Vex (22 page)

His head tips to the side, something in him hesitates as though his dream were coming back to him in perfect clarity.

I pull him up with me, level after level until we land in the dusty attic. We crawl along the joists until we reach the tiny door, and slip inside. I flip on the light while he secures over the closure.

It’s surreal.

Being here with Gage in the butterfly room when I have yet to set foot on Paragon blows my mind in every good way. There’s an intensity here, and judging by the wide-eyed look on his face, he feels it, too. I pull his lips down to mine and offer up the most chaste of kisses while everything in me cries for more.

His dimples slide in and out as he tips his head one more time with a measure of confidence regarding my true identity.

“What’s your name?” His warm breath washes over me, and I don’t ever want to leave. I want to stand here with the boy I love, just breathing Gage.

“None of your business,” it takes all of my strength to whisper those words—to keep myself from panting out the details of our lives with the fervor of a machine gun.

Gage takes up my face in his hands as though I were made of glass, presses into me with a scorching kiss that makes me wonder if my body could expire, dissolve completely from the experience.

I pull us down to our knees and we practice for hours for our first meeting—our first kiss, our first everything. Chloe will never return to this room. We can spend an eternity here if we wanted, swimming in our love, well into the deep end of the night.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Lead Me

“I remember that.” Gage squints into me with one dimple glaring in my direction.

The morning light is heavily defused by a thin veil of somber clouds. They blanket the sky with their cruel intentions.

I fill Gage in on the most erotic light drive ever as we snake around the long line of the ski lift.

I don’t dare tell Gage I’m scared spit-less to do this. I watch as the pair in front of us fall back into the chair as it gently swoops them away.

We scissor forward and wait our turn. I’m pretty sure I’d rather fight off an entire herd of human-faced lions than endure a single day on this mountain while pretending to be sporty for Gage. The ski lift comes up behind us and we’re forced to sit as it glides us into the air.

“Where’s the seat belt?” I ask in a frenzy. As if having these fifty pound space boots weren’t bad enough, they strapped six-foot javelins to the bottom of my feet. I’m ridiculously bottom heavy, and I think I’m starting to slip.

“There is no seatbelt,” he pulls a bar over our heads, and lets it rest in front of us.

“This is so barbaric. They should have us strapped in like on one of those crazy rides at an amusement park with the five way belts, and a freaking bar pressed into our stomachs to the point we can’t breathe.”

I take in a series of short little panic breaths as we climb higher and higher at an agonizingly slow clip. “Who’s running this thing? Chloe?” I know for a fact she’s not. She’s practicing her Olympic worthy maneuvers over on the black diamond runs because just a minute ago, she was begging Gage to join her. She said she’d take me on a few runs herself, if I wanted. “If Chloe takes me on this thing, you know she’s going to push me off.” God—it’s so far down, I’m half afraid I’ll toss myself overboard just from sheer temptation.

“You’re fine. Don’t think about Chloe.” He scoots in, and the entire apparatus sways and bucks.

“Shit!” I clutch onto the useless bar situated a good foot in front of me. And to my disbelieving horror, we climb even higher into the stratosphere. “You do realize I’m deathly afraid of heights.”

“I thought you were deathly afraid of clowns?” He gives a devilish grin.

“I’d welcome a clown right about now. An entire army of exploding Fem clowns would be more acceptable than this torment you’re putting me through.”

“
I’m
putting you through?” He brims ear to ear as though it were the funniest thing in the world. “Tell me again how hot we were in the past.” He lands a sweltering kiss on the side of my face.

“Funny thing is, I was simultaneously killing Chloe and getting it on with you.”

“You get props for that,” he whispers into my ear as though there were the off chance somebody might actually hear.

I turn just enough to see Brielle and Drake behind us in a serious lip lock. I
so
get it. She’s probably comforting him since this is his first time, too. OK, Brielle and Drake are right. I need to think about getting it on with Gage just to get my mind off the harsh reality of what feels like a three thousand foot drop looming below.

“In addition to that,” my voice shakes, “and more importantly,” God, my head would explode like a watermelon if I fell right now and with my rotten luck, Dr. Oliver would figure out a way to glue me back together—it so wouldn’t be pretty. “Um, anyway, we were sizzling in two time dimensions. Best New Year’s Eve slash homecoming ever.”

