She mock-sneered. “Well, hurry up.” When she reached to grab my arm, I dodged her hand. Even though we’d outgrown the physical means of bickering didn’t mean I’d lost all memories of how to defend myself from her. Thank God grabbing hair had never appealed to her.
“For?” I repeated.
Her eyes narrowed as she realized I wasn’t following her command, but instead of digging in and trying to manhandle me again, she stepped back. Glanced over her shoulder in the direction of our trailer. Huh. A change of tactics? She must really want something from me.
“Someone’s here.”
“Who?” I gasped and clapped my hands together. “Publisher’s Marketplace? I won?”
She deadpanned at my fake enthusiasm. “I don’t know. He was already there talking to Dad when I came back from babysitting those brats at Four-A.”
I shrugged. “Okay.” A stranger at our crappy home. Big deal. It was probably someone from the theater chatting about a screenplay or…
Sabine sighed. “He mentioned you.”
Or…not. Me? “Wait, Dad did, or this other guy?”
“Dad. And then he made me leave once he realized I was home.” She huffed and shielded her eyes from the setting sun to squint at me.
Something secretive. I resisted a grin. Surprises could be fun…
Instead of freaking me out, this stranger’s presence sparked my curiosity. I had nothing to fear, right? It wasn’t like I could be in trouble. Not that I was a goody-goody, but I never stepped near disobedience. At least I hadn’t since the last time I insisted I saw something that was obviously a hallucination. Because everyone knew unicorns didn’t exist.
For the last eight years, I’d never breathed a word about those kinds of…creatures again.
Down-low was my mantra. And it was working. It would work, dammit.
I shrugged. “Okay.” Better not to show Sabine I was intrigued. She exploited all things fun in life.
“Okay?” she jeered. “That’s all you can say? God, you’re so…lame.”
I crossed my arms and my backpack shifted.
“He looks like…” She waved her hands, her glittery yellow-polished nails flashing in the fading light. “Someone important.”
Good important or bad important? I wouldn’t trust her word for it, so I pushed past her and continued walking home. Her flip flops squeaked as she hurried after me. Her vanilla body spray sweetened the hot air as she matched my pace next to me.
“He’s all dressed up like some kind of lawyer or something. Fancy shoes. Nice clothes.”
No one from Coltin, then. So much for the start of my hunch that he’d be affiliated with the county animal control. If I’d warranted any attention lately, it’d be because of that rescue call I’d helped with.
I bit my lip as I walked. Was I approaching some kind of danger here? I’d just been dreaming and eagerly anticipating a life full of strangers, nameless people who didn’t already know me. But the mention of one unknown person interested in me, and I was starting to freak. So much for my bravado. Complete inability to trust people did that to a girl.
“I kind of thought he might be one of those looney bin docs, you know, like the ones you used to—”
I grabbed her upper arm and pulled her to my face. “I’m not crazy.” I bit the words out and wished I could wholeheartedly believe them. I shook my head, regretting my impulsive defense. Discussing my mental health with my twin sister only ever resulted in more ammo for her to ridicule me for, right before spreading it around her shallow friends.
“Yeah, right.” She shoved my hand off and snarled.
I stormed off and she once again rushed up to me, feet slapping in her rhinestone-decorated foam sandals.
“Jesus, Layla. Wait up. I just meant he seemed stiff and stuffy like those doctors were.”
Doctors. What a crock. I’d never trust another one in my life. Certainly not any who wanted to drug me up or lock me in a cell. It’d taken me years to trust Dad again, accepting that he’d sent me to those quacks because he hadn’t known what else to do. How else did a parent handle a child who swore the scratches on her arm were from a monster in the water of the local quarry hole? What else could he have done when my screaming from night terrors prohibited us from normal sleep for a year, when the neighbors demanded we relocate in the park because I was so “disturbing”?
We stood on the slim path to our trailer, the weeds hanging over the edges like a fringe of stubbornness. Dad usually tried to mow on time, but he was often behind, especially when he had a screenplay to work on. At least there wasn’t any chipped or peeling paint on the outside of our home. Even if it was painted in the ugliest shade of orange to ever be mixed in the hardware store.
