“Sorry?” He couldn’t follow her train of thoughts and everything she did caught him off guard.
“I never told anyone at school. And you moved here, and you knew where it was and you …” She eased into a chair and raked her hands through her hair, letting out a long breath. Krishani pressed himself against the counter, not sure what to say about what he did.
“I don’t get you,” she mumbled.
“I didn’t mean to upset you,” he began, trying to keep emotion out of his voice. He had to stay strong. If Cossisea knew, Darkesh knew, and Kaliel was screwed. She would be caught in the middle of chaos and if she wasn’t Darkesh’s pet she’d be Tor’s pawn. She’d never have a life of her own. All the emotion he’d repressed for years came flooding to the surface, a lump forming in his throat, the body weakening and begging him for rest. He had to leave before pain took over.
“And I could never hate you, Maeva,” he said, glancing at her body hunched over the table, her head in her hands. He slipped on his boots, zipping them up. His fingers covered the doorknob.
“What did you mean I didn’t have to worry about you?” He noticed the desperation in her tone, lines of red through the whites in her eyes and fingernails chewed to the quick.
He closed the door and hung his head solemnly. He didn’t want to answer, but she had to know. “What they’d do to you is far worse than anything I’d do.” He measured her expression, not wanting to offer her more of the truth if he could help it. She wasn’t his anymore. He didn’t owe her anything. He half hoped she’d tell him he was crazy, but she didn’t have time for crazy. Eventually they would find her, and war would break. He waited for her response, his eyes locked to hers, the dim light outside casting the room a faint gray.
“What would you do?”
He gritted his teeth and pushed the wall of indifference around himself. He’d do what he could to keep her hidden. He couldn’t look at her eyes so he averted his gaze to the white lacy curtains above the sink. “Where I’m from, we call it a mercy killing.”
He tested her reaction for a brief second; unable to explain to her why she didn’t belong here. She was a catalyst, a dangerous weapon capable of ending all life, everywhere, forever. She pressed her lips together, her eyes deadening, and it felt like all the air in the room had been sucked out.
“Is it quick?”
He blinked, cold flashing through him. He nodded, unable to speak.
“Why haven’t you done it yet?”
And he was undone. Pain lanced across his chest as he swallowed the bile in the back of his throat. He turned to the door, fighting squalls of nausea in his stomach and wrenched it open, blasting himself with an icy winter chill.
“I haven’t—I don’t—” He glanced at her mournful expression once more, forcing the words out. “I haven’t decided how.” He gulped, his insides a slosh of angry thunder clouds. He sucked in a breath and kept his head down as he padded through the snow.
***
Chapter 20
Not Safe
Maeva stared at the door for a long time until she peeled herself off the kitchen chair and crossed the floor. She put the mugs in the sink and pulled something off the counter, shiny and sharp. Her arm hung limply from the socket as she opened the basement door and trudged down unfinished stairs. She passed the laundry room and shuffled across a cement floor to her room.
Her feet found the disgusting goldenrod carpet and she rounded her bed, clicking on the doll lamp. In one hand she gripped the handle and with the other she grabbed her journal and threw it on the floor. Numbness washed through her as she opened the little box on the dresser and pulled out the pocket watch. She avoided looking at herself in the mirror as she slunk down on the floor, pressing her back against the bed. She drew her knees up half-mast and let go of the knife.
His words made her feel hollow and broken. Mercy killing. A dull thud caromed through her ears, making everything seem too sharp, acute, and blinding. The guilt she always felt lanced through her and a sob escaped her lips. Mercy killings were reserved for people with terminal illnesses, meant to relieve their suffering.
Maeva knew she wasn’t terminal but was the situation so dire that a mercy killing would save her from whatever “they” were going to do?
The look in Michael’s eyes when he said it was uncomfortable, but resolved. Prickles crept into her chest at the words. Had anyone else uttered them she would have laughed but not Michael. He was dead serious and remorseful. She wanted to believe he wasn’t dangerous, that he wasn’t there to hurt her, but … he was.
Her chest heaved as nausea roiled into her. She traced patterns on the golden pocket watch idly, not understanding them. It was like any other watch but the symbols for the hours were funny. She’d never seen them before. They weren’t Roman Numerals, or Hieroglyphs, or any of the languages she’d seen in her ninth grade history class. She put her finger on the glass face and ran it along the smooth scratchy surface, the urge to dive into the watch at the forefront of her mind. She snapped the watch shut and clenched it in her fist.
