The Sententia: Second Thoughts Part 24

Outside, settled in the comfort and quiet of her rental car, my aunt said, "I bet everyone's inside fighting over who's going to pay the check."

Through my sniffles, I gave a little smile. "That's fine, because I already did it."

"What! You did not, young lady. I paid it."

We locked eyes and I shook my head. My smile grew to full size as I told her, "You only thought you did because I told them to let you. I arranged everything last week."

"Elaine Rachel! You sneaky brat!" Her own smile gleamed in the growing darkness. The clouds that had started to give way during the ceremony had grown even thinner, showing patches of deepening blue sky and a hint of stars. "Abuelo will be disappointed. And Martin. They've been looking forward to this argument for years."

"I bet they never thought I'd be graduating from a place like this."

"No...but you loved it here, huh?" I nodded, though the question was surely rhetorical. "Not many eighteen year old graduates out there arranging to pay for their own dinners."

"I think I'm not like many graduates." I turned to look out the window, counting the cars of people I knew.

Aunt Tessa reached over to take my hand. "No, sweetheart. You're definitely not." After a quiet pause, she said, "Do you wish you'd made a different choice?"

I took a deep breath and held it before I answered. Did I? What a difficult question. My heart was screaming, yes, you idiot! But my heart wasn't all of me. A different choice would have meant sacrificing a piece of my soul. So, "No, I don't. Do you?"

She opened her mouth, probably to deny it, but hesitated. "I can't say I didn't want you to come home. But even though I know it's hard, I think you made the right choice. For you. It's your turn now-you lived my crazy life with me for plenty of years."

"I liked your crazy life."

"Me too. But I think it's time for both of us to settle down...for a while, anyway."

"I'm scared."

"Me too, sweetie," she admitted, squeezing my hand. "But let's try it anyway, okay?"

When I told her what I was planning to do, she didn't even seem surprised.

Chapter Twenty-Seven.

When Amy came home later, I was laying on my bed, still wearing my graduation dress while I stared at the ceiling and squeezed my stress ball. My stress avocado, as my roommate called it, which is really what it looked like. It was a multi-purpose avocado, good not only for stress but for strength-building after broken wrists. I was currently trying to build up the strength to walk across the street.

"Hey," Amy said gently. The door shut behind her and she slipped off her shoes before she sat on the end of my bed. Our room was as bare as I'd ever seen it, the majority of our things packed and ready to go if not already gone, which was compounding my sadness. "You okay?"

I shook my head. "I'm just..."

"Yeah, I know." She took a deep breath. "Last night here, huh?"

"I can't believe it."

"Me either. I'm...really going to miss this place."

"Yeah," I said. It came from low in my throat, sounding husky and soft. Amy leaned into me, until my knees were propping her up, and took it upon herself to fill the emptiness in our room with her good cheer, something she'd only just found again.

"I love that restaurant though, don't you? Caleb had never been before. Lobster Frica.s.see is, like, crazy delicious. My mom says it's pa.s.se but whatever. It's so good. I love this dress on you. You should wear white all the time, you know, it looks awesome on you. White and black, that's all you need. And no offense or anything, but your uncle is kind of hot." She sat up and turned a little to wink at me and I giggled.

"Uncle Tommy? Yeah, I guess he probably is." Actually, I was sure he was. So, too, was Uncle Tommy. He was younger than my aunt and just as pretty, but not so tiny, and had the most perfect white teeth. "He's a science teacher, you know-physics was his specialty."

"No way! Must be a lot of girls in cla.s.s hot for Mr. Espinosa. I don't think I'd be able to concentrate if he'd been my teacher, and I love physics."

"I know." I tugged on one of her curls. "That's just his 'fun' career though, he says. He makes his 'real' living doing some modeling for advertis.e.m.e.nts. You noticed the teeth? I call him Tio Trouble because he always finds it. I think he's a bachelor 'til the end, which makes my grandparents sad. Between him and Aunt Tessa, they'll probably only get me as a grandkid."

"Your aunt could still surprise them."

"I hope so. I'd be an awesome big sister." Of course she could always adopt-she'd adopted me-but Aunt Tessa was just young enough to still have her own baby, and I knew she thought about it. I wondered if, maybe now that she was committed to staying in one place, she would.

"She seemed really friendly with another attractive bachelor...He's kind of old, but Senator Astor is-"

My little twin mattress rocked like a waterbed when I swung my legs over the side and stood up. Amy basically fell into the rumpled blankets without me to hold her up. "Hey!"

"Sorry. I'm...going over to Carter's."

"Nice!" She propped her head up on her elbow. "Why didn't you just say so? I won't wait up."

"No, you can, well, you don't have to, but...I'll be back."

"Seriously? Why come back? There's no curfew tonight, Lainey baby." She smiled as she stood and stretched. I knew the only reason Amy was staying in our room was because Caleb was already gone. With his brother's help, he'd been fully moved out before the ceremony.

