by Carla Thorne
“That’s not possible, Ivy.”
“Why not?”
“Your membership has been revoked.”
Chapter 13
Mary
I headed into school with a brown handle bag full of my mom’s homemade chocolate chip cookies. She’d tied a football-themed ribbon at the top and added a school decal to the side.
I had several things on my mind. How soon would I see Gavin, and how fast would someone ask me about our breakup?
How was I going to get through the day while looking like a walking hematoma—fancy word for bruise I picked up at the hospital?
And how was I going to get that thank-you-gift bag of cookies to Jacob without it being so…awkward?
My mom had no concept of what a day from hell I was about to have, but as with everything else, I charged ahead.
Thankfully, Ivy was the first person to get close. Other students gave me a lot of room as if they understood, but more likely, they were waiting for the fallout of the most talked about Labor Day weekend in recent memory.
She approached with caution. “How ya doin’?”
“So far, so good. I’ve only been here about five minutes, so I’m still optimistic.”
“Can I be honest?” Ivy stepped closer and observed my face from too-close a distance.
“Yes.”
“It doesn’t look as bad as I thought it would.”
“Uh… Thanks?”
“No, I only mean it was pretty bad just yesterday, and today it’s already looking better.”
“Thanks for your honesty. I was able to downsize the tape and lose the gauze.”
“Try not to worry about today.” She gave me a side hug. “Everyone will get a good look and then move on. It’ll be old news tomorrow. What’s in the bag?”
“Cookies for Jacob.”
“Seriously?”
“I do have to see him eventually, I guess, and thank him for his help. I mean, he carried me to my car. My mom insisted I give these to him today and tell him how much she and my dad appreciate his efforts at the party.”
“Ho-boy. She sure knows how to make a strange day even stranger. Couldn’t she have taken you by his house or something?”
“Why do that when I could show up at school and give him a gift in front of prying eyes on the day after my breakup—a breakup people will think is because of him to begin with?”
Ivy pursed her lips. “Well, first of all, you and I know different about the breakup, and it’s no one’s business. Secondly, I think your mom is smart. I think she knows you can handle it, and that when it’s all out in the open, no one will have anything to gossip about.” She glanced at the time. “I’ll walk you to your first class.”
I wished I was as sure of myself as everyone else seemed to think I was.
Deep down, it all hurt. My heart was broken and I didn’t think I could bear to see Gavin. It was homecoming time again. Excitement buzzed in the halls, and I remembered the year before. My wrist corsage was still pinned on my memory board at home. I didn’t know how to maneuver through the sadness and distraction of the loss of my first love—especially since it came with the added baggage of his aggression. His pain was clear on the porch the day before, but I couldn’t imagine ever being that close to him again.
I tried to stuff the cookies in my backpack. “Thanks for walking with me. I’ll see you at lunch.”
“No problem,” Ivy said. “And we really need to all meet and talk about Corey.”
She turned to leave, then made a complete circle. “Don’t look now, but Jacob’s in this hall.”
I didn’t even know him well enough to have his number in my phone to text about the cookie situation, but I knew he wasn’t exactly on his way to class.
Ivy nudged my arm. “Go ahead. Get it over with. Do you want me to stay?”
“No. Go, or you’ll be late. I can talk to him later.”
“Why? Take the tardy and get rid of those cookies.”
I glanced at my teacher. She had yet to close the door as the second bell threatened to ring at any second.
I ducked behind a column to see if Jacob walked by.
Lucky me.
I held my finger at my lips so he wouldn’t speak until the hammering bell stopped its clanging, and Dr. Gianetti closed the door.
He looked over each shoulder and made a slow approach. The hint of a healing busted lip showed up like a fading scarlet line below his nose. “Mary… Glad to see you’re back.”
“What are you doing in this hall?”
He held up a pass. “I got this note to report to my counselor first thing this morning.”
“Oh.” Words drifted out of my head like my brain had a slow leak. Now, face-to-face with him, I realized I didn’t know what I wanted to say. And worse, the sight of him brought a wave of trauma back from the incident. My mom and dad had been hugging me to death the last few days, but it was Jacob’s strong arms that had protected me. He seemed bigger that morning…stronger. I wanted to lean into his embrace again and feel that same bubble of protection and his I’ll take care of you vibe of safety and comfort.
“Mary?”
“Yes! Sorry. I hope everything is OK. I mean with the counselor.”
“It’s fine. It’s about my transfer credits. Might have to tweak my schedule.” He took another step forward. “Are you OK?”
“Yeah.” I pointed at his face. “What happened to you?”
“It’s nothing. Football practice. I think your boyfriend’s still peeved at me.” He stopped suddenly and covered his eyes with one hand and dropped his gaze to the floor. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.” His cheeks reached a shade of red I’d never seen on anyone but a circus clown.
“It doesn’t matter. Me and Gavin—”
“It’s none of my business, Mary. I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“Fine.” I knew when I’d been dismissed. It kinda ticked me off. Not because he didn’t care, but because I’d brought it up. I wrestled the cookies out of my bag. “My mom sent these for you. She and my dad say thanks for your help.”
