Glass Heart

by Amy Garvey

  “Shhh, watch.” He points out the windshield, and I watch as the red light up ahead suddenly turns green. The opposing traffic screeches to a halt, and I wonder if their green lights even went to yellow or just blinked right to red.

  Fiona hoots. I slap my hand over my mouth, shocked. I can’t believe he just did that, and I really can’t believe I didn’t hear the shrieking metal sound of cars crashing.

  “Bay, what the fuck?” I manage when my heart stops pounding in my throat.

  “Calm down,” he says easily, waving a hand at me. “Nothing happened.”

  “But . . .”

  “Wren, loosen up, sweetie.” Fiona hands me a piece of gum, like it’s the answer to all my problems. “He’s a good driver.”

  My mouth is hanging open, but I can’t make any more sounds come out. I knew they liked to “play,” but I never pictured anything dangerous. Anything so reckless that innocent people could have been hurt.

  Bay glances at me and reaches over to pat my shoulder. “I’ll be good. Now relax, huh? We have important business to take care of here.”

  My house and my camera and the yearbook meeting are fading into the distance with every block, and unless I can figure out how to, like, teleport in the next five minutes, I’m stuck.

  Furious and horrified and stuck. I grit my teeth and pretend to relax into my seat. If nothing else, I can see for myself how far they’re willing to go, even if I can’t get a definitive answer about the pink house. And I’m beginning to think that I should know what they’re capable of before I wind up doing something I really don’t want to do.

  Well, something else anyway.

  “I thought we were off to have ‘fun,’” I say. It’s not totally possible to keep the sarcasm out of my tone, but I give it a shot.

  “Whoever said business couldn’t be mixed with pleasure was wrong,” Fiona chirps, and I pretend to smile while I hang on for the ride.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “WHERE WERE YOU?” ARE THE FIRST WORDS out of Gabriel’s mouth when he opens the door to his apartment later that evening. It’s after seven, and he’s already changed into his oldest jeans and a threadbare T-shirt the color of ripe olives. His feet are bare—it’s always warmer up on the third floor than it needs to be, even in January. “I waited at the shop till six thirty.”

  For a minute I just hang my head. I’m tired and out of breath, since I was trying to hurry after Bay dropped me in town.

  I walk past him into the living room, shedding my backpack and peeling off my coat as I go. I’m craving coffee or even tea, anything hot, but it doesn’t seem like the time to ask.

  “Wren?”

  I realize I haven’t answered him yet, and I turn around slowly, scrambling to say something. “I ran into some people, and I lost track of time.”

  His face is too blank, but his eyes are focused on me like lasers, and I swallow hard. It feels like a lie.

  Especially since I don’t really want to tell him what I was doing, not anymore. We ended up at a swim meet at the community college, where a girl who was competing had apparently called Fiona a slut sometime in the past few days. I stopped watching the mischief they were causing from the top of the bleachers after her straps tore, and she wound up flashing the entire pool.

  “You didn’t call.” Gabriel turns around to walk into the kitchen then. His shoulders are set too stiffly, as if he’s carrying something heavy and awful on them. He looks the way he does when a headache is starting.

  Crap.

  I follow him into the kitchen, where he’s grabbing a soda out of the fridge. There’s a bag on the table from Cosimo’s, and the bottom is shiny with grease. I can smell meatballs and cheese—my favorite sandwich.

  “I’m sorry,” I say, coming up behind him to run a hand over his back. “I wasn’t thinking.”

  He turns around, shutting the fridge with his hip. “Who did you run into?”

  “Just some friends.” I shrug and open the bag. “Do you want to eat? Or do you want me to go home?”

  He sets the can of soda on the table with a bang. It’s a diet, for me. “You know what? I don’t want you to be here if you don’t want to be. Fuck.”

  He pushes past me to walk out of the room, and I stumble against the table. He almost never swears, and for a minute all I can think to do is leave. But I’m not doing that anymore; I promised myself. Running away never works. Running away makes you the worst kind of coward, unless someone is actually chasing you with, like, a machete. I’m not even going to run from Bay and Fiona anymore.

