The Awakening

by K. E. Ganshert

  “You should eat something else.”

  The pile of food that looked so appetizing moments earlier no longer has any appeal. I know my body needs more than a bag of Cheetos, but my appetite has gone into hiding. He picks up an orange and peels it in the same way he did in the cafeteria. I’m mesmerized by the slow, even, unbroken way he removes the peel. When he finishes, he splits it apart and hands me half. I break off a slice and put it into my mouth. It’s bitter and dry, but there are vitamins, so I force myself to chew.

  “The first thing we need to do is look for some answers.” Luka grabs the two thick manila folders from the nightstand and plops them on the bed.

  Chapter Four

  Three Clues

  Luka takes one folder and I take the other. The more files I scan, the more tangible my disappointment. I’m sure Luka feels the same. We were counting on concrete answers to our questions. What is The Gifting? Why are we in danger? Who and where are the others? Maybe some clear-cut direction as far as what to do next. All we find are a bunch of patient files. People we don’t know suffering from every sort of disorder under the sun—bipolar, obsessive compulsive, narcissistic personality, and on and on and on. With each file, my hope dwindles. Dr. Roth must not have left these folders for us after all.

  “The only connection I can make,” Luka says, picking up another sheet, “is that the patients in my folder all live in the Detroit area.”

  Mine too.

  Of all the places I’ve lived, Michigan was never one of them, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t heard plenty of things about Detroit. The crime rate is off the chart. Drug cartel. Prostitution. Overcrowding. Muggings. Drive-by shootings. From all accounts, it’s a war zone. I can’t imagine Dr. Roth there. “Do you think that’s where he worked before Thornsdale?”

  “That would be my guess.”

  We go through several more. The only sound in the room is the shuffling of papers. Until abruptly, Luka stops and there’s nothing but silence. With his thumbnail between his teeth and a divot between his brow, he focuses on one file. “Look at this,” he finally says, handing me the sheet.

  Client’s name: Josiah Aaronson.

  Age: 60

  Diagnosis: Paranoid Schizophrenia

  It’s the first I’ve seen of it—the same diagnosis as my grandmother. My heart rate speeds up as I scan over his symptoms.

  Prophetic dreams. Hallucinations. Unexplained flashes of brightness.

  “Tess, look.” Luka hands over a stack of papers stapled together, photocopied pages filled with a slanted, rough scrawl. It’s Josiah’s dream journal. None of the other patients had one. But my grandmother did. And so did I. As soon as I got honest with Dr. Roth and explained my symptoms, he had me start one. Luka points to the upper right corner on the first page. The letters TG are written in perfect, miniscule script. Even though it’s only two letters, I recognize the handwriting as Dr. Roth’s.

  “TG,” Luka says.

  I look at him. “The Gifting.”

  We set Josiah Aaronson off to the side and look through the files with renewed fervor. From the two heavy stacks, we weed out three similar files. Each person was clinically diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. Each person kept a dream journal. And each journal has the same two letters written in the upper right corner on the front page. Two males. One female. Ranging in age from twelve all the way to Josiah, who was sixty. All three have symptoms that are not exactly the same, but similar enough to mine or Luka’s that it can’t be a coincidence. He shows me one of Josiah’s papers and points to a name next to Roth’s. Primary physician: Doctor Carlyle. “It’s the same doctor who referred the other two.”

  “Do you think he’s a believer?”

  “Maybe.” Luka gathers the other patient files. We look through them four times more, double, triple, quadruple checking. When we’re positive we haven’t skipped over something important, Luka stacks all the non-relevant diagnoses into one manila folder. It’s incredibly fat. Then he puts the three relevant diagnoses, along with their corresponding dream journals, into the other. It’s much too thin. I wish I could add my dream journal to the mix, or my grandmother’s. But I gave mine to Dr. Roth, hoping to never see it again, and my grandmother’s is buried in the bottom drawer of my desk in my bedroom.

