Crystal Caves (14 page)

I can’t remember. Maybe never.

That’s what happens when you walk in a pack, I guess.

He helps me up, then lets go of my hand as I get my feet under me. We walk down the corridor to the cafeteria, and if he was someone else (like that weird girl) I would think he’s a little too close. But I don’t think so right now.

I like how close he is.

That stupid flush seems to be getting worse. My face feels like it has its own personal heater.

He doesn’t seem to notice. And he doesn’t seem to feel the need to chatter all the time. When I was with M, V, & A, someone was always talking, commenting on this or that.

Or even weirder, was texting one of us as we walked and talked. I got fewer texts because I was the new girl, so half the time I felt like the texts were about me.

Maybe that’s why I wanted my sisters to have iPhones. Not just so we could talk, but so that I could have someone to text who was all my own.

Kit and I reach the cafeteria. The first thing you can see at the caff is the digital clock. There are three completely visible (and I think there are smaller ones). The first one is huge and right near the door. We have fifteen minutes until the bell rings marking the end of second period.

Agatha told me the caff is extravagant, that most schools have nothing like this.

Of course, I have nothing to compare it to. There are real plants near the door, and a stunning entry leading into my favorite room in the school. I don’t say that because there’s food here (although now that I’ve decided to eat what I want, that’ll help); I say that because the ceiling isn’t so much ceiling as a series of linked skylights that act like giant windows. On sunny days, like today, the entire caff feels like an outdoor park.

On rainy days, it’s the brightest room in the entire school.

The tables have little privacy areas, marked off by more giant plants, and that makes this place friendly too. I was braced for those bare, almost-prison-like cafeterias you see in the movies, where the new student gets frog-marched down aisles of uninterested students, but here, no one can really tell who you’re sitting with without looking.

Which, I suppose, is probably why M, V, & A hold their power gatherings in the courtyard rather than the caff (and probably why they eat off-campus most of the time).

This place always smells good. I’m usually not here so early, because my lunch isn’t for a few hours, so I’m surprised that the morning smells include baking bread and coffee.

My stomach growls, and I almost put my hands over it, but I don’t. I don’t want to draw more attention to myself.

Kit grabs a tray and heads to the long breakfast display, taking all kinds of stuff like pastries and apples and cereal and eggs. Me, I decide to stop at the omelet station (there’s a wok station at lunch and all kinds of other “stations” where they make you really fresh food).

I almost order the Mother-prescribed egg-white omelet with spinach and tomatoes, but at the last minute, I remember I’m doing things my way now. Cheddar cheese, ham, bacon, green peppers, and yes, spinach and tomatoes.

It only takes the lady at the station a few minutes to cook it up, and she hands me a plate with the World’s Largest Omelet on it.

Great. Now Kit will think I’m a pig.

Or, at least, he will if I eat all of it.

Then I have to remind myself that I don’t care. I don’t care about anything here. I’m going home in a few months.

Kit joins me, and I would have stopped caring about the pig thing even if I still cared (which I
so
don’t) because he’s holding two plates and has a third balanced on his arm.

He grins a little sheepishly when he sees my surprise. “Forgot to have breakfast,” he says, but I get the sense he’s not telling me the truth. I think this is his second meal of the day.

Growing boys and all that, as Mother says about her sons—who can eat whatever they want.
They’re
not fat. Just me, apparently.

Kit and I sit at a table that’s in the center of the room, with very few plants around it. But the sun from the skylight above halos us both, and illuminates my omelet, which makes me hungry all over again.

“So,” he says after taking a huge bite of scrambled eggs and sausage, “what upset you when I mentioned that you’d bested Melanie? Did you do it by accident?”

Good question. I seem to have a lot less emotional control than I did just forty-eight hours ago.

I take a bite of my omelet, stalling, and then getting lost in the crunch of properly cooked spinach mixed with the softness of the egg and yummy cheese. Oh, I’d missed real food. (Damn you, Mother.)

“No,” I say after a moment’s thought. “I didn’t do it by accident. I’m just tired of people treating me like crap, and me volunteering for it.”

He tilts his head slightly. Mother has a similar move when she’s intrigued, but his move looks nothing like hers. His doesn’t feel affected. It feels like he’s actually interested.

“Something changed,” he says.

I get the sense he’s paid attention to me, and I suddenly feel…odd. Has anyone focused on me like this before?

“I mean, it’d be nice if getting tired was the best way to learn how to stand up for yourself, but for most people, that doesn’t work.” He sounds fascinated. His gaze hasn’t left me at all.

“Yeah, well, I realized this weekend I’m never going to fit in, so why even try.”

He let out a small sound, almost a snort. “Why were you trying to fit in?”

“Because…” I stop. I can’t explain all the family dynamics and the magic and everything else to someone I just met. “I…I moved in with Mother and Owen and thought maybe…I don’t know…I could do what they wanted, but I can’t. I don’t belong here.”

He raises his eyebrows. “I don’t want to belong here either,” he says.

I realize then he’s talking about school. I’m talking about this non-magical “reality.”

But I’ll go with his version for the moment. “Why not?”

“It’s all phony,” he says. “That’s why I love your money speech. You didn’t grow up with money, did you?”

That’s impossible to answer. I suspect Daddy’s richer than Owen’s and Melanie’s families and all the other people on that Forby whatever list combined.

“Money’s not how power gets measured where I grew up,” I finally say.

“What is?” Kit asks.

“It’s complicated,” I say. “I guess the best answer is…”

And I pause again. I don’t know. Technically, me and Tiff and Brit were among the most powerful people in the universe when we were the Interim Fates, and we had
zero
idea what we were doing. Plus, we were being used by everyone around us, so we were like pawns on a chess game or something.

