Chapter Twelve

Black surrounds my vision until I can see absolutely nothing else.  Somehow I still have a conscious, but my eyes are sealed shut and all I can hear is white noise. Panic surrounds me, I've never thought of myself as claustrophobic, but right now the feeling of being stuck in this place is making my mind race. Oh my god, what if I'm not going to be able to wake up? Could I be, oh gosh no, what if I'm dead?  The feeling of not being able to move your body, but still being able to feel panic is something that I'll never be able to correctly describe to someone else. I've never realized what a physical thing panic is until now. I can't tense my body, shake, or even feel my heart beating faster, but somehow I can still experience that unforgettable feeling. 

Calm down Beth, come on you're fine. I try talking to myself down, but it just makes me even more frustrated. I'm thinking and trying to figure this all out, but the silence keeps swallowing me right back up. Every time that I try to shove the panic back down, a second later, it comes back in a sickening wave. 

The sensation of the helplessness that I experience after completely surrendering to the panic during an anxiety attack consumes me. The only difference now is that I have no outlet. I can't sob, whimper, or even breath faster. I just have to sit here in my misery.  

Warmth surrounds me all of the sudden. It starts at my toes and then shoots up the rest of the body. It feels like someone is petting the panic away from my conscious. A swooshing noise shatters the silence in my head and I find myself standing in a vibrant green valley. I whip around taking in my new surroundings. There are tall, willowy trees in the distance, a light breeze ruffling their leaves. Wildflowers cover every inch of the greenery making the air smell like a light, floral perfume. Immediately, I get nervous again because I don't see Skay or Nick anywhere. 

"Beth, calm down, please." When I hear his voice, my mind immediately lights up with recognition. I'm so thrilled to hear something familiar. I slowly turn around to see him leaning against a tree far away.  How'd he sound so close? I feel a tap on my should and whip around to see him standing behind me grinning. 

I roll my eyes and cross my arms, "Where am I? Also, why are you here?" He takes his hands and runs them down my arms. 

"I felt you panicking and decided to come to help you out. You're not dead by the way, Nick's powers just don't wear off very quickly." His hands continue to rub up and down, up and down, making me almost forget completely about our conversation. 

I yank away from him glaring, "I don't appreciate Nick knocking me out like that. You can involve me with these things, or at the very least ask me for my consent before knocking me out like that." I grumble looking anywhere but at his face. 

"You don't know how panic-inducing that state of mind is," I add. He doesn't respond, just staring at me like he's searching for something. His silence makes me even more frustrated.     

"I know that I'm not a part of your little team and that I really don't have a choice in any of this, but the least you could do is be a little more understanding. I've already explained what has happened to me in the past, yet you still do s**t like this! Maybe you don't understand what years of solitude does to a person, but you're not dumb enough to actually think that putting me in that sort of state could be a good idea. Pitch black nothingness? Yeah doesn't take a rocket scientist to know how that could mess with a person," I pacing and shouting at this point. 

He grabs my hands that were waving around while I spoke, and I turn to look at him glaring. 

"You're right, you're not a part of this 'team' me and Nick have going on. There is still so much that you don't know, but I'd be thrilled if once we finished telling you everything for you to stay with us as a 'teammate'." He uses the term with obvious sarcasm, but the meaning of his words leave me in shock. 

"And as for the state Nick's powers put you in, I apologize. I didn't know how you'd take it, and Nick and I desperately needed to talk privately." I nod giving him an uneasy look. They're still not fully forgiven, but I am trying to understand where they are coming from better. 

"Fine, but please don't do that to me again if you can help it. Also, thanks for helping me out of my panic I guess. How can you do this anyway?" I ask suddenly curious as I register that fact that he's somehow standing here with me in my consciousness. 

He grins at me clearly excited that I asked, "Just like how I can talk in your mind, I can also show up in someone's subconscious when they're unconscious. I can also change the surroundings of the place you're in. Just like this," He leans forward still wearing his Cheshire cat smile. He touches my forehead and I black out for a split second. When I come to, we're somewhere that I've never been. 

"Um, where are we?" I ask in amazement looking at my beautiful surroundings. The sky is a vibrant blue, and the ground in front of me is completely clear of grass. In fact, the ground's texture looks almost grainy with its tiny little particles and golden brown color. I bend down to pick up a handful of it and it's warm temperature surprises me as it falls through my hands. Maybe the most awe-inspiring thing in this dreamscape is the large body of water at the end of the grainy ground. It's the bluest, clearest water that I've seen. Huge waves of the water crash over each other and the sound is absolute bliss. I close my eyes and lean my head up to the sky to feel the sun wash over me. 

"You really don't know where we are, do you?" He askes watching me intently. I shake my head, eyes wide as I try to take in everything at once. 

He grins at the expression on my face, "This is what the rest of the people in this world call the beach." 

Still awestruck I start walking towards the water. "I guess I only really know the things about the world that I've read in the books that I managed to get my hands on in the coven. That leaves a lot for me to figure out, huh?" I ask quietly, feeling overwhelmed all of the sudden. It's going to take forever to get caught up with the rest of the world. 