  But I am going to tell them it’s over, whatever this weird friendship thing is. As soon as I can figure out how.

  So I straighten up and walk back into the living room, where Gabriel’s sitting with his elbows propped on his knees, his head hanging low over his chest.

  “I’m here, Gabriel. I wouldn’t be if I didn’t want to be. You should know that.” I move a couple of yoga magazines and an empty mug to sit on the coffee table in front of him. “Without looking in my head.”

  His head snaps up, eyes flashing. “I told you I don’t do that anymore.”

  “I know.” I push my knee toward his, bumping it. “But when you don’t, it seems like you’re never really sure of me.”

  “I’m just pissed off.” He sits back, breaking even that casual contact. “You said you would meet me at work, and you didn’t.”

  “God, I said I’m sorry, and I am!” I tilt my head back but the ceiling is only a blank white square. “I was just late, Gabriel.” I figure it’s a good thing he clearly forgot about the yearbook meeting, or I’d probably get chided for missing that, too.

  His eyes are still hot, burning into me. “And you won’t tell me who you were with.”

  The anger in his eyes lights up my own, a nasty flame. “Is this some ridiculous jealous-boyfriend thing? Because I really think you know me better than that.”

  It’s his turn to address the ceiling, shaking his head as he does. “I know you’re not cheating on me. But I can’t help wondering why you won’t say where you were.”

  I’m hungry and tired, and I stand up, trembling. “Who says you get to know everything about me, Gabriel? You’ve already got the double secret password into my brain, even if you don’t use it anymore. And if you want a list of all the things you won’t tell me, you can get me a ream of paper because we’re going to be here all night.”

  The words explode into the air like shrapnel, and Gabriel actually flinches. I sit down abruptly, still breathing hard, still angry, but I can’t look at him. I don’t know what I’ll see in his eyes. I didn’t even mean to say that.

  “What haven’t I told you?” he says after a silence that goes on way too long. “What do you want to know?”

  “Everything! You know everything about me, and you did a long time before I was ready to tell you.” I lift my head to face him, and this time he looks away.

  The living room is suddenly too small, suffocating, and I want to blast a hole through it to let the winter night in. But I don’t really want to blast a hole through Gabriel’s secrets—I want him to open himself up and show me who he is.

  As quickly as it flared, my frustration sputters out. “I don’t want to fight. But I do have questions. There’s a lot of stuff I don’t know about you, stuff it seems like a girlfriend should know, and . . . it hurts.”

  He leans into me, sturdy and solid, and nods. “Okay. So ask.”

  I wasn’t expecting that.

  But I can’t start with the big ones—why won’t you talk about your dad, what makes you look so sad sometimes, why do you worry so much about me?

  To buy time, I reach down to take off my boots and then turn sideways on the couch, cross-legged, so I can look at him. “How many places have you lived?”

  He lets out a soft, weary breath. “Wow. Um, let me think.” He’s quiet for a while, eyes focused on something I can’t see. “Since I was born? Uh, fourteen, unless I’m forgetting something.”
r />   I can only blink, my mouth wide open. He’s only seventeen now. “Um. Oh.”

  “Yeah.” He turns sideways, too, so we’re face-to-face. “My favorite, aside from here, was this little town in northern California, on the coast. You could smell the ocean in everything.”

  “How old were you then?”

  “Eight. It was pretty cool.” His smile is tight, an effort.

  I plunge on anyway. How old he was when his mom died, what she died of, what he wanted to be when he grew up back when he was in kindergarten, and the name of the first girl he ever kissed and when. He tells me everything—I can’t help grinning when he says he wanted to be a ninja—but he keeps it simple, one or two words where I want dozens, details, memories. It’s sort of like hearing The Lord of the Rings is about a piece of jewelry and some short people.

  I’m running out of things to ask, and I’m so hungry I’m beginning to feel a little dizzy. That’s when Gabriel turns the tables, of course.

  “So, quid pro quo. Where were you this afternoon?”

  I groan. “Did you take Latin in one of your many other schools?”

