Silver

by Talia Vance

  I pull my hand away. “So I repel you.”

  “Not like you think. You’re a ghost of yourself. If I hadn’t seen you last night, really seen you, I never would have suspected a thing.”

  I swallow, instantly back in that frozen silver moment. I was so exposed in the stillness of the room, and then he turned and spoke to me. It’s impossible. The whole thing was in my head, a manifestation of a latent psychosis I thought I’d buried three years ago.

  He steps closer still. “Even now, it makes me question everything. But I know I’m not crazy.”

  “That makes one of us.” I laugh at the irony of this statement.

  “Help me figure this out, Brianna. Before last night, we’d met at the coffee shop, right?”

  “Several times.” Six, to be exact, not even counting the fifty-one times he came in without seeing me at all. “And we were introduced again in the living room at the party.”

  “So something must have changed before you walked into the kitchen. What?”

  “Nothing.” Everything changed after.

  “Did you say something unusual? Did anyone else?”

  I wrack my brain for any details. “No. Haley and I were just talking, and some drunk guy hit on her. He spilled beer on me. Are you into Budweiser?” My hand instinctively finds my wrist, fingering the chain that circles it.

  His eyes follow my hand. “Do you always wear that?”

  “Yes.” I close my fingers around the bracelet, shielding it from his gaze.

  “And in the living room?”

  I nod.

  “In the kitchen?”

  I hesitate.

  “Were you wearing that bracelet when you came into the kitchen?” His voice is more insistent.

  My voice shakes. “Not in the kitchen.”

  “Can I see it?” His eyes glow with a silver sparkle that shouldn’t be visible in the dark.

  Here it comes. I wait for the darkness, the silence that I know will follow the silver light. I’ve always heard that people who are really insane aren’t aware of it, yet here I am, not only aware of the hallucinations but anticipating them.

  The hallucination doesn’t come. Blake still stands in front of me, waiting for an answer. I step back, easing toward the trail. “Why?”

  “I just want to look.” His voice is soft, seductive.

  I don’t move. He lowers his chin and looks out from underneath thick lashes. I know it’s just a bracelet, an accessory. There’s no logical reason for me to keep it from him. But nothing about Blake or the feelings he stirs in me has anything to do with logic. Everything is driven by some primitive instinct, animalistic urges that I should damn well ignore. I unfurl my fingers, one at a time, still covering the bracelet with my palm.

  Blake eases forward, placing his hand over mine. I pull my hand away from the heat of his touch. “Shhh,” he says, like he knows I’m a hair’s breadth away from bolting. He reaches for my hand again, taking the bracelet between his fingers and rubbing it lightly. He examines the charms one at a time, stopping to touch the flower for a few seconds before his cocky smile is back. “Someone in your family has a wicked sense of humor.”

  “What do you mean?” How does he know that the charms came from my family?

  “This one. Do you know what kind of flower it is?”

  “Yes.” At last, something tangible I can discuss intelligently. “Monkshood. It grows in the northern hemisphere. My grandma even managed to grow some in her yard in San Francisco.”

  “Wolfsbane.” Blake laughs again. “Just like you. Hiding in plain sight.”

  I push his hand away. His eyes shine again in the dark, reflecting the stars. I’ve been waiting so long for him to see me that it’s every bit as terrifying as it is amazing.

  “Can you take it off for a minute?”

  I cover the bracelet with my hand again.

  “Just to see if I’m right. You can put it right back on.”

  There have to be at least a dozen better explanations for my condition than a simple silver charm. Maybe my pheromones are finally kicking in, albeit erratically. Or maybe Blake is just jealous of Austin. Or he’s drunk again. I twist the chain and slowly unhook the shiny new clasp. I let the bracelet drop into the palm of my hand, closing my fingers around it.

  Blake stares at me harder.

  “Still me?”

  “I think you have to let go.”

  I close my fingers tighter, not wanting to part with the chain in my hand. I know the flower is just a charm. An odd little flower cast in silver. I still don’t let go.

  The bracelet has been in our family forever, so old that the story of its origin was lost generations ago. Nana gave it to me shortly after the fire, my fire. She said it would protect me. I love the little horse and horseshoe charms that hang on either side of the strange flower, but I haven’t really thought much about the bracelet since she gave it to me. I’ve just always worn it.

  Until last night.

  Blake stretches out his hand. “Humor me.” He flashes his “you can’t resist me” grin.

  All this time I’ve been waiting for him to grace me with that smile, and tonight it has no effect on me. I’ve seen him use it too many times to think it means anything beyond a calculated effort to get what he wants. I clutch the bracelet tighter.

  “Why don’t you humor me?” I ask. “Maybe I don’t want to give this to you. Maybe there’s a reason I can’t.” I link the chain back around my wrist.

  “Listen to yourself.” Blake’s voice is quiet. “There is a reason.”

  “What?”

  “So you can hide.”

  I try to keep the panic from my voice. “And what exactly am I hiding from?”

  His dimples are out in full force. “Bastards like me.”

