Her Awakening

CHAPTER 5: Grounded

CHAPTER FIVE

Grounded

Elias kept his fingers around my wrist until the bell rang.

The moment students began closing laptops and shoving papers into backpacks, he let go.

The ringing returned, but not with the same force. It hovered somewhere behind my left ear—a thin electrical whine I could almost ignore as long as I did not move too quickly.

Almost.

I remained in my chair while the room emptied.

Elias leaned against the edge of his desk.

“You should go to the nurse.”

“I should go to my next class.”

“You nearly passed out.”

“I did not.”

“You grabbed the desk like it was the only thing keeping you on the planet.”

“The floor looked untrustworthy.”

“Hannah.”

The way he said my name made arguing feel childish.

I hated when he did that.

“I’m tired,” I said. “I had a nightmare, went running, and drank melted sugar instead of eating breakfast. There is a very boring explanation for this.”

“Then the nurse can give you a very boring diagnosis.”

“I don’t want to spend an hour lying on paper while someone asks whether I might be pregnant.”

Elias lifted my backpack.

“I’ll tell her you’re a virgin.”

My mouth fell open.

He walked toward the door.

“You cannot tell the school nurse that.”

“Then come supervise the conversation.”

I followed him into the hallway.

“You’re terrible.”

“You’ve known that since eighth grade.”

The late bell rang before we reached the stairs.

I expected Elias to turn toward his classroom.

He kept walking beside me.

“You’ll be late,” I said.

“So will you.”

“I have an excuse.”

“I’m escorting the excuse.”

“You have a test.”

“I’ll survive.”

“What if I don’t?”

He glanced sideways at me.

“Then I’ll feel terrible for at least a week.”

“That long?”

“I’m a loyal friend.”

The word should not have felt complicated.

It did.

Maybe because his fingers had been wrapped around my wrist a minute earlier.

Maybe because my body had quieted beneath his touch in a way it never had for anyone else.

Maybe because some small, disloyal part of me wanted him to touch me again just to prove it had been a coincidence.

The ringing sharpened as we descended the stairs.

I gripped the handrail.

Elias noticed immediately.

“Is it back?”

“A little.”

“What does it sound like?”

“Static. Almost.”

“Your ears might be reacting to the pressure change.”

“What pressure change?”

“I don’t know. Weather?”

I looked through the tall windows lining the stairwell.

The morning sky had turned gray. Heavy clouds gathered beyond the athletic fields, but there was no storm yet.

“You should become a doctor,” I said.

“I just diagnosed you with weather.”

“You’d fit right in.”

The nurse’s office smelled like disinfectant, peppermint gum, and the faint medicinal sweetness of cough drops.

Mrs. Greene sat behind her desk reading something on her computer. She looked over her glasses when we entered.

“Which one of you is dying?”

“Hannah,” Elias said.

“I am not dying.”

“You said the floor was moving.”

“It was a figure of speech.”

Mrs. Greene pointed toward one of the vinyl-covered cots.

“Sit.”

I gave Elias a look.

He smiled pleasantly and placed my backpack on the floor.

Traitor.

Mrs. Greene checked my temperature, blood pressure, and pulse. She shone a light into my eyes and asked enough questions to make me regret every poor decision I had made since waking up.

“How much water have you had today?”

“Coffee has water.”

She lowered the light.

“How much actual water?”

“None.”

“Breakfast?”

“Coffee.”

“Hours of sleep?”

“Some.”

Elias answered from the chair beside the wall.

“Maybe three.”

Mrs. Greene looked at him.

“Does she always make answering simple questions this difficult?”

“Yes.”

I pointed toward the door.

“He can leave.”

“He brought you in.”

“He kidnapped me.”

Mrs. Greene handed me a bottle of water and a packet of crackers.

“Drink all of that. Eat these. Lie down for fifteen minutes.”

“I have class.”

“You also have a resting pulse that suggests your heart is attempting to leave without you.”

“That sounds dramatic.”

“It learned from your face.”

Elias coughed to hide a laugh.

Apparently everyone had agreed that my face was a separate person with poor emotional control.

I stretched out on the cot and opened the crackers.

Mrs. Greene returned to her desk.

Elias remained in the chair.

“You can go,” I whispered.

“I know.”

“You have a test.”

“I know.”

“You’re going to fail.”

“I won’t.”

“You’re incredibly arrogant.”

“Also not new information.”

He leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees.

The ringing continued.

Not loud.

Just present.

I drank half the water.

“Do you really think it was some kind of panic attack?”