  Luka carefully slides both folders into his backpack. “You want anything else to eat?”

  I shake my head.

  He stuffs half the food into my backpack, half into his, then sets both bags onto the chair. The clock says midnight. It’s time for bed and although we’ve been sitting on the same mattress for the entirety of the evening, sharing it now makes my stomach do some impressive acrobatics. This isn’t our first time sleeping together. It’s not even our second. Besides last night in the alleyway, there was another night a few days ago, when I had that horrible nightmare about crashing cars and Pete ended up in ICU and I didn’t want to be alone. Tonight feels different though. We’re in a motel room. My mother is not down the hallway. And we aren’t in survival mode, at least not like we were last night.

  Luka scratches the back of his head. “We should probably get some sleep.”

  I nod, feeling far from tired.

  “I’ll, uh, just sleep on the floor.”

  “You don’t have to.”

  He stops mid-reach for a pillow.

  “I mean, the bed is plenty big for the both of us, if you want to sleep in it. With me. Not with me, just beside me. It’s not like we have to … you know.” Oh my goodness, Tess, stop talking right now. “I just mean that we’ve already slept beside one another, so it’s fine, if you wanted to sleep … on the mattress.”

  He smiles.

  I look down at the comforter, entirely too embarrassed to maintain eye contact.

  “Tess?”

  “Hmm?”

  “If me sleeping in the bed makes you uncomfortable …”

  “It doesn’t. Honestly.” Look at him, Tess. Stop acting like you’re eleven. I force my chin up, as if to prove I can handle this. “Really, I’m fine.”

  He studies me for a moment, as if assessing the validity of my words. It reminds me of the way he used to look at me when I first moved to Thornsdale and he was the completely-out-of-my-league, massively popular kid at my new school. Whatever he finds in my expression must convince him that I mean what I say, because he switches off the light and the mattress springs squeak as he lies down. He stays on his side. I stay on mine. It’s entirely opposite from last night, when our bodies were tangled up in a knot. Yet somehow, I’m more aware of him—his breathing, the warmth radiating from his skin, the crisp clean smell of his shampoo. I swear I can even hear his heartbeat.

  Is it me, or is the heater working exceptionally well in here?

  “Luka?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m sorry for dragging you into this mess.”

  “Tess?”

  I pull the covers up to my chest.

  “Before you label me the martyr, you should know that breaking you out was as much for my well-being as it was for yours.” The mattress lets out another squeak as Luka turns over on his side. “I didn’t know the true meaning of insanity until those men dragged you out of school.”

  The confession turns the air in my lungs all light and fluttery. I bite my lip and blink up at the ceiling. What exactly am I supposed to say to that? There’s nothing adequate, that’s for sure. I want to ask him why. Why do I matter so much to him? It doesn’t make any sense. Instead, I scratch the tip of my nose and turn my thoughts to less confusing topics. Like who killed Dr. Roth? Or maybe it’s not who; maybe it’s what killed him. The term demon sounds incredibly archaic, like it belongs to the time period of medical leeching and a flat earth. My father would be the first to scoff. Science has disproven God, and demons pretty much come with the God-territory. But how can I deny what’s right in front of me?

  The question that has been circling my thoughts ever since we crawled out of his apartment creeps its way
to the tip of my tongue. “What’s going to happen now?”

  “We find a way to get to Detroit.”

  I pick at a loose thread on the sheet, wishing I could communicate with Leela. Maybe, if I could talk to her and tell her everything that has happened, maybe she would believe me. Maybe Leela could help.

  Chapter Five

  An Ally

  I’m standing on a grassy knoll with noise all around me. Kids chasing kids in a game of tag, younger ones rolling down the hill. There’s a field and players in uniform—one in blue and gold, the other in red and gray. Referees in black and white. Bleachers filled with spectators. The scoreboard at the end of the field displays a large red dragon.