An SUV was parked in the drive, sitting there under the generous shade of the ancient sweetgum tree. Its tinted windows and mostly unidentifiable license plate unnerved me. If it was a mental health visit, the vehicle would have those government plates. Still, it stood there, its shiny, glossy paint screaming of money and maintenance. Two things Coltin’s trailer park never saw much of.
Sabine peered at me, raising her brows and gesturing for me to walk up to our residence. Instead, I waited. Other than the car, nothing else hinted at a warning. I felt no foreboding of evil or danger, no signs that I was about to enter into a conversation I would wish I’d never heard.
Voices just barely carried out to us, deep, low tones of two men speaking. What was being discussed, I had no clue.
“Well,” Sabine hissed.
I shushed her and frowned at the front door.
People suck. I recalled my line of so-called poetry and tried to find my grounding in it. It was true. I’d never been on the receiving end of humankind’s compassion. Sure, Dad loved me because I was his daughter, but I knew he struggled with how to explain my “issues” from my youth. Sabine might have liked me as a sister before kindergarten, but she’d flipped to being my nemesis, post-peer pressure. Susan, she was all right, too. She seemed to value me and my talent at work, but that was just a workplace kind of thing.
Simply put, I didn’t know how to trust people. And now someone was seeking me out.
Friend or foe?
I swallowed past the lump in my throat. Maybe I could send Sabine in. Use her to suss out what Dad was talking about with this mystery man. She was clearly curious, maybe even jealous that for once, someone wanted to discuss me, not her.
“You go in.”
She gaped at me and then huffed. “No. Remember? Dad told me to leave for a while.”
“Then maybe we should wait until he’s done talking altogether.” I bet if Sabine couldn’t listen in, I wouldn’t be allowed to either. She was the golden one.
Crossing her arms, she snarled, “So, what? We wait out here all night?”
I shrugged. Sounded fine to me.
She slapped at two mosquitoes flittering by her bare shoulder. Her formfitting, new-breasts-enhancing tank top wasn’t much coverage for repelling bugs. “We’ll get eaten alive!” She smacked at one of the skeeters.
Another shrug. “I’m fine.” I was. I must have the most undesirable blood type ever because I was never bitten by anything.
“Just go in there.”
I shook my head. “You.”
“I told you, he kicked me out.”
I smirked. “Aw. You poor thing.”
“Shut up! He probably wanted me out of earshot because he’s so embarrassed by you.” She shoved at my shoulder. Seemed we weren’t completely past that sparring phase yet. I pushed back at her opposite shoulder. I refused to be an embarrassment. If anyone was a joke, she was with her gaudy attempts to look like someone ten years her senior.
“Don’t even,” she warned as she righted herself. Even though she was a head taller than me, I packed more of a punch.
I ducked out of her reach. “You started it.”
“Girls!”
We paused shoving at each other at the sound of Dad’s voice. He was leanin
g out the front door, his balding head the only part of him outside. Swiping and smacking at a bug buzzing by his goatee, he cleared his throat. “We, uh, have a guest.”
Sabine elbowed me toward the door, and I kept the glare off my face as I walked toward Dad. He almost smiled at me, his lower lip twitching side to side as though he wasn’t sure what kind of an expression to make. Or, he wasn’t confident in his thoughts or feelings. A man of the theater, Dad was skilled at coaching and managing his emotions and expressions.
Whoever this “guest” was, his presence was unsettling him.
Great. Made me so much more enthusiastic to see what was up. Dad wasn’t the smartest or bravest guy out there, but he was my dad, and I had to trust in his parental guidance. Right now, though, he was…intimidated.
“Oh yeah?” I asked under my breath as I climbed up the two aluminum steps that led to our tiny tin-can of home sweet home.
The stink of burnt oven-cooked food accosted me as I walked right past Dad’s failure of a dinner in the excuse of a kitchenette. In the middle of our trailer, smack dab center of the twenty feet we called home, were the single loveseat and solitary chair of our living room. Three seats for three people. With the patched-up upholstery and stains galore, those mismatched thrift-shop pieces had always worked for us.
