Fall (Roam Series, Book Two)

by Stedronsky, Kimberly

  He met my lips again softly. “Come in. Let’s talk. I’ll make you dinner.”

  I nodded, walking hand in hand with him to the front door.

  Chapter Three

  The inside of the Logan’s house smelled like Mrs. Rush’s favorite cranberry-scented candles for as long as I could remember. I took my coat off and hung it on the banister leading upstairs, a routine action stemming from years of visits to the Rush House. The colonial was built in the early nineties, as my family’s was, but the interior reflected Carol’s feminine touch where as my father preferred décor in only two categories- plain or plaid.

  “Fajitas?” Logan called from the depths of the open refrigerator. “I think we have everything we need for them.”

  “Sure. Thanks,” I answered, standing awkwardly by the counter. “What can I do?”

  Logan turned, depositing tomatoes, shredded lettuce, and sour cream to the granite countertop. “You can listen to me. I promise I won’t go into detail. I don’t want you to lose your appetite.”

  I shivered, unable to resist recalling one particular nightmare in a shadowy dungeon, circa 1533.

  “Refer to us in third person. It makes it easier,” I walked to the kitchen sink, taking a pump of hand soap for my hands. “I’ll chop the tomato.”

  “I have some of that pineapple salsa that you like,” he opened a dark, cherry cabinet. “It’s not cold, but stick it in the freezer while I cook the steak.”

  He remembers that I like the salsa cold. I smiled at the easy familiarity between us.

  “Okay. Thanks.”

  He opened the pre-cooked, seasoned steak and dumped it into a skillet. “What do you know about 1955?”

  “1955… I know that she was born in… Romania. But she moved to the United States. I… she… had wavy, blonde hair and green eyes.”

  “Romanian, with blonde hair?”

  “People with Slavic or Hungarian ancestry commonly have blonde hair.”

  “Huh.” He stirred the sizzling steak with a plastic spatula.

  “The only dream that I had about 1955 took place in North Carolina.”

  “What was it about?”

  I opened the drawer that I knew held the tomato knife. Marveling in the luxury of the forked tip, I silently thanked Mrs. Rush for being the chef that she was. In my house, we used a steak knife to cut everything. “Just West and I. Nothing significant happened. I was pregnant.”

  “Third person,” he muttered, tossing the steak around in the skillet.

  I sliced through the tomato, narrowing my eyes. “Right. She was pregnant.”

  “Well, my dream wasn’t so uneventful.” He turned the burner heat down to simmer, turning to face me. “I… hunted… her for as long as I could remember. I can’t think of any other word to describe my urge to find and kill… her.” He shifted his eyes, looking out the kitchen window above the sink and into the darkness. “West told me that in all of the lifetimes that he knew me… except for this one… it was my own will to kill you. I didn’t need to be threatened or persuaded in any way by Troy. I wanted to kill you.”

  I shivered, the knife frozen in motion. “Third person,” I whispered, my voice breaking.

  He closed his eyes, grimacing painfully. “I shot you. Three times- twice in the chest, once in the head, outside of a gas station. I shot West twice in the chest. The owner ran out with a shotgun and killed me. I died staring at a sign that said “Gasoline- twenty and a half cents.” Where I fell, I could touch your hair.” His breathing, quickening with every word, turned my stomach. “It was sticky from the blood.”

  Involuntarily, I covered my middle with my hand, staring at him. He opened his eyes to face me. “I was pregnant?” I already knew the answer.

  “Yes. And I felt… successful. Justified.”

  Swallowing, I carefully set he knife next to the half-sliced tomato. “Have all of your dreams been like this?”

  He continued to lean against the stove, perfectly still. “Every time I sleep. Since I got the numbers.”

  I nodded, flattening my hand over my nauseous stomach.

  “These past two months, especially if I wouldn’t see you in the halls or around for a few days, I would start feeling…,” he exhaled. “I would wonder what it’d be like to kill you… now.”

  “Logan,” I gasped a tearful breath, shaking my head. “Are you serious?”

  “I caught myself following you at school… watching you. Abby noticed and we got in a huge fight. When I would see you, I would feel… normal again. I know you, Roam. I would never hurt you.”

