Chapter 9
Life fell into an unconventional routine. I went to school and tried to keep Alastor at a distance to save my sanity. I did my best to just fit in and appear normal.
Alastor remained with me, my invisible shadow throughout the day. I could sense him hanging in the air around me even if he was silent. I felt him near me, knowing he was there even if I couldn’t hear him or see him.
Unfortunately, when I needed him to be silent the most that was when Alastor would decide to be the most vocal.
“That boy does not deserve so much thought,” Alastor complained when my mind drifted to Jonah. It was impossible to think of clever things to talk about with Jonah when I couldn’t get Alastor out of my head.
Alastor…Don’t start…
“You belong to me,” He whispered on the air. “The boy is nothing.”
I know, but he saved my life. I can’t not talk to him. I won’t be rude to him just to make you happy.
Every day Jonah would walk into History class with his dazzling smile and say something witty and charming. I would try to have a normal conversation, but I would fail miserably.
“Am I bothering you?” Jonah asked when all I could do was stammer a short “hi” after his greeting.
I could almost feel Alastor’s breath on my neck as I tried to think of something normal to say. Part of me was still infatuated, but another part felt guilty for thinking that way about anyone, but Alastor.
“Of course you’re not bothering me,” I finally said as Alastor shifted around me. “I’ve just got a lot on my mind.”
Jonah smiled wider, flashing his even white teeth. “Really? Like what?”
“Just school and stuff,” I lied as Alastor began swirling between us, creating an ice cold breeze I was sure even Jonah could feel.
Something must have changed in my expression because the smile faded from his face.
“I see,” He said as he turned away.
Not sure exactly what it was I did wrong, all that I could do was analyze every detail of our conversation while the teacher tried to explain the process of state succession, a topic Alastor took very personally and added his own opinions to the lecture.
“Damn rebels!” He complained inside my head. “If they hadn’t left the Union, things could have been so very different. They ruined everything just so they could keep their slaves.”
I ignored him and tried to concentrate, but my mind kept drifting back to Jonah.
Alastor’s icy phantom touch tingled the skin of my throat, “You waste too much thought on the boy. Always remember that it is I that loves you.”
I know that you love me.
“But it is still not enough,” he said with a ghostly sigh.
A few people turned and looked back towards me as if they actually heard Alastor’s breath, but it was only a brief glance. Perhaps they were only checking the time on the clock over my head.
How was I supposed to have any semblance of normalcy with Alastor whispering inside my head? No matter how predictable my odd little routine was, I felt like I was floundering. Time and time again, a lost, tight feeling clamped down on my chest. I was sinking quickly and I didn’t know how to stop.
The problem was I wanted Alastor near me. It wasn’t just the thrill of an invisible friend that could read everyone’s minds, it went deeper than that. Every time I felt him churning around me, I was overcome with memories and a sense of him that at times was so powerful it would leave me breathless. I loved him plain and simple.
My friends noticed changes in me. All too often I would make plans and cancel or just avoid them all together.
“I don’t really feel like shopping today,” I told Ally when she called one weekend.
Never one to take no for an answer, she of course pressed me on the issue.
“Why not?” She whined, “Billie is coming and we’re going for pizza later. We might even go see a movie.”
Alastor was circling me, touching me with invisible fingers. How could I ever leave this sort of tortured bliss?
“I’m just not really feeling up to it,” I said as a tingling sensation swept up the side of my face.
“Well, suite yourself,” She said, obviously disappointed.
I came up on them one day on the sidewalk after school. I was still in the shadows of the crape myrtle trees outside the science labs, unnoticed by them. I stopped short when I realized I was the topic of their conversation.
“Do you think she’s actually coming this time?” Ally asked Billie as she shifted her weight from foot to foot.
Billie stood there in all of her model without make-up beauty. She was calm and unmoving. “At lunch she said we’d all hang out after school. She’ll be here.”
“What’s been going on with her?” Ally wondered.
Always the voice of fairness and reason, Billie just shrugged. “Who knows? New in town, new school, I’m sure it’s all still a little overwhelming.”
“That doesn’t explain why she’s been acting so weird.”
“It explains why Becca is acting weird, but what’s your excuse?” Billie teased.
Even though we hadn’t been friends that long, they knew something was up. I saw it in the way that they looked at me. How could I keep them as friends and explain what was happening? No one in their right mind would believe me.
My evenings at home were no better; Dad also seemed to sense something was wrong. He was more talkative, asking all sorts of questions about my day and my friends. His newfound concern made me miss the days when my Mom was alive and Dad never got home until after I was in bed.
“When are you and your friends going out again?” He asked for the third time in a week.
“I don’t know.”
He was clearing the dishes after dinner when he brought it up again.
