In My Dreams (First Tracks Book 2)

by Kristen James

  “This is me.”

  “Yup. Avery got so jealous when I drew that! I didn’t know who it was.”

  “Really?” She glanced at me several times while she tacked my drawings to the wall. “How did that work? You could draw while you were in her head, but you didn’t even know who you were drawing?”

  “Yeah, I drew some of those in the middle of the night. She was sleeping and I somehow made us get up, and I used her hand to draw. I had this vague memory of you. Then Avery found them in the morning.”

  Thankfully Jen turned away then and didn’t see my evil grin. That night I also sneaked a peek at a few of Avery’s things…like her panty drawer. I wonder if Avery knew about that? I guess there’s a few surprises we can still share.

  Now I did have a more complete mosaic of my life with Jen and Avery. We’d have to put some up of mom and dad too, if I was here much longer. I ignored that thought and focused on the moment.

  A minute later, I asked, “You think Mom and Dad will come around about Avery?”

  “Don’t they have to?” she asked right back.

  I laughed and then had to explain. “I sounded like you there and you were being me.”

  She gave me a huh face until she got it. “Cause I’m reassuring you? I always do, you dork.”

  She was waving her hand at me and I was swatting her away when we noticed our parents.

  “Oh, hey, good morning.” I gave Jen a mock glare.

  “It’s nice to see you two having fun.” Mom gave my dad a big ol’ smile. “Isn’t it?” She kinda looked like a 40s housewife for a minute there, and her voice even matched.

  “It is.” Dad clamped a hand on my shoulder. “Laughter’s the best medicine. You’ll be up and running again in no time with your attitude.”

  “He’s always had a great attitude,” Jen said, rolling her eyes. She’s like our little police officer sometimes!

  “Now, Jen,” Dad started. I just smiled, watching them pick at each other. Better than soap operas. That reminded me of my Grams watching “her shows.” I do love my family.

  “Now, Avery got home safely and back to class?”

  I had no idea about the class part, but I said, “Yup.”

  “She’s been a real sweetheart to you.” Mom waited half a beat before giving Dad a look. They had a funny way of arguing.

  “Yeah, she has,” he said reluctantly.

  “She coming back up next weekend?” Jen asked, and it was the natural next question. But it was a loaded question—as in a bulldog loaded up on bad burritos and about to blow.

  “Think that’s the plan,” I said, keeping it short.

  Dad glanced at Mom and cleared his throat. “Don’t you think it’d be better for her to focus on school and not run up here again?”

  I opened my mouth but couldn’t respond. I’d wondered that too actually. But, damn, I wanted to see her. She would be here on the weekend, not during class, but he had a point.

  Still, I knew Avery would be miserable if she stayed down there, away from me. Knowing her, she’d be thinking about me and worrying and not studying anyway.

  My parents and Jen were all staring at me, and I got the ugly feeling that Dad thought he was making ground. Why did he want to keep her away from me in the first place? Did he think she was slowing my recovering or hurting me somehow? I shook my head, jaw clenched, trying to find the words to put this doubt to rest.

  “I love her,” I said. “She’s a big part of my life, and she’s going to be around. Okay? I know you don’t understand it all, but you love and trust me, and this is my life.”

  My throat tightened while I waited for my dad to respond. I wanted to hear him say something. The quiet in the room built until he finally pulled in a slow breath. A knock on the wall by the door stopped him from speaking.

  “Marcus! Ready for today’s session?” Jared, a stout, fit man of about thirty, spoke while walking into the room and flipping through the papers on his clipboard. He had big ears and usually a super wide smile, but when he looked up, he got concerned as he glanced between my family members.

  “Jared! I am. Let’s go.” He’d save me from this hell, even if he was taking me to another one.

  “Do you want us to come?” Jen asked.

  I shook my head. I couldn’t take any more family group stuff. So Jared helped me into the wheelchair.

