by Sarina Dorie
Pro Ro’s eyes went wide. He glanced at Pinky. Josie stared at the floor.
Thatch’s eyes were glued on Miss Periwinkle. “I didn’t realize you and Vega had plans.”
Vega covered her mouth and nose with a handkerchief. “Please don’t say this stench is going to taint this dress. It’s already hard enough getting the smell of gin and cigarette smoke out of my clothes.” Vega went on to complain loudly.
I was more focused on Thatch and making sure he didn’t see Derrick. He offered Miss Periwinkle his arm, and the two of them continued down the steps. He said something too low for the rest of us to hear.
Vega nudged me and then Josie with her wand. “What are you two lesbos doing?”
I ignored her.
The high sweet lullaby of Miss Periwinkle’s voice caught my attention from the steps below. “A girls’ night out. I hope you don’t mind. It’s been ages since I’ve gone dancing.”
“I would have taken you,” Thatch said.
“Yes, but you hate dancing. Besides, I don’t even know if I can dance anymore. Wouldn’t that be embarrassing for you to see?” She laughed. The sound was like wind chimes and water bubbling in a brook.
The way Thatch leaned toward her was filled with such longing, I doubted he cared if she made a fool of herself dancing. He obviously was smitten with her. He didn’t act like a soulless servant of the Raven Queen. He had a heart and cared about people.
Pro Ro and Pinky continued staring after Miss Periwinkle.
“Ugh, is no one listening to what I just said?” Vega asked. “What is wrong with you fucktards?” She stomped after them.
I breathed a sigh of relief.
Pro Ro sighed dejectedly. “Well, I guess I should be going to bed. It’s not like I have anything better to do. Too bad I don’t know how to dance.” He started up the steps, turning to glance over his shoulder at Pinky. “Are you coming?”
“In a minute,” Pinky said.
We stood on the stairs until Pro Ro left.
“Is everyone gone?” Derrick whispered.
“Hopefully,” Josie said.
“Good thinking,” I said. “I would never have thought of using Pinky as a human shield.”
Derrick stepped out from behind Pinky. “Thanks, I owe you one.”
Pinky crossed xir arms. “Okay, I gotta say, this goes way above and beyond avoiding someone. I might be the new teacher, but I’m not dumb. What is going on here?”
“Nothing,” I said.
Josie bit her lip.
Derrick stared up into Pinky’s brown eyes. Considering Derrick’s height, it was incredible he needed to stare up into anyone’s eyes. “I’m Clarissa’s boyfriend. If Thatch finds out we’re together, he’ll probably fire her—or me.”
It wasn’t an implausible lie. He was more convincing than I was too.
“But that woman we just saw—wasn’t she Mr. Thatch’s girlfriend?” Pinky asked.
“You saw how he was about catching us out after teacher curfew,” Josie said. “He is such a hypocrite.”
Pinky nodded. “Man, this is going to be a rough year, isn’t it? It’s hard enough coming in halfway through the year—after the semester has already started—and trying to figure out the culture of the school with the kids, but there’s all these tricky social dynamics with the staff I’m going to have to navigate. Sheesh.”
Xe didn’t know the half of it.
After parting with Josie and Pinky, Derrick and I went back to his room.
“How long until Vega gets back?” he asked.
I sat down on his bed. “It’s hard to say. I probably shouldn’t stay more than a few hours. It’s a school night.”
“Then we had better put this time to good use.” He waggled his eyebrows suggestively. He patted the chair and the hook on the door until he found what he was looking for. He went through the motions of putting on a coat, though I couldn’t see one. The air shimmered, and he was invisible.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Giving you a fashion show. I want you to tell me how I look.”
I shook my head, laughing. He was so random. “Nice, I guess.”
He pulled down his ski cap and strutted across the room. He was mostly invisible except for the tan of his neck and the neon pants.
He tripped into a trunk. “It might help if I cut two eyeholes in this thing too. I can’t see where I’m going.”
