Luka, page 10
I force myself to breathe evenly.
Tess is fine.
Tired, I’m sure.
But fine.
She’ll be at school.
I’ll see her soon.
But she doesn’t come to Current Events.
She’s a no show at the beginning of Ceramics, too.
The teacher passes out an exam.
I try to focus on the questions. It shouldn’t be hard. It’s a ceramics test, for crying out loud. But I’m so distracted I can barely process the words. Is she sick? Would Leela give me Tess’s number if I asked for it? The foreboding that grabbed me last night doubles down—so relentless, I make a decision. If she doesn’t show up by the end of second period, I’m going to her house.
Ten minutes after the bell rings, the door opens.
Tess steps inside.
And I take what feels like my first breath of the day. She sits across from Leela, who leans over the table to whisper with her. Meanwhile, Jennalee’s attention warms the side of my face. I can feel her watching me while I watch them.
Our teacher clears his throat.
He gives Leela and Tess a pointed look.
Then he gives me and Jennalee the same one.
I attend to the exam, a little less distracted now that Tess is here. I finish quickly, hand it in, and wait for her to do the same. Maddeningly, she takes the remainder of class to finish, turning the test in seconds before the bell rings. As soon as it does, I’m up and on the move. I snag her backpack from her chair and meet her at the teacher’s desk. Out in the hallway, I guide her off to the side as our classmates shuffle past.
“I waited for you in the driveway all morning, but you never showed.” I keep my voice low. Tender, too. The shadows beneath her eyes are concerningly dark. “What happened? Where’ve you been?”
Tess looks longingly over my shoulder and shoots someone a weak smile. I follow the direction of her gaze and spot Leela rushing past.
“Tess,” I say, suppressing my impatience. “You’re killing me.”
She transfers her weight from one foot to the other, eying our classmates as they pass. When most of them are gone, she hugs her arms and leans closer. “Last night in … our dream. What happened to me? Where did I go?”
“I don’t know. One second you were in front of me, and the next you weren’t. But I could hear things. It sounded like you were struggling, like you were fighting to escape something. And then you weren’t in class this morning.”
“I wasn’t the one struggling.”
“Who was it?”
“My grandmother.”
“Your grandmother? Wait a minute, you mentioned her. Right before—” A group of seniors on the basketball team walk toward us, their pace slowing like paces do whenever there’s something intriguing to make sense of. Tess and I together is the kind of thing they want to make sense of. They don’t even attempt to hide their curiosity.
Frustrated, I tip my mouth toward her ear. “We can’t talk about this here. I’ll find you at lunch.”
Lunch takes its sweet time. Three torturous periods with gossip buzzing in the air. I didn’t want to paint a target on Tess’s back, but that’s exactly what I’ve done. What I’m going to keep doing, apparently. Because in the cafeteria, I intercept her as soon as she’s through the line and lead the way to a table on the edge of the commotion, far away from the one at which I typically sit. Summer, Bobbi, Matt, Jared—all of them stare as we pass, Summer shooting daggers with her eyes.
I pull out a chair for Tess and sit down beside her with my back to the student body. She peers at someone over my shoulder. This time, she’s not looking at Leela, but her brother Pete, no longer sitting by Scott Shroud, but two of Thornsdale’s biggest freaks—Wren and Jess. The former has purple hair and decorates herself in an array of skulls. The latter has more piercings than anyone can keep track of, along with a forked tongue thanks to a procedure he had done his freshman year. The three of them sit with their heads together. Pete is doing the talking, and when he finishes, Wren leans back in her chair and stares at Tess with eyes that glow. When I turn back to her, it looks like she’s going to be sick.
“You okay?” I ask.
“Besides the fact that I’m going crazy? Sure.”
“You’re not going crazy.”
“My grandmother was crazy. It must skip a generation.”
Her grandmother again.
