The Watcher

Chapter Five



My friends were waiting for me at the crest of the trail, their mouths agape as Michael set me down on a nearby log.

Heather rushed over and threw her arms around my neck. “Oh my God, Mia. Are you okay? We turned around and you were gone.”

Michael stepped back to let her get closer, but his tall frame hovered as though he could lend me his strength by proximity.

She turned to him almost accusingly. “Where did you come from?”

He cleared his throat. “I—”

Gushing, Fiona cut him off. “Michael, that was so awesome! Carrying her up that hill. It was crazy-steep. Your feet barely touched the ground.”

“It was nothing,” he scoffed, and I could feel his attention on me again. “How is it?”

How’s what? I thought, blinking at him, still marveling at what I’d seen. Had I just remembered a dream? It seemed so familiar, so real.

Heather touched my shoulder, but asked Michael, “How’s what?”

He focused on me. “Your ankle?”

I checked it. I could point my toe now without cringing. “It’s okay. Much better.”

“What happened?” Heather asked. “Can you walk?”

“Sure.” I stood, but when I took a step, pain burned the length of my leg. I flinched before I could stop myself and nearly fell over.

Michael grabbed my elbow to steady me. “Maybe you shouldn’t walk yet.”

“It’s not nearly as bad as I thought,” I said, sitting back down.

“Uh huh,” he said. “That’s probably shock.”

An indescribable emotion welled inside me, catching in my throat. I felt frail and drawn, like something made out of tissue paper. Fighting a strange urge to cry, I swallowed hard and took deep breaths.

“I’m such a klutz,” I said to Heather and Fiona. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

“Shh!” Sitting beside me, Heather put an arm around my shoulder. “Don’t even think that way, Mia.”

Michael spoke to Heather and Fiona this time. “We should get her to the hospital so she can get checked out.”

“I’ll be fine,” I said.

“We can help you get back,” Heather said, standing. “You can lean on me. We’ll make it back okay.”

I tried another step on my own. It hurt but seemed easier than the last one. Heather, who was closest to my height, encouraged me to lean on her and we took slow, careful steps down the dusty trail together, with Fiona leading the way. It was slow going. We had to stop often so I could rest. Michael took up the rear, but when we stopped he was so preoccupied with the forest that he hardly spoke.

On our third stop, Heather sat beside me on an old stump. “We’re almost halfway,” she said, trying to encourage me. “We’re making good time.”

Finding a patch of sunlight, Fiona lunged into a yoga stretch that showed off her long, elegant limbs. Tossing her hair, she grinned up at Michael and my stomach hitched. She could be such a flirt.

To my relief, he didn’t notice her. His attention was on the golf-ball-sized rock he was rolling beneath his foot.

A chill ran through me again, and I got the feeling that someone, or something, was staring at me. One of the bushes around us seemed darker than normal, shadowy, and I thought I saw a glimmer of red. A jolt of fear seized my chest. If one of those dogs came after me, I’d never be able to outrun it. I could barely walk.

Heather followed my gaze, but obviously didn’t see anything. “You okay? You’ve gone really pale.”

“I thought…” I began, but when Michael glanced at me, I stopped. I didn’t want to bring up the shadowy dog again, not when he and I were starting to get along. “It’s nothing.”

Beside me, he kicked the rock into the bush and it landed with a satisfying crash of branches and leaves. When I looked back at the bushes, the darkness was gone.

I stared at him, amazed, wondering if he’d seen it too. He had been in the woods that morning when I was chased. Maybe he’d seen that dog after all.

He cocked an eyebrow at me. “What?”

“Nothing,” I said, chickening out.

Slouching, he shoved his hands into his pockets. “This isn’t working.”

“What isn’t?”

He tilted his chin to look up at me through his long, dark lashes and there was something so intense, so intimate, about his gaze that my breath froze in my chest. “If you keep walking on that foot, you’ll hurt it more.”

“She’s not walking. She’s hobbling,” said Heather, drawing her arm across her brow. Helping me was making her sweat. “We’re taking it nice and slow.”

Fiona stepped in a little closer. “I can take a shift,” she said.

“It would be better if I carried you,” Michael interjected.

