Stones: Experiment (Stones #3) (9 page)

Ryzaard turns to the table. “He will.”

“How can you be so sure?” Jing-wei’s voice is almost a whisper.

“Because he’s the only one who can save them.”

Jing-wei cocks her head to the side. “Who?”

Ryzaard waves his hand over the place where the globe was floating a few minutes before.

“Everyone.”

M
att opens his eyes and swings around to face Jessica. He wants to see the look on her face.

Her eyelids flutter open.

“Surprise!” Matt says.

They stand on a beach and look out at glassy turquoise waters gently lapping on white sand extending to the horizon in each direction. A line of palm trees ten stories high runs parallel to the ocean a hundred meters from the water. Another hundred meters beyond that, they see the wall of a primordial jungle, full of giant green ferns and trees with brown trunks and hanging flowers of red, purple, and yellow. A massive mountain range that would dwarf the Himalayans rises up from the jungle floor, its slopes covered in white from top to bottom.

“Why did you bring us here?” Jessica’s eyes scan in a circle. “We don’t have time for this.”

“It’ll just take a few minutes. I want to show you before we go back to Earth. Just in case.”

“In case what?”

“You know.” Matt’s face goes dark. “Something might happen. Things could get ugly. There’s no telling what Ryzaard’s done to the world. We need to have a place like this, our own Garden of Eden, just for the two of us. Even if it’s only just this one time. For memories.”

“OK.” Jessica nods. “Show me what you’ve done.”

“I’ve made a few improvements since the last time we were here.” Matt eyes drift up to the peaks. “There’s 100,000 feet of vertical on those mountains. Enough to ski on all day.” He grabs Jessica’s hand and pulls her toward the jungle. “The house is a little different. Come and see. We don’t have much time.” He kicks off his shoes, cool sand between his toes.

Jessica does the same.

They run, hand in hand, up the beach past the line of palm trees and into the jungle.

Matt hopes that Jessica notices the difference. He’s filled the jungle with the small furry animals she loves. Foxes, chinchillas, ferrets and cats, all with coats of white, roam at will. The occasional water buffalo chews on green foliage off the path. Multicolored fruit of a dozen varieties hangs from the branches of trees made for climbing. The music of songbirds and gurgling streams floats through the air.
Koi
fish swim in clear ponds lined with smooth rocks. The fragrance of vanilla plants and pineapples invigorates the air.

“Where did you find the time to work on this?” Jessica’s eyes move from left to right, taking in scenes cut from the Book of Paradise. “It’s so much better.”

“Don’t worry,” Matt says. “I’ve had lots of time the past few months. And it helps that Yarah hasn’t built any restrictions into her world. I can jump away whenever I like.” Reaching up, he pulls down a fruit resembling a barbell with two round purple spheres connected by a brown stem. Snapping the stem in two, he hands one of the fruits to Jessica. He brings the stem to his mouth and sucks on it like a straw. His eyes roll back into his head. “The nectar of the gods.”

Jessica grins. “Don’t tell me.” She brings a stem up to her lips and takes a long pull, closing her eyes.

Matt holds his breath.

“Impossible.” She brings the stem up to her mouth and takes another long sip. “It starts out as coconut, then moves to banana, past vanilla and peanut butter, and ends up with raspberry. All my favorite flavors.”

“That took some doing to perfect. There’s a lot more surprises on this world, but I’ll let you discover them later on your own. If we ever have time.” Matt takes her hand and pulls her back onto the path. “Close your eyes.”

Jessica obeys.

Matt pulls her closer. “No peeking.” They walk the winding dirt path for another thirty seconds until they come to a clearing.

“Happy birthday.”

Jessica’s eyelids lift. Her mouth drops open. Her eyes pan back and forth. When she finally moves her lips, it’s just a whisper.

“How did you know?”

Matt’s hand drops and squeezes her fingers. “Know what?”

“About this.” Jessica stares forward. “You even have the sign of the unicorn over the front door.” Her head slowly swings to face Matt. “I never told anyone. How could you have known about this?”

“You told your journal. When you were ten years old. As I recall, you wrote
My Dream House
over the top of that picture you made.” Matt looks back into Jessica’s eyes, grins and looks back up at the three-story house that vaguely reminds him of an old English manor, but with larger windows and a slide going from the roof to the green lawn that surrounds it.

Jessica’s eyes narrow. “Matt Newmark,” she says, turning her body squarely toward him and putting the palms of her hands flat on his chest. “How did you get my journal?”

“From your bedroom, of course.”

Her eyes grow wider. “You’ve been back to my house?”

“Only once.”

Jessica’s fingers curl into fists gripping his shirt. “Did you see my parents? How were they doing? And my little brother. Did you see him?”

“It was the middle of the night. I just popped into your room for a few seconds and found the journal.” Matt slowly inhales. “They think you died in an accident during your internship with MX Global. You were on a heli-transport that fell into the Pacific on the way back from Japan. They received a big payment. I saw the plaque on the wall in your bedroom.”

Jessica stares at the ground. “They think I’m dead?” Her fingers uncurl from Matt’s shirt and drop down. She goes into a crouching position, palms resting on the grass, staring in silence. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“I couldn’t, Jess. You don’t deserve this. You’ve already sacrificed so much for me. And now your family . . .”

Jessica looks up, eyes brimming with tears. “I’ve tried not to think too much about them. It’s just too hard. Knowing I may never see them again. If only there was something I could do, a way to let them know I’m OK. So they wouldn’t have to grieve.”

