Wait a minute, what is this? I look at James and shake my head, trying to show him this is not why I came here for. I followed him thinking he’d have answers to my questions, but it seems he’s just trying to drag me into whatever activities they’re up to—which no doubt are criminal as all get-out.
“A hand doing what?” I demand.
“All in due time, Marci.”
My expression tightens. “Listen, I’m flattered that you’re impressed, but I don’t get the feeling I’m going to like what you guys are up to.”
Medusa chuckles, “derisive” written all over her black painted lips. “That’s an understatement.”
I stand, making the chair screech across the floor.
“Settle down, Marci. This is not the sort of thing you’re imagining.” James points at the chair with an extended hand.
“Just tell me.” I will count till ten. If I don’t get a straight answer, I’m out of here. I’m not going to get involved in anything that will land me in jail.
One.
“Good luck with that,” Xave huffs, sarcasm wrapped around all four words. They haven’t told him anything either. Cult tactics vary, and I wonder if the lure of something enigmatic and dangerous is what they use to entrap thrill-seeking idiots like Xave and me.
Four.
Blare exhales with frustration. “This isn’t child’s play. And the sooner you two get that into your heads, the better. Besides, it’s not the sort of thing that can be told. You have to see it to be able to believe messed-up shit like this.”
“Oh c’mon, Blare,” Oso says. “You’re gonna spook them.”
Seven.
“Good! ’Cause this is spooky crap.” Blare’s eyes swivel my way. A pierced eyebrow goes up and her lips tighten for a second before she says, “Crap that’ll make you run crying to Mama. Make sure you understand that before you go joining.”
Ten.
I’m outta here. The only scary thing here is Medusa’s hair-do.
“Ooh, I’m shaking in my boots.” I snigger. “I don’t know about you, Xave, but I need more than just empty talk and secret meetings,” I draw quotes in the air, “to buy into bogus crap.”
That said, I head for the door and invite Xave to follow me with a quick nod toward the door. I’m still mad at him, but I can’t leave him at the mercy of this bunch. I can’t believe Clark has dragged his little brother into this.
Oso lets out a hearty chuckle. “The girl has spunk. I’ll give her that.”
Xave’s attention shifts from side to side, apparently considering the option of leaving with me. If he’s still the smart boy I know, and testosterone and jealousy haven’t skewered his brain, he’ll come with me. I doubt Clark even knows what’s really going on here. “Marci.” James stands and takes a deep, deliberate breath, a clear reminder of our earlier conversation in the alley. “Promise me you’ll think about it.”
He knows he has answers I’d kill to have and he’s using them as bargaining chips. The question is: are the shadows somehow linked to what they’re doing here? Or are they just bait to suck me into their cult? I’m afraid accepting a deal with James might be too high a price to pay for learning what I need to know. Anger seethes behind my breastbone. This isn’t fair. I was so stupid to think I could get something for nothing.
I hesitate and look at Xave. His brow furrows, as his eyes dance from James to me and back again. Everyone watches with interest, even aloof Aydan, who I’m sure understands why James’s offer is so tempting to me.
Decisively, I exit the room without an answer or backward glance. I didn’t say no. That should let James know I’ll at least consider it. No harm in that, I suppose.
Outside, I crank the bike and slide on my helmet.
“Marci, wait!”
Xave runs up to me. I lift the visor to look at him, but he avoids eye contact and looks toward the road instead.
“Um.” He bites his lower lip, blinks in slow motion as if his long lashes weigh a ton. Finally, he meets my gaze. His Adam’s apple goes up and down. “I …” His pause stretches for a full minute.
I sigh and roll my eyes at his fantastic eloquence. “Want a ride home?”
“Y-yeah, that’d be great.”
“Hop on.”
