by KB Anne
He peels out of the driveway. “Spill what?”
I reach over and pinch the underside of his bicep. “Spill. It.”
“Owwww,” he whines. “What am I spilling?”
“Don’t play dumb. You know something about Breas. What is it?”
“I know nothing about him. Nothing at all.”
“Scott.”
“All right, fine. I knew he hooked up last night, but I thought it was with Kensey.”
“Why?”
“Because he stopped by practice and showed us his bike. He said the bike makes lassies do crazy sexy things. Then he said he was going over to Kensey’s for the evening and most likely wouldn’t be home until the morning.”
Fucking bastard.
“Did he come home last night?”
He shakes his head.
And there goes my revenge high.
“Did he come home this morning?”
Another shake of his head.
We drive the rest of the way to school in silence. Scott’s probably thinking about all the ways he can keep me in my classes without skipping one himself, while I’m thinking about all the ways I can hurt Breas. Like face full-of-asphalt hurt. Doc-in-the-junk hurt.
And what does Kensey think? She must know that someone marked his neck. His hickeys would be impossible to miss. I made sure of that. He may have tricked her into believing he had a “slip” and somehow found his way back to her, but once she sees my neck she’ll know I was the “slip.”
And while she might be able to forgive an unknown hookup, she would never be able to forgive me.
The unexpected twist returns my thirst for revenge.
“What are you plotting?” Scotts asks.
“Huh?”
“You’ve got that look in your eye, and normally that means either the police will be involved or I’ll need to drag you out of a club and you’ll pass out for two days.”
I smile to myself. “Don’t you worry your pretty little head about it.”
He clucks his tongue against the roof of his mouth—his signal that he’s about to get lessony. His dad does that same thing, but at least Uncle Mark is an adult and a professor. Lessony is part of his DNA. Those suede-elbowed blazers and loafers certainly aren’t worn as a result of good fashion sense. When Scott gets lessony, the result is sarcastic retorts or punches to the ribs or at least that’s my reaction to him. I crack my knuckles in preparation.
“Gi, don’t do anything that’s going to get you kicked out of school.”
“Oh, Scott, you’re so cute.” I tousle the back of his head. (I’d get the top of it, but I can’t reach. Damn him and his giraffe relations.) “If I haven’t been kicked out yet, I’m not going to unless I kill someone.” I climb out of the truck and shut the door, but Scott’s not through with his lesson yet.
He follows me into the building. “Gi …”
“Not that the thought has ever crossed my mind. Blood’s messy, and jail doesn’t sound very appealing. Too many rules to follow.”
“Yes, that’s what’s wrong with jail. Forget the moral implications of killing someone. Gi, seriously.” He stops to look at me. I mean really look. “Please don’t hurt anyone. And please, Gi, please don’t hurt yourself.” His eyes water, and damn if he doesn’t make mine water too. “Promise me you won’t hurt yourself.”
I blink a few times. “I promise,” I say in a small voice. He’s managed to deflate the hurt and anger out of me again. I hate it when he does that.
Ryan strolls up between us. He looks from me to Scott and back to me. “Whoa, who died?”
I raise an eyebrow to Scott, asking permission. After all my knuckles are already cracked. He pulls his lip to the side and nods. I ball my fist and swing it into Ryan’s stomach. It’s like punching a brick wall without the nasty gashed knuckles, but there’s a tremendous amount of satisfaction when contact is made.
“Ugh, what was that for?” he says, rubbing his stomach. “You know for a little girl you pack a punch.”
I stomp on his toe.
“Owwww,” he squeals. “What was that for?”
“Just making sure I’ve still got it. I’d hate for anyone to think I’m getting soft.” It’s times like these that I feel positively giddy and forget all the baggage I normally cart around.
Lizzie rushes over to us. “Ryan, are you all right? Who hurt you?”
“Your best friend. That’s who,” he groans.
