Whispers - Chapter 1.2

CHAPTER 1.2

I’m woke by the sound of metal scraping against the pavement. Again. And again. I give up on sleeping and drag myself into a sitting position. It’s still dark, but I don’t hear the mourning doves outside, so it can’t be dawn yet. The scraping is still going on, but from this position I can hear Driscoll snoring too. The noises outside must only be loud to me.

I pull back the curtain. On the street below, men are chained together in a long line. Digging with shovels. Scrape. Scratch. Prison road work? In the middle of the night? Only they aren’t wearing orange jumpsuits.

“They’re Irish,” she says from right behind me. How I keep from screaming sometimes amazes even me. I listen for Driscoll’s snoring while my heart rate slows back to normal. Still there. “Indentured servants. But they’re not ghosts. They’re just a memory, you know.”

I nod. I know all about memories held in place and replayed over and over when the conditions are just right. Anyone can hear them. Or at least I think they can. At the farmhouse, Driscoll freaks out every time the scalded baby shrieks in the kitchen. I assume he sees it too. I would never ask.

I told them about the ghosts once. Right after Grandma died, and my mother made me come live with her and Driscoll, her husband. Though Grandma told me they weren’t legally married. Does that even matter if both of the people think of themselves as married? It doesn’t seem to.

Driscoll said the ghosts were an indication of the deep evil living inside me.

“Why else would the dead speak to her?” he said to Mother. “Why else would she hear them?”

They sent me to his sister in the woods, the one with the melted face, to have the evil purged from me. She used fire.

“That’s what the demons are running from. So now they’ll run from you too,” she told me.

The soles of my feet are mottled with the scars. I feel them when I stand, walk, breathe. They remind me to never tell Mother and Driscoll anything.

Whispers - Chapter 1.1

 WHISPERS - CHAPTER 1.1

      Even with their door closed, I’m certain Mother and Driscoll can hear me whisper if they want to.  They’re always able to hear me.
       I peel my dress off and wipe a layer of dust off of the bookshelf with my hand before placing my clothes on it.  A girl of about my age is watching me from the end of the couch.
      She coughs at the dust.  As if it bothers her.  As if the dead breathe.
     I suck my breath in between my teeth, and shoot a warning glance in her direction, even though I know Mother and my stepfather can’t hear her coughing. She rolls her eyes in response.
      But at least she’s silent.  She isn’t chattering away at me.  Tormenting me for a response like the lonely ones do.
      I slip off my sandals and stuff them under the couch.   She takes off her beautiful soft leather shoes.  They disappear quickly from my view as she mimics me, pushing them under the couch too. 
      I packed a knit blanket in my milk crate, thankfully.  Along with my toothbrush, comb, and extra underwear.  I pull the blanket around my bare shoulders and curl up on the couch with my face up.  The air in the apartment may be dusty, but it beats the smell of mold and cigars in the couch.
      She drops down on the other end of the couch, and I yank my feet up to give her space.  Her leg feels like ice against my toes.
      “Did you think I would leave?” she asks with a little laugh. 
      I shrug and close my eyes.  She’ll be gone by morning.  Watching me sleep can’t be much fun for her.

Flashes - Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2

Instant popularity. If I’d known telling people about my flashes would make me popular - not a freak- I would’ve told the whole world in kindergarten. I swear the entire class knows my name, and it’s only sixth period. A nobody at lunch. Most popular girl by sixth period.

Okay, second most popular girl. There’s Trinity. She walks down the hall, and boys turn their heads and sigh. It’s like flowers and birds chirping on a Spring day for them. She wore her hair in this loose braid that flipped over her shoulder yesterday. Today, ten girls are wearing their hair like that. It’s like she has a horde of Trinity clones, and it’s only the second day of school.

And you won’t believe it, but Trinity is walking up to talk me right now. No seriously. I just looked behind me to see if there was anyone there. There isn’t.

“Hi Laney.” The two girls beside her drop their heads to the side in the exact same way as Trinity when she talks. Weird. I’m telling you they’re clones.

“Hi. Um, Trinity. Right?” That’s me. Playing it like I don’t know her name.

“Right,” Trinity’s eyes scrunch up a little in the middle when she says that. I’m not sure she’s buying my act. “So I heard you did this psychic thing about Cameron Davis’s lunch meat.”

“Yeah. I had this flash of him shoving it under the table,” I say a little too perky and fast.

“He’s totally gross like that.”

“Um. Okay.” I don’t really know anything about Cameron. In fact I didn’t know his last name until Trinity just said it.

“So do you have psychic visions all of the time?”

“Uh huh.” Could I please stop nodding like an idiot?

“That’s cool.” The clones are looking restless. “So I would love to get to know you better. I was wondering if you’d like to come hang out by my pool this weekend?” Now the clones look like they’re choking. Sweet.

“Sure. Saturday works for me.”

“Okay. Here.” Trinity writes her phone number and address on my hand with her pen. Because we’re going to hang out by her pool on Saturday. Like cool popular girls in movies. I need to get a new swimsuit fast. I don’t think the butterfly one is going to impress.

“So I’ll see you around one. Okay?”

“Okay. See you.”

She and the bug-eyed clones do catwalk turns away from me. The boys all watch.

Paranormal Blog Books

There are currently two ongoing paranormal books being posted here at Blue Period Books.  You can access the books by their page tabs on the sidebar.  Each book will be updated a few times a week, so check back often. 

WHISPERS is a dark young adult novel about Eliza, a seventeen-year-old girl who sees ghosts.  She has been  hidden and controlled most of her life by her step-father, the leader of a small cult.  As her eighteenth birthday approaches, Eliza and her parents travel to New Orleans to collect her inheritance.  An inheritance her grandmother never wanted to see Eliza's step-father get his hands on.

FLASHES OF LIGHTENING is a middle-grade novel centered around Laney, an art student, who sees bits of the future like flashes of lightening in her mind.  It should be easy to navigate school, friends, and boys if you know the future, right?