Coveted

  Chapter 4

  That night, I settled on the couch in my pajamas with Riley asleep at my feet. I checked my phone. there were ten new texts from Michael. I didn't read them. I shut it off and stared at the small box in my lap. I hadn't dared bring it up again around him. He would have said I was being silly and should have chucked it long ago. When Michael came to a conclusion about something, it took ironclad evidence to change his mind. I, on the other hand, had not yet made up my mind.

  I stared at the note... He is coming. Remember.

  He. The only new he was Bran. No. It wasn't him. That was silly.

  Lifting off the lid, I looked down at the silver etching. There was no way Samantha or Amanda would have gone to the effort for a joke. They definitely would not have bothered researching runes. I picked it up.

  "Please, I don't know what else to do. I've tried everything but nothing ever changes... " Why was I crying?

  Large arms encased me and I sunk into the offered warmth. "I promised I'd always protect you. You need to have more faith in me." The deep voice was lilted by a thick accent. I loved his voice. I always had. "Promise me you'll give me more time," he pressed. "I will fix this."

  I pressed my face more deeply into him. I wanted to trust him but I did not know if he was making impossible promises.

  "Maera, promise me," he repeated.

  The door slammed and the stone fell to the floor. My mother was grumbling as she freed herself from her layers of winter clothing. I looked down at the dark stone resting on the carpet a few feet away.

  "Why do I even bother?" She asked no one. "Twelve years of this crap!"

  Riley hopped off the couch and trotted over to her to nudge her hand. He never liked seeing my mother upset. She followed up her mutterings with some choice expletives. I knew what this meant. It happened every time an abused animal came into the clinic.

  "You going to be ok, mom?" I asked. I stretched out to scoop the stone back into the box using the lid. Sealing it, I set it on the coffee table. I needed to focus on my mother as best I could but what had just happened with the stone was not so easily shaken.

  She sighed. "Yeah, sorry to worry you, honey. Another animal cruelty case involving a cat. That's the second one this week. Why do people get pets just to torture them?" She looked down at Riley to ask the question. He looked up at her innocently as if he could not make much sense of it either.

  "Do I want to know what happened?" I asked. Even at the best of times, it was increasingly difficult listening to the stories but having a shoulder helped her. She needed to get these episodes off her chest so I would do my best to listen without indicating my own horror and sadness.

  She huffed. "Probably not, honey. I just don't get people. This isn't why I went into this line of work. I wanted to help animals, not just be a witness to their abuse."

  I pushed up from the couch and walked over to her. She was still trying to get her scarf off, which was proving more difficult than usual due to her flustered state.

  "But that means you can help them," I offered. It was a feeble consolation and I was not feeling the sentiment myself at that moment, though that might have had something to do with the echo of a deep lilted voice in my head. "Is the cat going to be ok?"

  "If you call losing an eye and tail ok," she grumbled.

  I stretched my arms around her and held her close. She collapsed into my embrace. She trembled against my shoulder and sobbed. Riley pawed at my leg. He always wanted to be included in family hugs.

  I couldn't do my mother's job in a million years. I loved animals too but I would have broken long before she had. Despite the nights she came home and cried, she would always go back. She would take a night to indulge in her empathy and then be strong and immovable the next day; back at work and saving the pet population.

  When her crying had slowed, she pulled away to remove the last of her scarf and hooked it on the rack. She plastered the "I will survive" smile onto her face. "Let's order in something decadent and watch a movie."

  "Sure, mom, but I'm not all that hungry." I did not have the strength to confess I had not eaten all day nor that I would be making the school my home almost every evening from now on for practice. I would tell her tomorrow.

  Her brow furrowed. "You have eaten today, right?"

  She knew me too well. I looked down at Riley and scratched him behind the ears.

  "You are eating two of everything!" She insisted before walking down to her bedroom to change. Riley trotted behind her. "And get Fred cued up while I make the call," she yelled back down the hall.

