Lucid Read online

  I was about to turn when his eyes opened and stared straight into mine. He sat silent and resigned, the worry evident by the slight furrow on his wrinkled forehead. Before he looked away his mouth lifted in a disturbingly crooked smile, but the hint of light in his eyes made me feel less lonely. We flew alone, but we were in this together. My lips lifted ever so slightly before a lump caught in the back of my throat and a solitary tear slid onto my cheek.

  The plane jerked upward. I was thrust back in my seat before it tipped, jarring, and sent me sliding forward again. I clenched my hands tighter onto the armrests and held on for dear life.

  The aeroplane speakers crackled to life. ‘Brace for impact.’ There was a pause before the captain repeated. ‘Brace for impact!’

  I lowered my head to my knees and gripped my shins with shaking hands. My heart pounded against my thighs, and my breath thundered in my ears even though it was difficult to breathe at all.

  The screams around me dulled, moments before they were abruptly overwhelmed by the deafening sound of explosive metal as it crunched closer. Flames engulfed me, scorched my skin, and my mouth opened in a silent scream.

  — 2 —

  The darkness became blinding light as I opened my eyes and instantly closed them again, resisting the golden glow that blasted into my room. My pulse vibrated at a high frequency, and I inhaled deeply to bring it down. I wished I could stay in bed. All those deaths to contend with, I wasn’t sure I wanted to face the day. Maybe Mum wouldn’t notice if I was a no show.

  As though she heard my thoughts, her voice crept into my room. ‘Lucy Cate Piper, get up. Coffee’s brewing.’

  I tugged the covers over my head with a moan, before flinging them back again. Rubbing my eyes, I reached into my bedside drawer, and lifted my well-used A5 sketch book onto my lap. I flipped through the pages searching for one particular drawing: the one I’d pencilled the last time I’d had that same dream. It was nearly a year ago when news of the tragic plane crash swamped the television. It wasn’t unusual to have recurring dreams. Sometimes events stayed with me for days, forcing the images on me, making me afraid to fall asleep. Thankfully I’d never repeated the plane crash dream…until now.

  Faces peered from the page; the strange man across the aisle, the old lady beside me, the boy at the airport. The same boy who’d moved into the house around the corner.

  ‘Holy cow.’ My heart rate accelerated, like it did whenever I tried to piece together the puzzles from my dreams. But those pieces had never collided with real life before.

  Forty minutes later, after I ran a brush through my unruly hair, gathered it into my usual high ponytail, and added an extra coat of tinted moisturiser under my blackened, sleep-deprived eyes, I downed my coffee and stepped out into the fresh morning air. I wrapped my arms around my body as anticipation crept through me at the thought of the winter easing its descent upon us. I couldn’t wait for the wind in my hair, the feel of thick powder under my board, and my favourite time of year: that first week when it felt like we were the only ones on the mountain.

  A horn blared and I rushed to jump into the front seat of Jake’s ’92 Toyota van. Moments later, my younger brother, Ollie, always ten steps and three years behind me, clambered in the back with a grunt.

  ‘’Bout time,’ Jake said, tapping the wheel. Jake was taking the school year seriously, repeating his final year in an attempt to earn higher grades and pursue medicine. He regularly threatened to leave Ollie and me behind if we weren’t ready, and I’d been tempted on more than one occasion to let him go without me. Jake bought the van almost solely for the purpose of transporting as many people and snowboards as possible. It had grunt to get us up the mountain, but not a lot of charm.

  I leaned my elbow on the armrest, put my earphones in, and played with the beaded jet bracelet around my wrist, recalling all the lives lost in last night’s dream. It was a long time ago now, but the guilt after waking up when they didn’t hung heavily on my shoulders. And why had I witnessed the crash again after all this time? Biting my fingernails, I focussed on the mountain tops, unease rippling over my skin. Did it have anything to do with dream boy moving in around the corner? I yearned to know more, my usual need for answers prodding at me, cramming into my stomach, refusing to budge until I figured it out.

  *****

  My hand glided across the paper, sketching the fine lines of his cheekbones and his full lips. They were nothing short of perfect, and I did my best to draw them as I remembered. The shadow from the fall of his hair made his eyes appear almost black. Brown perhaps – I hadn’t been close enough to see – but I wasn’t drawing in colour so it made no difference.

