Nil Page 31

  Reaching up, I touched Thad’s cheek. It felt flat and lifeless, two-dimensional and cold like I knew it would.

  With Thad smiling at me, I finally read the article. Then another. I devoured them all. Regardless of the article, the theory was the same: he was lost on the slopes, on expert terrain. His body was never found. Duh, I thought. One article speculated suicide, noting a devastating breakup with his girlfriend, but his family and friends rejected that idea.

  “Thad would never commit suicide,” his mom was quoted as saying. “He loves life more than anyone in this world.”

  Maybe in this world, I thought, fighting the hollowness inside. But Thad wasn’t in this world, and hadn’t been for a year. He’d been on Nil, where you lived like you were dying. And while Thad had sacrificed his chance to live, it wasn’t suicide. Suicide was an ugly word. Selfish. And what Thad did was completely selfless. But either way, the result was the same: he’d died. For me.

  Thad smiled at me from the screen, cocking his lazy, knowing grin. I love you, Charley from Georgia.

  I love you, too. With all that I have, with all that I am. I love you.

  I wished that had been my good-bye, but in the end, our bye was anything but good. I stared at Thad’s picture, aching to be with him. Abruptly, his image disappeared, replaced by my stupid screensaver, which was, of all things, a tropical beach scene. I jiggled the mouse, bringing Thad back.

  If only it were so easy.

  Unwilling to lose his smile, I printed the picture, and when a tear fell, blurring Thad’s face, I printed another one. Then I crawled into bed, holding Thad.

  Salt on my cheeks, salt on my lips … a taste of Nil, it was all I had left. Tears soaked my pillow, but I didn’t move. I lay there, drowning in loss and pain, desperately wishing Em were here and deeply relieved she wasn’t.

  That was the night I finally understood there were worse things than being alone.

  CHAPTER

  67

  CHARLEY

  DAY 19, AFTER DARK

  There’d been no news, no calls. Nineteen days of complete Thad silence. I was still counting; I couldn’t stop, and last night I’d dreamed of the Wall. This time the space beside Thad’s name was filled—with a cross. And I held the knife.

  I’d stolen his gate. He’d pushed me, but I was the thief.

  Rubbing my eyes, I minimized Firefox. Even my browser’s logo seemed mocking. A warm-blooded fox, circling the globe, as fiery as a gate, as elusive as Nil. His eyes were shrouded, giving nothing away.

  I’d spent the last four hours scouring news sites. I didn’t bother with the Atlanta paper anymore. I started with Canadian ones, then went international, searching for news of Thad. But any specific search turned up articles I’d read a thousand times, and my generic searches turned up nothing. No news of a missing Canadian found anywhere, no word of a naked boy showing up somewhere strange. The only unusual story I’d found was in yesterday’s edition of Britain’s Daily Mail. Titled “Rhino Raises Hell in Helsinki,” the article reported the capture of a rare black rhino found charging down the streets of Helsinki. Local zoos denied responsibility, claiming all their animals were accounted for, and the incident sparked a national outcry demanding investigation into the exotic animal trade. “People shouldn’t be housing rhinos in their backyard for sport,” argued one Finnish man, whose bakery shop was damaged in the ensuing chaos. “What’s next, tigers?”

  Maybe, I thought. But I’m still hoping for a naked person. Over six feet tall, blond, with brilliant blue eyes and a selfless streak a mile wide.

  I stared at the flaming fox, wondering what angle I was missing. Then an idea sparked. Bringing up a fresh tab, I typed the word Nil.

  A flurry of results appeared. Most were definitions by online dictionaries and encyclopedias, followed by a few businesses that for some inexplicable reason had named themselves Nil. But one result caught my eye: a personal blog titled Nil Nightmares. Maintained by a South African man in his late twenties, the blog detailed his eerily familiar account of eleven months on Nil. He posted links to a private Nil survivor support group, various missing persons sites, and even a few crackpot wormhole theorists. The comments were scathing. Some questioned the man’s mental health, others urged counseling, still more begged for details to get to Nil themselves. It was an abyss of information that confirmed my decision to claim amnesia. Better forgetful than crazy. And Thad was still lost.

