Chapter Four-
Nothing was broken. Alexa confirmed it as she moved her jaw up and down and side to side. She held fingers in front of her eyes and quizzed herself on simple things to ensure that she didn’t have a concussion. Everything proved to be okay.
Her skin was raw and red and covered in small splotches of purple and blue and yellow.
She could hardly think back to what had happened. Taking in her surroundings, she realized that she was on the opposite side of the street than where she had been before. The smoking pipe. What had that belonged to?
“Keynan?” Alexa called out, her mouth as heavy as bricks.
She turned her head and her eyes landed upon a boy, clutching his head and groaning. A trail of blood ran from his temple onto the pavement. Alexa felt the blood drain from her face and her heart stuttered. Ignoring her own pain, she stumbled to her feet and hobbled over to where Keynan lay, crumpled in the street. Beside him was a person wearing a homemade motorbike helmet, hovering over Keynan.
“KEYNAN!” Alexa hollered, her voice cracking. She sank to her knees and her hands shook like dead leaves in a windstorm. She was afraid that she might break. She blinked harshly to keep the distractions at bay and the tears from her eyes.
“Okay,” she whispered. “Okay, Keynan. Keynan. Can you hear me?”
The blood pooled around near his ear. Alexa grabbed part of her tunic and dabbed it up against his temple, soaking up the blood. At the contact, Keynan moaned. The rider gave a choked sob. Alexa whirled on the person.
“Who are you?” she demanded. “Don’t you ever look where you’re going?”
“I–I do!” the person stuttered, they had a high voice. Gloved hands reached for the helmet and pulled it off, revealing an angular face with high, chiseled cheekbones, a pale complexion off-set by rosebud lips and sharp, periwinkle eyes. The girl’s hair was so light it looked almost like white and it was long and as straight as a line. Small tears crystallized at the corners of her eyes.
Alexa studied her before glancing back down at Keynan. “Who are you?” she said, the question directed at the girl.
“My name is Ember Jackson,” said the girl. “And I really am sorry.”
“I need you to help me,” Alexa said. “I can’t tell if he’s concussed.”
“You haven’t told me your name.”
“That’s the least of our matters.” Alexa pulled her tunic away and much to her dismay, the blood flow continued to stream.
Ember pulled a flask from a pouch at her side. She uncorked the top and poured a trickle of water down the side of Keynan’s slowly paling face.
“Hey, can you tell me your name?” she asked him.
Keynan blinked up at her with foggy eyes. “Wha…?”
“Can you tell me where you are?”
“Mable’s house…” he slurred, his eyes flickered shut.
Ember and Alexa looked at each other and in unison they said, “He’s concussed.”
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Alexa couldn’t stand the way Mrs. Mooring looked at the unconscious figure of her son. Her features were drawn together, looking sort of bunchy.
Ember had gotten ahold of the Oleander police and they had phoned Keynan’s parents. Now everybody was crowded around a single hospital bed, a silence running through them like a trickle of water, but it was heavy enough to drown them.
Ember was hulking in the corner of the room, trying to hide from Mr. Mooring’s accusatory glares. He hadn’t taken too well to meeting the attacker of his son, even if it wasn’t on purpose. Alexa went to go sit beside her.
“I know he seems intimidating, but really, he’s got a big heart,” she told Ember.
Unresponsive and kicking at a piece of medical equipment, Ember wiped her nose with her sleeve. The dull blandness of the hospital room seemed to match her mood. Depressed.
“I feel so stupid. So evil,” Ember muttered, flinching when Kacen stuck his tongue out at her.
“Just give them some time,” Alexa pressed. “We’re all just in shock. But I saw what happened and I do know that it was an accident.”
“You were mad at first.”
“Well, yes. But I’m really sorry about that.”
Ember gave her a small smile. “It’s okay…”
“Alexandra. But everyone calls me Alexa.”
“Alexa.”
“Like I said,” Alexa continued. “It was just an accident.”
Ember sighed and shook her head, her knuckles turning white. She stood up and shoved her hands in the pockets of her leggings. “You shouldn’t be saying that.”
Dread pooled in the pit of Alexa’s stomach. “Why?”
“Because,” Ember said darkly. “If he hadn’t pushed you, it would’ve been you in that hospital bed.”
Without another word, she stormed out of the hospital room, the door slamming after her.
Stunned, Alexa trudged over to the bed and looked down sadly at her unconscious friend.
“Odd, isn’t it?” a nurse with curly black hair walked up behind Alexa. “Seeing someone in a state between life and death.”
“He’s not dying,” Alexa retorted.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” the nurse said. She studied Alexa for a moment. “Your scar looks familiar. I think I was the one who gave you those stitches.”
“Probably,” Alexa sighed, tracing her finger tip over it. “I don’t remember much of that night.”
“He probably won’t either. There are some things best forgotten though, don’t you think?”
Alexa frowned at her. “I’d like to remember everything.”
“What if something was so traumatizing?” the nurse pressed. “And you could warp a memory or something?”
Alexa looked at her funny.
“I apologize,” the nurse turned away and messed with some buttons attached to a wire connected to Keynan’s forehead. “I’ve had a lot on my mind lately.”
Alexa nodded slowly and then turned to the Moorings and gave all of them a hug, promising to bring them dinner before she left the hospital and headed back home.
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Crack! Scream! Repeat.
Crack! Scream! Repeat.
Crack! Scream! Repeat.
It was an endless nightmare. A consistent pounding of the pain Alexa had spent all night trying to forget.
Shaking and damp with sweat, she peeled off her blankets and tossed her pillow across the room. The sound of it thumping against the floor with an unusually loud sound for a pillow made her roll over and glance in its direction. Cautiously and careful not to make a sound, she tip-toed over to it and peered into the silky pillowcase.
A book.
She gasped. An overdue book, nonetheless. Her insides squirmed with guilt and irresponsibility. She’d had a perfect record for six years and now it was ruined by an overdue book. She was tempted to see just how overdue it was. If it was just a few days or maybe a week than maybe Ms. Primm just might let it slide.
April 10th.
Alexa ran her hands down her face. That was over two months ago.
The cover was silver with a royal crest of wings, talons, and forked tongues. She didn’t even remember checking this book out.
The table of contents was vague. There wasn’t much that seemed to interest her.
I got it for a reason, she told herself. She wasn’t the type to check things out and not read them.
She began to flip through the pages. One felt bumpy. There was something underneath it.
“My bookmark?”
It was a question as well as a statement as Alexa pulled out the crushed daffodil her older brother had gotten her for her tenth birthday. She’d taped it to a piece of cardstock and strung a string to the top of it. That bookmark was so special to her. She thought she’d lost it. If she had put her bookmark in this book, it meant she’d truly been reading it. Not just flipping through the pages for reference or something. A book that didn’t fully capture her interest got dog–eared.
Alexa brought the book over to her desk and took out a pen. She flipped on her desk light and a flower of golden illumination blossomed across the page. The words went through her all at once.
“Keynan,” she whispered, feeling the color drain from her. “This must be the word you were talking about.”
She ripped a sheet of paper from a spare notebook lying on her floor and scrawled the word of a land she found.
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