  Who was he? The lady in the first part of my dream had been killed on the plane, and I always thought he was simply an innocent bystander.

  At the easel beside me, my close friend Amber groaned as she tackled her own portrait. That was normal for her in art, but I found myself with an equal amount of angst today as I attempted to draw dream boy exactly as I’d seen him. He reminded me of James Dean, the eyes and the cheeks, maybe the hair too. I only knew this because Granny Tess was a huge fan and, despite my protests, I’d grown up watching his movies. He stared back from the page, and I drew in a deep breath.

  ‘Everything all right?’ Amber whispered. She always flitted about like a kindergarten teacher, as if everyone’s happiness was somehow her responsibility.

  ‘Yeah, just admiring.’ I hadn’t taken my eyes off his face.

  ‘Why wouldn’t you, he’s a tad lovely,’ she said.

  ‘Only a tad?’ I could stare at him all day. But Amber was serious with Cal, one of my oldest and dearest, if not craziest friends, so she clearly appreciated a different type.

  ‘Hey, is he the new kid?’

  ‘Who?’ I darted my eyes to her.

  She flicked her hand in the direction of my picture. ‘Him. Looks like the new kid. You’ve met him then?’

  I resisted glancing over my shoulder as if he were standing at the back of the room. My pulse pounded against my chest. The boy who’d given me goose bumps from a single stare was at my school? I hadn’t been expecting that when I woke up. Who starts at a new school on a Thursday anyway?

  ‘Lucy?’

  ‘What? Uh no…’

  She scrunched her brows, examining my picture.

  ‘I mean, I haven’t met him, I saw him before school.’ Of course, I hadn’t really seen him before school. Well I had, just not in real life.

  ‘You saw him one time and drew him that accurately?’

  ‘I usually do.’ I didn’t mean for it to come out so abrupt, but it was true. I swallowed and shifted to take in her picture. ‘How you going with yours?’ Amber had drawn some seriously furrowed eyebrows on her portrait of an ageing lady.

  Amber whined. ‘I can’t get the eyes right.’

  ‘Looks great,’ I said. ‘She looks really angry.’

  ‘Exactly.’ Amber tucked a loose strand of honey blonde hair under her lace headband. ‘I was going for mildly irritated.’

  ‘You can’t change it?’

  ‘I’ve tried, but I might have to go with this now before it becomes a big smeared mess. I should just stick to photography.’ She turned back toward my drawing and tilted her head. ‘How do you do it? You get it perfect every time.’

  ‘Not always.’

  ‘Yeah, and I’m the most popular girl in the school. Looks pretty good to me.’

  I inwardly disagreed. I had a clear picture in my mind, but some elements didn’t transfer seamlessly to the page. A wrong angle, a misplaced line, and it wouldn’t be the same person.

  I’d seen this face twice now, and both times it’d held my attention, but this was the first time I’d drawn it properly. I wanted to get it right. I clenched the pencil. Oh my God, he was here. Part of me wanted to search the school grounds for him; the other half eyed the art store room and the lock above the handle.

  Mrs Mac appeared behind me, her hands on her broad hips
. ‘That’s coming along really well, Lucy. I love the intensity in his eyes. Makes me wish I knew what he was thinking.’

  Yeah, I’d thought that myself.

  I grabbed my books in one arm, slammed the locker door shut and spun around to make my way back to class. I’d forgotten my books for PE and ditched Max so I could sprint to my locker before Ms Furness noticed me missing.

  A girl just ahead swung open the double doors, and I dodged around her and slipped through before they shut. In my carelessness, I whacked into her arm. Without slowing, I shouted an apology and ran full pelt into someone coming from the other direction. Before my brain had a chance to comprehend the impact, my feet were in the air, the books too, and I landed with a massive smack against the concrete.

  ‘Shit.’ I placed my hand on the back of my head as a searing pain made its way from my shoulder to the nape of my neck and shot into my skull. Damn. I squeezed my eyes shut momentarily, and then remembered why I’d been rushing in the first place. I sat up as fast as my pained body would allow, my head down, and waited for the spinning to ease.

