Inbetween

Chapter 8

Finn My feet hit the sand and I stumbled. It was soft and grainy, a bright white under the moonlight and the stark black night. The pull was so strong, my head throbbed and my thoughts slammed together inside my skull.

It had been too close. I’d almost lost her. Maeve had…she’d pushed her. Sent her over the edge of a freaking ravine! The panic was still so fresh in my chest, it burned. I leaned over and gripped my knees until the world decided to stay in one place. If that soul I’d peeled off US 395 had asked one more question, I would have lost her.

She had seen me. Talked to me. She’d taken a freaking picture of me. I groaned, wanting to bury myself in the sand and burrow my way to China. If I’d thought it was actually possible to hide from Balthazar, I might have tried it.

Behind me, a girl screamed, the sound shrill and filled with terror. It was all I needed to hear to know I was in the right place. I stood up and made my way down the beach. White frothy waves washed up onto the sand, then receded back into the darkness. I made sure not to touch them, staying a few feet out of the water’s reach to avoid it grabbing me and pulling me into a memory I didn’t have the time or energy to relive right now. Not after what had just happened with Emma.

“He’s not breathing!” In the darkness, the girl looked like a shadow beating on another shadow’s chest. “Oh God, Brett. He’s not breathing.”

“Move!” The other kid shoved her out of the way and pressed his mouth against a boy’s blue lips.

There wasn’t a breath in his chest except for the artificial one his friend was forcing in. He was already gone. Waiting for me. I cocked my head to the side and watched it all unfold. What was Balthazar up to this time?

“Come on, Justin,” the boy gritted his teeth and wiped a tear from his cheek.

Damn it. I did not want to know his name. Names were personal. There was no room in my head for personal. The glow from the bonfire made it easier to make out their faces now that I was closer. The lifeless boy in the sand was still, his glassy blue eyes fixed on the starry sky. His skin looked like ash, an awful, final color against his vibrant orange swim trunks.

As bad as he looked, he probably looked a hell of a lot better than I must have looked after I’d died.

At least this kid was still in one piece.

I shuddered and focused. The girl sobbed over his body, but the boy she called Brett kept shoving her away so he could pump on the lifeless chest that was beyond any kind of help he could offer. I couldn’t watch this anymore.

With one swift motion, I gave him death, swinging the scythe over my head to bring down enough force to get a good hold on the soul. He was ready. I only had to pull once and he came stumbling out onto the wet sand, falling to his knees. A faint shimmer made his blond hair glisten and his blue eyes glow. Slowly, he turned his head to the side and watched his friend try to work the life back into him.

“Brett,” his voice wasn’t anything more than a cracked whisper. “Stop. Just…stop.”

Sheathing my scythe, I stood next to him. “He can’t hear you. You’re dead.” It seemed obvious, but some of them didn’t get it. God…my job sucked.

He looked up and glared at me, a cold hate in his eyes. It was obvious that Justin wasn’t one that needed reminding. “Yeah,” he said. “I got that.”

“He said he could swim.” The girl shuddered, wrapping her arms around her knees. Her wet brown hair hung in ropes around her face. “I thought you guys said he could swim.”

“I thought he could…” Brett’s voice trailed off into a pained whisper as his palms stopped pumping and came to a rest against Justin’s chest. “Try the cell again.”

A phone call wasn’t going to help this kid. I looked at him, then back to the girl, still trying to figure out the riddle Balthazar always wove in.

Her fingers trembled around a little glowing screen. “I still don’t have any service.”

Brett stood up and snatched the phone from the girl, wiping more tears onto his arm. “Then I’m going up to the car. We need to call for help.” When she started to stand with him, he pinned her with a wet stare and shook his head. “Don’t you dare think about leaving him.”

She nodded and sank back into her imprint in the sand, tears making a mess of her pretty face.

“Could you swim?” I asked.

