Vera Warden and the Two-Faced Demon by J Rose

Author:J Rose [J. Rose]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pleadine Books
Published: 2023-05-11T00:00:00+00:00

16

A Friend’s Secret

I’d often heard the word freak in my presence, but not usually in that context. Especially when it wasn’t right after surgery. Doctors had a habit of saying, “I don’t want you to freak out,” before shoving a mirror in my face to show off their great surgical skills.

Slowly, as if Nero himself were using a cane, he walked toward me and faced me. He took the longest, deepest breath I’d ever seen.

“Just tell me?” I didn’t know if we were close enough friends for this much drama. He couldn’t have done something that bad. But his anxiousness made me worried. Had he orchestrated some stealthy Grambook attack that would embarrass me or make things harder for me at school? I really didn’t need any of that online bullying in my life.

“Okay, here goes,” he said, looking down at the ground. “I’m sorry I was rude when we first met. I was just so shocked to see you.”

That was it? A backhanded apology? Nothing new to me. “All good.”

“No, you don’t get it. I never knew about Ghostblast, or that you even existed before coming here . . . Except I did.”

Nero was making absolutely no sense. “Spit it out.”

“It’s just that I’ve dreamt about you for the last couple years. I always thought you were a figment of my imagination until I saw you. Totally weirded me out.”

And now he was weirding me out. Seeing me in a dream? Now that was weird. And why me? I was speechless.

“Say something.” He fidgeted. Like he was afraid of my answer but still needed to know.

“Like what?” I asked, completely stunned. “Was I doing anything interesting in these dreams?” I needed to know if I was stuck here with a total creep. I didn’t think he was lying, because of his jitters, but I couldn’t be sure.

“Okay, here goes. Lately, you’re wearing a green dress with a coding language pattern. You’re just sitting in a black wheelchair, staring at something across your bedroom here. Sometimes it’s in this secret basement room. You’re trying to tell me something, but I can’t understand.”

Now that definitely threw me off. “How could that be? My mom gave me that dress as a gift for getting into Morton Tech, and I’ve never even worn it.” Had he gone through my stuff? Besides, I just got fitted for my new titanium chair before coming here. How was it possible he saw my chair before I did? Or was he just lying? Was this some cruel joke to get back at me for Claire? Since he couldn’t face her himself?

“The dreams changed over time. At first, you had a silver wheelchair with a hot pink cushion, and were doing some kind of martial art. And, um, your face looked different.”

“Surgery will do that to a person,” I tried to joke, but I didn’t understand. “But you’ve never seen my old chair.” And I never posted pics of myself to Grambook. Perhaps he’d been to Colorado, where I’m from.

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