Chapter 6
The next few days passed in a blur. It was a novel thing to suddenly have three people to talk to that I felt so at ease with. My friendship with Sam was blooming, and my mom was amazed at how close we had become.
“You guys act like you’ve known each other your whole lives,” she commented on Friday morning while we ate breakfast.
“She’s just easy to talk to and we have so many things in common,” I replied.
“Have you told her about your dreams?”She asked surprised.
“Um...” I was hoping she wouldn’t ask that question.
The four of us had decided that we were going to keep our dreams between us. The idea that we had the same dreams seemed crazy enough to us, surely anyone else would think we were loony. None of us had any desire to wind up in a padded room.
“No,” I mumbled, finally answering her question.
I hated lying to her, but I was doing what was best for her. I could already see the tension lines that had surrounded her eyes the last couple of weeks beginning to ease up. I knew a large part of this was because I was finally making friends, and of course she thought my bad dreams had gone away.
The dreams were still the same, but each morning when I woke from them, Mark would call me on my cell. We didn’t talk about the dreams; instead, we would discuss other things, like our hopes and dreams. Neither of us were surprised that most of these were the same. It was as if he was the other half of me. By the time we hung up each morning, I was pretty much over the heartbreak of the dream, and when my mom woke, all signs of the dream were gone.
“So have the dreams changed?” my mom asked, as if she had peeked in my head and read my thoughts.
“Yeah, they’re better now,” I lied, finding no loop hole for this one.
“I better get ready for school,” I said as I headed up the stairs. “Need to know,” I chanted the overused words to myself.
Sam was waiting in the usual spot when mom pulled up to the school.
“Hi! Mrs. Miller,” she called as I stepped out of the car adjusting my skirt.
“She’s a sweet girl, you should ask her if she wants to come over for dinner tonight,” she said as she waved at Sam.
“Okay. I’m sure she would like that; her parents are working on a big court case, and they’ve been stuck at the office late every night. I know Sam gets lonely by herself at night.” Lying blatantly for the first time, I knew for a fact that Shawn spent all of his free time with Sam and I’m sure she was far from lonely.
“Why don’t you see if she wants to stay over? Don’t you have plans to get together tomorrow, anyways?” she asked.
“Yeah, we’re going to the Boardwalk. Sam’s a ride nut, and she wants to try the roller coaster.”
Shawn and Mark were going with us too, but that obviously fell under the need to know category. Now that the newness of finding each other was beginning to fade, we were all anxious to figure out what tied us together. At first, I had felt apprehensive about going to such a public place, afraid we would run into students from school, but Mark and Sam both laughed at my concern.
“They wouldn’t be caught dead at the Boardwalk. If it doesn’t have the word country club or Gucci in it, they’re not interested,” Sam had said. “Most of them have houses on the beach and spend their weekends partying and drinking.”
“I’ll ask her. Thanks mom,” I said, closing the door behind me.
Sam and I headed up the wide staircase leading into the school. After the incident on Tuesday, we were now in the habit of waiting for the bell to ring on the bench outside of the school library. We had dubbed it ‘our spot,’ and ate lunch there every day.
As we climbed the many stairs, I noticed Mark coming toward us. Even though I had talked to him just a few hours ago, I couldn’t stop the excitement that raced through me at the sight of him. I drank in the sight of him and felt goose bumps pop up on my arms.
He nodded briefly to us as we passed as if we were just merely students. I wasn’t hurt. We had kept our distance at school and the gossip about us had eased up. By Thursday, most students were busy gossiping about some poor sophomore who was gaining weight. Rumor had it, she was pregnant. I felt sorry for this unknown girl, but was relieved that the spotlight was off of us.
Though we pretended to be indifferent, we were both hyperaware of each other every second of the day. Every time I caught a glimpse of him throughout the day, my palms would sweat and my head would spin. Each time our eyes met it was like the first time. With each passing day we became more sensitive to each other’s presence.
We continued to meet at the park every day after school and I felt like he knew me better than I did myself. There were no secrets between us. Each moment we were together was spent catching up on all the years we were unable to talk in the dreams. Sam and Shawn were always with us and made good chaperones. Not that they had anything to chaperone. Mark had yet to kiss me, and by Friday I was beginning to think he never would. Sure, he would touch my face or hold my hand, and each of these caresses always gave me the same warm feeling of familiarity that made my heart race, but I would give anything to feel his warm full lips on mine. I wanted to ask Sam for her opinion, but was too embarrassed to admit that maybe Mark didn’t want to kiss me.
Though we had all discussed it exhaustively, we were still no closer to figuring out the bond between the four of us. Sam and I had been surfing the web endlessly, searching for some link that would tie the four of us together. We found a few short articles related to my rescue when I was a toddler, but we were unable to gain any new information from the archives. Without the internet or amber alerts, the authorities had no luck locating my parents, and after a few months they had given up. Shawn and Sam had both wound up with the state, but Shawn, like me, had being adopted. Out of the four of us, Sam by far had it the worst. Not that you would have been able to tell, she was definitely the most upbeat one in our group. I think she was just glad to finally have people she cared about that felt the same way about her.