“I have the room in two days.” His arm tightens around my waist.

My mouth falls open.

“Two days,” I breathe it out like a poem.

“You think you’re ready?” His face smoothes out at the prospect, and I swear I see the slightest hint of blush on the apples of his cheeks as though he weren’t sure himself.

“I’m ready now.”

“Then, for sure, we’d fall off.”

“Can you think of a better way to die?” I ask, scratching the back of his neck with my fingers.

“Nope,” Gage looks straight ahead as though he were imagining it.

“Me neither.” I pull him over by the chin—make him kiss me all the way to the top.  

***

OK, getting on was one thing, but getting off is going to be impossible.

“Now!” Gage shouts with excitement as he tries to yank me off the chair by the arm. I try standing, only to hang onto the lift with the other arm and end up somewhere underneath the seat, one ski on and one ski off.

I knew this was a bad idea. I knew, long before the day was over, I was going to injure myself severely. I should have taken Marshall up on his offer during breakfast, cuddled with him, warm and safe in his bed.

The lift operator stops the machine. He comes out with a clear look of frustration as he and Gage yank me to my feet. I hobble and slide my way over to a bench nearby. Gage flops my errant ski on the snow and instructs me to step into it.

“Do people really enjoy this?” I find this, whole, put on uncomfortable clothes, and fifty pounds of leg weights thing hard to swallow.

“People love this. And, you will, too. You just need to get the hang of it.”

“When did you learn how to ski?” I give a hard step into the binding.

“I don’t know, I think I was four or five.”

“Are you kidding? This isn’t safe for children.” I’m shocked by Emma and Barron’s gross negligence.

“It’s totally safe for children, children do this every day.”

Brielle and Drake glide by. He actually looks like he knows what he’s doing, and this perturbs me.

“Come on, I’ll guide you. Remember to make the pizza slice with your skis and sit in the invisible chair when you start to feel out of control.”

“Right.” Invisible chairs and pizza slices—it fits right in with the random order of all things skiing.

I scissor forward. Gage lets me hold onto one of his poles as we head towards what looks like a very steep drop off. “Um, where’s the bunny slope?”

“You’re on it.”

It’s a freaking cliff!

“I’m going to nose dive. I’m going to fall into a ditch and break my neck,” I pant.

“I promise, no ditches. Come on. You’ll love it, I swear.”

Brielle and Drake are already near the bottom, and he’s still intact as far as I can tell.

I start in slow, following close behind Gage barely managing to stay on my feet. I’m baby giraffing it—flailing, as I mimic his every twist and turn. We create a series of less than perfect letter S patterns, and I start to relax, feel the wind on my face as I cascade effortless towards Gage.

A dark feathered bird flies regal overhead in a slow spinning circle. It’s Nev!

I hold up a pole to get his attention, and my left ski slips in line besides my right.

“You’re paralleling,” Gage shouts, “that’s more of an advanced move. Make a pizza slice.”

Without warning, I’m racing across the mountain in a horizontal line past the bunny slope, underneath the ski lift, across a far more advance run with bodies darting all around, and I do the unthinkable—I close my eyes as I barrel in at an alarming clip right into the forest.

I can hear Gage shouting from behind. The dense cover of trees douses his voice like a flame, assuring me I’m the only person on this dark, lonely planet.

Marshall said he smelled death at camp. Gage never did say he had a
vision
of Logan and I living to a ripe old age, he just said it as a fact. What if he was trying to pull some sort of positive thinking, mind control thing on me because secretly he knew I was going to croak sooner than later?

What if death at camp waits for
me
?

I slowly open my eyes. Ice-cold wind stabs through them sharp as glass. Trees whiz by in a blur. I’m moving faster than most cars I’ve been in. I can see the tips of pines straight ahead and for a moment I wonder why I’m practically above them.

My skis give way beneath me—I tumble down a jagged ravine until the entire world fades to black.

Chapter Thirty-Six

Mother

A harsh light comes from above. It blurs my vision, forcing me to give several hard blinks.

“Skyla,” a soft voice echoes from above. “Skyla, wake up.”

