Forever Blue (9 page)

Chapter Fourteen

Lennon

I was floating on cloud nine when I pulled Elmo up the drive after my conversation by the lake with Judah. The rumours were over exaggerated and ridiculous, the result of too many people having too little to do. I should've known. He had promised to come over again that night.

Flynn's car was parked outside. Grams sat on a bench seat in the garden, or rather, weed patch, smoking. Her lips curled when she spoke. "Where have you been?"

"You're here again?" I asked and poked out my tongue, only, Grams didn't smile.

"Where have you been?" she repeated.

"School."

"Why are you wet?"

"I went for a walk down by the lake."

Her eyes narrowed. "By yourself?"

Grams had always asked direct questions and they had never bothered me before, but facing them now, annoyed me. I wanted to keep whatever it was Judah and I had going on to myself for a little while before it came under the scrutiny of others.

"Do you ever do anything other than smoke?" I asked sharply.

"I also drink tea and play cards," Grams replied, her face blank.

"Have you ever considered getting a life, instead of always butting your nose into mine?"

Grams took a long drag on her cigarette before answering. "Are you saying that playing cards, drinking tea, and smoking, is not living? Playing cards keeps the mind sharp, my girl, and my body's already stuffed."

I stormed past her and walked inside to find Mum, Flynn and Cara sitting at the table, surrounded by trays of takeaway food.

"Hungry?" Mum asked.

It was obviously still too early in the relationship for Mum to expose Flynn to her cooking. I quickly changed into dry clothes, pulled a plate out from the cupboard and piled on some fried rice and satay chicken, but it wasn't until the scent of the food drifted into my nostrils that I realised how hungry I was.

After dinner, Cara and I went into the lounge, turned on the TV and flopped onto the couch. It was strange having other people in the house. I was used to it being just Mum and me.

"I hate this programme," Cara said and started to chew on one of her nails.

I changed the channel.

"Do you think we are going to have to do this a lot?"

"What?" I asked.

"Hang out together?"

"I don't know. I guess."

"Well I'm not hanging around with Sienna," Cara informed me.

"No one is asking you to." I bit my lip.

"Good. You know Dad told me I had to come up and say hello at school earlier." Cara folded her arms and sunk deeper into the couch. She looked like she wanted to ask me something, but since she didn't volunteer, I ignored her and settled in to watch whatever channel she was happy with. Mum and Flynn's murmured voices and laughter as they washed the dishes, floated into the room and I turned the volume up.

"So how do you know Judah?" she asked after a long silence.

"I've just seen him around."

"And that's why you asked about him? Because you've seen him around?"

"Sure," I replied. "Why not?"

There was another long silence before she spoke again. "You shouldn't hang around with him."

I kept my eyes fixed on the telly. "I don't really think that's any of your business."

She shrugged and adjusted her position on the couch. "You should just be careful, that's all. I'm only trying to look out for you. I trusted him once."

"I can look after myself."

"I knew Ruben well, too," she added.

"Uh, huh," I said absently.

"They used to be close. Not as close as they say some twins are, they didn't have that twin-sense that people talk about, they couldn't sense each other's pain or anything like that."

I looked over at her. "They were twins?"

"Yep. Not identical, identical. I mean they were officially identical, but you could tell them apart. Well, I could, anyway."

She pulled out her phone and started flicking through the images on her camera roll. She stopped on one and held it out. "That's Judah on the left and Ruben on the right."

The photo was of the three of them, Cara in the middle, her arms wrapped around the neck of each of the brothers. Judah's eyes were tilted towards Cara, and Ruben was gazing off into the distance, his look almost vacant. A twinge of jealousy flicked through me at the way Judah was staring at Cara like she was the only person in the world, the same way he looked at me.

"They were so different," she continued. "Everyone loved Ruben. He was so handsome, none of that casual, 'I'm too cool to care about how I look' attitude that Judah has going on. Judah was always a loner. I think I was the only person he ever really got along with. He prefers cars over people."

"You look happy there," I said, handing the phone back. "I thought you hated him."

"I do. That photo was taken before."

"Before?"

"Before he killed my sister."

"Shouldn't people stop saying that? Isn't it slander or something?"

"Not when it's true," she replied bluntly.

Cara's words stayed with me long after she and her father left. Mum was on cloud nine and I could tell she was falling for Flynn, hard. It was good to see, I guess, better than her still fawning after Dad.

