Swift by Heather London Page A

see him again and maybe prove to him that I wasn’t a head case. Or maybe I wanted to prove it to myself. The few times I had been in his presence, I had practically killed myself by walking out in front of a car, become mute when we were introduced, acted like a crazed person looking for him at Omega’s, and played a klutzy idiot at the library. Yes, I definitely had to prove it to myself that I was not totally losing it.
    “Sure, I’ll try my best,” I said. “But I really don’t know if I’ll be much help.”
    “Really?” Her face lit up in excitement.
    “I’m with my aunt right now, but I could come by—”
    “Tomorrow,” she said, cutting me off and finishing my sentence. “That will actually work out perfectly. It will give me more time to prepare; you know, clean up the rooms and put some plastic down,” she rambled happily.
    I was not sure why she was so oddly excited; it was just an afternoon of choosing paint colors. Maybe she’s just missing having a friend, I concluded.
    “How’s noon?” she questioned, her voice high with excitement.
    “Noon is good.” I nodded, already starting to feel a little uneasy about agreeing to it.
    “Are you familiar with the estates on the edge of town?”
    “Yeah, I know the area,” I answered. Then I realized what I had just agreed to: I had just voluntarily agreed to enter one of the houses that everyone I ever knew avoided like the plague.
    “Great. Well, it’s the third house on your left, 12 Estate Lane to be exact. See you tomorrow.” She bounced off happily, and I couldn’t help but think about how much her attitude had majorly transformed as well. It was possibly even a more dramatic change than her physical one. The first day we had met, she had looked at me like I was the nut; all the while it appears she was the one who looked to be insane.
    I met Aunt Rose at the register with an uneasy look on my face.
    “You feeling okay?” she asked as I approached her.
    “Yeah, fine,” I answered automatically, knowing deep down I truly wasn’t.
    “Who was that girl you were talking to? Someone from school?”
    “Oh, no, that was Abby,” I responded, glancing out the window to see her disappear around the corner. “She and her family are new to town—well, they are only here for the summer. They are restoring one of the houses on Estate Lane,” I explained further.
    “That’s nice,” she remarked.
    “Yeah, it should be neat to see how it turns out. She wanted some help with paint colors, so I’m going to help her choose tomorrow.”
    “That should be fun. You know, your mom always loved those houses. When we were kids she was never scared to go into them like the rest of us,” she said, probably not even realizing what she was actually saying. It was rare for Aunt Rose to speak about my mother. It hurt us both to talk about her as much as it hurt to hear about her.
    “Really? I didn’t know that,” I said. Just picturing my mom’s face made my heart ache.
    We headed back to the house and ate some leftover lasagna before I retired to my room for the evening. I was not really tired, but I was craving some alone time. The remark Aunt Rose had made about my mother had put me in a depressed mood. I’m sure she didn’t even realize it when she said it, and normally a comment like that wouldn’t stick with me like it did just then; but since I’d spent the past few nights seeing my family in my dreams, I was more sensitive than usual. Especially the dream from the other night, where we were all still happy, made me miss them even more. I lay on my bed and actually wished for another dream like that, wanting it so badly that I began to think about the last day they were alive.

 
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter Eight
    It started off like the first nightmare I had had just a few days ago: my sister and I playing hide-and-go-seek in the backyard, totally unaware of the terrible accident that lay ahead. After I had ventured into the