Awaken (Awaken Series Book 1) Read online

  The plane rolled away, down the tarmac to wait in line for takeoff.

  “Sir, what are you doing?” I heard distantly, over by the boarding entrance door.

  I looked up. A ghost appeared through the door, as it cracked open.

  In a split second all the agony and heavy weight disappeared, evaporating like yesterday’s fog. The most indescribable sense of joy was in its place. I couldn’t believe it. I started to weep.

  Austin gasped, “Kim! It’s Paul!”

  “Paul?” Kim questioned in disbelief, still in the haze of sadness and loss. Then, as she began to re-focus, she saw the ghostly image of her husband standing over by the boarding area. Slowly, she drew herself up from the floor and cleared her tear-stained eyes.

  It was him. He was here!

  “Paul! You heard me! You came back!” And she flew across the room, into his embrace.

  As the final bell rang and I headed for my locker, I was having a hard time controlling my nerves. I was crazy with anticipation for what was to happen next. Earlier this morning I prepared myself, knowing I’d have difficulties focusing, but I somehow managed.

  I glanced around not spotting Austin or Rebecca. So I took the note - I’d just found in my locker - and shut the door, heading toward the back end of the school. There was a secret spot tucked away, behind the classrooms, and only a handful of people knew about it. The note told me to meet him there.

  Turning the last corner past the biology room and saw him. His face, so flawless, so perfect, it was hard to look at him without blushing. I wondered why he wanted to see me. The way he stared at me sent my heart racing so fast, I thought it would jump out of my chest at his first spoken word.

  “I thought this day would never end,” Collin said, in the smoothest voice. He stepped over to me and my heart sputtered in my chest. “So I see you got my note.” He smiled down at the note I’d found in my locker.

  I didn’t know what to say next. This was difficult in all aspects, but I had to know where this was going, if it could go anywhere at all. I smiled.

  He stepped closer and my breath caught in my throat.

  “Collin, I know this is hard for you. It’s hard for me too, but we can’t hide from it anymore.”

  His strong body leaned in toward me, his fingers shifting as if he wanted to reach out and touch my skin, eyes searching my face. I felt inadequate when looking up at him. Here was Adonis Incarnate, close enough to feel his breath on my face. Through his shirt, I made out the definition of his muscular build. He was absolute perfection. Comparing Josh to Collin was like comparing hamburger to steak, there was just no comparison. This was the type of guy that would end up with someone like Becka, not me, but here he was standing two feet away from me.

  “I know you must think I’m a horrible person, but I can’t help it. I can’t help the way I feel about you…and it’s time I tell him,” he admitted.

  His expression was pained, but we both knew that we couldn’t continue like this. It was too difficult and if we were ever going to be happy, then we needed to get this out.

  “Bre…” Collin started, reaching out to touch my face. As his fingertips brushed over my cheek, I heard a guy yell my name, followed by the violent sound of a car’s horn in the distance. Then the screeching sound of smashing metal filled the air. It sounded like a dozen cars had piled up on the freeway.

  Not wasting any time, I ran out from behind the school and was shocked by the view. Somehow, I wasn’t at school anymore. The scene wasn’t familiar at all. The streets were lined with tall buildings that reached out to the skies. In both directions, cars were lined up, not moving because of the large mess blocking the intersection.

  I glanced behind me, confused. Collin was gone and I was facing a cement wall. I reached out to touch it, to see if it was real. It was as solid as a brick wall should be. Impossible.

  “Collin!” I yelled, but no answer.

  “I need some help over here! I need to get him out now!” a middle-aged man screamed attempting to tear open the mangled, white metal that was once a car. “Hey, you, girl with the blonde hair!” He pointed at me. “Call nine-one-one! Quickly! I don’t know how much time we have…go!”

  “Sir, I don’t have a phone,” I yelled back, panic in my voice.

  “I have one,” another man said, running up to the car.

  Through the car window, I saw a thick head of black hair. If I didn’t know any better, I would have thought it was Collin in the car, but that was impossible because he was just with me a moment ago.

