If only, Lucy thought. If only I could.
Chapter Twenty-Three
When Lucy got home, she mumbled something to her mother about feeling sick again and dragged her body up the stairs. She was suddenly so, so tired. She collapsed on top of her bed, felt herself yanked down into a heavy sleep. She dreamt of only blackness and a sound: tick tick tick.
Hours later, Lucy was smashed back into consciousness by a crashing sound outside and a buzzing next to her head.
She sat up, heart pounding. It was dark. Through her window the sky flashed. The rain was coming down so hard, it didn’t even seem real. Lucy was not entirely sure she was not still sleeping.
Her phone kept buzzing next to her head. She reached for it without thinking.
“Well, if it isn’t my tiny cake wad.”
Thunder shook the house and the windows chattered like teeth.
Adrenaline shot through her veins. She was suddenly wide awake.
“I am not your cake wad,” Lucy said. Her voice was tight and flat. “I’m not your honey pie or your sugar face or your fish stick marzipan banana bread lasagna.” She felt the anger bubbling up, pushing like steam against her lips.
“Well, well, well,” Olivia said. She laughed lightly. “What do we have here?”
During her long walk home the night before, Lucy had thought she never wanted to talk to Olivia or any of those girls ever again. With every step she told herself she was walking farther and farther away from them. But in that moment Lucy realized there were, in fact, a lot of things Olivia needed to hear. And some strong hard place inside Lucy, a place she didn’t even know she had, told Lucy she was the one who needed to say them.
“We have someone who knows what you are now,” Lucy said. “And needs to talk to you. Face-to-face.”
“Good,” Olivia said. “Because I need to talk to you too.”
“Meet me outside at midnight,” Lucy said.
“Okay, Lucy,” Olivia said. And then they hung up.
Lucy sat there, trying to slow her breathing. She’d see Olivia one last time. She would tell her what she needed to tell her. And then that would be it. Lucy would go back to the regular magic-less world, where Tristan was mad at her and Alex didn’t love her. And somehow she would manage to survive, just survive. It was all she could hope to do.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Lucy had told herself she wasn’t going to be afraid anymore, but when Olivia pulled up at midnight that night she felt that familiar fizzle of fear deep in her gut. And when their eyes met by the light of the cloud-covered moon, Lucy’s hands began to shake. Well, let them shake, Lucy thought. And she balled them into fists.
“You and your friends are monsters,” Lucy said. She took a breath. Her entire body was trembling now, even her heart inside her chest. But it didn’t matter.
Olivia tipped her head to the side, curious. “Go on.”
“When you first explained heartbreaking to me, I thought I could maybe see how it was okay somehow. But everything you told me about what you do is a lie. Max did not need to have his heart broken. He did not need to be humbled or opened up. And I don’t need any kind of magic to know that.
“What Liza did last night was disgusting and evil. And from now on I’m going to do everything I possibly can to stop you guys from hurting a single other person. And yes, you are powerful. And yes, I’m just some sad, pathetic, heartbroken girl with no boyfriend and no friends and no magic. But if you think that will stop me . . . just you wait.”
Lucy stopped. A wave of calm washed over her.
“That’s it,” Lucy said. “You can go now.”
She looked Olivia straight in the eye and felt nothing but relief.
And then Olivia smiled. She brought her hands up and started a slow clap. “Bravo, Lucy.” The sound of her claps echoed off the trees. “You’ve passed. The magic is yours.”
“I don’t want it,” Lucy said.
Of course she did. But not from them. Not like this.
Olivia reached out for her. Lucy stepped back.
“Lucy,” Olivia said. “What you saw last night, what I showed you on the cameras at Pete’s. That wasn’t real.”
“Whatever you’re going to say now? Don’t bother. I won’t believe you.”
