“Please, be careful,” he says then with real concern. I roll my eyes. I know that he has reason to be concerned – I can only imagine what I had looked like to him this morning. “Please,” he begs.
“I promise I’ll be careful. Will I see you after?”
“I’ll wait for you here at your monstrosity of a vehicle.”
He kisses me on the forehead and I get on the bus. Morgan is saving me a spot next to her, letting me in to take the window seat. I look out the window to Liam as he watches us pulling away and it feels like half of me has been left in the parking lot with him. I almost feel hollow somehow. I kiss my palm and put my hand to the glass as we pull away and I see Liam mouth the words, I love you.
“Spill,” Morgan says after we’re under way. I don’t need any more conversation to know what she’s referring to. I haven’t had a chance to talk to her during school being I was with Liam all day and our two classes together were taken up by tediously boring lectures. That doesn’t mean that she didn’t try, but I managed to studiously ignore her.
I mash my lips together in an effort to hide a smile. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything!” she exclaims. “Where did you disappear to after the dance?”
“Liam picked me up,” I answer vaguely. I try keeping my face smooth and expressionless, calm even, like Liam does. I’m not sure if I want to go into specifics anyway, but it’s very hard to hide my enthusiasm as I remember that night.
“But where did you go?” she probes.
“We just went and talked.”
I know Morgan will be expecting much more detail, but I decide that I don’t want to talk about the intimacy of our night. It’s too private.
“Has he kissed you?” she asks, getting to the point of what she wants to know.
“Yes.” I sigh. Morgan’s eyes bug out in excitement while she squeals and claps her hands together.
“And?” she pushes.
“You look like a barking seal when you do that.” I say dryly.
She ignores me. “And what was it like?”
“What was what like?”
“Your kiss!”
“Quiet.” I hiss. I look around to see if anyone’s paying attention to our conversation. Not that I don’t want anyone to know that I’m with Liam – that much is evident – I just don’t want the entire swim team to know about my social life. Our little school doesn’t need any Ammo for gossip. In a small school and small town, gossip seems to create itself.
“Sorry. But will you tell me?” she whispers now.
“Nothing like I imagined it would be,” I answer quietly, allowing a smile to take over my lips. It was so much better. Better than anything I had ever experienced or imagined. It was amazing.
“In a good way though, right?”
I nod.
“So are you together then?” she asks excitedly.
I shrug in an attempt to stay vague. “Well, he didn't come right out and ask me to be his girlfriend, but sure, I guess so.”
Morgan doesn’t buy into my fuzzy explanation. “I’ll take that as a definite, yes.”
The small smile I wear now turns huge and undeniable. I’m so happy with Liam that I feel like shouting from the roof tops as to exactly how thrilled I am.
“Wow, Breckin Nicolai: Homecoming Queen and Heart Stealer.”
“I wouldn't go that far.” I say, rolling my eyes.
“I’m happy for you,” she says candidly.
“Thank you. I’m happy, too. Actually… I’m more than happy. Happy doesn't seem like the right word.”
Morgan smiles excitedly.
“What?” I ask quietly.
“Oh, nothing,” she answers, shaking her head.
“Just spit it out.”
“I’m just so happy for you. So, so happy.”
“You already said that,” I say wryly.
“I know,” she giggles.
“You’re so goofy sometimes, ya know that?”
She nods. “I do. But you’re my friend and you wouldn’t have me any other way.”
“I suppose you’re right,” I laugh. “Just one of your many charms.”
“That’s right. Charmingly goofy. And I do a killer impression of a seal.”
“Better than charmingly ditzy, that's for sure. Our class has one too many of those.”
“Speaking of Amber, I'd be willing to bet she's just boiling over the fact that she lost Liam's affections. Especially to you. She's already pissed because she lost out to you for homecoming queen.”
“It doesn't matter. He never liked her anyway. It was a lost cause for her from the start,” I say, recalling Liam and I's conversation about her. “He doesn't really like the superficial kind.”
