Cupid's Match

by Lauren Palphreyman

  “Lila, you will be matched with Cupid.”

  8

  Charlie doesn’t seem too bothered about her new job as mentor; as soon as the bell rings, she skips over to Cal, who, incidentally, spent the rest of the lesson firing dirty looks my way. He now looks bored as my friend tries to engage him in conversation about the Welcome Back dance she’s helping plan for next Friday.

  I hurriedly pack up my things, hoping to sneak off without having to deal with Cupid. “I’ll see you at lunch,” I whisper to James.

  “Not wanting to escort the ‘love god’ around school?”

  “You know me too well.”

  I dodge swiftly around my classmates, trying not to catch

  Ms. Green’s attention as she concentrates on lesson planning. Finally, I reach the exit and look back. Cupid is still watching me with that same amused smile, which turns into a wicked grin when I give him my best innocent eyes. He coughs loudly.

  Ms. Green looks up from her desk.

  “Lila,” she says sharply, “make sure you take Cupid to his next lesson. English, I believe.”

  “I’m sure we can both find our own way around,” Cal protests.

  “Speak for yourself,” Cupid says. “I think I’d prefer Lila to take me.”

  His accent is different—American with a slight British edge that makes me think he’s spent some time in England. He says my name as though he likes the feel of it on his tongue, and it makes me uncomfortable. It feels too familiar, too personal. His blue-green eyes are twinkling violently.

  “Come on, then,” I say, making my way out of the door. I don’t look back to see if he’s following, but I know that he is.

  “So, Lila,” he says as we step outside.

  He pauses and I stop to look up at him. There’s something almost angelic about his features. The artificial light in the corridor—harsh and unflattering on everyone else—gives his fair skin a faint glow. He smells like summer—like grass stains and honey and a light floral fabric softener. I can feel the heat radiating from his body as he stands closer to me than appropriate.

  But, weirdly, I don’t step away. It is intoxicating. I want to be closer to him, to drink him in, to reach out and touch him despite myself. He makes me feel tiny—the top of my head barely reaches his shoulder—and I remember what Cal said back in the Cupids Matchmaking Service. He dabbled with human affairs, human hearts. Obsessed over women and made them obsess over him. I shiver involuntarily.

  He grins. “Your teacher seems to think you should give me everything I need.”

  For a second I feel the way a fly must feel when it’s caught in a spider’s web. What the hell is wrong with me? Then I blink and pull myself together and set off down the corridor.

  “Sure. As long as what you want is to get to English class without severely annoying me.”

  Cupid shrugs, falling into step beside me. “I suppose I could do that,” he says. “You have English too?”

  I shake my head, not really wanting to continue the conversation. He takes long strides and I have to pick up my pace as we walk outside to cut through the small square courtyard at the heart of the school. The fall sun coats the picnic benches with warm light.

  “You were talking all the way through history,” he goes on. “Legends not your thing, huh?”

  “No,” I say, looking him in the face. “Not really. I’m not one for fairy tales. I prefer the present, not relics from the past.”

  He grins again. “I think you should give myths a chance. There may be more to them than you think.”

  “I highly doubt that.”

  As we approach the doorway on the other side of the courtyard, Cupid stops. “That other new guy didn’t seem to want me to have a mentor. I wonder why that is.”

  He shoots me a sly look, and I wonder if Cal has unintentionally given away that I’m Cupid’s Match. Wouldn’t it be ironic if the thing that alerted Cupid he was on the right path to the Match was Cal being here in the first place? I knew from the start it was a dumb plan.

  “Didn’t notice. Do you know the other new guy?” I ask, deciding to play his game. “It seemed like you did.”

  Cupid smirks but doesn’t say anything as we reenter the school. As we walk through into another locker-lined corridor, a couple of the females shoot not-so-subtle admiring looks at him, which Cupid not-so-subtly notices.

  “The girl he was talking to,” he says, ignoring my question. “What’s her name?”

