Authors: Samantha Combs
I looked impatiently across the street for Jade, but she seemed to be running a little late too. She had been just headed across to meet us. Her guardian dog, River, ran halfway across the street with her, then turned and ran back home when Jade shooed her back to the house. Even after everything we had been through, it reminded me how protective our dogs still were of us.
“Good morning,” she sang out. Jade had dressed in her eclectic style as usual; bright colored tights, grey T-shirt, plaid mini, black high-top sneakers. I admired Jade’s unique color combinations. You could never lose her in a crowd, that was for sure. “Sorry I’m late.”
“You’re not late, we are,” said Tabitha. “I had another one of my bad nights.” Jade nodded in understanding. Apparently, Tabitha had been confiding in at least one person. She and Jade bowed their heads conspiratorially. It was clear I had been left out of this loop.
On the way to school, Jade and Tabitha sat in the back and chattered together while I drove, feeling like a chauffeur. I felt a little pang remembering when Logan and I would be in the front seat, holding hands, and the girls would be in the back giggling over us. Now, the girls were still in the back snickering, but Logan wasn’t next to me. It left me nostalgic for those early days of our relationship, when everything had seemed new and uncomplicated, before the stark reality of the Council and Christophe and the challenges that soon faced us darkened our lives together.
I still marveled over how he had rescued me that day in the barn. He’d literally saved my life. Talking about everything that happened afterward, he’d been was so casual about it, but his eyes betrayed what his words would not admit. It
had
been life-changing, as much for him as for me. I didn’t know exactly how he felt for certain, but I knew what I felt. I would spend the rest of my life with Logan, however short, or however long my life may be. He was my destiny and I could not imagine any part of my life without him. It was as simple as that for me.
Having Skylar back in my life only completed my happiness. He equated such a natural extension of me. Easy enough to see that we were twins, and by so much more than just our physical sameness. We had many mannerisms alike, the tone of our voices was similar, even our laughter closely resembled one another’s. Logan liked to joke that the reason he found it so easy to like Skylar was because he was so much like me. We were so close, in fact, that I was concerned he would soon learn about my visions. I had tried to keep them from everyone, including Logan, until Prudence and I figured out what they meant. All I knew was they scared me. They foretold of the return of Christophe and he was the one thing that stood in the way of my happiness and my very existence. I had ample reason to fear him. Nevertheless, I tried to continue to live my life.
Like I had a hundred times before with Logan, we pulled the car into the school lot and parked in the back. The girls and I got out, and instead of disappearing into the library, I walked up to our old hangout spot. Patty stood there talking with a couple girls I didn’t know. I took a deep breath and went to join them.
“Hi, Patty. How are you?”
Patty squealed with delight.
“Serena!” She whirled around and caught me in a desperate hug. “Holy stars! I’ve been looking for you all week. I saw Tabitha and Jade but I never saw you. Where have you been hiding?”
“I had a pretty hectic first few days back. It’s great to see you.” I gently peeled Patty off of me.
“Oh! It’s great to see you too. You look so good. How’s Logan? Have you seen Dave and Tamera lately? I don’t hear from her as often as before. I guess things are different when you’re married, huh?”
Poor thing. She’d probably thought things would be exactly the same following her best friend’s marriage. It must have been a rude awakening to find out they weren’t. Tamera was in the blush of her new marriage and the honeymoon period undoubtedly had no room for a needy friend like Patty.
“I’m sure they’re just busy setting up house, Patty. She’ll call you soon.”
“You think?” She sounded hopeful.
“I’m sure of it.” I made a mental note to plant a subtle suggestion with Logan to call Dave. Regardless, Patty liked my answer. She turned, happier than before, and said, “Let me introduce you Serena. You may not have met my friends.”
I said hello to Patty’s friends and we chatted for a few more minutes. I started looking for Tabitha when the morning bell sounded. Even that silly bell made me lonesome for Logan. I wondered how his morning had gone. Even though it would barely be seven hours until I saw him again, I still missed him. It made me happy I had met some new friends today, and I would pursue these new friendships, but Logan was my best friend, not these girls. I said goodbye to Patty and the girls and headed to my first class.
