“How?”
“You had traces of her memories in your world, but it wasn’t until you came here that they got worse, right?”
I consider his words before I answer. “Yes, I only had them in my dreams in my world. I didn’t start having them when I was awake until after I stayed with Reece. My first memory of hers was remembering her accident.”
“You remember her accident?” He sounds horrified, then his voice lowers. “How much did you remember?”
I hesitate. I’m not sure what I should tell him. As though I’m breaking her confidence. “The memory began right before the accident—when she was leaving the church—and ended when she died.”
He pulls me close, burying my face into the crook of his shoulder. “Oh, Jules. I’m so sorry. That must have been scary and overwhelming.”
I don’t answer.
“Was she scared?” His voice cracks, and he sounds as though he’s horrified at himself for asking. “Was she alone?”
“She was scared, but she wasn’t alone.” I pause. “Reece was there. He held her hand as she died.”
“Reece? Not Monica?” I hear the agony in his voice.
“No.”
“Did she love him?” His voice is so quiet that I can barely hear him over the crackle of the fire.
“Evan…”
He leans backward and smiles through his tears. “It’s okay. I know she did.”
“Evan…”
Shaking his head, he sweeps my hair away from my face. “No, Jules. It’s okay. It’s closure. I needed to hear it, even though I already knew. And I’m glad she didn’t die alone. That’s probably why her memories are stronger with him. Not only was she with him when she died, but she loved him.”
I was lost without Monica, but not only did Evan lose his Julia, but he found out she didn’t love him after all. Could I have survived if I’d found out Monica hadn’t been my friend? “If you knew she loved Reece, why did you come to find me?”
He looks into the fire. “I don’t know.”
I reach up and turn his face so I can search in his eyes. “Don’t do that. Don’t lie to me. I’m sure there are very few things you don’t know, least of all why you would risk your life to find me in another universe if you didn’t think I’d love you.”
He shifts his gaze. “It’s complicated.”
I grab both of his cheeks and force him to look at me. “I may not be as smart as you, but try me anyway.”
Pain crinkles his forehead. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
“I know,” I say softly. “But I deserve to know.”
He pauses then looks into my eyes. “I didn’t expect to be part of your life. Honestly, I just wanted to see if you had picked me in your world. Then I realized you weren’t with me there at all. And you weren’t with Reece either. I saw it as a chance to try again. But when I started to get to know you, I realized that you weren’t anything like her.”
It’s my turn to look away. I’ve been telling them both this all along, and both of them have told me this in anger. But for some reason, hearing it from him now hurts.
“Julia, look at me.”
When I turn back, love fills his eyes. “That’s a good thing. This way I know that I love you, not the memory of her. Does that make sense?”
I nod through my tears.
Fierceness and determination replace the love and tenderness on his face. “I’m going to figure out a way to take you home and fix this. Do you believe me?”
He’s promising me the impossible, but when I look into his eyes, I believe he can do anything. “Yes, I believe you.”
His hand slides up my back and into my hair as his mouth finds mine, hot and needy.
My body sinks into his as I close my eyes, returning his kiss. Every part of me needs him. Every part but the foreign memories in my head.
“I love you, Jules.” Evan wraps both arms around my waist, pulling me flush against his chest as his mouth lowers. His lips part, and his tongue finds mine. I press against him, my arm sliding around his neck and pulling him closer. “Julia,” he murmurs against my lips.
Heat rises deep inside, and I revel in the knowledge that these feelings are mine, not hers. This is real.
He tilts my back and deepens the kiss, his fingers caressing the side of neck. I twine my fingers in his hair, holding him close so I can’t lose him again.
The front door cracks, and I jerk backward, worried about Reece spotting us.
When he enters the room, he stops to watch us for a moment. “Everything looks good out there, but it’s starting to snow again, and it’s getting heavy. We may not be able to go anywhere tomorrow.”
I try to gauge Evan’s reaction, not sure if this is a good thing or bad.
He stands and moves past Reece to the front door. “We can use this to our advantage. It will give us a chance to rest. We seem to have lost the UR military, but we know that Deacon’s men are probably still looking for us. We have the advantage of changing trucks, but it won’t take long for them to track down the trade and find out what we’re driving now. But if we’re snowed in, then they probably are too. They’re stuck with the same vintage vehicles we are.”
I use the sofa to help me get to my feet. I’m not surprised to hear Deacon’s men are still after us, even this far out. Deacon had the same desperation in his eyes that General Ghertner had when he was so close to the portal. And Deacon is a man used to getting what he wants.
I can’t think about the dangers around us right now when I’m worried about the danger in my head. “I’m going to bed.”
Reece doesn’t respond, but Evan turns away from the open door and moves toward me. “This will give you another day to stay off your ankle. You’ve probably set the recovery back.”
Guilt pours off Reece, and he closes his eyes.
“Reece.” My voice is harsher than I intend, but he gives me his attention. “This is not your fault. Stop blaming yourself.”
