Of Breakable Things (4 page)

Ellington crouched down. “You’ll like it here.” He patted the water like a pet. “If you don’t mind me asking, what makes someone like you choose this alternative?”

“Someone like me?”

“Well, you weren’t exactly in love with life.”

Chase
, Alex thought to herself. Even now, without knowing where Chase was or how long it would be before she saw him again, merely the idea of knowing it would happen was enough. If he existed in his world, they’d find each other.

Ellington pushed himself to a stand. “Besides the obvious reason.”

“What do you mean?”

“When I saw you arrive, I saw a few other things, too. It’s just something I’ve always been able to do. It’s kind of like watching a trailer for a movie. As the images appear, I get little bits and pieces of the person arriving, and then I wait for them.”

“Do they always show up?”

“No.”

“What did you see about me?”

“Chase.” He sighed. “All I saw was Chase.”

***

As a child, Chase couldn’t fathom the idea that his best friend was sick. Alex had too much energy. When he stood next to her, he could feel it like the static electricity he learned about in science class. So then how could she somehow have less life than he did?

He knew it was called Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, and he’d heard Alex’s doctor say things like
type four
and
vascular
and
dangerous
. He knew Alex’s mother had been sick with it, too. And her mother was dead.

“They don’t look any different to me,” Chase whispered to his mother. That morning they had driven into the city so Alex could attend some sort of meeting. There was a huge banner outside the Baltimore Convention Center that read
Learning Conference: Living with EDS
. Jonas had snorted and told Alex she was going to a freak show. Chase had punched him in the belly, and to his shock and amazement, his mother turned her head and didn’t scold him. And now, sitting outside the convention center, the people walking inside didn’t look strange at all.

“There are different kinds of EDS,” Danya explained to him, ruffling his hair. “Some are worse than others.”

“Worse than Alex’s?”

Danya shifted on the bench. “No. Alex has the worst kind.”

“She doesn’t look sick.”

“That’s because most of it is inside her body.” She pointed to his arm. “You have tissues in there. Don’t scrunch your face like that! They aren’t the same kind that you blow your nose with. Your tissues hold your body together. Alex’s tissues don’t work quite as well as yours.”

No kidding. One time he’d pulled on her arm to get her attention and her shoulder fell out of its socket. He’d cried the entire way to the hospital because he’d hurt her.

“In our tissues, we have something called collagen. And if collagen is like the glue of body, the normal person has liquid cement while Alex has cheap Elmer’s glue.”

“Is that why Jonas says that Alex was assembled at Kmart?”

His mother rolled her eyes. “Probably, but Jonas really shouldn’t say that. I’ll speak to him.”

Chase fiddled with the Velcro on the pocket of his shorts. “I still don’t get it.”

“What?”

“Why is it such a big a deal?”

“Tissues support your skin, which is why Alex bruises easily. And they hold your bones together, which is why hers are more likely to break.”

“But broken bones don’t kill you,” he argued. “Why did her mom die?”

His mother’s face crumbled, and he felt that pang in his chest that told him he’d said something wrong. “I’m sorry.”

“No, don’t be sorry. I just miss her.” Between her hands, she rolled a pamphlet she’d picked up that morning at the convention. “Tissues also support your organs. Like your heart. That’s an organ. The things inside you that keep you alive, and if they aren’t supported properly, you could bleed inside your body. That’s what happened to Alex’s mommy when Alex was born. They couldn’t stop the bleeding.”

“Is that why her dad hates her?”

“He doesn’t hate her.”

Chase looked at his mom doubtfully, but quickly shifted his attention to several people exiting the convention center. His heart fluttered in hope, but his friend wasn’t among them. He couldn’t believe his mother had made him stay out here instead of letting him go in with Alex. This was all Miss Petra’s fault. Their teacher was the one to suggest that Alex’s friendship with the Lasalles might be detrimental to her health. She was always trying to put them in separate groups during class or encouraging Alex to hang out with the other girls during recess. Thankfully, Alex ignored the suggestions. But within the past few months, Alex had broken three different bones during their adventures with his brothers. So her dumb doctor recommended she meet other kids who were “limited” too.

A selfish part of Chase wanted Alex to come screaming out of that door. Usually they joked about her illness. They would look at the bruises on her arms and laugh about what they saw … like lying in the grass and finding images in the clouds, only these clouds were stormy. She was going to be sick no matter what, so what good would it do to sit around and talk about it? Alex didn’t like to think she was different, so he was sure she wouldn’t enjoy this experience. Or at least that’s what he hoped. After all, he needed her as much as she needed him.

She just never understood that.

“It wasn’t so bad,” Alex told him later that day. The convention had dampened their spirits, and they sat dejectedly on a log by the beach. “They had doughnuts. That was cool.”

Chase picked up a stick and pressed it into the sand. He drew a weaving line from his feet to hers and then traced an identical one beside it, tying them together.

“It was kind of depressing, though,” she added. “Sitting around and talking about death isn’t exactly my idea of a good time.”

Was it bad that he was relieved to hear that?

“It just sucks to know I’m not normal and it will only get worse.”

“Who said you weren’t normal?”

Alex laughed. “Wasn’t that the whole point of going today?”

He threw the stick across the beach. “Those people are stupid, Alex, and so is your doctor. You
are
normal.”

Alex bent her hand backwards so that her finger practically tickled her forearm. “That’s normal?”

“Lots of people are double-jointed.”

“I can’t do half the things other kids can do.”

“Like what?”

“I can’t participate in gym.”

“And most of the other girls wish they could sit out, too.”

