Waking the Dreamer (Transhuman) Read online

  Chapter 7

  I started breathing too fast. My heart started pounding. I could feel – I could almost see – the trees and bushes around me, reaching my way, ready to grab me or trip me.

  Then I realized I really could see.

  Without Zack's light, the forest was seriously dark. But after being in the dark long enough, my eyes adjusted. I could see just a little bit, like the way I could see the Milky Way if I stared at the sky long enough. There was enough light at least to see which way Zack and my dad had gone, and which way Zack and I had been heading. Towards the lake and Eena.

  I had to be close. If I could just move and get through a few more minutes of walking through this forest, I could make it. I just had to ignore the sounds of creaking trees, scraping branches and nighttime animals moving and hooting and pecking and buzzing. I had to forget that those same creatures might be watching me right then.

  There were some dangerous animals in Michigan. They had bear. Black bear. And of course, with another escalation of panic, I remembered the place my family was staying at – the place where I should be safe inside and sleeping – was Lone Wolf Lodge.

  Wolves.

  I couldn't handle a wolf. In my current state, I couldn't handle much of anything. A fluffy bunny would send me screaming, flailing my arms and crashing into trees until I knocked myself unconscious. That would be fun to explain to the doctor.

  I just had to move, head to where I remembered the lake was and focus on getting there without panicking.

  I had no idea how I'd make it back, but pushed that thought out of my mind. If I worried about it now, I'd lose what new scraps of courage I had left.

  I took it one step at a time. Literally. I moved slowly past trees and over moss and roots and dirt and rotting smelly things I'd rather not think about. I stumbled at first. My feet caught on undergrowth. I almost fell because I couldn't see what I was stepping on. I was slow, but I was moving.

  I kept my mind as blank as possible, trying just to peer ahead through the darkness and dodge trees and get through the forest ahead, get to where it started to thin out, where the trees were fewer and fewer, and suddenly I smelled water and seaweed and fish. I realized I didn't hate those things any more. I loved them, because it meant I was close. Close to the lake.

  I took a few final steps and moved out of the forest. The lake was in front of me.

  I'd made it.

  I turned in a slow circle, wondering at how odd the lake looked at night when no one was there. There were no kids playing and yelling. All I heard was the quiet rushing sound of the waves. The sun was gone and the water was not inviting. It was a black rolling surface that looked dangerous to touch.

  “You made it!”

  Her voice came from behind me. Excited, I spun around to look.

  It was Eena. This time she looked really different.

  Chapter 8

  Eena stood in front of me, though not like before. No swimsuit this time. She wore clothes similar to what I wore myself. They could belong to any kid at the Lodge. Jeans, a dark shirt and tennis shoes. She must've come through the woods, too, from Camp Nyhill. Flecks of tree branches speckled her shoulders. I wanted to brush them off, but I didn't.

  No pony tail. Her hair was different this time. It was pulled back into two long braids that followed the sides of her face and trailed down her back.

  She wasn't carrying anything. She'd gone through the woods too, though she'd gone much farther than me. This girl was tough. She'd done it all without a light or anyone to help her.

  At the thought of Zack, I felt a twinge of guilt. He was still out there and Dad had probably dumped him off at the cabin by now.

  “Hi, Tyler.”

  There it was again. How did she know my name?

  She looked a little different, but she behaved the same as before, self-assured, confident, looking up at me with that little smile on her face.

  “Hey, Eena. So I have a question. How do you know my-”

  She threw her arms around me and hugged me.

  I was so shocked I had no reaction. I just stood there and felt her squeeze with both arms and pull me in to her. Her hands pressed tight against my back. Even though the top of her head was at my chin, she was strong.

  Just as quickly, she released me and stepped back.

  She looked up at me with a questioning look, then she broke eye contact and looked away.

  I had no idea what she expected. I had no idea why she'd just hugged me. I mentally shook my head and tried to figure out what had just happened. I still felt the impression of her body against mine, of her size (short), her shape (there were definitely curves), and how it made me feel (I wanted more). I tried to remember the moment, because I had no idea what caused it and I didn't know if I'd ever have it again.

  She spoke before I could.

  “Look, I just don't have much time. I'm really sorry.”

  “Uh, no. That was like, totally okay! I just-”

  “It's not okay. Nothing's okay. There's too much to do and not enough time. I don't know how long I can stay away from Talia.”

  She'd said that name before. “Your camp counselor?”

  “Yeah.Right.”

  “You said she was a heavy sleeper.”

  “Sometimes she's not.”

  More confused than ever, I just stood there with a stupid expression on my face.

  “Tyler,” she said. “I'm not used to this. I'm not used to... asking for help. Even though it's not fair to you. But I have to ask. You're the only one.”

  This was a topic I could follow: She needed help. Check.

  “Sure,” I shrugged, acting like any request was easily done. “What do you need?”

  This was good. I was already nervous about being alone with this girl, but now here was something I could help with. Maybe she had problems at Camp Nyhill. Maybe Talia was a bad counselor. Maybe she had problems at home and needed to talk.