  With nothing left to search for, I turned off my Mac and climbed into bed.

  Even though everything told me Thad was dead, I refused to accept it. Because even though everything about Nil screamed temporary, Thad and I had always felt permanent. I kept thinking that perhaps Thad had miscounted his days, or that somehow Nil had granted him immunity, giving him extra time before his clock ran out. I hoped that any day Thad would show up, flashing his easy grin, flesh and bone, in this world. But with each day that passed, my hope shrank, collapsing on itself just a little bit more, like the pinpoint black dot of a gate right before it vanished for good.

  A soft knock intruded on my thoughts.

  “Charley?” Em’s voice. The door creaked open. “You have a phone call.”

  I sat up with a jerk. “Who?”

  “A girl,” she said, and just like that, my lingering hope died. Instantly, painfully. Irrevocably.

  “She swears she’s not a reporter,” Em was saying, “and that you know her.” Em paused.

  “Her name is Natalie.”

  CHAPTER

  68

  CHARLEY

  DAY 35, TWILIGHT

  Over the past fifteen days, I’d seen a neurologist, a psychiatrist, and a famous psychologist who specializes in victims of violent trauma. She’d actually made a house call after reading about me in the newspapers. Apparently it’s not every day that a seventeen-year-old American from a middle-class family, on track for a volleyball scholarship and with no record of crazy behavior, disappears for months, only to be found naked in a foreign country.

  I really needed to pay more attention to the news.

  But that would have meant getting my hopes up, something I could no longer handle. I’d stopped my dates with Firefox, refusing to scour news sites for an article I’d never find. I also refused to see any more counselors. They’d all come to the same conclusion: whatever had happened to me was so traumatic that, as a protective measure, my mind had walled off all memories of the incident.

  But I did remember. And as painful as the memories were, I’d rather die than forget.

  The only effort I made was to go running. It made my parents happy that I actually left my room, not to mention my bed. I’d run for hours, reveling in my memories. Thad running beside me, his hand wrapped around mine … Thad placing a lei around my neck, his sapphire eyes burning … Thad’s lips on mine, warm and sweet, hungry and wanting. I sifted through each moment one at a time, reveling in the joy and pain of it. I’d run until the fog of physical exhaustion settled over my brain. This morning I’d run sixteen miles, and I only came home because the drizzle became a torrent. I’d forgotten what it was like to get caught in the rain.

  Then, feeling bold, I’d tagged along with Em when she went to the grocery store. Waiting to check out, I’d spied a wall of photocopied images, grainy black-and-white photos of missing kids, mostly teenagers. Lured by the faces, I’d wandered over to the bulletin board and studied the pictures. Some were girls, some were boys, most had bright smiles, all had their dates of birth printed in black ink. All were missing. Maybe they were on Nil; maybe they’d met an end worse than Nil. At some point, I started crying. Em had to drag me away, and drag me home.

  That was two hours ago.

  No longer crying, I sat by my window, watching the rain.

  Silver drops speckled the window, each one a dazzling prism attacking the glass. I watched them glisten and fall, like if all the drops could run together they’d form a gate—a shimmering wall taking me back to Nil. But one by one, each drop slid d
own my window, out of sight, gone forever. Like Nil.

  For one perfectly uninterrupted moment, I stared at the rain, aching for Thad, aching for the chance to go back and find him. But even if I could find a gate in the great haystack that was Earth, it wouldn’t matter. Thad wouldn’t be there, and Nil would be nothing without him. My world was here. A world full of silver and gray—and rain.

  Thunder rumbled, abrupt and startling. It sounded like a quake.

  Lightning flashed as a quick double knock rattled my door. My door opened, and my dad poked his head through the crack. “Hey, honey. Can we come in?”

  “Sure.”

  My dad set a cup on the bedside table while my mom sat on my bed’s edge. “I brought you a Sprite. A Big Gulp, with that crushed ice you like.”

  “Thanks.” I managed a smile.

