The trees rushed by in a green blur, broken by flashes of sunlight that reflected against the car's side window. Kate averted her gaze from the scenery outside and yawned. Fifteen minutes ago when she, her boyfriend, and two of her closest friends had stopped at the gas station, she had taken a pill for motion sickness since, according to the map, a large number of winding turns were coming up.
A hand curled around her shoulder and half-turned her before an arm wrapped around her waist and drew her backward until her back rested against a firm chest.
She looked over her shoulder at Ethan who, with a twinkle in his ice-blue eyes, gazed down at her. “Are you volunteering to be my pillow?” She tried not to stare at him, but as always, it was so hard to take her eyes off his beautiful face. Sometimes she wondered if she would love him the way she did even if he weren’t as pretty as he was.
“Yes.” He wrapped his arm more tightly around her and pulled her into his lap.
“You are so courteous; feeding me and pretending to be my pillow, what's next?" She really appreciated his habit of always having a snack for her in his pocket. It was his way of showing affection. Since the time she had refused a bar of chocolate, jokingly accusing him of trying to fatten her up, nowadays his pocket contained mostly dried fruit and nuts. Sometimes she wondered what she had done that was so good that the entity had given him to her.
“Making out, if you are up to it?” His breath caressed the outline of her ear and stirred the black strands of hair that escaped from her braid.
She licked her lower lip and her eyes glided over Mandy's blond curls, visible over the back of driver’s seat, to her childhood friend Tyler, who was staring at them with narrowed eyes over the edge of passenger seat.
“Get a room,” he said.
“Or we could slip into our energy form,” Ethan proposed in a whisper.
“Our powers are for reaping souls and for hunting Soul Eaters, not for sneaking around.” She looked up at him and tugged on the blond curl that fell across his brow, even though she wanted a few of his kisses right now. But she always wanted them and, luckily for her, he was very generous with them.
“Don't look at me like that.”
“How am I looking at you?”
“Like you want us to get a room.”
“Eww.” Tyler grimaced. “You two, stop flirting already.”
“You'll have time for that later,” Mandy said, her gaze on the road and her hands on the wheel. She had replaced Ethan in the driver’s seat at their last stop. Tyler would probably love to get his turn to drive, but Ethan didn’t entrust his precious car to anybody but his sister, Mandy.
“No, they won't,” Tyler objected. “We went on this road trip for some friendly bonding, not so they could get their groove on. They can do that at home.”
“You could get your groove on, too,” Mandy said in a low, slightly timid voice, and Kate noticed, as the blonde glanced at Tyler, the redness that spilled across her cheeks. Tyler blushed too.
“They are so cute,” Kate whispered as she snuggled deeper into Ethan's embrace. Mandy usually reminded her of a cute puppy, despite her tall and athletic build, and she was a perfect match with Tyler, who was their school basketball star.
“Yes, but not as cute as you,” Ethan said to her in a low voice.
She felt heat crawling into her cheeks. She fixed her gaze forward, since if she had looked at him, she wouldn't have been able resist kissing him.
He chuckled and twirled a strand of her hair around his finger.
She cleared her throat. “I thought we came on this trip because Tyler wants to play ghost buster.” Since Tyler had learned about her being a Soul Reaper, he had, as a good friend, tried to learn everything about ghosts and ghost-related events. That included searching for local haunted sites and then insisting that they visit them. As a Soul Reaper she didn't have to search out ghosts, since, as soon as she materialized her scythe, they started to crowd around her. She had indulged Tyler, though, and they made small trips to those sites. This was one of them, even though this one couldn't be called a small trip. The ride to the haunted ruin of an old monastery Tyler had found online was a twelve-hour drive and, since Tyler loved camping, this was going to be a week-long trip. It was summer vacation and they had the time, so they had decided to check out the place where, according to the articles Tyler showed them, over the course of ten years seven teenagers had gone missing. She doubted they would find anything, since ghosts, even Soul Eaters, couldn't harm the living -- or at least normal Soul Eaters and ghosts couldn't. Ethan agreed with her. But they didn't mind humouring Tyler, especially not when it meant spending more time together.
“The proper term is ‘paranormal investigator,’ not ‘ghost buster,’” Tyler said.
“Huh?”
“He bought The Everything Ghost Hunting Book,” Mandy explained.
“Great,” Kate said.