Chapter Three
LOGAN
I woke up a couple hours earlier than my scheduled time. As soon as I swung my legs to the floor, Charlie, who slept at the foot of the bed, woke up too. For some reason I couldn’t sleep. I padded down the hall of our rented house, with Charlie trailing after me. We crept past Sully’s room, where I could hear him sawing logs from deep under his blankets. I couldn’t help but smile. But when I passed Skylar’s room, I could see in the open door that it was empty.
Right then I became aware of a faint light and sound from the downstairs living room. The hair on the back of my neck stood up. Quietly, Charlie and I descended the stairs to the first floor and peeked around the corner, only a little afraid of what we might find. All I saw, though, was Skylar, sitting on the couch, staring slack-jawed at the television.
“Man, Skylar. Have you been up all night?”
Skylar looked up slowly.
“Hey, Logan. What’s up?” Skylar sure looked like he had pulled an all-nighter. Initially, Sully and I had been surprised to find how sheltered a life it seemed Skylar had led. He had never been exposed to television or radio, didn’t know what an MP3 player could be, had to be taught how to use the microwave, the washing machine, even the computer. He was a lightning-quick learner, but he acted like he had lived under a rock or something.
I tried again.
“You doing the all-night thing?”
This time he responded. “Oh, Logan. Hey. It didn’t start out that way. But there are so many channels. I keep finding something interesting to watch. Things about history and insects and ways to use the oven. I can learn so much!”
“Amazing. The same channels where Sully complains there is nothing to watch.”
“I guess I’m not as bored of it as Sully.”
“I guess not. But aren’t you tired?”
“It’s funny. I’m not. I imagine I should be, but I’m really not. Why are you up so early?”
“I don’t know. Couldn’t sleep. Not sure why.”
I went into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. Of course, it groaned from the weight of all the food. With all the women in our lives, the fridge didn’t stand half a chance of being empty. Not one of them ever arrived without at least one bag of groceries from the market. The cupboards were so full they threatened to burst open. My mom and Serena were the worst. They both packed our kitchen mercilessly. We could easily feed a third world nation from our pantry. I threw some granola in a bowl with milk, grabbed a couple of bananas from a fruit bowl I swear wasn’t there yesterday, and joined Skylar on the couch.
I threw one of the bananas to Skylar. “Eat this, man. You’re gonna waste away in front of this TV if you don’t at least eat.”
“Thanks, Logan.”
A lumbering sound made us both turn toward the stairs. Sully was headed down them using his trademark herd-of-buffalo shuffle. He lurched into the kitchen.
“What’s for breakfast, man?” Sully plopped down in one of the easy chairs across from us.
I threw my banana peel at him.
“I should make you cook that for snoring so loud. Man, Sully. You need to see someone about that. Does it hurt your throat? You know, my sister’ll never sleep with you if you snore like that with her.” I said it as a joke, but the look on his face? Priceless. He had obviously never considered this and became stricken with the thought. He looked so horrified I had to say something.
“Dude, relax. I was just kidding.” His face smoothed, but only a little. I could see this would not soon leave his mind. I shot a look at Skylar and he was writhing on the couch, he was trying so hard not to laugh out loud. I elbowed him hard in the ribs and he stuffed the rest of his banana in his mouth.
I decided it would be a good time to broach the computer subject with Skylar. Sully and I had been talking about hiring Skylar to design a website for the sporting goods store. He had picked up the computer so quickly he’d already started programming. It seemed impossible, but he was. Computers were just in his wheelhouse. We thought it would be great to pay Skylar rather than someone we didn’t know. And Sully’s dad had given us the go-ahead. Plus, the benefit was he could pay us some rent. Win-win for all.
“Hey, Skylar. Sully and I wanted to talk to you about something.” I looked over at Sully and he gave me the nod. It would be a cool time with him to talk about it. “We’ve wanted to get the store online with a website for some time now. You know, join the twenty-first century and all. You seem to really be up on all this computer stuff. We were wondering if you might want to take that on.”