  “Chloe.”

  His eyes darken as we stop outside his classroom. “Chloe. I should probably get to know her a bit better.” He looks at me, eyes slightly narrowed, as though trying to gauge a reaction. He’s not going to get one.

  I smile. “Sounds like you’ve been getting to know quite a few girls from here already.”

  He laughs a low, musical laugh that attracts a few more admiring glances. “What can I say? I’m a friendly guy.” He opens his leather jacket and pulls a scrap of paper from an inside pocket. “Got a pen?”

  I raise an eyebrow. “You came to school without a pen?”

  His eyes glint. “I’m not on a quest for knowledge. I’m here for something much more interesting.”

  The way he says it makes my heart thud hard against my chest; for a moment I am sure he can hear it.

  He’s here for me.

  Then I roll my eyes and swing my backpack in front of me so I can pull out a blue pen from the side pocket. “Here.”

  His fingers brush mine as he takes it, and I feel my stomach clench. Seriously, what is wrong with me? To my surprise, he seems caught off guard too. He’s staring at his hand.

  “Do you believe in soul mates, Lila?” he asks suddenly, and I can see the storm behind his eyes. He’s trying to figure me out; trying to work out if I’m the girl he came here to find.

  I hold his gaze. “No. Love comes from friendship, and trust, and work. It’s not some magical force.” I think of my parents: my dad, lost in his memories, and my mom, gone from this world. “And it doesn’t always have a happy ending.”

  An emotion I can’t interpret flits across his face. His expression is serious, watchful. Then the grin is back.

  “Bad breakup?” he says.

  “I’m in a perfectly happy relationship, thanks very much.”

  “Sure you are.” Cupid holds my gaze a moment longer then scribbles something down and passes it to me.

  “What’s this?”

  “My address. My mother is . . . out of town and I’m having a party this Friday. You should come. Your friend too.”

  I don’t miss the emphasis on his mother being out of town. Do cupids even have mothers? I make a mental note to ask Cal later.

  Cupid turns and walks into the classroom, but before he disappears he looks over his shoulder. “By the way, I’m no longer so interested in getting to know Chloe,” he says. “It’s you I want to get to know better, Lila Black.”

  9

  At the end of the day I tell myself I’m not going to go to the gym to meet Cal for “training in the arts of the cupids,” whatever that means. I tell myself I’m going to go home and see how my father is doing and suggest that, hey, maybe we can have pancakes for dinner. However, when I pass by the dark gym on my way out the door, curiosity gets the better of me and I step inside.

  It seems empty. Rays of sun slip in through the high windows and cause elongated shadows to stretch out from the climbing frame stacked against the wall.

  “Cal?” I say tentatively, feeling stupid as my voice echoes back. “You here?”

  There’s silence for a moment, then the sound of footsteps.

  “Here.”

  My eyes dart toward the basketball hoop at the far end of the gym. When Cal emerges from the shadows, I take an involuntary step back. He has a bow slung across his body, and a sleek black case filled with arrows over on
e shoulder.

  “Jesus Christ! You’ve not been carrying that around school all day have you?”

  Cal scowls. “’Course not. They were in my car.”

  “You’re not going to . . . shoot me are you?”

  Cal looks insulted. “I told you before, I’m going to train you in the arts of the cupids.”

  “Does that involve shooting me?”

  Cal shrugs. “Not for the time being.”

  “For the time being?!” I take another step backward. This is insane.

  “They’re not ordinary arrows,” he says. “Each cupid has access to them. Our branch of the Cupids Matchmaking Service no longer uses them—we believe them old fashioned. But if you are to understand the ways of the cupids, and to understand Cupid himself, they are a good starting place. They were very commonplace up until the beginning of this century, when we started to rely on our advancing technology.”

  Taking another step closer, he pulls an arrow from its case. It is smaller than a normal arrow, and bright silver with indecipherable markings around the base of the shaft. The tip is pastel pink.