  “It’s good to see you smile, shug.” He sat on the edge of my bed, looking as lost as my mom. “Charley, hon, I can’t imagine how you survived what you did. But you’re strong. You always have been. You’ll get through this, love. I promise.”

  A promise means nothing, I thought. It’s a statement of present want, not future reality.

  My dad kept talking.

  “Your mama and I are behind you, one hundred and ten percent. We checked with the school, and with all your fancy AP credits, you’ve got college credit. You can take next semester off if you want. Graduate early or get your GED. Travel, or not. Whatever you want.”

  I want Thad.

  He patted my leg. “Think about it, hon. Think about what you want. If we can make it happen, we will.”

  “You don’t have to tell us today,” my mom said soothingly. “Take it slow,” she said, repeating the last counselor’s mantra. “There’s no rush. You have plenty of time.”

  Plenty of time.

  My mom’s unfortunate choice of words hurt me like few phrases could, and the pain pushed me to act. I took a breath, picturing my sweet Thad smiling at me, and looked at my parents.

  “There is something I want,” I said, proud I was able to speak without tears. No regrets. With Thad’s voice echoing in my head, I laid out my plan.

  Five minutes later, my mom stared at me like I’d just told her I wanted to get a full-body tattoo.

  “The University of Washington,” my mom repeated. “You want to play volleyball at the University of Washington. In Seattle.”

  “Seattle.” I nodded. “UW. The home of the Huskies.”

  My mom glanced at my window, and visibly brightened. “Honey,” she said, employing her let’s-be-reasonable-I-know-what’s-best-for-you tone, “let’s think this through. It rains all the time in Seattle. And when it’s not raining, it’s overcast. People go crazy because they don’t see the sun.” She smiled at me, confident she had a winning argument. “Think about it. Charley, you love the sun.”

  I just looked at her.

  “Charley?” She frowned. “Let’s think this through.”

  “I have,” I said softly. No sun, no shimmers. And no pretending.

  My mom shot my dad a pleading look.

  He cleared his throat. “Uh, love, Seattle’s just so far. What happened to good old UGA? Great college town, Saturday football games. You could room with Em again. And, shug”—now he grinned—“you know the sun always shines on Bulldog country.”

  “It sure does, Dad.” A girl disappeared in west Athens last month. All they found were her clothes. I loved my dad fiercely, but my mind was set. “Seattle,” I said gently. My voice didn’t waver. “I want to go to Seattle.”

  “Seattle!” My mom’s voice rose to a desperate wail. “That’s practically in Canada!”

  Exactly.

  Dad winked at me, mouthed I love you, then gently guided a still-protesting Mom out of the room. I could hear her sputtering all the way down the hallway. “Seattle! My baby, in Seattle!”

  Seconds behind Dad, Em breezed through the doorway, wearing faded jeans and a university-grown confidence that both fit her to a T.

  “Guess who’s back?” she asked, beaming.

  For a minute I thought Em meant me. Then Jen popped into the room. Her dark hair was chopped in an edgy pixie cut; it oozed Italian style.

  “Charley!” Jen hugged me like a long-lost friend, which I was. She started crying, and squeezed me tighter.

  In the background, Mom’s wails rose to a crazy pitch, breaking the moment.

  “Wow,” Jen said, wiping her eyes. “Your mom’s totally freaking out.”

  “Three thousand miles is a long way away,” I said.

  “She’ll come around,” Em said. “She just needs some time to adjust. The thing is”—now her voice cracked—“we just got you back.”

  Emotion welled, but I didn’t cry. Because I didn’t feel like I was back. I felt trapped in an unnamed place, caught somewhere between Nil and here, and I hadn’t figured out yet how to pull myself out.

  Jen squeezed my hand, and just like old times, the three of us sat on my bed. Em took my other hand, her fingers wrapping around mine.

  “Charley.” Her voice was tentative. “Do you remember anything yet? It’s okay if you don’t. It’s just—you were gone so long…”

  Em’s eyes begged for understanding. I looked away, knowing Jen’s face reflected more of the same: curiosity, worry, fear, hope. It was their hope that hurt the most, because I knew that to lose it was final, and devastating.

