Blue Is for Nightmares (17 page)

"Wait." Chad touches my arm to sttop me.

"What?" I pull my arm away

"That's not what I meant."

"Then what did you mean?"

"I meant just what I said--I'm glad it happened."

"Does Drea know how you feel? Hiave you actually told her everything you've told me, about the two of you being just friends?"

He thinks about it a second. "Well, I haven't actually put it into words, but I'm sure she knows.."

"Maybe she doesn't know as much as you think she does. Or maybe you don't know what you want."

"I know what I want," he says.

I look up at him and now
he's
the one looking at
my
mouth,
my
lips. And I want more t-han anything to bite them, to lick them, to suck them up into my face or cover them with my hand.

But instead I smiile and he smiles back. And suddenly I feel trapped in some p,-oofy toothpaste commercial, the kind where the actors get all lovey on each other from the sheer glow of each other's teeth.

We linger there for a bit, not quite knowing what to say or how to leave things. In the twenty or so awkward seconds, as we shuffle our feet--mine, a pair of Doc Marten knockoffs, his, shiny black Sketchers with silver buckles--I try to honestly ask myself whether or not I'd erase last night, including Drea finding out about my secret, if I could.

But the answer is a big, fat, walloping
no.

"I gotta go," he says. "I guess I'll see you around."

"I guess so," I say, not knowing if I should jump into his arms or high-five him, midair.

We do neither. Chad stuffs his hands into his pockets and walks off toward his next class. I, on the other hand, feign migraine sickness and get excused from B-Block English. There's really no sense in screwing up any more grades today. Plus, I have way more pressing matters to tend to than a discussion of
The Canterbury Tales.
I have a stalker's face to conjure up, for god's sake.

Hopefully a memory spell will help.

Back in the room, I plop myself down on the bed and take a few seconds to reflect on what I do remember. I know that my nightmares took me into the forest again, and that this time there was some sort of structure waiting for me. I remember the planks of wood, the open doorways, and Drea's name carved in the dirt. I remember the spotlight, hearing the phone ring, and even answering it. But when I try to picture the person standing behind me, whispering in my ear, everything goes fuzzy.

I grab the family scrapbook and ruin a finger down the partial list of contents at the beginninig.

There are several spells for memory, but only one that specifies it can help reveal the person you dreamed about. Itt was written by my great-great aunt Delia. I turn the fragille pages until I reach the spell, and notice right away that a ctouple of the ingredients are covered with droplets of wax. I try to scrape the clumps away, but it doesn't work. I'll have to piece things together as best I can.

I remove the few beauty items I own--a nude lipstick, a mauve eye shadow, and a tube of body glitter (a stocking stuffer from my mother two Christmases ago)--from the circular mirror on my dresser. I place the mirror flat on the floor and unscrew the lid off a jar of bllack poster paint.

The reflection of myself as I look down into the mirror reminds me of Gram. I move my hair aaway from my face in a hand-held ponytail and notice for the first time that I have her golden-brown eyes--not just the color, but the way they sit deep in the sockets, sort of bedlroom-sexy like Bette Davis--and how the lashes curl up at the ends.

I light a thick blue candle and plac:e it on a silver dish. Gram used to light one just like it, every night before bed, but it wasn't until I was twelve that I inquired about the color. I remember her looking up at me, her eyes heavy like tiny hammocks sagged in the skin pockets underneath. She extinguished the candle with a snuffer and frowned at my question. Still, she answered it--an answer that to this day makes me wonder: "Because blue is for nightmares," she said. "To make them go away or bring them closer, depending on how you use it."

"You get nightmares?"

She nodded.

"Every night?"

She pushed the dish of sugar cookies toward me. "Eat the last couple," she said. "They'll just go to waste."

I nodded and took one. I chewed it slowly, wondering if she could hear the crunching in my mouth, waiting for her to tell me more--to tell me for what purpose she used the blue candle--but she didn't. She looked tired and deflated, as though those eye-hammocks might collapse at any moment. I watched her curl up on the sofa her body like a flannel-covered g--and waited until she slept. I wondered if the blue candle really helped, or if there were nightmares alive in her mind at that moment.

