They were boxed in.
He surveyed the gang. Ratchet was holding a tire iron, and Holden had already assumed a battle stance. Star’s speed and Kate’s strength made them a fierce pair. And Maya… he had complete confidence in Maya. He’d seen her fight before, and knew what she was capable of.
In seconds, the other convoy was screeching to a halt behind the van.
Here we go, Fang thought, and felt his muscles tighten in readiness for whatever craziness was about to explode in the next thirty seconds.
For several moments, it was dead silent.
“What is this?” Fang heard Ratchet mutter. “I want to bust some heads.”
Then, slowly, a door on one of the trucks opened. Fang tensed, ready to dodge bullets. But what emerged from the truck was a much more effective weapon, one that left Fang speechless, with his eyes bugging out of his head.
“Hello, Fang,” said Ari.
Ari, Max’s usually evil half brother, who was enhanced, like the rest of the Erasers, with wolf DNA. Ari, who Fang had seen die, twice. He’d helped bury him! But… here Ari was. With a missile launcher balanced on one hulking shoulder. Pointed at Fang.
“Ari,” Fang managed to say.
“I heard you were going to be the first to die,” Ari said, his amused tone in sharp contrast to the crazy, feral gleam in his eyes. Fang shifted, remembering Angel’s creepy doomsday prediction. “I wanted to make sure I got to do the honors.” Ari pointed the heavy launcher on his huge, unnaturally muscled body at Fang. He smiled, baring long yellow teeth. “How about it, sport? You ready to die?” He tilted his head and looked through the gunsight.
For maybe the first time in his life, Fang felt… absolutely frozen.
8
“GUYS! OVER HERE!”
Dylan waved to me, Gazzy, Iggy, and Nudge from where he sat sandwiched between Eager Girl #1 and Eager Girl #2 at the popular-crowd lunch table.
I’d been headed toward the dweeb and misfit section, but when Dylan called out to us, Nudge squealed and hurried over. She confidently squeezed herself between some girls who looked less than thrilled at her arrival.
That decided it.
“Cover me,” I said, sighing. “I’m going in.”
“Got your back,” said Iggy.
“Later, bye,” Gazzy said, making a U-turn to go eat with some kids his own age.
I couldn’t blame him. I, too, would rather eat with a bunch of nine-year-olds than have to bear witness to the popular girls slavering over Dylan.
“Max!” Dylan beckoned. “Sarah, could you scoot over a little, please?”
Sarah looked like she would rather eat a slug than make room for me, but then Dylan turned his Pied Piper smile on her and she melted. She even patted the bench next to her.
It was almost scary, the effect he had. Thank God I was completely immune to it.
I sat down and a sudden silence fell as the girls looked at my heavily laden lunch tray. Dylan seemed oblivious, and kept up his easy conversation with Nudge.
“You must be… hungry,” said one girl, whose name I think was Bethany.
I wasn’t about to go into bird-kid caloric requirements, so I just smiled and said, “I don’t have to watch my weight, thank goodness.” So bite me.
Nudge popped open her juice. “Last night on Project Makeover, did you guys see where Tabitha was wearing those capris that looked like fruit salad?” she asked, her eyes wide.
Eyes quickly turned to her and heads nodded.
“Those were the ugliest pants I’ve ever seen,” Sarah said solemnly.
I busied myself with my huge chunk of cafeteria meat loaf. Of that last exchange, I had understood the words “pants” and “fruit,” but I couldn’t see how they would go together. Then it hit me: Nudge really did fit into this world. I mean, okay, she’d told me that a thousand times. But seeing her like this, chatting with these other girls, normal girls—the only thing that didn’t fit here was… her wings.
“How’s your morning going?” Dylan asked me, ignoring the pop-culture bonanza surrounding us.
I swallowed, savoring the availability of lots o’ food. To those of you who may sneer at cafeteria fare, I say: Try Dumpster-diving for a month, and then let’s see how happy you are with Monday Meatball Medley or whatever.
