by Garcia, Kami
The lowlifes were checking her out, three guys deep. I had to resist the urge to punch all of them in the face.
I dropped Liv's arm. "I'll meet you guys over there."
Link couldn't believe his luck. "No problem, man."
"We can wait," Liv offered.
"Don't worry about it. I'll catch up with you." I hadn't expected to see Lena here, and I didn't know what to say without sounding even more whipped than Link already thought I was. As if there's something you can say to sound cool after your girlfriend takes off with another guy.
"Ethan, I've been looking for you." Lena walked toward me, and she sounded like herself, her old self -- the Lena I remembered from a few months ago. The one I was desperately in love with, the one who loved me back. Even if she looked like Ridley. She stood on her tiptoes to push my hair out of my face, her fingers dragging slowly down my jawline.
"That's funny, because the last time I saw you, you were ditching me." I tried to sound casual, but I just sounded angry.
"I wasn't ditching you, exactly." She was defensive.
"No, you were throwing trees at me and jumping on the back of a bike with some other guy."
"I wasn't throwing trees."
I raised an eyebrow. "Yeah?"
She shrugged. "More like branches."
But I could tell I had gotten to her. She twisted the tiny paper-clip star I had given her, until I thought it was going to snap off of her necklace. "I'm sorry, Ethan. I don't know what's going on with me." Her voice was soft, honest. "Sometimes I feel like everything is closing in, and I can't take it. I wasn't ditching you at the lake. I was ditching me."
"You sure about that?"
She looked back up at me, a tear sliding down her cheek. She wiped it away, her fingers balled in frustration. She opened her fist and put her hand on my chest, resting it over my heart.
It's not you. I love you.
"I love you." She said it out loud this time and the words hung in the air between us, so much more public than when we Kelted. My chest tightened when she said it, and my breath caught in my throat. I tried to think of something sarcastic to say, but I couldn't think about anything except how beautiful she was and how much I loved her, too.
But I wasn't letting her off that easy this time. I broke the truce. "What's going on, L? If you love me so much, what's the deal with John Breed?"
She looked away without saying a word.
Answer me.
"It's not like that, Ethan. John's just a friend of Ridley's. There's nothing going on between us."
"How long has nothing been going on? Since you took that picture of him in the graveyard?"
"It wasn't a picture of him. It was his bike. I was meeting Ridley, and he happened to be there." I noticed she ignored the question.
"Since when have you been hanging out with Ridley? Did you forget the part where she separated us so your mother could get you alone and try to convince you to go over to the Dark side? Or when Ridley almost killed my father?"
Lena pulled her arm away from me, and I could feel her withdrawing again, moving back into that place I couldn't reach. "Ridley warned me you wouldn't understand. You're a Mortal. You don't know anything about me, not the real me. That's why I didn't tell you." I felt a sudden breeze as the storm clouds rolled in like a warning.
"How do you know whether I would understand or not? You haven't told me anything. Maybe if you gave me the chance instead of sneaking around behind my back --"
"What do you want me to tell you? That I have no idea what's going on with me? That something's changing, something I don't understand? That I feel like a freak, and Ridley's the only one who can help me figure it out?"
I could hear everything she was saying, but she was right. I didn't understand. "Are you listening to yourself? You think Ridley's trying to help you, that you can trust her? She's a Dark Caster, L. Look at yourself! You think this is you? The things you're feeling, she's probably causing them."
I waited for the downpour, but instead the clouds parted. Lena moved closer and put her hands on my chest again, staring up at me, pleading. "Ethan, she's changed. She doesn't want to be Dark. It ruined her life when she Turned. She lost everyone, including herself. Ridley says going Dark changes the way you feel about people. You can sense the feelings you had, the things you loved, but Rid says the feelings are distant. Almost like they belong to someone else."
"But you said it wasn't something she could control."
"I was wrong. Look at Uncle Macon. He knew how to control it, and Ridley's learning, too."
"Ridley is not Macon."
Heat lightning flashed across the sky. "You don't know anything."
"That's right. I'm a stupid Mortal. I don't know anything about your supersecret Caster world and skanky Caster cousin, or Caster Boy and his Harley."
