The Awakening (3 page)

Just one.

The door closes behind us and shuts out the rain. I stand there, unsure what to do next while Luka shrugs off his backpack and walks over to the heater and air conditioning unit. He hits a button and the unit rattles and clanks to life.

He holds his hands in front of the vents. “It should warm up in here soon.”

A weight I didn’t know I was carrying slides off my back. We are inside, where it is dry and soon-to-be warm. Far away from the police or anybody else who might recognize me.

“I saw a vending machine outside.” Luka squeezes my shoulder as he passes, then leaves again. Only this time our separation doesn’t cause me anxiety. He’s just slipping outside to find us something to eat. The thought has my stomach growling.

I slip off my waterlogged sneakers and close myself inside the bathroom. I turn on the faucet, bend over the sink, and drink gulps of lukewarm water from my cupped palm until the bite of thirst loses its sharpness. When I unzip my bag, I find neatly folded clothes and a bag of toiletries. I imagine my mom, carefully considering what I might need, tucking each item into the cosmetic bag. Did she wonder if she’d ever see me again? Did she cry? The same hot ball of emotion that came when I thought about Leela in the alleyway swells again.

Forcing it down, I slide open the shower curtain. A warm bath sounds heavenly, but one look at the mold growing on the grout between the tiles, the soap scum, the rust staining the tub, and I’m not touching any of it. I peel off my soaked clothes, ring them out over the bathtub drain, and hang them on one of the hooks on the back of the door. I turn on the water. The pipes hiss and groan before releasing a steady stream. Cold at first, but then almost scalding hot.

I grab my toiletries, step beneath the spitting stream, and let it soak my hair and my skin. I shampoo and condition, work the body wash into a lather and get to work shaving my legs. I’m not sure how long I stand beneath the shower with my eyes closed. I just know it’s long enough for the entire bathroom to morph into a dense steam cloud. I don’t move until my gurgling stomach convinces me its time. Reluctantly, I shut off the water, and when I do, I hear Luka shuffling around in our room.

I towel off as quickly as possible, dress in a pair of heart-dotted pajama bottoms and an oversized t-shirt with a monkey face on the front (thanks Mom), and step into our room. Luka is right. The musty smell remains, but the room is warm. He stops digging through his bag and turns around. He’s removed his rain-soaked sweatshirt and stands there with a t-shirt that clings to his body. My attention flickers to the muscles of his chest, the well-defined lines of his flat abdomen, and the air turns thin.

His smile doesn’t help. It’s a slow, crooked kind of smile. The same one that made all the girls at Thornsdale googly-eyed. And he’s aiming it directly at me. “Cute pjs.”

I look down at my bare toes—the same pale blue as my chipped nail polish. My cheeks are entirely too prone to flushing.

“Do you feel better?” he asks.

“A little more human.”

He motions to the bed where an assortment of vending machine food sits in a pile. Chips and Hostess pies, animal crackers and Pop-tarts and candy bars. And on the nightstand, a bottle of chocolate milk. For me.

My cheeks flush hotter. “Did you buy everything in the machine?”

“I thought about it.” He grabs his backpack off the one-and-only chair tucked into the corner of the room. “I’m going to get cleaned up.”

He’s probably long past eager for a shower himself, only I stood comatose in the tub for who knows how long. How thoughtful of me. “Did you eat yet?”

“I’ll join you as soon as I’m also feeling … a little more human.” His hand brushes my arm when he walks past. “Go ahead and dig in.”

After the way we huddled together for warmth the night before, you’d think I’d be more accustomed to his touch. But I’m not sure Luka’s touch is one I’ll ever get used to.

He shuts himself inside the bathroom where the pipes make the same groan-squeak they made for me. Tucking my damp hair behind my ears, I shuffle over to the window and peek through the blinds—nothing but a sheet of rain. It’s good we found this place when we did. I climb onto the bed and sit cross-legged in the center, twisting open my chocolate milk and taking a long, delicious drink before searching through the feast. I pick up the remote near my knee and point it at the television. The power button doesn’t work. I give the remote a few whacks against my palm and try again. The TV comes to life, but the screen is mostly fuzz. I flip through the channels and settle on the one with the most clarity. A local news station broadcasting a seven-day forecast that looks abysmal.

