When at first, no one hears me, I repeat myself. I say it louder this time, my own voice sounding foreign to me as it raises up above the others’.

Jess and Aimee look at me like I have lost my mind.

“That bet, the hundred bucks,” I say to the guy who was tormenting Tom. “Does that stand for anyone willing to jump?”

“Sabrina, I’ll just give you the money,” Jess says as she reaches into her pockets, even though I know she won’t have enough. I doubt anyone here does. “It’s way better than having you jump off this cliff into the water.”

“It’s not about the money,” I say to her. “You can give that to him for all I care,” I say, pointing at the guy who started the whole thing. “This is just painful to watch.”

The boys tormenting Tom sneer.

“Look at her go,” one of them says, elbowing Tom so hard that he almos

t topples over, “you’re going to let a girl fight your battles for you?”

“If it’ll get you to shut up,” I growl.

“Let her do it,” Aimee says, suddenly. “It’s honestly the only thing she’s seemed interested in in weeks.”

“Whatever,” Jess says as she shrugs her shoulders and goes back to stand next to Tom. “It’s your life.”

Yep, I think to myself. It’s my shitty life so I can do whatever I want. There’s no one here to stop me from doing anything anymore. I can hear the bitterness of my own thoughts resounding in my head.

The boy’s insults dull as they watch in surprise as I walk over to the rig at the edge of the cliff, their sneers turning to stares of disbelief. Even the attendant looks skeptical—but that’s no change from how he looked earlier.

I peer down over the edge at the churning water below.

I’ve never been bungee jumping before. I always thought it looked dangerous and stupid.

People do it because of the rush that they say it creates, something to do with endorphins and the body’s response to fear. As I stare down at the water below, I wonder how much more the endorphins would kick in if you didn’t know you were attached to a long bungee cord.

I wonder how much even more they would kick in if you knew that you weren’t a very strong swimmer.

For the first time, I feel a slight tingle begin at the base of my spine.

For the first time in ages, I … well … I start to feel. And it’s something other than agonizing pangs of pain.

The guy that works at the faire starts talking to me about the whole process and giving me the safety precautions run-down. I’m not listening.

I’m wondering what the air is going to feel like on my face as I fall.

He gets ready to attach the clip to my belt with affixes the cord to me, but hands me a pen and a clipboard first and tells me I have to sign the safety release before I can get ready to jump.

What a silly thing for him to think that he could stop me from jumping if I really wanted to.

What a silly thing to make me stand here without a cord attached and ask me to sign a paper.

I look at him as he holds out the pen and paper and waits for me to take it from his hand.

Then, without another moment’s hesitation, I jump.

At first, I hear the screams of everyone standing behind me at the top of that cliff. Even the worker at the faire lets out a surprised shout along with a few choice curse-words.

But then all I can hear is the sound of the wind in my ears as I’m falling. The longer I fall, the more the wind starts to howl; until it starts to sound like an actual howl. The noise no longer sounds like rushing air. Instead, it sounds like the painful cry of a wolf.

One of my wolves.

My heart races and my eyes flick open against the stinging air. I feel like I’m alive again. For the first time in weeks … that little flicker of something I felt at the top of the cliff, it lingers longer than a brief moment.

Tags: Eden Beck Wolfish Paranormal
Source: readsnovelonline.net