“Isn’t it, you know, invisible?”
“Not the inside.”
“All you need is an invisibility scarf and a pair of invisible pants and you can show Khaba you can still be an invisible man.”
He rolled the fabric of the hat upward, revealing the solemnness of his expression. “I don’t know if I should stay and keep working at Womby’s.”
“What do you mean? You can probably find a pair of invisible pants in Lachlan Falls. We can keep you secret until we figure out Thatch’s motivations.”
He sat on the bed beside me. “I already have him figured out. I don’t think I should be here. He can use me against you.”
“No, he can’t. He won’t.” I scooted forward so I could see his expression. “Even if there was a spell on you, I broke it. If he commands you to do something outrageous, you’ll have the free will to refuse. But I don’t think there is any spell on you like that.” I didn’t think Thatch would do that. If anything, Thatch wanted Derrick close so he would be safe from getting snatched again.
Derrick removed his coat and tossed it aside. “What if there still is a spell, only I can’t remember it? Something more than the invisibility and my memories being erased that the Raven Queen did to me? All it will take is a magic word or a command to turn me evil.”
I crossed my arms. “You’re being an Eeyore.”
“You’re being naive.”
My face flushed with heat. I turned away from him. He was wrong.
“Consider for just a minute… .” he started.
“No.”
“Clarissa, stop defending him.”
“Stop attacking him.”
“I’m not. This is the Raven Queen I’m talking about. She wants you because your affinity is useful for her. She knows where you are. She knows about our relationship, thanks to Thatch. She knows she can get to you by using me.” His voice rose. “If she decided I’m not valuable to her as a spy or a puppet, she’ll just go back to her original plan and pull out my entrails and leave me for you to find.”
The cold draftiness of the room seeped under my sweater and chilled me. I remembered those shards of confusing memories. I didn’t know what they meant, just that it was bad.
“Look, I don’t want to fight,” Derrick said. “I just don’t want you to get hurt. I’m afraid we aren’t safe here. You aren’t safe.” He gathered me up in his arms and kissed the top of my head.
My anger melted away as he hugged me. Whether it was my affinity, or my need to be comforted, I didn’t care. I turned to face him and sank into the sanctuary of his embrace.
“What do you suggest?” I asked. “That we run away?”
“Can you think of a better solution?”
CHAPTER TWELVE
One Shade of Gray
My dreams were haunted by the taste of pleasure and pain. The Raven Queen smiled at me, whispering a lullaby as she drank in my soul.
I woke up with Derrick spooned behind me. His arm was draped over my ribs, making it difficult to breathe. The weight of his words came back to my mind. I shifted his arm lower so I could move. He stirred in his sleep.
I hadn’t meant to fall asleep in Derrick’s bed. We had whispered plans and possibilities to each other late into the night. As much as I had originally wanted a romantic, passionate night with him, our discussion about all the ways we might die was too strong a killjoy.
I sat up. “What time do you think it is?”
“Hmm?” Stars shone through the skylight above.
; “I should get back.” I didn’t need Vega catching me out of my bed two nights in a row. Talk about living dangerously.
Derrick yawned. “Stay here and keep me warm.” He snuggled closer.
“I really need to go.”
He withdrew his arm. “Okay.”
I didn’t move. It was too comfortable. He poked me in the side. I squirmed toward the edge of the bed. He sat up and scooted out from behind me.
“You don’t have to get up,” I said. I groped through the darkness for my sweater.
“There’s no way I’m letting you stumble around the school in the dark by yourself.”
“I don’t stumble.” The moment I said it I stubbed my toe on the trunk.
“That’s right. You meant to do that.”
A breath of wind warmed brushed past me. The candles around the room glowed blue before fading into a more natural orange. I found my sweater draped over the chair and covering my wrinkled blouse underneath. I straightened my striped stockings and slipped my feet into my Mary Jane shoes.
