by D. S. Murphy
From close up, his features seemed otherworldly. He had high cheek bones, and his cheeks sunk in a little under them. His perfectly straight nose had a small bump on the upper part, and his jaw was lean and strong. My eyes were drawn to his round eyes, made prominent by dark lashes and graceful eyebrows, and his big, full lips, which made me think of kissing him. I tore my eyes away, my blush deepening. Yesterday I’d thought Mr. Sadleir was good looking, but standing next to Sebastian, he was unexceptional in every way.
What is he doing here? When I saw him the first night I assumed he was a local. But if he just moved here, why wasn’t he at school Monday? Why is he only showing up now?
Mr. Sadleir was looking around for a place to put him.
Not by me not by me not by me—
“Well, Clara is new too, as it happens. Why don’t you sit next to her for now?” Mr. Sadleir motioned to the empty seat next to me.
Sebastian sat to my left, stretching out his long legs and crossing them under the desk in front of him. He didn’t take out any books or notes. Not even a pencil. Whatever he was here for, it wasn’t an education. Mr. Sadleir started class and I tried to focus on what he was saying, but it may as well have been gibberish. I wasn’t the only one having trouble concentrating; a group of girls on the other side of the classroom was whispering and fluttering their eyelids at Sebastian.
I looked over at him, finally, and found him staring directly at me. I panicked, wondering if I had something on my face. I wiped my hands on my skirt.
“Stop staring,” I hissed at him.
He cocked an eyebrow and held his hands up defensively, before turning his eyes towards the front of the room. I couldn’t shake the feeling that Sebastian’s arrival wasn’t a coincidence.
I mean, what did I know for sure? A hot guy shows up at my school, and just because I first saw him under unusual circumstances, I think—what, that he’s following me? That he enrolled in this school and showed up in my English class to find out more about me? That’s insane, right? I’m obviously delusional. After what seemed like eternity, the bell rang and I was out of my seat like a shot.
Lunchtime.
I wanted the security of numbers. I grabbed Jackie when I saw her in the hall and linked arms with her. I didn’t let go until I was seated at a lunch table with friends on all sides. A few minutes later I saw Sebastian saunter in, surrounded by the group of doe-eyed girls from my last class. Jackie saw me watching him and turned to look.
“Who’s that?” she asked.
“No idea,” I replied, focusing on my food.
“He’s cute,” she said. “And he’s coming over here.”
I choked on my sandwich and then took a huge sip of milk to wash it down, but missed my mouth. I was wiping the milk off my face and uniform with multiple napkins when he arrived.
“Mind if I join you?” he asked a few seconds later, looking at me with his gorgeous green eyes and a confident smile that he had no right wearing. The group of girls trailing after him seemed crushed, and wandered off slowly.
“There’s no room—” I mumbled, my mouth still full of sandwich, but Jackie had already scooted over to make a place for him.
“I’m Jackie,” she said, holding out her delicate, well-manicured fingers.
I hid my hands in my lap.
“Sebastian,” he said.
“You’re new,” Jackie said.
“From Iceland,” I offered.
Jackie glanced at me with a confused look.
“We had last period together.”
“Oh, so you know each other already.”
“Yes,” Sebastian said, looking at me just as my lips were forming to say “No.”
I realized I was being unfairly rude.
I’m not sure what it was about him that got my blood pumping.
He was a new student, like me. It was only natural for him to seek me out. Not to mention the shared secret of our bizarre midnight meeting. It’s hard being the new kid. He probably just wanted to make some friends.
“What do you think of town so far?” I asked, pretending to be normal. Running from him hadn’t worked in my favor. I’m sure once he got to know me he’d realize how boring I was and leave me alone.
“It’s full of curious and surprising things,” he said, without taking his eyes off me, his voice dripping with hidden meaning, or so I thought.
“Oh! You should join us this weekend,” Jackie said. “Clara has only been here a few days as well, we’re going to do a little sightseeing.”
