The Rising Read online

  “Your friend isn’t an old spirit. She’s your opposite: ditsy and off kilter. You’re much too strong and intelligent to be friends with someone like her.”

  Her bluntness astonished me. A warmth spread through me that sent anger shooting up and out of my mouth before I had the time to catch it. “You don’t know anything about her – or me, for that matter. Watch your tongue, old woman,” I said coolly. She howled with amusement. What was with my rude comments lately? Ever since last Friday when I was attacked, I haven’t been able to control my anger. Not that I’m an angry person to begin with; more bitter than anything.

  “That’ll be $95.15,” the woman said, still hacking up one cackle after another.

  My mouth fell open at the total. I hadn’t bothered to look at the prices as I took them from Cindy. Glancing at them now, I noticed the high-quality leather and craftsmanship of each book, and remembered the mystery one was handwritten; I should have been more careful.

  “I can’t afford any of these books. I’m sorry,” I mumbled, still annoyed with her despite this sudden embarrassing twist. I backed away from the counter to leave.

  “This one’s free,” she called out.

  I turned to see the book in her hands, the one with the blank cover and handwritten Latin inside. It was the only one I had really wanted. A book that old should be expensive, right? I nodded and snatched it from her hands. I found her watching me, and to my surprise, she looked worried. An eeriness filled the air as I rushed out of the door, hoping to put as much space between us as possible.

  “Lamia, don’t do it!” The old woman called to me from the shop’s doorway. She stood motionless for a moment as we stared at one another out on the sidewalk, five yards apart. “Don’t look for Micah, and don’t trust him. He will kill you!” she yelled, her voice shaking.

  What the hell was she talking about? I took a few steps toward her, and she immediately shifted and slammed the bookstore’s door. A moment later, the lights inside switched off.

  Who is Micah, and how did she know who I was? The wind rushed up around me like icy fingers grabbing at my face, beckoning me to turn into the wind. I grunted loudly, book in hand, and trudged home, hoping I wouldn’t be frozen to the bone before I got there.

  ✽✽✽

  When I got to work the next morning and didn’t see Cindy waiting for me, I was relieved, and tempted to avoid her for the rest of forever. Yesterday made her uncomfortable, and I feared what she’d think of me now after purchasing that book. It was obvious she was afraid of something after that book literally fell into my hands. Maybe she’ll act distant now, think I’m weird, and I don’t know if I can handle that. I couldn’t bear to open the book last night after the incident at the bookstore, after that woman knew my name and offered it to me. What if it’s cursed? What if something happened to me when I read it? At lunch, I sat alone. I hadn’t seen Cindy yet, so she must have worked through lunch. I wondered if she did so because she didn’t want to see me. I stared at my chocolate pudding. I couldn’t help the voice in my head telling me it wasn’t the book that made her uncomfortable. Maybe I make everyone I get close to uncomfortable. I threw away what lunch I didn’t finish, regretting the wasted money I’d spent on it.

  “Come on, Cindy,” I heard as I exited the break room. I looked over as I passed through the door and saw Cindy struggling to escape Mark, who had her pinned in a corner with his hand on the wall.

  “I’m sorry. I just –"

  “You don’t have to be shy; it’s just dinner,” he said, getting closer. How did he have the balls to do this at work? Others glanced at Cindy and Mark but kept walking. Were people blind? This was obviously sexual harassment.

  “Mark, I’m –”

  “It’s dinner, he doesn’t have to know,” he said, smiling.

  I pushed my way to Cindy. I can’t believe I worked with some of these people. I watched them continue walking from the break room to the warehouse, ignoring what they saw. Soon I was the only one left in the hall aside from the two of them. Cindy saw me and tensed. I shoved Mark’s wrist away a little harder than I’d intended, but it worked. He took a step backward.

  “You OK?” I asked her. She practically jumped into my arms. Her trembling ignited an animosity for Mark that blazed through my limbs. I glared at him as she let go and took my hand. He looked pissed as all hell, but standing my ground wouldn’t be hard. That heavy heat that kept working its way up whenever I got angry returned, amping me up the longer I stared at him. I debated which route to take, whether I should lie and tell him Cindy and I were together or the truth, that Cindy had a fiancé. If this got pushed higher up into management, it would only help my case if I were honest.