Lena snapped. "Ridley and I were like sisters, and I can't turn my back on her. I told you, I need her right now. And she needs me."
I didn't say anything. Lena was so frustrated, I was surprised the Ferris Wheel hadn't come loose and rolled away. I could see the lights from the Tilt-A-Whirl, spinning in the corner of my eye, churning and dizzying. It was the way I felt when I let myself get lost in Lena's eyes. Sometimes love feels that way, and you find your way to a truce when you don't really want to.
Sometimes the truce finds you.
She reached up and laced her fingers behind my neck, pulling me into her. I found her lips, and we were all over each other as if we were afraid we might never have the chance to touch again. This time, when her mouth tugged at my bottom lip, biting gently into my skin, there was no blood. Just urgency. I turned, pushing her against the rough wooden wall behind the ticket booth. Her breath was ragged, echoing in my ear even louder than my own. I raked my hands through her curls, guiding her mouth to mine. The pressure in my chest started to build, the shortness of breath, the sound of the air as I tried to fill my lungs. The fire.
Lena felt it, too. She pushed away from me, and I bent over trying to catch my breath.
"Are you okay?"
I took a deep breath and stood up again. "Yeah, I'm all right. For a Mortal."
She smiled a real smile and reached for my hand. I noticed she had drawn crazy-looking designs on her palm in Sharpie. The black curls and spirals swirled from her palm around her wrist and up the base of her arm. The pattern looked like the henna the fortune-teller wore, in the tent that smelled like bad incense at the other edge of the fairgrounds.
"What is that?" I held her wrist, but she pulled it away. Remembering Ridley and her tattoo, I hoped it was Sharpie.
It is.
"Maybe we should get you something to drink." She led me around the side of the booth, and I let her. I couldn't stay mad, not if there was a possibility the wall between us was finally coming down. When we kissed a minute ago, that's what I felt. It was the opposite of the kiss on the lake, a kiss that had taken my breath away for different reasons. I might never know what that kiss was. But I knew this kiss, and I knew it was all I had -- a chance.
Which lasted two seconds.
Because then I saw Liv, carrying two cotton candies in one hand and waving at me with the other, and I knew the wall was about to go back up, maybe for good. "Ethan, come on. I have your cotton candy. We're going to miss the Ferris Wheel!"
Lena dropped my hand. I knew how it must have looked -- a tall blond, with long legs and two cotton candies and an expectant smile. I was doomed before Liv even got to the word we.
That's Liv, Marian's research assistant. She works with me at the library.
Do you work at the Dar-ee Keen together, too? And the fair?
Another flash of heat lightning tore across the sky.
It isn't like that, L.
Liv handed me the cotton candy and smiled at Lena, holding out her hand.
A blond? Lena looked at me. Seriously?
"Lena, right? I'm Liv."
Ah, the accent. That explains everything.
; "Hi, Liv." Lena pronounced her name like it was an inside joke between us. She didn't touch Liv's hand.
If Liv noticed the slight, she ignored it, letting her hand drop. "Finally! I've been trying to get Ethan to introduce us properly, since it seems he and I are chained together for the summer."
Clearly.
Lena wouldn't look at me, and Liv wouldn't stop looking at her.
"Liv, this really isn't a good --" I couldn't stop it. They were two trains colliding in painfully slow motion.
"Don't be silly," Lena interrupted, looking at Liv carefully, as if she was the Sybil in her family and she could read Liv's face. "So nice to meet you."
He's all yours. Take the whole town while you're at it.
It took Liv about two seconds to realize she'd walked into something, but she tried to fill the silence all the same. "Ethan and I talk about you all the time. He says you play the viola."
Lena stiffened.
Ethan and I. There was nothing mean about the way Liv said it, but the words themselves were enough. I knew what they meant to Lena. Ethan and the Mortal girl, the girl who was everything Lena couldn't be.
"I've gotta go." Lena turned around before I could catch her arm.
Lena --
Ridley was right. It was only a matter of time before another new girl came to town.
I wondered what else Ridley had been telling her.
What are you talking about? We're just friends, L.