  I had planned to start my Downton marathon early but she had a completely irrational crush on Fred Astaire. My Matthew Crawley crush could never compete so I turned to our stack of old movies in search of Funny Face. I didn't mind. Thinking about other people's problems was a good distraction.

  "Burgers or pizza?" She yelled from the bedroom.

  "You pick."

  "You're still eating two of everything!"

  "Fine!" I shouted back, pretending I was mocking anger. I was a little angry with her nagging but I didn't want her to know that. If I were honest with myself, I was at risk for a relapse. Chaos made not eating addictive. I could control something in the world by controlling what went into my mouth.

  I sighed. Starving myself wouldn't help me make sense of my feelings regarding Bran, Michael, or the stone. Life had been so predictable, simple, and peaceful once. How could only a few days change all of that?

  I looked in the direction of Michael's house. At that very moment, the person who had ruined it all was so close, just on the other side of two walls.

  The next morning, I awoke with the memory of a Scottish voice teasing my mind and a grease hangover abusing my body. I dressed and walked across the yard to Michael's. Even though it was late morning, I wasn't sure he would be awake. I couldn't wait. I wanted to apologize for acting like an ass. I was also hoping he would have come to his senses about Bran after a night tutoring him.

  I considered texting him but that just didn't feel right under the circumstances. I needed to apologize in person. Then I could also interrogate him in person.

  He opened the door and squinted at me. His hair was sticking up in the back and he was still in his pajamas.

  "You got Lucky Charms?" I asked.

  He stood aside to let me by. "You know I do."

  I slipped past him as I tried to mutter my real reason for coming but only managed, "I... uh..."

  He grinned. "Wanted to admit you acted like a complete freak yesterday?"

  I nodded. "I'm sorry."

  He waved a hand dismissively as he walked into the tiny kitchen. "I've already let it go. Bran's been making you act a little weird all week. I blame him." He grabbed two bowls from the cupboard while I sat on the stool by the counter.

  I couldn't stand dragging it out. "How did the tutoring go?"

  He shrugged. "Fine. He doesn't really need help. I figured he just wanted an excuse to talk alone." He smiled mischievously at me as he poured the cereal into the bowls. "I told him everything. Even how you peed a little when we went on the roller coaster at Six Flags when we were ten."

  I reached as far as I could over the counter to tickle his chin. "Did you also tell him that you pee a little if I do this for more than ten seconds?" He fended me off by tickling under my arm. I plopped back onto the stool. I had always been the more ticklish of the two of us.

  "Seriously, what did you tell him?" I pressed.

  His smile hadn't faded. He was enjoying prolonging my agony. "Why do you care?"

  "Because I want to know if I need a restraining order." The words I had heard holding the stone came back to me. Who did I need restrained?

  Michael pursed his lips. "Can't tell you that much. He only asked me two things about you and then we stuck to physics." He pulled the jug of milk out of the fridge and poured it slowly over the cereal, deliberately dragging it out by pouring little more than a thin trickle. He kept his lip
s pressed together as if he needed to concentrate.

  "So tell me already!" I yelled.

  He set the milk down and looked at me. The hint of his smile remained but he was completely serious when he spoke. "I was right. He's got it bad for you. He asked what there was between us. I explained you were like my sister and we'd grown up together."

  My guts flipped. A sister. Yeah, of course, how could I be anything else? I was literally the girl next door. "And?" I pressed to distract from my inner torment.

  "And he asked if he had a chance with you."

  I could feel the colour drain from my face in a cold rush. The idea of dating anyone was suddenly so daunting. I would probably suck at it. Aside from Michael, I was sure I was the only senior who had never kissed anyone. And what if that voice from the stone had been his?

  Michael was watching me. "You're not the least bit interested in what I told him?"

  I shook my head clear. "Of course."

  He crossed his arms. "I said he'd have to win you over but it wasn't impossible. Also hinted not so subtly that you didn't have plans tonight anymore."

  "Who appointed you my matchmaker?" I yelled, lunging at him to tickle his chin in that sadistic spot again. He grabbed my wrists and held them firmly as he looked directly into my eyes.

