01 Unearthly

by Cynthia Hand

  “Why not?”

  I give him a “why do you think?” glare.

  “No one’s asked you?” He looks at me.

  I shake my head. “Shocking, right?”

  “Yeah, actually, it is.”

  He rubs the back of his neck, then gazes at the woods. He clears his throat. For a second I get the crazy idea that he might be about to ask me to prom, and my heart does all kinds of stupid erratic leaps in my chest from sheer terror at the idea. Because I’d have to reject him right in front of Wendy and Angela, who are acting like they’re talking but I can tell they’re paying attention, and then he’d be humiliated. I have no real desire to see Tucker humiliated.

  “Go stag,” he says instead. “That’s what I would do.”

  I almost laugh with relief. “I guess.”

  He turns and calls to Wendy. “I gotta take off. Come here a sec.”

  “Clara’s going to take me home, so I won’t be needing your services anymore today, Jeeves,” says Wendy like he’s her chauffeur. He nods and takes her arm and draws her over to the side of the truck where he speaks in a low voice.

  “I don’t know what prom shoes cost, but this might help,” he says.

  “Tucker Avery,” Wendy says. “You know I can’t take that.”

  “I don’t know anything.”

  She snorts. “You’re sweet. But that’s rodeo money. I can’t take it.”

  “I’ll get more.”

  He must keep holding the money out to her, because then she says no more emphatically.

  “Okay, fine,” he grumbles. He gives her a quick hug and gets in his truck, pulls around the circle, and stops, then rolls down the window to lean out.

  “Have fun in Idaho. Don’t provoke any potato farmers,” he says.

  “Right. Because that would be bad.”

  “Oh, and, Carrots . . .”

  “Yes?”

  “If you end up going to prom, save me a dance, okay?”

  Before I have time to process this request, he drives away.

  “Men,” Angela says from beside me.

  “I thought that was nice,” says Wendy.

  I sigh, flustered. “Let’s just go.”

  Suddenly Wendy gasps. She pulls a fifty-dollar bill out of her sweatshirt pocket.

  “That little stink,” she says, smiling.

  The second I lay eyes on the dress, I’m in love with it. If I were going to prom, this would be it. The one. Sometimes you just know with dresses. They call to you. This one’s Greek inspired, strapless with an empire waist and a swath of fabric that comes up the front and over one shoulder. It’s a deep blue, a little brighter than navy.

  “Okay,” says Angela after I’ve been staring at it on the rack for five minutes. “You have to try it on.”

  “What? No. I’m not going to prom.”

  “Who cares? Hey, Maggie, Wendy!” Angela calls across the department store to Wendy, who’s in the shoe department with my mom looking through the clearance heels. “Come see this dress for Clara.”

  They drop everything and come to see the dress. And gasp when they see it. And insist I try it on.

  “But I’m not going to prom,” I protest from the dressing room as I pull my shirt over my head.

  “You don’t need a date,” says Angela from the other side of the door. “You could go stag, you know.”

  “Right. Stag to prom. So I can stand around and watch everybody else dance. Sounds fantastic.”

  “Well, we know one person who will dance with you,” says Wendy faintly.

  “He did just break up with his girlfriend, you know,” Mom says.

  “Tucker?” Wendy asks, confused.

  “Christian,” Mom answers.

  My heart misses a beat, and when Wendy and Angela don’t respond, I open the dressing room door and stick my head out. “How’d you hear about Christian breaking up with Kay?”

  She and Angela exchange a look. I only left them alone together for like five minutes this morning and Angela had obviously already presented her “Christian and Clara are soul mates” hypothesis. I wonder what Mom thinks of that.

  “If I were Christian you wouldn’t catch me anywhere near the dance,” says Wendy. “It’d be like a snake pit for him.”

  That’s true. This last week at school Christian seemed off—nothing too noticeable, but I watch him a lot, so I noticed. He didn’t crack any of his usual jokes in Brit History. He didn’t take notes during class. And then he was absent two days in a row, which never happens. Late, yes, but Christian’s never absent. I guess he must be pretty upset about Kay.