  EIGHT

  There’s a rustling behind us. Christy comes down the trail, staring at the ground. She looks up only when she nearly runs into me. “Brie! What are you doing here?”

  I look around for Blake, but there’s no sign of him. He’s gone. “Looking for you,” I say, though at the moment I’m scanning the bushes for any sign of Blake. It’s like he was never here. Where the hell did he go?

  Christy sniffs loudly, barely stifling a sob. Even in the dark, her eyes appear puffy and swollen.

  “What happened?”

  Christy just shakes her head.

  She’ll talk when she’s ready. I put my arm around her and lead her back up the path. “Let’s go.”

  Christy doesn’t say a word the entire drive back to her house. She just stares out the passenger-side window. I shut the engine off in her driveway. Neither of us makes a move to get out of the car.

  “Are you going to tell me what that creepshow did to you?” I ask.

  Christy wipes her nose with the sleeve of her sweater.

  “You’re getting snot on your Ralph Lauren. He’s so not worth it.”

  “True.” She grabs her bag and rummages through it, at last emerging with a crumpled tissue.

  “So, spill.”

  “It’s embarrassing.” Christy balls the tissue in her hands.

  “Did he hurt you?”

  “No!” Christy’s voice is two octaves higher than normal.

  “He made you cry. I want to kill the guy.” Whoa. I might not just be saying this. I can feel the seeds of violence growing in my heart. Not good.

  “It’s just embarrassing,” Christy repeats. Her cheeks redden.

  “What?” 8. 64. Breathe.

  Christy lets out a long exhale. “It wasn’t his fault exactly. It was more me. I kind of, well, I guess I didn’t … ” She pauses before she adds, “Swallow.”

  “Oh.” The shock of Christy’s words is enough to draw me back into the moment.
<
br />   Now that she’s started talking, there’s no stopping her. She doesn’t even take a breath as she recounts the entire story. “One minute everything’s fine, and then, well, it just kind of happened without any warning. I mean it barely started, so I totally wasn’t expecting it, and it was really gross, and I just gagged and spit and I was like, retching, you know?”

  “Who wouldn’t? That guy is majorly gross.”

  “It was kind of gross.”

  “Don’t tell me you’re crying because of that? His premature ejaculation is not your problem.”

  “He started yelling and freaking out. Then he just left.”

  “I can’t believe he yelled at you.”

  “It wasn’t that bad, really. I’m just embarrassed is all. Next time, I’ll be ready for it.”

  “Tell me you are not even considering a next time!” She’s completely off the cliff if she thinks she is going to see that loser again.

  “Maybe. I don’t know.”

  “Christy, you’ve only met the guy once, and already you know he’s a complete bastard. Add in the fact that he expects sex right away and even suffers from some kind of sexual dysfunction, and the guy has nothing going for him.”

  “You don’t think he’s cute?”

  “Since when does yelling at a girl qualify as cute?”

  Christy’s expression turns from uncertain to defiant. “I knew I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  “I’m sorry. But maybe you shouldn’t be so quick to go off with a guy you just met. What if he hurt you?”

  Christy glares at me. “I don’t need your holier-than-thou attitude right now.”

  Holier than thou? Is that what she thinks? Just because I don’t support her crazy infatuation with a guy who’s already shown he’s a creep of the highest order.

  “And how is my going off with Jonah any different than your going off with Austin last night?” Christy raises her eyebrow. She knows she has me. “It’s not like Jonah is Haley’s boyfriend.”

  I twist uncomfortably in my seat. I want to defend myself, but I don’t. “Look, if you don’t want to talk about the Jonah situation, fine.”

  “Fine.” There’s a tense silence before she speaks again. “I saw you flirting with Austin.”

  So much for our tentative truce. “We were just talking.”

  “You know Haley still likes him, right?”

  “She never once mentioned him today.”

  “That’s because he’s different. He’s not one of her flings, you know? She’s really into him.” Christy dares me to disagree.

  “Fine.” I’m not going to have this discussion now. It doesn’t matter anyway—I’m not trying to steal Austin from Haley. “It’s not like there’s anything going on.”

  “I thought so.”

  Right. Because on what planet could I ever consider being with a guy like Austin? Any guy? At least Christy is no longer crying over Jonah, and we manage to part on okay terms.

  When I get home, Mom and Dad are camped on the couch watching old episodes of Veronica Mars. “Home early?” Dad asks.

  I throw myself on the empty loveseat. “Looks that way.”

  Mom looks up and gives me a closed-mouth smile.

  Dad grins. “Couldn’t resist an evening with your mom and dad, is that it? I can make popcorn and put in the Lion King.” The Lion King is my parents’ cure-all, whether I’m sick or just having a bad day.

  “Do I look like I need a Lion King intervention?” I wonder if the cracks in my façade are starting to show. If they can tell that it’s starting again.

  Dad shakes his head. “No. But it’s been a while since we’ve watched it. What with your busy social schedule and all.”

  Mom gets up and heads to the kitchen. I pull a purple afghan Nana crocheted around my shoulders. I’m tempted to take Dad up on the offer, but I’m tired and need to work on my pheromone project. The Lion King will only help for ninety minutes or so. A new theory could carry me for a couple of months at least.