Xave gets behind me, wraps large hands around my hips then leans forward until I can feel the length of his torso against my back. My throat locks, keeping my breath captive. My eyes close and I find myself leaning back, pressing closer to him. My body’s reaction shocks me.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers in my ear, then he pulls away slowly. Cold air slides up my back, making the distance between us feel as wrong as a sixteen-year-old in a bikers’ bar. His warm breath quickly turns frigid at my earlobe. I shiver and snap the visor shut. My fingers feel numb. It’s too cold to be out tonight.
Chapter 10
Meeting James and the rest of his crew was nothing but a poor distraction. As soon as we drove away from the bar, the brunt of my pent-up emotions hit me like a hook punch. I got us home, fighting the urge to drive in the opposite direction and never look back.
Now, we sit on Xave’s front steps. I don’t want to go home and face whatever is waiting there. A suddenly joyful mother? A brand-spanking-new brother? A second fiddle? I hate feeling this way, but I can’t help it. I was there for her all along, why wasn’t I ever as important as the absent son she never really knew?
Crickets chirp and the moon hangs huge and watchful, unobstructed by clouds, even when light drizzle falls from a gray sky. I stare at a water stream making its way toward a drain at the far end of the street.
“What do you think about those fools?” Xave asks.
“Mmm?” My eyes are transfixed by the glittering moonlight as it skims the surface of the little stream.
“What’s wrong? You want me to apologize again?” he says a bit grudgingly. “I know I was an ass, and I—”
I tear my eyes from the drainage and the water traveling to its doom. “Luke’s dad was murdered.” Xave is a grade ahead of us, but everyone in school knows blond, popular, perfect Luke.
“What?!”
I let it sink in.
“You mean Luke Smith?”
I nod.
“Really? Wow, that sucks. Why? What happened?”
I bite on my thumbnail and taste bitterness.
“I gotta go.” I stand and take a few steps.
“Why? It’s still early. We could … hang out.”
I look over my shoulder. “I should go see Mom.”
“C’mon. She’s probably asleep already.”
“Not tonight.”
Xave stands and puts a hand on my shoulder. I look at his fingers.
Tears. Are prisoners. In my eyes.
Breathe and go home.
He pulls gently, makes me face him. He knows me so well, reads my face and finds there’s something I’m trying to drown. There’s no one else in the world who can do that.
“Luke’s my brother,” I blurt out.
Xave’s hand falls off my shoulder. A million expressions decorate his face, surprise, wonder, understanding, shock.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.” A whisper full of regret, anger, uncertainty. “All this time he was right there, and I … I think I knew, somehow.”
Xave shakes his head. “There’s no way you could’ve …” His words run out, like sand through a tightening fist. There’s nothing to say. Nothing to ever make up for the lost time.
I feel numb and slow like the passing of millennia. I blink and when I open my eyes, I’m in Xave’s embrace. His arms passed me by, drew me in, and I let it happen. Now his chest warms my cheek.
I pull away. No words cross between us, only the brush of his lips on my forehead. I dare hope we can go back to normal. I have a feeling my life’s about to redefine the meaning of rough, so I could really use Xave’s support right now.
Without him, I don’t know if I can make it.
“Marcela!” Mom cros
ses the living room with clipped steps and stops at arm’s length. “Where were you? How could you leave at a time like this?”
She takes my hand. Her touch is feverish, intense. I stare at her alabaster fingers pressed against my olive skin, my dad’s skin. I wonder if she hates me because I remind her of him, of what she can’t have. Or maybe expecting her to compare me to Dad is too much to expect. I’ve never been enough like him to make her happy. Never been at all like her to make her proud.
I always wondered what my brother would look like—if he would be like Dad, like me. I never thought we could be so different. In every imaginable way.
“Sorry,” I say, pulling my hand away. “I …”
Lie.
Relax.
“I was … I needed to think.”
She exhales and beams in a way I haven’t seen her beam in years. She lights up the room and I’m eclipsed, obscured by new reasons.
“I contacted the police. It was him, Marci. It was him. That awful man is dead. And Max … your friend has to be Max. They’ll begin an investigation.” Her voice cracks with joy, her cheeks glitter with tears made of hope.