  As he wheeled me down the hall, he said quietly, “Your family means well. It’s hard on the families.”

  I snorted.

  “Yeah, I know. All’s I’m saying is they got it hard too.”

  I scoffed this time, but not loud enough for him to hear me. This negative shit wasn’t like me. I didn’t like it.

  We entered the therapy room and I looked around at the torture devices. The rails to help me stand and walk taunted me.

  “Ya know,” he said, turning to survey the room with me. “You’re doing way better than I could have expected.”

  Maybe it had helped me, being inside Avery’s head. I wasn’t really in a coma, not like other people have been. I was active and thinking, and that might have kept my body strong. Before Jared could turn, I tried to grip the wheelchair arms and push up. My hands didn’t grip all the way but I found some inner strength to propel myself up outta the chair…

  And almost into Jared.

  My legs played stupid and buckled.

  “Whoa!” He caught me like I was a kid and lowered me back down. “Let’s do this right, man. One thing at a time. One step at a time.”

  I stared at his chest, blood flooding my face so fast I couldn’t hear. What if my limbs didn’t start listening to me? Was I going to be a ragdoll the rest of my life?

  “Listen, Marcus, you know this will take work. Small steps at first. I mean, you trained to make it to the Olympics, so I know you know how to work hard and be patient.”

  Fuck, I wasn’t going to sit here and dwell on this. I motioned for him to get started. I knew we had the stretches first. He kept talking the entire time, as he moved my good arm.

  “I know you want to get back on that snowboard… and you want to be there for your girl.”

  “You a mind reader now?” I asked, but only halfway irritated.

  “It’s the truth, ain’t it? You’ve got lots to motivate you.”

  “Yeah, and I’m still sitting here.”

  Jared turned and looked around. “Why don’t we get to work? Show me what you can do.”

  I thought back to how I gave Avery strength when I was in her head. That was all mental. Snowboarding is mental. Winning is mental. It all starts in your head.

  “I can work hard,” I told Jared. “I don’t care how hard it is or how much it hurts. I just want to be my own person again, and soon.”

  He grinned. “That’s what I like to hear.”

  That’s what I wanted to show everyone, and Avery most of all.

  Chapter Eleven

  Avery

  The world was waking up outside but I wanted to cherish the soft, warm, safe feeling in my bed for just a few minutes more. Why, I kept wondering, was I feeling so timid about going on with life? What was I so afraid of now? Was it just because so much had changed, and I couldn’t find the horizon anymore?

  I’ve lived through a lot of change. Losing my parents, and knowing it was my dad’s fault. I had to start out on my own. I’ve left so many things buried thinking I wouldn’t have to deal with them. I’m not sure why it clicked into place at this moment, but I realized I needed to tie up all those loose threads in my life. My dad was gone; he’d never get to right what happened or even apologize for it, but I know he would want to. Somehow I have to find a way to let that go and remember all the good times we shared before they died.

  My life is completely different again, but it’s good changes, right? I have Marcus in my life now. Jazz is still my friend. I would just have to fix the rest of it.

  My first day back; I can do this. I threw back the covers, got up and got ready. It was so nice ou
tside I rode my bike to school. The air smelled fresh and clean, a soft breeze kissed my skin, and blue sky showed through the clouds in places. A good sign.

  I locked my bike up and it felt good walking onto campus. And the first person I recognized as I navigated through the walkways was Ettore. I flashed him a smile and rushed over, swinging my arms up to hug him.

  Then I realized we weren’t exactly hugging friends, but he hugged me back. We always talked in class but I hadn’t spoken to him since all the crazy happenings.

  “Damn, Avery, you won’t believe the rumors I heard…and now I’m wondering after that hug.” He blushed, looking down at me. My super tall friend.

  “I… yeah, things got weird for me. Headed this way?” We turned and walked together, talking all the way there like old times. Maybe some things wouldn’t change on me.

