KEEPER

by Ingrid Seymour

  “I don’t need anything else, Mom.” He pushed the envelope back. “You’ve already spent enough money.”

  “We’re just trying to imagine you’ve gone off to college a few years early,” Dad joked. “We broke your college fund open.”

  Greg smiled bleakly. “Well, I’ll get a job for whatever else I need, which won’t be much.”

  “Use the money for food, then,” Mom said, stuffing the envelope into his pants pocket. “I don’t want you surviving on Pop-Tarts alone. You need meat and vegetables.”

  She wrapped him in a tight hug before he could say anything else. Greg rested his cheek on her head. “I’ll be all right, Mom.” He squeezed her in turn. He still wasn’t used to being taller than his parents. Hugging Mom felt different, but was still as comforting as ever. Greg extended a hand toward Dad, and he took it. They shook for an instant before Dad pulled him in for a tight bear hug.

  “Take care, son.”

  “I will.”

  “I wish we could help more,” Dad said, pulling back to look him in the eye.

  “You’re already paying for . . .”

  “Nonsense,” Dad cut him off. “That’s the least we can do. It’s nothing.”

  It was hard for Greg to believe he would be on his own now. No rules to follow but his own. It was scary and exciting at the same time. It was the Morphid way. He was an adult.

  “Sometimes I wish . . . we were more like humans.” Dad was struggling to say this, but seemed determined to get it all out. “I wish we didn’t have to let you go, but this is your path. We’re proud of you, son.”

  Dad took a step back, releasing Greg and wrapping an arm around his wife. Greg clenched his teeth and blinked while Mom buried her face in Dad’s chest.

  “I’ll . . . miss you,” Greg said, fighting back tears.

  “We’ll miss you too, son,” Dad said. And with that they got in the car and drove away.

  Greg stood in the parking lot for a few seconds before he realized it was a bad idea after what had happened this morning. He got in the car and started the engine. As soon as he remembered Sam was waiting for him, his heart felt lighter, and he let that feeling take over. He didn’t want to dwell on the possibility that he might not see his parents for a long time . . . or ever. Shifting his attention completely to Sam was just what he needed at the moment. But first, he would find a store and buy some new clothes.

  Chapter 19 - Greg

  Wearing new jeans, t-shirt and tennis shoes, Greg found Sam’s apartment without difficulty, and practically lunged for the doorbell as soon as he spotted the right apartment unit. A happy-looking lady in her mid-twenties answered the door.

  “Ah, you must be Greg, the hero,” she said, extending her hand with a smile. He briefly shook it. “Come in. I’m Rose. Sam’s waiting for you.”

  He followed her into the living room and liked the place immediately. It had a relaxed, inviting feel to it—not stuffy or too formal.

  “Please sit down. I’ll let Sam know you’re here.” Rose turned just to find Sam already standing behind her. “There you are. Well, your student’s here.” Greg thought he saw Rose wink at Sam as she left. “Oh, and dinner’ll be ready in an hour. You’re welcome to stay if you want and your parents don’t mind, Greg.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Rose,” Greg said.

  “Rose will do,” she said with a shudder, “Mrs. Rose makes me think of my mother.”

  “Your mom’s nice,” Greg said after Rose left.

  “She’s not my mom,” Sam corrected him. “I just met her.”

  Huh? This was confusing, to say the least. Although, now that he thought about it, Rose did seem too young to be Sam’s mother.

  “We’ll save that for later,” Sam said, noticing his confusion. “Right now, you’re the one who’s got some explaining to do.”

  “Right.” Greg dropped his backpack on the floor. No trig today, then. He would have rather discussed geometry, chemistry, calculus, anything but this.

  “Is there anywhere else we can talk?” he asked in a whisper.

  Sam was about to reply when Rose came back in, carrying a tray with two soft drinks and a plate of cookies. “The weather’s nice. Why don’t you kids study outside? They have picnic tables around the corner. I’m sure some fresh air would help you relax after the day you’ve had, Sam.”

  Crap! She heard.

