by Schow, Ryan
“Are you okay, guy?” Netty asks.
He nods, but it’s clear he’s not. He waves us through. At the entrance, I turn and watch Georgia behind me. The guy isn’t standing up straight now and Georgia’s face in the dark looks like a different color. Nearly translucent. She hands the sick bouncer her ID and right when he goes to look at it and compare it to her, he turns away fast, like he’s just been hit with a sharp pain in his eyes. Georgia takes the ID from him and walks in about the same time he’s going to his knees. Another doorman comes to help him as Georgia breezes in beside us.
“See?” she says, like nothing happened. “No problem.”
Netty can’t believe her eyes. “What did you do to him?”
“Nothing permanent,” she said, her face returning to its normal color. “Why?”
“But you hurt him,” I say, aghast. Georgia takes my hand and pulls me inside, the victory in her now normal eyes appearing plain as day.
“He’ll be fine,” she says.
She’s like Alice, I think to myself. Maybe worse because she didn’t need to hurt that man. And if she burned some stranger’s guts just to get into a club, what would happen if she really got mad?
Could she kill someone? Then after a second’s thought: Could she kill Dr. Heim perhaps?
Now there’s a cozy thought. Could she be used as a weapon for good without the line between good and evil completely blurring?
There are so many possibilities with her, but so many things could go terribly wrong. Because of the security I feel with my regenerative powers, I don’t fear for my own safety. I do, however, consider other people’s safety, and I’m wondering if I should start fearing for theirs.
2
The music is crushingly loud, the beat resonating deep within our chests. It makes me want to move. So I move. Sexual, the way Chloe moves. We’re inside not ten minutes when a group of moderately cute guys tries to get us to dance. We do. But then the song ends and we’re getting looks from better looking guys.
Older guys.
The thing about young guys is, they’re mostly annoying. It’s the college-aged boys we’ve come to meet. A girl hears a lot of things about older men, but mostly we hear they aren’t as crude or obvious or uncertain about their intentions. I see one hot guy who makes me think of Jake Teller and it makes me both sad and happy. Sad for the rejection I took, happy because he called and wants to make things right.
Part of me wants to call him right now.
Instead, I saunter over to the guy in the club and tell him he should stop staring and just ask me to dance already. He says he’s waiting for a friend and I try not to be too embarrassed. In fact, most of my brain is telling me to eat my rejection and go. Move on to greener pastures.
“Girl or guy?” I say, hanging in there.
“Girl.”
He’s doing this thing where he’s looking at me, but he’s not. Now my brain is screaming for me to leave.
“So, are you really bringing your own sandwich to the picnic?” I ask.
He laughs and finally looks at me.
“No,” he says with a sexy smile. Now he can’t take his eyes off me. “She’s just a friend.”
“Good,” I say, grabbing his hand and walking him to the dance floor. “Then she won’t mind waiting until I’m done with you.”
We dance and though I thought I was better at it, I look around and clearly I’m out of my league. It doesn’t matter. This guy whose name I don’t know and who isn’t mine is just an accessory. Eye candy. A way to establish what Brayden calls social proof.
When the song is over, I look at the guy and say, “I’m done, thank you,” then head back to Netty. It’s not exactly rude, I tell myself, it’s just the way things are fast becoming in my world. I’m looking for single serving men. No strings. No commitments. Everything on my terms. At least, these are the lies I tell myself in this oh so sexy social scene.
Netty can’t stop staring at a guy. She’s speechless. I follow her stare and she’s looking at a good looking white guy and an edgy looking Hispanic kid. They’re both on the dance floor trying to double team this leggy brunette with big hair and pointy tits.
“Take a picture already,” I tell Netty, grinning.
She blinks out of it and I see water gathering in her eyes. “That’s him,” she says. I can’t hear her over the music, I can only see the movement of her lips.
“That’s the guy?” I say.
The one who tried to rape her.
“Both of them,” Netty says, her face a paler shade of white than normal.
My adrenaline surges. My hands become fists.
“You sure?” I say, my temper flaring. She nods her head. “And the Hispanic kid? Was he the other one?”
Again Netty gives me a nod.
I thread into the crowd, this Kate Middleton lookalike, this human Raquelle doll, and I’m seeing only red. A hand grabs me, pulls my shirt sleeve hard enough to stop me.
I turn and it’s Netty.
“Don’t,” she says. There is real fear in her eyes, a mess of pleading panic.
“No f*cking way,” I say. “Not with everything they put you through.” If there’s one thing that continues to propel me through life, it’s the overwhelming need to mete out justice.
Shrugging off her grip, I break away and push through the crowd until I get to the boys. The Hispanic guy, he’s dancing with the brunette now, although she looks ambivalent over the whole affair. Like she could care less.
My face feels like a lunatic’s grin. Like Heath Ledger’s version of the Joker, or Charles Manson when he lets his pearly whites show. Both boys look at me, both smile. I’m not hard on the eyes. All of me, that’s my best feature. My everything perfect. Sometimes I’m so beautiful it works against me with the boys, though. The intimidation factor is through the roof most of the time. But not now.