“So, my mom wants to know if you want to stay over tonight?” I asked Sam as we waited for the first bell to ring.
“Definitely, it will be my first sleepover.”
“Mine too!” I quipped.
We both burst out laughing. We were nothing but a bunch of misfits. My mom was right; we acted like we were long lost sisters, which was one idea the four of us had discussed.
“No way,” I had protested loudly. “I would know if I was related to you.” I said looking at Mark.
“Not us,” Mark stated. “I mean you and Sam. Maybe you’re sisters or something like that.”
“I thought about it,” Sam said. “But our coloring and build are way off.”
“Sam’s right. I don’t think we’re related,” I added. “The connection has to be something else.”
“Is Mark meeting us at the park today?” Sam asked, breaking into my thoughts.
“No, not today,” I answered with disappointment clouding my voice. “He has a staff meeting this afternoon. He said he would try to come over afterwards for awhile. My mom’s going to an art show so it will be safe.”
“Your mom’s really taken to the art thing.”
“Well, she hasn’t started any projects yet, but she’s definitely into learning about it,” I replied with a laugh in my voice.
The bell rang.
Still laughing, we gathered up our books and walked down the busy hallway toward homeroom. We were both on a giggly high from the anticipation of our first sleepover. It felt good to be like a normal girl for once.
The morning classes passed quickly. We spent the time passing notes back and forth to each other. Getting good grades in school came naturally for both of us and neither of us had to pay much attention in class. We only bothered tuning into the lessons when we knew the teacher was watching us.
After lunch, we both headed off to history class. Though Sam was a good distraction, I was still keenly aware of every min
ute that passed until I would be with Mark again. My heart acted as an internal clock and every beat seemed to count the minutes for me.
When we entered the room, he was already there. I noticed that he was missing his usual smile. I looked at him questionably. He shook his head slightly. I sighed, ugh. This whole secrecy thing was becoming a big old pain in the butt. I hated waiting on things and hated surprises even more. The next hour stretched out endlessly ahead of me.
“What’s up with him?” Sam whispered, leaning toward me.
I shrugged my shoulders, trying to act blasé about it. Something was obviously bothering him, but I would have to wait until later to find out, and we didn’t want to give the gossip hounds anything new to talk about.
The next fifty minutes crawled by. I checked my watch almost every minute and it seemed to be moving backwards.
I gnawed on my thumbnail as I waited for class to end. Maybe he had decided to break off the relationship with me, and that was why he had not taken our relationship to the kissing stage.
Briiiiiiiiiing
“Finally!” I mumbled to Sam. “I never thought the class would end. I’m going to try to talk to him once everyone leaves the room.”
I gathered my stuff slowly as I waited for the room to empty. Finally, the last student left the room.
I approached Mark, noting that he still wore the same grave expression.
“What’s the matter?” I asked concerned.
“I had a meeting with the Dean this morning. It appears Matt followed up with his threat.”
I gasped. “What did he tell him?” I asked, disgust rimming my voice.
“Well, Mr. Peterson asked me point blank if I was interested in a student. I couldn’t lie to him. At first I was going to deny it, but I decided to come clean. He was unhappy with my answer, and expressed that was why he had qualms about letting me pursue my thesis here in the first place. He feels that the age gap between me and the students is too narrow. I tried to explain that it wasn’t a problem, there was just something special about you.”
“He didn’t buy it. He gave me the whole, ‘It’s not professional to think about students that way.’ The bottom line is, I’m supposed to stay away from you and finish my thesis up in a timely manner. He did tell me that he didn’t feel comfortable writing me a letter of recommendation. Without a letter, it will be harder for me to get my thesis published.” He ended his statement with a sigh.
I reached out a comforting hand.
“I’m so sorry,” I said, feeling bad for the trouble I was causing him.
“So, we have to stay away from each other?” I said with a quiver in my voice. Just the thought of staying away from him sent my heart spinning in panic.
“No, he said he would prefer that I stay away from you. I would rather stop breathing than be away from you. My thesis is almost done anyway, I only needed to observe students’ behavior’s for a couple of weeks to gather enough data for my study. I should be done by next week and I don’t think he’s going to revoke my internship before I finish,” he said, holding onto my hand.
My heart swelled as I comprehended his words. He wasn’t breaking up with me. So what if we hadn’t kissed yet, at least I wasn’t losing him.
“You are the only thing that matters,” he continued as he raised my hand to his chest and placed it over his heart. “Can’t you feel what you do to me?” I could feel his heart racing under my palm. “It races like that anytime I’m near you, or anytime I think about you,” he smiled. “Sam’s right, we belong together, and nothing is going to keep us apart,” he said with earnest.
I looked up into his eyes, he was right. When put like that, everything else seemed trivial. All that mattered is that we had found each other. The rest of the details, we could work out together.
I changed the subject.