  Greg winced. Good thing she wasn’t Sam’s mom, or she’d make sure they didn’t go anywhere after catching a glimpse of his secrecy.

  “Yes, that’ll be nice,” Sam said.

  “Here. Take this.” Rose pushed the tray in their path as they headed for the door. They both grabbed their drinks and a handful of cookies.

  Outside, Sam set her unopened soda can on the picnic table, stacked the cookies on top, and sat expectantly across from Greg.

  Sam looked at him from head to toe. “You look . . . different.”

  Greg tugged his new t-shirt subconsciously. She had noticed.

  “Well?” she said impatiently as he tried to draw out a gulp of cold soda. He hadn’t realized how thirsty and hungry he was. A whole cookie went into his mouth while Sam watched with irritation. He reluctantly set his food aside.

  “Did she make those cookies?” He licked his lips.

  “I don’t know.”

  “They’re really good.” If Rose had made the cookies, he’d take her up on the dinner offer. His stomach growled.

  “Yes, they’re really good and I’d love the recipe, but enough about the cookies!” Sam snapped.

  “Okay, okay” he said, feeling defensive in the face of her impatience.

  “Where do I begin?” he thought out loud.

  “How about you tell me who that man was, and what the hell was that red ball of . . . of whatever that was? Why was he trying to hurt me? And how did you . . . ?” she couldn’t finish the question.

  “You’ll find this hard to believe, but I don’t know who he is. I’d never seen him before.”

  “You’re right. I don’t believe you! Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the help. But this is all just too freaky, and I need answers.”

  Greg rubbed his neck. “Look, I’ll tell you what I know, but . . . fair warning . . . you won’t believe that, either.”

  “Try me. After seeing what I saw this morning, I wouldn’t be so sure.”

  He cleared his throat and decided to just rip off the Band-Aid. “Okay. I’m not human,” he said. Sam’s eyebrows shot up about ten inches. She looked mad and irritated by the ridiculous notion. Hastily, Greg added, “and in case you don’t know, neither are you.”

  Sam scoffed, rolling her eyes. “That’s just absurd and . . .” She trailed off and squeezed her eyes shut, probably remembering murderous balls of energy flying straight for her face. “Wait. What makes you say that about me?” She went with the flow, although the skepticism didn’t leave her voice. Clearly, she wasn’t ready to outright buy what he told her in spite of what she’d seen.

  “Well,” he tried to think of what to say. At a loss for words, he turned his back on Sam and pulled down the collar of his t-shirt.

  “What is that?” she asked at the sight of his mark.

  “Something I didn’t have a couple of weeks ago,” Greg said.

  “So you got a weird tattoo. What does that have to do with anything?”

  “It’s not a tattoo. Look closely.”

  Sam moved closer and examined the mark. As she leaned in, Greg felt her breath on his neck. A shiver ran down his spine. He had to clench his teeth not to visibly shudder.

  “Okay, so it’s one of those . . . scarification things. I’ve read about them. How do wings on your back prove you’re not human?”

  “It’s not a scarification thing either,” he said, letting go of his t-shirt and facing her. “I never got it made. It just appeared when I . . . changed. I’m a Morphid, and Morphids grow marks like this when they become adults. My parents have them too, although theirs are different.”

>   Sam squinted, exhaled and sat back down. “You’re an adult?” She smirked. “Now you’ve really lost me. I’d believe everything up to that point.”

  Greg glowered at her.

  “Okay, okay, I’ll play along a little longer. So how did you . . . Morphids get there and why?”

  “Well, there are legends that say we came from another realm called Nymphalia, but no one really knows if they’re true. From what most people can tell, we’ve always been here. I know, I know, it sounds crazy. I didn’t quite really believe it myself, until a few weeks ago.”

  Sam tried to restrain a chuckle, but failed.

  “Sorry.” She cleared her throat and asked, “So if Morphids have always been here, how come no one knows about it?”

