I shoved the tea away. “No, I’m done,” I said with an emphatic shake of my head. “I don’t want anything more to do with Wasitters, Swaugs, swords, or undead pirates. I’ve had my fill.”
Elena narrowed her eyes. “What is this really about, Davis? Is it Mike, or is it you?”
Her words hit me like a fist in the gut. “Look,” I snapped, “not everyone is as perfect as you, okay? I told Davy the very first day that I’m not cut out for this.”
She stepped away from the wall. “You’re sulking. You want me to feel sorry for you.” She came to stand in front of me. “Well, I’m not going to help you make a stupid decision by throwing you a pity party.”
“When did you get so caught up in saving the world?” I ground out. “You’re the one who wanted nothing to do with this mission.”
“I guess things changed when I saw what the enemy is capable of. This is important, Taylor. Our task matters.”
“Fine. You can be a hero if that’s what you want. I’m going back to Jersey.”
“You can’t. Your parents don’t live there anymore.”
“Watch me.”
She crossed her arms and glared down at me. “You’re afraid,” she stated. “You, who are so fond of calling Mike a coward. But Mike isn’t the one bailing on us, is he?”
I wanted to shut her up, to stop the flow of accusations. I considered stalking away, but the effect wouldn’t be nearly as grand with a blanket wrapped around me. And I certainly wasn’t about to drop the blanket.
“What will happen if we fail, Taylor?” she went on. “Are you willing to risk that? What if everyone gave up? Can you imagine a few Churkons loose in your precious New Jersey suburb with no one willing to take them out?”
I refused to speak. She made a sound of disgust in her throat. “If you go home, you’ve already failed. Because you’ll never know what you might have been capable of.”
I glowered at her, wishing with all my heart that someone else, anyone else, had stolen that cheeseburger.
****
Breakfast was a quiet affair the next morning. Elena seemed distracted as she ate her dill pickles, and I hardly tasted the ham and bacon quiche Ranofur set before me. Ranofur showed no emotion, but Mike surprised us all when he came bubbling out his door flashing a toothy grin. The Mozart costume was gone, replaced by a black T-shirt overlaid with a denim vest, baggy jeans, and an Oakland Raiders ball cap twisted sideways on his head.
Elena raised one eyebrow. “I know I’m going to regret asking, but why on earth are you dressed like a homeboy?”
Mike splayed his fingers and crossed his arms over his chest in a hip hop pose. “Because today I’m Lecrae.”
I moaned and let my face drop into my hands.
“And because I’m going to New Jersey with Taylor,” he finished.
“Oh no you’re not.” I straightened in my seat. Obviously, someone had filled him in on last night’s conversation.
“Taylor, Taylor,” he said, “I know we’ve had some difficulties, but I’m not about to abandon the child whom it is my sworn duty to protect.”
“I’ve had all I can take of your protection,” I declared. “You are not coming with me.”
He sobered. “I’m afraid you’re powerless to stop me.”
“Fine,” I said with an icy stare. “Come if you have to. But don’t expect me to speak to you, to look at you, or to acknowledge you in any way.”
A flicker of pain crossed his face, but he nodded. “So be it. And since you are penniless, I made arrangements for our flight. We leave at noon.”
I grudgingly conceded, hating that I was at his financial mercy.
“So, you were serious about leaving,” Elena remarked, swirling a cup of coffee between her fingers.
“Dead serious.”
“Huh. I didn’t think you’d go through with it.”
I smirked at her pensive expression. “Were you hoping I’d stay? Afraid you can’t get along without me?”
There was no humor or anger in her response, which took all the fun out of provoking her. “We need you, Taylor. You were chosen for this task. We all were, because we all contribute something unique. If you leave, our chances of success diminish.”
I studied her. “You’re really going to stay?”
She shrugged. “You know what will happen if Swain gains Findul’s fire. If there’s a chance that Ranofur and I can stop him, I’m staying.”
“How very noble of you.” My tone had turned bitter. “Suit yourself, then.”
