Aidan’s light is on. I hear the usual humming. Mom’s footfalls thump on the stairway. The light goes out.
I can’t sleep.
I keep remembering that horrible thing climbing up the fence. Jagged teeth. Sloth claws. Gray fur. Blue glowing eyes.
Those eyes.
They must belong to something rational. An unfortunate. A DNA mutation. An animal. An ape?
It’s 2:30 a.m.
I tuck my arm under my pillow, but I can’t sleep because of the throbbing.
Wind howls outside. Rain splatters the window. I roll out of bed and, keeping out of sight, I shut the curtains so that nothing can peer inside.
What have we done?
And how will I tell Aidan?
He can’t know. He’ll leave for sure if he thinks something scary is stalking our area. He sent me a very happy email that I read before I went to bed saying how excited he was to have a job. To earn some money so that he could take me to that stupid dance. And when Dad realized that Aidan didn’t know how to ride a bike, he pulled his own ten-speed out of the garage and fixed it for Aidan, who was already getting the hang of it before bedtime.
I have read of such things in books in my father’s library, but I had never seen one in person until I came here to your territory. The balance is tricky. I’ll practice tomorrow after school. I’ll master it by this weekend, which is when the job starts. I can hardly wait. Your intelligence, beauty and affection inspire me, Charity. I want to learn everything about your world so that I can be closer to you.
It’s definitely more than a crush. Am I in love with him? I can’t be. It’s only been a week. More like infatuation. But isn’t love that feeling where you want to live and die at the same time? And you can’t bear to be apart?
I wish I could tell him how I feel. Instead, I respond that I am completely thrilled and proud of him. I’d be happy to help him with the bike lessons. I don’t tell him that I’ve never liked bike riding, but maybe it’s better with the one you love?
Pushing aside books and computer parts, I sit against the wall shared with the sewing room. My wet cheek rests against the cool wall. This new secret aches, driving a wedge between us. I want him to wrap his arms around me, to assure me that I’ll be safe. That we’ll both be okay.
I hear rustling from the other room. A creak from the floor.
Slowly, the wall beneath my cheek seems to warm.
I pretend it’s him sitting on the other side, his body magically warming me from the other room, as the tears flood my face in the darkness.
During what little sleep I get, I have nightmares about living in a house with a front door that has broken locks. The creature is trying to force the door in my dreams, to slash me with its claws.
On the way to school the next morning, while other kids on the bus chew gum and scrutinize their phones, I research how to create a DIY motion detector. It’s not hard, it turns out. But I will need to hit Fry’s for a couple of things I don’t already have in my stash. Then again, would this even be useful? By the time that thing is on my side of the window, no indoor motion detector will matter. Perhaps what I need is an outdoor motion detector that switches on a floodlight.
Or a death laser.
No, no. I told everyone, no violence. But damn, it’s tempting.
I look up at Aidan. He watches me with a sad look. I ask him what’s wrong, but he doesn’t respond.
After I deposit my books in my locker, I hear someone sobbing. Probably one of Darren’s girlfriends. The vigil last night no doubt brought up oodles of drama.
But then the crowd stirs as I head toward class. “You!”
I ignore it. More drama.
“You killed my dog!”
It’s Keiko. I’m stunned. This is so unlike her, to make a scene.
“Charity Jones, you killed my dog!”
Chapter 15
One of Keiko’s new friends shoves me.
I spin backward and hit the lockers, but my backpack absorbs the blow. They’re not the girls I saw her with in the gymnasium when we met the cops. These are BFJs. I can’t believe this is happening.
“This is insane! What are you talking about?” I say.
One of her friends speaks up. Her cheap perfume gags me, her makeup thick and bright. “You know perfectly well. She didn’t like your birthday present, so you killed her dog, you crazy fucking bitch.”
After what I went through last night, facing true danger, I can’t take this stupid crap anymore.
“If you don’t want to wind up in court for slander or to finish your days at Pondorado for bullying, I suggest you take your lying asses out of my sight. If you touch me again, I will have you arrested for assault and sue you until you are old and wrinkled. Get out of my face!”
