Impossibility of Tomorrow (16 page)

The electrical cord is attached to a lamp that’s fallen to the floor, and I quickly locate its switch, blinking as the room is filled with light.

A beat-up suitcase yawns out from the open closet door. And next to that is the source of the smell. The carpet is covered with feces and, judging from the ammonia fumes that sting my eyes, urine.
Not human,
my rational brain tells me through my growing dread. I hurry to the room’s one window and throw it open as well.

I lean against the bare wall next to the window, closing my eyes. I knew Taryn was a junkie, but somehow the squalor she lives in makes it much more real—and more hopeless. I picture Kailey’s cozy, colorful bedroom. What was she doing with someone like this?

I feel something wet trail down my cheek, a rogue tear that welled in my closed eyes and escaped.
Poor Taryn
, I think.
Poor Kailey.
Two lost girls who found each other. One of them is gone forever. And the other can’t be far behind.

I’m about to give up the search when I hear a rustling noise from the closet. I freeze.

“Who’s there?” I demand, as I slip the knife out from my boot.

There’s no answer, but I see movement—the pile of clothes on the floor undulates. An errant hanger on the top of the heap loses purchase and slides to the floor.

“I have a knife,” I add, my voice braver than I feel. “And I’ll use it.”

No response. A shoe in the clothes heap shifts, falls away, and I find myself staring into two bright green eyes. A small, furry thing pokes its way out, holding its tail erect with all the grace of a princess.

It’s a cat. A damn cat.

I exhale in a huge gust, collapsing against the side of the bed. The tiny kitty approaches my outstretched feet, sniffing my sneakers. I brace myself for the inevitable hisses, the predictable claws and fangs that animals always show me.

But they never come.

Instead, the cat arches its back and lets forth a volley of outraged meows. She comes closer, right up to me, and sniffs my arm, my hip. I slide my knife back into my boot and put out a tentative hand. The cat walks right into it, pushing her head into my palm. A small pink tongue laps my wrist, and I laugh. It tickles. I don’t think a cat has ever touched me before, not in six hundred years.

“What’s the matter, huh?” I coo, running my hand experimentally down the cat’s furry side. Her coat is light gray, with just the hint of lighter gray stripes. Her body is
so thin. I rub down her spine to her hips, tears blurring my vision as I feel each vertebra, the jutting bones to either side of the tail. The cat meows again—not in fear. More like she wants to yell about how hungry and neglected she feels. I pick her up gently. The poor thing can’t weigh more than five pounds.

“Come here, little baby,” I say, cradling the ball of fur in my arms and stepping carefully out from the bedroom. I set her down on the kitchen counter and scour the empty shelves, the pile of trash on the floor. She watches my every move, her huge, pale green eyes looking like two full moons. I swear they look hopeful, like she knows what I’m searching for.

Next to the dented microwave that sits on the counter I finally get lucky, unearthing an unopened can of cat food.

“You’re about to have ‘ocean whitefish and tuna with gravy,’ ” I tell the cat, reading from the label. “Now if only I could find a can opener,” I murmur, regarding the trashed kitchen in despair. The cat meows again. Loudly.

“Okay, okay, you’re hungry, I get it. I can be inventive.” I pull my knife from my boot, piercing the lid in several places, then peel it back with my fingernails. I dump the unappealing contents onto a plastic Tupperware lid and push it in front of the cat.

She buries her face in the mush and takes huge bites,
her tiny body racked with purrs. The food is gone in minutes, and she regards me again with those huge moon-round eyes, meowing. She makes it sound like a question. “More?”

“Poor thing,” I say, petting her again and looking around Taryn’s apartment. I can’t leave the cat here—that much is obvious. Judging from how emaciated she is, plus the mess on the bedroom floor, Taryn’s been ignoring her for quite some time.

I remember the suitcase in the bedroom and quickly retrieve it. The cat follows me, staying inches from my heels. “You’re going to come with me, okay?” I ask her.

She meows agreeably.

With my knife, I poke air holes in the side of the suitcase, then open its flap. “Hop in,” I tell the kitty.

And then I see it. A glimpse of blue out of the corner of my eye, a blue I know as well as I know its owner’s original eyes. On the bookshelf, wedged next to a stack of scratched CDs, lies Cyrus’s book.

“Yes!” I whisper, triumphant, as I slide it off the shelf. I chuckle softly in disbelief—the bookshelf, of all places. The one object in the entire apartment that’s in a logical place. I had assumed it would be hidden.