Tess said she went to sleep thinking about her. Earlier this morning, she said her grandmother was the one struggling to escape. I don’t have a clue what her grandmother has to do with anything or what Pete said to his new tablemates that had Wren looking at Tess like that. I only know Tess needs to start talking before I lose my mind.
“Everybody is staring,” she says.
“Let them.” I open her chocolate milk and set it in front of her. “And while they stare, why don’t you tell me about your grandmother?”
“She suffered from psychosis.”
“I take it you didn’t know this?”
“Not until we moved to Thornsdale. For as long as I can remember, my parents have always told me that she died of a heart attack when Pete and I were really little, but last night I dreamt about her.”
“And that means she’s not dead?”
Tess picks at her frayed jeans and nibbles her bottom lip. She seems to be battling some internal war, but she’s not letting me in on what. Then she looks up and asks a question so out of left field, I’m completely thrown off balance. “Luka, can I trust you?”
I lean back in my seat. “Why do you ask that?”
“You didn’t answer the question.”
“Of course you can trust me.” I sound defensive. I can hear it in my own voice. But I don’t understand where this is coming from. Why wouldn’t she be able to trust me? “Tess, what’s going on?”
“There was a man in my dream last night. He said you were dangerous company.”
“Dangerous?” A spark of fire ignites in my chest. “Who was this guy?”
“I don’t know. He was with my grandma. I think maybe he was her doctor or something.”
My mind whirls. Not only was Tess’s grandmother in her dream, but her grandmother’s doctor? And he called me dangerous?
“After I left the beach,” she says, “I was in this white room and there was this old woman who looked like my dad. She was restrained to this bed, only she was trying to get free. And the guy was there. I don’t really remember what he looked like, except he had a scar on his face. He told me if I wasn’t careful, I’d end up like her.”
The spark fans into flame.
“Then all of a sudden, I was somewhere else. In a house with a man.”
“The one with the scar?”
“No, somebody else. He was really sad and he had a gun.”
A gun.
People aren’t supposed to have guns.
Not civilians anyway.
They were outlawed after the Newport disaster.
“He stuck it in his mouth and he ...” She closes her eyes, her lips tight. Her voice broken. “He pulled the trigger. That same guy committed suicide last night. I looked it up and his picture’s the same. He lived on the other side of town. He had two kids and a wife.”
My throat goes dry.
Another prophetic dream.
“Then this morning, I found out that my grandma has been alive this whole time. My parents have been lying to me all these years. Supposedly, she tried to kidnap me when I was a baby and now she’s locked up in some mental hospital.”
My whirling mind has gone tornadic.
I need Tess to slow down so I can process what she’s telling me. But Tess doesn’t slow down. She digs her fingers into her hair like she’s coming undone. Unraveling before my eyes. “I know you see what I see, Luka. But how do I know you aren’t another delusion? How do I know I’m not sitting here at this table, talking to myself?”
“I’m real, Tess. You can touch me if you want.” I hold out my hand, palm up. I want her to touch me.
But she stares at the offering like I’ve handed her a snake. “I bet that’s the kind of thing people suffering from psychosis tell themselves.”
She thinks she has psychosis.
Like her grandmother.
She’s so turned around, she’s not even convinced I’m real.
I glance at Pete, a growl rising in my throat, then reach under her seat and yank her chair closer. I don’t know what’s going on with her grandmother. I don’t know who the guy with the scar is or why he would suggest I’m dangerous. I don’t understand her dreams or how they interact with reality. I don’t understand my own dreams or why the two of us can see things nobody else can see. I only know that everything inside of me wants—needs—to hold her together. “You aren’t suffering from psychosis.”
She expels a dejected breath and looks over my shoulder. “I wish I could tell Leela.”
Her wish sounds an alarm. I don’t think Tess is crazy. I don’t think she’s suffering from psychosis. But I also don’t think she should tell Leela any of this. If it gets out, the doctor with the scar will be right. Tess will end up exactly like her grandmother. Removed from society. Locked up in a facility. “That’s not a good idea.”
