Total pages in book: 143
Estimated words: 130275 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 651(@200wpm)___ 521(@250wpm)___ 434(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130275 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 651(@200wpm)___ 521(@250wpm)___ 434(@300wpm)
“Together,” I replied, feeling like the luckiest kid in the world. Me and Cillian. Together, the two of us could conquer the world …
A sinking feeling pressed onto my shoulders, a ten-ton weight pushing me down into the ground. I opened my eyes, only to find myself standing in the dark, in the middle of our neglected and abandoned pond. Alone. No future we’d dreamed of waiting before us. No Woods Brothers conquering the world. Just me, and the specter of my brother hovering over me like a vacuum, sucking anything good and light into its ravenous void.
The wood of the hockey stick groaned in my hands as my fingers wrapped around it like a vice. The longer I stood there, immobile, fury filled the emptiness in my soul and built and built until I lifted that stick high and slammed it down into the ice with every bit of strength I could obtain, shattering and splintering it into a thousand broken pieces.
Our dreams were shattered now too, so what was one more casualty in this shit show of a situation? Pushing back off the ice, I shucked off my skates, kicking them into the mass of overgrown, leafless trees surrounding me, and slumped back to the ground.
You’re going, kid …
Dad may have well been behind me as for how loud his voice was in my head. I was eighteen. And about to go on a trip around the world with others apparently “like me.” I was eighteen and should be working toward the future I’d dreamed of. But the one I had been promised had been stolen from me by the one I loved most, the one I trusted most in this world. Nothing else mattered anymore. I was completely alone.
And for such a long time now, I hadn’t even found it within myself to care.
Timid Hearts and First Sights
Savannah
New York
“ARE YOU ALL PACKED?”
I looked up from where I was sitting on the edge of the hotel bed, lost in thought.
Ida stood before me, her long, dark hair down in soft waves and a dimpled smile on her pretty face. Mama and Daddy had brought me to New York to catch the flight to our first stop on the therapy trip. We were to meet in the airport, where I would meet the rest of the kids going, and our two therapists, of course. I had video-called with the therapists a few times and they seemed nice. It didn’t take my nerves away though.
Ida had refused to stay behind in Georgia, insisting on coming to see me off.
I pressed my hand over my closed suitcase. “I think so.” Ida had shared a room with me last night. She’d regaled me with stories from school and the latest gossip from the cheer squad she was part of.
If sunshine was personified, it was Ida Litchfield.
Ida dropped beside me on the bed and threaded her hand through mine. I stared at our intertwined fingers, her bright pink polish next to my clear. Ida placed her head on my shoulder, and just that simple act of sisterly affection brought a lump to my throat.
“I don’t want to go,” I confessed on a whisper, feeling the fluttering in my heart that ignited the anxiety I knew was preparing to strike.
Ida squeezed my hand. “I know …” She trailed off, and I knew she had stopped herself from saying more. I waited, unsure if I wanted to hear it. But then, with a shaky inhale she said, “But I need you to.” The sudden sadness in her tone was a knife straight through the heart.
I stilled at her confession and turned my head to look at her. She kept her face down, head tucked into the curve of my neck.
“Ida—”
“Please …” she said, quietly begging, then slowly raised her head. It gutted me to see her usually happy eyes crushed with sadness. A sheen of tears washed over her green irises. My heart began to race. Ida glanced at the window showcasing JFK Airport, then looked back to me. “I need my sister back,” she finally said, and I felt that knife slice even deeper. I wanted to say something, but guilt infused my cells, making it impossible.
“Losing Pops …” Ida trailed off, a lone tear spilling over her left cheek. I dusted it away with my thumb. Ida gave me an echo of a grateful smile.
She took a deep breath. “Losing Pops was the hardest thing I’ve ever gone through in my life.” I placed my free hand on her knee. “But seeing Mama and Daddy in the aftermath … seeing you …” Ida paused, and I knew she was back there, reliving those first few months after Poppy’s death. The darkest days we had ever endured. The aftermath, the knowing that nothing would ever be the same again. “Seeing what it did to you all … that hurt most of all. My family. My perfect, beautiful family was irreparably hurt, and I couldn’t do anything to make it better. Mama and Daddy were crumbling. Poppy, our perfect Poppy had gone, and I missed her so much I couldn’t breathe, but …” Ida cut herself off.