Staring blankly ahead, Ruby bent down and placed her tote bag on the floor. She then pulled out a T-shirt and held it up by the shoulders. “I thought all the students could wear these for the Tri-Centennial Celebration,” she said. When there was no response, she thought she was holding the T-shirt the wrong way; she thought the drawing that Fritz had helped her with was facing backward.
It wasn’t. David just couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Ruby was holding up a red T-shirt with the number three hundred written on it in white lettering, clearly in recognition of Double A’s anniversary, except that the zeros in the number were white roses. “Fritz,” she asked. “Am I holding it the right way?”
“Looks smashing, Rube,” he said proudly. “I think the headmaster is just gobsmacked. Ain’t that right, sir?”
They were staring at him, even the blind one, waiting for him to respond, waiting for him to give his consent, his approval, that their foul creation could be used as some sort of a school logo. And why not? What reason could he give to thwart their effort? Think, David, think! But David couldn’t think.
All he could see were the white roses, a symbol of every misdeed, every wrongdoing he had ever committed.
“Headmaster, what do you think?” Ruby asked. “I talked to Mrs. Lorenzo, and she said the art department’s ready to silkscreen one for every student. She’s just waiting for your official authorization.”
David tried to convince himself that the image was merely a stupid drawing that didn’t mean anything, but he knew that it meant everything. “Then Mrs. Lorenzo shall have it,” he finally said.
Before Ruby and Fritz could thank David any further, Dr. Sutton, sensing his leader’s discomfort, swooped in and made up some story about an administrative emergency that needed David’s immediate attention. Brania waited until Sister Mary left the couple before approaching Fritz and Ruby. Just like her father, she was thrown by the girl’s artistic efforts. Proving to be more resilient, Brania found her voice much quicker than David had. “White roses,” Brania remarked. “How incredibly ... clever.”
“Thank you, Brania,” Ruby replied. “I can’t think of any image that is more iconic to Double A.”
“How interesting that you would know that,” Brania said, searching Ruby’s eyes for a flicker of life.
“Even though you’ve never even seen them before.” Ruby’s expression didn’t change, but Fritz thought the air between the two girls was a wee bit thick. But Brania was kind of balmy and got along with very few people, so the tension was really nothing out of the ordinary. She just had to speak again for Fritz to recognize Brania was being her normal, prickly self. “It’s almost as if someone’s doing your seeing for you.”
So that’s what she was getting it. “That would be me,” Fritz said. “Also known as the boyfriend.”
Wasn’t that perfectly conventional. Brania wondered if Fritz knew the truth about his girlfriend, but from what she knew of the boy, she knew he would never win a blue ribbon for being astute. No, he had no idea what he was dating. “I’m glad to see that Ruby’s in such good hands,” Brania said. The truth, however, was that Ruby was much more interesting when she was alone. “Don’t forget to save me a T-shirt,” she added as she walked back into the crowd, shaking her head. She would have to remember to add another item to the growing list of things that bored her: mismatched lovebirds.
Mismatched friends, on the other hand, could be quite amusing.
“I’m free after school if you want a rematch,” Saoirse offered. “I know I probably bruised your ego winning all those games.”
How this one was related to Ronan and Ciaran, Nakano had no idea. She actually had a sense of humor. “Don’t get too comfortable wearing the tic-tac-toe tiara,” Kano replied. “That was only the warm up.”
How this one could be one of Them, Saoirse had no idea. He actually was fun to be around. “Bring it on, Kanosan! I’ll even give you a handicap. You can start with an extra ‘o’.”
“I don’t need charity,” Kano said. “But if you fancy being a loser, I accept.”
“Perfect! The tic-tac-toe tournament will resume in St. Martha’s at three o’clock today,” Saoirse announced. “Oh bollocks! Don’t you have swim team practice for the big meet?”
Biting his tongue, Nakano made a decision to go against his nature and be upfront, tell the truth. “I think I’m bagging the swim team.”
“Won’t that be a little redundant?” Saoirse asked, as gently as she could. “You already quit once before.”