Unfortunately, I never asked.

The flame flickers three times after I light it. And I feel a chill pass over my shoulders, almost as if the temperature in the room has suddenly dropped. But instead of freaking me out, the feeling comforts me. Because I know in my heart that Gram is here, watching over me, guiding me just like old times.

I dip a paintbrush into the jar and begin making sideways strokes, west to east, across the mirror's surface, until the glass is completely covered in black""The spirit of dreams is everlasting," I whisper. "It lives within my mind."

I fill a mug with water from the sink and place it in Drea's mini-microwave. The directions say I'm supposed to

drink a full cup of chamomile tea, rotating the cup counterclockwise with each sip.

When the water's ready, I dangle the tea bag inside, allowing the curls of steam to drift up into my face and fill me with the chamomile flower's ability to soothe.

I crack open four cardamom seeds and group their tiny, brown, pelletlike contents into my palm.

"The spirit of dreams is everlasting," I say, sprinkling them into the tea. "It lives within my soul."

I reflect a moment on the missing ingredients, and decide to use a teaspoon of mashed banana for prophecy and a sprinkling of thyme for strength and courage. I add these to the mug and stir counterclockwise with a freshly washed spoon. "The spirit of dreams is everlasting. It lives within my heart."

I take a sip, concentrating on the flavors inside and their ability to help grant me the vision I need. "May the spirit within my dreams show itself in my mind, my soul, and my heart." I rotate the mug with each sip until there's nothing left, then place the mirror in my lap and stare down into it. "Vision of darkness. Vision of light. Vision in daytime. Vision in night. To the north, south, east, and west, may my vision of you come out of rest."

The spell says the face of the person I dreamed about will begin to appear out of the blackness. I stare hard at the mirror for several minutes, trying to make shapes and features where there's just plain nothing. I look over every inch, wondering if maybe I should try wiping at the blackness to see the face underneath.

With a finger, I clear away a tiny circle of the wet paint in the center. I look down. Still nothing.

Using my palms, I start wiping away the black, my hands and arms getting completely covered in paint as I struggle to make the glass clear again.

I look down into the mirror one last time, but the only face that appears is my own. And the only one I can't seem to get out of my stupid,
stupid
head is Chad's.

The whole idea of it--of not getting the spell to work, of preoccupying myself with thoughts of Chad at a time like this--makes me want to toss the mirror right out the window, breaking the glass all over again. Instead, in one last pathetic attempt at trying to see something, I pick up the tea mug and study the glob inside--the mixture of banana and spices sitting at the bottom with the tea bag--now soiled with my negative energy and impatience. Still, I wait several moments, as if the mixture will change in some way and reveal information, but it only seems to get muddier.

I fish a towel from the dirty pile on the floor and wipe the paint from my hands and arms. I look at the directions again, trying to make out the words hidden beneath the clumps of wax. But it's no use. It will take me years to experiment with different ingredients and get the spell right, and maybe even longer than that to actually make it work.

I dump the contents of the mug into the trash, spring back onto my bed, and curl up into a ball inside my covers. Tears roll down my cheeks, sliding onto the pillow. I don't understand it. I thought Gram was with me; I thought she was going to help me. And now I feel more alone than ever.

I wipe my eyes and look at my amethyst ring. As much as I hate to admit it, I know exactly what Gram would say right now, what she always used to say about spells when they didn't work--

how it isn't the spell that fails the witch, it's the witch that fails the spell.

When things like this happened to her, she would try and go back to the root of the spell, the reason she was conducting it in the first place. She would try to figure out what she could on her own, reminding herself, reminding me, that spells aid us in what we want to do or know; they don't do the work for us.

I drag the covers up over my chin, wondering if I already have all I need to figure this whole thing out. If maybe I'm just not thinking hard enough. Or maybe I'm thinking too much. I glance over at the clock. It's a little after four--just an hour before dinner time. I'm anything but hungry, but I know I have to face them all--to see if Drea said anything, to tell Veronica that we should work on a plan tonight.

