CHAPTER FOUR

It’s pouring with rain when school finishes for the day, and I stand in front of the main entrance under the shelter along with numerous others. I left my umbrella at home today, and since I have to carry my school laptop because it doesn’t fit in my bag, I can’t walk home in the rain like I usually would.

An orb of light – or spirit, I should say – flits around the front gate, zipping back and forth through the metal bars. No one notices it, of course, and I do my best to ignore its presence. I pull my phone out of my pocket and send a quick message to my mum, telling her to come pick me up.

Just as I hit send, I feel a tap on my shoulder, and turn to see Caden behind me. “What now?” I ask, feeling annoyed.

“I thought you might need an umbrella,” he says, half-smiling as he offers one to me.

“And what? Since we’re such besties you thought you’d lend it to me?”

He laughs. “Something like that.”

As much as his offer is tempting, I shake my head. “Keep it. I’m getting a lift from my mother anyway.”

He lowers his arm, and for a few awkward and uncomfortable seconds, we just stare at each other. It doesn’t make sense for him to be to so kind to me, especially when he could have befriended anyone in the school. Why doesn’t he keep his distance like everyone else?

“Why are you being so nice to me?” I finally ask.

There’s a few seconds of silence, in which the sound of the rain seems to vanish, and all I can here is my pounding heart. His response shouldn’t matter to me – I don’t want it to matter to me – but I find that I’m sitting in wait, hoping.

I notice him considering the question, searching his brain for an answer. Maybe there isn’t one.

A part of me hopes there is.

With a shrug, he says, “Why not?” and I feel oddly disappointed. “Surely someone has to be nice to you.”

I shake off the disappointment almost as soon as I feel it, mentally frowning at my immediate reaction. I shouldn’t care what he thinks of me and I definitely shouldn’t get my hopes up with the possibility of a friend. No one can be friends with me – the girl whose touch will burn your skin and whose disease will freeze you to death. Even if people did like me, I’d end up hurting them one way or another, and in the end, I always have to leave.

Memories of Sarah flitter into my mind and I let in the images of her sad face for just a moment, before sending them away. I had to leave my only friend and fly to the other side of the world because of my disease and I haven’t seen or heard from her since. Although, it’s probably for the best. She never knew of my condition, and I can’t help but wonder if she would have wanted to be my friend if she had. I can’t imagine she would have.

After a while, Caden just says, “I’ll see you tomorrow,” with a small, almost sad, smile before walking off. I turn away from his retreating figure and focus on the steady flow of rain.

My mum arrives soon after and I hop into the warm car, drops of rain clinging to my bare arms from my dash to her silver rental corolla, sitting a fair few metres from the shelter.

My mum turns around in her seat, directing her typical forced smile in my direction. “How was your day?” Her eyes flick momentarily down to my bare arms, and disapproval falls upon her features before she looks up and it vanishes.

Without really thinking about it, I rub a hand against my right arm, which is tingling as if her gaze had actually touched my skin. “Fine,” I say in response.

She nods, her expression blank, and turns back around. She doesn’t expect any more from me and I don’t expect any more from her. Our relationship is at its best when conversation is limited.

My mum presses down on the accelerator and we drive out of the school parking lot and onto the road.  “I’ve been discussing our next location with your father,” my mum says as she drives. “We were thinking of going to California. They’re going into summer over there and it’ll be nice to have a couple of months of sunshine.”

I nod and smile as if I’m excited about the idea, but I really couldn’t care less about where we go. For me, it’s just another place with a bunch of people who will treat me like shit until I leave for yet another city with yet another group of people who will come to hate me almost as much as I already hate myself.

“We were thinking about going in about a week or so, how does that sound?”

I shrug, hoping that she’ll notice that I don’t really want to talk about it. She must get the hint, because she doesn’t say anything else.

I look out the window as we drive even though I can’t see anything because of the torrential rain and fogged-up glass, which is due to the hot air in the car. It’s not long before the heat becomes too much for my body and sweat forms at my temples even though I can’t actually feel the hot air. But I roll down the window anyway and stick my hand outside, delighting in the rain and air which feels almost cold in comparison to the warmth of the car.

Mum glances in the review mirror and our eyes meet for a moment – hers are sad and defeated, like she’s given up on me, and I’m sure mine are the same stormy blue they’ve always been.

“Enough with the rain, Melissa,” she says, her eyes focused on the road. “You’re letting all the cold air and rain in.”

Suddenly, the tingling returns to my arms, but this time more intense, and goose bumps rise on my skin. And then I’m shivering, overcome by the cold I felt this morning upon waking. I stare at my arms, knowing for certain that I’m actually feeling the cold, and my breathing quickens as I start to panic.

“Melissa?” Mum has noticed that I’m shivering, and I can hear the note of worry in her voice.

For a moment, I’m unsure of what to say or how to respond. Is this a good thing? Should I be happy or concerned that I can finally feel the cold?

