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Alright, I finally got permission to post the first chapter online as a sneak peak. Enjoy!
Chapter 1
I couldn’t understand it. How could adults look back on high
school as the best years of their lives? Either they were delusional or
their high school experiences were very different from mine. Dragging
myself through an endless mass of homework and tests was definitely
not what I would think of as high-point potential.
Of course, it wasn’t all bad; I had some fun classes and sometimes
had time to hang out with friends. But the point was to finish and
move on. How ironic would it be for us to look eagerly toward graduation,
only to then spend the rest of our lives looking longingly back at
what we were trying so hard to move on from?
On the bright side, my current school day was more than half over,
finally. It was a relief to be done with US history, calc, and financial
lit. The best part was still to come; after lunch I had zoology with my
best friend, Shae.
Zoology itself isn’t that great, but our teacher, Mrs. Taylor, is awesome.
She does a lot of hands-on stuff and is able to transfer her excitement
to her lectures. Somehow my calculus teacher just can’t pull that
off.
I’m not sure what I was thinking, scheduling all of my hard classes
on the same day. A days were a pain. B days were much better: English,
two Music classes, and Spanish.
The halls were packed. The daily sophomore shoving match had
migrated to right in front of the lunchroom. I tried to slide by but
timed it wrong. One of the boys knocked into me, pushing me into
another student. As I fell onto her, I felt a flash of recognition shoot
through me like a shock, and I looked back. It was Amanda, a girl who
was in two of my classes. She was looking at me strangely, a question
in her eyes. Had she felt that too? I shook off a shiver and continued
through the double doors to meet Shae.
We decided to eat outside. A cool breeze hit me in the face as we
stepped out into the courtyard. The fresh air was a welcome relief from
the stale food odors in the school cafeteria. I took a deep breath, savoring
the air. On the far side of the courtyard, we found an empty bench
and sat down to eat.
Shae had been my best friend since we were in kindergarten. Her
short sandy hair was currently streaked with light and dark highlights
and flipped up in the back. She wore trendy clothes and had a great
sense of fashion, unlike me. With her help, I did okay, but I really didn’t
care enough to spend huge amounts of time and money on primping.
Shae had convinced me to start occasionally straightening my slightly
wavy hair but much to her dismay, I usually just wore it in a ponytail.
My mom may have hoped for more of a girly-girl when she named me
Victoria, but I had been Tori for as long as I could remember. I seriously
doubted if any of my friends even knew the longer version of my
name.
“Hey, are you excited for tomorrow night?” Shae asked as we sat
down.
“Don’t remind me.” I groaned. “I’m already nervous enough. I
can’t believe I let you set me up again! Remember our bargain.”
“This is the last oneI promise,” she said, her eyes crinkled up
in amusement. “Listen, it’s going to be great. Jon and Eric have been
best friends since they were little, when Jon lived back east. Eric and
his parents are just visiting for the week, so there’s no pressure at all.
I’ve seen pictures of him at Jon’s house, and I pumped Jon with questions.
Eric’s about 6’2’’ with dark hair and gorgeous eyes. Jon says he’s
really nice, and I’m sure you’ll have a great time. You guys are perfect
for each other. Your honey blonde hair will be such a great contrast to
his dark hair, and he’s tall enougheven for you. But if you don’t like
him or whatever, it’s no big deal. Just don’t worry about it and have a
good time.”
I rolled my eyes. At 5’11” I towered over Shae’s neat little 5’4”
frame. “He sounds too good to be true.” I tried to smile, hoping he
wasn’t anything like the last friend of Jon’s that they had set me up
with. Tyler’d had octopus hands and a never-ending supply of gum.
“You sure you want me to be with Eric?” I teased.
“Not funny,” she retorted with a mock glare. “Jon and I are solid.
Besides, Eric’s not my type; he’s yours. You like them tall and dark,
right? I prefer sandy hair and green eyes,” she said, laughing. “Anyway,
we’d better get to zoology before the tardy bell rings.”
