A cottontail rabbit appeared at the edge of the clearing, its nose twitching as it studied us with bright, curious eyes. It hesitated only a moment before hopping closer. It came closer still until it reached Noel’s outstretched hand. He petted the rabbit absently, as if it were the most natural thing on earth. A moment later, a chipmunk appeared; then another. He watched them, smiling as he extended his other hand, offering nuts and seeds. They took them eagerly, stuffing them into their cheek pouches.
“What are you, Snow White?” I asked. The animals scattered, scurrying away just as quickly as they’d come. “Oops. Sorry.”
He brushed off his hands. “No need to apologize.”
Silence returned and I began to worry. Why had he brought me here? Why was he not talking? He seemed so withdrawn, so completely absorbed with…himself.
“We need to talk,” he said finally, breaking the silence.
“OK, let’s talk,” I agreed, but inside, I cringed. I knew what was coming.
“You need to decide, Valerie.”
“I know that,” I told him. “I plan to. Soon.” I still had a week or so left, I thought, give or take a few drops.
“Not soon,” he corrected. “Now. It’s getting too…dangerous.”
I looked at him. “Dangerous how?”
Noel toyed with the cap to his water bottle, unscrewing it and then securing it back into place. “I can feel the pull of it,” he said. “I don’t think…I don’t know if my magic can keep you safe from me anymore. We’re too close to Midsummer, to the change of seasons. I don’t want to risk it, Valerie. And I don’t want to risk you.”
I took another drink, letting the icy liquid pool in my mouth before swallowing. “But it worked yesterday. And it’s working today…”
“But I’m getting stronger,” he told me. “I have to, if I’m to defeat Leo at Midsummer. The magic you have is from the weaker me. Even though it’s from just a few days ago, it might not be potent enough. Do you understand?”
My heart felt heavy, as if it were dropping to the pit of my stomach.
“And you think that might happen? What’s in here,” I said, motioning to the pocket that held the bottle, “might not be strong enough?”
He nodded.
I swallowed hard. “Is it different today?” I asked. “Being around me?”
“Yes and no,” he said. He ran his hand through his hair and I longed to do the same, to weave my fingers through the thick, silken strands. “I don’t feel this overwhelming urge to get the stone from you but…it’s hard to explain, but I’m always thinking about it. Not taking it, but thinking about the stone. It wasn’t like that yesterday.”
“Maybe it’s just a fluke,” I told him. “Maybe you’re over thinking, worrying too much…”
He shook his head. “I don’t think so. That’s why I brought you here, away from everything. I thought maybe my proximity to it was causing me to react that way. But it’s not. Even here, where I’m the most comfortable, the most content, I can’t get my mind off of it. That tells me it’s time.”
“I’m not ready!” My words sounded like an echo. I’d voiced them or thought them so frequently.
“I know. I’m not, either,” he admitted. “But we need to do this. Will you? If not for you, then for me? So I don’t have to worry about what I might do to you?”
I studied his drawn face and haunted eyes and slowly expelled my breath. The last thing I wanted was to hurt him.
“OK.” I swallowed back the tears that were beginning to form. “But I can’t today. I don’t have it with me. And tomorrow and the next day are finals…”
“Wednesday then.” He looked at me. “Promise me.”
“I…” I faltered.
He reached for me, his hand covering mine. “Please,” he breathed. “Say it.”
The tears gathered in my eyes and swelled in my throat but I formed the words. “I promise.”
He gathered me to him in a soft embrace before quickly disentangling himself. “Thank you.”
Chapter 55
I sat next to him and mulled over the promise I had just made him. I had three days. Seventy-two hours. The tears flowed freely and I choked back a sob as the finality of my decision sank in.
“Don’t,” he pleaded. “Please don’t cry.”
I refused to meet his eyes. “How can I not?” I asked. “I’m losing you. The only person I care about. The only person who cares about me.”
