While I Was Away(19)

“There. Solidarity. When you're missing her, just look at your finger, and know that at least a small part of you is with her,” she suggested.

“I think that's stretching it, Zoey.”

“Shut the fuck up and absorb this heartfelt moment, Reins. I don't pass them out often.”

August laughed some more, then hooked his finger around hers in a “pinky promise” gesture, squeezing it. She smiled and squeezed him back.

You hear that, Adele? Now a part of me is with you – so sayeth Madame Zoey, and she's never wrong. So don't go too far away, because you have a lot you need to come back to.





9




Adele blinked, and found herself standing on a beach. A huge grin spread across her face. She loved the beach.

I could get used to this.

She started running across the sand. There was so much of it, it seemed like there was a mile between her and the water. She picked up her speed and began yanking at her sweater, finally working it over her head and dropping it behind her.

“C'mon!” she shouted over her shoulder while she pulled her hair up into a ponytail.

When she finally reached wet sand, she slowed down, hopping up and down on one foot while scrunching up the leg of her jeans as high as it would go. Then she switched and pulled up the other pant leg before splashing into the water.

It was warm. Easily eighty degrees, maybe more. It felt amazing. She put her hands on top of her head and sighed, staring out over the water. The sun was huge, and she could actually a hear a hissing, popping sound where it met the ocean at the horizon.

“What do you want me to do with this!?”

Adele glanced behind her. Jones was standing at the very edge of the water, holding her sweater in his hand. She rolled her eyes and turned to face him completely.

“Just leave it! The water feels amazing, get in here!” she ordered.

“Leave it? But it's your clothing! You can't just leave it laying around,” he pointed out.

“I think we both know I can do anything I want. Now come have fun with me, or I'll blink again and probably wind up somewhere else,” she warned him. He groaned and her sweater dropped to the ground.

“No. It's a bitch coming after you.”

“Really? Isn't that like your main job? You're not very good at it.”

“Oi! I don't think I care for this 'sassy' you.”

“Is there a complaint form I could see? Maybe a supervisor I could call?”

“Alright, that's it.”

Adele laughed and started wading farther into the sea, not caring when her pants got wet. Jones strode after her, not impeded by the waves at all. She dashed off to the left, but he had much longer legs than her. It only took him a moment to catch up. She shrieked when she felt his arms go around her waist. She clawed at his wrists, but he yanked her up off her feet, then started to fall, taking her down with him.

Just as they hit the water, she took a deep breath and squeezed her eyes shut tight to protect them.

And when she opened them again, she was laying in the poppy field.

Time had lost all meaning. There was no real night or day, it varied depending on where she was; Old Town – what she'd named the odd, cobblestoned town beyond her front door – was perpetually in night. The poppies, always sunny.

Sometimes it felt like Adele had always been in this magical place. When she was laughing with Jones in the bar, or dancing with him at the castle, or running along the shoreline with him. This place, it was her beginning and her end. Her alpha and her omega. Just her and him, since the beginning of time, for all time. It was all she knew, all she could think about – she was on permanent sensory overload, her brain didn't have room for anything else.

But there were other times when Adele would get scared. She'd be in her room, or standing on the castle parapet, or laying on the ocean, and she'd suddenly realize she had no clue how she'd gotten there. She couldn't remember the last time she'd slept. She ate if food was in front of her, but she was never hungry. Never thirsty. She was having fun, but other than that ... there was nothing.

And the worst part of all – Jones wasn't always around.

She'd gotten stuck in a loop once; she'd walked out the front door of her parents' house, tried to navigate her way through the fog, had come up against a door, and then went through it only to find herself walking into her parents' kitchen. So she'd walked on through and went out the front door once more. Same thing happened again, over and over. For what felt like an eternity. She'd finally hidden in the closet in her room, banging her head against the wall for hours.

When she'd finally gotten up the courage to try again, opening her front door led directly into the castle ballroom. Jones had been sitting on the stairs, acting for all the world as if he'd just been waiting for her to find him. There was no rhyme or reason to anything.

They never went anywhere, not really, but in a strange way Jones seemed to be guiding her. He wouldn't answer her questions, but he encouraged her to ask them. Encouraged her to push her boundaries.

He also talked about her life. Asked endless questions about her brothers, her parents. Her friends. She had trouble sometimes recalling faces or exact facts, but Jones always told her it didn't matter – it was good enough that she was remembering. He told her to concentrate on those memories if she ever felt lost or alone.