by ID Johnson
Liam didn’t talk to me much for the rest of the year. I heard he found someone else to tutor him, which was cool, because he needed it. I also heard he went out with Jessica a few times, but that didn’t last. The one time Mrs. Neely partnered us up for an assignment, I was cordial. There was no reason for me to be otherwise, after all, if I wasn’t mad at him for asking Lucy out, and as far as he knew, that had nothing to do with my turning him down for homecoming. I wanted to keep him guessing, so I never said anything at all about it to anyone, even though there were some chicks who came right out and asked. I pleaded ignorance.
I was getting really good at that. I had been able to fool my parents for over six months into thinking that I didn’t know my sister was a vampire hunter. Cadence did call from the road occasionally, and when she did, I was able to keep her in the dark, too. She said she’d met a lot of interesting clients, and I took that to mean she’d killed a lot of bloodsuckers. I was glad she was enjoying her time out exploring America, but whenever I was brave enough to ask her about Aaron, I could hear in her voice that she still had feelings for him, and when Elliott told me he was pretty sure it wasn’t over between them yet, I believed him. Still, when Cadence arrived in Nevada, she mentioned some other guy, another doctor, and I thought maybe he’d be the one to jar her loose of Aaron’s spell—not that I thought he’d brainwashed her or anything. I was pretty sure he didn’t have that power, though whatever he’d done to my sister seemed just as powerful.
Cheerleading camp for varsity was a whole week, and we had to go all the way to Des Moines. Lucy and I were super excited about it, probably even more excited than we’d been when school ended for the summer. I had just finished packing and brought my bags downstairs to wait for Lucy to pick me up and drive me to the high school where the bus was leaving from when there was a knock on the door.
I didn’t think it could be Lucy because she’s never early, and we still had fifteen minutes. I looked out the window by the door and was surprised to see Elliott standing there. He’d come to visit me a few times since homecoming, and called at least twice a week, but he had started telling me whenever he was on his way, and this visit was a complete surprise. Opening the door, I said, “What are you doing here?”
“Nice to see you, too, lil girl,” he replied. “You on your way to camp.”
I looked down at my cheerleading uniform. “No, I always wear this to lounge around the house.”
“Ah ha, sarcasm does run in your family.”
I wondered if he meant my sister, my grandma, or both. “Come in,” I said. “Yeah, I have to leave in a few minutes. Lucy’ll be late though, likely.” That’s why we’d told her the bus left at 10:00 instead of 10:30.
“You have to wear your uniform to get in?” he asked, walking into the living room.
“We have a pep rally as soon as we arrive,” I explained.
“Well, either that skirt is getting shorter or you’re getting taller.”
I looked down and suddenly felt like it was too short, though it had never bothered me before. How did he do that? “I have bloomers on under it.”
“TMI!” he shouted, covering his ears with both hands.
“No, they’re like shorts.”
“TMI!”
My mom came in from the kitchen just in time to spare him from receiving a punch in the arm. “Oh, Elliott,” she said. “Hello. We weren’t expecting you.”
“I know. I apologize for dropping in unannounced.”
“Oh, no, it’s no problem. How are you?” My mom came around and gave him a hug, something I hadn’t even done yet.
“Good,” he replied, kissing her cheek. “I just wanted to wish Cassidy good luck at her camp.”
“I see,” she said. “I will leave you to it then.” She patted him on the arm and said to me, “Make sure you let me know when Lucy gets here.”
“I will.” I knew my mom would want to say goodbye. Dad had already bid me farewell before he’d left for work. “What’s up?” I said to Elliott as soon as my mom had left the room. Something about his demeanor told me that this wasn’t a random visit.
“I was just on my way to Des Moines myself, actually, to visit with your grandmother. Thought I’d take a little detour.” He sat down in my mom’s chair, his seat of choice, and I pulled my skirt down as far as I could before taking a seat on the sofa. “You talked to Cadence lately?”