  My day turned into a day of catching up. First I had to make sure I could still attend this term. Then I had to catch up with professors and try to explain things, then get back assignments, and beg for more time. It was all too much, so I tried to make a list and work through it, not thinking about the actual work part yet.

  In the halls and outside, people were sliding glances at me but no one made eye contact. Did they all know? Were the rumors going around about how I’d gone off the deep end? I could go to the middle of campus and scream at the top of my lungs, “He’s real! He’s alive! I’m not crazy!” But I think that would defeat the point.

  I laughed to myself as I walked, thinking how Marcus would like that too. Hell, he’d probably do it.

  Isn’t that funny?

  But he can’t hear me anymore.

  I sighed and looked ahead, and someone caught my eye. I recognized his silhouette and took off running. “Nash!”

  He paused mid step for a half second before he just kept going.

  “Nash!” I ran up beside him. He stared ahead, his face stone like, while I caught my breath. “Please just give me a minute to talk to you.”

  His gaze slid over and returned to the path. “Sixty seconds and counting.”

  “I’m really sorry for putting you through all of that.”

  “If you had something going on with him, why did you string me along?”

  What? I tried to catch up mentally but didn’t do too well on that aspect. “Nash, I wasn’t sure he was real.”

  He twisted his face up and held up his palms, giving up on all of this, I guess.

  “I saw his video on Facebook,” he said in a flat voice. Somehow there was still a lot of emotion behind it.

  I didn’t know anything about that. I looked around, helpless, wishing for something to say to help this situation. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “Yeah, I know.” He turned and walked off at an almost sprint.

  I walked away, deflated and hurt. Yeah, I really hurt him but I didn’t mean to. I really liked Nash before Marcus fell into my head and life. I tried to shake the guilt off and get on with my day—with so much to do I couldn’t allow myself a pity party right now.

  Two hours later, back at home, I threw my backpack on my bed and starting unloading it. Looking at my books and notebooks, everything came crashing down. How was I going to write three papers, a short story revolving around smell, a paper on a short poem I didn’t like, a movie critique for my film class…and I hadn’t watched the movie yet…and all of the reading. Oh, and an assignment where I find a song as the background.

  I felt too overwhelmed to think straight. Maybe I needed to move more. I dropped down and started doing pushups.

  Then I laughed out loud. Marcus would love this—he wasn’t here to push me and I was doing pushups on my own. I finished twenty, then did fifty sit ups, and finally dug through my dresser for running clothes.

  It was early evening when I went outside, with puffy clouds all over the twilight sky, but no rain. The cool air felt perfect. This April was turning out to be a warm one. I took off, knowing I was procrastinating on my school work, but I needed to clear my head before digging into it.

  At first I missed Marcus and wanted to hear his voice, but soon I found my rhythm and just listened to his songs in my head. I didn’t think about how far or how long I ran; I simply ran along at a comfortable pace, imagining that each step cleared my head a little more. I headed out of town a ways and turned back when it felt too dark to safely run.

  I was back by the houses when a car came up alongside me, its loud engine startling me. I knew it was one of those little racing cars before looking over at the low rider Honda.

  Was Kris still hanging out with Kyle and driving it? I ducked down to see the driver and met Kyle’s brown-eyed gaze.

  Fuck. Goosebumps went all the way down my back.

  He pulled the car to the curb and shut off the engine. Why did he do that? I wanted to take off running at first, but I decided to face him and walked around to the driver’s side—there were houses on both sides and even a person pulling into their driveway.

  He watched me through the window, then got out slowly and shut the door. That made me nervous, but he leaned against the car in a nonthreatening way.

  I hadn’t seen him or heard anything about him since the trip to the coast. It had all taken a back seat to saving Marcus’s life. Now it rushed back, how he tried to kiss me and got Kris mad at me, and even before that how he played games with my life.

  I crossed my arms and glared. “You’re a real asshole.”

  He reacted physically, wincing like I had pinged him with a bullet.

