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Authors: Kirsten Miller

BOOK: The Eternal Ones

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“So. What’s been eating at you?” Beau said as he slid their box of supplies onto the table.

“Imogene’s not letting me go to school in the fall.”

“You’re kidding.” Beau paused as if waiting for a punch line.

“Nope.”

Beau leaned back against the sink and watched his friend. “What are you going to do?”

Haven shrugged. “Listen—you remember any of the stuff I used to talk about when I was little?”

“Not really,” Beau said, thrown by the sudden change of subject. “Your visions had pretty much stopped by the time we became friends. But you told me all about Ethan and Constance, of course.”

“D’you remember if I ever mentioned a fire?”

Beau thought for a moment. “No. Don’t remember anything about a fire. What’s this all about, anyway?”

“My dad wrote down everything I said when I was little. Mom gave me a box filled with his notes, right after Imogene decided to ruin my life.”

Beau stood bolt upright. “She had something like that all this time, and she never showed you?”

“She didn’t think I was ready to see it.”

“Well, what’d you find out?”

Haven reached into her back pocket, pulled out a folded sheet of paper, and began to read.

“Haven’s always been a little eccentric, and I figured Ethan was just an imaginary friend until I finally got around to asking a few questions. . . . That’s when I began to think that Haven might be remembering another life.”

“Whoa.” Beau looked as though Haven had just announced that aliens had landed on the front lawn.

“That’s what I thought,” Haven said, her confidence fading a little. “I told my dad that my name used to be Constance. And that I lived in New York. Ethan was my boyfriend.”

“Let me see that.” Beau took Ernest Moore’s letter from Haven’s hands. He sat down at the table, and Haven watched as his eyes tracked the words to the bottom of the page and then started all over again. “Do you really believe in this reincarnation stuff?” he asked when he looked up at last.

“What do
you
think?”

Beau ran a hand through his blond curls. “I don’t know, Haven. I guess I just need a little time to wrap my head around all this. I mean, I don’t think you’re crazy—and I’m
pretty sure
you’re not in league with the devil. But I was brought up to believe that God judges each of us. And I have faith there’s a heaven, even if most people in this town wouldn’t want to see me there.”

“Me, too!” Haven exclaimed. “But you got to admit it kinda makes sense. How else would I know about places I’ve never been? And . . .” She paused.

“What?”

“Well, I think I might be having the visions for a reason. I’m pretty sure I’m supposed to find Ethan. That’s what I told my dad when I was little.”

“Ethan? You think he’s still around? Wouldn’t he be awfully old for you by now? I mean, even if he is real, at the very least he’d be pushing a hundred and ten—”

Haven cut him off. “I had another vision last night. There was a fire. That’s how Constance died. I think it killed Ethan, too. And I think he’s been reborn, just like me. I have to find him, Beau. And you have to help me. I can’t explain how, but I know he’s out there.”

“Right.” Beau’s blue eyes locked on Haven’s. “So you’re telling me that Ethan’s your
soul mate
or something?”

Haven frowned and looked away. “Well, it does sound kind of cheesy when you put it that way.”

“I’m not trying to make it sound cheesy,” Beau said softly. He folded Ernest Moore’s letter and slid it across the table to Haven. “I think it’s kind of a nice idea. Totally insane—but nice. But where do you suppose we should start looking for Mr. Right? Johnson City? Unicoi?”

“Funny. He’s in New York. You read my dad’s letter. He said I told him that Ethan would be waiting for me in New York.”

“Wait a second.
Now
I get it.” Beau looked as smug as a TV detective who’s just solved a crime. “You forget I can read your mind, Haven Moore. You think Ethan’s come back as Iain Morrow, don’t you?”

“I do not!” It seemed even more ridiculous when Beau said it.

“Oh, yes, you do,” Beau teased her. “But don’t worry. You don’t have to admit it yet. I just hope
my
soul mate turns out to have a billion dollars and the face of a Greek god.”

“Be serious for a moment,” Haven pleaded. “You don’t think this whole thing is crazy, do you?”