  Do not trust Logan. You can love him all you want, but you cannot trust him.

  West’s words echoed through my mind, chilling me. I stared at him, my expression guarded. “Well of course you wouldn’t, Rush. Calm down.”

  Relief flooded his expression. “You believe me?”

  I continued slicing the tomato, calming myself as I thought through the defensive moves I’d learned over the past few months. “You saved my life in Russia.”

  He walked to me, and I couldn’t help but tighten the grip on the knife.

  “I’m trying to tell you that the dreams are getting more vivid. Places, events. I read the numbers on my arm in one of them, and I wrote them down.” As he reached for his wallet, the sleeve of his shirt slid up his arm slightly. The tattooed coordinates that matched my own hinted beneath his shirt cuff. “Do you know anything about where you were born in 1977?”

  “Nigeria. My mother was a journalist from the UK, and I was born premature,” I remembered West’s story. “Eventually I moved to the US.”

  “I had a dream about Troy and getting the numbers in 1957- the year you would have been born. They looked like this,” he spread a piece of notebook paper out over the counter top, moving the cutting board out of the way.

  3.4149618 5.2030514

  “When I Googled them, it was Nigeria, you’re right. Somewhere in the Gulf of…,”

  “Guinea,” I said softly, focusing below the coordinates. I had already plugged the numbers into Google Maps weeks ago. “What about these numbers?” I asked, pointing to the set below the first. “What are…what lifetime are these from?”

  “They’re not from any lifetime. They’re your birth coordinates from 1977- reversed.”

  I turned the paper toward me, reading the backwards numbers.

  41.503025 81.694143

  “I placed the decimals in the only places they would make sense- and give me a location.”

  I dropped the knife to the cutting board, lifting my eyes. “Where is this?”

  “Cam, it’s in the middle of Cleveland. Ohio.”

  “The fountain…,” I grabbed the piece of paper and turned, almost running to the family room. I stopped short when I realized the oversized computer desk was missing. “Where’s your computer?”

  “Mom and dad put it upstairs in the guest room. My laptop is in my bedroom.”

  “I can only think of one fountain,” I took two steps at a time, leaving Logan to follow behind me. “The War Memorial Fountain.”

  “Naked guy on fire,” Logan mused, and I rolled my eyes.

  “Yes. Him. Logan, your room is a mess,” I kicked a small pile of clothes out of the way of his desk, slipping into the rolling, black chair.

  He ignored my chastising observation. “Tower City has a fountain, doesn’t it?”

  “Too new. It was Cleveland Union Terminal until the late 1970’s.” I pulled up a browser window. “How could the secret-mysterious-reverse-coordinate lead us to a fountain that wasn’t even built yet? If you got the numbers around 1957…,”

  “Hold on. I’m going to turn off the stove. I’ll be right back.”

  “Uh-huh,” I murmured, already typing. I entered the coordinates from the notebook paper, not including the decimal points where Logan had put them.

  “I get a location off the coast of Cameroon...,” I narrowed my eyes as Logan walked through the doorway to his bedroom.

  “
None of the numbers have directional letters when they appear. After getting Cameroon, I went through to eliminate all other possibilities- adding and removing directional letters, dashes, and decimals.”

  “We knew about the Peterhof Fountains because of Tr-Troy,” my voice still shook when I spoke his name. He reached for me, taking my wringing hands into his tightly.

  “Right. So before we fly to Cameroon, try this.” He typed in the numbers, moving the decimal point over two spaces to the right. He then added directional letters, n and w after the longitude and latitude numbers.

  The results were immediate.

  “The Cleveland Mall.” I sat back, shaking my head. “It has to be the War Memorial Fountain.” My eyes darted to where his bedside clock used to be, and then to the window. “It’s can’t be more than seven o’clock- if we leave now, we…,”

  “Roam, hold on. Before we jump in the car, we have to make a plan. We don’t know where this fountain will take us- or if it’ll take us anywhere.”

  “Maybe it’ll take us to 1977! And we can find him,” I ran to the stairs, not bothering to close the laptop. “I just have to- I have to pack a couple things- and then we’ll…,”

  I doubled over, a wrenching cramp ripping through my insides. Logan caught me half-way down. “What’s wrong?”