I fell asleep waiting for Judah to appear, but the knock on my window never came.

I didn't see him during school, either. It wasn't until I was making my way to my car that I spotted him. He was pulling a beanie over his hair and his shoulders slumped under his backpack.

"Judah!" I yelled and ran to catch up.

He turned to face me, looking as though he had had a terrible night sleep. There was a trace of stubble on his chin and his nose looked slightly crooked like it had been broken.

"What happened to your nose?" I asked.

"Some people's heads are hard." He looked at me blankly before twisting his face. "Is there something you wanted?"

"I thought you were coming over last night?" I said.

He wrinkled his forehead. "And why would you think that?" He looked at me expectantly, unsmiling, waiting for my answer, but I couldn't find the words. "Is there something you wanted?" he asked impatiently.

"I—I just thought you said you were coming over," I mumbled. Maybe I was finally getting to see the side of him that everyone else did.

Judah laughed coldly. "Look, I don't know what your game is, but just leave me alone, okay?"

"But I told you I believed you," I said quietly.

He pulled his beanie down further so it hooded his eyes. "Look, this little conversation has been great, really, but I've got to go to work."

"Will I see you later?" I asked, deflated and feeling foolish. I was hurt by his dismissal, but at the same time, I was annoyed that I was feeling hurt.

"Probably. We do go to the same school." And then he adjusted the bag on his back and walked away, leaving me staring after him and wondering what I had done wrong for him to brush me off like that. Maybe he had come over last night and saw that Cara was there. But surely that wouldn't be enough for him to be annoyed at me, would it?

Sienna walked over and stood by my side, following my gaze as I watched Judah open the door to a big car.

"You alright?" she asked.

"Judah just brushed me off," I said as the engine roared into life and Judah exited the carpark without a backwards glance, gravel spitting behind him.

"Jerk. I told you he was bad news."

"He's not—" I looked down at the ground. I didn't know what to say.

"Forget him. He's not worth your time, not like Ross." She smiled serenely. "He called last night and we talked on the phone for, like, two hours."

"So you answered this time?"

She frowned. "Of course. Why wouldn't I?"

"Never mind." I sighed.

"Want to come to my place and I'll tell you all about it?"

"No." It was the last thing I wanted to do. "I just want to go home."

Sienna rolled her eyes. "Fine, go home and have your pity party, but I'm telling you he's not worth it."

I held my eyes open wide to stop any tears from falling on the way home, cursing myself for getting upset. I was hurt, but mainly, I was just confused. I felt angry, though I wasn't sure exactly what about. Maybe I had misunderstood the conversation we had down by the lake. I went over it in my mind, analysing everything he had said, but it just didn't add up. 

After tea, I avoided Mum and went to my room, claiming I had a headache. The more I thought about Judah, the more foolish I felt. But I just couldn't get him out of my mind. I hoped after our strange exchange at school that he might knock on my window and say it was all a mistake, he was simply in a hurry, or that he had been in a bad mood, but really, I couldn't think of a decent excuse he could give for being so rude. I needed answers and I needed them before my head exploded. I even opened my window, hoping that if he passed, he would see, and take it as an invitation. Then I closed it. Then I opened it again. I wanted to be mad, but the truth was I was falling for him and desperately wanted him to fall for me too. After a while of endless questions running about my head, I flicked on the computer and typed Judah Mitchell into the search engine. It didn't tell me anything I didn't already know. He was questioned by police regarding the hit and run of Cara's little sister, Lana, and his brother's death, but he wasn't charged in either case. There was no proof of anything other than exceptionally bad luck, and perhaps a whiff of doubt. With a sigh, I turned the computer off.

"What were you looking at?" Judah's voice startled me as he climbed through the open window.

My heart immediately started to pound and I rubbed my hands together to remove the clammy sweat that coated my skin. Judah looked at me with no sign of our previous encounter clouding his expression. I just stared at him, unsure what to say.

He took a step closer. "Everything okay?" he asked when I remained silent.  He took another step closer and I shied away. "Have I done something wrong?" he asked, crossing his arms. "Did Cara say something? I came over last night and saw Flynn's car up the drive. I saw you and Cara inside watching TV, so I figured I wouldn't be welcome." He waited for me to say something, but the words were stuck in my throat. "What did she say? She's not telling the truth." The muscles of his crossed arms twitched as he waited for my answer.

