Second Thoughts (2 page)

A glance down the familiar hall confirmed I was in the right place. When I reopened the door, sure enough, there was my roommate, smiling at me from beneath a liberal spattering of green paint. She looked like she had the measles and I laughed as she engulfed me in a hug.

“Lainey!” she shrieked. “Oops! Sorry. I hope I didn't get paint on you, but where the hell have you
been?!
I've been here since, like,
sunrise!
We're almost done, and you didn't even get to help.”

I pulled away, a huge smile testing the limits of my face even though my shirt looked like it had caught her illness. “I'm sorry. If I'd
known
you were coming, I would have made sure to be here…not that it looks like you needed my help. I didn't realize we were making changes.” Amy and her mother, who'd waved at me from where she was hidden behind about twenty bags full of new pillows, towels, and other decorations, really must have been there all day working on redecorating.

“Well, I wanted to surprise you!” Amy tugged me further into the mess. “You're going to need a new comforter and sheets, by the way; I'll help you order them later. The old look was nice and all, but it was just so—
calm.
We're seniors now! I thought we should have something a little spicier.”

Our room was definitely spicier, I'd give her that. The colors were rich, but not garish, and made me think of one of the beautiful royal bedrooms at the Palace of Versailles, a place I'd visited back when I was still a world traveler. Only Amy could have orchestrated this transformation, and only at Northbrook would it even be allowed. “I love it,” I told her truthfully. “And you know I default to you on all questions of style and decorating.”

She giggled and hugged me again. “Of course you love it, silly. I have excellent taste,
and
I have a surprise for you. Mr. Valser and my dad are getting ready to bring it up!”

The surprise was actually accompanied not only by Mr. Valser, the grounds manager, and Dr. Moretti, but also Caleb Sullivan, Amy's boyfriend, and
his
father too. I heard them struggling down the hall before Caleb kicked open the door with a grunt.

“Shit, Ame,” he said, then swallowed and glanced apologetically at Amy's father. “I mean,
shoot,
sorry Dr. Moretti, but this thing weighs a
ton.
We barely got it up here!”

This thing
was possibly the most amazing antique divan I'd ever seen. My mouth dropped open as I took in the pristine chartreuse silk, gilt woodwork, and thick rolled arms on each end. It looked like a piece that
could
have come from a palace bedroom. I didn't care how much it weighed, or how big of a pain it would be to get out of the room at the end of the year, because antique furniture was my first true love and this baby was going to live with me.

“Hello, beautiful,” I breathed, trying hard not to drool. Amy glowed with self-satisfaction.

“Suck it up, Caleb,” she said with a mock scowl. “You need to get back in shape for swimming anyway. You're getting paunchy.” Which was hardly true. Caleb was about five feet ten inches of solid muscle. Amy poked his not-paunchy stomach before turning her beaming smile back on me. “I
knew
you'd love it! We found it over the summer and I designed the whole room around it. You'll never believe how cheap it was, either. A total steal, you'd be proud of me. Daddy even said you could keep it at the end of the year, right Daddy?” Her father was out of breath as they struggled to maneuver the couch into place but he managed to nod and smile at me.

“Well that's great news,” Caleb huffed, “because that means
your
boyfriend can carry it back down the stairs.”

“I'm sure that won't be a problem,” I joked, forgetting momentarily that it might. That I might not be here when it was time to move out.

H
OURS LATER
,
AFTER
our room was rearranged and redecorated, our stomachs were fed, and Amy's parents were long gone, the two of us lounged in our own beds, exhausted. We left the windows open to dispel the lingering scent of paint, making the room cool and filling it with the complex symphony of the woods at night, chirps and howls and wind through leaves. I snuggled under my soon-to-be-replaced comforter. I was surprised my eyes were still open, but after nearly three months of essentially living by myself, I was excited to have my roommate back.

“Have you thought any more—” I started to say, but Amy cut me off completely.

