Appointed (13 page)

 

 

“Dear Mister Zesiro Willam, we thank you for your application to… blah, blah, blah… and are proud to offer you admission to our school.” Zes's eyes bugged out of his sockets as he continued to read the letter he'd received in the mail. “Enclosed are all of your forms along with an information packet.… We hope to see you in the fall.”

It was a nice perk on an otherwise gloomy Valentine's Day. He'd skipped classes, calling in sick, and hid in his room eating microwavable pizza rolls and ranch tortilla chips, guzzling down soda in his pajamas. Anj had gone to class and promised to bring him any notes and homework he might have missed. Most of his time was spent playing video games and watching movies. He avoided the phone every time it rang.

Four days had passed since his breakup with Cheyenne, and he'd made the mistake of answering a phone call only to find out it was her, wanting to talk. He'd hung up without saying more than hello. Anj called it harsh. Zes didn't care. Granted, one of the calls today might have been his brother or a teacher checking up on him. He'd let them assume he was sleeping.

For the first time since the breakup, Zes was starting to feel normal. He'd dutifully gone to his classes the other days, had suffered looking at Cheyenne from across the cafeteria as she sat awkwardly with Halyn, and had fantasized about pushing Denver off of a cliff every time he saw the guy in the hallway. Now, of course, Cheyenne listened to Zes and stayed away from the creep.

It'll only be a matter of time before she goes back,
he thought sourly, and it caused his arm to burn. Ever since he'd distanced himself from her, the pain had increased, as if it were a fresh and new burn. Sometimes it happened while he slept, and he dreamed about being in the underworld again. The dreams were vague, thankfully, but one thing always stood out. Three words.
You're her gift
echoed in his mind, as if someone were trying to get inside of his head. He rubbed his arm.

You're wrong. It'll only be a matter of time before she goes back to
you
.

Shaking his head, Zes sat back down on the couch. “Why would she come back to me?”

Have confidence in yourself. It's so much more attractive. Show her what she's missing. Show her you don't need her, and she'll be all over you again. For real, and not simply because of guilt.
Trust me. I know her far better than you. S
omething inside of him was insisting, but Zes shoved the voice aside.

“I'm going crazy. Maybe I should go outside and get some air,” he said. The only time he had ideas and thoughts like that was when his arm burned again. Almost as if it were some kind of channel to somewhere else. The only somewhere else he could be connected to through it was the underworld, though, and that scared him — a lot.

At the mention of outside, Guy's ears perked up and the dog walked over, nuzzling his head under Zes's hands, which still held his acceptance letter. He petted the dog, his eyes never leaving the paper.

With a smile, he stood up so he could put on his slippers. “All right, I'll let you go potty. It's been a while, huh?” He checked the clock. Classes would be ending for the day soon. Anj should already be on his way back. His brother had been kind enough to leave the dog home for the day to keep Zes company. Anj knew how to get around just fine on his own anyway.

He hooked Guy up to the leash, and they went outside through the back door. Zes stood in the cold in only his pajama pants and a t-shirt, but he didn't mind. Snow was floating down in soft, gentle puffs. It was beautiful and not something he'd stopped to admire in a while. There were a lot of things he'd been missing and hadn't even realized until now. Cheyenne had sucked up a lot of his life. He'd been happy but engrossed in her. Now that she wasn't around him so often, he was able to see more than simply her.

The snow brought peace, and the dry cool air helped clear his head. “What do I do, buddy? Should I stay here for college? Or go see what else is out there? What do you think?”

The dog barked. Zes didn't know what it meant, but it was nice to be listened to, at least. Once Guy finished his business, the two went back inside. Anj was back from class and shaking snow from his hair near the doorway.

“Where were you?” he asked.

“Piddle time,” Zes said. “Don't worry, I wasn't seen by the teachers or sneaking off for a secret meeting with the ex. I'm staying ‘sick'.”

“How you looked earlier today, I didn't think you'd be parading yourself around campus, but the secret meeting had come to mind. Wasn't sure if she'd try to talk you back into anything.”