"Hey, don't think about all of that. Just focus on where you are now, and what you're experiencing now." Skay says this as he comes up from behind me and slowly brings his hands around my body. He grabs my hands and squeezes them then drops them to skim his hands up my sides. His lips brush against my neck and skim over that super sensitive area where my neck meets my shoulder. Shivers run down my spine and I arch back against him. 

"Focus on what you're feeling," he whispers against me. I can't take anymore, I whip around an press my lips against his. He pushes back immediately deepening and embracing the kiss. 

I pull back slightly dazed, but extremely giddy. "What else can you show me?!" I ask excitedly. His eyes skim over my face as if trying to determine if showing me more is going to overwhelm me or not. Finally, a grin breaks out onto his face and he leans his forehead against mine. 

Once again everything goes black, and then when I wake up I'm back in a space that I've never experienced before. The first thing that I notice about this place is, how extremely cold it is. I turn away from him so that I can see everything, and my footsteps seem to crunch for some reason. I look down and see powdery, white stuff engulf my gym shoes. 

He chuckles again into my hair, "And this is what we call snow." My eyes flash around the scenery and I see a bunch of full, almost fluffy, tall, green trees covered in this stuff, but besides that, there's nothing else around us. Something wet falls onto my nose and I immediately flinch back, going crossed-eyed as I try to see what landed on me. Grinning he takes the pad of his thumb and wipes it off of my nose. 

"It's a snowflake." He points up to the sky, and as if on his command, tiny crystallized drops of water fall from the sky. I hold my hands out and watch as they melt on my warm skin. I look up at him in amazement. Bending down, I drive my hands into the 'snow' and gasp at how cold it is. I yank my hands back and glance at Skay, who's barely containing his smirk. With a snap of his fingers, a pair of gloves falls from the sky. 

"Come here." I walk over keeping a few feet away from us, and he just rolls his eyes and yanks my hand so that my feet are pressed against his. He gently puts my gloves on for me, which throws me off guard. Why's he taking care of me all of the sudden. He goes from cold to hot so fast that it's giving me whiplash. Wasn't he just throwing me into a car and having his best friend knock me out before he showed up in my mind? 

I look away from him suddenly questioning everything. I try to shake it all away, but it's hard to ignore. 

"What's wrong?" He askes tilting my chin up to meet his eyes. 

I shake my head dazed, "I'm just so, so confused. It's like you're two different people. One moment you're arguing with me telling me that I have no choice, but to do as you say, not to mention all of the insults you've flung my way. Then the next moment you're saving me from my panic, one you're reasonable for by the way, and taking me places I've never seen before. Not to mention all of the touching and kissing." As I  rant, I feel the need to do something with myself, so I turn around and walk in the snow as I talk. 

"Let me make this very simple for you then," he starts his words sound like a low angry rumble, "I haven't pretended to be anything other than what I am. I'm someone who does what I need to do, how I need to do it, to make sure things go in my favor. You are no exception. I kissed you because I wanted to, I'm touching you now because I wanted to. And I'm pretty sure you wanted me to. There is nothing more to it than that." 

I stop myself from flinching at his words because he's at no fault for saying them. It's just how he feels, but then he can't blame me for saying what I say next. 

"Understandable, but then you'll have to respect me for this, I can't be with someone who doesn't really care about me in the way that we've been together. You forget that not only, did I miss out on the world's scenery during my captivity, but I also missed nearly every single social experience. It might not be this way for you, but this touching," I wave between us, "and kissing, it means something to me.  I have never experienced this before, and I'm afraid that if it goes on much longer then I'll get attached. Clearly, you don't want that so this needs to stop now. Please." 

He slowly nods, "You don't have to say 'please' I'm not going to continue something that you're not comfortable with. I'm going to make this very clear though, I never said that I didn't care about you. If I didn't care, then why would I be making an effort to help you? I care about you, and that's the reason why this can't go any farther." 

I nod in agreement, but then bite my lip and hesitantly ask, "Can we still be friends though? This is all happening so fast, I've only known you for a few weeks, and even though it progressed kind of quickly, I'd hate to destroy all of the headway we've made together."

"We can try, but Beth, you have to understand that I won't hesitate to put our 'friendship' on the line to keep all of us safe. If I have to do something that you don't like again, so that the end game is still set in our favors, I will without a second thought," 

I scowl, but still, agree with what he's saying. "I get it, you have the power in this relationship, you know the things that I don't, which is apparently quite a few things. But you have to realize that if it goes much longer with me being kept in the dark, I'm going to have to take things into my own hands. It might get ugly." 

He smirks, "I'd expect nothing less." 

"So deal? On the friendship I mean?" I hold out my hand to shake his. He groans at my dorky-ness, but still firmly shakes my hand. 

"Deal now let's get out of here." As soon as the words leave his mouth, my vision goes black again and it feels like I'm zooming through all of space and time.