"Why were you so strange after school today?" The words finally rushed out of me in one long breath.

The colour drained from Judah's face.

"You acted as though you hardly knew me. Were you just hoping to keep this little thing we have going, separate from the rest of your life, if we even have a thing? Is it an embarrassment to be seen with me? Would your parents not approve? What is it?" I was rambling but I couldn't stop.

"I knew this would happen," he muttered under his breath. He walked over and sat on my bed, placing his head in his hands.

"Don't play games with me, Judah Mitchell." I lowered my voice. "I don't go for the hot and cold sort of stuff."

"I'm not playing games," he insisted. "You have no idea what you mean to me." He sighed and ran his hands through his hair, pacing the small strip of floor in front of my computer. "It's not what you think. It's just that—" He shook his head. "Shit. I don't even know where to begin."

"Just spit it out." I leaned back in the chair and crossed my arms. I did my best to be annoyed at him, only, I couldn't see anything but his soft lips and I wanted them pressed against mine like in my dreams. That made me even more annoyed that he had this effect.

"I will, I promise," he said. "But just not here, okay?"

I pulled my legs up to my chest and hugged them, raising my eyebrows stubbornly. There was something he was hiding from me.

He kept glancing at the door and wringing his hands. He paced the floor a few times before sitting down at the end of my bed and taking a deep breath. "I'm not Judah." 

Chapter Fifteen

Lennon

His grey eyes fixed on mine. The murmur of the TV through the closed door seemed amplified in the silence. I took in a deep breath and exhaled slowly before asking, "What do you mean?"

"I'm not Judah. The real Judah is the one you saw at school today."

The room swayed in my vision. "I don't understand," I stammered.

He was Judah. I knew he was Judah. Sienna knew him and Cara knew him. And if he wasn't Judah, then who was he?

"Look, it's a strange story and I promise I'll tell you everything, but please, not here. Take a walk with me." He rose from the bed and stretched out his hand. I ignored it and stood. Little bubbles of anger began to rise to the surface under my skin. He was talking nonsense. If he didn't want to be with me, he didn't need to make up silly lies. He only needed to say so, and I would leave him alone. But even as these thoughts floated through my mind, my heart quickened at the thought of losing him. And I hated myself for it.

"Fine," I said finally. I pulled on some shoes and headed for the window. "I'll go for a walk, but you must promise to tell me everything."

"I promise," Judah said, holding up his hands. "No more lies. I'll tell you everything if you just give me the chance. But not here. Not like this."

We climbed out the window and into the night. The sun hadn't quite set and it cast eerie shadows over the street. I followed two steps behind Judah/not Judah, watching the movement of his shoulders. They were hunched and he walked as though his feet were encased in lead. We walked past the houses until they became less frequent and further apart, and it seemed no time before we were walking along the road that led to the cemetery.

Agitation began to eat at my gut. "Where are we going?"

"Not far now," Judah said.

When the gates to the cemetery loomed ahead, the familiar cold dread descended, making my spine tingle. I stopped. "Is this some sort of joke?" I asked as he walked through the gates.

"No joke. No lies." He held out his hand again. "Please, just follow me. Trust me."

I took his hand that time, grateful for the contact, and the dread lifted, just a little. Fog rolled over the headstones and along the ground, greeting us like a thick grey carpet. I clung tighter to Judah's arm as the dread solidified in the pit of my stomach again. He stopped in front of Ruben's gravestone, let go of my hand and traced the name with his finger.

"This is me," he whispered, as though he were afraid the trees would hear.

I turned cold. "What do you mean?"

"I'm Ruben."

I didn't say anything. I couldn't say anything. I looked between Judah and the gravestone. I expected him to laugh. I thought he would throw his head back and tell me it was a joke, but his eyes, the same colour of the cold stone, remained fixed with no hint of mirth. I sunk to the ground, not caring that the grass was wet.

"I know this is a lot to take in and I can't really make sense of it myself, but I promised you the truth and this is it. I think—I mean—" He took a deep breath. "I'm dead."

I blinked. "You're Ruben," I said.

"Yes."

"And you think you're dead." Clearly his brother's death had affected Judah more than anyone knew.

"I don't think, I know. I know I died. I watched as Judah pulled my body from the lake. I know that no one can see me, no one can hear me, and no one can feel me. No one, except you."