  “Bre, Bre can you hear me? Bre, wake up! Come on, wake up!”

  Throwing my eyes open, I was blinded by the sun shining in through my bedroom window. Becka was standing over me, arms crossed over her chest.

  “Oh, hi Beck, what time is it?” I mumbled.

  “It’s time for you to get up and tell me where the hell you were last night?” She was furious. It took a moment but when I sat up, I realized why she was so upset. It was the Andersons. “I’m waiting?”

  “Well, Beck, it’s kind of hard to explain.”

  “Breanna Davis, you’ve got some explaining to do!” my mom yelled, barging into my room. She held up a piece of paper that looked like a statement. “Can you please explain to me why my sixteen-year old daughter bought a one-way plane ticket to Los Angeles yesterday?” A vein bulged from her neck.

  “How do you know about that?” I didn’t know what to tell her without admitting the truth, and she would say I was lying, so what was the point?

  “I was paying bills online this morning. All right, Missy, talk.”

  “Um…” I started to say, but Becka jumped in.

  “Oh, that was for me, Mrs. Davis. I didn’t have my purse with me so I asked Breanna if she would help me out and I would pay her back later. I’m really sorry I didn’t write her the check last night, but we got back so late I guess I just forgot.”

  Mom split a suspicious glance between the two of us. “Rebecca, why would you need a plane ticket to LA, and at the last minute like that? Where were your parents?”

  Here we go, I was done.

  Becka’s face relaxed, “I got a phone call that my grandfather wasn’t doing well, and they didn’t know if he would make it through the night. So I was going to fly down and say my goodbyes to him but…” she searched for her next words, “just as I was about to leave I got the great news that he was recovering.”

  “Oh, well, I’m glad to hear he’s doing better,” my mom replied, with a sincere smile across her face.

  “I can write you a check now if you like, I have my checkbook in my purse,” Becka said. If I wasn’t on the other side of this little story, I would’ve thought she was telling the truth.

  “That’s sounds good. I’ll go calm your father down. He thought Bre was trying to run away or something.”

  “I’m sorry, I forgot how much it was exactly?”

  “Oh, um, it looks like one hundred ninety-nine dollars and forty-three cents. But you can just make it out for one hundred ninety nine. Don’t worry about the change.”

  She wrote the check and started to hand it to my mother, “Here you go. Sorry about all the confusion,” Becka smiled to me, making a face as if to say, I had a lot of explaining to do.

  “Okay girls, go back to whatever you were doing. Oh, and Bre, I was thinking that you and I could go get a bite to eat later this afternoon, since I’ll be leaving again.”

  I looked away, confused. She never wanted to do anything with me. “That sounds great, Mom.”

  As the door slowly shut, Beck glared at me. When I was sure my mother was out of earshot, I said, “Beck, I know you’re mad, and you have a right to be, but please let me explain.”

  She slumped onto the bed. “I’m listening.”

  “I don’t know where to begin,” I hesitated, picking nervously at my comforter.

  “Why don’t you just start with stealing your best friend’s car and not telling anyone where you were going; not
picking up your phone to let us know that you were all right and something bad didn’t happen to you. Oh yeah, and why you wouldn’t come back and pick up this so-called best friend so she didn’t have to take a cab home. Yeah, I think you should start right about there.”

  “Beck, I’m so sorry I didn’t call you, but I was kind of busy.”

  How was I supposed to explain the Andersons?

  “What could you possibly be doing that you couldn’t take a minute to pick up the phone to tell me you were okay?” her voice shook with worry.

  She wasn’t as furious as she was concerned.

  “Beck, when I tell you the whole story you might understand.”

  “It all started when…” Over the course of a half hour, I went through the whole series of visions and events, starting with the first night I received this gift (if you want to call it that) to the very end, with Paul and Kim safely on the ground.

  Becka was studying the floor after I finished. I couldn’t tell if she believed me or not. She didn’t say anything for the longest time. So much was spinning through my head I really hadn’t just sat back with a clear mind to realize what I had done. I saved two lives.