I rose from the table in a cold fury. If she had scolded me, belittled me, or screamed at me, I could have accepted it, but I wouldn’t tolerate such self-righteous judgment.
Mike and I took our leave a short time later. It was a quiet farewell. Ranofur laid a gentle hand on my shoulder, his eyes communicating all the regret he didn’t vocalize. I passed the sword to him without a word.
Elena never looked up from her cold cup of coffee; neither did I glance at her. I simply walked out the door with Mike on my heels, heading back to the life I had left so unwillingly only a few weeks before.
Lesson #21
Consorting with Angels Puts You on Hades’s Most Wanted List
I slept for most of the plane ride. I guess my body was still healing after my brush with death. I didn’t care. It made the time pass quicker and gave me an excuse not to speak to Mike.
Dusk had settled by the time we landed at JFK International. Then it was a few hours by train back to Somerville, the quiet little borough in which I grew up. Since my iPod was at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, I did some people-watching and tried to figure out what I was going to do when I got home. For starters, I thought I’d visit my best friend, Shaun Runyon. He’d let me hide out for a few days till I formulated some sort of plan.
Shaun lived in a neighborhood near the middle school, only a few blocks from the train station. As I passed under the lights of Main Street, I was overwhelmed by the familiarity of it: the shops, the restaurants, the Twin Towers clock memorial, the courthouse, the old First Reformed Church. I knew every tree, every crack in the sidewalk. This was my town. This was where I belonged. Not in the Dominican Republic. Not traipsing all over the globe. Here, in Somerville. I felt like I’d been away a lifetime.
Mike walked several yards behind me, displaying some tact for once by not intruding on my homecoming. The night was mild, and I breathed in the moist fragrances of spring. Even though I couldn’t see them, I knew the trees were budding and the daffodils would be blooming in the yard I once called my own. I passed Jake Gonzales’s house and recognized the spicy scent of his mother’s chicken fajitas. I’d eaten them often enough.
For a moment, I considered knocking on Jake’s bedroom window but thought better of it. One of his many siblings was bound to discover me. Then Mrs. Gonzales would feel obligated to call my mother. No, I’d stick to my original plan. Shaun only had one brother, and Kyle was currently away at college. I was nearly to his house anyway.
When I turned onto West Cliff Street, I waited for Mike to catch up. I hadn’t spoken to him since we left the hotel that morning. Now I warned him in the sternest voice I could muster, “My friend’s house is three doors down. I’m going to spend the night there. I don’t care what you do, but if you follow me, stay out of sight. I don’t want to have to explain the past six days.”
“Done,” Mike answered.
“Are you invisible? I can still see you.”
“Shaun can’t.”
I narrowed my eyes. “How do you know—?” I started to ask before I remembered the angel had been following me for years. “Oh, right.”
I put Mike out of my mind and walked up the street. Shaun’s house was an old two-story with a porch that wrapped around the front. His bedroom was on the second floor, above the porch roof. I picked up a handful of pebbles and pelted his window before shimmying up the corner roof support.
“Taylor?” Shaun whispered sleepily through the newly opened window
. “What are you doing here?”
Shaun and I had been hanging out together since kindergarten, when he used to whisper the right shape or color every time I got stuck. He breezed through school, but he maintained such a cavalier attitude and caused enough mischief that it was easy to forget he was brilliant.
“Just let me in and I’ll explain.”
I squeezed through the small space as quietly as I could, basking in the relief that washed over me upon reaching this familiar sanctuary. Somerville, Shaun, this room, they all represented the normalcy I’d taken for granted before stumbling into Davy’s sinkhole. “You don’t know how good it is to see you,” I told Shaun in a quavering voice.
“Dude, you’ve only been gone a few weeks,” he replied. “What happened?”
I longed to tell him, to lift the load from my shoulders, but I knew Shaun would think I’d gone mental. Then he’d tell his parents, and what I needed more than anything was time to think things through. “Shaun, promise me you won’t tell anyone I’m here.”
