Read Online Remember Me by Christopher Pike - Free Book Online

buried.
    We'll talk about her as if she's dead.

    Just as important, we'll try to feel as if she's dead. We should get sad. But unlike the other game, we won't start to talk about how light she's getting. We won't try to lift her into the air with our fingertips. When we have her in a deep trance, we'll start to ask her questions, just as we asked the magnet.

    Only Shari should be able to answer us out loud. All right?"

    Everyone nodded. "Close your eyes, Shari, and just listen to my suggestions.

    You don't have to worry about anything. We'll take care of everything."

    I closed my eyes and thought back to the last time we had played the "dead girl" game. I hadn't been one of the subjects, but the two girls we used, Tricia Summers and Leona Woods, did get amazingly light after we went through the whole burial ritual. In fact, it had taken only one finger each from Jo and myself to lift Tricia all the way to the ceiling. She had seemed as light as a feather. Amazing, I had thought at the time, yet I was glad they weren't going to be floating me into the air. I was afraid of heights.

    "Take a deep breath, Shari," Jo said, her voice soft but firm. "And let it out slowly. Feel the air leaving your lungs.

    Feel the life leaving your body. That's good, that's fine.

    Now, take another breath, and again let it out very slowly.

    And this time, feel your heart slowing down, becoming faint.

    Listen to me, Shari, and don't be afraid. You're going to be all right. It is only your body you're leaving behind, not your soul."

    It may have been because I was tired, but the suggestions had a profound effect on me. I started to relax immediately.

    The tension in my shoulders and neck began to dissolve, and I could feel the pulse of my headache diminishing. It was almost like Jo had said—my actual heartbeat was slowing down.
    The muscles of my back eased deeper into the carpet.

    I began to feel as Beth said she had, as if I were floating.

    Jo continued her suggestions for a while—I'm not sure exactly how long—and then there seemed to be a long period of silence. I was still conscious of my body, of where I was, and yet at the same time, I felt removed from the situation. I didn't even feel like thinking. I just wanted to drift, like a balloon on the wind. But even though I was relaxed, I didn't feel content. The wind was pulling me along, but I wasn't sure if I liked the direction it was taking me. I was afraid, however, to try to move, to stop what was about to happen.

    That was it right there. I was a tiny bit afraid. Despite what Jo had said about my being safe, I felt as if I were about to lose something precious to me, that I had, in fact, already lost it.
    The idea of Daniel kissing Beth in the Jacuzzi flashed across my brain, and with it came a stab of pain. Then it was my brother's face that I saw swim by and fade away, drowning in the darkness inside. Daniel's voice came to me from far off.

    "She was a good friend of mine. We had a lot of good times together, and I'm going to miss her."

    That was all I heard him say. Two lines about his poor dead girlfriend and not one word about how much he had loved her. My sorrow deepened and, with it, the darkness. It was suddenly so dark inside that it seemed as if I were about to be devoured, soul and all.

    I was no longer floating. I was sinking, and fast. I don't believe I could have opened my eyes if I had tried. It was Jeff Nichols's turn to remember Shari Cooper.

    "I really didn't know her that well, not as well as my brother did. I suppose if I had known her better, I would have liked her more. We never talked that much. It's too bad she's dead, though. It's a real shame."

    None of them sounded sad. It was almost as if they were remembering someone they had murdered. Amanda spoke next.

    "I didn't know her very well, either. I knew her brother better. But she loved her brother—Jim. She was crazy about him."

    She sounded like a record that had already been