  “Wren.” He leans in and rests his forehead against mine. The urge to climb into his lap and kiss him until he shuts up is pretty tempting, but fair is fair, I guess. It’s not like I can keep Fiona and Bay from him forever.

  Well, I could. But I shouldn’t, and I shouldn’t want to. If he’s supposed to be honest with me, then I owe him the same courtesy.

  But before I can find my voice, Christmas night, and his horror at my little snow show, flashes through my mind. I take a deep breath.

  “I met some kids,” I say, pulling back far enough to look him in the eye. “And they’re . . . like me. They have power, too.”

  His face changes so fast, I jerk. For one brief moment, all of his walls come down and panic flashes raw pewter in his eyes.

  “It’s fine,” I say quickly, grabbing his hand and squeezing it. I want to keep him here, listening, not off in his imagination picturing disaster. “They’re just . . . you know, kids. And I figured maybe they would know some things about the magic that I don’t.”

  He narrows his eyes. “How did you find them?”

  No more lying, I tell myself firmly. But my voice comes out barely a whisper. “They . . . saw me. Doing some stuff.”

  “Wren.”

  “Look, I know, okay?” I hold his hand tighter, as if he can feel the truth in my touch. “And we’ve hung out some.”

  He must hear the hesitation in my tone, because his eyes narrow again, looking into me. Not like that, just like . . . a concerned boyfriend. I manage a half smile.

  “But they’re reckless.”

  “You know, you have a brilliant career as a detective ahead of you.” I’m trying to play it casual, laugh it off, but he’s not done.

  “Tell me.”

  “Look, they’re sort of . . . well, reckless is a good word. They like to ‘play,’ as they call it. And I don’t really want to hang out with them anymore, not after today, so—”

  “What did they do?”

  I like him cutting me off about as much as I like Bay doing it, and I give him a good angry glare to prove it. “Nothing illegal. I mean, they’re not committing murder or something. Seriously, they’re harmless, just . . . pranky.”

  He lifts an eyebrow. “Pranky? Really?”

  I smack his arm. “You know what I mean.”

  “No, I really don’t. I want to meet them, Wren.”

  I gape. “But . . . I told you I don’t even want to hang out with them anymore. They’re not criminals, Gabriel, just sort of stupid and immature.”

  And hurtful and a little bit malicious. But I’m not going to say that.

  “And I just want to see for myself, okay?” He leans closer to run his hand over my cheek, into my hair. “People like that get nasty, believe me. I just . . . want to make sure they’re not going to fuck with you.”

  I sigh. He looks so gentle, so gorgeous and sweet, and he’s like a huge, stubborn, immovable brick wall when he wants to be.

  “Okay. But you asked.”

  “I could get used to this,” I say as I climb into Olivia’s car on Friday night. “Walking is for suckers.”

  Gabriel snorts and turns the car on, waiting as it wheezes into gear. “Don’t hold your breath. This thing is dying in stages. I think the engine is held together with rubber bands.”

  “Exciting,” I say brightly, but I make sure to fasten my seat belt.

  I don’t want anything to ruin tonight, and so far everything is going according to plan. Bay suggested a party out at Summerhill, Olivia was willing to walk down to the bar and back for work so Gabriel could use the car, and the snow that has been threatening for days is still a distant bank of gloom on the horizon.

  Gabriel sort of looks like we’re headed to a hanging instead of a party, though.

  “We don’t have to stay long,” I tell him as he pulls the car onto the street. My seat vibrates as the engine chugs along.

  He shrugs. “I know.”

  Since the radio died a few weeks ago and he doesn’t seem to be in the mood for conversation, either, we ride the rest of the way in silence.

  Classes don’t start again at Summerhill until next week, so the campus is mostly empty, dark under its canopy of bare branches. But inside O’Keefe Hall, the student lounge upstairs is like a pounding heart in the sleeping dorm.

  I don’t see Bay and Fiona right away, and Gabriel slings an arm around my shoulders once we’re inside, as if he’s going to lose me in the crush. But there aren’t really that many people in the long room—maybe thirty, sprawled on industrial-issue sofas or perched in the deep window seats. It’s dark, the room lit only by an assortment of lava lamps and string after string of colored Christmas lights.