“Sure, whatever,” he said, squinting at me. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine now.” I sighed and flopped down at the foot of the bed. It felt so good to relax, to be safe. “It’s been a really long couple of days.”
“Why’d you leave?” Shaun wanted to know. “The Caribbean can’t be that bad, can it?”
I cut my eyes at him. “You have no idea.”
“Oh, come on,” he grinned. “Sunshine, beaches, girls in swimsuits.”
“Try sunburn, classrooms, and one girl in particular that I’d like to—” I made a strangling motion with my hands.
Shaun’s grin widened. “Sounds like someone has a girlfriend.”
I lifted my chin coolly. “I hope you’re referring to Jennifer Williams.”
He guffawed. “In your dreams.”
“She isn’t seeing anyone, is she?” I asked, too eagerly.
Shaun rolled his eyes. “I don’t think so, but I haven’t been on any Jen patrols since you left.”
My vision got a little blurry just thinking of my crush of the last two years. “Maybe I can see her while I’m here.”
Shaun sat down on the bed beside me. “How long are you staying?”
“Forever if I can manage it, but don’t worry. I’ll only put you out for a few days. Can you hide me that long?”
I knew Shaun wouldn’t let me down. “No problem. Do your parents know you’re here?”
I shook my head. “But I had their permission to leave. At least I had Mom’s. I haven’t seen much of Dad lately.”
“Is that what this is about? You mad at your old man?”
I almost laughed. How simple that would be! But I latched onto the answer he provided. “Sometimes I wish he could find as many good things to say about me as he does about Bobby’s motocross and Jessica’s grades.” At least that much was true.
But Shaun wasn’t buying it. Not totally. “It never bothered you enough to run away before.”
He was forgetting the time we both packed our bags when we were nine. We boarded the train, got to the next town, and turned around. Our parents never even knew we were gone.
I shrugged. “Moving has been harder than I thought. I guess I just wanted to come home.”
He let it go. “So now that you’re back, what are you going to do?”
That was the question, wasn’t it? One I’d already spent two weeks before the move trying to solve—with no success. I scrunched up my face. “Maybe Mr. Tomlinson will give me back my paper route. I can mow lawns and deliver groceries. And the weather is getting warmer. I can sleep in sheds and picnic shelters. You know, move around.”
“Right. What are you going to eat?”
I shrugged. “Cereal, potato chips. Stuff I don’t have to cook.”
Shaun was looking more and more doubtful. “What about showers? If you want to see Jennifer Williams without a clothespin on her nose, you’re going to have to hose off sometimes.”
“I can swim in the river a couple times a week.”
“If anyone recognizes you, you’ll be carted off to social services,” he warned.
“I’ll avoid everyone I know.” Somerville had over ten thousand residents. Surely I could hide out in a town that size.
“Then what’s the point of coming home?”
I blew up at him. “I don’t know, Shaun. I haven’t got the details worked out yet.”
He looked ashamed at once. “Sure. Sorry. Well, whatever you need, you got it.”
I relaxed again. “Thanks,” I said with a tired smile.
Shaun found me a sleeping bag and, even though my brain was crowded with things to worry about, I fell asleep at once. That meant I was awake the entire next day when Shaun was away at school.
“Just shove your bedding under my bed,” he told me before he left, “and hide in the closet if you hear my mom. But you won’t. She only comes in when my room is clean, and she only makes me clean it on Saturdays.”
I took in the array of junk food wrappers, text books, graphic novels, electronics, and miscellaneous clutter that covered every surface. “You did all this since Saturday?” I asked in amazement. It was Monday morning.
He grinned. “One of my many talents.”
I spent three days hiding out in Shaun’s room. I had intended to fill the hours by formulating a plan, but I got distracted by Shaun’s Gameboy. Then I noticed a few new editions in his stack of comic books that I hadn’t read yet. I even blew through the first half of a paperback that had been tossed in a corner.