“That would be great,” he said. “If it’s not an imposition.”
Imposition? Who talks like that?
“Facebook me,” she said, pulling out her phone.
“Face-what?” he asked. For a second, he had me going, but then I caught the glimmer of humor in his eyes. His lips twitched as he tried to keep a straight face.
Cute.
He pulled out the latest iPhone and sent Jackie a friend invite.
I listened as Jackie made small talk with Sebastian, but everything about the situation seemed surreal. My brain screamed at me to pay attention. Something about Sebastian wasn’t right. I didn’t feel threatened, exactly. He didn’t give me a creepy or dangerous vibe, like the guy in the pub had. But something told me to be cautious.
Then I figured it out: I was eating lunch with attractive people. Jackie was probably the cutest girl in the school, with Patricia a close second. Derry had that homegrown, boy-next-door appeal, and now Sebastian had joined us. Sebastian wasn’t trying to fit in: he belonged here. He was just naturally gravitating towards his own social class. I was the one who didn’t belong. And it wasn’t just looks, these were kids with self-esteem and confidence that came from years of getting what they wanted. I was pretty, and reasonably attractive for my age, but I also had the normal teenage girl shortcomings: chronically low self-esteem, overanalyzing and thinking about everything, the almost painful social awkwardness. Problems that didn’t seem to exist at this table.
Jackie suddenly laughed—a little too loudly—and put her hand on Sebastian’s arm. I’d never seen her flirt so openly before. A tiny, irrational part of my brain felt betrayed.
Sebastian seemed to have this effect on every girl though, and for obvious reasons. He was so good-looking he was practically angelic.
Jackie glanced over at me and I saw the smile disappear from her face.
“I, um, have to go…” she said, looking at me curiously. “Catch up with you two after school. Sebastian, great to meet you.”
I wanted to grab onto her arm and ask her to stay. She probably thought she was doing me a favor, leaving me alone with the new cute guy. Maybe she thinks I like him. Sebastian was looking at me expectantly. I searched for something clever to say, but under the intensity of his gaze, my whole body was desperate to get away. I got up from the table and headed across the cafeteria without a word.
He fell in step beside me.
“Fancy seeing you here,” he said with raised eyebrows.
“Are you following me?” I asked, instantly regretting the harshness of my tone.
What is it about this guy that brings out the worst in me? Why couldn’t I just flirt and banter like Jackie or Patricia? He reached in front of me and put his hand against the wall, blocking my path. He leaned in closer, inches from my face, and whispered, “Yes.”
I stopped breathing.
Who the hell is this guy?
“I saw you… in the ocean,” I said finally, my knees feeling wobbly. The space between us seemed to pulse with energy. He smelled like sunshine, lemon and lavender, and new clothes. My stomach was doing somersaults.
“And I saw you,” he said. “Standing at the edge, the sea calling to you. I haven’t seen one of your kind around for decades. I was… curious.”
“My kind? Decades?” I pushed his arm away and stormed down the hallway. I wasn’t sure what he meant, but it sounded insulting.
He caught up to me and grabbed my arm.
<
br /> “I don’t mean any offense. I just meant…” But then he stopped and looked at me in confusion. “You don’t know...” he said, making me feel stupid. There was a trace of pity on his face; an expression I’d become very good at identifying in the last few weeks.
I hated pity.
I didn’t need anybody else to pity me. Especially not this gorgeously annoying underwear model who swims naked in the middle of the night.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said, whipping my arm out of his grasp.
He was acting much too familiar and intimate for some strange guy I didn’t know. And what did he mean, he hadn’t seen any of my kind for decades? He couldn’t be much older than I was. I wanted to stick my head in a dark corner and hide, at least just to figure out what was going on. Not for the first time, I felt exposed in this uniform.
“I apologize,” he said, his cockiness and playfulness gone—replaced by an emotionless mask. “It’s just that I… I want to know more about you. Can we meet after school?” Something about his eyes soothed me, and I ached to give in to his request.
