B007Q4JDEM EBOK (7 page)

“Why would we go there?” I asked as I pulled out of the parking lot.

“Don't you want to?”

“I guess...” I sighed as I turned left onto the road. “There isn't much for me there.”

“All of your belongings are there.”

“That's about it.”

“It will make you feel better,” h
e assured me, but I was certain it would do the opposite. Nevertheless, I agreed to go home...at least temporarily.

The house was cold, vacant and depressing. I wanted to run to my room, collapse onto my bed and sleep until this nightmare was over. Salem followed me inside, admiring his surroundings as
we
passed through the kitchen and into the living room. It was incredibly dull and shabby in contrast to his house. I groaned when I smelled the sour milk that spilled across the dining room floor from the prior morning. I quickly gathered the mop and cleaned it up, spraying the area with
cleaner
to eliminate the wretched smell.

“You never did explain to me how you affor
d to live in that amazing house,
” I commented as I watched him
look around my place
.

“Technically, I did,” h
e said as he looked at the
TV
set,
“I told you I can make things materialize at will.”

“So you created that house?”

He
laughed lightly. “No, of course I didn’t
. The house was abandoned when I arrived here.
The furniture and touch-ups however…
”

“How do you do it?” He was still fascinated by the TV. I grabbed the remote off of the boring, scratched up brown coffee table.

“Magic,” h
e grinned up at me.

I glared. “
I’m serious, how exactly?
”

“I think of something, and it appears.
It is
really simple.”

“
Anything
?”

“No. I can materialize a wide variety of objects. The smaller they are, the easier it is for me. I definitely could never manage anything as large as a house.
And it's not something I am in constant control of.”

“What do you mean?”

“I only discovered the ability a few years
ago
and sometimes it works...other times
, not so much,” h
e laughed somewhat to himself. “Initially, things sort of backfired. Like, if I were to imagine a lamp...it would come out disfigured and broken. Eventually I figured it out, though.”

“What happened when
you discovered you could do it
?”

“I was...star
tled, for lack of a better word,” h
e appeared to be deep in thought. “But considering who and what I am, it didn't
affect me as much as it did you,” h
e smirked.

I hit the power button on the TV remote and a news report spread across the 36' screen. Salem jumped back.

“Please tell me you have at least seen a TV before.”

“I'm 126 years old Alexis, of
course I have seen a television,” h
e shook his head at me. “I just wasn't expecting it to come on.”

I wasn't paying attention; I was watching the TV intently. The slick-haired man behind the screen was talking about an incident in Denver, Colorado. My heart was beating rapidly as I stared. Salem came up behind me.

“What is it?” h
e asked, watching the screen.

I tuned out his voice and heard only the
rough
voice of the news reporter.

“Two hours ago, at the Denver Zoo, a black bear escaped its holding pens while a zookeeper was placing food in its enclosur
e,” he spoke quickly, “t
he woman was found brutally attacked within the bear's exhibit. We are still
unsure how the bear escaped.”

My heart sunk as a picture of a woman was pulled up on the screen. “No!” I screamed.

Salem's voice reached my ears again. “Alexis...” It was merely a gentle whisper, right behind my ear.

“No! Don't you dare speak to me or touch me!” I shouted, pushing him away. “Mark did this! I know it!”

He looked taken aback by my assumpti
on. “You think Mark did this?” h
e frowned. “We aren't like that, Alexis. There is no evidence that he had any involvement, clearly it was a bear attack.”

“That doesn't make him innocent! It could all be some sort of cover up!”

“You a
re just upset because he took her from you.”

“That has nothing to do with it!” Or did it? It was more Paul's fault than
Mark’s
wasn't it? I fell back on the sofa. “Did it say...did it say if she was still alive?”

“I didn'
t hear anything about her dying,” h
e sat beside me on the faux leather couch. “I assure you, it has nothing to do with Mark.”

“I won't believe it until I h
ear it from mom – Janet, I mean,
” This was going to take a while to
get used
to.

“Why don't you call her?” h
e suggested.

“Right,
” I nodded, relaxing just a little as I stood up and got the cordless phone from the kitchen. So much for crude accusations the first time I called her after she left. I dialed her cell phone number. It rang once. Twice. Three times.

“Hello?” a
deep male's voice replied.

“Is Janet
there
?” I said.

“
She can’t come to the phone right now
. Who is this?”

“This is her daughter,
” I said, ignoring the fact that I wasn't her daughter. “Please, put her on the phone.”

“She's a little groggy right now, but I'll see if she is willing.”

“Thank you,
” I said.

Silence followed, and then muffled voices in the background.

“Alexis?” h
er voice was different, scared
,
weak
,
“I was about to have Mark call you.”

“How are you?”
I felt relieved to hear her voice, but something about the way she spoke made me uneasy.

“I have been better
,
” I heard her laugh, which was cut through with a hoarse cough and groan. “Happy birthday, sweetie.”

