Foreverland Is Dead

you want to call that true nature—was pulled out of the body and replaced with Miranda’s identity. It’s a body swap, but we don’t know where the girls go once they’re pulled out of their bodies.”
    Where do you go when you don’t need a body?
    That’s the question everyone wants answered. Just because you have an answer, though, doesn’t mean it’s right. Maybe Miranda knows. Maybe she knows where she sent Sandy once she pushed her out of her body for good.
    Yeah, Miranda knows.
    The sleeping girl’s lips begin to quiver.
    Linda doesn’t notice; she doesn’t see the wisp of smoke leak from the corner of Miranda’s mouth. She doesn’t feel the frigid grasp of misty fingers ooze from the young girl’s lips, doesn’t see the vapor slither up Cyn’s arms, creep around her neck. Doesn’t see it seep into Cyn’s vision.
    Paralyzing her.
    Dragging her into the eternal gray where her soul dissolves. Where she becomes thinner. Transparent. Yet she still feels the gut-dropping fall, the endless collapse of her identity.
    The falling.
    Always falling—forever and ever—in the Nowhere .
    “Cyn?”
    Cyn jerks away from the hand on her arm. Chest pumping air that’s thick and stale. Linda takes both of Cyn’s hands, cradles them gently.
    Miranda is motionless. Lips sealed.
    “We all had the same dream.” Cyn’s mouth is dry. “Every night.”
    Linda patiently squeezes, staying present. Giving her space to work through what’s coming to light.
    Cyn tries to swallow, says, “We would walk up to a cliff and look down. But there wasn’t a bottom. There was just…it was just fog.”
    She hesitates, thoughts freezing.
    “What’s in the fog?”
    Tendons spring from her wrists. Fingers clenching. Memories push through a thick veil. She remembers what’s out there, remembers stepping through the fence at the edge of the trees, falling into the gray dream where memories pounced on her like demons.
    Her stepfather is out there. Dope. Violence.
    Desperation. Loneliness.
    “Fear,” Cyn says.
    Linda squeezes, reassuring her. Cyn doesn’t really see her; just feels her. But there’s something else out there, too. They are out there. The girls that were shoved from their bodies. The boys from Foreverland, too.
    And Sandy .
    Everyone that was pushed from their body was thrown into the Nowhere like fistfuls of ash where they would eternally dissolve. Forever fall.
    She remembers that. She remembers the falling.
    Arms out. Tipping into the abyss.
    Merging with the gray. Embracing the fear.
    And falling out of the dream.
    Cyn clenches Linda like a ledge. Feet dangling. Linda allows her to squeeze as if her life depends on it. Cyn looks away from the bed, breaks the trance. Indentions remain on Linda’s arm.
    They remain next to the bed, holding hands. Cyn’s breathing returns to normal. The fear recedes. Nothing escapes Sandy’s lips; her eyes remain motionless. This is not the dream.
    Jackie arrives to connect an IV. They help her turn the body, rub her sore spots with lotion. Even though she doesn’t know Sandy, Cyn cares for her body. She deserves that much.
    They leave the brick house and stand on the porch. The weather is warming. Cyn doesn’t tell Linda what she remembers.
    I know how I escaped.

55

    The sun is up.
    Linda quietly walks through the tent, pulls the curtain aside. She watches Cyn’s chest gently rise and fall then grabs a few things off her desk. The door closes.
    Cyn opens her eyes.
    That’s the second time Linda has checked on her. And the second time Cyn was pretending to sleep. Linda knows she isn’t sleeping well at night, tells her to sleep in as late as she wants. The morning will get along just fine without her.
    At night, the bed feels like a cell.
    Cyn wishes for the nights of falling into dead sleep, even misses the gray dreams, standing on the ledge. Better than the dreams she’s having now, waking in the night like a pillow has been pushed over her face.
    Linda woke her up sometime in the night, said she was making noise. Cyn doesn’t remember the dream, only remembers drowning in a sea of emotions. Her pillow was damp.
    She had waited there, listening to Linda fall asleep before sneaking through the tent and gently closing the door. The wind harvesters were still.
    The moon full.
    A couple guys were on the front porch of the dinner house, a cigarette cherry streaking from lap to mouth. Their chatter easily carried across the garden. She went back inside where