Coma (Paranormal Romance) (2 page)

“Seriously, Lyra, where do you go off to?”
Maya pursed her lips as if she was annoyed, resting her chin on the
back of her seat.

“What? I don’t get to drool over guys and you
do?” Attack is the best defense, or so I was told. What was I
supposed to say? My body is here, but I don’t feel like I should
be? Oh, that would surely get me a one way ticket to an asylum.

“Now you’re talking!” Helen’s high-pitched
voice went hand-in-hand with her excitement. “Who’s the
protagonist?”

Damn! That backfired. Um, let's go with,
“Damien,” I sputtered to put a lid on that subject. Pff, like I
cared for my ex boyfriend. Jerk.

“Still?” Maya made a face. “I’m glad it’s not
Brad, though.” Friends or not, she didn’t like me adding to the
competition. The entire school was fangirling over him, and that
irked her on its own.

“Of course it’s not Brad! But the way you two
talked about him and Darren...Um..It got me thinking about old days
with Damien,” I forced a smile; a little white lie never hurt
anybody.

“Okay, let’s get this party started!” Getting
out of the car, Helen made a poor attempt at imitating Pink's song,
and the two of us followed as back vocals. The last rays of sun
were touching the ocean making it glittery, creating a disco ball
effect. The sound of music and crowd murmur flowed over the sand
dunes in waves all the way to the parking lot, getting louder and
more consistent as we were getting closer.

The beach was lit up with colorful light
bulbs arranged in a square to form a dance podium. Spread around it
were familiar groups of people that usually hung together, kept to
themselves, and rarely mingled. Their business was talking about
other people's lives, since they had none of their own. Slightly
farther away, closer to the water, we saw our group of friends
sitting on one of the big blankets laid down for that purpose. One
look at those blankets, and it was apparent they presented interest
groups of sorts. Just like lunch tables––God forbid you should sit
at the wrong one, or too close to someone that outranked your
social status. Understandably, Brad and Darren's social blanket was
quite near ours, giving Maya and Helen a lot to swoon over.

Resting my back against Helen's, I watched an
endless mass of bodies moving to the sounds of music. Lights
reflecting on their bodies made it all seem magical. A group of
girls brought whistles, and blew them to the sound of music, making
the crowd go wild with excitement. My glance moved further toward
the kegs where an interesting pair of eyes grabbed my attention.
Now that one I could drool over!
––I thought seeing a tall,
dark haired guy, possibly in his early twenties, and clearly not
from our high school. Suddenly, I felt the need to fan myself. He
was absolutely stunning.

“I’ll get us drinks,” I said to my
girlfriends, not revealing my ulterior motive––getting closer to
that gorgeous set of eyes. Teen drinking wasn’t our game, but it
would be a perfect excuse to talk to him, to ask him where
non-alcoholic beverages were.
Perfectly innocent...
I
snickered.

My heart picked up a notch as I was walking
over. Finally, someone new and possibly interesting. I wondered who
he came with.
Please God, not the Queen Bee
. I crossed my
fingers, inhaled deeply, and lifted my gaze. My heart was racing
like mad. Looking at him sideways, he was absolutely gorgeous.
Dressed in dark clothes, hands nonchalantly tucked in his pockets,
glancing somewhere in the distance. Night breeze moved a few
strands of hair into his eyes, and he blew them away with his
breath like he couldn't be bothered. My mind kept repeating what to
ask him as I was nearing him. That close to kegs, I had a clear
view of his entire persona. He wasn’t looking my way, so I scanned
him from top down as if he were my personal eye candy. Unfortunate
for me, when I reached his legs, it was a major downer.
Damn
kegs!
I cussed. My world came crashing as I watched his feet
hovering slightly above the ground.
Pesky apparition!
I
growled internally.
He’s a freaking ghost!

Ghosts, or apparitions as I called them,
never stood out much from the crowd. It was more the weightlessness
of movement, and a hint of translucency that gave them away during
the day, but when it was dark, it was really hard to distinguish
them from normal people if their feet were not visible. It took me
a long time to realize that I could see something others couldn’t.
It would have been more apparent if they were typical ghosts, but
looking so much like the living made it that much complicated. Over
time, I started calling them apparitions, because I really didn’t
know what they were, and judging from other people’s stories,
ghosts were nothing like that, so I had to make a distinction. They
never paid attention to me, leaving an impression that they
couldn’t see me. That only added to my suspicion how I was
perpetually stuck between the worlds. Besides, they always seemed
somehow busy, driven even, making me not want to have anything to
do with them, anyway.

