I'm Not Who You Think I Am

by Felicitas Ivey

  “I understood,” Uncle Yushua assured her. “Don’t be too late.”

  Xiu opened her mouth to protest and I hissed, “Asian fusion.”

  “I know we don’t know the city, so we’ll be careful,” I assured Uncle Yushua with a smile.

  “I’ll look after them,” Kyle promised.

  “Thank you,” Uncle Yushua said.

  IT WAS after supper when Xiu started getting fidgety again. I owed Kyle a lot for keeping her occupied earlier in the day. But he wasn’t here now. I knew she wanted to know what was going on but was too polite or smart to interrogate me within the hearing of the three downstairs. Plus she had been sitting all day. While Xiu didn’t like to run or exercise, she did like moving around, so I needed to get her to work off all this energy.

  “I’m leaving,” Xiu announced when she’d run out of patience. “And you’re coming with me.”

  “I can’t.”

  Xiu didn’t understand and I didn’t want to tell her. Going back to New York would get her to safety, and as much as I wanted to beg her to stay, I couldn’t.

  “You need to tell me what’s going on right now,” she snapped. “Or I’m going to call the Boston police and say that you’re being held a prisoner here.”

  “I’m not!” I protested.

  “Then tell me what’s going on, because it’s gone beyond suspicious into the creepy category,” Xiu said. “I’ve been your friend since we’ve been in first grade. Why wouldn’t I believe you?”

  “Because you’re not believing me when I tell you—”

  “Because you’re feeding me a crap line,” she snarled. “Okay, I’m believing nothing sexual is going on here—”

  “Finally!”

  Xiu glared. “But there’s still something hinky going on. And you’re going to tell me about it.”

  “Hinky? That’s the word you want to use?” I asked, trying to break the tension. Xiu was almost vibrating with it, torn between just leaving or dragging me out of here with her when she went.

  “It’s a good word,” she protested. “Stop trying to change the subject.”

  “Let’s get a coffee,” I said. “We can talk about things then.”

  Xiu looked at me, wondering what the catch was.

  “There’s a coffee shop at the train station, so if you don’t like what I’m saying, you can shove me on Amtrak to go home.”

  “Don’t bet I won’t,” she muttered, going to get her bag. “I don’t care how big you are. Or what new ninja moves you seem to have.”

  I laughed and grabbed my purse before going to tell one of the adults where we were going. Uncle Yushua and Harper were looking at a map on the dining room table, while Rat was stretched out and reading on the couch. Mafdet had claimed his lap and was looking very smug.

  “Xiu and I are going for a coffee. We’ll be back in an hour or so.”

  Uncle Yushua frowned, looking at the clock and seeing how late it was, almost eleven. “At this hour? You’re not going to be able to sleep.”

  “I think that’s the plan,” Rat said, looking up from his book. “No sleep means no dreams, which means he isn’t going to visit her.”

  That was one of the reasons I was going. But also I wanted to explain things to Xiu with other people out of the range of whatever explosion she had. It was safer for everyone involved.

  Xiu popped up behind me. “We’ll be back eventually,” she chirped. “Don’t wait up.”

  She eyed all the books and papers scattered on the table. “It looks like one of my mom’s research projects.”

  She looked around the room, bright eyed and inquisitive, trying to get more information and failing.

  “Xiu’s mom’s a professor over at Columbia,” I explained. “Arthurian literature.”

  Her study did look like this most of the time, especially when she was writing a book. But mostly because she was messy person.

  “You aren’t staying out too late,” Uncle Yushua said. “I don’t care if you don’t have school. When was the last time you slept, young lady?”

  He was looking at Xiu when he said that, but he was including me in the question too.

  “It’s just been a little more than twenty-four hours,” she admitted.

  “She’s done worse,” I said. “I promise the coffee thing is more like a euphemism than a reality.”

  “I’m not getting decaf,” Xiu protested. “And sleep is for the weak—healthy and well-adjusted people, but ones who are wasting their life with this sleep thing. You can do a lot more with your life if you don’t sleep.”

