“You will stay.” His voice makes me look up from studying his toes.
“Yes.” I shift so I'm closer to him, hoping he won't move away. “Will you keep coming?”
“I will.” No hesitation. It makes me flush. I wish I were so sure of things.
“Why?” I ask.
He looks up at the sky, like he's searching for answers. He looks back down at me, his hair shifting for a second to reveal his eyes. All I want to do is see them again, let myself get pulled in. Trapped.
“I will come.”
“Suit yourself.”
I bring out the book from my bag. I don't feel right keeping it, even though I'm not sure it's his. I still can't shake the name Ellen Mackintire. I've thought about looking it up online, but I want to ask him about it. I just have to find the right time.
“Did you leave this for me?” I ask, even though I know the answer.
“I did.” A direct answer! I want to throw some confetti on him or do a dance or something.
“Why?”
“I thought you would enjoy it. Did you not?” He talks like he's from an old movie. Not like a normal person. I like it.
“No, I did like it. I was just wondering where you got it. It's very old.” I gingerly hold it out to him.
“It took me many years to find it.” His hands stay where they are.
“So it's yours? I saw the bookplate in the back. I'm not saying that you stole it. I just wondered how someone like you would come across something like this.” I still hold it out for him to take.
“There are many things you don't know about me.” He glances up at the stars again.
“Thank you, Captain Obvious.” He doesn't respond to that. “Here. I'm afraid of keeping it. I don't want to be responsible for it.”
“You may hold onto it.” He doesn't take it.
“What if it falls apart? It's got to be worth some money. You could sell it and buy some shoes.” I practically shove it at him.
“It is only a book.” His eyes pierce through the layer of hair.
“If it's only a book, then why did you search so hard for it? I mean, you could probably sell it on eBay for a lot of money.”
He pushes the book back. Not a shove, but enough pressure that I stop. He holds onto it, his fingers inches from mine.
“I would never sell it.”
“Then why give it to me?”
“Ava.” It's only the third time he's said my name. “You will not harm it.” He lets go.
“Or else you'll kill me, right? You said so last time.” He doesn't deny it.
I wipe some moisture off the cover. God, I was never going to be able to keep it safe. It belonged in a museum.
“Thanks for sharing it with me.” It's the only thing I can think to say.
“I am glad to have someone to share it with.” I don't think he's just talking about the book. It's like we're sharing something deeper, our souls or something. I shake my head at myself. I'm reading way too much into this. I lean my head back and watch the stars. Neither of us says anything or moves. Not until my back gets sore and the cold is too much to stand.
“Good-bye, Peter.” This time I'm the first to say it.
“Good-bye, Ava.” He doesn't look away from the stars.
~^*^~
The next morning I make a detour to the cemetery before school, placing a book just where he'd left the other one. Something appropriate. Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book. I hope it'll be gone when I check on it later. I also hope he won't think that giving him a book by that title means that I'm creepy cemetery girl. I fell in love with that book a while ago, but I haven’t been able to share it with anyone. It was too dark for my mother, and Tex doesn’t like anything fictional.
I liked the dark. Clearly more than I was aware of.
All day long, my mind is in the cemetery, wondering if he's gone back.
“Hey!” I yell. I look down and see Tex, biting my shoulder. She releases me from her teeth before I can shrug her off.
“I had to have some way to get your attention.” She sits back in her seat. The sound of the lunchroom pulls me back to the world outside my own head.
“Sorry, I'm really tired,” I say, yawning.
“From what?” Her eyes follow Ryan Harding as he walks by on his way to his posse's table. As soon as he puts his arm around the girl he's currently seeing, her eyes snap back to me.
“I just can't sleep lately.” I become really interested in my veggie pita.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
I shrug. “Not really.” Understatement of the year.
“Sure?” Her eyebrows rise with skepticism.
I shake my head. “Yeah. I'm just kinda behind on homework and stuff. No big deal.” My lunch is tasteless and chokes me on its way down my throat.
“Do you want me to call you off work?” She slips her shoes off and crosses her legs on her chair before digging into her sub.
“No, I need the money.” That isn't really true either. With my mother buying me stuff all the time, I've been saving a lot of money lately.
“If you say so.”
She grabs her purse and rummages around. She's got this ugly leather bag that I'm almost positive has no bottom. Like Mary Poppin's bag that she pulls a lamp out of. Tex starts piling things on the table while I wonder what the hell the clanking noise is emanating from the depths of the purse. Tex named her purse Harold. I don't know why.
“Aha!” She pulls out a large wedge of chocolate, half-eaten, but still wrapped in foil. “Chocolate solves everything. Here.” She shoves it in my face.
“Uh, thanks.” I take it from her.
“Eat. You look pale.”
I fold back the foil, remove some purse lint and bite off a corner. It's a little old, but still good. Tex has a soft spot for Belgian chocolate. I eat a little more while she watches me like I'm a bomb that's going to blow up.
She knows something is up. She just doesn't know that it is two somethings, and I can't tell her about either of them. I make it through the rest of the day only falling asleep once in French, but I might have done that under normal circumstances. I have no idea how I'm going to make it through work, but at least it keeps me busy.
