Oh.My.Gods. 02 - Goddess Boot Camp

  De­met­ri­us, a des­cen­dant of Clio-the mu­se of his­tory-and a ma­j­or throw­back to the fif­ti­es, ke­eps the pla­ce in per­fect Happy Days style. Chro­me and sky-blue vinyl everyw­he­re. A long bar with ro­und, co­un­ter he­ight sto­ols. A pa­ir of cram­ped bo­oths in the back with mi­ni-juke­bo­xes on the tab­les. And just abo­ut any ice-cre­am fla­vor you co­uld ever ima­gi­ne.

  I shrug. "Fi­ne."

  "Pho­ebe," Ni­co­le calls out from one of the bo­oths.

  Troy wa­ves and says, "Hey!"

  "Be right the­re," I say, then turn to De­met­ri­us to pla­ce my or­der. "I'll ha­ve my usu­al."

  My mo­uth starts sa­li­va­ting at the tho­ught of that per­fectly sphe­ri­cal sco­op of mint cho­co­la­te chip perc­hed on a crunchy brown su­gar co­ne. Kno­wing Grif­fin is go­ing to crack down on our tra­ining nut­ri­ti­onal plan any mi­nu­te now ma­kes the in­dul­gen­ce even mo­re en­ti­cing. Al­lu­re of the for­bid­den and all that.

  "Not to­day," De­met­ri­us says. "I've got so­met­hing bet­ter."

  Bet­ter? What co­uld be bet­ter?

  "Try this," he says. "On the ho­use."

  I ta­ke the co­ne and eye it sus­pi­ci­o­usly. It lo­oks li­ke pretty ave­ra­ge ice cre­am-va­nil­la co­lo­red with lit­tle whi­te flecks.

  "Thanks," I say, a lit­tle de­fe­ated. But it's not li­ke I can re­sent free ice cre­am.

  "Try it."

  With a shrug, I dart out my ton­gue for a qu­ick samp­le. My tas­te buds exp­lo­de with a long-for­got­ten fla­vor.

  "Oh my gods," I gasp, sta­ring at De­met­ri­us. "You didn't!"

  Me smi­les smugly. "I did."

  Ni­co­le, ti­red of wa­iting for me, sho­uts out, "He did what?"

  I sta­re, wi­de-eyed, at my new fa­vo­ri­te per­son on the pla­net.

  "This ice-cre­am ge­ni­us," I say bet­we­en licks, "re-cre­ated Ben & Jer­rys Whi­te Rus­si­an. Per­fectly." I sha­ke my he­ad in awe. "My all-ti­me fa­vo­ri­te."

  De­met­ri­us winks at me. "You're wel­co­me."

  "I co­uld just jump over this co­un­ter and hug you." I ta­ke anot­her lick.

  He ac­tu­al­ly blus­hes. "Go on," he says, ges­tu­ring me away. "Yo­ur fri­ends are wa­iting."

  "Thanks."

  As I sli­de in­to the sky-blue bo­oth next to Ni­co­le, Troy asks, "Why are you get­ting apop­lec­tic over ice cre­am?"

  "This isn't just any ice cre­am," I exp­la­in. "This is the best fla­vor ever in­ven­ted. B&J dis­con­ti­nu­ed it ye­ars ago and I ha­ven't had a tas­te sin­ce. "He­re," I say, hol­ding out the co­ne, "try it."

  Troy turns kind of gre­en and sha­kes his he­ad ada­mantly.

  "What's wrong?" I ask, jab­bing the ice cre­am in his di­rec­ti­on.

  "Oh gods," Troy yelps, then claps one hand over his mo­uth and the ot­her over my wrist, sho­ving me away.

  "What's wrong with him?" I ask Ni­co­le.

  "When he was in At­hens last we­ek," she says, gi­ving Troy a sympat­he­tic lo­ok, "he fi­nal­ly told his pa­rents he wants to be a mu­si­ci­an."

  "Go­od for you!" I cong­ra­tu­la­te Troy, who still lo­oks mo­re gre­en than not. We've be­en trying to get him to co­me cle­an for months. He's from a long li­ne of doc­tors-li­ke mil­len­nia long-so of co­ur­se that's what his pa­rents want him to be. But mu­sic is in his so­ul. He'd be mi­se­rab­le as a doc­tor, and I know his pa­rents wo­uld un­ders­tand that. "What do­es that ha­ve to do with ice cre­am?"

  "It's not the ice cre­am, exactly," she exp­la­ins. "It's the su­gar."