“Then it was a lost cause for her from the start!” Morgan agrees with wide eyes. “He sounds like quite the package. Honest, loving, attentive, doesn’t like fake ho-bags, and HOT!” The way she says hot, makes it sound like she’s singing a note in an opera song.
We both fall into a fit of giggles.
“I need to get me a boyfriend,” Morgan says with a dramatic lip pout.
“Well, Liam has a friend back home. How ‘bout we call him up and see if he wants to join in the fun.” I tease.
“Oh! Can he?” she exclaims.
“Oh, sure. I’ll have him give him a call.” I say rather sarcastically.
“I’m not much good at the long distance relationship thing, though. Remember I dated that Aaron kid from Carrington last year?”
I nod, vaguely remembering. I think it lasted a month.
“Yeah, well, I couldn’t even make that work, and he was only fifteen minutes away.” Her eyes widen then, her voice turning mournful. “How will you and Liam work it out? I mean, isn’t he only here for the year?”
I feel my face fall and the color draining from my cheeks. How will we make it work? Jeez, he’s going back home to England – not away to college. This is entirely different than two people separating to go away to school. I feel my bottom lip starting to tremble as the promise of loss and grief threaten their way in.
“I’m sure you’ll work it out,” Morgan soothes, clasping my hand and giving it a squeeze.
“Yeah.”
It’s a short trip to the rival’s school, so there isn’t much time for Morgan to really hammer answers out of me any further. Thank goodness. And I’m not allowed much more time to think about the doubt she’s planted in my head. I know it’s something he and I will have to face sooner or later, it’s just not something I want to think about right now.
We arrive at the opposing team’s school and everyone prepares for their own events. After our warm ups, it’s time for the races to start. I put in the headphones to my iPod as I always do so that I can muffle out the crowd and get focused for my race. I usually spend the time before races in deep concentration, but today all that fills my head is Liam’s perfect face, the way he’d touched me and held me, the way he had said I love you, the way his lips felt on mine...
Coach Dawson comes to appear in front of me when my event is up. I’m to start the night with my individual race. That’s good – at least if I lose this one per lack of concentration, I won’t let my relay teammates down. I’m going to have to make it a strict rule for myself to solely focus on swimming alone during meets.
I pace back and forth, swinging my arms around and jumping in place so that I can keep my muscles loose. I let my eyes scan the crowd as I lean down next to the pool to splash my arms and legs with water. Looking around, I notice that some students have made the drive to watch our competition. I step up to the starting block and then force myself to focus on the water in front of me. As I center on my lane, the cheering from the audience becomes muted and all that I can hear now is the even breaths coming in and out of my lungs. The lane in which I am to swim becomes all that I can see; tunnel vision. The other lanes don’t exist, the other swimmers don’t exist, the cheering from my teammates behind me sound very distant and s
low, and I can feel the adrenaline pulsing through my veins. I lean over to grab the block and I wait impatiently for the whistle to sound, setting me free like a jungle cat ready to pounce onto its prey. The whistle screeches into the air and I leap readily into the awaiting water.
I concentrate on my pace, absorbed by each stroke of my arms, getting into a rhythm with my breathing, timing it with my kicks. I know the opposing team has a girl swimming in this race that had been nationally ranked last year, so I start pushing myself even harder than I normally do at this point. Ordinarily I save all my strength for the last lap, but I feel that maybe my natural starting pace won't suffice today. After the second turn, I can see that I’m neck and neck with the girl in the lane next to me – guessing that maybe this is her. I put my head down and really push. The water whirls around me and I can see that I’m in the lead now as I reach the wall, reading myself to dive under for the next turn.
Suddenly, without warning, my chest tightens and I get a sharp pain directly in the center of my ribs. Lifting my head to take a breath, I instead discover that I can’t breathe. My ribcage is straining to expand but I feel as though I have a vice wrapping constrictively around me. Immediately following the sudden onset of chest pain, my head pounds and squeezes like it’s going to burst from the blinding pain that now engulfs it. My brain is pushing against my skull and the bones in my head are begging to crack inside my skin.
