Forget Me Not (The Ceruleans: Book 2) (22 page)

We lay in the next morning, making up for the long, dark
week apart. Eventually, though, the sounds of Cara clattering about loudly
downstairs gave way to her shouting up the stairs, ‘Get up, you lazy oafs! You
can’t just leave me on tenterhooks down here all day.’ So we got up – and took
a hot, steamy shower, which wasted another half hour. Then, finally, we
dressed, and while Luke made the bed I traipsed down the stairs.

Cara was waiting in the kitchen, sitting at the table
picking chocolate chips out of a muffin.

‘Morning,’ I greeted her.

‘Afternoon, actually,’ she said pointedly.

I was five steps into the room before I realised we weren’t
alone. Jude was standing at the patio doors, leaning against the frame,
watching Chester bounce around the garden.

‘I called him this morning,’ explained Cara hurriedly. ‘I
borrowed your phone – sorry! Sorry! But I thought we should all talk, the
sooner, the better. Now that we’re all on the same page.’

‘Yes,’ said Jude, turning to me, ‘it seems we’re
all
on the same page now.’

‘Don’t you say a bloody word to me!’ I snapped. ‘After what
you’ve done…’

‘Scarlett!’ I heard Luke shout from upstairs. ‘Are you
shouting? What’s wrong?’

‘It’s just Jude,’ I yelled back.

Footsteps thundered down the stairs and Luke flew into the
room.

‘You! What are the
hell
are you doing here?’

‘Calm down, brov. I called him.’

‘What? Why!’

‘Because we need to talk,’ barked Cara. ‘Like grownups. Not
shouting. Not accusing. Not lying.’ She gave me, and then Jude, a pointed look.
‘So sit down, all of you, grab a cake and let’s work out where we go from
here.’

I had to hand it to Cara, she had a certain commanding air
you couldn’t ignore. If she ever gave up fashion design, she’d make an
excellent army chief. Or nursery school teacher.

I sat down and eyed the cake selection. I was starving, I
realised, so I picked up a brownie and tucked in.

Slowly, reluctantly, Luke sat down beside me. Slowly, reluctantly,
Jude sat down beside Cara.

‘Right,’ said Cara. ‘I’ll be mediator then. This is the
talking stick.’ She waved a cake pop in the air. ‘When you have this, you may
talk. Now, let’s get it all out. Scarlett, you first.’ She passed the cake pop
over the table to me.

‘Huh?’

‘Pick up the stick and explain what your beef is with Jude.’

I picked up the stick. I felt really, really silly holding
it. But when I spoke, I was serious. I looked Jude right in the eye and said,
‘He lied. He set me up. Then he told you both a half-truth, as if that made it
better. As if telling them I’m dying was easier for them than letting them
think I was a heinous bitch.’

‘Good,’ said Cara. ‘That it?’

I nodded.

‘Right, pass Luke the stick.’

I tried to, but he ignored it and just launched straight in,
glaring daggers at Jude: ‘He’s a liar. That much he’s admitted. And yet he’s
going to sit there and expect us to trust what he says now, expect Scarlett to
go willingly to wherever the hell it is he comes from. And this not coming back
thing is bullshit – if he’s one of them, and he’s here, then Scarlett can come
back too.’

‘Okay,’ said Cara. ‘Jude, you’re up.’

He looked at the table for a long while before speaking, and
when he did his voice was abnormally flat. ‘I’ve failed here on many fronts. I
didn’t realise Daniel had got to Sienna. I didn’t convince her to stay with me.
I didn’t save her in the sea that night. And then you, Scarlett.’

He lifted his head, and I was shocked by the look on his
face. He may as well have tattooed
failure
on his forehead. Clearly, he
was feeling really bad.

‘I’ve tried to save you,’ he told me. ‘I’ve saved you over
and over. I’ve tried to support you, respect your right to time. But then, the
other day, when I found you nearly dead
again
…’

Luke shot upright. ‘What!’