  "I did," he said as if he had every right. "You're getting up there. You need to start giving the field a try." There was not even the hint of a smile.

  If I had the nerve, I would have hit him. Instead, I opted for a verbal assault as I pulled my wrists free and sat back down. "Seriously, you, king of the virgins, is playing the spinster card with me? You that sick of me?"

  He handed me a bowl and a spoon. "Any other time and I might be a little more cautious too," he admitted. "He definitely seems to be thinking much more than he says and I can't tell if that's good or bad."

  "And if I may have heard his voice coming out of that stone?" I asked.

  Michael raised a brow. "Your mother didn't let you start drinking last night, did she? Because I was pretty sure she was against that."

  I knew I shouldn't have told him but I might as well confess everything and get it over with. "I'm serious. Last night, I touched it and it was like I was in a dream. I couldn't see anything but I could feel and I could hear. I'm thinking I heard his voice."

  "I'm thinking I have been right to be worried about you," he said. "You may not have noticed, but you have started to retreat into yourself again. Now you're hearing voices from something that was obviously a prank and you're being driven nuts just by the fact we have a new student at school. This isn't normal. You're developing problems from being so much of a hermit. I can't be the only thing in your life. What if we go to different universities? I love you more than anyone but you need to explore other people too."

  "You make it sound like spelunking."

  "Maybe it is like that," he suggested. "The world isn't all bad and it's time you started experiencing it."

  "I don't see you being a social butterfly," I countered as I pouted down at my cereal. I didn't really want it. I knew he wouldn't listen. He was the consummate skeptic. As far as the stone went, my sanity might be in question but sane or not, I was alone.

  He shrugged. "Most of the people at school don't interest me. They don't scare me. You're afraid of them and I'm not just talking about Amanda and Samantha. You're afraid of all of them, even the people who would never bother you." He shoveled a heaping scoop of cereal into his mouth. Several sugared pieces fell back into the bowl.

  "Maybe you're right," I conceded. The fact that other people existed did tend to send me into a cold sweat.

  "Oufcous I amf," he said around his mouthful of food.

  We didn't talk about Bran or the stone again that morning. We watched dumb cartoons on TV while we finished the box of cereal but even that became tiresome. We had to keep the volume low so we didn't wake up his mother, who was doing her pre-patch-shift day of sleep. It made it difficult to hear the characters, making TV watching pointless. I gave up, thanked Michael for the cereal, and went home.

  I tried spending the afternoon working on university applications like my mother wanted but my brain was too frazzled to focus on forms and essays. I could not stop thinking about the Scot who would be visiting me that night and whether my mind was inventing stories about him.

  I ignored the stone, which I had hidden in my nightstand, because I was afraid of what might happen if I touched it again. Maybe I would learn something I didn't want to know, like the fact I really had hallucinated the previous night. I ended up watching Downton to get my mind off the possibility of Bran visiting. I did not watch it in my PJs because of the possibility of Bran visiting.

  Michael's pushing had made me only more torn. I did not want him to be ok with Bran's interest in me. If he was such a brother to me, why wasn't he being more protective and driving off potential suitors?... Why did I want him to?

  As sick as I felt admitting it, he was right that my aversion to Bran might have been entirely my own fear of social interaction. After all, I was only apprehensive about him when he wasn't around and my mind had the freedom to fill in the blanks.

  He wasn't even staring at me anymore. He smiled and looked at me, but not in that leering creeper kind of way. He was pleasant. He'd talked to me when it was appropriate and had never said anything questionable. When I really thought about it, there was no reason I should be feeling as apprehensive as I was. And even if the stone had tried to show me something of him, hadn't it been positive? Hadn't he promised to protect me?

  As for my jealousy of Maria, it was probably just that her presence was a threat to my safety blanket. That explanation did not ring as true for me as did my theory about Bran because I hated Maria. She was vapid and completely undeserving of Michael. If she was using tutoring to put the moves on him, I would make sure Michael nipped it in the bud.

