Spark (10 page)

Zach

              I gasped out loud.  I never told him about that!  Alex was the only one who knew.  Zach's words from earlier played like a broken record in my mind, "
I know everything about you"' Maybe
it was true.  Maybe Zach was some sort of alien, someone with supernatural abilities.  After everything that had happened to me, anything was possible.  It was a weird world.  My heart skipped more than a couple beats as I pushed myself away from my desk, put on my shoes and jacket and ran downstairs.  I dashed through the kitchen, running into my mom who was on her way in from work. 

              “Whoa!  Where are you going in such a hurry?”

              Startled, my brain scrambled to think of an answer.  Where
was
I going?  But I already knew.

              “I’m going to see Alex,” I lied.  “We’re going out.  On a date.  Dinner.”

              Mom just smiled, as if happy to see that I’d finally adjusted.  Finally, all was right with the world again.  Little did she know, the world was about to be turned completely upside down.

              I was breathing so hard on the way over that I had to roll down all the windows in the car.  When I got to Zach’s house, he was sitting on the front porch steps in a white t-shirt and jeans, barefoot, reading a book. 
How can he be so relaxed at a time like this? 
I walked up to him, nearly panting I was so mad. 

              “What are you, some kind of freak?”  I demanded.

              Zach looked up, confused.  He glanced around with a blank look on his face.  “Excuse me?”

              “The e-mail, Zach.  What’s with the e-mail?  You know everything about me, huh?  A great imagination you have there.  Maybe you should write a book.”

              “I’m sorry if I upset you,” he said.  “I’m only trying to help you.”  He sounded mechanical, like a computerized version of himself.  Then, his face softened and he sighed.  The old Zach was looking at me, with those soft, irresistible eyes.  “What can I do to convince you that I’m just a regular guy?”

              “Yeah, well you can start by not sending me creepy e-mails.”

              “That wasn’t my intent.”

              “So what was your intent, Zach?  Enlighten me, please.”

              Zach took hold of my arm gently and started down the sidewalk.  “This isn’t a good place to talk about this.  Let’s go somewhere else.”

              I pulled back.  “No, Zach.  I’m tired of all this.  I’m not going anywhere with you.”

              Zach took a deep breath.  “Fine, but at least take a walk with me.  I don’t want my mom to hear us.”

              Against my better judgment, I agreed.  “Ok, but make it quick.”

              He led me down the sidewalk.  “I tried to tell you, back at the lab, but you ran away.”

              “How long have you been stalking me anyway?  Do you have my house bugged, too?  My cell phone?  No—I know—you hacked into my computer, right?  Seriously, Zach.”

              “None of this is going to work if you don’t start trusting me.”

              “What are you talking about?  What is not going to work?  And why should I trust you anyway?”

              Zach stopped walking, turned, his eyes drilling into mine.  For a brief moment, he looked certifiably insane… until those eyes yanked me back into the land of normal.

              “What?”  I asked, suddenly speechless.

              “Like I said, I know things.  Trust me and I will prove it to you.”

              “Forget it.  I’m out,” I said, walking away.

              “Tess, wait.  Please.  There’s more.”  He looked desperate.

              "There's more?  As if you haven't said enough yet?"  Tears continued to stream down my cheeks.

              His eyes were like fire then—hot, dangerous, and driven.  “Tess, wait," he said, pulling me back to face him.  "I
need
to tell you this one last thing before you leave...  I’ve always loved you,” he said.  And all at once, he swooped in, his lips on mine, his arms around me, moving like someone who always got what he wanted.  And it only took me a second to give in.  Afterwards I wrapped my arms around him and cried for Dani, for four years of my life, lost, and because I didn’t know what else to do.