“No crazier than demonic possession, I guess,” Beau said with a shrug. “At least you didn’t claim you were Cleopatra in your past life. But how does reincarnation work, anyway? Why would God keep sending us all back to this screwed-up planet?”

“I have no idea. Maybe God sends people back if they still have something to figure out,” Haven mused. “You know, maybe that’s why you’re gay. Maybe you were a woman in your last life and you were terrible to lots of guys, so God sent you back so you can see what it’s like on the other side.”

“I was
not
a woman,” Beau snarled. For someone so good-natured, he could be surprisingly quick to quarrel. “Are you saying being gay is some kind of punishment? You sound just like Tidmore! Do you want me to help you find your damn soul mate or not?”

Haven winced. “Sorry, Beau. That didn’t come out right, did it? It’s just that this all makes me wonder if
I’m
being punished. Why else would I have been born into Imogene’s family? I must have murdered a whole town.”

Beau grinned, his anger gone. “So who do you suppose Imogene was last time around?”

“Oh, that’s easy.” Haven laughed. “Attila the Hun.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

“
Haven
, what in G—O—D’s name are you doing?”

“Going up to the attic, Grandma.” Haven paused halfway up the ladder and looked down at the old woman who was twisting her pearls into a garrote.

“For
what
?” She had been following Haven around since Sunday, sniffing for signs of demons. Haven was prepared.

“I’m blocked. . . .” she started to say.

Imogene’s face wrinkled with disgust. “Well, how is going up to the attic going to help with
that
?”

Haven rolled her eyes and let loose a theatrical sigh. “I’m
creatively
blocked. I can’t come up with any new ideas for dresses, and one of the juniors wants something ’80s style. So I thought I’d look at some of Mama’s old stuff.”

“You aren’t planning to rip anything up are you?”

“No, Imogene!” Haven insisted. “I’m not gonna destroy any of your priceless heirlooms. I’m just looking for a little inspiration.”

“Well . . .” Imogene paused, still suspicious. “Well, go on then.”

As her grandmother’s heels clicked down the hall, Haven pushed open the trapdoor and climbed into the attic. There were no cobwebs in the corners or dust bunnies roaming the floor—Imogene’s maid saw to that. Just boxes stacked neatly along the walls, entire decades relegated to obscurity. Most were filled with Imogene’s things, but one short stack bore labels scrawled in Mae Moore’s handwriting. Two of the labels read HAVEN.

Haven hauled the top box off the pile and tore off the lid. Inside was a pile of papers. Her first-grade report card.
Too chatty. Forgets to wear underwear.
A note from the principal dated 1999.
Haven saw fit today to educate some of her classmates about the birds and the bees. Please let her know that this is not appropriate behavior. . . .
Dentist bills. Handmade Christmas ornaments. A children’s Bible.

Disappointed, Haven shoved the box to one side. She’d come up to the attic looking for something—
anything
that might bring about a vision. Her desire to see Ethan had grown too powerful to control. Though she’d never tried drugs, for the first time in her life Haven knew exactly how it felt to be an addict.

She found what she was after inside the second box, nestled beneath a few books and a neatly folded baby blanket. A stack of drawings, each done in colored pencil on white typing paper. Though they were crude and clearly crafted by a child’s unsteady hand, the illustrations showed evidence of real talent. Haven pulled the pile from the box and knelt on the rough wooden floor. She was surprised to discover that she could identify several of the people and places in the pictures. A haughty blonde woman with her nose in the air and the trace of a sneer on her lips was Constance’s mother. The stern older man with glasses was Constance’s father, whose name was Bernard or Bertrand or Benjamin. He and his wife lived in the twin-towered building she had drawn that looked out over Central Park.

But most of the drawings featured a young man with auburn hair. Ethan. Haven paused with one in her hand and found herself trapped by the green eyes that seemed to stare back at her. Something about it left her breathless. The air in the attic grew thick, and Haven felt her scalp tingle. She braced for the vision to come just as the walls dissolved into darkness and a warm wind whipped around her.

