Stepping into the Sky: Jump When Ready, Book 3 Read online

  Even so, whatever was out there refused to be ignored. Tapping had been replaced by knocking while the wind outside howled. Henry wanted to fling the door open and face whatever it was. As far as he was concerned, he’d confronted way worse already—his own death, his parents mourning his loss, his family suffering Bethany’s abduction. Nothing out there could possibly be more threatening than what he’d already gone through. He wasn’t worried about himself. But Nikki stood next to him. Strong, as always, but it wasn’t his choice to make and something told him this wasn’t the right time.

  Without thinking about it, he took hold of her hand. Nikki wrapped her hand around his as she stared at the door, the knocking having now turned to pounding. The door rattled on its frame against the force. None of it was real, Henry told himself. They were inside the dream now. Only one thing here was real—Nikki standing next to him, the warmth of her palm meeting his. He led her down the hall to the room that had called out to him before as being safe and insulated. None of the rooms were without windows but that room lined with bookshelves had curtains covering the glass. They wouldn’t have to see outside, into the churning darkness.

  Henry pointed to a stack of wood, cradled next to the fireplace. How it had gotten there—or if it was even truly there—didn’t matter. They needed comfort and a glance showed that a box of wooden matches rested on the mantel. Kindling poked up from where it was held in a brass bucket.

  “I’ll build a fire and we’ll wait.”

  “For what?” Nikki said.

  Henry crossed the room and knelt next to the fireplace. “For whatever happens next. We can do this, Nikki.”

  He wanted to believe those words but he wasn’t sure. He set wood into the fireplace and tucked in kindling. He struck a match and lit the fire. Outside, the wind shook the house. Within the squall, he heard voices, both male and female, a hiss blending with the gusts.

  You’re not leaving again.

  You’re never leaving.

  You’re staying here with us.

  Henry glanced at Nikki and knew she’d heard the same. Again, he reminded himself that those voices weren’t real. Only one thing here was real. The fire blazed to life, flickering within Nikki’s eyes as she watched.

  Henry stepped back and settled onto the floor in front of the fire. He rested his back against the sofa. “This isn’t bad,” he said, watching the flames spread across the wood.

  Nikki looked at the walls and shrouded windows one last time before settling next to him. She nodded in the direction of the sounds outside. “I’m pretty sure we can kick their asses,” she said. “What’s your take?”

  Henry cracked a smile. “That’s our entire plan.”

  “I like the plan, River Rat.”

  “Remember the bullies back in school? Well, they probably didn’t mess with you very much. But you know what they hate most, right?”

  Nikki thought for a moment. “Being ignored.”

  Henry stared into the flames. “Exactly.”

  “It also makes them more angry,” Nikki said. “Just saying.”

  Henry laughed that time. “True, but that’s when they usually screw up.” He looked over at her as she hunched forward to stare at the fire, her arms wrapped around her knees. “Doing okay?”

  “Doing great,” Nikki said. “How about you?”

  “Yeah, I kind of like this. We need something like it at Halfway House, don’t you think? Cozy library. Crackling fire. Demented spirits whispering threats through the walls.”

  Nikki burst out laughing, something she didn’t do often. Henry had kept working on that and it seemed the plan was finally working.

  “Yeah, totally,” she said. “We could add Joseph psycho-face as an attraction too.”

  “Just what I was thinking. We could prop him up in a closet and wheel him out on Halloween.”

  Nikki snorted and pressed her forehead to her knees as she laughed again. “Oh, my God. Stop!”

  She shoved him lightly with her shoulder. Henry leaned into her, shoving her in return. Outside, the wind rose to a shriek, knowing and angry. Down the hall, the rapping on the front door pounded louder, more urgently.

  “I think we pissed off the bullies,” Nikki said.

  Henry put his arm around her. “But they’re still outside, right?”

  Even as he said it, Henry wondered how long it might be before they got in. Not into the house, but into their minds, dragging them further under. He felt sure this was what they’d been warned about. That “everything is about to change” meant as much inside them as around them. So, he went with a hunch.

