As Griffin and I head down the hall, I feel Scott’s weighted gaze resting on me. He’s still watching when we reach the door labeled Emily Wertz, Director. Griffin glances at me and quickly realizes I’m not about to knock, so he does it for me.
The woman who opens the door is tiny, blonde, and beautiful--nothing like the therapist I figured would be standing there. Oh, and did I mention she also has a sort of aura, just like Scott? The jeans and t-shirt accentuate her small frame.
“May I help you?” She glances from me to Griffin.
“I…I’m Elizabeth Moon.” Without realizing it, I’m hedging toward Griffin, wishing I could do anything but enter this room. I’d even go prod Scott’s ego a bit more if I thought it would get me out of here.
“Ah.” Realization dawns on her. “Yes, I spoke to Mr. Abram.” She steps to the side to allow me entry. “Please come in.”
I reluctantly enter, but Griffin stays put and gestures down the hall. “I’ll wait out here, Lizzie. Give you two a chance to talk.”
The breath catches in my throat, and I try to beg him with my eyes, but he looks away. Then again, I know he’s right. Whatever I might or might not say doesn’t need an audience. I stand perfectly still as she eases the door shut and gestures for me to have a seat.
Scowling, I stride to the chair, figuring the quicker we get this started, the quicker we can get it over with. Emily sits behind the desk across from me and opens a file on her desk. Part of me wants to laugh because I’ve actually generated a need for a piece of manila cardstock with my name at the top. What a problem I have become.
“So, Elizabeth, what brings you here?”
“Someone twisting my arm?” I offer a surface-level smile and start looking around at all the certificates on her walls and the framed pictures scattered throughout. There’s more than one of her and Scott, for some reason—and Scott, for the most part, according to these photos, seems to live in his uniform. In other photos, I see lots of teenagers.
“You and Scott must be close.” I say. I guess it’s a way of voicing my distrust without seeming to be combative. “All these pictures.”
She nods. “Yes, we’ve known each other for a long time. Is there something that bothers you about him?”
“He’s a bully.” I fold my arms across my chest and stare at her defiantly, waiting for her to defend him.
She peers at my file and looks up at me. “So I take it you’d rather he’d let you cut your wrist than keep you safe?” She might have said it like a question, but she really doesn’t want to know anything.
“I wasn’t going to hurt myself!” I stand up and start walking around the room. “How many times do I have to tell people that?”
“He also mentioned you not only thought he was someone else, but that that someone was an angel.”
I whirl, my eyes immediately finding the shading just behind her where her wings would be, and I start laughing. “Yeah, sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it. Angels…they don’t exist, I know.”
I step to her large window and peer out, only to be disappointed by a view of the parking lot. How much longer do I have to do this?
“You seem to be really angry. My question is what is causing that anger?” She’s so damned calm; her pen doesn’t even twitch against the pad, and I want to throw something.
“I’m not angry,” I snap, aware my tone is only bolstering her theory.
“Elizabeth, I can’t help you if you don’t open up.” She watches me, and I feel her blue eyes on me just like I used to feel Lev’s, which makes me wonder if angels ever have any other eye color. Weird. “Is it about Lev?”
I step toward her, my fingers balling into fists. “Why does everything come down to Lev? I don’t want to talk about him.” I used to think I’d be glad to find another angel. Now I know two of them, and I hate them both.
My body is shaking, and I feel that familiar panic. It used to hit me every day right after Lev died, but as the months passed it’s taken longer to come at me, but it’s always there, biding its time. Waiting. It’s like living in a pressure cooker, and I explode when I can’t breathe, which will be in about five minutes if I don’t get out of here.
“The key to dealing with pain is talking about it. Holding it inside won’t help; all that will do is let it fester until the pain and anger are all you have.”
She moves toward me, and I hedge towards the door. “How do you know what I feel?” I just need space, and I don’t think I’ll be getting that here.
“It’s not so hard to believe you’d want Lev to be an angel, Elizabeth. It’s a way of denying he’s really dead.”
