Imprint Page 9

  “Would it work?”

  “No, but it would sure be hilarious. I now expel thee spirit from thy body and all that crap.” He did a vague impression of a priest, complete with crude hand gestures. But he quickly sobered, that ominous expression returning. “Seriously, though, no one can find out about this. Not Hayden, not Ali.”

  “You’re just trying to trick me. If Hayden finds out, he’ll find a way to help me on his own,” Sean denied weakly, but he didn’t believe his own words.

  “His ambition is to prove that supernatural occurrences like us actually exist. Do you really think he would pass up a once in a lifetime chance, just because you’re his brother?”

  “You don’t know him –”

  “Don’t be so naïve!” Drew’s sneer was suddenly mocking, and it startled Sean to see the hostility. “People are selfish. They do what they want and don’t think about how it affects others until later. Your brother’s no different, and you’d be a fool to think he is.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “No, you just don’t want to accept the truth.”

  “I trust them, Hayden and Ali, they would-”

  “Help you. Of course they would,” Drew sneered. “Of course they would risk themselves to help the person who’s taken them for granted these past few years.”

  Sean knew there was truth in those words, secretly he’d always known. He’d done many selfish things in the past, used people for his own ends (in particular Ali), but Drew’s words still made him angry. He felt the anger seeping through him like a drug and suddenly, before he was aware he had done it, he was lunging at the boy in the chair and there was a dull roaring in his ears. For a fraction of a moment, he felt something connect with his fist. He was so surprised that his anger diminished in an instant and he stumbled back, reeling, with wide eyes.

  He could see the shock on Drew’s face and knew it was mirrored on his own. It wasn’t possible. He was nothing more than an Imprint, he couldn’t physically feel. Drew hesitantly lifted up a hand and touched his cheek, as if trying to check if he himself still existed or not. “How…?” the sentence trailed off into an unanswered question. How did you manage to touch me?

  “I-I don’t understand,” Sean stuttered, staring down at his hands in morbid fascination. “I don’t have a body. I can’t feel things. I should have just passed straight through you.”

  “You didn’t,” Drew hissed. “I felt your fingers touch me, I know it.”

  Sean thought for a moment, before suddenly a thought came to him. “I remember now,” he said. “When I first woke up, I leant on the hospital bed to pull myself up. I didn’t pass through it, so maybe something like that happened just now.”

  “It’s possible,” Drew’s expression faded from shock to apprehension. “You’re not exactly a conventional Imprint. Technically you’re not dead, so I suppose your soul still has ties to its body.” He sighed wearily. “This has never happened before, so I have no idea what else you may be able to do. I have a few theories, though.”

  “But why…?”

  “Don’t question why,” the other snapped. “There are some things we just can’t explain. Listen to me, if you want to stay in this world for as long as possible you shouldn’t do that again. Making yourself solid must take up energy, and if you run out…”

  “Shouldn’t you be happy that I’ll be gone sooner?” Sean interrupted bitterly.

  Drew paused for a moment, and a smirk tilted his lips. “Nah, you’re good entertainment.”

  “Gee, thanks.”

  “Just don’t do it though, okay?”

  Sean raised an eyebrow. “You can’t exactly stop me. I can tell Hayden now, I’ll expose you and end this-”

  “You’re more of an idiot than I thought if you think I’ll let you do that,” Drew snorted, and there was a strangely sinister glint in his eyes. “You remember that I hold the cards here, right? If you try and tell them, I will know about it and I’ll be forced to…silence them somehow. The existence of Imprints is a secret. No one living can know about them; it would disrupt the balance of the world.”

  The words sent metaphorical shivers down Sean’s spine. Despite everything that had happened, Sean had always pictured Drew as selfish and obnoxious but not…dangerous. This was different. Even if Drew was just bluffing which he suspected, he wasn’t willing to risk Hayden and Ali’s lives like that, not for him. It wasn’t fair to involve them in his own dilemma. “Okay,” he muttered finally in defeat. “Okay. I won’t let them find out.”