“Not for a few days,” I admitted. “Is everything okay.”
“Yeah, everything is fine,” he replied, but I could tell there was something wrong. “I just… uh… we might be going to California soon. We might have a lead on Giovani, and I just wanted to let you know that.”
It all seemed a little odd to me. “Wait. Isn’t Eliza in California?” I asked. “Is that why you’re acting so weird?”
“I’m not acting weird,” he protested. “Why would you say that?”
“Something’s not right,” I replied. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. “Is Cadence in some sort of trouble or something?”
“No, everyone is fine.” He shook his head at me like he thought I was overreacting. “I just… we’re working with some people, some shifty people, some people I don’t trust, and I just wanted to stop by and let you know, in case you heard anything, what was going on, that’s all.”
My forehead was so wrinkled, I likely looked like a Shar-Pei. “Elliott, no one tells me anything except for you. Why would you bother to stop by and tell me this if it’s not a big deal?”
He held my gaze for a long moment before he shrugged. “I don’t know,” he finally said. “I just… felt like I needed to stop by and see you, tell you we’re going out there, and tell you I hope you have a great time at camp.”
I crossed my arms and leaned back against the couch. “Okay,” I said slowly. “And…?”
He exhaled loudly. “Look, I wanted you to know I think you’ve handled all this secrecy like a champ. Not a lot of kids your age would’ve been mature enough to handle all of this. And if your sister finds out that I told you stuff, you need to deny it, okay? All it will do is make her upset, and there’s no need for that.”
“How would she?” I asked. “Why would I tell her? When will I even see her?”
“Well, I think she might be heading back to headquarters permanently, so you ought to be seeing a lot more of her.”
That surprised me. “She hasn’t said anything at all about that to me.”
“I don’t think she knows it yet.”
Confusion washed over me. “Say what?”
“I think that, by the time this is all said and done, she’ll be back together with Aaron and she’ll be back in KC where she belongs.”
“She was just telling me about some other guy….”
“Cale?”
“Yeah.”
He shook his head. “It’ll never last.”
“Why not?” I was looking at him out of the corner of my eye now.
“Because—she’s supposed to be with Aaron. I feel it. In my bones.”
“You should tell your old man bones they picked the wrong guy,” I teased, refolding my arms.
“Hardy har har,” he replied. He shook his head at me again, but this time he stood up and walked over to the sofa, sinking down beside me. “Listen, Cass, just trust me on this one, okay? I know you’re angry at him, but you can let it go. You’re not mad at Liam anymore, are you?”
“Liam is a boy child, a sad one at that. Aaron is a full-grown man who decided to do something awful to my sister,” I argued, pivoting around to face him.
“Aaron was tricked by a siren. You do know what that is, right? And he saw a falsified video of your sister that was misleading.”
This was the first I’d heard of this last bit of information. I wanted to ask for more information, but he cut me off. “Just do me a solid here, okay? If they end up back together, just understand that that’s what’s best for them, for all of us. Okay?”
He sounded so weird. Like Cad
ence and Aaron were going to be back together soon, but he wouldn’t be around to see it. “Elliott, what are you not telling me?” I asked, hearing a slight waver in my own voice.
“Nothing, I just wanted to make sure you understand that, okay?”
“Fine,” I said, still staring at him.
“All right. I’m sure Lucy will be here soon.”
I checked the clock on the wall since my phone was upstairs. If she didn’t get to my house in about five minutes we’d be late for our first fake deadline. “I’m not allowed to take my phone with me,” I said, “so I’ll have to call you when I get home.”
“That’s cool.” He nodded and gave me a sort-of sad half-smile. I couldn’t imagine he’d be that upset at not talking to me for a few days, so I chalked this behavior up to also strange and related to whatever else was going on.
“You’ll tell me all about whatever’s going on in California when I get back, right?” I asked, giving him a pointed stare.
“Of course,” he replied. “Every little detail.”
