Preview of Owlet by Emma Michaels

8/11/2019 Preview of Owlet by Emma Michaels

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If you purchased this book from anyone other than Crushing Hearts and Black Butter y Publishing or alicensed CHBB reseller, you should be aware this book is stolen property.

This book is a work of ction. !ny references to historical e"ents, real people, or real locales are usedctitiously. #ther names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author$s

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Somewhere between falling and ying...there is a girl.


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IRIS WATCHE HER bal!ony doors o"en of their own a!!ord# daring her to $%m".

The wind "%shed and "%lled the !%rtains b%t the doors were !om"letely still

against the walls# waiting for her to ma&e a mo'e. Her room was ali'e and

gently trying to "%sh her to lea'e the safety of its fo%r walls# li&e a mother

bird "%shing its !hild from the nest.ump. It will be so easy.?

The "oice was soothing and feminine.

Iris threw the sheets o( her legs and wal&ed to her bedroom door. T%rning

and fa!ing her bal!ony# trying to de!ide if she wo%ld gi'e in to her bedroom)s

strange form of g%idan!e# she listened !aref%lly to the hy"noti! 'oi!e.

ump. =ou know you can do it. -un. >ump. 0ly@ -un. >ump. 0ly. I will lead

you there. To the place you wish to see@? The 'oi!e remained soft and

lightly tem"ting b%t with no real for!e behind it# letting Iris &now that the

*nal de!ision was hers to ma&e.

This wasn)t the *rst time her dreams had ta&en on a mind of their own.

She wo%ld !lose her eyes ea!h night and e'erything wo%ld meld with her

memories of the night she de!ided to ne'er lea'e her father)s side. There

was a big di(eren!e between Iris when she was awa&e and when she was

fast aslee". When she sle"t# she &new that what her heart was telling her

was tr%e+ she was only one lea" of faith away from ying.

R%nning to the bal!ony she !limbed o'er the railing and loo&ed at the

night s&y.

ust@0!AA.?


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The tho%ght roared lo%dly in her ears. When her de!ision was made# Iris

felt herself fall forward# letting e'erything abo%t her life fade away as she

began to "l%mmet. ,%st as the gro%nd !ame r%shing toward her fa!e she felt

the wind !at!h beneath wings she wo%ld ne'er ha'e. She leaned into the

wind and smiled as the moment between falling and ying !ons%med her.

She was Wendy-with no need for a Peter Pan . She &new the way to her 'ery

own e'erland+ she !alled / e'er0 e'er.) She &new how to y witho%t

instr%!tion letting the dreams she held at bay ensnare her so%l and "%sh her

to new heights.

1nly e'er0 e'er was m%!h more a"tly named than Peter Pan$s

e'erland# be!a%se Iris wo%ld ne'er get to go there. It sim"ly didn)t e2ist+ it

wo%ld ne'er be her tr%e e'erland. She wanted the one thing that she !o%ld

ne'er ha'e# b%t e'ery night she still tr%sted the wind to ta&e her there. As

she tra'eled she wo%ld feel the !hill of the rain t%rning into snow and

free3ing her s&in thro%gh her nightgown. She &new she was !lose when she

"assed a towering !ity and was headed towards the sea.

The island.

4y island.

4y e'er0 e'er. She started to land and !losed her eyes# not wanting to s"oil that 'ery

*rst glim"se. She was so familiar with this dream that she didn)t need to see

the gro%nd to be able to land "ro"erly+ she !o%ld $%st let herself drift and the

wind wo%ld set her down. She waited %ntil her feet were "lanted *rmly in the

snow and as it melted between her toes she o"ened her eyes. It was li&e

magi! ea!h time she saw it. The snow falling li&e white feathers of all sha"es

and si3es before t%rning into the !old semi0li5%id beneath her feet. It was

"erfe!t. The trees "arted to re'eal a road that wo%ld lead to the rest of her

e'er0 e'er# and re'ealed the 'iew she &new so well.

A "lain white ho%se with many 5%ir&s sat before her+ shingles from the

roof were missing# bla!& sh%tters framed the windows ma&ing them loo& li&e

wide0o"en eyes# and em"ty "lanter bo2es were atta!hed to e'ery window.


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When she saw the ho%se she ran# "la!ing her hand at against the dar& red

door.

6et me in. 7o% are 47 e'er0 e'er-this is 47 dream8 6et me I 8 Iris

ga'e the door&nob a shar" t%rn b%t it wo%ldn)t b%dge. She felt li&e a !hild

throwing a *t and willed herself to !alm down. She !losed her eyes and when

she o"ened them again she s"o&e.