  “It'll be easier here,” she whispered, her eyes fixed on mine. I didn't know if she was talking to herself, or to me. I looked close and thought I saw, behind the her intense stare, something different. Fear.

  “Meet me here. Tomorrow night. Let me know how it goes.”

  I did a mental double-take, trying to figure out if I'd actually heard her right and what she could possibly be talking about.

  “How what goes?”

  “Practice moving the sand.”

  Chapter 9

  “Practice moving the sand? What is that supposed to mean?”

  Zack and I were back in the cabin. We lay in the dark on our beds and were talking about what had just happened. It was after one in the morning and neither of us was tired.

  After Eena's mysterious statement, she'd left quickly, moving away from me and back into the forest without another word. She'd looked back at me once, though, tiny and dwarfed by the massive forest behind her. She smiled.

  She ran three steps and the trees swallowed her.

  I'd found my way back to the cabin. Riding on elation and confusion, this time the woods hadn't scared me at all. The two feelings were strong enough to make me focus on getting back to the Lodge. There was no time to worry about weird noises. I had to just get back and tell Zack everything.

  Zack's adventure had been a little different than mine.

  After our dad found him (and missed me), they'd headed together back to the Lodge. Dad had taken a long time to show off his homemade sleeping area to Zack, who was totally bored by it. Then Dad walked Zack back to the cabin, lecturing him on what kind of soil is best for heat retention.

  Between Zack and me, I'd definitely been the lucky one.

  “I don't know,” I answered. “Practice moving the sand... Does she mean that literally? Pick up sand and put it somewhere else?” I looked down at myself. “Does she know how big this beach is?”

  I looked over at Zack. It was still dark, of course, and I felt a slight chill as a gust of night air swept through the room. He was laying
on his back and I saw his silhouette pause then shrug as he thought about my question.

  “Maybe you're supposed to dig a hole?”

  “What? Why? What for?”

  “To push someone in it?”

  “That... that makes no sense.”

  “Yeah, but it might be funny.”

  He was almost laughing. I wasn't.

  “Zack, you should've seen her. She looked really scared about something. She was worried about Talia finding her.”

  “If I ditched my camp, I'd be worried about getting caught too. What's the big deal?”

  I sighed. “I just don't know what she meant. I wish we had more time. She definitely got out of there in a hurry.”

  “Hey Ty, are you sure that's what happened?” He threw a dirty shirt at me. “You sure you didn't just make out the whole time?”

  I batted away the shirt. I thought about the hug, about how I could feel her body and how I'd never forget that moment.

  “Yeah, trust me. I'm sure.”

  Chapter 10

  The next morning, we woke up with our usual morning grogginess, but a few minutes of sweating in the morning sunshine annoyed us enough to get out of our beds. It would be another great day for swimming, though I had no interest in it now. We wolfed down breakfast - probably too much - and told Mom we were heading down to the beach.

  Zack wanted the whole story and I wanted to show him. Just a few minutes later, we'd made it close to where Eena and I had met.

  “It was right over there,” I said, pointing over to the line of the forest, squinting in the sun. I had to think – the landmarks were completely different in the daytime. I walked forward, examining trees and bushes.

  “Yeah,” I said. “This was the place. I came out through there.” I pointed to a wide dark opening leading into the forest.

  “You don't sound too sure.”

  “No, I think that was it.” I thought some more and nodded. “I left the trees, walked along this way, not too close to the water. When Eena met me we were right... There.”

  I turned and gestured. Zack and I both stared and froze in amazement.

  In front of us was the place where Eena and I had talked. There was a flat, painted letter T on the ground, about five feet long.

  It was like someone had taken white paint and sprayed it near Eena and me while we had stood there. You couldn't miss it - a definite, strong, thick, perfect capital letter T.

  Zack made a noise, an exclamation of disbelief. He crouched down to examine the painted sand. He reached out to touch it.

  “Wait!” I said. He froze, then looked back at me.

  “What if it's poisoned or something?”

  He broke out in laughter.

  “That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard! Who would paint a poison letter T into the sand? You read too much, dude.”

  I shrugged, feeling embarrassed for having spoken. I watched from a few feet away as Zack touched the gleaming white sand, first gingerly, then he plunged his hand into it and swirled it around.

  “Hey,” he said, his eyes growing big. “What's happening-”

  His whole body froze. Then he grabbed at his throat and made a choking noise. His face started to turn red.

  “Zack!” I yelled and jumped over to his side. I landed on my hands and knees in front of him.

  I looked down at his writhing body. He was groaning in pain, his hands now covering his face. I was so scared, I didn't realize that maybe I shouldn't touch him if the sand had done something to him.

  I grabbed his hands and pulled them away from his face. His eyes were pressed tight, his jaw clenched in a painful grimace.

  Then he started laughing.

  He went limp in the sand and kept laughing. I waited, feeling like a moron, until his laughter stopped and he dropped down to just giggling and was finally able to speak.

  “You should've seen your face!”

  I rolled my eyes and tried to blow it off. “Not a cool thing to do.”