Olivia shook her head. “Magic is power. Power beyond what most people are capable of handling. We needed to know you had the moral center required not to abuse it. And the balls to stop anyone who doesn’t. Last night was a test. The guy you saw? Max? There is no such person.” Olivia held out her phone. On the screen was a photo of Max from the back. Olivia scrolled to the next picture—a three-quarter view. Then a side view. Max was starting to look familiar. Olivia flipped to the next shot and then there was a photograph of Gil. Narrow-hipped Gil with her short pixie haircut slicked down. She was standing next to Lucy’s green Sharpie message—It’s going to be all right. She had one hand pointing at the camera, the other pointing at her heart.
Lucy wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry or turn back and run or just start screaming. “But why?”
“Before we could give you magic to use on your own, we needed to test you. When I gave you the scarf in the bathroom that was the first test. Your tears activated the ink. That meant that you had the potential to become a Heartbreaker. Last night was the second test. But it was only a test.” She paused. “We needed to know you could handle the magic.” Olivia smiled. “And you can.” She held out a little vial. “So here.”
The vial was a bit larger than a perfume sample. There was silvery-gold liquid swirling inside.
“Please take it,” Olivia said. “Okay? Just hold it and look at it? Can you at least do that?” Her voice sounded different then, pleading.
“Fine.” Lucy took it. The swirling slowed, and in that heavy, shimmering silver-gold, Alex’s face appeared: the curve of his cheek, the hollow of his eye. The face blew her a kiss.
“What is it?” Lucy whispered.
“Drink it,” Olivia said. “And then you’ll see. Then you’ll see everything.”
“You think I’m going to drink something because you said to?”
“Please, just drink it. It won’t hurt you.”
“And why should I believe you? How do I know it’s not poison?”
“Because if I am ever planning to poison you . . .” Olivia smiled then, just ever so slightly. “I won’t say please.”
“Well . . .” Lucy said. “That’s . . .” But crazy as it sounded, for some odd reason, Lucy believed her.
And besides, now she had nothing to lose.
Lucy raised the vial toward the sky like she was making a toast to Alex, to herself, to their future, whatever that was going to be. She tossed it back.
The liquid slid over her tongue and down her throat. It was freezing cold and chilled her insides.
She felt suddenly dizzy. There was an aching in her head, in her arms and legs. All her muscles contracted at once. She could feel the earth rotating under her, and for a second, just a second, she did not rotate.
“Open your eyes,” Olivia said.
Lucy felt her eyes open.
Tiny flashes of light glittered all around her; sparks sparkled. She heard a soft but many-layered hum, as though everything around her was vibrating its own note. She listened to the trees, to the moon, to the blades of grass.
It was funny that she’d ever existed in this world and not known about the magic. Because now that she could see it, she knew this: it was everywhere.
She looked down at her own hand. Shimmering pink light was coming off of her skin.
“Oh my God,” Lucy said.
“Oh my Goddess,” said Olivia. She laughed gold glitter bubbles. “Don’t worry. It’ll fade in a couple of minutes.”
The air was filled with thousands of tiny fireflies.
Olivia said, “Just breathe.”
Lucy breathed in and watched swirls of liquid floating through the air.
“But what are those?” Lucy
said. She tried to point at one.
“Currents of energy,” Olivia said. “Visible to you because of the Magic Magnet.”
“The what?”
“What you just drank. It was a liquid Magic Magnet. It makes you able to see more of the magic in the world, including some not usually visible to the human eye. Although only temporarily. And that part is more like a side effect. Its real purpose is to protect us and you.”
Lucy blinked. “From what?” Her voice sounded funny, like she was very, very far away.
“Well, imagine what would happen if people found out about our powers, about what we can do?”
Lucy blinked again. Each time she opened her eyes the sparks were dimmer.
“It’s only active so long as your heart is in the first seven days of being broken, which means it will seep into you over the next two days. If you don’t break a heart by then, it will gather all your magical memories and pass them back into the air.”
“But what does that mean?” Lucy blinked one more time. The sparks faded until they were gone.