We were just friends once, too.
Lena took off, pushing her way through the sweaty crowd, causing a chain reaction of chaos as she went. Her ripple effect seemed endless. I couldn't see it perfectly, but somewhere between us a clown fumbled as the balloon character in his hands popped, a child cried as a snow cone dropped, and a woman screamed as a popcorn machine began to smoke and catch fire. Even in the slippery blur of heat and arms and noise, Lena affected everything in her wake, a pull as powerful as the moon to the tides, or the planets to the sun. I was caught in her orbit, even as she pulled away from mine.
I took a step, and Liv put her hand on my arm. Her eyes narrowed as if she was analyzing the situation, or registering it for the first time. "I'm sorry, Ethan. I didn't mean to interrupt. I mean, if I was interrupting, you know. Something." I knew she wanted me to tell her what happened without having to ask. I didn't say anything, which I guess was my answer.
The thing is, I didn't take another step. I let Lena go.
Link walked toward us, fighting his way through the crowd, carrying three Cokes and his own cotton candy. "Man, the line at the drink booth is brutal." Link handed Liv a Coke. "What'd I miss? Was that Lena?"
"She left," Liv said quickly, as if things were that simple.
I wished they were.
"Whatever. Forget the Ferris Wheel. We'd better get over to the main tent. They're gonna announce the winners a the pie-bakin' contest any minute, and Amma will tan your hide if you aren't there to watch her moment a glory."
"Apple pie?" Liv brightened.
"Yep. And you eat it wearin' Levi's, with a napkin tucked into your shirt up here. Drinkin' a Coke and drivin' a Chevy, while singing 'American Pie.' " I listened to Link ramble and Liv's easy laugh as they walked ahead of me. They didn't have nightmares. They weren't haunted. They weren't even worried.
Link was right. We couldn't miss Amma's moment of glory. I sure wasn't winning any ribbons today. The truth was, I didn't need to bring the mallet down on the old, rigged carnival scale to know what it would say. Link might be CHICKEN LITTLE, but I felt lower than A REAL WUSS. I could pound away all I wanted, but the answer would always be the same. No matter what I did lately, I was caught somewhere between LOSER and ZERO, and it was starting to feel like Lena was holding the hammer. I finally understood why Link wrote all those songs about getting dumped.
6.15
Tunnel of Love
If it gets any hotter in here, people are goin' to start droppin' like flies. Flies are gonna start droppin' like flies." Link wiped his sweaty forehead with his sweaty hand, which sprayed liquid Link on those of us lucky to be standing next to him.
"Thanks for that." Liv wiped her face with one hand and pulled her damp shirt away from her body with the other. She looked miserable. The Southern Crusty tent was packed, and the finalists were already standing on the makeshift wooden stage. I tried to see over the row of enormous women in front of us, but it was like standing in the Jackson cafeteria line on cookie day.
"I can barely see the stage." Liv stood on her toes. "Is something supposed to be happening? Did we miss it?"
"Hold on." Link tried to edge between the smaller of the two enormous women in front of us. "Yeah, we can't get any closer. I give up."
"There's Amma." I pointed. "She's won first place almost every year."
"Amma Treadeau," Liv said.
"That's right. How did you know?"
"Professor Ashcroft must have mentioned her."
Carlton Eaton's voice blared over the loudspeaker as he fussed with the portable mic. He always announced the winners because the only thing he loved more than opening everyone's mail was the spotlight. "If y'all will bear with me, folks, we got some technical difficulties ... hold on now ... can someone call Red? How am I supposed to know how to fix a darn microphone? Shoot, it's hotter than Hades in here." He mopped his forehead with his handkerchief. Carlton Eaton never managed to remember when the microphone was on.
Amma stood proudly to his right, in her best dress, with the tiny violets all over it, holding her prizewinning sweet potato pie. Mrs. Snow and Mrs. Asher were next to her, holding their own creations. They were already dressed for the Mother-Daughter Peach Pageant that started right after Pies. They were equally frightening in their respective aqua and pink pageant mother gowns, which made them look like aging prom dates from the eighties. Thankfully, Mrs. Lincoln was not in the pageant, so she stood next to Mrs. Asher in one of her standard church dresses, holding her famous chess pie. It was still hard to look at Link's mom without remembering the insanity of Lena's last birthday. You don't see your girlfriend's mother stepping out of your best friend's mom's body too many nights of the year. When I saw Mrs. Lincoln now, that's what I thought of -- the moment Sarafine emerged like a snake shedding its skin. I shuddered.