I wouldn’t say that catching spiders was one of my favorite
activities, but it beat sitting in class. Mrs. Turner sent us all out to
collect specimens. Shae and I eventually caught one, but by the time
we returned to class the microscopes were all taken so we had to use
one of the magnifying lenses.
We dropped our spider into the kill jar and waited for the acetone
to do its work. In a couple of minutes the spider was incapacitated
enough to check it out under the microscope—or in our case, the magnifying
lens. We’d caught a male black widow; apparently they were
everywhere.
I looked at the spider first and then kept it still while Shae checked
it out. The legs were curling up, so I used a pin to gently straighten
one.
“Okay, I’ve seen enough, it’s brown, splotchy, and hairy. Kind of
like that spot on your hand.” She grinned.
“What spot on my hand?”
“Um, that little mole near the knuckle of your index finger.”
“Oh, my birthmark. Here, let me see.” I’d seen enough hairy spider
legs too.
Shae handed me the lens, and I stared in silence, confused by what I
was looking at. After a second, I removed the lens and rubbed the mark
to make sure it was really there. Then I leaned in closer and looked
again. What I saw was not an ordinary birthmark. It looked like some
type of miniature design. I pulled the lens away, and the mark looked
like an ordinary birthmark again. Weird. I felt a tingle go down my
spine for the second time that day as I realized there was no way this
was an ordinary birthmark. In fact, it wasn’t a birthmark at all. How
could it be? It had to be some type of tattoo. Why had my parents never
mentioned it? They were dead set against tattoos of any kind.
“Okay, it’s not that interesting.” Shae startled me.
“Are you kidding me? Look again. It’s not just splotchy,” I
responded.
She shrugged, and I gave her the lens. She looked at the mark on
my hand, her brow furrowed. “What, exactly, am I supposed to be
looking for?”
“A design, like a tattoo. Can’t you see it?”
“No, sorry. Aaah!” She squealed.
“What?”
“Our spider’s coming out of it. It’s twitching.”
“Ladies,” Mrs. Taylor called out to us. “Is there a problem over
there?”
“No, we’re fine. Sorry about that,” I said. Using a pair of tweezers,
I picked up the spider and put him back in the paper cup.
“Can I go return our specimen to the wild?” I asked.
“Go ahead.” Shae nodded.
After school I came home and went straight to the music room.
Playing the piano was my release. I pulled out Gershwin’s “Rhapsody
in Blue,” the piece I was currently working on, and turned on the
CD. The opening strains flowed through me as I prepared for my
entrance. Playing with a CD helped me secure the notes in my fingers.
I allowed myself to sink into the music and then joined in boldly. Halfway
through page seven, everything bogged down. Why couldn’t I get
those three measures up to tempo!
I massacred the runs and then came back in a few measures later
and continued smoothly through page seventeen. That was as far as I
had learned.
I stopped the CD and turned the metronome back on to continue
with my endless drills of the cursed section. I was on track with everything
else I had learned so far, but those few measures were taking
forever. There was no question that I would get it eventually, but the
hours of extra work were frustrating.
Two hours later I was done practicing and headed upstairs to finish
my calculus homework. But I knew there was no sense in denying the
issue any longer; I needed to deal with the mark on my hand. I’d never
really looked at it before today. Without the magnifying lens, it looked
like a regular birthmark, darker than a freckle. I’d had it as long as I
could remember.
I pulled out the magnifying lens that I’d borrowed from Mrs.
Taylor and sat down to confirm what I’d seen earlier in class. It was
still there.
If I could magnify it even more, I might be able to understand
what I was seeing. Unfortunately, I didn’t have anything stronger than
a 30X magnifying lens. But I knew the microscopes at school could go
to 40X if I could cram my knuckle under the lens.
The bigger question I had at the moment, though, was how it got
there. It was obviously put there on purpose. Marks like this didn’t
just grow. But I knew my parents would never give me a tattoo. Maybe
my birth mother had done it before she gave me up. But why? It didn’t
make any sense. I stewed about it all evening, and in the end, decided
to just ask my parents about it in the morning. I hadn’t done anything
wrong, and I wanted some answers.