I start laughing again and crying right about then. Stupid, I know. Just another way of realizing my pathetic brain can’t deal with all this crap. But now she’s trying to tell me I’ve created angels as coping mechanisms. Right.
“Elizabeth.” She softens her voice and comes towards me, hands raised.
“Just stay away from me! I didn’t make Lev into an angel because I didn’t want to deal with his death. He was an angel long before that.” I turn to the door and grab the handle.
“Where are you going?”
“Home. There’s no point in wasting your time or mine.” The tears are still coming, and I can’t stop them. My world is blurry, and part of me aches like it’s more broken than ever. I’m clutching the wall as I try to head down the hallway, but I can’t see anything. I rub my hand across my face, but I can’t clear the haze.
“Elizabeth?” A big blue blur. Scott. He gently takes my elbows, probably trying to lead me back to Emily.
“Leave me alone!” I jerk out of his grip, and this time he lets me go, free to stumble as I will. I keep brushing the tears away, but there are always more. I can’t seem to stop crying. But at least I can see Griffin through the haze where he sits on a bench, reading a book. I’d call his name, but he’s probably wearing his headphones and wouldn’t hear a word I said, so what’s the point?
It’s only when I stand a couple of feet from him he even looks up, realizing I’m there. “Hey? That was…brief.”
“Yeah, well, I’m ready. I’ve had about all the therapy I need.”
He looks beyond me where Scott and Emily stand, talking. Although there is a lot of noise in the gym, I can tell by the proximity of their bodies they are purposely trying to keep quiet. Once or twice, one of them shoots me a look, which only makes me madder.
“You sure they agree with that?”
“Doesn’t matter. I told Jimmie I’d try therapy, and I did. It’s not my fault it didn’t work.” I start walking toward the door, not waiting for Griffin, but he manages to catch me before I reach the door and blocks my path.
“Did you really give it a try, or are you just saying that? You weren’t in there that long.” He frowns, and I know he’s worried. I just wish I could make him see this isn’t the way to fix me. There’s no miracle cure waiting around the corner to the old Lizzie.
“You don’t get it, Griffin. She can’t help me. No one can. It’s going to take time and space.” Even though his hand is on the door, I thrust it open. While I know he’s not exactly thrilled with my attitude, I don’t think he wants to make a scene that’ll cause our ‘favorite’ cop to pin me again.
I know he follows me, and I wait for him at his car, wishing my world could be put back together, but I don’t see that happening. And the longer I’m alive, the more angels I see—not that I care. If they can’t—or won’t—lead me to Lev, there really is no point in seeing them at all.
Chapter Eight
If I need proof that Tellico Plains is just another version of Hauser’s Landing, my first day is it. The school is an older building, lacking the renovation Hauser’s Landing was giving to its school. Then again, while Hauser’s Landing was small, this one has it beat. With under a thousand people living here, I won’t just fade behind other students. Although I don’t see lots of Native Americans in the mix, I do get the impression it’s not a big deal. Rather, I a
m more worried that if a teacher decides to go psycho on me, there’s no place for me to hide.
Still, I’m grateful no reputation precedes me, and that the secretary doesn’t force an aide to give me the grand tour, probably because she figures it’s the first day of school and there are going to be a lot of lost students wandering around. No point in designating me as “special.” I tend to think I’m pretty self-sufficient. Of course, as I walk from the office to my locker, I go through the usual fanfare of being the new girl and all the guys paying extreme attention, probably out of boredom more than anything else.
As I have gotten to school an extra twenty minutes early, I have no problem checking in, finding my locker, and slipping into my first class, English, before the first bell rings. To me, it’s just easier sitting behind my desk, waiting for class to begin, rather than standing awkwardly in the hall, watching people watch me.
Once the first bell rings, students begin drifting through the doorway, at first one or two at a time but then a cluster of three with Sarah, the girl from the community center, standing in their midst, still wearing her goth best enters. Her golden hair contrasts sharply with the black, baggy clothes with skulls and crossbones all over them, and the heavy use of black eyeliner, black lipstick, and black nail polish give her skin a translucent look.
