Chapter Twenty-Four
Twenty-Four
In tonight’s dream, we’re indoors. The space is familiar—a dimly lit house with tall ceilings and widely spaced walls, shiny marble floors, all of it with its own great big pulse.
Everything is out of balance for a second or two, and I’m unsteady, nervous, until I locate Marcus just a few feet away from me.
I grab for his hand, and he lets me, as a synth-pop song plays loud enough to fill an arena.
Kids our age are grinding and drinking, talking and making out to its soundtrack.
Marcus leads me through the party now, our fingers intertwined.
When I was a kid, my dad read me a book about being “snug as a bug in a rug,” and that’s how my hand feels now.
Snug, warm, enclosed by Marcus’s much bigger hand.
It’s a weird thought to have about Marcus, but not as weird as the agreement we made that we’d hug tonight.
Marcus is mouthing along to the music as he checks something on his phone.
“Where are we?” I shout to be heard over the music. I could swear I’ve been here before. Something about the cabinets—the color of the wood, the host of those same purple-blue poppies on the dining table, and even the giant painting of a safari on the far side of the room.
Marcus leans in closer. “What?” he yells.
“Where are we?” I say, each word accompanied by its own feeble gesture.
Marcus is too busy bopping his head to be of any help. He shrugs.
“Let’s try and figure it out!” I shout.
“Maybe?” he yells back, clearly not on the same wavelength.
This is officially the most distracted I’ve ever seen Marcus.
Probably because this party with its chaotic energy, girls in skintight clothes, and sweaty packed bodies is exactly the scene I picture him thriving in.
Grateful for our entangled hands, I take the lead now, dragging him toward the entrance of the room.
And then it hits me.
“Penny!” I shout.
Marcus just looks at me.
“Penelope Miller’s house! That’s where we are!” I’m ecstatic to have figured it out. And right on cue, as if to verify my theory, Penny comes stumbling out of the kitchen in a leather miniskirt, crop top, and tall boots. She’s laughing with a guy I don’t know.
This is the party Penny threw in the summer last year. The party I met Marcus at. But the dreams had been becoming more recent, and this is going way back to the start. Plus, there’s something odd about the house. The light of the room or the proportions or something is off. It doesn’t look right.
We keep walking around, pointing out kids from the soccer team and yearbook and student council and dance.
The people don’t look quite right either, as if we’re peering through glasses with the wrong prescription.
My head is beginning to pound in direct opposition to the music, a thunderclap of discomfort, as I tug Marcus toward a long hallway.
Boom-BOOM. Boom-BOOM. BOOM, BOOM, BOOM.
I push into the first room on the right, seeking relief. I never get headaches in the dreams.
“Oh my God!”
Two people are standing in a corner, making out. Like aggressively making out. The girl I recognize as Jazz King. The guy’s back is to me, but I don’t think anything of it. I’m about to go out and shut the door when something stops me. A low throaty laugh I recognize.
Boom-BOOM. Boom-BOOM. BOOM, BOOM, BOOM.
I’m trying to place the voice when an identical one cuts into my thoughts, only slightly less sleepy and breathy. “I really think we should—” Marcus whispers, trying to lead us out of the room. I snap to attention.
“It’s you! This is your dream!” I say, smacking his chest hard. The shaggy-haired guy making out with Jazz is Marcus.
“Oh. No way,” he says with zero conviction. He gives a half-hearted chuckle. “That explains a lot.”
“You’re such a liar,” I say, because he clearly knew from the minute we got here where in space and time we were. “Ugh, of course, this is your dream. Typical.”
“Now, Cartwright, did I judge any of those dreams where you were slobbering all over my cousin?” he says, rubbing the spot on his chest where I hit him.
It occurs to me that if this is Penny’s party on the night I met Marcus, then it’s early on that night—which is why there is no sign of me or my friends. We aren’t here yet.
“You are such a good kisser?” Jazz King says, or rather, asks Marcus.
He laughs. “I’m a man of many talents.”
“I’m double-jointed?” Jazz says. “Wanna see?”
“Nope, nope, not in this lifetime,” I say, exiting as fast as I can.
We reverse through a hallway and try to find another room to go into, but everywhere is too full and too loud.
Boom-BOOM. Boom-BOOM. BOOM, BOOM, BOOM.
Before I can head for the front door, though, I spot someone wearing a familiar cropped knitted vest, leaving one of the rooms.
“It’s Mo!” I point out to Marcus. Even though she can’t see or hear me, I’m glad to see her.
A friendly face among my wasted classmates.
As usual, Mo seems completely sober. But she’s acting strange, adjusting her top and pulling the door tightly shut behind her like she doesn’t want whatever is in there to get out.