“It means that if you don’t become one of us, you won’t remember any of this. Right now, this moment, this conversation, it will not exist to you three days from now.” Olivia reached down her shirt and pulled something out. “And it means that what I am about to give to you, you will have no memory of ever having gotten.”
“Wait,” Lucy said. “You’ll take my memories?”
“Don’t worry,” Olivia said. “The memories the magnet will suck up aren’t memories you’d want to have if you aren’t a Heartbreaker. To know for sure that the world is filled with magic that you cannot see and cannot ever touch is far worse than not knowing there is any magic at all. . . . Now, will you get in the car, please. I have something for you.”
Lucy got in.
Olivia opened her fist and revealed a tiny eyedropper and two foil packets, one silver, one gold.
“Don’t look like much, do they?” said Olivia. “Funny to think how many people there are out there who would do absolutely anything to get at these little things.”
“What are they?”
She pinched the silver foil. “This is Empathy Cream. If you rub it on your skin and then touch someone else’s, you’ll feel their feelings instead of your own for the entire time you’re touching them. That means instead of believing someone when they say they’re fine, you’ll know whether they’re fine or not. You’ll know if a guy is scared even if he’s pretending to be big and tough. It’s useful for calling people out on their bullshit. If you can figure out what a person is feeling and put it into words even if they themselves aren’t able to, it will give them the impression that only you get them. That only you can truly understand them.”
Lucy stared at the packet. If only she’d had that while Alex was still her boyfriend. If only she’d had gallons of it to slather all over herself.
“The only caveat I’ll give you with this is that we had a bad batch of tears once. Tears that we thought were heartbreak tears but were just cried by a really good actor. And they got mixed in with the tears we were using when we made our last batch of this stuff. So there are a couple packets that don’t have any magic in them. Chances are you didn’t get one. But if you did, it still makes a really good cuticle cream.” Olivia winked. “There’s sweet almond oil in it.”
Lucy just nodded.
“It can also be useful in some more, how shall we say, recreational settings.” Olivia paused. “But in your case, it will help you know the exact right moment to strike. And in three minutes I am going to tell you what I mean by that. However, first . . .” She held up the eyedropper. It was amber colored with a black rubber top. “This is something I’ve thought you needed since the first second I saw you all crumple-faced in that bathroom, honey pie.” She unscrewed the top and held up the dropper. “Tip your head back.” She touched Lucy’s forehead, chin, eyelids, and cheeks with the tip. Lucy’s skin began to tingle.
“Your face is too expressive,” Olivia said. “It’s sweet really. But it’s not very useful. So now for the next forty-eight hours or so you’ll be able to make your face do or not do anything you want.” She held up the tiny vial and tucked it into her purse. “The stuff I put on your face is called Involuntary Muscle Control Serum. Basically what it does is slow down all the involuntary muscles in your face, the ones that react before you even know you’re doing anything. And gives you control over them.”
Lucy felt her face start to register surprise: Her eyebrows began to lift; her mouth began to open slightly. But then instead of letting her face follow through with it, she stopped herself. And decided to look not impressed at all.
“Gil calls them Oscar Drops because it makes people into such good actors; it’s like anyone who uses it could win an Oscar.”
Or their boyfriend back, Lucy thought.
“Thank you,” said Lucy.
Olivia smiled. “Now, see even I can’t tell if you’re honestly grateful or are pretending to be. That’s how well this stuff works.” Olivia held out her hand. The last packet lay flat on her palm.
“What you’re looking at right now is so valuable and so rare that Gil and Liza have never even seen it or even know for sure it exists. And of course it goes without saying that you will never, ever tell them that I gave this to you. . . .”
Lucy stared at the packet.
“My grandmother made this a long time ago,” Olivia said. The packet glittered in the moonlight.
Lucy reached out, her heart bubbling, her stomach bubbling. She held it in her hands.
“Remember when we told you a Heartbreaker can’t use magic to make someone love them?”
Lucy nodded.
“Well, that’s not entirely true. You can’t use magic to make someone love you who isn’t already on their way. But using what I just gave you, you can take someone who’s close and push them right over the edge.”
