Now he’s not my favorite anymore. I thought we had something special going on.
He steps back, and I ignore the painful tug at my heart. He’s the one I just knew would be in my corner, though I have no idea why I thought such a thing.
They’re not quite as awesome as I’d hoped they’d be if I ever got the chance to finally be seen and heard. I also thought touch would come with that, but now I’m glad it didn’t.
I think they’d kill me.
Feeling like the air has just been sucked out of me, I don’t say a word. Instead, I pass through the wall to go stand guard.
As long as I’m close, I can peek in and get my fix every ten minutes to keep from fading.
Jude really hurt me. I’m not sure why, but they all hurt me, if I’m being honest. I was amusing and then disposable.
I’ve waited five years to be able to speak to them, stupidly thought there’d be an instant friendship between us.
And no one even said good night.
Chapter 5
Nothing happens during the night. I mostly peeked in on Gage, since he sleeps the hardest and I knew he wouldn’t notice me. I was afraid one of the others would wake up and be annoyed with my presence.
My confidence from yesterday to today is nilch, thanks to Jude bursting my little bubble and no one even being nice enough to say good night.
I can hear them all in the kitchen, but I’m sitting on the steps. I’ve spent so long wishing they could hear me and see me, and now that they can, I just want to be invisible again so I can go back to feeling like I’m part of the group. Instead of the weird interloper who needs them to even exist.
Ezekiel rounds the corner to find me, and he stumbles to a halt, eyeing me. “Where’s all that spunk from yesterday?” he asks.
Like a petulant child, I don’t answer. I pretend they’re invisible to me now.
“Ah, this game? I’m good at this game,” he says as he takes a seat by me. “Used to play it when I was three or something.”
Dick.
I pointedly ignore that dig and him, and I continue staring at the wall like it’s fascinating.
He rolls his eyes and stands.
“Whatever. I tried.”
I’m being irrationally emotional over this. It really makes no sense.
Maybe it’s because my emotions have heightened since leveling up. Everything seems twice as crucial as it did before.
I’ll deal with sorting it out later. For now, my fantasy of these four guys being mine is done. I just want to be whole so I can exist without needing them.
He blows out an annoyed breath before finally walking away, rejoining his brothers in the kitchen. I can barely see them if I poke my head out.
Which I’m doing. Every nine minutes and fifty-eight seconds.
“What the hell did you say to her last night after I left?” I hear Ezekiel asking.
“I went to bed too,” Gage says to him in confusion.
I should probably tell them my hearing is exceptional. I hear whispers I don’t think I’m supposed to be able to hear all the time. No one else seems to be able to hear quite so well.
But I keep that secret to myself.
“What did you say?” Gage asks someone, who I assume must be Jude.
“Just gave her a friendly warning,” is Jude’s response. “I was fine with everything until I realized it’s just us who can see her. There’s something going on here, and now I think Kai is right. It feels like a trick, and it’s certainly something Manella would do to put us off our game.”
Kai is next to jump in and start talking. Of course. “I vote we ignore her like she’s not around until we get through the first round of the trials. Then we’ll deal with her during the month long break.”
“Her timing is suspicious,” Gage says on a sigh.
Tears prick my eyes, though it’s just transparent mist. Unlike the real tears I felt last night before fainting. Those stupid tears were happy tears, because this was not how this was supposed to go.
They’re so nice to all the women who come and go. I assumed they’d be nice to me too.
“There’s something about the way it feels when she tries to touch us. It’s just…I don’t know. I don’t feel like ignoring her is going to do anything but hurt her feelings, and what happens if she’s somehow linked to the answers we’re trying to find, and we piss her off enough that she—”
A phone rings, cutting Ezekiel off, thankfully.
Jude answers, and I hear the shuffling like they’re about to leave. Shit.
Just as I stand and go to chase them down, I see Kai turn and smirk at me. They all disappear before I can reach one to hitch a ride with, and a sick feeling creeps in my stomach.
They just left me here.
I told them I’d fade if I went longer than ten minutes without them in my sight, and they left me here.
I let them know I hated the fade. That it was nothingness.
And, still, they left me here.
The lights flicker, and the house vibrates as tears cloud my vision and anger simmers close to the surface. Things rattle off the counter, and it distracts me enough that everything stops at once.
The lights start shining solidly, and the vibrations cease.
My breath catches in my throat as I look around at everything. From Casper to Poltergeist, it seems. Just didn’t have the proper motivation until now.
But as time dwindles on, the stabbing pain catches me off guard. It’s never hurt before. Why does it hurt so much now?
It feels like knives are being dragged from my toes to my thighs before a lancing pain shoots across my back like a whip has been cracked.
A scream is torn from my throat as my vision dims, but before I can fade into nothing, I suddenly feel myself moving. My breath comes back in a harsh rush as I suddenly find myself in a huge tree. At the top of it, actually.
Right above the four assholes who left me in pain.
Glaring down at them, I watch as Kai takes out his sword. “You two get the Falker twins into the gulley, and we’ll herd the juggernauts in behind them. It’s the only way we’re going to get out of this with the highest times.”
I thought they were coming for orientation.
I’m only half listening as I gather back all my strength that they ripped from me. Apparently this new level I’m on comes with a perk.
It takes me a long second to realize that there’s more than one perk.
Looking around, I can see…everything.
And my stomach sinks when I take in the prehistoric looking land that surrounds me, along with various hideous creatures that are lurking about.
Gage slashes his sword through a stringy corpse as it tries to grab him. The stringy corpse falls away, its head rolling off, as they go on like it never happened.
Why did I think these sociopaths were so great before?
We’re in the middle of this forest or whatever you want to call it. I half expect a dinosaur or dragon to come barreling through the massive, elaborate trees that stretch on for as far as I can see.