Gypsy (The Cavy Files Book 1)

by Trisha Leigh

  Mole’s attention never leaves me, his sightless eyes strangely focused, as always. In fact, everyone’s watching me with varying levels of interest—Maya delighted, Savannah with steam coming out of her ears, and Mole 100 percent indecipherable.

  “I do, actually. Have plans with my father.”

  My rescue from the awkward situation comes, oddly enough, in the form of Dane Kim. He wanders up to our little group on his way to the exit, since once our eyes meet he doesn’t have much of a choice. If my nerves tickle over Jude’s presence, they’re throbbing now that I’m aware Dane knows more than he’s saying. Aching, like someone sawed them off and then brushed them with lemon juice.

  I force a smile because we’re supposed to be friends, but while Jude’s betrayal stung, Dane’s hurts. I thought we had things in common, that we were friends. The quiet kind, the kind that didn’t have to explain every little feeling. Turns out I didn’t have to explain because he already knows.

  “Dane, this is… everyone. Everyone, Dane Kim.” Every syllable scrapes my throat raw.

  They introduce themselves one at a time. Dane’s eyes linger on Mole, whose shoulders and neck are wound so tight his muscles tremble and jerk. Their handshake looks stiff, and when they drop hands, Mole wipes his palm on his thigh.

  The silence that follows tries to cow me, so I punch it in the face. “What are you doing here, Dane? I didn’t think you were coming.”

  “Still think I’m spying on you, Norah?” The playful inside joke is a nod to our friendship, and thirty minutes ago would have delighted me.

  At least it tells me he’s got no idea that Mole and I overheard him on the phone. That I’m the spy, spying on the spy.

  It makes sense now, Dane always knowing the right thing to say. From the first day of school he’s acted as though we share a secret—silly me, thinking it was something innocent like being new at Charleston Academy.

  Despite the betrayal, nothing can change. We need to know what he’s up to.

  “No,” I say, trying for nonchalance. “I just didn’t know you liked basketball.”

  “There’s still a lot we don’t know about each other, I suppose.”

  The pause swells, grows uncomfortable, like a too-big meal once you leave the table. I clear my throat, edging toward Mole and pushing him sideways. “Well, it’s nice to see you, as ever. We’ve really got to get going. I promised my father we could watch Star… something. And I’m running late.”

  “See you Monday, then? More tutoring?” Jude waits for my confirmation, then gives me a smile that’s confident—in himself, in what he and I have begun, maybe both—then turns to his friends. “You ladies ready for some coffee and dessert?”

  The girls nod, and Savannah makes a point to hug Mole and tell him she loved meeting him. A spike of jealousy makes me want to yank out her curls, confusing me, to say the least.

  It’s not all that weird, I suppose. The two of them clearly have a rapport born from their prickly senses of humor, but Mole is my friend. The thought of sharing him with her pisses me off.

  Which isn’t fair, considering she’s sharing her friends with me.

  Then they leave, headed to Kaminsky’s, a late-night coffee spot that attracts most CA kids after games and after school, and pretty much whenever they need caffeine. It’s just Mole, Dane, and me left in the atrium. Dane’s mention of cavies rushes back, tugs on my fear and worry, but before I can figure out the right way to ask about it, Mole whirls on him.

  “Who are you?” Mole asks, staring right at Dane.

  “What are you talking about? I just introduced myself.” Something flickers in Dane’s eyes. It’s not confusion. It’s apprehension.

  “No, but I mean… maybe the question is, what are you?”

  “You’re freaking me out, Stevie Wonder. I’m a human being. Like you, no?”

  The derogatory tone ruffles my feathers, but the question tagged on the end stands every hair on my body on end. There’s nothing in Dane’s face that proves he’s suggesting what it sounds as though he’s suggesting—except the fact that it’s blank. Innocent. His face is never like that.

  “Right. Like me.” Mole’s face goes whiter than it had outside the classroom earlier.