“No, so stop asking.” She fluffed her brown curls out around her, and I knew her peevishness wasn't
entirely
an act. We were both stressed about the big college decisions we were facing, sooner rather than later. “I have months to declare a major, right?”

“Sorry. I'm just curious what you're going to choose.”

“Me too,” she said lightly, but then frowned. “Daddy still wants me to go pre-med.”

“But that's not
what you
want to do.”

“Yeah. It's not. I don't want to be a surgeon, Lainey. I don't want to cut people open.” She grimaced. I didn't blame her for that one. She turned onto her side and propped her head on her hand. “It must be nice to know exactly what you want to do, huh?”

I laughed. “I suppose. It must be nice to know exactly where you want to
go.”
Despite that we hadn't quite started our senior year, Amy, teen genius, had already applied and been accepted early decision to MIT. And while I knew I would go to business school, since
I'd
dreamed of running my own antiques business since I was about thirteen, which one was weighing heavily on my mind.

“You know you love Boston…” She'd been encouraging me for months to come to the city with her, even if I was at a different school.

“I do,” I told her. “And it's a top contender, I promise. But…I don't want to disappoint Aunt Tessa either.” My “Aunt” Tessa had actually been my mother for as long as I could remember. She wasn't technically my aunt, but really my Godmother. She also, I knew, hoped I'd choose her alma mater in Baltimore, where she'd met my parents and I'd been born.

“Lane, seriously, you could run away to join the circus and not disappoint your aunt. She'll be happy with you no matter what.”

I wasn't sure that was true, but it was funny. “I'd make a great trapeze artist, don't you think? Maybe I should consider it. Where's a good circus school?”

Amy giggled too, but I could tell she was fading fast. Not before she had one more question though. “And Carter…?”

“Tiger trainer?”

“Hot! In leather pants with a whip…
that
would bring people to the circus.” We laughed for real before she said, “Seriously though? What's he doing?”

Ah, the current mystery of Northbrook Academy: why Cartwright Penrose hadn't gone to college yet. Not that much of the student body minded, since it meant he still worked almost daily at the bookstore. It had a great lounge with couches, chairs, and a huge fireplace, and tall, handsome, devastatingly flirtatious Carter was a popular attraction. Lucky for me, he was
my
boyfriend.

“He's…seriously considering Boston too,” I said. Technically he'd been top of his class at Northbrook when he'd graduated two years
ago and a full scholarship to pretty much anywhere was virtually guaranteed. “And, well, basically any city I'm considering, or close.”

“Wow. That's big, Lane. You'd actually go to college together?”

“Not the same school, but…yeah, I think he'll choose near wherever I do.” Actually, I knew he would. Over the summer, he told me so, reciting his list of potential colleges arranged geographically to coincide with mine. The idea of it both thrilled and scared me. I didn't want to have a long-distance relationship, but then again, I was afraid he was following me instead of his dreams. Maybe I should have been overjoyed by that, because I
did
love Carter, totally and absolutely, but I also couldn't shake the feeling that it was too much pressure.

“Wow,” Amy repeated. “I wish Caleb would be so definite about it.”

She was quiet after that, and before long I could tell she'd drifted off to sleep. I clicked off the reading light next to my bed and waited to fall asleep myself. I expected it would happen instantly, but it's never that easy when you want it to be. I kept thinking about college, and Carter too.

As always, the thought lingered in my mind that maybe I wouldn't have to make any lasting decisions anyway. Carter
was
going to kill me, after all.

Maybe,
I reminded myself as I finally fell asleep.

I
woke with a start the next morning, surprised to find I was alone. Of the two of us, I was the early riser. Amy slept as late as possible whenever possible. I'd just gotten my roommate back and already she was gone.

A hastily scribbled note on the board tacked next to our door told me she was helping Caleb with move-in over at his dorm. I smiled to myself as I slipped out of bed and over to the bathroom. Not that I ever questioned it, but this was just one more confirmation of how incredibly and crazily in love Amy was with Caleb Sullivan: she willingly got up extra early to devote her day to physical labor just to spend a little time with him. I understood though. I'd do the same just to be near Carter.

