Across Carina (30 page)

I was so over-stimulated that I detached. The bassline dropped, and the room pulsed with color and sweat.

Sal piped up, having shed his stupor.

“I’ve never been to a club before. Especially not like this.”

“No?” I asked. “This is pretty normal.”

Sal shook his head. “Not to me. And the music is . . . strange.”

I frowned. “Outside you were beatboxing to techno. I feel like there’s some overlap there.”

“I don’t think we were quite ourselves outside,” Sal said. “I don’t even know what techno is.”

I stared at him. “How is that possible?”

“What do you mean?” he asked. “This music—these clothes—this is all specific to Perunda. I know I missed most of high school, but I can’t imagine that the clubs all those annoying girls at school tried to sneak into were anything like this. . . . Right? I mean, Jade, if you’re saying that you’ve seen this stuff on Earth, then . . . I don’t know . . . I guess I’m confused. What year was it when you—”

I interrupted him. “Are you annoyed now?”

I gestured toward a waitress in nothing but carefully sited lace who was moving in our direction.

“Uh . . .”

Sal tried not to look at her.

“Hey, Jade, do you want to dance?” he asked.

“Not so fast, you two,” the waitress said.

She sauntered right up to us, offering us purple drinks off her tray.

Sal and I took the drinks. We didn’t want to be rude.

I started on mine, and I could feel the waitress’s eyes on me. When I was finished, I handed her my empty glass and met her gaze.

As soon as we locked eyes, I couldn’t look away. She had me in some sort of trance, and all I could do was stare back at her.

I watched her shift only her left eye to Sal, and when he looked, she pulled us both into her memory. . . .

She was walking along Dewey Street late one night with her friends. They had just left a bar and were too drunk to find their way home. They stumbled across the man in the overalls, and he leered at them, asking if they were there for the party.

At the mention of a party, the girls were eager to get inside the house. The man let them in even though they didn’t know the password—if there even was a password.

The girls only made it to the nineteenth floor before deciding that they never wanted to leave. In the house, everyone was loved.

“Here, have another.”

I came to, and we were still in the club. The waitress handed Sal and me more drinks and then left.

“This is a good place to be,” I said.

“Apparently,” Sal said.

And so we began to dance.

I don’t know how long we danced. Someone shouted that it was midnight, and the crowd cheered. The woman on the street had said that it was a few minutes
past
midnight, so unless we had drifted into another day . . .

The purple drinks kept coming, one after the next, served up by insufficiently dressed girls who had all just been looking for a party. Now they were living in an endless celebration of . . . well I didn’t know what, nor did I care.

It was easy to fit in on Perunda. Even with memories abound, nobody was passing judgments. Strangers danced with strangers. I wasn’t even laughed at as I tried to mimic dance moves that I’d seen on how-to internet videos.

After three more drinks, Sal muttered something about seeing faces. The music was too loud for me to hear anything else. He stumbled off the dance floor, and a swarm of guys boxed me in.

One of them danced up to me, putting his forehead on mine. He offered me his drink, which I finished in two gulps. I threw the empty glass on the floor and let him wrap himself around me. But when he started to kiss me, I tried to pull away.

“What’s your problem?” he asked, tightening his grip.

“I don’t even know you,” I said, but my tone came out all wrong.

I could feel myself smiling, and I didn’t know why. I tried to stop it, using my fingers to pull down on the corners of my mouth, but my smile was frozen in place.

Snap out of it, Jade.

Suddenly, every light in the club burned out. Every light except for one red beam.

It flashed in three-second intervals, making it hard for me to keep track of anyone. One second they’d be in front of me, and the next they would appear to have leapt halfway across the room.

My throng of men scattered in the confusion, and a path was formed from me to the corner of the room. People danced on either side of it as if it were normal for a walkway to exist in such a dark and crowded place.

In a flash of the red light, I saw a man standing in the corner. I could see him as if he were only inches away. He had black hair and was wearing a blood red button-down with a black jacket over it, the collar popped. He was looking up at the DJ. Then the room went dark.

