“Would you slap, kick, or otherwise injure said guitarist for trying?”
“It’s possible.”
“Hm. Risky,” he says, tapping a crooked finger against his lips. I can’t stop myself from smiling, nor can I stop the nerves bubbling from my stomach to my head. I don’t want to see his past. I want him to share it with me. I want to be normal. I want this to be normal.
He steps closer.
“Trivia: What’s your middle name?” he asks, voice low.
“Ruth. Yours?” I’m whispering, though I don’t mean to be.
“Thomas. Barnaby Thomas. My parents were really determined for me to get beat up in middle school,” he says, voice hushed as he grows closer, closer.
I’m terrified.
Jude takes my hand—I feel the memories start. They jolt through my fingers. Flashes of childhood—falling off bicycles, catching lizards in a woodpile, being switched for coming home after dark. His hand runs up my arm, but I can’t appreciate it. I want the memories to stop; I don’t want to see Jude this way again. It isn’t fair. He touches my collarbone, my cheek, and then before I know it, his lips are on mine.
And the memories stop.
The wall is up, built instantly, because I can’t possibly read his past when I’m so, so busy with the present. He kisses me, and I step closer and kiss him back. He tastes like coffee and salt water and sweetness, and I lean into him. I feel brave, I feel reckless, I feel all the things I never thought I’d be able to feel because of the power.
When he pulls away, our hands find each other’s easily.
“Don’t look now,” he whispers, letting his eyes leave mine, “but there’s a small chance your sisters and my roommates are staring at us.” I whip my head around to the coffee shop. The window is crowded with the four of them and a few random onlookers, laughing and making faces at us. Anne and Jane look both delighted and horrified at once. They’re going to tease me mercilessly when we get home, I can tell.
But they’re my sisters. It’s their job. We’re stronger together.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Naida
I’m able to push to the front of my mind as soon as I break the surface of the water—Lo falls back easily. I think she might be letting me win, though, letting me control the body we share to make up for her bolting from the Pavilion last night. Or… I think it was last night. I can’t tell—I feel like I’ve been asleep. Celia is already on the shore, looking at me worriedly as I emerge from the waves. I smile at her.
“Are you all right?” Celia asks, handing over the shoes. I slide them onto my bleeding feet; ocean water and blood slicken them quickly. She’s holding a piece of fabric—a dress, since I suppose the one I was wearing when Lo took over is lost to the ocean now. I pull it on quickly, grateful that Celia is averting her eyes.
“I’m fine. I’m sorry about… the Pavilion. It was Lo, she was just… she suddenly was so strong, too strong for me to stay… here.” In my own body, the body that was mine long before it was Lo’s, I think bitterly.
Celia pauses a long time. “I was scared when you didn’t meet me the other day.”
“What day is it?” I ask.
“Wednesday.”
“Oh. I didn’t even realize…” Five days? I lost five days? Celia seems to understand and nods. We walk toward the church together; she swoops in when pain shears through my feet, lets me lean on her. It’s different now than it used to be—instead of constant pain, it’s a dull ache punctuated by moments of absolute agony, like a knife is scraping away my bone.
“It’s like Lo got sick, so I got sick,” I explain. “When we were away from the water, I mean. The longer I was away, the worse it got, and the more desperate she got to go back.”
“It was a stupid idea, anyway. I should never have convinced you—” Celia starts.
“What would we have done instead?” I ask. We reach the church. I lean away from her, sit on the church steps. “Sat here. Again. Talking.”
“It’s better than you being in pain,” she says.
“Is it?” I ask. “What if even when I remember everything, I can’t leave the shore?”
Celia is silent. She sits down next to me. “Then…” She draws half circles in the sand with her toe. “Then we’ll have to renovate the church, because it’d be a god-awful apartment as is.”
We laugh together, and it warms me, like the summer air is evaporating more than just the water from my skin.
“So,” Celia says after a few minutes pass, “Jude and I… we sort of… we kissed,” she confesses, biting her lip.
“Really?” I ask, not even trying to hide the gleam I feel in my eyes.
“Yes,” Celia says. “It wasn’t what I expected. But that was what made it good.”
I wait, try to relax my mind, hoping that her story will finally trigger a memory I confess I long for—something romantic. Something about a boy who loved me, or a boy I loved, something sweet and perfect that will make me feel like a normal girl again. Nothing comes. I grimace, hold out my arm for Celia.
“Help,” I say, sounding meek. “I can’t find it on my own. Did I have a boyfriend? Did anyone want me like Jude wants you?”
“I… I might not be able to find it. That sort of thing is usually hidden—”
“Behind the screaming,” I say, sighing.
“I’ll try, though,” Celia says hopefully, and touches my arm lightly. She waits a long time, longer than usual. I hold my breath. I hope I had a boyfriend like Jude—not like him, exactly, but… funny. Clever, the kind who tells jokes. I don’t care if he was a musician, but maybe something artsy, like a painter or—
“I… I don’t see anything,” Celia says. She opens her eyes, meets mine. “I don’t see anyone, or any memories of kissing.”
“I’ve never been kissed?” My voice sounds small, not at all the way it usually does.
“Or it could just be a really deep memory,” Celia says quickly.
“Yeah, maybe,” I say, but I don’t believe her. I’ve never been kissed, and now my skin is blue and I live underwater.
Maybe I should just leave now. Go back to my “sisters.” They understand me; they’re my home. Why am I playing at being human again? Remembering when you had a soul isn’t the same as having one. And underwater, everything is beautiful, quiet, perfect….