“I think – I think I’m cold,” I say, and mum hits the brakes so suddenly that I go flying forward in my seat.

The car is sitting stationary in the middle of the road, but my mum doesn’t seem to care, and as she turns to face me, I notice that there’s an emotion in her eyes that I haven’t seen before: hope – hope that my disease might have finally gone away. It spreads across her face, lighting up her features and ridding them of her usual sadness.

“What did you say?”

A gust of wind blows in through the window, and the raindrops hit my arms like shards of glass, biting into my skin. I lean away from rain, rubbing my arms as I continue to shiver. Everything is cold – my hands, my arms, my body – and I can’t find any warmth. My skin is just as cold as the rain and I feel myself slowly freezing.

This isn’t right, I think. If my disease has gone away, then why is my body temperature still so low? And why am I cold when my mum has the heater on, warming the car to a temperature that she’s comfortable with?

I suddenly want to take back my previous statement. Whatever’s going on with me, it doesn’t have anything to do with my disease going away and I most certainly don’t want to give my parents false hope.

“Nothing,” I say in response to her question, hiding my goose bump ridden arms behind my back. “It’s nothing.”

She looks at me with suspicion for a few seconds longer before the hope burning in her eyes falls away and she presses down on the accelerator. Soon after, the feeling of cold vanishes and I feel myself relax.

“I think it’s time you put the window up,” my mum says in an emotionless voice, a moment later. And just like that, we descend back into our painful state of normalcy.

I only nod. After what I’ve just put her through – allowing her to feel hope before snatching it back – it’s the least I can do. I sit, enjoying the sensation of the rain on my skin for a moment longer before rolling up the window. It’s still hot in the car, but at least I can’t feel it, and I fan myself for the rest of the drive.

When we reach home, I head straight for my room and lock the door behind me. Thoughts and questions get lodged in my mind like splinters, inducing a throbbing headache. I spend the rest of the night thinking everything through, and despite my stomachs protests, when mum calls for me to come down for dinner I stay in my room, my eyes focused on the sky out my window.

Somehow, my train of thought always leads me back to the same two questions: Why, after all these years, have I started to feel the cold? And why can Caden – the new guy who’s arrived just after my first brush with the cold – see my hallucinations, or as he calls them, the spirits?

By the end of the night, there’s one thing I know for certain: Caden’s appearance and my sudden ability to feel the cold for short periods of time are in no way coincidental.

I do eventually go down for dinner, the hunger pains in my stomach forcing me to consume something. At the bottom of the stairs, the room is eerily silent. My dinner sits cold on the bench, still waiting for me to come and get it. Neither of my parents bothered to call me down more than once. They probably considered it lucky that I didn’t come down on the first call.

The dining room is empty, and the only noise in the entire house comes from my footsteps and the TV in the living room, the volume down nearly all the way. I grab my dinner off the bench, too hungry to care if the food I eat is cold or hot, and walk the few steps to the living room. But when I turn the corner, I forget all about the food and the hunger pains.

My mum and dad are sitting on the couch, sad eyes focused on the television. I follow their gaze and the moment my eyes land on the screen, I feel sick to the stomach.

Someone has died.

A teenage girl – maybe eighteen – is relaying the event to the cameras with tears in her eyes, shivering in the freezing outdoors air. At the bottom left handed corner of the screen, her name flashes, along with the words, ‘Friend of the victim’.

I have a bad feeling that I have something to do with the death.

As if having sensed my presence, my mum diverts her attention from the television to me. She’s not angry, just sad.

“What happened?” I squeeze out. I’m sure my eyes are betraying the worry and fear I’m feeling, as they always do.

Mum swallows. “Do you want to sit?” she asks cautiously, sensing the fragile nature of the situation.

“Just tell me,” I say through gritted teeth, wanting to get it over with.

My mother and father exchange glances before my mum says softly, “A girl died last night. Her body was found this afternoon in the park. Someone had robbed her and knocked her out, but,” she takes in a breath, “she froze to death before she could wake from her unconscious state.”

I can’t breathe.

My mother notices the look of horror in my eyes and rushes on, saying, “But it wasn’t your fault. If she hadn’t been robbed, she wouldn’t be dead. You can’t blame yourself – the blame belongs to the person who knocked her unconscious.”

She’s trying to make me feel better, but it isn’t working because we all know that I’m the reason she’s dead – my mum just doesn’t want to admit it. If I hadn’t moved to Sydney, that girl would have awoken and returned home – she would still be alive right now, eating dinner or watching the TV with her family.

And it’s my fault that that isn’t a reality.

I feel sick as I head back upstairs with my cold dinner, not only because my existence has claimed yet another victim, but because tomorrow everyone will blame me and I won’t be able to tell them they’re wrong.

Once in my room, I toss myself onto my bed and lie awake most of the night, my dry and emotionless eyes wishing for tears.