  “Tell me about something you really loved last time,” Henry said. “Tell me about the thing you loved most.”

  Nikki turned away from the fire, her eyes meeting his. “Why?”

  “Just because,” Henry said. “Got something better to do?”

  Nikki smiled and thought for a moment. “You mean something, not someone. Right?”

  “Yeah, just that,” Henry said.

  “It was dancing,” Nikki said. “But you knew that, right?”

  Henry nodded. “Sure. That’s what I thought. But what did it feel like? What made you love it so much?”

  Nikki sighed. After a moment, she leaned in and rested her head against his shoulder. She watched flames leap in the fireplace and Henry breathed in the scent of her hair while her ribs expanded with each breath.

  “Weightless,” Nikki said. “When I got it right, I felt weightless. Like I was flying through the air. In those moments, when all that training and all those rehearsals came together, it felt like I was outside my own body. The entire world seemed to just disappear. I know that probably doesn’t seem to make sense but that’s how it felt. Every so often—just now and then—I knew I’d reached the next level. It wasn’t like I even had to try, not in those moments. I just flew. Nothing else mattered. Nothing on earth.”

  “That sounds amazing,” Henry said.

  Nikki rubbed her eyes. “It was.”

  “You’ll do it again.”

  Nikki took a deep breath. She rubbed her eyes. “Do you think so?”

  “I know so.”

  Neither of them spoke for a moment and Henry imagined Nikki must have been thinking about those long-ago times in her last life. He wondered if he shouldn’t have asked, if maybe doing so had made her feel sad. But when he looked over at her, she smiled back at him.

  “What about you?” she said. “What was the thing you loved most?”

  Henry thought about how he’d once drawn with colored pencils, how he’d created comics in notebooks he’d kept under his bed. Old discarded notebooks from the previous year at school. That had been a long time ago and he’d forgotten about them as time had passed, even then, when he’d been in that realm. Where were those notebooks now? Had his parents found them after he left? Henry hoped they’d smiled, maybe even laughed at those crazy drawings created by the kid he used to be. He really hoped they hadn’t cried but suspected they must have. Still, thinking of those moments when he’d been immersed in that world of his childish imagination brought a feeling of remembered contentment now. Long ago, a little boy had drawn the world inside his imagination and had been felt completely at peace.

  “This might sound weird but I think it was the idea of the future,” Henry said. “Ironic, I know, all things considered.”

  Nikki spoke softly. “What do you mean?”

  “Well, first of all, I don’t mean that in a sad way. My life was pretty awesome. I was basically just a happy kid. But I really liked to paint and draw back then. I was thinking I might go into design. But there was another part of me that also thought I might even take it farther and become an architect when I grew up. I really loved that idea, that maybe someday down the road I might contribute in some way that made the world a better place.”

  “That’s really cool,” Nikki said. “You never told me that before.”

  Henry kept his eyes on the fire, his voice soft now too. “
I never told anyone. Looking back, I realize it was just the seed of an idea. I think I was just barely aware of it myself. At least, consciously. It seems funny to think that you could get to know your old self better after ending that life, but I think that’s kind of what’s happened. Like, there were these dreams I wasn’t even aware of. I mean, actual dreams I had when I was sleeping. In them, I used to see tall, gleaming buildings made of glass, with trees growing on these huge balconies to provide oxygen and shade, the buildings themselves powered by the sun. Stuff like that I didn’t remember when I woke up.”

  “Damn, River Rat, that’s really cool.”

  Henry smiled, remembering. Somehow, it didn’t seem long ago even though so much had changed.

  “Yeah, it was,” he said. “Don’t get me wrong. It’s not like I feel bad about it now or anything. But I had these cool things I imagined back then.”

  “I bet you become an awesome architect someday,” Nikki said. “Someone who makes the world better for everyone.”

  Henry settled back more against the sofa and Nikki did too. Outside, it had grown quiet, at least for now, which Henry had somehow suspected it would. That was the hunch he’d gone with. The fire had died down a bit, flickering steadily now. Henry guessed it would offer them a few more hours of warmth and comfort.