It hits me in that moment. Our suspicions have been correct. Mo’s Zebra app is, at least, part human. As in, there’s someone she’s been hiding.
“Ohhh.”
“Who’s she with?” Marcus asks, at the same time I freeze.
“Hold on,” I say. “She told me she wasn’t allowed to come to this party.”
Marcus looks at me, so I continue. “Ambs and I are going to show up later, but Mo never comes out tonight because her grandparents didn’t let her. So how is…she…”
I’m already looking at the door she shut before it even starts to swing open. I’m anticipating the person coming out of the room, the person who has been in there with Mo.
Jason.
Jason has been in there with Mo.
He comes out of the room and immediately slams into Josh Faraday.
“Yo, dude! Where you been?” Josh asks as Jason distractedly slaps his back. “What have you been doing, or should I say who have you…”
Jason smacks the back of Josh’s head, but they’re both laughing. “Go to hell.”
I bend to the ground because the world does not feel steady.
“Zadie,” Marcus says, dropping down beside me, but I can’t look at him. Can’t talk. Can’t breathe.
I spring up from the ground, race through the hallway and through the kitchen and out the front door.
Relief from the noise and the putrid air and the general too muchness of everything floods me as I slump onto the concrete and gasp desperately for oxygen. More oxygen. More.
I face away from the streetlights as I collapse in a heap on the steps and knead my temples with my thumbs. This is the first time a migraine has really followed me into the dream like this.
“What do you need me to do?” Marcus asks, voice a whisper. “Do you need water? Do you need…What do you need?”
“Mo and Jason” is all I can say. “That’s what all this leads to.”
A hundred pieces fall together in my mind. Mo never quite trusting Jason. Her fury when we thought he was cheating with Alana. Mo having a mystery guy. Maybe Mo is the girl Jason really bought this ring for.
Marcus helps me up then, pulls me into a ferocious hug. “Come here,” he whispers into my hair. I am solid at first, resistant, and then I melt into it.
“She’s my best friend. This doesn’t make any sense.”
My head is resting on his chest. I can hear his heartbeat. It’s fast and choppy and loud. It’s not like Jason’s. Jason’s heart is rhythmic and steady, but Marcus’s arms feel safe.
I nuzzle even closer to him, enjoying the feel of him, the roughness of his unshaven face on my cheek, the warmth radiating off him.
It has always been Jason for me. From the very beginning, even during these dreams where I’ve seen thing after thing that makes me question him. I haven’t wavered. But now I realize it doesn’t have to be this way. It never had to be this way. I am so tired of it being this way.
“Marcus.”
He looks down at me at the exact moment I stand on my tiptoes and kiss him.
He’s completely not expecting it. “Fuck,” he says, stumbling backward, but a second later, he kisses me back, gruff and hungry and impatient.
Marcus kisses like he has everything to lose. As with so much else, he is not disciplined or strategic, and his hand trembles as it cradles my jaw.
“Zadie.”
The kiss is messy and full of wanting and confusion. It is the most honest kiss I’ve ever gotten or given.
“Not like this,” Marcus whispers even as he keeps kissing me, our mouths roaming and incautious.
“Mmm,” I respond.
I wrap my arms around him more fully, slipping my hands under his coat.
“Zadie.” He takes a step back. “Fuck.”
He pushes a hand through his hair. “Not like this.”
I blink as I come back to reality, like I’m squinting against sunlight. “Like what?”
“Not when Mo and Jason and…”
“It doesn’t matter,” I say, reaching for the collar of his shirt again. “I don’t care.”
“You do care,” Marcus says, and all of a sudden he is angry. “Who am I to you?”
I frown. “What?”
“Me. Who am I to you?”
“Marcus Riddick?” I say. “Don’t be weird.”
“And who is that? Who is Marcus Riddick?”
I search for words, unable to understand why we stopped kissing for this. “Soccer player. You read books and carve birds. And, I don’t know, you’re Jason’s cousin…”
“That’s right. I’m Jason’s cousin. You’re kissing me, but how do I know it’s not because you can’t have him? Tell me I’m not a stand-in, a backup plan.”
I stare at him and open my mouth to speak, but no sound comes out.
The disappointment in Marcus’s face is devastating, and I start to argue. “No, this isn’t just about Jason. I like you. I liked you first.”
But Marcus looks at me like he can’t hear me.
And then after a second, I realize it’s because he can’t.
There’s a blurry haze surrounding him, keeping him separate from me. Because soon we’re dissolving, both of us breaking into less and less until there’s nothing left of either of us.