Dreaming Awake (17 page)

I heard a little voice inside me.
Liar
.

Okay, maybe there was more than physical attraction, but whatever was left would have to be really strong to overcome the fact that he had no face.

“Donny.” His voice lowered to that warm, rich tone that always curled my toes. “Please, this one time. Can you need me just a little this one time?”

I looked at him. Hard. It was possible that we were going to die. Why couldn’t I let my guard down? Okay, so he was really hideous-looking, but he never let me down. No matter how hard I’d pushed him, Gabe stayed.

He’d been a looker, but it was probably past time that I realized he was even better-looking on the inside than he had been on the outside.

“I do need you,” I whispered. And then I added, “Bonehead.”

Gabe took a deep breath. “If I come over there, are you going to let me be nice to you?”

I nodded. Quickly. “That would be appreciated.”

He moved to the couch and sat next to me, so I rested my head against his chest. It was easier this way, to not look at where his face used to be. God, I missed his face like, whoa. We stayed quiet for a long time. But then I decided I needed to know what had happened to him.

Gabe tensed when I asked. “I woke up in a dungeon. I was surrounded by skeletons and corpses and even though my cell was unlocked, there was no way out of it until you activated that secret passageway into your room.

“I don’t know what happened to me before I woke up. I’m kind of glad about that, I think.”

He stopped talking but the way he breathed suggested he was working up to continuing, so I didn’t butt in. Finally, after several long seconds, he asked me how ugly he was.

“You look like . . . an X-ray of you. That’s all.” I tried to say it brightly. I’m pretty sure I failed. “This is your worst nightmare, isn’t it? Waking up without your perfect hair?”

He chuffed out a laugh. “I’m less concerned with my hair than most people think. But yeah, waking up hideous is horrible. Does that make me shallow?”

“No. I think waking up a skeleton would freak anybody out.”

“Donny, I don’t know who I am if I’m not good-looking. That’s probably stupid, but that’s how I feel. If we get out of here alive, I can’t go back like this, Donny, I just can’t.”

His heartbeat sped up beneath my ear. “We’ll burn that bridge when we get there. Rest assured, I’m not going back pregnant either. God, Gabe. I swore this would never happen to me. Like ever. I know everyone at that damn school is going to think it’s no big surprise. So the class slut got knocked up—”

Gabe covered my mouth gently. “Don’t talk about my girlfriend like that. You’re not a slut. That’s not what I see when I look at you.”

I had to shift because not only was the conversation making me uncomfortable, but the baby was doing something to my internal organs. “What do you see?”

“Okay, but if I get mushy, you can’t get mad because you’re the one who asked.”

I poked him in the ribs. “Why do you stick by me when I know all your friends tell you I’m easy?”

“First of all, anyone who makes the mistake of calling you names is not a
friend
of mine. Second, you are the opposite of easy. You’re the most challenging person I know. I’m a guy, and not a very complicated one, but even I can see that you use your hotness like a suit of armor. You let very few people see what you look like under the front you paste on for the world. I want to be one of those people more than I can remember wanting anything.”

Little earthquakes shook the walls around my heart. There was nothing to hold on to while I rode out the aftershocks, one after the other as each moment of my time with Gabe replayed all the ways he’d become indispensable. As the wall crumbled, I realized that it hadn’t been keeping my heart safe from Gabe after all. He was already on the other side of it.

“So is waking up pregnant your worst nightmare?” Gabe asked, politely ignoring that I hadn’t responded to his eloquent laying of his heart at my feet.

“God, yes,” I answered. Knowing I needed to grow up and be honest, I squeezed my eyes closed and continued. “Also, I don’t know why I’m such a bitch. I know you have been nothing but nice to me. I realize that you have been cutting yourself off from the sneetches at an alarming rate in order to stay with me. I know it bugs you that I don’t let you say mushy things to me like a normal girl would. I just— Why do you put up with me?”

“I’m not gonna lie. There are times that I wished I’d chosen a different girlfriend. Somebody sweeter, less complicated. A nice girl who enjoys the same things I do, doesn’t mind my friends, and is maybe even proud that I’m her boyfriend.” He stroked his hands through my hair.

“Dream on, dude.”