  “What do we do now?” Nikki said, her voice fading and her head still resting against his shoulder.

  Henry glanced over at her to see that she’d closed her eyes. He closed his eyes too, hoping she’d dream of dancing, flying weightless as the entire world disappeared.

  7

  In the Garden

  Michelle’s eyes shot open in the dark. She’d just heard it again. The footsteps clicking on the stairs, the sound of someone taking deep mournful breaths. As if weeping, she thought, as she had so many nights before. This was the sound of someone grieving, gasping for air as her lungs convulsed.

  “Mommy!” Michelle’s daughter called out from down the hall.

  Each night, they left the bathroom light on in the hallway. The left closet lights on in bedrooms. But lights only chased away things you imagined.

  “Mom, I hear her again too!”

  Her son this time.

  Michelle heard their small feet slapping against the hardwood floors, racing in her direction. She threw off her blankets and sat up. Next to her, Caleb stirred, once again fighting for sleep, hoping this thing that kept happening would somehow just stop.

  Part of Michelle agreed with his continued attempts at denial. It wasn’t possible, not in real life. This wasn’t a movie and houses didn’t have ghosts. Those were just stories.

  Footsteps couldn’t sound on stairs when no one placed their feet upon them.

  Crying couldn’t be heard without a person nearby crying.

  “Mom, she’s in the hall!”

  “I heard her on the stairs too. I really did!”

  Small bodies launched themselves into Michelle’s bed and she wrapped her arms around her children. “It’s okay,” she whispered. She stroked hair and smoothed brows. “It’s okay. It’s just the wind. And that old furnace. Mom and Dad will have that looked at.”

  But what she told them wasn’t true. It wasn’t the wind. It wasn’t the house either. It was something that had happened here. Something that kept happening, over and over. Michelle pulled her children close and they nestled into her. She ran her hands down their backs, whispering that everything was fine, that there was nothing to be afraid of, that it was just their imagination.

