After Forever (2 page)

I sighed and ruffled Artie’s already messy
hair. “You know why. It’s only for a few more weeks. Then I’ll be
done.”

He grabbed hold of Bella’s hand and the two
of them walked in my friend Marcie’s house. She smiled
sympathetically in my direction before pushing her thick glasses
back up her nose. “They’ll get over it.”

I smiled and shrugged, “sometimes I’m not so
sure.”

She put her arm around my shoulders and
walked me down the sidewalk toward the bus. “They’re kids, they
will forget all about this.”

“I hope that you’re right.”

“I’m always right.”

I laughed and then waved before turning and
walking toward the bus stop.

It had been a few weeks since I had started
my community service at the assisted living home. During those
weeks, the dreams had begun to come every night. Before then, they
had just sporadic. Now, with each passing moment the desperation in
my interactions with Phillip was becoming a living entity. One that
I was pretty certain was a sure sign of losing my mind. I was
falling in love with a dream… with an idea… with the hope that
there was some truth in it all.

The bus pulled to a stop a few minutes after
I got there and I slipped wearily into a seat towards the back. The
dreams had definitely cut into my rest. There were circles
beginning to form under my eyes, I couldn’t stop yawning, and my
brain pretty much felt like someone had turned it to mush. I was
lucky that Miss Merriweather had kept me strictly as part of the
clean-up crew. I wouldn’t have been able to handle anything else.
Especially once I added school and my siblings on top of everything
else.

It’s funny, because even though I was tired
and felt like my thoughts were dredging through my swampy brain,
when I was with Phillip it was the only time I truly felt… alive.
It was the only time I could really be me and not have to worry
about anything else. There was a freedom in that and I couldn’t
help feeling grateful for the illusion.

Shaking myself from my thoughts and trying
not to fall asleep, I picked up a discarded newspaper that someone
had left behind. I didn’t have to look long before a headline
caught my attention. It was a story about a family that had gone
missing. There was no trace of them and the authorities had no
leads, but a reward was being offered for anyone who had
information.

“Sad, isn’t it?”

I hadn’t even noticed the ladies sitting
behind me, looking over my shoulder.

“It seems like such a waste for such a
wealthy family to just disappear.”

“I bet that they disappeared because they
were wealthy.”

“Now Florine, money isn’t evil, it’s what is
done with it that can be evil.”

One of the ladies tsked. “That’s your
opinion Fawn.”

“I’m sorry, did you two want to look at
this?” I asked them.

Two sets of friendly eyes twinkled back at
me. “Oh no, dear,” the one I thought was Fawn said. “You are going
to need that.”

I raised my eyebrows. “I think I’m
okay.”

The other one, Florine, shook her head and
sat back in her seat, “I think that there is probably something in
there that you can use.” She looked over at the other lady and put
the tip of her index finger against her lips. “Try page
thirteen.”

Fawn shivered. “What a terribly unlucky
number.”

“Oh poppycock! Luck has to do with the
person, not the number.” Florine looked at me then and smile
sweetly. “I think that luck has finally found you.”

The bus began to slow to a stop and I stood
up, anxious to get away. It wasn’t that they scared me or anything
like that. They seemed harmless and sweet enough. It’s just that
the whole situation seemed peculiar.

“Well this is my stop.” I held out the paper
again. “Are you sure you don’t want this?”

They nodded at the same time. “Take it,”
Fawn said, “somewhere in there is bound to be a happy ending.”

I folded it and put it in my shoulder bag.
“I don’t believe in happy endings.”

Before they could say anything, I turned and
hurried down the steps to the pavement. When I looked back up at
the bus, their faces were staring down at me with amused
expressions. I waved lamely toward them and their eyes sparkled in
the afternoon sunlight for just a moment before the bus pulled away
and drove off.

“Well that was strange.” I said out
loud.

