Ethereal

  Brielle fills her in on the situation.

  “Well you just got here. They need to give the place a shot. Its no wonder they think you’re acting out. You’re just trying to piece together this new life they gave you. I bet no one asked your opinion when they left L.A.”

  Actually they did, but now that I think back, when they asked if I was all for the move it was probably just a rhetorical question.

  “Natalie’s having an end of summer party. Her parents have a beach house on the coast and she does this big bonfire every year. You’ll have to come. I’ll take you at gunpoint if I have to.” Brielle gives a small laugh.

  “Gunpoint?” I muse. “It might be the only way.”

  ***

  I call Logan with the devastating news. He doesn’t say anything for a real long time, and it makes me wonder if he’s still on the other line.

  “It’s my fault.” He offers.

  “No trust me. Everything is my fault these days.”

  “I can’t believe this.” He blows out a breath. “I can visit.”

  “I doubt they’ll let you.”

  “We’ll apply to the same universities.”

  “And if we don’t get in the same ones?”

  “Paragon has an awesome community college.”

  I perk up a little. We make a depressing round of small talk before hanging up. It’s probably better that I’m away from Paragon. I’m a walking time bomb. I reach over and snatch Chloe’s diary off my nightstand. I pull it in close to my chest and let it warm against my body.

  I swore to her I’d never read it. I’m not really afraid of Chloe haunting me or even showing up in my dreams anymore. It’s like we’re old friends. I don’t think I’d mind it.

  I roll around on my bed as sleep eludes me.

  Wish I had that pendant. Wish I could give it back to Logan—keep it at the same time.

  Wish it were Tad instead of me that this nebulous enemy was trying to kill.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Spree

  Brielle’s mom, Darla, has become the new go-between for me and my parents. She somehow gets them to let me have a sleepover with Bree tonight and attend Natalie’s party tomorrow. Clearly, she could sell snow to an Eskimo and sand to an Arab. The only concession being, that she would be present the entire time. It’s not her fault she forgot she had a date with her boyfriend. But she trusts us. It’s nice to be treated like an adult by somebody.

  “What exactly does your mom do?” I ask fanning my nails back and forth over my head. I convinced Brielle we should both have black fingernails for tomorrow in expression of our deep, deep mourning over me leaving. I actually heard mom say she was glad she didn’t unpack the last of the boxes, and how much she didn’t look forward to starting the process all over again.

  “She works in real estate. She wasn’t the one who sold your parents the house, but she was amazed they bought it sight unseen.”

  “Tad’s stupid that way.” I say chipping off a dried bit of paint from off the fleshy part of my thumb.

  “You really think they’re going to send you to an all girls school?” Brielle would probably have some sort of hormonal meltdown if she had to do that. It would be like sequestering the fox from the chicken coop.

  “If it costs money, no. Tad can squeeze pennies from his ass. And he won’t spend a single one of them on me.” I pull my knees up and smooth out my long white nightdress. “I found Chloe’s secret room.” I wonder why she hadn’t told me about it herself, but I figured maybe it was too painful, too many memories, or that it was their space.

  “Are the butterflies still there?” She stops fanning her nails midair.

  “All of them.”

  A steady set of heavy footsteps rises slowly up the stairs.

  Brielle and I head into panic mode and sit up, each in our own corner of the bed.

  “Who’s there?” She shouts.

  I break free from my paralysis and slam the door shut before they have a chance to answer.

  “There’s no lock!” Her voice shrills out to nothing.

  I pan the area, but there’s no dresser, not one thing of great heft that could keep someone out. A pair of black oversized scissors garners my attention. I leap over to the desk and arm myself.

  A slow methodical knock, rasps against the door.

  Brielle lets out a bloodcurdling scream before ducking under her pillow.

