by Cynthia Hand
I want to get out there, stop this before someone gets hurt. I have the feeling that someone could really get hurt about now. But as I take a step toward the door, Angela grabs my arm.
“Don’t,” she says. “You’ll make it worse.”
“She told me you kissed her,” Tucker says.
“I did.”
“It doesn’t matter to you that she has a boyfriend? That she loves me?” Tucker is close to Christian now, climbing the steps to the porch. He stops a few feet in front of Christian and stands with his hands in fists, waiting for the excuse Christian is going to give him to hit him.
I can’t see Christian’s face from this angle. His back is turned to me. But somehow I know that his face is impassive, his eyes cool green emeralds that glitter unnaturally in the light.
There’s no warmth in him at all when he says, “I always liked you, Tucker. I think you’re a decent guy.”
Tucker laughs. “But what, I’m not worthy of her? She’s out of my league, just because—”
“She and I belong together,” Christian interrupts.
“Right. Because of your purpose,” Tucker says in a low voice.
Christian glances around, irritated that Tucker knows this word, that he would dare to say it here in front of all these people. “That and about a hundred other reasons, none of which you’d be capable of understanding,” he says.
“You smug bastard.” And that’s when Tucker punches him. Right in the face. Christian’s head snaps back and a river of blood instantly starts to stream from his nose. He wipes at it, looks at his blood-sullied fingers. It’s possible that he’s never seen his own blood before now. His eyes narrow. He wipes his hand on his jeans. Then the porch erupts in a flurry of motion, people scrambling to get out of the way, women shrieking, fists flying. I tear loose from Angela just in time to see Tucker push Christian back against the house wall so hard it cracks the glass in the front window. I watch Christian’s dark brows draw low over his eyes, a genuine fury rising there, about to be unleashed. He puts a hand in the middle of Tucker’s chest and sends him sprawling, striking the porch rail with a sickening crunch as he flies backward onto the driveway. Gravel scatters everywhere. Tucker springs to his feet, wiping a smear of blood off his chin, hair all disheveled, eyes blue fire.
“Come on, pretty boy,” he taunts. “Show me what you’ve got.”
“Stop!” I scream.
Christian jumps over the fractured porch railing so lightly he almost seems to float. Next to Tucker he has a slender grace, not the muscle from roping calves and working hard every day, not the grit of being a farm boy from Wyoming, but I know that he is incredibly strong.
Tucker swings at him, and Christian ducks away. He lands a punch to Tucker’s side that again sends him crashing back into the dirt. He grunts, straightens up to go at Christian again.
“Stop it!” I scream.
Neither of them pays any attention. Tucker feints another punch, then almost gets one into Christian’s gut, but one more time Christian moves away before the blow can land. Tucker makes a frustrated noise in the back of his throat as Christian hits him again, this time in the jaw.
This isn’t fair. There’s no way for Tucker to win this fight. Christian will always be faster, and stronger, and harder to hurt.
Please, I send to Christian with all my power to speak in his mind turned up full blast. If you care for me at all, stop.
He hesitates.
I stumble down the porch stairs toward them. I’m not thinking anymore. I need to get myself between them. “Christian, don’t hurt him,” I say out loud.
This stops them both cold. Tucker gives me this incredulous, offended look. How could I think that he’d be beaten by this fancied-up city kid, no matter what kind of blood runs through his veins? His lip actually curls in disgust. You don’t believe in me, his eyes say. Why don’t you believe in me?
At the same time, Christian drops his fists, turns to look at me with a hurt expression.
I wasn’t going to hurt him, he says in my mind. You think I would use my powers to do that?
I don’t have an answer for either of them.
“Okay, that’s enough!” a voice rings out. Billy makes her way down the front steps. She walks up beside me and glares at Tucker and Christian.
“What are you two doing here acting like elk in rut? This is a time of mourning. You should be ashamed.”