“Someday, when Ryzaard is gone, we’ll go back and make it all right.”

“Do you really think Ryzaard will
ever
be gone?”

“All I can do is hope. And not think too far ahead. Right now, we just have to be grateful Ryzaard didn’t kill your whole family. If your mom and dad knew you were alive, Ryzaard would—”

“Don’t say it.” Jessica puts a finger on Matt’s lips. “Just promise me one thing. Don’t ever go there again.”

“All right.” Matt takes Jessica’s hand and starts walking to the house, stepping onto the perfectly manicured lawn. “Come on. I want you to see the inside of the house.”

She stops and pulls back. “Matt, wait.” She turns him and stares into his face again. Her eyes move back and forth like she’s reading words etched in the depths of his mind. “You’ve been jumping back and forth to Earth. You went to my house. You went to Ryzaard’s office. Did you go anywhere else?”

Matt lets his eyes float up to the open blue sky above the clearing. It’s a beautiful day. No time for arguments. Especially with Jessica. He tries to smile at her with a look on his face that says:
Who? Me?

“You’ve always been a terrible liar,” she says. “Now tell me the truth.” Her fingers curl into his shirt again, and she pulls him close to her face. “Where have you gone? I need to know.”

Her eyes grow wide. Somehow, she sees the truth in the smile he’s trying to suppress.

“Your own house?” Jessica’s face goes pale. “Please tell me you’re kidding.”

“T
he stars are all different from before, back when we lived in the
favela
.” Yarah looks up and arches her neck back, pointing her eyes into the darkness above. “I can’t ever find
Grande Ursa
.”

“The Big Dipper? It’s not up there anymore.” Leo smiles at the way Yarah mixes English and Portuguese without thinking. She hasn’t done it for a long time, but the absence of Matt and Jessica has brought it back. Even now, when he speaks to her in Portuguese, she looks at him in a funny way and always answers in English.

She turns her big eyes to face him. “Where did it go?”

Leo pulls up the blanket, the thick grass of the riverbank underneath. Since Matt and Jessica left, Leo and Yarah have been sleeping out every night. The castle is too big and empty with just the two of them.

“We’re in a different part of the sky now, maybe a different galaxy.” Leo looks up at the points of light burning in the dome of night like pinpricks in the fabric of space. “We might even be on the other side of the universe, or a completely different universe.”

“But we always used to see it on summer nights back home.” Yarah yawns. “I miss the night sky back home. I miss Mommy and Daddy.”

“You mean Matt and Jessica?”

“They’re my mommy and daddy now.” Yarah turns in her blankets again. “How much longer do we have to wait? Hasn’t it already been a month?”

Yarah’s tiny hand touches his shoulder.

“Only three days,” he says. “Still almost a whole month to go. The time will go fast. We’ll keep having fun every day. I’m sure they’ll be back soon.”

Yarah giggles. “When Mommy comes back, I’m going to run to her and give the biggest hug in the whole world.”

A shooting star blazes across the sky. They both watch it in the silence of the singing frogs.

“Yarah?” Leo stretches his hands back and puts them under his head. “How did you make this world? Wouldn’t it be cool if I could make one too? Then we could go back and forth and have a
huge
game of hide-and-seek.”

Yarah bolts upright. “I
love
hide-and-seek! Let’s do it.”

“But first, you need to show me how to make a world,” Leo says. “Can you do that?”

Leo stares up at Yarah, and she looks back at him. Her eyes float up to the sky, sweeping back and forth across it.

“Well?” Leo says.

“It’s hard to remember.” Yarah’s large eyes roll from one side to another. “It was so long ago. I was just a little girl.”

Leo chuckles. “You’re still a little girl.”

“No, I’m not!”

“OK, you’re all grown up.” Leo stares at her. “Can you remember?”

Yarah closes her eyes. “I’m trying.” Her head bobs up and down like she’s watching a scroll unfold inside her mind. “I went to sleep. When I woke up, I was standing in the middle of a huge grassy valley. I thought about a river, and then it was there. I remembered a jungle I saw in a book, and there it was. The castle was next. It all just happened.” She opens her eyes.

“It all just happened?” Leo’s eyebrows rise on his face. “But how? No matter how much I try, no matter how much I think about it, it never happens for me.”

Yarah props her chin up on her elbows. “You really want to make your own world, don’t you.” She states it as a fact, not as a question.

“What do
you
think?” Leo says. “It’s not fair.” He drops his head as the emotion wells up in his throat. A tear streaks down his face. “You have your world. Matt has his. But I have nothing.”

A tiny hand reaches out and brushes the tears on his cheeks. Yarah’s voice drops to a whisper. “I could ask.”

“Ask who?”

Yarah stares at the blanket. “I’m not supposed to tell. I promised her.” She twists the cloth with her hand.

“What are you talking about?”

Yarah’s face floats back up to the sky. “My fairy godmother.” Her eyes catch the light of the stars.

“Fairy godmother?” Leo shakes his head and wipes his nose. “That’s just your imagination. She’s not real.”

Yarah looks at Leo, and her eyes narrow. “She is real. She comes to visit me whenever I call her. She knows a lot about the Stones and says she was just like me when she was little. She wants to help me to grow up and be like her someday.” Yarah drops her head back to the pillow. “I’ll bet if I ask her she’ll be able to help you make your own world.”

Leo speaks after a long silence. “A fairy godmother. She’s not something you created out of your imagination? Like the dragon.”

“No!”

“A real person?”