  My heart thumps unnaturally, like a thousand wild horses trampling through my bloodstream. I try and steady my breathing, try and ignore the thought of mom and my sisters mourning me at my funeral—Logan—his disappointment in me when he realizes I don’t have the pendant. All I know for sure is I’m going to kill the beast on the other side of the door. I’m going to start stabbing and not stop. I’m going to show the Counts that I’m willing to fight. I’ll fight harder than Chloe, if she did fight at all. I’ll make it impossible for them to keep me for two weeks alive. And I promise on my father’s grave, no one is going to breed me like a dog in a kennel.

  The door swings open and a tall man in a trench coat stands erect and threatening less than a foot away. Screaming at the top of my lungs, I plant the first puncture deep in his flesh right above his stomach—dead center.

  He doubles over and lets out a yell as he falls to his knees. I jab wildly at his back, but I can’t penetrate his leather coat. Before I can go for his eyes, Darla shows up and binds my wrist with her hands, while joining me in a series of wild primitive screams.

  “Shut up! Shut up!” I hear her shout. “Darrell!” She rolls him over and he lets out a groan before passing out. She looks right at me. “Call 911. I think you just killed my boyfriend.”

  ***

  Tad and mom sit stunned across from me at the kitchen table.

  The police officers actually commended me for defending myself so well. Since we weren’t expecting anyone, naturally we thought he was an intruder. Of course I thought I knew, he was a Fem hired out to kill me for my pure angelic blood, but I don’t share any of that information because it sounds ludicrous, and the psych ward at Paragon Hospital isn’t exactly where I want to sleep tonight, or any night ever.

  “Were the two of you drinking?” Tad asks rather morbidly.

  “No. I don’t drink.”

  “Smoking weed?” He continues with his exceptionally calm inquisition.

  “I don’t do that either. And no we weren’t doing anything, but our nails.” I hold up my black smudged fingertips trying to ignore the fact I probably still have blood encrusted in them.

  “If he decides to press charges, this could go on your record.” My mother is in a genuine state of panic.

  “He’s not going to. The officer I talked to said it was self-defense, and I won’t get in trouble. Besides, they said it probably wasn’t more than a flesh wound.”

  Tad shakes his head. “It’s like you’ve become this huge liability overnight. Did it ever occur to you to ask who it was?”

  “We did.” I think Tad’s the liability.

  My cell goes off and it’s a text from Logan.

  I’ve long suspected you were lethal.

  I slip my phone back under my thigh. I don’t feel like ticking off Tad or my mother anymore by texting while they try to break me.

  “We think you need counseling, Skyla.” My mother measures her words. Her cheeks have hollowed out since we’ve been here, and she has dark circles under her eyes the size of half dollars.

  “We met with a local therapist a few days ago.” Tad interjects. “It was just a consult. We never imagined you were capable of something like this, but now I’m afraid we’re going to have to insist.”

  “I don’t have any problem going to a therapist.” If he’s on Paragon, they’ll have to stay.

  “I’m really glad you feel that way.” Tad gives a sad smile. “We called him a few minutes ago. He thinks we should bring you in for a full evaluation this evening.”

  “It’s two in the morning. What kind of d
octor works at this hour?” I ask. Something doesn’t smell right.

  “Actually,” my mom says with tears in her eyes. “He wants you to check into the hospital so you can have a goodnights rest when he’s ready to see you.” Her lips twitch. Her lips always twitch when she stretches the truth.

  “Are you taking me to the psych ward?” Words I never thought would come from my lips.

  “Yes.”

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Spooked

  Paragon hospital lies smack in the center of the island. The fog has rolled back into the sea, and I see the bare naked landscape under the harsh disclosure of a sharp white moon.

  Tad confiscated my cell phone before we left the house. I wasn’t allowed to say bye to the girls because they were sleeping. Drake came out looking sleep deprived, and when they told him where they were taking me and why, his face bleached out.

  The doctor will probably discover things about me I never knew—that I’m a killer and lock me up forever. I really believe that somehow I killed Chloe. Even if I wasn’t responsible for the destruction of her life, I hastened it just like Logan implied.