She tried to remember anything before the concussion, but the first memory of her life had always been a set of stony blue eyes sunken into a wrinkled tanned face. The rest was dark. Her parents and guidance counselors tried to help her remember, taking her to the playground where she apparently fell off the monkey bars. Little things came back, names of teachers, friends, but the actual memory of climbing the monkey bars and falling off wasn’t there.
Grace was so paranoid about the concussion, she made it seem like Maeva was mentally challenged. She got angry when Maeva didn’t like hot dogs anymore, or gravy, perogies, pork chops, or freezer pops. She didn’t like ice cream in the summer, only in the winter, and she loved asparagus but her mom didn’t make it often. She told Maeva there was something wrong with her brain and forced Gord to get her checked. CAT scans revealed nothing and Doctor Cameron blamed it on growing up. Grace never got used to it.
Maeva picked up the journal, all her well-kept secret dreams and frustrations with her life scrawled along the pages. Michael didn’t have to say it, everything in his expression said enough. She didn’t belong there. She’d known for a long time, but Michael was the first to admit it. And he was the first to spell out the solution.
She skimmed through entries, dreams of forests, snow, explosions, shadows chasing her, falling off cliffs, blue eyes. She knew the eyes came from the man at the hospital, one of the doctors. She reached the last page she’d written and slammed the journal shut throwing it across the room. She ran her hands through her long hair, lifting it away from her scalp, dropping it, repeating the motion. She stared down the knife, its shiny stainless steel blade, serrated edge, and wooden handle with steel rivets.
She could do it herself, before Michael did.
She carefully pushed her sleeves up and grasped the handle in her right hand. She held out her left wrist, palm up and pressed the knife horizontal across her skin. A tear slipped down her cheek as she took a deep breath and pressed harder. Lightheadedness swelled, blurring her vision, making her feel like she was on fire. She gasped and turned the knife, laying it flat against her arm. She heard a door slam and jumped, shoving the knife under her bed. She stood, recovered the journal in the corner and put the pocket watch back in the box. She left the room and went to the bottom of the stairs, her hands gripping the railing.
Scott’s voice wafted down the hall and she let out a sigh. Not someone there to end her. Her mom’s shrill voice pierced the air and like a puppet on strings Maeva climbed the stairs. She pulled her sweater sleeves over her hands as she stood awkwardly in the hallway. Her mom was in the kitchen, pulling off a matching ski jacket and ski pants.
“Hi mom,” Maeva said, trying not to look like she had been downstairs, cutting. She wiped her eyes with her sleeve, hoping to clear away redness.
“You didn’t lock the door,” Grace snapped, narrowing her eyes as she peeled off the black, purple, and white jacket. Gord took it from her and hung it on the rack behind the door.
“Sorry. I didn’t think anyone …” She looked at the floor as her mom unzipped the ski pants and shucked them over her thighs, revealing a pair of khakis below them.
“Anyone could have come into the house. Don’t think that because this is a small town you’re safe.” She bent over and undid the thick boots, struggling to pull them off her feet. She stood, brushing herself off, still handing Gord her outerwear. “We have a lot of valuables.”
Maeva felt like Grace had punched her in the stomach. She sniffed trying not to let the woman see her cry. “Don’t worry, mom. I know how not safe I am.” She clamored downstairs and stormed into her room, locking the door before Grace said anything else. She sat on her bed and hugged her knees to her chest. She wasn’t safe and it was only a matter of time before not safe turned into dead.
The sick thing about it was that she didn’t want to stop Michael from doing it. She pressed her lips to her knees and scooted off the bed, digging through her backpack for her phone. She dialed Rob’s number and waited.
“Hey, Maeva,” he answered. She gulped back another wave of tears and smiled, instantly feeling a bit better.
“Hey Rob, are you busy?”
“No, why?”
She sighed, not wanting to let it all tumble out of her. She moved to the bed and laid down on her side, the phone pressed against her ear. “I don’t want to be alone right now.”
“Did you want me to come there? I can come tomorrow.”
Maeva shook her head, loving that he’d drop everything to see her. “No, I just need you now.”
“Is everything okay?”
She heard the hesitance in his tone and she sighed, wanting to tell him everything but not really knowing how he’d take it. He wasn’t like the guys at school, or scary like Michael, but he was different in a good way. She tried to rationalize it was because he was gay, but being gay didn’t define personality and Rob had so much more to him. She snuggled into the pillow, hooking an arm under it and holding it to her head.