As I made my way downstairs the next morning, my confidence
wavered. What if they didn’t believe me? What if they thought I had
gotten the tattoo myself? I decided to compromise. I would ask my
parents about the mark but not mention that I had discovered it was
really a tattoo.
“Good morning, Tori,” my mother sang out in her annoyingly
cheerful tone. “How did you sleep?”
“Um, fine.” I grabbed a yogurt and dumped it on my granola before
I joined the conversation. Mom was asking Chelsea if she knew where
her library book was. I smiled at how scatterbrained my ten-year-old
sister could be sometimes.
When there was a slight pause, I jumped in.
“Hey, Mom,” I began. I didn’t make eye contact and kept my voice
casual because this really was no big deal, right?
“Hmmm?” she was cutting a bagel in half for the twins, Chelsea
and Kyle, to share.
“You know that little brown mark on my hand?” I looked up to
watch her carefully for a reaction but there was none.
“Brown mark . . . ? Oh, you mean your birthmark? What about
it?” she asked, looking at me.
“Well, can you tell me about it? When did I get it?” My heart was
thumping; I hoped she couldn’t hear it.
“Tell you about it? Honey, it’s a birthmark. You’ve had it since you
were a baby. There’s nothing to tell.” She looked at me more closely
now. “Why, is it growing or changing or something?” she asked, her
eyes wider.
“No, Mom, nothing like that,” I assured her. Trust my Mom to
overreact. “I just wanted to know when I got it or if I had it when I
was born.”
“Oh, well I’m not sure if you had it when you were born. In fact,
I remember the first time I saw it, I tried to wipe it off. Babies aren’t
necessarily born with their birthmarks, but they show up when they’re
still very young.” She turned to Chelsea. “Do you want plain cream
cheese or strawberry?”
This was a dead end. Either my mom didn’t know about the tattoo,
or she wasn’t talking. And since she wasn’t a good enough actress to
pull off lying to me with no warning, my guess was that she didn’t
know about it.
No one noticed that I didn’t say anything more at breakfast. When
I was done, I ran up to my room and grabbed my backpack. I hesitated
and then grabbed the lens and shoved it in a pocket of my bag. I ran
out the door just as the carpool van drove up.
As I got ready for my date two days later, my thoughts shifted to
the little tattoo I had discovered on my hand. I was no closer to discovering
where it had come from.
The most likely solution was that it was something my birth mother
did before she placed me for adoption. My parents didn’t know anything
about her except that she was a young, single mom who wanted
the best for me and placed me in a family with a mom and a dad. At
least that’s what they had always told me.
The sound of the doorbell brought me back to reality, and my
stomach instantly filled with butterfliesbig surprise. I grabbed my
jacket, hurried downstairs to the living room, and found Jon introducing
my date to my parents. Shae hadn’t exaggerated about his looks. Seeing
him took my breath away, and the butterflies in my stomach turned to
rocks. How could I go out with someone like him?
When they heard me enter, everyone looked up at me. My eyes
locked with my date’s for a moment before I glanced away. Dang, why
did my face have to start burning so easily? I tried to remember his
name, but I couldn’t think of it.
“Tori, this is my best friend, Eric Jackson. We grew up together
before my family moved to St. Louis. Eric, this is Tori,” Jon said.
I took a breath and slowly raised my eyes to Eric’s once again. “Hi,”
I said, trying desperately not to look as nervous as I felt.
“It’s nice to finally meet you. Jon’s told me all about you.” Eric
smiled and then turned to my dad and shook his hand warmly. “A
pleasure to meet you, sir.”
Sir? Is this guy for real?
We said good-bye to my parents and then walked out to Jon’s car.