“I don’t know.”

“You sounded convincing earlier.”

“I was trying to keep you calm.”

“That is dangerously close to admitting you make things up.”

“Only when the truth is unavailable.”

I studied him.

Elias looked exactly as he always did. Calm. Neat. Difficult to surprise.

His dark hair had fallen across his forehead, but everything else about him seemed carefully controlled.

Except for his hand.

He kept flexing the fingers that had touched me.

Opening them.

Closing them.

“You felt something too,” I said.

His hand stopped.

“What would I have felt?”

“I don’t know.”

“That makes two of us.”

“When you touched me, everything stopped.”

“You said that.”

“It wasn’t just the ringing. The nausea stopped. My vision cleared.”

“Maybe it grounded you.”

“You keep saying that.”

“You trust me. Your brain recognized something familiar and stopped panicking.”

It sounded reasonable.

That was the problem.

Elias was good at offering explanations that left no obvious place to argue.

“Caleb is familiar,” I said.

His eyes lifted to mine.

I wished immediately that I could pull the words back.

“I know,” he said.

The answer was quiet.

Not offended.

Not jealous.

Still, something changed between us.

A line appeared where there had never been one before.

I looked down at the crushed cracker packet in my hand.

“I didn’t mean—”

“Yes, you did.”

“I meant that he’s known me longer.”

“I know what you meant.”

The ringing hummed behind my ear.

Elias leaned back in the chair.

“Maybe it would have worked with him too.”

“Maybe.”

“We don’t know that it wouldn’t.”

“No.”

I drank more water because it gave me something to do.

The door opened, and Caleb walked in.

His eyes moved from me on the cot to Elias sitting beside me.

“What happened?”

“You have class,” I said.

“So do both of you.”

“How did you know we were here?”

“Elias texted me.”

I looked at Elias.

He shrugged.

“Loyal friend.”

Caleb crossed the room and sat on the edge of the cot.

His hand found the side of my face.

The ringing continued.

I tried not to notice.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Dehydrated, overtired, and apparently unable to answer basic medical questions.”

Mrs. Greene spoke without looking away from her computer.

“That is the most accurate thing she has said since arriving.”

Caleb smiled, but concern remained in his eyes.

“Was it the dream?”

“I don’t know.”

“What happened?”

“The room got strange.”

Elias answered before I could.

“She got dizzy. Her ears were ringing.”

“Both ears?” Mrs. Greene asked.

“Just one,” I said.

“Any history of migraines?”

“No.”

“Vision changes?”

I hesitated.

The pale green cast had disappeared when Elias touched me.

“A little blurry.”

Mrs. Greene turned toward me.

“If it happens again, especially with a severe headache, you tell an adult immediately. No driving. No running. No pretending you’re fine.”

“That last one seems unnecessarily personal.”

“It was extremely personal.”

Caleb rubbed his thumb against my cheek.

“You want me to take you home?”

“I can finish the day.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I’m not going home because I forgot to drink water.”

“You went running after sleeping three hours.”

“I make poor choices confidently.”

“That doesn’t make them good choices.”

Elias smiled faintly.

“I’ve been telling her that for years.”

Caleb looked at him.

“And she listens to you?”

“No.”

“Good. I thought it was personal.”

Mrs. Greene dismissed us after I finished the water and promised to eat something that had once been part of a recognizable food group.

Caleb took my backpack.

Elias did not argue with him.

That should not have mattered.

It did.

As we walked back toward class, Caleb kept one hand against the center of my back.

Warm.

Steady.

Familiar.

The ringing remained.

I told myself that proved nothing.

By lunch, it had faded to a dull hum.

Tessa had claimed the end of our usual table and spread the pieces of the wildcat costume across three chairs. The giant head sat on the tabletop, staring blindly at a tray of chicken nuggets.

“You can’t put that there,” Caleb said.

“Why?”

“It’s been on your head.”

“My head is clean.”

Elias moved the costume head to the empty seat beside her.

“I have personally witnessed evidence to the contrary.”

Tessa pointed a nugget at him.

“I wash my hair.”

“Rain is not washing.”

“It is when you believe in nature.”

I sat across from her.

Caleb placed my tray in front of me.

Tessa looked between the two boys.

“Why is everyone carrying Hannah’s belongings today?”

“She nearly passed out,” Elias said.

Tessa dropped the nugget.

“You what?”

“I got dizzy.”

“She couldn’t see straight,” Elias added.

I glared at him.

“You have become an unreliable narrator.”

“You were clutching the desk.”

