Sound

by Juliet Madison

  “Freaking wonderful,” my sister whispered under her breath, her jaw tight with disappointment.

  I wished I could see Damon’s reaction, but turning back around now would be weird. I didn’t know much about him, but he seemed smart. If he was anything like his sister, he must be.

  Mr. Jenkins assigned the remaining groups and put more notes on the screen, including the due date. “You have six weeks to create a PowerPoint presentation and a visual display or model on one of the following three topics: social and environmental influences on health and disease; DNA, the master of the human body; or the inner universe—the wonders of the human brain.”

  Number three. Yes! I hoped like hell that Lara and Damon would agree. Though Damon probably would go along with anything and Lara would probably have the final say, so here’s hoping she didn’t have an obsession with DNA as strong as her obsession with fingernail art. If we studied the human brain, I could learn more about brain waves—delta brain waves in particular. The ones we (or I, mostly) proposed had something to do with our psychic ability after Savannah woke from her coma almost seven months ago.

  “Wonder if I could be the visual display for the human brain topic,” Savannah chuckled as she whispered in my ear. I didn’t know if she meant because of her past aneurysm or because of her psychic gift of sight. And then I had a strange sight myself—imagining the five of us in front of the class, showing everyone how we connected and how we sensed the future. If it wasn’t suitable for science class, perhaps it could go in the school talent show for most entertaining variety performance.

  Mr. Jenkins gave the class the guidelines, then continued with the lesson. My brain absorbed the information as usual and Savannah yawned as usual. When we finished, Damon approached and Lara turned to me and said, “We should exchange phone numbers so we can discuss the project.”

  Damon took out his phone and pressed a few buttons. “Here, put yours in.” He handed it to me.

  My hand shook a little as I took it. It felt weird to be using someone else’s phone. Even weirder that it was a guy. I tapped in my full name and number. Should I put my address? No, he didn’t ask for that. And he’d only need it if they planned on coming to our house.

  “We should each come up with a list of pros and cons for each topic, so we can work out the most effective option for getting the maximum grade.”

  Wow. She was like me on steroids.

  “Um, okay. Though I think the brain one could be the most interesting.”

  “I agree,” said Damon.

  Yes. I mentally pumped my fist in victory.

  “Possibly, but still, we need to make sure.”

  Damon rolled his eyes.

  “So, um, should I get your number too?” I asked no one in particular, though I meant Damon.

  “Yeah.”

  I took out my phone, pressed “add contact,” and handed it to him. “Here you go.” I hoped none of my sisters would take that exact moment to send me a text message saying, “Come quick, I’m getting a vision!”

  “Thanks.” He tapped at the screen for what seemed like forever.

  I tried to look casual when he handed it back, briefly glancing at the details he’d put in, including his address.

  Savannah and I left the class together.

  “You’re in a group with a boooy,” she teased in a singsong way.

  “Shh!” I turned to make sure the boooy wasn’t behind us.

  Phew. And great—the first boy to ask for my number only did it because he had to. Still, a girl could pretend otherwise, right?

  Chapter 3

  The tune I’d practiced at my violin lesson replayed in my mind as I walked home from my instructor’s home studio. The brisk autumn breeze tickled my face, swirling and slapping in a rhythmic mixture of high and low notes. It occurred to me then that sound wasn’t just sound—something you heard with your ears that the brain detected as an auditory signal—it was more like a bridge, leading toward some sort of recognition or awareness of a moment in time, triggering an emotion, a memory, and creating new ones.

  Huh, I mused, impressed by my insightful analysis of the sense of sound. I found that the more I focused on a particular sense, the more it focused on me, in a way. As though sound itself were a living entity and I were its sense.

  My shoe caught on a small rock and I tripped, landing on my knees, my violin case tumbling onto the ground. “Ouch!” I brushed gravel off my knees, and mentally brushed the deep, weird thoughts from my mind. I really should stop overthinking things and focus on what’s in front of me. I picked up my case and opened it, hoping the violin wasn’t damaged. There it sat in its padded red velvet case, perfect and shiny as always. I glanced around, relieved that no one had witnessed my moment of clumsiness, and continued the walk home.