‘Don’t interrupt,’ chided Cara, just as Jude said:

‘The gas leak.’

Luke turned to me and I cringed. In my epic retelling of the
past months last night, I’d left out a few things, the near-misses among them.
I didn’t see that they were relevant.

‘I’m sorry,’ Jude said to Luke. ‘I thought you knew. Cara
said she told you everything.’

‘I did!’ I said quickly. ‘But I hardly think those stupid
accidents are worth mentioning. No need to go worrying him, Jude.’

‘Worrying about what – what happened?’

‘Nothing. I fell asleep with the gas on, that’s all.’

‘And Jude found you?’

‘Yes. I felt rough. He put me to bed. You walked in…’

Luke closed his eyes. Then blinked them open. ‘Accident
s
,
you said. Plural.’

As I squirmed Jude said quietly, ‘There’s quite a list.
She’s convinced Death is stalking her. I’m starting to think it myself. That’s
why... Here, in the cove, I can’t be with her all the time. But it seems like
she’s in danger often. I didn’t want to risk not being there to Claim her when
it happened.’

‘So you thought, if it was over between us, she would come
with you,’ said Luke.

Jude nodded. ‘And I could keep her safe, until the end.’

‘Well, that plan backfired spectacularly,’ said Cara.

‘Yes.’

She pointed a stern finger at him. ‘People don’t like it
when you meddle in their lives, Jude.’

‘Thanks, Cara. I’ve got that loud and clear.’

‘I suppose you
did
come and tell us the truth in the
end...’

‘Part of it,’ I corrected. ‘Why did you, anyway? Why tell them
I’m dying?’

‘Because you wouldn’t answer your phone to me, and I had to
get you back here.’

‘Why?’

‘In case you got sick up there, and then I couldn’t get to
you.’

‘I was going to call you. Today. I was going to call you and
tell you to come for me.’

‘I couldn’t have come, Scarlett.’

‘What?’

‘I never told you – it never seemed important before. I
can’t cross the county border to the east, only to the west.’

Cara was fascinated. ‘What, literally? Like an invisible
barrier you can’t cross?’

‘I guess.’

‘So Devon and Cornwall is your patch. But other areas have
their own... what, Ceruleans? Or are they different supes? With different
powers?’

‘It’s just us, I think,’ said Jude, looking somewhat
discomforted by Cara’s interest.

‘You think? So –’

Luke slammed his hands down on the table, making everyone
jump. ‘This is the biggest pile of
crap
I’ve ever heard! The rules of
your weird little world make no sense at all. You heal some people but leave
plenty to suffer. You have no explanation at all for why Scarlett and her
sister are like you, or why the hell Becoming one of you requires death. You’re
wandering about in our world – only Devon and Cornwall, mind – but say Scarlett
won’t be able to. You put out all this garbage, and expect us just to accept
it.’

‘Luke,’ I began, but he was fixed on Jude.

‘You want her, that’s the only truth here. Enough that you’d
manipulate me into bringing her back here so you can take her away and imprison
her wherever the hell it is you people live.’

‘Imprison!’

‘Why else can’t she come back?’

‘Didn’t Scarlett explain? Women don’t Travel –’

‘Stop lying!’

‘I’m not lying.’

Luke sprang to his feet and toward Jude so quickly that he
almost fell off his seat lurching backwards. ‘That’s it!’ he yelled, looming
over him. ‘You and me, outside, now!’

‘No!’ I gasped, on my feet at once, but was drowned out by
Cara’s loud snort.

‘Luke, really, you’ve never hit so much as a punch bag.
What’re you gonna do: slap an angel?’

‘I’m not an angel,’ said Jude, standing, just as Luke said,
‘If it stops him lying...’

‘Luke, please!’ I laid a hand on his arm. Still he glared at
Jude, who was white-faced but didn’t flinch under his accuser’s scrutiny.

‘I see right through you,’ said Luke. ‘You’re a liar. You’ve
admitted as much already. I don’t trust a single word you say.
I don’t
trust you. And you are
not taking Scarlett
.’