  We pull into a tall rectangle of a building. A glossy white brick path leads into a set of double sliding doors, and a blast of warm air hits me. I hadn’t even realized I was cold.

  The elevator goes up for days, spits us out onto violent red carpet and a reception area with a nurse out front. A set of double wood doors with tiny, boxed shaped windows is the only other thing around.

  A male nurse in bright blue scrubs emerges from inside. He holds the door open and extends his hand for us to enter.

  I’m part way inside before I notice my mother and Tad aren’t trailing. Tad is already pushing the button for the next set of elevators, and my mother gives a silent wave as the nurse shuts the door behind him.

  They weren’t going to come inside. No long, drawn out goodbye, no kiss from my mother—just a half hearted wave goodbye—the cold slam of the door.

  ***

  Tears fill the crook of my arm. I lay on a glorified elongated box that’s bolted into the floor with no sheets and no pillow, locked in a dark room by myself.

  “Skyla.” A familiar voice originates from the side.

  I jump back and scream. There’s a small ray of light beaming in from the nurses station.

  “It’s me, Gage.”

  I rush into his arms and collapse in a fit of heaving sobs.

  “I can’t stay.” He whispers into my hair. “They’ll check you every fifteen minutes. Logan wants you to go to sleep. He can visit you there.”

  “He can? Why didn’t he tell me?”

  “He was saving it.” He tightens his grip on me. “They’re coming. Goodnight.” He presses his lips against my forehead until he disappears.

  I use the back of my arm as a tissue, and wipe a long streak of snot across the entire length of it. I still haven’t showered. I can feel the sticky residue of blood in places I missed, high up near my elbows, the crevices of my wrist. Lying back down, I start to drift into beautiful dreams that will soon be filled with Logan.

  ***

  Logan dreams us near a crystal blue lake on a bright summer day, in some other place far from Paragon where the sun isn’t afraid to shine.

  We wrap our arms around each other on a grassy knoll so steep we’re almost vertical.

  “Comfortable?” He asks wiping the tears from my eyes.

  “Yes.” My voice sounds muffled, and I wonder if it has anything to do with me being locked in a padded room.

  “You’re going to be fine.”

  “Did Gage say so? Why didn’t I think of that? I should have made Gage tell me everything about my future.”

  “It’s not right of him to do that.” Logan strokes my hair. It calms me down. Makes me want to stay in this dream forever.

  “I’m desperate.” I say.

  “You don’t need to be. Take in the master’s peace. He wants this anxiety, give it to him.”

  “I don’t know how to send it.”

  He lies back on the deep emerald lawn. A deflated balloon appears on his fingertips.

  “What’s that?”

  “Your anti-stress agent. Imagine all of your stress filling up this balloon. Come on.” He urges.

  I imagine all of the anxiety, the fear, the hurt, rejection, loneliness—grief, filling up that balloon.

  In one fell swoop it bloats the size of a basketball. Logan ties it off on the bottom and simply lets go.

  “There it goes.” He says mock shooting it with his fingers.

  We watch as it reduces in size, as it turns into a speck and blinks out of existence. The celestial blue of the sky is increasingly deeper near the northern portion—stars are visible—right here midday.

  “It’s done.” I feel lighter from the effort. “Thanks.”

  “Don’t thank me.”

  “Right. Thanks.” I call up to the sky.

  There’s so much more I don’t understand. So many more balloons to fill in this lifetime. I wonder how he has time to hear them all, or if they accumulate around him until he’s overwhelmed. I imagine I’ll get to ask him myself one day. He’ll show me a pile of decimated latex, and I’ll get to thank him all over.

  We fall asleep safe in one another’s arms. Logan and I intertwined. I don’t think I’ll ever sleep alone again.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Out

  Breakfast is served in the dayroom with a group of individuals who are either stoned or genuine zombies.

  A nurse, with a severe case of adult acne, supervises with a clipboard, circling the table in a rotational manner that actually makes me dizzy.

