Chapter One:

An Assignment

 

The weather had just turned from unbearably hot to cool with occasional gusts of frigid as I sat with my sketchbook, trying to capture the change of seasons within its pages. The gathering chill made the sky clearer than the muggy haze of full summer; the warm palette of autumn leaves draped the trees every shade of red from blush to blood. I gripped my chunk of graphite, determined to get the assignment exactly right, and looked out over the St. Clare River.

Autumn was the time of year when my brother Logan and I pulled out long sleeves and boots for the first time and tramped through the woods together, just as we did with our parents before they died four years ago. The woods surrounding Whitfield became our own private, living cathedral. We filled our pockets with its offerings: quartz, oddly shaped pieces of wood, a feather. We linked hands just before sunset and took turns talking to our parents about our lives as we walked. Logan always said he felt them more strongly in the woods than in the graveyard. Then we’d rush home, racing the darkness, and drink hot chocolate and fight over the remote until one of us fell over, dead asleep.

But not this fall. Things were different. Darker. There was no time for long walks through the woods, and no energy even if time could be found. At night, the stars were sharp as paper cut outs in indigo parchment. The crickets and cicadas had a spectacular backdrop against which to sing their last songs of the year. With luck, I could snatch a few minutes to watch night fall over Blind Springs Park as I sprinted from school to work to home. This fall, I was a freshman at Andreas Academy of Fine Arts with an almost full-time job at the coffee shop two buildings down from our apartment. It didn’t cover all the bills, but it did help keep us in health insurance. Things like insurance were actually important to me now. I kept the local bookstore steadily supplied with hand-painted tarot card decks for extra cash, and did all the other things running a household required that Logan couldn’t. Which was almost everything.

This fall, Logan had cancer. I watched it leach his brown eyes and his tall, compact carpenter’s body of life and vitality as surely as the approaching winter would rob the forest of color and life.

My brother’s once strong, sure hands trembled when he did something as simple as open a stubborn jar of pickles. His kind brown eyes were constantly ringed with purplish bruises. Logan, always so active, now had to sit down and rest halfway up the stairs to our third floor apartment. The chemotherapy affected his scent, somehow. I didn't really notice, but our cat Abigail sure did. When Logan came home from a session, she paced the floor and yowled, bewildered as to why he didn’t look, smell, or act like her beloved person. That killed him. Abigail was his baby.

Worst of all, there was nothing I could do about any of it. I felt so powerless and angry most of the time. Logan had been eighteen when our parents died. I had been fifteen. We were barely old enough to live on our own, but we tried. We took care of each other. Now I was doing my best to take care of everything while inside, I was falling apart.

So when my “gift” decided this was the perfect time to make its reappearance, I shouldn’t have been surprised. Everything else was coming unglued. Why not my head, too?

I was sitting on a wrought iron bench, graphite in hand, overlooking the St. Clare River, when I sketched a piece of my future. I’d been drawing the future for as long as I could hold a crayon.

“It’s a gift of your blood, Caspia,” my grandmother used to insist. She was the only one to speak to me about it, this "gift of my blood," back before she died. My family knew I had a strange ability, but no one else talked about its origins. “You’ll see,” she always said, examining the symbols or pictures that seemed to come from nowhere and always frightened me. “You just drew a vision of your future, honey.”

She was right. Every single ‘vision’ came true.

It’s not as dramatic as it sounds. It’s not like I draw lottery numbers or predict world disasters. Sometimes, it’s as mundane as a really bad grade. Sometimes it’s good things, when I drew a picture of our neighbors, who thought they couldn’t have children, with a pair of smiling twins.

But sometimes, I drew very dark things. Like Grandmother’s death. The fire across the street that killed our neighbor’s dogs. The happy family where things got broken and people bruised behind closed doors. Some things I still don’t understand. Either they haven’t come to pass, or they’re just gibberish.

That autumn afternoon, when I drew a strange and furious man less than a dozen feet away from me, I was hoping for gibberish.

I was supposed to be sketching the river. I kept staring at the lines of light and dark across its surface, at the way it seemed to catch on boulders and drag itself around them in great huge ripples like wrinkles in muddy silk. My eyes followed the jagged contours of the distant limestone cliffs. The river below me sheltered fish that leapt, glittering, out of its depths, and nurtured the lush woodlands that were just now turning the brilliant fiery colors of fall. Every so often, a storm swept through, swelling the St. Clare River and making it angry enough to flood homes or even drown a person.

