Aftermath

by Jenna-Lynne Duncan

  Hayden's soft lips came crashing down on mine and everything else seemed to float away. In that brief moment everything seemed right.

  “What did you do that for?” We started walking again as I touched my fingers to my swollen lips.

  “To distract you.” He turned briefly with a slashing smile.

  I smiled back dreamily. “Well, that worked.” Hayden had spent the past twenty-four hours listening to my every thought and theory. I had even told him about my dream at the theatre, wondering if there was a connection there. It had seemed so long ago since I'd had that dream; trying to figure out what the dream meant and what Christine had wanted had taken the back burner to my current crisis. Despite Hayden’s reassurances, he was right: I needed a distraction.

  He slipped his hand in mine when we got in the car. He waited to back out, letting the line of other students leaving pass us. I saw Bailey from class waving as she walked by and waved back at her.

  When I turned back to Hayden, I found him looking at me thoughtfully. “This may seem like a lot at the moment. But moments come and go. And pretty soon this will all be past you and you will have the answers that you’re looking for. When that time comes, this will all seem insignificant and you will become stronger because of it. You already are.”

  “Why do you always know how to say just the right things? Are you ever less than perfect?”

  He laughed satirically. “I am far from perfect, Ana. You should know that now. And the more you come to know about my nature, the more you’ll see that. That’s what I fear most.”

  I gripped his hand right back. “I’m sorry if I have given you any reason to doubt the way I feel about you. But that is never going to change. Never. Love is blind.”

  “Love is also arrogant and sometimes doesn’t see its true ways. But this isn’t about me. This isn’t what I’m worried about. You’re concerned with saving everyone’s soul but at what cost to you? I think you should just take one thing at a time. Everything else will work out itself.”

  “Do you think that I’m not supposed to be seeing the future? That no one can really change the future, they can just try to mess with it and face the repercussions?”

  “Honestly, Ana, I don’t know. Everything I thought I knew changed the moment I met you. It opened my eyes to see that anything is possible.”

  “That’s the hardest for me. Not knowing.”

  “It’s okay to not have everything figured out. It took me a lifetime to learn about Hunters. I hope for your sake, it won’t take that long to figure out who you are.”

  Was it really okay? Would it be okay to let what was going on with Marie slide? Would it be okay to just concentrate on stopping what was going to happen at the ball and not think about the consequences of trying to change the future? Did I even have that choice? I felt the need to have things figured out. I had to understand them but maybe I couldn’t understand everything. Not just yet.

  I caught a glance at the clock. “We'd better go. I don’t want to be reamed out by Zack again.”

  “You’re late.”

  “I know, I’m sorry but I came here straight from school.” I stuffed my backpack in my dad’s locker and peeled off my jacket just as quickly.

  “I get off of school at the same time as you and you don’t see me coming in late.” Zack didn’t look up from the sheet of paper he was reading over. “Oh, that’s right. I don’t sit and gossip with my friends after school. I actually need this job.”

  “I wasn’t gossiping with my friends,” I gasped, insulted.

  “Your little boyfriend, then.”

  I laughed at the thought of anyone thinking Hayden was little.

  “Yeah, that’s what I thought. Suit up. You got boat inspections you owe me.”

  “I—,” but Zack had left, leaving me alone to change in the locker room.

  “Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed,” I mumbled.

  “I heard that!” Zack yelled from the other side of the door.

  “Good!” and I grabbed my things to change in the bathroom stall.

  I had three boat inspections to do before I could leave and it would mean I would be staying a while. It wasn't as if I was in a hurry to go home. Hayden was taking his parents out tonight. The master of distraction, I thought, as it was clear Christopher and Elizabeth’s moods were anything but cheery under the current circumstances. Something told me they weren’t going out for a night on the town and I longed to tag along and know what Hunters did. This made me anxious and I quickened my pace in the water.

