by BC Powell
I’m stunned by her words. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t know if it would happen while you’re here now,” she replies. “It could have been on your next visit. I only knew it would happen before your Ritual of Purpose. In my Vision, there was no color of purpose in your hair.”
“That doesn’t explain why you didn’t tell me.”
“The last time you were here, you said you could take something to make your visits stop. If I’d told you I would die when you’re here, you never would have returned to Krymzyn. Even if it meant you had to die in your world, you wouldn’t have come back so that I could live.”
I listen to her answer again in my mind. “You’re right,” I say. “I would’ve done whatever I had to so I wouldn’t come back if I thought it would protect you, even if they can’t heal me in my world. You really know me, don’t you?”
“I do,” she says softly, “just as you know me.”
Her logic for never telling me sinks in as I look into her eyes. “You were going to let yourself die without saying anything so I could stay in my world if they could heal me, but come back here to live if I thought I would die on Earth?”
“That was my hope. I wanted you to have the choice.”
“That’s what you meant on the Mount when you said to make decisions that are best for my life?”
“Yes,” she replies. “I just wanted you to have a chance for life no matter what happened to me.”
Her explanation is the exact selflessness I would expect from her. Sash thought she would die in this river but still fought on top of the bridge so that others could get to safety. The idea of running to save herself would never enter her mind, even when believing that the end of her life was moments away.
I lean my forehead against hers. “Now that this is behind us, do you think we can be together?”
“That’s what I want,” Sash replies, finally smiling, “and I believe we will.”
We gently kiss, holding each other in our arms. The churning inside the billows slows, the rain stops falling, and the first rays of scarlet cut through the edges of the clouds. From the corner of my eye, I see bright light on the bridge and turn as Larn stops on top of the arch.
After tying it securely to the end of a rope, Tork throws the pillow into the river. Waves toss the pillow high in the air before it floats back to the water. They slowly feed more rope and steer the pillow to the edge of the rock. As I guessed it might be, when I pull the pillow from the water, it’s perfectly dry. I untie it from the end of the rope and kneel in front of Sash.
She helps me wrap the rope behind her back and under her arms. I tie a knot in front of her chest, checking it several times to make sure it’s secure. Enough spare rope still dangles from the knot for me to attach the pillow in front of her.
“Hold the rope tightly with both hands,” I say, looking into her eyes, “and use the pillow to keep your head above water. Kick your feet to stay upright. If you see a wave about to crash over you or feel yourself going under, take a huge breath and hold it in.”
Sash nods her understanding.
“Are you ready to do this, or do you need more rest?” I ask.
“I’m ready,” she says.
I help Sash to her feet, face the bridge, and make a megaphone around my mouth with my hands. “Pull fast when she’s in the water!” I scream.
Tork waves a hand over his head, acknowledging that he heard me.
I look at Sash again. “Hold your breath when I tell you. I’ll throw you as far as I can out into the water so you’re clear of the rock. You won’t have any problem doing this.”
“Chase,” she replies. “I love you.”
“I love you, too,” I say. “Always. Now let’s get us both to safety.” I grip her waist with both hands and quickly kiss her lips. “Take a big breath.”
After she inhales, I fling her as far as I can into the rapids at the side of the rock. A wave immediately crashes over her. I glance at the bridge to see Tork, Larn, and a Watcher furiously pulling the rope. My eyes follow the black line from the bridge back to the rapids, finding where it disappears under the water. Sash surfaces, kicking her way up and over a wave, then gulps a new breath. Another wave surges over her, but she comes back up behind it, still clutching the rope in her hands.
Time doesn’t seem to move as they drag her through the rapids. I finally see her body emerge from the water under the bridge. Glittering scarlet swings in the air as they pull her up to the edge. Tork grasps her arm, lifts her onto the bridge, and rests her on the steel surface. When I see Sash cough a few times, I know she’s conscious and breathing. Tork hands her his flask and she drinks from it, finally waving to me to let me know she’s safe.
Tork and Larn untie the rope from Sash, reattach the pillow to the end, and throw it back into the river. While they guide it down the rapids, I take several long, deep breaths, allowing myself to finally feel relief.
I look down at the river in front of my feet. My head starts to spin and I fall backwards onto the rock. I brace my hands on the granite, glancing up at Sash and trying to wave. She’ll know what’s happening.
A giant wave splashes off the side of the rock and high into the air in front of me, silver foam filling my vision.
* * *
“Sash,” I whispered to my computer screen.
As soon as I stopped shaking and strength returned to my hands, I slid the chair up to my laptop. When I watched the recording of my seizure over and over, frame by frame, I was amazed by what I saw.
Chapter 30
I dove for the Frisbee, slid on my knees across soft, warm sand, and whipped the disk back to my dad. He snagged it one-handed from the air before jogging across the beach to me.
“That’s all, Chase. I’m worn out,” Dad laughed.
I stood and gave him a sweat-soaked grin. The planets had aligned, the weather gods had smiled, and we had a beautiful, warm, sunny Friday at Zuma Beach. I turned to my mom and sister, who were sitting on a blanket spread out on the sand.
