by Allegra Skye
“He’s gorgeous,” Amanda said, “smart, too.”
“Go on,” her mother cooed, drinking in every detail as if she were the one he’d called.
Keira couldn’t listen to another word. She scraped her chair back from the table.
Her mother turned to her harshly. “You’re not going anywhere, young lady. Dinner isn’t finished. Don’t you dare make a fuss and spoil your sister’s happiness.”
“What am I spoiling?” Keira said. “I have an upset stomach. I want to go to the bathroom. I’m psyched that Tom called. I’m happy for you.”
“Thanks,” Amanda said lightly.
Her mother glared back at Keira, determined. “Sit where you are.”
Reluctantly, Keira complied.
Her mom turned back to Amanda. “Sorry about that, sweetheart. Come on, tell us all.”
“He wants to take me to a pre-football party. Thursday night. At the clubhouse!”
Her father raised an eyebrow, but kept silent.
“When exactly did you meet him?” her mother persisted. She couldn’t stand being left out of anything in Amanda’s life.
Amanda’s eyes lit up. “The very first day of school. He walked into the principal’s office.”
Keira tried her best to smile. She was happy for Amanda. She was glad she had someone like Tom. But it was becoming harder and harder to sit where she was. She looked pleadingly at her father, who saw what was going on.
“Dad, please,” Keira said finally.
“Okay, go to the bathroom,” he agreed. “But come back when you’re done.”
Keira dashed out of the dining room and through the foyer, and upstairs to her bedroom.
She slammed the door closed, leaned back against the door and breathed. She stayed that way for what seemed like a long time. She willed herself to think of anything, anything at all that could take her away from this place.
She thought of that boy, that beautiful, mysterious boy. Slowly, she began to calm. She wondered again if he’d really even existed. Was she just losing it?
Just thinking about him made her feel better, though she had no idea why. She wasn’t even sure if he was a student at the school, or if she would see him again. The thought of not seeing him again, suddenly made her feel very sad. My God, Keira thought, I don’t even know him. What difference does it make?
Keira looked down and realized that she had picked up her journal and was doodling again. Suddenly, she realized she was drawing a picture of Him, the guy in the alcove. His face was pale, but his features vivid and beautiful. She stared at the picture, fascinated, as if he were right there with her now. It was almost as if she knew him, had been waiting a long time for him to show up. Then she shook her head, brushing away the cobwebs inside. This was crazy, she realized, imagination running away again. She’d better get up and go downstairs to finish up dinner with the family and put him out of her mind.
When Keira returned to the dining room table, it was time for desert. Her mother put a dish of fried bananas in front of her, but the sight of them made her nauseous. She couldn’t eat a bite. She sat there and listened to more talk about Bertram High until her father turned to her.
“How about you, Keira? Are you meeting some nice, new friends, too?”
Keira swallowed hard. She had no idea what to say.
“Yes,” Amanda chirped up for her. “Keira has a friend. Nora, right?”
She looked over at Keira questioningly. They’d never really hung out with the same group of kids.
“Yeah,” Keira said, “Nora’s nice. And there are also some others.”
“Are they all the smart ones?” her mother chimed in. “All bookworms, like you?”
Keira resented everything about her mother.
“What’s wrong with reading books?”
“Nothing, dear, of course, nothing,” her mother replied. “But it depends how much time you spend reading! There are other things in life, you know.”
Keira wondered if her perfectly manicured, groomed, mother ever read anything at all.
“We all grow differently, Madge,” her father tried to chime in, but her mother didn’t hear a word he said.
“When you’re new in a school, no one cares how many books you’ve read. They care about whether or not you’re friendly, if you look pretty, how much you smile.” She sighed strangely. “It’s hard for me to understand how identical twins girls could look and act so different.”
Keira’d heard this a hundred times. There were lots of things it was hard for her mother to understand. Did she even try? At this point, Keira didn’t care anymore.
One more year, she kept telling herself. I’ll be away at college, completely out of here. I’ll go to a different school than Amanda, start a life of my own.
The thought of it thrilled her—but scared her, too.
CHAPTER 4
After dinner Keira went straight to her bedroom, pulled her clothes off, and put on old, torn jeans and a black T shirt. She ran her hands through her hair, tossing it in all directions, so it wouldn’t be neat and orderly. She hated dinner with the family. She hated listening to her mother and Amanda talk and make plans.
Amanda was changing, too. It seemed like she was becoming more like their mother, more like the popular girls. Keira remembered times that Amanda used to be closer to her. They’d laugh together about things that happened at school, and even shared secrets. Amanda used to be more concerned about Keira, used to ask her how she was doing. She seldom did anymore. Keira felt as if it was becoming more of a burden for her to have a weird twin sister around, and that hurt Keira.
Keira went to her desk drawer and pulled out her journal. It was a big book, with a leather cover and frayed edges. It was her best friend. She loved writing in it, and she wrote in it almost every day. It felt good to sit down with nobody around, and talk to it. At least no one would interrupt her. At least she could tell her journal all her feelings and thoughts, and it wouldn’t laugh at her, or judge her. It wouldn’t tell her to look pretty, or to learn how to smile.
