Downcast (25 page)

While talking to herself, she had gone around her office, running her fingers along every surface she could find and sweeping whatever dust was on it into her hand. She had a decent-sized baby dust bunny in her hand when she was done, then dumped it into the cup of water.

 "Haley, please step outside," she said, and the pinch of terror got a little tighter as he obeyed without question.

Her eyes began to swirl again, and I felt that same restless energy in the air, brushing at my legs and crawling under my skin.

"Close your eyes, please, Stephanie," she said, her voice oddly like the silvery cascade of chimes.

I did as she told me, my body tense as I listened for every little sound of what she was doing. I heard the quiet slosh of water and then nothing. The air around me began to buzz and vibrate, making my skin itch and tingle.

Then a damp coolness enveloped me, finding its way through, under, and around my clothes, touching every part of my body. It was fresh and soothing, like putting aloe vera over a sunburn, and just like aloe vera, I felt it soak into my skin. Risking a peek at my hands, I saw that the green swirly things were gone, and my skin was back to its normal, pale, opaque self.

The buzzing ended abruptly, and I slumped limply down in the chair. The door behind me opened, and Haley was instantly by my side, taking my hand in his. His touch was a relief in so many ways. It was the only thing that was solid and certain in my world at that moment.

Haley's cool fingers were on my chin, turning my face to him. His smile filled my vision, and for a whole glorious moment, all I felt was bliss at being with him. Then, like picnic ants, all my other worries and fears came marching back in.

"You said my mother could have killed me," I said, turning to her. "What do you mean? What happened? What did you do?"

Her lips quivered in a smile.

"I believe Mr. Brown was intending to assign a short paper on A.C. Swinburne at the end of class today," she said lightly. "You read ‘In the Garden of Proserpine’ in class?"

"Yes," I answered, tense, as I waited for the supremely frustrating, un-figure-out-able clue that I now knew was coming.

"It might be worth considering The Proserpine Puzzle as a topic for your paper," she said. "It's a riddle that Swinburne wrote when he was working on that particular poem."

"Where do I find it?"

"Where else?" Katie Jones laughed. "The Internet."

AT LUNCH,
I smiled as I watched Morris, thinking how beautiful my friend was just below the surface of his skin as his giant brain attacked the task of unearthing The Proserpine Puzzle from the depths of the Internet.

The joy of Morris at being able to ferret out obscure information on the Internet can't adequately be described by mere words. There was an eerie smirk that crossed his thin lips as they curled up in an almost-sinister smile, and his eyes narrowed like a cat's while his fingers flew over the keyboard. He went from being a nerdy weather geek to being a sexy anime hero...except for the glasses, braces, and whole gangly body where each part seemed to be growing at a different rate.

More than that, though, was the secret elation Snub Clubbers felt when they got to flex intellectual and creative muscles, even though it’s what got them labeled as “weird” and made their lives miserable in school.

My initial search engine query had produced nothing but endless variations of the poem. But with Morris? It was like watching an artist, well, a really sarcastic artist at work.

Roast beef sandwich forgotten, he muttered things like, "FTP crap," or, "Really, Wayback Machine?" or, "Restricted archive whatever."

Helen, despite working on Swinburne's poem, was far more practical about lunch, eating her Hot Pocket and slapping Zack as necessary when he tried to charm his way into her personal space. I could have told him there was absolutely no point in trying his luck when she was in I Don't Have Time For This mode. Then again, he was smiling, so maybe enjoyed it.

Helen's other Hot Pocket sat in front of me, but all I could do was stare at it. I had no desire to eat anything. I sat in Haley's lap, limply laying against his lean chest and resting my head on his shoulder. My eyes kept drifting closed, and the sleep of utter exhaustion kept tugging at me, numbing me to the various traumas of the morning.

"Tired?" Haley asked softly, tightening his arms around my waist.

"Exhausted," I replied. "It's like every cell in my body was put through the wringer."

"Not so far from the truth," Zack chuckled, sliding his arm along the back of Helen's chair in a not-so-smooth move.

"Excuse me?" My indignation came out kitten-level despite my inner lion roaring in frustration from yet another half-hint.