Caleb sat beside me.

“The nurse thinks she’s dehydrated.”

Tessa pushed her unopened bottle of water across the table.

“Drink.”

“I already had one.”

“Drink another.”

“You all got controlling very quickly.”

“Fear does that to people,” Elias said.

Something in his tone made me look at him.

He was peeling the label from his bottle in one long strip, his gaze fixed on his hands.

Caleb stole a fry from his tray.

“You coming tonight?”

Elias looked up.

“To the game?”

“No, to the secret event I’m announcing in front of everyone.”

“I’ll be there.”

“Your dad letting you stay out afterward?”

A small pause followed.

“He doesn’t have much choice.”

Tessa snorted.

“That has never stopped a parent.”

Elias’s father rarely appeared.

In the years I had known him, I had seen Mr. Shepherd at two school events, one birthday party, and Jinny’s funeral. He was always perfectly dressed and completely uninterested in anyone he had not come to collect.

Elias rarely spoke about him.

When he did, every sentence sounded rehearsed.

“We’re going to Millie’s after the game,” Caleb said. “You promised to help me study.”

“I promised to prevent you from failing.”

“That sounds less friendly.”

“It was.”

Tessa leaned toward me.

“Are you going?”

“Probably.”

“You almost passed out.”

“I have recovered.”

“You have consumed three crackers.”

“I’m eating now.”

She looked down at my tray.

I had not touched it.

I picked up a fry and took a bite.

Tessa nodded approvingly.

“Health.”

The rest of lunch felt almost normal.

Caleb argued that calculus was an attack on creative thinkers. Elias explained that failing to show work was not a political stance. Tessa put the wildcat head on and attempted to eat through its mouth.

I listened more than I spoke.

Every so often, Elias’s knee bumped mine beneath the table.

The ringing faded each time.

It returned when he shifted away.

I began testing it without admitting that was what I was doing.

I moved my foot closer to his.

The sound softened.

I pulled away.

It strengthened.

A coincidence.

It had to be.

“Hannah.”

I looked up.

Caleb was watching me.

“What?”

“You disappeared.”

“I’m sitting here.”

“You know what I mean.”

I smiled.

“Just tired.”

His gaze remained on me for another second before he accepted the answer.

Guilt pressed against my ribs.

I was not hiding anything from him.

There was nothing to hide.

Elias’s presence was doing something strange to my body. That did not make the feeling romantic. It did not erase everything Caleb and I had built.

It did not mean anything.

Beside me, Elias’s knee moved away.

The ringing sharpened.

I kicked him beneath the table.

He looked at me.

“Sorry,” I said.

His eyebrow lifted.

I placed my foot back beneath my chair.

He did not ask.

That somehow made it worse.

The football game began beneath a sky threatening rain.

By sunset, the air had turned cold enough that everyone in the stands huddled beneath blankets and school sweatshirts. The field lights glowed against the low clouds, making the entire stadium feel sealed beneath a white dome.

Tessa performed along the sideline in the wildcat costume.

Every time the band played, she attempted a dance the costume had not been designed to survive.

At one point, the mascot’s tail detached and landed beside the visiting team’s bench.

The crowd cheered louder than they had for the previous touchdown.

Caleb stood behind me on the bleachers with his arms wrapped around my waist. His chin rested against the top of my head.

Elias sat beside us, one knee drawn up, pretending not to be cold.

“You can have half the blanket,” I told him.

“I’m fine.”

“You’re shivering.”

“I’m vibrating with school spirit.”

Caleb lifted one side of the blanket.

“Get under here before Hannah adopts you.”

“She already did,” Elias said.

He pulled the edge across his lap.

The three of us ended up crowded together as we had been at dozens of games before.

Caleb warm behind me.

Elias pressed against my side.

The band blaring from the opposite stands.

Tessa’s enormous blue head moving through the crowd below.

For a little while, nothing strange happened.

No ringing.

No green light.

No voice from an empty path.

I relaxed against Caleb.

He kissed the side of my head.

“You feeling better?”

“Completely.”

“Liar.”

“Mostly.”

“I’ll accept mostly.”

He tightened his arms around me.

I covered his hands with mine.

This was real.

Not a dream.

Not a mysterious physical reaction I could not explain.

Caleb had loved me slowly.

There had been no instant certainty. No invisible force. No moment when the world announced that we belonged to one another.

We had become friends when we were too young to understand what love was. We had grown through awkward school dances, bad haircuts, first jobs, family arguments, and Jinny’s illness.