“That’s not true. Your parents love you. They do. They may be a little misguided, but they love you.”
But the dam had burst. “And then with Jess leaving…I was so alone. And there was no one else, no one at that stupid school I could be friends with, that I could even pretend to care about. And then you came along…” I put my head on my knees, wrapping my arms around my legs.
“There will be others,” he said quietly. “You’ve opened yourself up again. Think of Geoff,” he said, trying to keep his voice neutral. “And Fanchon. They’re your friends, right? You care about them.”
“But it’s not the same,” I said. “It’s not the same as how I feel about you.”
“If you let them in, just a little bit, it could be,” he said.
I didn’t want it to be. I didn’t want replacements and I didn’t want to have to search for someone to fill the void he would leave behind. I wanted him and it broke my heart that I couldn’t have him, even more deeply than Jess’s departure had. Not because I cared about him more, but because he represented a future I dreamed of and would never have. I’d never thought much of my friendship with Jessica; I’d just always assumed she would be there. With Noel, though, I could project myself into tomorrow with him, I could fantasize what my life would be like with him next month, next year, ten years from now. And it was everything I wanted.
“There will be others,” he repeated.
I refused to look at him. “How do you know?” I asked. “Can you see my future as well as my past?”
“No. But I know you and I know you won’t let these new friendships go. With Fanchon and her mom, with Geoff. You’ll let these grow. It’s just in your nature. And others will follow. I can promise you that.”
But I didn’t want that promise from him. I didn’t want other people.
I lifted my head. “Will you promise me something?” I asked.
Noel waited, saying nothing.
“If you can…I mean, if you do…come back,” I faltered. “Will you…would you find me? See me?”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he said, shaking his head.
“Why not?”
He sighed. “Because I don’t want you to wait for me. I can’t offer you anything, Valerie. I don’t want to give you false hope that something can exist for us. It can’t. And I don’t want you to miss out on what is waiting for you. What is possible.”
“Could you…could you take me with you?”
“No.” His answer was firm, resolute, and filled with regret.
But I pressed on. “No, meaning you can’t, or no, meaning you won’t?”
He sighed. “Did I say you were impatient?” he muttered, mostly to himself. “More like persistent.” To me, he said, “No, meaning I won’t.”
I sat up straight. “But you could. You could bring me with you and we could be together. This wouldn’t have to be goodbye.”
“But I won’t.” He enunciated each word.
I shrank back as if mortally wounded. Of course he wouldn’t, I realized. I was just a girl, someone who’d been forced upon him by fate and circumstance.
“Don’t think I don’t want you,” he said fervently. He gripped my shoulders with his hands. “If I did what I wanted to do, I’d bring you with me and never look back. But this is your life. And I’m not willing to allow you to give it up.”
“But I don’t want it,” I cried. “There’s nothing here for me…you are what I want!”
“You won’t want me forever,” he said. “You do now, but you won’
t always feel this way. And when you realize what you’ve given up for me, the resentment and regret will build. I want more than that for you.”
“I wouldn’t feel that way,” I said stubbornly.
“You would,” he promised. He stroked my hair with his hand. “Bronwyn did.”
“Bronwyn?” I pulled away and looked at him. “Who is that?”
His eyes closed. “A girl. A girl I knew ages ago.”
“Oh.” And suddenly I understood. Of course. One of his many conquests, one he’d loved enough to bring back with him.
“It wasn’t like that,” he said. “She was a girl, a young girl. I found her alone, just outside Ailewee Cave. Ireland. Her parents had been killed, crushed by a rock slide. I stayed with her, took care of her and tried to find her family. There was no one. So I…I brought her back.”
“What happened?”
“She grew up and grew old, and she grew resentful of what I’d done. And she died hating me.”
“But you saved her life.” I was confused. “Surely she would have died if you’d left her there alone.”
“And she would have welcomed it, rather than live the life I’d given her instead.”
