emma spoke again.
“You’re thinking about Sage, aren’t you?”
“What?” I jerked my eyes up at her. How did she know?
“It’s written all over your face. You’re like an open book, Crystal.”
I sighed. She was right about that.
“Be careful,” Emma warned. “You don’t want to come across too pushy. You want her to trust you.”
I nodded and looked down in disappointment at my phone again. It felt like any moment I wasn’t learning more about Sage was time wasted, but at the same time, I understood where Emma was coming from.
“So, Derek’s?” I asked. “Sounds fun.”
While we waited for Derek to get home, Emma insisted we have one of our psychic practice sessions. Normally we practiced after I was done babysitting Hope, but Emma said that since we’d be at Asher’s later this week, doing it now would make up for our Tuesday practice.
With a reluctant eye roll, I agreed. She was right. Even with the progress we’d both made, I still needed to practice my abilities.
I unrolled my owl yoga mat across my carpet while Emma reached into her bag and pulled out her own mat. My room wasn’t exactly the cleanest place on earth, but most of the mess was piled in front of my dresser where a heap of clean clothes sat unfolded and a drawer was open. That left enough room for the both of us to stretch out.
“How did you know?” I asked accusingly, eyeing Emma’s yoga mat.
“What?” she asked innocently as she situated her mat on my floor.
“You were just using Tuesday as a convenient excuse, weren’t you? You would have come up with anything to make us practice.”
Emma shrugged as a smile crept across her lips. “You know me well.”
I twisted my mouth up at her in discontent. Still, I couldn’t help but be grateful for her persistence. Without it, I wasn’t sure how good my abilities would be at this point. Plus, I was itching to make a psychic connection with Sage.
But, of course, I couldn’t let Emma know I was happy about this practice session. There’d be too much pride in it for her.
“After our warm-up exercises, I thought we could practice more with your crystal ball,” Emma said. “I mean, you should practice, but I’ll be here to help if I can. I’m not nearly ready for crystal ball gazing yet.”
I nodded. Maybe it would give me a glimpse into Sage’s near future, like how she was going to die. Then I’d have a better idea of how I could save her. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a way of controlling the information that came to me.
“Ready?” Emma asked, stretching her arms above her head to loosen them up.
“Yep.”
She fiddled with her phone for a few seconds until a soothing melody began playing out of it. Our first 10 to 15 minutes or so of each session was spent clearing our minds and relaxing our bodies. When we started these sessions, Emma would tell me what to do, but now we just gave each other time to do whatever our bodies felt was needed to clear our minds.
I took a few deep breaths and forced the muscles in my face to relax. I could hear Emma’s deep breathing next to me. She let out a soft hum.
I breathed in and out slowly and deeply as I concentrated on different points in my shoulders and back to relieve any tension. The task proved difficult as I worried about my newfound responsibility toward Sage. How can I save her when I don’t know what danger she’s really in?
I rolled my head to the side to stretch my neck.
I tried my best not to think; I attempted to clear my mind, but it was to no avail. As time passed and I worked my way through my yoga poses, my thoughts ran in a web of connections that eventually took me to a memory of my father before he died.
I was all of four years old when our next door neighbor, Mrs. James, fell in her kitchen. In the winter, Dad was always there to shovel Mrs. James’s driveway. In the summer, he’d even cut her grass without asking for anything in return. So when she fell and managed to reach a phone, my dad was the first person she called. He ran over to her house immediately and called an ambulance.
“Daddy,” I remember asking, “why did you have to help Mrs. James? Why did she call you?” What I was really trying to ask is why she hadn’t called the ambulance herself, but I don’t think I ever quite worded it right because what my father said next stuck with me.
“Crystal,” he had said, “sometimes we’re called on to help other people. Sometimes it’s because people
trust us. Other times it’s just sheer luck. And you know what? It’s our duty to rise to the challenge and help them. If we don’t help each other, that’s when we stop being human.”
I heard Emma shift on her mat, and I took this reminder to make my own body move. I folded my legs under me and positioned myself onto all fours, my head turned up and my belly sunk toward the floor in cow pose.