I shook my head.  "That doesn't make sense, you're just confused." What he was saying wasn't possible. A tear fell, even though I wasn't crying, and rolled down my cheek. Judah, Ruben, whoever he was, brushed it away.

"I was at my own funeral. I saw them lower my body into the ground. It's my bones that lie beneath us. I can't explain it. I don't know how or why these things happened, but they did. All I know is before I met you, I was unseen by the world, no one could see me, no one could hear me, and they couldn't touch me. I ceased to exist. I was dead." He looked at me with pleading eyes, eyes filled with life. "I am dead."

He reached out and took my hands in his, pressing them between his fingers. I watched as though disconnected from my body. He felt real. His hair swayed in the slight breeze. His eyes studied mine. The creases in his forehead deepened as he waited for my response, only, I didn't know what I felt. I didn't know how I was expected to feel. I felt cold, but most of all, I felt nothing. No alarm, no fear or disbelief, nothing.

"So today, that was your brother? The real Judah?"

He nodded.

"And he can't see you?"

He nodded again.

"No one can see you, but me?" I was repeating everything he had already said, but my mind couldn't process it. It was too strange, too foreign to wrap my thoughts around. "Why me?" I asked.

"I don't know." He laughed, but it was just a small puff of air snorted through his nostrils rather than a laugh. "I've got no one to ask."

I shook my head. "Tell me everything from the start. From the night you—" I swallowed. "The night you died."

He tugged my hands closer and rubbed over the top of them with his fingers, pushing away what little colour there was left and leaving them pale. "At first, I didn't realise I had died. I mean, there wasn't this moment of light or visions of my life flashing before me. I don't remember everything, things were hazy, but I do remember that feeling, the panic that hit me." He swallowed and looked at me hesitantly. He knew how difficult it was to believe what he was saying. "I was drifting, parts of my body ached, my brain screamed for air, and then I remember the relief as Judah dragged me from the car. We made it to the surface and I swam to shore. Only, when I turned around, I saw him struggling with something in the water. I yelled out but he didn't hear. I splashed back through the water, yelling at him, but he just kept struggling and dragging this body to shore. I tried to help but he ignored me. I thought he was just really annoyed, or—I don't know what I thought. I was confused, everything was a little hazy, and when he dragged the body onto the shore and started crying and trying to resuscitate it, I looked down and realised it was me." He spoke slowly, pausing often, as though the words themselves were painful. "Things went black after that, and I woke later with the lake water lapping at my feet. I stood, confused and dazed. There were flashing lights, blue and red. Mum and Dad were there. Mum was crying. I vomited when I saw the body strapped to a gurney. For the briefest moment, I thought it was Judah, but then I remembered. I tried to stop them taking the body away. I tried pulling their hands, prying their fingers from the rails of the gurney, yelling, screaming, crying, but I didn't exist anymore. It took me days to admit I was dead. Days when I followed my family around, begging for them to hear me, to see me, but they just looked through me. I thought it would pass. I thought that somehow I would end up back in my body, but it just didn't happen. I was dead. What other explanation was there?" He sighed and brought my fingers to his lips, watching me, waiting for my reaction. His breath was warm on my skin and my brain rebelled against what he was saying. How was his breath warm if he was dead? How was there breath at all?

A silent scream reverberated in my head. "I need to go."

"Don't," he pleaded. "Lennon, don't. I need you."

"Judah—" I took another deep breath. "Ruben, I can't."

I pulled my hands from his and took off running. My feet pounded over the grass and the wind whipped back my hair as I took in big gulps of air. I could hear him behind me. He didn't try to catch up but just ran behind, waiting for me to stop.

I ran until my chest felt like it was going to explode. I ran until I could run no longer and bent over in exhaustion, my chest heaving. I was in town. The shops were silent and dark. Footsteps fell behind me.

"Just leave me alone," I said. "Please."

"I can't." His voice was ragged and torn. "I need you to understand."

I stood and looked down the quiet street. The streetlights flicked on and off. I turned and stared at my reflection in the shop window. My hair trailed down my back and my face was pale. My blue eyes stared back, wide, like they had seen a ghost, and I almost laughed at the ironic absurdity of it. "Please give me some other explanation," I said to the space behind.

I felt his presence as he came and stood by my side. Again, he took my hand and raised it to his cold lips. In the window, I saw my hand lift as if of its own accord.

