Jacque Pierce sat in the window seat in her bedroom, watching her

neighbors’ house across the street. I’m not really being nosy, she thought to

herself. Just curious.

“Yeah,” she snorted. Only if you call curious having your eyes glued to

your neighbors’ house like a hound on the hunt. Oh, well. I can call a spade

‘a spade’tomorrow morning, she told her conscience.

The Henrys were having a foreign exchange student stay with them this

year. They didn’t have any children of their own and Jacque didn’t know if

that was by choice or because they weren’t able to have children. Either way,

Jacque was here to get the nitty-gritty on the situation and report to her best

friends afterward.

So here she sat, scoping out the neighbors house with her lights turned off

and blinds cracked just enough to see. To top off her James Bond experience,

she even had binoculars! Now if she only had the nifty background music to

go along her shenanigans.

She’d been sitting in her window for an hour and was just about to give up

when a black stretch limo pulled to the curb. Now isn’t this strange? she

thought. A foreign exchange student arriving in a limo? She put the

binoculars to her face and adjusted them to get a better look, settling them

over the passenger door to see who would emerge. She knew this was a little

much, but honestly, in a town of 700 there just wasn’t a whole lot of

excitement and Jacque would take it where she could get it.

The driver got out of the limo to open the back door, but it was already

opening, and the boy who stepped out of that limo had to be the most

beautiful guy she’d ever seen. And that was only his profile. Wow, I mean

wow, was all Jacque could think. Jacque couldn’t even imagine what his

entire face must have looked like. He was tall, probably six foot one or so,

and his hair was jet black. It was longer on top and she could tell that he had

bangs that fell across his face. They swept to the left, partially covering that

eye. He had broad shoulders and, from what she could see of his profile, high

cheek bones, a straight nose, and full lips. She realized her mouth had

dropped open and she was all but drooling over this guy. She shut it and

watched as he and his driver conversed. It all seemed very formal until the

driver hugged the boy with obvious deep affection. He must be more than just

his driver, Jacque thought.

Suddenly, the boy turned as if he had heard what she was thinking and

looked straight at her window, straight at her. Jacque froze, unable to look

away from the mesmerizing blue eyes that held her. All her thoughts seemed

to fade into the distance and she thought she heard the words: “At last, my

Jacquelyn.”

Jacque shook her head, trying to clear the haze that had filled it. After she

came to her senses from the intense stare, she recapped in her mind what his

face had looked like. She was right about the cheekbones, nose, and lips.

What she wasn’t prepared for was that his crystal blue eyes now seemed to

glow in the moon light; the hair that fell across his forehead and over his eye

only added to his mysteriousness. Overall he had a very masculine, very

beautiful face.

The shirt he was wearing was black and, thanks to her handy dandy

binoculars, she was able to see that it fit tightly and showed off a muscular

chest and flat stomach. He had a black leather biker jacket on, but past that

she couldn’t see because the car was in the way. She imagined his legs were

every bit as nice as the rest of him.

When she looked back at the street, the mysterious guy was walking into

the Henrys’ house. As she saw the door close she heard the voice again.

“Soon.”

Jacque sat there for a few minutes, trying to get her brain to work again.

Everything seemed so hazy. After blinking what felt like a thousand times,

she pulled herself together, picked up the phone, and dialed Jen’s number.

Three rings later Jen answered. “What’s the word?”

Jacque took a slow breath and said “I think you better come over.”

“I’m there, chick. See ya in 5,” Jen answered and hung up.

Jacque grinned to herself. It was great to have a friend you could always

depend on to be there when you needed her.

Jacque picked up the phone again and called Sally, who answered after

only one ring. She had obviously been diligently manning the phone, waiting

for Jacque to call with details on the latest small town drama.

“Jen is on her way over,” Jacque said. “I need you to come too. We need

to talk.”

“Okay,” Sally simply said and hung up.

Fifteen minutes later, the three friends were gathered on Jacque’s bedroom

floor, hot chocolate in hand, because how can you have a girl powwow

without hot chocolate?

“So fill it and spill it,” Jen said.

“Okay,” Jacque said, taking a deep breath. “So I’m sitting in my window

seat, shades cracked, lights off, binoculars in hand…”

“Binoculars? Really, you honestly were using binoculars?” Sally

interrupted.

“Well, you said you wanted details, so I was giving you details,” Jacque

defended.

“Oooh, did you have the Mission Impossible sound track playing in the

background? Cuz that would have been spy-tastic,” Jen said enthusiastically.

“Actually,” Jacque said distractedly, “I was thinking more James Bondish. You know, with the whole stakeout thing…”

“No, huh-uh. That would be more like Dog the Bounty Hunter type stuff.

But you couldn’t be Beth, ‘cause you’re not stacked enough on top. You

would have to be baby Lisa…” Jen rattled on.

“You are so, so not comparing me to Dog the Bounty Hunter’s daughter

right now. And why are we talking about this anyway, because it is sooooo

NOT the point!” Jacque growled in frustration.

“Spy analogies aside, I was sitting there about an hour and then a black

stretch limo pulled up in front of the Henrys’ house.”

“A limo? What foreign exchange student shows up in a limo?” Jen asked.