  “She’s not into you, Mark. She keeps denying you, she has a fiancé, and a child with said fiancé, so stop,” I said. His face burned red as his eyes bore into me. He wasn’t getting out of this now.

  “Just go get lunch, OK? I’ll see you after work,” I said, gripping her hand tight before letting go.

  “What business is it of yours what Cindy and I discuss during our off time? If she wants me to stop, she’d tell me,” he grumbled with a laugh, challenging me. I raised my eyebrows. As I thought about possibly decking him, that’s when I saw the camera on the ceiling and was reminded of the fight that happened last month in this same spot. Two guys from my section fought in view of the security cameras, and both were fired. I took a step closer to him and pointed out the camera at the corner of the door.

  “That right there is recording us, Mark. You just harassed Cindy, I’m a witness, and now I have proof. Do it again, and I will report you. They will have no reason to keep you – valued employee or not, you’re on camera. Now leave Cindy alone.” My voice was low as I gave one last threatening look before turning and walking back to my section.

  Once out of Mark’s sight, my body trembled with leftover energy as I thought about the possibility of getting fired for talking like that to him, since he had so much pull here. Once in the warehouse, I leaned against the wall and took a few deep breaths, clenching my shaking hand as I collected myself again.

  I stood up for a lot of kids growing up. When other kids’ bullies weren’t attacking me, I had my own who would beat me to a pulp. When high school came around and I grew more invisible by keeping completely to myself, I found it easy to stand up for others, regardless of the repercussions. I never fought back because it looked better when school administrators watched the altercation later on the security tape. I’d still get punished for being involved, but I never let it bother me. It made me happy to help others. I often give what I never receive in hopes that maybe one day the favor will find its way back to me.

  I looked for Cindy out on the street after work to make sure she was OK, but I didn’t see her. Maybe she had gone home early after what happened. Maybe she was avoiding me. I hoped she was all right and that nothing else happened with Mark McAsshole.

  Small, white lint balls floated in the air under the streetlights. I sped up as they came down in bunches and bit at my nose. Snow was the devil. This much about the world, I knew. Every year, I slipped on ice at least four times, and the slipperiness only increased every time I was caught outside without snow boots. I focused on my black work boots, which had deep scuffs at the toes but the steel underneath was colored in with permanent marker to make them look decent. The only way to keep warm in these was doubling up on socks. As stubborn as I was, I knew these were cheap, trashed shoes wouldn’t handle a Wisconsin winter. I seriously had to consider getting Midwest-certified snow gear.

  My war against the weather officially begun, my next check would have to be spent on a heater for the apartment. My battle to fix the heat was hopeless, no matter how many times I called and pounded on my landlord’s door. It had been broken since I moved in nearly four months ago, though the landlord promised to fix it back then. I didn’t need it in August, but I would have expected it to be fixed by now. I had to deal with it myself, and I don’t hav
e the money to go elsewhere – not to mention my lease. My remaining money will go to boots, an actual jacket, and gloves, or I would surely freeze to death. I had a nice jacket, but it was buried in a box somewhere in my ex-foster parents’ basement, along with old blankets I forgot to look for before I left. My leaving happened suddenly, after a large blowout fight that lead to me scrambling to pack my bags as quickly as possible. I never had the guts to go back there and beg for my old things that were surely now boxed in their basement. It was all secondhand anyway and nothing that I truly cared for. Except the blankets. How I’d kill for those now.

  Once I was inside the apartment building, the cold wasn’t unbearable ... until I got to 12E. Icicles could have been forming on my furniture. The hallway was warmer, and I contemplated either sleeping out there or leaving the door open to invite heat inside. I grumbled and shut the door. There was no point in taking off any of my clothes since they were warmer than anything else in this apartment. Throwing my bag onto the kitchen counter, I plucked some coins from my change bowl, pulled my comforter from the bed, and pocketed my keys before heading down to the basement laundry room. The only way to warm myself was to warm my blanket in the dryer, which I did sometimes in the winter at my foster parents’ house when they weren’t home. Lying in bed with a warm blanket could make me instantly fall asleep.

