her brain was still hardwired to believe that when she hit the
ground she would go splat and die.
She tried to grab at the air, and although there was a part of her
that knew how to make it hold her, she was either too scared or not
scared enough to do the trick in time. She hit the ground at an
angle and went into a skid, her feet digging up two loamy troughs
in the mud.
She was fine, of course, but still deeply shaken. Her knees were
wobbly and she had to laugh to let out the crazy feeling flapping
around inside her chest. After she had calmed down a bit she
hauled herself up off her butt. She pulled her feet out of the mud
and started to walk back toward the school, feeling like a jackass.
She was covered in smelly muck up to her waist, and in her head
she pictured how she must have looked as she came down from her
leap, her arms pinwheeling frantically like a cartoon character falling
off a cliff.
She glanced around to make sure no one had spotted her in her
moment of foolishness, just out of habit, but she wasn?t expecting
anyone to be near. Her heart turned over when she saw a dark
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smudge turn into a man?s shape. Then he suddenly stopped and
changed direction just over the next rise. He had seen her get up
and walk away laughing after falling from fifty feet high. Worse
than that, Helen could see there was something wrong with the
way he moved. He was going much too fast to be human.
Her entire body tensed instinctively. Without even thinking
about it she took off after the dark shape. Whoever he was, he was
headed back toward the high school?back toward Claire, who was
probably huffing and puffing along, slow and small and human.
The image of Kate lying unconscious on the ground flashed