  I wonder if something else happened. Maybe when they shook hands, because Mole had his shock under control until Dane walked up. I’m losing my grip on my patience, and every neuron in my brain fires at once, begging me to just ask Dane Kim what he knows about Cavies.

  I can’t gauge whether I’d be giving knowledge away instead of reeling it in. Dane might know something, but we don’t know what.

  Then again, Mole’s not exactly being cool.

  “We heard you talking on your phone a little bit ago. In that empty classroom.” I skirt the edge of the confession, dipping a toe into the water.

  That flicker again. Definitely apprehension, though he tucks it away fast. “Who’s spying now?”

  “It was an accident. But you said something that made me curious.” Another couple of toes. The water feels hot, like I want to be very careful about going in all the way.

  “You speak Korean?”

  “No. Stop deflecting.” I try a smile, mostly failing but taking him by surprise. In that moment his guard drops, and he’s less intimidating. He’s Dane, the guy who sat with me in the graveyard, who has an uncanny knack of making me feel better about not having all the answers. “You said an English word that sounds familiar, but I looked it up on my phone and it’s not in the dictionary. Cavies. What does it mean?”

  His reaction is subtle—a pause, a deliberate breath, out through his nose. Then he cocks his head, one eyebrow raised, doing his best to look confused.

  I don’t know how, but I know he’s faking.

  “That’s because it’s a plural. Cavy, the singular, is a proper noun,” he explains. “A South American guinea pig, to be exact.”

  The definition, one I’ve never known, rips me open me with a hot poker.

  The Philosopher told us they had to create a new word because no term existed that could do the ten of us justice, and the truth leaves a welt that’s hard to conceal. They’d been calling us guinea pigs the whole time. Like some sort of sick joke, given that their favorite pastime was experimenting on us, and it’s easy to see now that their tests had always been about their goals.

  “Why were you talking about guinea pigs? That’s a little strange.” Mole recovers while I’m still reeling, but it’s hard to understand him through the haze of betrayal fogging up my brain.

  I’m like a fish on the end of a pole, flopping, desperate to breathe but with no way to make it happen. Concern, the honest sort, touches Dane’s dark gaze and he reaches out, wrapping a hand around my bicep like he’s afraid I’m going to fall down.

  No number. There’s no number and he knows about the Cavies.

  He ignores Mole, stepping closer to me. “Are you okay, Norah?”

  The soft worry in his voice combines with his sturdy touch to give purchase to my scrabbling emotions, even though his touch is what’s freaking me out. Well, part of it. “Yes. Maybe if I can just sit down for a second?”

  Dane guides me away from the glass case and Mole follows the sound of our footsteps. The way he cracks his knuckles gives away his own concern—for me, for this precarious situation—but he doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t have to. The silent comfort of his presence has always been enough.

  Once I’m settled on a wooden bench, Dane turns back to Mole. “Cavies are part of a science project I’m thinking of doing. My dad wanted to know the best animals to experiment on so he could order them tonight. Cavies are great. They take whatever you give them and never protest. Like they think no one would ever hurt them. Or maybe they’re just dumb. Either way.”

  Dane has never sounded more snide, and the tone leaves no doubt in my mind that it’s an insult—one we can’t defend without giving ourselves away.

  I’m eye level with Mole’s hands, and they curl into fis
ts.

  “If you’re okay, Norah, I’d better be going. Shiloh here will get you home, I have no doubt.”

  Dane leaves without waiting for a response, which is fine because it’s getting harder and harder to hold down the vomit. Ralphing in front of him would only prove that he’s gotten to me.

  The glass doors at the front of the atrium close behind him, and the moment he hears the snick of their latch, Mole sinks down next to me. He fumbles for a moment to find my shoulders, then pulls my cheek to his chest. We’ve had years of practice. There’s no one’s touch I trust more. No one who can make the world better by just sitting next to me, letting me breathe him in, as odd as that sounds. The scents of mint and basil are fading beneath the fresher detergent smell, but linger enough to soothe me.

