Ice (19 page)

I returned the smile, somehow feeling like “your welcome” was inappropriate, like I would be taking credit for a thanks I didn’t feel worthy of. I couldn’t find the right words to say, so I just said, “I’m glad he’s okay.”

“I know my dad can come off as kind of a jerk sometimes, but he’s really grateful and I know he’ll never forget it.”

I just kept the smile on my face, even more unsure of what to say, so I settled for a goodbye and thanked Suka for letting Kavick drive me home in her dad’s vehicle.

Kavick and I walked out of the hospital carrying our junk food. When we got in the SUV, Kavick wasn’t in any hurry to start the engine.

“Aren’t you taking me home?” I asked as he took a big bite of one of his pastries.

“Once we finish eating,” he said amidst chews. “I didn’t eat much at the Factory ‘cause their food tasted like crap.”

I laughed and then took a swig of my pop. We chatted as we ate, taking our time. It was dark sitting in the vehicle, but the bright glow from a nearby pharmacy’s neon sign gave us a little light.

“So what was that about you getting married?” I asked nonchalantly.

He stopped eating for a moment and stared straight ahead at the pharmacy. It seemed like he was choosing his words very carefully. Finally he said, “I guess you could say I’m kind of betrothed to her.”

I raised an eyebrow
at him. “Wow…how can you be ‘kind of’ betrothed, though?”

He shook his head and resumed eating. “I have no idea. I would like to know how on earth I became just a little betrothed.”

I laughed and said, “So start explaining.”

He took a drink of his soda and sighed. He stared at the neon sign again and then started talking with his hands to help explain. “Well…there are really not that many people like me anymore.
You know, shape-shifters, Wolf-People, werewolves— whatever you want to call us, so Anana’s dad wants her to marry another Wolf-Person. I was not his ideal choice because I’m technically a wolf-dog, and he wants her to marry a ‘true wolf’…but he doesn’t have that many options.”

He stopped for a moment
like he had suddenly gotten tired from just thinking about it. He did not seem like the happy groom who couldn’t wait for his wedding day. Instead, he seemed like he didn’t want to get married at all. I ate silently, intently listening to him continue to explain the situation.

“Adrik used to give my family a hard time about a lot of things, actually. Our name; my grandfather wanted to change his name after all of the traveling, being cast out of so many places where there were a lot of Natives like himself. He chose Skarling because he got a scar on his chest from where one of the villagers tried to kill him. Well, Adrik thinks it’s a strange name and draws attention, so he doesn’t want any of his daughters taking on that name, but I made it clear I’m staying a Skarling.”

Kavick rolled his eyes before continuing, frowning as he spoke. “Adrik used to try to keep his daughters from playing with me and my brothers when we were little, because we were ‘dirty dogs’. He didn’t want them being around anyone who wasn’t a ‘true wolf’. He couldn’t keep us apart, though. Anana was always playing with Tupit and me, Suka playing with Tartok and my other brothers. Sometimes all of us would change into wolves and chase each other outside of town in the wilderness.

“Despite all the things Adrik would say about us, when one of us
would be discovered or our reputation would somehow follow us from the other places we had been, his family and mine would always travel together. We stuck together, because we knew that if it wasn’t safe for one family, it wouldn’t be safe for the other. We both just wanted to find a safe place for us to live. Then we met the O’Connells in Nome. My family, the Millers, and the O’Connells lived in a part of Nome that was densely populated with Eskimos. Both the O’Connels and my family have several Caucasian ancestors and our last names aren’t Eskimo, so we stood out at school and people wouldn’t believe us when we said we had Yupik and Inuit ancestry. We didn’t much like Nome, anyway. Suka and Anana didn’t like it, either, even though they didn’t get picked on at school. It was barren, and even colder there than it is here.

