Daemons in the Mist (The Marked Ones Trilogy: Book One) (4 page)

4

Pictures of You

Monday, January 9th

PATRICK

W
hen I got home I finally gave myself permission to freak out. I spent a good solid hour staring at my ceiling in shock. I had actually gotten up the courage to ask Nualla Galathea out, and even more shocking she had actually said
yes
. I had spent so long wishing that this would happen I hadn’t given much thought to what I would do if it actually
did
. If there was a higher power out there, they were probably laughing their ass off at me.

And then the panic set in—
and
the self-doubt.

What if it wasn’t real? What if I had hallucinated the whole thing? What if some part of my brain had just snapped? I mean, I
had
been feeling really ill as I walked toward them in the hall. What if I were actually in a hospital somewhere in a coma?

And even if it
was
all real, there were so many ways this could go wrong it wasn’t even funny. It wasn’t as if I had dated a whole lot of girls and would know what I was supposed to do. Knowing my luck I was probably going to manage to fuck things up in the first five minutes of our date.

I tried to calm myself.
Just play it cool Patrick, it’s not like you’re dating her or anything. You’re just going to one dance.

But what if we
were
dating now?
Should I change my Facebook status? No…best to wait until she does. But what if she’s waiting for me to change mine first?

I jumped up and all but ran to my computer. It would probably be a good idea to at least
add
her as a friend. I looked at my page, and there was already a friend request from her. I don’t think I had ever clicked a confirm button so fast in my life. But then I just sat there staring at the screen. What was I supposed to do now?

I decided to just roll with the punches; I mean what was the worst that could happen?

NUALLA

A
few hours of online investigation had turned up quite a lot about Patrick Connolly; the boy practically lived his life online. Forum posts, videos, pictures, and social media up the wazoo. He seemed to take pictures of everything around him, and I had to admit I was a little envious of how freely he could share his life with others. I, on the other hand, had to keep most of the things about myself private, hidden, secret. Like a CIA agent or a superhero, but without the awesome costume or badge.

The pictures told me what he liked to do, who he liked to hang out with and how unbelievably geeky he truly was. But the pictures also told me more about him than he probably ever intended.

One: he was most likely an only child with parents who worked too much. Even though he had a crap ton of pictures, his family was strangely absent from all of them. Other than his friends that sat with him at lunch he didn’t seem to be close to anyone else. Sure, there were other people in the pictures he took, but they all seemed to be just random strangers in even stranger costumes at some kind of event.

Two: I was pretty sure he had never left the Bay Area in his life. As far as I could tell every single picture was of somewhere in the greater Bay Area, which to me seemed a bit odd and only reinforced my previous deduction that he had busy parents who probably didn’t like to go on “family trips.”

Three: he was an incredibly good artist. What he couldn’t take pictures of, he seemed to draw or paint instead. I found hundreds of images of everything from the mundane to the fantastic. Precisely captured or quickly expressed, but all of them beautiful.

The more I learned about him, the more I wondered how in the hell he didn’t already have girls lined up around the block to date him. Their loss I guess.

It was when I was watching the same videos of him for the third time in a row that I had to admit I was entering creepy stalker territory. I finally made myself step away from the computer and go to bed. But that didn’t help me stop thinking about him as I drifted off to sleep. I didn’t know why he had just suddenly appeared in my life, but I was extremely glad he had.

5

A Thousand Different Ways

Friday, January 13th

PATRICK

T
he rest of the week was—awesome. Connor stopped getting on my case for staring at Nualla, and when I saw Michael in the hall I was pretty sure he loathed me, which just made me grin like an idiot. Best of all, Nualla talked to me in class as if we had always talked; like we had always been friends. I was so thrilled I didn’t even think to ask about her complete obliviousness to my existence for the last three years.

The more I talked to her, the less nervous about the whole thing I felt. It was like just being near her was putting me at ease. And this just made me stare at her all the more, which was how I finally got a good look at the pendant she always wore. It was a weird sort of silver circular pendant a little bigger than a quarter. It looked Egyptian with a gazelle horned deity, her hands held outstretched at her sides, a small crescent moon resting between her horns. A deep lapis blue enameled background covered with tiny silver stars, filled the space behind her, and a larger crescent encircled the whole design. An inscription ran across the outer crescent, but the symbols didn’t look Egyptian; they looked like something else—something I could almost remember.

“That’s a cool pendant,” I said as we worked on the day’s assignment in Mr. Lucas’ class.

