Beyond (Afterlife book 1) by Willow Rose Read Free Book Online Page A

from pushing my whole body through a solid brick
wall.

Chapter 7
     
     
     
     
    We had the weekends off. No
school, no class, no Mrs. Ohayashi. The weekends ruled. I spend
most of them hanging out with Abhik. We loved to go flying together
outside the castle. And we were allowed to do that as long as we
stayed near the castle. We were not allowed to leave the
castle grounds and especially not allowed to go near the
humans.
    “ Anyone who is caught leaving
the Academy’s campus will be punished stringently,” Mrs. Higgins
had told us one of the first days. So we stayed where we were
supposed to be and tried to make the best of it.
    One weekend a couple of months later, I
went out with Abhik as usual. We jumped from the windows in my
dormitory and let ourselves float over the big ocean.
    Spending time with him was one of my
favorite activities, since he was the only one I knew at the
Academy who just enjoyed being there. He never complained about
anything, and he was happy, content, and pleased with all this new
stuff we were learning. I loved to look at his eyes because they
were filled with such a childlike happiness when we flew. He was
like a kid the night before Christmas.
    “ What do you think life
will be like when we are done at the Academy?” I asked him as we
floated through the blue sky.
    He smiled one of his beautiful smiles.
“All I know is that it will be great,” he said.
    A couple of clouds had gathered in front
of us and he looked at me while his smile turned crooked. “I’ll
race you to them,” he said and speeded ahead of me. “Try to catch
me if you can.”
    “ Oh, no you won’t!” I yelled and
speeded up as well. A second later I had caught up with him as we
neared the clouds. When we got close to them Abhik looked at me
again and gave it a notch more so he was now in front of me. He was
too fast for me. Then he threw himself into the biggest cloud and
rolled around in it while laughing. I did the same with a smaller
one. I rolled around in it until I fell off and landed on Abhik’s
cloud and rolled right into him. Then we laughed till the tears
rolled down our cheeks. I got up on my legs, jumped onto a passing
cloud and tried to stand on it. That was always the hard
part.
    ” Look at me, I am
surfing!” I screamed. Far underneath me I could see the mighty
ocean and the castle.
    Now Abhik tried as well. But his cloud moved
too fast and he fell off.
    “ I am better than you!” I
yelled at him the second before my own cloud threw me off as well
and I fell into the air.
    Abhik grabbed my hand and we floated on our
backs for awhile, looking into the blue sky.
    “ How do you know?” I
asked.
    “ How do I know
what?”
    “ How do you know it is
going to be great?”
    He turned his head and looked at me. His
eyes were so joyful and sparkling, yet had a sadness that I
couldn’t quite figure out.
    “ Because ever since I got
here my life has just been getting better and better every
day.”
    I looked at the sky again. An eagle passed
us with a shriek.
    “ Yeah, it is great and
all, but how do you know it is better than what it was like when we
were humans?”
    Abhik smiled. His teeth were pearly
white.
    “ Look at me,” he said. “I died
in a hospital gown. I lived and died in the hospital. I admit I
don’t remember much about my life as a human, but what I do
remember I really don’t want to go back to.”
    “ What do you
remember?”
    “ I remember going in and out of
hospitals. I remember having tests taken, a lot of blood work and
stuff. Like constantly. I remember lying in a bed with tubes
everywhere. I remember being in a lot of pain all the time. I
remember being afraid all the time. I remember looking out the
window at a puddle of water and just wishing I could go and jump in
it and have fun. I remember longing to go outside again. To smell
the fresh air, to go to a playground or a park, to see the ocean …
I remember all that. And had I known all this was waiting for