Free TheFallenStarBookSeries1 by Jessica Sorensen Page A

twig. No, this sound was way worse. A crackle, like the one I’d heard in the school parking lot the day I’d first seen the glowing yellow eyes. Fear rocketed through me. I had no idea what to do. Turn and sprint back to the car? Try and explain what was happening to Alex?  Neither sounded appealing.
    My heart drummed in my chest as I shot a glance over my shoulder. Only trees and snow. I turned back around, only to end up slamming straight into Alex. My forehead banged against his shoulder, and a fire ignited under my skin. I gasped, backing away from him.
    Holding his hands out in front of him, he cautiously stepped away from me. “You okay?”
    I nodded, rubbing my forehead. “Sorry. I wasn’t watching were I was going.”
    “Yeah, I got that.” He nodded at the trees behind me.  “What were you looking at back there?”
    “Nothing.” My voice squeaked a little.  “I just thought I heard something, but it was nothing.”
    He eyed me over carefully, then apparently satisfied by my answer, spread his hands out to the side of him. “Well, this is it.”
    “Huh?”  I stared at him blankly. “This is what?”
    “This is what I wanted to show you.”
    Funny, but my near panic attack had made me forgot why we’d came up here in the first place. “Okay…” I glimpsed at all of the trees and snow around us. What was so special about this particular spot? It looked just like every other spot. “It’s…nice, I guess.”
    He laughed a genuine, heartfelt laugh. The kind of laugh that made his green eyes light up. “Gemma, this right here,” he pointed to a spot on the ground in front of him, “is what I wanted to show you.”
    For a brief second, I got lost in the way he’d said my name in a normal, anti-hating voice. But I quickly forgot all about it when I caught a glimpse of what he was pointing at. In the middle the crisp white snow, right between our feet, a small spot of dirt showed through like the snow had instantaneously melted away after it had landed there. And the dirt wasn’t brown, but black and ashy.
    I looked back up and found Alex watching me with curious eyes.
    “What?” I asked. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
    He shrugged. “No reason.”
    I shook my head. Whatever. “So what is it,” I asked, pointing at the ashy spot.
    “Well…” He tapped his finger on his lips. “See, there’s this legend that about twenty years ago, a star had fallen from the sky and landed right here.” He pointed to the strange spot. “And I’m not just talking about a meteorite, but an actual star.”
    I frowned. He was joking. He had to be. “If a real star hit the Earth then you and I wouldn’t be standing here, talking.”
    “Now that’s where you’re wrong,” he said simply. “It wasn’t a whole star that fell, but a small piece that broke loose when the star began to spin too quickly. And when the piece hit this spot, the snow has never been able to stay here. It’s like the heat of the star is still trapped there, and it melts the snow away.”
    “I’ve never heard of anything like that,” I told him. “Are you sure you’re not just trying to…”
    “Trying to what?”
    I sighed. “Pull one over on me.”
    He grinned. “Now why would I do something like that?”
    I rolled my eyes. “I think the real question is why wouldn’t you do something like that?”
    He deliberated this. “Yeah, I can see where you’re coming from. But I’m not.”
    We both stood there for a moment, staring at one another, my blood boiling from the electric heat.
    “So if this actually did happen, then why haven’t I heard of it before?” I asked, breaking the silence.
    “Because hardly anyone knows about it.” He paused, before adding, “Even some mediocre high school astronomy teacher.”
    “Mr. Sterling isn’t that bad,” I said. “And he knows a lot about astronomy.”
    He lifted an eyebrow. “He isn’t that bad? Wasn’t he was the one who put you and I together in a