“Why?” I asked. “What was so horrible about it?”
“It isn’t a horrible existence,” he said. “Not for gods, anyway. Or mortals, if you know what it is and choose it. But Bronywn didn’t get that choice.” He thought for a moment. “How can I describe it? She didn’t always hate it. But then she started aging. And we didn’t. She wanted children. And couldn’t have them. And she wanted to come back to this world. But she couldn’t. That’s when she realized that she didn’t want the life I’d given her. She would never have chosen it. Ever. She cursed me as she died, Valerie. She hated me for taking the choice away from her, for making it for her.”
“I wouldn’t,” I insisted. “I want to go.”
“And give up a normal, human existence?” He lowered his voice. “And know that your time with me was so limited, a nanosecond of my eternal existence? What about children. And grandchildren? What about your parents? You’re all they have. Would you leave them so easily?”
I didn’t respond. Put in that perspective, it wasn’t such an easy choice, after all. I thought about it; the things I would give up for the one thing I would receive, the thing I wanted most.
“You don’t have to choose,” he said gently. “Because I’m making the choice for you. The right choice this time. I won’t do it.”
He stood then, reaching his hand out to me but I didn’t take it. He grabbed it anyway and hauled me to my feet.
“We should go,” he said. “You have a life to get back to.”
Chapter 56
I dragged myself to school the next day and tried my best to focus on the questions on my finals and fill in the corresponding bubbles on the answer sheets. I searched for Noel as I walked between classes but I didn’t see him. My anxiety level was near the breaking point as I walked to my Spanish class, my last final of the day. Why hadn’t he come to school?
Peter fell into step with me as I rounded the corner by the chapel building. My Spanish class was two buildings down. I acknowledged him with a puzzled nod.
“Valley Girl,” he drawled. “How’s it going?”
“Fine.” Why was he talking to me?
He took off his baseball cap and smoothed his hair. He put it back on, backwards this time and grinned. “Hey, I was thinking we should hang out this summer. You know, maybe get to know each other a little better.”
I stopped on the sidewalk and glared at him. “What are you talking about?”
Peter raised his eyebrows. “Well,” he lowered his voice. “I know one of your boyfriends has already left. Leo, right? And rumor has it the dark-haired one is leaving, too. I just thought you’d be lonely…” His voice trailed off suggestively.
My mouth hung open. Inside, I was seething but I managed to keep my emotions under control. “ I wouldn’t ’hang out’ with you if you were the last guy on earth.” I turned and walked away.
His laughter followed me. “You might change your mind, Valley Girl.” He cupped his hand around his mouth, projecting his voice even further as I started to walk away. “I heard they showed you a real good time. I’ll bet I’m better.”
I resisted the urge to turn and confront him. Instead, I kept my head up and continued walking to class, ignoring the looks from other students and his continued taunts as they faded with the distance I placed between us. I took my seat in class and tried to ready myself for the exam. I found a pencil in my backpack and began reviewing my notes but it was useless. What was Peter talking about? Were there actually rumors circulating about me and Noel? Most of the students at St. John’s ignored me, which suited me just fine. At least, that’s what I constantly told myself. But rumors? Who would care enough about me and what I did to begin circulating rumors?
“The truth hurts, doesn’t it, Valerie?” I didn’t need to look up to realize who the culprit was.
I ignored her.
Ashley sighed. “Seriously, Val,” she said. “You really should watch who you hang out with. And what you do with them. Your reputation is in tatters.” She fiddled with the gold bracelet on her wrist, sliding it up and down her forearm.
I looked at her, my expression murderous and she shrank back, her eyes wide. Her hand froze in place.
“You don’t know anything.”
She regained her composure. “I know what everyone in this school thinks.”
I shrugged. “I don’t care what people think. I know the truth and that’s all that matters.” I returned to my notes, willing my hands to keep from shaking.
“Whatever,” she muttered. She turned on her heel and found her seat.