“You could have the girls over here anytime you want,” he said with a smile as he scraped the remains of my plate to his before stacking them together. “I promise to stay out of the way.”
“I know.”
“Maybe you all could do something this weekend?”
“Maybe,” I said without any sound of real commitment. “Can I be excused?”
And now I was back in my bedroom, alone and unobserved. I stood in the center of the floor, facing the windows. I didn’t call to him yet, but I stood there waiting.
From behind, somewhere just over my left shoulder, I felt him watching me.
I didn’t turn around, but my heart was pounding as I felt him gathering together behind me. I watched him in the reflection of the windows as he became solid.
When he spoke to me, it was in the soft type of voice I imagined a lover would use during an intimate embrace.
“I have been waiting for you, my love.” He whispered.
I turned around to face him. He stood only a few feet from me wearing a pale shirt open at the collar, his handsome face perfection in the moonlight. He was so very solid I could see the light and shadows moving over his face as he stepped even closer.
I watched him approach; we were only inches away from each other. His brilliant blue eyes focused on mine, true and unwavering.
Even though I knew better, I reached my hand toward him. My fingers were so close to touching his that I could feel the wintry heat radiating from him. I held my breath, reaching closer and closer.
Just as my fingers reached his, the vision of him twisted and turned into itself, disappearing in an ice cold blast of air that made me stagger backwards. Despite all of that, I felt him. I touched his cold hand for the briefest moment.
My room was empty again, only my curtains were still fluttering to a stop. I turned in a slow circle again, knowing I wouldn’t see him, but searching anyway.
“You’re still here, aren’t you?” I whispered up into the emptiness.
“Of course.”
I smiled at the sound of his voice, “I broke the rules, didn’t I?”
“Pardon?”
“I wasn’t
supposed to touch you,” I said. “It broke the illusion.”
He said nothing, but he was closer now. There was no sound to his breathing, but there was a pulsating in the air that came with his presence.
I stared back up into the empty air, “Are you still here?”
“Yes, my love.” He answered in an outdated cadence.
“Why do you say it like that?” I asked.
“Because you are my love, and my life, and my fate.”
“And what is my fate?” I asked.
Alastor laughed. It was a gentle rumbling like distant thunder. “My darling, your fate was sealed long ago.”
“Because I shot you?” I asked.
Nothing.
I turned in a circle again, narrowing my eyes as I searched for some trace of him.
“Alastor, why are you here?” I asked, knowing the answer would be the same as every other night. “Tell me the truth.”
“I would never lie to you,” He whispered as he closed in to surround me again. “I am here because of you.”
I was strangely anxious as I walked to the cafeteria with Ally, and it had nothing to do with her fidgety constant chatter.
Maybe it was because for the first time in weeks Alastor wasn’t hanging over my shoulder. He was still with me, but slightly more distant than usual.
I almost felt normal.
Billie noticed the change in me immediately as soon as I sat down at the table.
“What’s wrong with you?” She asked.
I tried to brush her off, “Nothing, why?”
Billie narrowed her eyes, “I don’t know. You just seem different.”
Luckily Ally didn’t care if I seemed different than my usual self or not. She launched right back into her tirade about her favorite reality show and a particular contestant that got booted off.
Since Alastor came into my life, there was little time for television so I was clueless about the latest travesty to primetime justice. I just nodded and smiled anytime she paused to take a breath and let Billie handle the bulk of the conversation since she seemed to at least know what was going on.
I was just about to excuse myself when I saw Jonah heading my way. I pushed my hair back from my face and tried to get some sense of where Alastor was, hoping he would keep his distance for the next few minutes.
Alastor might be my husband from a former life, but this was flesh and blood Jonah. My chest was heavy with guilt as Jonah stepped up to the table and gave me his most sparkling smile.
“Hey girls,” He said to all of us before turning his charm on me alone. “Did you finish that essay on General Sherman?”
I felt the heat rushing to my cheeks, hating I was blushing as if he had just complimented me when all he did was merely acknowledge my existence.
“I’m almost finished,” I answered. “I was going to try to get to class a little early so that I could finish it up.”
“Me too.” He said with another dazzling smile.
“I guess I’ll see you there.”
Something magical happened then—Jonah smiled directly at me with his eyes focused intensely on my face.
“I can’t wait,” he said.
I don’t remember watching him leave. I don’t remember leaving the table myself. One minute I was in the cafeteria, the next I was floating down the hall to History.
Somehow along the way, I took a wrong turn and when I snapped out of my daze, I was outside standing under the shade of the birch trees near the gym.
“What did the boy want?” Alastor’s voice demanded from behind.
I jumped and spun around as a reflex, not expecting to see him, but there he was.