Fiona’s jaw dropped, unable to contain her surprise. Was he serious? He seemed genuine enough—sincere, like he was living some code of chivalry, the kind you read about in medieval history. I remembered the feel of his hand on my back, his arm under my legs, and my heart sped up. When he first carried me, it was so intimate, so peaceful, it awakened a craving in me that I didn’t even know I had. I would have given anything to feel that way again, and that’s what made it seem wrong somehow, illicit even.

Heather grinned at me, as though she could sense what I was feeling.

“Thanks, but I think I can handle it,” I said.

Fiona wore a stunned expression. Obviously she would have accepted his offer.

Michael rolled another rock beneath his foot. “No need to be stubborn. You’ll only make it harder on yourself.”

I raised my chin defiantly. “Stubborn? I’m not—”

“Yeah, okay.” He laughed under his breath.

So maybe I was a bit stubborn, but what was so wrong with that?

There was a noise in the forest behind us. We both looked. Then he turned back to me. “Why don’t I piggy-back you?” he said. The smile he gave me could have melted gold.

If it were anyone else, I might have said piggy-back rides were for kids, but really it was a good suggestion. It wasn’t nearly as intimate, and it gave me the option to hold on, some semblance of control, instead of the helplessness of being carried. But when he crouched down so I could get on his back, the heat and closeness of his body permeated the dampness of my clothes. I stopped.

“Everything okay?” he asked.

“Uh-huh.” Biting my lip, I eased onto his back. His hands held my bare legs like they would sear me. The sides of his waist were warm and solid against my thighs, and that illicit feeling came back. Trying to focus, I clung to him with my remaining strength.

He shifted, readjusting his grip. “Relax. I got you.”

“I am relaxed,” I squeaked.

“Then why are your knuckles turning white?”

I could hear the smile in his voice. Could he tell how I felt?

“Oh, sorry!” I willed the fists clutching his black T-shirt to loosen until I felt the tautness of his muscles under my fingers and the steady beat of his heart. Which was better, I guess, but also worse.

Being the one with the cargo—meaning me—on his back, Michael set a quick pace that Heather and Fiona could barely match. Fiona talked about an upcoming horror movie she was excited about. Heather was against it. I could hear the exertion in their voices as they climbed up and down hills. In contrast, Michael was silent and his breathing even, as though carrying me was hardly any difficulty at all.

Soon we were back at Fiona’s old Honda Civic, parked in the shade of a huge maple, and Michael lowered me onto the car’s hood. The cold metal pulled the skin on my legs into goose bumps, and I was suddenly aware of how warm I’d been pressed against him. Then, holding my hips, he gently guided me down to my feet. Our eyes locked–there was such light in his –and the air grew warm between us. In that moment, nothing else existed: just that light in his eyes and the touch of his hands on my hips. If I were more experienced with guys, I might have known how to flirt with him. But I didn’t. All I could do was hold my breath and lean in ever so slightly, willing him to come closer.

It didn’t work. Letting out his own breath, Michael dropped his hands and swept his gaze to my feet.

“How’s your ankle?” He took half a step back.

My foot was swelling inside my boot, but the pain was completely manageable. I put weight on it and didn’t cringe. Not having to walk back must have helped. “It’s good. Thank you—for everything.”

“You don’t have to—”

“Michael, that was awesome of you!” Fiona cut in, still a little short of breath from the hike.

Oblivious to the moment we’d just had, she praised and thanked Michael a few times, and then reassured him that she and Heather would take me to the hospital to get checked. I thanked him again too, but only once. Fiona’s profuse attention made me uncomfortable for all three of us.

Once we were inside the car and Michael was well out of earshot, Fiona gushed, “Oh my God, he’s so hot—celestial hot. You’re so lucky!” She sighed for emphasis, putting the car into drive. “He didn’t even break a sweat when he carried you. And did you see that body? Like an Olympic swimmer.”

Heather made a face. “Fiona, Mia had a serious fall and may have broken her foot. That’s hardly lucky.”

Fiona backpedaled. “Of course not lucky to have fallen…but lucky he was there.”

“It was nice of him to stay,” Heather said, studying me for a reaction.

