Foretold

  Foretold

  Violet Lumani

  Contents

  Publisher’s Note:

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Epilogue

  Also by Violet Lumani

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Also From Uproar Books

  In this short Life that only lasts an hour

  How much—how little—is within our power

  * * *

  -Emily Dickinson

  Follow the Author at:

  * * *

  VioletLumani.com

  Publisher’s Note:

  If you enjoyed this novel, please leave a positive rating and/or review on Goodreads, Amazon, or other similar websites to let other readers know. Reviews work! Support your favorite authors.

  FORETOLD

  Copyright © 2021 by Violet Lumani.

  All rights reserved.

  Published by Uproar Books, LLC.

  Reproduction of this book in whole or in part, electronically or mechanically, is prohibited without written consent, except brief quotations as part of news articles or reviews. For information address: Uproar Books, 1419 Plymouth Drive, Nashville, TN 37027.

  All persons, places, and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is coincidental.

  Cover art by Shayne Leighton.

  ISBN 978-1-949671-21-6

  eBook ISBN 978-1-949671-22-3

  Advance Review Copy (Not for Resale)

  To Emirson, Evalina & Brendon

  for filling each day with magic

  * * *

  To my mom and dad

  for always telling me I could do anything

  (except the stuff they disapproved of)

  * * *

  And to Nicky

  forever missed even though

  he voted me off the island

  Chapter 1

  Today is a good day.

  And on the heels of that thought, as if summoned by it, its shadow follows—the image of my father lying in a pool of blood, the victim of a break-in occurring right before I get home. It’s a whisper of an impression but enough to kick it off: a familiar, inky sensation spilling down my spine and snaking out, growing in power and urgency. My fingers twitch. I reflexively ball them into fists.

  Please. Not in front of the school. A strangled cry rips its way up through me, but I wrestle it to a tortured squeak.

  I pick at my peeling nail polish and draw in June-warmed air heavy with the scents of honey-roasted nuts and sweating garbage bags. It’s hard to ignore the avalanche of jostling elbows pouring out of the school around me, but I try as I slowly move down the steps and through the gates to the sidewalk.

  Focus on that. Focus, Cass. One. Two. Three. Four. I am in charge.

  Mrs. O’s rust-red bodega awning calls out to me from across the street, and I lock onto it with all the intensity of a heat-seeking missile. I’ll pop in to visit her before heading home. It’s a Friday so Dad will order lasagna from the Italian place around the block; he’ll pretend he made it, and I’ll pretend to believe.

  A perfectly predictable plan. I almost feel normal.

  Good. Focus on the lasagna. Five. Six. This compulsion is not me.

  I dig my nails deeper into my palms and fight the urge, pleading with myself. It becomes harder to see the world around me, to focus on anything but overcoming this. Make it to ten. Make it to ten.

  Seven. It does not rule me.

  Eight…

  I leap over a spider’s web of a sidewalk crack to a “safe” patch of pavement and rap my knuckles on the street lamppost five times. I’m too mortified to look up and see the confusion on the faces of those around me—or worse, pity—so I pull off the flyer taped to the post.

  Maybe they’ll think I’m super into… I glance down at the paper. “Hot Yoga—Naked Yoga Classes for Beginners.”

  “Summer plans all set, huh?” one of the senior boys asks. His friends snicker. Awesome.

  The light changes and people stream around me, some grumbling as I stand rooted in the middle of their path. After all, they have places to be. I do, too. But right now I need to wait.

  The inky feeling has abandoned my spine and pooled in my limbs, leaving them leaden. Steely skyscrapers loom like gray giants, pressing down on me. The intersection light is about to turn again and the crossing crowds slow to a trickle, but I can’t move. Oh God, what is this? This is new.

  “Atypical,” Dr. Ward called my OCD and its various manifestations. Not exactly a word sixteen-year-old girls want associated with them, unless a cute boy is saying, “It’s atypical how gorgeous she is.”

  This feeling, though, like an invisible python’s squeeze, holding me in place, choking all thought from me until only animal panic remains… this is off, even for me. The idling cars at the intersection accelerate into a blurred river of metallic sound. A group gathering on the sidewalk presses closer, and I fight for control as my heart beats a runaway staccato against my ribcage. You’re okay, you’re okay, you’re okay, okay, okay.

  I shouldn’t be surprised. My OCD triggers are usually dark, intrusive thoughts, but my compulsions… some people have to run through predictable rituals to feel like everything will be okay, but although I’ve got a few favorites, mine are random. Washing, repeating, picking, whatever—the need to go along with twisted impulses, and the crushing certainty that noncompliance spells disaster. The thoughts, the worry, always hover in the background, but it’s been a while since I’ve had to fight off such a fierce urge to bust out an OCD ritual. I’d even fooled myself into believing I’d mastered them.