When I heard Mrs. Runyon drive away in the early afternoon of that first day, I sneaked downstairs and made myself ten peanut butter and jelly sandwiches that I stashed in my hideout just in case the opportunity didn’t present itself again. I was real careful to clean the knife and put everything back where I found it, except the missing food. I hoped Shaun’s mom didn’t get a sudden hankering for peanut butter toast.
After my late lunch, I read another comic book. I was a little embarrassed when Shaun came home and I didn’t have a single new idea to share with him.
The next two days I tried, I really tried to come up with a list of solutions. I forced myself to sit down with a pen and notebook and do some brainstorming, but I was walking the same path over and over again. Every idea I came up with was one I’d though of—and crossed off—before. I just didn’t see any legal way to make it on my own. Fortunately, Shaun didn’t ask again.
On Wednesday, Mike suddenly appeared in the room with me. I hadn’t seen him since I’d left him on the street several nights before. “Where have you been?” I asked, not really caring.
He twitched his head at the wall. “In Kyle’s room. Figured he wouldn’t be home before the weekend. Come up with anything yet?”
I bristled at the question and drew an arm over the empty notebook page. “I still have time.”
He shrugged. “I was wondering if you’ve given any thought to rejoining Ranofur and Elena.”
“I would rather check myself into an orphanage,” I retorted.
He shoved his hands deep into his pockets. He still wore his hip hop clothes. Of course, the first time he could actually blend into a crowd would be when I needed him to keep out of sight. I tried to ignore him, but by the way he hovered at my elbow, I knew he wasn’t done talking yet.
“Taylor,” he began, “I know it can be really hard when you want so badly to be good at something and you just aren’t. Believe me, I know.”
I didn’t respond. He didn’t seem to expect me to.
“But that doesn’t mean you’re without talents or that you can’t succeed.”
“Is that why you think I left Vancouver?” I asked.
“I think you’re afraid of failing.”
“You must have had a talk with Elena. She thinks she’s some kind of warrior hero since she took down a couple monsters.”
“She hasn’t acted at all unreasonably.”
I wasn’t admitting to that. “Thin
k about it, Mike. We are trying to take out a pirate who can’t die. We have to save a volcano but we don’t know when it will be attacked. And we have to stop a sub with a hundred soldiers onboard and we don’t even know where it is. You think I’m afraid of failing? That’s not it at all. I know we’re going to fail. I don’t want to lose my future to a doomed mission.”
“You’re giving up too easily,” he insisted.
“Too easily?” I yelped and had to remind myself to keep my voice down. “Too easily? You call a Swaug, a team of Churkons, and a Wasitter easy? Not to mention an assassin, a mountain troll, and a guardian angel who tried to kill me. Nothing’s been easy.”
Mike’s face turned red, but he persisted. “There is a way to succeed. We can do it together. You’ve been chosen for this mission.”
“The One of Two Names?” I asked caustically.
“Exactly!”
I had lost all faith in the prophecy. “This conversation is over,” I announced, turning away. And that would have ended it, except he kept talking.
“You’re making a mistake, Taylor. We’ve all made mistakes. You, me, Elena, even Ranofur.”
He waited for my response. When none was forthcoming, he continued hesitantly. “I’ve never told you what happened at the tree all those years ago—”
My curiosity got the better of me. I looked up. At that moment, Shaun burst through the bedroom door. Mike and I jumped up like a couple caught smooching when the light was flicked on. “Dang it, Shaun! You just about gave me a heart attack.”
Shaun glanced around the room. “Who were you talking to?” he asked.
That’s when I remembered he couldn’t see Mike. “Uh, no one. Just myself.”
“Well do it a little quieter or my mom is going to hear you.”
“Right. Sorry.”
“She’s gone. Don’t worry about it.” His entire face lit up. “Hey, at school today a bunch of us decided to meet for ice cream and walk down to the park behind the fire station.”
“So?”
“So,” he repeated, “Jennifer Williams is going to be there.”
I hesitated. “What if someone sees me?”
Taylor Davis and the Flame of Findul (Taylor Davis, 1) Page 16