  On the way down to the basement, I could hear nothing more than blaring TVs through the wall from the surrounding residences. It was 11 at night, so I figured I’d have the building essentially to myself. Rows of washers and dryers lined the walls. Two chairs sat in the corner beside a basket of outdated Better Homes and Gardens magazines. One washer was already in use, and the clanking of the machine made me anxious: I didn’t want to run into anyone tonight, so I moved quickly, opening the last dryer on the other end and shoving my comforter into it. I added my socks and the sweater under my jacket. Closing the rickety door, I slid the quarters into the slot and started it. It rumbled loudly and began to spin with a clank. I couldn’t wait to be warm.

  The perk of these dryers is that they got your clothes super-hot. Most people left their clothes in for an hour after they stopped to let them cool, but I never did. I liked them hot. I glanced at the dusty magazines that hadn’t been touched in a hundred years and picked up the one with a giant Christmas tree on the front. I shook it out, making the dust flop onto the floor. I flipped through the pages and observed the lame ads with staged pictures of happy, fake families decorating trees. I dropped the magazine back into the basket, causing a mushroom cloud of dust to tickle my nose. I coughed and scooted my chair toward the wall.

  Feet shuffled on the concrete steps. I hoped it wasn’t someone social. I was relieved to see a decrepit woman, maybe in her 70s, turn the corner. She wore purple slippers and a gray robe. She looked surprised to see me but didn’t say anything. She carried a round, black laundry basket that looked like it had been through the ringer and pulled her wet laundry out of the washer, humming a song as she transferred her clothes into the dryer and popped in quarters. When the dryer rumbled, she turned and spotted the empty chair and then regarded me, as if contemplating waiting here for her laundry to dry. She shuffled to the chair, making it creek under her weight. I crossed my arms and slouched. She mimicked my motion and looked at the magazines, decided against them, and chose to stare at the dryer warming her clothes. I could be this lady in sixty years. She reminded me of Gramma Beth, but grouchier, with that permanent frown on her face. Would I forever be living here? Wrinkled, old, and maybe owning a cat as my sole company. My life would be the same never-ending isolation.

  My dryer let out a long beep telling me my sentence was over. I quickly stood and yanked open the door. I took out my baked goods from the hot oven and pulled on my socks and sweater before piling my comforter, deliciously hot, into my cold arms.

  “No heat?” she asked. I turned to her and nodded. “I was there once. It gets better,” she said with an almost-smile. I smiled back and walked to the doorway.

  “If the cold ever gets to be too much to bear, you can always come to my apartment. 9E. You can sleep on the couch, if you need it. Fair warning, though: I have cats,” she said as I turned the corner. I stopped and backed up toward the room again.

  “Thank you,” I said, and she actually smiled and nodded before motioning me to go.

  “Better get that blanket back on your bed before it loses all its warmth,” she said, and I ran up the stairs. Sweet Jesus, she was me from the future. There was no doubt about that. I could see myself reaching out to teens late at night in the laundry room to come visit because I was tired of talking to my cats. She only lived three doors from me, yet I had never seen her before. But I made no effort to talk to my neighbors.

  Once inside my room, I threw my blanket on the bed and pulled off my shoes. I jumped onto my bed and wrapped myself like a sad burrito. I thought about the old lady, who turned out to be nice. No one had ever offered something like that to me before. As I snuggled into the warmth of the fabric, I thought about visiting her tomorrow. Before I knew it, I was falling asleep.

  ✽✽✽

  What the hell am I doing in the alley? I looked up to see my apartment window was open. How did I get here? Did I jump? That’s two stories. I would have broken a leg, at the very least. My limbs grew heavy as my body hummed with fear. When I peered out toward the street, two figures stood there, about thirty feet away. Their blue orbs glowed in the darkness. The two figures floated toward me, holding strange blades in their hands. I swallowed hard and watched in horror. The panic swelled in my chest as I knew there was nowhere to go, no way to get out, and that this was the end. These creatures were the last things I would see. They wanted me dead, and I had no way to fight back.

