Seance

Prologue

The end of the world swirled around me in a blur of colour: a yellow tree-shaped air freshener; the startling red bonnet of the Skoda Octavia; the baby blue sky and the slick, shiny brown of the river bank. Blonde hair fluttered and flapped before the tsunami rushed in, causing it instead to whirl in a frenzy. Water filled my lungs and pain lanced through me.

The open windows never granted us a sliver of a chance. When the Octavia smashed through the railing and plunged into the river, water invaded the car in seconds. I barely had time to hold my breath and even that was no use. Something had clobbered me in the ribs and my head throbbed, but nothing hurt quite as much as drowning.

As the car tilted and sank, I could see the diminishing sky through the water's surface. I tried to turn my head, but I hadn't the strength. I felt him beside me though; I always knew when he was close. I could picture him as the world blurred and dissolved around me: tall and tanned, with wavy blonde hair the exact same shade as mine. His grey eyes always met my gaze the instant I looked at him and his dimples would surface before he grinned. It didn't matter that I wasn't looking at him; he was the last thing I saw before my consciousness gave in to the fire in my lungs.

'Immy? Immy!'

My eyelids flutter, but the invasive light is too much. I stare instead at the orange glow of my closed eyes. The familiar voice, however, makes me smile. I want him to know I'm here, and I hear him.

It was a vivid dream. I can almost feel the burning in my lungs and my head actually physically throbs. I must have slept too deeply - that can affect my head something awful. I try to stretch, but that hurts my side. Strange, I must've whacked myself in my sleep. What an idiot.

I try to open my eyes again, but the white is overwhelming. Everything is blurry and bright and it was so much nicer when my eyes were closed.

'You look terrible,' Leo says, and I smirk and stick my tongue out.

'Hangover from hell,' I grunt in reply.

'That hits almost a little too close to home, sis.'

Frowning, I force my eyes open to look at him. He's standing over my bed, arms crossed. His hair is perfectly placed as usual and his thick, toned arms bulge out of his t shirt. He looks immaculate, which is salt in the wound when I feel so terrible. The light behind him makes him look almost ethereal. The light behind him is far too bright.

This is not my bedroom. I am not lying in my bed. As the room comes into focus, so does the pain. I notice the white curtain separating me from the rest of the room like a veil and I realise it hurts to breathe. The flowers surrounding me come into focus and my head pounds. I try to sit up and my ribs catch fire. Tears spring to my eyes as the bed catches me and I wail.

'You're okay,' Leo reassures me, rushing to my side. 'Just a little battered but otherwise alive.'

'W-what happened?' I moan.

'Don't you remember?'

'Um,' I mutter, frowning and clutching my side, 'we went to a pub with your mates... Did I get drunk or something?'

'We both had a few, yeah.'

'But you drove us home.'

'Partway.'

'And then... And then...?'

'A bus hit us as we rounded a corner. We swerved-'

'Off a bridge,' I recall, gasping. 'H-how-?'

'That's what we get for afternoon drinking, I suppose.'

'How long have we been here? How are you so...?'

'Sprightly?' Leo suggests with a smile. 'Well...'

He moves closer, taking a seat by my side, and I brace for the shifting weight of the mattress, but it doesn't come. The sheets dont even whisper as he plants himself there. Oh - I get it. This is one of those dreams within a dream where my brother's about to tell me we're dead. Or that they replaced my organs with robot parts. That would explain the pain. It's not a bad dream to have, becoming cyborg twins.

He reaches out slowly with a strong, tanned hand and places it atop mine. I don't feel it - of course I don't, this is a dream. But then how can I feel the pain? My head is throbbing. My gaze never wavers from his, but his grey eyes travel from my identical ones down to our hands. After a beat I follow suit.

My hand is red raw, marked with wounds that look a lot like symbols. The windscreen glass obviously did a number on me because the wounds are deep. A few of them bear stitches and one even weeps. Leo's hand, a stark, naked contrast in its tanned perfection, hovers above mine as if he's afraid to hurt me. But he slowly lowers it and I wait for his warmth to comfort me. Instead I watch with growing dread as his hand melts into mine, disappearing completely inside my cuts and scrapes.

My heart pounds as my eyes snap up to meet his.

'Am I...?' I begin, though I fear I know the answer.

'No,' he tells me with a sad smile. 'I-'

'Don't say it!' I cry, reaching out to cover his mouth, but my palm goes straight through him and a strangled sob escapes me.

'I managed to get your seatbelt off you,' he recalls. 'Do you know how hard it is to post your sister through a window while you're drowning?'

My head pounds. I vaguely remember my head breaking the surface, gasping in a desperate, half conscious breath as rubble continued to rain down from the bridge above. People shouted somewhere close, but I could barely keep my eyes open. I shake my head violently, blinded by pain, aching to erase the memory.

It's not true.

I'm still dreaming.

'They didn't get to me in time,' dream-Leo tells me.

I close my eyes.

Any minute now I'll wake up.