The stiff and stuffy, well-dressed man Sabine had gotten a glimpse of sat in the chair. Dad ushered both of us girls to sit in the loveseat. She inched away from me, not wanting our legs to touch, but she hid her scowl as though she didn’t want this guest to witness her hatred of me.
I reclined into the worn cushions and sighed before raising my face and meeting the man’s eyes.
Only I couldn’t.
I tried to.
I froze, my body going rigid and my eyes staying locked in place. Staring at his forehead, I blinked and stuck my attention to his gaze.
Facing the tall, older man, my sight was glued to his, those dark-brown eyes that looked almost black in the dim light of the room. My lungs seized the air I’d gulped in, making my heart race enough to make me lightheaded.
Dizzy, I could do. I wouldn’t faint. I couldn’t. I never had before. Yet I sat there, perfectly still, not even blinking to fight back the dizziness. Blood roared in my ears as I grounded myself, fighting back the panic attack. Heat spread across my cheeks, starting the flush that accompanied my nerves.
“Miss Holden?”
The man spoke, breaking my trance. I blinked, still staring at his eyes and sitting stock-still.
I parted my lips to speak, but words wouldn’t come. I cleared my throat.
He leaned forward from his relaxed posture in the weathered chair, the springs creaking under his weight as he shifted. As he slanted closer to me from across the chipped and glass-ring-marked IKEA coffee table, he smiled. A genuine, gentle grin that almost could have calmed me. Grandfatherly, if he looked older than the fifty-something he likely was. With his elbows on his knees, he settled in to speak to me. I prayed I could listen to a single word he might say.
Because no matter what, I couldn’t, wouldn’t, pay a single beat of attention to the small cat-headed reptile perched on his shoulder.
Chapter Three
“Hi,” Sabine chirped at my side.
Right. We were both a Miss Holden. But he’d been addressing me.
I’d forgotten she was right next to me. No easy feat, because she always demanded all the attention. I could have forgotten anything at that moment, so distracted as I was by the cat-iguana thing on this guy’s shoulder.
I swallowed.
Don’t acknowledge it. Don’t look at it. Just…don’t.
From the corner of my eye, I considered it. Glossy black fur shone on its face, perfectly tipped triangular feline ears twitching this way and that. The sweet pink nose any adorable shorthair mix might have sniffed before the thing licked its jowls, whiskers dancing. Fur covered the drastic shift to leathery, stiff green scales of its reptilian body—claws, webbed digits, tail and all.
Not. Real.
“Hello,” he said to Sabine, just now looking away from me.
Sweat pooled at the small of my back, and I fought to keep my lips together but not trembling. I nearly panted with nerves and fear. But no matter what, I refused to even glance in the direction of that…that thing.
It’s not real.
It’s not there.
Nothing is there.
I inhaled as steadily as I could, praying my chant could help keep me from losing it.
It’s not there.
Cat eyes narrowed at me. It curled and uncurled the end of its tail, like an adversary flexing their muscles in a threat.
It is not there.
Dammit. I wasn’t a good enough liar. Or actor. Because, unless my eyes were deceiving me, unless I truly was crazy, a messed-up hybrid cat-reptile was cocking its head at me from atop the man’s right shoulder.
I’m. Not. Crazy.
Another deep breath. Still, I stared straight at the man’s face, ignoring the thing that wasn’t there.
“Miss Holden,” he said again, refocusing on me, “my name is Gerald Suthering.”
“Nice to meet you,” I rushed out in a whisper.
“I’ve come here tonight to extend you an invitation to enroll at Olde Earth Academy.”
I swallowed, hard, and tried to concentrate on his words. A school? Did he know that thing was preening on his shoulder? Did anyone? No. He couldn’t because it wasn’t there.
It’s not real. It can’t be.
“He’s the headmaster,” Dad explained from the side.