  Drew smiled. “No outburst, no argument. That almost seemed too easy.”

  Sean didn’t answer. Did Drew really think he was just an obedient little dog, willing to be tugged around on a leash? Drew held all of the cards except for one: the joker. The secret weapon. And while he couldn’t rely on help from others, he could work through it himself. He would try to make himself solid, again. He would practice and perfect it even if it did make him fade out quicker, because it was hope: clear and bright, the starting point he’d been looking for.

  Chapter 9: Dirty little Secrets

  Power, that’s what it felt like. He cherished it and needed it and craved it. He wanted the control again, of his body and his life. In his suddenly perpetual spare time, he made an effort to practice making parts of himself solid as much as possible. He could only do so when Drew wasn’t around, but found to his immense satisfaction that he’d been right. The more he practiced the ability, the longer and more often he could hold it for. From what he gathered, it just took a huge amount of concentration and energy. Even if it didn’t make him any less invisible, even if it would sap all of his strength, it was something. And something was better than nothing, because he had nothing to lose.

  The next few days flew by in a confusing blur of silent nights blended brusquely into days spent wandering the streets out of sheer boredom. It made Sean wonder how Drew had managed to do this for four years without going mad. He met other Imprints on the street once or twice, but they were reclusive and unwilling to stop and talk to him, always hurrying in another direction with glassy eyes as if they had somewhere to go. With a shudder, Sean realised that being dead probably did drive you mad eventually.

  “Where do they all go?” he asked Drew the day before they were due to go back to school. “The other Imprints I see on the street. They never speak; they just keep going straight ahead. It’s like they’re sleep walking.”

  “It happens to most of us eventually,” Drew replied, with steel tinted eyes. “Going mad, I mean. You’ve never properly died, so you wouldn’t understand, but this existence is the worst possible torture anyone can go through. Think about it: you can see the people you love, but they can’t see you. You can’t comfort them when you know it’s your death that’s causing them pain. You can’t sleep, you can’t forget, you have to go through every waking hour with a constant reminder of what you’ve left behind. And at night, when it’s quiet and lonely, you remember exactly how you died over and over again. Those who aren’t strong enough, those without a purpose, they just give up in the end.”

  Sean was quiet after that, surprised at the other boy’s honesty. It made him think that he, also, was hiding behind a mask. Maybe it was just because it was the first time he had looked properly, but there was definitely sadness in Drew’s stony gaze. Death had so many different perspectives. “What about your family?” he finally mustered the courage to ask.

  “What about them?” Drew raised an eyebrow.

  “Did you stay with them, after you died? Where are they now?”

  “They left,” he replied simply, emotionlessly. Sean was surprised at the bland tone; it didn’t suit him. “A while after I died, they moved to another town. Too many bad memories around here, I guess.”

  “Didn’t you want to go with them?” Sean asked.

  “Yes, of course. But I told you, didn’t I? Imprints have to stay close to where their bodies are buried, otherwise they fade out.”

  “Oh,�
� was all Sean could say, feeling awkward, as if he had stumbled across something personal. “What about Brian and Penny though? They seemed pretty sane to me.”

  “Those two are among the lucky ones because they have each other.”

  “So then what about you?”

  “Well, you’ve said enough times that I’m a psychopath, haven’t you?” a wry grin flitted across Drew’s face, as if he found admitting his own mental instability endlessly amusing.

  It was the most Sean could (and dared) to get out of the enigmatic boy. It was true, Drew was a psychopath. But weren’t they all nowadays?

  When the alarm clock started ringing at the obscenely early hour of 6:30am on a rainy Monday morning, Sean almost did a double take. It had been so long since he’d heard anything ordinary and routine like a mere alarm clock that he’d almost forgotten what normal felt like. He watched discreetly as Drew woke up, dark circles outlining his weary eyes, and put in contact lenses before tramping into the bathroom. Sean had watched the boy twisting and turning in his sleep all night, so was unsurprised by Drew’s obvious sullen mood. Funny, he thought to himself, it was as though the sky outside was a mirror for both of them.