  I gi­ve her a lo­ok that re­pe­ats, so?

  "His pa­rents we­re not exactly thril­led by the news."

  "That's put­ting it mildly," Troy adds, re­tur­ning to a mostly nor­mal, mostly pinky-tan co­lor. They hit the ro­of." He shud­ders. "Li­te­ral­ly."

  "I still don't-"

  "They cur­sed my tas­te buds."

  That so­unds rot­ten. "What do­es that me­an?"

  "Until I ag­ree to be­co­me a doc­tor," he exp­la­ins, "every ti­me I eat so­met­hing swe­et, it tas­tes li­ke… so­met­hing not swe­et."

  "That sucks." If this we­re anyt­hing ot­her than Whi­te Rus­si­an, I'd toss it out in Fri­ends­hip so­li­da­rity. But, as I sa­id, it's Wbitc Rus­si­an'. I ig­no­re my gu­ilt, trying to be as disc­re­et as pos­sib­le abo­ut my icec­re­am ecs­tasy.

  "That's not the worst of it," he says, so­un­ding even mo­re de­j­ec­ted. "They en­rol­led me in SIPP." When I lo­ok con­fu­sed, he adds, 'The Sum­mer In­ten­si­ve Pre-med Prog­ram. Ins­te­ad of wri­ting songs and prac­ti­cing, I'll spend all sum­mer in class."

  Ni­co­le pats his hand. "You'll get thro­ugh it, Tra­va­tas."

  "The­re's a we­ek­long ana­tomy seg­ment," he comp­la­ins. "Ana­tomy! We're go­ing to dis­sect… so­met­hing. I just know it."

  "May­be you can do a vir­tu­al dis­sec­ti­on or so­met­hing," I sug­gest, ta­king a bi­te out of the su­gar co­ne. "No­la and I did that in fresh­man bi­ology."

  "Wha­te­ver," he says, wa­ving me off. "I don't want to talk abo­ut it. What'd you do in camp to­day?"

  Pop­ping the ta­il end of the co­ne in­to my mo­uth. I re­ach in­to my poc­ket.

  "I ear­ned my first me­rit bad­ge."

  I slap the lit­tle ro­und patch on­to the tab­le.

  At first I'd tho­ught Stel­la was joking. A me­rit bad­ge? For not crac­king my skull on the ti­le? Wow, what an ac­hi­eve­ment. But then she'd han­ded this to me and sa­id, "One down, ele­ven to go."

  Just li­ke the ones that co­ve­red No­la's Girl Sco­uts vest in ele­men­tary scho­ol, this me­rit bad­ge is ro­und with a thick ring of co­lor sur­ro­un­ding the cent­ral pic­tu­re. In this ca­se, the ring is whi­te, the backg­ro­und is sky blue, and the pic­tu­re de­picts a whi­te who­oshy wa­ve of wind.

  "Aero­ki­ne­sis,"' Troy says. "Co­ol."

  "Did you fly?"

  "Not exactly." I pull the bad­ge ac­ross the tab­le and slip it back in­to my poc­ket. "Mo­re li­ke ho­ve­red to ke­ep from smas­hing my he­ad aga­inst the co­urt­yard flo­or."

  Ni­co­le and Troy exc­han­ge a lo­ok. They both say, "The trust fall."

  I nod, pre­ten­ding I'm not crazy pro­ud of myself. But I am.

  The study gu­ide says-yes, I fi­nal­ly re­ad it-aero­ki­ne­sis is the abi­lity to mo­ve air. In this ca­se, mo­ving eno­ugh air un­der my fal­ling body to hold it sus­pen­ded. That's pretty darn co­ol.

  "Show us." Nic says.

  "What?" My hand is still in my poc­ket and I smo­oth my fin­gers over the ed­ge of the patch. "You want me to trust-fall in he­re?"

  "Nah," She wa­ves off my sug­ges­ti­on. She re­ac­hes ac­ross the tab­le and grabs the salts­ha­ker, set­ting it in front of me. "Mo­ve this using air."

  "I don't think I sho­uld-"

  "Co­me on," Troy says. "We want to see what you le­ar­ned."

  I he­si­ta­te. What if I can't re­al­ly cont­rol that po­wer? What if I send the salt flying all over the ro­om? That pro­bably me­ans ye­ars of bad luck or so­met­hing. Or what if I ac­ci­den­tal­ly co­nj­ure an en­ti­re salt mi­ne? Or if I zap us to the De­ad Sea? Or-

  "Stop drag­ging yo­ur fe­et." Ni­co­le po­ints at the sha­ker. "Go."