  I’m at a Thornsdale football game.

  A tall, lanky kid walks toward the bleachers with two cups of hot chocolate in his hand. My brother! My legs take off, sprinting after him. “Pete!” I yell, my voice drowned out by the mixture of cheerleaders chanting and the crowd cheering and children giggling and referees whistling and coaches yelling. Closing the distance between us, I call his name again. My voice rises above the din, but his stride doesn’t falter. “Pete,” I say, grabbing his elbow.

  But it’s like he doesn’t feel my grip on his arm. He doesn’t even look at me. I wave my hand in front of his face. “Pete?”

  He walks up the bleacher steps. Clank, clank, clank.

  I stop and watch him go, baffled and hurt. How could he ignore me like that? I know Pete and I haven’t been on the best terms lately, but things seemed to be getting back to normal in the hospital …

  Wait a minute.

  Pete was really banged up the last time I saw him. They moved him out of ICU, but he still had a long road to recovery ahead. He wouldn’t be released so soon. And what am I doing out in public like this, at a Thornsdale football game? It’s not even football season.

  I scratch the small patch of eczema on the inside of my wrist and feel nothing. I’m dreaming. Which means at any second, something frightening will appear. A skeletal, white-eyed man will show up and attack these people and my classmates and this crowd. Only it won’t just be a dream. I have no idea how it works. Dr. Roth didn’t give us answers. All I know is that my dreams have a direct impact on real life. My brother is proof.

  Pete stops a few steps ahead and hands one of the hot chocolates to somebody I can’t see. When he sits down and pulls a blanket over his lap, the person I can’t see comes into view.

  “Leela!” Her name explodes from my mouth, equal parts joy and desperation and relief all encompassed in a two-syllable squeak.

  Unlike Pete, she hears me. In fact, she looks at me as soon as her name escapes.

  I run the short distance Pete walked, then stop suddenly in front of her. I have no idea what she will do. Leela and I might have been best friends once-upon-a-time, but that was before she found out I had been lying to her about my whereabouts after school every Monday. I told her I took piano lessons when I was really seeing Dr. Roth, my own personal shrink at the Edward Brooks Facility. I brace myself for the cold shoulder. Instead, she throws the blanket off her legs and wraps her arms around my neck.

  She squeezes the air out of me, and when she lets go, her brown eyes are warm and friendly and every bit as excited as I feel. Oh, how I’ve missed my friend. Her excitement quickly morphs into alarm. She grabs my elbows and yanks me down into a crouched position, as if this will hide me from the crowd. “Tess, what are you doing here? The police are looking for you. If anyone sees you, you’ll be reported!”

  “Leela, it’s okay. Nobody is going to see me.”

  “What happened? Those guys—they came and took you and then you were gone. Your mother was in a panic. And now you’re on the news. Tess, you can’t be here.” Her voice grows increasingly freaked. She looks around again and spots a patch of teachers beyond the student section. “Principal Jolly called the whole school together for this big meeting and told everyone that if any of us have any clue where you might be, we are required to report it. The police interrogated almost everyone.”

  As Leela panics, Pete sits under his half of the blanket with a blank look on his face, staring mindlessly off into the football field. I ache to talk to him. To ask how he’s doing. How our parents are doing. But I understand now that this isn’t Pete. This is a figment of Leela’s dream. Leela’s version of Pete doesn’t see me. He can’t interact with me. Only Leela can, because somehow, I have entered into Leela’s dream. I have no idea how it works, but it has to be it.

  A puzzle piece clicks into place. This is not the first time this has happened. I visited Summer Burbank’s dream once, only at the time, I thought I was visiting Luka, because up until that point, I had only ever visited Luka. It all makes sense now. The Luka who was making out with Summer and completely ignoring me was never really Luka at all, but Summer’s wishful thinking.

  “Nobody else can see me but you. This is your dream.”

  “A dream?”

  “Yes.”