  “You're too gullible.” He grinned.

  “Yeah, and you're an idiot.” I grinned right back.

  My heart was just starting to slow down. I continued resting there on my knees as Zack did a cool half-flip-from-a-sideways-position and landed on his feet in a spray of sand. He stuck out a hand to help me up. I grabbed it and he heaved.

  As I came level with him, I noticed something about his neck.

  “Hold on.”

  “What?”

  “Just... don't move for a second.”

  His neck still had flecks of white where he'd grabbed it just moments ago. I assumed it was because the painted sand had stuck to his fingers and some of the paint had gotten on his neck. As I looked closer I saw that wasn't true.

  “Zack. The sand wasn't painted.” I stuck my head close and poked at his neck with a finger.

  “Hey!”

  I looked at my finger, decorated with a few small white flecks. Then I looked at Zack, then over to the white T on the ground next to us. Repeating what Zack had done, I fell to my knees next to the letter and plunged my hand into it.

  I scooped up the sand and stared amazed as it fell through my fingers.

  “It wasn't painted.”

  Each piece of sand – every individual grain – was white.

  Zack came and stood over me. He leaned over to look closer.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that all this,” I gestured at the letter T, “is actually white sand. Someone didn't just paint a letter on the ground. They separated out the white sand from all the other darker grains.”

  We both sat in silence for a moment. I tried to wrap my head around how it was at all possible. I shook my head at the scattered design on the ground.

  “It can't happen. There's no way you can sort sand like that. How would you pick up every single grain and find just the white ones? They're not magnetic, so you couldn't use a magnet or anything.”

  “Ty.”

  “I guess you could pick them up with static electricity, but you still couldn't sort them by color.”

  “Ty.”

  “I mean, you could get a bunch of people together and move all the grains by hand... But that would take forever, wouldn't it! There's no possible way-”

  “Ty, can't you just go to a store and buy a bag of white sand? Then bring it here and pour it on the beach.”

  Of course. That was disappointing.

  “Oh.”

  “Yep. Mystery solved.”

  “I don't know. There's more to it. Even if that's what Eena did, why did she do it?”

  “She told you why. You have to practice moving the sand. Maybe you should go to the store and buy your own bag,” he said with a smirk.

  “And why did she make a letter T? To get my attention?”

  “Hey, yeah!” He looked genuinely surprised. “That's what your name starts with!”

  It was my turn to laugh.

  “You'd suck as a detective, Zack.”

  He changed the topic. I wondered if it was to cover his own embarrassment. Zack was so self-confident and outgoing, I never saw him uncomfortable or out of place. I could never be like that. I was trapped as the younger brother.

  “So you're supposed to practice moving the sand, right?”

  “Yeah, right, I don't even know what that means. Am I supposed to pick it up and put it somewhere? Make a giant letter E?”

  “That's E for 'Eena', right?”

  I barely heard him. I was deep in thought and muttering to myself.

  “Maybe I'm supposed to make another symbol. Maybe buy some more sand and pour it... No, she said to practice moving sand, not practice buying it.”

  “Maybe we should practice buying a shovel.” Zack laughed.

  I got mad. “Get serious, Zack. This isn't a joke. This is important. Eena's worried about something and she wants my help. I've got to figure out what she was trying to tell me so I can help her!”

  I continued, pointing at him. “And you! Y
ou aren't helping! What's next? You're going to say I should just think about moving the sand, and then-”

  There was a hissing sound behind me.

  Zack was staring past me. I turned to look.

  The white sand had started to move. White streams crawled away from us as grains bounced uphill, away from the beach. It was as if a wind had come up and was simply blowing the sand away.

  Shocked, my mind went blank. As soon as it did, the sand stopped moving.

  As soon as I had spoken – as soon as I had thought about the idea – it had happened.

  The trees were still and the water was calm. There hadn't been any wind.

  It had been me.

  Chapter 11

  “Did you do that?!” Zack was excited, eyes wide and staring.

  I didn't answer. I just stared at the sand.

  Zack was practically dancing around me, moving back and forth to look at the sand from all angles. The letter T was now pretty messed up, smeared over the sand, as if a large fan had been turned on nearby. “I mean, the sand moved – you did that! You just thought about it and it happened!”

  “I... I don't know. I didn't do anything-”

  “Yeah, you did! You started thinking about moving the sand, and the sand moved! Do it again! Think about it!”

  I stared at the sand. I thought about it. We both watched expectantly.

  Nothing.

  I looked at Zack and shrugged. He had a weird look in his eye, like he was examining me under a microscope.

  “I don't know what the difference is,” I said. “I can't do it. It's like a light switch or something- Ow!”

  I stumbled backwards and fell and landed on my back in the sand. I looked up to see Zack standing over me.

  It took me a moment to realize what happened.

  Zack had pushed me. No, he had hit me. One fist in the middle of my chest. It really hurt and it had knocked me over and it was hard to breathe.

  One hand clutching where he'd hit me, I lay on my side and gasped for a while.

  Then I got mad.

  I stumbled to my feet and confronted Zack.