Nakano felt weird, not because Saoirse had added an even deeper level of honesty to their conversation, but because he didn’t feel the urge to run from her or to lash out. He really just wanted to talk. “Ever since I got bumped to the B team, Blakeley hardly knows I’m alive,” he explained. “The swim team used to be fun and always a challenge to try and be as good as Ronan.”
“And now?”
“It’s turned into a couple hours waiting around for my turn to swim a lap or two,” Kano admitted, surprised that it was so easy to be honest. “I guess part of it’s not being on the A team, but the main thing is that I just want to have some fun again. And swim team isn’t doing it.”
Boy, did Saoirse know how that felt. Well, not the stuff about the swim team, but the wanting to have some fun. As they were about to leave St. Sebastian’s, Saoirse saw two of her St. Anne’s classmates, and she actually saw a lightbulb appear in a cute little thought bubble in front of her very eyes. It was a stroke of inspiration, and she couldn’t wait to share it with her new friend. “You want to have some fun, Kanosan?” she asked rhetorically. “Then follow me.”
Ronan was convinced he was not going to have fun, but he still followed Michael into the movie theatre. He really didn’t have any other choice; Fritz and Ruby were waiting for them, and Fritz especially was looking forward to his large popcorn and soda. Ronan knew that if he snuck out the side entrance he would never hear the end of it from Fritz. Sometimes you just had to suck it up and like Saoirse said, grow up.
“Thanks, Ro,” Fritz said, grabbing the tray from him. “Did you make sure they sprinkled it with three layers of butter and didn’t just smother it on top?”
“Yes, Fritz.”
“Did you watch them do it? Because they don’t like special orders,” Fritz revealed. “They’re not the bloomin’ Burger King.”
“Yes, Fritz, I supervised.”
“And did you make sure they only used a half a cup of ice in the sodas?”
“I measured it myself,” Ronan replied tersely.
“No need to get snarky, mate,” Fritz scoffed, though he softened his attitude when he saw Ruby was laughing at their exchange. “It’s a dodgy practice, Rube, a trick they like to play on their customers.”
“And what trick would that be, Fritz,” she asked, sounding remarkably as if she actually wanted to know the answer.
“You see, what they do is they fill the cup to the rim with ice—sometimes the cubes stick out like a tiny replica of the bloody Arctic Circle—just so they can shortchange you on the soda,” he explained.
“Well, if I’m paying for a full cup of soda, I want a full cup of soda!”
“Well, you didn’t bloody pay for it, Fritz,” Ronan corrected, “so be happy with your Arctic Circle!”
“Boys, boys, you’re both pretty,” Michael joked. He held onto Ronan’s arm tightly, not because he was afraid he was going to punch Fritz, but because he was afraid he was going to try and leave. “But Ruby and I are prettier, so we demand you stifle it.”
Smiling at Michael, Ruby agreed. “Which translates to ‘shut up, mates’ because the previews are starting.”
At that very second the lights in the theatre dimmed, and the first preview was projected onto the screen. “How did you know they were going to start?” Michael asked.
Leaning her head closer to Michael, Ruby whispered, “You know us blind girls; we have a sixth sense for these things.”
Michael had no
idea if the preview was for a foreign language art house movie or an animated cartoon. He was too shocked by Ruby’s comment. “Did you hear her, Ronan?!” Michael asked. “She just admitted she’s got a sixth sense!”
“Easy love, it’s a figure of speech,” Ronan replied. “Now if she said she had six toes on one foot, that I would find interesting.”
Luckily the darkness of the theatre concealed Michael’s smile, so he could continue to act as if he was annoyed with Ronan. “I’ve said it before, Glynn-Rowley, you’ve got no sense of humor.”
Ronan’s hand found Michael’s and their matching rings clinked in the darkness as he replied, “Which is why I have you.”