Justin stood up and started to brush the sand off his knees. His fingers passed right through and he stopped, shaking his head. “No,” he said, softly. “Not very good anyway.”

“Then why did you tell them you could?”

Justin didn’t respond. Instead, he watched the girl with willowy arms, who was sobbing again.

“Because when the girl you’ve been in love with since the fifth grade asks you to go for a midnight swim with her, where she’s going to be wet, and in a bikini, you do it.” He sank down into the sand beside her. “I…I never even told her how I felt about her.”

And there it was, like a slap in face. One stupid mistake had cost him everything. Separated them forever before they even had a chance. One stupid mistake had cost me everything. Balthazar was never going to let me forget it. How many mistakes was I going to make before I got it right? By this point, I didn’t know what was right anymore. What was wrong. If Balthazar was trying to make me doubt myself, it was working. I hated him for it.

“Point taken,” I said to the sky, then looked back to Justin.

His pain was too familiar. I didn’t like it. It was almost as if it were leaking out of him and crawling across the beach to find a way into me.

“Tell her now,” I finally said. “You won’t get another chance. So do it now.”

I’d at least give the kid that. It wasn’t much, but maybe it would give him some peace. Peace wasn’t really in my job description, so I wasn’t sure if I was doing him a favor or hurting him more.

He didn’t look back at me. Just nodded and started to reach out to touch her but stopped, close enough for a breeze to hum between his fingertips and her hair. “I’m sorry, Brenna,” he said. “I’m sorry I never told you I liked you when we were kids. I’m sorry I never told you I loved you when we were more than kids.”

He buried his face in his hands, his shoulders tense, his back all shuddering bones and ashen skin.

“I’m sorry I invited Brett to come tonight. That was stupid. If I hadn’t invited him, maybe I would have been brave enough to kiss you. I wouldn’t have been able to stop kissing you. I wouldn’t have gone into the water. You wouldn’t be sitting here looking at me like I’m something that’s going to give you nightmares for the rest of your life.”

I stared into the clear, warm night, listening to the words bleed from his lips. Trying to shake how uncomfortable they made me feel. I might have told Allison how I felt in our very last moment together, but it didn’t do any good. Now she was another girl. Another girl who didn’t remember me.

She didn’t know how I felt. She was never going to know.

Whether I liked it or not, Justin’s words had started something inside me. The steady sting of longing burned its way through me like a fuse. Before I could stop it, the pain inside me exploded to life. I’d never get to tell Emma these things. And I wanted to. I didn’t realize until this moment how badly I wanted to tell her I was sorry. Sorry for choosing this life for her when she could have had something so much better. She could’ve had what she always deserved—Heaven. Somewhere in the distance, sirens started to wail. Brenna cried harder until she gave in and lay across Justin’s cold chest.

“Please don’t be gone,” she cried. “Not yet.”

Justin made a choked sound and I closed my eyes as if I could block it all out. A few shadows slithered up from the rocks, drawn in by the scent of desperation and death. I reached out and wrapped my fingers around his arm to pull him up.

“Time to go.”

His eyes turned into burning blue orbs. His hands shook in front of him. “Where?” He looked back at Brenna again. “Where are you taking me?”

God I hated this part. There was no explanation that would make him feel better. Not one that didn’t include a lie. One by one, faces flashed behind my closed lids. Faces with black holes for eyes, and darkness flowing through their veins where blood used to be. Allison’s face, dark and desperate, was the last one to appear. It lingered for an unbearable moment before I blinked it away.

That wouldn’t happen to this kid. He’d move on. He’d be saved for something better. Once I swallowed the lie, I took him by the arm and stepped into the twilight that swirled in front of us. I needed to get this over with. This kid, his words, they started fires inside me I didn’t know how to put out.

I was so damn tired of burning.

“Hey man,” he said, panicked. “You didn’t answer me. Where are we going? Heaven? Hell?”

I didn’t know what to say. So I just said, “Somewhere in between.”