“Such a shame,” I said to myself, and went
past the kegs to find those non-alcoholic beverages. I couldn't get
back empty handed. Well, at least I could freely stare at the guy,
feast the eyes, so not all was lost. Or so I thought.

Watching the apparition guy as I went by,
sure that he couldn’t see me, the strangest thing happened––my gaze
was met! A combination of fear and thrill zoomed through me. As if
stuck down by a lightning bolt, my feet stopped moving right in
front of him. Someone must have sucked out all the air, because I
couldn’t breathe. With mouth agape, I stared at him helplessly.
Shamelessly, he stared back, straight into my eyes, without
blinking. I’ve never seen more beautiful eyes on a man or a ghost,
but I’ve never felt more scared in my entire life either. I sucked
in a sharp breath, and swallowed a knot, feeling my lower lip
quivering. He didn’t move or twitch. Breathing steadily, his eyes
took their time examining every inch of my face with cat-like
interest. Immobile, I screamed internally at my feet to move, but
they wouldn’t. His head tilted to the side, his gaze holding.
Taking cautious, shallow breaths, I felt life slowly returning to
my legs, so I willed them into moving forward.

After two steps, I sped up, still unable to
break eye contact, and then quickly got lost in the crowd. Cold
sweat tingled the back of my neck, accompanied by intense heart
beat. Drinks stand was right in front of me, so I hurried over as
if it were my refuge. Unaware of my trembling hands, pouring drinks
ended up being a disaster. I spilled half of it all over the stand.
Luckily, no-one saw my mishap, but I had to steady myself before
trying to carry three paper cups through the crowd. I closed my
eyes, and took several deep breaths, telling myself everything was
okay.
He’s not a danger to you
—I encouraged myself—
so
what if he saw you?
I felt calm enough, so I opened my eyes.
Scanning the crowd showed no sign of him, so I took the drinks, and
went to find Helen and Maya.

“What took you so long?” Helen said, tapping
her foot impatiently.
Was I really gone that long? Didn't seem
so.

“Sorry. I got held up at the drinks stand,” I
sputtered, handing her a drink.

“Maya finally hooked up with Brad! You should
have seen it. He’s so sweet with her,” Helen said grinning, her
voice elated.

“Can’t believe it! She was so worried he was
into someone else,” I said, but I never really doubted she would
win. Once she gathered some courage to talk to him, that is. Maya
was beautiful, and eventually got who she wanted, but her shyness
got in the way more than a couple of times. I just hoped Brad was
worthy of her attention. Hot guys rarely were. Jocks
especially.

“Apparently he was into her all this time,”
Helen continued, “She whispered it to me just before she left with
him.”

“That’s so cool! I guess she’ll be riding
home with him?”

“Yeah. She slipped me her car keys,” Helen
waved huff'n'puff keys, winking, and smiling, then changed her
expression into a worried one. “Are you gonna be okay with Damien
being here?”

Little did she know. He wasn't my biggest
issue anymore, “Sure. I'm used to it by now. What about you and
Darren?”

Helen rolled her eyes, “No luck. He’s all
over Queen Bee,” she motioned behind her with disgust. My gaze
followed, but instead of spotting the
lucky
pair, my eyes
met an intense stare. The apparition guy was watching me. His green
eyes were dissecting me piece by piece. Chills prickled up my neck.
I must have turned pale white, because Helen took my hand and said,
“You okay? It’s not that big of a deal. Really. Whoever messes with
Bee is a jerk.”

“You’re right,” I squeezed through my teeth,
“Let’s mingle,” and pulled her far away from the apparition, deep
into the crowd. Meeting my gaze was one thing, but following me
around was another. Creepy.

~*~

Morning came all too soon. The sunlight
peeking through the drapes hurt my eyes, and I pulled the comforter
over my head. It would have been great to sleep in, but the sound
of my mom vacuuming meant it wasn’t that much of a morning, more
like noonish. Still half asleep, I dragged myself downstairs to
have some breakfast.

“Good morning, sleepy,” Mom said, turning off
the vacuum cleaner. “Did you have fun last night?”