  She knew she was lying.

  ~~~

  The doorbell rang and her eyes sprang open to daylight. Nikki shook her head briskly, trying to wake up. She’d been dreaming about a woman comforting her children. Michelle. In the dream, her name had been Michelle. Nikki had felt her fear and her children’s fear as well.

  The doorbell rang again, echoing in the hall. Nikki saw the foyer inside her mind, that large space full of polished mahogany. Henry rustled into wakefulness beside her. He opened his eyes, his arm still around her shoulders.

  In his gaze, Nikki saw the same question she was asking herself. Who was at the door? How could anyone be at the door?

  We’re in the dream, Nikki told herself, but that didn’t make her feel any better. She’d just been dreaming of someone else’s life. And she and Henry had just shared their old dreams. Dreams surrounded her now.

  A knock sounded on the door now. Not the same knocking as last night. A light rapping that sounded somehow friendly rather than the insistent pounding of someone trying to frighten them.

  “I think someone’s really there,” Nikki said.

  Henry nodded, blinking as he continued to wake up. Neither of them said anything more as they got to their feet and left the room.

  From the hallway, Nikki saw half of a girl’s silhouette in the windows framing the front door, windows she hadn’t noticed last night in the darkness. In fact, light streamed through those widows now suggesting a beautiful day outside. Nikki felt pretty sure she knew who was at the door.

  A moment later, the knocking sounded again. “Is anyone home? It’s Rose, your neighbor!”

  “This should be interesting,” Henry said.

  As they approached the door, Nikki happened to glance into a mirror hanging on the wall. She took a sudden breath and stopped. “Henry, look.”

  He stopped and turned toward the mirror.

  “Do you see it too?” Nikki asked.

  “Okay, that’s strange.”

  So, he did see it. Nikki took another moment to stare at the two of them reflected in the glass, no longer teenagers. Not here, evidently, in Rose’s dream. Nikki somehow understood what she was seeing. She saw herself and Henry as Rose imagined them—suddenly in their early twenties. Maybe mid-twenties, Nikki couldn’t be sure. Henry stood dressed in jeans and a light green golf shirt, his hair now short with just a bit of length where it touched the top of his ears. Nikki herself wore a crisp sundress with a light floral pattern, her own hair tied back in a ponytail.

  Henry started walking toward the door again. “Martha did say everything would be different.”

  “She wasn’t kidding. Do we look like that when Rose isn’t around?”

  “No idea,” Henry said. “I didn’t even notice that mirror last night with all the weird stuff going on. Kind of over the top, if you ask me. Hope they didn’t mind us not being scared.” He placed his hand on the doorknob and raised his eyebrows questioningly.

  Nikki understood his meaning and she nodded. “Here we go again.”

  Henry opened the door and Rose smiled at them. “Hi, I hope I’m not intruding.”

  Nikki had noticed yesterday how Rose spoke more formally than she would have expected for someone her age. She wasn’t sure if that was due to the era in which Rose imagined herself still living or because she’d been wealthy. Probably both was Nikki’s guess.

  Nikki smiled. “Not at all. Please come in.” The words sounded stiff to her own ears, falsely mature. But she wondered if, at least for now, it might be a good idea to try speaking in a similar way.

  Rose looked back and forth between them “Are you sure? I can come back some other time if it’s more convenient.”

  “It’s absolutely fine,” Henry said, apparently also deciding to keep things a little formal. “We weren’t busy at all.”

  He opened the door wider and Rose stepped into the foyer. She looked around but Nikki couldn’t tell from her expression what she was thinking. Or, for that matter, what she saw, although she assumed Rose saw the same space with its old, dark wood and the ornately carved staircase.

  “Sorry, I meant to ask for your phone number yesterday,” Rose said. “Anyway, it’s not like you were hard to find since this house has been on the market. How do you like it so far?”

  “We love it,” Nikki said, trying not to think about the sounds they’d heard the night before trying to warn them off.

  “I was wondering who might buy it. I’m so glad
it was the two of you. Originally, Joseph and I were going to find a new home of our own but we decided to stay here for the time being. Anyway, it will be refreshing to have another young couple in the neighborhood.”

  “We’re so glad to be here too.” Nikki started walking down the hall toward the kitchen and Rose followed. “It seems like such a nice place to live.”

  They entered the kitchen, its counters now cluttered with boxes. More boxes stood stacked against the wall in corners. For a moment, Nikki was confused. The boxes hadn’t been there last night, she felt sure of it. But they were in Rose’s dream, she reminded herself. Things could shift at any moment.

  “When are people arriving to unpack for you?” Rose said.

  Henry shrugged. “We thought we’d just do it ourselves.”

  Rose placed her hands on her hips and scanned the room. “Wow. That’s a lot of work. But I guess that way you make this house your own, right?”

  “Exactly,” Nikki said. She made eye contact with Henry and willed herself not to smirk. “Henry and I want things to be perfect. The best way to guarantee that is by doing it together. Right, honey?”

  Nikki achieved her desired result. Henry’s face burned red. He shoved his hands into his pockets and stared at the boxes, apparently speechless.

  “That’s really neat,” Rose said. “I think it’s…cool.”

  Rose’s hesitation wasn’t lost on Nikki. It seemed like Rose wanted to be someone other than who she was. Or, at least, she’d once wanted that when she’d still been living her last life. Nikki knew so little about her but she knew enough to guess that Rose’s life had been mostly a lonely one. Had she ever been allowed to be truly young?

  “We think it’s totally cool,” Nikki said.

  Rose giggled uncertainly. “Totally cool,” she repeated. “I like that. Do you two enjoy pop music?”

  Nikki refused to meet Henry’s eyes this time, afraid she might snort. “Do you mean, like, rock?” Even as she said it, Nikki wondered about her phrasing.

  Rose cocked her head and studied Nikki, then smiled again. “Yes, rock and roll. Do you like it? It’s really popular right now but—” Rose rolled her eyes and gestured with her head to indicate the world outside these walls “—people around here can be a little slow to catch on, if you know what I mean.”