Fairy Circle (17 page)

“
I’m like, out with this really cool guy for the first time and I feel like soooooo light-headed,” she whispered with passion.
Please let ‘stupid girl’ work
. She backed away from him and pasted a Cheshire grin across her face.

He fiddled with his ear lobe and considered her. Now that Saffron was eye-to-eye with him, she noticed the earring he played with, a diamond stud, just bigger than a green pea. Her eyes skittered down him, then up again as her face bloomed red. His skin was flawless, his nails, obviously manicured, and his haircut, well, it was perfect and clearly not mastered within fifty miles of their sheep-infested shores. She wobbled in her shoes and ignored the sensation that she had to pee, badly. She wondered why she was standing next to a vampire, and wondered how he could be so beautiful. She searched the dirty rug for her ChapStick, and hoped she wasn’t about to die.

When he spoke to her next, he displayed two rows of perfectly beautiful, normal, white teeth.

“
Your secret is safe with me.” His Eclipse breath barely covered the copper scent of congealing blood. His lips closed over his teeth and, still grinning, he nodded her on. Her shoulders hiked up to her eyes as she slunk past

Markis picked up her ChapStick and trotted after her. A new set of girls giggled with the ticket-tear guy.

“
What did you say to him?” Markis was bewildered. Maybe Saffron hadn’t noticed Mr. Wonderful when all of the other girls did; but did she really have to almost faint when she finally did see him? It kind of crushed a guy. He rubbed at the pang in his chest.

Saffron started talking to her shoes. “I just said something stupid. I didn’t want him to call the ambulance or anything. I wasn’t going to faint, you know. I just felt dizzy. Strong perfume makes me dizzy. There’s a lot of it in here.”

Markis’s mother lifted the collar of her blouse to her nose and sniffed. She let it fall back into place and sniffed the air. She shrugged. Markis’s father sniffed his popcorn, then ate some more.

“
Markis, I have to run to the bathroom before the movie - I’ll meet you inside.” Her knees felt like hot rubber as she awkwardly made her way across the plush, blood-red carpet and fumbled with the restroom door. The door was so heavy. At first she couldn’t open it. She slammed all of her weight against it, and finally it began to give by degrees.

Markis watched her, his eyebrows drawn into a frown. He called over to her before she went through the door. “It’s okay. I’ll see what seats my parents pick out and wait for you in the hallway so you don’t get lost in the dark looking for us.”

She tried a smile for him. “Thanks, I appreciate it.” When the door had given just enough, she slipped through the crack and out of sight. Inside the bathroom, she drew
her hand across the painted concrete wall, leaning heavily on it as she expected to pass out any second. She walked all the way to the end of the room and locked herself in the handicapped stall, then leaned against the wall furthest from the not-pristine toilet. She took deep breaths in and out, in and out, to try to calm her frazzled nerves.
T
here’s a vampire collecting ticket stubs at the movies. Oh, God, you stupid ass, why didn’t you just listen to Li?

She replayed the scene in her head to try and see if she remembered anything that would show that he knew she knew what he was. She didn’t think so. But what was she supposed to do now? She still knew who and what he was! At that moment, she hated the fairies. She hated them because she’d been more afraid than ever since she’d met them - fighting with that rotten gnome and the freakin’ gremlins, a bunch of small, scaly things she couldn’t name, the ghosts that did nothing but still scared the crap out of her, that guy that walked out of her woods today. Who
was
he? He wasn’t dead, her mother and Derek could see him and talk to him. But something about him made her feel really…undone. And now a vampire? Her breath caught in her throat, she wanted to scream.

She decided she could avoid the movies, indefinitely, or until he moved on. If she saw him anywhere, she would just look away. She shuddered, realizing she was alone in the bathroom and started to worry about
dying
alone in the bathroom.

What if he comes in here? What if he’s looking for me right now
?
What if he rips open my jugular and I fall to the dirty, white floor and crack my skull? What if my blood runs gushing and streaming across these tiny, white tiles and drips down the rusted metal drain in the center of the room? Would he eat that blood too? Suck it off the floor? Waste not, want not.

Saffron gagged on her thoughts as the restroom door opened and two boisterous girls came screeching into the bathroom. Saffron let herself out of the handicapped stall and washed her hands robotically, while the girls yelled to each other over their pee from their separate stalls. They were talking about the hot guy loitering in the hall outside.

Saffron turned off the faucet, dried her hands for a few seconds under the blower, then wiped her hands the rest of the way on the seat of her jeans. She looked at herself in the mirror, saw how she hunched, and forced her back to straighten. As she moved out of the room, her body curved back into the safe ‘c’ shape.

In the hallway, Markis waited as Saffron pushed out of the ladies room.

“
Are you sure you’re okay?” He looked doubtful.

“
Yeah, sorry. Can we just go watch the movie?”

In the dark, while the coming attractions pulsed on the screen, he leaned over her shoulder and whispered, “We can just sit anywhere we want.”

Saffron closed her eyes and nodded. He was alive, human, and whispering in her ear. She wanted to turn into him and feel what it was like to have someone hold her. She wanted to know if holding him would take away her fears. She was desperate for him to reach for her but they walked up the aisle instead. That was okay, too. PDA? She sure as hell didn’t want to become the main feature. Just before the show began, it went through her mind that she hadn’t even checked her teeth or nose in the bathroom. In light of all the newest developments in her life, things in her teeth and nose became supremely unimportant. Still, she leaned her head in her hand through most of the movie and hoped her palm held any bad breath at bay.

Chapter 10

A
fter the movie, Markis’s father boomed his goodbye and clapped Saffron on the back. Markis’s mother told her that it was very nice to have met her. Markis stood between them and winked. Saffron smiled. They parted ways in the main entrance, which was crowded with the departures of many other movie-goers.

