Earth & Sky (The Earth & Sky Trilogy) Read Online Free PDF Page B

all my memories of Noam, the thought comes with a jab of guilt. An echo of another memory, the last one: his skinny form in the corner of my vision, waving from the doorway before disappearing forever.
    My fingers have moved on to the third bead, the threes rattling out in my head, before I realize what I’m doing. Heat floods my cheeks. I didn’t mean to give a demonstration. I shove the bracelet back into my pocket.
    Win doesn’t comment on my slip. “So there aren’t any patterns to when you get the feelings?” he asks.
    I pause. That’s the sort of question my childhood therapist would have asked. “Not really. Except . . . I did start to notice, they mostly seem to come with things that are new, or somewhat recent. I’ve stopped going to current movies and picking up current books and even going to new places when I can avoid it. Somehow sticking to stuff that’s older seems to help. What about you?”
    “Something like that,” Win says. “New things rather than old. That would fit. Have you gotten one of those feelings about anything recently? Other than the bomb, I mean?”
    “I’m not sure,” I say. “They’re not exactly fun—I try to forget them as soon as they’re over. But, this bomb—you said you were at the courthouse to make sure it didn’t go off—so there really was a bomb? How did you know? Did the feelings tell you somehow?”
    “The bomb’s not important,” Win says with a flippant gesture. “I took care of it. Are you sure you don’t remember anything?”
    “Why does it matter?”
    “It could make a difference. Just think about it for a minute.”
    The hint of impatience in his voice sets me abruptly on edge. He’s dodging my questions. I’ve told him so much, and other than his initial suggestions about what I’ve experienced, everything he’s said has been vague, if not a total evasion. How can some wrong ness I noticed last week be more important than him stopping a building from exploding?
    Maybe this was never about helping me. My stomach twists. Well, I don’t know what he wants, and I don’t see why I should have to figure it out if he’s staying clammed up.
    I take a bite of my cookie. Around us, friendly chatter carries through the coffee shop. Five junior-high girls whisper over their whipped-cream-topped mugs. A couple of middle-aged men discuss a video playing on one of their laptops. A barista is wiping down the table across from ours, her long brown hair swaying with the movement of her arm.
    Everything is fine. Safe. Normal.
    “So?” Win says.
    “I told you,” I say. “I don’t really keep track. And I’m not okay with you asking all the questions and not answering mine. Who are you?”
    “I told you,” he says. “I’m Win.” As if that really tells me anything. As if I’m the one being difficult. He sighs, cupping his hands around his coffee mug. “What if I say I’m a . . . a special investigator into these sorts of phenomena?”
    With that hesitation in the middle of his sentence, he sounds like he’s making up a story on the spot. “I’d say you’d have to do better than that. What phenomena? Do the feelings mean something? Where do they come from? You haven’t explained anything.”
    “The problem with explaining it, well—”
    His voice cuts off. His shoulders stiffen. Suddenly he’s pushing back his chair and reaching for my hand. “We have to go.”
    Okay, this situation has gone right around the bend. “What?” I say. “I’m not—”
    Then I lose track of my sentence, because beyond Win a new couple is walking into the cafe. At least, I think of them as a couple at first glance, because it’s a man and a woman and they’re about the same age: early thirties, I’d guess. But the second they step through the doorway, the woman pushes ahead with an air of authority. The man flanks her as they scan the interior of the shop. It’s difficult to look away from her, she’s so striking: tall and slim in her tan