Damage (11 page)

Jesse

“Okay, so we’re both healing faster, running faster, feeling stronger. What else?” I ask, loud enough for Dani to hear me through the bathroom door. I stare at the lined paper in my lap and do my best
not
to think about the fact that she’s taking her clothes off in there.

Just handing her the jeans and sweatshirt I pulled from Traci’s drawers was weird. I’ve never picked out clothes for a girl before. It was a strangely … intimate thing. Combined with the fact that I can’t seem to keep my hands off Dani for more than a few minutes and I’m amazed I can sit still right now.

But I do. I sit, unmoving and focused at the end of my bed with my notebook, writing down everything we know about what’s happened to us. Know thy enemy. I can’t remember where I heard that, but it’s always stuck with me. Knowing when the Thing would come, knowing the ways it attacked and the tricks it used saved my life when I was little. Now the dragon has stepped up its game and I need to step up my knowledge or I won’t last long. Neither of us will.

“What about the timing of the attacks?” Dani’s voice is muffled, as if she’s pulling something over her face. Up and over. Off. I imagine her sweater falling to the floor and her fingers moving to the buttons of the shirt underneath.

I squeeze my eyes shut and refuse to imagine what Dani will look like when her button-down shirt joins her sweater on the floor. Even if she seems to like me—maybe even more than like me, maybe even want me the same way I want her—I don’t deserve to imagine things like that about her. She would hate me if she knew the truth, if she knew that I’m part of the reason her life is in danger.

There’s no doubt about that now. But why had her uncle—or step-uncle or whatever he is—paid me to get her on the bus? Did he just want to make sure she was out of town so he’d be free to come raid her father’s office and rough up her stepmom in private? Or is it something worse?

I can’t throw the feeling that the bus crash wasn’t an accident. I keep seeing the semi’s headlights in my mind, the way they raced for the bus so fast, like a bullet aimed from a gun. It’s probably stupid, but I add “research crash” to our to-do list anyway, right below visiting the children’s ward.

The bathroom door cracks open. I look up, meeting Dani’s eyes. They’re brighter now, sparkling above the white sweatshirt I grabbed. “You look nice,” I say, the words out of my mouth before I can stop them.

“Thanks.” She studies the floor, her cheeks pinker than they were a second ago. It’s probably the cold. The house is freezing. As usual. Heat is on the list of things Trent figures we can do without in the name of buying more cigarettes. “The jeans are a little short.”

“Oh … I didn’t see.” All I see is that the jeans that are loose on my scrawny foster mom cling to Dani’s every muscle and curve. She looks good in jeans. Very good.

“So what do you think? Is there any kind of pattern?” She perches beside me at the end of the bed, close, but not too close. I can tell that she’s nervous. Being alone with me in a room where a bed is the main piece of furniture isn’t something that’s going unnoticed on her end. It isn’t going unnoticed on my end, either. Not by a long shot. I have to fight to focus on our conversation.

“Well, the dragon showed up the first time after the crash and the more I think about it … ” I pause, the image of sharp claws scratching against glass flashing through my head. “It seemed like it was trying to keep us in the bus. I know that sounds crazy, but—”

“No, it doesn’t. I mean, they obviously want us both dead.” Dani’s brows pinch together. “So you think the dragon knew the bus was going to explode?”

I shrug. “I don’t know. I don’t know if it thinks like that.”

“But Rachel does. And she dropped the branch while we were trying to get away from the bus and threw the bottles when I was drinking my Coke at the bar,” Dani says. “I was feeling better anyway, but usually I would have needed that Coke to keep from passing out.”

A strange thought enters my mind. “When the dragon showed up at your house, I was getting something to drink and eat.”

Dani cocks her head. “And Penny was getting ready to take us to the hospital.”

“It’s almost like … ”

“Like they don’t want us to do anything that will help us survive,” she says, eyebrows unpinching as her lips curve. “Why are you smiling?”