“Ally, come for a walk with me,” I called, motioning to her with my hand.
“Not now, Chase. Mom and I are chillin’,” she replied, wrinkling her face.
“Come on,” I said.
I walked to the blanket, leaned down, and lifted Ally by the arm to her feet. As she stood, a feigned frown on her face, I was instantly reminded of Tela. Maybe I just wanted to see a resemblance between them, comforting my mind that I could find a surrogate in Krymzyn to replace my sister.
We strolled along the edge of the water, calm waves breaking onto the shore and white foam lapping at our feet. I’d started taking the anti-seizure medication as soon as I’d returned from the trip to the Mount. I’d had a lot to take care of over the past week and wanted everything in place before my Ritual in Krymzyn, just in case the outcome wasn’t what I hoped for.
I’d spent late nights in my studio working on the painting to leave for my family, only sleeping an hour or two each night. Since the cancer was still in an early stage, the only symptoms I’d experienced were headaches, mild nausea, and occasional blurry vision. I’d been able to hide them all from my family, despite how tired I’d felt.
Every moment of the day, every second I could, I’d spent with Mom, Dad, and Ally. When feelings of sadness and anxiety would hit me, panic at times, I’d ease my mind by telling myself that I didn’t have to go through with it. But I knew I would.
Mom had said to me that she’d be more upset at my missing my chance for happiness than she would be if I moved away. She hadn’t known that moving away meant never seeing each other again, but that didn’t lessen the meaning of her words. My chance for happiness was in Krymzyn.
For a few minutes on a slab of black granite in the center of a savage river, I’d had that chance taken away from me. When the breath of life had returned to Sash, I’d vowed that I would do everything I could for as long as I lived to make sure that chance never slipped away again. Those minu
tes on the rock, a scene from her own Vision of the Future, had been meant for me—final, absolute confirmation that my life belonged in Krymzyn.
After we walked about a mile, Ally filling me in on her junior year at Berkeley, I sat on the sand and looked out over the ocean. Ally sat beside me, both of us watching as the sun quickly fell to the horizon.
“You know, we’re lucky we grew up the way we did,” I said. “We just have, like, a perfect family.”
She turned and smiled at me. “Yeah, we are lucky. It’s funny to hear you say that, considering all you had to go through.”
“That didn’t matter,” I said, looking out over the waves, splashes of sunlight on their crests. “Shit happens, you know. But the important stuff has always been there for us. I mean, I hope they know how much I love them and know that you and I appreciate everything they’ve done for us.”
“They do,” Ally replied, still smiling.
“Ally,” I said softly. “I want you to know that I love you. I mean, I know I was an asshole sometimes. That’s just how big brothers are. But you’re the best sister a guy could ever have.”
She paused before answering. “Why are you saying this stuff, Chase?” She reached one arm around my shoulder, her voice cracking. “It’s back, isn’t it?”
“Two tumors,” I said, nodding. “They’re both malignant.”
Her hands shook as she reached her other arm around me, smothering me in a hug. Tears dripped from her face onto my shoulder. “What did they say?” she sobbed in my ear.
“Six months to two years. Who knows? There’s always a chance for full recovery. The surgery is in a few weeks,” I lied, wanting her to return to school. “I haven’t told Mom and Dad yet. Please, Ally, I don’t want you to say anything. I’ll tell them after you go back to school. I just wanted us to have this week together.”
“I won’t say anything,” she said, trying to control her tears. “This really sucks. I love you so much, Chase. You don’t deserve this.”
“I’ll let you know the exact date of the surgery so you can come back if you want to,” I said, continuing my string of lies.
“Of course I want to be with you,” she replied.
Sitting on the sand, we held each other for several minutes. Then I leaned back to look in her eyes.
“Ally, I have to tell you something, and you have to listen to me. You’re going to think I’m crazy, but you have to listen.”
She nodded, never taking her eyes off mine, and bit her bottom lip.
“You know all those pictures I’ve drawn over the years . . . and you’ve heard me describe what the doctor called a hallucination when I was younger.”
“I remember,” she said. “Mom thought you obsessed over it so much to escape reality.”
“It is reality. I go there, like to another dimension or universe or something, and I know for a fact it’s real. If I die on Earth, there’s a way I’ll still live in that world.”
She smiled at me, but it was a sad, patronizing smile, as if to say, “If that helps you get through this, it’s okay to believe that, and I won’t say anything to dispel your fantasy.”
“Ally,” I said firmly, “come to my studio late tonight, after Mom and Dad are asleep. I’ll prove to you it’s real.”
Curiosity momentarily reflected in her eyes. I pulled her close again and hugged her without saying anything else. We both looked out over the ocean, our arms around each other, watching the sun until it touched the water. When I was sure her emotions were completely under control, we walked back to our parents.
Late that night, Ally knocked on my locked studio door. She was leaving the next afternoon to go back to school. This was my only chance to try and convince her it was all real. I opened the door, walked her around my easel, and stood her in front of the four-foot-by-three-foot canvas I’d been working on all week.