“Then, one day we went to a party
. I don’t remember what it was for, but the whole community was invited. People made their own costumes and masks that were supposed to be inspired by their Native ancestry. My family, the O’Connells, and the Millers showed up with masks of wolves. Not long after the party, one of the people in the village was attacked by a wolf. Wolf attacks are extremely rare, so some people started blaming us. Apparently, someone had seen us turn into wolves and started telling people about it after the attack. Whether anyone actually believed we could turn into wolves, I’m not sure, but they acted like we were somehow responsible for it, so we left.

“Our families worked our way down to Riverton over the years, and as Adrik’s daughters got older, he started talking to my parents about Tartok and Maguyuk marrying Suka and Anana in the future. After all the name calling over the years, he said he thought we were closer to true wolves than the O’Connells. Adrik thought they were out of touch with their Native roots
, even though they shift into actual wolves.”

Kavick laughed a
t that a little and continued.

“Of course, my parents didn’t think arranged marriages were a good idea and said that it would be up to us to decide when we’re older. Then Maguyuk died, and Anuun, too. Anuun hadn’t been a candidate—he was a sol
id white Husky—but that was another Skarling slashed from the list of prospects for his daughters…so that narrowed it down to two Huskies and a wolf…and then Tupit died. So it’s just Tartok and me. After Tupit died, Tartok started to wonder if it was a good idea, after all. He said we were dying out and thought we had to fight extinction. I told him I don’t want to marry Anana. She’s my friend; that would be weird. And, despite me telling him I don’t want to do it, he acts like I have no decision in the matter and that it’s just going to happen one day. He’s also told me the fact that Anana and I are friends actually make us a good match, and the O’Connells don’t have any daughters….”

Kavick let out another deep breath and stared at the neon sign again. He looked defeated, like he had just given up on the matter. “Then Tartok and Adrik thought it would be smarter if we lived as wolves for a while, so the hunters couldn’t find us. It made me
rethink everything. I’m never going to fit in anywhere, and if I’m going to be a wolf for the rest of my life, then I should probably spend it with another wolf. After all, that’s the only place I can fit in. I don’t like it, but I’ve started considering it.”

Kavick grinned
at me in an embarrassed way, much like he had when I caught him praying over his food. “It’s stupid, sick, messed up….” He shook his head. “I’m sorry I’m such a freak.”

“You’re not a freak!” I said firmly, leaning toward him. “And as far as messed up goes, everyone is.”

“You’re not, though. You’re normal.” He was still acting like he was ashamed of himself.

“I hate to distort the nice vision you have of me, but I’m messed up, too.”

A large incredulous grin played across his face. “What’s so messed up about you?”

I took a sip of my soda and gulped hard because I remembered the journal I had found earlier that day.

“I still have not attained the Unattainable…”

The words flashed in my mind like a bad dream I wanted to forget.

“Uh…well…I can’t say that my issues have been quite the size of yours. I mean, you already know about my parents dying. They were in so much debt that even after selling the house and most of their belongings, it still wasn’t enough for me to live on my own…thus I’m here with you right now, in Alaska. But, I think I already told you all the details of that.”

He gave me a sly grin and narrowed his eyes at me. “You can’t sneak out of it that easily. C’mon. I told you my dirty laundry, now you have to tell me yours.”

I gave up then and slumped over in defeat. “Okay…did I ever tell you why I only have one friend from California?”

He shook his head. He suddenly looked puzzled, sensing a story behind it, no doubt. “No.”

“Well, I did have another friend. Marcus Garcia…but, alas! His girlfriend didn’t want him hanging around me.”

He laughed and imitated my dramatic footnotes version of what happened in
California. “But, alas! There’s more to it than that!”

I smiled, but
was unable to laugh as I remembered what happened. “Of course there is.”

“Why did she not want him hanging around you?” he asked with a confused frown.

“She thought I liked him,” I answered simply. I shrugged like I didn’t understand why. Truth be told, I really didn’t know why his girlfriend suspected me. The only one who had ever suspected me before was Charlotte, but everyone else seemed to act like they thought there was nothing more than friendship between us.

