School's Out - Forever

  “Get in line,” I told him, and went over to Fang. I watched what he was doing for a minute, and he turned to me with an “I dare you to say something” expression.

  “You’re an artist,” I managed. He turned back and surveyed the neat rows of marshmallows lined up across the casserole of mashed sweet potatoes.

  “We’ve all got crosses to bear,” he said, and went back to work.

  I leaned down and looked into the oven again. “Anne? The little white thing popped up. I think it’s ready.”

  “Oh, my God!” Anne exclaimed from the other room. She rushed into the kitchen and grabbed some oven mitts. “It popped?” She was lunging for the oven door when suddenly she turned to me. “What if the popper thing is wrong? What if it’s not really ready?”

  I looked at her. “Take the turkey out of the oven.”

  She breathed out. “Right. Okay.”

  Sheesh. Grown-ups.

  80

  Fifteen minutes later, we were all sitting around the dining-room table. Everything looked very schmancy. We had a white tablecloth and cloth napkins. Candles were lit. The food was on the table, looking like all the pictures on the packages.

  Gazzy was holding his fork and knife upright on the table, and I frowned at him and shook my head. He put them down.

  “How about we go around and each give thanks individually?” Anne said. “Ariel? Why don’t you go first?”

  “Uh . . .” Angel looked at me, and I smiled tightly.

  Just do your best, sweetie, and don’t give anything away. She gave me a tiny nod.

  “I’m thankful for my family,” she said, gesturing at all of us. “I’m thankful I have a dog. I’m thankful I have Max to take care of me.” And then, as if realizing that Anne was sitting right there, Angel added, “And I’m thankful that we’ve had this good time here. I really like this place.”

  Anne smiled at her. “Thank you. Now Zephyr?”

  “Um, I’m thankful for all this food,” said Gazzy. “And you know, my family. And being here.”

  “Krystal?”

  “I’m thankful for food and my brothers and sisters,” said Nudge. “And I’m thankful I have big brown eyes and long lashes. I’m thankful that we could stay here for a while. I’m thankful for MTV. And gummy worms.”

  “All right,” said Anne. “Jeff?”

  “Uh, what Zephyr said.” Iggy’s fingers drummed on the table. “Fnick’s turn.”

  Fang looked like he’d rather be at the dentist. “Me too. Family, food. Place to stay.” His dark eyes met mine and his face flushed, like he was having one of those heat attacks.

  My turn. I was thankful for stuff—but not anything I wanted to mention in front of Anne. Silently I was thankful for all of us being together and being healthy. I was so thankful we had Angel back, and that we were free and not at the School. I was thankful we weren’t being attacked by Erasers at this very minute. Bad things had happened to us, could happen again, but weren’t happening now, and I wasn’t stupid enough to take it for granted.

  “Uh, I’m thankful that we’ve had this time here,” I said. “It’s been really great. And, you know, thankful for my family, and for having plenty of food.”

  Anne paused, as if waiting to see if anyone would add anything. “My turn, then. Thank you all for helping make our Thanksgiving meal. I never could have done it myself.”

  You ain’t whistling Dixie, I thought.

  “To me, it’s even more meaningful that we all worked together to make our dinner,” Anne continued. “I’ve never had children, never been that domestic. But these last weeks with you here, well, I’ve gotten a real idea of everything that I’ve been missing. I like the fact that my life is centered around yours. Amazingly, I like having a household of children.”

  Total licked my leg under the table, and I almost yelped, then heard him chuckle softly.

  “It’s chaotic, and tons of work, and expensive, and I get called to the school, and every night I fall into bed completely exhausted and know that I have to do it all again the next day.” She looked around at us and smiled. “And now I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  As speeches went, it was a pretty good one, I’ll give her that.

  “So I sincerely hope that this Thanksgiving is only the first in a long line of Thanksgivings we’ll share together.” Again she smiled at us, letting her gaze linger on Angel. “Because I would like to adopt all of you.”

  81

  “Yes, let’s give thanks for what we have by leaving it,” the Gasman muttered.

  “Gazzy, I told you—you don’t have to come,” I said.

  “Of course I have to come,” he said, tying his sneakers—new ones that Anne had bought.

  “I just can’t believe it,” said Angel, bouncing a little on my bed.

  “It’s what we’ve all waited for,” said Nudge, sounding wistful. She looked over at Iggy quickly. “I’m glad it’s happened to you, Iggy. I mean, it would be nice if it happened to all of us, but for the first one, I’m glad it was—” She stopped, as if realizing she was running on.

  “Thanks.” Iggy was sitting tensely, shoes and coat already on. His face was flushed, and his long, slender fingers drummed nervously on his knees.

  Last night, after some of our Thanksgiving bloat had eased, Fang and I had told the others about possibly finding Iggy’s parents. They’d all been stunned.

  “Do you want to go see them?” I’d asked Iggy.

  “Yeah, of course!” Iggy had said, then his eyebrows came together. “I’m not sure.”

  “What?” Nudge shrieked. “How can you not be sure?”

  “It’s what we’ve talked about before,” Iggy said, looking self-conscious. “I mean, I’m blind now. I have wings. I’m a weird, mutant hybrid, and they’ve never seen anything like me. Maybe they would want the original, all-human me, but . . .”

  That was exactly what I was thinking. Personally, I thought that even if we found info on my parents, I probably wouldn’t want to go ring their doorbell. And they probably wouldn’t want me to either.

  “I understand,” I said. “But it’s up to you. We’ll support you, whatever you decide.”

  “Let me sleep on it,” Iggy had said.

  “No prob,” I’d said.

  So he’d thought about it and decided to go, and here we were.

  Fang opened my bedroom window wide. Nudge clambered onto the windowsill and launched herself into the air. The sun lit her tawny wings as she caught the wind and rose into the sky. One by one the rest of us followed, with me going last.

  It felt weird to be flying out in the middle of the day, but today was special. Today we were taking Iggy to see his parents, his real parents.

  I had no idea what would happen. Today could be filled with unbelievable joy or tearful heartbreak. Even if it ended with happiness for Iggy, the rest of us would get the heartbreak. Because we would be telling him good-bye. Which for me was too painful to begin to comprehend.

  We hadn’t really talked about Anne’s offer to adopt us. As far as I was concerned, it wasn’t even worth thinking about. I wondered if any of the younger kids felt diffe