And to see Chad again.

twenty-thr-ce.

Dinner time. I spot Veronica by the condiment table, busy picking the egg slices out of her salad.

I wave, but she ignores me--like last night in the café, when she made the great transformation from Veronica the Villain to Veronica the Victim, never even existed.

I take a plate piled high with the dinner
du
jour--turkey fricassee: perfect cubes of mystery meat smothered in a

gray and chunky cream sauce over a sticky ball of rice. Indigestible. I trade it for a wrapped tuna sandwich and walk over to the condiment table. Veronica's still there, still working on ridding all the evil yolk bits from the lettuce leaves. She notices me and takes a step away, like it's grade school all over again and I have cooties.

"Why don't you come sit with us?" I say. "You know, so we can talk about tomorrow."

"I don't think so," she says, waving her red acrylic nails in my face.

"Why? We agreed yesterday that we'd come up with a plan. Tomorrow's the day"

"Oh, that. I guess I was tweaked out at first. But after talking it out with my real friends, I know exactly who the stalker is."

"You do?"

"Think about it. This isn't a slasher movie, it's a prep school. Obviously someone who doesn't like me--" She pauses as Drea walks by. "Someone who's probably jealous of me, who can't hold onto her man, is trying pretty hard to scare me. Not gonna work."

"Don't you think--"

"What I think is that it seems pretty obvious who that person is, seeing that she's been supposedly getting stalked too."

"You think Drea made this up?"

"What else am I supposed to think? She hates me. Hates that I talk to Chad. Is jealous whenever I go near him."

"Wait," I say. "This has absolutely nothing to do with Drea being jealous over Chad."

'Are you kidding?" She takes a step closer to me. "This has
everything
to do with her being jealous. Just you wait. One day, very soon, Chad and I will be together. What will Drea do then?"

"Just stop, Veronica; you're talking crazy. I know it's not Drea. I know she's not making this up."

"You're her best friend. Why should I believe you?" "Because I know. Look, whether you like it or not, we're going to help you."

"Save it for the movies, Stacey. A little too drama-fest for me." She pulls a handful of napkins from the dispenser and pokes a straw into her iced tea. "Oh, and when Drea's ready to 'come and get me,' tell her I'll be on the jock side." She motions to the right side of the cafeteria and then makes her way in that direction.

I look toward the left side, where I normally sit. Drea, Amber, and PJ are already engrossed in conversation. I'll just have to get Drea and Amber's help to convince Veronica that we need to collaborate. Even though I'm not completely sold on all the details of Veronica's story, I'm not willing to just cast it off as fiction. I definitely think it's possible that she too could be in danger.

I also think that helping her out might help us help Drea.

I collect a two-inch stack of napkins, extra straws if anyone needs one, and a wide assortment of condiments, ranging from mustard to jam. At least six people come to the condiment table while I'm stalling here, arranging everything in neat little rows on my tray. I wonder what the three of them are talking about and if I'll be welcome.

But more importantly, I wonder what Drea told them about this morning.

I make my way to the table, my haands keeping steady by gripping firmly onto the tray. "Hi guys," I say.

"Hey, Stace," PJ says. "What's up?'

"Not much." I park it beside Amber and peek up at Drea, who is already looking away.

"Have an extra straw, why don't you," Amber says. "Thought you guys might need am extra," I say.

"I could." PJ grabs a handful of them and begins blowing the wrappers at us.

"Bug off, PJ!" Amber says, pulling a wrapper from her hair.

"So what are we all talking about?" I ask.

Amber looks up at Drea and I Icatch an exchange of snickers. -Nothing much. Just bitclhing about how little time we have between classes. You know, like, how hard it is to make it from building to building in such short time." Amber picks at the turkey fricassee with her chopsticks.

'And how they're building a new admissions house on, like, the other side of the woods."

"Stopped building, you mean," Drea says.

"Oh yeah, because our school's so poor, they can't even finish what they start."

"You have to wonder where all the money goes," I say, relaxing enough to peel down the spout of my milk carton and actually take a sip.