,%st this on!e9"lease# let me stay. :lease# let this be real. 6et me be

normal# e'en if it)s only while I slee". 6et me ha'e this ho%se# this life. 6et

my father and I li'e here and let me ha'e friends who aren)t "aid to stay by

my side. 1r# if yo% "refer# let me $%st stay alone here. I don)t e'en ha'e to be

normal. :lease# all I as& is that yo% let me stay. I only feel right when I am

here and I am so tired of feeling wrong. :lease9 Iris felt her !alm "leading

t%rn into tr%e begging# something she had ne'er done before no matter how

m%!h this dream and this im"ossible life had been the ob$e!t of her !onf%sed

mind)s obsession when she sle"t.

Closing her eyes she rea!hed for the door&nob again# trying to t%rn it

slowly this time. She held her breath for a long moment before she reali3ed

it still wo%ldn)t mo'e. It wo%ld ne'er o"en. 6oo&ing at her hand# she

s%ddenly reali3ed that the door&nob was gone+ in its "la!e was a !old# hard#golden feather that was so hea'y that it weighed her hand down# b%t she

!o%ldn)t let go. Iris stared down at the strange golden feather# and s%ddenly

felt e'erything aro%nd her shift and fade %ntil the feather was all that was

left and the world aro%nd her was nothing more than a white 'a!%%m-as

"lain as a blan& "ie!e of "a"er.

It is gone. It is all9gone.


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I-I2 $ B#+= 0 AT cold and the roaring in her ears started again. 0or a moment

she wondered if her dream had been real and a bli ard had hit, making her

sight go white and her breathing stop. 2he could still be stuck in the snow,

free ing or drowning as it slowly melted into an ice4cold ocean. 2he tried to

take a deep breath and couldn$t. Panicking, she tried to sit up but felt a hand

against her shoulder, holding her down.


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as she sur"eyed the scene nothing was familiar to her. It felt as if she were

sitting in a foreign land.

2he wanted to ask him where she was but she panicked again when she

reali ed she was intubated. 2he had to keep herself from mo"ing because

she knew she could scratch her throat, or seriously inGure herself if she ga"e

in to the temptation to rip the uncomfortable machine from her mouth.

Instead, she Gust looked to her father and let her eyes open wide, pleading

silently to be freed.

3odding, he opened the door, calling out for help. Iris glimpsed the

hallway wallpaper and felt herself go still. 2he was in her house, after all. Her

father had always needed his own personal area where he could work and

write in peace. Iris had come to understand the reason for his pri"ate space

when +iana eEplained to her that sometimes it was hard for a single father

who homeschooled to spend e"ery moment with his daughter and her

caretaker and ha"e no time for himself@especially when he missed his wife

so much. #f course, +iana had also taught her that it could be her own

pri"ate time, too, if she wantedFwhere they could sneak books her father

didn$t appro"e of, go shopping online, order Chinese takeout, or make all

their cra y kitchen concoctions that were almost always lled with chocolate."en if the chocolate wouldn$t cook, got a little crispy, or went terribly wrong,

it was always good enough to eat when you were done trying.

Iris, howe"er, had ne"er been allowed in this room before, and she

couldn$t help but feel slighted that when she nally gained entry into her

father$s world she could not e"en turn her head to look around.

+iana came through the door and straight to Iris$ side.


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loss of all freedom. 2he couldn$t mo"e, her own body wouldn$t breathe for

her and she had to rely on those around her Gust to keep her ali"e. It always

felt wrong, e"en if it didn$t happen "ery often.


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must ha"e forgotten about the ight.? -oger was looking at Iris strangely,

waiting for her to say anything in return.

6ies. That was a lie. on)t let him lie to yo%.


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He looked shocked as he stared into her eyes, the same eyes he normally

couldn$t force himself to look at when he was emotional. They eEactly

mirrored her grandmother$s uniKue eyes, a light ha el that was almost

yellow, with Gust a touch of green that o ered a hint of mystery. They were

the one thing he remembered about his own mother and Iris knew it. He had

told her once that his parents were ne"er a part of his lifeD he only

remembered that one remarkable feature.

Tell him 5%i!&ly. He doesn)t %nderstand. He needs to %nderstand.


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hallway. alking out Kuickly, with the necklace still in his hand, her father

disappeared from sight, lea"ing the door open behind him.

He &nows now. 7o% will get to go home. 7o% will see HI4 again.