Fritz had given himself a goal: He was going to kiss Ruby by the time the previews ended. But the third one had started, and he still had not made a move. Maybe this double date thing wasn’t a good idea after all; there was so much added pressure. If he made a fool out of himself when he was alone with Ruby, she wasn’t going to tell anyone, but if he did something stupid in front of Michael and Ronan, they might tell everyone. Then again, Ronan really didn’t gossip and Michael was his friend, but Michael could slip when he was talking to Saoirse, and she had the biggest mouth of anyone he had ever met. Oh God, why was he thinking about Michael and Ronan and Saoirse when he was sitting in a darkened movie theatre holding hands with his girlfriend? Just stop thinking and kiss her.
“That was nice, Fritz,” Ruby whispered, the taste of butter still on her lips.
“Yeah, it was,” he replied, his voice a bit gruff.
“I wouldn’t mind if you did it again.”
Sassy! Fritz Ulrich had found himself a sassy girlfriend, and he couldn’t have been happier. The feeling, however, wasn’t universal.
In the middle of their second kiss, there was a huge explosion of sound, and for a second Fritz thought he was hearing the buzzing in his head, some sort of residual effect of a really hot kiss. But it was quickly evident that the sound was real. Someone had pulled the fire alarm because the theatre was filling up with smoke.
Curl after curl of gray, smoky fog filled the theatre, rolling in from somewhere within the bones of the building. It entered the theatre defiantly, determined, as if it were on a mission, the smoke rolling, rolling, rolling, devouring everything in its path, and soon it was impossible to see the movie screen.
Gray tendrils split apart from the huge cloud of smoke that hung in the air in the front of the theatre and began to slip in and out of the seats, wrap themselves around the legs of the moviegoers who were desperately trying to get out of the theatre, and swirl around their faces, making them cough and their eyes burn.
Piercing through the frightened screams of the patrons, a voice boomed from a loudspeaker and instructed everyone to follow the ushers and quickly, but calmly, evacuate the premises. “Don’t let go of my hand, Ruby,” Fritz ordered, bravely keeping his fear to himself.
“I won’t.” And true to her word she didn’t, not even when she turned around to face Michael, not even when her eyes turned into two orbs of solid white, and not even when she hissed through lips that never parted, “This is all because of your friend.”
Stunned, but not really surprised, Michael watched Fritz lead Ruby out the side exit, his arm around the girl’s slender shoulders, protecting her from the swarm of people bumping into them. For a second Michael breathed in deeply and listened intently. He neither smelled nor heard the crackle of fire, and he knew there was nothing natural about this interruption. Still, he instinctively reached back to grab Ronan’s hand and make sure he was right behind him. He wasn’t, but another familiar face was.
“Phaedra! I knew it was you!” Michael yelped. “And by the way, Ruby knows it’s you too. So would you mind explaining what’s going on here?”
To the untrained eye, Phaedra looked like just another patron whose night at the movies had been ruined, but Michael could tell that she was different. He could see the blue veins underneath her skin, and her hair, still curly and slightly disheveled, seemed to be floating around her face like the wisps of fog that it truly was. It was a depressing sight because Michael realized she was, without a doubt and without reversing the trend, more efemera than human.
“I’m sorry, but I had to do something,” Phaedra said, her voice floating in the air like a wayward piece of cloud.
“This is all you could come up with?” Michael asked, slightly dumbfounded. “You know shouting fire in a crowded movie theatre is illegal, not to mention highly dangerous.”
“Ruby is dangerous,” Phaedra countered.
Michael wanted to touch Phaedra’s hand, but he knew it would only make him feel sadder; he knew it would be like trying to hold onto air. “We know that. Why do you think we’re here?” he said.
“We’re actually doing some spiritual reconnaissance work.”
If the situation hadn’t been so grave, Phaedra would’ve laughed, but her time was limited. “You have to be careful around her,” she implored. “And you need to keep her away from Fritz.”
He should’ve known. Once a teenage girl, always a teenage girl. “Okay, I get it. Is this how efemeras act when they’re jealous?” Michael asked. “They turn a movie theatre into their own little playroom?”
“This isn’t a game, Michael!” Even though Phaedra had tried to shout, her voice was hardly more than a sliver of sound. She was using all the strength she had just to appear in human form; she didn’t have any strength left over to shout. “Listen to me, this is important,” she said. “Wherever Ruby goes death will follow.”
