Little Memories ; S. Stilinski ; book 1

[17]

melody

+

We sat at a table with our textbooks laid out in front of us. The sunlight shined against the cold concrete top, so that our shadows danced across the gray surface. 

I sat between Scott and Stiles, who constantly checked their cellphones and looked around nervously, "Okay, so what happens to a person with a near-death experience and comes out of it seeing things?"

"And is unable to tell what's real or not?"

Allison bit her nails, "And is being haunted by demonic visions of dead relatives?"

"And has nightmares of the people you love being slaughtered in front of you?"

"They're all locked up because they're insane," Isaac jested.

Stiles flashed the curly-haired boy an irritated look, "Can you at least try to be helpful, please?"

"For half my childhood, I was locked in a freezer. So, being helpful is kind of a new thing for me," he quipped. The curly mop of hair flopped on his head as he spoke. Soft elongated curls bounced above his electric eyes.

Pestered with Isaac's continuous witty remarks and sass, Stiles responded with just the same amount of sass, "Hey, dude, are you still milking that?" The neurotic boy's hazel eyes were almost invisible through his squinting eyes.

"Yeah, maybe I am still milking that."

They continued to bicker against themselves. Too tired due to lack of sleep and a proper meal, I shifted my attention to the thread of my jeans. I pulled at the string until a small hole formed at my knees. I ignored the bickering and spoken words of my friends until their deafening silence began to scare me.

In front of us, the new girl from our history class, Kira, stood with her books in her hands, "Hi. Hi, sorry. I couldn't help overhearing what you guys were talking about. And I think I actually might know what you're talking about," She said. We exchanged nervous glances among one another, "There's a Tibetan word for it. It's called Bardo. It literally means in-between state. The state between life and death."

"And what do they call you?" Lydia asked her. My strawberry-blonde friend pursed her brightly painted lips, and glared at the new girl. From under the table I kicked her slightly. She glared at me too.

"Kira," Scott announced. It must have not been meant to be said out loud, because as soon as he said it, he ducked his head, and softened his attitude, "She's in our history class."

They ignored him. "So are you talking Bardo in Tibetan Buddhism or Indian?"

"Either, I guess." She took a seat next to Stiles, "But all the stuff you guys are saying? All that happens in Bardo," Kira said. "There are different progressive states where you can have hallucinations. Some you see, some you just hear. And you can be visited by peaceful and wrathful deities."

"Wrathful Deities? And what are those?" Isaac asked her.

Kira thought for a second, her hair fell into her face, "Like demons."

Stiles sat up, "Demons, why not?"

"Hold on, if there are different progressive states, then what's the last one?"

"Death," She said, "you die."

+

After school, Scott, Stiles and I headed over to Deaton's clinic where we hoped we could find a solution to the nightmares and the hallucinations before we reached the last state of Bardo. "Sounds like your subconscious is trying to communicate with you."