Roam (Roam Series, Book One)

by Stedronsky, Kimberly

  “No, you’re not.” He ran his hand through his hair, buttoning his shirt. Two of the top buttons were opened. Did I do that to him? “I’m sorry- Roam, I’m so sorry,” he knelt down to me, putting his hands on my shoulders. “We can’t do this. Like I said, it ends badly. Every time.”

  “I know,” I controlled myself, guilt kneading in my stomach. I held my abdomen, willing it to settle.

  “I don’t want you alone at night. The dreams- they will get worse.” I couldn’t imagine what was worse than last night. “No one can know about the numbers. You have to keep them covered.”

  I stared into space, lost in my guilty thoughts. I thought of Morgan, proud of my new “tattoo.” I decided I wouldn’t tell him about her seeing the numbers on my arm.

  “If there is a night your dad won’t be here, I need to know. You can’t be alone.”

  “The dreams- will I have them every night?” I asked, expressionless.

  He shook his head. “No. They will lessen and then become infrequent... in time.”

  I nodded. My feelings from when Logan was with Abby surfaced- I couldn’t imagine hurting Logan like that. He was intuitive, and I was a terrible actress, as he pointed out. I thought about the last few minutes. I had no control over my mind or my actions- I was completely at his mercy. If he hadn’t stopped, I wouldn’t have stopped.

  “You should go.” I lifted my eyes to his. “I’ll just see you tomorrow morning.”

  He stood up. I cleared my throat, standing up to face him. I could still taste him on my swollen lips.

  “Please call me when you wake up?” Patiently, he waited for me to consider my feelings.

  “I will, West,” I promised, looking up at him. Fury burned my gaze. “As long as you take me to Russia. If you’re really going, I’m going too. Otherwise, I walk. Away from all of this. I want to find Troy before he finds me… and I want to be ready for him.”

  I pictured his face, his menacing eyes, as he laughed and stuck the knife in my throat.

  West frowned. “Roam, seeking revenge will get you killed. You can’t kill Troy, so you don’t want to go searching for him.”

  “But, I can trap him. Trick him,” I clarified.

  “How?” I could tell he was just entertaining my ideas, but I took advantage of my open floor.

  “With something he wants.”

  “He wants to kill you.”

  “He wants to end the world- by ending our child. Our child that will save this world.” I tightened my right hand’s grip on my left. “If we succeed in going back to one of our lives, we have to make him think that he’s killed me- and our child. Just long enough for the child to be born. Troy becomes mortal, and we end him.”

  He was shaking his head. “Absolutely not. There are too many questions, too many variables that we have no answers to yet. We can’t play games with him. The point is to keep you alive.”

  “For how long? Until Troy finds me again? I can’t be afraid of him for all of my life. Any life.” I pulled on my hands, taking a breath to steady myself. “This can work, West.”

  “I know you’re afraid.” He spoke so softly, I barely heard him.

  I reflected, looking down. “I’m trying to be brave here.”

  “You want to try this, if we succeed in finding this door?”

  “We’ll try until we fail. Our last try will be now- this life.”

  “Go get some rest,” he ordered, walking to the stairs. “Call me.”

  I nodded. “I’ll stay down here for a while.”

  He turned around, reaching for me. I stiffened, but he only offered a quick hug. “Never again, Roam.”

  I nodded. He sighed, brushing his fingers against mine. I watched him walk up the basement steps, and waited until I heard the front door close before I buried my face in my hands.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Logan came over again that evening. We sat on the couch beneath my favorite afghan, a giant bowl of popcorn between us. He immediately turned to the History Channel, handing me the remote. I placed it back in his lap.

  “Just pick a movie, please.”

  “Anything in particular?” He asked, shifting to wrap his arm around me. I leaned into his chest, sighing.

  “Just anything.”

  I could think of nothing but West, the past, and the few minutes in the basement that made me nauseous with guilt. The display on the digital cable box turned to ten o’clock. I fought another yawn, knotting my hands in the strings of the afghan.

  “We just watched ten minutes of Braveheart and you haven’t said one sarcastic thing about how historically inaccurate it is, how Queen Isabella would only have been about three years old at the time, and how Scots didn’t start wearing kilts until three centuries later. What’s up?”