“I know, right? That’s what I was thinking,” Jacque stated. “I assure you

the limo was of no consequence once the person inside stepped out. Ladies, I

saw the most gorgeous guy to ever grace my line of sight.”

“When you say gorgeous,” Jen started, “are we talking Brad Pitt boyish

good looks, or Johnny Depp make ya want to slap somebody?”

“No, we’re talking Brad and Johnny need to bow down and recognize,”

Jacque answered. “But, aside from him being dropped off in a limo and aside

from the fact that he was a walking Calvin Klein ad, it began to get strange at

this point in our story, boys and girls,” Jacque said in a spooky voice.

“Like it wasn’t strange already?” Sally asked.

“Well…okay, strange-er. Just as he was about to walk up the path, he

suddenly turned and looked straight at me, as if he could sense I was watching

him! Like, he looked right in my eyes. I literally couldn’t move. It was like I

was mesmerized by him or something. And then we entered the world of

‘what the hell.’ As he was staring at me, I heard a voice in my head and it said

‘at last, my Jacquelyn.’ Then, as he turned to go in the house, I heard the

voice again. It said, ‘soon’.”

Jacque stared expectantly at her two best friends, waiting for them to tell

her she’d finally jumped off the deep end. But they just sat there, staring back

at her.

“Well?” Jacque asked.

Finally, Jen stirred. Taking a deep breath in, she looked down at her empty

hot chocolate mug and said, “We’re gonna need more hot chocolate.”

“Agreed,” Sally and Jacque replied at the same time.

Once Jen had returned with three fresh mugs of hot chocolate and Oreo

cookies, she said, “So, let me see if I’m catching what you’re throwing. Hottie

exchange student drives up in a limo, steps out, rocks your world, looks into

your eyes, and speaks to you in your head? Am I getting the gist of it here?”

Jacque nodded her head, sheepishly looking at the floor. “I mean, I guess

it was his voice in my head. It could’ve been a long lost dead relative who

decided to speak to me the moment that hottie looked into my eyes.”

Jen and Sally both gave Jacque their “get a larger spoon if your going to

shovel it in that big” look.

“What?” Jacque asked. “I’m just saying,” she said, throwing her hands up

in the air in frustration. Flopping back onto the floor, she groaned loudly and

covered her eyes with the back of her hand. “Am I going crazy, ya’ll?”

“No, sweetie. You’ve been gone a long time now, we just didn’t want you

to know that we knew,” Sally said with humor.

“Seriously, I know it sounds crazy. But I promise I heard a voice – a

beautiful, deep, masculine voice in my head, and it knew my name! That is

crazy, jacked up, ‘put her in a straight jacket’, totally insane!” Jacque looked

at them both with fear in her eyes. She truly did wonder if she had finally

cracked.

There was after all, people in her family of questionable sanity, her mother

being one of them. Jacque loved her mom and they had a good relationship,

but she wasn’t always in touch with reality. Jacque’s father wasn’t in the

picture and never had been. He had bailed as soon as he found out her mom

was pregnant. Thankfully, she had two best friends who kept her feet firmly

on the ground, which was why she was so fervently seeking their thoughts on

this matter.

Sally finally spoke up. “I don’t think you’re crazy, Jac. Really, you’re not.

There has to be some sort of explanation. We’ll figure it out, we always do.”

“Yeah,” Jen added. “It’s two weeks ‘til school starts. From now until then

we are on scout detail.”

Sally nodded her agreement.

The three were quiet for a few minutes, each pondering ways to “run into”

the new exchange student without seeming too obvious. Jen was lying on the

floor, looking up at the ceiling fan when she said, “We need to find a way to

introduce ourselves to him so that we can each get a good look and see if

Sally or I hear a voice in our head.”

“My mom was planning on taking over a good ol’ Southern meal for him

since he isn’t from here. We could ask if we could go over with her. Or would

that be too lame?” Jacque asked.

“No, I think that’s perfect,” Jen stated.

By midnight they had come up with a somewhat weak game plan, the

whole of it revolving around going with Jacque’s mom to give the new

exchange student some fried chicken, taters, and corn on the cob. Seriously,

how lame can you get? Jacque thought as she lay on her bedroom floor. Jen

and Sally had fallen asleep on the other side of her room each with a blanket

wrapped around them.

Jacque sat up and looked around her room. This was a place she felt safe

and comfortable: the twin-size bed with the new green bed spread her mom

had bought her for her birthday, the stained-glass lamp with absolutely no

theme whatsoever that sat on her small wood desk. She, Sally, and Jen had

carved various things on the desk’s surface. She looked at her dresser mirror,

which had pictures lining both sides, mostly of Jen, Sally and her in various

places and poses.

A few hours ago I was just another seventeen year old getting ready to

start her senior year. I was so normal, she thought.

She had three homecoming mums hanging on the wall next to her bed,

and on the other side was the window seat she had occupied tonight, where

her life had changed in a way she wasn’t sure of yet. Jacque lay back down on

her back and watched her ceiling fan go around in a circle, the motor lulling

her to sleep. Her last thought as she drifted off was of a full moon, whatever

that meant.