“What am I supposed to tell her, then?”
“About what?”
“This.” She motions from herself to me. “Us. She’s going to ask.”
She’s right, of course. Leela will ask. Everyone at my lunch table will ask. Along with anyone else who gets the chance. I chew my thumbnail, considering as Tess takes a forlorn sip of her chocolate milk. “You could tell her we’re dating.”
She nearly spits out her drink.
“What?”
“Nobody will believe that.”
“Why not?”
“Because …” She looks at me incredulously, like I’m being willfully dumb. “It’s not believable.”
Before I can tell her that it is believable—very, very believable—Matt and Jared crash our conversation, helping themselves to a seat at our table. I lean back in mine, my jaw so tight it throbs.
Matt plucks the apple off Tess’s tray and takes a bite. “What’s up, Williams?” he says around a mouthful. “Too cool to sit with us now?”
Jared nods toward Tess’s chips. “You going to eat those?”
“Go ahead,” she says.
“Summer glared at you the entire lunch period.” Matt takes another bite, specks of juice spitting into the air as he does. “I thought her head was going to pop off. It wasn’t attractive.”
Jared opens the bag of Lays. “Summer’s always attractive.”
Matt tips his chin. “Better watch out, new girl.”
“She has a name,” I growl.
Matt studies me over his apple while Tess stares at Leela, who dumps her uneaten food in the trash and hurries from the cafeteria. Looking very much like a friend who’s been slighted.
19
No Competition
The ocean whispers rhythmically as I stand on my back deck, hoping Tess might join me on hers. The wind is calm. The waves, gentle. Terrible surfing weather but great for talking. I’d really like to talk. We didn’t get another moment alone after lunch. No class time to work on our year-long project. After school, I spotted Tess with Leela, who no longer looked hurt, but excited. Giddy, even. Which makes me think Tess went through with the plan. She told Leela we’re dating.
Across the yard, a door slides open.
Tess steps outside, then slams it shut. She marches to the end of her deck, sets a can of soda on top of the railing, and stares hard at the horizon as a soft breeze flutters hair that refuses to stay tucked behind her ear. She doesn’t notice me at all. She doesn’t notice me much in general—a fact that brings a chagrinned smile to my face.
She props her elbows on either side of her soda and rubs her temples.
“How’d it go with Leela?” I call over.
Her arms jerk from the banister. She sets her hand over her clavicle, her chest rising and falling with a breath. “Have you been out here this whole time?”
“Maybe.” I cross my arms and lean casually against the railing, my thoughts a direct contradiction to the laidback posture. I’m itching to ask her more about her grandmother, the kidnapping, this doctor from her dreams. It’s an itch I refuse to scratch. After the intensity of lunch, I’m determined to keep this conversation as light as possible. “Did Leela believe you?”
“I think so.” Her shoulder lifts in an uncertain shrug. “I promised her I’d go to that Halloween party tomorrow.”
“Bobbi’s?”
“Yeah.”
I raise my eyebrows. Tess is going to Bobbi’s Halloween party, one I had no interest in attending this past weekend or this morning. But that was when my mother and Summer and Jared were talking about it. Now? I scratch my forehead. “Care if I tag along?”
“You want to go?”
“That’s what couples do, right? Go to parties together.”
She groans. Loudly.
It’s not the reaction I was hoping for. “What?”
“I’m not a big fan of costume parties. I never know what to wear.”
Her concern is so benign, the tension in my body lets go. “You could go as a crazy person. I’m sure Dr. Roth has a straitjacket you could borrow.”
Tess laughs.
It’s such a gratifying sound, I find that I want to spend the rest of my life making her do it again. The impassioned thought sets off alarms in my head. Yes, Tess and I share an unexplainable connection. Yes, we see and feel things nobody else can see and feel. Somehow, we can even communicate in our dreams. But Tess hasn’t spent the majority of her life dreaming about me. Consumed with me. Searching for me. If I’m aiming for light, I’ve got to dial my thoughts down a notch.