  I slip the dress over my head. It fits. Like it was made for me. So unfair.

  “Come on, let’s see it,” orders Angela. I go out and stand in front of the big mirror.

  “I wish my hair wasn’t orange,” I say, brushing an unruly strand out of my face.

  “You should buy it,” says Angela.

  “But I’m not going to prom,” I repeat.

  “You should go to prom just so you can wear that dress,” says Wendy.

  “Totally,” agrees Angela.

  “You are so beautiful,” Mom says, and then to my total shock she digs around in her purse for a tissue and blots at her eyes. Then she says, “I’m buying it. If you don’t go to prom this year, you can wear it next year. It really is perfect, Clara. It makes your eyes this stunning cornflower blue.”

  There’s no reasoning with them. So fifteen minutes later we’re walking out of the department store with the dress hanging over my arm. That’s when we split up, divide and conquer, Mom calls it. Angela and I check out the bling stores, and Mom and Wendy head toward shoes, since there’s nothing on heaven and earth my mother loves so much as new shoes. We agree to meet back at the mall entrance in an hour.

  I’m in a weird mood. I find it ironic that Angela and Wendy are both going to prom and the only thing we’ve bought so far on this trip is a dress for me. And I’m not going. I’m also irritated because I can’t wear real earrings because piercing my ears doesn’t work—they heal too fast. I don’t like any of the non-pierced earrings I see. I want something dangly and dramatic for this dance I’m not going to.

  I’m feeling queasy and light-headed all of a sudden, so Angela and I stop at Pretzel Time and each get a cinnamon pretzel, hoping some food in my stomach will help. The mall’s crowded and there’s nowhere to sit, so we lean against the wall and eat our pretzels, watching the people stream in and out of Barnes & Noble.

  “Are you mad at me?” Angela asks.

  “What? No.”

  “You haven’t said two words to me since breakfast.”

  “Well, you weren’t supposed to talk angel stuff, remember? You promised.”

  “Sorry,” she says.

  “Just tone it down a notch or four with my mom, okay? What with the staring and the questions and everything.”

  “Am I staring?” She blushes.

  “You look like a Kewpie doll.”

  “Sorry,” she says again. “She’s the only Dimidius I’ve ever met. I want to know what she’s like.”

  “I told you. She’s like one part hip thirty-something, one part tranquil angelic being, and one part crotchety old lady.”

  “I don’t see the old lady part.”

  “Trust me, it’s there. And you’re like one part crazy teenager, one part angelic being, and one part private detective.”

  She smiles. “I’ll try to behave.”

  That’s when I see him. A man, watching me from the doorway of the GNC. He’s tall, with dark hair pulled back into a ponytail. He’s wearing faded jeans and a brown suede coat that hangs off his body loosely. Out of all the people passing by in that swarming mall, I might not have noticed him except for how intensely he’s staring at us.

  “Angela,” I say weakly, my pretzel dropping to the floor. A wave of terrible sadness crashes over me. I have to fight not to double over with the sudden intensity of the emotion. My hands clench into fists, my nails bit
ing painfully into my palms. I start to cry.

  “Whoa, what’s the matter, C?” says Angela. “I swear, I’ll behave.”

  I try to answer. I try to press through the sorrow to form the words. Tears pour down my face.

  “That man,” I whisper.

  She follows my gaze. Then she sucks in a jagged breath and looks away.

  “Come on,” she says. “Let’s find your mom.”

  She puts her arm around my shoulder and steers me quickly down the hall. We bump into people, push our way through families and groups of teenagers. She looks back again.

  “Is he following us?” I can’t manage anything louder than a whisper. I feel like I’m struggling to keep my head up in a pool of dark, icy water, chilled to the bone, wearier with every step I take, and it’s too much. I want to sink down and let this blackness take me.

  “I don’t see him,” says Angela.

  Then, like an answered prayer, we find my mom. She and Wendy are coming out of Payless, both carrying shopping bags.

  “Hey, you two,” Mom says. Then she notices our faces. “What happened?”