He chuckled. “This fantasy girlfriend also wouldn’t be friends with demons, or half-demons, and our dates would not end with me not knowing where the hell she was when I woke up lying on a curiously damp dungeon floor surrounded by cadavers in various states of decomposition.

“But no. I had to choose you, a girl who can’t even have a normal girl name, a girl who would prefer it if we only met up when it was time to have sex and then I left her alone the rest of the time, a girl who tries to drive me into jealous rages whenever I
can
convince her to go out in public with me. It’s like you choose your clothes with the express goal of effing with my head every single day.”

“I really do. I love it when you think I’m dressed totally inappropriately and you want to be mad but can’t because all you think about is getting me back into that janitor’s closet. So, again, I ask . . . why are you still even here?”

“You’re the best thing that ever happened to me.” He said it so simply, so matter-of-factly, that for the first time ever, I believed that maybe I really was.

I never knew what I had to offer Gabe, other than the obvious. All the times I got mad at Amelia or Theia for their low-self-esteem issues, and I’d been packing around the same ones wrapped in different paper.

“I don’t want to be pregnant and I don’t want you to be Skeletinator or whatever.”

“Skeletor,” Gabe said, correcting me.

“Whatevs. But I do want you to always think I’m the best thing that ever happened to you. And I hope you never give up on me. I will try really hard to be less difficult and maybe occasionally I will surprise you with being nice.”

“That’s all a guy can ask for.”

A noise outside the door sent every hair on my body straight up. By the time I got my ungainly ass out of the chair, Gabe was already across the room. He had a fire poker in his hand. Why hadn’t I thought of grabbing a fire poker earlier? I was so not cut out for scary castle living.

“Stand back from the door!” It was Varnie’s voice.

Gabe and I exchanged relieved glances. Varnie was hitting the door from the other side, probably trying to smash the lock. As the wood splintered and he made progress, I lost my marbles again.

Gabe noticed the look on my face right away. “What?” he asked.

“I don’t want him to see me like this.” I panicked.

“Hey.” His voice was smooth. Gabe had a way of laying on the butter that always chilled me down when I got worked up. “It’s going to be okay. Varnie will help us figure out what to do, right?”

I nodded, but tried to tug my top down over my huge belly. Gabe pulled off his hoodie, his T-shirt below riding up with the action. His abs were still perfect, his skin still that healthy shade of bronze. While his face was covered with the shirt, I could imagine him the same. But once it was off, the sight of his skeleton head cut me all over again.

He handed me his shirt and I sank into it, pulling it over my plus-one gratefully. “I’m going to stretch out your shirt.”

Even a skeleton head can portray an eye roll. “I don’t care about the shirt.”

I didn’t care either if he cared, actually. He wasn’t getting it back. The familiar scent of him soothed me—his soap, his cologne, and something that didn’t come in a bottle or bar, something that was unique to Gabe. I used to chalk it up to pheromones, but I suspect it was more than that.

And then the door burst open. Varnie rushed in and stopped in horror at Gabe. “Duck me!”

“It’s okay,” I said, stepping in front of Gabe. “The bonehead is my boyfriend.”

Varnie swung his head to look at me and his jaw dropped at the sight of my rounded stomach.

“I’d rather not talk about it,” I said. “But I suppose that is way too much to ask for right now. Let’s get out of here first and then we can figure out the whole Renesmee thing I’ve got going on.”

Varnie whistled. “How long have we been down here?” He shook his head. “Wow.”

“Where’s Ame?” I asked him.

“Follow me,” he replied, and we tried to keep up with him.

He was moving pretty fast through the corridor. I tried not to take in too much of the scenery. It was damp and chilly, like cold sweat. Varnie was a man on a mission, though, and I didn’t blame him. Nobody wanted to think of Amelia all by herself in a place like this. Especially if she was still being all lights-are-on-but-no-one-is-home.

It was hard to keep up with my new body, and Gabe hung back with me, not willing to chance a separation. Thank God.

“Is it too much to ask that we look for a kitchen? I’m starving.”

The boys halted and stared at my baby bump.

“You guys need to stop. Am I the first pregnant woman you’ve ever seen or something?” I rubbed my belly. “I would sell my soul for a grilled cheese sandwich right now.”

Gabe clapped a hand over my mouth. “Are you crazy? Don’t even joke like that around here.”

