The Heart Ring

Chapter 7 – Pressure Builds

Abby told herself she’d learned her lesson with Jenna. She believed it until Monday.

By third period the colors were already tugging at her attention. If she looked softly, not hard, she could “nudge” them without being swallowed. In history, she let her eyes rest on a boy slumped two rows up. His chest shimmered faint green. When she thought calm, the green brightened, a flicker of yellow threading through. He sat straighter.

In the next row, a girl by the window sagged into her hand. A gray haze wrapped her chest. Abby leaned gently, no harder than a breath. The gray rippled, letting a pale pink glow through. The girl blinked, stretched, and began writing again.

Abby’s heart lifted. It didn’t hurt this time. No flood, no backlash. Just a touch.

Maybe she was learning.

The thought carried her through the day, careful as someone balancing water in a glass. On the bus home, colors crowded the narrow aisle, but she kept her gaze soft and let them pass. She slid the ring against her finger with her thumb, the stone catching slants of sunlight, and thought: Maybe Grandpa was wrong. Maybe this isn’t a trial. Maybe it’s a gift I can learn to use.

---

She saw Randy before she reached the stairs.

He leaned against the lockers near the stairwell, backpack dragging at one shoulder. His glow pulsed darker than ever: reds boiling into bruise-purple, black threads thickening, smoke curling out as though it wanted to breathe on its own. The air warped around him like heat above asphalt.

Abby froze. Then, slowly, she stepped closer.

“Randy?”

His head snapped up. His eyes were bloodshot, jaw clenched. “What?”

The shadow stirred, stretching taller, tasting the air. Abby’s stomach clenched. She told herself she wouldn’t push, wouldn’t pry. Just a nudge. Just enough to help.

She let her focus lean, soft but steady, like pressing her hand flat against a closed door.

Heat punched her chest. The ring seared.

Randy’s glow convulsed—red surging, black writhing like snakes. The shadow lashed outward, and for a heartbeat Abby felt its hunger sink into her. Her lungs cinched. He hates you, the hiss slithered. He always hated you.

She staggered, books clattering to the floor. Her vision swam, her breath cut short. The connection held sticky and hot, sucking her strength like sap from a wound.

“Abby?” Randy’s voice, real and startled, broke through.

The shadow recoiled like smoke caught in a gust. The link snapped. Abby hit her knees, chest heaving, hands trembling too badly to pick up her books.

Randy stared. “What the hell’s wrong with you?”

Abby shook her head, grabbed her things in a rush, and bolted down the hall before he could ask again.

---

In her room, she leaned against the door, gasping. The cedar chest sat in the corner, brass fittings dull in the dim light. The ring still burned against her skin, a brand she couldn’t put down.

“This isn’t helping,” she whispered. “It’s hurting.”

But the chest stayed quiet.

And somewhere across the hall, Randy’s glow pulsed dark, steady as a drumbeat.