  ‘You right?’ The voice was smooth and deep.

  ‘Yeah, you?’ I lifted my head.

  ‘I’m fine–’

  From around soft strands of hair, familiar dark eyes peered out, widening as they met mine.

  I couldn’t breathe.

  It was him. So much for searching him out. Now he stood in front of me, all I wanted to do was race back and lock myself in that store room.

  ‘You sure you’re okay?’ He rested a hand on his knee and leaned over, running his fingers through his hair.

  Where was my voice? Not wanting to witness the humiliation, it’d apparently packed up and shipped out the moment the panic set in.

  My pulse thundered in my ears as I spoke. ‘Perfectly fine.’ My voice was hoarse, as if I’d just run a marathon. I collected the books beside me, and scraped myself off the ground.

  I scrunched my brow and looked at him again. Tears stung the back of my eyes, but I couldn’t tell if it was from the sharp pain in my head or because for the first time in my life I stood face to face with someone who I’d only ever seen in my dreams. He held out one of my books, a tentative smile on his face.

  I extended a shaking hand, grabbed the book, and backed away. I lowered my eyes, mumbled a thanks, and, still struggling to take a lungful of air, barrelled away from him.

  — 3 —

  My vision blurred, the buildings warped, and I couldn’t see the ground below my feet, but I kept running. I blinked rapidly to clear my eyes so I wouldn’t end up on the ground again. My head throbbed, a cocktail of pain and anxiety. Of shock. I was expecting it, but the impact of actually seeing him slammed into me like a ship into ice, breaching my core.

  And he’d looked almost as startled at seeing me. Why? He couldn’t possibly remember me from the airport, I’d only ever been there in my dream. My hand trembled as I covered my mouth, swallowing back a wave of nausea.

  I darted into a small alcove between two buildings, the dull orange bricks looming above me. I dropped my books, lowered my hands to my knees and inhaled slowly. This made absolutely no sense. He’d been in my dream, I’d been in his reality; but he shouldn’t recognise me. I tried to shake off my uneasiness, but it wouldn’t budge. I wiped at my still moist eyes, picked up my scattered books, and staggered back to the gym.

  ‘What took you so long?’ Max peered nervously over my shoulder at the teacher. ‘I said you had to go to the toilet, but that cover was starting to look embarrassing. Hey, you okay? You’re all pale.’

  ‘Good, that’ll go well with my cover story.’ I avoided her question.

  ‘Yeah, but I know you’re not sick, what happened?’ Her voice was laced with concern.

  ‘Lucy and Mackenzie,’ Ms Furness called. ‘You two, court four, you’re up against Karla and Abby.’

  ‘Aren’t we doing theory?’ I asked Max.

  ‘Yeah, later, apparently.’ She rolled her eyes.

  I’d known Max since we were in nappies. She’d been part of so much in my life, she was like my birthmark – always there, as much a part of me as I was her – and we matched strides as we marched from the gym, grabbing our rackets on the way out.

  ‘Spit it.’ Max bumped her hip against mine.

  ‘I saw someone unexpected, that’s all.’

  ‘So unexpected you look like you’ve seen a ghost?’ She grabbed my arm, staring more closely at me. ‘Hey, have you been crying?’

  ‘No, I’m perfectly fine.’ I waved my hand in front of me before stupidly deciding on a truth so absurd it would probably shut her up anyway. ‘Okay. I literally just banged into someone that I dreamed about last night. I ran into him, fell on my ass, and smacked my head on the ground. I made a complete moron of myself in front of someone who, only this morning, I thought was a figment of my imagination. Now, say I’m not crazy.’ I giggled, trying to dismiss the queasy misgivings rumbling in my stomach at admitting the truth to Max.

  She wasn’t laughing; her eyes narrowed, lips turned upward. Dark hair swayed around her face, highlighting her light brown skin, one of the best assets her Fijian father gave her. ‘Did you say him?’

  ‘Seriously? Out of all that and you want me to clarify that part?’

  ‘It is the most interesting bit…well, maybe after the crazy part.’ She grinned boldly as we reached the courts. Abby and Karla stood on the other side of the net, waving their arms and racquets in animated conversation.

