Rippler (6 page)

I straightened up, ready for anything.

“Your step-mom,” he said. “How’s her cheesecake?”

I laughed. “It’s the best.” I reached in my pack and cut him a slice.

“Looks great. Forks?”

I rummaged through my pack for a minute before remembering I’d left the forks on the counter at home. “Oops.”

Will shrugged, picked up the whole piece, and stuffed half of it in his mouth. His eyes widened. “It’th delithouth!”

I laughed. “I’ll tell her you said so. Exactly like that.”

Will finished chewing and swallowed before adding, “Nice of Mick to take off. More for us.” He held out a hand for seconds.

I frowned. It was my fault Mickie had taken off.

“Don’t even
think
about feeling bad. Mick’s like a volcano. She’s not happy unless she lets off steam every couple days.” Will shook his head. “Seriously, it’s her problem, not yours. It’s not like you did it on purpose.” He looked inquisitively at me. “
Did
you disappear on purpose?”

I shook my head no. “I only noticed when I went to grab this rock and I couldn’t see my arm.” I held up the pinkish rock. “So, does stuff disappear if you pick it up when you’re invisible, or does it just sort of hover out in the air?”

“Neither.”

“Either you can see it or you can’t.”

“No, it’s not like that—you can’t pick things up once you ripple.”

“Huh?” I stared at him, feeling confused. “Why not?”

“Wow, Sam, it’s weird you haven’t noticed this—no offense—it’s just that there isn’t any

‘you’ to pick something up with, you know?” He paused. “I mean, I guess it isn’t
that
weird, you not noticing. You haven’t rippled much.”

“Are you saying I don’t have any . . . substance? When I ripple I’m not just invisible, I’m

. . .” I broke off, not able to figure out what the opposite of having substance would be.

“Mickie used to get so mad at me for rippling when we were little. She’d have us playing tea party or Barbies or something and I’d get bored. If I would try to run away, she would catch me. But if I rippled, she couldn’t grab me or figure out where I was. She tried a lot before she figured out it didn’t work. She said that the air got really cold where I rippled, though, so sometimes she could tell I was still in the room, and she’d bribe me to come back and play.”

I guffawed, picturing Will being forced to play dolls with his sister.

“You tell anyone about the Barbies and you’re toast,” he said, grinning.

“So, where does your body ‘go’ when you ripple?”

“No idea.”

“Creepy. So, it’s a good thing that I know how to come back, then.”

Will nodded, fingering the pink rock I had set down. “When I was little, I’d see

something and want it, and if I was invisible, I couldn’t grab it. I remember that really pissed me off.”

“There go my plans to decimate the Merced Mall.”

He looked over at me to see if I was serious.

“I’m joking.”

“It would appeal to plenty of people. My dad, for instance. Mickie wasn’t stretching it when she said he’d sell me to the highest bidder. Or sell you. He’s never cared about anything but his next fix. Least, since I’ve been alive.” Will nudged a couple of large rocks into the creek with his foot. “Mom died thanks to his habit.”

I thought Will had said breast cancer, but I didn’t want to bring up things he might not want to talk about. I had led a sheltered existence compared to Will. I had parents, normal parents, who actually loved me; Will only had Mickie.

He stood and repositioned himself at the edge of the creek, squatting. I couldn’t see his face. He doused his hands, face, and hair.

“Hoooo-eeee,” he hollered, “that’s some cold water.” He turned and grinned at me.

I smiled back and then gazed at the golden creek once more. The surging water would plunge over Illilouette Fall then join the Merced River where Will had first seen me vanish.

All at once it hit me: There’d been
water
each of the times I’d disappeared.

“Will! It’s water! Water is what makes me vanish.”

“Huh?”

“Get this, Will: I
love
water. It completely relaxes me to stare at a river or lake or, well, anything with water.” Suddenly I saw a flash from the day we buried Mom; I’d held it together staring at falling snow and icicles all day. Goosebumps ran along my arms as I realized something else that had happened that day—something I just realized.
I’d rippled
.

“Huh,” Will grunted. “Water. That’s different.”

“How do you ripple?” I asked.

“Me? Oh, uh . . . hmmm . . .” His eyes took on a glazed-over, far-away look. “I kind of go inside myself, to a space where it’s really calm and peaceful. Then I’m gone.”