“Thanks,” Nualla answered with a nervous smile.

“Where’d you get it?”

“My…my dad gave it to me when I was little,” she answered, a flicker of unease crossing her face.

“My mom gave me a pendant too.”

“Really?” Nualla asked, looking at my bare neck.

“But I seem to have lost it this week.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, and now it feels a little weird since I’ve been wearing it as long as I can remember. And I still haven’t told—” I cut off mid sentence when Mr. Lucas’ gaze drifted in our direction.

We studiously went back to work on the assignment, but I couldn’t help but notice how Nualla kept unconsciously rubbing her fingers over the surface of her pendant. And I realized with a start that I had done it again. This whole week I had found myself answering all kinds of things about myself, but still learning very little about her. And even though I had spent hours looking online, I hadn’t learned a whole lot from her Facebook page.

Sure, there were photos, but not a whole lot, and nothing that really revealed that much about her that I didn’t already know. I couldn’t believe that she didn’t lead an interesting life, so why didn’t she post any of it? It almost seemed like the bits that
were
online were just for show. Maybe her parents checked up on her, and she didn’t want them to see what she was up to or something.

So all I had to go on was what I had learned from just observing her in class. A lot of little things that added up to a very interesting picture—well at least to
me
anyways. Her favorite color was blue, she adored cats, and she had a fondness for big black boots. She hated having to pull her hair back for Chem class, and she drank coffee to an almost obsessive level. And a thousand other little quirks that made me adore her just that much more. But mostly I had learned that there was something different about her, something hiding behind those eyes. She gave herself away in a thousand different ways each day; I just didn’t know yet what all the pieces meant.

6

Let’s Get Out of This Town

Friday, January 13th

NUALLA

A
s Nikki and I walked down the street from the coffee shop it had started to rain, making the ground on Powell Street slick. We had nearly finished walking down the steepest part when I slipped. Instinctually my lightning-fast reflexes kicked in, and I landed in a comfortable crouch not a drop of coffee spilled. I looked around without moving my head. Dozens of people were flat out gawking at me.

Great,
just
great.

A guy just behind us, pizza in hand, spoke first. “Jesus girl, are you a gymnast or something?”

Nikki grabbed my arm pulling me to my feet and flashed a radiant smile at the guy. I could feel her influence hit him like a Mack truck. “No, she’s a martial arts champion.”

The guy must have bought the story because he smiled and continued walking down the street.

“Martial arts champion?” I said, questioningly.

“Your boobs are
way
too big for you to be a gymnast. Martial Arts was the only thing I could think of,” she answered with a shrug.

“
Right
,” I said, rolling my eyes.

I looked around, everyone else on the busy street had continued on their way paying us no mind. Well
almost
everyone. Patrick—who had apparently been walking down the street behind us—just stared at me, his mouth hanging open just a bit and his eyes wide with surprise. I would have thought he was following us if it wasn’t for the fact that the mall was at the end of the street.

“Oh
frak
, he totally saw that,” I cursed, turning back around quickly.

“Who?” Nikki asked, looking around.

“Patrick.”

Nikki looked over my shoulder completely failing at nonchalant. “Yeah, most likely.”

We came out of the dress shop, our dresses for the Winter Ball in hand. With a slightly self-satisfied smile, I imagined the look on Patrick’s face when he saw me in the dress. It was going to be priceless.

Nikki stopped and looked in her purse. “Frak! I left my phone in the store; I’ll be right back, ‘kay?”

As she dashed off back toward the dress shop, I looked around. We had stopped in front of a jewelry kiosk, so I looked through their displays to kill some time.

While I was examining one of the necklaces, the kiosk girl asked, “Can I help you with anything, miss?”

I looked up to answer her, but stopped. Michael was standing about a hundred feet behind her, looking around.

Great,
just
great.

“No I’m good,” I replied as I dropped down and pretended to tie my boot. The girl looked at me suspiciously but said nothing. I looked around for a place to hide; a bookstore stood a short distance away.

Perfect!

I chanced a quick glance in Michael’s direction. He was looking the other way. I took a deep breath and walked as quickly to the bookstore as I could without attracting too much unwanted attention. I really did
not
want to have to deal with Michael,
especially
outside of school where he was less likely to get in trouble for harassing me. The boy just didn’t seem to understand the word “
over
.”