  The sun was slowly setting as I entered the water to do my third and final dive. The orange ball in the sky reflected onto the water making the water look falsely warmer than it was. I would have to hurry before it got dark. Something about the Mississippi at night scared me. It was already hard enough to see through its muddy waters.

  I ran out of air halfway through and had to resurface. I quickly took a new tank, not having the time to refill mine. Just what I needed when I was trying to get done quickly, I thought resentfully. When I was back underwater, I felt the day come to an end above me. My flashlight was my only light source. I suddenly felt chillier than the water around me. Forget it, Zack, you’ll have to finish this tomorrow. I didn’t want to stay in the water another minute. Everything felt wrong. I started my ascent to the surface when I felt a spine-tingling chill. I started to panic; emotions attached to the tingling came flooding back to me. Nausea took panic's place and I wished I didn't have a mouthpiece in at forty feet under water; in any other environment, I would have thrown up. I took a few deep breaths through the mouthpiece and convinced myself I was just scaring myself. I showed the flashlight all around me. Just to make sure. Nothing but darkness was beside me, which wasn’t comforting in the very least. I started my ascent again, more anxious to get out of the water than ever. It’s not like my ears are ringing, I told myself, remembering what happened the last time I felt the skin tingling and nausea. It was almost as if it were a signal that something, or someone, bad was coming. I continued to gradually kick my feet as I released air from my vest when I was halted. I wasn’t moving. I felt like I was in a nightmare as I tried to kick my feet toward the surface again but wasn’t moving. Only one leg moved. I was caught. Someone had my fin.

  I was already panicking when my ears started to ring. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to calm myself down. I must have just caught it on something. There would be no way someone was down there. I would have seen their light or their bubbles. But they wouldn’t need light or bubbles if they weren’t human. Suddenly, all the water around me felt claustrophobic. I was still a good thirty feet from the surface but it could have been inches or miles away. It was easy to die in water. Seconds trickled by as I tried to work myself free from what I told myself was an old fishing line. Still, I couldn’t bring myself to shine the flashlight down by my feet. My hands shot to my ears as the ringing became suddenly painful. Something wrapped around my body, pulling the compressor from my mouth. My worst fears were confirmed. My leg was freed but the hold around my body suit was tighter. My lungs started to tighten with the breath I held and my heart beat wildly against my ribcage. I could not even scream at the thing that was trying to kill me. I was underwater and needed to save the air that was left in my lungs. I tried to shine the flashlight at my feet but saw nothing there. That’s because it’s behind me. I didn’t have time to think about what it was or why it wanted me dead. I needed air. And fast. I could ascend without risking my lungs exploding from the pressure but I needed the thing to release me. I fought wildly against it and tried to reach my arms back to grab my emergency air compressor. A hold on my arms kept me from reaching around. Even more unsettling, the restraint didn’t feel like human hands. My lungs tightened even more and I was going to have to release the breath or die. I tried to reach for my diving knife, hoping a weapon would work. Zack was supposed to be monitoring me; I held on as long as I could, hoping that he would notice something was wrong. I even f
oolishly thought Hayden would come to my rescue again. I struggled, feeling light-headed, trying in vain to reach my knife. I moved the flashlight, trying to see where I was grabbing when I felt something coming toward us. I didn’t know whether I should feel relief or fear. Was it someone coming to save me or was it someone coming to help kill me? With a deep inhale through my mouthpiece, I prayed for the former. I aimed my light in its direction, not waiting another second to find out which one. No. Way. Alligator? I fought the monster behind me even harder and it suddenly let go. Shock momentarily came over me but I didn’t have time to dwell; my lungs were dying. Two monsters were in the water around me. Two very different predators. I stole one more look at the alligator before unclipping myself from my vest and kicking with fury until I broke the surface of the water. I didn’t stop swimming as I gulped in air. I quickly made my way over to the boat and flew up the ladder. I finally allowed myself to collapse on the boat deck when I knew I had made it safely out of the water. I kept sucking in breaths. I couldn’t get enough air in my lungs. I felt the light-headedness return with a new symptom. And my eyes closed slowly around my consciousness.