              Call me crazy, but yes, a mere kiss was enough to convince me to go back to the lab with Zach.  He said he wanted to show me something important, and at that point, I’d decided that I was in.  Besides, I couldn’t stop looking at him, and I really wanted to kiss him again.  He was like every cheesy leading man in every sappy teenage romance all rolled up into one tall, brooding-eyed stranger who could steal me away with his blue eyes.  And, on top of everything, he loved me.  I don’t know how or why, but to him, I wasn’t the willowy girl who was too tall, the girl who didn’t fit into any group.  No, I wasn’t one of the Beautiful People.  I wasn’t into sports.  I wasn’t even that smart, if my grades were any indication.  I was just one complicated person with a lot of silly problems, a girl who’d lost her best friend and found another one, in Zach Webb.

              Once inside the lab, Zach combed one finger through a piece of my hair.  “You’re beautiful.  Better than all the rest.”  Then he kissed me for the second time, and it was just as spectacular as the first.

              “C’mon, I have a lot I want to show you,” he said.

              He sat down at a small computer screen that looked dirty and outdated, pushed some buttons, and pulled up an interface called Project Zero.  Then for some reason, the words
Soliloquy 18
popped into my head
.

              “Wait,” I said. 

             
Soliloquy 18.

             
“Soliloquy 18?”

              “Yep. That’s the password,” Zach said.

              The keyboard clicked as Zach typed in a bunch of things, and then a screen popped up with a document.  “You were in a coma for four years,” he said.  “There was an immense electrical storm at Fuller Park on May 11, 2008.  It was your 13
^th
birthday.”

Zach got a funny look on his face like he wanted to tell me something else, but he was afraid to. 
How bad could it be?
  I wondered.  Unless he told me we were really Siamese twins that were separated shortly after birth, I was prepared for pretty much anything.   He just stared at me and raked his fingers through his hair, which messed it up, leaving pieces going in all different directions. 

              He leaned away from the computer, revealing the following screen: He wheeled his chair aside.  “Just… read it,” he said.

              --Log June 18, 2008

              Data collection on subject Soliloquy 18 begins.  Subject:  13 year old female suffered a lightning strike, resulting in a comatose state.  Subject is housed at Ellerman Regional Medical Center.  Permission given by father of victim, one Walter Turner.

              “You expect me to believe this.”

              Zach shrugged.  “It is what it is.”

“There’s only one problem with this
data
,” I said, with air quotes.

              Zach looked at me with a furrowed brow, a stoic expression that made him look much older than 17.  “What?”

              “I was never struck by lightning,” I replied. 

              He frowned, slightly, as he’d just taken a bite of something and wasn’t sure, yet, if he liked it.  “Yes, but you were
present
when these electrical storms were at their peak.  You were still a viable subject.”

“
Viable Subject
?  What the heck?  In some scientific experiment?”  I huffed.  “You mean I was some lab rat?”

              “No,” Zach corrected.  “My dad was trying to help you.”

              Funny thing.  I didn’t even budge.  Didn’t try to pull my hand away, didn’t try to run.  At that point, nothing was going to surprise me.  “Wow,” I said again.  “That’s better than Siamese twins,” I added.  An afterthought. 

              “Huh?”  Zach was the poster child for confusion. 

              “Nothing.  Never mind. Anyway, I don’t believe a word of what you’re telling me.”  I started to get up.  “And I’m getting tired.”

“Wait.”  He typed a few letters, and started a music player on his computer.  “Listen.” 

String up the stars and steal the sky

Today is a dream, today is goodbye

              Take it all with you, take every last sigh

              String up the stars and steal the sky

              Today is a dream, today is goodbye.

It took me a few moments of sitting there, just enjoying the music before it hit me.  It was the song Dani and I had listened to, back when we were kids.  I sat down hard in the chair in disbelief, just shaking my head.

“You’re not freaking out,” Zach observed.

              “Why should I?  Crazy is normal at this point.”  I sighed, resigned to the fact that I was in way deeper than I ever imagined I’d be.  There was definitely some truth in what Zach was telling me.

              “And,” Zach continued.  “I have been reading all about you.  From your… um… brain data.”

              “What do you mean?”  I admit the fact that someone had not only
studied
my brain covertly, but had
recorded
stuff from it, was a bit disturbing. 

