Auracle. Part 7

Rei shakes his head without smiling and talks in that detached tone people use when they are saying one thing and thinking something else. "Sometimes people land on their head in aikido. You learn what to look for." He stares into her eyes for a few seconds more, his eyebrows creasing together.

She leans forward and looks right back into Rei's eyes. "h.e.l.lo? What are you looking for in there?"

Rei blinks and drops his hands onto his lap. "I don't know. So you really fell off your desk chair?"

"Um, yeah. Did you ever see that chair? It's ready to fall apart."

"Yeah, I know. Your mom's been meaning to buy you a new one for a while."

"Oh."

"So what do you mean, you don't remember stuff. What don't you remember?"

"Hmm ... Oh, my full name-isn't Anna short for something?"

Rei's jaw practically unhinges. "You don't even remember your own name?"

"I remember Anna Rogan."

"Annaliese Grace Rogan."

"Oh." She nods thoughtfully. "That's pretty. Where's my driver's license?"

Rei grins. "You don't have a driver's license."

"You're kidding."

"Sorry. Your mom never got around to teaching you how to drive. My dad said he'd teach you this summer."

Taylor rolls her eyes and leans back on her hands. "No license. This is really going to suck! How am I supposed to get to school?"

"You take the bus with me."

"The bus." She shudders. "Great. And what's the deal with the guy in there?"

"Your father?"

She shrugs. "I guess."

Rei suddenly looks uncomfortable and he lowers his voice. "Anna, your dad's been an alcoholic for years. You don't remember that?"

She shakes her head. "What about my mother?"

"She's not home a lot, but she's fine. Remember? She sells real estate."

"So is he a mean drunk or a mellow drunk?"

Rei bites his lips together and hesitates before slowly shrugging his shoulders. "You get along best with him when you stay out of his way."

"What do you mean by that?" Swish.

"I mean this," Rei reaches up and traces his index finger along the scar on my forehead, "happened one time when you didn't stay out of his way. He hit you and you fell against the counter. It only happened once, and he promised he wouldn't do it again. Anna, does your mom know how much stuff you don't remember?"

Taylor shrugs. "They figure it's temporary."

"But what if it's not? This isn't little stuff you're forgetting; this is some major stuff! You remember me, right?"

"Pretty much. Aren't you, like, my boyfriend or something?"

Rei grins at this. "Wow! Um, well, I'm a boy and I'm your friend, but you never considered me a boyfriend. You've always thought of me more like a brother."

"I have?"

I have?

"You have."

I don't remember that.

"What are we, then, just like neighbors?"

Rei is still smiling. Obviously the concept of us dating is extremely amusing to him. "And we've been friends forever." He stops smiling and groans. "This isn't funny."

"No," she agrees as she hugs her knees to her chest. "Not at all."

"So Seth never showed up at school today either, and I doubt he got his phone back. I wonder where he went."

Taylor freezes for a second, then turns slowly toward Rei. "You mean after he killed Taylor Gleason?"

Rei stares. "What are you talking about?"

"I saw him kill her." Taylor sits straight up, and her voice is serrated. "I went to the waterfall, and I saw your friend Seth push Taylor right off the ledge into the waterfall. He just threw her off. She's dead now. Did you know that?" She's staring daggers at Rei now.

Rei's mouth is hanging open. "What? Anna, you're not making any sense. Seth would never..."

"Never what ... commit first-degree murder? I saw the whole thing." She's talking more to herself now than to Rei. "I need to call the police! I need to talk to my parents. I'm an eyewitness."

"Anna! Listen to yourself," Rei puts one hand on her shoulder and turns her to face him. "You told me yourself your memory is all messed up. No offense, but you can't even remember your own name."

Her aura turns the color of dirty bricks as she slaps his hand away.

"This I remember!"

CHAPTER 11.

Rei's voice is carefully controlled when he says goodbye to my mom, but he sprints the entire way home, trying to stomp the anger out through his feet. He kicks off his sneakers before disappearing into his house, and the front door closes with a little more force than usual. I'm not used to seeing Rei angry, especially at me.

I really wanted to fix this myself. Maybe it's my own stubbornness or maybe it's because I'm the cause of this mess, but I did not want Rei to have to worry about this. Now I know that not only is Taylor planning to blame her accidental death on Seth, but she's using me as the star witness. If I can get my body back, I can exonerate Seth, but how do I get her out? I tried to force my way back in. I even asked her politely to leave, but it's done me no good. It's time to swallow my pride, admit I screwed up, and ask for help.

The garage door grinds open, and Rei comes out, wearing only a pair of torn, faded blue jeans and dirt-caked work boots, a shovel slung over his bare shoulder. He walks right by me, so I must be invisible to him at the moment, which is a good thing because I'm kinda sorta staring right now. Off to the side in the front yard there's a small crabapple tree that Yumi got for Mother's Day waiting to be planted.