"It's our last night."

"Psht. I mean, I know, but you're sleeping over at my house tomorrow. Do something reckless tonight."

Reckless? No. What I was about to do was horribly, terribly calculated. I pushed my feet into shoes I wasn't even sure matched and headed for the door. "Just...I'll be back."

It must have been the look on my face, or the catch in my voice, that tipped her off. Her eyes grew so wide I could see myself reflected in them. She knew. Maybe not exactly what was about to happen, but something.

"Lane?" she called but I was almost out the door. "What are you going to do? Lainey?!"

IT WAS ALMOST curfew, but as Amy had pointed out, that was inconsequential. I'd just graduated; they couldn't kick me out. They couldn't possibly do anything to me worse than what I was about to do. The first bells started to ring as I stood at the back door to the bookstore, s.h.i.+vering while I worked up the courage to climb the stairs.

For months Carter told me, over and over, how he'd never hurt me, and he believed it. For a long time, I'd believed it too. I knew he'd never harm me on purpose and he didn't think he was capable. But neither of us knew he'd do whatever our uncle wanted.

And it never once crossed his mind that I'd be the one to hurt him.

There was a moment, many moments, when I could have changed everything. Right up until this afternoon on the graduation stage. Probably even now, I could call Daniel Astor or walk to Dr. Stewart's and tell either of them I'd changed my mind. I could agree to work for the Perceptum.

But I was a coward. A selfish coward. I recognized at the end the other option Dan was offering me: the chance for escape. The cost was high, but not as high as my life, and I wasn't sure I wouldn't have to pay it anyway. This was the choice I hadn't seen I could take, the one I wouldn't have wanted to see anyway, because of the thing I'd been blind to all along-it wasn't all about me. I'd been guilty of that a lot this year, failing to see beyond myself. Maybe I deserved this.

Or was it a different kind of punishment? Twice now I'd tampered with fate, changed the future. Once was selfless, but the second time? I'd begged G.o.d, the G.o.ddess, the Universe, whoever would help me, not to let me die. And they'd listened. But were they benevolent or malevolent? Had I unwittingly traded a terrible fate for a worse one? I didn't want to believe that, but right about now, it felt like it.

Because it was late, I knocked on the kitchen door before I opened it even though I wasn't really expected to anymore. Carter leaned out of his room at the sound and he smiled the most beautiful smile at the unexpected sight of me coming down the hall. "This surprise just made my night," he said. I was supremely glad to see he was wearing wind pants and a T-s.h.i.+rt, which meant he was still up reading or playing a video game. I'd delayed for so long, I was afraid he might already have been in bed. We were supposed to leave early tomorrow, which meant he'd get up even earlier to run.

When I got to his doorway, he embraced me. "Hey, beautiful." The stiffness in my posture was his first clue that all was not well. "I thought you said you were exhausted and we'd just see each other tomorrow. What's up?"

Behind me, I closed the door. I took one, two small steps into the room, afraid to move any further into his s.p.a.ce or closer to him. "I'm sorry it's so late." I cleared my throat. "But I wanted to talk to you."

"Okay..." He looked around as if a little lost and then sat down on his chair, but not comfortably. He leaned forward with his elbows on his knees and waited for me to go on. Only one lamp was lit, and over his shoulder I could see a game, hockey maybe, on pause.

"I'm leaving in the morning."

"I know," he said. "I'll be there." He laughed, like I was being silly, and for half a second, he started to relax. But when I didn't smile, or move, or laugh along, he sat up straighter. Between us, his hand hovered in the air, beckoning me to come closer, but he dropped it after a while. I wasn't close enough to touch anyway, which contributed to the tension in the room. He knew there was something wrong even if he couldn't understand what.

I doubted he'd ever understand.

"By myself," I clarified and the confusion started to set in.

"You don't want me to drive with you?"

I swallowed, hard, and then met his eye. "I don't want you to come at all." I'd planned those words, practiced them in my head, and I'd meant them to sound hard, more determined. Instead, they sounded broken and unsure. But I said them.

"What?" He was standing now, coming closer.

"I'm sorry. I...I love you, but-"

"Lainey? What's going on?"

After a deep breath, I said, "I can't do this with you."

It was only a few steps, and he reached me in seconds, putting his hands on my shoulders and pulling me closer. "Is this why you were crying? Lainey. We can do anything together. We've proven that."

I stepped backwards, out from under his touch, until my back hit the door. He didn't try to hold me. "I know," I said. Speaking the next words was equivalent to dragging my heart out through my throat and throwing it at my feet. I wanted to do anything, anything, other than say them, except for die. "But I don't want to."