  My eyes snapped to the screen. “Oh- I must have dozed off…,”

  “Cam, let’s get to bed. I need to head home.”

  “No! No, I’m not tired,” I promised.

  “I walked over, so I need to walk home before it gets too late.”

  “Stay here.”

  He lifted a dark eyebrow. “Sure, I’ll just crawl in between you and Bun,” he teased, referring to the trodden, yellow stuffed bunny I’d had since I was five months old.

  “Bun is small. There’s plenty of room.”

  “Veto!” My dad’s voice carried in from the kitchen. I scowled, and Logan smirked.

  “Sir, yes, sir!” Logan called back, reaching behind his head to stretch, yawning and grinning. “How about I just tuck you in?” He suggested.

  My dad peeked in the living room from the kitchen. “Door open at all times, boot.” Boot was dad’s favorite nickname for Logan now that he was headed to boot camp.

  I rolled my eyes. “Enough. Ugh.” I got up and stopped in the kitchen, dumping the bowl of popcorn in the trash while Logan folded the afghan over the couch. We walked upstairs silently.

  I headed for the bathroom, and I heard him rummaging around in my bedroom.

  Standing in front of the sink, I stared in the mirror. I almost expected to see my reflection as I had lately, older, in a different time and place, and pregnant. Instead, my wide, green eyes stared back at me. My face was heart-shaped, my skin smooth and even. Morgan often complained that I got the long eyelashes and perfect skin, and all that she got was twenty-twenty eyesight. Morgan was classically beautiful, and she knew it. My grandmother told her that she looked like a young Audrey Hepburn.

  I turned to the side, placing my hands over my stomach. My long-sleeved tee-shirt was thin, and I pushed my abdomen out as far as I could. I looked like I’d over-eaten at the Rush family Thanksgiving dinner.

  I was never overweight, always slender, but I needed to strengthen. In addition to swimming, I would have to start working out. I remembered earlier in the day, West pinning me to the mat, and the only strength I had was in my vocal chords.

  If he hadn’t stopped, I wouldn’t have stopped…

  Cringing, I quickly washed my face and brushed my teeth. I was sure to keep my sleeve pulled all the way down my arm.

  When I came out of the bathroom, Logan had stacked pillows in a circle on my bed. I smiled, wrapping my arms around him. I had believed as a child that a pillow-circle would chase away monsters and protect me.

  I need a pillow circle for my mind.

  Logan tucked me into bed, folding the quilt under my chin. He went to the linen closet to get more pillows, making a circle completely surrounding me. “Bun was under your bed in your memory box- I found her while you were in the bathroom. I made a few other interesting discoveries…,”

  “You can’t read my diary!” I shrieked, yanking Bun off my pillow and hugging her tightly. He licked his lips, clearing his throat with exaggeration as he opened the leather-bound book. I had kept a diary until fifth grade, and stopped the day my mother died.

  “If you’re going to be my wife, I need to know what I’m getting myself into. You know, besides genius IQ, fainting like a goat, and wicked
dreams.”

  “Jerk.” I punched his shoulder. He only smirked, pretending to lick his thumb and turn a page.

  “July 14, 2002…,”

  “Hand me my iPod, please, so I can ignore this.”

  He reached with one hand to the nightstand, not taking his eyes off the page, and collected my iPod. I took it, unrolled the ear buds and shoved them in my ears.

  “Today I am seven years old. Morgan is getting all of the attention, of course, because she’s a BRAT.” He laughed, grinning at me. I smirked.

  “She cut a piece of my cake, BEFORE THE PARTY EVEN STARTED, and gave it to her friend Lauren. She thinks the whole WORLD revolves around HER.”

  I laughed too, tugging the ear buds out of my ears. Logan flipped pages randomly. “The correct spelling and usage of dramatic capitalization, for a seven-year-old, is disturbing.” He said.

  “Close it, Rush. Come on, I wrote some personal things in there,” I protested. He stuck his lower lip out.

  “Please- one more.”

