18 Thoughts (My So-Called Afterlife Book 3) (14 page)

“Works for me.”

We sat down together and joined hands.

“You remember my directions from before?” he asked.

Nodding, I closed my eyes and relaxed. The cool, crisp air brushed my cheeks. Frogs croaked happily; the smell of wood smoke from the bonfire at Kyle’s house lingered in the air. This time I recited a Psalm that Mom had crocheted onto a pillow at home: “Cast your burden on the Lord, and He will sustain you.”

And just like before, after a few minutes, a vision appeared.

We’re at Jumpin’ Java Coffee House off Washington Street. Nate’s standing next to me at the entrance, looking sexy in a tight blue T-shirt and a pair of baggy corduroy pants. His hair is crammed under a wool cap, a few brown strands peeking out onto his forehead. He gently places his hand on the small of my back. “I’ll get you something.” He pulls out a wallet attached to a chain from his back pocket.

I tug at my shirt collar. “Barca, you are a gift from the gods. Truly.”

He leans toward me. “A gift from God, I am. Unwrap me, you will.”

I give him a playful nudge.

Tammy appears next to us, smiling mischievously. “You two are so cute.”

Nate hands me an espresso.

The vision disappeared like smoke in the wind. Both of us jumped apart.

“I’m beginning to think these visions happened already. They feel too real to be premonitions.”

Nate shuffled his feet on the porch. “Then why can’t we remember? Do you think we’ve been reincarnated and we’re remembering a different life or something?”

“I don’t know.” As I said the words, I realized I felt old, like I had lived a lot longer than I remembered. I could almost hear my former self from a vast distance telling me to not waste a minute of life, to take nothing for granted, to love myself, believe in myself, fight for myself. Maybe I just couldn’t handle my alcohol very well.

Nate gazed at me, all the pent-up energy radiating from his body, and I knew what he wanted. “So, what do you think we should do now?”

“Maybe forget about the whole thing and head back inside. I’m not ready for this much weird,” I muttered, standing and then pausing by the porch steps.

“I think we should make plans to go to that coffee house next weekend with Tammy. We’ll see if the vision comes true again.”

Nodding, I said, “With all the other freaky things happening to me, I’m sure it will.”

After we trudged back across the street in silence, he caught my wrist. “You act like these visions are a bad thing.”

“Aren’t they?”

He took my hand and tugged me closer to him. “They’re weird, yeah, but they’re things
I
would like to happen.”

I scrubbed my free hand over my face. “Do you think if we purposely avoid doing the things the visions show us, then we can stop them from happening?”

Nate sighed. “Is that what
you’d
like to happen?”

Scraping my shoe against the concrete wall of the house, I released his hand. “I don’t know what I want.”

“Well, let me know when you figure it out.”

“I won’t have to!” I shouted.

Without a backward glance, he stomped away from me.

The hinges of the front door groaned as Nate disappeared inside, and I couldn’t help but notice that my body responded in the same way every time he left me.

“Thoughts, like water, will stay on course
if we make a place for them to go.”
—Boyd K. Packer

glanced at the clock and remembered the day: Sunday. My eyes burned with exhaustion, but tired or not, I knew I needed to attend Mass. As I stood under the scalding hot water in the only bathroom in our two-bedroom apartment, ominous questions plagued my mind as I remembered the strange dream I had had last night.

Conner, Nate, and I stood in this lobby full of labeled doors with an angel. I knew he was an angel because his wings were popped out, practically blinding me with his great beauty. He spoke to us about the meaning of our names. He told me Olga means holy and that God consecrated me for a purpose and was giving me a new beginning. He addressed Nate as Nathan and said his name meant to give and because he had given freely to me and some girl named Grace, he’d been given a second chance at life. Then the angel told Conner his name means strong willed and that God would test him to see if he really wanted God’s help.

What did it all mean? Just like the visions I shared with Nate, the dream felt like a memory. My mind whirled with tired thoughts. Maybe I wasn’t meant to figure everything out. Trying to control things hadn’t gotten me very far, had it? I was so tired and down all the time, even if I managed a good night’s sleep. Holding on too hard to stuff I needed to let go of wasn’t working for me. And too much worrying about the future was removing me from the present. No matter what secrets lay in my past or what things awaited my future, the present was the only existence I had. I had to do what was necessary right now. Nothing more, nothing less.

A knock on the door disrupted my swirling thoughts. “Olga? You have a visitor.”

The thought of it being Conner or Nate made goose bumps break out all over my body. “Okay, I’ll be right out.”

After dressing in my denim skirt and my silver top with the sequined heart in the middle, I headed out to the kitchen, following the heavenly scent of fresh coffee and the sound of my parents talking to someone, but not a boy. To my surprise, Tammy sat at the glass table with them. Same model-tan legs, stylish blonde hair, sparkling blue eyes, despite the fact she must be hung over. She was dressed in a long gray tunic, a bulky belt around her waist, paired with black leggings and boots.

