Edge of Seventeen (3 page)

“Maggie, what the heck is going on?” Her
voice cracked, the raised pitch of her question coming out in a
whine.

Rather than answer her question or even close
the distance to give Sunday the comfort of her embrace, Maggie
simply turned around and stepped slowly toward the living room.
Without turning, she spoke, raising her voice just enough for
Sunday to hear.

“Whatever happens, my girl, you’ll be
alright. I have seen it.”

Winter in St. James Parish, Louisiana wasn’t
anything like the winters in Salem, Massachusetts. It wasn’t so
much the lack of snow. It didn’t snow in Salem all that much,
anyway. It was everything else. In Salem, where Sunday had spent
the first half of her young life, the air was crisp. Even the sea
breeze had a certain definition about it that the Mississippi and
Gulf air didn’t have. Seasons changed with such richness in
Massachusetts that it permeated every aspect of life. It was in the
colors of the leaves. It was in the local harvest. Even the energy
that hummed through the air changed.

In Salem, everything about the transition
from spring into summer into fall and into winter was something
Sunday could feel from the hair on her head to the soles of her
feet. It was life. Electric, vivid, and invigorating
life.
Winter had always been her favorite season because, with it, came
the joy of Christmas. Around her, people buzzed with excitement
about the possibility of snow. Even if it was unlikely at best,
everyone in Salem wished for a white Christmas. School broke for
the winter and people swarmed the streets in search of the perfect
gifts for their loved ones.

For all the years of memories that had
accumulated since then, one stood out from the rest with such
clarity that she was hard pressed to believe it happened eight
years ago. It was early December, and she was only six years-old at
the time. She and her mother walked hand-in-hand down Downey
Street, beset on either side by small shops. The aroma of fresh
baked pastries streamed from the open shop doors lining the road.
Every window they passed was decorated with tinsel and glittering
red and gold Christmas ornaments.

The bravest of all orange leaves clung
desperately to an otherwise bare tree that they passed. Sunday
stared at it through upturned eyes as her mother gently squeezed
her hand and guided her forward. A slight breeze blew and the leave
shook terribly but never let go of its impossibly strong grip on
its branch. Her eyes were still on that leaf as her mother stopped
moving forward and turned to her.

“Sweetheart Sunny, you’ve got to look ahead
or you’ll bump into something.”

Her mother’s large chocolate eyes glistened
in the morning sun. Cascading brown waves framed her face and
swayed with the pull of the soft wind. Looking down on her like
that, Sunday’s mother was larger than life. And all of her, every
inch of that towering frame, beamed with uncompromising, absolute
devotion to her daughter. Even then, Sunday knew that she was
different. Sunday knew that the way she felt her mother’s love
wasn’t the way her mother felt hers. Yet, her love was just as
complete, just as all-compassing.

Sunday pointed her gloved finger to the
single leaf dangling from the tree that they had passed.

“It’s holding on so strong, mom,” she said.
Her small voice came out in squeaks, and her mom’s freckled nose
crinkled as a grin formed on her face.

“It’s just one of a million leaves that holds
on until it can’t anymore. In the spring, another will come up in
its place and, in the next winter, that same leaf will hold on just
as hard as this one. It’s all just a part of what happens. You
can’t just fixate on that, or you’ll miss everything else happening
around you.”

She raised her arm and brushed over the
canvas of Downey Street around them. Sunday’s eyes followed it, and
her world opened up. Her mom was right. The shops, the people
milling about the street, and the cool winter air were all a part
of their narrative that day. The leaf had a role in it, but it was
just a small part.

In her small corner of Louisiana eight years
later, it was almost the direct opposite. There was no Downey
Street to walk down. No little shops with cracked-open doors
welcoming in the passersby for Christmas goodies. The trees were
green as they had been months ago and as they would be months
later. Perhaps, like the last morning she spent with her mother,
this last morning with Maggie would stay etched in her mind for all
time. At least, Sunday hoped, as she forced herself to take each
step farther and farther from her home, that would be true.