When he finally kissed me, it felt less like something beginning than something we had been walking toward for years.

That mattered.

It had to matter more than the way my pulse changed when Elias sat close.

The crowd rose suddenly.

Caleb released me and shouted as one of our players broke free near the sideline.

I stood with everyone else.

The ringing struck without warning.

Sharp.

Painful.

I grabbed the railing.

The field tilted.

For one second, the players below became dark shapes moving beneath a wash of pale green.

Then Elias caught my elbow.

The world snapped back into place.

“You okay?” he asked.

Caleb was still cheering with the crowd.

I stared at Elias’s hand.

His fingers rested lightly against the sleeve of my coat.

He followed my gaze and let go.

The ringing returned, softer this time.

“Still happening?” he asked.

I nodded.

“You should go home.”

“I’m not leaving.”

“Hannah.”

“Please don’t tell Caleb.”

His expression changed.

“I’m not asking you to lie,” I added. “I just don’t want him worrying all night.”

“He should know.”

“He already knows. He was at the nurse’s office.”

“That was hours ago.”

“I’m fine.”

“You keep saying that as if repetition makes it true.”

The crowd settled.

Caleb wrapped his arms around me again.

“What did I miss?” he asked.

“Nothing,” I said.

Elias looked at me.

For half a second, I thought he might contradict me.

Instead, he pulled the blanket higher across his lap.

“Your girlfriend has terrible balance.”

Caleb laughed.

“She’s always had terrible balance.”

I leaned back against him.

Elias turned toward the field.

The lie was small.

Kind, even.

Still, he had told it for me without hesitation.

Millie’s Diner remained open until one in the morning on Fridays, mostly because the owner had accepted that half the high school would arrive after every home game whether she wanted us there or not.

We crowded into our usual booth near the back.

Tessa had changed out of the mascot suit but still wore streaks of blue paint across both cheeks. She ordered pancakes, fries, and a chocolate milkshake, then acted offended when the waitress asked whether she wanted separate plates.

Caleb spread his calculus notes across the table.

Elias looked at them with visible pain.

“You have written six numbers.”

“They’re important numbers.”

“One of them is your phone number.”

“I needed to test the pen.”

I laughed.

The ringing had disappeared sometime during the drive to the diner.

Maybe the nurse had been right.

Maybe food, water, and several hours without thinking about the telephone had finally forced my body back into something normal.

Caleb slid into the booth beside me.

Elias sat across from us.

Tessa occupied the remaining corner, dipping a fry into her milkshake.

“This is why people don’t trust you,” Elias told her.

“Sweet and salty is a recognized culinary experience.”

“That sentence sounded copied from an advertisement.”

“All knowledge comes from somewhere.”

The waitress brought coffee.

Elias reached for his cup.

Black.

Of course.

I watched his fingers curl around the handle.

Nothing happened.

No ringing faded.

No pressure lifted.

He was simply Elias.

My friend.

The boy who had spent years sitting across from me in booths exactly like this one.

I felt foolish for turning it into anything else.

Caleb rested his hand on my thigh beneath the table.

I leaned against him.

He smiled without looking away from his notes.

Across from us, Elias lowered his gaze to the page.

The moment passed.

At eleven forty-seven, Elias’s phone vibrated.

He checked the screen.

The change in him was immediate but subtle. His shoulders tightened. The easy humor disappeared from his face.

“Everything okay?” I asked.

“Fine.”

He silenced the phone.

It vibrated again almost instantly.

Caleb looked up.

“Your dad?”

Elias nodded.

“What does he want?” Tessa asked.

“For me to come home.”

“Tell him you’re studying.”

“I did.”

“And?”

“He remains unconvinced by my devotion to education.”

Caleb began gathering his papers.

“We can take you.”

“No.”

The word came too quickly.

Elias softened it with a smile.

“He sent someone.”

Tessa looked toward the windows.

“That is aggressively parental.”

A dark vehicle had pulled into the parking lot.

Its headlights remained on.

I could not see the driver through the tinted windshield.

Something cold moved through my stomach.

“Who is it?” I asked.

“One of my father’s employees.”

“What kind of employee?” Tessa asked.

“The employed kind.”

“That answer was designed to make me more curious.”

“I know.”

Elias stood and pulled on his coat.

Caleb held out his fist.

“Tomorrow?”

Elias bumped it with his own.

“I’ll come by in the afternoon.”

“You’re finishing this review.”

“I’ll finish it. You’ll ignore it. We’ll both pretend progress was made.”

Caleb grinned.

Elias looked at me.