  “We keep it a secret. Um, things work a little differently for us and our population has never been large.” As in, we don’t all get to procreate, Greg thought, but no way was he getting into that conversation right now. He continued, “In the past, any time humans found out about us, they thought we were witches or demons or whatever was the latest fashionable enemy. As you can imagine, that never ended well for us. So we just lay low, pretend to be human and live our lives in peace.”

  “Is that so?” Sam said with sarcasm.

  “Most of us, anyway. I promise I don’t know what was up with that guy. All I can tell you is that he was a Sorcerer.”

  Sam leaned forward, her voice hushed. “Alright, alright . . . so are you also a . . . ?”

  “No. I’m not a Sorcerer. When I morphed—”

  “When you what?” Sam’s eyes went wide. She looked somewhere between incredulous and frightened, like this was all a bad joke that had gone too far.

  Greg continued, trying to choose his words carefully. “Remember how I told you that a few weeks ago I changed? Well, what happened is that . . . I morphed.”

  “What? Like a bug?”

  “I guess, but I’d rather not think of it that way.”

  “And you think I’m . . . I’m . . .” She couldn’t bring herself to say it.

  “You’re going to morph, too.” He finished for her.

  The desperation and disgust in her voice sounded like she was picturing hideous cockroach legs sprouting out of her abdomen. “Into what?” she managed to ask.

  Into the most beautiful creature on earth, one side of him wanted to say. He could see it in her, how magnificent she would be, how perfect. He bit the inside of his cheek, his new side pushing him away from the thought.

  What mattered was which mark would decorate her back, what caste she would be, and how it would affect her mind. Both sides of his split personality feared the answer. But that was a harder conversation. Telling her she would morph into a beautiful woman would be a lot easier to digest at first. Reaching for his backpack—which he’d brought outside to keep up the tutoring pretense—he retrieved his cell phone, pulled up the latest picture of himself, and handed it to her.

  She examined the image for a moment, then looked up, confused. “Who’s this?”

  “Me. It was taken a month ago. Look at the date.”

  Sam lowered her eyes to the phone and frowned. “Sure, that’s some amazing growth spurt. What are you on? Steroids?” She handed back the phone, smirking sarcastically.

  Greg gave her an unamused stare.

  “You’re serious?” Sam whispered in a half-question.

  His parents had taken the picture at one of his basketball games at school. He was standing by the sideline during a time out. The jersey and shorts hung on his body as if they were draped over a broom stick. His old, unremarkable face held a disapproving frown. Something must have been going wrong in the game, but he couldn’t remember what. It seemed like ages ago.

  “Let me see that again.” Sam snatched the phone from his hand and, this time, she examined the picture in greater detail, looking back and forth between the image and the boy in front of her. Greg shifted in his seat as she scrutinized him.

  “It’s impossible,” she said after a moment, having seen the resemblance he still shared with his old self.

  “Tell me about it,” Greg said in commiseration. “It’s still weird to see myself in the mirror every morning.”

  “Well, you did change for the better,” she said, sliding the phone back across the table.

  He took it and peered back, hopeful at the comment, at the fact that she might find him attractive. But when he saw the twinkle of a sarcastic joke in her eyes, he realized how stupid that hope had to be.

  Sam grinned crookedly, putting a ton of attitude in her expression. “Okay, so what you’re saying is that tomorrow I’m going to look like Barbie?”

  “No,” Greg said, ignoring the joke. “What I’m saying is that Barbie won’t hold a candle to you.” There was no twinkle of a joke in his eyes when he said this. He made damn sure of that.

  It was Sam’s turn to squirm. She averted her eyes and smoothed her hair, her cheeks flushed red. Part of Greg writhed at his own words. His Morphid side nagged at him that it was wrong to talk to her this way, that this sacrilege would soon cost him hell.

  Sam shook herself visibly, then said, “So, just like Barbie, I’ll come with my own logo.” She touched to the back of her neck, where her mark would be.

  Greg nodded.

  “Why? What for?”

  “Because Morphids don’t only change on the outside, and the mark reveals how we change . . . inside,” he added cautiously.