Could I learn to do that? Instead of staring at water? Not that I wanted to do this more often.

Will interrupted my thoughts. “If water calms you, that makes sense. Have you always found water soothing?”

“As far back as I can remember. Dad says Mom called me her water-baby.”

“Huh,” said Will. “I wonder why you didn’t ripple more when you were . . . you

know . . . before your Mom passed.”

I hesitated a second but decided to tell him what I’d just figured out. “The day we buried Mom, I must have rippled; people said they couldn’t find me. There were icicles hanging from the eaves by my bedroom window seat. I watched drops slide down the spokes and hang a moment before freezing. It was like the house cried for Mom. Those icicles, they were like these pure, perfect things.

“I heard people talking about me, downstairs. How resourceful I’d been calling 9-1-1, how brave I was. Which was a bunch of crap. Maybe shell-shocked and brave look the same to adults. I mean, I hadn’t cried. Not since the ambulance came to take Maggie and my mom away. But that didn’t mean I felt brave. Just . . . anesthetized.”

Will sat silent. My eyes blurred and I realized I was crying. Will didn’t judge or

comment. I kept talking.

“I sat there all day looking out my window and never got cold or hungry. I remember lunch-smells creeping up the stairs and then coffee smells. A woman carried cocoa to my room, and I heard her call my name, but I didn’t turn. I just kept looking out my window at the snow falling and the ice melting, and she left.

“And when it was time for the burial, my cousin ran into my room, checked my closet, pulled the duvet off my bed, and thumped out, shouting I wasn’t in my room. I ignored him.

But then my dad started calling my name, and he sounded worried. I must have come solid then; Dad saw me. And here’s a weird thing I remember. When I turned to my Dad’s voice, I finally felt the cold. It was like a wall of
ice
shattering on me.”

“Temperature change,” Will said. “It’s the biggest clue you get when you ripple. You can’t feel the outside temperature. Or hunger. Or thirst. Until you return solid.”

I nodded. “I wanted to tell Dad I wasn’t going, but my teeth chattered so bad I literally couldn’t talk.”
So I let them bundle me into layers. I let them buckle me into the car. I let them
lower her into the ground: a dark wound in the deathly white.

Will didn’t tell me he was sorry or any of the other lame-ass things people say.

I blinked back tears and spoke again. “Before your sister found out about me, just now, I was completely chilled, watching the creek. When I realized I’d rippled, I panicked and came solid. At least I think that’s what happened.”

“You left your ripple-zone. You were startled. Your dad calling for you would’ve done that, if you weren’t focusing on staying immaterial.”

“I’m gonna test out my water-theory.” I turned to face the creek. “And you can see if it’s cold where I am . . . or was . . . or whatever.”

“I already did,” said Will, looking a bit sheepish. “I ran my hand through you—through where I thought you were—right before Mount Saint Mickie erupted. It felt ice-cold.”

I smiled at the moniker he’d given his sister. “Well,” I said, “Here goes . . .”

I gazed at the creek. The sun was heading west, toward the cliff we had descended

earlier. Light, filtering through pines and laurels, flickered on the water. I relaxed as I saw bright and dark dancing along the creek, casting shadows on granite rocks below the surface.

There were pine needles stuck between some of the rocks. They were dark, rusty-brown, with five needles each, which I thought meant sugar pine, one needle for each letter in
sugar
.

Was I invisible? I closed my eyes, took a slow breath, and shifted my gaze so that when I opened my eyes I would see, or not see, my knees. My eyes opened.

I was gone.

I smiled. Thought a smile, anyway.
I have no lips to smile with. That is seriously
creepy
. . . I thought of turning and found myself facing Will. He wore an enormous grin. He brushed his hand ‘through’ me and laughed. As his hand passed through me, my vision shifted and for the second time it felt as if I were looking at a movie; I saw a beautiful girl, smiling and sitting by the creek eating cheesecake. I realized with a shock that the girl was me. Then my vision corrected itself and I was looking at Will again. I’d have to ask him why I kept seeing movies.