He’s finished eating everything off one plate. “What’s the best answer?”

I shrug. “I don’t know. It’s not simple where I’m from.”

“Greece, right?”

“Yeah, but a special part of Greece,” I say.

“You’re going back?”

I eat some more omelet. It’s delicious. “At the holidays.”

“Why?” he asks.

“I don’t fit in,” I say.

“You haven’t even tried,” he says.

I frown. I did everything Mother said. And I went to Megan, and I didn’t eat, and I wore stupid clothes, and I didn’t say what I should say and…

Oh, yeah. He means here.

“I did too,” I say. “I was with Melanie and Veronica and Agatha.”

“That’s not fitting in,” he says. “That’s finding the top of the heap and ingratiating yourself with it.”

“That’s a mixed metaphor if I ever heard one,” I say.

He grins. “I’m better at math than metaphors.” Then he leans back in his chair, a fork hanging from his right hand as if he’s just pausing on his second breakfast. “I think you’re better at math too. You don’t belong in that Advanced Algebra class. You’re acing every quiz. And it’s pretty clear you know some pre-Calc stuff, if not a lot of Calculus.”

“How do you know?” I ask.

His cheeks grow darker. He looks a little sheepish. “I’m not supposed to say.”

“You’re grading the tests,” I say.

“Maybe.” He bends forward and pulls his second plate closer, starting in on it. “You’re good. You don’t know a lot of stuff in the other classes, but you didn’t grow up in this culture. But jeez, I’ve never seen anyone who knows math like you do. And you let them put you in a baby class.”

“They couldn’t figure out what I know and don’t know,” I say.

“Well,” he says, “maybe if you stop trying to fit in, start doing the homework and listen in class, and actually use this place for an education, you’ll figure out who you really are.”

I open my mouth, about to ask,
Is it that obvious that I don’t?
when the first bell rings, marking the end of second period. I feel an odd mixture of disappointment and relief. Disappointment that the conversation will end; relief that I didn’t reveal any more of myself.

I take a few more bites of the omelet. He finishes up everything on that second plate, then grabs a donut off the third before putting the plates back on the tray.

“You’re awfully opinionated,” I say, mostly because that’s the only thing I can think of to say.

“Yeah,” he says. “That’s why I don’t talk very much.”

He stands up.

“You know,” he says, “I kinda hope you don’t leave in December. You’re the most interesting person in the school.”

Then he grabs his tray, dishes tottering precariously, and hurries toward the tub where everyone dumps their trays. He seems so cool—and then he trips a little, grabs at the plates as they start to fall, and manages to catch them before they topple to the ground.

He looks over his shoulder at me, I guess to see if I saw it all, and when he sees me watching him, he shrugs. He looks embarrassed, not ever-wise like he was pretending to be.

I grin, and say, “Good catch,” because it was. I’m impressed in spite of myself. And I’m feeling even better than I did this morning.

Although, if I were honest, it might just be the food.

But I don’t think so. I feel like I’m starting to get a grip on myself and everything around me.

I feel like I’m finally beginning to figure out who I am.

TWELVE

THAT I-KNOW-WHO-I-AM FEELING lasts all of five hours. Then three things happen—and all three concern M, V, & A.

First, Veronica catches me after American History, a class I’m so lost in that I can hardly pay attention even if I want to. She grabs my arm as I leave the room and pulls me into another of those comfort groupings.

Her fingernails catch my skin. I don’t really want to talk to her for a bunch of reasons. Mostly, I don’t want to get yelled at for my talk with Melanie in the morning.

Veronica’s hair is different than it was a few hours ago. It’s not as elaborate. She has it combed away from her face and pulled into place with a plain barrette. I’ve seen that style before. It means that she tried on a bunch of clothes, probably in those stores she was talking about. Plus, she’s wearing a diamond-studded bracelet that fits over her sleeve. She got rewarded for something, or she made a lot of money in her transaction that morning.

“Hey,” she says, tucking a strand of blonde hair behind her ear. She wants to pull me into one of the chairs, but I won’t sit down. My last class meets halfway across the building and today, for once, I want to be on time.

“I don’t have time,” I say.

She makes a disapproving face. “You should have time. I want to tell you something important—”

“After school,” I lie. Because after school, I’m going to run for the car and Ron the chauffer.

“Look,” Veronica says, glancing around as if she expects someone to be eavesdropping. As far as I can tell, none of the students flowing around us are paying any attention to us at all. “Melanie really wants to stay friends with you. You just have to apologize.”

“
I
have to?” I ask. “She pulled out my hair.”

“She gets…you know…” Veronica opens her hands in a
what-are-we-going-to-do gesture. “She’s ready to talk to you.”

I make a dismissive sound. “Good for her. Then she can apologize to me.”

“Melanie doesn’t apologize,” Veronica says. “It’s just something we put up with.”

Like Daddy. Tiff says we shouldn’t put up with anyone like that anymore.

“I don’t put up with that crap at all,” I say. “If she apologizes, good. If not, no loss to me.”

And then I walk away. I probably should’ve said something about Veronica, like I appreciate the fact she’s talking to me or cares about me or something, but I don’t.

Because I know it’s really not about me and her. Melanie sent her, and Melanie expects her to get results. The fact that I’m not playing will probably get Veronica in trouble, and I should care. I really should.

But Veronica can say no to Melanie just like I did. In fact, Veronica
should
say no to Melanie, but of course she won’t. Melanie buys her things. Melanie makes her cool. And Melanie takes care of her until, of course, she doesn’t anymore.