I suppose I could materialize now and try to tell Rei what's happening, but he looks kind of busy at the moment. He starts to dig, stepping all of his weight on the shovel until it sinks through the thick turf. The gra.s.s is very much alive, and the thick clumps of sod won't let go of the earth without an angry hiss. The sound of ripping gra.s.s seems to calm him, though, and by the time he's cleared a sizable circle of gra.s.s, he's breathing slower and his expression is neutral. He pays no attention to me, so I must still be invisible to him. I float near the porch swing and watch him scoop shovelful after shovelful of dirt and rocks into a pile on a tarp, prying loose the bigger rocks with the tip of the shovel and throwing them overhand into the woods between our houses. It takes him a good five minutes to wrestle one particularly large rock out, and he heaves that into the woods with a satisfied look on his face. By the time he's planted the tree and replaced the soil, he's streaked with sweat and soil, and ... okay! So maybe I am checking him out. A little.

He shoulders the shovel and the rolled hose, then heads back to the garage with his usual calm face restored until he pa.s.ses the porch. He stops cold and looks directly at me. Uh-oh. He looks mad again.

"Anna!" he says sharply.

My first reaction is to dart into the spruce tree so fast, it appears I've vanished into thin air. Rei continues to talk to the swing in the same steely tone. "I know you're there." He waits a few seconds for me to materialize, and when I don't, he lowers his voice. "I don't know what you think happened, but I would appreciate it if you would think this through before you talk to anyone about Seth." He stares at the swing expectantly. "Do you have any idea where he is?"

His colors are wavering between red and green, like Christmas but not at all joyful. It's the aura of conflict, of someone who is trying really hard to keep an open mind and make sense of this. I glide out of the spruce and settle on the steps to the left of him. I latch onto the small bit of positive energy that's radiating from him and recharge from that. He catches sight of me in his peripheral vision and jumps slightly.

"Don't DO that!"

Of course I know where Seth is, but I don't know how to tell him. Through the years, Rei and I have learned to silently communicate a lot to each other through our eyes and gestures. Little things, like hey, do you have an extra pencil or I'm freezing; can I wear your hoodie? are easy to figure out. But even if I didn't suck at charades, how would I communicate he's on a back road about fifteen miles south of the Canadian border?

Rei sits down next to me and rests his elbows on his knees, his chin on his fists. His eyes are a.s.sessing me again, trying to fit together the pieces of my puzzle. "Are you really going to the police?"

I shake my head.

He relaxes a little. "Then why did you say you would?"

I shake my head again.

"Yes, you did. I heard you. Oh, right, you don't remember, do you?" His tone is uncharacteristically condescending.

I shake my head, and point to my house. I mouth the word that's.

Rei rolls his eyes. He sucks even worse than I do at charades. "Great. Now I have to guess what you're trying to say, right?"

Right.

He watches carefully as I mouth the word again. "This," he guesses.

I shake my head and try again.

"Uh, that."

Close enough. I nod. I mouth the word not and shake my head.

"Not?" he guesses. Good, he's doing better than usual.

I nod again, and point to my chest, mouthing the word me.

"Me," he says softly. "'That's not me.' That's not you? Well, then, who is it?" He looks more confused than ever. Over at my house, the front door opens. Taylor comes out barefoot and walks slowly up the driveway toward the mailbox. She doesn't look over, but Rei sees her, and he knows I can't be here and there at the same time.

I mouth the word very slowly. "Taylor."

CHAPTER 12.

"So what you're telling me is that's Taylor inside your body," he says quietly.

I nod. Taylor's still at the mailbox, pulling out a wad of catalogs and bills, but she's too far away to hear him. I scoot to the side so if she looks over, she can't see me.

"Why isn't she inside her own body?"

I run my index finger across my throat.

"She's really dead?" he whispers.

I nod.

Rei lets out a slow deep breath and rubs his temples with his dirt-caked hands. "That's bad. She said Seth pushed her."

I shake my head hard.

"No, I didn't think so. Do you know how to find Seth?"

I nod.

"Okay, good. Let's go inside before she sees us," he says. Once he's inside, he looks at his grungy hands apologetically. "I need five minutes to shower."

I wait downstairs and imagine every possible reaction Rei might have when he realizes all that's happened. He's so good at hiding his emotions from the world, but how can he not be feeling, disbelief, anger, fear, and worst of all disappointment.

As soon as Rei is all clean and dressed in shorts and a T-shirt, he calls me upstairs, motioning for me to follow him to his room. The sight of the swing chair sparks his memory.

"So last night," he says, "you weren't here because you were dreaming, were you?"

I shake my head.

"And by that time, Taylor was already dead, wasn't she?"

I nod.

"So, why didn't you tell me?"

I didn't tell him because I wanted to get my body back first, because I didn't want him to worry, because I am so profoundly embarra.s.sed that I am locked out of my body, of all things. And the number one reason I didn't tell him? Because while I'm stuck in this dimension, I have no voice, no words, no way to tell him all the complicated details of this debacle.