  “Are you okay?” Talia accosted me as soon as I opened the front door.

  “Yes, why?” I glanced down at my knee. It was red and dimpled from loose gravel but wasn’t bleeding.

  She noticed the direction of my gaze and her eyes widened. “I knew it! See, girls, told you I sensed something.” She turned around but only Tamara looked up from her laptop screen with interest. Sasha was on the phone, Savannah wasn’t around (probably at Riley’s), and Mom was still at work. “I felt a pain in my knee, a little while ago.” She touched her hand to the affected leg.

  “Really? I tripped,” I said. Hmm, this was interesting. Talia was also getting an increase in her sense, though usually our senses were only heightened and gave us future glimpses when we were all together, connecting with our hands.

  “Well, there you go.” She gave a nod. “Cool.”

  “Cool.” I smiled.

  “How did you trip?” asked Tamara, and I thought how nice it was of her to tear her focus away from the mouth-watering recipe pictures on Pinterest to inquire about my well-being. Until she added, “You were thinking up some grand hypothesis about something and got distracted, didn’t you.” It wasn’t a question. And she laughed. “Am I right?” She didn’t need to be psychic to know the answer. She only needed to be my sister.

  “Um, a little bit, yeah.” I retreated toward the bedroom. The bedroom, because when you shared with two of your sisters, there was no my about it.

  I pushed open the slightly ajar door and gasped. “Oops. Sorry!”

  Riley and Savannah looked up from their kiss, frozen in an awkward “we just got busted” embrace on Savannah’s bed. Thankfully, they were fully clothed. I didn’t think their relationship had progressed to that extreme yet. At least, Savvy hadn’t mentioned anything. Would she mention something? I stepped backward and left the door slightly ajar, as it was before, placing my violin case against the hallway wall. I wished I did have my own bedroom that I could escape into, since Savannah seemed to think this one was hers and hers alone. Why couldn’t they get all lovey-dovey at Riley’s house? He didn’t have parents there to object, only his older brother, Leo, who was probably working at the restaurant.

  I sighed, kicked off my shoes outside the door, and went to the kitchen to grab an apple.

  As I chewed, I wondered…What would it feel like to kiss Damon?

  What? Huh? Why am I thinking that?

  Warmth flushed my face. I didn’t even know him very well. I didn’t even like him in that way. Or did I? Maybe I was just feeling all weird and grown-up because I gave him my number and got his, regardless of the reasons. That, combined with seeing Riley and Savannah making out. That was all it was, a random collision of nerve impulses in my brain, conjuring up ridiculous scenarios.

  I had an urge for salted caramel choc-chip fudge ice cream and went outside to sit on the patio with a small serving. I rested my phone on my thigh and opened up the notes app.

  Pros and cons for each topic for our science project…

  I’ll start with my choice.

  The inner universe, the wonders of the human brain:

  PROS: CONS:

  I can learn more about our gift. None.
<
br />   It’s the most interesting.

  I want to.

  Yeah…no. Don’t think Lara would find that scientifically valid.

  I jotted down a few ideas, making sure to favor my choice of subject with a convincing list of pros, and by the time I’d finished I heard the squeak of the front door.

  “Hello, my darlings.” I could feel a shift in energy in the house from Mom’s entrance even before she’d spoken. The house expanded with her presence. “What’s new?”

  We read Dad’s letter.

  A boy asked for my number.

  And if she went into my—our—bedroom she’d find out something else new. But when I walked back inside and popped my empty ice cream bowl in the kitchen, Savannah and Riley had already emerged, Savvy with a strand of hair sticking up on one side.

  “I have a science project to get started on. With two other students, so I might be working some afternoons at their house,” I said.

  “And one of the others is a boooy,” teased Savannah.

  “Oh?” Mom asked.

  I diverted my gaze. “Damon and Lara. They’re twins.”

  “Sounds like your school is the center of multiple births.” Mom chuckled.