Powerful. Calm. Sheltering. Beautiful. These were the things I was supposed to be drawing, the things my Drawing II teacher, Dr. Christian, had actually assigned to us. “Go draw the St. Clare River in all its fall splendor,” the temperamental Dr. Christian ordered us, shortly after taking roll. A few of the girls actually made quiet sounds of disappointment. That’s how drop-dead sexy Dr. Christian is. Even though he’d just given us the day off, probably half the girls would have happily stayed just to look at him.

I wasn’t one of them. I loved the weather, and I loved the Riverwalk. I couldn’t wait to get started, couldn’t wait to lose myself in the sheer joy of creating something out of nothing on the blank page. I was the first one out the door, even though my best friend Amberlyn yelled at me to wait. Despite my freakish prophetic ability, or maybe because of it, I lived to draw and paint. And with all that was going on in my life, I was desperate for some physical and mental escape.

And yet I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t finish a simple assignment like a landscape sketch. I got the basics done quickly enough. Then I started to relax and focus in on the details, like the massive oak on the far bank charred and split by lightening. My fingers moved as if they had tiny minds of their own, drawing the graphite smoothly, fooling my brain into thinking that strange part of me, the part that had been creating prophetic images for as long as I could remember, had gone to sleep or something. But of course it hadn’t. It had been months since I’d drawn one of my visions, and it had never happened in public before. Ever. When I looked down at the sketch across my knees, an incomplete but distinct figure that had no business being there stared back at me.

It was male, and I had drawn enough of him to note his protective, even angry stance. He stood with his body squared and his hands loose but steady at waist level, as if he was ready to go for a weapon or block an attack. I had drawn a dark cloud swirling around him. Soaring planes of light and shapes I couldn’t completely make out pierced the dark cloud. The few I could recognize sent my stomach plummeting somewhere south of my ankles: a hand with nails like talons, dripping blood; a shattered knife; a tattered book; a heart-shaped box, smashed to bits. Sleek white lines swirled around the man, whirling with the dark cloud. I squinted. I couldn’t tell what they were, if anything. I had only half-drawn his face before I stopped, so he kind of looked like the creepy Twilight Zone character with no mouth. I shivered and zipped my hoodie up all the way.

I had managed to finish his eyes. It was only a charcoal sketch, so I couldn’t tell what color they were, but I had done a good job capturing the light in them. His eyes were so light they almost glowed at me out of the charcoal whorls. They were narrowed underneath arched brows, and they practically sparked with anger. His eyes were so angry, in fact, that for just a minute I wondered why my drawing didn’t catch fire right in my lap.

He stood on the Riverwalk side, just a few dozen feet from where I huddled with the rest of my art class against the October breeze. Of course, in reality, there was no one there. No angry mystery man with only half a face glared at me from the banks of the St. Clare River.

Instead, groups of art students, clad in thrift store chic, huddled all along the Riverwalk. Some worked and some goofed off. I had been part of the first group until my freakish ability manifested itself again. After that, I kind of froze in horror. Amberlyn sat with her striped tights pressed up against my knee, bent over her own sketchpad. Like me, she had cut the fingers off a pair of knit gloves to keep her hands warm but still allow her to draw. I had been hoping to finish quickly, with time left over to run home and check on Logan before work. Amberlyn was so into what she was doing that she didn’t notice, at first, when I stopped working.

I should have known better. Amberlyn is really, really observant. It’s part of what makes her such a good artist. And why she can be such an annoying friend.

“Caspia,” she purred, her voice low and throaty like she’d just swallowed honey. “What is that?”

“Well,” I heard myself say stupidly. “Um. Nothing. No one.”

Amberlyn just looked at me like I’d insulted her intelligence. I struggled to sound more convincing. “Really. I have no idea who that is. I just made him up.” Lame, but true. I tried to cover with a nervous giggle. That was my mistake. I wasn’t the giggling type, and Amberlyn knew it.

“Caspia, honey,” she drawled, prying the bar of graphite from my fingers. I’d snapped it into pieces and ground part of it to dust. “It looks like you just drew a man being eaten by a tornado, or something.” She squinted and tilted her head slightly sideways, trying to get a better look. I flipped the drawing facedown so she couldn’t see it. She sighed and took my charcoal smeared fingers in her own and massaged them, getting black dust all over her cute pink fingerless gloves. “I just wish you’d tell me if someone’s tormenting you so much you need to devour him with an imaginary tornado. Instead of doing your homework, no less.” She clucked her tongue in mock severity. “I’m trustworthy. I won’t even tell Logan,” she taunted, emphasizing my brother’s name with a wink.

