Never Say Never (Resetter Series Book 2)

by Brenda Barrett

  He is smug, entitled, and downright dangerous and if nobody else sees it, I do. I am going to put a stop to this now. I need your help."

  Travis gasped. "I had no idea that..."

  "Because you detached yourself from the business!" Pasha snapped. "You gave that immoral creep, Duke Gillings a foothold into our company. Your father is planning to announce his succession plan to the world on his birthday.

  "And I guess he is going to confess that Duke is his and then they are going to change his name and hand him our company on a platter."

  Travis inhaled. "Mom, when did you find out about Duke?"

  "I always knew that Arlene was a threat." Pasha growled. "She was at the house before I got married to your father, playing wife. I guess they thought they could continue after I got here.

  "Some things you don't want to face. If I had acknowledged that I knew that Duke was his, I could have cut off the head of the monster before it began and they wouldn't have felt the need to go behind my back and strike deals and make insane decisions!"

  "But Mom," Travis swallowed, "if I come home this summer what am I going to do to change Dad's mind."

  "He will remember that he has another son." Pasha sighed. "He will know that just because you are in a wheelchair doesn't mean that you are invisible! Just come home. I have a plan and a thirty percent stake in Jefferson Pharmaceuticals. Your father has to respect that kind of power."

  Travis hung up the phone feeling disturbed.

  ****

  Sky was on her way to Travis' office when she saw Amelia Perkins marching towards the door. She made a detour to the cafeteria instead. The last thing she wanted was to go to the office with Amelia Perkins looking at her suspiciously. She had Amelia for second summer session, Macro Economics. She had just signed up; it was as good as done.

  Now she needed to find an eight-week job that could pay for the four courses she had just signed up for.

  Most of the on campus jobs were long taken. She slowed down at the entrance to the cafeteria to check the notice board anyway.

  Most of the notices were for summer rentals.

  "I would think that since you are seeing Doctor Hotty you could just sit out the summer," Emma said behind her, "or at least get a spot on his company's industrial placement scheme."

  Sky spun around. Emma had a headphone around her neck and a Walkman clipped to her jeans pocket and was looking considerably slimmer.

  "Hi." Sky tried not to act too shocked. She hadn't seen Emma in class for weeks.

  "You can say it," Emma muttered, "I look like hell warmed up, chewed up and spit out."

  "No," Sky shook her head, "not really. You've lost a ton of weight though. Where've you been?"

  "In Fluville," Emma muttered. "You are so caught up in your little romance with the man in wheelchair you didn't realize I was missing, did you?"

  "I noticed. I thought you were doing your usual, class skipping."

  "Nah." Emma cleared her throat. "I had the flu then got pneumonia. Did a one-week stay in hospital. They injected me like four times a day. I think my butt has holes in it."

  Sky headed to the food section with Emma walking behind her. Emma only chose a fruit plate and water. Sky chose the same; she was still full from breakfast.

  "Why did you say I had a romance with Dr. Jefferson?" Sky asked as soon as they sat down. She couldn't wait until they were out of earshot to accost Emma about it.

  "People said they see you two together and you looked chummy," Emma said biting into a mango slice.

  "I don't have an appetite." She looked at the fruit plate dispassionately. "I still feel like I am readjusting."

  Sky inhaled. "I wish people would mind their own business."

  Emma looked at her and then laughed. "Really? If we minded our own business, the world would be so dull and friendless and colorless. We need to be our brother's keeper, no man is an island...yada... yada"

  "Got it." Sky smirked.

  "You two did the deed yet?" Emma sipped some water and looked at Sky slyly. "You can tell me, I won't tell a soul."

  Sky chuckled. "I know you wouldn't tell a soul, you would tell several souls."

  "I am not a gossip," Emma protested unconvincingly. "I am just your garden variety friendly non-judgmental ear."

  Sky chuckled. "I am not going to talk about that."

  "Why not?" Emma wheedled. "There is nothing else juicy to talk about, unless you had a cat fight with Amelia Perkins, or he is bringing you to meet the parents. Is he?"

  "No." Sky sighed. "Here is something juicy to discuss, exam is in a couple of days."

  "You should totally insist on meeting the parents." Emma ignored her, "I heard that they live in a mansion in the St Andrew hills with a garden that is out of this world. The mother is a botanist or something..."

  Sky rolled her eyes. "I am not engaging you till you change the topic."

  "Industrial Placement Scheme," Emma said smugly, "Jefferson Pharmaceuticals hires university students every summer. I signed up. My parents are playing hard ball said I had to work for the summer because I wasted my time last year."

  Sky raised an eyebrow. "I would do that unfortunately I don't know anyone in Kingston."

  "You know me!" Emma said excitedly, "And what's more, we have room in the castle for you. My parents are excellent hosts."

  "No thanks." Sky shook her head.

  "Don't dismiss it, unless you are going to be staying with your boyfriend?" Emma was back to being nosy.

  "He is not..." Sky paused. What were they really? They had become extremely close in the past couple of weeks.