“Thank you, but it wasn’t necessary.”
“Well, my mom thinks it was, and you should know those are the best homemade cookies in the country.”
“No, wait. I didn’t mean I don’t appreciate it, I only meant I wasn’t expecting anything. I was glad to help.”
The whole conversation had become stuck and uncomfortable. We were like two birds trying to get the same tiny seed from between two large rocks. We just banged our heads together.
I stood straight. “I have to go, but I wanted to say thank you too. It was an awful night, and I appreciate the first aid and all the other help. Enjoy the cookies.”
“Don’t go.”
It was the tone of his voice that stopped me—not the command. “Why?”
“Because this is weird, that’s why. We never finish a conversation like normal people. We’ve been together three times and haven’t ended with a simple catch ya later yet. You always leave mad. Or hurt.”
“I’m not mad, Jacob. I guess I’m cautious.”
“What about me makes you feel like that?”
Good question, considering I wanted him to put his arms around me not that long ago. “I like honesty. It’s kinda my motto. Always the truth so you don’t have to keep up with any lies.”
“You don’t even know me, but you think I’m lying to you?”
Did I? Or had I spent too much time under Gavin’s possessive thumb, not to mention in the company of newly-discovered supernatural beings… Geez. It was no wonder I was confused.
“Let’s reboot.” I stepped back behind the safety of the column. “You never answered my question back on the day of the fire.”
“You mean the small electrical incident?”
“Cut the crap, Jacob. It was a fire in the wall behind the AC. Everyone knows that.”
He grinned. “I’m messing with you. And I didn’t answer your question because I
didn’t understand it. You asked me what I was.”
“Fair enough. Why did you pick me for your team?”
“Why did you agree?”
“I agreed because that’s what you do. A captain starts picking, and people graciously accept. I’m a good sport, and you didn’t answer my question.”
“I picked you because I didn’t know many people there. I figured if you played soccer, you likely played volleyball too. Some of those girls wouldn’t risk breaking a nail to set me up for that winning point.”
“There were other female athletes there.”
“Agreed. But I didn’t know who they were at the time, now did I?”
“And you swear you weren’t trying to make trouble with Gavin? Because I don’t appreciate being used like that.”
“Look, that guy is a jerk in practice, but at that time I didn’t know how tight you two are—”
“Were. How tight we were.”
“OK, were, and no. I’m a football player with a lot more on my mind than messin’ with Gavin. I plan to get a scholarship to play ball, and I’ve been moved from a large school with lots of opportunities to here because my parents… Never mind. All I’m sayin’ is that I picked a competitive athlete who I thought might want to win.”
“All right. Thank you for your honesty.” I hooked my thumb through the loop on my backpack. “See? We did it. We had a conversation and now I’m going to say catch ya later and go get my tardy slip.”
“Not so fast. This honesty thing goes both ways.”
“What do you mean?”
“I value the truth too, Mary, and I have a question for you.”
I had no idea where the conversation was going. “OK.”
“What was all that weird stuff that happened when I carried you to your car that night?”
“What weird stuff?” My mind raced to the pool party. I’d grown used to all the weird stuff, but was convinced nothing supernatural had happened. “You’re kidding, right?”
“No. I know you were busted up, but you have to remember that walk to the car.”
“I didn’t walk to the car. You carried me.”
“Yes, I know, and that’s when it happened.”
“What happened, Jacob?”
He scraped his hand across his short hair. “You really don’t remember.”
“No. Tell me. It might jog my memory.”
“So, I picked you up and Scout put fresh ice and a clean towel near your face.”
“Right. I remember that.”
“And you rested your head against me.” He tapped near his collar bone. “Like way up here because I was holding you high. And you wrapped your arms around me and that ice and that towel were kinda wedged all in there…” He stepped closer.
I let my bag drop and backed as far against the column as I could and slid a couple of inches away from him. “I’m sorry, Jacob, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. I was kinda out of it by that point.”
“No. Stop. It’s not that.”
“Then what?”
“Your mom rushed ahead to open the door and get in so she could help you from the other side and take off. I rounded the corner with you, and Gavin was there with that girl.”
“What girl?”
“I don’t know, but I don’t think she was at the party.”
“What did she look like?”
Irritation swept across his face. “C’mon, really? She’s a girl. Not too tall…” He put his hand by his neck. “Hair about here. I don’t know. A girl.”
My mind clicked through the girls at the party. Ivy said Corey had showed up at the end and we needed to talk about it, but hadn’t gotten around to it yet. “Did you hear a name? Corey, maybe?”
“Didn’t hear a thing. But listen. Gavin was talking to her on one side of the walk, and when we rounded the corner, he pushed her toward the other side.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“OK, whatever, but that’s when it happened. Maybe he didn’t want you to see him talking to another girl.”
I really wanted to massage my temples, but that was impossible given the whole broken nose situation. I leaned my head against the brick and closed my eyes. “What is happening right now? All I wanted to do was give you cookies and take my tardy, and now I’m trapped in a bizarre conversation loop.”