  I opened them again briefly when I felt the world drop beneath me. My eyes tried to adjust to the light as I saw the ceiling of the warehouse. I was inside and I was being carried. I fought to keep my eyes open, to see who had me, but no matter how hard I fought, the numbness of unconsciousness called to me and my eyes closed again.

  I was forced to open them again when my chest was pushed with such force I thought my ribs were about to break. It was Zack, his hair dripping droplets of water onto my face. He was giving me CPR, I realized. I’m not dead, I just want to sleep. I groaned and tried to turn away but he slapped my face. Ow.

  “Stay with me!” I thought I heard him yell.

  “Leave me alone, Zack,” I groaned again. “You are always so mean to me,” I babbled with as much coherence as I could manage. “You came to my house and won’t even let me sleep. I’m not supposed to be working today.”

  “Come on. You have to get up. You can’t fall asleep, now.”

  My surroundings came into focus and the warehouse was familiar. We were at Taylor Diving. I was working. I had been underwater, doing a boat inspection when…

  I shot up as the memories came back. “Oh my god…”

  “Shh,” Zack hushed me, placing a hand on my shoulder. “Don’t get up so quickly.”

  “Ow.” My hands gripped my head at the sudden pain.

  “Here, drink this.” Zack handed me a cup of something hot. Drinking was the last thing I thought about doing but I took it from him anyway and took a sip of the coffee to help appease him.

  “What the heck, Zack?” I winced at the pain from my own yelling. “You were supposed to be monitoring me. I almost died!”

  “Don’t you start with me. I was monitoring you. Why do you think you are here right now? How exactly did you almost die anyway?”

  “I—I was caught on…something.” I tried to think of another way of explaining just how exactly I almost died without sounding crazy by saying that there was something down there that grabbed me. “I am never, ever, going back in there again!”

  “Just because you had one accident?”

  “No. Because there are alligators.”

  “Alligators by the docks?” He sounded almost as nervous about the idea as I was. “You sure you didn’t hit your head?”

  Or not. I pushed him away from me as I tried to sit up but he stopped me. “You should just rest until there is enough oxygen back in your blood. You could have burst a lung ascending as fast as you did, ya know.”

  “If I didn’t know any better I’d think you actually cared. Now let me up.” I finally managed to break free of him and headed towards the locker room. “The only reason I didn’t burst a lung is because I was so scared, I let out a scream the whole way up.”

  “It looks like your fear scared you,” he winked at me.

  I scowled back at him. “And how did you know how fast I surfaced, anyways?” I paused, my hand on the locker room door.

  He shifted, running a hand through his hair. “You…you don’t remember what happened?”

  “Actually, I remember exactly what happened and I don’t remember you anywhere near the water.” My hands were on both hips as I regarded him skeptically.

  “I think you hit your head, Ana.”

  I grunted as I turned on my heel and pushed the locker room door open.

  It was late by the time I emerged from the warehouse. The cool winter air blew into my damp locks and I shivered. I inhaled deeply, offering gratitude to be alive. Again. Then panic sunk in. My head whipped around to the shell-covered parking lot outside our building. Hayden wasn’t there. It was long past the time he usually picked me up. I wrapped my arms around my body, suddenly feeling very vulnerable and alone. After everything I just went through, I needed Hayden. I needed someone to talk to. Why wasn’t he here, I wondered? And the hurt immediately went to concern. More importantly, if whatever was lurking at the bottom of the Mississippi was supernatural, why wasn’t he called to Hunt? Why didn’t he save me? It felt like such a childish thing to think. Hayden wouldn’t always be there to save me, would he?

  With the edges of my heart burning, I started walking across the parking lot.

  “Do you need to go to the hospital?” I turned around to see Zack’s back toward me, locking the front door.

  “No,” I said with more sadness than stubbornness.