I wasn’t entirely sure if I was remembering my father’s words correctly, but as I looked back on them, I had to wonder if he was trying to tell me something more important than I ever imagined.
I pulled my chin and tailbone into my body and stretched my spine upward into cat pose.
Was he trying to tell me that someday I would be called on to help people? Because of my abilities?
Cow pose.
He knew my mom was psychic, so maybe he thought I was, too, which turned out to be the truth.
Cat pose.
Was that why I was always so desperate to help anyone who crossed my path? Was it because of what my dad said to me when I was four?
I curled my toes into the mat, lifted my knees from the floor, and pushed my butt toward the sky to position myself into downward facing dog.
What would things be like if I hadn’t been psychic like Mom had thought for so many years? No one would have come to me for help, and I wouldn’t have a responsibility toward anyone.
I slowly lowered my entire body to the mat and then lifted my chest up into cobra pose.
A normal life. That sounded pretty nice. It’d be like it was before last Halloween.
I paused back in downward facing dog.
I’d be able to hang out with my friends care-free and enjoy my teenage years without abuse, abductions, and death on my mind.
I shifted my body weight between each of my legs, pressing my heels into the mat to stretch my calves.
But wait. That would mean that my mom would still be hiding her secret and that we wouldn’t have this bond anymore. That would mean that Kelli might still be in an abusive relationship and that, after everyone but me gave up on her, Hope would still be in Lauren’s hands. That would mean that Robin and I would have never taken that side trip last Thanksgiving and gotten to know each other and started dating.
That would mean that Sage wouldn’t have a chance.
A loud clap snapped me out of my thoughts. I fell to my knees and jerked my eyes up toward the sound.
“I’m sorry,” Emma said. “I didn’t mean to clap that loud. Ready to move on?”
With me, Sage has a chance, I thought, which filled me with a sense of hope.
Emma and I continued through our exercises. We started by writing down three predictions for tomorrow. Mine were really dumb, like what was going to be on the lunch menu. We had done this exercise so many times that I could see little things like that with ease. What I really wanted was to see something about Sage, but even as I focused on her, I couldn’t see even the tiniest bit of detail.
Next, Emma made me leave the room while she hid an object for me to find. I was gifted with psychometry like my mom. When I reentered the room, I knew exactly what she’d hidden before I even touched anything. That’s because the one thing in the room that was always in its proper position was missing. Emma had hid my stuffed owl, Luna. I immediately unzipped Emma’s duffel bag and found Luna sitting on top.
“Whoa.” Emma took a step back in shock.
“What?” I asked with a shrug. “I didn’t do anything different, did I?”
Emma nodded slowly, like she was unsure of what I’d just done. “You didn’t even touch my hand to find out what was missing.”
Oh. She was right. Normally I needed something to touch that had recently been around the hidden object.
“Well,” I said, “I noticed Luna had moved as soon as I entered the room, so maybe since I already knew what was missing, I knew where it was.”
“Or maybe you’re just getting better,” Emma theorized. “Or maybe it’s because you’re so attached to Luna.”
“What?” I practically squeaked. “I am not.”
That was such a lie, and Emma knew it. Still, I turned my face and put Luna back on her shelf so Emma wouldn’t notice how blatantly I was lying—since my eyebrow twitched every time I lied. The truth was, I was attached to Luna. After all, my father had given her to me.
“Okay, your turn,” I told Emma.
Emma didn’t have psychometry. She could never tell what I hid, but she could get feelings about situations. It was like she could tell when she was hot or cold because of which decision felt better to her.
Once she left the room, I searched for something to hide. I couldn’t make it too hard for her, but I also couldn’t make it too easy. I stood in the middle of my room for several long moments wondering what I should hide for her. When my wandering eyes fell to my feet, I was reminded of the first time we played this game and Emma hid her sock. I decided to do the same. I slipped off the other sock just so she wouldn’t notice I was missing one.
“Okay, you can come back in,” I called.