Varnie looked sad for a moment and then shook his head. “We need to keep moving.”

We followed him around a corner, but it was like he poofed.

“Varn?” I whispered. “Varnie?”

“Where could he have gone?” Gabe asked.

I didn’t like the prickles his sudden absence left behind. “Let’s just hang out here until he doubles back when he realizes he’s lost us.”

Gabe nodded but we both wondered if and when that was going to happen.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Amelia

I
know everyone assumed that just because I couldn’t respond from my catatonic state I was also unaware of what had been going on around me.

Man, that would have been way better. Trust me.

It’s really claustrophobic to be trapped in your own head, unable to talk or control your body. Unable to help or explain to your friends what you know is happening and ways to stop it.

I know Theia totally blamed herself for all this. She believed that we should have left her in Under to begin with. That all of our problems would have been gone and we would have been safe from Mara.

Theia was very, very wrong.

I was still trapped, though now I was sitting in a hard wooden chair in a room that I didn’t recognize. I wasn’t in the cabin and I was alone. The wall in front of me was stone. Not brick but cold, gray stone, and it bled. The wall pulsed like wounded skin under the rivulets of red.

That’s all I could see because it was all that was directly in front of me and I had no control over my eyes. They stared straight ahead and I blinked occasionally, though not when I tried. I couldn’t even control my own eyelids. This was totally a mega-suck.

I’d never been in a castle before, but I guessed that’s where I was now—Mara’s castle in Under. I’d have shivered if I could. She was bad enough when she was on our home field; I hated the thought that I was on hers now.

And then I felt Varnie. He wasn’t in the room with me, but he was near. Maybe not physically, but awareness of him blew around me like a breeze. His name, his face, his heart—the things I counted on every day swished through my head and around my senses. But something was off.

I wanted to push through, find that bond, hold on to it. I thought that I probably could. But I hesitated.

Which I’m not good at, by the way, hesitating.

If I had learned that skill—that one that makes you think before you leap—it’s possible that none of us would have been in this situation to begin with. No one but me knew that
I
was the reason Mara was in our lives. Me. Not Theia. I realized that the moment I saw who Mara was at the bowling alley—the moment I recognized her.

Somehow I had to find a way to make it right again.

So before I reached through the veil to find Varnie, I hesitated to think. Was that what I really wanted? Was it for the best? If he was in trouble, would I distract him? Would he then be too worried about me to take care of himself? He made a big show of being a coward, but he wasn’t. Not really. Varnie was there every time I turned. If he had been my partner in the trust-building exercises we had in contemporary issues class last week, I wouldn’t have fallen on my butt during the fall-back-and-your-classmate-will-catch-you segment.

Varnie would always catch me.

Mike Matheny wouldn’t even realize I was falling. I knew that. I’d always known that.

I’d heard Theia in the cabin when she said she saw something ugly connecting the two of us and I knew exactly what that was now, even if Mike didn’t. Part of me really wanted to strengthen that connection, but that would have been a mistake. No matter how much I wanted him to love me, he didn’t. And now I knew why I couldn’t let go.

The thing that connected me to Mike wouldn’t let me. The vile magic that hugged my heart like a noose pulsed and throbbed and tied me to him forever.

Amelia
.

Varnie was looking for me. I sensed him stronger than ever.

I stilled the freak-out parts of my brain that were going nuts because I was essentially trapped in a box of my own body and reached out to his voice through the bond we’d made metaphysically the past few months.

Varnie?

When I heard nothing, I shouted his name in my head again, but I realized I was not the only one shouting. Disembodied voices were screaming and moaning all around us. There was whimpering too, but I think that was me.

The anguish the voices projected was awful. What had happened to them all? I was frightened, but I was also angry. They were evidence of Mara’s appetite for destruction. They were lost, angry, sad, humiliated—and they were all trapped here. Just like me. Just like Varnie.

I centered myself, like Varnie had taught me to do, and let the sounds wash over me, trying to figure out where they were coming from and what was going on.

Through the din, I heard his voice, strong and true.
“The beach, Miss Amelia
.”

Our favorite visualization place.

I had to open all my senses, which wasn’t easy because I was totally freaking out. I visualized myself sitting cross-legged on a sandy beach, focusing on the briny smells, the sound of the surf and the gulls, the texture of the sand. And then I concentrated on Varnie. His shaggy blond hair, his sun-kissed nose, the way he made me laugh. For a brief second he was there, in front of me, and then he was gone again.