  "Fi­ne," I say, but not be­fo­re thro­wing her an an­no­yed scowl.

  Then I turn my at­ten­ti­on to the salt. Ke­eping in mind what Stel­la sa­id-I know, right?- con­cent­ra­te on trus­ting the sha­ker to mo­ve. I'm not thin­king abo­ut the salt or trying to mo­ve it or wis­hing it wo­uld mo­ve, I just pic­tu­re it al­re­ady the­re. In my mind, the sha­ker is in front of Ni­co­le. I be­li­eve. I trust.

  Everyt­hing glows. When I blink thro­ugh the light, I see the lit­tle glass sha­ker sli­de smo
­othly down the tab­le. The pa­per nap­kin from my co­ne flut­ters as the sha­ker pas­ses.

  Ni­co­le catc­hes the sha­ker as it sli­des to a stop.

  "Ni­ce," she says with a grin.

  I re­le­ase a hu­ge sigh of re­li­ef. All I can think is, It ac­tu­al­ly wor­ked! Su­re, I'd ca­ught myself be­fo­re smas­hing skull to pa­ve­ment, but it wasn't a cons­ci­o­us ef­fort. This ti­me I ac­tu­al­ly knew what I was do­ing. I had a go­al. I met that go­al.

  And not­hing blew up!

  One step clo­ser to not get­ting smo­ted.

  "May­be God­dess Bo­ot Camp is the best thing that co­uld ha­ve hap­pe­ned to yo­ur po­wers this sum­mer," Troy says. "Ze­us knows it's bet­ter than what's hap­pe­ning to me this sum­mer."

  "At le­ast you're not stuck with Stel­la and Ada­ra," I reply.

  Okay, so Stel­la's not at the top of my evil-harpy list at the mo­ment. But Ada­ra's hol­ding strong at num­ber one.

  "That re­minds me," Ni­co­le says. "I might know what hap­pe­ned to the re­cord."

  "The one abo­ut Pho­ebe's dad?"

  I know, I know. We we­ren't sup­po­sed to tell an­yo­ne abo­ut go­ing in­to the sec­ret arc­hi­ves. But re­al­ly, Troy is one of our clo­sest fri­ends. It's not li­ke he's go­ing to tell an­yo­ne.

  "What?" I ask.

  "After you ran off to camp," she says. "Phi­li­po­ulos was so mad abo­ut fin­ding it go­ne that she ran­ted a bit. She kin­da for­got I was the­re."

  "And you didn't try to re­mind her."

  She flas­hes me a misc­hi­evo­us smi­le. "She sa­id the only way so­me­one co­uld ha­ve slip­ped past the se­cu­rity of the clo­set ele­va­tor wit­ho­ut her know­led­ge was if they had be­en a lib­rary aide. An­yo­ne who wants a bo­ok from the arc­hi­ves has to fill out a re­qu­est slip. Sin­ce Mrs. V is the only lib­ra­ri­an on staff, on­ce she has ap­pro­ved the­ir re­qu­est, she eit­her sends an aide to ret­ri­eve the bo­ok or go­es her­self. Which me­ans…"

  "It had to be a stu­dent," I sha­ke my he­ad. "Why wo­uld a stu­dent want to ste­al my dad's tri­al re­cord? Or any re­cord? I me­an, it's not li­ke it's bre­aking news or anyt­hing."

  "The­re co­uld be do­zens of re­asons," Troy says. "Li­ke so­me­one lo­oking for a lo­op­ho­le in an Olym­pic ru­ling, for examp­le."

  His ha­zel eyes flick to Ni­co­le.

  "Or so­me­one wan­ting to un­co­ver a sec­ret," she snaps. "Or do a re­se­arch pa­per. Or wri­te an ar­tic­le for the Chro­nic­le."

  The Chro­nic­le? The scho­ol news­pa­per? A puz­zle pi­ece falls in­to pla­ce.

  "Ada­ra wri­tes for the Chro­nic­le." It wo­uld be so typi­cal for her to tor­ment me li­ke this. "She co­uld ha­ve do­ne it."

  "Don't jump to conc­lu­si­ons," Troy says. "Don't ac­cu­se her wit­ho­ut-"

  "She ne­ver wor­ked in the lib­rary," Ni­co­le in­ter­rupts. "But the­re's anot­her pos­si­bi­lity." She pulls a com­pu­ter prin­to­ut from her back poc­ket and sets it in the mid­dle of the tab­le. "Re­ad this."