Pressure. Immense pressure.
I can’t move my limbs because they’re paralyzed with numbness. I fight against the deadened feeling in my arms and legs and thrash around without success in an effort to get to the surface. It goes against everything I know not to do if you’re having trouble in the water, but I can't help it. Panic completely immerses me. When my head breaks the surface, I take in a gust of air only to suck in a large mouthful of water. The shock of the water going down my throat stuns me into stillness and all I can focus on is the burning it creates in my ribs in addition to the pain. Burning and pain, burning and pain. That's all I can feel. My lungs ache in protest. I watch the blue water rush past me as my body sinks to the bottom of the pool like a boat anchor. Hundreds of tiny white bubbles flutter past me to the surface as my limp hands automatically reach for the heavens.
I’m drowning.
A set of arms wrap around me but I’ve closed my eyes, so I have no idea who. The arms bring me toward the surface and as I struggle to open my eyes, I see now that my vision is blurry, still not allowing for me to tell who it is. All I can focus on is the stinging pain in my chest and the beating in my head. I can hear small screams and urgent voices surrounding me as I feel the cool tile floor beneath my back. I violently choke and wheeze as water rushes up from my chest, pouring out of my nose and mouth causing me to viciously vomit. Someone rolls me to my side and I try incoherently to sit up.
My head still throbs with the sudden onset of pain and as I struggle to focus after managing to open my eyes, I see that my vision remains cloudy. It appears as though I’m trying to see underwater. I grab my chest and my head much like I did this morning, and that’s when realization hits me. There is a reason for my pain. I blink viciously against the blurry fog that impairs my sight and as I sweep the frightened faces around me, I see him.
The transparent old man with dark empty eyes standing directly over me.
Chapter Thirteen
“Who are you?!” I yell. This time the fear has registered. This man – whoever he is – has not only completely blindsided me with pain, but has now caused me to almost drown.
Coach Dawson is over me now, holding me down as I struggle to sit up and push my way out of her protective grasp.
“Stay down,” she orders. “We need to make sure you’re all right.”
My attempts to claw my way out of her grasp is feeble as she is accompanied by the medics that have been standing by. I watch horrified and half-crazed as I realize that the daunting man hasn’t moved away from me and the raw pain that has violently engulfed me is not subsiding. How ridiculous I was to want to see him again just to know if I would feel this way a second time. I’m clearly masochistic to want to experience this again! Now that I have my answer, a little part somewhere way in the back of my sane mind knows there’s a reason I’d wanted to know. I’m just too insane writhing in pain to understand.
“What do you want?” I choke as more water burns its way out of my nose. I curl in on myself and wretch more pool water.
He doesn’t speak as far as I can tell. I normally don’t hear other spirits in the same way as I hear Sera as it’s usually more of an odd humming noise – although when I had last set eyes on this man, he spoke in gurgled murmurs and I heard those just fine. I’ve never been particularly upset by the fact that I can't hear them very well, but now as I lay twisting in this terrible pain, I hope against hope that I can hear him. I desperately want to know why this man has zeroed in on me.
Coach Dawson looks at me with a worried expression – probably more from the fact that I’m screaming out irrational questions to no one in particular, rather than from the fact that I have almost drowned – as I fight against her and the medics who are trying to keep me still.
Sera appears to me and I frantically gaze through fuzzy sight with pleading in my eyes. She looks just as agonized as I feel while she stares at me with a horror struck expression. I give her a very slight and groggy sideways nod to signify that I want her attention toward the man looming over me. Sera turns whisper fast to leer at the chilling and dark phantom hovering near with a look I’ve never seen before. Her eyes could ignite fire.
“Get away from me,” I whimper, clutching at my chest.
“We aren’t going to do that, honey.” Coach Dawson murmurs, misunderstanding my plea. But how can she know that my words are directed to someone she is unable see?