I shake my head and turn back to my notebook. “It’s just nice that we’re thinking the same thing.”

“Yeah. It is.” She scoots closer. I catch a whiff of her grassy shampoo and barely resist the urge to turn and sniff the top of her head. Instead, I clear my throat and watch her long fingers uncurl as she points to the bottom of my to-do list. “That’s a good idea. We should find out more about the wreck.”

The wreck. The bus. Her stepmom’s creepy brother and his money.

I cover the list with my hand. “Yeah.” I should tell her now, tell her why I’m so interested in finding out more about the wreck.

“Don’t be embarrassed,” Dani says. “I make lists all the time. I love lists.”

“That’s not surprising.” I stare at the pale freckles dotting the bridge of her nose. I imagine what they will look like in the summer when the sun makes them stand out dark against her skin. I bet they’ll be cute. I bet she’s even prettier when she’s tan. I can practically see her nose wrinkle as she jumps off the swimming dock near the lake.

With effort, I cut my fantasy short, knowing if I start thinking about Dani in a swimsuit I’ll embarrass myself. This is pointless anyway. I’ll never see Dani in the summer time. If we live through the winter, she’ll end up hating me like every other girl I’ve ever tried to know.

“So you’re saying I look like a compulsive, list-making kind of girl?” she asks, her face moving closer to mine.

“No, you … ” My words fade away. Her lips are so close. She wants me to kiss her. Do I dare? I shouldn’t. She doesn’t know me—not the real me—and she wouldn’t like me if she did. I have to tell her the truth. I have to—

“You’re right,” she says, moving closer, closer, until I forget how to breathe. “I am a list-maker, and a little compulsive. And I’m usually very shy. And I’ve only been on one date and … I’ve never kissed a boy.”

“Never?” The confession rings true. I saw Dani walk down the aisle of the bus. Even something small like that made her a total mess, and she’s known most of the Mad Prep kids her entire life. Still, it’s hard to believe no one’s ever touched her. Some guy, some time in fifteen years, should have stolen a kiss. She’s too pretty, too nice and easy to be with, and … funny. Unexpectedly, Dani’s funny, too. Like now. Here she is, making fun of herself, daring me to play along.

“If Rachel had killed me with that tree,” she says, “I would have died without ever being kissed.”

“You’re not going to die.”

“I hope not. But just in case, I … ” She swallows and leans so close I can feel her breath on my skin. But I can tell she isn’t going to come any closer. She wants
me
to kiss
her
, not the other way around.

My heart races and my tongue slips out to wet my lips. I can’t remember ever being this nervous before a kiss. I’ve kissed a lot of girls. Most of them older and more experienced than Dani. College girls. Some even older. Full-grown women I’ve met at bars who liked the fact that I seem dangerous. Girls our age—especially the Madisonville Prep girls—are usually afraid of me. Maybe because I’m a foster kid nobody wants, maybe because I’m big for my age and don’t try to control my temper the way I should. Maybe because they can tell that I’ve had more experience with the shitty side of life than they even want to imagine.

Whatever their reasons, I’m not someone they invite home for dinner at their mansions. Those girls think they’re too good for me, and I know I’m not good enough for Dani.

“Please, you don’t have to mean it.” The tremor in her voice echoes in my chest.

“Oh, I’d mean it,” I whisper, heart surging up to pulse in my throat, making it hard to speak.

“Then mean it,” she whispers back.

I can’t remember if she moved those last few inches or if I did. All I know is that seconds later we’re stretched out on my bed, Dani beneath me, kissing me like the world is going to end. And maybe it is. At least for us. Maybe that’s why my entire body comes alive when her tongue slips past my lips. Maybe that’s why I ache all over when she holds me tight, twining her legs in mine. Maybe it’s simply knowing that this might be our last kiss—as well as her first—that makes it the
best
kiss, but I doubt it.

