Becoming Truitt Skye 2

By Adrea Peters

Obsessed with finding Eva, Truitt is at her wit's end and incredibly destructive on all levels. She refuses to accept her responsibilities in the City on the Sea and to all souls round the world. Furthermore, Truitt will not let anyone help her. Truth be told, everyone has had quite enough of the explosiv

• Language: English
• Publisher: MMH Press
• Release date: Dec 12, 2020
• ISBN: 9780645015591

Book preview

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When I put this book (The City on the Sea) down it had become an old friend.

Pat, Mt. Philo

My children and I loved Becoming Truitt Skye: Book One as it had such wonderful elements of creativity, imagination, humor, and thinking beyond current limits! I enjoyed finding a book that we could read together and enjoy! Cannot wait to read Book Two together!

Maria Weesner and kids, age 11 and 9

Truitt Skye is a truly inspirational character who allows you to see the world in a whole new light. I was captivated by her spirit in the first book and cannot wait to be enlightened by this book.

Kaylee LeCompte

Truitt Skye is an intense, electrifying literary work that took me on a journey of deep introspection, challenging my thoughts as I delved in a world of wonder and intrigue about what is real and what is imagined.

Jennifer Sharp, author and publisher

Truitt Skye (and Adrea Peters) were masterful in their ability to weave a bridge between the known and the unknown, to explain in a way I can understand, what we were, what we are and what we will become. Tell me MORE Truitt.

J Botelho

Truitt’s journey catapults the mind into a realm of endless

possibilities. It’s nothing short of magical!

Jen Frankenhoff

Magical, like the book’s author with her two dogs,

Skye and Fig.

Peter Dietrich

Truitt is the mirror of life; curiosity, bravery and courage. She represents the love, trust, and possibility we can lose over time and fight to bring back. A true representation of how we are working to raise our 3 teens today.

Jodie Gallant

I am mesmerized by Adrea Peters’ writing. She not only captures the essence of a typical Milwaukee winter but makes the reader feel as if you are living in it as you read. We loved reading Truitt as a mother daughter book club!

Becoming Truitt Skye is a marvelous mystery tour of whimsy and wonder. This treasured story takes the reader on a journey of inner expansion and exploration that feels like a quantum leap in consciousness and is wildly entertaining ride the whole way through.

Amber Lilyestrom

A perfect combo of an intro to Quantum Physics, and a living our best lives primer. Truitt Skye, Book 1: The City on the Sea is like experiencing The Beatles’ ‘Here Comes the Sun’ in the form of reading a book. Truitt Skye gives us a glimpse, in Truvie’s short seventeen years and seventeen days, of lifetimes of curiosity and love, pain and healing, loss, joy and hope. I cannot wait to read Cave of Souls, and I agree with Truitt’s Dad, as he says about Gram: ‘She’s earned our listening.’

Holly Hall-Perry

The author, Adrea, knows how to weave a story that is vivid, creative, and brings all the characters to life. A page turner that leaves you craving for the next adventure and now it’s here! I cannot wait to read the ongoing journey of Truitt Skye!

Laura Hudman, an avid fan of Truitt

It is not only entertaining, but to an open heart, allows the

labyrinthian of lessons to filter into the amazing possibilities of ‘what if?’ one allows oneself to go there. My mind was like a sponge absorbing all the delicious messages as I read through this beautiful story. I laughed a lot and cried too, and nodded as I quietly whispered to my Mother in heaven… ‘’That’s what I thought…’’ Hope is healing. Heartfelt congratulations Adrea L. Peters. What a creative genius you are. Ten stars all the way.

Mickey Martin – Author of The Given Trilogy

While reading Becoming Truitt Skye, Book 1, my dreams

became more vivid, complex and other-worldly. Truitt is

personable, someone you adore immediately. Her exploration of the multi-layers of humanity through quantum physics had my mind expanding as it once did when I was younger. This book is a reminder to allow for the possibilities in life. Let go and trust.