  Move, I beg my worn tennis shoes, blinking back tears. I summon up Dr. Ward’s exercises as the light turns for a second time. Or third? I’ve been standing here for an eternity, I know that. I guess I live here now, I think, swallowing a hysterical laugh. Humanity parts around me like the Red Sea.

  My eyes dart around as I seek out assistance, a lifeline, but no one makes eye contact in this city if they can avoid it. A blue-black glint of hair from across the street catches my eye, and then the boy beneath the hair looks up at me. His eyes are bright blue. I can tell, even from a distance. They draw me in until everything narrows to those two sapphire points. In that moment I can smell the tang of his skin, the place where his shoulder meets his neck. My fingertips tingle, but not with a new OCD compulsion—with remembered touches.

  I know him. How?

  His surprised expression gives way to a slow, sweet smile I feel deep in my chest. Oh my God. I glance behind me, but sure enough: it’s me he's looking at.

  And suddenly that panicked, glued-in-place feeling melts away, like I’ve stepped into a shower. I exhale the lungful of air I was holding in and experimentally lift my foot off the ground. I’m loose, and I need to move—closer to him. />
  Maybe my body knew I was waiting for him, for this moment, before I did. My cheeks warm, and the corners of my lips twitch upward in a shy answer to his smile. I can feel myself blushing. He points to himself and to me with eyebrows raised in question, asking if he should come over. I shrug in what I hope is believable disinterest, and my heart leaps when his smile widens. I’ve never felt this before, this soaring…

  He moves to make his way toward me, taking a step—

  Screeching tires. Horns. Screams. My mouth works once, twice, but no sounds emerge. I hear a keening wail in the distance, and it’s a second before I realize I’m the source. I tremble violently, staring stupidly.

  The driver steps out of his car and shouts as he peers at the crumpled figure in the street. His hands pull at his hair in despair as he paces around, unsure of what he should do next. I clutch blindly for the streetlamp again, bile rising in my throat.

  “Are you alright?” a woman asks.

  Chaos. Strangers, good Samaritans, run to help the boy, but he’s gone. I know it, I can feel it, and the loss claws at my gut. I’ve just watched a boy die, skidded across the pavement. Dark spots dance in front of my eyes. Is this what fainting feels like? I focus on the woman with a herculean effort.

  “Do you want to sit?” She sounds worried. Her white blonde hair waves around her shoulders like a flag of surrender.

  Am I okay? No. I look out onto the street and…

  No accident. No boy.

  An urban orchestra. Horns sound in the distance. People chatter, laugh. Cars once again idle at the red light, engines quietly purring.

  I sink down hard on the curb, panting. Not real. Not like Mom.

  “Can I call someone for you? Do you need an ambulance?”

  I lick my lips and swallow with an effort. “I’m fine, thanks. Just a little dizzy. I…” I swing my gaze around, trying to acclimate to where I am. The school behind me, Mrs. O’s across the street. The crosswalk on Dryshore and Third. Me? Cass. Cassie. Cassandra Morai. The roar in my ears recedes, slowly. My heartbeat settles into a steadier rhythm.

  “Is she having a stroke?” a girl I recognize from school asks, more eager for gossip than my well-being.

  “I think she’s going to throw up,” another girl offers eagerly.

  I’m attracting a crowd. That, finally, penetrates my confused fog, and I leap to my feet. “I’m good. I just skipped lunch today and I’m feeling lightheaded.” Shaking off the crushing misery is difficult, but embarrassment is a great motivator. I concentrate on my breathing the way Dr. Ward always encourages. She’ll be pleased to know, despite all my resistance, that I really do pay attention. For some reason the thought almost triggers another bout of hysterical laughter, but I clamp my jaw shut as best I can.

  It wasn’t real.

  But my mind whispers back: You’ve been wrong before.

  Chapter 2

  “Go home, Cassandra,” Mrs. Otero says.

  “Rude! I came here specifically to visit you and you’re kicking me out?” My eyes stray to the shop window and the offending street beyond.

  “You came here to eat my popsicles and hide from whatever is bothering you. I see right through you, little one.”

  Mrs. O can only see shadows due to an accident from her youth, but she still knows everything going on in her cramped little store. I toss the ice pop stick in the trash and leap off my countertop perch to grab a broom. The shop is spotless, but I’m no freeloader.

  “You’re always asking me to stick around, and now you want me to go. Got it,” I mumble.

  Mrs. O shakes her head, her henna-orange hair barely budging with the movement, and attempts to pull her kind, matronly face into a disapproving expression. Her softly rounded cheeks and fleshy chin make it impossible. “You know I love having you here. But what do we say about the ostrich?”

  I pull a face and dutifully repeat, “‘An ostrich can hide, but its problems will wait.’ You know ostriches don’t really hide their heads in the sand, right? They’re rotating their eggs when they do that.”

