“So?”
“So,” she mimics with wide eyes, “maybe you can’t control what’s going to happen to you. But you can control your life now. If you’re going to inherit your mother’s illness, the disease obviously hits later in life and has a rapid onset. And it sounds like you already know her medical diagnoses. So, learn the warning signs and have regular sessions with your psych. It doesn’t mean you need to throw away your chance at something great.”
“But what if I’m making a mistake?” I say, my voice small.
“Let the current carry you,” Anna says, and my eyes lift to meet hers.
“I don’t know what that means,” I say.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Anna stares at me earnestly. “It means trust yourself, Ella. Follow your heart.” She shifts in her seat, turning so her legs are angled toward mine. “Close your eyes.” I give her a look. “Just do it, ho,” she orders. “Close your eyes.”
Exhaling, I do as she asks.
“What do you see?” she says, her gentle tone coaxing me to search the darkness behind my lids. “What do you want?”
Parker’s beautiful golden gaze flashes before my eyes.
“These powers don’t make us different, Ella. They make us special. Being a time traveler lets you relive any memory you want. It’s a gift.”
I want to believe him. I want to make memories I’m desperate to relive. And I want him to be in them.
I open my eyes. Anna’s brows are raised, a knowing smile on her dark red lips.
She’s right. I can’t control my genetic predispositions. If my mind’s going to fail me, like my mother’s did, I need to enjoy my life now. And I won’t be alone at the end, because I’ll have created memories worth being lost in. Exciting memories as a time traveler, at Neurovida. With Parker. And Rose. As an Alpha.
“What do you want?” Anna asks again, shrugging her shoulders as if she’s asking the simplest question in the world. Perhaps she is.
“I want to be a time traveler,” I say, my mouth splitting into an open grin.
“Duh,” she says with wide eyes, and angles her head toward my house. “Now go get your shit.”
“What?”
Anna starts her car, and a pop song blares through the speakers. “You can’t stay here, babe.” She slips on a pair of oversized black sunglasses and angles the rearview mirror to study her own reflection. “You’re coming home.”
Rays of white light bounce around me, shimmering in my periphery like the midday sun on the surface of the ocean. I’m standing in the mental health ward, my mother and younger self crouched before me.
The hospital staff move toward my mother.
“Get off me,” she screams. “No. They’re trying to kill me.”
The wall of bright light edges toward me, readying to carry me into another time, another memory, but I pushagainst it, demanding it wait until I’m ready. It’s time I stop running.
I follow the hospital staff dragging my mother back toward her room. The tunnel of white is closing in, a sphere of light and pressure pushing against me. Gritting my teeth, I try to hold it back, but only my mother and her bed are now visible within the dazzling light.
She’s injected with some sort of sedative and left prone over the crisp white bedsheets. The bolt on the door clicks after they leave. Unable to move, my mother’s gaze drags to the far corner of the room, focused somewhere past the wall of white.
“I’m sorry this happened to you, Mom,” I say aloud, even though she can’t hear me. I step closer to the bed and reach for her, my hand moving through hers like a lost ship drifting through mist-coated water. What I’d give just to hold her. To let her know she wasn’t alone. To thank her for the wonderful memories she left me with. I want to tell her that reliving them in my dreams is the greatest gift a mother could give their child.
My vision blurs, and I blink away tears. “I’m sorry for forgetting what it was like before you got sick. For blaming you for sending me away. For spending my life wishing I wasn’t like you. You told me all along I was special. I believe it now. And I know I am who I am today because of you. Because of how much you loved and cared for me when you could.” I sink to my knees beside her bed, head bowed, tears blotting my light blue dress.
“I know you’re there,” my mother mumbles, and my head snaps up.
“Mom,” I cry, my heart lurching into my throat. “Can you hear me?”
My mother’s head turns, and my heart stops as her haunted gaze drifts into the shimmering light behind me.
Hairs rise on the back of my neck, and I get to my feet, slowly turning to face the wall of light.