Bella Icenhower

Truitt is absolutely mesmerizing! Adrea found a way to take quantum truths and share them through story in a way that is fun, enchanting, and so beautifully written that no matter who reads it, they will walk away with a deeper understanding of themselves.

Kristen Hubbard, poet

Truitt Skye transcends age, time, and physics. As her name and her story suggest, the sky is not a ceiling, but an aspiration to reach for. Reading this book reminded me that my mind is my box and to work at breaking down the walls and breaking through. I’m excited to see her next adventure.

S. Reed

Copyright © 2020 Adrea L. Peters

First published in Australia in 2020

An imprint of MMH Press

www.mmhpress.com

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the copyright owner except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Cover design: Cassandra Neece

Interior design: Cassandra Neece

National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication data:

The Cave of Souls/ Adrea L. Peters

YA/ Fiction

ISBN: 978-0-6450155-7-7 (hc)

ISBN: 978-0-6450155-8-4 (sc)

ISBN: 978-0-6450155-9-1 (e)

For Lauren and Win,

who gave me a home when I needed it most.

All my love, always.

Contents

Prologue

The Isle of Necessity

1

Over the Edge

2

Resistance, Party of One

3

Chasing Pebbles

4

Seeing Red

5

Breaking Through

6

The Reel Room

7

The Need to Share

8

Trouble

9

Illumination

10

The Orange Grove

11

Confronted

12

Out of Focus

13

In Service

14

No More Buts

15

The Moving Map

16

Letting Sylvia Go

17

Inside a Life

18

Permission to be Truvie

19

Inside

20

Piecing Truitt Together

21

The Equation for Imagination

22

Mind Becomes Matter

23

The Next and the Next

24

The Hunt

25

Serena Rolling

26

Falling Apart

27

No Other Way

28

Soul Searching

29

Back on Glass

30

Isle of Exchanges

31

The Last Thing

32

The World of Serena Rolling

33

Hello and Goodbye

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Prologue

The Isle of Necessity

A sunny, brisk autumn day rippled across the islands of the City on the Sea. Clouds meandered in the distance. A smoky scent of amber lingered in the air.

Junius Stelae clad in a black tee shirt and jeans with a beanie knit cap covering his bald head sat at an outdoor table donned with a full afternoon tea set up. Across from him and smiling was Miss Frank, who wore a cashmere white turtleneck dress. Her feet bare, and her toenails painted a shimmering lavender blue. Her golden-brown hair draped across her shoulders. A stack of romance novels on the chair beside her.

How much more do you think can she take? Miss Frank asked.

Junius lifted the ornate porcelain tea pot nestled in a cozy patterned with a green crow and replenished Miss Frank’s cup.

Unfortunately, he said. Quite a bit more. She’s not nearly desperate enough to take our help.

Poor Sussy, Miss Frank said with a slight laugh. She’s blown up the Restore so many times.

Three hundred and two, Junius said, then raised his index finger. Make that three hundred and three. She’s just blasted him to bits again.

Miss Frank took a sip of tea. I do love her creations though. Café Coeur and a bookstore. I feel spoiled.

Junius offered Miss Frank a gingerbread cookie. A proper tea with you does fill me with particular contentedness.

I couldn’t agree more, she said.

Behind Miss Frank was a small café with the name, Café Coeur, painted above the arched entrance. Large windows on either side of the front door housed a few tables. The décor French with blue tablecloths, vintage wallpaper and the gentle sound of accordion music playing in the background. Right next door was the charming The City on the Sea bookstore.

How’s Tots handling this? Miss Frank asked. I’m sure she’d prefer Truitt get back to work in the Cave of Souls.

Wouldn’t we all? Junius said as Tots materialized wearing an orange beret, a brown silk jumpsuit and a pair of brown Mary Jane’s that had orange polka dots to perfectly match her hat.

I hate it. And I love it. A chair and tea setting appeared in front of Tots LaRue. Cocoa, please. Whip it.

When Junius tipped the tea kettle, a steaming rich chocolaty-ooze poured into Tots’ cup. Simultaneously the chooshhh sound of whipped cream spraying from a cannister echoed as it smothered the cocoa.