For a moment, neither of us spoke.

I thought of his hand around my wrist.

The silence that had followed.

“You feeling okay?” he asked.

“I’m fine.”

His expression made it clear he did not believe me.

He reached across the table and placed two fingers lightly against the inside of my wrist.

The contact lasted less than a second.

Nothing changed because there was nothing left to stop.

“Good,” he said.

The gesture was so quick that Caleb did not seem to notice.

Tessa did.

Her eyes moved from Elias’s hand to my face, but for once, she kept her thoughts to herself.

Elias released me.

“Text me when you get home.”

“You’re turning into my mother.”

“Someone has to.”

He walked toward the entrance.

The person in the waiting vehicle never came inside.

Elias opened the rear door and climbed in.

Not the passenger seat.

The back.

The vehicle pulled away before he had fully closed the door.

Caleb watched it disappear.

“His dad is strange.”

“That is a gentle word for it,” Tessa said.

I looked at the empty space across from me.

The booth felt wrong without him.

Like a photograph with someone cut from the center.

At midnight, Tessa left with two girls from the cheer squad.

Caleb paid the bill despite my argument that I had money.

“You can buy next time,” he said.

“You always say that.”

“One day I’ll mean it.”

We stepped into the parking lot.

The clouds had broken while we were inside, revealing a thin slice of moon above the trees. The air smelled like wet pavement, although no rain had fallen.

Caleb opened my door.

“Your chariot.”

“It smells like old fries.”

“Your luxurious chariot.”

I climbed in.

He closed the door and walked around the front of the car.

For a moment, I sat alone.

A dark vehicle waited near the edge of the parking lot.

Not the one that had collected Elias.

This one was smaller.

A sedan.

Its lights were off.

I could not see anyone inside.

Caleb started the engine.

The sedan remained still.

“You okay?” he asked.

I looked away.

“Yeah.”

He pulled onto the road.

The diner disappeared behind us.

Most of the route home followed a two-lane highway bordered by woods and stretches of open farmland. During the day, it was ordinary.

At night, every bend hid the road ahead.

Caleb turned down the radio.

“You’ve been quiet.”

“I’m tired.”

“Only tired?”

“Yes.”

He looked at me briefly.

I could tell he wanted to ask about Elias.

Not because he was jealous.

Caleb had never been jealous of him.

That almost made the secret feel worse.

“There’s nothing going on,” I said.

His eyebrows lifted.

“I didn’t say there was.”

“I know.”

“That sounded guilty.”

“It wasn’t.”

“Then what isn’t going on?”

I groaned and covered my face.

“I don’t know.”

Caleb laughed.

His hand found mine between the seats.

“You are very strange tonight.”

“Tonight?”

“More than usual.”

I looked at our hands.

His thumb moved slowly across my knuckles.

Warm.

Gentle.

Nothing inside me quieted because nothing inside me was wrong.

Maybe that was the difference.

Elias stopped the strange things.

Caleb made me forget they existed.

I turned my hand over and linked our fingers.

“I love you,” I said.

His smile faded into something softer.

“I love you too.”

The words filled the car.

Simple.

Chosen.

Real.

The road curved ahead.

Caleb’s headlights swept across a weathered sign and a line of bare trees.

I glanced at the dashboard.

12:11.

My chest tightened.

I stared at the numbers.

“What?” Caleb asked.

“Nothing.”

The clock changed.

12:12.

A faint ringing began.

I sat straighter.

Not inside my ear.

Outside me.

Caleb turned down the radio completely.

“You hear that?”

My hand tightened around his.

The ringing came again.

Soft.

Delicate.

Like an old music box playing one note at a time.

My skin went cold.

“Caleb.”

“What is it?”

I looked toward the back seat.

Nothing was there.

Ring.

The dashboard changed.

12:13.

Caleb slowed the car.

“Is that your phone?”

“My phone doesn’t sound like that.”

I pulled it from my coat pocket.

The screen was black.

Ring.

The sound came from somewhere beneath the dashboard.

Or inside it.

Or from the road ahead.

A pale green glow appeared so faintly that I almost thought it was a reflection.

It moved through the trees on the passenger side.

Keeping pace with us.

“Stop the car,” I whispered.

Caleb looked toward me.

“What?”

“Stop.”

A pair of headlights appeared around the next bend.

Too bright.

Too close.

On our side of the road.

Caleb’s body went rigid.

The dashboard clock changed.

12:14.

The ringing stopped.

“Run,” Jinny said.

Caleb jerked the steering wheel.