Dead River

Chapter Twenty-Five



I blink awake, only to find myself lying in the soft pine needles. It’s dark and bitingly cold, and the only sound is the rushing of water. My body is numb from the cold. Cold! I feel cold. I pull up my shirt and run my hand along the smooth skin of my belly. I sit up quickly and realize the fingers of my other hand are wrapped around something. I open them, and in the moonlight I can just make it out. A wilted flower petal.

Flowers? From where?

And suddenly it hits me. The Outfitters, and me swaying with Justin under the swirling disco lights. The corsage he gave me, crumpled and wilted.

I gasp. I ran away, and I slipped on the rocky embankment, and … then what?

Was it all just …

Could it have been …

And when I think of everything that has happened to me in the past twenty-four hours—somehow being stabbed, dying, meeting my mother, searching for my body, kissing Trey—I know it. I bring my hand to my lips, and they’re frozen, stone. Of course. Of course none of that happened.

I stand up and start to run, and stop when a jagged pain rips through the back of my head. I hit my head, passed out cold. Who knows how long I’ve been out here, wherever here is? I’m surrounded by nothing but trees and inky darkness. I need to get to the Outfitters. I need to see my dad. Justin. Angela.

Because I can barely feel my legs, I’m nowhere near as graceful as I’d been in my dream—was it a dream? I stumble over the rocks, then fall to my knees and feel a rock dig into my flesh. Now I feel my legs. The pain makes me see fireworks. Fireworks. The bright colors of my dreamworld are gone. The beauty of the way everything struck me as if I were seeing it for the first time. Now everything is dull again, heartbreakingly so. I try not to concentrate on it as I find my way up the embankment, and yet that’s all I can see.

That is, until Trey appears before me.

He’s a ghost, I know, and for the first time, he looks that way. He’s tinged with blue, faded, yet so perfect. His face may not be clean-shaven, but his wounds are gone. He smiles at me.

I hear his voice, clear inside my head. Everything is all right now. I’m moving on. Wanted to tell you something, though. I shouldn’t have denied it.

“Kiandra!” a voice calls. It’s one I haven’t heard in centuries. I whirl around. Justin. He’s standing at the top of the embankment, the hood of a rain slicker hiding his face. But even though I can’t see most of him, I can tell he’s stricken with relief and amazement. He starts to navigate his way down the rocky ledge, but by now I’m reaching for something that is just out of my grasp. Trey is walking away, in that same lazy, carefree way I’ve come to know.

“Trey!” I shout. “No! Just—”

Justin moves closer, ignoring my plea. “What?” he’s asking. He has his arms out, ready to envelop me, to pull me close to his big, strong body the way he has a thousand times.

“What’s wrong?”

Justin clutches me to him, and in the music of his heartbeat, I watch Trey walk to the river. I wish he’d just look back, but he doesn’t stop, doesn’t even falter. Everything is still, so still, except him. I need to run for him, to grab him, to tell him to come back. When I push myself away from Justin, there is no sound but the whistle of the wind, no movement but the dance of the leaves in the trees. Justin whispers, “You’re in shock. Let’s get you inside, okay?”

I push against his body with such violence that he steps back. “No!” I scream, but the second I do, Trey disappears, leaving nothing but an outline in my memory. I blink again and again, but he is gone. I turn to Justin. It’s him. He’s lured me back to reality, to his world, when I need to be in the other one. I need to be with the dead. But as I look around helplessly, I realize I have no idea how to get back. I clasp my hands over my mouth. “Oh my God. He’s gone.”

He moves closer, tentative, and scans through the pines. “Who is he?”

“Leave me,” I whisper into my hands. I don’t know how long I’ve been crying, but my palms are slick and salty with tears.

Suddenly a fireball bursts in the distance. I don’t even look at it, almost as if I expected it, and yet I don’t know where it came from. Justin steps back, his mouth forming an O. “What the—”

He starts to take a step toward it, but as I’m moaning “Please, can’t you leave me?” another fireball bursts behind us. It rocks Justin, and he steadies himself as I remain still. The rain begins to fall steadily now, and the fire melts to nothing, but Justin surveys the area, and I know that in all the years he’s been here, he’s never seen anything like it. But still he won’t leave.

“What the hell? We’ve got to get out of here, Ki. Now.”

“Leave me,” I beg, knowing there will be another eruption, possibly closer, if he stays. I don’t know how I know, but I know.

But I can’t expect him to leave. He’s just found me. Instead of obeying, he narrows his eyes. “Wait. You’ve been missing for nearly twenty-four hours and now you’re telling me you don’t want to be found? Jesus, Ki, did you do this on purpose? Because of me?”

I simply stare at the spot where Trey once stood. I can’t comprehend what Justin is saying. Because of him? Why because of him? Everything from this world is strange, like walking into a foreign country. I turn to him as he tries to put his arm around me. Even he looks different. His arm around me feels different, heavier. Wrong.

“No, I didn’t do this on purpose,” I whisper, because I know that if I admit I did, I’d have to acknowledge that everything that happened to Trey is my fault.

And it is.

Why can’t I see him? Is he gone? Off to the next place? Away to where I will never see him again?

Tears flood my eyes again. I start to speak, to explain, but I don’t know how to explain this. Justin puts a warm hand over mine, and it’s only when my hand starts to sting in his that I realize my limbs are frozen. He says, “You’re like ice. You can explain later. Let’s go back. Your dad is waiting for you.”

My dad. It’s those words that lift me. Justin helps me to my feet, and they feel like they’re tethered to the ground with elastic bands as I walk unsteadily toward the path that will lead us to the rest of civilization. To my old life. How can it be that it’s only been a day since I’ve been part of it? I slump against Justin, and the one thing that feels familiar is how effortlessly he piles me into his arms. In the rhythm of his footfalls, I’m lulled to sleep.