“I’m going,” Tucker says. He doesn’t look at me again. He must be hurting all over, but he keeps his head high, his back straight, as he walks to his car. Over his shoulder Wendy shoots me a look that’s half murder, half apology. She gets in the driver’s seat. I can see her talking, possibly yelling at Tucker as they drive off.
Christian wipes blood off his face. His nose has stopped bleeding, but the blood’s still there.
“My uncle’s going to kill me,” he says.
“He can get in line,” I shoot back.
He looks at me, startled. Clara, I’m—
Don’t you dare tell me you’re sorry. Just go.
I was only—
Go. I send again. I want you to go away, Christian. I don’t want you here. I don’t need you.
He swallows, stuffs his hands in his pockets, and looks at me hard. He doesn’t believe me.
“Get out of here,” I say out loud.
He turns and tromps off into the woods, where shadows are stretching out through the trees.
“Girl, you have a knack for drawing trouble,” Billy says, clapping an affectionate hand on my shoulder.
Don’t I know it.
After darkness falls the people all go home. The house gets brutally empty. Jeffrey comes home, from wherever it is that he disappears to every day, retreating into his room without a word to anyone. I go to the door of Mom’s office and push it open. Part of me expects her to be there, hunched over her computer, writing code. She’d look up and smile.
“Tough day, sweetie?” she’d say.
I swallow. I try to remind myself that she’s in heaven. But I can’t picture it. I can’t feel it.
All I know is that she’s gone, and she’s never coming back.
That night I can’t sleep. I’m not even sure I want to. I stare up at the ceiling and watch the shadows flit across it, the outlines of leaves from the tree outside my window, moving back and forth.
Around midnight, the phone starts ringing. I wait for someone to answer it, but no one does. Where is Billy? I wonder. When will Dad come back?
The phone keeps ringing its lonely song. I pad sock-foot into the kitchen, take it out of its cradle, and look at the caller ID.
CLARA, it reads.
Huh?
I’m getting a call from my own phone.
I click TALK. I’m suddenly wide awake. “Hello?”
Silence.
“Hello?” I say after a few seconds of nothing on the other line.
“Hello, little bird.”
It’s such a strange thing, hearing Samjeeza’s voice without the accompanying sorrow.
Almost like talking to a normal person, having an ordinary conversation where I don’t have to fear for my life or wonder if I’m about to be dragged to hell. Strange, like I said.
“What do you want?” I ask him.
Silence.
“Well, it’s been nice talking to you, but I’ve got to go. . . .” I start to lay the phone back down. “I have to bury my mother in the morning.”
“What?” he says, sounding truly shocked.
He doesn’t know.
“Please,” he says after a minute, real desperation in his voice. “What happened?”
“You knew about the one-hundred-and-twenty-years rule, didn’t you?” He hisses out a breath. “Is that how old she was? I knew she was nearing that, but . . . it’s hard for me to keep track of human time. When?”
“Three days ago.” I feel a flash of anger, which actually feels good. Any emotion besides crushing sadness feels good at this point. “So now
you won’t ever be able to hurt her again.” Again, there’s silence. I think he might have hung up. But then he says, “I didn’t feel her pass. I should have felt it.”
“Maybe you weren’t as connected as you thought you were.”
“Oh, Meg,” he says.
That’s when I blow a fuse. He has no right to grieve, I think. He’s the bad guy. He tried to kill her. He wanted to bring her down to hell with him, right? He doesn’t deserve my pity.
“When are you finally going to get it?” I ask him furiously. “My mom’s name is not Meg.
Whatever you had with her, whatever was between you, was over a long time ago. She doesn’t love you. She never did. She was always meant for someone else, from the very beginning. And there’s nothing you can do about it now because she’s dead.” The word rings in the air. I sense the presence of someone behind me. It’s Billy. She catches me by the shoulders, steadies me when I wasn’t even aware that I was swaying, about to fall. Then she slowly takes the phone out of my hand and sets it down in the cradle.