  “Always with the random facts and the fancy words. Well, since you’re so smart, you know even a flawed saying can hold true. Confront your problems, drag them into the light. They grow in the dark.”

  I sweep and say nothing.

  “I know you can hear me.” Mrs. O places one hand on her plump waist. “You should be out doing something fun, with friends your own age.” She walks off toward her back office.

  I roll my eyes. Friends my age? “I would if there were any.”

  “Learn to forgive, Cassandra,” Mrs. O calls.

  This isn’t the first time she’s thrown that bit of advice out there, and it won’t be the last. I sigh, abandon the broom, and wheel a hand truck loaded with boxes over to the shelves in the middle of the store. I set an empty box down at my feet and drop an expired can of peaches into it. Expired peas soon join them with a satisfying bang.

  Grief is contagious. Or, at least, that’s how my friends acted when Mom died. Like it’d invade their perfect little lives if they were subjected to my pain for too long. I remember hearing them, the ones that didn’t immediately dry up like a dying vine, wondering when I’d “get over it”—as if a mourning grace period I wasn’t aware of had expired. I pick up a can of beets and slam it into the box. Maybe misery has a shelf life. Who knew?

  I snort. Forgive? I walk the box of expired cans to the back office. “Hey, do you smell skunk? Mrs. O!”

  There, sitting in her office chair with a joint suspended on the way to her mouth, is Mrs. Otero. “It’s for my glaucoma.”

  “You don’t have glaucoma! You’re blind.”

  She grins. “Oh, yeah.”

  I shake my head, some of my anxiety leaching away. “You’re the worst influence ever.”

  “No, just human. And you have a beautiful smile.” She holds up a hand to stop me from speaking. “I can hear the smile in your voice, and I can tell it’s beautiful. You should smile more often, Cassandra! Laugh! What do I always say?”

  “An ostrich can—”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Fake it until you make it.” I laugh.

  Mrs. O nods wisely, as if I’ve just confirmed she holds the keys to the universe. “Smile long enough and your mind will catch up.”

  “You’ve been spending too much time reading the greeting cards on the counter, Yoda,” I say.

  “I have no idea what cards I have.”

  She knows exactly what cards she has. I set down the box and march back to the shelves, tearing into the new shipment of cans. Mrs. O shuffles behind me and puts a sturdy, warm hand on my shoulder. She doesn’t say a word, just pats twice and hands me cans to organize.

  That’s how it started with us: a sorrowful look and a pat on the shoulder at my mom’s funeral. Then, later, she’d share anecdotes about my mom when I’d pop in for a gallon of milk. I eventually stopped making up errands and accepted we’d become friends. There was something in the way she reached out when I was at my lowest, when I was gathering all of the broken bits of me and trying to glue them back together into who I used to be, that told me she had experienced loss, too. There’s a stink to those of us who have. A dirty, secret compassion, I think.

  That boy… as comforting as Mrs. O’s presence is, I can’t kick this feeling, like the last of the light in the world has been snuffed out. The big ball of misery in the center of my chest swells. No good. I don’t want to stress out Dad, so I need to put my game face on.

  “I won’t pry, but I have an ear with your name on it when you’re ready. You know that,” Mrs. O says, moving behind the counter again.

  I hesitate and briefly debate telling her about today. After my mom passed, I told a few friends about the things I’d seen and felt before she fell ill—a vision of her collapsing and the sense that something terrible was going to happen. The reactions I got, chock full of pity, humoring me, flash through my mind. After my OCD diagnosis, those same people assured m
e it had just been my catastrophic thinking, the fuel that feeds my obsessive-compulsive actions. Mrs. O is different, but even she has a limit for the amount of nuttiness she can tolerate.

  I circle the counter and give her a quick hug. “I know. Thank you.” She squeezes me back and smooths my hair behind my ear. The door chime sounds before I can take my leave.

  “Hello, Mrs. Otero!” A sandy-haired man in an ill-fitting gray suit maneuvers his girth through the doorframe. Mrs. O stiffens as he slides his briefcase onto the counter and busies himself with the latches. “Good to see you again. I wanted to drop the paperwork off personally. Prepared in braille for your convenience. I think you’ll be pleased with the city’s offer.”

  “I recall telling you that you’re not welcome here. Please leave,” Mrs. O says with an alarming wobble to her voice. I step closer to her and glare at the stranger in solidarity.

  The man hands over the documents anyway. Despite her clear anger, Mrs. O runs her fingers over the pages quickly, and her face pales. “Generous? You call this generous? This is robbery. I’ve been here for seventy-four years. My father worked like a dog until he had enough to buy the building and open this store. You’re not only taking away my livelihood, you’re taking my home! And for what? To make a rich man richer?” Mrs. O’s voice crests on a tidal wave of pain, and her hand shakes as she sets the papers down. I take another step closer to her, willing her to take comfort in me the way I always have in her. “How is this legal?”