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“Can you remember when you first saw it?” I ask, hesitantly.
“Yeah, I think so. I must have been five. I saw the car wreck that killed my parents and…” she stops staring up at me wide-eyed. “Oh, God! Seven! I can remember! I was ten and had this bad dream that my parents were killed in a fire. I remember screaming when my mother came into the room to calm me down. We had breakfast the morning after. Our neighbor was there. She was going to watch me because there wasn’t school that day. My parents were going to a doctor’s appointment. They died in a car wreck. When the neighbor rushed us to the scene there was fire all over the car just like in my dream.”
“Gracie…”
“I can remember, Seven.” Her voice breaks as she looks down wiping her cheeks, tears filling her eyes. She looks back up at me, still in shock. “I can remember! I lived with my neighbor and went to school. I remember prom and moving here from Colorado after school. I remember it all, Seven!”
I feel as if the world is being torn from beneath my feet as she happily recounts her memories. I mean, I’m happy for her, but I know what’s coming. I know the other shoe is about to drop and after what she saw in the lab—it’s the worst possible time.
“I can remember the monster dream too. It started about a year ago. It wasn’t bad at first, but they began getting more intense, scarier, and then…” I watch the realization flash in her features as the eyes that just looked at me filled with love and happiness stare at me in confusion.
“Gracie,” I say cautiously.
“It was you,” she says, in shock. “It was you.” I wince under her accusation. “It was you in the visions. You were coming after me. You were going to kill me. You had fangs and glowing eyes—just like the man downstairs!” She pushes herself away from me, recoiling against the headboard. “That wasn’t a vision, was it, Seven? That was real.”
“Grace,” I protest, trying to find words. I’m hoping I can talk to her now like I wasn’t able to before. I need her to listen to me.
“The restaurant. That was you that night. You were on a blind date. We’re not engaged…We’re nothing other than… Oh, God…” Her voice goes quiet, filled with pain and despair and it tears at my heart. “You were trying to find me to kill me…”
Grace starts screaming, desperate to get away. She moves so fast she falls from the other side of the bed. I stand up, holding my hands up in surrender as I walk toward her.
“Grace, it’s not what you think,” I defend, doing my best to keep my tone and words calm. “Just take a second to breathe. Listen to me.” I need her to listen and give me a chance to explain.
I start to walk around the bed making my way to her, but before I can take another step, she throws a lamp at me. It whizzes by my head, smashing on the floor behind me.
“Grace, calm down, please.”
I’m struggling, fighting every fiber in my being not to rush to her and cradle her body against mine until she’s okay.
“Get out!” grace screams, fury and fear coming off her in waves as tears stream down her face. “Leave me alone!” She turns to grab the next closest weapon, hurling book after book in my direction. They bounce off me, but the hurt is nothing compared to what I’m feeling inside. I deserve anything she does. I did this. I caused this by lying to her.
“Grace.” I try again, holding out my hand trying to get her to stop. “Gracie, listen to me.”
She screams so loud her voice starts to crack. “I said, get out!” She hurls the tv remote and alarm clock, one after another with everything she’s got. The remote flies by, thumping against the wall. She’s moved to the corner, curling in on herself, making herself small. Still screaming, her chest heaving with broken sobs.
“Seven, leave,” Oracle says. I’m not sure when he came in. I take my eyes off her to look at him. His face is still, composed into an indifferent mask. I look back at her and she’s shaking like a leaf, petrified.
Of me.
“No! I’m not leaving her,” I cry. My voice betraying my heartbreak as it feels like it’s being ripped from my chest and stomped on. “I need to make her understand!”
“If you don’t leave now, you’ll be chasing her away forever.”
“I am leaving forever! And if you—any of you—come near me, I’ll call the law and have all of you arrested,” Grace yells, pushing away from the wall, yanking open a dresser drawer as she grabs some of her clothes.
