Fearscape (5 page)

James was sitting with his jock friends, and he was one of the people laughing the hardest. Val stared down at her blank piece of paper and wondered again why Lisa was so convinced that the two of them had anything in common. She was beginning to suspect Lisa knew no such thing, and the fact that James was cute was supposed to be enough.

Ms. Wilcox eyed her students with fond disapproval. “Now that you've gotten that out of your system, I expect total silence while you sketch. Total,” she said, switching off the radio, “Silence.”

The back of Val's neck prickled as the room was plunged into a hush broken only by the sound of scribbling pens and pencils, and whispered giggles. She had the same creepy feeling she'd gotten on the track field, and then again in the girls' locker room.

Her fingers closed around her pencil as if it were a weapon. She tried to think about what she wanted to draw, but her thoughts were occluded by swirls of uneasiness mired in irritation. For some reason, she thought of those fierce-looking little kittens from Petville. They had been so beautiful, what with their detailed markings and large blue eyes. Maybe should draw them. And then her hand was moving almost before she'd even completed the thought, describing wispy tufts of baby-soft fur, velvet whiskers, liquid eyes.

“
Nice use of detail, Val,” Ms. Wilcox said, in passing.

Val smiled in response, using the tip of her finger to smudge and blend the stripes. “I love animals,” she said, more to herself than her teacher.

It was the one bright spot in her day.

After Art was English, which Val hated. Mrs. Vasquez brandished works of literature the way other people, in crueler times, surely must have wielded pitchforks and spears. Before the more standard
Romeo and Juliet
, Val's teacher had gotten them started on
Titus Andronicus
, which was absolutely awful. Murder and rape and torture — but everyone else in the class was pretty enthusiastic about it, which meant Val had to pretend to like it, too, so they wouldn't make fun of her the way they did the one Mormon girl in the class.

Emily Abernathy, the Mormon, was on a customized lesson plan since her religion precluded many of the books and movies Mrs. Vasquez had them watch in class, including the 1960s movie with the infamous flash of boob. Many of the boys were looking forward to that movie.
James included, probably,
thought Val, leaning on the heel of her hand with annoyance.

“
We'll also be watching the movie,
Titus
,” Mrs. Vasquez was saying, “So I'll be passing out permission slips. If you don't turn them in by the end of the week, you can't watch the movie.”

Oh, really?
Val immediately resolved to lose hers. These things happened, after all, and an imposed study session in the library under the hawkish eyes of crabby old Ms. Banner was far more appealing than watching people get chopped up and baked into pies. Just the thought made Val want to throw
up.

Emily looked equally discomfited. She caught Val's look of horror and gave her a shy, strained smile of camaraderie.

Mrs. Vasquez looked at Val, then at Emily, and said, “If you don't watch the movie” —
how could she possibly know what I was thinking?
“ — I'll be expecting a five-page analysis of your thoughts on
Titus Andronicus
, along with detailed examples and quotes from the play.”

Fudge
, thought Val, and from Emily's face, it was clear she was thinking the same thing.
I hate English.

She ended the day with Health, which wasn't much better. Some poor college girl had been recruited to tell her story about alcohol poisoning after a party gone wrong.
It sounds like something out of one of those Lifetime movies Mrs. Jeffries watches
, Val thought, as the girl talked about waking up with her head in a toilet, and how she had panicked when she started puking blood. Val wanted to puke herself.

The bell cut the girl off just as she started talking about her enlarged pancreas and unpleasant emergency visit to the hospital.
Thank God
, thought Val.
Saved by the bell.

“
How was school?” Mrs. Kimble asked.

Val yanked open the door and plunked herself into the passenger seat. “Gross.”

“
Gross?”

“
People vomiting blood and getting chopped up.”

“
That must have been an interesting lesson.”

“
It wasn't.”

“
Well, I have some errands to run. Do you want to come with me, or shall I drop you off at home?”

Val started to say “home” and paused. “Could I go to Petville?”

“
Val, I've told you — ”

“
Not to buy. It's just — they have these baby kittens. They're the cutest things ever, Mom, I've never seen anything like them before. They're a new breed — I'm drawing them for Art.”

“
This is a school thing?”

Val nodded. That cinched it.

“
Oh, all right. How long do you think you'll be?”

“
I have my phone,” said Val. “You can call me when it's time to pick me up. And then I'll come out to the parking lot and wait.”

“
You certainly have this planned out.”

Val colored. “Mom! God, not everything's a conspiracy, you know.”

“
It is when you're blushing,” her mother said, which only caused the flush to deepen. “What on earth are you planning?”

“
My art project,” Val mumbled, swinging herself out of the car door when her mother pulled into the shopping center. “I'll call you when I'm done.”

Stupid, nosy mothers.

The automatic doors slid open with a whir as she walked towards the store. Val's chest tightened, and she tightened her grip on the strap of her backpack.

The strange boy was glaringly absent — not that she was looking. In his place was a heavyset man in a blue apron her eyed her with undisguised suspicion, staring at the sketchpad under her arm. Val looked around nervously before approaching the man and explaining what she wanted.

“
I just want to draw them,” she said, shrinking under his gaze, “I won't touch or bother them or anything like that. It's for, um, school.”