“Do you want to see it?” Tyler offered, enthusiasm in his voice.
“No, not really.” When she saw disappointment written on his face, she said. “Maybe later.” Her mouth opened in a yawn again and her eyes fluttered closed. She lifted her legs onto the backseat and leaned more heavily on Ethan. “Wake me up when we get there.”
#
The greyish light that poured through her eyelids woke her up. She rolled onto her side and buried her face in the pillow, but the light was still there, preventing her from diving back into the comfortable darkness of sleep. She heard the soft thuds of feet and the creaking of wood before a hand descended on her shoulder and shook her.
“You sleepyhead, wake up,” a familiar female voice said.
She opened her eyes and peeked out from under her eyelashes. An oval face framed with jaw-length blond curls looked down at her. She knew the girl quite well and wanted to say her name; she had it on the tip of her tongue... What was it? Something with an M? Maya? Mandy? “Mandy?”
Mandy sat on the edge of her bed and put her hand on her forehead. “Your fever seems to be gone. Do you feel well enough to go to classes today?”
“Yes.” Had she been ill? Well, that would explain the heaviness in her head.
“The first class is going to start in an hour.” Mandy stood. “You better hurry up, if you want to stop for breakfast.”
Her stomach rumbled. “Breakfast, yeah.” She sat up and stretched her arms. They were sore and heavy.
“See you downstairs.” Mandy grabbed her books from the desk by the bed.
She tossed her legs over the edge of her bed and frowned as her eyes scrutinised the bare greyish walls and simple, worn-out furniture. The room she had been sharing with Mandy for -- she pinched her eyebrows together. For how long? “Three years. Yeah. Something like that.” Her brain felt slightly muddled and her body a little weak. She must have been really ill.
“Breakfast.” She jumped up, feeling as if her brain rattled against her skull at the movement. She staggered slightly and, teeth clenched, stumbled into the adjoining bathroom. Splashing cold water onto her face cleared her mind and made her feel slightly better. She washed up, then she tossed on the clothes she found in the cabinet beside her bed, grabbed the bag on the desk on her side of the room and went into the weakly lit hallway. The cafeteria was two corridors away. She found Mandy sitting at the end of the second of the two long tables. After she got her food from the poorly-stocked self-service buffet, she strolled toward her.
A black-haired girl sat beside Mandy. She looked familiar and her name came as soon as she laid her eyes on her. Katherine, but everybody called her Kate.
“Hey.” She lowered herself into the seat beside Mandy.
The girls greeted her back and after a few minutes three boys joined them.
Seeing the blond, beautiful oval face with its narrow nose, high cheekbones and strong chin, her mouth stretched into a smile. She knew his name as if it were imprinted onto her brain. “Ethan,” she breathed out. She loved that boy and he loved her, or so he said, and not only said, but showed her, repeatedly.
“Hey, Claire.”
Claire? Her name wasn't Claire, her name was -- Claire. She rubbed her forehead and sighed. When she lifted her head, she saw ice-blue eyes staring at her, something like worry written on his face. She smiled. “I'm afraid that I'm not completely well yet.”
“You might not be completely well for a while,” Ethan said. “You were quite sick, much more than Mandy and Tyler were.”
“Ryan was almost in as bad shape as you.” Kate put her hand on the black-haired boy's shoulder. “But you feel better now, right?”
Ryan nodded.
Claire watched Ryan’s spiked hair shift with his nod, wondering how much time he had to spend on gelling it. His skin was pale and had a grey sheen. She leaned toward Ethan. “Who's that?” she asked in a whisper. “A new student?”
“You are so silly.” Ethan flickered her forehead. “That's Ryan, Kate's boyfriend. He has been here for two years now.”
He had? But he looked so... unfamiliar. She faced Ryan and found him staring at her. Had he heard her? She gave him a smile.
He rolled his eyes and turned toward Kate. The light scowl that marred his face smoothed out and his face lit up. He picked an apple from his plate and offered it to the black-haired girl.
He must really like her, Claire thought.
“What's that?” Kate asked, frowning.
“For you. You have been really into them lately,” Ryan said.
Kate took the apple, but instead of biting into it as Claire expected she set it on the tray before her.
It was such a nice gesture and I would have eaten it in Kate's place, Claire thought as she wrapped her fingers around her apple, which she had taken in her pillage of the buffet. After she had read that they were good for one’s health, she tried to eat at least one a day. She lifted the fruit up and sank her teeth into it, breaking the red skin. The sweet juicy taste spilled over her tongue. She had really started to like apples. They had become one of her favourite fruits.