  “Can we talk to you for a minute?” Angela grabs Mom’s arm and pulls her away from Wendy, who looks confused and somewhat offended as we walk away. “There’s a man,” she whispers. “He was staring at us, and Clara just . . . she just . . .”

  “He’s so sad,” I manage.

  “Where?” Mom demands.

  “Behind us,” says Angela. “I lost track of him, but he’s definitely back there somewhere.”

  Mom zips her hoodie and pulls the hood up to cover her head. She walks back to Wendy and tries to smile.

  “Everything okay?” asks Wendy.

  “Clara’s feeling sick,” Mom says. “We should go.”

  It’s not a lie. I’m hardly able to put one foot in front of the other as we make our way quickly toward the department store.

  “Don’t look back,” Mom whispers close to my ear. “Walk, Clara. Move your feet.”

  We hurry through the cosmetics department and the lingerie, past the formal wear section where we started out the day. Within moments we’re in the parking lot. When she sees our car, Mom breaks into a full run, towing me after her.

  “What’s going on?” asks Wendy as we run.

  “Get in the car,” Mom orders, and we all scramble in.

  We gun it out of the parking lot. It’s not until we’re a few miles away from Idaho Falls that the sadness starts to dissipate, like a curtain lifting. I take a deep shuddering breath.

  “Are you okay?” asks Wendy, still looking wildly confused.

  “I just need to get home.”

  “She has medicine at home,” chimes in Angela. “It’s a med-ical condition she has.”

  “A medical condition?” repeats Wendy. “What kind of medical condition?”

  “Uh—”

  Mom shoots Angela an exasperated look.

  “It’s a rare form of anemia,” Angela continues smoothly. “Sometimes it makes her feel sick and wobbly.”

  Wendy nods like she understands. “Like that day when she passed out at school.”

  “Exactly. She needs to take her pills.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” says Wendy. She glances at Angela and then back at me, as if she’s really saying, “How come you told Angela about this and didn’t tell me?” She looks hurt.

  “It’s not usually a big deal,” I say. “I’m feeling much better now.”

  Angela and I share a glance. Especially given the way my mom reacted, we both know that it’s a very, very big deal.

  When we pull up to the house three hours later, after first dropping Wendy at the Lazy Dog, Mom says to us, “All right. Go up to your room. Wait for me there. I’ll be a little while.”

  Angela and I go into the house. It’s not dark yet but I have the urge to turn on all the lights as we retreat to my room. We sit down together on my bed.

  We hear Mom knock on Jeffrey’s door.

  “Hey,” she says when he answers. “I thought I’d drop you off at a movie in Jackson, since I’ve spoiled your sister all day. It’s only fair.”

  After they’re gone, Angela puts her arms around me and pulls my quilt around us both, because I can’t stop shivering. And we wait. Mom’s car crackles up the driveway about an hour later. The door slams. We listen to the careful creak of her feet on the stairs. Then she knocks, very lightly.

  “Come in,” I croak.

  She smiles when she sees us huddled together.

  “You shouldn’t have taken Jeffrey away,” I say. “What if that guy’s out there?”

  “I don’t want you two to be scared, okay?” she says. “We’re safe here.”

  “Who was he?” Angela asks.

  Mom sighs, a resigned, tired exhalation. “He was a Black Wing. Chances are he was only passing through.”

  “A fallen angel hanging out in the mall in Idaho Falls?” says Angela.

  “When I saw him, I . . .” I start to choke up, remembering.

  “You felt his sorrow.”

  “His sorrow?” repeats Angela.

  “Angels don’t have the kind of free will that you or I do. When they go against their design, it causes them an enormous amount of physical and psychological pain. All Black Wings feel this.”

  “Why didn’t you or Angela feel it?” I ask.

  “Some of us are more sensitive than others to their presence,” she says. “It’s actually an advantage. You can feel them coming.”

  “And what should we do, if we see them?”

  “You do what we did today. You run.”

  “We can’t fight them?” asks Angela, her voice higher-pitched than normal. Mom shakes her head. “Not even you?”