Zack smiled apologetically, though there was something tight and stern in the tension around his eyes as he looked at me. Suddenly, I wondered if he was playing the biggest game of all.

"Screw you, Wikipedia," Helen announced, clearly peeved.

"What's wrong?" Zack asked, gently resting his hand on her shoulder, only to have her brusquely flick it off.

"I hate it when people edit the entries and mix up Greeks and Romans."

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“I looked up ‘Proserpine’ and the first thing in the entry says that she is the daughter of Demeter. Thing is, Proserpine is a Roman name and Demeter is a Greek name.”

“So, what should it be?” I yawned.

“If you go with the Greeks, it’s Demeter and her daughter Persephone.”

I chuckled weakly. “I like the sound of ‘Persephone’ better than ‘Proserpine.’ But, who was she, anyway?”

"Persephone is the Greek goddess of Spring and new life," Helen replied. "She is the daughter of Demeter, goddess of fertility, growing things, life, and harvest. Persephone is also the wife of Hades, god of the Underworld, and she spends six months of the year above ground, with her mother, and six months of the year underground, with her husband. That's supposedly how we get summer and winter."

"Sounds like Persephone needs to move out and get an apartment of her own," I joked. "Six months underground? Yuck!"

"Don't forget six months with her mother, who basically threatened to kill off all of humanity, if her daughter wasn't returned to her," Helen said.

"Returned to her?" I asked. Haley's body stiffened against me, and his fingers convulsively dug into me where he held me.

"Hades fell in love with her at first sight and kidnapped her, taking her to the Underworld," she answered. "The Underworld isn't Hell like we think of it. It has the Elysian Fields as well, which is kind of like our Heaven. All souls go to the Underworld after death. They just kind of get sorted out when they arrive."

"So, what happened when Persephone was kidnapped by Hades?"

"Well, it doesn't say much about Persephone herself or what she thinks in the original myth. But Demeter went nutso and basically refused to show up for work. She wouldn't let anything grow, and she wandered the world, mourning for her lost daughter. Zeus saw humanity dying off because of food shortages, and he ordered Hermes, the messenger god, to go get Persephone from Hades, in order to save humanity."

"Zeus seems like a pretty reasonable dude," Zack remarked with a smile, earning him an eye roll from Helen.

"Anyway, Zeus was basically pulling rank on his brother, Hades, and forcing him to give Persephone back. Hermes explained the whole deal, and Hades sadly agreed. Except, it turns out that Persephone had eaten six pomegranate seeds from one of the trees in Hades' palace, and she was now bound to him."

"That meant that Persephone would end up spending six months with Hades and six months with Demeter, creating winter and summer, blah, blah, blah," Helen concluded.

"That's right, beg!" Morris exclaimed, his eyes glued to his computer screen. "Who's your daddy now, Balliol archives?"

Helen and I stared at each other blankly. I shook my head and shrugged.

"He's your friend," I said.

"You met him first," she retorted.

"You take classes with him."

"That's not my fault. You're the one who tried to help him find a portal to Narnia in the janitor’s closet."

"That was third grade."

"Not an excuse."

"Dude, is this a girl fight?" Zack jumped in, grinning. "Are you guys gonna mud wrestle?"

"Not winning points here, Zack," I said drily.

"Chauvinistic pig," Helen added.

"I can be an animal, but I'd never be a pig," Zack replied, sitting up straight and looking slightly offended.

"Mmmm," Haley hummed softly against my neck. "Bacon."

My guffaw was a little limp from being so freaking tired and came out as kind of a choking snort.

"Um, is anybody actually interested in hearing what I found?" Morris demanded, aggrieved.

"Yes!" Helen and I said in unison.

"Okay," Morris replied, mollified. "Just so you all appreciate my spectacularly mad skills, I want you to know that I had to dig deep into Balliol College's archives at Oxford for Swinburne's unpublished stuff. I almost went blind reading this PDF of this eighteen eighty-nine book to find the single reference in it to the puzzle. You can all worship my brilliance now."

There was silence around the table.

"So unappreciated," Morris grumbled. "Only my code loves me. Anyway, The Proserpine Puzzle was written as a Victorian parlor game riddle once his poem became famous. Here's what it says:

I am half of life but not Life.

I am half of death but not Death.

Winter is my joy.