#
“Kate said there’s a party this evening.” Claire pushed the brown thing that was supposed to be meat to the edge of her plate. The food here... She grimaced, put the fork down and leaned back in her seat.
“Yes, there is.” Ethan leaned his forearms on the table.
“She said we are going?” Which was weird, since usually they liked to keep to themselves.
“That’s the plan.”
But she and Ethan didn’t have to go. “You could back out.” She eyed the table, annoyed that it separated her from him. Usually he sat on the same side as her, so that he could hold her hand. She liked the way he slid his fingers among hers and slightly squeezed them as if in reassurance, telling her that he was there and that he wasn’t about to go anywhere. She glided her hand over the table and her fingers touched his then tiptoed over his hand. “You could come to my room.” As he had so many times before, and they would snuggle and talk late into the night. “You haven’t been to my room in such a long time, not since I got well again. I miss you.” And their talks and his warmth against her back.
He hauled his hand against his side.
She scowled. “What’s the matter?”
“It’s forbidden.”
She chuckled. “You are not serious.”
“It’s forbidden,” he stubbornly repeated.
“So is the party.”
“That’s different.”
“Both are against the rules, aren't they? But when has that ever stopped you?”
“We are not going to have...”
“What?”
“I’m not going to break the rules.”
“Why not?” Claire couldn’t understand it. He was the one who always waltzed into her room, into her bed and under her bedcovers to spoon with her. Why had that become such a problem now? “You’ve done it before.”
“I might have, but...”
“What?”
“Look at the time.” He glanced at his watch and stood up. “I have a meeting with a teacher I’m helping on a project for extra credit.” He piled his plates onto one another.
“Wait, let me walk you part of the way.” She jumped up and picked up her plates.
“If you must.” He started to walk away.
“The way you are acting, I might start to think you don’t like me anymore,” she said, a chuckle in her voice.
“No, I...” He put the plates on the counter.
He should have said, ‘As if that would ever happen.’ Her eyebrows furrowed as she scrutinised his profile. “What’s going on with you?”
“What are you taking about?”
“You are different.”
“Nothing’s different. You are just tired.” He took her plates off her hands and added them to the pile. “Maybe you should take a nap.”
Her eyes narrowed into slits.
“What did I say wrong this time?”
It wasn’t the first time he had proposed a nap to her, but before it was always accompanied by a naughty wiggle of his eyebrows and a suggestion that he could join her. She pressed her fingers against her forehead. Or maybe she really was tired and it was making her too sensitive. This was Ethan, the boy who had taught her that leaning on others wasn’t a bad thing, the boy who had showed her that she wasn’t alone in this world. He had proven his worth to her, more than once. And he loved her, she was certain of it, he had said that to her many times -- and not just said it, but proved it with his actions. Nothing said ‘I love you’ more than supplying her with care and attention, and by that she didn't mean only his habit of bringing her food. Something that he hadn’t done for quite a while now, not since she had gotten well.
She frowned. Had something happened while she was sick?
#
“Claire,” she said her name out loud. “The girl with straight, mousy brown hair.” She leaned closer to the silver surface of the mirror to better distinguish the colour of her eyes. “Brown.” But not the warm colour of chocolate, but dull light brown. Her nose was slightly too wide and her chin too strong to be called beautiful, but if she put on make-up to enlarge her eyes and to highlight her cheekbones, she would be pretty. She smiled. Her smile was sort of cute. She puffed her cheeks and patted them with her hands as she exhaled. “This is you, Claire. This is you. You are not beautiful, but you are not ugly either. That's something, isn't it? You do look tired though.” Even after a nap.
A knock on the door and Mandy called, “Are you ready yet?”
“Almost.” She put on some mascara, a dash of lip gloss and a brush of blush to cover the fatigue that lingered as a dull greyness in her skin. She tied her shoulder-length hair in a low ponytail before she left the bathroom.
“We are going to be late.” Mandy tossed her a light blue sweater; which vibrant sky blue had faded with wear to a grey blue. It was faded like everything in this school, the colour of the walls, floors and furniture, even the students' skin looked washed out, but that was probably because of the flu that put the majority of them into their beds for a week.