  He finished and turned toward me with a surprised expression. I waited for his sarcasm. When he didn’t deliver it fast enough, I turned to continue walking. My footfalls were so angry a path of broken shells trailed behind me.

  “C’mon, I’ll give you a ride.”

  My body spun around to face him. “What, you ran out of snide comments?”

  “Do you want a ride or not?”

  I bit my lip as I considered my options. In the end, fatigue won over pride. I walked to his truck and got in without another word. “Thanks,” I barely whispered as he turned the key to start the truck.

  Zack wasn’t trying to start a conversation on the drive back and although I wanted to ask him about the accident, I was relieved. I stared out the window, watching the blur of lights as we drove by. I was briefly aware of my phone vibrating in my backpack before my eyelids fluttered closed.

  Chapter Sixteen

  “Ana, wake up.” His voice was soothing as it led me out of the fog of sleep. With a smile on my face, I stretched my arms out to wrap them around Hayden’s neck. When he wasn’t lying next to me, my eyes shot open.

  “Oh my gosh.” I looked around and realized I wasn’t lying down, and I wasn’t alone. I finally calmed down when the recent memories came back to me. “Oh.”

  “Sorry to disappoint. But you’re home.”

  “How did you know where I lived?” I said, suddenly alarmed. Last time someone brought me home without directions, well…

  “Uh, I have been here more than a few times with my pops?” He looked at me with suspicion and craze.

  “What?” Desperation came out on my tone and he held my gaze until I looked at the house we were parked out in front of. It was my Dad’s house. Of course he knew that. They didn’t need to know I had moved out and I didn’t see the need to tell them that tonight. I let out a weak laugh. “Right. Sorry, still waking up. Well, I’m going to go.” I pulled the door handle and the car door flew open. I grabbed my backpack and stumbled out of his truck. I was not used to the height differences.

  “Careful.”

  I listened for mockery in his voice but found it surprisingly absent. “Yep, I’m fine. Thanks for the ride, Zack.”

  “Anytime.”

  I looked at him, giving him one last chance to dare to make a comment about why he had to give me a ride home and why Hayden was a no-show. When he didn’t, I said goodnight and shut the door.

  I took baby steps up to the front door of my dad's house. Zack still h
adn’t left by the time I got to the front and I tensed, hoping he wouldn’t want to see me go inside. I turned back, giving him a wave to signal he could go. He didn’t. And I waved again until he finally got the picture, shook his head and left rather too abruptly. I let out a breath when he was finally gone. I realized I was just standing on the front steps like a stranger. I peeked through the sideline window. Inside looked warm and cozy. A perfect place to be on night like this. But this wasn’t my home anymore. The sounds of laughter from inside confirmed that. I turned away, walking back the few blocks to where I lived now.

  When I got close, I saw Hayden running out into the driveway, obviously hearing me approach. He scooped me into his arms and I was all too eager to fall into them.

  After kissing me frantically, he spoke. “Where were you?” Then as if realizing something, he looked around the street suspiciously.

  “Where was I? You were supposed to pick me up.” The wind blew and I shivered again.

  Hayden led me inside, not releasing my arm the entire time. When we got inside he turned to face me. “I’m so sorry, Ana. I got called,“ he paused, “and I didn’t know if Luke would be there or how that would work out, so I had to go. Elizabeth said she would be happy to pick you up from work. When she got there, she said you were gone. It turned out to be nothing, so I came back home to see if you got a ride. My parents are still out looking for you.” He finished frantically searching my face for any signs of injury before finally resting on my eyes. Then my lips. “If anything had happened to you...”

  “Shh... I’m fine. But I need to tell you what happened.”

  I took a warm shower and then explained everything to Hayden as I was getting ready for bed. When I finally lay down for the night, I vaguely remembered Hayden saying he had to go out. I had no energy to form a protest. I had school in the morning and I knew Nikki would say something about getting beauty sleep. Whatever tried to kill me, Zack, Mr. Christian, Marie, Luke... all that could wait until the morning.