2 Empath (21 page)

“So, what time would you like your swimming lesson tomorrow?” he asked. “I was thinking we’d go back to Turtle Bay this time, if the surf’s calm enough.”

Tomorrow.

I sniffled. “What time works for you?”

“How about noon again?” he offered. “I’ll pick you up. And I really hate to say this under the circumstances, but I’ve absolutely got to get out of here — like
now.
It’s getting late, this lanai is technically part of your bedroom, and I’d hate to start off on the wrong foot with the Colonel.” He pulled his keys from his pocket.

Start off?

I liked the sound of that. “You want me to walk you out?” I asked, rising and following him back inside.

He smiled at me, amused. “Um… no offense, but I’d rather you didn’t. If we went downstairs together with you looking like that, I might not get out alive.”

I looked in my mirror. My hair was wild, my cheeks were streaked with red, and my eyes were puffed up like sausages.

I laughed out loud. “Wuss!” I accused.

“Guilty as charged,” he agreed, moving towards the stairs. “I’ll see you tomorrow. And about your dad — try not to worry too much. We’ll figure it out, I promise. Goodnight, Kali.”

There was no question of a goodnight kiss. He was standing six feet away. I wasn’t surprised or disappointed, since the mood obviously wasn’t right. But there was something about his expression that encouraged me. He looked… well… almost
nervous.

What exactly had he felt when he caught and held me? It had been the first time since our reunion hug that we’d touched any more than holding hands. Did he feel the same heady, nearly overwhelming pull of attraction? Is that why he’d dumped me so quickly back in my chair?

I had no way of knowing. But a girl could dream.

“Goodnight,” I returned, smiling.

Chapter 17

That night, exhausted, I dropped off into a deep, dreamless sleep the minute I crawled into bed. It was not until morning, when the warm rays of tropical sunshine began to stretch through the glass door to my lanai and fall upon my pillow, that my brain began to stir again. My mother was in the room.

“I’m getting up,” I said lazily, only reluctantly opening my eyes. “I know, I know… I promised I’d get back to work early. What time is it?”

My sight came into focus, but my mother wasn’t there. Why had I thought she was? I could hear the television downstairs; the air smelled of bacon, toast, and coffee. I sat up and stretched. Maybe she had called up the steps for me.

My head jerked suddenly to my left. Someone was watching.

No one was there.

I stared into the empty space. And then, in an instant, I knew.

“Kalia,” I breathed.

No human form was visible to me. At most, what my brain translated from my eyes was a mild disturbance in the air — like a video with one area pixelated. But I was aware of her presence. It radiated with an aura I could only classify as “maternal.” The breakfast aromas from below became mixed with the scent of ginger.

“What do you want?” I croaked, my insides churning with conflicting emotions. “Is Dad in danger? Show me!”

The presence shifted. It moved from my bedside to the far wall of the room, then hovered over a stack of still-packed banker’s boxes. I rose and walked to them.

I lifted the lid of the box on top, my arms actually sliding through the presence to do so. I couldn’t feel her like I could feel the shadows. But still… there was something. Reading her feelings was like trying to watch a movie in a foreign language: the words were gibberish, but sometimes, if you were paying attention, you could get the gist.

She was insistent. Practically frantic.

It was
her
box. The box of her memories and mementos. I pulled out what I knew to be lying tucked in the folds of her wedding dress ever since I had stashed it there last night: my DNA results.

“I know Albin wasn’t my biological grandfather,” I said stiffly. “But how does that put
my
father in danger?”

The presence grew agitated. The pixilations seemed to grow denser; I could no longer see through her clearly. But neither could I make any sense of her image.

“Look,” I said, getting frustrated myself. “If all you’re worried about is him finding out, then forget about it. I don’t plan to tell him. It would destroy him, as you should know!”

The blurry area became still thicker, creamier. It seemed almost to bounce upon the box. I heard nothing with my ears, but I was certain the presence was screaming.

“Stop!” I ordered, feeling a reluctant tug of sympathy. She was trying so hard… but it was never going to work. “I can’t see you!” I explained, suddenly unsure whether she knew that. “Zane can see you, but I can’t. All I see is a blur! Save your energy for him — maybe he can understand you.”