“Thanks, mom...” I muttered. “Tell me what happened.”

I heard the muffled voice of Mark in the background but I couldn't decipher what he was saying. “I was feeding the brown bears, when one of them must have gotten loose-”

I broke her off suddenly. “The newsman said black bears.”

“Right...” she trailed off, “black bears. My mind is a bit hazy right now.”

“Did Mark do something to you?” I asked anxiously.

“Of course
not!” h
er voice sounded unconvincin
g, almost as anxious as my own, “h
e's right here with me in the hospital, making sure I'm taken care of.”

“How badly were you
hurt, are you going to be okay
?”

“It's not as bad as the TV might make it sound. It's just a few scratches
really
.”

“The news reporter said you were brutally injured.”

“The TV was over-exaggerating.” Janet's voice was replaced by the deep male again. “Janet needs her rest. I'll have her call you
back
when she is
feeling better
.”

He hung up. I crumbled onto the sofa, bawling my eyes out in frustration.

“What did
she say?” Salem asked tenderly as he sat beside me.

I filled him in on the entire conversation, including the errors in her story. It must have been difficult to comprehend through my sobs.

“Perhaps she
is just hazy like she said...” h
e said
with
a hint of doubt now in his voice
.

“You don't believe it any more than I do, do you?” I said, sitting up and looking into his eyes.

He looked down, strands of black falling across his face, “No. But, that still doesn't mean Mark was responsible.”

“I need to go to her,
” I said suddenly.

“No, you don't. If Mark is dangerous, you need to stay as far away as possible. She can fend for herself.”

“Apparently she can't!”

“I won't let you put yourself in danger, Alexis.”

“Why not?” I stared in disbelief. “She is – was – my mother!”

“You're too important...”

“You barely even know me, Salem!”

“As far as you know,” h
e whispered.

“What are you talking about?”

“I can't explain it right now,” h
e sighed. “Your friends are expecting you to be bright and cheerful.”

“What?”

“
It's your birthday, remember?” h
e grinned. “They're coming over to celebrate.”

“How do you know?”

He shrugged his shoulders. “That blonde haired girl might have mentioned it.”

“Of course she would have...” I grumbled. “Is this the real reason you wanted me to come home
so badly
?”

“That might have played some part in it, yes.”

Salem remained downstairs in the living room while I took a quick shower before my visitors arrived. I changed out of my blue jeans and red tank top into a flowing dark blue skirt and
white, semi-frilly sleeveless shirt
. I felt a little over-dressed, but it was my birthday
party
after all
, so why not
. Time passed slowly as I waited for the guests to arrive, and Salem was sitting silently on the sofa staring off into space. I wondered what was on his mind, but before I had the chance to question him someone hammered their fist against the door. Salem came out of his stupor at once and stood up.

I peeked through the tiny peephole and groaned. There were at least ten of my
classmates waiting out there. After putting on a false smile, I r
eluctantly
twisted the door knob and let them flood into my house. They piled their presents upon the dining room table and wished me happy birthday individually. I was surprised to not see Jason or Karen among the crowd.

“Karen said she’d
be a little late,
” Brittany Crosswood said casually, as if answering my question. She was more of Karen's friend than my own.

“Oh, okay,
” I said quietly. Someone turned on the ancient, black
stereo
that sat on the end table beside the sofa and started blaring music. I sighed.

Jason showed up about five minutes later, bustling in through the door and heaving a gift at me with a grin. The present was flat and badly wrapped. “Open it!”

“Now?” I asked, rattling the present around. “Are you sure you don't want me to wait?”

“No one's going to care,” h
e insisted.

“Okay...” I pulled at the paper and gasped in shock when I realized what it was. I gaped at the sleek, black laptop that I held in my hands, temporarily speechless. “Oh, Jace! This is too much!” I flung my arms around his muscular form in a tight hug.

He laughed happily.
“You’ve
been saying for so long that you wanted one, so I have secretly been saving up my allowance and money from the part time job at Howard's.”

Howard's was a small convenient store in town that Jason had worked at for the past five months
or so
. I could feel them coming, the warmth of tears building up in my eyes. I fought them, but I wasn't strong enough. I hugged him tightly again. “You shouldn't have...” I whispered.

“I wanted to,” he grinned, “b
esides, after what you've been through, you needed the excitement.”

If only he knew just how much I had gone through. I finally released him and happily ran to my room to put away my new laptop. As I
headed back down the stairs
, I saw the
front
door whip open and Karen came waltzing in carrying what was unmistakably a cake box. I grinned and approached her.

“Ha
ppy birthday, Alexis!” s
he shouted when she saw me. “You look a lot better than when you left school.”

“I feel a lot better, too,
” I lied; the excitement from the computer
had been enough to mask the stress on my face, for now
. “What kind of cake
did you get
?”