“You say that like she's manipulative.”

“When it comes to relationships, all girls do it.” Anj said it trying to be funny, but it didn't tickle Zes's funny bone in the slightest. “Though I do have a number of cards to pass on to you from your adoring public. I'll get them from my bag, hang on.”

Zes raised an eyebrow. “Adoring public?” He rolled his eyes at the idea. Most of his friends were based on association. At least, he thought so. The students at Vala liked Anj, so they had to like him too, right? But getting some cards was pretty cool all the same and unexpected.

Anj knelt down and dug around inside his bag for a moment before pulling out a small stack of cards and candy. “Yes, and most of them are from girls. Who are crafty, I should add, because I feel glitter and construction paper. My bag is going to be sparkling for the rest of my life.”

Taking the cards from his brother, Zes settled back down on the couch with the dog. Sure enough, there were a number of cards that had been made by hand. “‘Happy Valentine's Day, Z. You're the best. Hugs and kisses from Noel…?”

“She's cute. And she smells like cheesecake,” Anj said. “Redhead, I believe, and petite. One of the witches.”

“Oh, right, okay.” He half-smiled and looked at the next one. “This one is from Halyn. ‘Love you bunches. Don't be a stranger.'” He'd need to call her. It wasn't fair of him to punish her because of what Cheyenne had done. The girls were roommates and best friends, but if Zes could stay neutral every time Jewl and Anj had a fight, then Halyn could do the same thing.

Zes picked up another card, reading it silently this time. “What are you doing sitting around anyway? Don't you have some hot Valentine's date to plan for like usual?”

“Not tonight. We decided it'd be easier to go out another time. Restaurants are a pain to get into, I don't feel like cooking or doing much of anything beyond studying for my test next week—”

“It's next week.”

“—and I have six hours of lectures to dictate into notes I can use, again, and at least a hundred pages of reading. That's only so far. I didn't take slacker courses this semester like you did.”

Zes snorted. “I don't have my life planned out, so I didn't take college-level classes. Not my fault I know how to plan ahead and get most of my required classes out of the way. Rather than break myself trying to get ahead, I filled up on electives. Sort of. Outside of Calc and Mythology, which are really hard I should add, I don't have a whole lot to do. But I wouldn't call it slacking.”

“I was teasing anyway. Back on topic though, we decided to go out later. Besides, you know how I feel about Valentine's Day,” Anj said with a wave of his hand.

“You don't need a special holiday to prove you love her,” Zes said, and went back to searching through his stack of goodies.

There was a plethora of hard candies and chocolates attached to a number of cards, even a couple of small flowers, which he hated because every time Zes saw a flower all he thought about was Cheyenne. There was one card from Teague in the mix, which was a little awkward, but it was the type of card Zes would have picked out in elementary school, robot and everything. Most of them were from girls whom he didn't know by name or sight. Anj had all of their details: which ladies were cute, which to avoid, and what they smelled like.

With a scowl, Zes put the cards down on the coffee table. “If I didn't know better, I'd say you were trying to set me up with someone.”

Anj shrugged innocently. “A rebound might not hurt.”

“Did you ever have a rebound?”

“No, can't say I ever did. Thought about it, but most of the girls here aren't worth my time.”

“But they are mine?” Zes shook his head, rolling his eyes.

“I think you can do better, but for the purposes of a rebound, they'll do fine.”

“And why do I need a rebound?”

“It's only an idea, first of all, and the reason why I'm suggesting it is because you need to remember that you are awesome,
can
do better than Chey, and that there are girls out there who are interested in you. They probably have been for a while. I'm not saying go out and do unmentionable things with them, but it might not hurt to flirt a little.”

Zes picked up the last card in the pile. It had a rose attached to the front of a shiny, red paper heart with lace around the edges. There was no name attached, but he recognized Cheyenne's handwriting.
“I love you.”
He picked off the rose, touching the pedals tenderly as if it were her, then set it back on the table again.