“Some bad stuff happened,” she said quietly. She glanced at the door knowing one of her parents would be downstairs to talk to her, but she really hoped Rob would wait through the interrogation.
“How bad?” Rob whispered.
She crunched into a tighter ball and tried to stave off tears. She swallowed the lump in her throat. “The worst, I think.”
“Oh.” Rob went silent for a long time, and Maeva didn’t know what to say so she held the phone to her ear and listened to his breathing.
“Rob?”
“Yeah?”
“Can you stay on the phone until I fall asleep?” She didn’t need to hear his voice or have a lively conversation with him. She’d be comfortable knowing he was on the other end, listening to her breathing the way she was listening to his.
“Yeah I can do that,” he said, sadness in his tone. She frowned, shifting to pull the blanket over her shoulder.
O O O
Mr. Weir had a sick sense of humor.
Michael sat at the only other empty desk in the room, at the very back. School reopened a week ago. After Mr. Weir got through a few long droning lectures about exams, and liabilities he passed out cameras. Maeva thought she was scot-free until he began talking about portraits, the use of shadows and light to form contrast. She scribbled notes, which seemed to be the only thing she did in what she thought would be a fun class. At the end of the lesson Mr. Weir stood at the front, his hand on his hip, chalk clutched between his fingers.
“I guess I have to let you use these things,” he said.
He paired everyone up for a portrait assignment worth twenty percent of the grade. He paired people by who they were sitting with, and while Maeva was sitting alone, Michael was the only other person in the room also sitting alone.
Mr. Weir made him her partner.
“You two have a fight or something?” he added, standing in the aisle beside the empty side of Maeva’s desk looking back and forth between them. She couldn’t believe him. The bell rang and she gritted her teeth. She packed up her things and went into the hallway, walking briskly, wending around throngs of students. She stopped at the end of the hall and threw her hands up in frustration. For the love of all things holy she was going to have to talk to Michael. She turned, the hallway traffic dwindling down, and noticed him lumber out of the classroom slowly, his head down.
She tried to approach him but her feet wouldn’t move. She waited until he saw her, eyes bloodshot, deep purplish bruises under his eye sockets. His skin looked more pallid than it did when he was at her house. Her stomach muscles clenched and she pressed the binder to her chest, trying not to tremble. He opened his mouth to speak and closed it again, his binder tucked under his arm, his leather jacket open revealing the standard black shirt underneath.
“Do you ever wear anything other than black?” Maeva asked, not caring what she said anymore. He was going to kill her, she could say whatever she wanted, she didn’t have to worry about pissing him off, making him form a vendetta against her, making him want to hurt her.
He stopped; bewilderment on his face. “What?”
“You don’t … wear …” She gulped and chickened out, pressing her lips together.
“Oh. I don’t own anything in another color.” His eyes cut through her, making her feel transparent. She tried to remember what she needed to talk to him about and Mr. Weir came rocketing back to her mind, his utter insanity pairing her with the boy that was going to kill her.
“Somewhere public,” she blurted.
“For what?”
“The assignment? I think we should do it somewhere public.”
He raised his eyebrows like he was both amused and surprised. “Do you have qualms about coming to my flat?”
“Your, what?”
“Flat … apartment, it’s downtown.” Michael shifted the binder to the other arm and Maeva noticed he wasn’t wearing a brace. Maeva frowned, acutely aware of the way his Adam’s apple bounced when he talked, and the tiny red dots on his neck, shaving, most likely. She averted her gaze, realizing too late she was checking him out.
“We don’t have a downtown,” she said, pulling as much of the calm, cool, and collected attitude out of herself. Her heart had to stop thrumming, her palms had to stop sweating, and she needed to stop staring at his mountains for knuckles, scars indented in the skin on the back of his hand.
He shot her a wry smile. “It’s not like Leeds but …”
She shook her head trying to clear her mind. “Nobody lives downtown. That’s what I meant. There’s nowhere to live.”
Michael shrugged. “I live on Main, above the Candy Corner.”
“Seriously?” She didn’t expect her assassin—stalker—psycho, to live above a candy store.
He smirked and there was nothing menacing about it. “Do you have a problem with it?”
“No … just …” She couldn’t say it to his face, not at school. He was acting like he hadn’t told her he was going to kill her, and it was so bizarre.
“After school?”
She sighed, she had choir practice after school and sundown was around four thirty. She nodded. “After choir practice, what’s the address?”
“105 Main,” Michael said, walking away. She shook her head, hardly believing she just agreed to go to his place, and trudged towards her next class.
***