Mouths open, the girls disperse. The crowd makes approving noises. I might have won this encounter—if winning is even possible.
Keiko lingers, studying me. Her eyes red. Lips and nose chapped.
I feel queasy and shaky, flushed with adrenaline. “You, too! Get away from me!”
Did I even really know Keiko?
We met at Mathcamp last year. I know how incredibly dorky that sounds and it really is, but it’s super fun. They held it at Stanford University. If it weren’t being held in California, my parents wouldn’t have let me go. They could barely afford it as it was, what with having to cover Charles’ legal expenses. At least Dad’s job was covering the relocation costs. Anyway, I loved Stanford. It looked like Hogwarts for graduate witches—to me, anyway.
I didn’t notice Keiko at first, even though only maybe a quarter of the students were girls. We wound up being roommates in the dorm. Nervous beyond belief, neither of us had ever been away from home on our own before. But the fear didn’t last. They kept us so busy with cool classes and games and singing and skits…I miss it just thinking about it! Neither of us had been anywhere where we weren’t the smartest person in the room. It was kind of an ego blow at first, but also very liberating. We went off campus with some of the guys to San Francisco and visited The Haight, had crepes at Squat-n-Gobble, and got generally traumatized by the amount of incense in the shops and on the sidewalk. I’ll never forget our conversation that night in our dorm room—lights out, window open to the Bay Area breezes—talking about our dreams. I wanted to build robots, no question, but not for the military. I’d never said that aloud before because I didn’t want to hurt my dad’s feelings. He comes from a military family, grew up a military brat moving around the world. It totally shaped his genius. I never want to disrespect that. But I don’t like violence. My bots must have peaceful purposes.
Keiko wanted to teach. Or make spy satellites. Or save the whales.
Her mother had already told her that she’d die if Keiko married a white man. Any future husband also had to be both Japanese and Christian. Keiko was already crushing on three guys at camp: two were Midwestern, agnostic white dudes and one was Jewish.
I understood her angst and we bonded over it. Most of my mom’s side of the family won’t have anything to do with us. I’ve never met my grandparents or aunts and uncles. A couple of cousins have reached out to me online—my cousins Melissa and Josh, who are both in college at Texas A&M—but they’re caught in the family drama. We want to be friends, but until they’re no longer dependent on their parents for anything, it’ll be pretty much impossible to have an IRL relationship.
Dad’s family is more open, especially his sister Bellina. At least my parents are cool and don’t care who I date or marry, as long as I’m happy.
Well, they almost don’t care. This whole thing with Aidan would definitely freak them out. How did I manage to get in a relationship with the one boy they’d freak out over?
Anyway, Keiko and I bonded over that, math and the fact that we were both big-time Hermione Shippers.
We were both shocked that I would be going to Oakwood High School after winter break. She’d been going there since the beginning of her sophomore year. Obviou
sly we were ”meant” to be friends. She had very few friends at Oakwood High, but she chalked it up to being shy rather than shunned. She didn’t seem shy to me. Maybe because at Mathcamp she felt less self-conscious about being smart. Or because she was so far away from home.
I don’t understand the depth of Keiko’s anger, why she cut me off. Did her parents have something to do with that?
And this—this is the lowest thing anyone has ever said or done to me. The taunting, the bullying—I can rise above that to a degree. I feel like a space alien at school most of the time, anyway. I’m getting used to it and the isolation. The internet helps. But not now. I’m actually too angry to get depressed.
At least it’s Friday.
Michael texts me with more details confirming what I already feared. Apparently, after we drove the creature away from someone else’s dogs, it later attacked Jackson instead when Keiko’s parents let him out to do his business last night before bed.
In a way, I did kill her dog.
I head to AP English. Anger coils up inside of me, ready to strike at anyone in arm’s reach. It’s not fair. I couldn’t have let the creature kill those dogs. Damned if I did, damned if I didn’t. One thing is for certain: this thing has to be stopped before it kills again. But not with guns or any other weapon other than wits.