I heard Lucy’s car pull up outside and hoped he hadn’t parked in the potential path of destruction. “That’s Luce. I’m sure she’ll want to say hi to you.”
“Cool,” he replied. I started to stand, but he put his hand on my arm. “Cass,” he said, and the seriousness in his voice intensified tenfold. “You are going to be an amazing Hunter someday. I just want you to know that, okay?”
“Thanks,” I said. “I’m sure you’ll be there to train me every step of the way.”
His smile was forced. “I’m sure I will be.”
I didn’t let my mind wander away from me; he was saying odd things, acting strange, but I didn’t let myself go down the path of possibilities too far. There’d been enough craziness in my life over the last six months to read too much into this. I stood and walked to the door as Lucy knocked, and I opened it. She came in and saw Elliott and flew over and hugged him as I grabbed my bags and shouted for my mom.
“Now you be careful,” my mom warned, hugging me. “Call when you can.”
There was a phone in the dormitory we were allowed to use once a day to call home. “I will,” I assured her.
“Drive safe, Lucy,” my mom said, hugging her, too.
“She’s just driving me to the school,” I reminded her.
“Well you never know,” Mom said in that I’m-your-mother voice.
Elliott took my bags and walked out with us. He didn’t say goodbye to my mom, so I wondered if that meant he was going back in. He tossed them in the back with Lucy’s and hugged her one more time, telling her to behave.
“I’ll see you when I get back,” I said, stretching up on tiptoe to wrap my arms around him.
“Yeah you will,” he replied. His voice sounded surer this time, and I thought I had just imagined there was anything fishy going on before. “Be careful, lil girl. Don’t let them drop you on your head again.”
“I won’t.” I was not planning on flying ever again if I could help it. I was permanently afraid of heights after that basketball game when Elliott saved me from making a personal connection with the floor. He stepped back, and I took a deep breath before I opened my mouth again. “Look, this might sound super weird, but I never really got a chance to tell Jack how important he was to me, how I’d thought of him as a big brother for all those years. And well, I’m headed off to camp now, and you’ve got to go all the way to California, so....” I realized I was rambling. I glanced in the car window and saw Lucy patiently waiting for me, but I knew we needed to go. “I’ll just say it. Thanks, Elliott, for being there for me. I really appreciate it. You have been like a big brother to me, too. More than that, you’ve been like a superhero who's always there for me. I really appreciate you.” He was smiling at me proudly, the way my dad looked at me when I showed him my all-A report card for the first time. “So… I love you. Like a brother. You’re awesome.”
“Thanks, Cass,” he said, swallowing hard, and I thought maybe I saw tears glistening in his eyes. “I love you, too. Like a sister. Like a little sister.”
“Well, okay then,” I said, feeling heat in my cheeks. “I’ve gotta go.”
“Take care, lil girl.”
“You, too.” I gave him one last smile and then climbed into Lucy’s car. He stood on the sidewalk and watched us pull away, and I turned and waved at him one more time, not realizing that would be our last goodbye.
Chapter 19
I don’t think I’ve ever felt as free in my life as I did that week at cheerleading camp. Being away from my family, from my phone, from the news, from everything, was refreshing. At night, I would close my eyes and imagine that was what 1998 must’ve felt like—nothing buzzing or ringing in the middle of the night. No texts, messages, posts, instas, nothing to worry about that couldn’t wait until I was darn good and ready to address it.
Of course, it was also hard not to know what was happening. Elliott had me worried. While he’d left me on a “see you later” note, I’d replayed our conversation at least three dozen times, wondering if there was something going on he wasn’t telling me, like some sort of another sixth sense he had that told him there was danger in his future, but he wasn’t coming right out and saying it. I remembered him telling me on more than one occasion that there wasn’t much that could kill him, or even hurt him, but then there were these new bullets, too, the one that had hurt my sister. The whole thing had me worried, but at the same time, I was able to push it aside and live in the now.