Lizzie turns to me. It’s the first time we’ve seen each other since our little fight at the flea market. Her new pendant swings back and forth, staring at me. She sees my neck. Her eyes widen. Her real eyes, not her necklace. Her reaction fills me with hope that Kensey’s will be far more thunderous and dramatic and, with any luck, possibly murderous.
“You didn’t,” she says.
I smile. “I did.”
“When?”
“After.”
“What’s happening right now? Am I missing something?” Ryan asks Scott.
“Female intuition,” he says to placate him, but he knows it’s something more than that.
“Wow,” Lizzie says.
“Yeah.”
“She know?”
“No.”
Her eyes drift past me down the hall. “She’s about to find out.”
The fresh scent of rain on a hot summer day shifts the air. My stomach tightens just below my belly button. I smile. I like this feeling. I like it a lot. I swing around to face Breas and Kensey, their arms slung around each other with their lips locked together.
A wave of betrayal floods me first. It strips my courage. How can he kiss her when we were together just hours ago? How can he want to be with her when he’s pursued me so hard?
Or is it exactly as I’ve been treated dozens of times before? Once he gets what he wants, he throws me to the wolves. I’m nothing more than helpless prey.
“Confront him,” a voice that sounds an awful lot like my own whispers.
“Say something,” Lizzie murmurs in one ear.
“Don’t do it,” Scott says in the other.
“Breas!” yells Ryan from behind us.
Breas pulls away from Kensey but keeps her tucked close, as if standing apart would cause great pain. When I’m through with them, they’ll know what pain is. Fear too.
“Alloo, laddies,” he says to Ryan and Scott. He nods to Lizzie, then slowly—like frame-by-frame slowly—he turns to me. His eyes fall to my neck covered with his hickeys. I lift my chin to draw attention to them. He lifts his, but there’s nothing there. Not one hickey. Not one mark. Not one piece of damning evidence that he was in the arms of another. “Lassies.”
How can that be? I don’t understand. He and I. We. My body goes numb. Black ink claws at the edges of my already questionable sanity. How can this be?
“Ewwww,” Kensey whines. “Who would want to suck on Skunk’s neck?”
My eyes meet Breas’s. His expression reveals nothing. The jagged cut on my wrist starts to itch. I try to dig into it with my nails. Lizzie wraps her hand around it, effectively stopping me. I might hurt myself, but I’d never hurt Lizzie. Never.
“I mean, for someone to get close enough to give the crack whore hickeys, he’d have to wear a containment suit so he wouldn’t catch anything.”
Scott rests his hand on my shoulder. Ryan lays his hand on the other. Their touch pulls me back to this space.
“That’s enough, Kensey,” Scott says.
She squints at him. “I will never understand why you are friends with her and the Jesus freak.”
I lunge at her. It’s one thing to insult me. It’s quite another to insult my best friend. Scott tightens his grip, but Ryan’s the one holding me back.
“Bitch,” I growl.
“I hope you’ve all had your rabies shots, because that rodent is infected,” she says. “Come, Breas. Walk me to class.”
Ryan tightens his hold on me as they stroll by. Breas’s gaze falls on my neck. A smile tugs on his lips
, but he says nothing.
“Bastard,” I growl.
It’s not until they’re a good ten feet away from me that I hear chanting. Low chanting, and it’s coming from Lizzie.
Her eyes don’t leave Breas and Kensey as she continues to chant.
“What language is she speaking?” Ryan asks Scott.
“Gaelic,” he says. “She’s speaking Gaelic. Lizzie,” he releases me and grabs her hand, “what are you doing?”
“I think she’s trying to curse them,” I murmur. “Scott, you need to break the connection.”
“What?” He looks from me to Lizzie and back to me.
“Break the connection. Stand in front of her so she can’t see them.”
Her chanting keeps getting louder and louder, growing more and more feverish with each refrain. She’s almost at the end of the curse.
“Now. Do it now.”
Scott steps in front of her and shakes her. “Lizzie, wake up.”
She keeps chanting. Her eyes are glazed over, almost black.