He inhaled audibly and stared at me for a few seconds. Around us the air seemed to tighten, heavy and thick with a kind of antic.i.p.ation, or disbelief. I was reminded of the first time we met, on the second floor of the bookstore, in the Rarities and First Editions section, when I told him I was a Legacy who didn't know who she was and everything changed. It was still my favorite part of the store and I went up there all the time, just to look at the books and remember. After this, I knew I wouldn't really be welcome there anymore.

"What are you saying?" he finally responded. "Are you...are you breaking up with me?"

I stomped on my heart, and his, a few more times when I told him, "Yes. That's what I'm saying."

He shook his head, making his caramel waves catch the lamplight and look something like a halo. "No. This...No, Lainey. I love you. Has...the vision hasn't come back, has it? I thought-"

"No. It's totally gone. I don't even think about it anymore."

"This isn't..." He paused, bewildered. He seemed to waver and then sat on his bed, dragging his fingers through his hair. "This is crazy," he said. Then tentatively, "Is this about what happened at the range? Did something-I swear-" He touched three fingers to his forehead, pus.h.i.+ng hard enough to leave a red mark and I knew he knew. Something was wrong with his memory, but he couldn't remember what. "You've been different ever since."

"No! I mean, it's-" I grabbed on to his reason and let my mouth run, infusing it with some of my real fears to make it ring true. "Yes, sort of. But, it's mostly about me. I could have died, at the range, if your gun had been loaded, or you could have. I've almost died three times in the last year. Being with you, it's dangerous." When he started to protest, I cut him off. "N...not just physically. I'm only eighteen. This is too much pressure. You knew...you knew this summer, when you said you'd follow me, you knew I was scared. I should have told you then. I should never have agreed. I love you, but I need to be me, to-to figure out who that even is...I have to do this. By myself."

He was staring at me, and I could see it. See how he didn't want to believe me, but he did. I watched the tears pool in his eyes while his heart began to break, little shards of it stabbing me as they fell and mingled with the broken pieces of mine that already surrounded us.

"Maybe..." I shouldn't have said what I said next, shouldn't have given him any line of hope, but it was for me, too. "Maybe someday. We can be together again." Those five words came out in a rush, because they were dangerous. "But not right now."

His voice cracked and he dropped his head into his hands. "When?"

"I don't know. Just not right now." At the end, I whispered what I feared was true: "Maybe never."

When he looked back up at me, with an expression of pain and desperation I'd never known his features could form, it felt like actually shooting him, or myself, would have been less painful than what I was doing now. "Please. Lainey. Don't do this." The tears in his eyes spilled over and if he said my name one more time, so help me, I would split in two. "Please," he repeated. "I love you."

He held out his hand, reaching to me, pleading, and I did the only thing I could.

I ran.

If I touched him again, I'd never let go. I was wrong. I thought I wasn't willing to die to be with him, but I was dying. This was killing me, and Carter too. "I love you, too." My voice broke as I backed out of his bedroom. Out of his life. "But I can't. I'm sorry."

Melinda was in the kitchen, and I rushed past her without stopping. From the tears on her face I knew she'd heard enough to know this was goodbye.

"Lainey!" Carter called once more.

But I was already gone.

Chapter Twenty-Eight.

In the morning, up early after a restless, dreamless night, I folded the last of my things while I cried again. On her side of the room, Amy did the same. We were crying for different reasons, though not entirely. She was sad for me, too, and for Carter, who was her friend before I was.

But though she didn't understand, she supported me, and that was all I could ask of her. If it was what I really wanted, she said, who was she to tell me I shouldn't be on my own? She didn't believe it was what I really wanted and I didn't try too hard to convince her. It didn't matter anyway, whether she believed me or not. I wanted to tell her the real reason, the whole story, but I'd spilled enough secrets to her and Caleb as it was. The danger and burden of keeping the rest would be mine alone.

When the last of our things were finally packed, and before our families came to help take it all away, Amy and I hugged for a really long time.

"I love you, Young."

"You, too."

"Even if you're crazy, and have some scary mind abilities, and I hope you won't make me forget saying that."

"Even though you're too smart for your own good, and a terrible influence, and are bound to get me in trouble someday, I wouldn't dream of it."

After approximately forever, we released each other and I felt bereft all over again. But as not-ready as I was, it was time to go. We both grabbed bags and started our final treks up and down the stairs of Marquise House. Downstairs, Ms. Kim was helping direct chaos and dry tears, so we got goodbye hugs from her, too. It didn't escape my notice the parity between the beginning of my year and the end, and how I'd gone from the one consoling the tearful young creatures to the one being consoled.

Change was scary. I understood, really understood, that now, for the first time. Once upon a time change had been my constant, but two years at Northbrook had changed that. Changed me. It was time to see how the next years would change me too.

Finally loaded up, Amy and I hugged once more before she climbed in the car with her mom and I made a final trip across the street. Amy rolled down her window before they left. "I'll see you tonight?"