  The first thing Sean heard when they stepped onto the bus was his name being called out: “Sean! Over here!” It was Ali. He stared in bewilderment for a minute, purely stunned. The last time he saw her, a week ago, she had been just Ali. Now, though, her hair glinted a deep scarlet red in the light, the colour of blood. There was something foreboding about it. Black accentuated her eyelashes, the make-up transforming her face into that of a perfect porcelain doll. A tank top was tucked into the new skirt that clung to her body, showing off her slender waist and the slight curve of her hips. She’d lost weight. And yes, by modern-day standards she was beautiful, but by his standards she was unrecognisable.

  Drew was surprised as well, he could tell by the way his mouth almost dropped open, but he recovered quickly. He had to, he was an actor. He smiled at her in acknowledgement and limped down the bus to join her. “Whoa,” he crowed in greeting. “The hair. And the skirt. And…what happened?”

  She blushed slightly. “Oh, nothing. I just thought it was time for a change. Do you like it?”

  “Yeah, I like it,” he did another of those ‘charming’ smile/smirks. “Really, I do.”

  Watching them, Sean felt queasy. Everything Drew did or said was fake; he was simply an actor, playing a part to not rouse suspicion. It made Sean wonder if having a life was really worth it if it wasn’t your own.

  The first lessons passed by quickly. Falsely sympathetic faces without names came up to Drew with ‘get well soon’ smiles and ‘is it true you were ravaged by an escaped wolf?’ rumours. Word, sensible or not, travelled fast. It made Sean think of little children playing Chinese whispers in the school courtyard, how the message could start out as ‘I like pork’ and end up as ‘seagulls have obtuse beaks.’

  “You’re handling all this attention surprisingly well, you know,” Ali commented once. “I’m surprised you haven’t stormed off yet to sulk.”

  “I don’t think I’d get very far with this limp,” Drew replied. “Besides, it looks like all my favourite sulking spots are taken by all of these annoying couples.”

  Ali laughed. “Well, I think the gloomy closet behind the English office is still free.”

  “Oh, are you suggesting that you want to come along?” he raised an eyebrow with an almost feral smirk, causing the girl to blush and smile. He wasn’t sure why but Sean felt angry, furious. When was the last time Ali had smiled for him like that?

  It was lunch, though, when the subtle differences finally became not so subtle anymore. Liz, a friend of theirs, refused to sit with them. Sean also noticed that Ali seemed to be on good terms with Kim, one of the year 13 sluts, whom she had previously avoided. She didn’t eat any lunch. “Aren’t you hungry?” Drew asked when he noticed.

  She shook her head. “Not really.”

  He offered her one of his own sandwiches. “Here, you should eat something.” Looking quite touched, she politely refused. Sean shook his head in irritation, it was probably just another of those ‘girl things’.

  The day lagged slowly to its end, like an exhausted marathon runner heaving themselves up the last hill to the finish line. The rain had finally let up in the afternoon and morose clouds hung overhead instead, grey and wispy plumes of smoke. The teachers struggled to control their classes, the students chattered. Drew and Ali were the only ones to diligently take notes. Then, once the last bell rang, the corridors streamed with students and the percussion of locker doors being slammed shut saturated the air. Sean stood out of the way, still uncomfortable with being walked through. Ali disappeared into the crowd quickly, but Drew stayed behind once the majority of students had left. He walked purposefully towards one of the girls standing at the far end of the corridor, chatting quietly with a few others.

  “Hey, Liz.”

  The girl jumped in surprise and spun around, breaking off her previous conversation. “Oh, it’s you.”

  “Well, glad to know you remember me.”

  Liz smiled warmly in greeting. “How are you?” she asked.

  “I’ve been better,” Drew admitted. “Hey, could you do me a favour?”

  “Sure. What is it?”

  “Can I talk to you alone?” he asked.

