Significance (Significance #1)(21)

“Here.” He reached for me again. “Maggie, I know you’re withdrawing. I am too. Come here, you need me.”
“What?”
“Maggie, it’s just the withdrawals. Touch my hand and everything will be ok.”
“Kyle, I am not your significant. What are you doing here? Where’s Caleb?”
He looked hurt and shocked. He started muttering to himself.
“Dad never told me about this. I thought you’d need me, right away. I didn’t think you’d fight me and hallucinate.”
“I’m not hallucinating!” I yelled. “Where’s Caleb?”
“Mags,” he said more pronounced. “Who is Caleb?”
I started to falter. Had I just imagined it all? Kyle looked serious. He looked startled. He looked hurt and his eyes beseeched me to take his hand. I didn’t know what was going on but I held my hand out and let him grasp it. His fingers were cold and rough, not like Caleb’s and his touch didn’t calm me or sooth me. In fact, it made my skin crawl.
“Maggie, what are you doing? You’re blocking me somehow. Let me help you.”
“I’m not doing anything. Kyle, come on. Where’s Caleb? I need him, he’s the one. This isn’t right,” I yanked from him and pleaded.
Even I heard the hysteria in my voice and I turned away from his betrayed expression.
Kyle pressed his mouth to my ear. “Caleb can’t come out and play right now,” the voice said but it was no longer Kyle’s voice. It was deeper, more menacing and definitely not nice. “Neither can Kyle. Sorry.”
I turned, looking around but saw no one. “Who are you?”
“You don’t remember? I’m hurt, Maggie, really,” the voice sang with sarcasm.
He appeared in front of me from the shadows off the porch and smiled as he saw recognition flash in my face.
“Marcus,” I gasped. I backed into the wall. “You scared me. What are you doing here?”
“Oh, I scared you? Well, you’re scaring me. You see, you’re special. Not like in a get-a-big-head special, but special enough for us to be pissed about it. It’s not fair that the Jacobson clan gets to start getting their ascensions back when we’ve been just as patient as they have. They will have the upper hand now, you see? We’ve had many a discussion about you in my clan. There is a reason for you, there has to be. There’s something special about you and we can’t let it come to pass.”“What? You can’t let what come to pass?” I asked but was afraid of the answer.
“Your ascension. If we take you away from Caleb, you won’t ascend and neither will he.”
I gasped with pain at the thought.
“You can’t do that! I’ll die.”
He laughed maniacally.
“You won’t die, silly human!” He laughed again. “You’ll be in agony, but you won’t die. Well, not at first anyway. That’s a sacrifice we’re willing to make.”
“No, please,” I whispered my plea.
There was nothing else to do. He pointed outside. I saw a black car waiting on the curb for us. “Get in.”
“No! No! Please!”
“Too late for that. If only you hadn’t saved him. This is your fault, I want to make sure that you see that. He will be in just as much pain as you, you know. He’ll writhe in wanting and agony just as you will, with no cure. Now, how’s your conscience?”
“What did Caleb ever do to you to make you hate him so much?” I ground out.
“He was born,” he growled and then we were standing beside the car and I had no idea how we got there.
He grabbed me around my arm and threw me into the darkness of the open car door.
I screamed and scrambled to get a footing but there was none. I fell farther and farther into a dark place of nothing. I felt nothing, I heard, smelled, nor saw anything. Except the burning black handprint on my arm and when I finally hit the bottom, a loud boom.
I was jolted awake in my bed like I’d been dropped. I was sweating and crying. I reached up to my cheeks and felt the wetness and then the aches in my body pounded into me. It was almost too much. Even though I knew what was happening, I wanted to freak out and cry more from the pain.
I heard the doorbell in the back of my mind, heard voices. I lay on my bed and tried to catch my breath, but it felt like I was suffocating as the stars danced in my vision.
Then I felt a hand on my forehead and wanted to sigh until I realized it wasn’t the hand I needed. It wasn’t Caleb. I opened my eyes to see Dad looking at me with clear worry, the stars bouncing in my vision behind him.
“Honey, Caleb’s downstairs, but I’m gonna go tell him you’re sick. You’re burning up.”
