The Watchers by Wendy Reakes Page B

Stonehenge, I’m going to be praying for the both of us, because you won’t be there with me.”
    Son-of-a… she thought as she slammed down the phone.

Chapter 16
    Wiltshire, England
     
    On the 1st June 2026, Mi a was once more at Stonehenge. It wasn’t so much a duty, but more like she knew she just had to be there. It had been a week since she last saw the Watchers; a week since Tom had emerged safely from the siege in New York City; and it had been a week since she’d begun her quest to seek out the Watchers so that she could see their world, maybe even stay there with them. If they’d let her. The only person she’d told about her decision was Tom. As far as her parents knew, she was off glamping with her friends from school. She’d asked Tom to go with her, but he wouldn’t entertain it. ‘ But I’ve told you all I know ,’ Mia wrote when she’d messaged him. ‘ How can you not want to come with me? How could you not want to get away from this crazy existence in this crazy world? How could you not want to be with them? How can you not want that?’ She didn’t get it.
    His response was flippant, but that was just Tom. ‘What, live on a cloud or something? I don’t think so. I’d miss my X-box.” She’d imagined him grinning at his own senseless wit.
    He irritated her beyond belief. He wouldn’t take her seriously. Yes , not many people would just up and leave their family and their normal existence to go live with Angels. It was weird, but that was what she was prepared to do. She couldn't fight it. She didn't want to fight it. She just wanted to be with them. When she'd sat with Uriel and he'd told her about the Watchers and where they lived, she was breathless with excitement. Their world sounded pure and beautiful, not of this place, a dimension that no one could access unless the Watchers wanted them to. ‘It’s not like that. It would be more…spiritual…like heaven or something,’ she wrote.
    ‘ So, wait until you’re dead. You’ll see it then won’t you?’
    ‘I don’t want to wait that long.’
    ‘You could get run over by a bus tomorrow, then you’ll be happy, eh?’
    She knew he was cross at her. He was lashing out because he wanted her to want to be with him, just as she’d always said she’d wanted. ‘ Well, I don’t care what you say. I’m going…if they’ll let me .’
    ‘How are you going to get them to do that? You know what they said. They will contact you when the time is right. You’ve been at Stonehenge every night for a week and they still haven’t responded to your vibes.’
    He’d highlighted ‘vibes’ with inverted commas. Sarcastic idiot! ‘They’re not vibes. I use a dousing rod to communicate through the ley-lines. It’s how I told you, Tom.’
    ‘ Look, hun, I’ve gotta go. Speak tomorrow, okay?’
    ‘What…? Oh, whatever, Stoney!’ she’d snarled as she pressed a button and closed him down.
    When she’d stabbed her phone to turn it off, she hadn’t talked to him since. Who needed it?
    Now with Charlie at her side, Mia was camped in an open field with a bunch of avid pagan worshippers and Glastonbury travellers, all waiting for the day of the summer solstice when the sun would rise and shine through the stones. It was the best place she could locate herself. The Watchers had told her the Henge meant something, that it was the place between life and death, perhaps a gateway to another dimension. That was her take on it. The summer solstice was pending. Where better to be if she wanted to reconnect with the Angels. Surely this was the place to be. There was no question in her mind.
     
    a balmy Tuesday evenin g left her rummaging through the supplies in her rucksack. She put her hands on a large bottle of mineral water. ‘Yes,” she sang. She thought she’d run out. The final bottle was a life saver since she was dying for a cup of tea. Thirsty as a beached goldfish. When she looked up, a strange figure was standing right next to her.