  She lets go of my arm, her face transforming into a mask of skepticism. Her attention flicks to Pete. Disappointment floods the brown of her eyes. It’s no secret she has had a crush on my brother since our first day at Thornsdale High School. Only she never got to meet the real Pete. She met the sullen, surly Pete, the one being controlled and influenced by a darkness he didn’t know existed. Now, thankfully, he is safe. He is my brother again. Maybe Leela will get to meet that Pete soon. “You mean this isn’t real?”

  I don’t want to dash her hopes, but we have so much to talk about. I need to convince her, and convince her quickly that this is a dream so we can move onto more important things. “If you don’t believe me, pinch yourself.”

  “Huh?”

  “Pinch your arm.”

  “Tess, I’m not going to—”

  I reach out and pinch her arm for her. Hard. Instead of pulling away or yelping, she rubs her thumb over the spot. “I didn’t feel anything.”

  “That’s because we’re dreaming.”

  She plops onto the bleacher looking bereft. Pete has disappeared altogether. “I knew this was too good to be real.”

  “Listen to me, Leela, this is a dream, but I’m not part of it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean I’m really here. What I tell you now, you have to remember. And you have to believe that I’m not part of the dream. You have to believe that this is really me talking to you.”

  “This is weird.”

  “I don’t know how much time we have.” That’s the thing about dreams. They are unstable. Leela can wake up at any moment, or her subconscious mind can drift somewhere else and maybe I won’t be able to follow. Or worse, something bad could show up. A wave of cold fear stretches through my body. My muscles coil. Adrenaline pulses through my veins. If anything tries to attack my friend, I will be ready to fight. I sit beside her on the bleacher. “How’s my brother?”

  “From what I’ve heard, he’s out of the hospital. I’m not sure when he’s coming back to school, though.” Leela shifts so she’s facing me. “Tess, what’s going on? The news reports are saying that you’re dangerous.”

  “I’m not dangerous. I’m so sorry for not trusting you before with the truth. But I didn’t even know what the truth was—honestly, I still don’t.” I grasp her hands. “Leela, I need your help. Luka and I both do.”

  Her eyes widen. “Luka’s with you?”

  “Yes.” For now, at least.

  “I wondered. There’s been so much speculation. Luka hasn’t been to school, but none of the teachers will talk about him whenever we ask where he is.”

  “Nothing is like you think it is.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I search through my thoughts, trying to figure out a way to explain everything to Leela. How do you tell a person that everything we’ve learned our entire lives, everything our parents and the government and our schools have taught us, is wrong? “Our world is more than physical.”

  Her br
ow furrows. Leela and her family are supposedly Catholic, but even she admitted that the title was born from tradition more than anything. She called her parents closet atheists.

  “I know this is going to sound crazy, but there is supernatural stuff all around us.”

  She looks around, as if she might see it for herself, the furrow in her brow deepening.

  “Science is wrong. The government is wrong. There are real, legitimate evil forces in this world.” I realize as I speak how crazy I sound, but onward I press. Because it’s true. All too clearly I remember the man with the scar marking my brother with that strange symbol, preparing to claim him. If not for Luka and I being in the right place at the right time, he would have. And then what would have happened to Pete? “They’re able to impact things—people and events. I see them. And somehow, so can Luka. That’s why we have such a connection.”

  Leela stares at me with her mouth hanging open, her hands limp in mine. I can imagine what I look like—this wild-eyed, frenzied girl who busted out of a mental institute and is now spouting off things that sound certifiably insane. I wouldn’t believe me if I were her. Except we are in a dream, so surely that has to bring some validity to my proclamations. Or maybe Leela will wake up and think she’s the insane one.

  “You need to believe this. You’re not crazy. I’m not crazy. I’m not mentally deranged or a danger to society. Dr. Roth knew that all along. That’s why he broke me out. He didn’t commit suicide. He was murdered.”