In the second flash of light, he was facing me. Even from across the room I could see that his eyes were solid black, just like Sal’s had been. Then the room went dark again.

In the third flash of light, he was magnified further. I could see into his flawless pores and down the lines of his strong, supple hands. I could feel him touch me, and I wanted him. The room darkened, but I moved toward the man in my clear path.

In the fourth flash of light, he was gone. The path had dissolved.

I scanned the room for him, jumping when I saw a demon beside me. I blinked, and it turned out to just be a patron.

I thought that maybe the strobe lights had fooled me, but then it happened again. I saw a demon staring at me from across the room. It had a white face with a pointed chin and black slits for eyes—a mask from a horror film. Except the demon was in loud pants, dancing to the music with everyone else.

I bumped into some girls, and they sneered, pushing me out of their away.

“Sorry,” I mumbled.

I needed to find Sal. I didn’t know if he was still in the room or if he had stepped out for air—but I circled the room about half a dozen times, looking. I couldn’t find him
or
the exit.

There has to be a way out. There was a way in.

I pushed through the crowd, asking where the exit was, but nobody could hear me over the heavy bassline.

Again
I saw a demon. This one was cloaked and had the head of a clown. It approached me with a thick smile, and I screamed, colliding with one of the waitresses. She managed to catch her tray, and then she handed me a drink.

“You okay, honey?” she drawled. “Drink up. The lights will drive you crazy if you don’t balance them out.”

I nodded and drank. Then I set my empty glass on her tray and took another. She left me holding the second glass. The clown had disappeared, but I was still on edge.

The light flashed again, and he was in front of me. Not the clown, but the man in red and black.

I sighed in relief.

“I’m Fleuric,” he said, biting his lip.

“Fleuric?” I asked. “Like a fleur-de-lis?”

“No.”

He towered over me, his chest in my face. I stood on my tiptoes and looked up at him just as he was taking a long sniff of the air above me.

“Everything okay?” I asked.

“Very okay,” he said. “There’s been a scent captivating me for the last hour, and I just found its origin. You’re a vanilla musk. I want to eat you right up.”

He smiled at me, but I didn’t smile back. I was too focused on his eyes, two prying black holes.

“Is that your natural eye color?” I asked.

He nodded. “You’re not from here, are you, Jade?”

“How do you know my name?”

And then I remembered.

“Memories,” I said. “I’m still getting used to that.”

“I have a rather common eye color,” Fleuric said, “but I’m flattered that you find it unique. I don’t mind a beautiful girl thinking I’m special.”

He reached for my hand, and indeed his skin
was
soft. It was smoother than air, positively inhuman.

“So what do you do?” I asked.

“I’m a people person,” he said.

It was strange, but even with the music booming, I could hear everything that he said. I didn’t have to lean in close.

Though I was sort of leaning in, anyway. I wasn’t the only one who smelled nice. He smelled like tangerine, cinnamon, sage, and a few other notes that I couldn’t discern.

His hair was thick and vibrant, just long enough for me to run my hands through. He couldn’t have had more than a decade on me.

I played with my own hair, twirling it around my ear as I tried to look into Fleuric’s eyes.

“It doesn’t work with you,” I said. “Why is that?”

“You feel guilty all the time,” he said, pressing on my hips.

He began to sway, and I let him guide me to the beat.

“You believe that you’re responsible for Garrett’s death, and so you’ve convinced yourself that you don’t deserve to be happy. You tell it to yourself every day.

“As punishment, you seclude yourself from your friends, but abandoning them only causes you to feel more guilt. You hate the inconvenience of loving them.

“You act out and try to push them away, but then that reminds you of how you and Garrett were growing apart before he died. And thus the filthy cycle starts over.

“You tell yourself that the next place, the next phase, will be better, even though you know it won’t be. You’re in denial and masochistic.”

In listening to him, my breath had caught in my throat. I let it out and swallowed, feeling for the right words.

