Authors: T. G. Ayer
He knew it was me.
***
The hours ticked by slower than a sleepwalking snail and I'd wasted enough time moping around, wondering what Aidan was thinking. Time to find out. I padded down to his room, straining to keep the floorboards from creaking beneath my feet. The clunk of a cabinet drawer downstairs echoed up the stairs. Ms. Custer was still awake. Guess she had her own bad dreams to evade.
We hadn't received our scolding from our foster mom after all. She wasn't faring too well. She'd never lost a child before. And though Social Services understood and hadn't questioned the quality of her care, she still blamed herself. As if she'd personally caused Brody's death. As if she thought she could have prevented it. Guess we were in pretty much the same boat.
My knuckles tapped the door. Not too loud, as we could still get in trouble. The door whispered open against the pressure of my knock. "Aidan?" I whispered. My voice echoed in the empty darkness. I flicked the switch, my heart racing, dread weighing on my bones. Before the bare bulb exposed the room, intuition had already filled me in.
All traces of Aidan were wiped clean. No rumpled bedding spilled across his bed. No computers, electronics or books overflowed the table. His dresser lay bare and his closet hung open to reveal abandoned racks and shelves.
When did he pack? When did he get all his stuff out? And why in the hell would he leave like a stranger, without saying goodbye? As if we'd shared nothing between us. Not the tumultuous heat of those kisses or the shared grief or even my strange and horrible secret. How could he leave me now?
The amber stone seared my throat as if sharing the simmering pain in my gut.
Staggering toward the open window I slumped against the sill, struggling to breathe. Voices filtered to me from the porch below: Aidan and Ms. Custer. "Thank you, and good luck," my foster mom was saying, a sad and oddly hollow timbre to her voice.
I didn't waste a second, just tore out of the room and down the stairs, landing on the last step as the door closed with a soft click.
I didn't think.
Didn't stop.
I just hurtled past Ms. Custer to the door and flung it open. "Bryn, honey. What—" Her voice rose. I ignored her and hurried after Aidan, praying I wasn't too late. On a different level of consciousness, I recognized I was going all crazy, over-obsessed girlfriend on him as he drove out of my life. At this point, I didn't care.
"Aidan!" I called out as I hopped down the porch stairs and skidded to a stop in front of him. "What's going on? Where are you going?"
He reached for his helmet, a weary sadness shadowing his eyes. "I have to leave. My boss wants me back ASAP. Emergency."
"What about school?"
Lame reason Bryn. There are other schools outside of Craven.
He shrugged, as if school was the least important thing in the world. But the sadness lingered in his eyes. He couldn't hide it.
I ached with too many facets of grief. I felt so profoundly tired. Of losing the people I cared for. Of being alone. Of caring.
Don't you care about me?
The question teetered at the tip of my tongue. Either pride or self-preservation stole my question away. I gritted my teeth, refused to appear a love-stricken teenager begging Aidan to stay.
He swung his leg over the Ducati seat and tugged me close. I didn't want the hug. False comfort when he prepared to desert me. His embrace was a twisted fusion of lies and dreams. But I shared the hug, took every little bit of him I could.
"I'm sorry, Bryn." Above me, warm breath ruffled my hair but the night mocked me. "I have to go."
Then he mounted the bike, tugged the helmet on and tightened the strap. He revved the engine, the sound dragging forth memories of that cool evening when he first rode into my life.
In seconds, he turned onto the street and disappeared into the darkness.
Straight out of my life.
***
I stood in the dark, not bothering to hug myself against the cold, not registering the twitch of drapes across the road. Not caring that Ms. Custer might come out and scold. The cold night transformed my breath into a ghostly apparition, spreading fading fingers to grasp the softest breeze. My amber talisman burned the skin at my neck as I watched him go.
So many questions he'd left unanswered. What was wrong with me? Why did I see the golden haze? Questions only he knew how to answer. He knew. And he'd left. It wasn't like Aidan at all.