  “Are they identical twins?” asked Sasha.

  I looked at her with eyebrows raised. “You’re not serious?”

  “Yeah, well, are they?”

  Everyone stayed silent until Sasha burst out laughing. “You don’t really think I’m that stupid, do you?” She laughed, then plonked herself on the couch.

  Um, for a moment I had thought she was serious. You could never tell with Sasha. She gave the impression that she didn’t care about retaining knowledge, but there was a smart-ish girl underneath—she just didn’t like to admit it.

  “Riley, sweetheart, are you staying for dinner?” Mom asked, taking her bags to the kitchen.

  He scratched his head, probably also trying to put his own hair strands back into alignment. “Um, thanks, Mrs. Delcarta, but Leo brought some leftovers home from the restaurant last night so I better not let them go to waste.”

  “In that case, let’s go eat at your place!” Mom joked. “Nah, well, if you’re sure.”

  “Yep, thanks.” He turned to Savannah and kissed her on the cheek. “I better get going.”

  She walked him to the door as he waved goodbye to us, even though we’d all see him tomorrow morning anyway. He was practically part of the family now, and I think Mom took pity on him a little, for the fact that he’d lost both his mother and father at such a vulnerable age.

  Speaking of parents, I felt a pang of guilt at the fact that we’d read the letter and Mom wasn’t aware. Talia must have sensed that, because she cast a warning glance in my direction.

  Think of Mom.

  Yes.

  She was starting to get back to normal again, whatever that was, and there was no need to disrupt the peace.

  “Are you using a new massage oil with your clients, Mom?” asked Sasha, wrinkling her nose. “Smells kind of…different.”

  “Juniper,” she replied. “It’s good for the lymphatic system.”

  “What’s the lymphatic system?” Sasha asked, then added, “Don’t worry, school’s over, no need to overload the brain in one day.”

  Mom was about to explain, then waved her hands about as though it were too much effort anyway. “Well, time to get started on dinner.”

  “Don’t you want to put your feet up for a few minutes first, Mom?” Talia gestured to the couch.

  “Don’t tempt me, darling. If I sit down I might not get up. Best to keep going.”

  Mom’s motto. Keep going, don’t stop, because stopping meant fatigue, and stopping meant thinking, and stopping meant remembering. And remembering meant feeling. And that hurt too much.

  After dinner, Mom said, “So, girls, any, ah, new developments?” She eyed us curiously. And we eyed each other with awkward, conflicted expressions.

  “Nope, if you mean have we seen anything, then no. Not for a while,” Talia spoke for all of us.

  “Right. Well, you know where I am if you, ah, need anything. Or have questions. Yeah?”

  We nodded. Mom lowered her head for a moment, as though feeling helpless. Here we were, psychic daughters of an experienced psychic who had lost all her abilities. She must feel stranded without them. Maybe I could think up some general questions to make her feel useful, but there were only two questions on my mind:

  How did Dad know his life was in danger?

  What aren’t you telling us?

  Mom busied herself in the kitchen as Tamara helped her, and I texted my pros and cons to Lara and Damon. Lara replied back, with about sixty percent of her pros and cons the same as mine. At this rate, she was feeling more related to me than my own sisters. A few minutes later, Damon replied, his text simply ditto. Then Lara said she would spend some time weighing up the options and get back to me.

  After dinner, we gathered in the bedroom (as it was for triplets, our room was bigger and the obvious choice for our gatherings). “Well, let’s see how we go.” Savannah held out her hands with a sigh, as if she didn’t expect to see anything. And we probably wouldn’t. Just because we’d opened Dad’s letter didn’t mean we would suddenly understand all its secrets and be enlightened as to what it all meant.

  I grasped Savannah’s left hand and Sasha’s right hand. We closed our eyes and took a deep breath. And waited. And waited.

  “See? Nothing.” Savannah dropped her hands.

  A buzzing sounded in my ear. “Hang on.” I grasped her hand again. The buzzing resumed, like a bug was flitting around my ear. And then, something else…bubbles. Recognition made my heart beat faster. Ooh, here we go. The bubbles are back!

