Sleep No More
Page 23

I sense Smith standing at the black drape, waiting. I’m not sure what to do. I don’t see a curtain. And it’s not like I actually walked through one when I came; I just pulled it to the side and then I was here.
Maybe I’m making this too difficult. “Let him in,” I whisper into the night air.
Nothing.
My chest is tight and my muscles are clenched so tightly I know I’ll be sore tomorrow. I can’t stay in this weird limbo for much longer. “Let him in!” I yell now, lifting my face up to the sky. “Let him—”
“I’m here.”
THIRTEEN
I spin, frightened.
He looks exactly like he does in the physical world, right down to the clothes he’s wearing. His hands are in his pockets and snow dots his hair as he strolls toward me. It feels wrong, like something is invading my space and stealing my air. I did this, I remind myself. I let him in; it was my choice.
But that doesn’t mean I don’t want it over so I can get him out.
“Where’s the stone?” Smith says before I can speak.
I don’t understand what he means. The necklace isn’t here; my physical body is holding it. But even as I have the thought, I realize there’s a weight in my fingertips. I gasp as I open my hand and see the necklace, glowing red.
“Put it on,” Smith says, clearly not surprised at all.
“But it’s not here.”
“And neither are you. Technically.”
“But—”
“It’s the embodiment of the necklace, just like you’re the embodiment of yourself. Touching it or wearing it while you’re here is essentially just like holding it in the physical world. And you’re going to need it.”
I lift the chain over my head and drop the gem down the front of my shirt where it sits warmly against my skin.
“Why don’t you have one?”
“Just like in the physical world, there’s only one. And you’re the one using it now. I hitched a ride with it essentially, but I know how to stay here on my own. You’re still a novice.”
I don’t completely comprehend his answer, but then, I don’t understand half of what he’s said. Or what I’ve done. “What now?” I ask, pushing my other questions away for now.
Smith is silent for a few seconds. He walks past me and crouches beside the dead body, staring at Jesse’s open, lifeless eyes. “We have to stop this.”
“How?” I ask, insistent. I want this done.
He stands. “Back up the scene. For starters, let’s see if we can figure out who this bastard is.”
“How do I . . . do that?” I ask.
His brow furrows. “You should be able to simply tell the scene to back up. Going forward, backward, stopping things, that’s easy. It’s learning to affect the actual scene that’s hard. Just . . . tell the whole vision to rewind.”
I lift my chin and concentrate. Rewind, I command in my head.
Nothing happens.
“You want this to be easy,” Smith says, “but—”
“You said I just tell the scene to back up.”
“You’re mistaking ‘simple’ for ‘easy,’” Smith says, and I have to bite down my impatience. “I’m not sure what technique is going to work best for you; maybe picture the scene going backward in your head and then force your mind to let it.”
I’m so tired already. Smith is right—I vastly underestimated how difficult this would be. Feeling more than a little self-conscious, I decide to use my hands as a kind of focal point. Palms out in front of me, I move my arms from left to right as though I were paging backward through a book.
“Back,” I whisper as I will the scene to move in reverse, wishing it with all my soul.
At first I don’t see anything, but after a while Jesse isn’t covered with snow anymore. Terror churns in my belly and I realize I should have considered what event will inevitably come next.
I lose my focus for a second and the snowflakes pause all around me.
“I know you don’t want to see this, Charlotte, but the only way we can save him is to go back before the murder. You can do it,” Smith prompts from behind my right shoulder.
I shove the fear away—attempt to anyway—and think of saving him.
Saving him.
Saving him.
The flakes are flying upward again. Maybe even faster than before.
A figure in black walks backward to Jesse’s prone form. In seconds, he’s on top of Jesse’s chest, his hands iron vises around Jesse’s neck as Jesse kicks and struggles, trying to throw his killer off.
“Stop!” I scream, and try to run forward.
But just like in my usual visions, my feet are stuck. Jesse is frozen with his eyes wide, his face purple, his mouth open in a silent scream. It’s worse than blood and death. So much worse and my whole body trembles in disgust and desperation.
“Stop him!” I yell at Smith when I still can’t move. “You said you could stop this!”
“You have to go further,” Smith says, his calm demeanor breaking through to my rational self and giving me a sliver of sanity. “We can’t fight him off—we’re not in the real world. We’re inside your mind. Go back more and we’ll keep Jesse from being here at all. That’s what I meant when I said I could stop him.”
“But,” I stare frantically at the frozen attacker, “the killer! He’s right there. Can’t we rip his mask off and find out who he is?”