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It felt like running to her balconyD that sense of adrenaline and speed

before the Gump was intoEicating.

+iana$s smile spread as the plane started to pick up speed.


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me the ticket. 3o one can swim across e"en if they wanted to.? Iris watched

+iana$s face as relief swept o"er it, immediately replaced with a look of total

confusion.

ust from a ticketJ? +iana turned and

the trees that had surrounded them on the roads thinned as they broke

through the woods and reached a beach.


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would recogni e her 3e"er43e"er anywhere@and this was it. 2now or not,

this !2 the same island from her dreams.

The wind whipped her hair in e"ery direction as Iris walked past the rocky

shoreline to the end of the wide ramp and boarded the ferry. The wind was

erce and cold against her skin, eEactly as it had been in her dreams when

she ew. looked down for a moment before ga ing at the island as if wishing with all

his heart he could see the girl Gust one more time. The ferry was now pullingout as other members of the crew untied ropes and stood on a higher deck in

order to steer.


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She was here. *y e'er0 e'er was her Sand ollar.

Iris went o"er what she knew about sand dollars in her head. Though not

uncommon, they were rare and hard to nd shells that were said to bring

luck to anyone who found them.

< hat will you bring me, my 3e"er43e"erJ? 2he wanted the ferry to mo"e

faster but it was slowly inching its way across the water. Iris dgeted with the

feather necklace and wondered why she was so calm. 2he wondered why she

wasn$t panicking about her dream being real, or the abundance of facts that

she was Gust now beginning to learn.

7o% always &new it was real. ,%st li&e I am real9I am a "art of yo%.

Part of her wanted to run into the cabin and force the deck hand to talk to

her again but she could only feel the pull of the island drawing her forward.

2he wanted to be there@to walk to the dark red door and, for once, be

allowed inside. Iris wanted to see the interior of the house and be whereF

she somehow knewFher mother had once been. To sit on her mother$s bed

and nd out more about her from the things she had once held dear.


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without the falling white feathers and the snow beneath her feet Iris was sure

she was there. 2he was absolutely sure she was home.

He is here.

2he felt something at her side and heard a soft snap but when she turned

to look nothing was there and her heart was pounding so fast that when she

looked down she reali ed that her o"erwhelming emotions had made her run

Fsomething she ne"er allowed herself to do. Her chest was so tight that it

felt like someone had clamped it shut. 2he tried to breathe deeply but

instead felt her lungs whistle, and started to cough.

7o% still won)t a!!e"t me# e'en here. 7o% still won)t listen to me.

0alling forward onto her hands and knees, Iris felt like her soul was taking

o"er her physical body and she bent forward trying to stay alert. The rustling

neEt to her grew louder and she thought she saw someone walk out from the

tree line, but as soon as the person had appeared they were gone.

+iana came running up behind her.


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+iana was watching her again. Her eyebrows furrowed as she stood up

and closed her eyes for a moment, as if needing to clear her head. hen she

opened them again she reached her hand down to help Iris up.


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! 2 I-I2 2T##+ in the open doorway she felt e"ery emotion from ama ement to

awe to confusion. The feather necklaceFan obGect that had been in her

father$s possession all alongFhad actually opened the door of her dreams.

Iris turned the feather key and the door unlocked. 2he closed her eyes and

used the new door handle.


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Gust enough so that she hadn$t noticed. But as she mo"ed forward, Iris could

Gust make out the staircase waiting for her arri"al.

H%rry8 =o8 R%n %" them. He is here.

2he could feel her mother all around her in e'er0 e'er , and Gust hurrying

up stairs that she knew her mother had probably walked up and down for

years, knowing that she was going to get to sleep in the same room she had

slept in and would look out at the same "iew from her window, made Iris

burst with Goy. 2he followed her heart and walked down the hallway to the

"ery last door, ignoring the other four and tried to turn the apple4shaped

doorknob, but it wouldnRt budge.

Turning away toward the other rooms, ready to nd something else to

in"estigate, she suddenly heard something behind her click. 2he turned in

time to see the door swing open, though no one was on the other side.

! cold bree e touched her skin as Iris walked to the door. Peeking her

head around the corner she could see that the window was open, the

curtains were billowing in the wind. 2he ran to them and sho"ed them aside. Thick i"y ran up the side of the house and someone was climbing down it.

It)s him8


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>erking her head up and staring out the window, Iris saw that the boy had

disappeared into the trees, but she was sure +iana would ha"e heard her

call. 2tanding there, searching for the stranger and completely lost in

thought, Iris nally turned around to look at the Kuiet room.