“I’m at school,” I said pointedly, and got that smile again, the one that seemed to suck the air out of my lungs. “You seem to be doing well, though.” I slanted my eyes at the girls and then looked back at him.
He grinned. “Same old, same old.”
“Uh-huh. Being God’s gift to girls everywhere is just your cross to bear.”
Dylan nudged my knee with his. “You think I’m God’s gift?” He sounded horribly pleased, and I wanted to smack myself.
“No, but at least you do.” I smiled and took a sip of juice. Dylan smiled wider and I felt a tiny thrill run down my spine. I knew I was courting danger, but this kind of easy almost flirtation was rapidly becoming addictive.
“I couldn’t believe it when Terry said that orange was the new black,” Nudge chattered on next to me.
“I know!” said maybe-Melinda. “I mean, black is the new black, you know?”
Nudge stabbed the air with a french fry. “Exactly! Nothing needs to be the new black, because black will always, always be the new black!”
There was fervent agreement around the table. I had no idea what they were talking about. Black what?
“Actually, it seems to me that blind is the new black,” Iggy said, apparently deciding to shake things up.
“What?” a girl named Madison said.
“I mean, I can’t believe there are so many blind students! A whole school of them!”
Silence. Nudge pressed her lips together; it had been going so well.
I started working intently on my square of spice cake.
“Um…” said Bethany.
“I know why I’m blind. Let’s hear your stories!” Iggy waved his hand, “accidentally” flinging peas all over the people sitting closest to him. Nudge’s cheeks flushed, and she stared at me, like, Stop him.
Oh, yeah, that could happen. No prob.
He turned to Madison. “What about you? Were you born this way, or did something happen to you?”
The people around the table looked at one another in uncomfortable silence.
“I’m not blind,” said Madison.
Iggy pretended to look confused, then shook his head, the soul of compassionate understanding. “You’ve got to face up to it. You can’t let it hold you back,” he said gently. “Denial is not just a river in Egypt.”
“I’m really not blind,” Madison said, looking confused.
Nudge gritted her teeth and stared down at her food, mortified.
Yep, we spread joy and sunshine wherever we go.
9
I TICKED OFF bird kids on my fingers. “Gazzy has Science Club today. If he blows something up, I will personally take a belt to him. Nudge is walking home, unwilling to be seen with any of us. And Iggy has soccer.”
“I saw him on the field yesterday,” said Dylan. “He looked great.”
“He’s always been good at it,” I said. Somehow, Iggy’s blindness had forced all of his other senses to overcompensate. His navigational skills and coordination were sometimes even superior to the rest of the flock’s. “So can we fly home, or do we have to be normal some more?”
“Oh, I have something better planned, sugar drop,” Dylan said with a twinkle in his eye as he led me to the school’s parking lot.
“Call me that again and I will flay you alive,” I promised, but I followed him to a large red motorcycle. “What’s this?”
“I’m borrowing it,” Dylan said, swinging one leg over the saddle. He patted the seat behind him. “Hop on.”
I had been raised unburdened by the concept of “other people’s property,” so I hopped on. Dylan kicked the motorcycle into gear, and off we went.
I don’t know if you have eve
r been on a motorcycle (if your parents don’t know, please do not nod now), but I must say: If I didn’t have wings, and if motorcycles weren’t, essentially, extremely cool death traps, I would want to ride on one all the time. It’s about the closest approximation to flying there is. The wind whipping through your hair, the sense of freedom, the bugs slamming into your face—it’s flying, but on the ground, burning gasoline and making a lot of noise. What’s not to love?
We didn’t go straight home. I put my arms around Dylan’s waist, leaned my head against his back, and closed my eyes. He felt warm and solid. I didn’t have to do anything, for once—I just sat there. It was almost scary. Because I wasn’t totally in control of the situation.
I felt the motorcycle slow, and then come to a rolling stop. Reluctantly, I opened my eyes. “Where are we?” I asked.
Dylan climbed off the motorcycle and held it steady while I got off. He waved his hand at the view. We were on the coastal highway, with rocky cliffs on one side and the Oregon coast in front of us. The ocean looked gray-blue and choppy, and the air temperature had dropped about fifteen degrees. Seagulls wheeled above the waves, cawing, and I wanted to join them.