Derrick pulled his pink pants over his underwear and groped around for his invisible jacket. I suppose that was the problem with invisible clothes. You had to remember where you left them.
“Those pants are going to give you away if Thatch sees you.”
“No, they won’t. Everyone will see hot-pink pants and assume they’re Khaba’s.”
“Maybe you should dye them black or gray so you’ll blend in with the shadows.”
“Or I could use magic to change their color.”
“Really?” Giddy delight filled my heart at the idea of seeing him perform magic. It wasn’t like I hadn’t seen spells before—or even his—but sometimes I couldn’t get over the fact that I now lived in place where miracles and fantastical things could come true.
“Stand back. This is going to be an experimental spell.” Derrick waved me behind him.
I moved. Derrick had never done anything dangerous with his magic—if one didn’t count the tornado—and that was partly me drawing out more power in him than he knew he had. Even so, the idea of experimental magic didn’t sound reassuring.
Derrick removed the pants—which I didn’t mind at all. He laid Khaba’s pink pants next to Thatch’s gray slacks on the bed. He looked under his pillow and felt along the mattress.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
He pressed his palms together. “The problem with an invisible wand is you have to be able to remember where you left it.”
I wondered what else Derrick had lost.
He closed his eyes and gestured with his hands. The motions were somewhere in between voguing and sign language. Blue light glowed between his fingers. The air of the room turned warm and then cold. A breeze turned the pages of his open sketchpad on the table. The candles flickered and spluttered out.
Derrick spoke, but most of his words were drowned out by the whistle of wind breathing in from under the door. “Gray and gloom enhance the pink in this pair of pants.”
The glow of magic illuminated the two pairs of pants as they twisted together in a dervish. Wind blew more fiercely, snuffing the candles. I staggered back. The blankets flapped back against the wall. I couldn’t tell what color the pants were anymore. The cyclone of fabric slowed. The glow faded, along with all the light in the room.
Derrick picked up the pants. Candles sparked back to life. In one hand he held a pair of torn hot-pink pants. In the other he held Khaba’s wider, but shorter-legged pants. They were now gray. I stared in horror as I realized what he’d done.
“Perfect. Now the pants are charcoal instead of hot pink.” Derrick turned to me. His smile faded.
I suspected the anxious expression in his eyes was due to the horror in mine.
“You turned Thatch’s pants pink.” I said. “Now how am I going to get them back to him without him noticing?”
“Seriously? They have a giant rip in the back.” He dropped Thatch’s pants on the floor and dressed in the gray pants. “Were you going to just slip them into his closet and think he wasn’t going to notice? He would do some kind of homing-beacon spell that would point to you as the thief. Or me as the person who tore his pants. Just let him think the brownies didn’t return the pants after washing them.”
“I don’t want to be a thief. I planned on returning his pants,” I said.
He kept staring at me like he wanted to say something. He laced his invisible shoes, sneaking looks at me.
“What?”
“Um, nothing. I’m sorry.” He bit his lip, eyeing me. “I don’t want to make you mad.”
I went over and hugged him. “I’m not mad.” I kissed his cheek.
“You’re right about the color pink,” he said. “It really is . . . conspicuous. Gray is a much better color for being incognito.” He looked at me and then looked away again. “Have you ever thought about . . . ahem . . . gray as a hair color?”
My eyes went wide. I had a feeling where this was going. “You’re kidding me.”
“Heh.”
I ran to the mirror and slid the painting over. My beautiful pink hair was dull and gray.
“Derrick!”
“I’m sure we can change it back. Maybe Josie or Khaba can help.”
I shook my head in exasperation. “It’s a good thing I love you.”
We headed to my room, Derrick using his wand to light the way. He kept the light dim, with just enough to see by. With his invisibility clothes and dark pants, he was impossible to see now. I didn’t like the idea of having gray hair at my young age, but it probably was more practical for clandestine adventures in the middle of the night.
“There are so many times I’ve been out after dark that Vega has never said anything. I can’t believe she had a fit about it last night,” I whispered.