  Savannah’s hand gripped mine harder and I knew she felt it too, the strange sensation that always heralded the onset of our visions. When it was over, we’d write down what we experienced in our journal, and try to put all our senses together into a complete picture to make sense of it.

  Paper crumpling…pen scratching…Dad’s letter? Then a voice. No, voices. Muffled, like they were coming from another room. I angled my ear, trying to make out what they were saying, even though it probably didn’t make a difference. Two different women’s voices. Maybe one male. “Not right,” someone said. “Must do something.” Who were they? I didn’t recognize them. They sounded old. And sort of refined. Like, upper class or something. And what were they talking about? There was a subtle clattering, like someone was gathering up fancy cups and saucers. I tried my best to memorize everything; you could never tell how significant some little sound might be. As I settled into the experience, absorbing the sounds, something pulled me right out of my relaxed awareness—a gut-wrenching, soul-destroying scream.

  Nausea rose in my belly. I tried to maintain the connection, but my hands dropped free and gripped first my belly, then my ears.

  “What did you hear?” Savannah asked, her eyes wide.

  “A scream. Oh God, it was awful.” I rubbed my ears.

  “Whose scream? Not one of us? Mom?”

  “I don’t think so, but it was hard to tell. It was definitely female, though.”

  “You didn’t see who it was?” I asked Savannah.

  She shook her head. “All I saw was, um…” she closed her eyes. “Let me start from the beginning. I saw paper getting tossed into the trash, and letters—as in the alphabet—all jumbled up and floating around but not forming any words. And teacups. Really old, expensive teacups and saucers. Old fingers, holding the teacups, bringing them to their lips. Pursed lips, wrinkly, and then a quick flash of their faces. Three people. I can barely remember what they looked like now, but there were two old ladies, and one man. Glasses. Curly short hair—the woman, not the man. He was bald.”

  Talia jotted down what Savannah said.

  Savannah opened her eyes. “And then, a splash of water, a big one, like in the ocean, and I couldn’t see anything else after that.”

  “Do you thin
k the scream could have been one of the old ladies?” asked Talia.

  I twisted my lips to the side. “Don’t think so, it sounded younger. But then again, who really knows what someone’s scream will sound like until it’s heard?”

  I shivered. I hadn’t been prepared for such a sound, especially after so long without hearing anything much. Dread pooled in my gut. Did this mean there was some other tragedy we’d have to prevent? Great. Just great. Now my mind would never relax.

  “Well, I tasted tea. Black. Strong, too. Yuck!” Tamara stuck her tongue out. “But then, nothing but a dry, bitter sensation. Really dry, like my mouth had been sucked of all its moisture.”

  “Ew, gross, Tamara!” Sasha sat on her bed. “I smelled the tea, then salt. Like salt water.” She leaned back on her elbows. “Oh, and also some revolting perfume. Like, powdery, and flowery. Grandma perfume.” She leaned over to her bedside table and spritzed herself with body spray, I assumed to get the revolting memory out of her mind. “What did you feel, Talia?”

  “I felt myself writing, but couldn’t tell what. Then scribbling something out, and scrunching up the paper.” She eyed us all. “Do you think that was Dad writing his letter?”

  “But we usually only see the future, right, not the past?” I asked.

  Talia shrugged. “Guess so, but then again, we never thought Savvy would see Dad’s ghost. Or Riley’s dad’s ghost. Who knows how this thing works?” She jotted something down. “I could feel the fine china against my fingers, the coldness of it against my lips. Then I felt sort of dizzy. That’s it.”

  Hmm. Confusing. “What does it all mean?” I asked, but mostly to ask my own brain, because I found that when I asked myself questions out loud I was more likely to come up with an answer.

  “Some geriatrics having a tea party, by the looks of it,” said Sasha. “How fascinating.”

  “Maybe we’ll get more clues tomorrow night when we connect again. Let’s let it settle and come back to it,” Talia yawned.