“Or I could just go as Tess Eckhart,” she says.
“Lame,” I reply playfully.
“What are you going as?”
“Dr. Roth. I can be your shrink.” I’m angling for another laugh.
I get a smile that melts away too quickly as she fiddles with the tab of her soda can.
“Hey,” I call over. “You okay?”
“What if something is there?”
“I’ll be there, Tess. I won’t let anything happen.” I don’t know how I’ll keep this promise. I only know a surge of overpowering protectiveness compelled me to say it.
Behind me, the door slides open.
My mother steps outside looking like a total ice queen. “I’d like you to come in for the evening, Luka.”
“Mom,” I say, every bit as icily in return. “You remember Tess.”
The girl you were rude to yesterday.
Mom nods, but makes no attempt to strike up a conversation.
I peer at her through narrowed eyes. Is she really so obsessed with Summer, the mere sight of me talking with another girl turns her into a prickly cactus? “What time’s the party tomorrow?” I call over.
Mom’s reaction behind me is palpable.
My grip tightens on the banister.
“Seven, I think,” Tess replies.
“Seven o’clock, then. Want to meet in my driveway?”
“Sure.”
“See you then.” My spirits lift, despite my mother’s irritating disapproval. I flick it away like a pesky fly and focus instead on the flood of anticipation I feel for tomorrow.
20
Costumes
Mom might not approve of who I’m taking to the party, but she’s glad I’m going. So glad, in fact, she comes home Saturday afternoon with a selection of costumes.
Apparently, when she asked me what I planned to wear, my very unconcerned, “I’ll figure it out” didn’t suffice. Hence, the bag she unpacks on the kitchen island. I rummage through the selections, stopping to hold up a purple and turquoise Mohawk wig.
“A punk rocker. It goes with these leather pants.”
I drop the wig.
I also bypass the face paint, the vampire teeth, a pouch of gaudy rings (“A pirate!” Mom exclaims), before picking up a cowboy hat and sliding it on my head. My mother’s expression goes all soft and gooey. I know what she’s thinking before she says it.
“My little cowboy.” With a sigh, she folds her hands beneath her chin. “Remember how obsessed you were?”
I do.
So obsessed, she bought me and my father matching cowboy boots for my fifth birthday. So obsessed, I’m sporting those cowboy boots in every photograph for the entire year following. Until my sixth birthday, when I went horseback riding. My mare stepped on a wasps nest, got stung, bucked me off, and my future in the rodeo took a sharp turn.
“It comes with this.” She picks up a shoestring necktie, then rummages through the pile of paraphernalia before pulling out a belt buckle. “Your dad still has those cowboy boots. I bet they’d fit you.”
Which is how I end up dressed as a cowboy, leaning against my car with one leg crossed over the other, rolling a wintergreen mint from cheek to cheek as I wait for Tess. To the west, a deep pink paints the horizon. To the east, a familiar navy blue that’s quickly become my favorite. Soon, it will be dark and we’ll be at Bobbi’s annual Halloween party.
What if something is there?
The question sticks like gum. So does my confident reply. I’m so focused on how I might keep such a promise, I don’t hear Tess’s door open. I don’t see her until she’s halfway across the yard. Dressed in black. Fiddling with something in her hand.
I tip my hat with a self-deprecating grin.
Then I notice her brother.
He shuffles behind her, glaring at nobody in particular.
“Have room for one more?” she asks.
“Sure.” I shove aside my disappointment and meet her at the passenger door while Pete ducks into the back seat without a hello.
Tess tucks her hands into the front pocket of her hoodie. “My mom wanted Pete to come. I hope that’s okay.”
“Of course,” I say, my attention traveling upward from her black shoes to her black pants to her black hoodie. “Goth girl?”