Her heart skipped a few beats. The room had books piled almost to the

ceilingD some of the stacks were bent at a precarious angle away from the

wall. !ll of the books missing from all of the shel"es in the house were

crammed into the corners and scattered in piles across the oor.

ords were written in a beautiful script across one of the two walls that

were still "isible.


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< hy would it be lockedJ? Iris went to open the co"er of the book she was

holding but +iana reached out for it.

Iris passed it to her.


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The scene reminded her of an apple tree she remembered ha"ing seen

long ago, when she was only a little girl. 2omething about the tree had

always stayed in her thoughts, e"en though she hardly remembered

anything else from her childhood. The fruit ne"er seemed to become the

deep, full red they were meant to beD instead, there was always a hint of

green left around the stem. That tree and the fact that she was the reason

her mother was gone, were her only real memories from before the age of

se"en. 2ince her father had ne"er told her how her mother had died, passing

during childbirth was the only eEplanation that made sense. 2o Iris had

decided when she was eight that she was the cause for all of the horrible

things that happened.


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time. It m%st ha'e ta&en ages to !reate this. 2he traced her ngers o"er the

paintingsFall di erent types of birdsFthough a number of them seemed to

show up repeatedly e"ery few feet. #ne was an eagle, one a hawk and then

another bird she couldnRt Kuite recogni e. It was white and black with long

talons that looked both terrifying and feminine all at the same time and

seemed to ha"e been gi"en the most detail of the three with beautiful cur"es

and highlights used to create its feathers.

The oor was a dark cherry wood that matched the furniture around the

room) bookshel"es lining one wall with a desk in the center and a four4post

bed with a sheer canopy o"er it that matched a nightstand sitting close by.

The entire wall seemed like a storybook, playing out scene by scene. "en

the bookshel"es had car"ings on the outer frames, making it look like it was

coming to life.

"erything about the room was so perfectly re ecti"e of a uniKue

indi"idual that Iris felt like laughing and crying. 2he couldnRt help but be

thrilled to be there but it also made her miss her mother because she had

now become someone far more than Gust a character in Iris$ imagination. It

made her a person that Iris could learn to lo"e as someone other than the

ideal image of a mother she$d created o"er time. This room@this house@made her human.

Aooking at her room, seeing the bed she used to sleep in, the desk she

wrote at and the same walls she used to see before she would go to sleepF

all of it was so personal, so "i"id and real. 2omehow being in this room made

Iris feel like she &new her mother, but it also brought up the many Kuestions

that were left unanswered.

alking along the wall, Iris continued to trace her ngers o"er the

paintings and the car"ed bookshel"es.

This m%st ha'e ta&en years to !om"lete. It m%st ha'e so m%!h lo'e "%t

into it. It is $%st so bea%tif%l. Why; Who did it; What is the story behind these

"aintings; Iris couldnRt stop the KuestionsD suddenly, instead of feeling like

she was getting closer Iris could only hear the multitude of Kuestions race


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through her mind. Then her ngers hit cloth and she reali ed part of the wall

she had been walking beside was co"ered with a curtain. It m%st be another

window.

#pening the cloth she looked out on yet another breathtaking "iew. But

unlike the perfect picture seen from the li"ing room, this window also o ered

an appleFresting on the sillFthat was Gust like the one Iris knew from her

childhoodD it was green around the rimFnearly a perfect match.

2he let the curtain drop and put the apple on the nightstand.

He was in here.

Iris lay back on the bed and debated whether she should tell +iana about

the handsome, smiling stranger or keep it to herself. The answer came

Kuickly.

ot yet. ot %ntil yo% remember.


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couldn$t stop herself from running as she opened the door and headed for

the trees.

+iana ran out behind her but Iris turned back.


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the dog started to lick her hands, e"en though her laughs were pained and

made her cough.

oseph called out to the dog that went

running back to his side.


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oseph

told 0alcon who looked at Iris and smiled.


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Iris wanted to yell at the "oice inside her head to shut up but considering

the words that had already come out of her mouth, screaming at an in"isible

entity might Gust cause 0alcon to run away.

< hy aren$t you talking to meJ? he asked her, stopping again and

watching her. 2he tried to stay silent for a moment but seeing how upset he

looked she decided to go ahead and tell him.

remember a past I can$t e"en imagine. hat is wrong with meJ? Iris asked,

hearing the anger in her words.

wanted to do was lean forward and steal a kiss. 2he kept still and so did he,

both of them simply staring into each other$s eyes.


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Preview of Owlet by Emma Michaels