  “Fine.” I didn’t want to go to sleep anyway, but I also didn’t want to read passages about my mother’s breast cancer.

  “First Kiss Checklist’- Oh, yeah, I’m reading this one,” he snuggled in closer to me, as if reading me a bedtime story. I closed my eyes, fighting my embarrassment. “When I get kissed for the first time, a real boyfriend kiss, I want it to be like in a movie. So, here are the things that have to happen while I’m getting my kiss.”

  “One- it HAS to be sunset, like in The Princess Bride.” He narrowed his eyes. “Well, of course it does. That one’s a given.” I elbowed him playfully.

  “Two- I have to be wearing a dress.” He rolled his eyes. “This from the girl who lived in a bathing suit all year long,” he accused. I smiled.

  “Three- my hair has to be blowing in the wind- and it has to be long. So, that’s why you freaked out when I cut off an eight-inch piece of your hair in kindergarten.”

  Giggling while my eyes skipped forward on the entry, I remembered the final requirement before he read it out loud.

  “Four…,”

  “Logan,” I interrupted, and his eyes darted to mine as he read the fourth requirement. I had never told him. I gestured to the book. “It says- Four… It has to be Logan.”

  He closed my diary with a soft snap, turned on his arm and stretched over me. Both of his palms cupped the sides of my face as he lowered his lips to mine. “Of course it has to be me,” he whispered, between deep, quiet kisses. I was calmed, lost in his loving, undemanding arms.

  “I don’t hear talking!”

  My dad’s voice boomed down the hallway. I shifted away from his kiss, rolling my eyes. “I love you.”

  “I love you, Roam,” he kissed my forehead, and then the tip of my nose, and I was smiling by the time he reached my lips. What am I doing, allowing West to kiss me? How could I want him when I have Logan?

  He got up and walked toward the door, and I turned over to watch him go. He stopped, turning to me. “Please promise me you won’t try to stay awake all night.”

  “I promise.” I crossed my finger over my heart. Lie. “I’ll just read for a little while.”

  Unconvinced, he winked and went downstairs.

  I was in the middle of three books- a historical fiction, a horror, and a biography of Abraham Lincoln. I chose the biography, not wanting anything to do with history- or horror- in the darkness of night. It was three o’clock in the morning before I started to feel my eyes glaze over.

  Sitting up with a jerk, I considered going downstairs to the kitchen to make some coffee. Scenes from A Nightmare on Elm Street slipped into my head, and I worried that I may already be dreaming. I thought of Troy, and decided I’d prefer Freddy Krueger and his knifey fingers over Troy anytime.

  Coffee. The prospect of dreaming was terrifying; I climbed over my retaining wall of pillows and went downstairs. The churning of the old coffee pot comforted me as I sat down on the bar stool at the counter. Our family’s laptop was plugged in and against the wall. I lifted the lid, powering it up and went to Google.

  This time I searched ‘Julie Henry 1977.’ Results were immediate. Cold Case: Woman found strangled in motel. Fingers shaking, I clicked on the link.

  April 15, 1977 Atlanta Press… The body of 20-year-old Julie Henry was found in the Byway Motel at 11:00 AM this morning by the motel manager. Cause of death was strangulation. Police suspect her husband, 27-year-old Wesley Henry. Mr. Henry’s whereabouts are unknown.

  Wesley… West? I cringed. He not only had to deal with my death, he had been wanted for my murder? The website was part of a cold case series in the United States. I searched for more information, but found very little.

  The coffee pot was silent. I removed my favorite Cedar Point mug from the cupboard and filled it, adding cream and sugar. The laptop was still open, and I sat back down and closed the browser. A picture of Morgan and me, both sunbathing in the backyard, splashed across the desktop. I remembered it was early June when the photo was taken, and my dad came up behind us and took the picture, looking down at our faces. We were smiling, heads together.

  This is real, I thought, staring the screen. I absently scratched my arm, and then focused on the numbers stamped in a rigid line. West is real, Troy is real- all of this is real. Denial had protected my mind from absorbing what was truly happening over the past week, but now, I realized, I had no choice but to accept. I couldn’t walk away.

