Chapter 28 Mariella
“Ta-da,” Anna says, pushing me in front of the full-length mirror in her living room.
She’s spent the last hour tweezing, curling and styling, all to prepare me for tonight’s psychology ball.
A transformed girl stands before me. My beautiful navy dress plunges indecently low on my chest, loose curls falling around my face, makeup contoured to perfection.
My blue-brown eyes are enhanced with smoky eyeshadow, my lips a creamy pink.
Anna’s even managed to hide the bags under my eyes.
“Well, what do you think?” Anna asks.
“I love it. Thanks Anna.”
“No problem, babe. I’m going to put my dress on,” she says, ducking into her bedroom.
Laughter in the corridor draws my attention to our front door, my mind jumping to Parker and Rose’s door opposite.
During the first two weeks of their absence, I occasionally knocked on their door in the hope they’d returned.
Now, resigned to disappointment, I don’t bother.
It’s been months since I’ve seen either of them.
Thanksgiving and Christmas came and went. Why didn’t Parker say goodbye?
I’m desperate to talk to him about my conversation with Silas. I knew Rose and Parker were in trouble, but I never found out who they were running from.
I yawn while I wait for Anna to dress. She’s stopped asking about my nightmares, even though my screaming wakes her every other night.
My vivid dreams have intensified in Parker and Rose’s absence, playing on repeat during my sleeping hours.
My mother by the ocean, Parker kissing me, followed by my nightmare—the violent booming and suffocating darkness before an unsettling silence descends.
I wake with my heart pounding in my chest and electricity racing through my body.
That smooth, deep voice ringing in my head, “I love you, Mariella.” Those emotion-laced words echo through my mind as Anna returns in her dress.
“Anna, you look stunning.”
“I know,” she says, beaming. “Hey, it’s not a big deal, but did you go through the closet in my room?”
“No, why?”
“A few things were in the wrong place.” She waves her hand. “It was probably me last night. I was pretty drunk.” She eyes me up and down with a knowing smile. “You ready?”
“Drink,” Anna screams, pointing a black fingernail at Emma’s date, a tall, red-haired guy in a velvet suit.
We’re on the third round of a drinking game in our apartment common area, waiting for our limo to collect us for the ball.
The group is borderline drunk, and almost no one notices the tall, temperamental woman dressed in black who storms past. She disappears down the corridor, leaving a trail of white, apple-scented mist in her wake.
“I’ll be back,” I tell Anna, springing up to follow Rose. I step out into the corridor and scan the empty space for Parker. Rose stands alone outside my apartment, her long, dark brown hair tied back in a messy low ponytail.
“Can we talk inside?” she asks.
“Sure.” I let her in and shut the door.
Her tired, onyx gaze slides over me. “You look… nice. Or whatever.”
My hands wrap around my bare arms. “Thanks. There’s a ball on tonight.”
Rose nods and checks her watch. We stand in awkward silence, avoiding each other’s direct line of sight. I have so many questions I want to ask her. “Where is he?” I blurt.
Rose tucks her hands into her hoodie and turns toward the sofa, taking in the colorful items of clothing draped around Anna’s living area. “Parker isn’t with me anymore.”
The energy within my stomach dissipates. “I don’t understand. Did he get his powers back?”
“That doesn’t concern you,” she says coolly.
“Yes, it does,” I fire back. “He promised to take me to see my mother. To find out if she was a time traveler.”
Rose whips around and strides toward me, the tendons in her neck taut. “Time travel isn’t genetic. Leave the past alone and accept you won’t see Parker until you’re recruited to Neurovida.”
I study her butchered nails and the dark rings under her eyes. Is she trying not to shake? “Is that his decision or yours?” Rose scoffs, and I step toward her. “What else aren’t you telling me?”
“There’s a difference between lying to you, and not telling you things you don’t need to know,” she growls, straightening her spine.
“Well, now I need to know. Because you and Parker disappeared without saying goodbye, and I’ve had police interrogating me.”
“What?” she blurts.
“They’re looking for you.”
She grabs my shoulders. “Ella, listen to me. That wasn’t the police. They don’t know Neurovida exists, or anything about time travel.”
“I promise you it was the police.” I storm into my room and return with the photo Silas gave me. “The officer showed me this.”
Her face stills as she takes the photograph from my hand. “What did you tell them?”
“Nothing. I’ve been waiting to talk to you first because I don’t know what to believe.”
“Thank fuck. Never tell anyone we were here.”
I throw my hands up in the air. “Great. So now that I’m lying to the police for you, I need answers. I’ve been having this dream, and I think I’m sub-ting.” I shake my head. Dark visions flash before my eyes and goosebumps rise along my skin. “Something about it is wrong, Rose. What happens to me?”
“Nothing,” she says, a little too quickly. Judging by the firm set of her jaw, she’ll never give me the answers I’m looking for.
I sigh. “What do you want?” The words have far less fire than I’d intended.
“I need more of your blood,” she says.
I laugh. “You’re joking. Why should I help you if you won’t even be honest with me?”
Rose closes her eyes and exhales through gritted teeth. “Because if you don’t, Parker might die. Don’t you get that? Without his powers, he’s in danger, Ella.”