“They are not going to leave without us.” Claire draped the sweater around her shoulders and knotted the sleeves. She would have preferred to skip the party that a few students had organized in the clearing on the west side of the forest that spread out behind their boarding school, but since they had already made the plans, she didn’t want to be the one ruining them. The gathering had been organised without permission from the school administration, which meant they would have to sneak out. Because of lax supervision, that wouldn’t pose any problems to them. They would have to be careful, though, when leaving the protective walls of the converted monastery, since the teacher's lounge in the upper level of the south wing overlooked the expanse of lawn they needed to cross.
“They might. You know how boys are.” Kate, who sat on Mandy's bed, stood.
“Tyler would never do that,” Claire said. She would have said, ‘neither would Ethan,’ but Kate had told her that Ethan had said he would join them later.
“You are right.” Kate plastered a smile on her face. “Let's go.”
The girls’ rooms were in the east wing and the boys’ in the west, both with an entry point in the common hall and connected by a gallery that overlooked the inner yard. Tyler and Ryan were waiting for them in the common hall, perched on the sofa watching a black-and-white telly, the only television in the dorm.
Together they went outside and climbed up the low sloped ribbon of grass that led to the forest. After a twenty-minute walk among the high trees they could already see the yellow dot of a bonfire in the twilight and hear the faint sounds of music. A few more minutes and they found themselves at the edge of the crowd. Some of them were dancing to the music of guitars and home-made drums; some stood by the fire, cups in their hands, their silhouettes outlined by the warm glow of the fire.
Somebody pushed a cup into Claire’s hand and she took a sip, expecting beer, but the liquid she tasted burned her tongue and throat. She coughed.
“Home-made brandy,” Kate said over the music and chatter of people.
“It seems everything is home-made here,” Claire said to herself.
“Huh?” Kate's eyebrows rose up.
“Can we move closer to the fire?” Claire removed the sweater from her shoulders and put it on. It was summer and yet she always seemed to be cold; because of the flu, most likely. The fact that the school was nestled under a hill that blocked the sun in the afternoons didn't help, either. There was not much sun here and the light pouring over the hilltop and through the forest that overlooked the school was dimmed and without warmth.
“There's Ethan.” Kate lifted her hand and waved.
Claire followed her gaze. Yes, there he was, her boyfriend. Her mouth curled into a smile on its own, but when the blond came closer and he stopped to whisper something in Kate’s ear, her lips narrowed. She averted her gaze and it landed on Ryan, who stood beside her, staring at the two. Her eyes moved to Mandy and Tyler. Tyler had his arm wrapped around Mandy's shoulder and he was saying something to her with his head bent. They looked so perfect together. A ghost of a smile appeared on her face, then her eyes focused back on the boy who wore heavy thick eyeliner around his eyes, a lip ring, and tight black clothes with zippers and chains. She had never seen Kate wearing any make-up, or without her long black hair in a braid, and she always wore casual, slightly baggy clothes. She and Ryan seemed such an odd couple. But ‘odd couple’ could be applied to her and Ethan too. The mouse and the beauty, that's how she would have described them. But the beauty didn't matter to Ethan, it actually burdened him. She walked over to the blond and looped her arm around his. “You are late.”
An action like that usually resulted in a smile and a twinkle in his eyes. And yet, when his eyes lowered to hers, a scowl marred his face and for a moment she thought that he would yank his arm away from her. “I'm sorry. I had something to do.”
“That project again?”
“Yes.” This time he did smile, but she had used enough placating smiles herself to recognize a fake one.
Ethan exchanged glances with Kate.
Claire’s eyes landed on Kate.
Kate, who noticed Claire staring at her, gave her a small smile before she turned to Ryan.
Kate and Mandy were good friends; it was only natural that Ethan, who was Mandy's brother, had a good relationship with Kate. Claire wondered how long they had known each other. Later, when the boys went in search of something less alcoholic and Kate had disappeared somewhere, she joined Mandy on the log by the bonfire. First she made a small talk, then when it seemed appropriate she casually asked, “How long have you known Kate?”
“Since we moved from Japan, a year ago.”
“A year? But... we have been roommates for three years now.” A feeling of unease washed over her and the fine hair on the back of her neck stood up.
“Oh, yeah.” A small crease cut between Mandy's eyebrows. “I don't know why I said that. We must have come from Japan three years ago, then. The time sure flies by.”