I turned away from Will's grinning face to the creek. Then I realized, if I could turn my head, I could probably walk. I’d never thought of trying to move; I’d assumed I was “stuck,”

in fact. I looked at a large boulder in the creek and launched myself towards it. Magical! I felt as if I were a kayak cutting through a still lake, with nothing resisting my passage. The creek burbled past the place where my legs should be—rather, where my legs
were
—it was no use pretending I didn't have a strong sense that I still
existed
somehow. In fact, I had never felt so piercingly alive.

I couldn't sense the icy cold of the creek. I felt perfect temperature-wise. But I could make out a whisper of feeling as I passed through the water or as it passed through me. It was like when I ran by the willows, arms outstretched.
Like dry water!
I focused my thought upon the sensation and it increased from a whisper to a shiver.

I needed to solidify to ask a million questions. I turned to face Will and, still standing within the creek, I rippled back.

An explosive crackling, like thunder, left my ears ringing. Something had gone wrong.

Will’s alarmed expression mirrored my own. I stood in ice-cold water up to my shins while a downpour struck against me from all sides. Then the force of the river asserted itself against my legs. It felt furious, strong, and I threw my arms out to maintain my balance. Will closed the span between us with an arm to catch me back from the angry water.

For a moment I was safe.

Then I slipped and lost Will’s hand, and the raging creek carried me downstream.

Instinctively I shielded my head with my arms as I shot down, feet first. Last winter’s heavy snow-pack meant the water flowed swiftly. I couldn’t regain my footing, but I hoped I might be able to grab a tree limb as I shot beneath the snag. I reached and missed, the water plunging me under. Icy-cold gripped like a giant hand squeezing air from my lungs.

I bobbed to the surface again, choking on the freezing water. I grabbed at boulders as I raced past them, but it was hopeless. The rocks were slippery; I was slippery. And suddenly I was terrified.

If I couldn’t stop myself, I would plunge over the falls.
I want to live;
the thought resounded in my head. Forgetting about protecting my head, I flailed, trying to catch hold of something, anything, as I careened with the icy flow.

A group of boulders loomed large ahead, forcing the creek to narrow and surge between the solid masses. Something to grab hold of, or be smashed senseless upon. My arms flew to my head again, but water forced its way into my nostrils, down to my lungs, and as I choked, I lost any hope of catching myself against the boulders. I couldn’t breathe.
No!
I was going to be thrown onto the rocks and my broken body would ride over the falls to the Merced River. I coughed furiously, cleared my airway, and tried to see as I hurtled into the stone wall.

Chapter Six

IMPACT

I slammed into the wall: it hurt less than I’d expected. Was I too numbed by the cold water to feel things properly? It seemed as if my body pushed against the current. My eyes opened and, looking down at my waist, I saw strong arms wrapped tightly around me. Will!

He inched us along the boulder to shore, slipping once, but catching himself. I was too exhausted to speak, too numb from cold to help.

“Thank God,” Will sighed low, hugging me to himself.

I felt the warmth of his body pressed into mine. I tried to hug back, but my frozen arms didn’t respond. My head nestled in the space below his chin, and I breathed his scent of peanut-butter sandwich and pine and sweat. We collapsed on dry land, slipping apart, avoiding eye contact, embarrassed.

I shook from cold or from remembering the shape of Will’s arms around me.

“You’re bleeding,” Will said, pointing to my elbow—a bloody gash.

It stung as I thawed.

“Firs-taid-tsin-mupack.” My lungs and nostrils burned and my words slurred. I turned my head coughing out creek-water.

“I’m not leaving you here for Band-Aids.”

I lifted my leaden arm to examine my elbow. It was an ugly scrape.

Will reached beyond me and placed something he’d grabbed onto the cut. I winced

briefly.

“Wuz-zat?” I asked.

“Cobweb,” he replied. “Stops small injuries from bleeding.”

“Nuh-uh.” I laughed, more like a snort. “Where-d-chu-hear-that?”

“Shakespeare.”

I coughed, my throat stinging. Feeling was returning to my mouth and jaw muscles.

“You’re
such
a history geek.” My words had returned.

Will shook his head grimly; his dark eyes were serious. “All I could think was I had to catch you before the falls. I remembered this spot where the boulders almost touch.”

It made no sense that he could outrun the river, not with all the brush, fallen trees and uneven rocks surrounding the creek. “How did you get here so fast?”