  This set her friends off into giggles, but she only rolled her eyes at them. She probably already knew what he wanted to say. Sean didn’t though, and he was utterly bemused. “Of course, let’s go outside,” She suggested, turning to the other girls. “You guys go on ahead, okay?”

  The two walked out of the school building into the deserted courtyard, and finally came to stop at a dilapidated bench. Sean had never been particularly good friends with Liz, but he liked her. She was nice enough, ordinary and easy to be around. She was the sort of girl who stayed home at the weekend and did her homework, who had her mousy brown hair up in the same practical ponytail every day.

  “Sit,” Drew offered. “It’s been a while since we’ve talked.”

  She nodded, doing so as he joined her. “I know, it has been. Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “I’m improving,” he said. “Walking is still a pain, but luckily I don’t need crutches.”

  “I’m glad. Ali was really worried when you were in the hospital, you know. She visited you almost every day. I was worried too.” She stared at her shoes awkwardly. Sean had forgotten these little details about her, that she always averted her eyes when she was nervous.

  “Hey, it’s fine.” Drew attempted to sound upbeat. “Thank you, for worrying about me.”

  Her eyes widened slightly. “Erm, sorry?”

  “I’m trying to be nice here, don’t act so surprised.”

  She looked down again, embarrassed. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to. You just…seem different.”

  “Yeah, well, it’s an after effect of nearly dying I guess.”

  She grinned timidly. “Real funny.”

  “I’m sure the last few weeks must have been dull without me being the comic relief.”

  “The teachers definitely got on just fine without you.”

  “Hurtful,” he pouted. “Anyway, what have I missed while I’ve been off?”

  She looked hesitant suddenly, biting her lip discreetly. “Nothing much. Just the usual, you know.”

  Drew was suddenly serious, all amusement gone from his face. He sent her an ‘I-don’t-believe-you’ look. “I know something happened, Liz. Why didn’t you sit with us at lunch today?”

  “I…”

  “There’s something wrong with Ali, isn’t there?”

  Liz sighed, and ran a hand through her hair tiredly. “I’m sorry, Sean. I would tell you, but I don’t think you’ll like it.”

  “I don’t care, just tell me.”

  She thought for a minute, a frown crinkling her face. “Ali’s changed,” she admitted finally. “It began about two weeks ago. She said she was go
ing on a diet, and then she said she wanted to make friends with Kim and those girls. She sat with them at lunch a few times. And then she started wearing girly clothes, makeup, she did her hair and…she’s different now. I tried to talk to her about it, but she wouldn’t listen. She cares so much about her appearance and being popular.” Liz shook her head sadly. “It’s like I don’t even know her anymore.”

  “Maybe it’s just a phase,” Drew suggested.

  “Maybe, but I miss how she used to be. I miss being friends with both of you. I was kind of hoping she might listen to you and realise that.”

  “Me?” he snorted. “What makes you think I can get through to her?”

  Liz just smiled again. “Trust me, if there’s anyone in the world who can get through to her, it’s you.”

  When they arrived home, Drew made a beeline for his (their?) room. Sean was glad to avoid any further conversation with Hayden, so followed silently without the glare that he would usually wear. Today was different. He could feel something in the air, a sense of urgency, and wondered briefly if having heightened senses was part of the Imprint package.

  “What’s wrong?” Sean asked once the door was shut and locked. Locked. He could tell the imminent conversation wouldn’t be pleasant.

  “You shouldn’t have to ask.” Drew had fallen back onto the bed with an exhausted sigh, wincing. His injuries were still not completely healed yet, and he got tired quicker than usual.

  “I know, Ali. I heard what Liz said as well but it’s no big deal. She’ll get over it, whatever it is.” Of course she would, she was Al, she was just fine. She was always fine.

  Suddenly Drew shot up again to glare at him directly, and there was anger in his eyes that caught Sean off guard. “No big deal?” he snapped, looking quite disgusted. “Is this what you say about all of your friends? You know, I thought at one point that under all of those scowls you did care about the people close to you.”