  All of the windows are barricaded with either wood framing or some kind of metal bars that make long rectangular patterns alternating with shorter squares, and some of those are in color.

  Along the back wall, a giant piece of butcher paper is taped up behind the television. It’s a picture of a cabin by a lake with a boat bobbing in the middle, all done in magic marker and it reeks of third grade. This is what my life has come to, breakfast with zombies and finger-paints.

  A short woman dressed in an over cheery shade of pink, slaps a plastic tray with a covered dome in front of me. I pull the lid off ready for the big reveal, hopeful for something palatable even though I’m not that hungry. It’s a small bowl of white foamy mush, a piece of burnt toast, and a small portion of lumpy scrambled eggs that smell like a wet dog. I replace the dome and sink down in my seat.

  Without asking, the rather over eager zombie to my left glides my tray over and grunts into it. He quickly dumps my portions into his own tray and slides mine back empty.

  Great. Guess I’ll wait for the next fresh serving of brains.

  “Skyla Messenger?” A slim man with dark hair and thick-framed glasses leans into the dayroom clutching at my chart. “Come with me, please.”

  I follow behind him a good two feet, down the long never-ending hall. I can feel the air rising up through my pale yellow gown, my sticky-back socks catching on the carpet all the way over.

  He unlocks an over-bright room equip with two seats and a table, asks me to be seated before clicking the door shut behind us.

  “Dr. Booth.” His face brightens. He’s got tiny brown eyes shadowed by furry brows, and he’s just now starting to remind me a little of a teddy bear. He flops the chart on the table and folds his arm high up on his chest, examining me.

  “Am I supposed to say something?”

  He shakes his head rather bored. It’s like the door shut and he’s loosened. He probably does this with all his patients. He’s nothing more than a big fake that bilks insurance companies. He’ll probably want to keep me locked up for the next five years to insure his annual Hawaiian vacation.

  “I want to go home.” I say weak.

  “I’m going to let you, but first we need to have a little talk.”

  A surge of adrenaline percolates through me. He’s going to let me go home!

/>   “Yes, anything.” I’ll make stuff up, tell him whatever he wants to hear, just get me out of here.

  “I know who you are, Skyla. I know you’re a Celestra.”

  Oh God. Oh no. He’s one of them. Tad sent me right in the arms of some psycho Count who wants to kill me. He’s probably going to keep me locked up for good, and issue a battery of blood tests until I have none left.

  “I’m Levatio.” He gives a tiny laugh and offers his hand.

  “Really?” I shake his hand. “One of my good friends is Levatio!” I’m surging now. I’ve beat Tad at his own game.

  “Gage Oliver.” He says knowing. “I’ve known the Oliver’s from times and times past.” He widens his ultra calm smile.

  “So you’re going to let me go, right?” Maybe he can convince my parent’s I’m totally sane, lock Tad up instead.

  “I’ll let you go, but I might have to incarcerate you from time to time just to make it look good.” He stretches his smile then snaps it back to the way it was.

  “What?”

  “Kidding.” He pats me on the arm before leaning deep into his seat. “I know the problems you Celestra have. You’re the one client I’ll have to pay special attention to. Logan mentioned you have a hedge pendant?”

  “Did. I sent it back in time.” It sounds insane even to say it. “Please don’t tell. I want to be the one to tell him.”

  “Your uncle said your blood was stolen from the lab. It means the Countenance has access to your full genetic code. They’re going to want to stop you from ever having children if they don’t kill you first. But that’s not a worry for today. And they’ve certainly let other Celestra live. If they were to wipe out the entire race it might ignite a civil conflict.” His forehead creases dramatically and a look of genuine worry crosses his face.

  “How many are left?”

  “I don’t know, but the numbers aren’t impressive.”

  “Please, just send me home.” I pick off the polish on my fingernails. It’s a nervous habit, and since I’m prone to being nervous I don’t usually wear nail polish to begin with.