Keira picked up her favorite pen and started writing.
I used to be pretty, she wrote.
She stopped. It was a strange way to start the journal for today, she thought. What had that got to do with anything? But her rule of writing in the journal was that she didn’t censor herself. No one could judge her, not even herself.
I used to be pretty, she wrote again. My twin sister Amanda is beautiful, so how can it be that I’m not? What makes people want to be someone’s friend?
I wish I knew the answer.
I never, ever, thought that moving here was going to be so hard. This place is so different from what I expected. Maybe it is me? Maybe my mother is right, that I’m just gloomy and downbeat? But I don’t think so. I tried. I smiled at a guy in class. Was it my fault that he didn’t give me the time of day?
There is someone who likes talking to me. Nora’s nice enough. I have nothing against her. But she chose me. I didn’t choose her. Not that I wouldn’t have. It’s just that she was the one to say hello. She seems to get some strange pleasure from being my friend. Maybe it’s because I live in Everstock and there’s this big divide between the kids from Everstock and everyone else. I think the kids from Everstock are nasty, looking down at everyone else. So, what’s the big deal about being friends with them?
And it’s not just the kids either. This place is weird. The streets here, the homes—they’re so big and cold, with huge lawns, and I never see anyone on the streets. And the people here are so unfriendly. Uptight. Cold. Everyone looks everyone over the minute they see them. Like you have to pass some test--to prove that you are good enough for them to say hello. It’s disgusting. It’s nothing at all like where we came from. I don’t know how I’m going to last here all year. I really don’t.
Keira put her pen down. She’d written a lot quickly and her hand hurt. Probably because it was so tense—she had practically knotted it into a fist. Her head hurt a
little, too. Maybe she had one of the autumn colds her father mentioned, because the weather kept going from hot to cold. She couldn’t remember an autumn like this one. She certainly didn’t feel like herself.
Keira went to the window and opened it up, letting the cool, night breeze in. The fresh air made her feel better. She leaned out over the window sill, into the dark night, looking up at the sky. She loved looking at the stars at night. They made her feel peaceful, reminded her that something was watching over everybody. She didn’t know what exactly, but deep down she felt something was there. She couldn’t be just totally alone.
There were no stars to be seen tonight and it was silent, except for a few leaves rustling on the trees. She leaned out of the window for a long time, even though she knew she had reading to do, homework to finish. Right now she needed a time out, and it was comforting to look into the darkness and wonder about everything.
Suddenly feeling lonely, she decided to text her old friend, Cara, from her other school. Cara used to understand how hard it was for Keira being Amanda’s sister. Cara had seemed so upset when Keira told her she was moving. Then after a few days, she just got kind of distant. By the time Keira left, she barely talked to her at all.
Keira picked up her phone and typed:
Hey Cara, How’s it going? I’d love to hear back from you. Miss you a lot. Keira.
She quickly sent it, but as she did, she suddenly had a sinking feeling in her stomach that she would never hear back. Not from anyone. It made her really sad.
Cara always texted right back. But Keira waited a few minutes and nothing came.
She felt sadder.
Will there ever be anyone, she thought, who I can really count on?
Suddenly Keira heard a rustling noise, and she looked out the window. She thought she saw something move in the branches of the huge oak tree near her window, and she leaned closer and stared. Suddenly, there was the sound of a snapping branch, distinct in the silent night. Keira flinched and gasped.
Something—or someone—was in that tree.
She leaned out again, staring. It had to be an animal, she reasoned, maybe a squirrel. The tree branches started so high up—at least fifty feet off the ground—that no one could have possibly climbed that.
As she stared and stared, minutes passed, and she began to wonder whether she imagined the whole thing.
And just then, she saw it.
Her mouth dropped open in shock and terror.
There, just feet away from her, amidst the huge oak branches, was a pair of bright, yellow eyes. It leaned forward, staring at her, as if it were human.. But, of course, it wasn’t. It was a creature though, unlike any she’d ever seen. It looked like some kind of animal. —It had a small, wiry body, with tight, red skin. It quivered and curled up in the branches, as though ready to pounce..
Keira slammed her window shut, terror-stricken, and locked it.
She yanked down hard on her blinds.
She quickly ran across the room, shut off all the lights, and jumped into bed, hiding under the covers, her heart pounding.
Even though she knew it must have just been a strange animal, Keira felt as though she’d seen a supernatural creature that completely defied description. Or was she completely losing her mind?She didn’t know which terrified her more.
Lying there in bed, she fell into a deep sleep. A sense of peace came over her, and she was transported into another world. She dreamt that she was standing in a wide field, far, far away. The field was beautiful, surrounded by huge oak trees, clear streams and strange, brightly colored birds flying overhead. The birds sang to each other loudly, in off key voices. Keira looked up, wondering where they came from, when her eye caught someone walking towards her in the distance.
As the figure came closer, she recognized with a start that it was the gorgeous guy she had seen walking across the lawn. He had the same shock of blonde hair and his eyes shone so brightly she couldn’t look away, even if she wanted to. The closer he came, the more her heart pounded, and the more she felt drawn to him. Who was he? What was he doing here in this strange field, headed straight to her?