  Becka looked to me squinting her eyes, “So if this really happened, it would be all over the news by now, right?”

  That took a second to register. I jumped off my bed and ran to the home office. Sitting at the computer was my younger brother, Caleb, playing computer games, like usual.

  “Caleb, I need the computer!” I snapped.

  “No way,” he grunted, “I was here first.”

  “I’ll give it back. I just need it for a second.” He sighed, loud and frustrated. “Just let me finish my game and then you can use it.”

  I watched the screen. He was in a particular spot I’d seen him in several times before. He’d be here for a while. Crawling underneath the computer desk, I switched the power button off.

  “Hey, why did you do that? I was almost to the end,” he whined.

  “I’m sorry, but I need the computer now.”

  “Fine, but you just wait until you’re in the middle of something important!”

  “Whatever, Caleb, just leave us alone for a minute.”

  I shut the door on him and flung my body into the computer chair. I shook my foot impatiently while the computer slowly booted up, then I worked fast.

  “Beck, what was the name of the station at the mall yesterday?”

  “I think it is KTVL Action News.”

  My fingers flew across the keys. When it popped up, I scrolled down the page looking for breaking news. There it was, right in the center, jumping off the page. The headlines read, ‘Tragedy hits the greater Medford, Oregon area. Plane falls from the sky just after takeoff and all one hundred twenty-seven passengers on board were killed instantly on impact.’

  My eyes fell from the screen. All those people. Dead. I should have saved them. I should have stopped the plane. My eyes burned, tears swelled, my chest tightened. How could I have been so selfish? I could have prevented this. Tears flowed down my face like a running faucet.

  “Bre, look.” Becka had read ahead of me and was pointing in the middle of the screen, at a quote. She read it aloud but it was hard to focus with the pain I was feeling, my lungs were caving in cutting off airflow. “Even in the midst of such a horrific tragedy, there is a little shimmer of light in this dark and sad story. Paul and Kim Anderson, a husband and wife, who live in a little town close to Medford, Oregon called Rogue River, were scheduled to be on that same dreadful, ill-fated flight. When asked why they decided not to take this flight, they said, ‘We were stopped by a guardian angel who told us that we shouldn’t get on the plane.’ It’s a good thing they listened to this so-called guardian angel because that person has saved their lives.”

  I looked to Becka, tears falling down my face. Her mouth hung open completely in awe. She believed me.

  “Bre, this is a good thing,” Becka whispered.

  I shook my head, “I didn’t save all the other passengers.”

  “Bre, you can’t do this to yourself. You saved the Andersons. You have to look at that.” She was trying to comfort me, but pain was hidden in her eyes. She was thinking about all the other people. “Bre, it’s okay.” Becka pulled my quivering body into her.

  “I’ve been dealing with this all by myself. It’s been really hard not knowing why this is happening to me. I thought I was going crazy. If it were you, wouldn’t you think you were going crazy?”

  “Well, I’ve always thought you were crazy!” I sat up and she tried giggling to lighten the mood. “No, but really, why do you think you have this ‘gift’? Do you think that you’re some kind of a psychic or something? Just think, if you give me the lottery numbers for next week, I can quit my job! We could shop every day and never have to worry about anything!”

  I chuckled a little by her candidness then shook my head. “No, I don’t believe in that. I mean, it did occur to me at first, but when I investigated the psychic stuff, it doesn’t match up with this kind of thing. Psychics read palms and talk to the dead. It’s not the same thing.”

  “I guess you’re right. It doesn’t match up. Well, whatever this is, it’s something that’s truly inspiring.”

  “Inspiring? I don’t think I would call it that.” I rolled my eyes.

  Becka placed her hand over mine, “Of course it is! You have the gift of changing someone’s future. You have the power to help people in horrible situations.”

  I hadn’t viewed it that way. How could I when I thought I was just going crazy? Having the ability to help people was a noble idea, but with it came a lot of responsibility that I wasn’t sure I could handle, especially after almost failing yesterday.

