Spellcaster (23 page)

Instead Brendan stormed in a few minutes later, his jaw clenched, his eyes narrowed so tightly his black eyelashes were practically touching.

He threw his backpack on the floor, and slid into his desk, turning to face me.

“What’s wrong?” I asked. He opened his mouth and held his hand up, then shut his mouth, shaking his head.

“I’ll tell you later,” he replied curtly. I didn’t need Angelique’s empath skills to know he was angry. Seriously, completely, steam-coming-out-of-his-ears angry. The rage was rolling off him in waves.

Soon, Kristin shuffled in and meekly sat in her desk, back a few seats in the aisle next to me. She kept her head down, pulling her white-streaked blond hair in front of her to hide her face as she kept stealing glances at Brendan through the pin-straight locks.

Then Cisco strolled in, walking by Brendan with his hand out. Brendan high-fived him and Cisco hopped over his desk to sit in his seat next to mine.

“Emma, have I ever told you how
happy
I am that you came to Vince A?” Cisco asked, grinning so widely his dimples were showing.

“Okay, what happened?” I asked, exasperated, and Cisco just bit his lip, shaking his head.

“Ask your boyfriend,” he replied devilishly. “Because he’s hysterical when he’s being a badass mother—”

“So who has Dante papers for me?” Mr. Emerson asked briskly, interrupting Cisco. “Come on, you got to create your own level of hell—that’s better than some boring book report, I’d say,” Mr. Emerson chastised us when the class collectively groaned. I grabbed Jenn’s papers from her desk behind me as Brendan turned around, his palm outstretched. I placed my paper in his hand—I was glad I had finished it last week, long before the drama with Megan started.

“Thanks, sweetheart,” he said loudly. “Love you.” Cisco put his head on his desk and shook with laughter.

“Cute, Salinger,” Mr. Emerson said witheringly as he collected the piles of papers from the students in the front row. “Want to keep that to yourself until after class?”

“Sorry, Mr. Emerson.” Brendan slouched low in his seat, his legs sprawled out in front of him. “I’m just moved by all the great literature we’ve been reading. What can I say? I was inspired to express myself.”

“Let’s hope your paper on Dante’s
Inferno
is just as inspired,” Mr. Emerson retorted, and Brendan nodded his head.

“It’s an epic masterpiece,” Brendan said seriously, and Mr. Emerson rolled his eyes at Brendan before turning to the blackboard. I stared at the back of Brendan’s head, wishing I could somehow get answers out of the wayward locks of black hair. Fortunately I didn’t have to wait too long—Brendan turned around at lunchtime, throwing his arm cavalierly over my desk and grabbing my hand. He then glared at Kristin as she skulked out of the classroom, darting wounded glances his way.

“Sharing is caring, Brendan,” I said, thoroughly entertained and confused by his little display. “What happened?”

“It was awesome,” Cisco interjected, laughing.

“Feel free to tell the story,” Brendan said, dropping my hand to stuff his books in his backpack. Cisco leaned forward, his brown eyes sparkling mischievously.

“Well, we’re leaving French and on our way to English, and Kristin actually runs up to Brendan and tries to grab his hand and says something like, ‘Aren’t you happy to see me?’”

“What?” I growled through clenched teeth as Brendan rubbed his palm on his shirt at the memory, frowning.

“So Brendan’s clearly feeling a little saucy, because he pulls his hand back and says something like, ‘Why are you touching me?’ And then loudly starts asking everyone for hand sanitizer, complaining that Kristin touched him. He starts wiping his hand on the wall and saying he’d rather go rub his hand inside the fourth-floor bathroom urinals.”

“It’s a really nasty bathroom,” Brendan explained and Cisco nodded his head in agreement.

“The nastiest in the school, seriously,” Cisco added.

“I think it’s because it’s near the teachers’ lounge,” Brendan mused, standing up and throwing his bag over his shoulder. “I bet they trash it and try to blame the students.”

“Enough about the gross bathrooms,” I said, standing up, as well. “What happened next?”

“Oh, Kristin starts freaking out on me,” Brendan said offhandedly, leading the way as we filed out of the English classroom.