I watched Ally’s pensive reaction as she studied the oil painting of Sash and me on top of the Tall Hill. In the painting, our hands were clasped tightly together, spears dangled from our other hands, and our feet were surrounded by crimson blades of grass. Under billowing clouds, brilliant streaks of scarlet and orange high above our heads, we both had peaceful smiles on our faces. I’d added a huge sustaining tree to the side of the hill in the foreground that wasn’t accurate as far as its location, but no one on Earth would know the difference. The Mount of Krymzyn rose behind us in the distance, majestic in its forest green glow.
“Geez, Chase. You’ve been drawing that girl since you were twelve,” Ally said.
“Her name is Sash,” I replied, “and the love we share, the way I feel about her, is more real than anything I’ve ever felt with anyone here.”
She slowly turned her head to me and frowned. “Do you realize how incredibly fucked up that sounds?”
“Yeah, I know, but listen. Have you ever had a recurring dream, but the exact same amount of time passes in between your dreams and in real life? Like, when you wake up from your dream on a Tuesday morning, in the dream it was Tuesday morning as well? Two days later, Thursday night, you reenter the dream and it’s Thursday night in the dream? Like the dream and real life are in perfect sync, and it happens over and over?”
“No, of course not,” she replied.
“Well, that’s what happens when I go there. Hallucinations don’t work that way, Ally. Everything is sequential when I go. People age the same amount as I do between visits. I mean, I first went when I was twelve, then seventeen, and now twenty-three. Everyone there has aged the exact same amount as I have. If I make a plan for something while I’m there, then it happens the next time I go. My seizures are only seconds here, but I can be there for hours during them.”
“That’s kind of weird,” she finally answered after a few seconds of thought.
“I want to show you something else,” I said.
We stepped to my desk, and I turned my laptop towards Ally. The video was already queued, so I clicked play and showed her the recording of my seizure. In the video, my body suddenly convulsed, legs stiffened, and hands jerked away from my body. Then I just sat in the chair, shaking, with drool dripping from my lower lip. Right before the seizure ended, my entire body jolted again like I’d been hit by an electric shock.
“I’ve seen your seizures in person,” Ally said quietly.
“But you never saw this,” I replied.
I scrolled back to the beginning of the seizure and zoomed in to my face. Stepping through the video frame by frame, I showed her the first convulsion forwards and backwards, making sure we saw the same frame over and over. In only one frame, dull beams of amber light streamed out of my eyes straight towards the camera.
“What is that?” Ally asked.
“Watch,” I said.
I scrolled to the end of the video, to the last flex of my body before my muscles relaxed, and stopped on a frame. The same amber light flared from my eyes.
“Where I go,” I said, “they do something called ‘blending their light.’ They merge their own bodies with rays of light. It’s complicated. The amber light you see is what takes me there.”
Ally stared at the screen for a few seconds then turned to look at the painting again. For a brief moment, I saw belief in her eyes.
“This isn’t proof of anything, Chase,” she finally said, shaking her head. “That could just be a computer glitch, or maybe you even painted those on there.”
“I didn’t touch the video,” I replied.
“It still isn’t proof of anything,” she argued.
“If the cancer kills me,” I said, knowing that it wouldn’t be cancer that killed me, “I want you to know I’m alive there. I have pages and pages of all that’s happened to me in a journal. You can also look at my drawings. I have hundreds of them you haven’t seen. You’ll know, Ally. You’ll know I’m there, and you have to convince Mom and Dad it’s all real so they know I’m safe.”
Ally shook her head and started to cry. I stepped to her, and we hugged tightly.<
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“Just keep an open mind, Ally,” I said in her ear. “You know I’m not a psycho. Besides, maybe I can beat it.” The last words were said only to calm her down.
“It’s sure a beautiful painting,” she whispered. “The best you’ve ever done.”
“Thank you, Ally. Anyway, you’ll come back before the surgery so we can talk more about it then,” I said, lying to her yet again. “I just wanted you to see this before you left.”
I hated deceiving her, but it was the only way she would return to school without saying anything to our parents. She spent another ten minutes just studying the painting and then went to bed.
I’d stopped taking the anti-seizure meds the day before, wanting to get them out of my system as soon as I was ready to return for my Ritual. A headache had started that afternoon, but I didn’t think much of it at the time. They were gradually getting more frequent as the cancer spread through my brain.
As the headache amplified, shooting from the back of my neck into my temples, I knew what it was. I had just enough time to hit record on my laptop and sit in a chair before the seizure started.
Chapter 31
Sash sits ten feet down the Empty Hill with her back to me when I arrive. I know she knows I’m here, but she doesn’t turn to me. After walking to her, I sit on the grass beside her. Slipping one arm around her waist, I pull her close. She nuzzles my neck with her nose.
“I would have come sooner,” I say. “Not that I can really control it, but I had a lot to take care of in my world.”
“I understand,” she says. “When I last slept, I saw you return in a dream, so I’ve been waiting for you.”
She lifts her head and turns her face to mine. I lean forward and kiss her lips.
“Have you recovered?” I ask.
“Yes, I’ve healed,” she says. “Thank you again for what you did, Chase.”
“It’s just what we do for each other,” I reply. “What happened to Miel?”