I couldn’t dare to shift my gaze. I resolutely locked in on Mr. Suthering’s face and refused to deviate from my plan. Look as calm and normal as possible, and not freak out.
And do not let anyone know I can still see impossible creatures.
Sabine shifted next to me, casually pulling her leg up under her butt. “Olde Earth Academy. Sounds…ancient.” Her tone was as calm and normal as it ever was. Dad wasn’t gawking at this cat-reptile either. Clearly, Mr. Suthering was oblivious to it. Only me. I was the only one to see it.
Sabine made a moue of interest. “I’ve never heard of it.”
Never heard of what? I counted my breaths in and out, wishing I could voluntarily surrender my peripheral vision.
It’s not real.
It can’t be real.
Focus.
Sabine had never heard of what? Oh, right. A school. An academy?
“Most haven’t,” Mr. Suthering said. “It is a private institution.”
Olde Earth Academy. I had no clue why he’d approach me about it. Or invite me to enroll. “What—”
With a wide-open maw, the creature emitted a soundless yawn. Inside its mouth, two rows of red teeth glistened with saliva.
I froze and blinked rapidly again. No one spoke or moved in our teeny living space. Complete absence of reactions. And I was determined to pretend I was the same as them.
“Miss Holden?” Mr. Suthering tilted his head toward the thing on his shoulder. He grinned. “Cat got your tongue?”
I snapped my lips shut and clenched my jaw.
Say what?
I frowned and stared at him harder, as though I could weasel some meaning out of his words via his steady gaze.
Cat. Got. Your. Tongue?
Did he…
Was he aware…
Why would he have said that?
Still, he smiled, some tease of confidential knowledge in his expression. Not like a know-it-all like Darren, not haughty like Sabine. Just…a hint of a secret. Or maybe he was just poking humor at my stilted speech. “I understand our offer may come as a surprise.”
“Try shock,” I quipped. Cat got your tongue. It’s a figure of speech. For speechless idiots like me. That’s all.
He nodded, almost bobbing the animal thing perched on him. It rocked back and forth, the fur shifting as it bunched its muscles to stay seated up there. “Yet our enrollment committee bel
ieves you would be a most excellent fit at our Academy and thus wish to extend an exclusive invitation, free of tuition.”
Just like that? “How?”
Dad stepped closer to our little roundtable and said, “They heard about you from that news report, Layla. Can you believe it?” He let out an adorably embarrassing chuckle, like a male version of the obnoxious Mrs. Bennet from Pride and Prejudice. “They heard about you helping those officers with those dogs.”
“The animal control thing on the news?” Sabine asked. Her hint of laughter sounded something more like scoff rather than a side of disbelief. “With those mutts?”
They’re not just mutts. “Pitties,” I said. “Well, pitties-slash-mastiffs.”
Sabine just barely hid her eye roll.
“Yes. We found a clip of the news report, and we were intrigued.” Mr. Suthering reclined into his seat.
“But…why?” Sabine blurted.
Yeah. Why?
Mr. Suthering licked his lips yet didn’t seem at all put on the spot or annoyed with her belligerence. “Our enrollment selection is a complicated and intricate process, Miss Holden.”
“And you want her.”
“Correct.” He waved a hand toward me. “You’ve captured our attention, Layla. After a few phone calls and verifying records, we were pleased to find such a uniquely advanced scholar.”
Well…thanks. Fancy way to describe me as a straight-A student.
I still stared at him, pinpointing my attention to his face almost obsessively in my attempt to dismiss and ignore the farfetched possibility of the feline lizard licking at its tail on his shoulder. So single-minded in my focus, I mapped him out. The faint laugh lines hiding in wait at his eyes. The suggestion of a dimple on his cheek, all those depths signaling he was an older man who’d likely aged with years in the outdoors. Graying blond hair was clipped close to his head, almost in a militaristic style. A polished man so different from the sloppy appearance Dad bumbled about with.
“Should you accept, we would need to leave immediately, as the Academy’s first quarter begins in two days. Once we arrive—”
Secrecy: Olde Earth Academy: Year One Page 2