“Oh, God, Amberlyn, shut up!” I squealed. I did not want to think about my best friend and the crush she’d had on my brother since the seventh grade. I jerked my hands away and grabbed the sketchbook from my lap. “It’s just… I was just daydreaming, ok? Seriously. There is no one.” I started to rip the picture from the book to wad it up, but she stopped me.

“No, wait,” she insisted, snatching my sketchbook away. She ignored my squeals. “Daydreaming or not, this is really good, Caspia.” She crinkled her perfectly shaped little nose and narrowed her golden-green eyes. “In a Gormenghast meets William Turner kind of way.”

“A fantasy-horror landscape painting. That just about sums up my life right now,” I moaned, falling back against the bench. My head felt hot and heavy. I let it drop into my hands. “They say there’s truth in art.”

“Oh, Caspia. Sweetie.” She let her golden-brown curls rest against my shoulder. “You know what you need?” Even in fall, she managed to smell like cocoa butter. “You need a caramel latte with extra caramel. And you need me to buy it for you.”

I sat up straight and looked out over the river. School was supposed to be the easy part of my day, and here I was, almost crying. I still had work and chores and homework and Logan. Then I realized I had just lumped my brother in with chores, and almost started crying again. A sudden chill breeze helped bring me to my senses; I quickly wiped my tears and reached for my knapsack. “I have to check on Logan before I go to work at the place that makes the caramel lattes. Making my own makes it less of a treat,” I grumbled.

“Mmm hmm. Just go ahead and be difficult then. Because then I won’t have to tell you how much charcoal you just smeared on your face, wiping away your own tears when you had a friend right here to do it for you. And I surely won’t have to go buy three extra caramel lattes that someone else made so Logan can have one too and then bring them up to your apartment while you clean yourself up for work.”

Amberlyn had already smoothed my incriminating drawing and closed my sketchbook, tying it tightly closed with its black leather cord. She held it with uncharacteristic solemnity. Her golden-brown spiral curls blew all around her café-au-lait skin. In the afternoon light, she looked angelic. I felt suddenly, powerfully alone. We’d been best friends since we both showed up on the first day of junior high with identical cartoon lunch boxes, cementing our eternal torment and instant solidarity all in one day. But my visions were a secret I had never shared. Not even Logan or my parents were comfortable with the subject; Gran had been the only one.

I felt heavy with secrets and pent-up emotions. “You don’t have to do all that.” I started to refuse, but my voice came out in a whine even I was sick of hearing.

“Just promise me two things.” I nodded, ready to sign over my first born child for the chance to catch up with Logan, grab a shower, and drink pure sugary sin with my friend before work. Amberlyn slapped me on the forehead with the front of her hand. “Don’t be such a martyr. You and Logan are like family.” I scowled and rubbed my forehead.

“And the other thing?” I prompted warily, ready to smack her back, if necessary.

She swept her corkscrew curls out of her face with one hand and held my sketchbook out to me with the other. “Don’t you dare trash that picture. It’s good, Caspia. Really original.” I gave her the barest nod before slipping it into my knapsack. A part of me wished it had been my firstborn child after all. She had no idea what that picture represented to me. All my feelings of freakish isolation and impending disaster came bubbling up, threatening to overflow. But then I stopped myself. What if it wasn’t bad this time? What if it really was just a picture of some random guy?

I realized then I wasn’t afraid of the picture so much as I was of my “gift” reawakening, in public, when everything else was so out of control. But my visions weren’t something I could control. Never had been able to. I slung my knapsack across one shoulder and gave Amberlyn a wicked grin. “Try not to get eaten by tornadoes on your way over,” I teased. “Logan might actually notice this time.”

I tried to dodge the flying object I knew was coming but I wasn’t quick enough.