“Mom?” I mean Lizbeth, but a part of me wants it to be Candace.

A shock of dark hair, bright blue eyes burn through me. I recognize those deep-set dimples. It’s Gage’s long dead sister.

“Giselle,” I offer a startled smile.

She gives me a hand, I feel light as feather as I rise to my feet. I shake the snow off the back of the oversized circus pants Mom picked out for me to wear.

“I look ridiculous. All of the other girls look cute in tight fitting outfits and I could fit ten of me in here.” I attempt to tug at the monster-sized jacket, and I can’t seem to grasp the fabric. “I think something’s wrong with my head. I feel numb all over.”

Giselle flicks a finger down at the powder rich ground. Halfway buried lies a girl with her hair spilled out in long spiral tendrils.

“Oh, my God!” My hands fly up to my face. I bend over and try to rouse her but I can’t feel her. It’s only then I notice she’s wearing the same tragically ugly snowsuit, and I let out an unexpected scream.

“It’s OK, Skyla.” Giselle seems unmoved by the fact I’m lying on the ground while standing over myself simultaneously—a completely impossible feat for the living in general.

“Am I dead?” Three words I never thought I’d say, not yet anyway.

“You’re unconscious. You hit your head pretty hard.”

“Well, don’t just stand there. Wake me up. Fix me—
heal
me. I’m going to freeze out here. They’ll have to hack off all my limbs just to save me.” The errant thought of harvesting Chloe for more parts runs through my mind.

“They won’t find you until much later,” she says it with a sorrowful expression. “But they will eventually, isn’t that great news?”

Later? Like, how much later? Weeks? Months?

“No, Giselle, it’s not good news. Not if I have to live the rest of my life as a torso. It’s definitely not alright.” I dart around looking for something that might lead someone to me, a pathway, an unexpected slope, but I’m completely isolated. In the far distance, I can hear Gage as his voice drifts off in the wrong direction. “How could this have happened? Nevermore!” I let it rip in one bionic roar, but my voice sounds muted, like shouting in a fishbowl.

“Come, Skyla,” she offers her hand. “Nevermore can’t hear you.”

“Help me call him. He’ll get Gage.”

“You’re not awake to instruct him. He responds to commands. I’m afraid it’s pure luck that they find you at all. You need to come with me.”

“Where are you taking me?”

“Your mother would like to see you now.”

***

The earth moves. It shifts under our feet. The backdrop turns once to the right, and we’re no longer standing at the bottom of a mountain ravine, we’re standing somewhere vaguely familiar with a fat lavender moon and cobbled streets.

“Sectorville,” I say just under my breath.

“Soulennium,” Giselle corrects, pointing over my shoulder, “Transport,” she orients me to a large red cave that stands out like a thing of beauty in this strange ever-dark world.

There’s a coffee shop ahead with tables set out and far more patrons than I remember from the time I was here with Marshall. I would give anything if he were here. I can’t help feeling alone and terrified as though I’m about to fall down a steep flight of stairs with every step I take.

“I’m here with you,” Giselle assures, leading me towards the crowd seated outside the tiny shop.

“You can hear me?”

“We’re touching. If you want to maintain privacy simply pull away.”

“No, that’s fine.”

“Skyla!”

My name booms from up ahead. A girl about my age runs with open arms. Her dark hair spirals in long soft curls with gold highlights that shimmer with an intense brilliance but it’s her white dress that stops me from inching forward. Same one Marshall had me wear when he taught me a lesson by way of his hostile arrows.

She pauses and takes me in. Her skin is luminescent, strangely pale with a rosy hue on the apples of her cheeks. She is breathtaking, alarmingly beautiful. She lunges at me, locks her arms around my chest so tight. I’m surprised at how comfortable it is—it’s something altogether mysterious, that I have unknowingly been yearning for deep inside. I don’t need an introduction. Instinctively, I know this is my mother.

“I have counted the moments until this day,” she whispers warm in my ear.

I pull back and sweep my eyes over her. Her entire person is dusted an iridescent sparkle. She looks radiant—noble, wise beyond understanding.

“You don’t look that much older than me.” I guess at this point anything is possible, eternal youth being no exception.