That was it; I snapped:
‘I AM STANDING RIGHT HERE!’

They all turned and gaped at me. Outside in the garden,
Chester whined.

‘Please,’ I implored Luke. ‘I don’t need you to speak for me.
And I don’t need all this conflict. This’ – I gestured at the four of us,
frozen in a tense tableau – ‘is not what I want.’

Across the table, Jude sat down.

Cara picked up her coffee and took a sip.

Luke hovered awkwardly.

‘Look,’ I said, ‘I know this is really hard for you, and I
appreciate your concern, I do. But you have to back down, Luke. This is
my
life,
my
death,
my
choice. It’s not your job to protect me – you
can’t
protect me.’

Pain flashed in his eyes, so much pain. He slumped back into
his seat.

‘Listen to me,’ I said to Luke, but for the benefit of the
others as well. ‘I’ve read my sister’s diary. I know it’s real. I’ve met
Daniel. I know he’s real – he and all that he stands for. I know, I know right
here’ – I laid a palm over my heart – ‘what Sienna did for me. If Jude says
that in going with him, in Becoming a Cerulean, I can find my sister and save
her...’

‘But he could be lying!’

‘Don’t you see, though? It doesn’t matter. If there’s even
the smallest chance that Jude is telling the truth about taking me to Sienna –
and I think that he is – I have to go with him.
I have to.
She’s my
sister. You know you’d do the same for Cara.’

His eyes slid to Cara, and then Jude, and then back to me.

‘Do you understand?’

Slowly, soberly, he nodded.

‘Good,’ I said. ‘So here’s how it’s going to go. I’ll stay
here, with you guys, for as long as possible. Until the sickness is taking
over. And then I’ll kiss you goodbye, and I’ll leave the cove, with Jude. We’ll
find somewhere quiet and private, and wait to the end.’

But Luke was shaking his head. ‘I want to be there. Right to
your last breath. You can’t just go off with him. I want to be there. I’ll –
I’ll hold you.’

‘No! Absolutely not. I’m not leaving you holding my empty
shell, Luke. That would be terrible for you! And you’d have to call someone to
sort... that... and then my mum would find out.’

‘There won’t be a body,’ said Jude quietly.

‘What?’ Three heads spun around to face him.

‘Sienna – that’s why she was never found. I thought you knew
that. When I Claim you, it will be all of you that comes with me, flesh and
spirit. You’ll just disappear.’

‘Blimey,’ said Cara.

‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Well, that’s… oh.’

‘Not
dying
dying then,’ said Luke softly. ‘Just going
someplace else.’

‘So,’ said Cara. ‘Does that mean you’ll stay with us,
Scarlett, to the end?’

‘Yes,’ said Luke firmly.

I didn’t want to argue now, not when he’d just calmed down.
But in my mind were terrible images I’d been blocking for weeks. Me wasted and
frail, lashing out from the pain, no longer myself. Jude seeing that was one
thing. But Luke, Cara... I couldn’t let them see the very end.

Across the table, Jude cleared his throat. We all looked at
him.
Don’t say anything to set Luke off again,
I begged silently.

‘What’s most important,’ he said seriously to me, ‘is that
you’re not alone from here on, Scarlett. All those accidents – it’s too
dangerous. Someone has to be with you at all times.’

Luke’s hand took mine possessively. ‘Cara and I will cover
that,’ he told Jude. ‘So feel free to go back to mysterious land of Cerulea
now.’

‘But Scarlett needs –’

‘Me. She needs
me
.’

Across the table Cara threw her hands up in despair. ‘Not
again
,’
she moaned.

‘We’ll call if we need you,’ Luke told Jude.

‘If? Don’t you mean
when
?’

Jude stood up.

Luke stood up.

I stood up.

‘Right,’ I snapped, pointing to the nearest irate male. ‘You
and me, outside, now!’