I moved to the railing, ready to jump off.
“Wait, Max.” Suddenly, Dylan’s dazzling smile was nowhere in sight. His face was solemn, his eyes a darker shade of teal. For a second I thought he’d spotted some kind of trouble far in the distance, across the cliffs. You could say Dylan didn’t just have the eyesight of a hawk—he had the eyes of the Hubble Space Telescope. His gift for seeing faraway things, especially in space, was a little mutant DNA bonus from the mad scientist-slash-genetic engineer who created him.
“I found this place the other day, when I was out flying,” he said, shifting to a less guarded, more emotional tone. “I feel closer to the clouds here, more than anywhere else. I wanted to share it with you because… I feel closer to… to Angel here, too.”
My eyes flew to his face, my mouth partly open in shock. Angel. The youngest member of our flock. My littlest bird.
I was assaulted with memories: Angel smiling sweetly at Total, her pale blond curls making a halo of fluff around her head. The depth in Angel’s eyes when we witnessed disaster, way more knowing than any seven-year-old’s should be. The way she’d get into my head, under my skin, inside my heart, always. And then—
Angel disappearing in a cloud of smoke. I grimaced, thinking of Paris and the explosion.
“We do not talk about that,” I reminded him tightly.
He gave a sad smile and gestured out at the vast ocean, the craggy cliffs behind us. No one was around—it was me and Dylan, water and rock and sky. And my bleeding, ripped-open heart.
“You can’t pretend she was never born,” he said as I narrowed my eyes and pulled out my trusty standby: rage.
I opened my mouth to snap at him, but he continued, gently, saying, “You can’t pretend she never died.”
I actually gasped, drawing away from him in shock, feeling a sharp pain in my chest as if he’d plunged a dagger into me. It’ll be okay, Angel had said the last time I saw her. I’ll be with you always. But it wasn’t okay. She wasn’t with us. She never would be again.
“Shut up!” I croaked.
Dylan put his hand on my shoulder, holding me as I tried to spin away. He pulled me to him firmly, cradling me against his hard chest, one hand on the back of my neck, the other on my back. “We all miss her, Max,” he whispered against my hair. “We’ll always miss her.”
And that was it. A horrible keening sound filled my ears, and it took me several seconds to realize it was coming from me. Then I was clutching Dylan’s shirt, pressing my face against him, sobbing uncontrollably.
He held me tightly, his cheek against my hair, stroking my back and whispering, “I know. I know. Let it out, Max. There’s no one here but me and you. Just let it all out.”
I almost never cry. I keep my emotions on a supertight leash. They normally don’t just burst out of me like that, but once they did, I sobbed and sobbed until my throat was raw and Dylan’s shirt was wet from my tears.
My baby was gone. After everything we had been through, after love and betrayal and fury and love and forgiveness, she was gone. Forever. She’d sacrificed herself to save thousands, and she would never, ever be back.
And I hadn’t let myself believe that, until now.
10
I DREW IN shuddering breaths, my sobs subsiding. I had needed to grieve over Angel. And I had a lot of other things to grieve about, too. I’d been abandoned by my mother, my half sister, my pseudo-father, and the boy I thought was my soul mate.
And so finally, after all this time, I wailed my guts out. In a really loud, out-of-control, sloppy, wet way. All over Dylan.
I pulled away from him awkwardly. I was thirsty and empty and feeling hollow, and imagining the possible humiliation resulting from the revolting scene I had just made was vomit-inducing. “Remember that time you bawled like a baby?” Dylan would say for years to come. “That was hysterical!” I just wanted to collapse on my bed with the covers over my head. Forever.
But Dylan was still looking at my puffy face. “Remember how Angel saved that little kid from the hotel fire?” he asked, his eyes shining.
I did. I could still picture her smile shining victoriously out of her dirty face, the boy clutched in her arms, her wings gray with smoke. Angel, rising from the ashes.