In reality, I'd do just about anything to be near Carter, not limited to running, occasionally shelving books at the store, and learning to shoot a gun. I'd risk my own
life.
If it seemed crazy that I'd be so desperate for his company despite that he was
—maybe
—going to kill me, it probably was. I knew this. It just didn't change how I felt about him.

The first things I
should
have done, after I had the vision, were 1)
tell him
about the vision and 2) Divine what other death he'd somehow
caused. My mind went back and forth over which should've been one or two. But what I did was neither. Despite the certainty from the vision that he'd caused a death before, not a single part of me could believe Carter would hurt someone—hurt
me
—intentionally. And having just been through a serious trauma at the time, I couldn't handle another.

I couldn't handle being wrong.

So the longer I didn't tell him and didn't try to Divine his past, through the whole summer and into the unofficial start of autumn, the less likely it seemed I'd do either. Instead, I spent every possible moment with him
not
doing either of those things. I liked to tell myself the more time I spent with him, the more chances I'd have to catch glimpses of that frightening future and be prepared to change it.

That's what I told myself anyway.

Mostly, I was in love. Hopelessly, stupidly in love. And even though that was true, there was still one other thing we'd
not
been doing. Despite the long, romantic summer, and one almost-night, I was hesitant to take that next big step. In my mind, if I was hesitant it meant I wasn't ready. Even if I might die before I was. Even facing the distinct possibility of dying, reckless abandon just wasn't my style.

Showered and cozy in my bathrobe, I sat down for the first time on our magnificent new-old divan. And was jolted out of thoughts of my own death by the visions of not one but two others.

I leaped up from the soft silk upholstery and nearly fell backwards over the ottoman. I stared at the pretty green sofa with new eyes. No wonder Amy had gotten such a great deal on what should have been a several thousand dollar piece: it was from an insane asylum. Literally.

The visions showed me the psychiatrist's plush office in the otherwise dreary mental hospital where the divan had previously resided. As if that wasn't creepy enough, two patients had
died
on it, after going into hysterics and being forced to swallow some kind of narcotics.
Even worse, I couldn't tell if their deaths were accidental or intentional.

I shuddered. A Grim Diviner's day could be full of unwelcome surprises. I wasn't sure if I'd be able to sit on our new couch anymore, or how I'd explain my reluctance to Amy.

Perhaps the worst part, for me anyway, was that these were the first unbidden visions I'd had in weeks. Since I'd been working with my gift for nearly ten months, I'd obtained a significant amount of control over it. I thought of it like a muscle, my Diviner sense, one that the more I worked, the stronger it had become. Usually now it only did what
I
told it to do.

Classes didn't start for three more days, but that didn't mean there was nothing to do. Summer vacation was over, even if the warm weather was not. I tied my long, dark hair up in a ponytail, donned my Northbrook Academy T-shirt and workout pants, and headed across campus to help initiate the new students.

After enjoying a summer gig giving campus tours to incoming students, I'd volunteered this year to be the upper-class representative for a seventh and eighth grade dorm. Some of the student reps, including Caleb, actually lived in the bigger dorms in exchange for free room and board, much to Amy's chagrin. His was the hardest one to sneak in and out of.

Sanderson House, the dorm I was responsible for, wasn't nearly so large, but just as challenging in its own way. I didn't have to live with them, but I
did
have thirty mostly wealthy young teen girls to contend with. And, to make it even harder, most of those girls, like me, were part of a group of people who all had some form of what most of the world called extrasensory perception. Amongst each other, we simply called ourselves Sententia, and what we could do, we called that Thought. Besides helping the girls move in, I'd be the upperclassman they could approach with problems or for advice. Like getting along
with roommates, or adjusting to living away from home…or how to deal with a newly developed ability to divine deaths. Just as an example.