“I have to go,” I mumbled instead, pushing past him.
I thought he’d run after me again, and I was expecting to feel his grip on my elbow. It never came.
I wanted to leave school, but the day wasn’t over yet, so I had to suck it up. I set out with no plan other than to avoid other people, and soon found myself at the back of the school near the old chapel. It was a small, one-room stone building, with two rows of pews and an altar up front. The ceiling was high and vaulted with wooden beams, and stained glass windows cast multi-colored splashes across the interior. Outside, vines crept along the old stone walls. In front of the building was a garden area, with flower bushes and benches. I didn’t want to be found, so I gave the bench a miss and pushed straight into the foliage, finding a comfortable spot to sit against an old oak tree with a thick trunk. I took a deep breath, inhaling the scent of autumn leaves.
What just happened? Some crazy guy and an awkward conversation, that’s all. It was probably some lame pickup line, a way to get into my head. Maybe it was common in Iceland. If so, I should feel flattered.
It’s not like he wasn’t handsome. I could appreciate his perfect features, his flawless, creamy skin, his tall, lithe body with a swimmer’s torso. I shook my head and steadied myself. He was the type of guy I would have been happy to appreciate from afar. But when he got up in my space like that—I’ve never been that close to a boy before. At least not a boy like that.
I’d made out with a few guys, at parties, but they were always insecure and clumsy. Too much tongue, ramming into my teeth; or sloppy drool-filled kisses that made me want to take a shower. This was different. Nobody had ever made me feel… like this. When Sebastian looked at me it felt like I had a spotlight on me, and I was melting. Which is kind of funny because I usually do fine on stage, under a spotlight—at least when I’m singing. But then I don’t have to make eye contact with anyone.
I shook my head to clear my thoughts. My parents just died, it was my second day of school in a new country, for heaven’s sake. How could I be attracting this much drama into my life when all I wanted to do was blend in and try to be normal?
But those green eyes…
I heard footsteps and made myself even smaller, hoping they’d walk past me. My heart beat faster when the footsteps stopped in front of me, but then the person sat down on the bench, and I could see his face. Ethan. He had his jacket off, his shirt open at the top and his tie loose. He rolled up his sleeves to the elbow, exposing muscular forearms with even more tattoos. The bell rang for the next class. Ethan didn’t even flinch. I was going to be late, and now I was stuck. Shit! I didn’t relish the thought of me stumbling out of the bushes in front of him.
He flipped his long hair out of his face, then bent down to pick up an orange oak leaf. He put the leaf on the tip of his index finger, holding the stem with his other hand. Then very slowly, he let go of the stem and balanced the leaf on his finger. That’s when things started getting weird. Ethan hunched his shoulders and drew his eyebrows together in concentration, without disturbing the leaf—it looked like it was glued to the end of his finger.
Then the leaf starting spinning, slowly at first, then faster. Eyes wide, I stood up slowly to get a better look. After that, I swear the leaf jumped up and landed on his finger again, standing straight up from the stem. So now it was balanced in a physics-defying stance, like a little ballerina up on one toe, spinning on Ethan’s index finger.
The branch I was leaning on broke with a loud crack. I spilled sideways, my knees sinking into the dirt. Before I could collect myself with dignity, Ethan burst through the bushes and was leaning over me with his fists clenched together.
“You again,” he snarled. “Why can’t you leave me alone?”
“I came out here first, long before you showed up. I had no idea you were going to be here.” I stood and brushed myself off.
His eyes narrowed. “You were hiding. Spying on me,” he said.
“I may have been hiding, but I wasn’t spying,” I said, holding his gaze.
“Did someone send you? One of the families?”
“What families?” I asked. Why wasn’t anybody making sense today? “Believe me, I have no interest in what you do with your free time. I came out for some fresh air, then when you sat down I got stuck, I didn’t want to disturb you, so I stayed hidden.”