“Are you sure?”
“Why wouldn't I be?”
“I don't know.” Claire shrugged her shoulders. “It’s just... it's weird, isn't it?” From the corner of her eye she noticed Tyler and Ryan turning left and right, probably looking for them.
“What is? -- Tyler!” Mandy lifted her arm. “Here.”
The boys came to them. Tyler juggled three glass bottles of what appeared to be root beer. He gave one to Mandy, one to her, then sat down on the log beside Mandy. He put his arm around her shoulder.
Mandy, with a light blush on her cheeks, snuggled closer, sipping at the bottle in her hands.
“Where's Ethan?” Claire asked Ryan, who sat beside her.
“He said there's something he has to do.”
Claire opened the old swing-top lid of the bottle and took a sip. Lately, Ethan had quite a lot to do.
#
The light dimmed by the thick, dirty glass drew grotesque silhouettes on the dark stone floor and the bookshelves. Claire leaned close to the shelf as she moved her finger from spine to spine, reading the titles. She found a spine void of any title and she pulled it out. A cloud of dust lifted and she coughed, then waved her hand to disperse the greyish fog. She had found two books in the pile on the table pushed against the wall, near the door. One was Dickens's David Copperfield and the other Gaskell's North and South. She had already read both of the novels and she didn't mind reading them again, but she would have loved to find a mystery, something she hadn't read yet, to occupy her brain. She would even have been satisfied with some Christie story, though she had read all of them. But all this large, deserted and dusty library had was bunch of old books -- most of them written in Latin -- and quite a large number of Bibles. There were also a lot of guides on plants.
She sighed, her eyes darting over the shelves against the walls, then up at the vaulted ceiling laced with cobwebs. The whole building, including her modestly furnished room, showed neglect and lack of funds.
She sighed again and picked up the two books she had put at the edge of thick oak table. She wiped them with the edge of her cardigan and then, with them under her arm, left the library. In the hallway she turned right and left, then left again, than right again. A few steps and she should have come to the stairway leading up to the east wing, instead she came to a dead end.
She stared at the stone wall. In her mind she reviewed the path she had taken, trying to figure out where she had turned wrong. The third left? She turned around and retraced her footsteps. She arrived at a staircase, but not the one that led to girls' rooms, she was certain. She heard the screech of wood coming from above. Even though she had just thought how good it would be to run into someone she could ask for direction, she panicked and hid in the empty space behind the stairs.
What's wrong with you? she silently chided herself as she peeked from between the stairs. Ethan's evasion and the lack of attention and care he had so freely bestowed on her in the past was probably getting to her. She didn't believe he was falling out of love; he couldn't. Love was a precious and fragile feeling. Without nurture it could fade away so easily, especially a teenage love, a young love. But Ethan and she... the ties that held them together couldn't be so easily broken.
First appeared a pair of tennis shoes, then jeans, a black sweater and at last a tuft of blonde hair. She only saw the back of the head, but she would have recognized it anywhere. She opened her mouth and took a step aside, ready to call to him, but the ‘E’ of his name stuck in her throat.
He stepped off the last stair and continued down the hallway.
She had asked him what project occupied him so and he had murmured something incomprehensible and quickly changed the subject. She didn’t even know which class he was doing it for. For all she knew, the ‘project’ could be just a lie to get her off his back.
He turned around the corner.
She should have called after him, she really should have, but this was her chance to learn what he was up to. She darted behind him. Slowly, cautiously, she followed him, keeping close to the cold stone walls, flinching and diving low every time he slowed down or glanced over his shoulder. She was close behind until he disappeared for the fourth time around a corner and when, after a few seconds she carefully peeked after him, a wall awaited her. Dead end. This wall wasn't made of stone, but was covered with wooden panels. She pressed her ear against it.
Silence.
She slid her fingers over the rough grooves of the wood, searching for slots or parts that could be pushed in.
A cough.
She whirled around and hid her hands behind her back.
Heavily lined eyes stared at her, under black spikes of hair.
“Hi, Ryan.” She nudged up her chin in greeting. “What are you doing?”
“Shouldn't I be asking you that?”
“I was just...” She waved her hand. “Well...” She stepped past him. “It was nice seeing you.”
“You were following him, weren't you?” He fell into step with her.
She pinched her eyebrows. “What? Who?”
“You don't have to play stupid.”