  “I don’t know,” I managed through clenched teeth, gripping the railing.

  “Is it the baby?” His voice cracked on the last syllable. He held me against him. “Is something wrong?”

  “I don’t know, Logan, hold on,” I waited for the pain to pass. It did, eventually. I took a deep breath, steadying myself on my feet. “I’m okay. It’s normal. The books say things are… changing… in there.”

  “You need to sit down.”

  “We need to go!”

  “I couldn’t decide whether to tell you about the fountain for this reason. I thought maybe, just maybe, you’d be logical and not let your crazy need to find him take over.”

  “I’m going, with or without you.”

  “That’s funny, threatening me. As if I wouldn’t call your dad the second you walk out this door.”

  Helpless fury raged through me. I balled my fists and kicked the drywall above the stairs as hard as I could with my foot.

  Seconds later, mortified, I stared at the hole in the Rush’s wall. Powdered white dust mixed with torn pieces of painted drywall settled on the carpeted floor.

  “I can’t believe you just did that,” Logan stared at me, stunned. “I can’t freaking believe you just kicked a hole in the wall.”

  “I… can’t either,” I struggled with embarrassed tears. “I’m so sorry… I don’t know why I did that, I…,”

  “Calm down. Roam,” he reached for me. I folded into his arms, no longer able to hold back tears. “I know you’re emotional, and I know you’ve been going to kickboxing- you just overreacted.”

  “I feel like an idiot.”

  “Well, go finish the fajitas while I go in the garage. I think we have a drywall patch and some putty. But- listen to me. We are not going to Cleveland until we are prepared. Got it?”

  I nodded.

  “Good. Now chill the fuck out, young grasshopper.”

  Sniffing and giggling at the same time left me a snotty mess. “Don’t swear. I need a tissue.”

  “Okay.” He kissed my forehead. “Go clean yourself up.”

  I started to head for the bathroom but he held me close, pressing my face against his shoulder. He moved his mouth to my ear, his voice barely a whisper.

  “I love you, Roam.”

  I sighed, nodding against his shoulder. After a moment, he released me.

  Chapter Four

  We spent the evening eating dinner and patching up the drywall. He acted as though he knew exactly what he was doing, but when the putty was smooth and drying, the wall looked ridiculous. “We just have to sand it, that’s all. I can sand it first thing in the morning, and paint it. Mom will never notice.”

  “O-kay,” I mouthed sarcastically, slipping into my boots. “Just don’t take the blame. Your parents can add this to the file marked ‘Roam’s Impulsive Actions Dash Stupid Decisions.’ Can you hand me my jacket?”

  He held my jacket open while I slipped my arms in. “My file’s just as big, Cam.”

  I reached for the doorknob, turning to him quickly. “Hey… have you heard from Violet at all?”

  Logan shrugged. “Once, when she got back. Not again since.”

  We stepped lightly into the newly fallen snow on the front step. “Do you think we should contact her?”

  He shrugged again. The light from the fixture beside the door cast moving shadows on his face as the snow scattered through the air. He took a step toward me, testing, and when I remained still, he slipped both arms around my sides and along the inside of my open jacket.

  I stared up at him, the dialog in my mind quickly becoming a shouting match. If I let him back in, he’ll always be second to West. Does he know that? Does he care? What do I really want? I closed my eyes and leaned forward slightly, looking down.

  I felt him fumble with my coat. He quickly pulled the zipper up to my chin.

  “You’ve got a lot going on up here,” he tapped his finger against my temple lightly, his dark eyes searching mine. “I do, too. Let’s keep it simple for a while.”

  “Okay,” I whispered.

  “I’ll come over tomorrow and we’ll talk about the fountain. No matter what, we can’t miss dinner with my parents on Thursday. I made a promise.”

  “I’ll be here,” I agreed. He nodded once, pressing his lips to my forehead quickly.

  “Good… and Roam,” he held his car door open for me. “West isn’t here right now. The West that we left in 1977 didn’t sit around, waiting for thirty years for 2012 again because- he’s not here right now. That means we find him. Did you ever think about that?”