"You're really not here," I whispered.

I turned to Judah—no—Ruben, as he faced himself in the window. He was there. He was real. But when I turned back I only saw my own reflection.

"I am here," he said. "I may exist only for you, but that's more than I've had in a long time."

Chills trembled through me. I turned to face him, ignoring the image that didn't reflect what I saw. He was there. The connection that existed between us still drew me to him. He was visible. I could feel him, see him, hear him, and those were the things that mattered.

"You're not dead to me," I whispered.

He took me in his arms then and pressed me against him. I trembled and clung onto him as he wound his arms around me, pulling me closer and closer until I couldn't tell where he started and I stopped. That he didn't exist to other people, didn't matter. What mattered was the way he made me feel. The pressure of his body against mine. The pounding of my heart whenever he was near. That he saw me. That I saw him.

We broke apart and he pressed his forehead against mine, tucking my hair over my shoulder.

"You feel real to me," I said.

"That's all I can ask. Believe me, I know how this must sound to you. I know how improbable it is, how unbelievable. I've gone through it all myself. But I see you and you see me. What could be more real than that?"

We walked hand and hand down the street and back towards my house. The first time I ever drank coffee was when we were out for breakfast with my parents, not long before they announced their separation. I drank cup after cup, indulging in the previously forbidden drink, and by the time I left, I felt spaced out, keenly aware, but not present. That was how I felt as we walked down the street.  My mind couldn't compute the facts, but I didn't care.

"Why do you think you are still here?" I asked.

He shrugged, not the shrug of a dead boy, a shrug like anyone would shrug. "Maybe everyone who dies is still here. Maybe they are all just wandering around, condemned to watch life pass them by, just a spectator as their loved ones carry on without them, unable to communicate with any of them, alone, their own personal hell."

"Is that how it feels for you? Like hell?"

I leaned against him as we walked, something within me wanting to be as close to him as possible. The fear, the disbelief, and the nothingness that I felt before, gone. The more I felt him, the more I watched him, the more I accepted who he was. How could I not, when he was right there before me? It wasn't possible that my own eyes would lie.

"It was." He reached out and wrapped his fingers around mine. They were warm and real and alive. "But that was before you. Now, I'm not so sure. Maybe I'm here for a reason, you know? Maybe I'm supposed to do something, fix something. Maybe you were sent to help me. Maybe that's why we can communicate through your dreams."

"You know about my dreams?" I asked, and felt the colour rising to my face at some of the situations I had found myself in while dreaming.

He grinned sheepishly. "While you were sleeping, I crept into your room just to be close to you." At the look of horror on my face, he laughed. "Yes, I know how completely creepy that sounds but you've got to understand, I've wandered this town for months, completely alone, and then one day you walked up to me and spoke. You can't possibly understand what that felt like. I was suddenly alive again and I just had to be near you, and since you could see me, the only choice was to be around you when you couldn't. You looked so beautiful sleeping, so peaceful, and so I reached out and stroked your face and found myself in your dreams."

"That's really creepy."

He nodded and squeezed my hand. "I know, but I've gone without human contact for months. I'll take anything I can get."

I leaned my head against his shoulder again, our arms looped together, and fingers entwined. Even though I couldn't make sense of everything in my head, I felt calm. "So why did you make it feel like I was drowning when we kissed?"

"What?" He stopped walking.

"In my dream, while we were kissing it felt like I was drowning."

"It never felt like that for me. I'm sorry," he said and started walking again.

"Have you ever seen another person like you?"

"Another ghost?" He shook his head. "I hate that word, but to answer your question, no, not that I know of."

"Well, why do you think that is? Surely if everyone who died turned into a ghost, then this place would be crowded. What makes some spirits hang around and others vanish?"

"I really don't know. It's not like I've got anyone to ask. There was no fairy-ghost-mother just waiting to show me how it all works. Maybe they've gone to heaven or wherever people go after death, and this is hell, but rather than the fiery pit that people cram down your throat, maybe this hell is simply what you've chosen; a life away from God, if he exists. No love, no connection with other souls, just left to wander the earth. Well, not wander the earth, as it seems I'm stuck here. I've tried leaving but it's like there is some sort of a force field which surrounds the graveyard in a perfect circle. If I try to leave, it is like the world glitches and I'm set back a few paces. I'm all alone."