He shakes her again. “Lizzie, wake up. Wake up.”
Her head jerks. The black slips from her eyes and her pupils come back into focus.
Ryan releases me and wraps her in his arms. “You’re okay, Lizzie. You’re okay.”
Scott and I share a long look. His questions form in my mind.
What was that?
I don’t know.
Yes, you do.
It was a curse. How does she know a curse?
How do you know it’s a curse?
Never before have his questions been so clear in my head that I can actually hear his thoughts and answer him back. Scott and I have always communicated in a way that goes beyond what Gram and I share or what Lizzie and I just experienced. I always thought it was ESP or some Freudian thing—like that sharing a crib causes two individuals to know what the other’s thinking due to excessive exchange of slobber and fecal matter. But this is something new. This is some freaky paranormal shit going on.
Not that my life hasn’t been without its difficulties and surprises. Hell, I’ve come to relish the almost-daily disruptions from an otherwise mundane world. But these last few weeks, it’s been one otherworldly encounter after another, and my sanity might not break on through to the other side.
21
Zombie Thief
Lizzie’s shaken after the curse. Hell, I’m shaken. Scott and Ryan are hot beds of confusion not knowing what’s the best line of defense or offense they should take.
Her knees wobble beneath her, as if trying to decide whether they can hold her weight or will drop out from under her. Her teeth keep chattering so hard I think they might break, and her pupils are doing a sort of creepy pinprick thing. She’s not in any condition to say or do anything except stand in the middle of the hallway in a zombie-like trance. Ryan whooshes her off to class, acting as if an Egyptian history lesson is exactly what she needs to return to herself. Acting as if she didn’t try to curse Kensey and Breas. Acting like she wasn’t chanting Gaelic as she delivered the curse.
Two things: How did she know a curse in Gaelic? And why didn’t she tell me about it?
Then it hits me.
I drop to the floor and dig through the contents of my backpack. The spell book should be nestled between my sketchbook and chemistry folder. When I don’t find it, I dump the entire contents on the hallway floor. Scott scrambles across the hall to grab the cheetah-print lighter, cigarettes, and spray paint I sent flying in my mad search. I imagine he’s trying to hide the damning proof that I once again smuggled banned items into school. What he doesn’t realize is that if Lizzie—our dear, sweet Lizzie—lifted the spell book and was able to learn a curse written in an ancient language, we’ve got much more serious things to worry about than lung cancer or suspension.
“It’s not here,” I mutter. “It’s not here. She took it. I can’t believe she took it.”
He bends down beside me. “What’s not here? Who took what? Lizzie? Do you mean Lizzie? What did she take? Should we go get her? Should we tell her parents? Should we go to the principal? Should we—”
I hold up my hand in warning.
He immediately silences.
“I had an old book in my backpack, and now, it’s not there. I think Lizzie might have taken it.”
“You always have old books in your backpack. Our houses are filled with them. Why would Lizzie take an old book? What was it about?”
I flick my hand back in the air, and he shuts up. He’s like a squirrel on crack sometimes.
“Let’s not worry about it. I’ll get it back from her after school.”
He shakes his head. “I am going to worry about it. She was speaking in another language, and you were freaking out like you knew what she was saying even though it’s a language neither one of us has heard before …” He stops and looks at me. “Have we heard that language before?”
I shove my crap back into my backpack. “I think it was Gaelic, and by the way, you said it was Gaelic too.”
He nods. “I did, didn’t I? How does Lizzie know Gaelic?”
“From the book she borrowed.”
“I thought you said she took it. You couldn’t believe she took it. If she took it, she didn’t borrow it.”
I narrow my eyes and shift into evil-eye mode.
“All right, I’ll shut up. What should we do? Do we go get her now? Should we tell Ryan? Do I go to class? What are you going to do?”
“Scott,” I raise my hand again. He quiets. “We’re not going to do anything. You’re going to your class. I’m going to my class, and I’ll talk to her either at lunch or after school.”
“You’re willingly going to class?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I am a student at this school.”