The picture in my mind kept shorting out, the way the television loses the satellite signal at my house whenever someone uses the microwave. I focused harder. I felt him hovering, then disappearing. The next time he reappeared in front of me, I grabbed him, pulling him towards me with all my strength. I wouldn’t let go.

I. Would. Not. Let. Go.

Varnie began dissipating again, so I grappled at him more, harder.

Stay with me, damn it!

We tumbled backwards on the sand, Varnie landing on top of me. He tried to ease up a bit, since I was carrying all his weight, but I was terrified he would disappear, so I clutched him tighter.

“Miss Amelia,” he said, his face less than an inch from mine. “Did you just swear?”

Without thought, I scrunched my hands into his sun-bleached hair and removed that last inch between us with a kiss I didn’t know I had in me.

Varnie responded instantly. In a distant part of my thought process, I’m sure I understood that this wasn’t real. We weren’t really on a beach. We weren’t even really together.

I poured everything I had ever felt,
ever
, into that kiss. My fears, my joy, my excitement, my dread—he would know what to do with them all. And he did. He took them like they were the first drink of water after crossing a desert.

And then suddenly we stopped kissing and stared at each other.

Hello, awkward moment.

I felt guilty because I knew my heart didn’t belong to me. It belonged to Mike, and even though I finally understood that it was a lie, I couldn’t stop the wrongness from creeping in. As for Varnie, he probably wondered why the hell he was kissing some high school kid.

“Are you okay?” he asked finally, after years and years of uncomfortable silence.

I nodded, aware of all the distance that was so not between our bodies at that very moment.

“Am I hurting you?”

I shook my head.

“Good,” he said. But he didn’t move. His eyes were so intense. He didn’t seem like his usual humble, shy dude. He seemed like a guy who ate his Wheaties, saw the finish line, and wasn’t going to let anything get in his way.

That was so hot.

I blinked hard, trying to clear the jumble of thoughts I wasn’t used to having. This wasn’t right. Varnie wasn’t Mike. And then I tried to rethink that as well, because I knew one of those thoughts didn’t matter. I just didn’t know which one. Finally I gave up. I couldn’t do this on my own anymore.

“I have to tell you something.” My voice sounded very grave. I didn’t like feeling all serious and stuff. It wasn’t me.

“Okay,” he said amiably, and then he began kissing me again.

I never thought about kissing anyone who wasn’t Mike before. I think I’d just become accustomed to the fact that I might never have my first kiss because, well, Mike didn’t know I was alive and I would never give my heart, or my lips, to someone who wasn’t him. I wished I’d thought to wonder why I didn’t think it was strange that I’d let that happen—that I’d let myself be dismissed and write off love.

I know my friends thought it was weird. After the first year of my “harmless crush” they’d tried getting me interested in other guys. It was like most of my brain agreed with them but there was this voice inside my brain that said, “Under no circumstances.” My heart was available only to Mike Matheny and that’s all there was to it.

And the only person I could blame for my stupidity was myself.

So as I kissed Varnie on the beach like in a scene from some cheesy movie (without the surf splashing over us), I felt equal parts amazement and guilt. The voice was screaming at me to stop. The rest of me felt like I’d been waiting for this moment my whole life.

Maybe we could stay like this forever. Maybe whatever happened to our bodies in Under didn’t matter now.

He stopped kissing me, his eyes dimming in intensity and changing to concern. “Miss Amelia, you’re crying.”

“I am?”

Varnie wiped a tear with a careful swipe. “I have to admit it’s a first. I’ve never made a girl cry by kissing her before.”

“It’s not you, it’s—”

Something about his eyes made me shut up. He pushed off of me and I missed him so much I thought I would break into a million pieces.

I sat up and ran my fingers through my sandy, clumped hair. “Varnie, you don’t understand—”

“I’d rather we not have the ‘It’s not you, it’s me’ conversation right now. We can save the demoralizing for a different day maybe. What are you doing Thursday?”

He joked, but he was wounded. I’d probably been hurting him for months. That was a shame. I’d spent my life being the girl who looked out for people, who took care of their feelings, and all the while I’d been stomping his heart into the ground without even thinking about it.