“I don't know what you mean?”
“I was following him, too.”
Her step slowed down. “Why?”
“You lost him, didn't you?”
She stopped. She pressed her lips together, scrutinising his face as if she might find an answer there as to why he had been following Ethan. She should have expressed her thoughts out loud, it wasn’t as if she had something to lose by asking him. “Why did you follow him?”
He didn't answer right away and for a long moment she thought that he wouldn’t, but then he spoke up, his voice low and hesitant as if he were being forced to tell her. “He and Kate... Kate has been quite mysterious lately and I think it has something to do with him.”
“He doing a school project for extra credit.”
“And you bought that?”
“He is not cheating.” Even though it had been ages since they had kissed, Ethan would never stoop so low as to cheat on her. If -- and this was only hypothetical -- he had fallen out of love, he would have told her, he would never do it behind her back. Never.
“I never said he was,” Ryan said. “Or that she was. It's just... you know?”
Yeah. It was just that things were not as right as if they should be. She had thought that she was imagining things, especially since Mandy never confessed to having the same doubts, too distracted by Tyler, most likely. Claire couldn't help but smile. Mandy, despite her tall and athletic body, most often reminded her of a cute puppy. She and Tyler, with all their blushing and shyness, made such a lovely couple.
He rubbed his neck.
She gazed at him. She didn't know Ryan well, but he seemed like an okay guy with a problem similar to hers. They could become allies. She turned toward the dead end. “I think there's a secret passage.”
He lifted his eyebrows. “Or maybe you lost him.”
“Yes, because he used a secret passage.” She walked back to the wall and slid her hands over its surface. “There must be some lever or handle that opens it.”
“Let me try.” He joined her, the side of his hand touched hers.
A weak current of electricity made her hand shiver. Frowning, she peeked at him, and by the way he stared at their hands, knew that he had felt it too. “It's just static,” she said, but more to herself, since... The first time she had met Ethan and their hands brushed against each other, she had felt an electric current, too. Just thinking that both touches had the same meaning, if felt as if she was betraying her boyfriend. But there was no way they could have the same meaning, especially not since she felt such a strong electric current because Ethan's powers were the ones -- Wait, what powers?
“What’s wrong?”
She shook her head. “Nothing. Just...” For a moment she debated whether or not to tell him. “Lately I have stumbled over reality, when on second thought it doesn’t make any sense.”
He stared at her as if he had no idea what she was talking about.
“It's hard to explain.” She furrowed her forehead. “It’s about little things that I think happened, but didn’t. And small facts that don’t add up.”
“Because you dreamt about them?”
She tilted her head, thinking about it. “It could be. Maybe the sickness muddled my brain a little.” She faced him. “Hey, Kate said you were quite sick, too. Do you have any weird side effects?”
“Like hallucinating?”
She narrowed her eyes at him, trying to gauge if he was making fun out of her. She noticed his mouth twitching at the corners. She pinched her mouth, turned on her heel and stomped away. Here she had been thinking that she had found an ally with the same goal: to find out what was going on with Ethan. And Kate. But he preferred to make fun of her.
“Hey, don’t be mad, please.”
She accelerated her step.”
“What about the secret passage?” Ryan called after her.
She ignored him.
#
Claire sat on the grass behind the dorm, watching Tyler and Ethan playing basketball with a couple of boys. Tyler was very good at it, while Ethan was playing a sorry game. “It's like he isn't aware of his own height,” she commented to Mandy, who was sitting beside her.
“He's not good as Tyler, but I have seen him play better.” Mandy leaned back on her arms. “He's not on the team, so it doesn't really matter.”
“On the team?” But there was no team here, was there? Claire stared at the playground before her, which was actually a grass field with buckets tied to the trees. They never played basketball in gym classes or any other sports like volleyball, mostly they ran and played dodgeball.
“I don't know why I said that.” Mandy gave a nervous laugh and straightened.
Could it be that this was another case of little facts that didn’t add up? “Hey.” Claire shifted closer to Mandy, carefully eyeing Ryan, who sat a small distance away waiting for Kate who had been detained by a teacher. “Do you ever get a feeling like you are in a dream? You know, where everything is logical and makes sense when you think about it, but at the same time feels new and foreign?”
“Well...” Mandy pulled her knees against her chest and wrapped her arms around them. She frowned and looked as if she were going to say something, but then a yell from the playground drew her gaze and a smile lit her face. Seeing Tyler playing hoops always managed to do that and to distract her. “Not really.”