  ‘Ready?’ Abby called. We positioned ourselves and she threw the ball in the air, delivering a perfect serve. Max lunged on long legs and hit the ball squarely over the net, it landed out of Karla’s reach.

  I picked up a spare ball, bounced it on the court, and belted it into the air. Max and I were in flawless sync, a fusion of white and navy dancing across the court. The ball flew through the air, and Max gracefully sent it soaring back.

  ‘So, you dreamed about him, then saw him in the flesh. That’s pretty cool. And crazy. You sure you haven’t seen him before? The school’s not that big.’ Max did always go for the logical.

  Yeah, in the dream a year ago – but I couldn’t tell her that. Whack. The ball bounced off my racquet. ‘Maybe I saw him without realising it.’

  ‘That or you’re destined for the loony bin’.

  ‘That’s what I’m afraid of.’ I missed the ball as it flew past my head. ‘Damn!’

  Max placed a hand on her hip, breathing hard, her chest heaving against her tight polo. She looked me in the eyes. ‘Hey, I’m kidding. You’re only crazy if you believe it, so stop. It’s not possible you dreamed someone up. Like, you know how insane that sounds. I mean, the possibilities sound fun, but also insane.’ Her mahogany eyes glimmered.

  This was what Max did. She wasn’t the friend who validated my feelings – she told me not to feel what I felt, with the notion it helped.

  It didn’t.

  My feelings, doubts, insecurities, whatever you wanted to call them, weren’t a light switch to be turned off so easily, no matter how insane they sounded. Confiding in Max and her telling me to stop my train of thought only reinforced why I kept my dreams to myself.

  When I was younger, my brothers had gathered around me each morning to listen as I recapped the previous night’s dream over breakfast. Their pancakes grew cold, and untouched cereal turned to mush as I recounted the events I’d experienced in my dream life.

  They were good memories, but, like anything worn and old, my dreams turned into a darker, less desirable kind. I was thirteen when Mum replaced her smile with wary eyes and small shakes of the head. She ignored my brothers’ protests, afraid my recollections would be too grim for Ollie, never mind if they were even worse for me. So, ever so slowly, like the shift of the tide – not noticed until it’s gone – I spoke of the dreams less and less, until one day I couldn’t remember the last one I’d shared with them.

  Seeking to replace my loss I’d turned to Max. She hated horr
or stories, but didn’t seem to mind mine until I suggested my dreams were things that’d actually happened. She brushed me off, said I was probably imagining it. And when I suggested I was actually there she went all weird on me. She didn’t say anything, but the indifference, sometimes awkwardness in her face each time I recounted my dreams showed how uncomfortable they made her. I wasn’t so open after that, though it didn’t stop her reaching out when I’d had a bad one. She supported me the best way she knew how, though not always the way I needed.

  So my solitary quest to figure out the meaning remained exactly that – solitary. Maybe I ought to listen to Max after all and stop with the crazy thoughts, but seriously, what the hell?

  Why was I seeing the aeroplane dream again? Was it because he’d shown up, or did it mean something more? Add the fact I was sure he recognised me too, and I was back on the train, on an endless loop I couldn’t get off, reeling with a dizziness I knew all too well.

  I hated feeling out of control; I liked answers, and I’d be damned if I wasn’t going to figure these ones out.

  I stopped by my locker to grab the textbooks meant to assist me for the next forty minutes in my least favourite subject. I slammed the door shut before diving into the crowd. A sea of teenage faces stared back, and I swam through them like a salmon against the current. Their voices echoed in my ears, ricocheting against the rise of my inner screaming. I plucked the dangling earphones from my shirt and positioned them in my ears.

  I’d almost reached the doors when I saw him walking toward me. Our eyes met, and I was transported back to the airport, making my skin heat. I yanked my gaze away and picked up my pace.

  I ducked into the toilets so I could breathe without fear of seeing him. He might be good looking, but he was still a painful reminder of my insanity. I splashed my face with cold water and gasped. I felt like I’d run a marathon, and as my reflection gaped back at me – sunken dark eyes, whiter than usual face – I decided I might look better if I had.