  She spent more time in his apartment than hers. Maybe they were close friends who once shared a kiss. A kiss she could still remember in stark detail. A kiss that she brought to life in her mind before going to sleep, before she showered, in the middle of class when he was speaking, and at odd times during her study group...

  "Oh Sky," Emma snapped her fingers before her eyes. "You are staring into space."

  "Sorry." Sky cleared her throat. "As I said, Dr. Jefferson is just a friend and neighbor."

  Emma speared a fruit and then grinned. "I so believe you."

  She miraculously changed the subject. "Want to help me with an overdue project?"

  "No." Sky shook her head, "I have eight exams to study for."

  "I'll give you my cassette," Emma held up her Walkman. "I have Celine Dion, Mariah Carey, Tony Rich Project on here. Weren't you crazy about that song, Nobody Knows it But Me, earlier this year?"

  Sky looked at the cassette and pretended to consider the offer.

  "No thanks, I would help you only if you had the Waiting To Exhale CD," Sky scratched her chin, "but then again, my cousin Addi said she'd send it to me next month."

  She got up and closed her fruit plate. "Take care Emma."

  Chapter Eleven

  "You are exceptionally quiet tonight," Travis said in the silence. Sky had entered the apartment earlier with a stack of books and past papers and had made her way to his couch, turned on the radio to Rick Dees weekly top 40 charts and had effectively ignored him.

  Not even Return of the Mack, a song she usually went crazy over, could stir her from her intense concentration.

  Sky looked over at him and frowned. "Sorry. What time is it?"

  "Time for you to take a break from studying," Travis wheeled closer to her and looked into her eyes. "You are tired. You should rest."

  He pointed at her mounds of papers covering his settee. "Close your eyes, relax."

  "Easy for you to say." Sky rubbed the back of her neck. "You are not the student."

  "I was a student once," Travis murmured, "and I have found that relaxing between bouts of studying worked."

  "Maybe." Sky leaned back in the settee and put her heavy textbook beside her with a sigh. "I saw Emma today."

  Travis chuckled. "Me too. She had her doctor's letter and meticulously explained why she wasn't around. She mentioned working at Jefferson Pharmaceuticals
this summer too. She threatened me to put in a good word with the HR department in forceful Emma style."

  Sky grimaced. "I would ask you to do the same for me but I have nowhere to stay in Kingston and I would never ever want to stay with Emma. One semester of living with her has cured me."

  "You could stay at my apartment," Travis offered lightly. "It has three bedrooms. My sister Milly lives there now, so you can get the guest room. It's also walking distance from the head office. You could work in the president's office. My dad's admin assistant, Betty, always needs an assistant. It would be an invaluable experience for you. You could get to see the inner running of the place."

  Sky sat up straighter. "You are kidding!"

  "No. I am not." Travis shrugged. "I can call the relevant people tomorrow."

  "Thank you, Travis." Sky whispered. "Thank you."

  "You are welcome. It's selfish of me really. I don't want to miss you this summer since I have to be in Kingston as well. There is a bit of a power play going on at the office and my mother wants me to be around and flex my muscles."

  Sky widened her eyes and looked at him a coy smile playing around her lips. "You'd miss me?"

  Travis nodded. "Yes."

  "So would you categorize us as... er... more than friends?"

  Travis backed away from her. "No talk about any of this until you are officially not my student.

  Sky chuckled and picked up the book she was absorbed in earlier. "Counting the days, Dr. Jefferson."

  ****

  Travis couldn't sleep after Sky left. His sister Milly called him pretty late to complain about his housekeeper, June who was watching her suspiciously.

  Travis soothed her somewhat and hung up the phone, making a mental note to call June and ask her to back off a bit. Milly was staying at his apartment for a month because she had nowhere else to go.

  She had shafted everyone who had helped her in the past somehow. All family members were on high alert even her own mother. Milly had stolen from Marla time and time again to feed her habit. He hoped she would kick her addiction for good this time around.

  He dearly hoped so.

  It pained his heart to think about it. Milly, was just five years older than he was; she had been battling addiction for over half of her life.

  He turned on the lamp. He didn't want to think about his family right now.

  He didn't want to think.

  He should probably lose himself in a book and then hopefully fall asleep, but he had no books close by other than that diary that Sky had insisted that he read.

  He picked it up reluctantly. On the very first page was the title: Resetters And Their Special Gift.

  "I am really reading this," he muttered to himself and skipped to the next page and began reading.

  This diary was written June 3, 1975

  My name is Gwendolyn Fisher Campbell and I am a resetter. I know I have the gift to reset events but I won't go back. Even though Vernon is not here with me anymore. I will not take the chance. What if I go back and I change something? Will my family change?

  I couldn't bear that. I would love to set some of my life events the way I think would be ideal but the past for me should be firmly left where it belongs, in the past.

  I met a resetter once; his name was Oswald King, the writer of the article attached to this book.

  He was born in 1889 and he had the gift to reset. I sought him out after reading the article attached in 1949, by that time he was sixty years old and living as a recluse in the hills of St. Andrew. He sent regular articles to the Daily Paper mostly surrounding the things that he changed in the past.

  He called his articles How It Was Before.