“You’re exactly right,” I said. “Tell me something, Fleuric. I know that memories can be seen here, but something happened to me upstairs. My memories—even my fears—were projected for the entire room to see. And I hadn’t locked eyes with anyone.”

“Still inquisitive as ever, aren’t you, Jade?”

Fleuric pulled me in close.

“That’s what happens when you partake of the purple drink. It eases our communication. We let our bodies do the talking here—it allows us to connect on a deeper level. We’re one family here in this house, and you can stay and be a part of it.”

“Do you live here?” I asked.

He laughed. “I live everywhere. I’m a free man.”

“That’s all I want,” I said.

“Then feel guilty no more. Enjoy these people. Enjoy me. And then—” He smiled. “Then you’ll be free.”

It sounded wonderful. I was about to respond, but then I noticed Sal standing across the room.

“Sal!” I called, trying to get his attention.

Fleuric turned my cheek back to him.

“Will I see you again?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe?”

His black eyes swirled, and suddenly I knew that the answer was yes. I felt assured in his presence.

“If you’ll let me see you tonight,” he said, “then I’ll leave you now with a parting gift. It’s something that you’ve always wanted.”

“What is it?” I asked.

He pressed his lips against my ear, whispering evenly, “I can make you invisible.”

I pulled back just enough to study his face. I sensed that his promise wasn’t a matter of if, but of how. He was not from Perunda. I could see that now.

Maybe he can help me contact . . .

I frowned. I couldn’t remember who I needed to contact.

From inside his jacket, Fleuric retrieved a small square stone. It was shiny and black.

“Whenever you need,” he said, “rub this three times and vanish from all.”

He dropped the stone in my palm.

The stone was smoking, but it rested cool in my hands. I stowed it in my pocket and looked back up to thank Fleuric.

He was gone.

“Who was that?” someone asked.

I spun around. Sal was standing in front of me. His eyes were bloodshot, and his hair in ratty tangles. His shirt was soiled from purple drinks. He was trembling.

“Sal!”

I tried to hug him, but he pushed me away.

“We’re not in our right minds, Jade. And
that
,” he said, smacking my glass out of my hand, “isn’t helping. No more drinks.”

The glass hit the floor, spilling out liquid and shards. A few people dancing almost slipped, but Sal paid them no attention.

“What’s your problem?” I demanded. “What are you even talking about?”

“Come with me,” he said.

He grabbed my arm and dragged me toward the exit—which, suddenly, was in plain sight. It had been in front of me the whole time.

“I was looking for the door!” I cried. “It’s been missing for hours!”

“Hours? Try days,” Sal said. “I’m a fool. I should have never left you in here alone, and I’m sorry.”

He opened the steel doors and pulled me through.

“They want us apart, Jade. We have to leave
now
.”

“What? Why?” I asked. “I’ve been having a good time . . . for the most part.”

I had just remembered the demons, but as I stroked the stone in my pocket, I became less worried about them. If I could disappear at will, then I could escape them.

“You don’t have to worry,” I said. “We’re safe.”

Sal circled me, pulling at his hair.

“You don’t understand! This place is a vacuum! You get sucked in and start drinking that purple crap, and then you never leave!”

“I get that it tastes good,” I said, “and you’re probably right—we’ve had a few too many drinks—but you make this house sound like the devil’s playground.”

I laughed at my word choice.

“I don’t know
what
this house is,” Sal said, “but I know it’s not good!”

“People are just dancing, Sal. They’re having fun.”

“They may be having fun on this floor, but there are eighteen other floors that we don’t know a thing about, and we have to visit them all to get out of here! It’s absurd! We should’ve never come inside this house in the first place! We’ve totally sidetracked from our plan!”

I barely heard him. I was swaying to the music coming from inside the club.

“Jade! How many drinks have you had?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know.”

Sal began to pace the room, muttering to himself.

“This is so stupid, stupid, stupid . . .”

In my pocket, the stone was warm from all of my rubbing. I could feel its heat starting to seep to my thigh, and it was relaxing.