She stood by my open door with her eyes closed for what seemed like forever. I knew she was trying to get “in the zone,” as she put it, but her silence left me wondering if I had made it too hard for her. I sat on the end of my bed and simply observed.
After a while, she began moving around my room. She’d go one way and then turn around and pace a few steps the other way. She did this several times, inching closer and closer to the sock each time. Several long minutes passed. Finally, she stood over her duffel bag and opened her eyes.
“You hid it in the same place, you dirty little cheat!” she exclaimed.
“Well, I didn’t think you’d look there.”
She opened her bag and threw my sock at my face. We both laughed.
“Okay. Are you ready for crystal ball gazing?” Emma asked.
I sighed. “I guess.” This was one thing I still wasn’t good at, and it always made me nervous. I crossed the room and picked up my crystal ball from where it stood on my dresser. Every time I touched the ball, it called out to me somehow. Colors swirled in it, and I felt nothing but tranquility.
Suddenly, Emma’s ringtone cut through the silence. I jumped, and the ball slipped out of my fingers. It fell with a thud onto the clothes in my open dresser drawer.
“I’m sorry!” Emma said. “It’s just Derek. He says he’s back from church.”
“I guess our practice is cut a little short today.” I knew that even as much as Emma loved practicing her psychic abilities, she wanted to get to her boyfriend’s house as soon as possible.
“I guess so,” she agreed.
I glanced back at my crystal ball and lazily decided to let it lay where it was. Besides, it looked kind of cozy tucked in a cradle made of my tees.
6
When we reached Derek’s, we entered his house without knocking. I still found it weird, like I was intruding, but ever since Emma and Derek started dating, things had shifted slightly in our group of three. It wasn’t so bad that I felt left out or like a third wheel or anything, but even after a few months, it was still awkward to witness their peck when they greeted each other. The good news was that Derek’s parents adored Emma.
“Do you guys want to see it?” Derek asked excitedly.
“See what?” I replied.
“My driver’s license. That’s why I left school early on Friday. Remember? I texted you about it.”
Derek handed over his license, and Emma and I gazed at it with enthusiasm. Milo—Derek’s dog—sniffed at me while I tried to get a good look, so I petted him softly to calm him down.
“That’s great that you passed the first time, Derek,” I said, momentarily reminding myself that now everyone I knew could drive and I was still the youngest one around. At least it gave me a chance to hang out with my friends when I needed a ride, though.
We said hello to his parents and twin sisters and then followed Derek to his bedroom—but had to leave the
door open per his parents’ rules. He eagerly told us about his driving test.
I sat in his desk chair while Emma and Derek claimed a seat on his bed.
“I know you haven’t talked about it a lot, Derek,” Emma started, “but this just reminds me of your birth parents. Did your mom and dad ever really tell you more about them?”
Derek had found out he was adopted when he got his learner’s permit and he caught a glimpse of his birth certificate. When he finally admitted his secret—well, not so much admitted it as much as I found out because of my psychic abilities—he said he didn’t care because his birth parents were dead and it didn’t change that his adoptive parents were still his parents.
He shrugged in response to Emma’s question. “I guess my mom and dad have always felt like my mom and dad. I don’t really feel any need to search for information about my birth parents.”
Emma ran her fingers through her curly dark hair. “Wouldn’t it at least be nice to kind of know where you came from?”
“It’s not like I’m having an identity crisis,” Derek said lightheartedly, like he didn’t care to know what happened to them. I couldn’t bring myself to believe he wasn’t at least curious.
“I know.” Emma shifted on the bed. “I guess I just feel like if I found out I was adopted, I would at least do a Google search and try to figure out more about my birth parents.”
Derek shrugged again. “I guess.”
“Well, why not?” She stood from the bed and shooed me from my spot by Derek’s computer. “What were their names?”
“Uh, Thomas and Sharon Woods. I got the Johnson last name from my mom and dad,” he explained, meaning his adoptive parents.
Emma typed his dad’s name into the search bar.
Meanwhile, I turned to Derek. “Want to hear about the crazy stuff that happened to me this weekend?”