Then it hit me like a bolt out of the deep black sky. How well did I really know Aidan? He'd barely been with us long enough to call him part of the family, but he'd found little nooks and crannies to immerse himself in. Ms. Custer, her kids and just about the entire population of Craven adored him.
But my knowledge of his past was nonexistent. We'd spent a lot of time together and yet I had no idea where he came from, or what his family had been like. He'd never spoken of his last foster family, never discussed himself at all.
The frigid fingers groping at my heart had nothing to do with the winter cold.
Who was Aidan Lee?
***
I tiptoed into the house and held my breath as I shut the door. Then winced when Ms. Custer called out. Entering the living room, I pulled a rug from a small pile near the door and sank onto the couch. Another of her favorite old black-and-white movies flickered on the small screen.
"What did he say?" I asked, staring at Marilyn as her dress floated on a cheeky gust of air.
Her voice crackled and she cleared her throat before she spoke. "That he had to leave. That he was being transferred to another foster home and the circumstances were unusual. It wasn't my place to ask, honey." She nodded in silence, taking Aidan's words as gospel.
"He didn't say why?" I asked.
Marilyn pouted.
Ms. Custer shook her head.
"Or where?"
"Bryn, honey, I think he meant to leave and not be found. So whatever plan you're hatching in that pretty little head of yours . . . forget it." Her eyes were sad as she took my chin in her hands and drew me into her soft embrace. "Your heart will heal, child. First love is always the hardest."
But her smile failed to soothe me. She knew mere words would not help me. I was desperate for her to call Social Services, the police, anyone who could help us to find him. But in that dark place where I knew I couldn't help the poor people who glowed, in that same dark corner of my soul lived the truth.
Aidan did not mean to be found.
We watched Miss Monroe entrance her beau, in a sad and comfortable silence, until the credits rolled and my discreet tears dried.
***
The last of the credits and the onset of Ms. Custer's soft snores gave me a reason to slip upstairs. The stairs creaked in the eerie, middle-of-the-night way they always do when the house settles and warmth creeps out of the wood. I passed my room and stood in Aidan's doorway. He'd left, despite knowing how much I needed him, and that nobody else could help me. I dared not risk my secret with anyone.
I was completely alone.
I blinked as my eyes stung. I just wanted to go back to my room and close the door on Aidan and his chapter in my life. But as I turned to leave, the light from the bare window caught and reflected on an object beneath the bed. I froze, ears straining for Ms. Custer's footsteps.
Releasing my breath, I tiptoed into the room. I crouched, reaching splayed fingers between the wall and the bed, and retrieved a thick, leather-bound book. It shifted in my hand, fragile and ready to fall apart if I so much as breathed on it.
Holding it with infinite care I traced the edge of the cover, lifting it slowly, unable to curb my curiosity. The floorboard on the second stair creaked and I snuck back into my room in a flash. Ms. Custer had enough to worry about. I'd only be adding to her worries if she thought I wasn't handling Aidan's departure well, if she found me moping in his empty room.
I eased the door closed with seconds to spare. Ms. Custer paused outside, her shadow slipping in across the floorboards. Then she sighed softly and plodded to her room. Tears singed my eyes and I rested my forehead on the door, among the multitude of hanging scarves. How long I'd waited to have a mother care for me that way. Little things like these, when people cared enough to share your pain—these were moments to treasure. In our grief for Brody, in our communal, familial pain, we helped each other heal. But my ache for Aidan was my own pain, borne alone, and it would remain alone.
I sank onto the bed and flicked the lamp on. The book and its intricately carved leather binding weaved its spell around me. I opened it, allowing the book to fall open naturally to a well-used page. To the painting of the Valkyrie called Brunhilde. This time more notes filled the margins, and one particular newly printed phrase jumped out, boldly written and circled again in red ink.
Brunhilde - Bright Warrior = Bryn.