  “I don’t know, maybe this was a one-time thing. I guess I’ll just have to wait and see.”

  “Maybe, but if it isn’t, then I guess you’ll have a lot of good stories to tell.” Becka raised an eyebrow and smiled.

  “Beck, you have to promise me that you won’t tell anyone about this. Not a soul. Not even Trevor.”

  “But…”

  “Promise,” I demanded, pointing my finger at her.

  “I promise,” she said, crossing her heart. “Does anyone else know about this?”

  “Not yet, but I have a feeling I’ll have to explain myself to one more person.”

  “Who?”

  I paused then sighed. “Austin James.”

  The last week of summer flew by in a breath. Before I knew it, the first day of school was here. Becka worked almost the entire time, so I spent most of my time alone. I got a few dozen voicemails from Josh, but I never responded. I figured I’d deal with him when school started.

  Pulling into the school parking lot, I searched for Josh’s truck. Luckily, I didn’t see it so I pulled in right next to Becka’s car. I grabbed my backpack from behind the seat and heard a light tapping on my driver’s side window. It was Stephanie’s smiling face, not Josh’s. I didn’t even get my foot on the pavement before she fired off the questions she’d stored up since last weekend. With one big breath, she fired off, “Bre! Oh my gosh! I am so glad to see you! Beck told me all about it! I wanted to call you, but I didn’t because you probably wanted to rest and everything, but are you okay now? Of course you’re okay, you’re standing right here, but no, really, how are you?” She let the rest of her breath drain out of her, like a deflated balloon.

  “Um…” What did Beck tell her?

  Walking up to us, Becka cut in, “Steph, like I told you before, she’s fine. Now I’m sure she doesn’t want to talk about this right now, and we really should get to class. We don’t want to be late on our first day.”

  Stephanie exhaled with a big sigh. “Alright. But I want the whole story later.”

  “You bet,” I answered back hesitantly.

  “So what classes do you have this year? Let’s see if we’re in any together.” Becka and I pulled out our schedules to compare.

  “First period is
Algebra two-trig with Mr. Wright…”

  “Me too!” Beck said.

  I smiled. “Second is PE with Johnson, French with Neville, then Home-Ec with Mrs. Jones, lunch, English with Mr…” I paused before saying his name. “Mr. Anderson, and last…”

  “Hey! I’m sorry to cut you off,” Stephanie interjected, “but have you guys heard about what happened to Mr. Anderson last week?”

  I flashed a look to Becka’s widened eyes as my stomach hit the ground. “No…what happened?” I tried to speak evenly.

  “You haven’t heard? It’s all over the news and everyone’s talking about it!” Shrugging my shoulders, she continued, “Apparently, Mr. Anderson and his wife were supposed to be on a plane, you know the plane that crashed just after it took off from Medford?” She paused for a response.

  Becka replied, “Yeah, I heard about that.”

  Stephanie nodded her head and continued, “They should’ve been on that flight, but someone stopped them before they got on the plane and because of this mysterious person, they didn’t die! Isn’t that crazy?”

  “Crazy,” I muttered, making little faces to get Becka’s attention so she’d change the subject.

  Stephanie added, “I know! I wonder if we know the person, but anyway, they’re so lucky.”

  As the bell rang, I heard a noisy rumble that I’d been dreading since I arrived. Josh’s black Chevy truck barreled into the parking lot. Great. I need to get out of here.

  “Beck, we have to go. Don’t we have the same first period?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then let’s go! You don’t want to be late, right?” I urged.

  Becka spotted the truck. “Right. See you later, Steph.”

  “See you guys at lunch,” Stephaine replied.

  We took off and didn’t slow down until we reached our lockers. “So Beck, it’s explaining time. What did you tell Stephanie?”

  Becka bent over to catch her breath. She chuckled uneasily, “You won’t be happy, but I couldn’t think of anything else.”

  Oh, no. Now what?

  “Great. What is it?” I asked anxiously.