Tots took a slurp, then said, I’d like Truitt to be happier. She licked the white sugary remnants from her upper lip. And she will be. Suffering first, elation after.

Truitt, elated? Miss Frank said with a smile. Hard to imagine even before she was Truvie Tucker.

The chime of a bell sounded. Dinggg as the door to the café opened.

She’s trying too hard to hold onto them, Pel said as he walked out of the doors of Café Coeur carrying a charcuterie board. He popped a chunk of cheese in his mouth. I like her now. All mixed up.

We know, Tots, Miss Frank and Junius said in unison.

And she likes you, Junius said.

It’s the only thing keeping her here, Miss Frank said.

Love, Tots said with a giggle. Is everything.

1

Over the Edge

Truitt Skye leapt over the trio of cobble stone steps and into the small stone cottage called the Restore, where memories come to life, without bothering to open the door.

Out! Sussy Vox, clad in a pink suit and lime green bowtie, shouted from behind the wood counter of the otherwise empty room made of pale cream brick walls. He pounded the side of his fist to the countertop sending a stumbling vibration in all directions. This is not the place to escape your responsibilities.

Truitt gave Sussy a tight, gripping leave-me-alone-and-do-as-I-command look. She needed a memory, any memory, as long as it got her out of the City on the Sea.

You have to help me, Truitt said. It’s your soul’s purpose, Sussy. It’s what I have you here for, isn’t it?

There are no memories left to share, Miss Skye, Sussy said.

Truitt taught Sussy Vox how to find just the right memory. But, of course, that was as the Truitt before she’d lived as Truvie Tucker for seventeen years and seventeen days. The Truitt that knew things. The Truitt that everyone here loved and respected and listened to.

This Truitt lived a life with humanity, with a real sense of smell and sound, and the touch of fingers and toes and full body hugs. This Truitt wanted to be human again.

Not just human. This Truitt wanted her life as Truvie Tucker back.

Then take me to one I’ve seen before, Truitt said. Autumn, preferably. I didn’t care what memory. So long as it isn’t here.

Trust me, Sussy said. If only I could help you remember your future, I would do it in perpetuity.

I’m sure. Truitt stared at his multi-colored polka dot tie, frowning.

Truitt should be repairing souls in the Cave. That was her role, just as Sussy’s role was to offer memories to soul workers. Those who needed to remember why they remained here in the City on the Sea, the world of souls, as opposed to jumping in the silver pool and beginning again. New body. New life. No memory of the City on the Sea.

What’s so wrong with wanting to be home? Truitt asked. I only have memories left of my family. I want them. I want to hold the memories because I can’t—I’m not there with them anymore.

At all cost? Sussy asked. Risking the stability of this world, and theirs?

They’re fading too fast, she said.

The more you become who you are, Truitt Skye, the less—

Seventeen and in love with Hatch I’ll be, Truitt cut in. I know.

The last three times she’d come to the Restore, Sussy gave her the same memory of falling into the crevasse after Fig’s red ball and hitting her head. It was the fatal blow that ended her life as Truvie Tucker a couple hours later.

You created the Restore to show souls the memory they need to see, Sussy said. To accept and become who they are, unseparated from humanity forevermore.

I’ve decided to change the rules, Truitt said. I demand the Restore show me the memories I want to see.

It’s doing that, Miss Skye, Sussy said. Repeatedly.

No it isn’t! Truitt screamed. The floors crackled and snapped open. Bricks bulged and shifted the mortar holding them in place.

Oh Truitt. Sussy slowly lowered behind the counter as the wall gave way with a plume of dust and rubble. Not again.

Without hesitation, Truitt ran straight into the bursting wreckage.

2

Resistance, Party of One

Truitt emerged from the collapsing Restore into a memory from the middle of grandmother Helena’s art studio in the carriage house of her parents’ home in Milwaukee. She glanced out the window to her right and found the golden leaves of a birch tree surrendering to the call of autumn. It was her favorite time of year because school started and the air cooled. Heat made her insane. Truitt wanted to see her father working on the equation he was designing to accelerate imagination into experience. Or reading her something he discovered from an out-of-print book or an article from Nature magazine. Anything with physics at the center of conversation.