  When my mother left for another night shift at the clinic, I felt even more vulnerable to Bran's potential appearance. I had hoped she would have been too upset from the previous night to go back but, after spending the day buying a new back door and installing it, she was back to her unstoppable-as-a-train self. At the same time, I conveniently neglected to mention the possibility of a boy coming to visit. It had been difficult not telling her given it was a lie by omission—my stomach was unhappier than ever with my first attempt at duplicity—but I had little choice. If I had told her, I would have let her talk me into keeping Bran away when I was home alone and Michael's words still echoed in my head as a challenge. I would force myself to take a risk, even if it did make me feel like I would be vomiting my spleen into the toilet at any moment.

  My heartburn worsened. I had given up taking anything for it. Nothing was powerful enough. I was lamenting this fact with a rubbing of my chest when the doorbell rang. I nearly peed myself.

  I turned off the TV and walked to the door. Riley sensed my agitation. He walked to my side and gave a small whine. I smiled down at him and rubbed his ears, which he welcomed before trotting back to his place on the couch.

  I stared at the door and wrapped my arms around my middle as I considered following Riley's lead. My usually-dominant, honest self said that would be best. I would have an uneventful night at home just like my mother had expected. I stared at the empty cushion next to Riley.

  The doorbell rang again. My heart pounded in my ears. I did not take my eyes away from the couch. What if it wasn't even Bran but some attacker? The gnawing animal behind my heart wanted me to rip the door open.

  I watched Riley. If it was an attacker, he'd probably do his best but he was getting too old with too much arthritis to be considered a guard dog. I'd just have to scream at the top of my lungs and Michael would hear me. Tutoring Maria or not, he was just feet away. Yes, Michael would save me.

  The gateway to doom lay before me. I stepped forward. I reached out to grab the handle and berated myself for actually being surprised that nothing happened when I touched it. My fi
ngers were shaking and my skin was pale. God, I was pathetic. Michael was right. I was afraid of people. I twisted the knob and pulled the door open. Bran smiled his crooked smile back at me and I came within a hair of losing my sense enough to collapse.

  "Bran?" I tried to sound surprised. I wasn't sure I had succeeded. I had sounded more breathless, like I was in need of a good doctor.

  He looked a little sheepish. "Yeah, Michael told me he's tutoring Maria tonight and I thought I might, you know, stop by and see if you wanted some company."

  Did I? I could still send him away. The gnawing did not agree.

  "It's alright, dove. If you're busy, we can always see each other Monday," he offered.

  Dove... and he'd done it. I opened the door wider and stepped aside to let him in.

  In the much smaller environment of my home, he looked huge. I supressed a visual of his bare, muscular shoulders.

  "Have a seat," I suggested.

  After pulling off his boots and hanging his coat on the rack by the door, he walked to the couch to sit down. Riley's eyebrow's twitched but he otherwise didn't move.

  "Want to watch something?" I asked.

  "You pick."

  I turned on the TV and selected Doctor Who from my PVR. Downton was too personal to spring on a stranger. I couldn't handle the rejection if he hated it.

  I sat on the opposite end of the couch next to Riley and started the first episode.

  "Everyone back home watches this," he said. "But we're further ahead in the story."

  "So you like it then?" I wasn't sure if this was a good sign. Michael loved Doctor Who but I was not as fond of it.

  He shrugged. "Genius man who can travel through time? What's not to like?"

  "It can be a bit violent," I countered.

  He gestured at Matt Smith on the screen. "The Doctor isn't violent. He won't even touch a gun."

  I felt sheepish admitting it out loud. Michael just knew this about me. I didn't need to justify it to him. "Not him, others in the show. It makes me uncomfortable," I explained.

  My aversion had never seemed so pathetic before. My mother took no joy in violent movies, preferring to keep to her Fred. Michael had just accepted this fact about me. Aside from teasing me about which games I should try, he had even stopped grumbling about it. I hadn't had to discuss the issue like this before and doing so made me feel stupid. I wondered if that was what Bran thought.