The question is: how?
After the bus pulls away, Aidan takes my hand. He’s wearing a dark blue button-up shirt over a long-sleeved thermal shirt. Mom made him put the thermal shirt on under the dress shirt I picked out. Like the black, the blue makes his eyes shine like jewels. A couple of girls on the bus were gawking at him. He seemed clueless. “Something is wrong. Are you upset with me?”
“What? No!” The rain has let up. The smell of wet dirt and trees is sweet. My arm aches. The cold weather isn’t helping. “I’m just going through a lot right now. I can’t talk about it yet. But as soon as I can, I will. I promise.”
“Is it about Keiko’s dog? I heard there was a ruckus.”
Ruckus. “Yeah. Keiko accused me of killing her dog.”
“But that’s absurd!”
“Right?”
“She’s grieving. She wants to place blame.”
“But why on me? Why not on the mountain lion or whatever it was that killed Darren? Maybe it killed her dog, too?”
“She’s still angry at you. But I know you didn’t do it.”
He puts his arm around me and squeezes.
I yelp and pull away.
“Oh, no!” He looks panicked. “Did I hurt you? I’m so sorry!”
“It’s nothing,” I reply, wincing. “I hurt it last night. At the vigil. I fell against a wall.” Worst. Liar. Ever.
He doesn’t look convinced.
I bury my fingers in the hair on his neck. He shudders, closing his eyes. With a dramatic sweep, he dumps his backpack and takes me in his arms, kissing me deeply. His mouth tastes like grilled cheese and chips, but his lips are so soft that I want to die touching them. I avoid his back, ever aware of those horrific scars and the secrets they hold.
A rustling in the brush at the side of the road. My eyes snap open and I pull away again. “Let’s go home.”
His face darkens. “Home? But we can’t be together there. What’s wrong?”
I pause. What good is it being smart if you can’t actually use your wits to get out of trouble with your boyfriend? “If there really is a dangerous animal around, then we shouldn’t mess around outside. We need to be more careful. Physical safety first. And we’ll figure out the rest.”
A memory of the creature lunging at me surges forward. I suppress it, willing the nausea to subside, focusing instead on Aidan’s eyes. My fingers brush his chalky cheek. While some acne lines his jaw, he has very little facial hair. Does he shave?
He scans the trees lining each side of the street. The foliage is sparse closer to the asphalt, thickening farther from the road. “You were both naughty and nice last night, weren’t you?” he says at last, but there’s nothing playful about his words. His fingers trace my lips.
“What the heck are you talking about?” I ask. “Ever since you first arrived, you’ve been saying things like this. What are you, some kind of moral savant? And whose moral compass are you using, anyway?”
He smiles the way Mr. Reilly does when someone asks a question he doesn’t expect and takes my hands in his. “That is the question, isn’t it, Charity Jones? Who gets to decide what is good and evil? Who makes the rules? Man or monster?”
He kisses my fingertips, his ghostly eyes leveling with mine, and a shudder sweeps through me.
“Who is to say which is which?” he continues. “I cannot tell you. Yet I know your heart. I can peer into it. It’s as transparent as a glass of water. And not just your heart. Everyone’s heart. I can see what’s in that glass. But how is a mystery. Since I left home, I’ve been inundated by these impressions from people.” He brings my hands to his cheeks. “I try to stop them. Sometimes I can. Often I can’t. I only say things to you because I feel that I can trust you. If you wish to condemn me for this, I accept that condemnation. I’ll never speak of it again. Because I think I love you, Charity. And anything that brings you happiness brings me happiness. Even if it puts my very life in danger. I would give it for you.”
He’s an empath? Or a psychic? There’s no evidence whatsoever for psychic activity. Michael is right. He must be some kind of Sherlock Holmes, making deductions from miniscule physical cues. I only take this speech seriously because he knew. He knew. He’s scaring me a little, but I can’t hold back the tidal wave of blazing emotion. He loves me. He said it. Granted, Mom has always said that guys will say this—or anything really—to get you into bed with them. She’d probably also say that you can’t love a guy without knowing him. But right now, in this spectacular, dizzying moment, Mom’s cynicism just doesn’t ring true.