  Of course, nobody took his stories literally, it was to them a good piece of alternative historical fiction, a good way to past the time, but on discovering that the 't' in my palms was significant, and similar to what he described in his articles, I traveled to St. Andrew to find him.

  I could not tell any other family member about this, just Vernon who accompanied me.

  I was 28 at the time, married for twelve years, had three children, one of them, my dearest youngest boy Frederick died from typhoid fever just a few months earlier. I was still raw with grief.

  Vernon and I had never ventured into the capital city before and we were excited to experience what it was like to go to Kingston. It took my mind off my child's death for a while.

  We took the train from Kendal to Kingston and it was quite an experience. We had never been on a train before and I was quite taken with the beauty of the interior hills.

  We reached Kingston late afternoon after venturing out in the early morning, the train was so slow; it was a good thing we carried food for the journey.

  When we found Oswald King's house it was near night. The house was a white square edifice with brown shutters. There was a wrap around veranda at the top, which I assumed was to take advantage of the views.

  Vernon was the one who knocked on the door. By this time we were feeling exhausted and not very confident in leaving our home just to pursue what was for us an unlikely adventure.

  When Oswald King answered the door, Vernon pulled back; he wasn't expecting a tall imposing white man to answer.

  Oswald was stern looking, and heavily tanned with red patches along his face especially his nose. It was obvious that he spent hours in the sun. He was suspicious of us at first but then I showed him my palms as we greeted he became very excited.

  I have never been greeted so enthusiastically by a human being in my entire life.

  He pressed us to stay for the night.

  His housekeeper Mrs. Cotton was quite friendly too and told us that they didn't have many visitors. She cooked corned beef and serve slices of it with cabbage and potatoes. It was Mr. King's favorite meal. He was half Irish on his mother's side.

  Oswald King spoke all throughout dinner. He told us of his childhood, he told us of his marriage to a woman named Daisy who left him twice in each timeline and he told us everything about the resetters.

  He had met many resetters in his life. He had been an army man and traveled the world.

  It was an Irish cousin of his, Sean O'Sullivan who had seen his palms and told him that he was a resetter and what it meant.

  It was also Sean O'Sullivan who gave him clues to where the pathways were in Jamaica.

  He had gotten it off a sailor, who had gotten it from a pirate and this ancient map could be traced all the way to Sir Henry Morgan, who was rumored to be a resetter himself.

  He showed us the pathway clues and I readily recognized that one of the clues was linked to my land. I could barely contain my excitement.

  Here they are:

  'In a land that is cool, the stone is blue; palm-to-palm you'll know what to do.

  'At the side of the road in plain sight covered in stone lays a resetter and his ride.'

  'Nestled in a rock with grime and filth lays a gem in the midst of it, for a resetter do with it what he wilt.'

  There is a stone on my land, which is blue; it has a palm print of sorts in there. I told Oswald King and he was excited too and then he sobered up.

  He warned us that going back would not necessarily change the future for the better. He told us that resetters can go back anywhere in their lives even their birth.

  He told us that resetters have been dabbling in time for centuries. Some were burnt at the stakes as witches and have been persecuted through the ages. They tend to keep a low profile, many of them choosing not to travel back in time because it was more trouble than it was worth.

  He also said that resetters have made changes in political events but weren't very successful so far. He says that he has met resetters who tried to avert major disasters but ended up creating another. He told us that resetters should be mostly observers. Vernon and I retired late into the night unable to sleep.

  Thinking about all we had learned and if it was true. We talked about going back and changing things for Frederick. We conside
red how blessed we were that the other children who had also gotten the fever had not died.

  Suppose I went back and then all three of them died. Resetting was a gamble we were not willing to take.

  When I got up in the morning I was sure that resetting was not for me. But I am sure that there are other people braver than me who would do it. It is powerful thing—having the ability to go back in time with prior knowledge. If you are a resetter and you want to go back here are all the facts that I learned from Oswald King.

  Some facts about resetters:

  Resetters are characterized by having a t in their palms. This is a very rare occurence. Most resetters are not aware that they have this gift.

  Resetters have to connect with a pathway. Pathways are usually made of stone. One known pathway is right in my backyard, the blue rock.

  Resetters can take back some things with them including rings, watches, photographs and notebooks. But only if it was produced or available in the time in which they went back to and only if these items are clutched in their palms.

  Resetters usually forget their other life the longer they stay in the new one. For some people it happens quickly they only have a few days to reset, for others there are exceptions to this rule.

  There are resetters who remember the other time line clearly for the rest of their lives. Oswald King says he has met a few of them; they give him stories for his articles. They make predictions and are called prophets.

  They sometimes prevent disasters.

  Oswald King has met resetters who are coming from as far ahead as 1980. He heard that he would die Septemeber 1, 1957 from what is now known as the infamous train crash in Kendal.

  He told us he will never ride that train again, he wouldn't leave his house in 1957 but apparently he did. He was one of the casualties of that accident.

  If you are a resetter and reading this, please note that you have a great responsibility on your hands, use it for good not evil.

  *****

  Travis glanced at the clock. It was nearing two o'clock in the morning. He couldn't believe that he had been so engrossed in the diary.