Spiritdell Book 1 (4 page)

“I'll say.” My cheeks feel hot; I must be blushing.

She puts her cool hands on my cheeks and gives me the softest kiss on the mouth. She leans back, resting one elbow on the pillow, and says, “Let's take this one day at a time, okay?”

“That's my plan. I'm not going to look, ever again. No more poking.” I make an emphatic hand gesture to punctuate my new plan.

“You could get your belly button sewn up,” she says with a sly smile.

What's happening here? Is she playing along, or making fun of me?

She walks her hand, using two fingers as little legs, across the sheet toward my stomach.

I shift my body back, but she keeps advancing.

Now she's definitely mocking me. I'm such an idiot for opening up to her. She's probably going to tell her cousin, who'll tell everyone else.

Her hand sneaks closer.

“Don't,” I say, pulling the covers up. “I don't want to know the future.”

“Look at you, you're so serious,” she says. “Listen, I don't have anything to hide. I just met you and spent the night with you, so you already know I'm a big ol' tramp. There's nothing else, except for the severed heads I keep under my bed.”

“Severed heads aren't so bad,” I say, trying to match her lighthearted mood.

“My mother stopped buying me Barbie dolls because I decapitated them all. I swear, I've reformed.”

“I don't know if I feel safe alone with you!” I joke. “I'm rather attached to my head.”

“Of course, there is one thing ... unusual.” Her expression flattens and she looks away, out the window, as though there's something to see besides clouds.

“Do you want some breakfast?” I ask, even though I don't want to leave the bed.

She fluffs her pillow and curls up on her side. I've been trying so hard to be polite and keep my eyes above her neck, but they sneak down disobediently. I have a funny, smart girl in my bed, and she's in her underwear. I shouldn't have a single care in the world!

But, I don't
know
her. Who is Austin? Maybe I should look into her—get her to poke me so I can see her future, her secrets. It may be best to break the spell now, before she smashes my heart to bits later.

“Breakfast, hmm?” She runs her hands along her sides, then puts her finger into her own belly button. Her eyes flutter. “I'm getting a vision of us eating cold cereal because that's all you have in the house.”

“No, I have bagels. Cinnamon raisin. Plus dill cream cheese. Best combination ever!”

She wrinkles her nose.

“Seriously, you have to try them together, cinnamon and dill. I have everything in the fridge.”

“Shouldn't put bagels in the fridge, they go stale. Don't you know? Oh, of course you don't, you're so young.” She gasps and sits up. “Oh God. How old are you? You have, like, almost no chest hair. Oh God.”

“I'm fourteen,” I say.

Her eyes get watery and her lip trembles, as though she might start to cry.

“Joking, I'm seventeen,” I say. “What, do I look fourteen?”

“This was kind of a bad idea,” she says, shaking her head. “I should go.”

“No, don't.” I grab her hand and try to pull her back in for a hug, but she's partly twisted to get up, and she falls backward with a giggle, landing on me.

She looks at my belly button for a second, just as her finger goes straight into ...

No!

Too late. Her finger is in my belly button.
It's happening.

* * *

The world slows, but my breathing is still normal speed. Her breathing is normal too, and I can see the pulse on her neck. We're both very still.

Something strange is happening. Or, rather, something strange is
not
happening. There's no vision, no Secret Town. I'm still in real-time, in my bed, next to a beautiful girl.

“I think my finger's in your tummy,” she whispers.

“It can't be.” I look down, but there it is, her index finger, resting gently in my navel. I should be having a vision right about now. The only time the vision doesn't work is when it's a dude, and Austin is definitely not a dude.

“That's weird,” I say as I take her hand, pull the finger out, then stick it back in again. She laughs nervously.

“What do you see?” she asks. “Am I going to be late for work today? Am I going to enjoy your bizarre raisin and dill bagels?”

“No, not that.”

“What is it?” she asks. “Something terrible? I swear, he was very old and the surgery was so expensive. It's what he would have wanted.”

“Who? I don't know what you're talking about. It's not working. Maybe it's because ... we, um.” Because why? Because last night I poked her in an entirely different way? Could the trick have disappeared from my body, along with my virginity?