  I took a steadying breath.

  “There was a boy,” I said quietly. “He saved me.” I paused, fighting the emptiness inside. “His name was Thad.”

  It was the first time I’d spoken Thad’s name aloud in days.

  “And?” Jen said. “What happened?”

  No more words would come; they were stuck, in that lonely in-between place. Maybe one day I’d tell Em and Jen the whole story, but not now, not yet. Not until I’d processed it all myself. Right now I needed the one thing this world offered that Nil hadn’t—time.

  I knew it was irrational, but one reason I wasn’t ready to tell my story was that I wasn’t ready to admit that it was fully written. That the end—Thad’s end—was final. My heart simply refused to accept it.

  Watching Jen’s hopeful face, I slowly shook my head. Not yet, I thought. Not yet.

  CHAPTER

  69

  CHARLEY

  DAY 51, LATE MORNING

  When my mom’s taillights disappeared into the misty rain, I sagged against the bay window in relief.

  I was finally alone.

  Being alone meant I was free to remember, and being alone meant I could stop pretending. Stop pretending to be fine, stop pretending I didn’t remember. Stop pretending I was whole. Because fifty-one days later, my heart still begged for Thad. I needed time to grieve and to heal—the kind of time only distance could provide.

  That was a huge part of my decision to pursue a volleyball scholarship at the University of Washington, a school as foreign to my parents as Nil was to me. If you’re gonna be a dog, be a ’Dawg, not a Husky, my dad had argued. But I was determined, and I’d won. I was also considering going out for the cross-country team, because running was the only time I felt alive, so I ran a ton, and I’d gotten pretty good. But no matter what I did in Seattle, I wouldn’t have to pretend. And I’d feel close to Thad, even though he was gone.

  Today was January gray, cool and wet. Not a storm, just gentle sheets of silver drizzle.

  I watched it fall, oddly soothed by the colorlessness outside my window. And like I always did when I was alone, I thought of Thad, remembering us.

  As I relived our last moment together, anger flared, slashing and painful, then the emotion fizzled as quickly as it had come. Fury had flickered lately in place of the numbness, fueling my latest runs. I was furious with Nil, with Fate, or maybe with both. Fate brought Thad and me together only to tear us apart, or maybe that was Nil; I couldn’t tell where one ended and the other began. And I didn’t understand why. Why let me meet my soul mate, only to take him away? Was my
purpose on Nil only to solve the mystery of the carvings, rediscovering knowledge that had been lost? And if so, why take me first, when my work on Nil wasn’t done?

  I felt confident that I’d figured out the pattern to the gates, and I was grateful I’d shared my storm theory with everyone in the City. But I never figured out the numbers, not completely.

  Maybe I wasn’t meant to know, I thought, leaning my head against the cool glass. Maybe the numbers are someone else’s mystery to solve. Like how Sabine shared the knowledge of the deadleaf leaves, but left before teaching anyone how to brew deadleaf tea.

  Maybe I wasn’t on Nil to meet Thad after all.

  Every cell in my body screamed otherwise. The screaming reached a fever pitch, and in that instant, I was furious with Thad. I’d stolen his gate, but he’d thrown me in; his act was selfless, but it felt like quitting. On me, on us. And yet what he did was so perfectly Thad that my anger didn’t last, because I couldn’t be angry at Thad for being Thad. Sometimes I got mad at myself, wondering how I hadn’t seen his slick move coming.

  Don’t you dare give up on me, I’d said. Never, he’d promised, his eyes burning with blue fire.

  I’d misread him completely.

  I rapped my head against the glass, then I let it go. I refused to play the what-if game. It wouldn’t change the past. But while the past was over, it still shaped the present.

  I missed Thad so much it hurt.

  Out of habit, I touched my bare neck. All Thad’s gifts were reduced to memories; the necklace, the lei, his kisses. Except one: me. His final gift was life. My life. To throw it away would diminish it, something I refused to do, because even though no one else would know, I would know. And I’d never forget.

  My dad was right. I was strong; I would make it. I owed it to Thad, and I owed it to myself.