It was just a few blocks to the assisted
living facility and I hurried toward it, eager to get the work
done… and if I was honest with myself, I was eager to see Phillip
too. It was hard to separate the Phillip in my dreams with the
flesh and blood stranger lying in that bed. I wanted it to be real,
but I knew that it was all my imagination; that some glitch in my
brain had created the illusion that I actually had someone as
amazing as he was who really cared about me.

The reality was that no one really cared
about me. At least not in the way I needed them to. With my mom
still sick and my brother and sister counting on me to take care of
them, I hadn’t always made the best choices. If I had, I wouldn’t
be hurrying toward an afternoon full of bedpans and soapy mop
water. It was my job to take care of things now, not fantasize
about someone else taking care of me.

My strengthened resolve lasted until I
walked through the doors of the assisted living place. It was
quiet; eerily quiet. There were no nurses bustling about, no
patrons staring blanking out from wheelchairs, no staff… no one. I
looked up at the clock and saw that I was about ten minutes early…
but still. This was creepy.

“Hello? Is anyone here?” I called out
through the halls. Nothing.

I rubbed my arms absently against the goose
bumps that were starting to pop up. A shiver worked its way up my
spine and I looked behind me, hoping to see someone. Still nothing.
I was afraid to look into the rooms that I was walking by. There
was an unexplainable fear taking hold of me and I couldn’t shake
the feeling of dread that was snaking its way through my bones.

Phillip.

His name rang through my brain and I began
walking toward his door more and more quickly until I was running
down the halls. The sound of my shoes hitting the tile was
deafening in the otherwise silence of the building. I didn’t know
what was going on. The only thought running through my head was
that I had to get to him. I had to make sure that he was still
here… that he was real.

When I finally stood before his door, my
heart beating from exertion, I was suddenly not sure I wanted to
open it. If he wasn’t there, I would have to admit that something
terrible had happened. Even if he was, I’d have to admit that
something wasn’t right. Businesses weren’t run this way. People
didn’t just disappear… buildings weren’t just left empty.

Closing my eyes and taking a deep breath, I
reached forward and turned the knob. Surprisingly, it turned and
the door swung open. What I saw on the other side was something
from a nightmare. Mallie, with her arms extended over her head and
sparks flying between her fingers, stood over Phillip with an evil
grin on her face.

A scream tore from my throat and her
attention shifted from him to me. “I won’t let you have him.” She
said sweetly.

Before I could ask her what she meant, she
threw her arms down toward me and the blast of energy she sent my
way knocked me off of my feet. Her malicious laughter was the last
sound I heard before blackness took me.

“Time is running out.”

Tears welled in my eyes. “Why would you say
that?”

We were inside the house this time. I
couldn’t remember ever having been in here before, but I knew
instinctively that we were in his bedroom. He was lying on a huge
four poster bed and I was sitting next to him, his hand tucked
protectively in mine. Even in the dim light from a few candles, I
could tell that he was ill. There was a pallor to his skin that
hadn’t been there before. Dark circles framed his honey toned eyes,
and a sheen of sweat covered his face.

“Because it’s true,” he said sadly. “If you
don’t find me soon, I’ll be lost forever.”

I shook my head, confused. “I don’t
understand. How can I find you when we are already together?”

He brought my hand to his lips and I could
feel the fever burning on his skin. “You have to find me in the
other place… the other world. It’s only there that we can truly be
together forever.”

I gulped back fresh tears. “I don’t like the
other place. Bad things happen there. I’m… different… there.” I
lowered my eyes and let the tears fall freely. “You won’t love me
there.”

“I’ll love you anywhere Rory.”

I looked up, hopeful, “but you don’t know
what I’ve done.”

“Yes I do, I told you – you’re a hero.”

I shook my head. “The other you. You don’t
know what I’ve done. I’m ashamed.”

He laughed softly. “I’ll understand – I
promise. I can help you. I can take care of you… all of you.”

It was too good to be true so I didn’t say
anything. I didn’t want to ruin what little time we had left
together. Instead, I crawled all the way into his bed and lay down
next to him. He held me like that for what seemed like hours.
Murmuring promises into my ear and wiping the tears that continued
to fall. I was so scared to lose him, that even the fever raging
between us wasn’t enough to stop the chills that wracked through my
body.