I’m halfway through a bag of Cheetos when Luka comes out of the bathroom towel-drying his thick, dark hair. He’s wearing a comfy pair of sweatpants and a familiar white t-shirt and the glasses I saw on his nightstand all those days ago, when he first told me about his recurring dream. He must wear contacts. And he must have taken said contacts out in the bathroom. I bite the inside of my cheek. No boy should be allowed to look that sexy in a pair of sweatpants and glasses. And yet Luka does. Of course he does. He wears those sweats and glasses so well it’s distracting.

“That might have been the best shower I’ve ever taken.” He tosses the towel off to the side, joins me on the bed, cracks open a can of Mountain Dew, and holds it up in the air. “To Motel California.”

“To being out of the rain.”

We tap our drinks together and I lick the cheese off my fingers when a static-filled name from the television grabs my attention. I freeze with the tip of my thumb in my mouth. On the screen, a female reporter stands in front of an all-too-familiar apartment complex.

“Forty-six-year old Charles Roth, a renowned doctor in the field of psychiatry, most recognized for compiling several important anthologies on the human brain, was found dead in his apartment early this morning.”

Luka gets off the bed and twists the antenna until the picture is clearer.

“The medical examiner has declared the cause of death suicide. There was no note left, but it is believed that the threat of losing his license after helping a highly-deranged and dangerous mental patient escape from the very facility where he was employed prompted such a fateful decision.”

My school picture from Jude fills the screen.

My mouth drops open.

“Seventeen-year-old Teresa Ekhart moved to Thornsdale with her family in September of last year. A reliable source tells us that her family moved in order to give Teresa the help she needed after she experienced a mental breakdown. Take a look at this.”

The TV pans to Thornsdale High, where students mill about in the courtyard.

And there she is—Summer Burbanks—looking at the camera, beautiful and smug and hateful as ever. I want to jump through the screen and clutch my hands around her neck. “Nobody really noticed her at first. She was the quiet new girl. Looking back, I can see the signs. She was always fidgeting or staring intently at nothing. But then things started to go downhill really fast after we came back from winter break. Out of nowhere, she attacked me in the locker bay. My boyfriend, Jared, had to pull her off me.”

The screen pans back to the reporter. “Last week, Teresa was admitted full-time into the Edward Brooks Facility, a privately owned psychiatric center here in Thornsdale, where she was previously being treated by Dr. Roth. A team of doctors were working on getting her properly medicated so she could rejoin her classmates at school. According to a nurse there, she was not cooperative and had bursts of violence that required restraints.”

“They’re lying!” I may not be able to remember much about my two-day stint there, but I remember enough to know that they were pumping me full of so many drugs, I couldn’t have been violent if I tried. That nurse kept telling me Luka wasn’t real. That my grandmother was dead. She was lying to my face and now they are lying to the world.

“Before doctors could help the young girl, Dr. Roth broke her out of the facility. So far, his motivation for doing so is unclear.”

I wait for them to mention Luka, because surely they have put two and two together by now. Surely reporters have dug into history and realize that Luka was once a patient at the Edward Brooks Facility, too. All of our classmates saw him fight to get to me when those two burly bodyguard men dragged me away.

“Teresa is currently at large and is considered highly dangerous. If you think you might now know of her whereabouts, there is a bounty for any successful tips or leads. Please call the Thornsdale Police station.”

A number flashes on the screen.

“And now back to you, Jeff, for a look at sports.”

I stare with mouth open, unable to think. I was just televised over the entire Thornsdale viewing area. I have a bounty on my head. They’ve labeled me as highly dangerous. But Luka, somehow, is still in the clear. He jabs the power button on the remote.

The television screen goes black.

Guilt digs in its claws. Despite my good intentions, I have done exactly what I promised myself I wouldn’t do. I dragged Luka into this dark pit right alongside me. His father was right. He should have stayed away. My life will never be normal again. Never. But Luka? He still has a chance. It’s not too late for him. “You need to go back.”

“What?”

