Illusory | ✓

i l l u s o r y : 04

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED COPYRIGHTED 2015

I L L U S O R Y : 04

Shock is plastered across the handsome features of Bridger as he stands in front of me as though I just had spoken in a different language in our entire conversation. I duck my head downwards, feeling shame flowing through me. A part of me wants to run away from him and the other part of me just scoffs at myself, knowing that Bridger would never like someone like me. The Queen of the Dead, as my school classmates called me. A queen who rules over the dead, a queen who'd never have a king because he'd die just from my touch...from my breath, from my gaze.

I blink and rub my arm, as awkwardness slithers itself into the living room and I take a step back as though I had revealed a side of me to him that I didn't want to. And it's true. I wish that Bridger's sister wasn't dead, that she was still alive, because then he'd not have to be in front of me and watching me in action when it comes to being clairvoyant.

My head ducks down and as I'm taking steps backwards again, Bridger dismisses the shock in his features. I don't notice the coffee table behind me and smacking against it hard, I feel myself falling backwards to hit the glass surface of the table...only for a pair of arms to grab me and hold me in mid air. My breath leaves me as I blink a few times, before studying the scene now in front of me.

Bridger is holding me with determined strength, while his hair has fallen a little over his eyes. It hovers in the air and with his head ducked down to me I can see the worry coated within his gray eyes. He's concerned, concerned about me. I feel my skin blister with warmth at the thought, and know that my skin feels on fire with his arms around me.

How many times have I imagined this happening? I've always liked him, always admired him from afar. He's the only one that I have imagined holding me and telling me that everything is going to be okay, the only boy that has captured my attention. My thoughts surround me as Bridger breathes with a little shake his breath.

"A-Are you okay, Jane?" Bridger's voice is soft, sweet, and I almost swoon on the sight from the kindness in his voice but don't. Instead, I slowly nod my head, knowing that if I speak it will give everything away.

A streak of redness overlaps itself over Bridger's face as he finally notices with more clarity in his gray eyes the change in the room, the tension that has taken residence. He pulls himself and me up before laughing a little, a nervous laugh. He hasn't let his arms around me fall away and a shimmer of something else sparkles in his irises. I can't place my finger on it, but it lingers there for a few seconds and then disappears underneath the surface.

Bridger lets his arms fall from around me and takes my hand without a second thought, before we make our way towards the couch and sit back down in the couch. Bridger doesn't let go of my hand, instead he smiles before he whispers with wonderment in his voice, "Patty is still here, isn't she?"

Clearing my throat, I glance over to where Patty is. She's still by the windows, but watching both me and Bridger with careful eyes. She flickers her eyes on me, "you can tell him I'm here. I don't mind."

"Yes," I answer him and he instantly starts looking around the room (something that everyone does, whether or not they are a believer), before his eyes fall on me again.

"Can, can you ask her why she's still here?" Bridger asks me and I tell him that she can hear him, that he can talk to her but I'll be relaying what she said to him, one hundred percent the truth. I wasn't given this ability to decieve others into believing that they were loved or hated by their loved ones, not even now will I ever lie about a message.

"Patty, why are you still here? Why aren't you in Heaven?" Bridger pulls away from me, letting my hands go and the warmth that has circulated throughout the space between us dismantles itself. I pull my hands away and place them close to me.