The road Sunday walked from the convent to
the bus stop was long and lonely. On either side of her were long
stretches of grass before half-ruined houses with For Sale signs
staked into the lawns. She’d never seen a factory till she came to
Louisiana. Not in real-life, anyway. Here, there were at least two.
A black smoke stack rose to the west from the metal plant that sat
on the east bank of the Mississippi River. Even from miles away,
Sunday could feel the pollution seeping in through her pores. If
anything, it made her wish her guards were stronger, but she
doubted that she wouldn’t notice it anyway if she were mundane.

The temperature changed little, and the
humidity, even in the winter months, was stifling. Sure, people
noticed that it got a bit colder, but they didn’t exactly celebrate
it. It was just another thing that Louisianans took in slow, steady
strides like everything else in the world.

That even-temperedness was good for Sunday,
in a way. It meant that she could coast through her days without
sudden spikes in emotion or agitation that would send her reeling.
Her ability was such that unexpected eruptions of passions could
spell devastation. If she wasn’t prepared to handle them, she’d
ignite. She was sensitive to the world around her, even more so to
the people around her. Dynamic energy buzzing and spiking about her
ignited fires within her.

It was magic. That much she knew. But her
kind of magic wasn’t like everyone else’s. Her mother was a witch,
and the nuns who looked after her were witches too. Yet those
witches, along with every other witch she’d ever known about, were
gifted in other ways. Moreover, their gifts had been honed through
years of study and practice, something that Sunday didn’t have.

The nuns who’d fostered her were kind, kind
enough to tutor her in the ways of the spirit and of the mind.
They’d taken care to honor her gifts and treat her as a kindred
soul. To them she wasn’t a threat. Maggie was the closest thing to
a mother that Sunday had since her own had died. Sunday didn’t
think that woman could ever compare with Maggie. Maggie loved her
and Maggie taught her. Even when Sunday argued with Maggie to let
her go to the movies with Brad Bower (he was
so cute),
and
even when Maggie got upset with her for copping an attitude like
adolescents were wont to do, what they had was love.
Mother-to-daughter, tutor-to-student love.

Now, however, Sunday wasn’t sure she’d ever
see her again. It devastated Maggie, and it devastated her
equally.

Sunday hardly noticed the bus pull up in
spite of the harsh screeching of its ancient brakes. She’d been
staring off into the distance across the empty road rather than
looking down the street, eagerly, for her ride. The sky had grown
heavy with ominous grey clouds during her walk. The hairs on her
skin rose to greet the oncoming rains still miles from where she
stood. Her gifts made her a lot of things, and one of those things
was a walking, talking Farmer’s Almanac, except much more precise.
Still, the storm wasn’t what distracted her.

This might be the last time I ever see
this.

“Got the world on your shoulder’s today,
Sunny?” Clark asked. His gravelly voice came out more a bark rather
than human, but he was one hundred percent mundane. Even so, Sunday
hopped back as he’d spoken, his voice startling her into
attention.

“You okay, kid?”

Hooded eyes inspected her head-to-toe to make
sure she was alright. Clark was a good man, and he’d been a good
man the entirety of Sunday’s life in St. James Parish. His wife ran
the grocery store by the convent where Sunday lived, and Sister
Margaret had been acquainted with their family for decades. For
years, she saw him nearly every day. Same gravelly voice and same
familiar manner. But, today, it caught her off guard because she’d
been expecting something else. She wasn’t quite sure what, but she
knew it wouldn’t be good.

Sunday’s eyebrows pinched and she bit her
lip.

“Sorry about that,” Sunday answered, pulling
a dollar from her pocket and feeding the ticketing machine at his
side. “Just have a lot on my mind today is all.” She looked over
his shoulder and out the window toward the gathering slate clouds.
“It’s gonna rain soon. Probably going to pour.”

Clark gave a somber smile.

“Glad I showed up now to get you out of it,
then.”

He leaned forward against the steering wheel,
and pointed his head to the empty front row bench across the aisle
from the driver’s seat.

“At least your spot’s not taken.”

Sunday grinned weakly, brow still heavy, and
with a gloomy expression. She pulled the strap of her bag tighter
over her shoulder as she crossed toward it and dumped herself onto
the seat.

