Seconds Before Sunrise (The Timely Death Trilogy) (11 page)

Eric

I was finally home, but I wouldn’t even be able to go back school until tomorrow. My father wanted me to rest as much as possible. The injuries weren’t life-threatening, but I had to heal quickly, and I couldn’t cheat by turning into a shade. The doctors might be in the Light, and then I would be a discovered shade. I had become more useless than I already was.

I fought the urge to throw m
y stress ball at the ceiling. My ribs were already burning from the first throw. I couldn’t strain myself, even if I wanted to. If my car wreck had taught me anything, it was the fact that I didn’t own my body. My life held the future for hundreds, and I couldn’t be selfish anymore. Not even as a human.

A small knock echoed through my bedroom
. I slowly sat up to see Mindy in my doorway. Her hand grasped the door. “How are you feeling?”

I kicked my feet off the bed
and stood up. “Better.”

She’d been che
cking on me every hour since my return, and I couldn’t help but feel more empathy for her. As far as I knew, she was human, and humans healed dreadfully slow. I hated to think how slowly her emotions healed.

“Your father wants
to talk to you,” she said.

I tensed.
“About what?”

“Not sure,” she admitted, tying her bright
, red hair into a ponytail. I knew the look. She was getting ready to prepare dinner.

“N
eed help cooking?” I asked.

H
er head moved back like my words shocked her. I had to remind myself that they probably had.

“I’d love that, but your father—”

I had already forgotten. “I’ll go talk to him.” I moved past her, and she went to the kitchen. The few words were the only words we had exchanged all week.

I manage
d to get down the hallway without much trouble. I was used to pain, but I wasn’t used to human pain. It was different − more constricting and lingering. I ignored it when I entered his office and hoped he wouldn’t notice the pain on my face.

“Shut the door
behind you.” He didn’t glance up from his paperwork.

I shut the door and locked it, wondering if his paperwork
involved more news from the Dark. They usually avoided writing anything down but had gotten desperate with the upcoming fight.

I
waited for him to finish reading. He continuously flipped papers over, only moving his hand up to gesture to his chair in front of his desk. I sat down, grateful to be off of my feet, and he stared. His glasses made his eyes look too large for his face.

“Mindy said you wanted to talk to me,” I said, trying to look over his paperwork, but h
e laid his palm on top of them.

“I do.”

I cleared my throat. “What about?”

“How are you feeling?” he asked, but I didn’t respond. He knew I had three weeks before anything would
change.

“What do you want to talk
about?”

“Teresa was over earlier.”
Apparently, she had been the one to drop off the papers. “She said you’ve been refusing to talk to her.”

“She’s already lectured me once,” I
said, thinking of Camille.

She ha
d been different ever since she began training. She planned on fighting, and I didn’t understand why. It was between Darthon and me, but everyone was acting like Hayworth would be at war.

“I do
n’t need to hear it again,” I said.

“She’s protective of you, Eric,” he said. “That’s her job.”

“And my job is to prepare,” I repeated the very words she had told me in the hospital.

“She’s worried about you.” His words lingered, and the meaning changed in the s
ilence.

“She thinks I’m going to do somethi
ng stupid again,” I guessed.

M
y father laid his fingertips on his forehead. “Not exactly.”

My heartbeat thumped against my injuries. “What is she worried about then?”

He stared past me. His pupils glanced over the decorations littering the office, and the light flickered over his hesitant expression. “As your father, I should talk to you about your depression,” he said. “If you’re considering suicide—”

The words were worse than the torture machine. “Camille
thinks I tried to kill myself?”

His wrinkles deepened when he closed his eyes.

I leapt up, unable to remain still. “I did not crash my car on purpose,” I said.

M
y father spread his hands out like he could force me to sit down again. “You have to understand—”

“I’m not
my mother.” My words escaped with a hiss. “It was an accident. I’d never consider that.”

My father didn’t speak, but he didn’t have to for my anger to rise. My mother’s suicide had affected my life more than any other event I could consider. I’d dealt with th
e aftermath my entire life. I couldn’t contemplate inflicting that pain on others. I’d seen what it could do. That was enough for me.

“Then
, we can drop it,” my father said. He didn’t want to talk about it any more than I did.

I gripped the back of the chair.
“Now.”

“Okay.” He bent
over to open a drawer. “I have something for you.”

He shut the drawer and laid a black box on his desk
in front of me. I waited for it to do something − to open up in a magical way like an object from the Dark would − but it didn’t. It was a simple box.

“Take it.”

I picked it up. “What is it?”

He pointed at it, and I
opened the box. I stared at the object inside and had to sit down when I realized what it was. “Dad—”

“Don’t argue against it, Eric,” he said. “Your mother would’ve wanted you to have it. Believe me. She talked about it all the time when she was—” Alive.
Even he couldn’t say certain things aloud.

I wanted t
o run my finger over the object, but I couldn’t. “What am I supposed to do with this?”

“It
’ll help you through this, Eric.” His chair squeaked as he reclined. “I promise.”

I opened my mouth but snapped it shut as I closed the box. Without being able to look my father in the eye, I
stood up and walked out of the room. There was nothing left to say. There were only things left to do, and I had to begin now. I had to finish what I was born to do, and I had to do it as a human − as my mother had seen, even before her death.