I opened my eyes to Jacob’s frosty glare.
He sighed. “Are you finished?”
“Yes.”
“So, it happened when I stepped between them. First, there was this really bad feeling. I couldn’t get a breath, and I thought I might stumble or drop you… I looked around because it was so strange.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Then I felt this pressure from outside, but it was a good pressure and it pushed the bad stuff away and I felt bigger and stronger.”
“You are bigger and stronger. You never would have stumbled or dropped me.”
“I know, but it was like stepping through a portal or something in a movie. Are you saying you didn’t feel that?”
“Um. What else?”
“It was you. It was as if you were all wrapped around me like some invisible force. You were so close and your body was so warm, I couldn’t feel the ice on my chest… It was like we were in a cocoon together or something and we stepped through the bad stuff and you were nuzzled all tight against me—”
“OK, stop.” Heat blazed from my toes to my cheeks in a super-hot second. “I don’t know what to say, Jacob. Uh… I’m sorry I made you feel weird with my body?”
“C’mon, Mary, it’s not about that. It was different, and I can’t believe you don’t remember. And that smell. I know you couldn’t have smelled a dang thing because of your nose, but whatever those plants were on the side of Scout’s house were giving off some odor. Like I said, it was like walking through some smelly-space-blackhole-dream portal from a bad movie.”
I massaged my temples anyway and let the pull of my cheekbones and nose hurt as they wanted. No, I didn’t remember it. Yes, it was possible. Maybe I understood it, and maybe I didn’t, but I sure as heck couldn’t explain it all to Jacob. My best guess was that Sebastian was near in my time of need. Gavin had been the one to hurt me, so maybe his continued presence only made my supernatural help more alert to my situation. Corey’s appearance—if it was even Corey—made no sense in the matter.
But I was apparently some clingy octopus-like all arms and legs warm creature who wrapped myself and my spiritual and earthly realms around Jacob and disoriented him.
Good for me. I sure knew how to confuse a guy, and obviously, I had no control over my movements when things were muddled by injury, pain, confusion—or when someone like Gavin had kept me pinned down and away from the rest of my world… Wow.
The discovery was staggering. I’d missed a lot of cues because of Gavin.
Jacob cleared his throat. “What’s the matter?”
“Nothing. Just realizing some things.”
“And you still don’t remember?”
“I’m sorry, I don’t.” I rummaged in my bag for one of the tiny bottles. “But sniff this.” I waved the frankincense under his nose. “Is this what you smelled?”
“Yeah. That’s it. Why?”
“No reason. Just clears up one of my questions.” At least I knew it was Sebastian who’d been there. How Jacob got into the inner circle of that realm was still a mystery.
“Really?” He challenged me. “You just happen to have that same scent in your bag? C’mon. You have more information.”
“I’m telling the truth when I say I don’t understand it. If I did, I would tell you.”
“Look, you wanted honesty, and I’m being honest. From the day we first met in the café to today, things have been different for me. I don’t know what it is, but now I walk along and wonder when I’m going to get sucked into some wormhole. And,” he added with a pained expression. “I’ve done a whole lot of thinking about you. There. I said it. I’m not trying to be all
stupid and romantic or anything. I’m saying there’s a connection.”
I swallowed hard. “I agree. And I’m sorry, Jacob, I wish I had more answers for you, but I don’t. I promise to explain if I ever figure it out.”
“You mean when you figure it out, because you’re clearly a step ahead of me in whatever this is.”
“All right. When I figure it out.”
He turned to read the signs in the hall. “OK, I have to go that way.”
I’d forgotten how new he was. “Yeah. That hall and to the right.”
He turned to me with his go-to considerate and protective glance. “Are you going to be all right? I can walk you where you’re going first.”
My heart fell into my shoes. He was still trying to take care of me. “No. Thanks. In fact, I’m thinking maybe it was too soon to be here. I might text my mom and head to the nurse’s office to see how I feel.”
“OK. Here. Put your number in my phone.” I did as he asked and he smiled. “I’ll uh…catch ya later.”
“Hey, Jacob, something like that has really never happened to you before? There’s been no other odd activity or feelings like that?”
“No.”
“And you’ve never had a group of friends talk about that sort of thing happening to them?”
“Never.”
“Are you a Warrior, Jacob?”
“I don’t even know what that question means, Mary.”
Chapter 14
Scout
I popped the top on a soda can and let the cooler lid drop.
We’d had no fall in Texas. Our seasons that year had been hot, hotter, hottest, and face of the sun. It hadn’t even cooled down when we hit October and neared homecoming. And since all our plans to meet the previous couple of weeks had ended in nothing, we decided to spend the night of the homecoming dance together in my pool.
Except me. I didn’t get in the pool.
But Deacon the Dolphin flopped, floated, and flailed to his heart’s content as the afternoon sun went down behind the house and left the slate around the pool still too hot to sit on.
I did anyway.
Deacon back-stroked his way toward me. “Should we check on Mary and Ivy? They’ve got the food.”