The dancers are still.
Even the noise of the city below is silent.
Wow… how drunk am I?
I continue my dazed runway turn and gasp when I see Asher. He’s locked in time, mid-step in the doorway, returning with our drinks. I rush over to him and cup his jaw, tears stinging at the rims of my eyes. “What’s wrong with him?”
“Nothing. I just need a private word with you, then I’ll release them.”
When I turn back, fierce fury burns in my soul. “Whatever you did, undo it!”
“Don’t be afraid, Poppy.” The stranger’s voice is deep and pulls at something at the back of my mind like a forgotten dream. “I’m not here to upset you. I came to give you a gift or, rather, to return one.”
My mind stumbles over that, but I don’t care. I step between him and Asher. I may not know what’s going on, but there’s no way I’ll let anything happen to my best friend while he can’t defend himself. “Give him back. I’m not interested.”
Blue Eyes tilts his head to one side, and a sly smile curls his lips. “You’re not interested in finding out who you are, where you came from, or about your family? You’re not curious about how you ended up here, so far from the life you were meant to live?”
The questions pierce my heart and steal my breath. How could he possibly know I have no memory of my life before I was sixteen? My earliest memory is of a seventeen-year-old Asher dressed up as Wolverine, leaning over me as I lay on the sidewalk a block from his foster home.
He picked me up, dusted me off, and when he realized I was alone and in trouble, he snuck me into his room. As time passed and nobody came looking for their missing daughter, we figured there must be a reason I blocked it all out.
That was October 31stfive years ago.
And here we are.
The only person who knows that story is Asher, and there’s no way he’d ever tell anyone my personal business. The shared bond of trauma kids is unbreakable.
“Who are you? What do you want?”
“I told you. I’m here to give you back that which was taken from you.”
Before I can ask him what the hell that means, a spark ignites between us. A fizzing, white-hot thread of energy arcs from his finger into my skin. The jolt of electricity rockets up my arm and zaps through me like I’ve been electrocuted.
I suck in a breath, and my knees betray me, threatening to give way and assplant me on the concrete of the balcony.
“Ow! Holy shit, dude, that hurt!” I shake out my hand and stumble to the side, bumping into Ines and Shaz standing like posed mannequins. I squeal and steady them, unsure what would happen to them if they fell.
This isn’t right. None of this is right.
Cradling the burning sting in my hand, I prepare myself for what I’ll find, but there’s no burn, no blood, not even a mark.
Heart racing, I turn back to the man.
Only… he’s not there.
The stranger is gone. One second he’s staring at me with those weird blue eyes and the next, the space where he stood holds only moonlight and the scent of a summer bonfire.
I rush over to Asher, wrapping my arms tight around him. He’s warm and solid, and as another huge jolt of energy engulfs me, I hold on to him with everything I’ve got.
As quickly as the world froze, it burst back to life without missing a beat. The music pumps. My friends dance. And trucks bump over the bridge on the freeway in the distance.
Everyone is oblivious to anything being amiss.
Of the purple and blue energy swirling around us, building pressure… Of the feeling of coming apart at a molecular level…Of the shift in reality stealing us from a private apartment in Wichita and dropping us into what looks like an old haunted mansion.
When the air stops glowing, I suck in a deep breath, and Asher unfreezes, staring down at me. “What the hell just happened? Was that real? Am I so drunk that I’m hallucinating?”
I swallow. “No, the blissful buzz of my birthday celebration abandoned me the moment the world froze, and this strange guy wished me a happy birthday. That was real… I think.”