He came close and their eyes locked again, as if they’d known each other forever. It was as if they were meeting again now.
Who are you? She wanted to ask him out loud, but her throat froze as she tried to speak.
“I’m here for you,” she heard him whisper.
As he spoke, Keira tossed wildly in her bed, reaching both arms out to hold him.
Then, suddenly in the flash of a moment, she woke up, trembling and drenched with sweat. The dream was more real than her everyday life. He came closer to her than anyone else ever had. What did it mean? What was happening? Was she really going insane?
CHAPTER 5
Keira woke in the morning exhausted. She had barely slept all night, tossing and turning, dreaming both of that guy and then of the horrible creature she saw in the tree, jumping through her window.
When she got out of bed, she slowly, hesitantly, opened her blinds, bracing herself.
She was relieved to see that, in the bright light of day, nothing was there.. The large oak tree sat completely empty, nothing in its branches. Keira began to wonder if she had imagined the whole thing. After all, it was late, and she had been tired, and overwrought.
Keira sighed, got dressed quickly, and bounded down the stairs, determined to shake the cobwebs off and turn over a new leaf. She decided to be friendly in school, to smile, get involved, act more like Amanda. It wouldn’t be easy, but she knew she had to do it. Otherwise, life here would be too lonely. She just couldn’t take it for a whole year. Even though she liked Nora, she needed more friends.
On the way to school with Amanda, Keira talked more, forced herself to be peppier.
“What’s on the agenda for today?” Keira asked, in a loud, perky tone.
Amanda was taken aback. “What agenda?”
“I mean what’s the plan? What’s going on?”
“What’s got into you?” Amanda asked.
“Just curious about what’s going on,” Keira shrugged. She’d taken a lot more care this morning dressing and doing her makeup, too. She let her blonde hair down from the tight pony tail she wore it in, and brushed it for a long time. Now it hung, loose and wavy. She wore her best jeans and chose a tee shirt that looked a lot like the one Amanda had on. Keira wondered if she might even look as pretty as Amanda. At least she didn’t look as bad as before. It was easy to see that Amanda was confused about how Keira was acting.
“Well, there’s tryouts for the volleyball team this afternoon,” Amanda said.
“Great,” said Keira.
“Great?”
“Sounds like fun,” Keira said. “You trying out?”
“Of course,” Amanda said. She loved sports and had always been on one team or another. Keira, not being particularly well coordinated, hadn’t ever tried out once. She liked to run, but preferred running on her own, in the park, when she was in the mood.
“I think I’ll try out for the volleyball team, too,” Keira piped up.
“Really?” Amanda asked. She looked at Keira oddly. “Why?”
“Is that a problem?” Keira asked lightly.
“Of course not,” said Amanda, “do whatever you want. It’s just that you haven’t ever really played the sport.”
“I can learn pretty quickly.”
“I don’t want you to make a fool of yourself.”
“It doesn’t seem like such a big deal,” Keira said.
“It is a big deal.”
Keira could feel that Amanda didn’t want Keira embarrassing her any more than she already had.
“Don’t you want me there?”
“Of course, I do,” said Amanda, biting her lip, “I’m just surprised, that’s all.”
The more Keira thought about it, the more she felt good about her plan. It could be fun to be part of a team. She’d watched enough volleyball games and even played in a few of them.
It hadn’t been so hard.
Keira felt better that day, thinking about being on the team. She pretended she’d been accepted, and the thought gave her a boost. In her mind, it was as good as done. How could she fail? Amanda was sure to get on the team. They couldn’t say no to her sister.
Even though it didn’t feel natural, Keira forced herself to smile more at others, too. She was trying her best. And when that cute guy sat next to her again in English, she thought maybe she was being given a second chance. She purposely tossed her hair back over her shoulders, just like Amanda, and looked coolly out of the window. When she turned back to see his reaction, he was busy talking to a girl on his other side.
But another smaller, thinner guy was watching her closely. He was sitting one seat behind the cute guy, and was looking at her. She caught his eye for a second and he gave her a quick smile. Keira nodded back. He seemed nice enough, but not special to her. Keira sighed. She never really knew how these things worked.
Enough was enough. She put her head in her hands, dove down into her books and concentrated with all her might on what the teacher was saying. That really helped the time go by.
After class, the staring boy came up to her. “Hey, how’s it going?”
“Great,” she said.
He was fumbling, “You’re new here.”
“Yeah,” she said.
“I’m Ben,” he said, smiling, revealing braces. “Like the class?”
Keira saw how nervous he was talking to her, and felt sorry for him. She knew what that was like, to feel nervous and want someone to like you.
“The class is cool,” she said, trying to make him feel comfortable. This guy was definitely not for her. But maybe they could be friends? She wondered if girls and guys in this town were ever just friends.
Just then Nora came over to her with another girl.
“Hey, Keira, this is Amy Lee,” Nora said.
“How you doing?”
Amy Lee was tall, too thin, with angular features, gray eyes and very long, brown hair. Uneasy in her body, she stood there, shifting back and forth.