“She starts yelling. It was really funny—what did she say exactly?” Cisco asked Brendan, and he rolled his eyes.

“She said, ‘You’re not supposed to talk to me like this! This isn’t fair!’” Brendan said, mimicking her nasal voice as he started walking down the stairs. “‘Are you sure you want to talk to me like this?”’

“And then Brendan goes off on her even more,” Cisco added, grinning evilly. “Sorry, it’s your story, go on.”

Brendan just shrugged nonchalantly. “I told her I’ll talk to her however I damn well want to.”

“Yeah, but that’s not the best part,” Cisco interrupted gleefully, stopping us on the landing. “The line was, ‘I’ll do whatever I want. And if you and your coterie of baby hookers don’t leave my girlfriend alone, I’ll forget I was raised to be a gentleman.’”

“Baby hookers?” I asked. I started laughing so hard I had to sit down on the red-carpeted steps and my side actually began hurting.

“Now you know why I was laughing so hard in class,” Cisco said, and Brendan just held his hands up innocently.

“What?” He shrugged, sitting next to me. “I’m pissed about what you told me, Emma, about how she and Kendall keep bringing things up to you. And I’m still pissed about the way she talked to you at the Cloisters. Anyway, she kept up with this whole, ‘You’re not supposed to talk to me like this!’ routine and I tried to ignore her, so finally I said, ‘I don’t care who your parents are or who in my family they’re friends with. I’m
supposed
to talk to you however I want, and I want you to know that I think you’re awful.’”

“And then he said, ‘It’ll be a cold day in hell when I leave Emma for you, so get it through that thick skull of yours,’” Cisco added, laughing again. “You can finally forget about Kristin Thorn giving you a hard time, because I think he traumatized her.”

“She did look shocked,” Brendan observed, standing up. “I have no idea why, but she looked so surprised.”

He held out his palm to me and pulled me off the step I was sitting on, keeping a hold on my hand as we continued walking down the stairs.

“I wish I could have been meaner but I can’t—I just
can’t
—go off on a girl worse than that. Even her.” He sighed, a frown on his face.

“Brendan, as funny as this is, you can’t punch everyone—or verbally punch everyone—who insults me,” I said.

“But I want to,” Brendan said innocently.

“What you said was perfect. It was
glorious,
” Cisco added, his voice heavy with a faux reverential tone as we headed into the cafeteria. Brendan had suggested that we brave the cafeteria’s Ipecac-level cuisine in case Megan was cutting school and hanging around the building—if she was crazy enough to attack me and curse Ashley, a little truancy sure wasn’t a stretch. After a pathetic lunch of a half-frozen turkey sub drowned in something that I’m fairly sure had a heartbeat, I headed down to chemistry a few minutes early to meet up with Angelique, who refused to deal with the cafeteria.

“You seem like you’re in a good mood—in spite of the circumstances,” she observed, taking a dark green-painted nail and circling it around my face.

“I know. I even ate in The Pasture today,” I added, using her nickname for the cafeteria. Angelique called it that because, as she once said, “it’s filled with sheep.”

“I haven’t eaten in there in months. Has the food improved at all?”

“I’d have been better off if I ate an actual sheep. Wool and all,” I replied. She grinned then cautiously looked around the sparsely populated lab.

“Megan will not stop texting me,” she revealed, her voice low. “She says if you don’t meet her at the Met steps at four, she’s threatening to show you just how powerful she can be.” The Metropolitan Museum of Art was just a few blocks away—and the steps were a popular meeting spot.

“I have work in the library after school, and even if I didn’t, there’s no way I would meet her,” I replied, taking my chemistry textbook out and letting it drop on the black-topped lab table with a satisfying thud. “So she can go right ahead and marinate in her rage until her fingers get wrinkly.”

“I figured as much,” Angelique drawled, adding, “I’ve still got that big feeling of dread, though. I can’t help but feel like this isn’t over.”