  “No. Angels are almost infinitely powerful. The best you can do is escape. If you’re lucky—and today we were lucky—the angel won’t consider you worth his time.”

  We’re all quiet for a minute.

  “The surest defense is to stay undetected,” Mom says.

  “So why didn’t you want me to know about them?” I can’t keep the accusation out of my voice. “Why don’t you want Jeffrey to know?”

  “Because your consciousness draws them, Clara. If you’re aware of their existence, you’re more likely to be discovered.”

  She looks steadily at Angela, who meets her gaze for a few seconds before she turns away, her fingers tightening on the edge of my quilt. Angela was the one who told me about the Black Wings.

  “I’m sorry,” whispers Angela.

  “It’s all right,” says Mom. “You didn’t know.”

  Later I crawl into bed with Mom. I want to feel safe next to her radiating heat, but she’s cold. Her face is pale and pinched, like she’s worn out trying to be the brave and knowing one, trying to protect us. Her feet are like blocks of ice. I put my feet against them, hoping to warm her.

  “Mom,” I say into the dark. “I was thinking.”

  “Uh-oh.”

  “In my vision, when I suddenly feel so sad, is that a Black Wing?”

  Silence. Then another sigh.

  “When you talked about the sorrow you felt, the way you described it, it seemed like a possibility.” Mom grabs my waist and pulls me closer. “Don’t worry, Clara. You won’t help it by worrying. You don’t know your purpose yet. You’re still working with a few very small pieces. I don’t want to fill your head with preconceptions before you see everything for yourself.”

  Another shiver passes through me.

  Chapter 12

  Shut Up and Dance

  By Monday, everything starts to get back to normal. I walk the halls of Jackson High with the same students, and I attend the same boring classes (except for Brit History, of course, where I watch Christian and Brady do a presentation on William Wallace and entertain a brief fantasy of Christian in a kilt) and soon enough, the Black Wing seems like a bad dream, and I feel safe again.

  Still, I decide I need to take the whole purpose thing more seriously
. No more playing at being a normal girl. I’m not. I’m an angel-blood. I have a job to do. I need to quit whining, quit stalling, quit questioning everything. I need to do it.

  So Wednesday after school I catch up with Christian at his locker. I go right over to him and touch him on the shoulder. A small zing passes through me like a static shock. He turns and fixes me with those green eyes. He doesn’t look like he’s in any mood to talk.

  “Hey, Clara,” he says. “Can I help you with something?”

  “I thought I could help you. I noticed you were out of class last week.”

  “My uncle took me camping.”

  “Do you want to borrow my notes for British History?”

  “Sure, notes would be great,” he says like he couldn’t care less about British History but he’s humoring me. He’s not acting like himself at all, no jokes, no confidence, no subtle swagger in his step. There are shadows under his eyes.

  I hand him my notebook. Right as he takes it, a group of girls pass by, popular girls, Kay’s friends. They whisper and shoot him dirty looks. His shoulders stiffen.

  “They’ll forget,” I tell him. “You’re front-page news today, but give it another week. It will all settle down.”

  “Yeah? How do you know so much?”

  “Oh, you know. I’m queen of the rumor mill. It seems like there’s been a new rumor about me every week since I got here. Comes with being the new girl, I guess. Have you heard the one where I seduced the basketball coach? That’s a personal favorite.”

  “The rumors about me aren’t true,” says Christian heatedly. “I broke up with Kay, not the other way around.”

  “Oh. In my experience, rumors aren’t usually—”

  “I was trying to do the right thing. I couldn’t be what she needed, and I was trying to do the right thing,” he says, a fierceness in his eyes that reminds me of how he looks in the vision, this combination of intensity and vulnerability, which only makes him impossibly hotter.

  “It’s really none of my business,” I say.

  “I didn’t know it was going to be like this.”

  We stand in the hallway as the other students stream by. On the ceiling, practically dangling over Christian’s head, hangs a banner for prom. MYTHIC LOVE, it reads in bright blue letters. Saturday, seven to midnight. Mythic Love.