Beautiful Chaos (4 page)

Savannah didn’t think so, or she didn’t care. “Oh, sorry. Are you two together?” She paused for a second, pretending to appear thoughtful. “No. That’s right, you aren’t.”

Anyone who spent any time at the Dar-ee Keen knew that Link and Ridley’s on-again, off-again relationship was off at the moment. Savannah hooked her arm through Link’s other arm. A challenge. “I guess that means Link can make his own decisions.”

Link untangled himself from both of them and draped his arms over their shoulders. “Ladies, ladies. There’s no need to fight. There’s plenty a this to go around.” He puffed out his chest, even though it was big enough already. Normally, I would’ve laughed at the idea of two girls fighting over Link, except they weren’t just any two girls. We were talking about Savannah Snow and Ridley Duchannes. Supernatural or not, they were the two most powerful Sirens mankind had ever been lucky—or unlucky—enough to encounter, depending on how they used their powers of persuasion.

“Savannah, let’s go. We’re gonna be late for class.” Emily sounded disgusted. I wondered why Link’s Incubus magnetism didn’t work on her.

Savannah wedged herself tighter under his arm. “You should find yourself a guy who’s more”—she looked at Ridley and her safety-pinned shirt—“like you.”

Ridley shrugged Link’s arm off her shoulder. “And you should be careful who you talk to like that, Barbie.” Savannah was lucky Ridley didn’t have her powers anymore.

This is about to get ugly, L.

Don’t worry. I’m not going to let Rid get kicked out on her first day. I won’t give Principal Harper the satisfaction.

“Ridley, let’s go.” Lena walked over and stood next to her cousin. “She’s not worth it. Trust me.”

Savannah was about to fire back, when something distracted
her. She crinkled her nose. “Your eyes—they’re two different colors. What’s wrong with you?”

Emily wandered over to get a better look. It was only a matter of time before someone noticed Lena’s eyes. They were impossible to miss. But I had hoped we would make it past the parking lot before the first wave of gossip hit. “Savannah, why don’t you—”

Lena interrupted before I could finish. “I would ask you the same question, but we all know the answer.”

Ridley crossed her arms. “Let me give you a hint. It begins with B and rhymes with bitch.”

Lena turned her back on Savannah and Emily, heading for Jackson’s broken concrete steps. I grabbed her hand, the energy pulsating up my arm. I expected Lena to be shaky after facing off against Savannah, but she was calm. Something had changed, and it was more than just her eyes. I guess when you’ve faced a Dark Caster who also happens to be your mother, and a hundred-and-fifty-year-old Blood Incubus who is trying to kill you, a few cheerleaders aren’t that intimidating.

You okay?

Lena squeezed my hand.

I’m okay.

I could hear Ridley’s shoes smacking against the concrete behind us. Link jogged up alongside me. “Man, if this is what I have to look forward to, this year is gonna rock.”

I tried to convince myself he was right as we cut across the brown grass, dead lubbers crunching under our feet.

9.07

T
here’s something about walking into school holding hands with a person you actually love. It’s strange—not bad strange. The best strange. I remembered what made couples hang around attached to each other like cold spaghetti. There were so many ways to be knotted up together. Arms draped around necks, hands crossed in pockets. We couldn’t even walk next to each other without our shoulders finding a way to bump, as if our bodies gravitated toward each other on their own. I guess when electric voltage marked each of those tiny connections, you noticed them more than the average guy.

Even though I should’ve been used to it by now, it still felt weird to walk down the halls while everyone stared at Lena. She would always be the most beautiful girl in school, no matter what color her eyes were, and everyone here knew it, too. She was that girl—the one who had her own kind of power, supernatural or
not. And there was a look a guy couldn’t help but give that girl, no matter what she’d done or how much of a freak she would always be.

It was the same look the guys were giving her now.

Calm down, Lover Boy.

Lena bumped her shoulder against mine.

I forgot what this walk was like. After Lena’s sixteenth birthday, I lost more and more of her every day. By the end of the school year, she was so distant I could barely find her in the halls. It was only a few months ago. But now that we were here again, I remembered.

I don’t like the way they’re looking at you.

What way?

I stopped walking and touched the side of Lena’s face, below the crescent-shaped birthmark on her cheekbone. A shiver shot through both of us, and I leaned down to find her mouth.

This way.

She pulled back, smiling, and dragged me down the hall.

I get the picture. But I think you’re way off. Look.