  The comfort knocks tears from my eyes, and they soak silently into his shirt. His heart thuds too hard, too fast, and the shuddering of his breath tells me Dane’s definition hasn’t left him unwounded, either.

  “They were making fun of us,” I whisper. “The Philosopher and everyone. Calling us guinea pigs and acting like they made it up because we’re special.”

  His fingers tighten on my shoulder. We both know it’s true. Somehow, it feels truer than anything they ever told us. It’s a long time before he speaks. The sound rumbles straight into my face, vibrate my cheek, but it’s too soon to think about letting him go. It might always be too soon.

  “When Dane shook my hand, it made me cold. It freaked me out, felt like a threat, and I reached for the heat just in case. But it wasn’t there.” Terror trembles through his confession.

  For me, touching Dane and not seeing his age of death was almost a welcome shock. The lost look on Mole’s face suggests this is different. A nightmare.

  “I meant to say something the other day about not seeing his number, but after the attacks and the increased power of our mutations, it didn’t seem important.” I hug him tighter. “I meant to talk to you about it, but we haven’t been alone. I miss you, Mole.”

  “You’ve got all these new friends. They’re nice, even the superstar. I thought… I was trying to let you have this new kind of life, if it’s what you want.”

  “I like them, but they’re not you. I can’t talk to them about everything. Even if we figure out what’s going on with us, I would never trade you guys. Could never.” I take a shaky breath, scared even thinking about it. “Why do you think our talents don’t work on Dane?”

  “I don’t know how, but it felt like he blocked it. Like the heat hit a wall.”

  “How could he do that, unless he knows what to block?”

  “He knows, Gyp. I don’t know how, or why he’s trying to keep it a secret, but that stuff about a science project is bullshit, and we all know it.”

  I sit up, crossing my legs so that my knees press against Mole’s thigh, and peer into his face. He’s looking back at me, into me, with that uncanny way he has of making me feel as though, even though he’s blind, he’s the only person who can really see me.

  “What are we going to do?”

  “I don’t know. Wait, I guess. Keep looking for the attackers, find out if they’re like us. You keep being friends with Dane, see what he’ll tell you. We’ll see everyone else in Beaufort on Sunday, and we can talk more then. I have a feeling we’re going to find out the truth sooner or later.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  My father and I spent Friday night and most of Saturday in front of the television watching those movies, which turn out to be called Star Wars, and I like them except for Anakin Skywalker. He’s a real piece of work, and I don’t see how Natalie Portman could have any faith in his supposed goodness after he tried to kill her and his unborn child. Children. But, whatever.

  The films weren’t in the library at Darley, and while they played on the screen I wondered why. Then it occurs to me that in Star Wars, the Jedis are different. Have powers. I spent half the night online, researching movies by genre and content, and couldn’t believe all of the films out there about people like us—people who mutated, accidentally or on purpose, until they had some special power or ability.

  It seems that, although we’ve been imagining that finding out about the Cavies would be a shock to society, we’re the ones who keep being surprised by the idea that we’re not a novelty. Of course, the mutations in the movies are fiction. Society might not be quite ready to take the real thing in stride, and I doubt they’d see us as heroes.

  The Philosopher must have desired our ignorance. None of the movies revolving around the concept of genetic mutation were available to us at Darley.

  The question is, why?

  It’s just one of the questions that plays on a loop in my mind while Maya and I spend Saturday texting about whether Jude, Dane, and Mole all have crushes on me—or rather, she keeps harping on it while I try to change the subject.

  Jude texts once on Saturday night to ask if we can get together to study on Sunday instead of Monday because he has extra basketball practice. I reply that I’m getting together with the other kids from Darley but that we can do it afterward if it’s not too late, wondering the whole time why we’re studying if he’s determined to fail.

  We don’t talk about that, but we do talk about the other kids from Darley.