  I tried to wrap my mind around the time paradox that Logan explained, but the same answer always took over any logical reasoning that I could use to comfort myself. “West’s not mortal. We are. We don’t know anything. We don’t know that the same science is true for an immortal.”

  He dropped me off close to nine-thirty. Morgan and my dad flanked either side of the couch in the living room, tapping their toes animatedly as I walked in the front door. Morgan bounced to her feet quickly, hands on her hips. “I have been calling. And calling. And texting. I am so disappointed in you right now and…,”

  “Morgan.” My father held his flat palm up in the air. “Cool it.”

  “I told you I was going to Logan’s. We talked for a while, ate dinner, and here I am, safe and sound.”

  “Morgan, go to bed. I need to speak to your sister.”

  “Dad…,”

  “Go.”

  She stalked up the stairs, her eyes flashing me the middle finger with every step. I scowled at her.

  “I’m fine, Dad. I needed to talk to Logan about things and…,”

  “Stop there.” He crossed his arms over his chest, the lamplight highlighting his increasingly graying hair. “Here’s what you need. Rest, nutrition, and safety. Right? Right,” he ordered. I nodded, focusing on my wet boots.

  “Yes.”

  “Here’s what I need; communication, consideration, and respect. Did I have any of those three things tonight?”

  I shook my head, guilt noshing at the pit of my stomach.

  “Okay, then. I’ll tell your sister to lay off. Don’t forget what we talked about, Roam.”

  “I’m sorry, Dad. I love you.”

  “Love you too, honey.”

  I returned his hug before escaping to my bedroom. As I dropped to my bed, I thought of Morgan. She had never elaborated on her relationship with Reed (or Troy) but I guessed that she’d gotten intimate with him. I remembered West’s words to me after Troy drowned me.

  I will make sure you never fight alone again.

  His smooth baritone voice, even in my memory, was comforting. I thou
ght about Logan’s words about time continuity. My desk, still piled with unfinished college applications to the Ivy League schools of my former dreams, sat too close to West’s carry-on. I moved the bag quickly and sat down, grabbing a piece of notebook paper and a pencil.

  Drawing two lines, I labeled one 1977-2012. The second line broke off at 1977, suggesting that by traveling through the Peterhof Fountain, we had created a new timeline. If we then traveled through the fountain in Cleveland to… wherever it took us, would yet another timeline be created? What would then happen to the original one? Or the second?

  I don’t believe there is a way to time travel. But- I do believe you carry some type of knowledge specific to the prophecy- that you may not even know about yourself- and this knowledge will allow us to move through the past. To give us another chance.

  Sighing in frustration, I sat back in the chair. West was right- we were not time travelers. We became the people that we were in another life, in a past life, so then the idea of a time paradox was negated. But what happened to Julie? Why did she- I- cease to exist?

  History, not science, was my passion. I threw the pencil at the desk and headed for the bathroom. Lately, I barely made it an hour before having to go again. What to Expect When You’re Expecting was thoroughly read and bookmarked in several areas on my dresser. I remembered that as I moved into my second trimester, the urge to go to the bathroom every five seconds would finally go away, only to be replaced by other fun and exciting symptoms. The first few weeks were spent over the toilet bowl, but eventually the nausea and vomiting episodes became less frequent.

  I was exhausted by the time I crawled into bed. Mentally preparing for where the fountain in Cleveland might take us (if it would take us anywhere), I thought of Russia and Logan’s ‘recon’ trip before West and I arrived. West, knowing we were going to 1977, prepared cash and forged identification for the three of us. Should Logan and I travel once first, to determine where we are? And then prepare? I thought of the many times and lives we’d spent together as I fell asleep.

  I am cold. There is ice everywhere as I look out the stone window. I shiver, looking around frantically. I am dreaming. Why am I dreaming? I am not supposed to dream when I’m pregnant! I am running through brightly lit, stone passage ways of some kind of castle. The castle is glowing with ornate chandeliers that seem to be dripping with icicles. I stop, staring intently at one of the chandeliers. What- some kind of light bulb? Incandescent light was not heard of until the nineteenth century. Why am I in a castle?