No one except my family has ever said “I love you” to me. Most of all, he’s the one I’ve most wanted to say it.
I grab his bag with my good hand and break for the house. He chases me. “What are you doing?”
I laugh and run faster. He catches up with me, but I keep going. When I hit the front door, I listen for sounds of Charles rummaging in the kitchen or playing music in the garage, but the house is empty. Feet pounding upstairs, racing toward my room. I glance into Charles’ room: he’s gone. Aidan stops at the threshold of my room like a vampire needing an invite. As I dive inside, I grab his shirt and pull him with me, kissing, grasping and devouring him. We tear off our coats. My body drives against his, and I can feel the heat just below his belt. As he caresses me, he smells like rain, shampoo, sweat, starch, heat, hands, dirt, skin…
Fear ripples through me. Even though I want it, I’m not ready for what should come next. Or what other people say should come next. And I’m alone with Aidan, vulnerable if he should decide to take what he wants. We should really have a relationship talk about sex. When we’re calmer.
I smother my chattering thoughts and kiss him. We fall to our knees and stretch out on the floor. I avoid lying on the arm that’s hurt. His hands stroke my waist, hip, and thigh as I raise my leg up over him. His palm brushes the underside of my breast. My fingers dig into his shirt and pull it out of his pants so that I can massage the silky skin of his waist. I’m dying every time I look into his eyes. Fading in a blaze of light as I turn inside out with lust. His kisses move to my neck and up to my ear. “I love you, Charity Jones,” he whispers and kisses my lobe.
My phone buzzes. I ignore it and instead throw Aidan on his back as I straddle him, heart pounding. I lean over him, French kissing him. My phone buzzes again.
And again.
And again.
Something tells me to stop. I place my hand on Aidan’s chest—a “hold on” gesture—and put a finger to my lips. “It might be my mom.”
I roll off of Aidan, who looks a thousand times more delicious with tousled hair and blushing cheeks. He sits up against the bedfra
me, watching me.
The phone lies on the floor under my coat. I pick it up and check the texts.
The heat drains from my body.
Aidan sits up. “What’s wrong?”
I turn the phone toward him.
“Death threats.”
Chapter 16
Maybe I should go to the police, but part of me doesn’t believe these threats are actually serious. People believe whatever they hear, and these people clearly believe I killed Keiko’s dog. They want me to feel badly for it.
A dark suspicion blooms in my mind. Charles swore his vengeance and he’s been unusually quiet. Invisible and silent last night behind his closed bedroom door. He came home and ate obediently with the family, keeping to himself. Totally out of character. He would never hurt me, of course, but he loves to incite a little of the old ultraviolence. He used to brag that he’d killed a pigeon by simply throwing a rock at it when we lived in Woodland Hills. He never says “I’m sorry” or feels guilty about anything.
I sometimes wonder if he’s a sociopath, but never out loud.
The next morning is Saturday. Aidan writes me an impassioned email in the middle of the night imploring me to tell my parents. He mercifully lets the subject drop over the torturous weekend. We can’t kiss or touch, and even trying seems like a disastrous idea. Aidan watches Doctor Who. He thinks it’s the greatest thing he’s ever seen, but says it makes absolutely no sense. I guess he can stay my boyfriend.
We still need to talk about sex stuff. Soon. Like, how we’re not doing that. Or are we?
I block every number that has texted my phone in the last twenty-four hours except for my tight circle of friends. It’s awesome that I now have a “circle” of friends.
Monday morning, Aidan watches me as I head to my first period class. His coat hood raised over his head. Breath white in the cold air. Brooding eyes blaze against the purple dress shirt tucked into his dark blue jeans. I glance back at him, and he barely breaks eye contact with me when a couple of girls flank him, asking his name.
Snowed (The Bloodline of Yule Trilogy Book 1) Page 9