“Well, now we know why he’s mad at you tomorrow in the cemetery,” she says. She shakes her head at me. “I would feel a lot better if you didn’t go around antagonizing Black Wings.” Then, without me even having to ask her, she walks me back to my bedroom and lies down beside me in the dark, sings a low song that matches the cadence of the wind outside, like I’m a kid again. And she holds my hand until I fall asleep.
Chapter 20
Loving Memory
There are a lot of things the dream didn’t prepare me for. Like seeing Mom’s body so still and waxlike lying in the casket. They put too much makeup on her. Mom hardly ever wore more than mascara and lip gloss. In the coffin she looks like a painted doll. Beautiful. Peaceful. But not her, you know? It’s hard to look at her like that, but I also find it hard to look away.
Or for the line of people who file by to look at her, and then expect to talk to me. It’s like a reverse wedding reception. First, see the corpse. Say your good-byes. Then say hello to the family. They all think Mom died of cancer, so they keep talking about pain. “At least she’s no longer in any pain,” they tell me, patting my hand. “She’s beyond the pain now.” At least that’s true.
Or the actual funeral. The church part. Sitting in the front row with Jeffrey and Billy, a few feet from Mom’s coffin. Dad’s still a no-show, and part of me feels betrayed by that. He should be here, I think. But I know he’s in a better place, literally. With Mom.
“He is with Mom, right?” I’d asked Billy as she braided my hair this morning, a long clean plait that miraculously stays in place all day. “He has been all this time?”
“I think so. Funerals are not really for angels, kid. Your dad would unsettle everyone if he came. He knows that. So it’s best if he stays away. Plus, he wants to be with your mother now, help her through the transition.”
Tucker’s at the church. He comes up to me after the service, stands in front of me with his hands folded together, looking lost. I stare at his black eye, the cut on his cheek, the scrape on his knuckles.
“I’m here,” he says. “You were wrong. I’m here.”
“Thank you,” I say. “But don’t come to the graveside. Please, Tucker. Don’t come.
Samjeeza will be there, and he’s angry, and I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“I want to be there,” he protests.
“But you won’t be. Because I’m asking you to stay away,” I whisper. I would say the same thing to Wendy, ask her not to come to the cemetery, but I already know she won’t listen.
Because she’s there, every time, in my vision.
“Please,” I say to Tucker. “Don’t come.”
He hesitates, then nods and files out of the church.
So finally, after a day that seemed longer than any other, like it could really have stretched a thousand years, I get out of the car at Aspen Hill Cemetery. I blink in the sunshine. I take a deep breath. And I start walking.
I thought I knew how this day would go, this day that finds me at last standing in a black dress in the grass at Aspen Hill Cemetery. I have seen it so many times. But this time, the real time, it doesn’t feel the same. I’m future-Clara now. There’s an ache in the middle of my chest that makes me want to cut my heart out and chuck it into the weeds. But I bear it. I walk. Because there is no other choice but to put one foot in front of the other.
I see Jeffrey ahead of me, and I say his name.
“Let’s just get this over with,” he says.
The color of his tie didn’t matter, after all.
Everyone’s here. The entire congregation, every single one of them, that I can tell, even the Julia lady. No one chickened out.
Funny that it turned out to be a self-fulfilling prophecy, my dream. I drive myself crazy trying to figure out why Tucker isn’t there. Thinking he’s dead. Thinking there shouldn’t be a force on earth that would keep him away. But in the end, he’s not there because I asked him not to be.
That’s what we call irony.
The ache really gets me then. This is it. My destined time. My gauntlet to run, and I was meant to do it without Tucker. It gets so bad I have trouble breathing. I stop to catch my breath.
Someone takes my hand. Christian, as I knew it would be. I take in the sight of him, his neat black suit, pressed white shirt, silver tie. His gold-flecked eyes are red-rimmed, like he’s been crying too. In them, a question and an answer all in one.
And this, I realize, is the moment of decision, what my vision has been warning me about all this time. I could break away now, pull my hand from his, tell him again that I don’t need him.