The bus ride was unusually quiet that day.
Mostly, this ride was a lonely one until a few stops closer to her
school, but there was at least always another person taking the
ride with her. This dreary Monday, however, there wasn’t a soul on
that bus other than Clark and Sunday. After a minute or so on the
road, Clark noticed the emptiness too. His head bobbed from the
poorly maintained road, and he peeked over his shoulder to his
frequent passenger. Sunday stared out the window with squinted eyes
and that ever-pinched expression. She could sense his question
before it was asked. Still, though, she sat motionless and
pensive.

“Maggie give you a rough time this morning or
something?” he asked with a half-chuckle and an inviting smile.

As much as that ridiculous question might
have usually garnered a roll of the eyes and an incredulous
headshake from Sunday, she didn’t respond. Instead, she sighed and
her shoulders slumped a little heavier. The driver turned his face
back to the road, and they continued along in much the same silence
even when others embarked at the next stops. When they finally
reached Sunday’s school stop, she rose quietly and dragged her feet
forward to the door, never once making eye contact with her
friend.

Just as the door was about to close behind
her, Sunday turned. Her face was soft with a lack of expression,
but her eyes told an altogether different story. In them swirled
faint wisps of grey that dissipated like smoke even as Clark
watched. He frowned, and his eyebrows gathered tightly. He shook
his head sharply, and leaned slightly forward as though he could
get a better look and see it was just an effect of the light.
Sunday’s lips pressed tightly together until they all but
disappeared into her mouth. Her chin dropped, and she looked at her
feet.

With an ever-amassing boulder resting on her
shoulders, she turned her back and walked away. It wasn’t the best
last impression to make on a cherished neighbor, but it was the one
she was going to make. Nothing was going to change that.

Everything was
as Bernadette had said it would be. The convent’s location, the
girl’s daily routine… all of the information they’d received from
the witch had been accurate. Like clockwork, Cyrus got a call to
let him know that Stephen and Angel were en route to Albuquerque.
They had secured the package, and the Incarnate was traveling with
them to their one stop along the way to Bernadette.

The next morning, the knock came as he
watched cable television on the motel bed, his back to the
headboard and his legs extended. . From the other side, Angel
announced that they’d arrived and asked Cyrus to open the door
because they needed to bring in the Incarnate. She’d been sedated
for the abduction and was likely still reeling from the effects of
the drugs when they’d pulled up to the motel, or so Cyrus thought.
What he didn’t imagine was that Sunday wasn’t the typical
abductee.

“She’s walking, just not wanting to,” Angel
barked as Stephen passed him by and entered the room. His head held
high, he nodded to Cyrus as he entered.

“Look to the girl,” Stephen called over his
shoulder.

Angel hesitated for a moment, gritting his
teeth and blowing a hard breath from his nose. Evidently, Angel
wasn’t the Incarnate’s biggest fan. He didn’t need to be told
twice, however; and he turned on his heel and stormed off toward
the car.

Alone in the motel room with the eyes of the
pack far from them, Cyrus looked directly to Stephen, eye-to-eye.
Cyrus towered over Stephen with his six-foot four-inch frame and
his tightly muscled physique. Even so, he appreciated Stephen’s
dominance. They were friends, not rivals. The Alpha had an ability
to control his wolves like none other whom Cyrus had met.

The werewolves of the Alaska pack were
soldiers. The pack was a unit of fifteen werewolves; brothers and
sisters in arms and circumstance. Though the pack was comparably
small considering the much larger packs that helmed from more
densely populated and more centralized locations, they were
regarded as the elite force of the preternatural community. Mostly
former military and hard-living men and women, the Alaska
contingent was an impressive community.

Historically, most of Cyrus’ experiences with
other werewolves ended badly. He had been in a pack for some time
early in his post-transformation life, playing the role of
submissive for as long as he could milk it. Still, as the pack
warmed to him, a majority of his more submissive packmates
gravitated to him and sought his counsel, approval, and affection
at all costs. His Alpha then, not one for the threat of mutiny or
murder, challenged him. The Alpha’s mutilated corpse was the answer
to his challenge.