It’s Dani who makes it the best kiss. It’s because she looks at me with eyes that see beyond the mean, the bulk, the bullshit. It’s because she isn’t afraid to hold my hand, to let me take care of her, to trust me with everything, even her life. No one has ever trusted me like that.

No one ever should.

I pull away and force myself to move my body a few inches from hers. “I can’t. I’m sorry. It’s not you. It’s … I’m—”

I’m a liar. I took five hundred dollars from a man I didn’t know to get you on that bus and I’ve spent half the day running for my life with you and didn’t tell you the truth. You shouldn’t trust me. You shouldn’t care about me. You should find someone who can really help you and let me live or die on my own.

I would have said something like that. The words were on the tip of my tongue.

But just then, someone knocks at the front door downstairs.

“Hello? Mr. and Mrs. Jennings?” The voice is low, deep, official-sounding, like the Department of Human Services workers who used to come check on me when I was first placed with Trent and Traci.

Back then, my foster parents made more of an effort. They needed the check they got every month a lot more than they need it now. Traci was barely twenty years old and so depressed she could barely get up most mornings let alone hold down a job. She was the one to suggest taking in a kid. She’d been in the foster system and knew you could make a little money if you were careful.

So she and Trent pulled it together and did enough to make the social workers happy. It didn’t take much—a clean kitchen, turn the heat on, make sure I was always dressed appropriately for the weather. The men and women who showed up at the door dealt with horror every day. A boy with a few bruises and haunted eyes from nights spent fighting an “imaginary” monster wasn’t at the top of their needs-protection list.

I haven’t seen a social worker since I was in junior high. Whoever this official person is, it’s probably someone Dani and I don’t want to see. Not if we want to keep our freedom and have a chance to investigate what happened to us at Baptist on our own.

Another knock, this one hard enough to make Dani flinch and her eyes fly wide. “Should we answer the door?”

“No. Get your shoes on. There’s another way out,” I whisper.

Dani scoots off the bed and dives for her shoes while I throw our notebook, all the cash from my secret stash, and anything else I think might be useful into my gym bag. A can of nuts, a few smashed granola bars I was planning to throw away, the waterproof poncho I wear when I go running on rainy mornings, and a flashlight—never know when you might need a flashlight—go into the bag. It takes less than thirty seconds, but already the knock and the voice come again.

“Jesse Vance? If you’re in there, you need to come on out, son.”

My mouth twists.
Son
. I hate that word. I’m no one’s “son,” especially not this condescending asshole’s.

“This is Agent Bullock,” the man continues. “I’m with the FBI. I’m here to help you.”

Dani’s eyebrows shoot up as she silently mouths, “FBI?”

I shake my head, indicating I have no idea what the guy is talking about. But something in his voice makes me want to run in the other direction. Maybe it’s just my natural response to an authority figure—I’ve been pulled into the police station often enough to develop a healthy hatred of cops—but I don’t think so. There is something …
off
about this. I haven’t done anything worthy of the FBI’s attention and there’s no way an FBI agent would be investigating the crash this quickly. A cop at the door, looking for kids whose bodies they haven’t found in the wreckage, I would buy.

But the FBI? It doesn’t make sense. Until it does, I’ll be avoiding Agent Bullock.

I take Dani’s hand and slip out the door of my room, heading toward the window at the end of the hall, the one that leads out onto the sagging roof. I’d sneaked out this way fifty times or more before I figured out that Traci and Trent didn’t give a shit if I walked out the front door so long as they didn’t get a call from the police to come pick me up in the middle of the night.

We’re at the window—sliding it open—when Agent Bullock calls out again. His voice sounds even louder in the hall, making it seem like he’s already in the house, calling from the bottom of the stairs. The hairs on my neck stand on end.

“Jesse, is Danielle Connor there with you?”

The hairs on my neck go from standing on end to jumping around screaming. Something is wrong. Why is this guy so sure I’m here? And how does he know that Dani’s with me?

“Do you think Penny called them?” Dani hisses.