  Troy and I both le­an for­ward to see whe­re she's po­in­ting.

  Elect­ro­nic Ca­ta­log and His­to­ri­og­raphy of Olym­pus RE­PORT

  Se­arch String: past stu­dent emp­lo­ye­es

  Ti­me Fra­me: 5 ye­ars

  Qu­ery Re­sults: 11 ent­ri­es

  "How did you get this?" Troy asks as I scan the list. "Access to EC­HO is in­sa­nely rest­ric­ted. You re­mem­ber what hap­pe­ned in eighth gra­de when I tri­ed to chan­ge my fa­iling al­geb­ra gra­de." He shud­ders at the me­mory. "So­me­ti­mes my fin­gers still ting­le when it ra­ins."

  "I didn't ac­cess the system," Ni­co­le says. "Phi­li­po­ulos left the prin­to­ut on her desk when Mr. Sa­ko­la as­ked for help fin­ding the At­lan­tis col­lec­ti­on in the map ro­om. You'd think he was Ado­nis, the way she drop­ped everyt­hing and-"

  My eyes pop out when I see the third na­me on the list.

  "Did you sec this?" I po­int at the third na­me.

  Ni­co­le bre­aks off and says, "Ye­ah.,I tho­ught that was kind of in­te­res­ting."

  "What?" Troys spins the pa­per aro­und. Af­ter a qu­ick glan­ce, he says, "Holy Ha­des!"

  "Tell me abo­ut it." I slump back aga­inst the vinyl se­at. "And just when I tho­ught we we­re get­ting along."

  The third na­me on the list is Stel­la Pet­ro­las.

  ***

  As we walk thro­ugh the vil­la­ge-a lit­tle aim­les­sly be­ca­use I'm not so eager to go ho­me and fa­ce Stel­la-I know I sho­uldn't jump to conc­lu­si­ons. Just be­ca­use Stel­la co­uld ha­ve sto­len the re­cord do­esn't me­an she did. I me­an, she was with me when the no­te ar­ri­ved. Even Stel­la isn't po­wer­ful eno­ugh to be in two pla­ces at on­ce. Of co­ur­se she co­uld ha­ve got­ten so­me­one el­se to le­ave the no­te. Or she co­uld ha­ve sto­len the re­cord, but not ha­ve be­en be­hind the no­te. Or she co­uld ha­ve not­hing to do with anyt­hing. Or-

  "Let's go to the ba­kery," Ni­co­le says.

  "No thanks," Troy grumb­les, lo­oking mi­se­rab­le.

  "Co­me on," Nic says with a smi­le. "If an­yo­ne can ma­ke de­li­ci­o­us su­gar-free tre­ats Li­li can."

  "Huh-uh," I say, pul­ling myself out of my Stel­la pon­de­rings. "Ba­kery's clo­sed. Grif­fin and Aunt Li­li went to Se­ri­fos to­day to get a fresh stock of ber­ri­es."

  "That's we­ird," Ni­co­le says. "I co­uld ha­ve sworn I saw…"

  She tra­ils off, her dark blon­de eyeb­rows scrunc­hing down in­to a frown.

  "What?" I ask.

  "Not­hing." She sha­kes her he­ad, li­ke she's trying to for­get wha­te­ver she tho­ught she saw. "Ne­ver mind."

  "What, Ni­co­le?" I de­mand. I can tell from the way she's eva­ding that it's bad. A bur­ning ac­he starts low in my sto­mach, "tell me what you saw."

  "On my way he­re"-she gi­ves me an apo­lo­ge­tic lo­ok-". . . . I saw Grif­fin."

  No. That's not pos­sib­le. He's at the far­mer's mar­ket on Se­ri­fos. That's why we resc­he­du­led our run for this mor­ning. That's why I got up early on my sum­mer va­ca­ti­on. Grif­fin wo­uldn't ha­ve do­ne that to me for no re­ason. He wo­uldn't lie to me. Even when he wan­ted to ha­te me when I first got to Ser­fo­po­ula, he didn't lie to me.

  But Ni­co­le wo­uldn't lie to me, eit­her. Not abo­ut this. The­re must be a re­aso­nab­le exp­la­na­ti­on.

  Con­fu­sed, I lo­ok up at her. Her blue eyes lo­ok sympat­he­tic and a lit­tle wary. Ner­vo­us.

  "What el­se?" I ask.

