Falling (The Falling Angels Saga) by Van Lowe E

Author:Van Lowe, E.
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: White Whisker Books
Published: 2014-03-11T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nineteen

That was when everything changed.

I remember the exact moment. We were standing in the middle of Maudrina’s kitchen, hugging. The dogs were doing their best to get between us. The late afternoon sun was shining through the blinds that covered the kitchen window over the sink, throwing prison-bar-like shadows onto the tile floor.

“I’m ready,” I said.

Maudrina pulled back and looked at me with a puzzled yet knowing smile. “Ready?” she asked. “Ready for what?”

I sighed, and with the sigh I felt all the fear and worry I’d been clinging to these past several days fall away. I was a caterpillar shedding her cocoon of fear, worry, doubt. “When we were at Aunt Jaz’s, you said you’d carry things for me until I was ready to carry them for myself. Until I was ready to start believing I could actually win. Thank you for carrying the weight for me these past few days,” I said, looking her in the eyes. “But I’m ready to start believing now.”

Maudrina’s smile broadened and a look came into her eyes. Something like pride, like she was proud that I’d finally gotten there. “What brought this on?” she asked, that look never leaving her eyes.

I didn’t know exactly how to put it into words. It started with me surviving the weekend. It’s not like I was dying or anything, at least not on the outside. But when I’d dragged myself home from Aunt Jaz’s Saturday evening, I truly did feel like my world was coming to an end.

Yet when I woke up Monday morning, my world hadn’t ended. I still had Guy and Maudrina. I still had my mother. I still had hope. After that, I’d gotten through a day of school along with my former best friend telling my current best friend to take a hike. My current best friend didn’t take a hike. She was standing here in her kitchen wearing the cutest Hello Kitty PJs, eyeing me with pride, like a young mother whose daughter had just completed her first day of Kindergarten. Now, that wasn’t so bad, was it? And finally, it was the yellow-toothed girl I’d seen again on the escalator. You can win.

“I don’t know,” I said in response to her question. “I guess just the fact that I’m still here. That we’re still here.” My expression shifted. A nervous little bird began hopping around inside my stomach. In the past, this jittery stomach would have indicated a feeling of fear or worry, but today I felt exhilarated. “We’re going to beat him,” I said with conviction. “We can win.”

Maudrina’s smile broadened. “I know we can. We beat him before, and we’ll beat him again.”

“The final hurdle in a long and grueling race,” I said, repeating her words of Saturday afternoon in Aunt Jaz’s bedroom. “We’re almost there.”

She nodded. “Yes, we are,” she said, continuing to smile.

We came up with a simple plan to get the ball rolling. I knew it was something Guy wasn’t going to approve of, but I also knew it was the right thing to do.

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