  When I dared to look at him, he seemed to be considering what to say but nothing in his expression spoke of judgement. In fact, he seemed to be taking his response seriously, much more seriously than a person who might have thought I was an idiot. Or maybe he thought me so much of an idiot, he didn't know how to speak to me politely? Maybe he was trying to figure out a way to excuse himself. "So the Doctor is more your type then? The Intelligent pacifist?" he asked.

  "I suppose so." Was that a bad thing?

  He stayed quiet and I had no way of knowing how to interpret this new silence between us. He muttered to himself. "I wish I could go back in time."

  I pursed my lips. "Not forward?"

  He smiled and it was not the full, charming crooked smile I had come to expect. It was pained. "The future will come without anyone's help. It's the past that makes the present and the future. Isn't there anything you wish you could prevent that happened in the past?"

  I considered. With modern history fresh on my mind, I said, "I guess stopping Hitler would be something."

  He scoffed and with that gesture seemed to be pulled back to himself. "That's everyone's pick and I'm convinced people only say that one to sound like they'd use the power for the greater good."

  I was shocked. "You wouldn't?"

  He shook his head. "If he hadn't killed millions, someone else would have. I wouldn't waste a gift on that. I'd be completely selfish."

  My breathing quickened at his honesty. I swallowed hard. I would help people if I had it in me. I couldn't think of anything in my own life worthy enough to sacrifice someone else.

  We kept watching in silence but I stole glances over at him when I was sure he wouldn't notice. He really was gorgeous. His shirt wasn't tight but stretched just enough across his chest to hint at the musculature beneath. His arms were defined just as subtly. I was sure his bicep would have been firm under my touch. I flushed at the thought.

  "Are you dating anyone?" he asked.

  From pure shock, I hesitated. "No," I squeaked finally, adding, "No one has ever shown any interest in me. I'm the geek with no fashion sense."

  He looked right into my eyes. Why did the colours in his have to dance so beautifully?

  "What if I were interested?" He kept his eyes on me, not looking away even for a second.

  I swallowed but could not find the folder for vocabulary filed in my brain. Blinking back at him was all I could manage. Inside, I was both squealing with delight and screaming in fear. This was completely new territory for me and exploring it with Bran put so much more pressure on the situation.

  His crooked smile flashed nervously on his face and he looked at the couch between us. "Because I am interested," he stressed.

  "Why?" Did I seriously just ask that? Had my mother dropped me on my head as a baby?

  He chuckled. "Why not?"

  Then he did something horrifying: he moved closer. His eyes locked once more onto mine. He was right next to me. Riley stirred as if he planned to get between us but with another reassuring scratch behind his ears, he settled down again. Considering how conflicted I was, I seemed determined that nothing prevent this moment. The gnawing in my chest strengthened. It was developing long talons that scraped down the length of my internal organs. I needed to find some way to sate it soon or it would devour me.

  "I... " could think of absolutely nothing to say. The gnawing was too distracting. He was too distracting.

  He lifted his hand and caressed my cheek as he tucked my hair behind my ear. If he was trying to gain my compliance by turning me into useless mush, it was working.

  "You're beautiful," he said. His eyes lowered to my trembling mouth. "Intelligent," he added, "And definitely not like the other girls." He rested his arm on the back of the couch between us so that his hand still lingered near my shoulder. If he just stretched his fingers, just a little, he could caress me.

  I swallowed again and his eyes flicked up to mine. "If you're not interested, I'll back off," he said. "I have no desire to force anyone into anything."

  "I... " Why could I not think? Why were the only words that came to mind those of panic and ones I would never dare voice aloud?

  He pushed away and returned to his end of the couch, saying, "Think about it."

  The gnawing gave a great shriek of protest and dug its talons into my gut with all its force. I was powerless to appease it. The malnourished daring within me was all too aware of the tingling of my flesh. The scared little bunny that comprised most of my personality was petrified.

  I turned back to the screen and took in none of the rest of the episode. I put on the next. We finished it and I put on another and then the last on my PVR. We said nothing.

  He left, flashing me one last smile and promising to see me Monday. I closed the door behind him feeling like a totally pathetic failure with nothing left to me but regret.