  Sam seemed to recoil inwardly. Greg felt her anxiety triple. He’d been aware of it all along, and now it made the hairs in the back of his hands stand up straight. He needed to be careful as her wall of incredulity weakened. Biting his lower lip, he decided to say nothing else until she was ready for more.

  After a quiet and awkward moment, she homed in right on the issue. “What do the wings on your back mean?”

  “They mean I’m a sort of . . . guardian, your guardian, and I’ve come to realize it’s my job to protect you.”

  “What do you mean you've come to realize?”

  “Well, my parents had never seen a mark like mine before, so they don’t know what I am. That guy, Veridan, he called me a . . . Keeper, and it feels right for some reason.”

  “Yeah, I heard him. He said he wasn’t expecting a Keeper,” Sam said the last word in a whisper. She pinched the bridge of her nose between two fingers and squeezed her eyes shut.

  Again, he let her take the time.

  “So I need someone to protect me, because . . . because that guy wants to hurt me?” she asked after some time.

  “I think so. It makes sense. That’s how things work for Morphids. Fate decides a lot of things for us.”

  “Fate,” Sam echoed, making the word sound like something forbidden and dirty. “But why? Why does he want to hurt me?”

  “I don’t know. All I know is that when you’re in danger, I feel it,” Greg put a hand on his chest, “And I know just where to find you. Like when I called you on the phone that first time. My instincts were screaming you needed my help.”

  Sam’s eyes widened in surprise, and maybe anger, as if he’d just quoted a secret page from her diary. Sam lowered her eyes and turned her back on him.

  “Or at the gas station,” he decided to continue, “I knew I had to be there to protect you, I just didn’t know from what. That’s why I acted so strangely when I saw you. It’s just an instinct, a very strong one.”

  “Is this what you mean by changing inside?” she asked, still facing away.

  He nodded, wishing she would turn around. He wanted to see her eyes, to guess what she may be thinking. She stayed put.

  “Yes,” he said finally, hoping she wouldn’t lose it.

  “And after you . . . changed . . . you started feeling this . . . pull toward me?”

  “Yes. I took my dad’s car and drove all the way from New Orleans as fast as I could. I knew to come here, to this town, although I didn’t know exactly where to find you. Bonds between Integrals are that strong
.”

  “Integrals?” Sam’s voice was shaking, barely audible.

  As calmly and rationally as possible, Greg explained everything his parents had ever told him. When he finished he waited, hoping all that information didn’t push Sam over the brink.

  “So you truly don’t know that guy?” she asked.

  “If you search your heart, you’ll know it’s true.” It was a strange answer, spoken by his Keeper half, but it seemed to have an effect on her.

  She sat silent for a long time. Then Greg noticed her shoulders shaking ever so slightly. He got up and stood next to her. Sensing her need for comfort, he put a hand on her shoulder and forced her to face him. She turned, reluctantly. Placing a finger under her chin, he forced their eyes to meet. Her eyelids remained half-shut at first, but eventually she looked him in the eye.

  “It’ll be all right,” he said softly. “I promise I won’t let anything happen to you. I . . . don’t freak out . . . but I would give my life for you. You should know that.”

  She shook her head.

  Damn it! He was making things worse blurting out stupid crap like that. He had to learn to control himself.

  “Things are hard enough already, and now this,” Sam said.

  “I know something else has been bothering you, I can . . .” He stopped. He wanted to say he could feel what she felt, he could sense her moods, but that would just freak her out even more. “I’m a good listener. You can talk to me about it—whatever it is.”

  Sam seemed to consider it. “I think . . . I can trust you.”

  Greg smiled. He wanted to know everything about her. He already sensed so much, it was as if her soul spoke to his, but he could only understand a fraction of it. He wanted nothing more but to figure it all out.

  She was close, and he wanted to embrace her.

  -You can’t, his Keeper half screamed in his mind, while a more human Greg longed to fill the emptiness of his arms with her warmth. Still, he fought his desire and took a step back instead.

  “I guess we should go back in,” Sam said with a sniffle. “I know I’ll come up with more questions, but right now, I just . . .”

  “I know. It’s a lot to take in. We can talk anytime you want.”