Tex and I get stuck unloading a huge shipment of books, many of which I put aside to buy. Using my employee discount, of course. At least Toby isn't there. I cannot stand his sounds of disapproval and his awful unibrow.
“I am so tired of books.” She stabs her knife into yet another box.
“You're the one who wants to be a librarian, explain that to me.” I grab another new release that I've been wanting for months. They might as well pay me in books this week.
“Easy. Same as if you were a male gynecologist you wouldn't want to have sex with your wife when you got home.” She yanks out some Bubble Wrap and starts popping it.
“Ugh, Tex! You are so vulgar sometimes.” I chuck one of those plastic pillows of air they put between the books so they don't rattle around at her. I miss.
“Look at you, using big words.”
“Pretty soon you're not going to be able to understand me. I'll be so smart that you'll have no idea I'm insulting you.” I chuck my empty box at her. I miss again.
“And then I'll just punch you in the face.” Of course she would. She took karate a few years ago and I know she still has her skills.
“I'll just continue to eviscerate you with my words.” I stick my chin in the air and speak in a lofty British tone.
“And then I will punch you some more.”
I cross my eyes at her and we both laugh until her mother comes out of her office to glare at us for messing around when we're supposed to be working. There's always someone glaring at us.
Tex's parents are serious booksellers. They both wear glasses, even though neither of them needs vision correction. They are just that serious. It is a great mystery as to where Tex's sharp-as-knives wit comes from. Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton are squares about everything except
naming their children.
“Coby, what are you doing?” Tex's thirteen-year-old brother lurks in a corner, looking sketchy, as usual.
“Nothing,” he mumbles. I haven't heard him talk in a normal voice for years. I also haven't seen his eyes in a few years, since he never looks at anything above the floor. They're probably stuck that way.
Tex gives him a glare of her own. Then, and only then, she looks exactly like her mother. “You'd better get going. Mom wants these boxes broken up and put in the Dumpster ASAP.”
He swooshes his hair out of his face, but it just settles back in the same place. “Yeah, I'm going.” He takes a box and shuffles off.
“I swear, he gets more emo every day. I'm going to have to start checking his room for razor blades,” she says after she's sure he's out the door. Not that it really matters if he is present. I've seen their parents talk about him as if he isn't even there, which probably doesn't help with the whole emo thing.
“His hair is starting to get a bit too long,” I say, holding my fingers up to show how much.
“The moment it completely covers his eyes and he starts wearing black nail polish and skinny jeans, I'm having an intervention.”
“What do your parents think?” Tex glances into the office, making sure her mom's on the phone.
“They don't. Mom still thinks he's her wittle baby. He could shove coke up his nose in front of her and she wouldn't see it. Honestly, it's sick.”
Tex and her brother, full name Cobalt Harrison Joshua Hamilton, have clashed from the moment he was born. I think her parents hope that someday, down the road, they'll have one of those movie moments where they find common ground and pull together and hug and all that, but I don't see it happening anytime soon.
“He's just such a pain in the ass.” The back door slams, letting us know he's back inside.
“Aren't all little brothers?”
“Supposed to be, anyway.” She stops talking when her mother yells at her to go empty the trash cans. She rolls her eyes and makes a gun with her fingers, miming shooting herself in the head. I nod sympathetically, even though I don't agree.
I've never told her I'm jealous. Not of her having Coby, specifically, but that she has someone else, even a surly emo brother. I always wished I had a big brother. Someone who would take over as the man of the house and would keep us together after we lost my mother. Someone strong that would never break, never crack. I guess I want a superhero, but they don't exist.
~^*^~
I'm shuffling through my books, looking for my copy of Dracula that I want to give Peter when there's a sound on my window. Unlike a normal person, who would assume it was a bird or something, I assume it's someone trying to kill me.
My eyes search for a weapon and the only thing I come up with is an old dance trophy I won when I was five. Well, not really won. They gave them to everyone, so it is kind of small. Deciding it's better than nothing, I pick up the trophy, holding it at the ready. Clearly, it's not a bird outside, because birds don't raise windows. I get ready to beat the daylights out of whoever it is. Screaming isn't really an option.
Instead of hitting the person who climbs through my window, I say, “What are you doing here?” It's not the scary guy in a ski mask I pictured; it's Peter, which is almost scarier in a way.
“I came to see you,” he says, as calm as if this happens every night. His hair's really messy, all blown around, like he's been in a wind tunnel.
I'm still clutching the trophy, like my arms are frozen. My brain can't understand what he's doing here. In my bedroom, moonlight spilling all around him like liquid light.
“Why?”
“I came to see you,” he repeats.
My curtains shiver in the breeze. I shiver too, and not just from the cold night air.
“Get out of my room.” Wait, how had he even gotten in? My brain starts to catch up to the situation. “How the hell did you get in here?” I want to go look out the window to see if he's got a ladder or something, but he's still standing in my way, so that's a no go. Unless he somehow climbed onto the overhang under my window, then it would be easy to get in. Still, it is at least fifteen feet to the ground.
