Chapter 8

• “I’m sorry. I should have asked you first. I’m Crissy.” She motioned around us. “I heard you say you needed a window and thought you wanted some air.” She looked left then right. “There’s lots of air here.”
• I backed away from her.
• We were on a roof. A roof! Holy mother of pearl! I gaped at her. She was how I got from the fire escape to that cube. “It was you.” I put my hand over my mouth. “You put me in that clear cube.”
• She frowned at me, then her eyes went wide. “No. No, that was Victor with his port box.” She nodded.
• …I wonder how those work…
• …she doesn’t look happy to have fresh air…
• …maybe the library has a book…
• …Victor is going to be upset I did that…
• …grey hair and black eyes…
• …has to be more pieces…
• The voices just kept coming, or it was one voice, several thoughts at the same time. I put my hands up to my temples and backed up a few more feet. The word pattern…these were Crissy’s thoughts. All of them.
• Music started playing. Crissy looked at her phone and then tapped the screen.
• “Cristy?” There was no mistaking Victor.
• “I’m here. We’re on my roof. I thought Kara wanted some air.” She looked at me and bit her lip. “I don’t think I helped her.”
• “Kara?” It was Daxx.
• “Yes.” I was having to focus hard to keep all of the thoughts out of my head. I wouldn’t be able to block for long without another meltdown.
• “Are you all right?” She asked.
• I grimaced. “Not really.” I looked around. “We’re on a roof.” I looked back to Crissy. “How the pish did we get on the roof?”
• “That’s complicated.” Daxx said slowly.
• I stared at the phone in Crissy’s hand. “Can I get off the roof now?”
• “Do you want me to…”
• “I’ll be there in a moment.” Victor said before Crissy could finish.
• She bit her lip. “He’s not happy with me.”
• I could only shrug. He could get in line.
• Victor was suddenly standing beside her.
• He. Just. Appeared.
• I hope they were watching what things like that did to me on their Fitbit. Or, I had suffered a complete mental breakdown and this whole day was in my head. It had been ten years since that last happened.
• Giving her a quick once over to make sure she was all right, Victor turned to me. “I have a better location if you require fresh air.”
• “On the ground?” I glanced around. “I’m not normally afraid of heights, but I’m feeling…” I waved my hand in front of my face. “A little shaky right now.”
• He inclined his head and looked at Crissy’s phone. “I’ll take her to the courtyard.”
• “We’ll meet you there.” Chase answered.
• Victor held out his hand to Crissy, she took it without question. When he held his other one out to me, I looked at it. “Take my hand, take a deep breath and then close your eyes.”
• I looked at his hand as I walked toward him. He closed his hand around mine, then looked at me. I nodded, took a deep breath and closed my eyes.
• My head was filled with white noise again. Not as bad as before, but it still wasn’t pleasant. I opened my eyes to see grass and stone. I let go and stumbled back several feet. Looking around I spotted a stone bench and quickly went to sit down.
• Victor and Crissy didn’t follow me.
• “Everyone all right?”
• I turned to see a woman with long black hair leaning over a railing on the top floor. A redheaded woman appeared beside her.
• “Crissy you can’t just vanish like that without a word.” She scolded.
• “Sorry, Beth. I could hear how upset Kara was getting and wanted to help.” Crissy called up to her.
• “We’ll be down in a moment.” The dark-haired woman said.
• I was trying to decide if this was inside my mind or really happening. Looking down, I moved my feet over the grass. At least I wasn’t on a roof now. I gave Victor and Crissy a cautious glance, they were keeping their distance. There was no way my imagination was creative enough to invent people like this.
• Their body language told me he was expressing his displeasure that she’d vanished us to that roof.
• This was really happening.