The only victim of violence outside was a garden gnome who
lost his head in a Chester tail-wagging frenzy as we stepped out onto the
patio. Of course I hadn’t brought Jude out here to do him damage. Quite the
opposite, in fact.

He followed me to a wooden bench at the far end of the
garden. I sat down, and, after a glance at the kitchen window where Luke was
visible, pretending to wash up but blatantly watching us, Jude sat at the other
end of the bench, as far away from me as possible. Chester came and buried his
head in my lap and I combed my fingers through his fur.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said.

‘For what?’

‘For all that, in there. Luke’s –’

‘Angry, hurting. I get that. He has every right to be. And
to hate me.’

‘I wish he didn’t, though. It makes it so much harder.
There’s so little time left, and I don’t want to waste it fighting.’

‘Don’t
you
hate me, Scarlett?’

I looked into his eyes, saw the regret there, the fear. If
we’d been alone, I’d have slid across the bench and hugged him. As it was, I
had to settle for words I hoped would mend what was broken between us:

‘I don’t hate you, Jude. You’re my friend, I know that. I
need you. I want you around. But Luke...’

‘Doesn’t. And I’m fine with it, Scarlett, giving you space.
But what he said in there,
if
, not when...’

‘You’re worried he’ll block you. That he won’t call you if
I’m in trouble.’

Jude nodded.

‘So you don’t trust him either.’

‘Yes. No. I don’t know. He
really
hates me.’

‘No, he doesn’t. He just doesn’t know you. He looks at you
and all he sees is the person I have to choose over him, the guy who’s going to
take me from him. He hates that I’m dying, that’s what he hates. But how he
feels won’t for a moment stop him doing the right thing. He will call you
when
I need you. He absolutely will. You have to trust him.’

‘And he has to trust me, Scarlett. To make that call, he has
to trust me.’

‘So build that trust. Make amends for hurting him – hurting
both of them.’

‘I don’t understand – how?’

I looked away from him, to the house. Brother and sister
were framed in the window, watching, waiting.
Still
in the dark. There
was just one revelation in Sienna’s diary I’d kept from them:

A car crash. A mother and father in the front. A teenage
boy and girl in the back. He got there before the emergency services. He got
there soon after it happened. Everyone was unconscious. He had to work quickly.

The parents in the front were in a bad way, bleeding out.
It was their time; he knew it. He left them be.

The girl in the back was stirring. Her legs were crushed,
but she would survive. He wanted to heal her – her legs – but he knew he wasn’t
meant to. He left her be.

The boy in the back had been hit in the face by a shard
of glass. It was embedded deep and he was dying fast. It wasn’t his time. Jude
knew it wasn’t his time. So he pulled out the glass and he touched his hands to
the wound. When he woke up, the boy had nothing more than a broken arm and a
cut on his nose.

‘Tell them what you did,’ I told Jude. ‘Tell Luke that he
owes you his life.’

He shook his head vehemently. ‘No. That’s not our way. We
don’t seek recognition for what we do. We don’t need it.’

‘But Luke needs to know. It will make all the difference, I
know it. Show them that you’re
good
, Jude, that Ceruleans are good. I’ve
tried, but it needs to come from you.’

‘What do you mean you’ve tried?’

‘Well, I’ve healed his scar, and I’ve healed a good few of
Cara’s, but...’

‘You’ve
what
!’

Chester jerked in my lap and barked again. The kitchen
window swung open.

‘You all right, Scarlett?’ yelled Luke.

‘Fine,’ I called back. I smiled at him until he closed the
window again.

‘See,’ I said to Jude. ‘He’s so on edge. If he knew what
you’d done for him, he would trust you, I’m sure of it. He’d know that you’ll
take care of me. And then all of it, today, tomorrow, afterwards, it would be
easier all round.’

But Jude was still frowning. ‘You’ve been healing. What did
I tell you about healing, Scarlett, now, before you’re a full Cerulean?’

‘Not to. But I had to show them, Jude. And I’m hardly going
to leave my friend disabled and scarred and in pain when I can make that go
away, am I? I always intended to finish – oh! No! I didn’t think.
You
didn’t heal Cara. That night.’

