CHAPTER TWENTY

"So, what did you guys do to end up in detention?" I ask as we walk down a fairly quiet street.

"I'm often late and I cut class every now and then, so the teachers tend to give me detentions all the time," Harrison says, shrugging. "But Lauren here has been wearing the wrong uniform consistently for two weeks, so they're giving her detention every afternoon until she wears the right skirt."

I look down at Lauren's black and white polka dot skirt. "As you can see, their plan isn't really working," she says, gesturing to her outfit.

I smile for what feels like the hundredth time today.

The ice-cream parlour is empty when we reach it, which comes as no big surprise.  We're served by the shop keeper instantly. Lauren goes for mango flavoured ice-cream, Harrison gets cookies and cream, and I go for the chocolate. We're all given extra big scoops.

The young woman behind the counter smiles as we pay her. "You know, you're my first customers for the day and it's past three in the afternoon."

"I can't say I'm surprised," Lauren says. "The cold can't be helping your business."

"No, but it's nearing Winter anyway, so it's not a huge inconvenience." She smiles, her eyes passing over each of us in turn. The jolt she gets when she recognises me is far from discreet.

"Oh, wow, you're–" She stops, her mouth hanging open.

I lick my ice-cream and stare at her, waiting.

Eventually, the lady just shakes her head. "I suppose this whole ordeal is much worse for you, isn't it?" She shoots me a sympathetic look and I inwardly cringe. Yes, my life is shit. No, I don't need your sympathy.

I shrug, trying for nonchalance, and after that, no one says anything for a lengthy minute in which every sound is amplified – a cacophony of painful engines, screeches and beeping horns. When Harrison speaks, it's a shock to my ears, and I'm quickly brought back into the state of dulled senses and dulled awareness – dulled everything.

"We should probably go," he says.

And the lady shakes her head, as if awakening herself from a trance. "Yes, of course. Enjoy the ice-cream." Then we all say goodbye and leave, ice-creams in hand.

"I'm guessing you see her often?" I ask after stepping outside, the door swinging softly shut behind us. It's a lame attempt to steer the conversation away from my 'disease', but it works.

"Yeah," Harrison replies. "We're regular customers."

"I bet you guys are getting sick of all this ice-cream then."

"It's turned into an addiction, actually," Lauren says. "I can't go for more than a day without it."

I raise an eyebrow. "Aren't you worried about putting on weight?"

"Nah, I've got a fast metabolism." She grins.

It's been only five minutes when we reach their place and I stop out front as I realise everything I'd forgotten. I still have to warn Rand about Patrick and avoid a guy who's coming to kill me. In my head, I laugh at myself. I'm making it sound as if warning Rand and avoiding death are just chores to tick off a list. Where'd the fear go?

"I better go," I say, as Lauren opens the door, the slightest wisp of a grin still on my face. "I wouldn't want to intrude, and besides, I have things I need to get done."

"Oh," she says. "Well, I suppose I'll see you tomorrow. And don't worry about intruding, you can come over whenever you like."

Then my impenetrable bubble of happiness and fearlessness comes crashing down as reality spreads its arms and welcomes me. I can't come over whenever I like, and I certainly can be friends with them. I've already put my parents in hospital, and I'm scared to think what might happen to Lauren and Harrison if we really do become friends. I'll just be putting them in danger, and even if they don't get hurt, the chances are that I won't be seeing them for that much longer. I'll be moving soon – that is, if I don't freeze to death or get killed by a nameless group who swapped me with my best friend.

I nod in reply and smile sadly. Then, changing my mind, I shake my head. "No, I can't. It's nice of you to offer, but we can't be friends.

Lauren frowns noticing my sudden change in mood, but doesn't say anything. Beside her, Harrison speaks up. "What do you mean?"

I ignore them, and start taking slow but casual steps backwards. When it's clear I don't plan on replying, Lauren says, "We aren't worried by your disease, Melissa. You can be friends with us if you want."

For a second time, I completely ignore them, and speak as if they hadn't said a word. "Bye," I say, waving slightly with a sad smile plastered onto my face. And then I turn around and walk off, not waiting for a response or a reaction. I just go.

-:-:-:-:-

I hate that I have to push Lauren and Harrison away, but I have no other options. My parents have been hurt because of me and I'm not even their real daughter. What if the next time someone tries to kill me, they hurt my friends too?

I don't say a single word to my father when I get home and he doesn't say anything to me.  I don't even look at him as I pass him on my way upstairs. Determined to do some research of my own about the crazy shit happening in my life, I turn on my laptop and bring it over to my bed where I sit so that if my father were to walk in – which he most probably won't – he won't see what I'm doing.

I open up google, type in spirits and start browsing. Most of the things I find are just websites claiming to be factual, when really they're just a bunch of speculations and websites about the drink that also goes by the name spirits. A few sites even seem to be created by crazies with pages and pages of sightings and claims of being able to communicate with the spirit world made by people who are probably drug addicts and believe their hallucinations are real.

It's been an hour of looking through pages of nonsense when I finally find something that looks promising. I click on it and end up on a blank white page with a small box in the middle, asking for a password. I just frown at the screen. Do they really need to password protect their information? Why bother making a sight that no one access? Unless maybe the password is something obvious enough so someone who knows the truth about spirits can work it out, but not too obvious that a complete moron can stumble across it and crack it on the first guess.

Just to test it, I type spirits into the small rectangle under the word Password. The white screen flashes red and my text is erased.

Alright, I think. Let's do this.

I try every word I can think of relating to spirits. Invisible. The screen flashes red. Cold. Red screen. Float. Another red screen. I start to think outside the box. Maybe the site doesn't just hold information on spirits.