  What was the end of the world like? I thought of the many action-packed, doomsday movies that had hit the box office over the past few years, featuring volcanoes erupting and birds dropping dead out of the sky. West hadn’t elaborated on what exactly the end of the world entailed… or how our child would “save the world.”

  Opening the internet browser again and searching ‘the end of the world’ would only send me into hysterics, and I knew it. Instead, I gathered my coffee and went to the couch for the television remote. Skipping the History Channel (no Hitler at four AM) I settled for a Friends re-run.

  With coffee-induced energy, I made it to seven o’clock. When Logan pulled into the driveway, I met him outside. Dressed in jean capris and a peasant-style, long-sleeved (of course) white top, I was happy to feel a cool breeze after the heat wave.

  “Happy Friday,” I grinned, slipping in the passenger seat next to him with a grin. He kissed me softly, returning my smile.

  “You’re full of energy this morning. No nightmares, then?”

  “Nope.” I fastened the seatbelt, not elaborating.

  “Good.” He grinned. “Are you swimming after school?”

  Every Friday during the school year, an open swim was scheduled at the high school. “Oh- I completely forgot! I need to grab my swim bag.”

  Five minutes later we were on our way. “What are we doing this weekend?” he asked as I struggled to fold and fit my towel into the bag.

  “I think I’ll just stay in the pool all weekend.” Swimming was an escape for me, and an escape was exactly what I needed.

  “Let’s go to the lake on Sunday. I have to go to a meeting with my recruiter on Saturday,” he added. “In Columbus.”

  He was tentative, and I could tell he was walking on eggshells around the subject of the Marines. I nodded, squeezing his hand. “That sounds great. Please don’t be weird with me about Marine stuff. I support you, remember? Crazy Roam is back in her cage.”

  He laughed, giving me one-armed hug. “I love every bit of you- even Crazy Roam.”

  I grinned, and then fought back a tiny yawn.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Halfway through history, I was nodding. Oh my God- I’m going to fall asleep in school. I had never slept in school, and the thought of having a nightmare in the middle of class was horrifying. I blinked rapidly, glancing at the clock. Still a half an hour of class. I’ve only been here for fifteen minutes?

  West had lifted his eyes when I walked in that morning, asking a silent question. I shook my head to indicate n
o dreams, no nightmares. He looked relieved. Now, he stared at me intently from his desk, and I tried to avoid his gaze. He knows I stayed up all night.

  “We’re going to prepare for the test on Monday.” He stood and walked to the board, taking the cap off of the black marker. “I’m writing every question and answer on the board, so copy it and learn it. My goal is that you learn history, so playing games with you on a test is not the way to do that.” He started copying from a piece of paper, and I transcribed what he was writing on the board into my notebook.

  The class feverishly scribbled the questions and answers, but I set my pencil down and squeezed the bridge of my nose with my thumb and forefinger. I know this. All of this. I decided to make notes about questions to ask West- specifically how our child would save the world. What other questions had I thought of in the middle of the night and wanted answers for? I tapped my pencil against the notebook, muffling a discreet yawn. Propping my head up, palm to chin, I let my hair fall like a curtain to shield me from the class. Someone was asking a question, and West was answering.

  I am in a church. I look around, and everything is familiar. It is the Catholic Church that I was raised in, the same church that Morgan and I spent hours in while my mother taught Sunday school.

  The organ is playing a song I recognize from mass as a child. I think that I haven’t been to mass in years, not since my mother died. Why? I can’t remember why. My father is standing next to me, not singing. He stares forward, toward the altar. My face is wet, and I wipe my cheek. Water… tears? I am crying? I turn and follow my father’s gaze.

  A coffin. Oh, my mother’s funeral, no… I try to find a way out of the long wooden pew, but the church is filled and I am boxed in. I am in the front row, so I crawl over the pew and into the empty space between the congregation and the altar.

  No one notices me. I begin to run to the door but stop. Can I see my mother one last time? I walk slowly toward the coffin. My father’s voice stops me.

  “Roam, come here.” I turn to him, and he holds his hand out to me. Shaking my head, I turn and continue toward the coffin.