“The roof.” What had he done, scaled the walls like Spiderman? Is he Spiderman? His name is Peter.
“What do you want?” My arms are tired of holding the trophy up, but I'm not putting it down.
“I wanted to see you.”
“Why?” I almost yell it, wanting a straight answer so I can decide whether to freak out or hit him with the trophy. Something needs to happen, one way or the other. Thankfully, my parents’ room is downstairs, or else they might have heard me.
“I don't know.” He says it as if he really doesn't know.
I fight the panic that rises in my throat and pounds in my ears and makes me sweat. “Will you back off for a second?” He takes one step back as I reach out to flick on the light. He doesn't blink at the brightness. “I think you should leave. I'm not really cool with people coming into my bedroom at night unannounced.” My voice quivers.
“I am sorry you are frightened.”
“It's okay.” My heart is beating right next to my vocal chords.
There it is, that voice that sounds way older than twenty, or however old he is. It finally hits me with the force and power of a freight train. All those little doubts I've had about him being something else. Maybe it's the fact that he got onto the roof that did it.
“Peter. What are you?” I finally lower the trophy. My stupid arms won't stop quivering, so it isn’t threatening anyway. Not that I think he's going to do anything. I hope.
“If I told you, would you believe me?” His head goes to the side, his hair sliding away from his eyes. I may have dropped my weapon, but I'm not looking in his eyes.
“Yes. I know you're not human. I just can't figure out what that means.”
For a second, I look up and our eyes meet. God, they're amazing. I can actually see them now. One green as sea glass, the other blue as sapphire. Mesmerizing. Stop looking!
“I could show you.”
“Okay.” I back up until my legs are against my bed. My knees give out and I sit without meaning to.
Without another word, he pulls his shirt over his head. Oh, God. Is he going to rape me? A scream assembles in my throat, whirling like a hurricane. My pepper spray's in my purse, which is downstairs. So basically, I'm out of luck unless a miracle happens.
“My dad is right downstairs. He'll call the cops,” I say around the scream I'm still holding in, my voice dry and weak as paper.
Peter just closes his eyes. I tremble, trying to figure out the best place to hit him or punch him and how I'm going to do that and vault over the bed to get out the door. I should invest in a Taser. Or I should just carry the pepper spray around with me everywhere.
I'm distracted from my plans by something happening behind Peter. Something dark unfurls, spreading out behind him, making a small ripping noise that reminds me of Velcro. Wings. A set of silky black wings. What. The. Crap.
“What the hell?”
He opens his dual-colored eyes and looks right at me. The contact hits me like a slap. I slide off the bed onto the floor.
“I am called many things. Angel. Demon. God. Vampire. Immortal, and that is just in America.”
“What are you?”
He turns, showing me the set of wings that sprout from his back. I keep blinking, as if they're an optical illusion or a trick or something. Anything other than that this is actually happening, because it can't be. “You may touch them, if you like.”
Trembling, and against my better judgment, I get on my knees and hold my hand out. One finger brushes a feather so fine that you can't tell where one begins and the other one ends. The weak light from the lamp bounces off the feathers, showing their iridescence. They sprout right from his shoulder blades, skin blending into feathers without a seam.
“So you're an angel?” I lose my nerve and sit back, hard.
> “I am not,” he says, looking over his shoulder at me. His hair matches the color of his wings. His freaking wings.
“Okay,” I say slowly. I scoot backward, pushing myself with my hands. As pretty as the wings are, I don't want to be close to him. Who knows what else is going to pop out from his back? I'm pretty sure the pepper spray has been rendered useless. Someone who's got wings is bound to have other powers.
His eyes reach for mine, and he says, “The closest to what I am is immortal. I cannot die.”
“I know what immortal is,” I snap. For a moment, I wonder if all this is real. Like in The Matrix. Maybe all this is just a dream, or a weird government conspiracy.
“So what was with all that suicide stuff?”
“While I may be immortal, my existence can end.”
“How?”
Blink.
Guess I'm not getting an answer on that one. Moving on... I rewind to something he said earlier. One of the words snags on my brain.
“Wait, you said vampire.” I hold up my hand, as if I can stop this runaway train of a situation.
“I drink blood to supply energy.”
“Holy Fuck.” I dive backward, slamming into my nightstand, groping for the trophy. Foolish, seeing as how he just told me he can't die. His wings shift as he turns around.
“I will not drink yours.” He puts his hands up, palms out, like he's calming a frightened animal. The animal is me.
“How the hell do I know that?” For some reason, the fact that he wants to drink my blood freaks me out more than when he said he was going to kill me.
“I told you that I would kill you. You told me that if I truly wanted to, I would have done it already. You were correct.” This isn't reassuring anymore.
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I trust you.” He stretches his wings out as far as they will go, which isn't very far. The tips hit my bookshelf and door on either side. They're really... impressive and shiny.
“Why? You don't know anything about me.”
“I just do.” He tucks them back in again, folding them in like the sleeves of a shirt. I wonder if they're heavy. They certainly look very solid.