              “The lab contains all the digital files from the patient’s recorded brain waves.”  He coughed a little bit, on purpose, it seemed, to ease the tension that we were both starting to feel.  “It’s all here.”

              “But why me?  I mean, how did the doctor know about me?  And more importantly, why did my parents give him permission to hook up crap to my brain?”  I felt violated for something I never even knew was happening to me.  I was getting severely annoyed.

              “After the accident, your dad contacted mine.  They were old friends.  I think your dad knew about his research.  Maybe they thought it would help you.  Your parents were desperate for answers.”

              I felt like crying and I couldn’t decide if it was because I felt sorry for my parents, or I was just fed up with my life.  “Great.”  Being a sci-fi special of the month was the last place I thought life would take me.  But then, freaky is as freaky does.

              I still wasn’t convinced, but you had to give him credit for trying.  “Ok,” I hesitated.  “So what, my brain waves were recorded for science.  Yeah me.”  If I was involved in some intricate scientific experiment involving comatose me, brain waves, and lightning in hopes of reviving me, what was the point of talking about it now?  It was all over.  Yet, there was something else.  Zach had clearly said it was related, somehow to him, and by default, apparently, to me.  I took a deep breath.  “So, what does this have to do with me and you?”  I asked, finally.  “Why are you telling me about this?  Why not just leave it alone?  I could have lived without knowing any of it.”

              “Because I love you,” Zach said.  “I know it sounds weird, but it’s true.  You won’t understand it yet, not until…”

              “Until I trust you,” I offered. 

              “Right.”  Zach started punching more keys on the keyboard.

              “Zach, a document on the computer isn’t going to convince me—” I protested.

              Zach reached over and placed his fingertips over my mouth.  “Shhh,” he soothed.  His eyes were so soft and approachable just then; I couldn’t look away or say a word.  There were faraway places in his eyes.  Worlds, even. 

              “Are you ready to read about Project Zero?”  He asked. 

              Don’t ask me how or why, but at that moment, I believed, with every thread of my being, that Zach Webb indeed
knew things. 
And as much as it scared the wits out of me, he probably did
know everything about me.
  The only question was—how?  And more importantly, why?

              “Ready as I’ll ever be,” I replied.

Floating

Project Zero:  File 6-18-2008, Subject Tess Turner

              My first thought:  Am I dead?

              Then, I start thinking about myself—not the boring stuff like my name, address, phone number, but like about
me. 
I start thinking about what’s on the inside, like what, for example, makes me have thoughts to begin with.  Why, for example, did I just think up the words, “Am I dead?”  It’s because I’m very much alive.  A dead person can’t have thoughts.  And a dead person most certainly cannot
think
about having thoughts.

There’s something else I’ve discovered about myself.  You’re probably not going to believe it.  You might think it’s either really, really cool or really, really scary.  But to me, it’s just normal.  It’s normal, but somehow freaky all at the same time.  I’m a walking contradiction, but that’s ok by me.  It just means I’m complicated.  And what would the world do without complicated things?  Well, for one, we’d have nothing to analyze or discuss or argue about.  In fact, we would all be pretty darn boring.  When you get right down to it, it makes life sort of interesting, my being such a mixed up mess. 

              Don’t get me wrong—I’m not telling you this because I want to be analyzed.  Because believe me, I
do not
like to be analyzed.  That’s the last thing I need.  My friend Dani is always analyzing things to death, and it drives me crazy.  Like, once I was going through my sock drawer trying to pick out what to wear with my favorite sweater, and she literally drove me nuts.  The sweater was this weird shade of pink like the color of a grapefruit, with these swirly black and white designs on it that sort of looked like penguins, if you think Picasso and/or a blender.  I swear Dani pulled out every pair of socks I owned.  Those would work if I had black shoes, but
only if
I had black shoes.  These would work because they were
almost
the right color of pink and no one would notice anyway.  And why not wear two different socks, start a trend?  Seriously made me want to scream.  She is always doing stuff that drives me crazy.