Fated (The Soul Seekers #1)(10)
Jennika’s face crumples. Scrunches in a way that tells me I’ve failed to make my case. “Well, that’s the thing—according to the doctors, that’s what everyone in your condition claims.”
“Everyone in my condition?” I roll my eyes, shake my head, swivel back in my seat ’til I’m facing the window again. Counting an import furniture store, a vegan café, and a psychic with a blinking neon eye in the window among the local offerings.
“You know what I mean,” she says.
And something about her tone—a tone that perfectly mimics every smug doctor who’s ever had the pleasure of reviewing my case—causes me to lose it. To let out every pent-up thought I’ve held back until now. “No, Jennika, I don’t know what you mean. I really, truly don’t. And while I get how hard this must be for you—trust me, it’s not like it’s some kind of picnic for me! When your doctor friends aren’t drugging me into a stupor, I’m being terrorized by images that are all too real despite the fact that no one else sees them. And even though you refuse to believe, I’m here to tell you that time really does stop! There are moments when everything just comes to one big crashing halt. And, for the record, I am not suffering from some sudden bout of adolescence-induced crazies, this has been happening for a while now. Ever since I mentioned it that time we were on location in New Zealand when you refused to believe me, just like you refuse to believe me now. But just because I stopped mentioning it doesn’t mean it stopped happening. I mean, have you ever stopped to consider that maybe, just maybe, you’re wrong? That there just might be more to this world than you and the oh-so-smart-white-coat-crew want to believe? You’re all so eager to draw scientifically based, logical conclusions—to reduce me to some convenient, textbook diagnosis—but you can’t. It’s just not that easy. And I wish—” I pause, curl my hands into fists that lay useless in my lap as I fight to catch my breath. “I wish that just this once you would listen to me instead of them! I wish that just this once you would trust what I tell you!”
My voice ends on a high, frantic note that seems strangely out of place in this quiet Venice Beach neighborhood. And when Jennika noses the car into the drive, she’s barely come to a stop before I’ve already opened the door and made a mad dash for the house.
“I’m exhausted,” I tell her, using the key Harlan gave me to let myself in. “The meds are starting to kick in and…”
I’ve barely made it past the threshold before my knees fold and buckle beneath me, as Jennika rushes up from behind, anchors her fingers under my arms, and half-drags, half-carries me to the sofa bed where she eases me down onto the soft yellow sheets, props a pillow under my head, and carefully tucks the blanket around me as I drift into a deep pool of nothing.
*
I wake to the sound of Jennika’s phone—her Lady Gaga ringtone making it as far as the second verse before she rushes out of the kitchen and snatches it up from the recycled-glass table.
Careful to keep her voice muffled and low on the first hello, she checks on me, sees I’m awake, and repeats herself in her normal tone, chasing it with, “Yes, this is Jennika.” Which is soon followed by an incredulous, “Who?”
She squints in confusion, drops onto the nearest chair. Her free hand reaching for the Diet Coke she left on the side table, bringing it to her lips, then abandoning it to the table again before she can even take a first sip. And though I strain to hear the voice on the other side, all I can determine is that it sounds like a female.
Maybe.
I can’t be too sure.
“I’m sorry, but—” She shakes her head, her voice growing edgy, fingers plucking at the long silver necklace she favors this week. “I don’t get it. If you truly are who you claim to be, then why now? Where’ve you been all these years? It’s not like I haven’t tried to reach you, you know? But you were nowhere to be found. It’s like you fell off the face of the earth!”
When she catches me staring, she’s quick to abandon her spot and head for the kitchen, shooting me a backward glance that warns me to not even think about following.
I lay still, pretending to comply. But really I’m just waiting to hear the familiar sounds of Jennika settling—the screech of a chair sliding away from the breakfast table—before I creep toward the doorway and press my body hard against the wall in an effort to listen without being seen.
Trying to remember when she’d used that phrase before. So many people have come and gone from our lives—Jennika has made sure of that—but there’s only one she’s described in that way, as having dropped off the face of the earth.
There’s only one other person who’s proved to be even more elusive than Jennika and me: my dad’s mom. My long-lost grandmother, who, according to Jennika, didn’t even make it through her son’s funeral.
Paloma Santos is her name, and it’s only a moment before Jennika confirms it.
“Fine. Let’s just say that you are Paloma. You still haven’t answered my question, which is—why now? Why nearly seventeen years later? What could possibly be the point of all this? Do you have any idea how much you’ve missed?”
And while I have no idea how Paloma might’ve answered, since from where I stand the call is pretty one-sided, I do know that whatever she said was enough to silence Jennika. Other than a sudden hitch in her breath, it’s a while before she speaks up again.