“The difference is that you come back. Last night you didn’t.” Derrick’s voice came from beside me, but I couldn’t see his face with the invisibility clothes. “You had her worried. She’s not a bad roommate. She’s looking out for you.”
“Only because Thatch makes her.”
He grunted. I didn’t say I thought Thatch was the one looking out for me. That would have just started us arguing again.
I thought I caught a whiff of cigarette smoke. I eyed the shadows. It wouldn’t have surprised me if one of the students was smoking in a secret passage somewhere. Or if one of them had lit the school on fire again. I hoped it wasn’t the latter.
He walked up the creaky stairs to the women’s dorm. The light of Derrick’s wand illuminated a portrait on the wall of an old man in a witch hat. Out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw the silhouette of a bird shift across the painting, but when I looked, I only saw our shadows.
Derrick kissed me on the forehead outside my door. I stood on tiptoe, wanting more than a chaste kiss.
The light of his wand faded. Fabric rustled.
He gave me a quick peck on the lips. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Or maybe that’s today. I don’t know what time it is. It’s probably after midnight.” His warmth withdrew as he stepped back.
I unlocked the door. An oil lamp burned in the room. I didn’t remember leaving a lamp on. Perhaps Vega had. Her bed was neatly made. She wasn’t back yet. I turned back to Derrick, a smile on my face.
A light flared in the darkness of the hallway. Vega leaned against the wall, the tip of her wand glowing brilliantly white. She still wore her black flapper dress.
She advanced, bringing with her the odor of sweat and cigarette smoke. “What the hell are you doing?”
“Me?” I asked.
“Who else would I be talking to?” She grabbed the front of my sweater, yanked me back out into the hall, and slammed me against the wall. “You’re going to tell me where you were tonight, and if you try to lie to me, I’ll make you regret it.” She shoved the wand under my chin menacingly.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Romantic Rivals
&nb
sp; I stared at Vega in terror.
She shook me. “Where were you?”
“With Josie?”
“Bitch, please!”
Her breath smelled of alcohol and tobacco smoke. Up close I could see her lipstick was smeared. I turned my face away and tried to breathe clean air.
“Ahem,” Derrick said, probably a little too quietly to get the attention of Miss Drama Queen.
“Fine, you want to do this the hard way.” Vega released me, but I remained pinned against the wall. She flourished her wand in the air, about to hex me. “I’m not above torturing this out of you.”
“Actually.” Derrick coughed from the darkness behind Vega. “She was telling the truth. Miss Lawrence was in Josie Kimura’s room earlier.”
Vega whirled. She squinted into the darkness, waving her wand to the left and right. “Who’s there?”
Vega’s lips moved, and pinpricks of white drifted out of her wand, floating in the air and radiating larger. They glowed like stars. The fragrance of night air intensified, cool and crisp and tasting of moonlight and the cosmos.
“I can’t see you. Where are you?” Vega said.
“You aren’t supposed to see me. I’m invisible. I work for security.”
“I don’t believe you.” She waved a hand in the air. A grid of lines appeared a foot out around Derrick, flashing blue and purple. In front of him glowed the school crest. Underneath was beautiful ornamental writing that looked like it could have been Arabic.
“That’s Khaba’s stamp of protection.” Derrick sounded cheerful and calm. “He only does that for classified staff.”
Go, Derrick! He didn’t sound intimidated or scared at all. He was handling Vega with far more ease than I did. It looked like being escorted by a security guard might have provided a good alibi for me.
My relief was short-lived.
Her eyes narrowed. “You’re that perverted invisible man who peeks on us while we’re showering, aren’t you?” Her wand glowed red.
“I will have you know I never spy on women in the shower. That was the former invisible man. And I don’t go into any of the staff quarters, locker rooms, or student dorms.” Derrick peeled back enough of his ski cap that his grin was visible. “They call me Invismo. You’ve never met me, but I’ve seen you around.”