“What are you doing here?”

“Jeez, don’t sound too excited to see me.”

“Sorry. I just meant it’s early.” I glanced at the clock. Nine thirty a.m., a half hour until service.

“I’ve decided to start the list we talked about. Remember, the one about eighteen things I missed during my nonexistent childhood?”

I remembered the conversation we had last night after I went back inside Kyle’s house, effectively avoiding Nate the rest of the party. Tammy’s dad had been a complete drunk, and since her mom died during childbirth, Tammy spent her childhood taking care of him. She became a model at the age of thirteen just to pay the bills at home. Several of our talks this past summer revolved around her childhood of misery. So at the party, I told her she had some making up to do, and that I’d help her get in touch with her inner child during our senior year. The idea just popped into my head, and I wasn’t sure where it came from, but I thought the whole quest sounded brilliant. Not to mention it’d keep my mind away from You-Know-Who number one and You-Know-Who number two. Yep, wasn’t gonna think about them at all anymore. Just me and my girls from now on.

I knew I should eat something even though I wasn’t hungry, so I walked toward the kitchen counter to grab a bagel and spread on some cream cheese while I pondered what to do for Tammy today. “Sure thing, but your list will have to wait until after Mass.”

“Silly, coming to church is the first thing on my list. I’ve never been.”

With my bagel wrapped in a napkin in one hand, I turned around and smiled. “Well, what are we waiting for then? Let’s go.”

“We’ll follow you out,” Dad said, grabbing his car keys from the hook on the kitchen wall before shutting off the lights.

A minute later, a rush of affection took over as I rode with Tammy in her Lexus, listening to her sing along to the Cantankerous Monkey Squad songs on her iPod. Here was this stereotypical cheerleader who I discovered had so much more in her than meets the eye, a girl who would befriend an unpopular girl like me in
her
time of grief. Conner screwed her worse than me, literally. And her dad had been a hot mess these past few months. I stifled a muffled sob from thinking about all the stuff Tammy had told me about her life during our girl talks this past summer, but she still heard me.

She turned the volume down. “What’s wrong? Did you and Nate get into a fight when you stepped outside for a while last night?”

I shook my head. “No. Well, maybe. I’m not sure what it was. Not a fight, but I don’t think we ended our talk on good terms, either.”

Suddenly, I felt a million years old again; the weight of everything that happened in the last twenty-four hours made my shoulders droop. But I knew I had to play my tears like they were good ones. I couldn’t drag her down with me. Besides, what good were tears anyway? They only served as reminders of how weak I’d become. Today I refused to wallow in self-pity. Today I would do something to contribute to the greater good. I would make today about Tammy, not about my stupid problems. “I’m just laughing so hard I’m crying. You know, remembering the band’s parody of “Time of Your Life” by Green Day.”

When Conner was in his coma, Sean and Kyle had retrieved his songbook from his room so they could play the stuff he’d been writing in the hospital room, hoping the gesture would help wake Conner up somehow. One of them was titled “Ode to a Septic Tank,” a song about him convincing me to jump into a pile of poop on Halloween night, also my sixth birthday. Nic and I rolled on the ground in laughter for a good ten minutes when the boys played it for us. Then, Nic made them play the song again so she could film it with her iPhone and post the video online. At that point, a good month into Conner’s coma, I never thought I’d laugh again. The song saved me in a way, showing me that life could go on, no matter what happened, even if I felt like the world should stop.

Tammy steered the car into Saint Patrick’s Community Church parking lot with one hand and held up her other hand for a high five. “I just watched the video again on YouTube the other night. Hands down, “Ode to a Septic Tank” is the funniest piece of crap I’ve ever heard.”

She laughed at her own joke, and I joined her. As we got out of the car, I thought of how that was the best thing about Tammy. Even though she didn’t truly laugh often enough, her giggle was infectious and made me want to say funny things just to hear her cackle.

“Tammy?”

“Yeah?”

“I know I haven’t been dealing with everything very well. But I just want to thank you for making me become friends with you. It’s been the best distraction I could’ve hoped for.”

She nodded. “Well, we all have our role to play in life. Reigning Queen of Distraction and Denial is mine.”

“Mmm-hmm. But don’t sell yourself short. I think your role is so much bigger than that.”

Scrunching her brows, she pointed to the front entrance of the church. “Let’s hope so. Maybe God will throw me a bone today and let me in on his purpose for my life.”

Wrapping my arm around her skinny shoulders, I said, “Absolutely. And remember, whatever doesn’t kill us makes us stronger. Those bad things made you who you are, even more so than the good things.”

Did I believe those things about myself, too? This morning I decided I needed to give up control. I still couldn’t see how any good could come out of my situation with Conner, but I needed to grab hold of childlike faith as things unfolded, knowing God would only give me what I could handle and trusting there was a higher reason to everything I faced.