He starts to push past me, but I grab his arm. My fingertips tingle and her memories ignite. He does this. He blames himself for everything when things go wrong, even when there’s no possible way he could have stopped it. I can’t stand to see his pain, and the way he hides it with his surliness. Where no one else sees it but me. I have to take this guilt from him. I have to—
My own consciousness grabs control. I snatch my hand back as though Reece’s arm is on fire.
Pain and confusion flicker in his eyes before indifference replaces it. He lifts an eyebrow in mock nonchalance.
Evan’s eyes widen in concern. “Jules? Did it happen again?”
I nod. “I need to go to bed.” I back way, almost falling when I forget about my ankle. Evan reaches to right me, but I push his hand away. “No, I’m okay.”
Evan lowers his hand to his side. “I’m not sure you should be alone right now.”
“I won’t be alone. I’m sleeping with Jo.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I’ll be fine.”
Turning my back, I hurry to our room, confused by own reaction. I want so much to run back to Evan and have his arms around me, reassuring me that he’ll make everything better. But how can I when I still have lingering feelings for Reece, still retracting to their hiding place?
What a mess.
Jo sits on the bed when I enter, facing the wall. A candle sits on a table next to the bed. Shadows from the flame flicker on the wall.
“Jo?”
She turns to face me, tears on her face, holding a silver hairbrush in her hand.
I’m afraid if I ask her what’s wrong that she’ll push me away. Instead I wait, my back against the door.
She runs her thumb over the bristles. “I thought you were making out with Evan.”
A blush rises to my cheeks. “Were we that obvious?”
She shrugs.
“I’m sorry.”
“Hey, what do I care who you make out with?”
I take a step toward the bed
. “That’s not what I’m sorry about.”
She stands, reaching for her bag, and starts to put the brush inside.
I don’t want her to shut me out so quickly. If we’re going to be friends, I need her to open up. It’s easy to see she’s in pain. Maybe she needs someone to talk to. “What’s that?”
“Nothing. It’s just a hairbrush.”
I take a gimpy step toward the bed then sit down. “Can I see it?”
She hesitates.
“Please?”
With a shrug, she pulls it out and hands it to me. “Whatever.”
The silver handle is warm from her body heat. I turn it over to examine the back. It’s covered in intricate scrolls and carvings of flowers. It reminds me of the doodles I drew in my notebook after the accident, only these decorations are recognizable. “It’s beautiful.” The fact this seems precious to Jo catches me off guard.
“I found a few things in the attic of the house Evan stayed in. Sometimes the scavengers miss things.”
Now it’s even more surprising that she’s attached to the brush. It’s delicate and feminine, everything that Jo isn’t. Understanding dawns on me. Maybe that’s why she wants it.
“It will get a good trade the next time we stop somewhere. Too bad we didn’t have it before we went to Deacon City.” She takes it from me, and her fingertips trail over the carving.
“I think you should keep it.”
Her eyebrows rise in surprise. “Why?”
I shrug. “You deserve something pretty, Jo.”
The shutter exposing the emotion in her eyes snaps closed. “There’s no room for pretty. Life is ugly out here.”
She reaches for her bag again, but I cover her hand with my own. “Maybe that’s all the more reason to have something special.”
Condescension hardens her face. “Special doesn’t last out here. It gets stolen or snatched away. When are you going to learn that, Chipper?”
I gently take the brush from her hand and scoot closer, extending my leg on the bed. She tenses, her back ramrod stiff as she faces the wall. As I run the brush through her hair, she starts to slide off the edge of the bed, but I grab her arm and hold her in place for several seconds. Her eyes sink closed, and I brush her hair again, the way my mother used to do when I was little. My eyes burn when her back relaxes, and she doesn’t pull away. When was the last time someone did something kind to her?
“What happened to your family?” I whisper. I’m worried about her reaction, but I’m determined to break through her defenses. She knows much more about me than I know about her.
“They died.”
“How?”
“Which time? My dad died in the attack in the gully.”
Her father died a week ago, and I haven’t seen her cry about it once. She’s spent the last week helping us, helping me, when she should have been grieving. “I’m sorry.”
Her back stiffens again, and I worry she’ll make me stop, but I brush several more strokes, and she sinks back toward me.
“Tell me about your mom,” I say.
After several seconds, I’m sure she’s not going to answer. The only sound in the room is the soft crackle of the bristles in her silky hair. This moment reminds me so much of my mother trying to break through my emotional wall several weeks ago. My heart spasms with grief of my own, thinking of her. Jo and I are more alike than either of us have realized. “I’ve lost my mother. She’s back in my world. My universe. We had a huge fight before I left, and now I’ve disappeared. Does she think I ran away?” I pause. “I suppose I did.” I knew I was going away somewhere with Evan, even if I thought I would go back home at some point.
“Did you fight a lot?”
I laugh. “Yeah, I guess we did, although now I realize we fought over stupid stuff. The last year, we fought more than we got along. But I still love her. And she loved me.”
“Not loved,” Jo says quietly. “Loves. She’s still alive. She still loves you, even if you aren’t there.”
I sigh. “I suppose you’re right.”