Me? I feel myself go pale. I’m a ghost.
“Tell me about him.” Mom grabs me by the elbows, pushes me into the living room and stuffs me in the sofa. It’s kindergarten all over again, where eager kids pestered me until I share all my secrets.
“No,” I say.
Her lips make a small circle, her eyebrows a crease above her nose. “No? You know him, right?”
“I … don’t think so.”
“You’ve had classes together, I would guess. Is he … tall? Smart? Kind?”
My eyes find a speck on the far wall. “He looks like you,” I say and after a pause, “can I go? I didn’t sleep good last night. I’d like to rest.”
Mom stands, frustration painting her face red.
“I don’t understand you. Aren’t you glad we’ve found him?”
“I am, Mom.” I nod, my voice monotone. “It’s good to see you happy. I think you’ll like him.”
Mom, I don’t have to be strong for you now, don’t have to pretend I’m okay. You got your heart’s desire. And maybe when you’ve traveled that road you’ve craved, your regrets will be for me.
Closed casket.
I look away from it, fidget and ignore Mom’s restless energy. Her eyes are glued on the blond boy in the black suit. The boy who sits very still staring at the carpet, blue eyes void of the cocky liveliness I’m used to seeing in them.
Mom is dying to talk to him, to spill years of longing onto his lap. But she sits there, smiling and frowning all in the same second, containing her desire to tell it all.
A few brave classmates approach Luke and offer their condolences. He barely acknowledges them. I wonder what I should do; what he will think of my silence once he learns the truth?
Deep breath.
I decide to be brave like the others. I’m about to walk his way, when Luke stands, stuffs his hands into his pockets and walks away. Mom watches his every move.
“Where are you going?” she asks when I stand.
“Restroom,” I lie. “Be right back.”
As I pretend to go toward the bathroom, my gaze follows Luke. He goes through a set of French doors that lead outside. Unnoticed by Mom, I sneak into a corridor. The funeral home is an intricate maze of dreary halls, parlors and visiting rooms. I find another door that leads outside and step into the quiet evening.
Luke is reclining against a tree, chin on his chest, shadows splitting his face in odd angles. The sharpness of his features, the gloom around him make me shiver.
Be brave.
I don’t want to catch him by surprise, so I walk with meaningful steps. He looks up, an annoyed expression on his face, which disappears when he realizes it’s me.
Why?
“Hey,” I say.
“Hey,” he says back.
“I—I hope I’m not bothering you.”
Luke shakes his head and shows me a tiny smile.
“Um …”
Meaningful words.
Don’t exist.
“You don’t have to say anything,” Luke tells me in a quiet whisper.
“I’m sorry,” is all I can think to say.
Your father was a thief, but I’m sorry you have to go through this. I’m sorry you’ll have to go through so much more.
Luke blinks several times, then looks up at the branches above. A tear spills over, and he slaps it away, quick and proud.
Something beyond my control takes my hand to his arm. He startles a bit, looks at my fingers, then into my eyes. I hold his gaze, sense the iron bars that cage his pain. Too much to bear by himself when he doesn’t have to.
More tears streak his cheeks and when he looks away, my arms find their way into a tight embrace I didn’t know I had in me to give. In the first instant, his limbs become stone, but they melt quickly, like pieces of ice next to kindling flame. He rests his cheek on my head, but leaves limp arms hanging at his sides.
It’s not his fault Mom preferred the idea of him to the reality of me. It won’t be his fault if he hates me when he finds out the truth. The truth that will make his life up to this point a lie.
I pull away, feel my own tears building, building.
“I’m sorry, Luke.”
He frowns, as if aware my apology is meant for more than it should be, meant for what is to come.
“I’ll see you soon.”
Brother.
Chapter 11
After the funeral on Monday, the week has been strangely calm. Realizing I’ve nothing to share about Luke, Mom left me alone. The few times I’ve seen her, she’s been filled with anxious energy, jittery like a rocket ready to blast off into space.