Then there are the other two. The guy, all six-foot-four of him, towers over both girls. His dark brown hair hangs in his eyes, and he’s dressed in a yellow t-shirt and denim shorts. He wears a braided necklace with shells on it, and as he enters, he sees me and smiles. The other girl has long hair colored of caramel with blond streaks running through. Her skin is also fair, and I think she’s probably the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen. She, too, looks at me and smiles.
“You were at the center, weren’t you?” Sarah asks, taking a seat in the row next to mine. She sets down her notebook and looks at me. “Hope you enjoyed it more than I did.”
“Not really.”
“So why go, then?” she asks, watching as the guy sits next to me, and the beautiful girl behind him.
“My guardian seems to think it’s good for me.”
All three of them exchange glances. “I’ve been going for six months,” Sarah says. “Hasn’t done a bit of good. By the way, I’m Sarah Warren. This is Jayvee Reynard.” She points to the other girl, who nods at me. “And this is Kane Bristow.”
Kane also nods. “Nice to see a new face. So where are you from?” He ignores the fact that more students pour into the room and take their seats.
“Hauser’s Landing. Massachusetts.”
The tardy bell rings, cutting off any further conversation as my teacher, Ms. Monroe, begins going over her “expectations” for this class in a low, monotone voice. Considering how my first day at a new school went last year, I’m so not falling asleep this time.
Although I’m not any more thrilled with Brit Lit than anyone else, I manage to focus on what the teacher tells me, despite feeling Kane watching me intently. His dark eyes seem more attuned to me than getting through this class, and finally, when Monroe turns to the board and scribbles a quote by Eleanor Roosevelt, I look at him. He’s so tall he has to stretch his long legs in the aisle. Of course, this makes him look like he’s constantly slouching.
“What are you staring at?”
“You.” He grins. “I figured you knew that by now.”
Blushing, I peer back at the board, suddenly feeling emotionally groundless. I start to jot the quote in my notebook, but my fingers twitch, and I end up scratching it out. In short, Kane is everything Lev wasn’t, which should make being around him easier, but it doesn’t. It doesn’t matter that he has dark hair and reminds me of a typical teenage guy instead of an angel. He’s not Lev. That’s the trouble.
My shoulders stiffen, and I make another mistake while trying to copy the quote. I scribble the quote again and try it a third time, which works, but I know if he keeps watching me, I’m probably going to rub holes in this paper with all the mistakes.
“Shouldn’t you be watching her instead?” I nod to Ms. Monroe. Granted, she’s old enough to be our mother, but then again, she’s giving us the grade for senior English, not me.
“I will. When I need to. Right now, she isn’t telling me anything I don’t already know.” His voice sounds amused, which matches the devious grin making me wonder what he’s up to. A strand of his hair slips into his eyes, and he brushes it back.
“So what were you at the center for?”
It’s an innocent enough question, but that doesn’t mean I don’t react. My back stiffens, and my stomach sucks in as though it’s been punched. He hears the sharp intake of breath and frowns.
“Nothing. I don’t really want to talk about, okay?” I flip to the next page in my notebook and keep writing. It’s better than facing him—or anyone—right now. “Aren’t you taking notes?” It’s all I can think of to distract him.
“Guess I could.” He opens his binder and begins copying the lines from the board, but even so, he still gazes at me from time to time, his pencil stalling in its slow scrawl.
We pass most of the hour taking notes, which keeps Kane from asking any other difficult questions I’m not ready to answer, and as the bell rings, I stand, ready to fly out the room when Kane catches my arm while Sarah and Jayvee scoot around us and head into the hall, whispering about some guy at the front of the room.
“Hey, I guess I kind of touched a nerve a few minutes ago. I’m sorry. It’s none of my business what happened, and if you want to tell me, you will.” He slides from his desk and stands, towering over me. “I just don’t want things to be weird between us like this: I didn’t mean to upset you.” Around his wrist, he wears a fiber bracelet, and I am struck by how different he really is.