Unfortunately, this memory had memory had nothing to do with physics. Or her father.

She knew this particular memory all too well and could do nothing but live it. One thing about the Restore that never failed: once a memory started, it ran its course until it kicked the rememberer out. The Restore had complete control, something Truitt found beyond infuriating.

I suppose I can’t say I’ll die young anymore, Truvie’s grandmother, Helena, said. I thought I would, you know? Die early. So much earlier. Nothing tragic. Just a short life well lived. But dead, nonetheless.

Happy birthday, Gram, Truvie said as her soul, Truitt, wriggled and for a split second held on before fully succumbing to the memory.

Seventy-seven, her grandmother said as she picked up a paintbrush and carefully coated it with paint. A drip lowered to the edge of the bristles and released just as she raised the brush, leaving a drop on her grandmother’s already paint-spotted house coat. I thought I might make sixty-seven. Didn’t want to, she said she dabbed and stroked the paint into place. I never wanted to be this old.

She turned to face Truvie. I never wanted to live a day beyond your grandfather. Not one minute, actually, and here I’ve gone and lasted forty more years.

I’m glad you did, Truvie said, moving toward the painting. I love you.

Her grandmother smiled. I love you, too. But if death mattered to the dead, what would be the point?

Dad thinks you get a new body and start over immediately, Truvie said. Mom says you become your favorite flower. I’m not exactly sure what she means though. A seed? Or the actual flower? Bloomed or budding? Or all of it?

And what do you think? her grandmother asked.

About flowers? Truvie asked. Not much.

About dying, dear, her grandmother pressed.

Truvie shrugged. Dunno. I guess I think about living.

Her grandmother paused for a brief inhale. Then said, Life is a series of deaths. Not just people. Everything dies. I know you don’t understand, she said. I hope you never do. I hope when I go, you’re glad. I might even try to piss you off, so you applaud when I go. Relieved to be rid of me. At peace, they’ll say about me. Rest in Peace. R. I. P. Let’s hope that’s the truth. Finally get some peace for this old lost and bitter soul.

Tears burned behind Truvie’s eyes. She swallowed.

Mom! A distant but distinct call sounded. It was Truvie’s mom. Mad. Very mad.

Truvie and her grandmother looked toward the window facing the main house.

This is YOUR PARTY! her mother shouted. Truvie! Are you hiding up there?

I’m sorry, Helena said to Truvie. You know how awful I get on my birthday.

MOM! Sylvia shrieked.

Even though it makes me sad, Truvie said. I like hearing what you have to say.

You and you alone, her grandmother said with a sweet smile.

• • •

Truitt stood before Sussy. She gritted her lower teeth to the back of her upper teeth, eyes narrowing, the tops of her ears burning. She wanted to return to Milwaukee and never return to the City on the Sea again.

Memories don’t move you, Sussy said. They imprison you.

"I’d rather be in that prison than this one," Truitt said.

Sussy yawned and inspected his fingernails for several seconds before he said, The more you fight this world, the less you will experience that one.

Not true, Truitt said.

True. He pointed his thumb at the memory of her grandmother’s studio rapidly fading back to the pale brick wall of the Restore. You think clinging to memories will save you, but they hold you in place, spinning in circles. You, and all of humanity, need you as you are now, not then. Never then. Yesterday is gone, as in never to be again. Ever. Never. Ever. Gonnnneee.

Did I intend to be this tortured here? Is that what I wanted? What I desired? Truitt stared at the pale brick wall willing it to return her home, but knowing that she would only feel—

Torn. Shattered. Sussy circled his wrists, fingers flailing and added, Please. That’s absurdity, Miss Skye. Let me remind you, ah-gain, you lived as Truvie to know what it means to be human so that you could better us to serve them, not you. But, of course, when one serves others—

Truitt turned away and drew in a deep breath. They serve themselves. We’re them, they’re us. No separation. Heard it. Hate it. I’ve never felt so far from who I am.

