CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

It’s around five o’clock when I get home. My father asks me where I’ve been and for a split second, I actually consider just telling him the truth, but the moment passes and I say that I’ve been out with friends, which technically isn’t a lie.

He looks surprised but since that’s the excuse I’ve been using for a while now, he doesn’t question it. I head for the stairs.

“What are their names?” he asks, his voice floating over to me from the living room, and I halt with one foot on the bottom step.

Cautiously, I reply, “Why do you want to know?”

“Oh, I was just wondering. Maybe you could invite them over some time. This is the first time in… in a while that you’ve mentioned friends. I’m just curious.”

I close my eyes and take deep breaths. “Sure,” I lie. “I’ll ask them.” Then I climb the stairs before he has a chance to ask me anything else.

I practice using my telekinesis all night, hoping to distract myself from thinking about the happenings of today and the events of tomorrow. But the past and the future keep slipping into my thoughts – my mind running over the details of what has been and what could be. Again and again, I lose focus, my powers failing to work because my mind is elsewhere and occupied with other things.

Eventually, I give up and go to bed early, having only managed to lift a few items before exhaustion set in. It seems that without any adrenaline, my powers aren’t half as good, not that it really matters. When am I going to use them anyway?

But even while lying in bed, my thoughts continue to shout at me, loud enough that I imagine them escaping the walls of my mind, echoing throughout the eerily quiet house. There’s Sarah’s voice asking me to meet up with my real mother, and Caden’s repeating over and over again that he doesn’t believe me.

Somehow, I manage to drift off, and the hope that things will turn out okay provides a warmth in my chest that lasts through the night, ensuring a deep, dreamless sleep.

-:-:-:-:-

The next morning, the light filtering into my room is a dull grey, like an invisible fog. I sit up in bed and my eyes automatically jump to the window where the thin curtains flap in the breeze. This morning feels different. 

I stand up, my feet sinking into the soft carpet as I pad across the room to the window. I watch my hands shake as I place them on the window-sill before lifting my eyes to the view what waits outside my room.

I suck in a breath.

The world is covered in white. The cars, the rooftops, the streets, the trees – everything. Everywhere I look, the colour has been wiped, replaced with a colourless void. It’s not black and white, like in old films – it’s just a sea of the same colour, like a song with only one note that drones on for ever and ever. And on top of it all, wisps of sparkling white glide gently down to the ground, which from a distance, give the impression of a thick fog hanging low over the city.

It’s snow, I realise.

The snow, coupled with the fact no one is in sight, makes the world look empty, like everyone has gotten up and left overnight and I missed the memo. Slowly, I'm lulled into a state of calm where no one and nothing matters, where all my energy is focused on just existing, no strings attached.

I stick my hand out and let the snow land on my skin where it melts almost immediately. The fact that I feel nothing, not even the slightest sensation of cold, should scare me, but it doesn't, and I don't care. Standing here, in front of my own sparkling world, I don't care about anything; the things I've learned in the past couple of weeks, the people that watch me, the time limit on my life with the deadline drawing closer with each passing second – none of it matters.

Suddenly, there's a strangled cry and a cat dashes across the street and into the neighbour’s front garden. The sound is quickly followed by voices and a distant car engine, and it's then I realise that, of course, the world isn't empty – that everyone is still here and living out their daily lives.

And this realisation rips me from my temporary state of calm, pouring adrenaline and fear directly into my heart.  Oh my god. I did this.

My hands come to my mouth as I take a step back from the window, the feeling that I’m about to be sick washing over me. I’ve never let it get so cold before. I’ve never seen it snow.  

“Dad?!” I call out, my voice shaking. “Dad, are you seeing this?”

There’s no response, and I tear my eyes from the window and walk quickly out of my room, set on finding my father. “Dad? Are you awake?”

I step into his room and find him sitting in a chair by the window, his eyes on the snow outside. “Dad?” I ask once more. He doesn’t reply.