“It’s okay,” I manage. “Just a few things I haven’t worked out yet.” I look down at my schedule, trying to figure out where my next room is.
“Can I see?” He points at it, and when I nod, he takes it and reads through my class list. “Well, it looks like we have four out of five classes together. What a shocker.”
“What do you mean?”
He shrugs. “It’s the small-town thing. We all have pretty much the same classes because this town isn’t big enough to have more than about twenty teachers. So we all have Ag Science or Bask Weaving 101 for electives. Now those classes are definitely going to come in handy.”
I can’t keep from laughing as we head out into the hall. “Sounds like you enjoy small towns as much as I do.”
“Hate ‘me.” He shakes his head. “I moved here last fall, and I haven’t been able to accept that the biggest pastime around here is watching the grass grow. Or not. Go figure.”
He stops in front of a locker and opens it to slip his spiral inside. “What about you?”
I chew my bottom lip and try to form a reasonable answer. “Let’s just say my last experience in a small town wasn’t so hot, and I’d rather be someplace like Dallas or even Knoxville right about now.”
“I can’t say I blame you.” He shuts the locker, and we move on with the flow. Even though I stare ahead, knowing I’m not graceful enough to watch where I am going, I feel his gaze lingering on me.
“So what do you for fun around here?” I watch Jayzee and Sarah duck into the bathroom while we keep going.
“That depends on what you call ‘fun.’” A group of students stand in our path, forcing us to move to the side to brush past.
“Not watching the grass or basket weaving, that’s for sure.”
Kane chuckles. “We go out to the Cherokee National Forest a lot. Do some camping. Go swimming in the Tellico River. That sort of thing.”
“Figures,” I mutter.
“Meaning?” Another narrow passage through students. Doesn’t anybody go to class?
“There’re no bowling alleys or movie theaters here, are there? Nothing even remotely resembling the modern world.”
He shrugs. “Basically.” At this point,
he gestures to a classroom to my right. “That’s our math class. Ms. Martin is pretty strict. You definitely don’t want to get on her bad side.”
I want to burst out laughing because Jimmie has unknowingly placed me in yet another small town where I’ll stand out like a rose bush blooming in December. Camping and fishing aren’t exactly on my list of preferred activities, so this could definitely be one long senior year.
“What about cemeteries?” I ask as we head into the classroom, our bodies sandwiched between two other small groups.
“Graveyards? Why?” He’s looking at me like I’ve suddenly morphed into a green-skinned monster.
“What—you have something against them?”
He shakes his head. “Not sure how to answer that, Lizzie.”
I chuckle; his confused expression says it all. “No, I’m not some freak. I like to take pictures of statues, and sometimes I find cool ones in cemeteries, that’s all. Feel better?”
“Definitely.”
Although I figured we would beat Sarah and Jayzee, they must have passed us in the hall because in the back of the room I see the two of them sitting across from one another, whispering. We slide into our seats behind them, and they giggle at our arrival.
Kane kicks the back of Jayzee’s chair. “What’s so funny?” Although he pretends to scowl, I can tell he’s just giving her a hard time.
“Nothing.”
“Really?” He leans forward and gooses her sides just as the bell rings. The teacher, a woman in her mid-twenties wearing a soft, flowing pink dress, waves a chiding finger at him.
“Now, Mr. Bristow, this isn’t the place for that kind of nonsense.”
“What kind would you prefer?” he asks, offering a good natured grin. “Oh, sorry, Ms. Martin. Too much fun this summer, I guess.” He clears his throat and leans back in his seat, his long legs edging into the aisle.
She nods at him, accepting his apology, and takes roll. Soon after, she begins going over her class procedures, and even as I jot down notes, I still feel Kane watching me, his dark eyes carefully studying my profile. I’m wondering if he’s just an ace student or if he’ll eventually apply himself to the work instead of watching me.