Emory Watkins and the other guys from the basketball team were staring past us as we walked by his locker. He nodded at me.

I hate to break it to you, Ethan, but they’re not looking at me.

I heard Link’s voice. “Hey, girls. We shootin’ hoops this afternoon or what?” He bumped fists with Emory and kept walking. But they weren’t looking at him either.

Ridley was a step behind the rest of us, letting her long pink nails trail along the locker doors. When she got to Emory’s, she let the door close beneath her fingers.

“Hey,
girls.
” The way Ridley rolled out the words, she still sounded like a Siren.

Emory stammered, and Ridley let her finger trail across his chest as she walked past. In that skirt, she was showing more leg than should have been legal. The entire team turned to watch her go.

“Who’s your friend?” Emory was talking to Link, but he didn’t take his eyes off Ridley. He’d seen her before—at the Stop & Steal when I first met her, and at the winter formal, when she trashed the gym—but he was looking for an introduction, up close and personal.

“Who wants to know?” Rid blew a bubble, letting it pop.

Link looked at her sideways and grabbed Ridley’s hand. “Nobody.”

The hallway divided in front of them as an ex-Siren and a quarter Incubus conquered Jackson High. I wondered what Amma would have to say about that.

Sweet baby in a manger. Heaven help us all.

“Are you kidding? I’m supposed to keep my things in this filthy tin
coffin
?” Ridley stared into her locker like she thought something was going to pop out of it.

“Rid, you’ve been to school before, and you had a locker,” Lena said patiently.

Ridley flipped her pink and blond hair. “I must’ve blocked all that out. Post-traumatic stress.”

Lena handed Ridley the combination lock. “You don’t have to use it. But you can put your books inside so you don’t have to carry them around all day.”

“Books?” Ridley looked disgusted. “Carry?”

Lena sighed. “You’ll get them today, in your classes. And, yes, you have to carry them. You should know how this works.”

Ridley adjusted her shirt to expose a little more shoulder. “I was a Siren the last time I was in school. I didn’t actually go to any of my classes, and I certainly didn’t carry anything.”

Link clapped his hand down on her shoulder. “Come on. We have homeroom together. I’ll show you how it’s done, Link-style.”

“Yeah?” Ridley sounded skeptical. “How is that any better?”

“Well, for starters, it doesn’t involve any books….” Link seemed more than happy to walk her to class. He wanted to keep an eye on her.

“Ridley, wait! You need this.” Lena waved a binder in the air.

Ridley slipped her arm through Link’s and ignored her. “Relax, Cuz. I’ll use Hot Rod’s.”

I slammed the locker shut. “Your gramma is an optimist.”

“You think?”

Like everyone else, I watched Link and Rid disappear down the hall. “I give this whole little experiment three days, max.”

“Three days? You’re the optimist.” Lena sighed, and we started up the stairs to English.

The air conditioning was running full blast, a pathetic mechanical hum echoing through the halls. But the outdated system didn’t stand a chance against this heat wave. It was even hotter upstairs in the administration building than it was outside in the parking lot.

As we walked into English class, I stopped for a minute under the fluorescent light, the one that had burned out when Lena and I had collided on the way into this room the first day I saw her. I stared up at the cardboard squares in the ceiling.

You know, if you look really close, you can still see the burn mark around the new light.

How romantic. The scene of our first disaster.
Lena followed my eyes up to the ceiling.
I think I see it.

I let my eyes linger on the squares speckled with perforated dots. How many times had I sat in class staring up at those dots, trying to stay awake or counting them to pass time? Counting minutes left in a class period, periods left in the day—days into weeks, weeks into months, until I got out of Gatlin?

Lena walked by Mrs. English, who was buried in first day of school papers at her desk, and slid into her old seat on the infamous Good-Eye Side.

I started to follow her, but I sensed someone behind me. It was that feeling you get when you’re in line and the person after you is standing way too close. I turned around, but no one was there.

Lena was already writing in her notebook when I sat down at the desk next to hers. I wondered if she was writing one of her poems. I was about to sneak a look when I heard it. The voice was faint, and it wasn’t Lena’s. It was a low whisper, coming from over my shoulder.

I turned around. The seat behind me was empty.

Did you say something, L?

Lena looked up from the notebook, surprised.

What?

Were you Kelting? I thought I heard something.

She shook her head.

No. Are you okay?

I nodded, opening my binder. I heard the voice again. This time I recognized the words. The letters appeared on the page, in my handwriting.