Memories from a Different Future: Jump When Ready, Book 2 Read Online Free

foot
pumping against concrete, her left balancing the board as she continued to
build momentum.
    “I’ve got this!” Henry said. “Get out of my way!”
    “Yeah, whatever!” Jamie said. “How about you get out of
mine?”
    Nikki couldn’t help laugh as she heard them struggling to
catch up. Sure, they’d been to this skate park a thousand times and she’d just
finally been invited to join them. Naturally, they’d been confident that she’d
be looking to them to show her the ropes. And she had for the first hour or so,
but it wasn’t long before she had most of it down. After all, she’d spent half
of her last life honing her strength and agility as a dancer. Had they really
thought their time spent casually gliding around on wheels could compare? Sure,
they had the basic skills down and some nifty tricks. But where was the
discipline, the commitment? Yeah, exactly. Pretty much what she’d figured the
whole time. After all, how much did Henry and Jamie take seriously?
    Ironically, the competition had been their idea. Typical
for boys, of course, and they’d definitely assumed one of them would be first
to complete six laps. Seeing as she was about ten yards out now from the finish
line, Nikki suspected this show was over. She knew it was over when she
heard them collide, wipe out and start swearing at each other. Oh, well. Live
and learn, right? Or, die and learn. Same thing, weirdly.
    The fact was, Nikki had only been curious about seeing
the place they kept disappearing to all the time. Henry and Jamie had created
it together, so the invitation had been needed, but originally she hadn’t been
sure she’d even get on a board. Now, she smirked as she spun and turned to look
back. She watched as Henry and Jamie picked themselves up.
    “Beginners luck,” Jamie said, preening his mohawk back
into place.
    “I was seriously gaining,” Henry said. “Another few
seconds and I would have—”
    “Still lost,” Nikki said.
    Henry pretended to consider, then shrugged. “True, but
not by as much.”
    Henry’s eyes met Nikki’s and she forced herself to
maintain a neutral expression. She did allow the corner of her mouth to rise
just a little, enough that she knew Henry would smile. Sure enough, he smiled.
Henry was Henry, after all. Some things in afterlife remained the same and
Nikki appreciated that consistency.
    Nikki was long past questioning so many aspects of this
realm she’d come to think of as home. After all, people on Earth just accepted
that the sun would rise and that night would fall. That was the natural order
of things. Obviously, time moved way differently here—to the point where time
itself barely mattered. Sure, it used to disorient her but that had mostly been
during the years when she’d kept crossing over. Back when she’d watched her
parents, and then her sister, slip away. After that, she hadn’t looked back.
She’d only been torturing herself and it hadn’t benefitted anyone. It hadn’t
been until Henry arrived to join them that she’d found the courage to make that
leap again. And it had paid off, no doubt about it. They’d rescued Henry’s
sister. They’d saved—or at least, prolonged—a life. Still, that had been almost
twenty years ago, Earth time. Where Nikki lived, maybe a few months. At least,
that’s what it felt like.
    “What next?” Henry dusted himself off. “Maybe the woods?
Or how about the pond? You know, someplace relaxing.”
    Nikki missed the pond. They hadn’t gone there much since
saving Bethany. Henry went there sometimes, she knew. Well, she didn’t know for
sure. But he went somewhere, just slipped totally off the radar. She shouldn’t
care. After all, why would she? Nikki asked that of herself too frequently
lately. It scared her, this change, this caring, in a place where she’d long
thought it couldn’t happen. Maybe shouldn’t happen? What kind of doors might
that caring open? Big doors, she suspected. Doors that couldn’t be