I wiped my nose. “I’m done talking about her.”
Dylan nodded. He was silent for a moment, looking out over the ocean. His hair looked dusty in the afternoon sun. “I don’t know what to do with the sadness,” he said finally, sighing. I looked up at him, surprised at his directness.
“Why do you keep talking about it, then?” I was too worn out to even get angry.
“I don’t know what else to do.” He shrugged. “I have all these hard feelings inside, and I thought talking about them might help. And… I don’t want to forget Angel. I’m scared that if we don’t talk about her, it will be like she never existed.”
I nodded warily. I had my own hard feelings that I didn’t know what to do with. They sat like a pile of rocks in my stomach. Building and building.
“You’re the strongest person I know, Max,” said Dylan.
“Yeah…” I picked at my nails, thinking about my meltdown. I had never been very good at receiving compliments, especially ones that seemed heartfelt.
“Seriously. I’m learning how to be strong just from watching you.” Dylan put his hands on my shoulders. “But I know not everyone can be strong all the time. I just wanted to tell you that if you ever need to not be strong, you can lean on me. I can be strong enough for both of us—for a while, at least.” He gave a slight grin.
Dylan looked into my eyes with such naked trust I had to look away. Below, the waves smashed into the rocks, spraying a cool mist over everything, and I felt goose bumps rise on my arms.
Fang always had my back—that is, until he didn’t. He didn’t have to say it aloud; I’d known it anyway. Dylan was so different. It was like he didn’t know how to be guarded. His emotions were raw, on the surface for everyone to see, and the sarcastic wall that had protected me so efficiently in the past was slowly crumbling in the face of his honesty.
I felt vulnerable, exposed, so out of my element. I shifted uncomfortably.
“Can we fly now?” I asked, my throat dry.
Dylan smiled, his face lighting up, his eyes crinkling at the corners. He stuck the motorcycle’s keys under its seat and took my hand, and we climbed up on the guardrail.
I took a deep breath, and together we jumped off.
11
THICK, HEAVY CLOUDS had rolled in, blocking the sun, and it felt like Dylan and I were the only two people on earth. Our wings took us high over the water, up and up until the cars on the highway looked like shiny beetles, bustling to and fro.
We wheeled freely through the air, no destination in mind, copying the gulls, seeing dark schools
of fish in the water below. My chest expanded again, after being all crumpled up from crying. I felt my heart beating hard, felt the cool mist against my skin, and I felt fresh and alive and somehow lighter. Like I’d dropped some of those hard, heavy rocks I’d been carrying around.
Dylan was good for me, in some ways. I had to admit it.
“What?” he asked, raising his voice over the wind.
“What what?”
“You were sort of smiling.”
I shook my head. “I don’t know why.”
“You know, Max,” he said after a few more minutes. We’d slowly turned in a huge circle and begun to head toward home.
I looked at him, eyebrows raised.
“You know I love you.”
I almost dropped right out of the sky. I literally forgot to flap my wings for a couple of seconds, and plummeted about fifteen feet before they started working on their own.
“I know you were programmed to love me,” I said cautiously, rising back level with Dylan.
“Maybe I was,” he said. “I don’t know. I just know I do. And I know that love has to go both ways. You might not love me now, but I hope you will, in time. I can wait. I’m not going anywhere.”
I said nothing, and we flew together wordlessly, higher and higher, as if we could touch the sky.
12
THERE WERE NO days. There were no nights. There were tubes and bright lights and indistinct voices. And pain. Always, always pain.
When Angel was finally put into a kennel, she whimpered with relief. This had to be better than the crisp white sheets, the stretcher that meant scalpels and masks and gloved hands always reaching for her. She shuddered violently, thinking of those hands, and shrank into herself. She never wanted to be touched again.
The kennel was meant for a large dog, but Angel still couldn’t stand upright in it. She felt around in the cage, her hands brushing against the cool metal of the bars. She searched for a water bottle; her throat was sore from the feeding tube. She winced as she shifted her small body in the cramped space. She was covered with bruises, and her healing wounds stung.
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