Skylar tore his gaze from the television with excitement shining in his eyes.
“Really? Yeah! That’d be great. I could totally do that!” He jumped up from the couch and started pacing near the front of it, back and forth and around the “gently used” coffee table, talking excitedly about ideas he had for the site. “I’ve got some great graphics I could show you I found surfing the net the other day, they’re free, and I can show you a way to link up a distribution site so you can ship directly to your online customers and have them pay you for the shipping costs. And I can demonstrate a great way to integrate your customer lists to create a newsletter to keep your customers updated with all your new products as the seasons change.”
“Whoa, filly. Slow your roll.” Sully held up a hand. “I don’t understand any of what you said, but it all sounded good. You’re hired.”
I laughed. “Man, Sully. Good thing we know
and
like Skylar. Also good thing I’ll be handling the hiring from now on.” Still chuckling, I stood and clapped Skylar on the shoulders. “Better calm down now, though, like Sully said.” I looked at Sully. “We need to get to work. And you…” I squeezed Skylar’s shoulder. “…you really need to get some sleep now.”
“I’m too excited to sleep, Logan. I’m going to get going on the computer project. I’ll check you guys later.” And with that, Skylar got up and went to the computer table in the back corner of the living room, booted up the desktop and tuned us both out.
“Well, let’s get a move on, Sul. I want to stop by the flower shop on the way to work. Say hi to my mom. I haven’t seen her for a couple days.”
“Let’s do it.”
We both headed up the stairs to get ready for work. As Charlie raced up ahead of me, I looked over my shoulder and saw Skylar, hunched over the computer, already hard at his work.
****
We cruised up to the strip mall and found a parking space in front of my mom and Elizabeth’s new flower shop. The name still killed me.
Free Spirit Flowers
. If the town only knew what the Spirit part really stood for. Sully and I got out and went into the store. A little bell Jade had hung over the door announced our arrival and my mom came out from the back. She had on a purple apron and held a bunch of flowers in one hand and pruning shears in the other. Pockets in the apron were spilling over with ribbons and pipe cleaners in all different colors. Her hair had been tied back and where loose pieces had come free, they were framing her face, which was flushed with color. She didn’t have on any makeup, but my mom looked beautiful. She also looked happy. It had been a long time since I’d seen her this way. I liked it.
She put the flowers and shears on the counter and rushed up to hug us both. “Oh, Logan, honey! Sully! What a wonderful surprise! You should have told me you were coming. I would have bought some bagels or something.”
“Hey, mom.” I hugged her back and looked the shop over, appreciating the subtle touches that made the place look pretty classy. “Wow, you and Elizabeth have done a great job here.” And they had. The shop felt homey and inviting, with hand-lettered signage and a real women’s-touch feeling to it. “Where is Elizabeth, anyway? I want to congratulate her, too.”
“You just missed her, son. She ran some letters to the post office. So how’s business at the sporting goods store?” She addressed this to Sully.
“It’s going really good, Mrs. Daniels. And with Skylar doing the website, it could get even better with internet sales.”
My mom turned to me. “So you
are
going to hire Skylar. I’m so glad to hear that. Serena tells me it’s almost scary how quickly he has mastered the art of the computer.”
I raised my eyebrows at my mom. I still found it crazy how well my mom and my girlfriend got along. Sometimes it all seemed too perfect. She winked at me with a look that said
just go with it, Logan
. I shrugged my shoulders and winked back at her. Just then the shop’s phone started to ring and at the same time a customer came in the front door. My mom grabbed the phone, acknowledged the walk-in with a smile and one raised finger and then looked at me. I got the hint. She’d gotten too busy for chit-chat.
I kissed her on the cheek while she took an order. She told the walk-in customer she would be right with her, and then Sully and I got out of her hair. As we drove to work, I mused that my mom seemed way too happy just from working. I made a mental note to check with Serena if there might be something else new in her life we hadn’t gotten the chance to talk about. I drove the rest of the way to work with Sully pounding out Led Zeppelin drum solos on the dashboard. At least it was already Friday.
Chapter Four