“How?”
“Those are called Sparks. To you they look like glittery bits, but that’s only because you’ve taken the Magic Magnet. To anyone else, they’re invisible. Olivia leaned in close. “Sprinkle them on your palm, and blow them at your target.” Olivia blew Lucy a kiss. “And then . . .” She poked a finger gun into Lucy’s chest and pulled the trigger. She leaned in and whispered, “Kapow.”
“Wait, I don’t understand, they’ll kill someone?”
Olivia let out a silvery laugh. “No, doll cakes, they give you a direct line to someone’s heart. The Sparks take whatever someone is feeling about you at the moment at which they inhale them, and amplify it, and make that feeling last for a day, a week, maybe more. Be careful, they can be dangerous. If someone is angry at you, these will make them furious. And if that happens you better watch out. Remember Ricky back at the party the other night? Sparks gone wrong.” She shook her head. “But if someone likes you a lot, they care about you a lot but aren’t quite there yet, these, well, these will make them love you, really and truly and deeply. Maybe not for forever, but definitely for long enough to break their heart. The thing is, people’s feelings about each other fluctuate a lot, sometimes from moment to moment. You walk into a room looking hot and he suddenly feels a rush of lust. A minute later you take out a pack of gum and don’t offer him any and he feels hurt. So you have to time it all just right . . .”
“. . . and that’s where the Empathy Cream comes in?”
“Exactly.”
Lucy felt the color rising in her cheeks again. This was what was going to save her.
Maybe Alex had never loved her, but he’d definitely liked her at some point, and that was before she knew what he really wanted. But now she did and her next steps were crystal clear—all she had to do was everything they’d taught her, pick the right moment, use the Sparks, and then . . . Alex would fall in love with her. And this time she’d do everything right, so even after the Sparks faded he still would. For real this time.
And then, and this was the especially wonderful part: She would
be able to forget what she’d done. The Magic Magnet would take effect, and she would not know how she and Alex had ended up back together. She would never have to deal with the guilt of knowing and not telling, never have to wonder if it was wrong to use magic to make someone love you, because she would forget that she’d done it.
The only magic she would know would be the magic of love. Which would be more than she’d ever need.
She felt such relief then, that the tears did start coming. She did not try to stop them. They dripped down onto her cheeks. She looked up. Olivia was staring at her. But Lucy could not look her in the eye. She looked, instead, right past her, to the trees, which were still ever-so-slightly shimmering.
“Thank you,” Lucy said. Even though she knew Olivia had no idea what she was actually thanking her for.
“Maybe one day you’ll have a chance to repay us,” said Olivia.
Lucy got out of the car, holding on to those two tiny packets.
“Good luck,” Olivia said. “Your training is complete, so for now at least, this is good-bye.” She pointed to Lucy’s fist. “And be careful, sugar pie,” Olivia said. “Don’t waste that. It’s more valuable than you even know. And it’s all you’re getting until you’re one of us.”
“But what if it doesn’t work?”
“Well then”—Olivia shrugged—“I guess that’s all you’ll ever get.”
Lucy nodded.
Olivia drove off then into the night, but Lucy swore she could hear the tinkling bells of Olivia’s laugh echoing long after she was gone.
Chapter Twenty-Five
On the morning of the sixth day, there was Lucy walking down the hallway with a blank face, a bubbling stomach, and two very special somethings hidden in her pocket.
She stared at each person as she passed. Two girls laughing at something a third girl had said. Two guys who looked bored. A couple who were having a fight. People were fixing their hair and putting on lip balm and sending secret text messages and hurrying to class. They thought the world was just what they saw, the way she always had. The way she always used to. They had no idea that they only saw the top layer, like the thin skin of ice on top of a deep lake at first freeze—everything that really mattered, everything that made a lake a lake was trapped down below. All it took to get to it was one tiny poke.
The Secret Sisterhood of Heartbreakers Page 18