I approach him slowly, walking around the chair until I block his view of the world beyond our house. For a while, he continues to just stare straight ahead, as if I don’t exist, and it scares me. “Dad? Are you okay?” His eyes drift up to mine as I speak, and the emptiness in them nearly swallows me whole.

“I’m fine,” he says after an eternity, his voice only just loud enough to be heard.

I kneel down in front of him, my voice soft as I say, “You’re not fine, dad. Please, tell me what’s wrong.”

For a minute – or maybe it’s an hour – he just stares out the window behind me. I watch him with pain in my heart as he sits motionless, the hands resting on his legs going blue at the finger tips. I frown at the lack of colour in his face until I realise that he has the window open. A jolt of pain tears through me. If I was the normal daughter my parents deserve, this wouldn’t be happening right now. If I was the normal daughter they deserve, I would have noticed by now that he had the window open and closed it instead of letting him sit in the cold. Guilt seeps into me, making my stomach revolt against the food I ate last night.

I stand on unsteady feet and close the window, feeling no difference between the temperature of the room and the temperature of the world outside. I place a hand on the glass and will the cold to seep into my skin so that for once I might feel normal. But I feel nothing and I squeeze my eyes shut, resting my head against the window while tears gather in my eyes.

“Melissa?”

Shaking myself out of my sadness, I turn around. “Yeah?”

“I’m sorry,” he says. I notice that his once empty eyes are filled with tears.

“Sorry?” I frown. “Sorry for what?”

“I got a call early this morning…” he says softly. “From the hospital.”

My insides turns to ice. “What is it? What happened?”

“I should have told you the moment I hung up the phone, but I couldn’t. I’m sorry.”

There’s a knife in my chest and its stabbing again and again, turning the walls of my heart to shreds

“Told me what?” I ask, tears spilling out onto my cheeks because I already know the answer. “Why are you sorry?”

Don’t say it, don’t say it, don’t say it.

“I’m sorry,” he says looking down.

“Stop saying that!” I shout. “Just tell me!”

Dead silence.

Then: “You’re mother’s dead. She – she died early this morning.”

“You’re lying!” I scream. “Why are you lying to me?!” The tears are flowing in streams now, blurring my vision, but I don’t care. I don’t care.

“Melissa!” my dad says, standing. “Melissa, you need to calm down.” He places his hands on my shoulders.

“Get off me!” I shout, twisting away from him, but his grip stays firm. “Get away from me! Don’t you understand?! It’s my fault she’s dead! It’s my fault!”

“It’s not your fault,” he says.

“It is! Stop lying to me!”

“Melissa.”

“No! No don’t! Don’t touch me!” I push him away from me but he doesn’t even budge. “Let go!” I scream, pounding on his chest. “Let go!”

“Melissa. Melissa!” He grabs my wrists. “Stop it!”

My eyes go wide and for a split second I go still before breaking out into movement again, desperately trying to twist free of his grip. “What are you doing?! I’m burning you! Stop! I’m burning you! I don’t want to hurt you!”

“Melissa. It’s okay,” he says. “It’s okay.”

And suddenly the fight gushes out of me and I collapse into his arms. He hugs me tightly as I cry into his chest, the pain and the guilt and the sorrow mixing together to form an emotion so overwhelming that I don’t what to do with it. A minute passes – an hour. The pain continues to flow out of me in streams down my cheeks until his jumper is soaked with tears.  “It’s all my fault,” I choke out between sobs.

“Nothing is your fault. You didn’t cause the crash.”

And there’s the knife again – twisting, stabbing, slashing. It tears a whole in my heart so deep I don’t think I’ll ever be able to repair it.

I pull back and meet my father’s eyes. “But I did,” I say softly, sniffling. “I did cause the crash.”

“No. You didn’t,” he insists.

“I’m sorry, dad,” I say, shaking my head. “I should have told you earlier. I shouldn’t have waited. I was selfish and I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologise to me. You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“No. I do have to apologise to you. It’s time you knew the truth.”

“The truth?”

The words are there, circling in my lungs. They rise up, flowing up my throat and puddling in my mouth.

The words are right there.

And I let them out.

“I’m not your daughter.”