“Help me,” I gurgle toward Sera, still struggling to push against everyone else. I vomit again.
“Breckin, listen to me. We’re trying to help you, but you have to be still,” my coach orders.
My eyes focus away from Sera’s and onto my coach’s anxious face. I know that the pain will go away if only the haunting imposter would just disappear. I know the ease of my breathing will come back despite the fact that I have water burning from my nose and throat, if only he would disappear. I close my eyes in agony as the pain in my head continues to rip its way through my skull. It feels as though I immediately have a deep splintering bone fracture running down my forehead. I moan and wrap both of my hands around my head.
Then as if he’s heard my silent pleas, the terrifying man vanishes.
Follow him, I think to Sera.
“Breckin,” she says hesitantly. I can sense that she doesn’t want to leave me.
Please! We have to find out what it is he wants! I beg.
Sera sighs, and then she, too, vanishes quicker than I have ever witnessed her disappear.
I lay still on my side, moving my hands from my head to wrap my arms around myself. I focus on my breathing as the tightness around my chest eases and my lungs take in the dry air gratefully. I’m panting more than breathing as the incoming oxygen echoes the stinging of the water, ripping its way down my throat and into my lungs. It feels like I’m inhaling razor blades.
“Miss Nicolai, can you sit up?” One of the EMT’s asks.
“Her lips are blue. Go get her a blanket,” another one orders.
I blink a few times and look around, confused to the many sets of frightened eyes focused on me. There are two EMT’s, and of course Coach Dawson, along with several of my teammates circled around me. I slowly sit up and manage to ignore the spinning in my head while everyone begins to urgently say my name over and over again, asking if I’m all right and what happened?
“You should keep still,” orders one of the paramedics. “We need to check you out before we move you.”
“Move me where?” I ask, disoriented.
“We need to take you to the hospital.” The other answers as he sti
cks his stethoscope into his ears. He positions the small circular end on my chest and listens intently as he eyes his wristwatch. “Can you tell us what happened?”
I rub the side of my head slowly as the EMT starts taking my blood pressure, trying to bring myself to terms with what really just occurred. I very well can’t tell them that I’ve just succumbed to a sudden onset of blinding pain brought on by a dark and sadistic ghost. I stare at the medic as he silently counts my breaths and I attempt to compose my face as I feel it beginning to show just how terrified I am. My eyes widen in horror, but I answer quickly.
“Charley Horse,” I lie.
“That must’ve been some Charley Horse to take you under water like that.” The EMT answers while giving me a look that makes me think he isn’t buying it.
I nod sheepishly and look away.
Coach Dawson kneels next to me, holding my hand in one of hers while she shoos away my worried teammates so the EMT’s can work. I look around me now and notice that the once cheering crowd awaits in hushed fear for me to be given the all clear. Morgan looks the most anxious as she stands on her tip toes to see what’s happening.
“I’m okay.” I mouth to her.
Morgan’s eyes are filled with silent tears, but she smiles slightly and seems to relax just a little.
The opposing team also remains quiet out of respect on the other side of the pool. After the paramedics give me the go ahead to be moved, I’m loaded onto a narrow uncomfortable cot with wheels and as confused as I still am, I lower my head into my hands in humiliation.
The entire ride to the hospital is spent being questioned. Which leg did I experience the Charley Horse in? Did I have any chest pain? One of the EMT's notice that I'd been holding my head, so he asks over and over if I'd knocked it at the bottom of the pool. After asking for a second blanket, my blood pressure is taken a fourth time. An oxygen mask is placed over my nose and mouth as well as an IV inserted in the crook of my elbow. I complain about that one; I don't see the reason behind being stuck with a big, dragging needle in my arm. I’m simply told that it’s standard “protocol”, but don't believe it. I’m overcome with an urgent need to shut my eyes then as exhaustion suddenly overhauls me. Sleep isn't an easy task to accomplish though, with bumpy roads and an ambulance siren blaring overhead.
Hollow Sight Page 28