Swapped. Red screen. Ghosts. Red. Vision, ability, power. All red.

I'm at for a while, going through every word I can think of relating to what I've learnt in the past week. It's not until later that I realise it could be more than one word, so I start trying combinations of words, phrases, names of things.

After a while, I start trying combinations that make no sense: Ghosts are cold invisible, my ability spirit, swapped in a council.

My stomach starts to growl and I check the clock. It's nearly seven o'clock, which means I've been sitting here trying to figure out this password for at least an hour and a half. Why hasn't my dad called me down for dinner yet? It's not as if he's been working, so we don't have to stick to our normal late dinner.

I sigh and close my laptop. I may as well get something to eat. Besides, my brain needs a rest. The beginnings of a headache have already formed and I rub my head as I head down the stairs, attempting to ease the dull pounding through the thick wall of my skull.

"I'm getting dinner," I call out as I enter the kitchen. I open the freezer and stare at all the boxed pre-made dinners. None of them look even remotely appetising, so I close my eyes and grab one at random. I pull back, opening my eyes, and stare at the box in my hand.

Macaroni and cheese it is.

I shut the freezer, pull the meal out of its box and stuff it in the microwave. Dad appears around the corner the moment I turn around, my dinner spinning around and around behind me as it cooks.

It's probably the first time I've looked at him today. And I don't mean glanced at, I mean really looked at him. There are bags under his blood shot eyes and he looks older by at least a couple of years. His movements are slow and sluggish, as if it's an effort just to walk and stay awake, and he's still wearing the same clothes as yesterday.

It occurs to me then that, of course, he'd have been affected by the condition my mother's in, too. It's not just me who feels the pain and worry of waiting for her to get better.

"Are you alright? You look really tired."

He stares at me for a bit, blinking hard to keep his eyes open, as if my words didn't register in his ears. Then he nods.

"You haven't been sleeping, have you?"

"Of course I have," he replies, and I can see how much of an effort the words are to get out.

I sigh. "Go to bed, dad. She'll be fine."

"I know, but it's not just her I'm worried about."

I work out what he's hinting at straight away. "I'm fine, too," I say, but I don't really mean it.

My dad doesn't notice the lie. He walks over to the freezer and pulls out a boxed risotto. "Are you willing to tell me what happened when the car crashed yet?" he says, as if asking whether I've done my homework.

The shift in conversation startles me, and once again, I go rigid, not trusting my own mouth to speak. What if I say the wrong thing? What if everything I've kept hidden all spills out?

"I don't know what you're talking about." I force my mouth to move, hoping that it won't betray me. "I wasn't at the car crash. I know as little as you, if not less."

The microwave beeps behind me, and I turn around, focusing on getting my dinner ready and doing my best to ignore the way my father stares at me, like he's trying to figure me out and show me pity all at the same time.

The unfinished conversation hangs in the air like a heavy fog as I move away from the microwave and peel the plastic film off my dinner. I can feel it swirling around me, brushing past my skin and pressing down on my shoulders and head. Every breath I take in is filled with it – it rolls down my throat, making it near impossible to breathe.

"Is there something wrong?"

Something ignites within me, and I realise with a jolt that it's anger. I'm angry at him. I want to scream that, yes, there is something wrong. That I'm dealing with my disease, and the people watching me, and my abilities. That I killed someone just last week and I don't even know my parents. I want to shout that I'm dying and that everything is my fault. I want to scream malice filled words at his face until I'm a mess of tears. I want to release the rage that has been simmering in the pit of my stomach for years – years and years of being abused and ignored, of being mistreated and accused.

But of course, my father doesn't deserve any of that, and so instead, I do the exact opposite of what I want to do, pouring all of my strength into two movements that mean absolutely nothing: a shake of the head, a small shrug.

It's been barely a few minutes, but it feels like it's been a lifetime when I finally leave the kitchen and rush upstairs before my dad can get another word in.

-:-:-:-:-

At school the next day I'm walking to the back of my maths class to sit down in my usual seat when suddenly, someone grabs my arm. In the split second before I see their face, my pulse doubles in speed and a tinge of fear spreads through me. It could be anyone; my overactive imagination has me thinking it'll be Branden set out to finish what he started now that I'm no longer hanging around Caden. But when I snap my head to the side, my gaze lands on a pair of kind blue eyes – a girl with long brown curly hair – and even though I don't relax, I do calm.

It's Lauren.

"Sit here," she says, and tugs me into the seat next to her. She's stronger than I would have thought, and I find that I'm helpless to do anything but sit.

"What're you doing?" I ask quietly.

"I'm sitting in maths, that's what." She opens her books, dumping the stuff for her next class on the floor.

"No, I mean–"

"Look," she interrupts, turning to face me. "I don't care what pathetic excuses you want to come up with, you're sitting with me and that's that."

I stare. Half a minute later, I ask, "Why? You don't even know me."

"Why not?" she replies with a grin, and suddenly, I feel a tidal wave of déjà vu. Didn't Caden, just last week, say that exact same thing in answer to a similar question? And didn't he reveal he was different just a few days later?

Maybe it's just my imagination, but I get the feeling that something's not right. Why, after all, would she only start speaking to me now? She said that her friends were critical of me, so what's changed? And why is her brother suddenly speaking to me, too?

Just like everything else, it doesn't add up.

But instead of questioning her, like I did with Caden, I push it all back and apply a smile. I won't say anything, but I'll keep my eyes open for any oddities or gaps in their words. After all, they're probably just average students who aren't afraid of me. It's not too hard to believe. And if they are like Caden, surely they'd have said something to me by now.

Right?