  At first, it makes me wonder if he’s still doing research for his dad, but none of the questions are suspicious. He asks their names, what they’re like, how close we are, stories about growing up, things like that. They’re real, the things I share, and not being able to talk about the Cavies’ mutations makes me realize how much more there is to like about them. Even Pollyanna, who goes out of her way to make other people uncomfortable. I’ve always thought maybe she acts that way to be sure she’s not accidentally using her ability to make friends.

  Jude and I talk for a long time, and when he finally admits he’s falling asleep, the clock beside my bed says it’s after three in the morning. I close my eyes, feeling lucky to have good friends and even happier that tomorrow we’ll all be together again for the first time since leaving Darley.

  I drift away and tumble headlong into a dream, a perfect place where my new friends and the Cavies spend a Sunday together in Waterfront Park. Even Dane is there, but there are no worries, no one who wants to exploit us or stab us, we’re just… living.

  Sunday dawns in the real world and anticipation propels me out of bed with more force than mornings usually inspire. I cannot wait to get to Beaufort. It’s a good thing the twins convinced their dad they might fall into an irreversible depression without in-person contact with the Cavies before he gets to know them and realizes that depression and the twins should never be used in the same sentence.

  Even though it’s not even 7:00 a.m., the clanks and bangs from downstairs suggest my father is awake and in the kitchen, hopefully about to cook some bacon. We’re supposed to be in Beaufort by ten, and it’s about an hour and a half drive, depending on traffic.

  I fly in and out of the shower in record time, then grab the same pair of jeans I wore Friday and pair them with an orange-and-brown sweater and a pair of boots. It takes thirty minutes to wrestle my hair, and in the end, I get impatient and twist it into a braid before clomping down the stairs.

  I filch a piece of bacon from the plate on the table, munching on my way to the fridge for grape juice. My father’s initial discomfort and hesitation over having me around has started to ease to gentle, encouraging, and this is the one area of my life that’s going smoothly. If the world outside, full of Dane Kim’s evasions and syringes and homeless people and new abilities, makes me want to hide, this house, my father, might be turning into a safe place to hunker down.

  He flashes me a smile from the stove, where he’s flipping French toast. “Funny how most parents with kids your age would be tearing their hair out about all the noise and the banging on the stairs, but it makes me happy.”

  “I’m sure it’ll wear off.”

  “I doubt it. I just got you, and I’ll only
have you here for a while, so it’s easier to appreciate.”

  My stomach sinks, the bacon caught in my throat. “Why will you only have me for a while?”

  “Because you’re seventeen years old. Next year you’ll be eighteen and then you’ll be off to college, if you want. Either way, you’re almost grown.”

  I sit at the table, taking a moment to recover from his statement, which meant nothing sinister, but sounded that way at first. It makes me realize that even if we deal with what’s changing now, adjustments are just part of life.

  He sits across from me, looking sad as he slides a plate of French toast my direction.

  “Maybe, but I’ll still be your daughter.”

  “You’re right, Norah Jane. Of course. It’s hard to explain why having you around makes me a little bit sad sometimes, is all.”

  “Because of my mother?” It’s a subject we haven’t really broached, because I’ve been waiting for him to bring it up.

  “Yes. She would have been so happy to meet you.” He clears his throat, and tears shine in his eyes before he looks away, intent on drowning his entire plate in syrup. “Eat up. We’ve got to leave in twenty minutes or so if we’re going to make it to Beaufort by ten.”

  I copy the way he squirts syrup on his bacon as well as the pastry, then take a hesitant bite. It’s delicious. Salty and sweet together. The golden brown color of the syrup reminds me of Jude’s eyes, and also the way he’s a little bit salty and a lot sweet—he doesn’t let anyone walk all over him, but he’s always polite about it.

  “What are you thinking about?” My father watches me, a slight, knowing smile tipping up one corner of his mouth.

  “Nothing,” I insist, ignoring the heat in my face.

  He chuckles, my palms start to sweat, and we spend the rest of breakfast snickering through sticky lips.