  Someone seized my hand. As soon as fingers threaded with mine, I felt as though I were literally on fire. I turned to see him, standing there, looking at me, his long, white hair tousled and covering part of his face. He looked worried as he nodded, tightening his grip on my hand. What was he doing here?

  “She is one of us,” my attacker said, his hand held up to stop them.

  The blue-eyed figures were only a few feet away, not listening, arms above their heads, ready to come down on me with their swords. He grabbed and cocooned me against himself, wrapping me up tightly in his embrace. Soon after, I felt him shudder as their blades went into him instead. Sirens filled my ears as everything went black.

  Four.

  THE JERK OF MY BODY woke me as I gasped. Was I dreaming? Or was this a nightmare? My brain felt scrambled, but one thing was clear: I saw something just before I woke. I had my first dream. I saw those monsters and the angel guy, my attacker. He was protecting me. Why? I jumped out of bed at the sound of real sirens coming from outside, the cold floor stabbed at the soles of my feet like splinters as I moved.

  Did this really happen?

  I ran into the living room and looked out in the limited light. There was no one in the alley beneath my window, but if I craned my head enough I could see the road at the mouth of the ally. There was a squad car parked there. I reached for my phone in my backpack to check the time: three in the morning. What was going on? The squad car’s lights cascaded off the brick building across the alley and illuminated my apartment.

  Now I was too awake and hot to fall back asleep. I stripped off my sweat shirt and laid my skin on the concrete floor. As soon as I made contact, I felt like a sizzling egg in a frying pan. This heat was similar to the night I was attacked. Could it be a coincidence? I could hear neighbors walking back and forth in the hallway as I cooled down. Maybe it was a drug bust or raid or someone was sick. There were a lot of elderly people in this building.

  As I gave up on hearing what the police were doing, I replayed the pieces of my nightmare: the alley, floating black figures, bright blue glowing dots staring at me, swords, Angle guy's face, his eyes, his hand in mine. It felt like he was holding my hand for real – like he had been right there, lying next to me
as I dreamed. Do all dreams feel so real? Did he die in my dream? I felt him shudder as the swords hit, when he sacrificed himself. She is one of us. What does that mean? Earlier, he’d tried to kill me, so why would I dream of something like that?

  I forced my disturbing shift of feelings for angel guy out of my head as my body temperature returned to normal. I wasn’t tired, but I knew I would be exhausted tomorrow if I didn’t try to get more sleep. I dressed again before shuffling back to my room. Thankfully, my blanket was still warm. I cocooned myself within it and closed my eyes. I thought about angel guy and envisioned the two of us fighting side by side. I imagined using one of the swords to stab the creatures in the creepy blue holes in their heads. I snorted a little at my imagination, which had me looking like a badass.

  “In visions of the dark night

  I have dreamed of joy departed –

  But a waking dream of life and light

  Hath left me broken-hearted.”

  – Edgar Allan Poe

  Five.

  HIS NAME IS MICAH.

  The shopkeeper had told me my assailant’s name. I hadn’t understood what she meant at the time, but when I woke and put it all together, I wasted no time pulling out my sketchpad. I needed to draw him again. I needed to get his face right. The words of that woman spoke swirled in my head like a nasty hurricane.

  Don’t go looking for Micah. Don’t trust him. He’ll kill you. I sketched his hand in mine. Once I was done with that, I had enough room on the paper to shade in two figures with glowing blue orbs. Like a madwoman, my hands flew across the paper. When I finished the creatures and their strange blades, I flipped the page and drew Micah’s eyes, then his messy hair and half covered face. It turned out better than expected.

  As I shifted the pencil between my fingers, I thought about how this ghost of a man haunted my life. Obsessing made me nauseated. How could someone I met for only five minutes, who happened to be attacking me, have this much sway in my everyday thoughts and dreams? I have never dreamed – never – and my first dream was of my almost-murderer protecting me from bizarre dark creatures who were out to kill me. She is one of us. It all made less and less sense as time went on. I took my time finishing a stray hair against his cheek, I glanced at the clock and saw I was almost late for work.