  “I know, I did figure that out.” He combed his fingers through his hair, then slid both hands in his jeans pockets. “I’m sorry about everything. I really want a chance to apologize to you.”

  Sorry? Mr. Movie Star Looks and Charm was sorry?

  Was he genuine? Or just trying to make points to get back with Kris? Or still trying to mess around with me?

  “I shouldn’t have tried anything over on the coast. I don’t know why…” He shrugged, a helpless shrug like it was out of his control. My anger spiked.

  “What are you after?”

  “Just wanted to apologize?” He looked around, self-conscious. “Kris and I are over. I’m not trying to make anything happen here. I just saw you and, well… we were all friends and I screwed it up.”

  He squinted at me.

  Had we really been friends? He’d dated Kristina for a year after him and I broke up, but we were more fake friends than real, just playing parts for Kris. I glanced around because I didn’t know how to react or what to say. The neighborhood was quiet but my heart started pounding super hard. I heard it in my ears and felt it in my fingertips. It didn’t help that I’d been running.

  “And what about before?” I asked. That little simple word was dirty in this case. I thought back to that night and the nightmares. It doesn’t bother me like it used to, but it was still wrong of him.

  “I’m sorry about that too,” he said quietly, his face down for a long minute. Then he made eye contact again and repeated, “I’m sorry. I’ve been stupid. That was really stupid, and mean, and I’m sorry I scared you.”

  I don’t ever let myself think about that night with Kyle so long ago—how I didn’t want to go all the way with him and he punched the wall. The weird part was, I always felt embarrassed about it. Humiliated even. But I didn’t do anything wrong.

  I stepped back, wanting to run away from the emotions bubbling up like hot lava.

  “I guess we should have talked about that a long time ago. I lost it, and I was wrong. I was embarrassed too, you know? I knew I did something wrong, and I don’t know. I got with Kris, and we all acted like things were normal.”

  We did. It had been easier that way, but not better. I wasn’t going to admit that to him now though.

  “No one else knew things weren’t.” I bumped the toe of one sneaker into the ground.

  “But maybe things can be fixed, you know?” A car rolled by and we waited it out. It wasn’t like they could hear us from i
nside the car but it felt right to wait. He held out his hands. “Is there’s something I can do to make things right…”

  I swiveled around slowly, thinking, wondering about this. When I turned back his way, I asked point blank, “Where is this coming from?”

  “That’s the crazy thing.” His voice picked up, excited. “I had these dreams. They were so real. Well, the dreams were really shitty, but I dreamed like I was you, like on the other end of things, and saw what I did.”

  I stepped back again, this time disbelief almost knocking me over. He had dreams? That was something special. He didn’t deserve to be a part of this thing that had touched both Marcus and me. I took another step back, shaking my head.

  “I know, I know, it sounds nuts. And even if you can’t believe me, you can see I’m different right?” He straightened up, holding his hands out like he was begging. “And it was awful. I didn’t know. But please believe me. I even talked to my mom and told her everything. I’ve actually been looking for you so I could apologize.”

  I turned away, a hand over my mouth. I couldn’t believe it, not because I didn’t believe it could happen, but because I couldn’t believe he got to have dreams.

  A memory floated to the surface in my mind, from that day on the coast trip. I came downstairs and he was talking to his mom on the phone. It sounded like she was sick because he kept saying he’d go home and take care of her.

  “Do you believe me? At least believe how sorry I am?”

  I faced him again. He stood, palms out, pleading with wounded eyes. Maybe he did understand the pain he caused. And I have to believe him about the dreams. I didn’t trust my voice to sound normal so I nodded.

  He fell back against the car, his gaze on me, and as odd as it was, we shared a brief look of understanding.

  I nodded again and started off slowly, feeling dazed. I had to get away so I could breathe. It was like leaving a long movie and emerging into the bright daylight outside of the theater. He was quiet behind me, and I waited until I reached the corner and turned before looking back. Kyle was still leaning against his car.