Saffron adopted her best poker face and slowly scanned the room. With a sigh of relief, she confirmed that the ticket-tear vampire was nowhere to be found. Then her gaze fell on something even more frightening.

Her cousin was sitting on a bench on the far wall under a poster for the newest and best action flick in the history of film. A suited, suave, and slick action star stared out in challenge. A car crash was taking place above his head. Just below his scowling face was Mindy’s scowling face. She jumped up from the bench and pointed to the floor by her feet. Saffron rolled her eyes. Did her cousin think she would actually heel like a dog?

Saffron raised her chin, and taking her sweet old time, she strolled over to Mindy.

“
Where’ve you been? I been sitting here for half an hour! I been asking people if they’ve seen you and everybody’s like, duh, what, who? The other girls left, they were so pissed you dissed us like that, they took a ride with those freakin’ DeMarco twins, they’ll probably get raped. Don’t ask me why I stayed and waited for you – you didn’t do
me
any favors.”

“
Mindy, you guys went into the movie without me!”

“
Well, where the hell were you?”

“
I was standing in the middle of the room, where anyone in the world could have seen me, talking to Markis.”

Mindy jerked her head back. “Markis? Markis who? Markis Bryant? From school?” She smirked. “Ah, Saffron...I don’t know where you and Markis went for over two hours but I suggest you get off him and quick.”

“
What are you talking about Mindy? I’m not
on
him.”

“
Samantha just told me tonight that she likes Markis so I’m warning you now, cuz you’re my cousin and everything; don’t mess with her when she wants something.”

“
Jesus Christ, Mindy…he’s not a freakin’ dog. Samantha can’t just act like she owns him.” Saffron felt something vicious wake and squirm around inside her.
Samantha
?
Dexterous Whore of the East?
It was well known that Samantha taught yoga at the town gym, three barns down from DeMarco Auto Parts, and that she was a self-proclaimed expert on the Kama Sutra, and that her breasts could keep herself and a small village afloat in a flood.
When Markis found out that Samantha liked him… Saffron whispered, “Markis can hang around with anyone he wants.”

“
No,
Saffron
, you don’t get it,
Saffron
. You
need
to leave him alone now that I’ve just told you she wants him. It wouldn’t be fair for you to continue, whatever, at this point.”

“
Well, what if
I
want him?” She tried not to mumble, but couldn’t bring herself to say these bizarre, self-centered words any louder.

“
Pah! Yeah, right! If you want everybody to think you’re sneaky like that, that’s your problem. Just text your freakin’ mother so we can get out of here.” Mindy plopped back on the bench, folded her arms across her chest, and glared across the now-crowded lobby.

Saffron fumbled with her mother’s phone. She forgot if you were supposed to press the little green symbol before or after you dialed, was it before or after you texted?

Mindy’s face contorted into another form of miserable. “And who were those
old
people you guys were hanging around with?” Mindy knew who they were.

Saffron’s shoulders hitched. It wasn’t hard to guess where this interrogation was headed. “His parents,” she whispered.

Mindy sprung up, her perfect face twisting into something hideous under her blonde hair. “Dude! You went out on a date to a movie with him…
and his parents!
That’s
so
not normal. You better hope nobody finds out about this. Markis better hope so too. Samantha won’t even consider dating him if she finds out. You better not tell her.”

Saffron’s face blanched. “Why would I tell her? Why would I not tell her? When would I tell her? I hadn’t seen any of those guys for months before tonight! Who’s going to find out about us? Hasn’t everyone gone on with their lives yet?” Now she was shrieking.

Two junior high boys walked by. They snickered at the women in battle. They hissed and howled like alley cats. Mindy reached over and managed to slap one upside the head.

“
Hey!” was his only comeback as he reached to fondle his scalp. They scurried off.

Saffron’s freckles stood out like cocoa powder on a sheet of white paper. Her voice came low and harsh. Mindy’s words had hit her like a pile driver. She wasn’t too far gone out of high school to remember how everything worked - the cliques, and how Markis’s own friends had sneered at her. How, back then, someone like him would never ever go out with someone like her. She shrank inside her clothes. This night out had been too much. She scanned the lobby for the vampire again, but he was nowhere around; only a gremlin in the trash, and a fat woman floating on the ceiling. “Why would he even care if Samantha likes him?”

Mindy raised her eyebrows. “Oh, hunny,” she grunted with overripe condescension. Her lips drew back; she made a click noise with her tongue and teeth. “You don’t really think Markis
seriously
likes
you,
do you?” She reached over and gently patted Saffron on the shoulder. “C’mon, why would he like you?” She eyed Saffron without blinking.

Saffron said nothing. She was fighting to keep from blubbering here, in this busy room, in front of Mindy.

“
I mean really, I’m not trying to make you feel bad or anything, but honestly…Markis Bryant? Does that make any sense to you, Saffron?”

“
Hey, Saffron!”

Saffron and Mindy turned toward the entrance doors where Markis stood waving, something small fisted in his hand. He ran over.

Saffron could smell the cold, autumn night on his clothes. She breathed deep, and as the air moved inside her, it froze the monster in her belly.

“
Saffron, I forgot, you dropped this earlier. I’ve had it in my pocket the whole time.” He beamed as he took her hand, held it, and placed the tube of ChapStick in her warm palm. He stood back to look at her, then stepped forward and reached out with both hands. He locked his fingers around her wrists and slowly, slowly he slid his hands up her arms as he pulled her forward to touch his nose to hers. He looked straight into her eyes. “I hope you had fun. I did.”

She nodded. Then he was gone, skipping through the lobby doors, and out into the world.