The man grunted something like reluctant quiescence before going off to harangue some middle schoolers Val recognized from last year, when she was in eighth grade, for pestering the beta fish and laughing as they attacked the glass.

Val shook her head, hoping she hadn't been that annoying at twelve, and sat cross-legged in front of the kitten pen, wincing a little at the grimy dustiness of the floor. A few of the kittens crawled over to the wall to stare at her and mew. Val was flooded with the urge to coo over them, but the image of the stern-faced store manager dampened that impulse.

Slowly, conscious of the manager's menacing presence, Val began to sketch. At first she used grids to try and map the proportions of the kittens' faces. She realized immediately that she had made their foreheads much too small and their cheeks much too fat in her preliminary sketch.

As she sat erasing, she was aware of a shadow crossing her pad. She looked up, startled, to see the fat man hovering over her. “Are you an artist?”

“
I guess,” said Val, stiffening a little as she looked back at her paper.

“
Hmm.” The man grunted again. “That's quite good.”

“
Thank you.” She could feel her cheeks getting warm. She wished he would go away.

“
There's a boy works here — he's an artist, too.”

At that, Val looked up. “Really? How old is he?”

“
Old enough to know better, young enough to worry about.”

Now what on earth did that mean? Val wanted to ask him more, but the man had grown tired of the subject and walked off towards the rows of bird cages, shaking his head and muttering as he resumed tailing the rowdy group of preteens through the store.

That was weird.

Val finished her sketches, brushing the man's strange words off like the dust from the floor, and checked her phone for new messages. No calls from her mother, which meant she was probably still shopping. Instead of calling for early pickup, Val walked over to the Starbucks two stores down to get herself a drink while she waited.

The coffee shop was crowded because of the grocery stores nearby. Val waited in line, flipping through her sketchbook to study her drawings, and also secretly hoping that someone walking by might comment, when she was suddenly compelled to look up.

There, sitting at one of the tables by the window with a half-drunk espresso, was the boy from Petville. Staring — at her.

(There's a boy works here. He's an artist, too.)

I wonder if he's the artist.

But such a coincidence seemed too great. There had to be dozens of people his age —
our age —
working there. The artist could have been anyone, a college student, maybe.

Funny, though, her running into him here.

Don't be stupid. He's probably on break or something.

“
What can I get for you today?” the barista asked.

“
An iced hazelnut latte, please.”

“
That'll be three dollars and fifty cents.”

Val came up with exactly two-fifty. The barista fixed her with an annoyed look, glancing over Val's shoulder at the long line building up behind her. Val's face flushed.
Where is that other dollar? I know I had more money in here.

“
Miss? You still owe me a dollar. People are waiting.”

“
I know. Um.” Val wished the floor would just open up and swallow her whole. “I don't think — ”

“
I'll take care of it,” said a deep, amused voice.

Val looked up in shock. Gavin had left both his table and his drink unattended, and was handing the barista a crumpled dollar. She couldn't believe what she was seeing. It was like something out of a book. She didn't know this boy or anything about him, really, and yet here he was, stepping in to her rescue like a hero from a harlequin romance.

Except he's not the hero
, she reminded herself. Lisa had made that painfully clear.

“
Wait,” she said, “You don't have to — ”

“
It's fine,” he said smoothly, slipping his wallet back into his pocket.

Val crossed to the other side of the counter, blinking back tears. She wasn't sure why she was so upset, but she was. That had been
so
embarrassing — and then he had just paid for her, out of the blue. Who did that? Not that she wasn't grateful, because she was, but she was nervous, and her nervousness was intensified by the sheer force of her gratitude. It threatened to bowl her over as he sauntered over to where she stood, pointedly not looking at him.

Indebted, that was the word for her feelings. She felt indebted.

“
You're welcome,” he prompted.

“
Thank you.”

“
Is that all you have to say to me?”

What else was she supposed to say?

When the barista called out her name, mispronouncing it as “Valerie” the way everyone did, he took her drink, and Val was forced to chase after him, all the way back to his table. She reached for the cup and he shook his head, sliding it out of reach so that she would be forced to slide in beside him to  reclaim it. At her hesitation, he said, “I don't bite.”

Resigned, she plopped into the booth and sat away from him as far as possible.

He was wearing a black and white checked shirt beneath a black V-necked sweater, and one of those newsboy caps all the hipsters wore. He didn't look like a hipster, though, not even with those glasses. He didn't look quite like anything she had ever seen before.

He cleared his throat, and she realized with no small amount of embarrassment that she'd been caught staring. “Are you always this reticent?”

“
You were rude to my friend,” she said in response.

“
Mm, that's right. You're the girl from a few days ago,” he mused. “Valerian — Val.”

Val stiffened. “You — you remember my name?”
Now that's a first.

He smiled at his espresso as he took a sip. “I remember more than that.”

“
She told me I should stay away from you.”

“
I figured,” he said pleasantly. “That's why I used a lure. How's the wrist?”

“
It's healed,” Val said, “What lure? What are you talking about?”

“
Making you come to me. With this.” He tapped his cup.

Val's frown deepened. “You shouldn't be so dismissive. I think you hurt Lisa's feelings.”