He ran a hand over his lips, trying to think. “Maybe it wouldn't hurt, but I'm not sure I want to. We just broke up. It's been four days. Can't I take a break?”

“Of course you can,” Anj said. “But don't feel bad if maybe you do find yourself wanting to flirt a little if the opportunity arises. Don't be afraid to move on. I don't want you to be hung up on her.”

Zes snorted. “And how many times did I tell you that about Jewl?”

“A lot.”

“And you never moved on.”

“She's different.”

“Why? Because she didn't cheat on you? Big deal. Maybe this is one of
our
hiccups. Maybe we will work things out. Maybe I'll be able to forgive her. I don't know what's going to happen in the future, and neither do you. Unless there's something going on I don't know about?”

He watched Anj and noticed how he tensed up. Zes's confidence deflated. “You do know something.”

Anj shook his head vigorously. “No, I don't.”

“Then why are you being weird?”

“I'm not being weird.”

“Your face suggests otherwise. I know you're not all super-expressive, but I can still tell and my eyes work,” Zes snapped.

Anj's vision flashed on then, and he glared. “I. Don't. Know. Anything. Maybe I reacted the way I did because your choice of words bothered me. I do have feelings too, even if I'm not Mr. Sensitive.”

“I'm not sure what's so offensive about what I said.” Zes glared back. The two were caught in a stare-down all too much like a Western movie.

“Your tone suggested sarcasm, particularly at the parts where you mentioned how neither of us can see the future.”

“And you call
me
sensitive.” Zes pinched the bridge of his nose. “I wasn't being sarcastic. Chill out.”

“I see. Jewl talks to me a lot like that, and I guess I've come to expect it from everyone,” Anj said.

“To be honest, if you didn't act like a know-it-all so much, she probably wouldn't,” Zes said back.

“So now I'm a know-it-all?”

“Don't act all hurt. We've had this conversation before.”

“And every time we do, it frustrates me.” Anj huffed and turned his magic off again.

He wasn't sure how to respond to Anj's statement. Zes shrugged, relaxing in the couch now that they weren't getting into a screaming match. At least he didn't think they were. They fought a lot, like most siblings tended to do, but only on a rare occasion did they get verbally aggressive.

“I know. And what you do frustrates
me
. Sometimes I'd rather you not say anything instead of giving me some kind of cryptic warning about petty little things.”

“And you don't understand that it's important for me to,” Anj said.

“Why? Oh wait, you can't tell me. I've asked you this before.”

Frowning with defeat, Anj sat on the couch next to Zes. “So what have you been doing all day?”

Disappointment filled Zes, and he didn't understand why. It's not like Anj had ever given him an answer before, so why would he start now? Still, Zes always held out hope that maybe he'd get more of an explanation than “Just trust me.” And he did trust Anj, a lot, so he understood there was probably a good reason. But they were brothers and best friends, so it always stung.

With a sigh, Zes opened up one of the candies and popped it into his mouth. “Beat one of my games, watched some of those movies we got last birthday, nothing big. Well…” He stopped, thinking about the letter he'd gotten.

“What?” Anj tilted his head toward his brother.

“I got an acceptance letter to the big university in the city.”

“You did?”

“Yeah.” Zes smiled.

“You're going to go, right?”

He stared at his brother in disbelief. “Why? Didn't we talk about this? We're going to be here together next year.”

“That was before you'd gotten an acceptance letter to a big school. This is amazing. You need to take advantage of this opportunity.”

“A/k/a, you don't want me to be here with you next year.”

“A big school will look a lot better on your resumé than here, especially if you're going to be a doctor or an engineer or whatever else you're thinking about doing. You have an unlimited amount of possibilities.”

“What about you?” Zes asked.

“What about me?”

“You could do anything, but you're limiting yourself to here.”

“Because I can use my magic to study here, and with what I want to do, it's not going to be as big of a deal. Besides, if I went farther than five minutes away, Mom would have a meltdown.”