“No, Dad! I need him!” I yelled and kicked off the covers.
“Maggie,” he scoffed and held me down. “Look, I know you like this boy, but he can wait a day to see you if you’re sick.”
“No. Please. Caleb,” I breathed painfully.
“I’m right here.” He actually pushed my father aside to get to me. Pushed! 
His hands were on either side of my face and I almost cried with relief. Everything felt normal and right and I could breathe again. Except for when I opened my eyes and saw how pissed my father was.
“Excuse me, son, but I think you need to leave, right now,” he boomed.
“Dad, wait. Listen-”
“You be quiet. No boy is coming into my home and pushing me around while he jumps into my daughter’s bed in the morning like it was completely normal. What have you done, Maggie?”
“Nothing-”
“Sir,” Caleb butted in as he set me and him up on the bed beside each other. He kept his arm around me for contact and I felt his protection seeping out. Even though this was my dad we were dealing with he was pretty red faced. “I’m really sorry. I just heard Maggie so upset and I panicked. I shouldn’t have pushed you.”
“You’re dam- darn right you shouldn’t have! I don’t know who you think you are, but-”
“Dad, he said he was sorry,” I begged and he looked at me finally.
Then he cocked his head and pressed the backs of his fingers to my forehead and then down my cheek. “What happened to your fever? You looked like death warmed over when I came in here.”
“I feel fine,” I said and shrugged, trying to seem nonchalant.
“Hmmm.” He looked between us. “You can go with Caleb today, but he is not to come over so early in the morning like this anymore. Understand?”
“Dad-” I started to argue, but Caleb squeezed me and interrupted me.
“That’s fine, sir. Thank you for understanding. I am sorry.”
“Fine. Whatever. You be careful with her on that deathtrap of yours.” He turned to go, but then pointed his finger at him. “And if I ever catch her on it without a helmet, so help me-”
“No, sir. Never. I promise you that.”
“Fine,” he said and huffed out of the room.
I turned to Caleb and reached my fingers around his neck just to have the contact and then started to protest about his non-protest.
“How can you say you won’t come over in the mornings?”
“I will, he just won’t know it,” he whispered and smiled conspiratorially.
“Oh.”
He pulled me close to him, hugging me to him and inhaled deeply from my neck, his nose grazing my skin.
“Wow, you smell good,” he muttered and nestled closer. My heart rioted in my chest. My hand was still on his neck and I felt my fingers pulse with need to bury them in his hair. “And you look very cute in pajamas.”
“Oh, yeah.” I pulled back bashfully and crossed my arms over my chest. “I forgot.”
“It’s ok.” He laughed. “You do look cute. But, something’s not right. What happened this morning? That wasn’t a normal withdrawal. You were terrified.”
“I had a dream. It was so real.” I rubbed my arm absently, remembering Marcus and his hateful grasp.
Caleb turned his head slightly. He looked concerned and then wary. He pushed my short sleeve up. I gasped as I saw a burned black handprint on my arm. But it was a dream right? He growled beside me. “I’m gonna kill him.”
“But I was dreaming. How is this possible?”
“We need to go see my father. I wish you could show me what happened,” he muttered.
“But I can can’t I? Just like you did me?”
He shook his head.
“You can try but everything is harder for humans.”
I turned to him, laying my knee on his leg. I pulled his face close and I saw a flash glimpse of a kiss. I realized it was him imagining me kissing him. I held my gasp in check and pushed that aside. It was good to know he at least wanted to since he hadn’t done it yet. I was curious as to why. But now that I could see that in his mind, I wanted to smile but it wasn’t the time. I pressed my forehead to his, just like he had done to me in the restaurant, immediately feeling his heartbeat unsteady and slightly faster, and remembered the dream.It was just as real. Unlike any memory I’ve ever had and I guessed that it was just as real for Caleb as me when we memory transplant. I heard his fast intake of breath and knew he was seeing it too now, so I let it all flow between us.
His breaths sped up as he saw me in pain, getting out of bed. Then when I yanked the door open to find Kyle instead, he grunted in annoyance. And when Kyle told me he was my significant and Caleb didn’t exist I had to grip Caleb’s head harder to hold him in place.