Between Haylee and the Traveler’s Stone and Haylee and the Last Traveler, the author has a conversation with the main character.
Wake up, Haylee.
“Go away Joey, I am trying to sleep.” Haylee flung a warm pillow out from under the covers. With no specific direction in mind, the soft projectile was meant to disrupt the cat’s plan to get her out of bed.
I thought we could talk for a few moments.
“Joey! Come on!” Haylee complained.
This isn’t Joey.
“Huh?” Haylee responded. She cracked her eyes into thin slits and scanned the room. Accustomed to hearing voices in her head, she took a moment to assess the quality of this particular one. It was not totally foreign; she’d heard it before…
Now that she was focusing on it, she understood that it was not Joey or any other animal. Animals didn’t form words and complete sentences. They sent a series of flowing visual images with emotions attached.
It wasn’t a thought from any of her victims either. After being absorbed into her mind during Haylee’s unusual feeding process, they were mere memories. When she was finished with them, they didn’t make new ones.
Re-asserting her tight clamp-down on those, Haylee was suddenly wide awake. She threw back the blankets and scrambled out of bed. Already wearing sweats, she threw on a jacket, slipped into a pair of shoes, and ran a comb quickly through her dark, curly mass of hair.
She was out of the apartment in less than ten minutes. The streets of Berkeley, California were not as busy as they usually were at this time of day, but there were enough people around to make Haylee feel part of something larger. Thinking that the voice was a dream remnant, she let relief trickle down her spine.
You can tell Josh all about this conversation when you see him.
Haylee stopped in mid-stride. A forty-something, dark-skinned man carrying a to-go coffee grumbled, “Watch where you are going, Miss!” He extended his hot cup away from his body while barely avoiding a collision.
“Sorry,” she muttered.
“Who are you?” Haylee asked, looking up and all around. The coffee man, glanced over his shoulder, frowned, and picked up his pace.
I can’t tell you that, but I want you to know that I am someone who cares.
“Are you my mom?”
Not exactly.
“Alright, whoever you are, what do you want and why are you talking to me?”
A pair of female students, seeing the young woman gesturing and speaking out loud, crossed to the other side of the street.
I want you to know that when I kill you, you won’t suffer and that your time here has had a much bigger purpose.
“You are going to kill me? I don’t think so. I’m dying because all of the women in my family have some weird inherited thing that happens after they give birth.”
A husky blonde came out of a store with her son. They emerged near where Haylee was standing. The precocious boy pointed. “Mommy, that lady is talking to a ghost.”
The mother shushed him and hurried them toward their car.
That’s right. Why do you think that is?
A suspicious look crossed Haylee’s face. “I don’t know…. Do YOU?”
People are staring Haylee; you should keep walking. Yes, I am the only one who does.
Instead of walking, Haylee began to jog.
“Are you saying that it was your idea that I die at the age of twenty-three?”
You could have lived for a few years more if you hadn’t returned the souls that you stole. But it was the right thing to do.
“Not that I believe you, but did you also have something to do with my time jump to 1849 and…Reece?” her voice broke a little on the last word.
Of course. That is part of the story arc for the women of your lineage and the crystal fragments that you possess.
“Then you know about the Travelers and why they do what they do?”
Yes, and you will too before too much longer.
Haylee who had started running at top speed stopped to rest when she felt the energy of the voice begin to pull away.
“Wait! Are you saying that I’m not real? That my dad, Gori, Josh, and Serena aren’t real either?
You’re real to me and I love you all. You are like my children.
“I don’t accept this.”
I’m sorry.
“If this is true, why do I have to die? I don’t want to die! There’s so much more I want to do!”
I know.
“Josh needs to know about this! He thinks he can help. He’s started a research project.”
That is exactly what he needs to be doing. His work is going to be an important part of what happens next. But you won’t be able to tell him about this conversation because I have to wipe it out of your mind.
“What? Why?”
I need you to go into Haylee and the Last Traveler with no memory of it having taken place.