Summer is my joy.

Yet my seasons bring despair in halves.

I have a garden that never grows,

Yet yields the fruit of winter.

I have a garden that grows all things,

Yet there is none of summer's bounty for me.

All that sustains me are the seeds of love.

Who am I?"

"Too bad Swinburne named it 'The Proserpine Puzzle'," Helen remarked drily. "He gives away the answer right there: Proserpine."

"Don't be too hard on him," Morris said, still scanning his laptop. "Apparently, it was called something else, but his mistress, Katherine Jones, found it after his death and published it as 'The Proserpine Puzzle.’"

"So, why is this a clue?" I asked. "Does it have something to do with the weather? I mean, that's supposed to explain summer and winter, right? Is there some kind of weird super-secret Proserpine weather conspiracy or something?"

Morris gave me a withering look.

"Right, never mind," I mumbled, laying my head back down on Haley's shoulder.

Helen remained silent and frowning.

"Ugh, I don't know how I'm going to make it through work tonight," I whined. "All I want to do is nap for a week."

"Are you really going to work tonight?" Morris asked, clearly surprised.

"Um, yeah. Especially if Mom hasn't been showing up at work, someone has to pull in a paycheck for the bills and stuff." I was so tired that it was easier to worry about things like bills than trying to take in the idea that my mom had tried to kill me. In fact, it was best for me to just shove that whole concept in some deep dark closet so I could function and not break down into hysterical tears.

"It's almost time for class," Helen interjected as she packed up her stuff and stood up. "And, I agree with Stephanie. She needs to act as normal as possible, including going to class and showing up for work."

"Babe, are you seriously considering going to class after all this?" Zack exclaimed, scrambling to his feet.

Helen threw him a dangerously sweet smile. "What? You can't go to physics and save the world at the same time? Amateur."

"Total amateur," Morris echoed before getting up and following Helen out, leaving a slack-jawed Zack staring after them for a moment before he sprinted after them.

"I don't suppose you would consider skipping work and staying with me this evening?" Haley murmured in my ear, his breath tickling my skin. That was such a dirty trick, turning my heart into a rocket-propelled yo-yo.

"No," I replied, fighting the rush of longing that ached deep inside my heart. "I wish I could, but I have to go to work."

He made that low rumbling sound in his chest that was somewhere between a growl and a purr and skimmed the backs of his fingers against my cheek.

"Always so responsible," he said. "Always looking for balance."

I blinked, my tired brain connecting something with his words. It was there for just a moment—a big, blazingly bright answer—and then it slipped away to hide in my stupid, uncooperative subconscious.

"Perhaps a compromise?" Haley suggested, shifting me on his lap so that he held me even more tightly against his chest.

"Mmmh," was my distracted answer as his voice lulled me further into drowsiness.

"Skip the rest of your classes this afternoon. I'll help you find a safe place to take a nap, and then I will take you to work afterwards."

“I’ll get in trouble if I skip,” I mumbled.

“No, you won’t. I’ve got…an ‘in’ with Mr. Applebee, remember?”

"'Okay. Sounds goo..." My voice trailed off as blessedly cool wave of darkness washed up on the shores of my thoughts and swept everything out to a tranquil river of nothingness.

***

My pillow was not very comfortable. It was also moving. I pondered this as I leisurely swam up from the soft darkness into a fluffy world of pink cotton candy contentment.

Buttons. My pillow had buttons...and ribs. Blindly, I rubbed my fingertips over the fabric of a shirt to feel muscles and bones before I realized that it was Haley's shirt and the lines of his chest that I was tracing.

I opened my eyes, but my brain needed a moment to catch up. The rest of my body became aware as well, absorbing arms and legs wrapped around me.

Lifting my head, I saw we were sprawled out on one of the couches in the reading area in the library. I lay on my side between Haley's legs, resting against his chest. I had managed to hook one of my legs around his in my sleep, and he had lightly crossed his free leg over mine so that we were completely entwined. I had one arm stretched out above me to hold onto his shoulder, and my other hand pillowed my face on his heart. My shirt had ridden up slightly as I was sleeping, and I realized that Haley's cool fingertips rested on bare skin. His other hand was playing with the stray tendrils of my hair.