 

***

 

I burst through our apartment door, slightly breathless from my sprint up two flights of stairs. I loved our little apartment. It was just big enough for Logan, Abigail, and me. What it lacked in modern conveniences it made up for in outdated charm, like the oversized claw-footed bathtub, the hand painted kitchen wall tiles, towering ceilings, and ivy-covered patio. It overlooked Whitfield’s Old Town Square, with its gorgeous fountain and trees draped with lights year round. I could walk almost anywhere I wanted or needed to be in minutes. Most importantly, it made me feel like I was a part of the city’s vibrant beating heart. Whitfield wasn’t a big and exciting city. It was definitely Southern and I had lived there all my life, so by rights I should have hated it and been desperate to escape. But I didn’t. Instead, I felt an intense connection I couldn’t exactly put into words. I tried to paint it instead, with varying degrees of success.

“Logan!" I yelled, dropping my knapsack next to the door while I kicked my Chuck Taylors off in two quick, sure movements. “Amberlyn’s coming over.” My hoodie crumpled onto the gold-varnished wooden floor, missing its hook by inches. I just shrugged and slammed my keys down on top of the bookshelf by the door, knocking several pieces of mail off in the process. “She’s bringing delicious beverages,” I continued, walking away from the mess I’d made without a second glance. We were both used to my slovenly ways. Logan had given up trying to break me of them long ago. He picked up after my messes, and I did his laundry. “I’ve got just enough time to grab a shower before work, so if she…”

Logan wasn’t listening. He was curled up in a little ball on one side of the sofa, his shoulders rising and falling slowly. Very slowly. A knit navy toboggan covered the tops of his ears and most of his eyes. His bare neck looked pale and graceful in its fragility; I resisted the urge to stroke it. Abigail lay sprawled against as much of him as she could reach, every orange and fluffy inch of her radiating watchful protectiveness. She head-butted me as I leaned over my brother, touching his face, reassuring myself that yes, he was breathing, he was alive.

But he was icy cold to the touch, and the skin under his eyes, even in sleep, looked sunken and hollow. The bones of his face were so sharp, so prominent; it struck me how much weight he’d lost over the last few months. He covered himself in the baggiest clothes these days, so I hadn’t really noticed. Or maybe I was just that unobservant. I was failing at this, at taking care of him…

A blurry orange vibration nudged at my hand. I blinked away tears yet again as I petted the purring cat that meowed quietly for my attention. “You’re right, Abby,” I whispered, pulling an old fleece throw over my sleeping brother. “We’d better not wake him. I’ll put a note on the door for Amberlyn, warning her.” Abigail flicked her tail in agreement before resuming her position as guardian of Logan’s fleece-covered back.

I lingered a moment longer. I knew I had to hurry, that work was waiting, that Amberlyn would come trooping in at any moment like a pack of wild wolves. In the slanted half-light pouring in through our front window blinds, my brother looked like something newborn and delicate, something so vulnerable that the very act of observation might be enough to take him away. I thought of baby rabbits trembling in my hands, of snowflakes melting on coat sleeves, of lightning bugs in mason jars living only until morning. I watched him, hardly daring to breathe, willing myself to memorize this moment when my brother’s shoulders brushed too slowly against the fuzzy orange of Abigail the cat.

You’re going to lose him soon, a voice whispered deep within my mind. He’s too fragile for this world now. Winter will take him. I clenched my fists against the truth of it.

“No,” I whispered through locked teeth. “I will fight for him. He’s all I have left.” I let myself feel the fear, give in to it completely, for the space of several deep, long breaths. Then, because I had no other choice, I let it go.

Under the bay window overlooking Old Town Square stood an antique mahogany roll top desk that used to belong to my father. We kept our parent’s wedding bands, important papers like birth certificates and insurance mumbo jumbo, keepsakes, art, and photographs in it. On the top of its dark surface stood the last picture of the four of us together, surrounded by candles, dried flowers, and whatever odds and ends happened to catch our eye. It was a shrine of sorts, I suppose, although both Logan and I would deny it, if pressed. I went to this picture and lit a half-melted candle.

I wish you could make him better, I thought at the picture, reaching out to touch my parent’s smiling faces with two fingers. I wish… I wish you could help us. There’s only me, and I’m not enough. It was the closest I had come to praying since they died.

I saved my tears for the shower, where they finally took me in great heaving waves, muffled by music and pounding hot water that washed them down the drain.

 

***

 

Thanks for reading this excerpt of Gifts of the Blood!

You can find it at www.amazon.com, www.barnesandnoble.com, and www.smashwords.com

 

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Website: http://www.vickikeire.com

Blog: http://vickikeire.blogspot.com