Her voice sounding husky and serious, Austin says, “I blame the cold light of morning.” She waves her hand between us, drawing a zig-zag. “All of
this
just got a little weird. I'm glad you're seventeen, really, but I think the age gap is still a bit ... gappy.”

I continue to stare at my belly button, dumbfounded.

She rolls out of bed and puts on the dress she wore last night. I thought the dress was black with little stars, but it's actually navy blue, just like my photo booth backdrop.

“Any last words?” she asks, smoothing out the wrinkles of the skirt.

“I love you,” comes out of my mouth. I'm sure in about a minute, I'll realize I've said the stupidest thing imaginable, but right now, it doesn't exactly feel wrong. I do mean it.

“Before, what I said—I didn't kill anyone,” she says. “Not really. At the moment when my finger went in, I suddenly thought of our cocker spaniel. He was incontinent, which I didn't mind, but he was also in pain. I don't think it's fair to keep them alive if they're suffering. In more civilized countries, they do the same for humans. That's what you saw, in your vision, right? That's my terrible secret.” She turns away and walks out the door, still talking. “My parents thought it was the right decision, but I dream about him, that he's still alive somewhere.” She disappears down the hall.

“Are we talking about euthanasia?” I grab my jeans and jump into them awkwardly as I run after her.

I expect to find her in the kitchen, but she's already at the front door, surprisingly fast, and backing away with her shoes on. She says, “I'm sure you think I don't believe you about the visions, but I do.”

She fumbles with the door knob behind her, but the door's locked.

“It doesn't matter,” I say. “Don't go! I'm sorry about whatever I said. Don't go. Stay for breakfast.”

She pulls at her sleeves, which are striped, unlike the rest of the dress. “For the last few months, I've been seeing all sorts of things,” she says. “Auras. People who aren't there. I like you, Zan, but I don't think two crazy people together can work. It's too much crazy.”

“Auras?”

She turns to face the door and curses as she tries to figure out the deadbolt.

GONG! The clock in the living room gongs with the half-hour, and this time I must be hearing it with Austin's ears, because I jump up and clutch my hands together, my eyes closing instinctively.

When I open my eyes, the front door is closing. Austin's gone.

Instead of running out after her, my legs lock up and I stand, frozen, as the echoes of the clock's gong continue to reverberate through the room. My ears ringing, I sit down on Gran's floral-embroidered footstool. I'm alone. My psychic power's on the fritz. It's the first day of summer vacation. What else?

Oh, that. Yes, in retrospect, saying
I love you
probably was the wrong choice.

Austin's run out the door and I'm alone.

And yet, the cat gnawing on my big toe reminds me I'm not actually alone. Mibs is here, and he wants his breakfast. His brown tabby-striped tail wraps around my leg.

“I love you. Do you love me?” I ask Mibs.

He looks up from my toe, a string of saliva hanging from his mouth. “Meow.”

“What did you think of Austin? She was nice, right? What did she say to you last night?”

“Meow?”

“Talking to a cat isn't like talking to yourself. It's not crazy.”

Mibs gives me the cat equivalent of a frown and pit-pats in the direction of the kitchen. A few seconds later, I hear utensils being knocked to the floor from the counter.

When I get in the kitchen, he feigns innocence. I get his insulin from the fridge and he waits expectantly. At first, my friends were horrified that we have to give Mibs a needle twice a day, but I assured them it's far easier than giving a cat a pill. The big guy doesn't even feel the tiny needle, and he actually looks forward to it, as he gets his treats at the same time. Treats are a great motivator for cats. Humans are more complex.

Why did Austin run away so quickly? And what's happening with my power?

I'm musing over the morning's mysteries while feeding Mibs his favorite canned food when the wall phone rings, and since I'm standing right next to it, I pick it up instead of letting it go to voice mail. The voice isn't one of Gran's friends, though, but James, asking if I'm ready to go to the lake.
The lake.
I forgot.

“Why are you calling the land line?” I ask. I didn't even know he had the number.

“Cause you're not picking up your cell, Sherlock. Hey, you disappeared on us last night. You left with Raye-Anne, huh?”

