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at the small kitchen table. She looked weary. My fun-
loving mom, my pillar of strength, appeared as though
she had aged significantly since I left for school that
morning.
Do you feel okay, Mom? I kept my eyes on the
steaming colander I was now balancing over the sink.
You sound pooped.
Just a long day, sweetie. How was your afternoon?
I shuddered involuntarily. I wasn t very good at keeping
secrets from her and I worried that this one could be
classified as an outright lie. I knew the time would
come around soon enough for her to ask how I had
actually spent the remainder of my day, the day I
started off so excited about. Surely she would want to
know about that. I decided to be somewhat truthful. To
a degree.
I got a coffee after school then spent some time at a
park. It was too beautiful to be cooped up here at
home.
Hmmm. That sounds nice. Dinner looks great, by the
way.
I was hoping she wouldn t expect me to elaborate
anymore on my seemingly ordinary afternoon. I felt
guilty about leaving out the more important details, but
being completely truthful right now would only open
Pandora s box and I wasn t ready to share my can of
worms yet.
We ate in silence, which was more the norm for us than
the conversation we had shared at breakfast. The time
flew by, each of us absorbed in our own thoughts.
I ll clean up, Mom. I scooped my plate off the table
and walked over to the sauce-splattered counter. I
wasn t exactly the most organized person when it
came to cooking. I felt a twinge of embarrassment as I
began restacking the little seasoning jars that had
fallen into the dusting of Italian bread crumbs around
the cutting board.
Thanks, hon. Dinner was great. My mother stood up
stiffly and laughed a bit as she took in the mess I had
created. She shook her head with a smile. You have
your work cut out for you. Are you sure you don t want
my help?
Nah, I m sure. I don t have anything better to do.
The truth was, I still felt guilty. The only way I thought I
could redeem myself was to make dinner and clean
up.
I straightened up the kitchen in record time. After one
last inspection, and feeling my efforts were worthy of
Mom s blue ribbon of approval, I dashed quietly up the
steps to my room, wanting nothing more than to relive
the hours I had spent with Garreth.
It was Friday night. A girl my age should be getting
ready to go out, but the only thing I wanted to do was
put on my comfiest jammies, set my iPod to shuffle,
and zone out, thinking about the blue-eyed boy I had
spent the afternoon with.
Chapter Six
My intentions of reliving my afternoon with Garreth
were but a memory now. I woke to find my room
blanketed in darkness, my body slumped over my desk
and drenched with sweat. I wrapped my arms around
myself, a futile attempt to hold myself together. Hours
must have passed since I came upstairs.
Shuffling to my bed, I threw myself on top of my still-
tucked covers to think, forcing myself to remember.
Since meeting Garreth, my strange, recurring dreams
had slipped away from me. I had hoped they were
gone for good, but tonight proved me wrong. I couldn t
remember the dream but I could still feel the terror
beneath my skin. I could still feel eyes watching me,
eyes that I had always looked for, knowing they
existed...but, still, they eluded me.
This dream was nearly the same as the others,
something lurking, keeping a close watch...but this
time, I wasn t the only one being watched. Garreth was
in my dream, protecting me from an unseen force of&
Oh... If I could only remember!
I sat up, pushing my hair out of my face and felt
overwhelmingly tired. The dream seemed more of a
memory to me than anything else, though that was
impossible. The edges of it were still hazy in my
groggy head.
Though my covers were ice cold, I had the sense of
feeling warm, as though someone had held me all
night, cradling me. The warmth was familiar. Like the
soothing comfort of being safe and reassured as a
child when I woke up from a bad dream. I used to
check my mother s hands over and over after dreams
like this, feeling for the warmth I had felt in the night. I
had been so sure that she was the one to come into
my room to soothe me. Who else could it have been?
My mother was amused by my insistence but her
hands were habitually cold, and she claimed another
theory. That it was a guardian angel who came in to be
with me when she could not.
Her theory worked for a while, helping me sleep at
night when I was little and afraid. But the day came
when I grew too old for such stories, even though the
dreams never left me.
It wasn t until lately that I had begun to feel afraid all
over again. And I felt silly and inadequate, which is why
I read so many books on paranormal creatures and
myths. I was stretching my boundaries. I had run out of
theories.
So now, sweating and in a panic, I resorted to my old
method of comfort. I imagined a beautiful angel with
outstretched wings sweeping into my room, chasing
away the darkness from the corners, from the
shadows. As hard as I tried, I could never picture a
face on the angel from long ago. That is, until tonight. I
gave it the identity that I knew would comfort me all
through the night.
I gave it Garreth s face.
I pictured warm hands, warmer than my own or even
my mother s for that matter. Hands warmer than
anyone s...save one.
As I tried to concentrate on the hands in my dream-
memory, a sudden flood of other near-horrific incidents
swelled up from my subconscious, revealing
themselves in swift order like an unstoppable
slideshow. Glimpses. Accidents I had suppressed
deeply into my brain s storage box. Choking. Warm
hands. Slipping on ice and whacking my head until
black splotches swirled. A voice like velvet, soothing,
reassuring, keeping me in the here and now. A
voice...not just any voice. One voice I would recognize
over anyone else s.
And eyes...the most perfect heavenly blue...aqua...pure
and mesmerizing. Something inside me clicked just
then. A switch of recognition flipped to the on
position. Then something fluttered in the corner behind
me and I turned around. There was nothing there. The
sound was familiar to me and this time I realized I
wasn t scared, not like earlier.
My eyes strained through the darkness of my room,
waiting, and then I saw him. I rubbed my eyes, sure I
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