  “There are three types of cupid arrow, all extremely dangerous,” he says. “Arrow one: the Capax—or ‘Fool’s Love,’ as it has been nicknamed.”

  Before I can move or react, he swings the bow in front of him, looks right at me, aims, and then fires.

  I gasp as Cal’s arrow speeds past my face. I feel it happen in slow motion—the whoosh of cool air, the feather fletching brushing against my cheek, and the surge of adrenaline that makes my heart pound and my entire body feel cold.

  There’s a thunk as the projectile hits the wall behind me. The arrow quivers where it’s now embedded in the Forever Falls Lobsters team mural painted above one of the exits, adding an obstacle for one of the spirited crustaceans as it dribbles a basketball toward the hoop. I turn back around, dismayed to find my hands shaking.

  “What the hell?!”

  Cal clearly doesn’t think he’s done anything remotely odd. He pulls out a second arrow. This one is a deep gold, with a dark, blood-red tip. “Arrow two,” he states matter-of-factly as he holds it up. “The Ardor—or the ‘Burning Flame.’”

  He shoots again. I flinch as the second arrow pierces the air beside me and embeds itself next to the first.

  “Hey—”

  “And lastly,” Cal says, ignoring my protest and pulling out a sleek black arrow. “The Cupids’ Arrow.”

  As arrow three hurtles past me, Cal’s expression turns dark. I stand frozen to the spot, my heart racing.

  “Was there any need for that?” I ask weakly, attempting to regain my composure.

  “Look behind you.”

  I look at him curiously then turn around. The three arrows, all lined up, simultaneously turn into ash that crumbles to the ground.

  “I wanted you to see,” he says.

  He walks toward a large blue gym mat that has been dragged out onto the floor. Gracefully, he sits cross-legged, placing his bow and three more arrows in front of him. I shake my head as I join him. I think the weirdest thing about all this is that I’m starting to believe what I’m seeing.

  I lower myself onto the mat, instantly engulfed in the scent of bare feet and antiperspirant that seems to linger in all school gyms.

  “I remember when my life was normal,” I say.

  Cal looks at me curiously. “Do you?”

  I realize it’s the first time that Cal’s wanted to know anything about me. I shrug, not really wanting to answer. My life hasn’t been normal for a while now, not really. Not since my mom left us. It’s been more of a pretend normal, a life with dulled edges—with my dad acting like everything’s okay while he becomes part of the sofa, and me following a script that was written before she died but not really feeling it anymore. But that’s an entirely different type of abnormal than this utter descent into madness.

  “You said there are three types,” I say, changing the subject as I look down at the weapons between us. If Cal is disappointed that I didn’t answer his question, he doesn’t show it.

  “The first one, the Capax, is the mildest. It lasts a couple of hours—longer if the person hit is pierced in the heart. Someone who gets hit by that becomes more susceptible to love or suggestion. It was used before we had access to technology to speed up our matches.”

  “Like mind control?”

  Cal shrugs. “More like hypnosis. There has to be a feeling there in the first place for it to work.”

  I gently run my finger along the body of the silver arrow, realizing it’s almost a perfect match for Cal’s eyes. It’s cool to the touch and there are ridges where runic symbols have been carved into it.

  “Does it hurt—to get hit?”

  Cal shakes his head. “Humans can’t feel it. In fact, it is known to give a certain feeling of euphoria. It leaves no mark and humans immediately forget they have been hit.”

  I study the second arrow—deep red and gold.

  “What does this one do?”

  Cal looks at me seriously. “The Ardor is more severe than the Capax. It fills its victim with a fiery obsession. It was meant to be dealt out only in punishment. It consumes a person—some will stalk people they believe to be their match, others will die of longing.”

  I frown. “What about the last?”