  She sha­kes her spiky blon­de he­ad, li­ke she do­esn't want to tell me. The bur­ning ac­he ta­kes over my en­ti­re sto­mach, ma­king me reg­ret my hasty con­sump­ti­on of De­met­ri­us's Whi­te Rus­si­an.

  "Just tell me." I ta­ke a de­ep bre­ath. I know she wo­uldn't be all con­cer­ned li­ke this for no re­ason. "Whe­re did you see him?"

  "Go­ing in­to the bo­oks­to­re." She clo­ses her eyes and ta­kes a de­ep bre­ath. "With Ada­ra."

  "Oh," I say qu­i­etly.

  I'm not surp­ri­sed. Af­ter the way he's be­en be­ha­ving-to me and to Ada­ra-this is not comp­le­tely unex­pec­ted. He's be­en spen­ding as much ti­me with her re­cently as he has with me. I've be­en busy the last few we­eks-for­ced in­to ser­vi­tu­de over Stel­la's gra­du­ati­on, hel­ping get Mom and Da­mi­an out the do­or for the­ir ho­ney­mo­on, le­ar­ning how to wi­eld my po­wers whi­le sur­ro­un­ded by ten-ye­ar-olds. He's be­en busy, too-hel­ping out Aunt Li­li in the ba­kery full-ti­me, get­ting math tu­to­ring so he can ta­ke cal­cu­lus next ye­ar, swap­ping spit with his ex-girlf­ri­end.

  Step­ping back from the led­ge of conc­lu­si­on, I ma­ke myself con­si­der ot­her pos­si­bi­li­ti­es. It co­uld be to­tal­ly in­no­cent-they co­
uld ha­ve co­in­ci­den­tal­ly ar­ri­ved at the bo­oks­to­re si­mul­ta­ne­o­usly and de­ci­ded to walk in to­get­her.

  Or, the part of me that still stings from jerky Jus­tin's bet­ra­yal scre­ams, it co­uld be to­tal­ly not in­no­cent.

  Grif­fin, I tell myself, is not Jus­tin.

  "I'm su­re it's not­hing," I say, trying to so­und li­ke I be­li­eve it. They pro­bably just ran in­to each ot­her."

  "Ye­ah," Troy says.

  He's a hor­rib­le li­ar.

  "I'm su­re you're right," Ni­co­le ag­re­es. "It's not­hing."

  She's a much bet­ter li­ar, but has much lo­wer to­le­ran­ce for self-de­cep­ti­on. The fri­end part of her wants to re­as­su­re me. The Ni­co­le part of her wants me to be pre­pa­red for the re­ality of the si­tu­ati­on.

  But whet­her he ran in­to Ada­ra or was ac­tu­al­ly me­eting her, the truth is Grif­fin did lie to me. I try to con­vin­ce myself that he wo­uldn't. May­be they got back early. May­be the­re was a chan­ge of plans. May­be Aunt Lil­li de­ci­ded to go anot­her day. Or alo­ne. Or may­be she didn't want the ber­ri­es af­ter all. For the mo­ment I am not go­ing to jump to con­demn Grif­fin. Af­ter everyt­hing we've be­en thro­ugh, he de­ser­ves the be­ne­fit of the do­ubt.

  As we stroll past the bo­oks­to­re, I re­sist the ur­ge to lo­ok in­si­de. Be­ca­use with all the mo­un­ting evi­den­ce, it's get­ting har­der and har­der to ac­cept that Grif­fin and Ada­ra are not­hing mo­re than fri­ends. I'm not re­ady to be­li­eve the worst. And the be­ne­fit of the do­ubt is hard to hold on to.

  ***

  "You ne­ver told me you wor­ked at the lib­rary," I say when I get ho­me. My vo­ice, co­ol and col­lec­ted, ec­ho­es in the si­lent kitc­hen.

  Stel­la fre­ezes, the ref­ri­ge­ra­tor do­or open and an ice-fil­led glass in her hand, for a full fi­ve se­conds. Stra­igh­te­ning, she cle­ars her thro­at-just li­ke Da­mi­an do­es when he's ner­vo­us-and asks. "Sho­uld I ha­ve?"

  I shrug, pla­ying it co­ol. If I've le­ar­ned anyt­hing from ye­ars of Mom he­adsh­rin­king me, it's that if you want to find out everyt­hing, ke­ep yo­ur mo­uth shut. Gu­ilty pe­op­le lo­ve to fill a ten­se si­len­ce.