Right now, these pair of roosters, they’re cocky as hell. Overly confident. They have no idea what’s about to hit them.
The one Netty said she went out with—the white guy—he’s cuter than the other one, but not as aggressive looking. My hands unclench, my smile softens and I cut in on the brunette, who moves to the Hispanic one. I try remembering how Chloe moved. My body is trying to mimic hers. And the white guy Netty dated, he’s trying to come off like a baller, like he has the biggest dick in the room, but his tell is he keeps sneaking looks at his friend like he can’t believe what’s happening.
Believe it you giant rooster, I’m thinking to myself.
He edges in close to me, so close I can smell the Peppermint Schnapps on his breath. He tries to grind his chest to mine. I keep the very edge of space between us.
“You’re amazing to look at,” he says over the music.
“A girl is more than just her looks,” I say just as loudly in his ear. He puts his hands on my hips and that’s all I need.
I violently grab his crotch, squeeze and twist the way my sensei taught me, and when his body folds forward and his mouth shoots wide open with pain, I snatch his Adam’s apple with my other hand and step forward fast. As he’s falling—and gravity is on my side—I jerk him up by his balls and shove him down by his throat.
His feet come out from underneath him and it’s all bad from this point forward.
I drive him to the floor, controlled the way I was taught. In the last second, the instant he hits the ground, I release his junk and let my knee drop perfectly on his crotch. His skull smacks the ground, my hand releasing his throat, but the pain of my knee coming down on his family eggs makes his head jump up off the ground the second he hits. That’s when I punch him will all my might square in the nose.
My fist hits it flush, making a loud popping noise on the break. His eyes roll around in his head and he’s painfully incapacitated.
F*ck this clown.
He’s conscious, but hurt. I lean in close and say, “That’s for almost raping my friend Netty you soggy douchebag.”
I push off his face, st
and up, then turn and look at his Hispanic friend, whose face is the picture of disbelief. A crowd of stunned onlookers form around us. With all my might, and moving fast the way I was taught, I slam a fist into the other boy’s face, which connects with his chin the way your fist would connect with a brick wall if you hit it super hard. My knuckle breaks, but I bite down on the pain.
The would-be rapist crashes to the floor, knocked out cold. I follow it up with a ruthless kick to the groin that he’ll certainly feel later.
Shaking off the pain in my hand, I shove through the crowd, the heat stealing into my body and making me hot. My knuckle is healing itself, faster than I thought. The way my own personal martial arts experience has given me bruises and fractures, it’s forcing my body to become more efficient in its healing. The fire ants march. My skin breaks into a light sweat.
“Let’s go,” I tell the girls. Georgia, she has no idea the martial arts I’ve been learning, what I’ve been through with Sensei Naygel and what I’ve become, so she’s staring at me in complete awe. Netty manages to look both mortified and pleased.
“I love you,” she says, grabbing me into a hug.
“You’re welcome,” I reply with a grin.
“No,” Netty says, “I seriously love you for that.”
3
Instead of hitting another club—because how are we going to top that?—we head to Sift’s Cupcake and Dessert Bar on California Street. The small entrance is half pink and half white and it’s still open so we head inside and get cupcakes.
The best cupcakes ever!
After a long deliberation, I order the Stud Muffin (a brown sugar beer cake with salted caramel frosting and cayenne dusted bacon on top) and, since I can’t help myself, the Limonata (lemon cake with a lemon curd filling topped with Meyer lemon buttercream). I put the Stud Muffin away like a fat girl would, then dive into the Limonata, and that’s when my cell phone rings.
The number says it’s Damien.
WTF???
Instead of ignoring the call, which is exactly what I should do, I excuse myself and answer it.
“I wasn’t sure you’d pick up,” he says.
“Almost didn’t,” I say in a cold, ambivalent tone. I head out onto the sidewalk where the chilly night air makes me want to hug myself for warmth. “So what’s up? What can I do for you?”
“Stop being like that.”
Whispering angry into the phone, trying not to be heard by passerby’s on the street outside, I say, “You called me a lab rat. Now you want me to be civil? I don’t think so.”
“I know,” he says, humbled. “That was terrible of me. Inexcusable.”
“You think?!”
After a long bout of silence, he says, “I think that possibly, well maybe I’m sure, I don’t know, I guess—”
“Jesus f*ck, Damien, just spit it out.”
“I think maybe I’m sort of…I don’t know, attracted to you,” he says, but fast on the end of that revelation he adds: “But I don’t want to be. I mean I do, but I don’t.”
The laughing that starts in the back of my throat powers out of my mouth and I can’t stop until tears are in my eyes. I can hear his total and complete silence on the other end of the phone.
Did he hang up? Doesn’t matter.
When I’m done, I say, “Thanks for the laugh,” and then hang up.
There’s no reason for me to be like this, but God almighty, talk about bad timing. Talk about being the last one to the party. Back inside, I finish my Limonata in peace. Both Georgia and Netty are looking at me with questions in their eyes but I wave them off and lick a bit of frosting off my finger.
My phone rings again. It’s Damien. This time I don’t excuse myself.
I stab the green button and say, “What?”
“I deserved that,” he says, and it’s the most grown up I’ve ever heard him sound.