I tentatively sit down on the couch and run my fingers over the cover, the blue leather worn and supple, the broken lock that was added far after the original manuscript was
bound, once its owner had descended well into paranoia and secrecy. The lock that I myself broke when I smashed it against the sea-damp metal surface of a shipping container crane, moments before I intended to leap into the Oakland Estuary and end my life.

If Taryn had been able to offload the book, it would have changed her life. A complete alchemy text from the fourteenth century? An auction house or museum would have paid hundreds of thousands for something like this. Taryn could have gone to rehab, moved away, gotten the fresh start she deserved.

The cat, I realize, is scratching and whining at a door I hadn’t noticed earlier, half-hidden behind a purple velvet armchair. “Come back here,” I tell her. “We need to go.”

But she just meows louder, sticking her paws under the door. My arms erupt in goose bumps for no reason. “What’s in there?” I whisper, stepping toward her, foreboding raising the hairs on my neck.

More scratches.

I wipe my clammy forehead, take a deep breath, and open the bathroom door. The opaque orange shower curtain mocks me. I don’t want to see what’s behind it. I don’t.

I don’t have a choice. The cat bolts toward the bathtub and leaps up to its chipped porcelain lip, batting at the shower curtain with her paw.

When it briefly moves aside, I glimpse lank, dark hair surrounding a complexion as pale as the tile behind it. I run toward the tub, yanking the shower curtain from the wall. The entire rod crashes to the floor with an echoing metallic clang.

“Taryn!” I yell. She’s fully clothed, a rubber strap tied around one pale, scarred arm sprawled on the soap dish next to a blackened spoon and a needle.

I drop to her level, banging my knees on the tub and jamming my fingers into her neck. Her flesh is ice cold.

But dimly, faintly, I feel it. The small, slow, thrum of her pulse. She’s alive.

“Taryn!” I yell again, pulling my hand back and smacking her across the face, hard. Her head lolls heavily to the side.

I twist the faucet knob and cover her in a spray of hot water, trying to raise her body temperature as quickly as I can. I shout her name. “Wake up!” I tell her.

And then, to my surprise, she does.

Her mouth moves for several long moments before any words come out. Then: “Kailey?”

“Yes, it’s me.” I turn off the shower and stroke her clammy forehead.

“No, it’s not.” She opens her eyes, stares at me. “I know who you are. You’re the angel girl.”

“Stay awake,” I command her.

“Angels don’t get to boss me around,” she sighs. “I’m tired.” Her eyelids flutter, then close.

“Taryn, no! Don’t fall asleep. Stay with me.”

“But you’re not Kailey. I just saw her. . . . You took me away from her. She’s dead.” My stomach drops. My skin breaks out in a sweat. Freight trains screech through my head.

“We’ve got to get you to the hospital,” I say. “I’ll help you get up.”

But she doesn’t respond. I put my hand on her shoulder, shake it roughly. Nothing.

I scramble from the bathroom and dig my phone from my bag. I’m about to dial when I realize I can’t use it—I can’t be traced here, to Taryn’s apartment. I hurry back to the kitchen, where I saw a landline phone next to an old pizza box on the counter.

With quavering fingers, I dial 911. “Help,” I say, when the man answers, my words tumbling out. “There’s a girl. She’s unconscious. Drug overdose. I think she’s about to die. In the bathroom.”

“Can you describe—”

But I’ve already hung up. I scoop up the cat and drop her in the empty suitcase. To my surprise, she doesn’t fight. I zip it closed and run out the door, leaving it unlocked, and stumble down the stairs with the suitcase in hand and the
book under my arm. I can already hear sirens wailing in the distance.

I explode out the building’s front door and down the stairs to the street, breath tearing holes in my chest as I scramble down the block to Mrs. Morgan’s car. Ignoring the cat’s frightened mews, I strap the suitcase into the passenger seat and start the ignition.

And then, without really knowing why, I pause, sliding down in the seat so I won’t be seen as the first ambulance tears around the corner. EMTs burst out the doors and into the apartment building in a crackle of walkie-talkie feedback and red lights.

Several police cars pull up as I throw the car into gear. I need to leave. I can’t be questioned. But some instinct tells me to wait. The officers jump out of their cruisers and I recognize one of them: a lean, powerful figure with mirrored sunglasses over his eyes, despite the deepening dusk. I hold my breath as Officer Spaulding takes the stairs two at a time, then disappears inside.