So, he doesn’t have his powers back. Then where is he? “Why? Why are the police after you? I don’t understand—”
“Which is the way it should be. Jesus, Ella. Wake up. People have come here questioning you, which means you’re being watched,” she says, and the hairs on my skin prickle. “Not knowing could save you. Fuck, can’t you see I’m trying to protect you? If anything happens to you or Parker—”
She abruptly turns away from me, pressing the back of her shaking hand to her lips.
“Fuck,” she whispers. “It’s this.” She gestures around herself.
“Traveling, I mean. It’s not normal to spend so much time in the wrong year.
It’s messing with my head. I wake up, and I don’t know where I am anymore.
I can’t get more than an hour of sleep at a time because my sub-t is out of control.
It’s always worse when you’re in the wrong time.
I have nightmares all night long and when I wake, I’m in a different kind of hell, and there’s never any break. ”
Rose is killing herself for Parker, but with her hard exterior, it’s so easy to forget. “Wait here.”
I duck into my room and grab the sleeping pills I found at Silas’s place. “Maybe these will help?” I say when I return to the living area and hand them to Rose.
She rotates the bottle to read the label. “E2409. Take once at night. What are these?”
“Sleeping pills. It’s a long story, but my friend Silas booked me in with a psychiatrist. He misdiagnosed me with a sleep disorder. Drowsiness is obviously a side effect, but it also stops my sub-t. They’ll help you sleep.”
“I don’t want them,” she says, wiping her eyes.
“Take them,” I insist, stuffing the pills into her hand. “Even if you only take one every now and then—to get a good night’s sleep.”
She smiles, offering me a glimpse through her rock-hard exterior. “You know, the only reason I agreed to help Parker was for you? Because of what he meant to you, or will mean, in your future. You were the first true friend I ever had.”
“She doesn’t like accepting help.” The words Parker spoke when Rose was unwell. But all she does is help Parker. When was the last time she put herself before the needs of others?
“We might not be besties yet, but I’m still here for you, Rose. And so is Parker. He’d want to be with you.”
Rose shakes her head. “I can’t carry him with me anymore. And it’s better this way. It will be easier for us, when—” She draws in a sharp breath. “When we split.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean… after Parker gets his powers back, we’re going our separate ways,” she says, keeping her gaze low.
I step toward her. “I don’t understand. Did you two have a fight?”
Rose stares at me with wide eyes. Her voice lowers. “Not yet.” She shakes her head. “We always planned to go our separate ways, and when Parker realizes the damage we’ve done… It’s not good, Ella. He’ll leave.”
“How can you say that? He loves you, Rose.”
She shakes her head. “He doesn’t.”
“Of course he does. Every time you were sick, he would barely step outside your bedroom, let alone leave you.” I let out a humorless laugh. “I may know nothing about you, but I do know Parker, and so do you. He’d never abandon you. Have a little faith. Has he let you down before?”
Rose grimaces. “Can you just let me take your blood? McGregor says he needs it.”
I exhale. “Fine. But don’t get any blood on my dress or Anna will kill me.”
Rose grabs her bag, and we sit on the sofa while she takes six vials of my blood. When she’s done, she pulls the needle from my skin and I wince.
“Thanks,” she grunts and shoves the vials of blood into the pocket at the front of her hoodie.
Troubled thoughts tumble around in her bleak onyx gaze.
“Get on with your life. And stay away from those police.” She storms toward the front door and halts, frowning at the handle.
Her sharp gaze flickers to mine. “I’ll need to travel from here.
Now that you’re being watched…” She shakes her head, cursing under her breath.
Silence stretches between us. “Will you at least tell me where he is?” I ask, and she stiffens.
“Somewhere he can’t hurt you.”
“Parker would never hurt me,” I state.
“Every second we spend with you, in a time that isn’t ours, we are hurting you.” Squaring her shoulders, she closes her eyes and lowers her head, drawing a deep breath past her full lips.
I rush toward her. “I don’t believe that.” I can’t accept I won’t see Parker until Neurovida. “Rose, wait. When am I recruited? Please tell me. Just this once, please give me a straight answer.” I grab her forearm. “Please?”
Rose studies me for a long moment, chewing on the inside of her cheek. “Two years. You won’t see him again until then.” With a sad smile, she closes her eyes and disappears, my medication bottle forgotten on the hallway table behind her.
On the way to the ball, the limousine stops intermittently along the river as planned. Anna pulls me into a few photos with the rest of the group before I slip away and stroll beside the frozen river, the city lights twinkling in the distance.
Two years.
Two years until I’ll need to decide. Psychology or Neurovida.
Two more years of waiting, as I’ve spent my adult life to date.
Waiting those agonizing years to leave the toxic environment of boarding school.
Waiting for Silas to let me in. Waiting to start college.
Waiting to become a psychologist. To find out what happened to my mother. Waiting to be recruited to Neurovida.
And then? When am I going to stop waiting and live my life? Really live it, without fear or hesitation? How many times have Rose and Parker told me to live my life to the fullest? How many times has Anna?
I can’t keep waiting. I need to make a change, and it needs to be now. I won’t spend the next two years waiting for Parker, or Neurovida, consumed by dreams and nightmares. If I want a chance at a normal life, I need to start now.
I spend the night drinking, dancing and laughing with Anna. By the end of the night, my feet are aching from hours of assault in high heels. After sitting at a table watching Anna make out with a random guy on the dance floor for three songs, I grab my coat and stroll home alone.