“Aurora… Aurora! Wake up!”

Cold water splashed on my face and I
sputtered and flailed my arms as I struggled to sit up. Bright
light assaulted my eyes when I opened them and I squeezed them
shut. I tried to push whatever was holding on to me away, but my
whole body ached. It was like my bones had shattered and then put
themselves back together with pieces missing. I hurt… bad.

“She’s fine, give her some space,
Mallie.”

My eyes flew open when I heard the name and
my heart sputtered with fear. Her eyes looked into mine with malice
and I wondered briefly why I had never noticed the evil that shined
through them. I would have screamed then, but there was something
wrong with my voice. I opened my mouth and moved it to form the
words and sounds I wanted… but nothing happened.

“I think that she is in shock,” Miss
Merriweather said.

For a second, when she looked at me, I was
reminded of the two ladies from the bus. The warmth and goodness
had radiated from them… just as it did now… from her. How could I
have been so wrong about everything? I wanted to apologize, explain
what I now knew was truth, but I couldn’t. My voice had been taken
from me, stripped away so I couldn’t expose what I had seen.

Things happened quickly then. I was lifted
to a wheelchair – one much like those the other residents were
trapped in. My body ached and cracked much like I would imagine an
older person’s would. Then I saw my face in the mirror and I wasn’t
even surprised by what I saw. A blank expression staring out of a
wrinkled face. My body felt old because it was old.

“Now Aurora, how did you even get out of
your room?” Mallie asked nastily as she wheeled me into one of the
rooms that I was pretty sure had been vacant before. “I guess that
we are going to have to put everyone on lockdown again.”

Right, I thought, so we can’t escape and
expose this place for what it really was… something out of a
nightmare. My dream came back to me and I could still feel
Phillip’s arms wrapped around me. He had tried to tell me that we
were running out of time. Had he meant this? Somehow I didn’t think
that this was all of it.

She spread the newspaper from earlier on my
lap. “I thought you might be interested in this.”

It was turned to the page about the family
who had disappeared and there, staring back at me through the black
and white photo was Phillip. I tried to pick it up to look at it
closer, but it fell through my stiff and cracking fingers and pages
scattered across the floor. Mallie laughed at my complete
helplessness while she walked out of my room.

The next few hours were the worst of my
life. Visions of my brother and sister vied for prominence in my
thoughts against visions of my mother. The truth was, when she had
gotten sick, there was no one to work and no money to come in. So I
had done what I had needed to do. I stole. Food, money, toothpaste.
Whatever those kids had needed, I had gotten for them. Phillip
called me a hero… the judge had called me a criminal.

Now, with me tucked away in this body and
this place, I couldn’t help wondering what was happening to them
and how they were managing without me. I knew that Marcie and her
family would care for them. At least until my mom was released from
the hospital… if she was released…. But that didn’t ease my fears
or the desperation I felt trying to choke me.

Then, one morning after a night of restless
sleeping, something amazing happened. Just as the morning sun began
to rise and throw my room into a rainbow of pinks, oranges, and
yellows, my body began to tingle and come to life. I threw the
covers off of my bed and ran to the mirror. My own normal face
stared back at me.

Heart practically beating through my chest,
I tried opening my door. It opened. I took a deep breath to give
myself courage, certain that I would run right into Mallie. I was
wrong. It was like I was in another place completely. I was inside
my dream. Only instead of seeing Phillip outside of this stone
mansion, I was greeted by the faces of hundreds of people.

One of the ladies from the bus smiled
sweetly at me from a few feet away. “Welcome Rory, we knew you’d
come.”

“Is this a dream?”

She shook her head and a few of the other
people chuckled. “No. This is our home.”

“I don’t understand.”

She walked forward and put her arm around my
shoulder. “We are under a magic spell that keeps us trapped in an
almost paralyzed state. You are the only person who can save
us.”