She disappeared as quickly as a soap bubble popped. The image, the scent, the presence, the feelings…
gone.

I collapsed on my bed.

“Kali?” My mother called up the stairwell. “Who are you talking to up there?”

“Nobody living,” I called back.

There was a pause. “Breakfast is ready.”

I chuckled at the absurdity that was otherwise known as my “gift.” It was either that or cry, and I had done more than enough of that already.

I dressed quickly and joined my parents downstairs. My dad was in uniform. For them, the moving “vacation” was over. Today they went back to work.

“Kali,” my mother began, her voice tired. The creases of tension in her forehead were deeper than usual. “I know you were planning to start putting job applications in soon, but… I have a proposal for you.”

My eyebrows rose.

She sighed. “This house is going to take a lot more work than we thought to make it livable — and I just don’t have the time to deal with it right now. We’re not even through unpacking, and I’ve got to get back to the textbook project or I’ll never make my deadline. So since you need spending money anyway…”

My hopes climbed.

“Your dad and I have discussed it, and we’d like to pay you to work on it. Nothing too complicated — just cleaning, unpacking, sorting, reorganizing, figuring out
some
way to save some more space… and then the repainting, and every stitch of carpet needs to be torn out and the floor cleaned before we put in new—”

“Deal!” I answered, short-circuiting the rest of the list. I didn’t care if they wanted me to scrub the tile grout with a toothbrush, so long as I could set my own hours and spend the maximum amount of time possible with Zane.

My father threw me a questioning glance. “That easy, huh? And what about your surfing friend? Does he plan on getting a job anytime soon?”

My hackles rose. I knew that a lot of people viewed surfing as a pastime for loafers and druggies. I didn’t care what most people thought about most surfers, but I did care what my dad thought about Zane. “Dad,” I said heavily. “Zane has worked some job or other, year round, since he was fifteen years old. For a while there, he was essentially supporting himself. And after the accident he went straight into PT — doing two and three times as much workout as he was supposed to, just so he could better faster. When he moved to Oahu, Craig and Trina — that’s the lawyer and his wife — made him promise he would take a couple months off to chill out and relax before starting college in the fall. The doctors and therapists at rehab all told him the same thing. Which is—”

My dad raised his palms in surrender. “Down girl, down!” he mocked, grinning at me. “I was just asking, after all. Where is he going to college?”

“University of Hawaii Manoa.”

“To study what?”

“Engineering.”

My dad humphed in reluctant approval.

My mom chuckled. “Anything else, Mitch? Think quickly now.”

My dad straightened. “They have engineering at the Academy, you know.”

My mom and I groaned out loud.

“Fine then!” he said with good humor, rising. “I know when my opinion isn’t valued. I’m off to the base.”

Fear stabbed suddenly at my insides. Was he in danger, or wasn’t he? Would he walk out the door only to be mown down by the bus he planned to ride? Would an airplane drop out of the sky? I was halfway out of my seat to prevent his leaving when I stopped and slowly sank back into it. With no specifics on whatever threat might loom, what could I do? Who was to say that if I prevented his going to work, the roof of the house wouldn’t collapse on him?

“Goodbye, Dad,” I managed.

“Goodbye, Darlin’,” he returned, kissing my mother and heading for the door. He was halfway through it when he turned around and popped his head back in. “Oh, and by the way,” he said with a smirk. “I do like the boy.”

He whirled back out and shut the door behind him.

***

My second swimming lesson took place in the sheltered snorkeling area at Turtle Bay. The ocean water was crystal clear and teeming with brightly colored fish. The sky was blue and the air was warm. Gulls and the occasional giant frigatebird soared overhead, and a brisk wind twirled the tall white turbines of the wind farm on the green peaks nearby. Children splashed in the shallow water all around me. Zane was helpful and instructive and patient and kind.

His student sucked.

“You’re getting it,” he insisted.

“Ah erm mnot,” I argued, pulling seawater-soaked curls out of my mouth. I was supposed to have been keeping it closed. I was nervous, like I always was when large bodies of water were involved, but this afternoon was worse than usual for me. I couldn’t focus.