Tuesday, she started to tell me about the social worker handling “Max’s” case. When I showed no interest in her efforts to reach out to Luke—a name she refuses to use—she was upset for a millisecond, then the glow of more important matters than me filled her eyes again. She’s too far up on cloud nine to notice her insignificant daughter. Her indifference has reached an unprecedented level.
That was until this morning, when she said I had to skip school to go with her to the child protective services office. She informed me that today Luke would hear the truth about his abductor. The social worker would then ask him if he’d like to meet his real family. Mom wants to be there, waiting for him to come out and meet us. It seems she expects him to come running into her arms as soon as he hears the news. I wonder if she’s considered the possibility he might not?
I wait in my room, reading in bed. Gently, I hold Dad’s copy of a Neruda book of poems between my hands. Dad’s full name is written on the first page in his beautiful rolling script—Marcela Victoria Guerrero is spelled in my third-grade, blocky letters right underneath.
I treasure the book, treasure the words of the poet my father so admired. He grew up reading Neruda’s work with Grandpa Roberto. They both liked him for his skill with words and for the fact that Neruda was from Chile, Grandpa’s homeland. This book has love poems, mostly. The rich language and word-play challenges my mind. Every time I re-read them they evoke different feelings and conjure new meanings.
My foot shakes nervously. I don’t want to imagine how Luke will react, so I shift my thoughts to James and his crew. As promised, Aydan sent me the code he used to hack my system. The jerk did it to boast. There’s no other explanation. Not when he named all his routines things like “ProbeKiddieCode,” “ChildsPlay,” and other condescending stuff like that.
The program told me a lot, especially the fact that leaving a way to access my own system remotely—a feature I used only once—was monumentally stupid. It also told me that Aydan is a thorough, methodical, smart son-of-a-gun. Man, I can’t wait to show him up. I hope I get a chance. Other than Aydan’s code, I’ve not heard another peep from IgNiTe, which is oddly comforting and disquieting at the same time.
Putting down
the book, I heave a sigh and decide to check my email for the hundredth time. I push away from the bed and sit at my desk. I’ve been so bored that when I notice a new message from sender IgNiTe, I double-click it in a rush.
James, Aydan, whoever, has sent me a small challenge. The message is encrypted. I relish the game and the tiny clues they’ve given me to help solve the puzzle. It takes me fifteen minutes to crack the message. When I do, I’m almost disappointed.
Answers. Saturday night. Midnight. The bar.
A knock at the door startles me.
“It’s time,” Mom says.
I cringe at her beaming smile. Doesn’t she realize this won’t be easy?
“Is that what you’re wearing?” she asks.
Ripped jeans. Boots. Tight olive t-shirt with black strokes of the Chinese symbol for “serenity.” Yep, that’s what I’m wearing. What does she expect? A skirt? A grin full of teeth?
“Luke’s seen me a thousand times, Mom. He won’t recognize me if I go in disguise.”
“I don’t understand your attitude,” she says, turning on her heels and clip-clopping down toward the kitchen. She wears a dress I’ve never seen before. It’s white and it hugs her slender body tightly. A thin black belt encircles her waist. Her normally straight hair curls at the tips and bounces as she heads for the door.
My feet shuffle forward. I give myself time to build some patience. When I enter the kitchen, Mom waits with a hand on the knob of the open back door.
“Hurry, Marcela. I don’t want to be late.”
We ride in silence, a silence loaded with Mom’s expectations and my dread.
She thinks Luke will be delighted to learn he has a family.
I think she sees the world through rose-tinted glasses.
The question is: who will be proved wrong?
We sit in a claustrophobic office, waiting. I’ve been staring at a dusty plant in the corner, sure it’s fake or it would have choked by now.
The door opens. Mom and I look up.
“Mrs. Guerrero?”
Mom jumps to her feet, a nervous smile on her lips. For once her expression seems to match the situation.
Ignite the Shadows Page 7