I schooled my expression to a neutral one so she wouldn’t notice my rush of excitement from thinking about him. With my luck, she’d analyze my feelings, try to set me up on a date, and I’d embarrassed myself around this guy enough already, thanks. Whatever I felt would be best kept secret for now. “Yeah, it was nice, I guess.”

“You guess?” Fiona turned her head to look at me in the back seat. Then remembering she was driving, she turned back to the road. “The way he carried you was so romantic. If he’d carried me like that—”

Heather began to laugh. “I think we have a pretty good picture of what you’d do, Fiona.”

I laughed too, grateful for Heather’s injection of humor. The strange sensations and pain coursing through my body after the fall were overwhelming enough, not to mention all the strong feelings I’d had around Michael, or the strange things I’d seen. I didn’t need to add Fiona’s fantasies about him to the mix.

***

Luckily for us, the Emergency Room wasn’t too busy. Heather walked me in while Fiona went foraging for something to eat.

The nurse at the administration desk paged my mom and asked me to take a seat in the waiting area. Mom came down a few minutes later wearing the lilac-colored nurse’s uniform we’d picked out together last spring. It brought out her green eyes and softened the gray streak in her hair. After greeting Heather, she drilled me about the accident. Between her crazy hospital schedule and my starting the school year, I hadn’t had much time to spend with her since I’d returned from Denver. I had to admit, getting injured was a strange way to do it.

I told her about the log bridge and that some noise had startled me, for lack of a better explanation. I didn’t want to talk about the likelihood of seeing the same dog again, not with Heather present. If it were real, surely someone else would have seen it.

“Eight feet,” she said coolly. She was never one for big emotional scenes, not when it came to injuries. “It could have been a lot worse. How did you get back?”

Mom was far too smart sometimes.

This was where Heather chimed in. “A boy from school came by. He knew some first aid and helped us get Mia out.”

Mom squinted at me suspiciously. “Were there boys on this hike?”

“No, Mom.” It was silly to have to apologize for a boy helping us out. Mom could be so overprotective.

“It’s a popular trail,” Heather added.

Fiona joined us, carrying a large box of pizza in one hand and the slice she was eating in the other. She greeted my mom and plunked herself into the empty seat beside us.

“Hi, Fiona. Heather and Mia were just telling me about the accident.”

I tensed. This was not a time for Fiona to talk about the glorious attributes of Michael Fontaine—or his swimmer’s body. I didn’t need my mom prying about him, or worse trying to play matchmaker.

Fortunately, all she said was, “Yeah, it was really scary.”

The topic of Michael didn’t come up again. Instead, Mom shared a pizza slice with us and asked about our first week of school. I settled in with my pizza, hungrier than I expected, and let my mind wander.

Behind the administration desk, the paramedics rolled in a girl on a stretcher with tubes in her arms. A poppy-red blood stain pooled through the blanket on her chest. Doctors and triage nurses swarmed her, and the previously quiet ER erupted like an upturned anthill. As they wheeled the patient behind a room divider for privacy, I noticed a tall figure standing in the doorway bathed in a soft golden light. Michael. What was he doing here?

I raised a hand to wave at him as a nurse in surgical scrubs walked by, but by the time she passed, he was gone. Why didn’t he stay? Staring at the empty doorway, I wondered if my eyes had deceived me. I wished I could get up and follow him, to find out if he was real, but with my ankle not working right, he’d be a block away by the time I hobbled to the door.

A few moments later, Heather and Fiona left and I was led into a semi-private examination room with pale yellow curtains for walls. After checking me for injuries and applying a tensor bandage, the doctor said I had a mild sprain and recommended ice, over-the-counter painkillers, and rest.

Mom drove me home and set me up on the couch with a cold pack and some movies before she went back to finish her shift. I couldn’t focus on them. My mind kept wandering back to that house I’d imagined. Thinking I might have seen it in a book somewhere, I hobbled to my room and rifled through my books on ancient civilizations.

Sitting on my bed, I scanned for pictures and descriptions to see if anything jogged my memory. As I worked through ancient Greece, my mind played over the morning’s events. Had I been imagining the dreamlike images, the strange flashing lights, the shadows in the bushes? None of these things made any sense, no matter how much I wanted them to. Perhaps I had a concussion.

But the doctor had checked me for any head injuries. I was, by all accounts, perfectly fine.