He grinned and said, “Well, of course you like
d him!”

I felt my eyes widen. Was I really that transparent? “What?”

Kavick started laughing again. “If you didn’t like him, he wouldn’t be your friend! God, it’s not fifth grade!”

I faked a laugh, still feeling nervous. He did have a point. It was very elementary of her to have suspected I had a crush on him just because I liked hanging out with him…even though it was true. “I know, right? Ha-ha-ha…”

Kavick’s laugh faded and I was all too eager to stop faking mine. He took another drink of his soda and I did the same to escape talking about it a second longer.

“So, did you?” he asked like it was the most casual question in the world.

I rubbed my neck and decided I would stare at the neon sign like he had to avoid facing him. The Y in the sign was starting to flicker. After a moment, I finally found the courage just to tell it how it was. This was Kavick, after all. Not Marcus. We had shared our darkest secrets. This was the only one I hadn’t told him.

“Yeah…I did…but I lied.”

I could feel Kavick staring at me. He didn’t say a word. The silence gave me more time to think, more time to focus on my words—I was surprised I had sounded so somber when I spoke—and more time to reflect on the events of the past. I relived them in my head. It was the last thing I thought I would ever talk about with Kavick, but it somehow seemed fitting. I had told Kavick about my parents’ deaths, after all. How I felt awkward and depressed in Alaska, misplaced, and how the aunt I had known all my life didn’t want me, yet an uncle I had never met before did.

“I know that it wasn’t right, that I should have just told him the truth, but I didn’t. I lied, and I lied again and again.” I shrugged, still watching the Y flicker on the neon sign. “What can I say? It was my first instinct. I know that sounds awful, but it’s the truth. He had always looked at every girl
, except me. And then she’s the first one to see it? Someone I had only met once? She saw me one time and then pulled him aside. That’s when it happened. Later that day, he was telling me the ultimatum she had given him: her, or me. He said he
loved
her, that he didn’t want to give her up, but that he didn’t want to give up our friendship, either.”

I chuckled as I recounted the incident. “He said, ‘I told her you don’t like me, but she doesn’t believe me for some reason!’”

I heard Kavick chuckle a little, too. I still didn’t have the courage to look at him, though.

“I didn’t want to lose him. Even though I did have feelings for him, I was just as scared of losing him because he was my friend. I told him to tell her I said I didn’t like him and that she could relax, that she had nothing to worry about. He did it without even asking why I couldn’t tell her myself. I couldn’t though, because she had already seen my feelings for him. I was scared of lying to somebody who could see the truth.”

I cleared my throat and took another drink before I continued. “And to top it off, right before this happened I had told my friend Charlotte I had feelings for him.”

I glanced at Kavick to see him nod. “The friend you talk to on the
Internet.”

“Yeah…” I kept my eyes on him this time, feeling a little more comfortable. He didn’t have that kind of scandalous look Molly would have when I would talk to her about something (which was never anything like this. I was smart enough not to confide in her about anything too serious). He just listened to me. “…we talked about what I should say, how I should say it. She practically helped me prepare a speech.”

I chuckled again at the memory.

“I hadn’t realized he was in love with her. He would go through girls so fast, I had thought she was just a fling like the others, that’s why I didn’t wait until he was single to tell him. But when I started to tell him my speech, he said he had bad news which was very important. That’s when he explained the ultimatum she had given him. I never told him how I felt, and she
didn’t believe the lie, so he stopped hanging out with me…which meant he also had to stop hanging out with Charlotte, because Charlotte would never leave my side after that.

“It was a couple of weeks later when
my parents died. He met me at the airport when I was going to leave, though. I had left him a voicemail saying goodbye and that I was moving. Charlotte had called him, too, telling him I was moving and why, but he had to ask for his girlfriend’s permission first to tell me goodbye.”