“My mother died when I was young. For a long time it was my dad, my brother, my little sister and me. Then my dad and my brother had a fight after my sister died. It was my dad and me. And now it’s just me.”
“I’m sorry.”
She shrugs. “My mom had a brush, a pretty silver brush that she used to brush my hair with. She said it was a gift from her mother. One day we were short on things to barter, and we were down to the last bit of food. So my father took my mother’s brush and bought some flour and some milk. My mother cried for days.” Jo pauses. “I swore to her that I’d find her a new one and I kept looking, even years after she died. I finally gave up. And then I found this one.”
“Then you should keep it.”
“It’s bad luck. I never should have taken it.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Everything went to hell after my father sold her brush. My family fell apart.”
“Jo, it had nothing to do with her brush.”
“It had everything to do with her brush.”
I’ve learned arguing with her is pointless, so I run the bristles through her hair for several strokes.
“We need to go to bed,” she says.
I finish one last stroke, then hand her the brush. “I don’t think there’s good luck or bad. Luck is what you make it. If someone or something can bring you luck, then you’ve brought me good luck.”
She turns and looks over her shoulder. “What are you talking about? I almost got you killed by taking you to Deacon City.”
“You saved Evan by taking us to Deacon City.”
She takes the brush from my hand, stuffs it in her bag, then tosses me a blanket. We lie down on the bed, our backs to each other.
We lay in silence for several minutes, but I can tell she’s not asleep.
“Jo, I think I’m losing my mind.”
To her credit, she doesn’t call me crazy or agree. “Why do you say that?”
“The other Julia, her memories have blended with mine. They stay in the background, but they’re coming out more and more, especially around Reece. Sometimes I have trouble figuring out which are my feelings and which are hers.”
She waits a couple of seconds. “So what happened with Reece…?”
“That was her. Her memories were like a tornado and completely took over mine. She loved Reece, even though she was with Evan and had been for years. Maybe that’s why she had such a hard time admitting that she loved Reece. It’s hard to change something after so long. But she was with Reece when she died. I have the memory of her accident and her dying in my head. Her last breath was trying to tell Reece she loved him.” I pause for a few seconds. “When I kissed Reece last week, it was her kissing him. Her memories and feelings overtook mine and it was like I was her.”
“Crap.”
That seems a good way to sum it up. “I’ve hurt them both, and she’s hurt them both too. I’m tired of hurting people.”
“And Evan? If your feelings for Reece are hers, then what about how you feel for him?”
“When I’m with Reece, I have to fight her memories back, but when I’m with Evan, they’re completely mine.”
“Did you tell Evan?”
“I told him last week when I realized what was happening, but tonight I told him that it was getting worse.”
“You told him everything?”
“Well...not kissing Reece after we escaped. But I told him that she loved him. Evan thinks her memories are more prominent around Reece because he was with her when she died, and she loved him. He thinks our subconsciouses fused together and that’s why I can draw and dreamed about them in my world. He thinks taking me back to my world will save me.”
We’re quiet for several seconds. I hear her slow steady breath and think she’s fallen asleep until she asks, “How can you be sure that Evan loves you and not her ghost?”
I consider telling her Evan’s confession, but it fe
els too private. “I just do. I’m sure of it.”
“So if the portal to your universe is in Springfield, why are we going the opposite direction?”
I can pick from a host of answers, but I realize none will work. “That is a very good question.”
Chapter Sixteen
I’ve slept in the same clothes for three days. I know that I stink—Jo has told me so multiple times—and my hair is a greasy mess. I can’t remember the last time I last took a shower. Still, I haven’t been this happy in days.
We’ve found a tree.
Not the dead, toppled stumps that litter most of the Midwest and Rocky Mountains. This is a real pine tree with green needles.
The four of us stand around it like Charlie Brown and his supposed friends gathered around his pathetic Christmas tree, but this thing is real. Jo reaches out a hand and slides her thumb and index finger over the needles. “I’ve never seen a live one.”
“I was fascinated by them in Julia’s world,” Evan says. “The trees had leaves and many of them were going through chloroform loss and changing colors. It was amazing.”
I realize what a sad world they live in, to go their entire life never seeing a tree. It’s only one of so many things wrong with their world.
“Now what?” I ask. “This is a good sign, but how close are we to the rebel compound?”
Jo picks off a pine needle and holds it in her hand. “If our information is correct, we could reach it tomorrow.” What she doesn’t add is if we had enough ethanol.
Evan looks around. “Maybe we should camp here tonight and then start out again in the morning. We can spend the evening working out a plan for how to approach the compound.”
The jeep is running on ethanol fumes, and Evan is buying time to figure out what to do. We were lucky to run across a town yesterday, but could get only enough fuel to fill up our tank and not our spare containers. We may have to walk, which is how most people make this trek. Only, my ankle still isn’t healed.
“Good idea.” Reece mumbles. “Let’s get mauled by a bear.”
“Look around you, Reece.” Evan grins. “If there were a bear out here, he’d be waiting to maul you under this tree.”
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