I could hold on to my anger, my frustration at this hopeless choice. Or I could accept him. I could face what’s between us, and move on. It’s such a big decision to ask of me now. It’s not really fair. But then, it never has been fair, this entire fiasco, from start to finish.
The thing is, with him holding my hand, touching my skin, the ache in my chest eases.
It’s like he has the ability to take on some of my pain. I feel so much better around him. Stronger.
And he is willing to take my pain. He wants to bear it with me.
I can see it shining in his eyes. I’m more than a duty to him. I’m more than his literal dream girl. I’m so much more.
I think back to that morning in November, in my kitchen in California when I first saw him standing there in the trees, waiting for me. My heart pounding, my mouth opening to call his name, even when I didn’t know it yet, that irresistible need I felt surging through me to go to him.
It all plays out in my mind like a movie reel, every moment I’ve spent with him since then, him carrying me to the nurse’s office on my first day of school, Mr. Erikson’s history class, the Pizza Hut. Riding the chairlift together. Prom. Sitting on the front porch looking at the stars. Him coming out of the trees the night of the fire. Every night he sat on the eaves, the meadow, the ski hill, this cemetery where he kissed me, every single moment that’s passed between us, I felt this force pulling me toward him. I’ve heard this voice, whispering in my head.
We belong together.
I don’t realize I’m holding my breath until I let it out. I gaze down at our joined hands.
His thumb strokes slowly over my knuckles. I look up again, at his face. Has he heard all this, the babbling of my heart? Has he read my mind?
You can do this, he says. I don’t know if he’s talking about Mom, or something else.
Maybe it doesn’t matter.
I meet his eyes, tighten my hand in his.
Let’s get up there, I send to him. People are waiting.
And together, we keep walking.
I expect the circle of people, the gaping hole in the ground with my mother’s coffin poised over it, but the shock of seeing it has worn off some. I know the words Stephen will say. I expect to sense Samjeeza there. But I didn’t know that I would feel sorry for him in that moment.
I didn’
t plan to go to him afterward, after the prayers are said and the coffin lowered into the ground, dirt layered over it, after the crowd scatters and leaves Jeffrey and Christian and Billy and me standing there. I feel Samjeeza, his sorrow that doesn’t come from being separated from God or going against his angelic design, but from finally accepting that he’s lost my mom for good. And I know so clearly what to do.
I let go of Christian’s hand. I walk off toward the fence at the edge of the cemetery.
Clara? Christian calls after me, alarmed.
Stay there. It’s all right. I won’t leave hallowed ground.
I call to Samjeeza.
He meets me at the fence. He comes up the hill in the form of a dog, then changes, standing silently on the other side of the chain-link with mournful amber eyes. He can’t cry—it’s not part of his anatomy. He hates that he hasn’t been given the dignity of tears.
This is awkward, him being evil and all. But I’ve finally moved beyond mad.
“Here,” I say.
I fumble to take a bracelet off my wrist, Mom’s old charm bracelet. I thrust it through a hole in the fence.
He looks at me, face slack with astonishment.
“Take it,” I urge.
He holds out his hand, careful not to touch me. I drop the bracelet into it. It tinkles as it falls. He closes his fingers around it.
“I gave this to her,” he says. “How did you . . . ?”
“I didn’t. I’m just playing it by ear, here.”
Then I turn and walk back to my family, and I don’t look back.
“Baby girl, you nearly gave me a heart attack,” says Billy.
“Let’s go,” I say. “I want to go home.”
Samjeeza is still standing there, like he’s been turned to stone, a marble angel in the cemetery, as we drive away.
What I really don’t expect is the police to be waiting for us when we get home.
“What’s this about?” Billy asks as we get out of the car to gawk at the police car parked in the driveway, the two officers poking around outside the house.
“We need to have a few words with Jeffrey Gardner,” one of them says. He looks at Jeffrey. “You him?”
Jeffrey goes pale.