He raises both eyebrows. I don’t blame him. I wouldn’t believe me either.
“Fine. I want to see if anyone talks about Lizzie. I want to find out what everyone saw.”
“Yeah, yeah, okay,” he says backing away from me. “I’ll see you later. Come get me if you need anything or figure out what’s going on.” He disappears around the corner.
I collapse again, taking giant breaths in and out to fight off the panic attack taking hold of me. Lizzie scared the shit out of me, but I’m the only one who can help her.
After several more inhalations, I gather my things and stomp into class. The Lizzie situation sucks, and I’m freaked out, but I can’t act like I’m freaked out or these classmates of mine will eat me alive. I wear this armor for my own protection as much as theirs.
Mr. Demarest had the nerve to dump all his office supplies and papers back on my desk, which really pisses me off. I’m only twenty minutes late for class, and was in his class yesterday, and it’s like he completely expected me to be at detention today or hanging out with Principal Donahue or skipping. I wish he’d at least pretend I’m a regularly attending student.
The rest of my morning classes are more of the same. I stomp in after the bell because it goes against my nature to follow the rules. The teacher runs over to clean off my desk before I can cause any damage. Then for the remainder of class, they tiptoe around me for fear that I might trip them or stab them with a pencil—I stabbed one teacher in sixth grade, and somehow, I can’t get rid of the reputation.
Not one person mentions Lizzie or her curse attempt. Which makes me believe that either no one witnessed the scene this morning or they’re completely preoccupied with my hickeys. There’s a lot of speculation about the origins of them. A few even suggest that I gave them to myself for attention.
Like I need the extra attention.
By fourth period, the rumors run so wild, that even I, the girl who has spent her life listening to nasty rumors whispered about her, can’t take it anymore. I turn around in search of a victim, but to my surprise and confusion, not one person is talking. They all have their heads down, working on their At the Bell assignment.
I have d
anced along the Cliffs of Insanity for many years, but hallucinating that I heard the thoughts of an entire class borders on a one-way ticket to a locked cell.
Is it possible that I’m really hearing my classmates’ thoughts? Is it possible that this is one of the “gifts” Darius was talking about?
Because, honestly, it feels more like a curse.
22
Curses, Kisses, and Daydreams
By the time the lunch bell rings, I’m fairly certain the constant, mind-numbing noise will drive me berserk—as if that wasn’t a very real possibility already. If I didn’t need to talk to Lizzie, I’d grab a cup of Gram’s tea from Mrs. Paige, feign some minor medical emergency, and leave this godforsaken place. But, alas, I never get what I wish for.
As the voices continue buzzing around my brain, I smash headfirst into a freshman. The stupid, minion-T-shirt-wearing kid takes one second too long to stare at my hair, so I slash his cheek with my dagger nails. I’m in no mood for idiotic behavior. Besides, he clearly needed a lesson in manners.
As he tries not to cry, he clutches his cheek and runs away. I smile for the first time all day. His reaction makes me feel a lot better. Or at least the sight of his blood does.
I walk the rest of the way to lunch feeling hopeful that maybe some more underclassmen will knock into me. Gushing blood is a real rush.
Unfortunately, everyone keeps their distance. They’ve either witnessed or heard about the freshman incident (because gossip travels lightning fast) or they witnessed the witchy scene this morning and blame me and not Lizzie. And now, instead of hickeys, everyone suspects my neck is covered with boils because I’m a meth user.
Please. That shit will kill you.
As I walk into the cafeteria, Lizzie leaves through the side door with her hood up and no Ryan in sight. I didn’t think he’d leave her side for the rest of the day—that’s the only reason I didn’t chase after her this morning. But now he’s gone and left her, and she’s going to wind up with a detention for wearing a hood. Detention equates to her public school death sentence in her family. By the time I reach the opposite doors, she’s already disappeared down the stairs. When I finally catch up to her, I yank her arm. As she whips around her hood falls off, and I realize it’s not Lizzie at all.
