The Second (The Immortal Prophecies: Book I)

XXXII. Lincoln

Who knew I'd find shrieking delightful? Because Emma's constant yelling as the wind played with us and the dead-alive dandelions that floated everywhere, giving me pre-allergies. "You're very slow," she teased, scampering further down and releasing more seeds. Determined to reach her, I forced more momentum into my kicks and sped on.

"Hey, wait, I just wanna play!" I was too short to catch up with my stubby legs and watched her run away, wondering what to call her, because I still hadn't known her name.

With her sunny hair whipping around, she turned around and coaxed me to follow. "Come on, Lincoln, come on!" She blurred in my sight, though, as the day soon was taken over by the dark, and her dream like presence became a still nightmare when I all could see was black, even when she still cried for my loyalty.

"...Linc, come on, wake up. Lincoln." Except her voice became annoying by the minute. "Don't make me climb on top of you, you moron." And more harsh. "Linc!" My head spun when something stung against my cheek and alerted me that I had my eyes glued shut.

Coughing out, I weakly protested. "Ow."

Alex snorted. "It's gonna hurt more if you don't get up, you dumpster smelling dumbass. Jeez, how you reek."

"Alex," warned a second voice. Oh, crap, it sounded all too familiar. Forcing my eyes to open, burning brightness from the outside world scalded me and I moaned like I was on fire. And if that wasn't enough to get me up and going, my back felt as stiff as ice, becoming just as sore as my head. The aftertaste of pity rose from my throat to mix with the puke I didn't get rid of yet, and it rose to my nose still, smelling like stale beer.

"Oh, Jesus," I groaned, getting a good whiff, curling up into a ball. My eyes crossed involuntarily when I saw my cousin laugh at me and my pain, focusing at the cross armed red head standing behind him, which caused my eyes to go to the back of my head. "Ugh, do I wanna ask now?" With a hazy memory, I didn't know what happened after drinking half the pub and walking back to the orphanage, where apparently I made it into my room without much trouble.

"Get up, we've got to get out of here before someone finds out we are here."

"What?" Not enough of my brain was functioning to full capacity and being dragged around wasn't helping.

"Damn it, let's go to your room, you idiot." With my legs barely standing enough, I fell into Alex and finally looked at my surroundings. Again, Gwen stood there without anything in her face to tell me what went on, especially when it was her room I had passed out in. You could say it was then when the many rounds of beer washed off their effect. With a grunt, Alex moved me away and shut the door behind him.

"She--" I began, not coming up with words. The floor broke under my weight.

"God!" Alex complained. "Yeah, the next time you go AWOL, watch it. Even I knew where to go when my fingers looked like sausages to me. But then again, I've had plenty of practice--rookie."

***

A shower and four aspirins later, I laid on the couch with the most killer headache I've had after having a heart to heart with Jack Daniels, an old blanket covering my head to keep my eyes in the dark. Instead of trying to sleep, I stayed hearing Alex shuffle back and forth from my room and out the door. "Really? You call that a hangover?" It took me a few minutes to figure he was mommy-ing my sore loser persona.

"Screw you," I threw back at him.

"Yeahno, tell that to Gwen." Checkmate.

Pulling off my sunblocker, my face turned to look at him drinking a coffee, an expectant look on him for the first time in a while. Shaking my head, I sighed back the cushion, staring at my cousin with raw eyes. "I don't know a lot about what happened yesterday, aside from the pints of dignity I tried to down. Why was I in her room?"