“Will you still come over tonight? Sam’s spending the night and we were going to search the Internet some more. Shawn will be coming over too for a little while.
“I’ll be there as soon as the staff meeting ends. Do you want me to pick up some dinner?” he asked, handing me my customary chocolate.
“That would be great. I’m so excited it’s Friday, and that we get to spend all day together tomorrow,” I said. Throwing caution to the wind, I reached up and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. Before he could comment on the kiss, I sidled toward the door.
“I better go, the bells going to ring and I don’t want to be tardy,” I said in a hurry, feeling a little embarrassed over my impulsive act.
I did it, I kissed him; sure, not on the lips, but close enough. I closed the classroom door behind me, feeling a little smug from my bravery. Lost in thought, I was startled when I heard a voice behind me.
“Well, what did teacherpoo think about his talk with the Dean?” a snide voice asked behind me.
Turning around, I saw Matt leaning against the wall with an evil smile on his face. I was filled with an uncharacteristic urge to sock him, which was strange because I had always been the type to avoid any kind of conflict. Ever since I had met Mark and Sam, I just felt somewhat empowered and had more self-confidence. Still, I decided I would rather walk away than give this creep the satisfaction of seeing me upset.
I was jerked back as his hand wrapped around my left arm. He increased the pressure making me wince in pain. I didn’t know what shocked me more-- the fact that he was touching me, or the pain. As a rule, I usually avoided contact with people to escape a rush from their emotions. Contact seemed to intensify the emotions someone was feeling, and Matt’s negativity made my knees want to buckle.
“Not concerned? Maybe I will tell everyone you’re a slut, he threatened. “Maybe that will put you in your place.”
I felt heat overtaking my cheeks. My breathing became labored as I tried to fight back the flood of embarrassment. I knew I wasn’t a slut, but I was shocked at the contempt in his voice. What had I done for him to obviously loathe me as much as he did?
I felt the sickness begin to spread and I knew from past experience, if I didn’t sit down quick, the emotions would over-take me completely, and then I would embarrass myself further. Pulling back, I tried to jerk out of his hold, but he only tightened his fingers around my bicep making me gasp in pain.
“Please let go,” I pleaded, closing my eyes to try to stop the sickness as it began to engulf me.
“Oof,” I heard him grunt.
I felt his fingers slide off my arm; I opened my eyes in relief. I was shocked to find Matt on his knees in front of me. Mark was standing over him with a deadly look on his face. He had the fingers that had been pressed around my arm bent completely back.
“If you ever touch her again, I will kill you,” he said in a quiet lethal voice. “If you even look at her, you will regret it, do you understand me?” To emphasize his point, he pushed Matt’s fingers back even further.
Matt let out a whimper of pain.
Mark abruptly released his hold. “Get to class. Now,” he threatened.
Matt got to his feet. With one last dirty look at both of us, he was gone.
Mark and I stood there for a moment. Then I felt the wave return, I knew I was going to be sick. I needed to get to a bathroom, and quick. Turning away, I fled, barely making it to the toilet before I retched horribly. Everything I ate that day insisted on coming up, until eventually, I was left heaving out nothing. When the wave passed, I rested my forehead on the side of the stall.
“What can I do?”
I cracked my eyes open. Oh God, he had followed me into the bathroom. I wanted to die of mortification. I didn’t want him to see me like this.
“Water,” I croaked.
“Okay, I’ll be right back.”
I rose on shaky legs and headed to the sink. Turning the cold water on, I cupped my hands and splashed water on my face. My cheeks were deep red and burned painfully.
“Did he hurt you?” Mark asked, as he handed me a bottle of water.
“No, I got sick becau
se my emotions overtook me.”
“Is it always like that?” he asked, concern now coloring his words.
“It used to be, but over the years I’ve learned how to control it. This was different; it was a combination of feelings. I was embarrassed, scared, and very angry. Plus, because he was touching me, I got to deal with all of his loathing feelings. When I have that many emotions, it’s hard to fight back the sickness,” I said weakly. My body felt like it had gone through a ringer.
Mark lightly grabbed onto my elbow and guided me down the hall to an unused classroom. He helped me to a desk and sat across from me with concern still etched on his face.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked, rubbing the side of my face. “Do you need anything else?”
I rested my pounding head against the palm of his hand. His touch was instantly soothing and the pounding receded to a dull throb.
“He’s going to go to the Dean,” I muttered.
“No, I don’t think he will. He doesn’t want to look like a weakling. He’s not going to admit to anyone that I got the better of him. He may try to get revenge in one way or another, but I’m pretty sure he is smart enough to stay away from you from now on.”
“I’ve never seen anyone look at someone with such menace. You looked like you could have killed him.”
“I wanted to. It was all I could do to control my rage. I have never felt that way. I can’t explain what it did to me to see his hands on you and to hear you pleading for him to let you go,” he said.
I could still feel the anger radiating off of him. I placed my hands on his face to soothe him. After a moment, I could feel the tension sliding away from his body. And with one last shudder, the last of his anger left as I dropped my hands.