Eric opened the door for me and gently took my hand as he helped me
in. For a second all I felt was surprise at his chivalry and then I looked
up at him and all previous thoughts were gone. A wave of strong emotions
and images washed over me like a deeply buried memory being
unearthed. I was in a beautiful green valley surrounded by high snowcapped
mountain peaks. I could feel the cool, crisp air as it brushed
by my face and whipped through my hair. The memories quickly grew
stronger as I inhaled the sweet fragrance of the surrounding foliage. I
was lost in a place that called to me so strongly that everything around
me faded to gray. I was finally home—in a spot that I loved and that
loved me. For the first time, I was filled with a sense of complete acceptance.
“Are you guys getting in or what?” Shae’s voice ripped me rudely
back to the present. Eric released my hand and took a step back. Reality
shifted back into place as he continued to look into my eyes, his face
looking as confused as I felt. What had just happened?
I slid into the backseat and snapped my seatbelt into place. Shae was
snickering in the front seat. How long had Eric and I stood there holding
hands and looking into each other’s eyes? I flushed again as I tried
to make sense of what had just happened. I wondered if Eric had experienced
the same thing that I had or if maybe I was just going crazy.
With a start, I realized that I had unconsciously put my hand over
my heart as if to steady my erratic heartbeat. I dropped my hand to my
lap and glanced over at Eric without turning my head.
He got in and put on his seatbelt without saying a word, his eyes
straight ahead. “Tell me what restaurant we’re headed to again?” he
asked, his voice tight.
Jon glanced over his shoulder. “Let’s see, I forgot the name. It’s
this little renovated two-story stone house over on the Lincoln expressway.”
“We’re going to Thai Garden? But you hate Thai food,” Shae
blurted out.
“I don’t hate it. Anyway, since Tori is making a huge sacrifice and
going out with Eric, I figured we’d better take her somewhere she can
at least enjoy the food, if not the company.” Jon smirked. “If I remember
right, it’s your favorite place, right, Tori?”
“Yeah, it is,” I stammered.
“Hey, don’t scare her off completely before I can win her over with
my charm,” Eric said, laughing. He sounded way more composed than
I felt after what had happened, and I glanced up at him in surprise. The
little crease between his eyes was my only clue that he hadn’t shaken it
off as quickly as it seemed.
“In your dreams, buddy. You’ve got about as much charm as a
kangaroo in a dinner jacket.”
“What I don’t understand is how you ever got someone as intelligent
as Shae to go out with you more than once. How do you stand
his arrogance, Shae?” he shot back.
“Knock it off guys, or Tori will run for her life,” Shae broke in,
trying to suppress her amusement.
“Please accept my apologies for the rude behavior of my companion,
ladies,” Eric said with mock formality. “Jon, try to control yourself
tonight.”
Eric held the door as we walked into the restaurant, and it seemed
like he was being careful not to touch me again as we made our way to
the table. I wondered what would happen if we did touch. The thought
scared me a bit, and I maintained our unspoken buffer zone as well. I
was pretty sure he had felt something too, but I couldn’t ask him about
it with Shae and Jon there. After I ordered my meal, I looked over
at Eric, fascinated by the way his eyes scrunched up as he smiled at
the waitress and ordered. I didn’t realize I was staring until he looked
over at me and caught my eye. I felt my face flush and quickly looked
down.
Attempting to recover a little dignity, I forced my eyes back up and
tried to make a contribution to the conversation. “I’ve never been back
east. What’s it like in . . . New Jersey is it?”
“Yes, I live in a small township in New Jersey. I love it there; it’s
very green. But I think my favorite thing about New Jersey is going to
the beach early in the morning to watch the sunrise. There’s this one
beach I love to go to that has a great big flat rock that will fit three or
four people comfortably. When the sun breaks over the horizon and
fills the sky with color, it’s amazing. If you’re lucky, you might even see
a pod of dolphins greeting the sun as well.”
My stomach twisted a bit as I wondered who he was with when
he went to the beach and if he was thinking of her. Hold on, take a
breath, I told myself. How could I possibly be jealous over someone I
just met and hardly knew at all? It made no sense.