  The dark look reappears on Cal’s face as he turns his attention to the black arrow. “The last one is arguably the worst of them all.” He pauses. “It turns a human into someone like me: a cupid—strong, fast, powerful, immortal . . .”

  He flicks his gaze up to mine, his silvery eyes deep and sad.

  “Alone.”

  10

  Cal abruptly stands and gathers the three arrows, slipping them back into the case over his shoulder. When he heads toward one of the doors, I get up and follow. The mood’s clearly shifted.

  “Everything okay?” I ask as we walk down the dimly lit school corridor, which is decorated with flyers for team tryouts, auditions for the drama club’s production of Romeo and Juliet, and a couple of pink posters for the Forever Falls school dance, which I’m pretty sure Charlie stuck up.

  Cal keeps his eyes fixed straight ahead. “Yes.”

  He doesn’t speak for a moment and I find myself staring at the bow and arrows slung across his shoulder.

  “You need to be more careful,” Cal says suddenly, as we walk outside. He makes his way around the angular building toward the parking lot and I fall into step beside him.

  “What do you mean?”

  He glares at me, exasperated. “With Cupid. Day one of meeting him and you’re already his mentor.” He shakes his head. “As I said, the path of your match has already been put into motion. You will be drawn to each other. And Cupid, if he realizes who you are, will create reasons be alone with you. But you must fight it. You mustn’t create more opportunities.”

  “I wasn’t the one who put the path of the match into motion.”

  Cal looks a little sheepish for a moment, then pulls out a key from his jeans pocket and points it straight ahead. A double beep sounds and the two side doors of a bright red Lamborghini slide upward.

  “That’s your car? Way to fit in with the students, Cal. I take it being a cupid pays well, then?”

  The corner of his lip briefly quirks. “It has its perks.” He slides into the driver’s seat. “Want a ride anywhere?”

  I was planning on walking across town to the Love Shack, one of Forever Falls’s only places to hang out. I said I’d meet James and Charlie, and there’s usually a good crowd out on the first day back at school.

  “Sure,” I say, making my way to the passenger side. “You know the Love Shack?”

  Cal nods as he smoothly reverses and pulls out of the parking lot. We pass the houses dotting the quiet roads, and I look out the window, suddenly feeling awkward at th
e close quarters. Soon we approach the cobblestone town square and Cal pulls up beside the alley between the florist and the diner. The Love Shack sits at the end of it.

  As he presses a button that opens my car door, I look at him tentatively.

  “Do you want to—”

  He holds up a finger, silencing me, as he puts his cell phone to his ear.

  “Curtis?” he says urgently.

  I roll my eyes. Cal seems to act like everything is an end-of-the-world situation and I wonder whether I should just leave him to his call.

  His eyes narrow. “If the Records of the Finis isn’t in our archives, then maybe it’s in one of the other Matchmaking Service branches.” He lowers his voice. “No, do not involve anyone else. Let me know when you find it.”

  He clicks off the call and puts the phone back in the pocket of his jeans. He looks at me, confused. “Well? We’re here,” he says.

  I suck in an irritated breath. “I know, Cal. I was asking if you wanted to come? You can get to know some new people. James, Charlie . . . it could be fun.”

  A fearful look passes over his face at the mention of my best friend, and I recall her chattering to him in class earlier. I can hardly think of a more unlikely pair; him stern and silent, her dizzy and loud.

  “She’s not so bad if you give her a chance,” I say.

  He frowns. “Will a lot of people from school be there?”

  “Yeah, a whole crowd of us. There’s nowhere else to go.”

  Cal pulls his keys out of the ignition and unfastens his seat belt. “Then Cupid will be there, so I had better come along”—he gives me a pointed look—“and make sure you don’t get into any trouble.”

  With an electronic beep, Cal locks his car and we head down the cobbled alleyway.

  “So. . . . what’s this Records of the Furnace thing you were talking about?” I ask in an attempt to make conversation.

  “Finis. Nothing.” His eyes remain fixed ahead.