  “While that might be your favorite quote,” Rat said, “you still need sleep, being a growing girl and all that.” He grinned. “Not that you need to grow much more, Kay, but Xiu should get a chance to catch up with you.”

  “I am a pocket Venus,” Xiu sniffed, turning her nose up at him.

  “Is that another phrase for short?” Rat teased. “Just take a phone with you in case you need to call.”

  “I promise I’ll call if there’s trouble,” I said. Not that I was ever really without one, and Xiu was the same.

  “I might even let her,” Xiu added brightly, tugging at me so we’d leave.

  Uncle Yushua looked a little alarmed, while Harper was trying to ignore us. I wasn’t going to tell Harper Xiu wasn’t going to let him get away with it, if she wanted his attention.

  “Call us if you run into anything,” Rat told us, but he stared at Xiu while he was saying that. “You never know what’s out there.”

  Xiu gazed back at him. “Or what’s in here.”

  Uncle Yushua looked at her questioningly, and I wanted to shake Xiu for thinking he was the source of my troubles. What the heck were she and Rat doing? I felt either one of them was baby steps away from marking me as their territory from the way they were looking at each other.

  “So we’ll be close by and will call you if we need help, but we want to do some girl bonding. Away from all of you,” I announced, trying to break the tension only I seemed to have noticed.

  Uncle Yushua nodded. “Away from all the old men,” he teased.

  “Who sit in the corner and plot,” Xiu quipped, before herding me out the door.

  THE NIGHT was hot, with a hint of rain in the air. With the humidity, my curls sprang out all over the place. I’d given up on taming them. I knew a losing battle when I saw one.

  “I’m glad you’re not wearing the hat,” Xiu said.

  “You can’t shame me about my hat,” I said loftily. “It’s a thing of beauty.”

  Xiu snorted. She agreed with Mother about how ugly my hat was. I think that was the only thing they had ever agreed on.

  “You want to grab real food?” I asked. “There’s a diner down the street.”

  There would be fewer people there to overhear our conversation. Plus, I thought most of the shops at the train station would be closed by now, but I had noticed the diner was open twenty-four hours when I’d passed it earlier on a run.

  “You just want to avoid me pushing you on a train out of here,” she sniffed. “Not that I think I can do it, with your new ninja moves.”

  “They are not ninja moves,” I protested. “I’ve taken the same self-defense courses you have.”

  “And yet I don’t remember the part where we were taught to disembowel someone with a butter knife,” Xiu pointed out acidly.

  “I….”

  “If I thought you were going to really do it, I’d have stopped you,” she continued. “Even if it looked like something you can do automatically. I would have tackled you or something. Just so you didn’t get into trouble for it.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  And I didn’t. Xiu studied my face, boring her eyes into mine. She made a lot of people uncomfortable when she did this. It was like she was trying to scan your brain and learn all your secrets. It was just part of who she was.

  “Diner it is, then,” she announced after a minute. “I want to eat my weight in
pancakes.”

  Chapter Twelve

  THE PLACE was empty when we got there, and the twentysomething waitress looked annoyed when we pulled her away from the textbook she was frowning at. It was some sort of bio book from the cover. She motioned at us to sit, and we took a booth in the back, far away from the table she had claimed.

  “Do you want coffee?” the waitress asked as she handed us menus. Her battered nametag read Beth and looked like it was older than the three of us put together. “The special tonight is blueberry pancakes.”

  “Coffee,” Xiu and I chorused, and Beth wandered off to get the pot.

  “We’re never going to sleep,” I said. And that wasn’t a bad thing to me. But Xiu needed it, because I didn’t want her to start hallucinating or something.

  Xiu snorted. “Speak for yourself. Coffee never kept me up.”

