Riley Bloom Dreamland Read Free Page A

totally and completely in control, but I knew him well enough to know better.
    He was making a colossal effort to hide a major case of nerves.
    Though it’s not like she noticed.
    Oh, no. She was too busy swinging her long, shiny black braids. Too busy adjusting her sweater and straightening her short, pleated skirt. Too busy smiling, and waving, and looking really cute.
    And even though I should’ve known, even though I should’ve guessed by the way she shouted and catcalled the loudest at that weird graduation ceremony I attended when I first got Here, I had no idea that the girl I’d mentally referred to as cheerleader girl (mostly because of the cheer-leading outfit she always wears)—I had no idea that she and Bodhi were friends.
    I guess I was hoping she and I could be friends.
    But now it was clear that was not meant to be.
    And just when I thought I couldn’t feel any lower, I watched Buttercup race toward them like the worst kind of traitor.
    I shoved two fingers into my mouth and whistled for him to return.
    And when he didn’t, when he completely ignored me, I whistled again.
    And when he still didn’t return, I manifested a handful of his very favorite doggy biscuits as a bribe—praying it would work, and feeling ridiculously relieved when it did.
    He slumped toward me, snatched the biscuits right off my palm, then turned away to eat them, as though I couldn’t be trusted. As though I might change my mind and try to yank them right back, even though I’d never done so before.
    I knelt by his side, watching Bodhi and cheerleader girl talk, and laugh, and use any excuse they could think of to tap each other on the shoulder, the arm, the hand. A scene that reminded me of the times I used to spy on my big sister, Ever, and her boyfriend.
    Telling myself I was merely studying for when it would be my turn to be a teen—that I wasn’t invading her privacy—remembering how they acted the very same way.
    And if I thought my insides felt bad before, watching Bodhi and cheerleader girl flirt with each other, well, it left me feeling all hollow and weird.
    Sure I could manifest the same shiny, pink lip gloss that made her lips gleam.
    Sure I could braid my hair with the same kind of glistening beads that chimed like bells every time she flicked her head from side to side.
    Heck, I could even manifest my own cheerleading outfit—all I had to do was envision it and it was as good as mine. Easy-peasy.
    But I could never fill the sweater like she did.
    I would never look as good in the skirt.
    I would never look anything like her.
    She was gorgeous, exotic, and when she wore a bra she managed to fill it.
    Unlike me, she was a teen.
    She was as opposite of lanky-haired, semi-stubby-nosed, blue-eyed, flat-chested me as you could get.
    And there was nothing I could do about it.
    I was stuck.
    Eternally stuck.
    Or, at least, that’s what I thought until I remembered what Bodhi had recently said:
    “You have no idea how it works, do you?” His eyes had locked on mine. “No one is ever stuck anywhere, Riley. Seriously, what kind of a place do you think the Here & Now is?” I’d gaped. At first unable to utter the words, though it wasn’t long before I’d said,
    “You mean, I can … I can, maybe … actually
    … turn thirteen someday ?” I’d pressed my lips together, sure it was too good to be true. It was all I’d ever wanted. All I’d ever dreamed. And from the moment I died in the accident, I’d been sure the possibility had died along with me.
    But Bodhi just quirked his brow and shrugged in a vague, noncommittal kind of way. “There’re no limits that I’m aware of—pretty much anything is possible,” he’d said, refusing to give any details, keeping the statement purposely hazy, and yet, he’d said it all the same. And at that moment, watching the glorious cheerleader girl standing before me, well, I clung to those words like a drowning man to a life raft.
    Bodhi hooked his thumb over his