The words cause me physical pain, but I have to say them. “They aren’t looking for you. There’s not a bounty on your head. They must not know you’re involved. You can still get out of this mess.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“Dr. Roth is dead. He’s dead because he helped me.” What if next time, Luka’s the one hanging at the end of a rope? My head begins to shake of its own volition—back and forth, back and forth in a panicked, jerky fashion. “You should have left me in the Edward Brooks Facility.”

“Tess, look at me.” Luka steps forward and takes my face with firm hands, giving me no choice but to look at him. “They would have taken you to Shady Wood. I never would have seen you again. I wasn’t going to let that happen.”

“The entire town is looking for me. Maybe even the entire nation. I won’t be able to get anywhere. I’m going to be caught.”

“There’s a Walgreens a couple blocks up the street. I have plenty of money. I can go there and buy hair dye and a phone. We’ll figure out what to do.”

“You’re throwing everything away.”

“Throwing
what
away? Don’t you understand?
You
are everything.”

As soon as the words hit, they quickly bounce away. Because they’re too unbelievable to stick. I sink onto the edge of the bed, my vision growing blurrier by the second. Luka doesn’t know what he’s saying. He is committing suicide, and what’s worse, I’m letting him do it. I should insist he return. I should demand it. But I’m too weak, and deep down, I don’t want him to go. “We don’t have IDs. We don’t have a car. We can’t call my family or yours. Their phones will be tapped. And if we’re caught, you’ll be locked away too. We’ll both end up at Shady Wood.”

“We won’t be caught. Listen, Tess, I don’t know why I wasn’t on the news. I have a feeling it has to do with my father’s connections. But it’s a good thing. Nobody’s looking for me. That gives us options.” The confidence in his voice is so strong, so sure, I almost believe him. “I need you to trust me.”

Trust Luka.

It’s something I’ve never fully done before. There was always a smidgen of doubt. A pocket of fear and uncertainty holding me back. Sure, the man with the scar warned me against Luka in my dreams before I knew the man was no good, and there were other things that muddied the waters. Deep down though, I know it was never about those warnings. Deep down, in my most honest parts, I just couldn’t believe that a boy like him would go out of his way—risk everything—to protect a girl like me. Not without ulterior motives. Deep down, I believed that the man with the scar made sense. Turns out, the man with the scar is malevolent and unreliable. It’s time to stop believing his lies. I look into Luka’s eyes and for reasons I will probably never understand, I know that he will stand by his word, with or without my cooperation—he will not leave me. I give him a small nod. For now.

“You should eat something else.”

The pile of food that looked so appetizing moments earlier no longer has any appeal. I know my body needs more than a bag of Cheetos, but my appetite has gone into hiding. He picks up an orange and peels it in the same way he did in the cafeteria. I’m mesmerized by the slow, even, unbroken way he removes the peel. When he finishes, he splits it apart and hands me half. I break off a slice and put it into my mouth. It’s bitter and dry, but there are vitamins, so I force myself to chew.

“The first thing we need to do is look for some answers.” Luka grabs the two thick manila folders from the nightstand and plops them on the bed.

Three Clues

L
uka takes one folder and I take the other. The more files I scan, the more tangible my disappointment. I’m sure Luka feels the same. We were counting on concrete answers to our questions. What is The Gifting? Why are we in danger? Who and where are the others? Maybe some clear-cut direction as far as what to do next. All we find are a bunch of patient files. People we don’t know suffering from every sort of disorder under the sun—bipolar, obsessive compulsive, narcissistic personality, and on and on and on. With each file, my hope dwindles. Dr. Roth must not have left these folders for us after all.

“The only connection I can make,” Luka says, picking up another sheet, “is that the patients in my folder all live in the Detroit area.”

Mine too.

Of all the places I’ve lived, Michigan was never one of them, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t heard plenty of things about Detroit. The crime rate is off the chart. Drug cartel. Prostitution. Overcrowding. Muggings. Drive-by shootings. From all accounts, it’s a war zone. I can’t imagine Dr. Roth there. “Do you think that’s where he worked before Thornsdale?”

“That would be my guess.”

We go through several more. The only sound in the room is the shuffling of papers. Until abruptly, Luka stops and there’s nothing but silence. With his thumbnail between his teeth and a divot between his brow, he focuses on one file. “Look at this,” he finally says, handing me the sheet.