She lifted higher, her body now spinning in the outer band of the swirling cloud, as if Dorothy caught in the tornado.
She closed her eyes and thought of her parents, struggling to hold onto good memories as bad ones continued to a.s.sail her from all sides. Each time they hit her, they ripped into her body, piercing it like knives.
I won"t go.
Something slammed into her and she felt her body fly higher and higher, fear coursing through her, certain she was going to hit the ceiling. But she kept flying upward, caught in the tide.
I won"t go.
And then, like that, she was in free fall through the clouds, the dark smoke gone. She closed her eyes, praying she wouldn"t plummet to the earth only to die. Before she fell, though, she pa.s.sed out.
When she woke, she was back in Oz, under blue skies and a warm sun. She was still in the dream, but reality seemed closer than ever. She ran as fast as she could through the daisy-covered meadow to find a boy her age, or slightly older, swinging on a swing set in the middle of a clearing.
He slowed to a stop. "Would you like to swing with me?" he said pointing to the empty seat next to him. "I"ve been saving this one for you."
LUCA HARDING.
This doesn"t feel like I thought it would. It"s like swimming, except it"s air and not water and everything is clear instead of blurry. It"s like swimming through the sky with special goggles.
Everything faded to white and Luca found himself walking through a large meadow with a tall wooden swing a hundred or so feet in front of him. Two empty seats were there. Luca chose the one on the left and started to swing, saving the other for Paola.
He could see her not too far off, stuck in the shadows with that thing that hid in the terrible scary and made all the good dreams go bad.
Once she knows I"m out here, she"ll want to come and join me.
Luca knew it with certainty, so he wasn"t at all surprised when Paola managed to make the bad disappear, then stepped outside and into their shared sun. She saw Luca, then crossed the meadow and stood beside the empty swing as he slowed to a stop.
"Would you like to swing with me?" he said. "I"ve been saving this one for you."
She said yes, then sat and started to pump her legs back and forth.
Up and down...up and down...up and down.
Luca swung too.
Up and down...up and down...up and down.
They were quiet for a while until Paola finally broke the silence.
"Thank you."
"For what?"
"Coming to help me."
"I"m not really sure what I did."
"Me either, but everything looks so pretty now."
Back and forth...back and forth...back and forth.
Back and forth...back and forth...back and forth.
"Do you know what happened?"
Luca shook his head. "Even Will doesn"t know."
"Who is Will?"
"My friend. He"s the one who brought me here. He"s been dreaming about you and your mom, just like me."
"Do you know what"s supposed to happen now?"
Luca shook his head again.
"Do you know how we get home?"
"I"m not sure, but I think we can probably go whenever we really want to."
"Do you want to?"
"Not yet," Luca said.
"Me neither. I miss my mom, but everything here is so... calm."
"Yeah."
Back and forth...back and forth...back and forth.
Back and forth...back and forth...back and forth.
The Indian was leaning against a tall Jacaranda tree, like the kind across the street from Luca"s house in Las Orillas. The fallen blossoms painted purple on the ground around him as the Indian looked into the sky and smoked his giant plastic pipe.
"Do you see the Indian over there?" Paola asked.
Luca laughed, "Yes, he"s my friend. He"s actually my dog."
Paola didn"t seem surprised. "What"s his name?" she asked. "The dog, not the Indian."
"I call him Dog Vader, but he doesn"t really like that very much. So I call him Kick, but only out loud. And most time, I forget, and call him Dog Vader."
Paola laughed and Luca joined her, then they fell into quiet together.
They swung in silence. They had no way to count minutes in a place that didn"t have any hours, but they swung back and forth and up and down until Paola finally flew from the top of her swing and landed with both feet in the soft, flowing gra.s.s.
"Okay," she said. "I"m ready."
Luca slowed to a stop, then joined Paola. He took her hand, because it seemed like the right thing to do, then they walked toward the rainbow together.
The rainbow was both near and far. They took only a few steps then the colors scattered into darkness. They found themselves blinking awake beneath the dim light of the hotel lobby.
"Mom!" Paola yelled.
Her mom was sobbing. "I"m so glad you"re okay!"
Everyone seemed happy, but Luca felt another feeling in the room as well.
They"re staring at me and they"re scared. They"re looking at me, but their thoughts are the same as if they were looking into the terrible scary.
Luca noticed that his clothes were all torn, including his shoes.
Will"s hand was on Luca"s shoulder. He dropped to his knee and whispered, "Come with me," then led Luca across the room to a pair of full-length mirrors on the other side.