“I do, sometimes.”
Claire's head whipped around. How had Ryan managed to get so close without her noticing?
“I'm sorry about before. I just wanted to lighten the mood, I didn't want to anger you or anything,” he said in a low voice, so low that Claire doubted Mandy could hear it. “When you asked me about side effects, I planned to tell you... Do you remember that time in the dining room when you asked who I was?”
She nodded and slowly shifted away from Mandy and closer to him, but not too close.
“I thought the same thing about you.”
“Really?”
“I think I have memory problems,” Ryan said. “Do you think it's possible that it wasn't the flu, but something else?”
“Like what?” Claire glanced at Mandy, who was occupied with admiring Tyler taking a shot. Good.
“I don't know.” He rubbed his elbow. “This might sound far-fetched, but what if it was some sort of medical experiment?”
“Are we the only ones who have these reality and memory problems?”
“Mandy could have them, too.”
“That doesn’t mean anything.”
“You don't know that.”
“No, I don’t know that, and neither do you. The other thing, have you noticed --” The cut between his eyebrows smoothed out and a smile like a sun lighted his face. “We'll talk about it later,” he said to her and stood.
Claire followed his gaze and saw Kate coming their way. Her eyes returned to Ryan's face and at the look of pure love that shone from his eyes suddenly a pang of jealousy burned through her. That was how Ethan used to look at her. While now -- she turned toward the playground -- he barely even glanced at her. And when she mentioned anything about it, he tried to blame her bad health. Maybe he really had fallen out of love.
She waited until the end of the game and then joined Mandy, who rushed toward the boys. Mandy launched herself at Tyler and got a half-hug in return, while Claire only brushed Ethan's shoulder to let him know she was there.
Ethan's eyes as they turned to her were dull and without any spark.
She inwardly sighed and forced her mouth into a smile while her fingers curled around the edge of her shirt, wrinkling it. “You played well.”
“I guess.” He shrugged his shoulders.
“We are going to the common,” Tyler said to them, ‘the common’ meaning the lounge part of the main hall.
“Yeah.” Ethan nodded. “I'll join you later.” He waved to them before he turned and walked toward the south side of the building.
Claire rushed after him. “Where are you going?”
“To the teachers’ chambers. I have an errand that I need to run. For that project.”
“Do you need help?” She drew up parallel with him.
“No.”
“Do you have some time later?” She had rarely asked for his time before or been the one to invite him on a date, since she had never had to; he was always the one who initiated those. He had spoiled her quite a lot in that regard.
“What for?”
“To have dinner with me. Just the two of us.”
“I'm not certain I'll be able to make it.” He stared straight ahead, not even giving her a glance, and quickened his stride.
She grabbed his arm. “What's going on?”
“I don't know what you mean.” He half-turned, and she expected that he would face her, but his eyes darted around.
Her jaw clenched and her teeth cut into her lower lip before she loosened her jaw with a sigh. She hated this... this evading and sneaking around. “If you don't want to be with me anymore, tell me.”
He scowled and tilted his head down. A wayward strand of hair fell on his brow.
She automatically lifted her hand, as so many times before, to tug on it. She caught herself and her arm fell to her side. “I love you, and breaking up...” Her throat contracted and she had to clear it as pain cut through her like a poorly sharpened knife. She felt as if the distance between them widened with each passing day and she didn't know what to do to stop it. She knew she loved him, and as much as a break-up would have shattered her into small pieces, she didn't want him to force himself to be with her.
He lifted his head, his cold eyes -- when had they become so cold? -- bored into her. “I don't want to break up with you.”
“Then why... Why are you shutting me out? Why are we so rarely alone and why don’t you ever...” …kiss me? She had to clear her throat again. “You don't even hold my hand anymore. I feel like we are not a couple anymore, only distant friends.”
“A teacher asked me for a help on a project for extra credit, that's why I don't have time for you. I told you that.” He shook his head at her, disapproval written all over his face. “You are so insecure and demanding, you are making a big deal out of nothing.”
Because he didn’t look at her the same way he used to do and because... The old Ethan would have pulled her into a tight hug and assured her that he loved her and that she was worrying for nothing, while this Ethan made her feel stupid. “Yes, you already told me that.”
* * * * *
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