I reached the bookstore and quickly stepped behind a front display shelf. I would be fine as long as he didn’t come in here. I took another deep breath and peered over the top of the shelf into the mall common area.

“Is he bothering you again?” someone asked quietly from behind me.

I jerked up with a start. I whipped my head around and was met with kind brown eyes. I knew those eyes.

Patrick?

“What, are you following me or something?” It sounded just a tad bit rude, but honestly it had just popped out of my mouth.

“No, actually I come here nearly every day.” He smirked at me in a friendly way. “You sure you’re not following
me
?”

I opened my mouth to say something, but caught sight of Michael looking in our direction. I grabbed Patrick’s hoodie and crouched down behind the short shelf of books. He looked at me, raising an eyebrow. “I’ll take that as a
yes
.”

“
Yes
he’s bothering me,” I answered, peeking around the corner of the bookcase.

After a minute or so of silence Patrick asked, “What’s in the bag?”

I turned my head quickly back toward him, meeting his eyes and almost wished I hadn’t. His eyes were the type of brown that was nearly black; deep pools that looked like they would swallow me if I looked too long.

I realized I had been holding my breath and let it out in an audible puff. “Huh?”

“The bag,” Patrick said as he pointed at the dress bag next to me.

I looked down at it then back up at him. “A dress.”

“Is it the one you’re going to wear to the dance?” he asked as he peered a little closer at the bag.

“Yeah,” I answered cautiously.

“Can I see it?”

“
No
, I want it to be a surprise,” I answered, scooting away from him to get a better look outside the window. Michael was still standing just outside the store and seemed to be having a heated conversation with someone on the other end of the phone.

Come on Michael go check out the food court or the theater,
anything
that gets me out of here without running into
you
.

“What does he want anyways?” Patrick asked, leaning over me to peer around the bookcase.

“Me,” I replied without pulling my eyes from the window.

“Well I can see why,” Patrick said matter-of-factly.

That got my attention; I turned quickly around to face him. “
Excuse me
?”

Patrick’s expression looked queasy—pained even—like he hadn’t meant for the words to
actually
be spoken out loud. “Oh
wow
, that sounded way stalkerish didn’t it?”

“Yeah, just a bit. But it’s okay; no one really says nice things like that to me.”

“
Really
? I would think guys would be falling all over themselves to tell you you’re pretty.”

“You might think that, but you’d be wrong.” I chanced a peek around the shelf again; Michael was still talking on the phone but had moved a few feet farther away. “I think I make them nervous,” I said in a small voice.

“Oh I can definitely understand that,” Patrick said with a slight smile in his voice.

I turned back to face him. “Do I make
you
nervous?” He stared at me open mouthed like he was unsure of what he should say. “I’ll take that as a
yes
.”

“Okay, you do—a little—okay,
a lot
. It’s just that—” Patrick stammered, a blush spreading across his cheeks.

“Can I help you two with something?” someone asked from behind us.

I looked up to see a very bored, college aged guy, staring down at us over a stack of books in his hands. “Um…” I looked out the window again in time to see Michael going down the escalator. “Nope we’re good.” I stood up, grabbed Patrick’s hand, and walked quickly to the exit.

Patrick let me drag him for several feet before he asked, “So by our quick escape I’m guessing Michael’s gone somewhere else?”

“You would be correct.”

I whipped out my phone and quickly texted Nikki as I walked. Looking up every few seconds to make sure I didn’t run into anyone.

Please have found your phone by now Nikki.

Michael’s here want to get out of town?

I wove around a pack of stroller moms but didn’t lessen my pace. I hoped Patrick wouldn’t think I was a complete lunatic, but after what he had seen happen between Michael and me this week, I kinda doubted he would. But still somehow what he thought of me mattered, maybe a little more than it should.

My phone buzzed and I looked down at it again.

Sure I’ll call Shawn & tell him to pick us up out front k.

It was then that I realized I was still dragging Patrick through the mall. I stopped and turned a little too suddenly, his hand still in mine. Unable to stop his momentum, he ran straight into me, and we crashed to the floor.

Sigh.
Sometimes I forgot just how much slower human reactions were to ours.

Patrick looked at me in horror—his legs straddling my hips—  before he quickly got back to his feet.

I just had to smile at him because he looked so embarrassed even though it was completely my fault. “Wanna get out of here?” I asked, broadening my smile.

After a short pause his lips slid into a grin, and he offered his hand to me. “Sure, why not.”

Once back on my feet, we all but sprinted to the exit.