Zane looked at me thoughtfully. “You’re worried about your dad, aren’t you?”

I looked back at him, then exhaled with a sigh. Yes, I was worried about my dad. When Zane had come to pick me up, we’d walked around every inch of the house looking for Kalia, but the ghost had been AWOL. I still had no idea what her problem was, no idea how to protect my dad, and no clue how to deal with my own conflicted feelings about my grandmother.

But that wasn’t the only reason I was out of sorts.

“Yes,” I answered. “Maybe we should call it quits for today? Before I drown?”

His killer green eyes blinked at me, affronted. “I’m not going to let you drown, Kali.”

I looked at him standing there in the waist-deep water, his bronzed torso glistening with drops of seawater, his blond curls shining in the sun. It would almost be worth it to inhale a lungful or two, if it meant he would actually touch me.

So far today, he’d been doing just about everything to avoid it. When teaching someone to swim, that took effort.

“But if you’re not feeling it,” he continued. “We can try again tomorrow.”

We walked up out of the water together, and as his gaze drifted back over the open ocean, I could see the spark of excitement in his eyes. The waves had been growing steadily higher all afternoon.

“Zane,” I chuckled. “If you want to get out there, don’t let me stop you. Park me on the beach and I’m good. In fact, I’d like that. I could use a couple hours to just sit in the sand and chill. I love to watch you surf.”

His face, first lighting up at the suggestion, darkened at my last few words. He seemed suddenly deep in thought. “I do want to get out there,” he replied as we collected our things and headed towards his car. “Maybe in a bit.”

He said no more, and by the time we reached the parking lot, I had had all I could take. There were only two things that explained his bizarre behavior. Either he had decided he wasn’t into me after all — a reasonable decision given the baggage I’d revealed over the last twenty-four hours — or we had some kind of major misunderstanding going on. If he wasn’t into me, I’d rather know now. As for misunderstandings… I didn’t do them. Life was too short.

We dumped our stuff in his backseat. But before he could get in the car, I stopped him.

“You’re afraid to touch me and you don’t want me to watch you surf,” I said. “Would you tell me why? Please?”

I had startled him. But only a little, thank goodness. If he couldn’t handle directness, he would have dumped me in Nebraska.

“You’re very perceptive,” he said softly.

“Off topic,” I replied. “Let’s do one at a time. Why don’t you want me to watch you surf?”

His eyes left mine. “Kali…” he said with discomfort.

My heart began to crack wide open. “Zane,” I interrupted, forcing myself to say the words, to get it over with. “You don’t owe me anything. You’re not obligated. I helped you get your memory back and you gave me two swimming lessons. We’re even. There’s no need to pretend anything you don’t feel anymore. All you have to do is—”

“What are you talking about?” he broke in. “Are you kidding me? You can’t possibly think—” He ran a hand through his curls and turned away. Then he blew out a breath and turned back. He started to reach out toward me, then abruptly withdrew his hands. “This is impossible!” he said with a groan. Then he faced me squarely.

“Just listen to me, Kali. I know you think you know me already — that
I’m
the one who needs to get reacquainted with you. Well, I’ve done that. It took about thirty seconds. I’m as crazy about you as I ever was, could possibly ever have been. How you could be so perceptive about everything else and not see
that,
I have no idea. But what you don’t get is…
you
don’t know
me.”

My knees were getting wobbly again. My heart, newly repaired, was now pumping blood so hard I was afraid my cheeks would explode. “Of course I do,” I argued.

“No, you don’t,” he insisted. “Kali, the guy you fell for before… he wasn’t real. He was like some kind of superman. He could disappear; he could reappear. He could walk through walls. He could walk on water. He could jump off the wing of an airplane and hang suspended in the air. He could
surf the pipe!”

His voice nearly broke. “I can’t do any of those things,” he said roughly. “It’s taken months for me to get back to anything even close to the guy you remember. But even in the best of shape, I’m no great surfer. I’m nothing but a rank amateur from Hackensack, New Jersey.” His eyes held mine. “I can’t defy physics anymore. I’m not that guy. I’m just…
me.”