  Beth came back, and we studied the menus as she poured coffee into mugs and plopped down a dish of creamer packages. Xiu nabbed the sugar silo that was on the table and emptied an unhealthy amount of it into her coffee before whitening it with cream. And I did the same. Coffee was a ritual for a serious talk, not a drink either of us really enjoyed.

  I studied the menu as Xiu fiddled with her coffee. I didn’t want to start talking only to have Beth interrupt us by asking for our order.

  “What do you want?” Beth asked, after leaving us alone for a couple of minutes.

  “Blueberry pancakes,” Xiu chirped.

  “A Reuben and fries,” I added. I was suddenly hungry, although dinner had only been a couple of hours before.

  Beth nodded, took the menus, and wandered off.

  “I’m stealing your fries,” Xiu announced, stirring her coffee, while she stared at me. “What’s really going on?”

  I opened my mouth to tell her and then closed it again, wondering how I was going to explain any of this to her.

  Xiu sighed and rolled her eyes. “I like Rat.”

  It was a good opening gambit to coax information out of me. She was going to poke until I started talking, so I might as well start.

  “He’s a nice guy and not because he goes running with me.”

  “I reserve judgment on the nice-guy thing, because he’s a morning person,” Xiu proclaimed in horror.

  I laughed. Xiu thought mornings were evil, but she did have to deal with her four brothers also trying to get ready for school and other things during them.

  “The morning is a great time to get things done, while all you night owls are out of the way.”

  It was nice to fall into the rhythm of teasing Xiu, like there was nothing wrong with my life.

  “Which wouldn’t be happening if you were sleeping,” she said. “So spill.”

  It was my turn to stir coffee and stare at her. Xiu vibrated with impatience but kept quiet.

  “I don’t know where to start,” I said, sighing.

  Thinking about it made it all appear crazier than it was. Well…. Now that I did think of it, this was too crazy to believe. Like I was in a really bad novel.

  We were silent for a while. A comfortable one, one neither of us wanted to shatter with talking about my problems. Xiu drank about half her coffee before she spoke again.

  “You’re word-searching,” Xiu blurted out. “Most people wouldn’t notice it, but I’ve had too many language classes with you.”

  “Word-searching?” I echoed. I swore she knew me better than I knew myself.

  Xiu shrugged, trying not to panic. “It’s like you hesitate for a millisecond or so and then figure out what word or words you need to use. You’re doing the same thing now for English.” She paused for a second, thinking. “And you’ve looked surprised when you were talking to Uncle. Like you weren’t using all the right words when you were speaking, but you would have sworn you were.”

  “That’s part of it,” I admitted.

  “Your notes are half in this strange language you were so happy I didn’t notice,” she continued. “But I did. I just didn’t want to say anything. So what language is hieratic?”

  “You looked it up,” I said.

  Xiu glared at me. “That’s not an answer.”

  “I can’t tell you a lot, because there’s some things that aren’t mine to tell,” I said, giving in.

  “I’m thinking there is a language worm in your brain,” she stated.

  “Ick, we’re about to eat here,” I protested.

  “That isn’t a yes or a no,” she shot back. “So?”

  Our food came then, so I was saved from answering. Beth served us, refilled the coffee, and left us alone again. I decided getting some food in me was a good idea, so I ate. Xiu ate too, but the look in her eyes told me she wasn’t done yet.

  “There’s a guy, sort of,” I admitted.

  “Since a guy is never part of your plans, it’s a problem,” Xiu said, pushing the remains of her pancakes around.

  “He’s pushy,” I said, poking at my fries. “But he has a cute dog.”

  “Yay for having a dog,” she drawled. “Is it that Kyle person? I really don’t think so, but it’s good to get the obvious choices out of the way.”

  “He’s a nice man,” I said. “And no, not him.”

  “I haven’t seen you with anyone else, but the trio knows there’s trouble since they all seem to be watching you like you’re a pot about to boil.”

  “That’s kind of close to the issue,” I said slowly.

  “Really?” Xiu grinned. “I’m getting better at this watching-people thing, then.”