My hands quivered. Shock, anger and disbelief warred within my head. The sounds of clanging metal reverberated in my ears and I attributed it to the depth of my fury.
Crap! What had possessed Aidan to attach my name to the stunning Valkyrie? They were figures of myth for heaven's sake. Beautiful, strong women, but just figments of the imagination of an ancient race. Nobody believed such stories were true anymore.
I breathed deep, counted to ten and hoped it would help to reduce the rapid beat of my heart to a steadier pace. I needed facts to help ease the turmoil in my head. Neither Bryn nor Brynhildr were common names. I had a crazy father who might have loved the long-dead legend. Who knew why he chose the name?
I shook my head. Aidan was blowing the coincidence way out of proportion. I ran my finger along the sharp edge of the aged paper, traced the circular grooves Aidan's red pen had carved into the thick paper. The Valkyrie's face drew my gaze, a painted magnetic force, entrancing me.
Uncanny.
Shivers trailed down my spine. The majestic warrior maiden stood confident, bronze chainmail gleaming, her strong chin tilted upward as if in defiance of . . . who? Her god or her father?
She resembled me to the finest detail, even the way my ears curved, and the proportion of my eyes. My twin stared back at me from a painting dating more than five centuries ago. More than uncanny. Downright creepy.
What did Aidan know? And why was he studying this book at all? What kind of cosmic coincidence caused a boy researching Valkyries to pitch up on my doorstep with a painting of a Valkyrie bearing not only my name but my face?
***
Sleep eluded me. The book, hidden beneath rumpled clothing in my dresser, whispered. Taunted. So I got up and read until sunrise, despite the niggling feeling that I was privy to priceless information, the feeling that I shouldn't turn another page, that I wasn't meant to have the book at all. All that, overshadowed by that face.
That eerily familiar face.
The temptation to cut school teased at the edges of my conscience, but sanity prevailed. We were all Ms. Custer's kids and my actions would hurt her reputation within the town. Vice Principal Warren waited with vicious eagerness for my first wrong move and I refused to give him the satisfaction.
I hid the book deep within my closet and trudged off to school.
Each minute of the day crawled by, a caravan of tortoise-seconds. The red second-hand on the wall clocks ticked closer and closer to three. As home time drew closer, the snide comments and knowing looks of the other students no longer penetrated my conscious thought.
At last I escaped, racing home, my mind already rifling through the enticing pages of Aidan's book. I dashed into my room and locked myself in, spending the next few hours poring over the book in much the same way as Aidan had. I read until my head drooped and my eyelids grew too heavy to keep them open a minute longer.
Although I'd slept in small, uncomfortable fits, judging from my strange and fantastic dreams I'd had a fair bit of shuteye. In my dreams the pages swirled to dust as I turned them, and the book glowed like the light of the iridescent living dead. The book burst into flames while the painted Bryn cackled at my despair.
I heeded the message within the dreams. I took extra care with the fragile leather cover whose spine was so worn it threatened to fall apart each time I opened it. Now I understood why Aidan had chosen the expansive dining table for his work. My little study desk was not cooperating and I struggled to get comfortable. But I didn't take the book downstairs. Best not to advertise that I had Aidan's book in my possession.
Many of the pages were written in the strange ancient writing Aidan had been translating. Widely spaced and in overlarge print, much of the beautiful, original writing had faded, ink stolen by the unscrupulous fingers of time. In contrast, sloppy handwritten notes desecrated a multitude of pages, made by bold and sometimes inconsiderate scholars. Brighter and more enduring writing covered the remainder of the pages. Saddened by the violation, I prayed it was just a copy.
I massaged the stricken muscles at my neck and flipped toward the back of the book. A handful of papers shifted out of place. For one terrifying moment, I feared I'd pulled away a whole section from its binding. Then I sighed. A stack of letters, notes and other random things like newspaper articles and copies of photographs had come loose. Taking extra care, I picked through them.