The bell sounded and Mrs. Gomez stood, giving directions in rapid fire Spanish. I pushed all other thoughts out of my mind as I struggled to translate. Once the test booklets and answer sheets had been distributed, however, my thoughts returned to Peter and Ashley. These were the people who loomed on my horizon, who promised to be part of my future. Noel’s world sounded infinitely better than what I knew would be waiting for me in the fall. Maybe I could broach the subject one more time and hope that I could somehow convince him to change his mind. Not likely, I thought, especially since he didn’t even appear to be at school.
But I was wrong. Noel was waiting for me outside of class. I wanted to throw myself into his arms but I didn’t.
“Hi.”
“How did it go?” he asked.
“Fine, I guess.” I adjusted my backpack. I didn’t feel like talking about finals. I wanted to talk about the fact that he was forcing me to stay right here on this earth, with the evil Peters and Ashleys of the world, regardless of what I wanted.
“Leo’s waiting out front. He’ll drive you home today.”
“What?” I stopped walking. “Why?”
“I have some things I need to take care of. Some loose ends to tie up.” He kept walking, quickly it seemed, and I hurried to catch up with him.
“What things? Will you come by later?”
“It’s going to take a while. And you should study.”
I swallowed my anger. “Fine.”
Leo’s car was parked directly in front of the building. He smiled when he saw me, a huge grin that spread across his face. I scowled back at him.
“Don’t be angry.” Noel reprimanded me like a parent chiding a sulky child.
I didn’t respond. How could I not be upset? I had two days left with him and he wasn’t even willing to spend them with me. Every minute that ticked by represented one less minute I had with him. And I wanted to explore the idea he’d mentioned yesterday, to have a say in the decision to stay or go. But he had removed me from the equation. It was his choice, he’d said, and he’d made up his mind.
Noel opened the passenger door for me and waited. I stared at him uncertainly and he raised his eyebrows.
“I’ll see you later,” he said. The fi
nality in his voice was clear.
Anger and hurt bubbled to the surface again. “Fine.”
Leo tried talking to me but I silenced him with a withering look. He pulled up in front of my house and I leaped out, slamming the door shut. I raced up the stairs and to my room, ignoring my mother’s called greeting from the kitchen. I flung myself on my bed and cried, my tears as much from anger as sadness.
Noel was already disconnecting, severing the ties between us. His look had been cold, his expression reminiscent of the darkest, cloudiest days of winter. I thought back to our conversation at the island. He’d said he wanted me, that if it was his choice, he would take me with him. The only reason he wouldn’t take me was because he cared too much. But if that were true, why was he so cold and distant now? It didn’t make sense. But, I realized, nothing in my life made sense anymore. Nothing.
Chapter 57
Tuesday. I finished my English and history exams and headed to art. There was no final. Instead, we were submitting our portfolio of completed works from the semester. I got to class and began compiling my collection of abysmal drawings. The bell sounded but the seat next to me remained empty. I didn’t know whether to feel irritated or relieved that Noel was late. But then five minutes ticked by, then ten and Noel still didn’t come.
“Oh, is he already gone?” Ashley slipped into the seat next to me, her voice dripping with false concern. “Your boyfriend…or is lover a better term?”
I ignored her.
“It must really suck to be…” she paused, glancing up at the ceiling as she searched for the best words to hurt me. “I don’t know…used like that. Tossed aside. He’s gone, right? And here you are, used goods. No one is going to want you now, Val.”
I said nothing, concentrating instead on placing my drawings in the binder Mr. Pinkney had provided each of us.
“Maybe I should clarify,” she said, her voice low. “Lots of guys will want you but you’ll never know the real reason why. Will they want to date you because they like you? Or because you’re a quick and easy lay?” She laughed meanly. “Think about that, Val. I know everyone else is.” She stood up, straightened her black lace camisole and denim mini skirt and flounced back to her seat, her blond ponytail swinging.
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