Luca stared at his reflection.
He was him, but not like he remembered.
He was now slightly taller than Paola with a full head of hair that fell just past his shoulders.The face staring back at him was at least a good five years older, and looked remarkably like his father"s.
TEAGAN MCLACHLAN.
Teagan stayed hidden in the stairwell as Ed negotiated with the emo-looking guy with the bat. When the guy swore that he didn"t mean any harm, Teagan cringed, praying Ed wouldn"t shoot first and ask questions later as he"d been doing since they met.
When she heard the bat hit the ground, relief washed over her. She was fairly sure Ed wouldn"t shoot an unarmed guy. If he had, she might have lost it right there and taken off, as far and as fast as she could.
She was grateful to Ed for helping her and possibly saving her life twice, but that nagging part in her brain was still reminding her that not once had he waited to find out if the people he killed were friend or foe. Shoot first, ask questions later. Except when people were dead, there wasn"t a lot they could answer to.
Had the men in the gas station posed an actual threat to them? Maybe they were just people looking for answers, like them. And who was to say the helicopter wasn"t from the government looking to help?
When Ed started talking rather than shooting, Teagan found her breath again. Perhaps they"d found someone else after all. Someone they could work with to figure out what was going on, or maybe find others who were still here.
When Teagan heard Jade, she emerged from the stairwell.
Ed"s daughter looked like she was in her early 20"s, with auburn hair and green eyes like her. If Jade"s hair had been long instead of a short pixie cut, she could have easily pa.s.sed for Teagan"s slightly older sister. Their resemblance was uncanny, which made Ed finding Teagan, a girl who looked so much like his daughter, after the rest of the world vanished, a most odd coincidence.
Yet, there they were, all breathing just a few feet apart.
Jade ran to her father and threw her arms around him. Ed held tight like he"d not seen her in forever, and maybe never would again. As the two embraced, Teagan felt a longing for her own father. Not the man she"d come to know, but the one who"d once been a kind, doting daddy, not yet reduced to shreds by life"s slings and arrows. He hadn"t been that man in a long time, so Teagan was only missing a ghost of a ghost. A good feeling, once remembered.
As the two hugged, Jade"s eyes opened, then found Teagan, making her feel like the biggest third wheel ever in the history of ever.
Jade looked confused. She pulled away from her dad, and walked toward Teagan with a smile, "Hi, my name is Jade," she said with a confidence that surprised Teagan, though it shouldn"t have, given how direct and confident Ed was.
"I"m Teagan," she said, shaking the girl"s hand.
"I ran into her on the road. Her parents vanished right in front of her while they were driving home," Ed said, almost apologetically. "She didn"t have anyone else."
It was then Jade noticed Teagan"s swollen belly.
"Oh," Jade said, "How far along are you?"
"Five months," she said, her hands instinctively ma.s.saging her baby"s home.
"Do you know the s.e.x yet?"
"I didn"t want to know. Wanted it to be a surprise. Didn"t expect this sorta surprise, though," she said, shrugging her shoulders at the missing world.
"This is Ken," she said, introducing the guy with the bat, who looked like a college student too. A good looking, emo-artsy-coffee house-type.
"Hi," she said, shaking Ken"s hand.
"Did you hear from your mother?" Ed asked.
"No, I called when the phones were still working. But no answer. I was gonna go to her house, but then we saw the things."
"What things?" Ed asked.
"Whatever they are," Ken said, "They"re nothing like I"ve ever seen."
Ken looked frightened, as if he"d seen a ghost, monster, or something else unimaginable. Ed looked like he was about to make a joke, but then swallowed it, perhaps not knowing the relationship between Jade and Ken.
"Come here," Ken said, "I"ll show you what I"m talking about. Do you mind?" he asked, pointing to his bat.
Ed"s foot found the handle, pushed against it, propped it up, grabbed the business end, then handed it to Ken in one quick movement. Teagan wasn"t sure if that was Ed showing his alpha dog status as dads tended to do with guys who dared to date their daughters, or if it was just Ed being the all-business, all-bad a.s.s, all-the time that he was. Teagan was surprised to find herself laughing inside.
Pity the poor guy who wants to date Jade.
They went into Apartment 410, which technically didn"t belong to Ken. He had been staying with a friend the night everyone vanished. When Ken said friend, and mentioned the friend was a guy, with a look in his eye and a momentary pause, Teagan figured maybe Ed had nothing to worry about concerning Ken and Jade.