I drive the whole way home with the book in my lap. Its weight feels solid, like an anchor. Or a weapon.

TWENTY-FOUR

“No way. You’re
allergic
to cats, Kailey.” Mrs. Morgan’s hands are on her hips as she eyes the little ball of gray fur that I’m cuddling in my arms.

Oh. Kailey’s body may have been allergic when she was alive, but the alchemical process of transferring my soul would have healed any such maladies. “Not this one, apparently,” I say with a smile. “Which means I’m
meant
to keep her.”

She doesn’t say anything but tentatively reaches out her hand to scratch the cat’s ears, earning a loud, rumbling purr.

“Please?” I whisper.

“Where did you find her, again?” Mrs. Morgan asks, continuing to stroke the cat’s chin.

“On the street, by my friend’s house. Feel how skinny she is, Mom. She would have died if I hadn’t found her.” I feel tears burning my eyes. I’m not sure why, but I
need
this cat. I don’t know if it’s because she belonged to Taryn, the girl whose life I’ve tried to save twice, who might already be dead. Or is it because no other animal has ever shown me affection?

“Aw,” Mrs. Morgan murmurs, as the cat arches her back and closes her eyes. “Poor little baby. She’s definitely a stray.”

“Please?” I repeat. “Can we keep her?”

She looks at me for a long moment, but I know I’ve already won this battle. I don’t see how anyone could fail to love this cat. “Okay,” she says. “But
you
have to take care of her. Feeding, litter box, everything. And if you start getting asthma attacks, we’re taking her to the shelter, straightaway. Deal?”

I nod vigorously. “Deal.” I hug the cat to my chest, cradling her thin body, then set her down on the checkered linoleum floor. “Go ahead, little kitty,” I say. “Explore your new house.” The cat begins to sniff everything in sight, rubbing her head against the table legs, the cupboards.

“You’re going to have to give her a name, you know,” says
Mrs. Morgan. “ ‘Kitty’ is a bit common, don’t you think?”

“Right,” I answer, kneeling down next to the cat to stroke her head. “What’s your name, huh? What should we call you?”

She stares at me, her huge green eyes reminding me, not for the first time, of twin full moons. Suddenly I know exactly what to call her. “Luna,” I say solemnly. “Her name is Luna.”

“Perfect,” says Mrs. Morgan. “And very Berkeley.” This comment makes me unaccountably happy. Luna, my little Berkeley cat, meows, as though to say she’s pleased with her new name.

“I think the drugstore might still be open.” Mrs. Morgan pulls on her coat, her purse already dangling from her arm. “We should go get Luna something to eat.”

Luna meows in agreement, casting me an accusatory glance. I can’t help but chuckle softly at her outraged feline expression.

“I don’t think I’ve seen you this happy since—well, since last week,” Mrs. Morgan says carefully as she fishes her car keys from her purse.

“You can say it,” I tell her. “Since Noah and I broke up.”

Her cheeks relax. “I didn’t want to say anything,” she admits. “I figured you wouldn’t want to discuss boy problems with your mom.”

“It’s okay,” I say, though I’m not very convincing. “We’re still friends. We just weren’t meant to be together.”

She regards me for a minute, then reaches out to tuck a lock of hair behind my ear. “Kailey, I’ve known you your whole life. I know when you’re sad. I hope you know that you don’t have to keep up the tough-girl act around your own mother.”

I can feel my shell cracking, can feel the tears I can’t shed for Noah threatening to break through my fragile composure.
Be a hawk,
I command myself. Luna rubs against my leg, and I sink back down to her level, grateful to have an excuse to hide my face. Her fur is so soft, like a rabbit’s.

“We should take her to the vet,” I say, swallowing the lump in my throat and feeling Luna’s jutting ribs. “What if she’s sick?”

Mrs. Morgan kneels next to me and pets Luna. “I don’t think she’s sick, honey. She’s just hungry. But you’re right, we should take her to the vet to be sure. I’ll call first thing tomorrow.” I nod gratefully.

“You know what else we should do this weekend?” she continues. “Take you shopping for a dress. The dance is next week, right? The stores will be crowded, with all the after-Thanksgiving sales, but we can go early . . .”

I stare at her. Does she really think I’m still going to the dance?