“No, Austin. Actually, she just left.”

James emits a noise like the
squee
sound his sister Julie makes over books.

“I'll tell you when I see you,” I say, and then I hold the phone away from my ear because he's yelling so loud. I don't think he got this excited when
he
slept with a girl for the first time. He's a good friend.

* * *

I grab some things for the lake and throw them in one of Gran's cloth shopping bags. Mibs climbs into the bag, all fifteen pounds of take-me-with-you. He twitches his tail when I tell him to find something more constructive to do. I shake his little cat treat bag and he's out like a fat champagne cork.

He'll need an insulin shot tonight and then again tomorrow morning. Gran and I usually trade off taking care of him, but one of our neighbors is a vet assistant and she usually steps in on short notice. I did mention something to Krystal last week, I think, but I need to make sure she's able to take care of the big guy, or else I can't leave town.

I run across the street and ring the doorbell. I'm wondering how Mibs is going to like a long vehicle ride stuffed in my shopping bag when Krystal opens the door. The woman looks like an Indian movie star, and I find myself lost for words, caught by her green eyes.

After I explain the situation and apologize for the intrusion, she says, “Mibs is still alive?”

“Yeah, he's a tough little bugger.”

“He's a sweet boy,” she says.

“Don't worry if he dies while I'm away. Put him in a bag in the freezer, and whatever you do, don't tell Gran. She made me promise the same when she left for the cruise.” Gran and I did have that discussion, including both of us getting teary-eyed at the thought of something happening to Mibs. Since he first got sick a few years ago, and used up a few of his nine cat lives, we've been aware he's down to his last few, and we cope by using a little dark humor.

Krystal rubs her temple. She's wearing a pink thing—two pink things, actually—scrubs, I guess. “I've got some special extra-large turkey Ziplocs,” she says. “From the clinic, but I'd have to charge you cost. You know, if worse comes to worst.”

“Turkey Ziplocs?” I sense Krystal's talk of Ziplocs is more cool professionalism than dark humor, though I imagine in her workplace, where they deal with life and death constantly, both serve her well.

“They're fine for cats, but only twenty percent of dogs,” she muses. “Though in recent years, dogs have been getting smaller on average.”

“Dogs are shrinking?”

“Not the actual dogs,” she says, smiling, and she goes on to explain about the trends in dog breeds. While she's talking, I have a mini discussion inside my head. There's something different about Krystal today, but not her lovely features or her tiny gold earrings. No, what's different is how I feel. My crush on her is almost entirely gone. Krystal is no longer The World's Most Perfect Unattainable Woman. That title has been taken by Austin.

“And that's why everyone should adopt a mutt from the pound,” Krystal says. “Or a dachshund, because they snuggle under the covers.”

I agree with her, hand over a spare house key, and run off to wait on my own porch for James and Julie. As I'm halfway across the street, Krystal calls out, “You're in a hurry! Is everything okay?”

“Awesome like possum!” I shout back. I sit on my porch and wave at her, still out on her own front step. She waves back and hesitates before returning to her house. Perhaps she notices a change in me as well. I am different. Lighter. My curse has been lifted, and I'm in love.

* * *

I want to talk about this new feeling I'm having, but James is not really a hearts-and-flowers kind of guy. He only wants the physical details. Actually, I didn't think I was a hearts-and-flowers guy until today. Love at first sight is something that happens to girls, or so I thought. This morning, I find myself staring out of the window of James and Julie's Jeep, at a flower shop, and wondering which flowers Austin would like best. Purple flowers. I think she'd like purple ones.

James is squirming around in the driver's seat, twisting to stare at me periodically when traffic allows. His interest in my recent activities is palpable, but I'm concerned about Julie's feelings. She's also up front, in the passenger seat. She has a book open on her lap, but she hasn't turned the page in the last five minutes.

James, who is also aware of her unrequited crush on me, asks me questions, in code.

“How late were you up playing
that video game
?” he asks.

“Like, uh, three maybe. I sorta dozed off without checking the time.”

“Did you play more than one video game?” he asks.

Julie turns around and looks at me suspiciously. “You should probably get a summer job,” she says. “Video games are a waste of time.”