Our squad won a trophy on the last day for fourth best dance routine, which was awesome. SHS had never won anything at camp before, and we loaded up the bus to go home all smiles, glad to be seeing our families again soon and tired from a week of staying up talking too late and getting up early to cheer for long days.
Lucy’s parents had come and gotten her car while we were gone, but they brought it back that morning so when we pulled into the parking lot at school, it was waiting for us. I hoped that she hadn’t forgotten how to drive while we were gone. We loaded our stuff into the back and waved at everyone before I climbed into the passenger side and prayed we’d make it the few blocks to my house.
“I’m so tired,” Lucy said as she pulled out of the parking spot. “I think I’m going to go home and take a nap.”
Yawning, I said, “I think that’s a great idea.” I wasn’t used to spending essentially the whole day doing cheers and dancing, either. My muscles were a little sore and I felt like I could go to sleep for a few hours and still be tired when I woke up.
When we got close to my house, I spotted the Aventador parked outside, and my blood ran cold. I’m not sure what it was, but I thought that didn’t seem right.
“Oh, my gosh!” Lucy chirped, suddenly awake. “Do you think Elliott’s here?”
“Maybe,” said. “But… he mentioned he didn’t like to drive that thing. Too cramped.”
Lucy pulled to a stop a good four feet behind the car and grabbed my arm. “What if it’s your sister?” Then, in an even more shrill voice she added, “What if Aaron is with her? OMG! Cass, I’m walking you in. I might finally get to meet Mr. Gorgeous.”
I couldn’t help but laugh at her. Her excitement translated up my arm, and I found myself beaming back at her. Thoughts of seeing Cadence had my heart pounding in my chest, and I grabbed my stuff out of the back and flew up the walkway almost as fast as I’d seen her do once before.
Hitting the door full force, I pushed it open, and when I saw my sister standing there, I was suddenly overwhelmed as all of the emotion I’d been keeping bottled up over the last few months flew to the surface. I ran into her open arms, and taking a line from Lucy’s script, I exclaimed, “OMG! Cadence!”
Cadence squeezed me tightly. “Hey!” she said, and it was just good to hear her voice in person. "How'd you know it was me?"
I didn’t really have an answer for that, so I said, "Because Aaron's the only one who drives the Lamborghini, and he wouldn't be here without you
--at least, I didn't think he would be. I can't believe you're home! I’ve missed you so much!" I hugged her again. The past week, while I was away, I was afraid something might’ve happened to her again. Now, at least she was standing here in front of me. Alive and well.
"I missed you, too, sis," Cadence said. She leaned down and kissed me on the head. As if she’d just noticed Lucy standing there, she let go of me and smiled at my friend, saying, "Lucy, it's nice to see you, too.”
Lucy Burk is rarely speechless. In fact, off the top of my head, I’ve never seen her not able to speak. Yet, here she was, standing in my living room, the front door open behind her like she’d forgotten how to shut it, and when my sister spoke to her, all she could say was, “Uh, huh."
I guided her out of the way and closed the door, realizing what was the matter with her as I looked back in my sister’s direction and saw that not only was Aaron also at our house, he had followed Cadence to the door. I waved my hand in front of Lucy’s face. "Luce, you okay?"
Lucy finally blinked and closed her gaping mouth. "Oh, yeah, sorry.” She was turning a shade of pink that would’ve matched her homecoming dress.
Cadence said, “Lucy, this is my boyfriend, Aaron.”
Lucy continued to stare at him, even as he stepped forward and offered her his hand. A long moment later, she said, "It's nice to meet you," and shook his hand.
I could tell he was trying not to laugh as he said, "You, too.” Eventually, Lucy let go of his hand and stared at her own, and I thought she was having one of those, “I’m never washing my hand again,” moments I’d once shared with Liam White in this very house.
Aaron turned to me, looking at me like he wasn’t sure how to greet me, whether I was friend or foe, and cautiously said, "It's always nice to see you, too, Cassidy.”