  “They’re all worried about the guy,” I explained. “He’s not a nice person.”

  And while I felt guilty saying that about Sutekhgen for some reason, he hadn’t been nice to me. Pushing a language into my brain via kiss was just a start. It seemed like he was doling out clues instead of telling me right out who our… my enemy was. While he was trying to be a good guy, he wasn’t a nice one. But then I was beginning to think if he had been nice, I’d be in a lot more trouble than I was.

  “I haven’t seen anyone following us,” Xiu said. “I looked.” She ate a couple of bites of her pancakes. “The only time all of you seem to relax is in that ugly building. And there’s something weird about it.”

  “Besides being a neo-Gothic monstrosity?” I quipped.

  She rolled her eyes. “No buttresses, it’s the other medieval building style. But it’s more than that, like… it’s not important.”

  I thought about it for a second. If they had a ton of cursed and magical items in the basement, they must do something to protect the place so they weren’t active or whatever the term was. Xiu must be picking up on the same feeling I’d gotten.

  “The guy only comes to me in my dreams,” I said, before taking a bite of my Reuben.

  “You’re the last person who needs a man of her dreams,” Xiu said. “Besides the fact you have me to dream about like that. But that explains Rat’s comment.”

  “I’m being serious here,” I protested. “That jerk is the reason I’m not sleeping at night.”

  “That must be messing up your REM cycle terribly.” Xiu frowned. “Besides all the other crap, since you aren’t acting like he’s Prince Charming.”

  “He’s learning my boundaries and stuff,” I said, defending Sutekhgen.

  “But one of those boundaries should be not causing you to lose sleep,” Xiu shot back. “Or not messing up your brain. Unless you managed to learn that weird language all on your own on the train ride up here.”

  I shook my head, pushing my plate aside, my appetite deserting me. “No, he sort of ‘gave’ it to me.”

  I tried not to sound bitter when I said that, but my hands clenched, and I wanted to scream.

  “What else has he given you?” Xiu demanded. “Because….”

  I shook my head. “He’s been… I feel sorry for him half the time.”

  “Why?” Xiu shouted.

  Beth looked over at us, worried. We both managed to wave her off, and I made a mental note to tip
her heavily.

  “Because he’s looking for a person that isn’t me,” I explained. Xiu just stared at me, furious and worried. I tried to explain in a way she would understand. “It’s like after a really, really long time, you came looking for me and I turned out to be a total stranger, because I didn’t remember you.”

  Xiu sat back. “But that isn’t your fault,” she protested after thinking about it. “It should have dawned on him by now, you’re not his dream girl and that he should leave you alone.”

  “He keeps claiming I’m in some sort of danger.” I shrugged. “I’m beginning to believe him.”

  “He’s not brainwashing you or something?” she grumbled, attacking her pancakes again.

  “Just odd things I’ve found reading,” I confessed. “And while he can be a jerk—”

  “You can’t fix him or whatever crazy idea you’re having,” she said.

  “No fixing,” I promised. “But…. He needs someone in his life besides Fido.”

  “He can go bother someone else in their dreams for that,” Xiu said.

  “He’s starting to feel familiar,” I admitted.

  “He better not be feeling you,” she growled. “Use the ninja moves on him if he is.” She stopped for a second. “Did he give them to you?”

  “I think so?”

  “Then he might be useful,” she said with a disdainful sniff.

  I laughed. I couldn’t help it.

  “That doesn’t mean that he’s off the hook for bothering you,” Xiu said. “He’s going to be wishing he’s in one of the Chinese hells if he hurts you. Because I’ll destroy him if he does that.”

  I was impressed she didn’t say kill, because Sutekhgen was dead. I think. But I wasn’t going to ask him, because that went beyond rude to hurtful.

  Xiu sighed and pulled out her phone to check the time. “Want to bet the trio is about to send out the cavalry to get us?”

  “Mafdet?” I teased.

  Xiu snorted. “Good choice, but we should get back before Uncle kicks me out of the family.”