‘No,’ he said grimly. ‘I didn’t.’

‘And if you tell them the truth about their accident,
they’ll know that. You healed Luke, but you left their parents, and you left
Cara... They’d hate you. Really hate you.’

‘Would they be right to, do you think?’

I was startled by the question. Surely he believed he’d
acted correctly, according to the instincts that were part of his gift. After
all, he’d told Sienna the story of the accident as an example of exactly that.
Perhaps he was testing me.

‘
Serviam
,’ I said, gesturing to his arm where his
sleeve was pushed up and his tattoo was visible. ‘You serve the light, and that
means respecting its boundaries.’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘It does.’

Then he stood up and stalked down the garden.

‘What – hang on – oof – Chester, move, will you!’

By the time I’d disentangled myself from the dog at my feet
Jude was inside the house. I hurtled across the lawn and through the patio door
just in time to grab Luke, who was rushing full pelt across the room shouting,
‘Don’t you touch my sister!’ I wrapped my arms around him and took in the scene
in a blink: Cara sitting on a stool at the breakfast bar, cheeks as red as I’d
ever seen them, eyes feverish with emotion, staring down at the hands hovering
above her legs. Jude’s hands.

‘Don’t you want me to heal her?’ said Jude.

Luke stopped struggling in my arms. ‘What? What did you
say?’

‘I will heal your sister. Right here. Right now.’

‘All of it?’ said Cara. ‘No more scars? No more limp?’

Jude nodded. ‘No more pain.’

‘No!’ I let go of Luke and hurried to Jude. ‘You can’t!’ I
touched a finger to his tattoo. ‘
Serviam
. This is wrong for you, Jude.
It’s against what you believe in.’

He slanted a look at Cara and Luke. ‘Sometimes the wrong
thing is the right thing,’ he said to me. But I saw it in his eyes, the
conflict.

‘Let me do it,’ I said.

‘No.’

Luke came to stand over Jude. ‘What is your problem?’ he
said. ‘If Scarlett wants to do it, let her! Better from her than
you
.’

‘Stop that,’ I snapped. ‘Stop getting at him!’ His eyes
widened, but before he could speak I said, ‘You have no idea what Jude is
offering here – the sacrifice he would be making. He is
not
allowed to
heal Cara. But he’s prepared to do it, to earn your trust. And the reason he
won’t let
me
do it is that it’ll make me ill. Even more ill. Which would
mean less time together, Luke.’

He slumped against the kitchen counter. ‘I can’t think
straight,’ he muttered, rubbing a hand over his haggard face.

‘You don’t have to do it.’ I looked around to find Cara
sitting tall on her stool despite the tears coursing down her cheeks. ‘I’ll
understand,’ she told Jude in an almost steady voice.

I saw him glance at his tattoo, and I thought for a moment
he would retract his offer. But then he smiled and said, ‘Hush now. Sit still.’
And without another word, he placed his hands firmly on Cara’s thighs and
closed his eyes. Luke instinctively began to reach for his sister, but I took
his outstretched hand in mine just as the most dazzling flood of blue I’d ever
seen shot out of Jude’s fingers, spreading out until Cara’s legs were
impossible to look at – like trying to stare directly at the sun.

‘It’s impossible,’ breathed Luke.

I remembered saying the same thing in the cottage garden
when Jude healed a cut on my hand. I remembered the question Jude had asked me
in response
.

‘Do you want it to be impossible?’ I asked Luke.

He shook his head, tears in his eyes, on his cheeks, and I
put my arms around him and held him as we waited.

When the light blinked out, Jude lurched back, grabbing the
kitchen counter for support. Cara launched herself off her stool and stood –
upright.

‘Oh!’ she said.

She looked down at her legs, lifted one and wriggled it
experimentally. ‘Oh!’

She tried the other. ‘Ohhh!’