“I’m sure it isn’t,” I said, resting my chin on my hand. Our conversation paused as Kristin came in, but apart from glaring at me, she kept her mouth shut for once. Still, I didn’t look forward to whatever she might throw my way during class. Her latest weapon: paper clips. And they were a pain to get out of my hair.

Once she was out of earshot, I whispered to Angelique, “So what else can we do to stop Megan?”

“Apart from the binding spell Randi and I did last night, I have no idea,” Angelique admitted, rolling one of her bangles back and forth on the lab table with her finger. “I’m hoping it took. Only time will tell.”

“Fingers crossed,” I whispered as Mr. D headed into the classroom.

“Fingers, toes, eyes, legs…” Angelique said, her voice trailing off.

“By the way, I had an Ethan dream last night,” I whispered, pulling out a piece of paper and hiding it behind my lab workbook.

“Way to bury the headline story, Emma,” Angelique huffed.

“I know, I know. I’m going to write it out for you—I think it’s a good idea to keep a record of these,” I added, pretending to take notes and instead I wrote out everything I could recall from my dream. I slipped the note to Angelique before she headed off to A.P. Latin.

The rest of my day was fairly uneventful—even Latin, which I normally shared with Ashley and her friends. I hadn’t taken the language at Keansburg High, and Vince A required all students to take at least two years of the torture-emus—leaving me in freshman Latin. Catharine and Vanessa didn’t even pepper me for too much info—they’d gotten the full lowdown from Ashley last night after I’d left her house. If Ashley had spilled about the magical cause of her illness, her friends were the best liars in the world, because they seemed to believe that her collapse was just a random occurrence.

Finally the bell rang. Just three more hours and I would be home free. Brendan met me after basketball practice at Vince A’s library—one of the few rooms from the original mansion that was still used for its intended purpose. The second-floor library was small but impressive—intricately molded ceiling, Corinthian pillars carved into the dark wooden bookshelves that lined the walls, a series of high-gloss mahogany tables that looked better suited for some high-powered captain of industry’s boardroom. Mr. Emerson used to let snide comments drop about Brendan’s presence by my side when I worked—“Maybe you should crack a book instead of just looking at them,” which wasn’t even a great insult, considering Brendan had a strong GPA—but now Mr. Emerson just ignored him.

“Miss Connor, I’m heading up to the teacher’s lounge to grade some papers,” Mr. Emerson called as I pushed a beige metal cart loaded with returned books down a nearby aisle. Brendan was helping me put back the books which belonged on higher shelves, which he could reach without having to stand on one of the velvet-cushioned chairs, the show-off. Emerson picked up the stack of papers he’d collected in class that morning and smacked them against the lacquered wood of the front desk.

“I’m really looking forward to reading
your
paper, Salinger. I’ll make sure my red pen has plenty of ink,” he addressed Brendan, who paused, the collected works of Anton Chekov frozen in his hand as he looked at me with an “I’m screwed” look on his face. Then Brendan’s cool demeanor returned, and he casually slipped the book into its place on the shelf.

“You’ll love it, Mr. Emerson,” Brendan promised without a hint of sarcasm in his voice. “It’s going to change the world. You might want to frame it to preserve it for future generations.”

Our crusty English teacher actually let a smile slip before returning to his stiff demeanor.

“Once you’re done with those books you can leave.” He glanced around the empty library. “I don’t think anyone’s going to swing by here today. Seems everyone’s caught a case of spring break-itis early.”

I thanked Mr. Emerson as he left, the heavy wood doors slamming shut behind him, leaving us in the library alone.

“I really need to learn to keep my mouth shut around Emerson,” Brendan said, reaching up on his tiptoes to return another book. His black hair was a little damp from his after-practice shower and hung in his eyes. He looked adorably rumpled, the knot on his black tie hanging low on his untucked, white shirt. And he was staring at me with an amused smile on his face, since he’d just caught me shamelessly checking him out.

“What?” he asked innocently, picking up a book in an exaggerated way so he could flex.

“Is it wrong that I want to take you into the foreign-languages section and do naughty things to you?” I asked Brendan, and he laughed loudly.

“That might be one way to get you to finally appreciate Latin.”