“I miss that,” Jon broke in. “You don’t find many ocean beaches
in St. Louis.”
We both looked over at Jon and Shae. I had forgotten for a moment
that they were with us. Get a grip, girl.
“Hey, you guys have exactly the same eye color,” Shae announced
with a mischievous look in her eye. “Purplish-blue. I couldn’t tell from
your picture, Eric. So, do your eyes go darker when you’re upset too?”
Eric smiled, and Jon threw his head back and laughed. “I’ve never
seen Eric mad and I’ve known him for ten years.”
“Well, there’s a challenge for you, Tori. You should see if you can
get him mad.” Shae winked at me. “Actually, Tori doesn’t get mad very
often either, but you should see her if she sees someone getting picked
on. She goes ballistic, and then you’d better get out of the way!”
I was looking at Shae as all the attention turned to me. Involuntarily,
I glanced over at Eric and met his eyes, and my stomach flipped again.
He had a speculative look on his face as he said, “That’s something I’d
like to see.” The corners of his mouth turned up in a smile.
Luckily the food arrived, and everyone’s attention was diverted.
I was surprised at how aware I was of everything Eric was doing.
We reached for the Panang Curry at the same time. My heart skipped a
beat as our hands nearly touched. I still wasn’t sure what had happened
earlier, but I wasn’t ready for casual contact with Eric.
He pulled his hand back quickly just before we connected, and I
thought I saw a touch of panic in his eyes. Then he smiled apologetically
and winked at me.
He must have felt something earlier! I was strangely reassured; if he
had experienced something as well, I wasn’t going crazy.
We finished our dinner and headed to The Game Zone. When we
got there, Jon and Shae immediately wanted to go sign up for a game
of laser tag.
Eric glanced over at me and then turned back to Jon. “You two go
ahead, we’ll catch up with you later.”
We walked toward the doors leading to the outside activities. “I
hope that’s okay with you, Tori. I thought maybe we could just take a
walk and” he paused, considering for a moment, “well, there are a
few things we could talk about, aren’t there?” He held the door for me
as we walked outside, and his smile made me catch my breath.
“No, I’d much rather talk,” I assured him.
He scanned the area for somewhere to go and then pointed to
some empty picnic tables tucked away in a corner and raised his eyebrows.
“How does that look?”
I nodded, and we made our way to the secluded area. I noticed
that he kept his hands clasped firmly behind his back and stayed just
far enough away from me to ensure that we couldn’t accidentally touch
each other. That was fine with me.
We sat down across from each other at one of the tables without
saying a word. He rested his chin on his closed hand and looked at me
curiously. I folded my arms and rested my elbows on the edge of the
table. I had no power to draw my eyes from his, even as I felt my face
flush warmly.
“I’m not exactly sure what happened earlier at your house.” He was
quiet for a moment. “Do you always have that effect on people, or is it
just me?” he asked with a grin, leaning toward me.
“No, I’ve never had that happen before,” I said, surprised at the
suggestion. “When you . . .” I pulled my gaze away and took a steadying
breath. “When you took my hand, I felt like I was in another place.
No, it was stronger than that. I really was in another place. It was
like I was remembering something from a long time ago. I could see
this green valley and towering mountains. I’ve never felt more at home
than I did right then.” I stopped, afraid to say more. After a moment, I
looked back up at him, uncertain how he would respond.
“I saw the same thing, I think. Did you feel the breeze and smell
the air? It was so clean and fresh, like I could smell flowers blooming,”
he responded intently.
“Yes,” I breathed, “that’s exactly what I experienced.”
We looked at each other for a few moments. I wasn’t sure what to
say.
“Would it be all right with you if we tried again? I’ve been careful
not to touch you all evening because I wasn’t sure what would happen
and I didn’t want to go zoning out in a crowd of people.” His eyes were
guarded, uncertain. “If you’d like to . . .”
I nodded slowly and reached out my hand, palm up on the table
in front of me.
His eyes softened, and he smiled at me as he gently placed his hand
on mine.
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