Alastor stood in the twisting shadows of the tree. I had never seen him so solid. I could see the lines in his lips and my own image was reflected in his stunning blue eyes.
He lowered his voice to a gentle purr, “Would you betray me so quickly? Does my love mean nothing to you?”
I couldn’t answer him; the movement of his hair in the early autumn breeze had me mesmerized. There was something so terrifying about it. How could he appear so real?
Alastor seemed amused by my reaction. To show how powerful he was, he reached his hand out and caressed my cheek.
“Do you not love me?” He asked.
His fingertips were cold against my cheek, solid and real, but ice cold, like no human touch. I shivered under his hand, but there was something else, a strange, vibrating, electrical sensation that ran through my body and settled somewhere in the pit of my stomach.
The world spun and faded away, taking me to a long ago place where we once stood just like this. I looked up into his face, alive and real, coming closer to give me my first kiss as his wife.
“I will love you until the end of time,” He had whispered and touched my face in exactly the same way.
The memory faded, swirling away like a puff of smoke, and I was back to the here and now. I was left with a deep ache in my heart, pulling at me, reminding me of my vows.
Forsaking all others…
He was touching me and he wasn’t disappearing. I wanted to cry. I wanted to throw myself into his arms. I wanted to slap at him.
“Why did you ever come back?” I choked.
Alastor’s own eyes were shinning with unshed tears; his lips trembled as he caressed my face, “Oh my Becca, I have waited so long for this moment. I would have traded my soul to hell just to touch you again and now I am selfish enough to still want more.”
I closed my eyes. I was trembling under his fingers, but savoring the feeling of his icy touch. It was real, it was solid. I wanted to reach out to him, to touch him in some way, but I knew that he would just disappear.
I forced myself to take one faltering step back, “Alastor, I can’t keep doing this. It’s driving me crazy.”
Walking away, I felt the tears sliding down my cheeks. I glanced back when I reached the door to the school, expecting to see that he had vanished, but there he was staring back at me.
I wanted to go back to him, but instead I brushed my tears away. I opened the door and went back inside the school. Ally and Billie were there waiting with their arms crossed.
“Someone’s been keeping a secret,” Billie declared with a smirk.
“What do you mean?” I stammered, trying to blink away the remaining tears.
Ally playfully shoved my shoulder, “Come on, out with it. Who was that guy?”
“What guy?”
Billie rolled her eyes and jerked her chin toward the door. “That guy you were just talking to outside.”
The world lurched sickeningly to the left as I realized what she meant.
“You saw him?” I asked.
Ally and Billie exchanged confused glances.
“It’s not like you two were hiding or anything,” Ally accused, “So who is he?”
My mouth fell open in disbelief. They could see him. He had been strong enough even they could see him. How was that possible? I glanced back at the trees again, but he was gone.
“He’s an old friend,” I lied.
Billie raised an eyebrow, “He looked like more than just that. The two of you looked pretty serious.”
Just then I spotted Jonah standing not too far away. It was obvious he heard our entire conversation. He turned and walked away.
I wanted to run after him, but my feet were frozen. I tried to take a step forward, but Alastor’s secret voice echoed inside my head.
“You swore…Forsaking all others…” He threatened.
I pushed past my friends and followed Jonah down the hall to our class. He didn’t even look up as I walked past him to my seat. I sat down and looked at his back, something about the tension in his squared shoulders made my palms sweat.
“Jonah?”
“I’m trying to read,” Jonah said flatly. “We’ll talk later.”
“Are you angry?”
“What would I have to be angry about?” He asked.
I bit my lip. It was ridic
ulous to think he overheard the girls talking about Alastor and was jealous, but what other explanation was there?
“I’ll leave you alone and let you read,” I whispered.
“Thanks.”
Jonah was silent throughout class, never turning even once to look at me. It seemed impossible that he was jealous, but an even darker thought began to surface. Did Alastor mean for Jonah to somehow find out about us? Is that why he chose that moment to show himself so clearly?
The thought wouldn’t go away. All through class I kept asking myself over and over. At the sound of the bell, I ran to the nearest bathroom.
I bent down and checked under each of the stall doors before looking up at the ceiling. I could feel him near me. I strained my eyes to look for ever the slightest disturbance in the air.
“How did you do it?” I demanded. “Why did you do it?”
Nothing.
“If you could make yourself that real, why did you wait so long?”
Invisible hands ran up my back and mussed my hair. His seductive laugh echoed against the tiled walls.
“Is that what you’re mad about?” He teased, “That I waited so long to show you?”
“Yes,” I said. All of a sudden, it didn’t matter why he did it, it was only important that he did become that vivid for me.
“Why is that?”
“Because,” I sighed. “For just that one moment, you really seemed like you were mine.”
“I am yours,” he whispered. “Now and forever.”