  “Thanks, Dad, but I’m kind of tired. Maybe we can watch it for my birthday?” My birthday is just a couple weeks away, and watching the movie then might spare me the torture of sitting through an entire meal at a restaurant listening to my mom talk about the local real estate market.

  “It’s a date. For a second there I was worried you’d outgrown it.”

  I laugh. “Funny, I was thinking the same thing about you.”

  Dad grins and restarts the show they were watching. My mom wanders back in from the kitchen with a Diet Coke and sits down next to him. It’s my cue to leave.

  I crawl into bed, pulling out the notebook stuffed underneath the mattress. Fifty-seven entries, all neatly organized in chronological order: a scientific survey of my every encounter with Blake up to last night. I skim a few pages, like I need the reminder of who I am. Like tonight’s strange discussion with Blake wasn’t all the proof I need.

  I’ve barely started making some notes when my cell phone starts barking. Literally barking, like actual dogs howling and yelping. Haley’s idea of joke. She always downloads weird ringtones when I’m not paying attention. I grab the flashing rectangle, but it stops before I can answer it. The message light blinks on and off. I don’t recognize the number on the screen; it’s probably Haley using Kimmy’s cell, since hers was confiscated by her mom. I debate whether to read the message now or wait until morning. But if I don’t answer now, Haley will keep calling. I flip it open.

  Where are you? the message blinks.

  Haley has no way of knowing that Christy and I went straight home. In bed, I type, hoping she’ll get the hint.

  After I send the message, I start writing again. I’m tempted to omit the details about the silver flash and frozen time. “Stress-induced hallucination” should cover it.

  The barking and yelping are back. I groan and roll over. I’m going to have to turn off the ringer.

  Yum, can I come?

  I sit up straight, instantly alert. Definitely not Haley.

  Who is this? I tap back.

  I stare at the phone, waiting for a reply. I can hear my own breathing. After what seems an eternity, the phone finally lights up.

  Who do you think? The message teases me in the dark.

  It occurs to me that there are two possibilities, and that fact alone is something I wouldn’t even have comprehended two nights ago. I twist the bracelet around my wrist self-consciously.

  Blake was talking nonsense; this bracelet is just a good luck charm, nothing more. Nana gave it to me my first day home from my three-night hospital stay. They said I was kept there for observation, to make sure I didn’t go into shock, yet they kept asking me questions about whether I was suicidal or hearing voices. I wasn’t. I wished I could blame what I’d done on voices in my head or suicidal depression, but when it came down to it, there was no one to blame but the monster that is me.

  My old middle school always held a pajama party lock-in, an overnight event with games and movies and pizza that marked the beginning of eighth grade. It was a rite of passage that set the stage for where you’d fit in the school hierarchy, an event with a secret underground of spin the bottle and thermoses full of cheap sparkling wine. At thirteen, before my pheromone problem kicked in, I was a minor deity in a clique of girls poised to take control of the school. That night, Derek Kingston, the cutest boy in our class, asked me to meet him in the chemistry lab at one in the morning. I was convinced that not only was I going to get my first kiss, I was going to land an amazing boyfriend, securing my place at the top of the pecking order.

  It all seems so stupid now, but at the time I was foolish enough to think that being pretty meant something.

  At one o’clock, I put on the fuzzy yellow slippers I’d bought to match my sun-and-stars pajamas and told a yawning
chaperone that I was going to use the restroom by the gym. The chemistry lab was dark when I got there, and at first I couldn’t make out anything but shadows. There was a shuffling noise in the back. Gradually my eyes adjusted, and I made my way along the rows of tables. I could just see the silhouette of the spikes in Derek’s hair. I started to walk faster, but stopped when I heard a giggle from behind him.

  “Shhh,” he said. “She’ll hear you.”

  “Hear who?” My voice came out higher than it should have, a nervous squeak.

  “No one. Brie, is that you?” Derek hurried to meet me, glancing back over his shoulder. “Hey,” he said as he grabbed my hand and guided me to the front of the room. “You’re early.”

  Another giggle came from the back, and everything fell into place. I was not the only girl Derek Kingston had invited to the chemistry lab. I was just his one o’clock appointment.

  That’s when I snapped.

  The phone starts to vibrate and “The Final Countdown” starts playing. I can’t blame Haley for this ringtone. I downloaded it myself.

  “Hello?”

  “I’m hurt,” a teasing male voice says.

  I release a breath I haven’t realized I’m holding. “Blake.” Of course Blake sent the messages—I gave him my number, after all. “What are you doing?”

  “Looking for you. You left without saying goodbye.”

  I almost laugh at the absurdity of this statement. “Last time I checked, you were the one who took off.” Vanished is more like it.

  “It looked like your friend needed you. But we aren’t finished.”

  The thumping in my chest is so loud I’m afraid he can hear it through the phone. Defenses down, I go on the offense. “And behind door number two we have Blake Williams’ psychotic stalker personality, not to be confused with his aloof, ‘everything about you pushes me away’ personality.”