I agree, Miss Skye, Sussy said. If you could conjure a modicum of focus on your training—on learning how to help souls instead of gripping to Truvie’s lost life, everything would fall into place. He snapped his fingers. In a flash of a human instant.

Her life isn’t lost, she said.

I’m a reflection of you, Sussy said. You think that. Not I.

Without looking at Sussy, Truitt released a guttural groan and walked into and out of the door of the Restore.

• • •

A gusty, frigid wind ripped against a bruised sky as she hurried down the steps of the Restore. Dense clouds billowed and shifted swiftly on all sides as thunder punched the silence. Truitt hugged her bare arms around her chest. Goose bumps prickled at her skin, head to toe and back up again. Her skinny jeans and tee hardly warmed her.

With a blasting crack, the rain released, dousing her.

Truitt knew she could stop the storm, but she wanted it to rage. She wanted everyone in the City to know how miserable she was, and pelt them, if only metaphorically with it. She missed the life she loved, including horrible Candace Little and her minions who teased her endlessly. And as much as she hated to admit it, she loved her life in the City on the Sea. Pel, and Tots and Latham. The genius of Dr. Blick and the annoying insights of her grandfather. . .

She was stuck. Plain. Simple. Trapped. Ensnared. Entombed. And extraordinarily alone.

• • •

It was Truitt Skye’s fault. All of it. She created this mess. On purpose. A fact the Truvie in her could not reconcile. Truitt hardly knew what was real, and what was not. Truvie Tucker was dead. No doubt. Thing was, no one bothered to tell Truvie that nothing ever ends. It changes. People dropped their body but lived on. As energy. And a little concentration.

She had concentration up the wazoo. But little good it was doing her. No one would help her. To which they all kept blaming her for. You’re doing this, not me, they’d all say. We reflect you.

She let out a groan that escalated to a scream.

To every soul—other than the Truvie of her Truitt—being here was welcome and exciting news. Something to celebrate, and they did. She’d asked a multitude of souls who had arrived in The City and they had all jumped for joy without hesitation. All thrilled to be here. What she couldn’t understand was how she, Truitt Skye, knew the life of an innocent teenaged girl named Truvie Tucker would end on the seventeenth day of her seventeenth year, and did nothing to stop it. Why Truitt did nothing to continue on as Truvie and thwart the plan to end Truvie’s life was absolutely beyond her comprehension.

Truvie had to go, or Truitt did. That was the rub. She couldn’t be both. Everyone here in the City on the Sea, the world created to serve the souls of humanity, told her there was no Truvie. Only an expanded Truitt. Yet Truitt still very much felt her Truvie-ness. And despised her responsibilities as Truitt.

When Truitt quieted her mind enough to relax, she knew Truvie would love it here. She simply couldn’t figure out how to keep her mind quiet for more than a nanosecond.

Which made her want to combust!

Truitt let out another wailing scream. Aaaaahhhhhh! STOP THINKING!

She took off at a sprint then took flight into a boiling black sky.

• • •

As she flew, trying to outpace her mind, Truitt Skye heard her grandfather Junius’ words echoing, You are a soul to serve all souls.

This obligation was meant to be a good and honorable thing. Truitt created the City on the Sea to be a world where humans were heard, protected and served in perpetuity, whether they knew it or not. It didn’t matter what horrid thing they did or said or believed, this world served. Judgement and opinion free. Adoration its fundamental emotion. And when a human decided their time in a body was complete, this world greeted their soul with a grand celebration. Then it broke apart their major lessons and returned the lessons to the silver pool so new souls would evolve from the experiences of the prior souls and thrive evermore.

The world of Truitt Skye was a world of never-ending love. A world that not only celebrated possibility, it was possibility. Always becoming more based solely on the experiences of humanity. Humans were at the helm through their living of life, though a miniscule few believed that. Truth was, the separation of soul and human was nonexistent. Death was a farce from the perspective of every soul here. No endings. Only beginnings, which more often than not, made Truitt Skye question their sanity.

"Souls become more inside the limitations of