“Yeah, it was pretty good. Did I wake you
when I came home?”

“No, honey. You know I sleep with one eye
open until you arrive,” Mom smiled and signaled me to follow her
into the kitchen. “What do you want for breakfast?”

“Don’t know. I’m not that hungry. Maybe some
cereal––”

“So what are you girls up to for the day?”
Mom said, placing a bowl of cereal in front of me.

“We’ll take it easy, hang out over ice-cream
down by the beach, maybe even catch some sun. Helen and Maya are
coming over around two,” slowly, I poured some milk over the
cereal, making flakes swirl in the bowl. God, I was so tired.

After breakfast, I took a long shower, and
applied some light makeup. Running water must have possessed some
powerful energy, because it upgraded my ass from slow motion to
turbo speed. At the sound of Maya’s huff’n’puff car in our
driveway, I stormed out the door, waving Mom goodbye. She said
something, but I was already way out to hear what.

On our way to the beach, Maya told us all
about her dream date with Brad. It turned out they had a lot of
things in common, and mutual liking since junior high was one of
them. Matchmaking aspirations were apparently the other one.

“A blind date? Really, Maya?” Helen was not
thrilled at all with the idea. “And what made you think I’d go
along?”

“Brad suggested it, and I thought it would be
cool,” Maya grinned, not at all bothered by Helen’s pouting.

“Oh, and that makes it okay, then? Why not
Lyra? Why me?” Helen protested, crossing her arms on her chest
defiantly.

“Hold it right there!” I interjected. “You’re
not getting me into this one.”

“Because he’s not her type,” Maya explained
so as-a-matter-of-factly.

“And he
is
mine? And you would know
this, how?” Helen snorted.

“I’ve met the guy last night,” Maya giggled,
and parallel parked huff’n’puff in the shade. Old tin can wasn’t
equipped with air conditioning, so I was glad she nailed that spot.
At least we wouldn’t be cooked on our way home.

Helen scowled and said, “If this goes bad,
you’ll owe me big time! No, scratch that! You already owe me!”

“And if it doesn’t?” Maya snickered, and
waved her hand like she always had when Helen was overreacting.

“Come on, Helen. I should be upset, not you.
I’m the third wheel here,” I rolled my eyes. “At least you two will
have something to do––”

“Aww, you know we won’t neglect you,” Helen
pushed out her lower lip.

“That’s what I’m afraid of! Please, present
me as your mute cousin. That way I can sit and keep to myself,” I
hoped they really would, but they both laughed, dismissing my
remark.

Approaching our rendezvous point, we could
see a myriad of familiar faces from last night, sipping ice teas,
soaking up the sun, hiding tired eyes with dark shades, and nodding
our way in recognition. It was our high school’s favorite hangout
by the beach during summer. Brad got up from the table wearing a
silly grin, and motioned for us to come and sit. Seeing his friend,
Helen’s body language revealed she liked what she saw. Mine on the
other hand, showed utter terror. I stopped dead in my tracks.

Last night’s apparition guy was standing
there, only two feet from
our
table, staring at me. Unease
shot straight to the pit of my stomach. I forced myself to calmly
walk over to our table, sit, and not look at him. I decided to act
as if everything was perfectly fine––which turned out to be rather
difficult. I felt the constant need to squirm. Hell! I wanted to
run away that instant. I had to find an excuse to leave, and real
soon. My heart pounded so hard, ears buzzed, and I felt quite
lightheaded.
What does he want from me?

“Earth to Lyra,” I heard Brad say, so I
flinched, only to see an annoyed waitress standing, waiting to take
my order.

“Oh, sorry. Coke, please,” I felt blood rush
to my face, and my company laughed.

“You do that a lot lately,” Maya said, and I
sheepishly smiled. Keeping pace with reality was hard enough
without a distracting ghost-slash-apparition on my back. I darted a
glance at him, and tightness gripped my chest. That stare was
disturbing. The guy had no shame!

The entire time we were there, the apparition
guy didn’t take his eyes off of me, nor did he move. I tried to
participate in the conversation at my table, but failed at it
miserably. I was glad more than ever that they were all into each
other, and not paying attention to my rambling. Each time I tried
to excuse myself, Maya or Helen would beat my arguments––a downside
of knowing each other so well.