The breeze lifted her hat from her head. It tumbled across the plaza and came to a rest at the feet of a young man standing nearby. She had noticed him a few minutes earlier, staring at her from an outdoor café. As she started toward him, she scanned the dusty plaza for her mother’s blue dress. They had become separated on their tour of Rome’s fountains, and though she had tried to return to her mother’s suite at the Ritz, the narrow streets had led her here instead, as if she were following a familiar path. Once in the Piazza Navona, she was overcome by the sense that she’d been there before. It was a feeling that had tantalized her since her first day in Rome. Her mind was playing tricks on her again.

Now she approached the young man, hoping he couldn’t hear her heart pounding in her chest. No more than twenty years old, he was uncommonly handsome, with auburn hair and a face that reminded her of the statue of Apollo she’d discovered in the Vatican Museum. She’d stood so spellbound in front of the nude marble god that her mother had found it unseemly.

“Buon giorno
,” the man said, holding out her hat.

“Hello.” Her throat was dry and her voice cracked.

“You’re American. What luck.”

“I’m from New York.” She knew him, she thought. “Have we met somewhere before?”

His smile was a little lopsided, she noted, a tiny flaw that rendered him perfect.

“Not in this lifetime. My name is Ethan Evans.”

“Constance Whitman.”

“What do you think of Rome, Constance?” Ethan asked. He had barely looked away from her face since she’d arrived in the piazza.

“It’s lovely.” She could feel herself blushing.

“Yes. I feel oddly at home here,” the man remarked. “Sometimes I can’t help but think that I’ve lived here before. Do you ever feel that way?”

“A little,” she admitted.

“And the Piazza Navona. Perhaps you’ve seen it before. Perhaps you’ve dreamed about it?”

“Who are you?” Constance asked. “How do you know these things?”

“I’ve been looking for you,” he said. Suddenly his face was close, his lips brushing hers. She closed her eyes.

“Constance!” A voice screeched across the piazza. “Get away from her at once!” Her mother was rushing toward them, wielding her Japanese parasol like a sword.

“Now it’s your turn to find me,” Ethan whispered, slipping a card into Constance’s hand.

She looked down. Printed on the back of the card was an illustration of a silver snake swallowing its tail.

FOR A FEW BRIEF seconds after Haven woke on the floor, she felt happier than she ever had. With the taste of Ethan’s lips still on hers, Haven closed her eyes before the attic could come into focus and desperately tried to reenter the vision. When she found herself stuck in the dreary present, she reluctantly rose and began to sift through the pile of drawings that had fallen from her hand and now lay scattered around her. An ivy-covered mansion. A beautiful girl with dark hair. Her eyes briefly rested on a picture of a row of little houses that lined a cobblestone street. Colossal apartment towers rose behind them in the distance.

Mixed in among the drawings was a scrap of newspaper. Haven turned it over to find a short article, accompanied by separate pictures of Ernest Moore and Veronica Cabe.

Two people were killed when a truck driven by Ernest Moore of Snope City crashed on Route 36 just outside of Johnson City. Moore died instantly, and his passenger, Veronica Cabe, was pronounced dead at Johnson City Regional Hospital early yesterday evening. The cause of the crash has not been determined.

With the article in hand, Haven snatched the drawings and rushed for the ladder that led down from the attic. She took two stairs at a time on her way to the kitchen, charging past her grandmother who didn’t have a chance to chide her. Haven arrived at her destination out of breath. Her mother dropped her spoon into the pan of gravy she was stirring and took a step back, one hand raised as if to ward off an assault.

“What is this?” Haven thrust the paper at her mother. Mae Moore gazed at it as the blood drained from her face. “What is it?” the girl insisted. She was furious and she didn’t know why.

“A bit of newspaper?” her mother muttered.

“Technically, it’s a crash report. You know which one?”

“Can I see it?” Mae asked softly.

“What’s going on in here?” Haven’s grandmother stood in the kitchen door.

“Go away, Imogene,” Haven growled. “This isn’t any of your damn business.”

“How
dare
you curse at me in my own house!” Imogene barked back.

“She’s right, Mother—this isn’t your business.” When Mae lifted her eyes from the newspaper, they were clear and determined. “Leave us be.”