Talk about an exit line. Before Michael could question Phaedra further, get her to elaborate, find out if she was exaggerating or downright lying in an attempt to scare him so he’d do something that would break up Fritz and Ruby, he saw her fade away. There was so much commotion and so much smoke all around him that no one saw her evaporate. It was almost as if he had experienced a hallucination, until Ronan confirmed that he wasn’t crazy.
“You saw her too?”
“Yes,” Ronan confirmed. “I held back because I figured she’d talk more openly to you if you were alone. Did she say anything important?”
Michael quickly relayed Phaedra’s brief message. “I don’t know, Ro,” Michael said, suddenly confused. “I can’t be sure if she’s telling the truth or if she’s just royally pissed off that Fritz’s got a new girlfriend.”
“Well, the only thing we do know, love,” Ronan said as he threw his arm around Michael as they started to walk out of the theatre, “is that your double dates really do suck.”
The drive back to school was mainly silent. Ronan wasn’t known to be a jabberjaw, Fritz wasn’t happy that movie night had been cut short, and Michael wasn’t sure who was in his back seat—Ruby or Rhoswen—so he hesitated to start a conversation. There was some small talk, but it was forced, so Michael let out a sigh of relief when he parked his Benz in the lot near David’s office and turned off the ignition. The night was finally over. In Michael’s mind, it hadn’t been a complete catastrophe. He had gained another piece of information about Ruby, albeit from a completely biased source, but still, it was something new and that’s why he had arranged the evening in the first place.
Fritz’s motives for their night in Eden had been much more basic: He had just wanted to snuggle next to Ruby during the movie. Since that hadn’t worked out he’d have to settle for holding her hand as he walked her back to her dorm room. After they had exchanged their good-nights and Michael and Ronan walked in the other direction toward St. Florian’s, Fritz thought he’d take the long way home to get as much one-on-one alone time with Ruby as possible. She had other plans.
When they reached the clearing behind David’s office, Ruby stopped to face Fritz, and the boy almost fainted. Her irises were gone; only the whites remained. Even though her body wasn’t shaking, he thought that maybe Ruby was having a stroke or something. Nothing was going to happen to her; it was Fritz who was being put under a spell.
“Leave Ruby alone and go home,” Rhoswen ordered. “When you wake up tomorrow you’ll remember none of this. You’ll believe you walked Ruby safely to her door.”
It was as if a see-through door had slammed shut in front of Fritz’s eyes, like he was locked within an invisible cell; he could see the world around him, he just couldn’t interact with it. He had no control over his body; he had relinquished it, unaware, to an unseen power. Without saying another word, Fritz started walking into The Forest; from behind no one would have known that he was being manipulated like an untethered marionette. And no one could imagine why his girlfriend would want to visit the headmaster at such a late hour.
As she walked past the mirror in David’s greenroom, Rhoswen smiled at Michael, the archangel, who had always been her favorite. She looked up at the carving and took in his heroic face, his powerful body, Satan cowering under the weight of his boot, and she was overjoyed. Good always did triumph over evil. Sometimes it took centuries to win a battle, but what did several hundred years mean when the end result was victory?
Glancing at the other archangels that graced the mirror’s frame, the feeling of joy grew. There was so much evil in the world that sometimes it was easy to forget that there was also good. That was because the evildoers penetrated every aspect of society, earthly and otherwise. She knew that Zachariel’s eyes had turned bright red and were glowing in her direction, but she didn’t feel the need to acknowledge his presence. He was one of those charlatans who had posed as virtuous, who had infiltrated a corps of peace-loving guardians, but was nothing more than a lowly, despicable creature and undeserving of her attention. She would never understand why her brother was so fascinated with him.
Silently, she entered David’s office and spied him sitting next to the fireplace, its flames suddenly igniting, crackling enthusiastically upon seeing her again. David didn’t look up. He didn’t share in the flames’ applause. He couldn’t; he didn’t know she was there, and so he continued to drink blood from a brandy snifter and remained deep in thought. Until his thoughts were interrupted.
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