Page 51 of Ecliptic

None of the eighteen versions of CereNex passed preclinical testing.

I turned away, unable to bear another word. A silent tear slid down my cheek. I wasn’t my mother’s child. I was her experiment.

I didn’t wipe the tear. Instead, I let it slide down my face, feeling every bit of pain in that single teardrop. As soon as it fell from my chin, I would be free. But in this moment, I would feel it all.

When the tear crashed to the carpet, I spun back to the screen, opened a new email, set the recipient toall contacts, and dragged the folder into the window. I couldn’t let my parents get away with this.

Just as I was about to hitsend, a familiar voice halted me in my tracks.

“Oh my God, Keira! Wha . . . Where did you come from?” my mother stuttered as she nearly collapsed against her bookshelf

“I fell through stars, Mama” I said, reciting how I described it as a child—still as true then as it was now.

I stood so she could fully see me.

Her eyes widened like saucers, the whites visible all the way around. “What happened to you? You disappeared from the hospital.”

“It’s my turn to ask the questions. Tell me everything, or I’m sending my folder to everyone you know,” I said, my finger hovering over the send button. “I’m sure you wouldn’t want this sensitive information getting leaked. You were always afraid I would destroy the image of Copeland Psychiatry, but you seem to be doing a great job of that on your own.”

“I’m just so glad you are safe, my darling,” my mother said, running to hug me.

I dodged her embrace. “Don’t touch me,” I stammered, even though it broke my heart. My mother had never shown such affection, and my inability to run into her arms broke me in two. “It’s not safe.”

How different my life could have been if I could recall one other instance of a shared embrace.

“I’m so sorry for everything,” she said, her voice trembling as if she were about to cry.

My resolve wavered, but I quickly steeled my spine. “Tell me everything,” I demanded, my stance and tone making it clear I wasn’t leaving here without answers.

“I’m not sure where to begin,” my mother said, her strawberry-blonde hair loosening from its clip. “You were always such a strange child,” she trailed off as if unsure how to proceed. “I was frightened. For me. But more for you.”

“Go on.”

“You still don’t remember?”

“I deserve to hear it from you,” I said, my finger still hovering over the button.

“Very well,” my mom replied with a nod. “You would somehow escape out of the house every night. The problem was isolated at first, but then you began displaying symptoms at school. You would hurt other students and teachers. You would tell disturbing stories of a man with orange eyes killing men, forests, and creatures and how we needed to help them. You disturbed everyone—even me. And you would . . . hurt yourself.

“We tried everything before CereNex. We would ground you, punish you, take away your telescope. My, how you cried for that hideous thing. One day we woke to find you covered in blood. We thought you’d been kidnapped, but instead of telling the truth, you would make up outlandish stories. We set up camerasin the house. Some nights you stayed put; others, the footage was too bright to make anything out. It all went away when you were medicated.”

“You weren’t medicating me. You were poisoning me. I heard Dad say it was enough to drug an elephant and that I’m lucky to be alive.”

“You do have some undiagnosed illnesses, but we can figure that out together now. We thought we were protecting you. Can you not see that your delusions run rampant? You never wanted to face the truth, and you still don’t.”

Her words hit me like a battering ram. “It was you who never faced the truth. I never lied. You just refused to listen. I wasn’t ill, I was astral projecting. Walking between worlds.”

Something flickered across my mother’s face. She eyed my strange clothing and the elongated tips of my ears. “That’s impossible. There is no evidence to support that astral projection is real. It’s pseudoscience. Unprovable.”

“I came here . . .” I choked out, my throat constricting. “I came here to tell you that you kept me from the best thing in my life. You kept me from where I was meant to be, and that nothing will ever keep me from it again. I just came to say goodbye.”

This was the most disheveled I’d ever seen her, and her eyes flashed from my hand to my eyes. She fixed the loose strand of her hair and refastened it into her clip. “Would you like to help me prove astral projection is real?”

My eyebrows furrowed. “How?”

It was an unexpected question, but I recovered quickly. She had broken me once, and I wasn’t so quick to shatter again. She turned from me and rummaged through a nearby drawer, no longer worried about the email that could ruin her reputation.

“You can start by telling me everything,” she said, slowly stepping toward me.

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