  “Wren?”

  I turn around from inspecting the beer and soda in the cooler along one wall to see Jude. “Hey!”

  She doesn’t look happy to see me, and she’s giving Gabriel the same vaguely disturbed little frown. “What are you doing here?”

  “Party crashing.” I grin. “No, Bay mentioned it, and I wanted him to meet Gabriel.” That’s a white lie I can rationalize under the circumstances. “Gabriel, this is Jude. She’s a junior here.”

  “Hi.” Gabriel sticks his hand out, and even though Jude seems surprised by the show of manners, she shakes it.

  “Nice to meet you. Um, I’m not sure Bay’s even here. . . .” She twists her head to scan the room just as Fiona pops up behind her back, whispering, “Boo.”

  “But Fiona is,” Jude says with a tight smile. “Well. Have a good time.” She’s gone before Fiona can do more than leave a bright red lip print on her cheek.

  “Wee barista!” Fiona cries, and leans in to hug me, a little too hard. She’s in her rabbit fur jacket again, over black skinny jeans and a white-and-black-striped top, complete with a red beret and huge, white fur boots. She looks sort of like a castoff snow bunny by way of 1950s Paris. “I’m so glad you came! And who is this very yummy tall person with you?”

  Okay, that needs to stop right now. I take a step between them. “This is Gabriel. My boyfriend. Gabriel, this is Fiona.”

  Fiona smirks and actually bats her lashes, and I stomp on the urge to cough up a hairball. All over her. She catches me glaring. “Just being friendly, Wren. Tick tick boom.”

  “Nice to meet you, Fiona.” Gabriel sounds like it’s anything but, and he slides his arm around my waist, fingers digging into my hip to pull me back against him.

  Oh, this is going well so far.

  “Does Gabriel . . . play?” Fiona is nothing if not predictable, and about as subtle as a hurricane. She’s still examining him like he’s some rare, possibly dangerous species, and for a moment her bright white nails look a little too much like claws.

  “No,” Gabriel says. The ice in his voice is thick. “I don’t.”

  “Shame.”

  Before I can say anything else, she flutte
rs off, batting at low-hanging lights as she goes.

  “Is she wearing a costume?” Gabriel mutters, and I elbow him.

  Across the room, a girl with a sheet of black satin hair climbs up on a low table, and someone else turns the music up. In the near darkness, I can just make out her mouth moving before she starts to dance, and behind me Gabriel shifts uneasily.

  It’s sinuous, all lazy S curves as she moves, but the dance isn’t the show—it’s her skin, bare arms under a sleeveless top that just grazes her stomach, and a short skirt. She’s literally a human glow stick, colored light shifting and pulsing magically under her skin as she moves, and for a minute I can’t look away.

  Until I see Bay, just behind her, watching with his head tilted to one side and a red cup in one hand. Something about the way he’s looking at her is wrong, as if he’s not just delighted but proud.

  He sees me a moment later, and I straighten up as he crosses the room, pushing through a couple of kids who have gotten up to dance, too. My blood is racing, spurred by the noise and the light. Just that, I tell myself. Not nerves. Definitely not nerves.

  “You came,” Bay says, and drops into an empty chair beside me, one leg slung over an arm. As if he’s the king, and we’re commoners, peasants, come seeking an audience.

  “Did you think we wouldn’t?” I ask him, and grab his cup to sniff it. Something sharply alcoholic tickles my nose.

  Instead of answering me, he says, “Who’s this?”

  “This is Gabriel.” I glance over my shoulder, and my heart sinks. Gabriel’s features are pinched in what looks like the start of another headache.

  “Gabriel looks like he wants to be elsewhere.” Bay takes his cup back and drinks from it slowly, watching me over the rim.

  “I think he has a headache.” I put my arm around Gabriel’s waist, hoping it doesn’t look like I’m propping him up, even though I’m pretty sure I am. It’s never been this bad before.