“Start talking.”
“About what?”
“You’re kidding, right?” I was trying not to shout.
She pulled at her necklace, twisting the tab from a soda can. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“How about explaining what just happened back there.”
She stared out the window, into the darkness. “He was angry. Sometimes he loses his temper.”
“Loses his temper? You mean hurls things across the room without touching them and lights candles without matches?”
“Ethan, I’m sorry.” Her voice was quiet.
But mine wasn’t. The more she avoided my questions, the angrier it made me. “I don’t want you to be sorry. I want you tell me what’s going on.”
“With what?”
“With your uncle and his weird house, that he somehow managed to redecorate within a couple of days. With the food that appears and disappears. With all that talk about boundaries and protecting you. Pick one.”
She shook her head. “I can’t talk about it. And you wouldn’t understand, anyway.”
“How do you know if you don’t give me a chance?”
“My family is different from other families. Trust me, you can’t handle it.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Face it, Ethan. You say you’re not like the rest of them, but you are. You want me to be different, but just a little. Not really different.”
“You know what? You’re as crazy as your uncle.”
“You came to my house without being invited, and now you’re angry because you didn’t like what you saw.”
I didn’t answer. I couldn’t see out the windows, and I couldn’t think clearly, either.
“And you’re angry because you’re afraid. You all are. Deep down, you’re all the same.” Lena sounded tired now, like she had already given up.
“No.” I looked at her. “You’re afraid.”
She laughed, bitterly. “Yeah, right. The things I’m afraid of, you couldn’t even imagine.”
“You’re afraid to trust me.”
She didn’t say anything.
“You’re afraid to get to know someone well enough to notice whether or not they show up for school.”
She dragged her finger through the fog on her window. It made a shaky line, like a zigzag.
“You’re afraid to stick around and see what happens.”
The zigzag turned into what looked like a bolt of lightning.
“You’re not from here. You’re right. And you’re not just a little different.”
She was still staring out the window, at nothing, because you still couldn’t see out of it. But I could see her. I could see everything. “You’re incredibly, absolutely, extremely, supremely, unbelievably different.” I touched her arm, with just my fingertips, and immediately I felt the warmth of electricity. “I know because deep down, I think I am, too. So tell me. Please. Different how?”
“I don’t want to tell you.”
A tear dripped down her cheek. I caught it with my finger, and it burned. “Why not?”
“Because this could be my last chance to be a normal girl, even if it is in Gatlin. Because you’re my only friend here. Because if I tell you, you won’t believe me. Or worse, you will.” She opened her eyes, and looked into mine. “Either way, you’re never going to want to talk to me again.”
There was a rap on the window, and we both jumped. A flashlight shone through the fogged-in glass. I dropped my hand and rolled down the window, swearing under my breath.
“Kids get lost on your way home?” Fatty. He was grinning like he’d stumbled across two doughnuts on the side of the road.
“No, sir. We’re on our way home right now.”
“This isn’t your car, Mr. Wate.”
“No, sir.”
He shined his flashlight over at Lena, lingering for a long time. “Then move on, and get home. Don’t want to keep Amma waitin’.”
“Yes, sir.” I turned the key in the ignition. When I looked in the rearview mirror, I could see his girlfriend, Amanda, in the front seat of his police cruiser, giggling.
I slammed the car door. I could see Lena through the driver’s window now, as she idled in front of my house. “See you tomorrow.”
“Sure.”
But I knew we wouldn’t see each other tomorrow. I knew if she drove down my street that was it. It was a path, just like the fork in the road leading to Ravenwood or to Gatlin. You had to pick one. If she didn’t pick this one, now, the hearse would keep on going the other way at the fork, passing me by. Just as it had the morning I first saw it.
If she didn’t pick me.
You couldn’t take two roads. And once you were on one, there was no going back. I heard the motor grind into drive, but kept walking up to my door. The hearse pulled away.
She didn’t pick me.
I was lying on my bed, facing the window. The moonlight was streaming in, which was annoying, because it kept me from falling asleep when all I wanted was for this day to end.
Ethan. The voice was so soft I almost couldn’t hear it.
I looked at the window. It was locked, I had made sure of it.
Ethan. Come on.
I closed my eyes. The latch on my window rattled.
Let me in.
The wooden shutters banged open. I would say it was the wind, but of course there wasn’t even a breeze. I climbed out of bed and looked outside.
Lena was standing on my front lawn in her pajamas. The neighbors would have a field day, and Amma would have a heart attack. “You come down or I’m coming up.”
A heart attack, and then a stroke.
We sat out on the front step. I was in my jeans, because I didn’t sleep in pajamas, and if Amma had walked out and found me with a girl in my boxers, I would’ve been buried under the back lawn by morning.
Lena leaned back against the step, looking up at the white paint peeling off the porch. “I almost turned around at the end of your street, but I was too scared to do it.” In the moonlight, I could see her pajamas were green and purple and sort of Chinese.
“Then by the time I got home, I was too scared not to do it.” She was picking at the nail polish on her bare feet, which was how I knew she had something to say. “I don’t really know how to do this. I’ve never had to say it before, so I don’t know how it will all come out.”
I rubbed my messy hair with one hand. “Whatever it is, you can tell me. I know what it’s like to have a crazy family.”
“You think you know crazy. You have no idea.”
She took a deep breath. Whatever she was about to say, it was hard for her. I could see her struggling to find the words. “The people in my family, and me, we have powers. We can do things that regular people can’t do. We’re born that way, we can’t help it. We are what we are.”
It took me a second to understand what she was talking about, or at least what I thought she was talking about.
Magic.
Where was Amma when I needed her?
I was afraid to ask, but I had to know. “And what, exactly, are you?” It sounded so crazy that I almost couldn’t say the words.
“Casters,” she said quietly.
“Casters?”
She nodded.
“Like, spell casters?”
She nodded again.
I stared at her. Maybe she was crazy. “Like, witches?”
“Ethan. Don’t be ridiculous.”
I exhaled, momentarily relieved. Of course, I was an idiot. What was I thinking?
“That’s such a stupid word, really. It’s like saying jocks. Or geeks. It’s just a dumb stereotype.”
My stomach lurched. Part of me wanted to bolt up the steps, lock the door, and hide in my bed. But then another part of me, a bigger part, wanted to stay. Because hadn’t a part of me known all along? I may not have known what she was, but I had known there was something about her, something bigger than just that junky necklace and those old Chucks. What was I expecting, from someone who could bring on a downpour? Who could talk to me without even being in the room? Who could control the way the clouds floated in the sky? Who could fling open the shutters to my room from my front yard?