Link elbowed me. "Dude, look at Savannah. She's got the crown on and everything. She sure knows how to milk it."
Savannah, Emily, and Eden were sitting in the front row with the rest of the Peach Pageant contestants, sweating away in their tackiest pageant evening wear. Savannah was in yards of glittery Gatlin peach, with her rhinestone Peach Princess crown balanced perfectly on her head, even though the train of her dress kept snagging on the bottom of her cheap metal folding chair. Little Miss, the local dress shop, probably had to special-order it for her all the way from Orlando.
Liv edged her way closer to me, eyeing the cultural phenomenon that was Savannah Snow. "Is she the queen of Southern Crusty, then?" Liv's eyes twinkled, and I tried to imagine how strange this all must look to an outsider.
I almost smiled. "Just about."
"I didn't realize baking was so important to Americans. Anthropologically speaking."
"I don't know about other places, but in the South, women take their baking seriously. And this is the biggest pie-baking contest in Gatlin County."
"Ethan, over here!" Aunt Mercy was waving her handkerchief in one hand and carrying her infamous coconut pie in the other. Thelma was walking behind her, shoving people aside with Aunt Mercy's wheelchair. Every year Aunt Mercy entered the contest, and every year she got an honorable mention for her coconut pie, even though she'd forgotten how to make it about twenty years ago, and none of the judges were brave enough to taste it.
Aunt Grace and Aunt Prue were arm in arm, dragging Aunt Prue's Yorkshire terrier, Harlon James, behind them.
"Well, fancy seein' you here, Ethan. Did you come ta see Mercy win her ribbon?"
"Of course he did, Grace. What else would he be doin
' in a tent fulla old ladies?"
I wanted to introduce Liv, but the Sisters didn't give me a chance. They kept talking over one another. I should've known Aunt Prue would take care of that for me. "Who's this, Ethan? Your new girlfriend?"
Aunt Mercy adjusted her spectacles. "What happened ta the other one? The Duchannes girl, with the dark hair?"
Aunt Prue looked at her suspiciously. "Well, Mercy, that's jus' none a our concern. You shouldn't be askin' anything about it. She mighta up and left him."
"Why would she do that? Ethan, you didn't ask that girl ta get nekkid, did ya?"
Aunt Prue gasped. "Mercy Lynne! If the Good Lord doesn't strike us all down on account a that talk ..."
Liv looked dizzy. She obviously wasn't used to following the banter of three hundred-year-old women with thick Upcountry accents and fractured grammar.
"Nobody tried -- nobody left anyone. Everything is fine between Lena and me," I lied. Even though they'd find out the truth the next time they went to church, if their hearing aids were turned up high enough to hear the gossip. "This is Liv, Marian's summer research assistant. We work together at the library. Liv, this is Aunt Grace, Aunt Mercy, and Aunt Prudence, my great-great-aunts."
"Don't you be addin' any extra greats in there." Aunt Prue pulled herself up a little straighter.
"That's her name. Lena! It was on the tip a my tongue." Aunt Mercy smiled at Liv.
Liv smiled back. "Of course. It's a pleasure to meet you all."
Carlton Eaton tapped on the mic just in time. "All right, y'all, I think we can get started."
"Girls, we need ta get up ta the front. They'll be callin' my name in no time." Aunt Mercy was already working her way through the aisles, rolling forward like an army tank. "We'll see you in two shakes of a rabbit's tail, Sweet Meat."
People filed into the tent from all three entrances, and Lacy Beecham and Elsie Wilks, the winners of Casseroles and Barbeque, took their places next to the stage, holding their blue ribbons. Barbeque was a big category, even bigger than Chili, so Mrs. Wilks was about as puffed up as I'd ever seen her.