He rubbed his jaw. We were all alone, during class. And I was pretty sure I’d just seen something I wasn’t supposed to. The smart thing to do would be to leave, now.
“How did you do that?” I blurted instead.
Ethan brushed his hair out of his eyes and then rolled his sleeves back down, covering the tattoos. “I don’t know what you are talking about,” he said finally.
“With the leaf—balancing it like that, I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Ethan leaned in closer, until I could see the details in his amber eyes.
“I get it,” he said, “You’re infatuated with me. You can’t help it. You’re new here and trying to make friends. Maybe you think making up crazy rumors about me is going to get people to like you. But that isn’t going to work for me. So get your shit together, and get lost.”
His words hit me like a slap in the face, and I stood frozen as he turned and walked away. Why did he have to be such a jerk? But I knew what I’d seen. Something about Ethan wasn’t normal, and I was going to find out what.
I didn’t see how the day could get any worse. I was actually looking forward to gym class, if only to focus on something simple and stop my racing mind. I grabbed the duffel bag from my locker and headed to the volleyball court, but nobody was there. I walked back to the office to ask Mrs. Weavers where I should be.
“Oh, they’re at the pool today, hon,” she said, wiping her glasses.
The pool?
My whole body froze.
She asked another student to show me the way to the pool building, where I met up with my class and teacher. The other students were already swimming laps.
“You must be Clara,” a young woman approached me, “I’m Miss Baxter, the swimming coach. I was wondering where you’d gotten off to.”
“I didn’t know swimming was part of the curriculum here.”
“Every Tuesday. I’ve got some extra suits, I’m sure one will fit you for today.”
I looked down at my feet and said quietly, “I can’t swim.”
“You can’t, eh? Is it your special friend?”
“What? No! I just—we lived in Arizona. It’s dry. There was never any reason to learn.”
“How interesting! Well, you can just practice in the shallow end. Maybe I can give you some after school lessons. Swimming isn’t that hard.”
My body was going into panic mode. I felt the adrenaline kick in and my brow start to sweat. This was how I felt whenever I had to stand in front of the class and give a presentation. But my fear
of public speaking couldn’t compare to my lifelong terror of the water, ever since that day at the beach in Oregon.
I shook my head and bit my lip, not sure how to explain.
“I have aquaphobia,” I said. “Persistent and abnormal fear of water.”
She gave me a funny look, and I knew she thought I was making it up, and considering whether to force me in the water or send me to the principal’s office.
My eyes welled up and my lip started quivering.
I’m not going to cry. Not going to—
I felt so stupid, but today had already been confusing and emotional, with the unexpected confrontations with both Sebastian and Ethan. The idea of learning to swim in the shallow end in front of Brianna and Roisin, like a baby, mortified me.
I squeezed my eyes shut but tears were already spilling past the walled gates of my eyelids.
Stop it! You’re embarrassing yourself.
By now the whole class had stopped swimming and was watching us. I could see Roisin smirk and I knew the whole school was going to hear about this. I couldn’t take it anymore. I ran out of the pool area before Miss Baxter could decide what to do with me.
Not sure where to go, I ended up at my locker.
There was a large piece of notebook paper taped to it.
Go home, Yankee.
It was too much. I sank to the ground with my back against my locker, letting the tears stream down my face. I obviously wasn’t wanted here.
9
I blew Jackie and Derry off after school. The long bus ride home was painful, as Jackie tried to figure out what was wrong and I just retreated further into myself. Then I rushed home and tore off my uniform. The black leather dress shoes felt like they were sucking out my soul. I put on sweats and a T-shirt. When Aedan got home I told him I felt sick and didn’t want to go to school the next day.
I could tell he didn’t believe me, but he let it slide. I stayed in bed for most of the evening, catching up on all the TV shows I liked, downloading and binge watching episodes. I tried to get on Facebook and message Beth, but with the time difference she was probably sleeping.