“Yes, you did.”
“I know I hurt you.”
I say nothing. The sound of his breathing is like screaming in my ear. I roll my eyes as Netty is practically coming out of her skin. The way she wants details is the way addicts want that next fix. She knows I was in love with Damien. I just didn’t tell her we had a falling out at Maggie’s funeral and I’m all done with him.
“I hurt you and I’m sorry.”
“I’m fine,” I say. Which is girl code for whatever. “Just don’t tell me you’re attracted to me anymore because we both know you don’t know what you want.”
“I know.”
“Well I know exactly what I want,” I say, flippantly. Then, taking another jab, I say: “How’s your sister?”
“Step-sister. And we both know you don’t care about her.”
“She’s fine, right?”
“Yes.”
“Well, there you go. You got everything you wanted.”
“Are you really going to be like this?” he asks.
“Some things you can’t take back, Damien. Something things you can’t un-say and I can’t un-remember.”
“I’m trying here, Abby.”
“When you said what you said, it was you driving a stake into the heart of whatever this could have been between you and me.”
“I get it,” he says.
“Too late, though,” I reply. “Is there anything else?”
For a veritable eternity, he sits on the phone, being silent, then he says, “Nope.” After that the line goes dead.
I pull the phone from my ear, look at it. The line really is dead. “Really?!” I all but shout. The heat in my face, it’s the burn of embarrassment. My second high school crush just hung up on me.
“Who was that?” Georgia asks.
“Damien,” I say. Didn’t she hear me talking to him? I’m pretty sure I said his name. I’m all but certain of it.
“Damien, who?”
“From school,” I say, starting to get frustrated. I hate explaining shit when I’m pissed. What’s wrong with her anyway?
“From Astor Academy?”
“Oh my God, Georgia, YES!”
“Sorry,” she says. “It’s just that I’m having a hard time with some of my memories.”
Setting my fight with Damien aside, trying to compartmentalize my feelings because I’ve got my friends with me, I force my body to relax. I tell myself to be calm with Georgia, to be patient. After all, she nearly died. And we don’t really know what she is or what’s been done to her. Instead of looking at her like a demon in sheep’s clothing, I tell myself she’s just a girl. This isn’t her fault. This was done to her. Sympathy cools the fires inside me.
“Yeah,” I say, softer. “Well the Damien you knew, he’s a memory best forgotten.”
4
We spend the rest of the evening talking about my knock-out punches in the club, how those guys were total jerks, high school and San Francisco, and then of course, we walk back to the Audi and head home. All in all, I feel it was a pretty successful evening.
Well, entertaining at least.
This bullshit with Damien, though, the more I think about it, the more it’s getting under my skin. I don’t want people falling in love with me. Not now. Not until I get Rebecca back.
My mind unwinding, I think to myself, and Brayden? What the hell was that? We’re friends for heaven’s sake! I can’t have him falling in love with me.
When I get home, rather, back to Netty’s, I’m in the bathroom brushing my teeth when my cell phone flashes with a text message.
It’s from Damien.
“Oh, for the love of Jesus,” I mutter. Spit, rinse, re-read the text.
CALL ME.
Wow, pushy. I don’t respond to shouty capitals. I refuse to.
So I text him.
NO.
I send another text, rapid fired right on top of the last: 2L8.
The phone rings, making me jump.
I answer it quickly.
“I told you it’s too late,” I say in a grated whisper. Everything in this bathroom echoes, for sure.
“Too late to call or too late for us?” he says.
“Whatever,” I say. “You pick and either one will be right.”
“I shouldn’t have told you I thought I was attracted to you. I don’t want you thinking I’m in love with you or anything.”
“In so many words, Damien, you said I remind you of your step-sister and that I’m a fraud. As in barely human.”
“I know,” he says. “I was mad at…everything. Plus, at the funeral, the way you were looking at Jake—”
“Professor Teller?”
“Yes, and then you lied to me and told me he didn’t give anything to you when I know damn well he did—”
“Surely you didn’t call to talk to me about your conspiracy theories.”
“No.”
“Then don’t.”
Frazzled, he says, “I called to apologize.”
“Fine, go.”
“What?”
“Apologize already, you’re cutting into my beauty rest.”
“I apologize for kissing you at the end of the semester. I shouldn’t have done that. I led you on and that was unfair.”
Led me on? OMG!!!
“I was over it like forever ago,” I lie, like I couldn’t possibly care. “I practically don’t even remember it happening.” In the back of my mind a little voice is telling me I’m being a total douche right now. I’m ignoring it, but dang that voice is loud!
“Okay,” he says. “Wow.”
Silence.
“So, what are you doing this summer?” he asks. The hesitation in his voice is unbecoming, then again, I now realize if I can have this effect on Damien, Jake and Brayden, I can have it on anyone.
I love this new power I have, yet I hate it because it’s manipulative and that’s not me.
Rather it’s not my strong suit…
Yet.
“Look, Georgia’s here with me and—”
“She’s okay?” he interrupts, excited, relieved.
Whispering into the phone, I say, “Yes, mostly. But she’s not without her complications.”
“Like what?” he asks.