“You need to listen.” I scooted closer to him, but he returned his gaze to the water, shutting me out, ignoring my tentative touch on his arm. “It really is
me
. You’re a great guy—”

“Amelia.” He growled.

“Just listen. When I was a freshman, Mike Matheny . . . Don’t you start tuning me out, Archibald Egnatius Varnie—you need to listen.”

He stared at me now, with wide-open eyes. “How did you figure out my whole name?”

I groaned. “I looked through your wallet one day when you went to the bathroom.”

“You looked through my wallet?”

“Can we focus for a minute?” I rubbed the sand from my palms onto my pants. “So, I thought Mike was cute. I had a little crush and I was just starting to get into the metaphysical. And I was thirteen. It was kind of a bad combination. Sort of the perfect storm of uncontrolled feelings meeting uncontrollable forces.”

His brow furrowed. “What . . . you did a spell?”

“Sort of.” I couldn’t look at him. I was so ashamed.

“Miss Amelia, lots of girls do love spells who know nothing about magic. It’s a layperson’s playground. They’re simple charms but they don’t carry real weight. It’s like playing a harmless game. Don’t be too hard on yourself.”

“It’s not such a harmless game when you live in Serendipity Falls and accidentally summon someone.” I snuck a peek at him through my hair. “I didn’t know who she was until I saw her again the night at the bowling alley.”

A slow wave of understanding passed over his face. “You summoned Mara?” He exploded from a sitting position into full-on angry pacing, kicking up sand as he went. “I can’t believe this. How could you not tell anyone?”

I covered my face with my hands. “I didn’t know. Everything happened so fast at the bowling alley and then when I realized where I knew her from—well, then it was too late. I’ve been trying to figure it out, but it wasn’t until Theia saw the . . . intestinal thing between me and Mike that I put it all together.”

“Enlighten me.”

“Could you sit, please? You’re making me nervous.” He glared at me again, but took a seat. “Okay, so I was thirteen and crushing on the new guy. I Googled some love spells and put out some serious mojo but nothing seemed to happen. Then one night I woke up and Mara—who I didn’t know was an evil demon at the time, thank you very much—was in my room. She was wearing a pretty dress and was all glowy and she told me she could bind me to Mike forever.”

Varnie jumped up again. “And you let her?”

“I thought she was some kind of angel,” I protested. “I didn’t understand what she was offering. I was
thirteen
. Forever is a different concept when you’re thirteen.” I kicked at the sand. “I thought I was being offered the fairy tale, so she did a spell, took a hank of my hair, and was gone.” God, if I could take the night back. “Obviously, Mike didn’t wake up in love with me. I chalked it up to a very strange dream.”

“But you never got over him?”

I shook my head. “I’m still not, Varnie. That’s what I’m trying to say. Logically, I know that what I feel for Mike isn’t real. It’s manufactured. She bound me to him, but not him to me. But my heart . . . my heart doesn’t understand the difference.” I got brave and looked at Varnie, really looked at him. “My heart isn’t free.”

He reached for my hand and gripped it firmly, possessively. “It certainly doesn’t belong to Mike Matheny, I can promise you that.” He forced me to look at him, not letting my gaze retreat.

Even knowing that I was bespelled to love Mike didn’t change the fact that I
did
love him. “You understand, don’t you? I brought Mara here. It’s my fault she’s obsessed with us. I summoned her, unintentionally, but I did it.”

“You can’t blame yourself for Mara’s appearance four years ago or now. Like you said, you didn’t know what she was. She’s evil. You can’t be held accountable for her actions.” He pulled me up, and we stood facing each other. Holding both my hands, he closed his eyes. “It’s time to unbespell you.”

“You can do that?”

“I’m certainly going to try.”

I should want this. I should want Varnie to help me bludgeon the ball and chain that had kept me from moving on for four years. But I didn’t. I wanted to clutch the endless longing I had for Mike like a security blanket. I began to tremble. “I can’t do this.” I didn’t want to stop loving Mike. It was all I knew.

“Amelia, that is fear talking.”

“I don’t care.” I wrenched my hands out of Varnie’s grip. “You don’t know him like I do. You don’t understand.” Even as I said the words, I was shouting from within,
Don’t listen to me, Varnie.