She pointed out her collection of bruises. “I can’t wakeboard with you guys. I have to sit in the boat like a baby. I can’t ski. I can’t even go sledding.”

To top off her argument, Alex pulled at the collar of her shirt, revealing the maze of veins branching across her chest like blue coral. Evidence of her vulnerability.

Chase shrugged. “It just looks like a really cool tattoo,” he said, and when Alex’s face broke into a huge smile, he felt light enough to fly.

“I never thought about it like that!” She glanced down into her shirt. “You’re right!”

Apparently, fate overheard their foolish conversation, because that night Alex broke her ankle simply rolling over in bed.

Chase presented her with a teddy bear in the ER, patted her back and said, “Who wants to be normal, anyway?”

Alex stared at Ellington while they walked, but he didn’t seem to mind. “Do you see much about the lives of the people you meet?”

“Not a whole lot. Just fragments of the important parts.”

The wind picked up, dancing through the gargantuan trees. Their voices reminded her of the woods at home. They had stories to tell.

“So, there are ghosts all over the world?”

Ellington nodded. “Some more civilized than others.”

Alex watched her feet trudging through the muddy path, but she noticed only one set of footprints trailed behind them. Those belonged to Ellington. “How did I end up back there? And how did you know where I would be?”

“Because everyone I see shows up there.”

Every answer fed her curiosity. “Can I keep asking questions?”

“Please. That’s why I’m here.”

“Why don’t I have any footprints?”

“Because you aren’t thinking about making them. You’ve chosen to be in a mental world, but you really don’t know what that means yet. You will, though.”

“Why do you think people choose to be like this?”

Ellington cocked his head. “I suppose some people have trouble letting go of who they are, or who they
were
. Some, I think, are merely curious about omnipresence, knowing what people are doing without their awareness. Most don’t realize how much they hate it until they taste it. Others do it for the clout.”

Alex dodged a bird flying by. It flashed with light like a crystal in the sun. “Clout?”

“Power. You’d be surprised what your mind is capable of.”

“I don’t get it. What does a spirit
do
? Hover around and watch people?”

“Maybe once upon a time that’s how it was, but now there’s much more to it,” he explained. “You’ll learn more about this soon, but a while back spirits became a problem.”

“Why?”

“Exactly what you said. All they did was hover, observe. Mischief is the product of an idle mind. A life without walls opens a Pandora’s box of new temptations. Just because a soul is spirited enough to come here doesn’t mean it is
good
. Therefore, a solution was created. Much like in the physical world, once our numbers grew, someone had to step up and take control. The result is about fifty feet ahead of us.”

They reached a fortress of black, leafless trees with branches intertwined from the ground up. Nature had weaved the bark so intricately that Alex doubted she could find a hole large enough to fit an arm through. The branches continuously twisted into a word she’d never heard before. “Eidolon.” The term tasted magical, and she licked her lips to savor it.

“Eidolon,” Ellington echoed with a content sigh.

More colossal redwoods waited through the gate. There were no buildings, no signs. There was no one there to greet them. She reached out her hands, but could only grasp the “bars” like any normal person.

“How do we get through?”

You’re here?

Alex gasped. The melody of Chase’s voice soared through her mind like a tranquilizer, engulfing her with a happiness she’d long forgotten. Distracted, Alex failed to notice Ellington reaching for her hand. The electric pressure of his grasp startled her, but the prickles of electricity preceded something much worse. Stepping through the branches was like passing through a cookie cutter of needles. Alex attempted to pull away from the pain embedded in the bark, but Ellington wouldn’t allow it. A scream exploded silently within her, deepening with the pressure of the punctures. With a lurch, she reached the other side. The torment left no traces but white sparks of shock erupting from all around her.

“Allow the discomfort to remind you that you exist. It’s alarming, I know, but I promise you’ll get used to it,” Ellington assured her. He brushed his hair from his forehead. “I hate to rush you, because I know how distressing the experience is for the first time, but unfortunately, we need to hurry.”

She felt vulnerable and frightened, but the echo of Chase’s voice motivated her. Stiffly, she followed Ellington, each step easier than the last. They ascended a hill and reached a wall composed of mossy stones with palettes of tired blue and smoky gray. A small archway stood crookedly off center, etched with the words
Ab Vitam
.

For Life
, Alex translated in her head. The Latin had been inscribed on her great uncle’s tombstone. He died during World War II, and she had often passed his tombstone when she visited her mother’s grave. Alex had thought during those visits how ironic it was to carve those two words on a stone that marks the existence of death.

As they stepped through the archway, Alex noticed that they were venturing through a
series
of walls, each one tilting at a different angle. She shuffled through one disorienting arc after another, feeling like the rotating hand of a clock.

Darkness shrouded the sky when they finally reached a courtyard framed by two black L-shaped buildings. They towered in size, and thus Alex realized the purpose of the mammoth trees. Crossbreeds between skyscrapers and medieval churches, the epic structures stood blatantly out of place in the middle of the forest. Crookedly placed gothic stones comprised the misshapen framework, each block cracked into a unique form. It was imperfection at its best.

“This is it?” Alex whispered.

Ellington’s shoulders relaxed. “It’s a small part of Eidolon, but it’s a good place to start.”

A rippling of fog lapped at her ankles like an airborne stream. Outlining the rickety, stone pathways through the courtyard, hazy streetlights stood at attention allowing ivy to coil around their bases. This is exactly what she’d expected a ghost town to look like. The scene was daunting and exquisite in a fabulously eerie kind of way.

One was thing missing. “Where are all the people?”