She reached down and smoothed a hand down her jeans-clad
thigh, and then grabbed it, hard. ‘Ohhhhhhhhhh.’

She took a step forward, and then another. ‘I don’t feel
anything,’ she said wondrously. ‘There’s no pain!’

She ripped open the top button of her jeans and yanked them
off, quickly, until she was standing there in her underwear and we were all
staring at an indisputably beautiful pair of legs.

Luke stumbled forward. He walked around his sister,
examining her from every angle. He swore quietly. And then loudly.

‘Cara!’ he yelled, grabbing her shoulders. ‘Your legs!’

‘My legs, Luke,’ she cried. ‘I’m whole again!’

She grabbed him and spun him around, and the two of them
whooped and laughed and cried and whirled around and around in a euphoric
dance, casting off so many years of pain and limitation and regret.

I was so engrossed with the spectacle that I didn’t notice
Jude beside me until he said in a low voice, ‘You take care, Scarlett. Stay
close to Luke.’ By the time I turned to him he was gone.

A collision with the fridge door put an end to the twirling,
and Luke staggered across the room and grabbed me to him.

‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘
Thank you.’

‘It’s not me you need to thank.’

He let go of me and scanned the room. ‘Hey, where –’

‘He’s gone.’

The room fell silent as we considered what Jude had done.
For all of a second before Cara exclaimed:

‘He healed my legs! My legs are healed! Scarlett, look at my
legs
!’

I grinned at her. ‘So what are we waiting for? Call Si! Grab
a party dress! Let’s celebrate.’

‘YES!’ she shrieked, but in a heartbeat all the joy drained
from her face. ‘On no. We can’t. I’m sorry, Scarlett. I didn’t even think…’

‘What?’

‘About you. Here’s me, dancing about all healed. And there’s
you…’

‘Dying?’

Luke let out a little moan.

‘We have to say the word,’ I said. ‘We can’t pretend it
away. I’m dying.
Dying
. And that sucks. But moping about won’t change
anything. So today, at least for today, can we celebrate the good stuff? Being
alive and together and
healed
.’

‘We can do that,’ said Cara. ‘We should do that. Let’s have
a party!’

‘A Cara’s Legs Are Gorgeous party.’

‘A Cara’s Legs Are Gorgeous and Scarlett’s Back for Now and
We Love Her party!’

‘What are you waiting for?’

‘TUNES!’ shouted Cara, and she ran to the stereo in the
corner and began fiddling.

Luke was noticeably quiet. I turned to find him watching me
with such a sad look on his face.

‘I love you,’ he said. ‘So much.’

‘I love you too.’

The four words in the English language designed to bring
comfort and happiness. Yet if anything, he looked sadder.

Across the room, Cara began chanting, ‘Part-ay, part-ay.’

‘Hey,’ I said, poking a finger playfully into Luke’s
stomach. ‘Are you up for this, Cavendish? Because if I have to do the party
food, you guys are in for an interesting spread.’

Finally, a smile cut through the gloom on his face. A small
one, but it was a start.

A beat emanated from the stereo, quiet at first but quickly
ramped up loud enough to make the glassware on the shelves rattle. I recognised
it once the lyrics kicked in: Fun, ‘We Are Young’. I grinned as Cara flung
herself into a series of pirouettes that spun her across the room to us, then
grabbed my hand and waltzed me around the kitchen.

‘I’m dancing!’ she yelled. ‘I’m dancing in the kitchen!’

‘In your pants,’ added Luke pointedly. ‘Sis, d’you think you
could –’

‘Nope. I really couldn’t. Come on, big brother. Stop
thinking. Stop worrying. Just dance it all OUT!’ She spun me quickly and then
let go so I flew several feet and crashed into Luke, who grabbed me and held me
up.

‘Scarlett –’

‘Dance with me, Luke,’ I said breathlessly. ‘Just dance.
There’s nothing else to do right now but dance.’

So he did. And it was clumsy and it was crazy and it would
have horrified any judge of any dance competition ever. And it was divine.