Predestined (Existence Trilogy #2)(6)

“You look...sad,” she pointed, out wrapping her arms around my waist.

“Just thinking,” I assured her, pulling her tightly against my chest.

“You just took a soul, didn’t you?” she replied, studying me.

I nodded.

“A kid?”

I nodded again, “a boy.”

She understood. We’d talked about this before. There were so many things she’d wanted to know and I was helpless where she was concerned. I couldn’t manage to tell the girl no.

“When will he come back?”

“In six years.”

“Who took him?”

“Gee.”

“Oh, good. He’ll like her.”

I grinned. Gee wasn’t the most likable being I’d ever met but for some strange reason Pagan liked her. Even when she’d thought Gee was a teenage girl who suffered from schizophrenia.

She laid her head against my chest and sighed. Death wasn’t something Pagan dealt with well but she was learning to understand it more.

Pagan

The tree wasn’t so big. Stupid Wyatt didn’t know nothing. Just because I was a girl didn’t mean I couldn’t climb it too. I’d show him. By the time he got here I’d be all the way at the top. See if he thinks girls can’t do things boys can do. HA! We can do them better. Cause we’re just cooler.

Glancing back to see if Mom was watching from the kitchen window and finding it all clear I grabbed a hold of the rough bark. It was warm and sticky. Once I had both arms and legs wrapped firmly around it I began inching myself up higher. I just wouldn’t look down. I’d keep making my way until I was at the tippy top. No reason to look down. That would just mess me up. A sliver of wood cut into my hand and I yelped pulling it back to see if I was bleeding. There was a small splinter poking out of my hand and I pressed my palm against my mouth and used my teeth to pull it out. Smiling with satisfaction once the small painful bark was firmly between my teeth I jerked it out and spit the offending object out.

See, I was as tough as any boy. Wyatt and his dumb mouth saying I was weak. Whatever! I continued my upward climb. Maybe once he saw how much cooler I was than him because I could climb higher he’d let me into his new treehouse. That “boys only” sign looked just plain stupid anyway. Mom said I needed to ignore them and let the boys have their special hideout but I couldn’t do that. It just wasn’t fair when I was the one who came up with the treehouse idea in the first place. Besides, all Miranda wanted to do was put on makeup and paint our nails. Who wanted to waste time doing that stuff? Not me! That’s who.

My foot slipped and I tightened my hold on the trunk trying not to panic. I could do this. My hands began to sweat and my firm grasp had weakened. This wasn’t good. I moved my arm so I could find something to hold onto other than the tree trunk when my other foot slipped and I went into a free fall backwards. I tried to scream but nothing came out. Closing my eyes tightly I waited for the ground to slam into my back. It was going to hurt.

“Umph, got you,” a familiar voice said and I opened my eyes to see a boy staring down at me. He was holding me. Odd. Shaking my head I stared up at the tree I’d just fallen from and tried to remember how I knew this boy. Had I hit my head and he picked me up?

“Uh,” I replied still confused. I’d been falling. Then... this boy was holding me and talking.

“What were you doing up there? That was too high.”

I turned my gaze back to his, “Um, I uh... did you catch me?” I asked incredulously.

He grinned and the baby blue color of his eyes appeared to darken. “Yeah. Why else do you think you’re not lying on the ground with a few broken bones?”

I shook my head and pushed to stand up. He put me down easily and once again I was startled by how familiar he looked. Did he go to school with us?

“Where’d you come from?”

He shrugged, “Just around. Saw you climbing too high and came over to see if you needed help.”

“Do I know you?” I asked watching his face take on a strange smile.

“I wish you did but you don’t. Not yet. It isn’t time.”

“What do you mean?”

He was weird and he talked like a grown up.

“Pagan Moore, get your butt over here if you’re going to get a sneak peek at my tree house before the boys get here,” Wyatt was standing at the street grinning at me like he’d just offered me a million dollars.

What was he talking about a “peek?” I wanted IN. Not a stupid peek. I glanced back at the boy who’d caught me to see if he wanted to come too but he was gone.

“Almost time, almost time, almost time, almost time.”

I sat up in bed gasping for breath as the chanting in my ear faded away. The same voice from yesterday. I knew that voice. Didn’t I? And what did it mean by “almost time.”

I dropped my head into my hands and sighed. What was happening to me? These dreams seemed so real. Like memories I’d forgotten. The same boy. The same voice.

I stared through my fingers at the light barely coming through my window. The sun wasn’t even completely up yet. There was no way I was going back to sleep. Mom would be thrilled I’d managed to get up in time to eat breakfast with her today. The dream was going to bother me. I needed to ask Wyatt about that tree. Had I told him about falling? I couldn’t remember. Maybe he would.