Eric

I was helping Mindy with the dishes when the doorbell rang. It didn’t interrupt our conversation because I hadn’t been able to speak yet. My father’s words still rattled through me. I was surprised I had even heard the doorbell.

“I got it,” Noah chirped, running downstairs. He slammed into the door before he opened it. “Hey, Jess.”

The name stopped me.

“Jess is here?” My dad stood from the table and left his
coffee there. He went to the stairs before I could make myself.

“Hello, Mr. Welborn.” I heard her voice before I saw
her. “Is Eric home?” She quieted when I appeared at the balcony, and her bottom lip hung open for a millisecond. Her presence twisted me.

“Hey, Jessica,” I
said, trying to ignore her blue sweater. “How are you?”

“I was about to ask you the same question,” she said
. She was curling her fingers against her side. She was as nervous as I was.

“Come on in, dear,” Mindy shouted, rattling the dishes at the sink. “I’ll make you guys some apple cider. How does that sound?”

Jessica’s face lit up. “That’d be nice,” she said as Noah ran back upstairs. Jessica watched him but didn’t join us until I waved her up.

“Do you like cinnamon in yours?” Mindy asked, and Jessica nodded. “I’ll get right on that. You two should
sit.” She tapped the table.

Jessica followed her suggestion before I did. She sat with her back to the
railing, and I sat next to her. Her stare lingered on my hands, and I moved my scratched fingers around.

“I’m healing,” I said, and she bit her lip. It drove m
e crazy. “Thanks for visiting.”

“Jonat
hon told me you were back.” She was barely breathing. “I thought I’d visit again.”

“It’s good to see you,” I
said, wanting her to relax, but even I was struggling. My father was lingering behind us, and I didn’t want to say anything he’d find inappropriate. He would lecture me about getting too close to her.

“Here you go, Jess,” Mindy said, placing two cups of apple cider in front of us. The drink reminded me of the cooling autumn outside my house. Winter would be here in a few weeks.

“Thank you,” she said.

Mindy beamed,
grabbing my father’s arm. “We’ll let you kids talk,” she said, and my father didn’t protest as she dragged him down the hallway.

The kitchen was silent
, aside from Jessica sipping her drink, but I couldn’t pull my eyes away. Her presence was too surreal, like the summer before her memory was erased.

“I didn’t know you had a brother,”
Jessica said.

I grasped my cup.
Jonathon’s theory was correct. More than her shade memories were gone. She had met Noah before. She knew he was my stepbrother. I didn’t know what to say other than what I said the first time.

“Noah’s my stepbrother,” I said. “He’s always snooping around my bedroom.”

“He looks up to you,” she said. She hadn’t responded the same way.

“What?”

“He’s a younger sibling,” she said, fog moving past her nose as she breathed into her hot drink. “He’s snooping because he looks up to you.” She winked. “I bet he’s been nicer since you’ve gotten back from the hospital.”

She was right. Noah had helped as much as Mindy had. They’d checked on me periodically, even leaving me alone when I was resting. Even Noah stayed out of my bedroom. But it took Jessica’s words to realize it. She had that effect on me, and I missed that about her more than anything.

“I’m coming back to school soon,” I volunteered, unable to hold back the information.

“When?”

“I’m not sure,” I admitted. “But I’m trying to get as much rest as I can.”

She ran her finger over the rim of her cup. “I don’t think I’ve been so excited for homeroom class,” she said.

“I doubt Ms. Hinkel feels the same way,” I joked, and her giggle lightened my dark mood.

“I like talking to you, Eric.” She was blushing again, but she wasn’t trying to hide it. “Why else would I visit you?”

“Because you can’t stay away?” I wasn’t joking, but she thought I was.

“Don’t let your ego show,” she said, trying not to laugh. She took another sip of her drink and placed it on the table. We fell into a silence, but it wasn’t an awkward kind. It was an understanding silence that’d grown between us over the past few months. It was familiar.

Too bad the silence was interrupted with the front door opening. George Stone bounded up the stairs and halted at the sight.

“Jess,” he
lingered on her name, his stare darting between the two of us. “How are you?”

“Mr. Stone,”
she said, but her voice teetered. I wondered how she remembered him but not Noah. “I’m good. How are you?”

“Good,” he said.

My father appeared as if he had been waiting in the shadows. “Jess came to visit Eric,” he clarified what he couldn’t say aloud − Jessica didn’t have her memory back. She was simply here.

“That’s good,” George said, turning his back to us. They muttered words under their breath as the door opened again, and Jonathon appeared within moments.

Jessica waved. “Hey, Jonathon.”

“H
—Hey,” he stuttered.

Something was wrong.

“How are you?” Jonathon repeated the same polite script everyone did, but Jessica didn’t answer.

“I should go,” she said, standing up slowly. I wanted to stop her, but I knew I had to talk to my father. “I came at the wrong time.”

“No, you didn’t,” I said.

“We di
dn’t plan on coming over, either.” Jonathon took my side.

Jessica
tapped my arm. “I’ll come back another night,” she said, moving past me.

I followed her. “Let me walk you out.”

“Okay,” she said, and we walked downstairs. She slipped her shoes back on, and I opened the front door, feeling my friend’s eyes on my back as I left with her.

Jessica walked to her mother’s car, keys in hand, and turned around at the last second. Her hair was much longer than I remembered i
t, and I fought the urge to move her curls out of her face.