Kindling (13 page)

“Can I sit next to you?” I whispered to Heike, waving my hand in front of my nose. He laughed and waved me over.

“The boy takes advantage of free food,” Heike whispered. Most of the cabin was dark, but Heike’s pod remained lit. I didn't think anyone could hear us even if we were loud, though, so I didn’t bother to talk too low.

“Does he have a problem?” I ask. “A drinking problem?”

Heike grunted. “Braith’s been through a lot. But, you’ll notice a lot of children of Hunters have similar problems,” he said. “Their fathers ...” he trailed off then looked at me. “The students aren’t going to make it easy on you, Katja. Even the older hunters, they don’t like women in The Coven. It’s going to be difficult. I’m sorry about that. I’ll try to help when I can.”

I nodded. “Bisabuela already told me.”

“That’s good she warned you,” he said. “You need a lot of warning, because you’re not going to understand until you get there.”

I was sick of being told how much I didn’t know, so I changed the subject. “How old are you?”

Heike furrowed his brow for a moment then grinned. "Your bisabuela talks to much," Heike laughed. “Believe it or not, I’m exactly 217 years old. I remember because you were born a week after my 200th birthday."

“Holy avocado!” I said. “Happy birthday, then.” Heike didn’t even look like he was any older than my papa!

“Thanks,” He smiled some more and then shook his head. “What is this “Holy avacado”? What is that supposed to mean?”

“Oh,” I said. I laughed a little. “After the twins were born papá, mom, and me had to invent new ways of swearing because they would repeat everything we said. So, we starting using random objects as curse words.”

Heike wrinkled his nose. “Shit, Katja, start swearing! You’re going to get beat up for swearing with vegetables. You can’t say that when you’re there. Say “Holy shit” at least.”

I smiled. “Okay, holy shit you’re old.”

“Good,” Heike said. “Yes, I’m very old. Not quite the oldest, though. You’ll meet a few older than me, including your grandfather.”

My mouth dropped open. “My grandfather is still alive?”

Heike smiled and nodded. He was amused at how shocked I was. Then, he pointed to Braith’s seat. “Our young friend Braith, he’s about 40.”

“Are you serious?” I peeked through the crack between the seats in front of me and saw Braith, huddled in his chair, thin line of drool snaking from his partially open maw. I rolled me eyes. “He looks like he’s twenty!”

Heike nodded and smiled. “Yeah, but he’s a middle-aged twat.”

I laughed and rolled my eyes again. “And he acts like he’s a 14-year-old boy.”

“Don’t be too hard on him, Katja. He’s had a difficult life.” I shrugged but, really, I didn’t feel like I could bestow much empathy for someone like him. My whole life I had been awkward, a weird looking giant of a girl with a flat chest and paper-white skin. I’m ugly and weird and never fit in. Then, there was Braith, a gorgeous, golden-skinned, nearly-perfect looking man with an Australian accent who has no issues getting gorgeous women to fall madly in love with him in a matter of seconds. I assumed life came easy for beautiful people and Braith certainly was beautiful ... and cocky, and arrogant, and conceited and, at the moment, incredibly inebriated. And then I remembered something.

“Heike?” I asked.

“Hmmmm?” Heike said. He was getting close to nodding off.

“Why is Braith healed?”

He opened his eyes and looked at me. “What?” he asked.

“Braith is healed. We had that fight with the ...” I trailed off. I still felt weird, almost silly, saying that word. “With the vampyres, yesterday. And we were both really beaten up. But now he doesn’t have any bruises. I look awful but he looks better than before.”

"Oh,” Heike said. He seemed to think about this for a long time. “I think you need to ask Braith,” was all he said.

“You don’t know?”

“Oh, I know.” Heike adjusted himself in his booth, readying himself for sleep. “I just think he would prefer it if he were the one to tell you.” I sighed. “He’s going to be around you a lot, Katja. You’ll have to make friends.”

I shrugged. “I don’t understand why everything in the last 24 hours has been weird. My life up until yesterday was normal. Now I’m on my way to a vampyre training camp.”

“We’re not training vampyres, Katja.” Heike smiled.

I sighed at his glibness. “Do you ever get used to it?”

Heike shrugged. “Yes and no. I’ve been around for a long time, it’s just part of life. But, I never get over what I can do, how the world works, how vampyres work. Life is beautiful and ugly, Katja.” He paused for such a long time I thought he had gone to sleep. Finally, he said, “Menno, your papá, he’s a good man.”

“Yeah,” I said. The hum of the plane was lulling me to sleep and I found my body slinking downwards as I began to fade.

“Your mom and papá talked to me all the time about you. I wanted to make sure I knew you, Katja,” he said.

I was surprised.“They talked to you a lot?” Heike nodded. “About me?” Heike nodded again and I sunk back into my seat. “How often?”

Heike shrugged. “About once a week since you were a baby.”

“What?” I was surprised.

“I just wanted to feel like I was doing something. If I couldn’t be around you, I could at least coach on the sidelines.” We were silent for a few minutes. I couldn’t believe my parents had been in such close contact with him since I was a baby and I never knew. “Menno is very proud of you,” Heike said. He pulled me out of my thoughts and I grinned a little. “But, I wondered for a long time, do you hate me? Menno wasn’t sure. Because I thought you’d hate me for what I did.”

I looked up at him. “For what you did? You mean leaving?” He nodded. “I never hated you. I thought it was kind of jerky, but I really never gave you much more thought.” I blushed. “I’m sorry, that’s the truth.”

Heike grinned. “Don’t be sorry. Your papá is a better father than I could ever have hoped to be. I’m glad you are so close.”

“Me, too,” I said. “But I don’t think you’re so much of a jerk anymore. If a childhood with The Coven is as bad as you and my papá and my abuela say it was, then I should be thanking you. I just wish ... why didn’t you let me know about you sooner?” I asked. “We could have at least been friends.”

Heike sighed. “I know. It’s something I grappled with. But, I would just disappoint you time and time again. I’m too far away to visit regularly and something could come up suddenly and I disappear for months. How could I hurt you like that?” He let out a long sigh and closed his eyes for a second. “And, me being around you would have attracted vampyres. What if something happened to you or your sister and brothers? And what would I tell you when I had to run or leave or cancel? That I was fighting the boogeyman? That I fought the things of nightmares? That each day I faced my death? How could I tell you that?”

“Good point,” I said.

“When I saw you at four, I could have told you, then. Menno said I should. But, you were so happy. You had your papá and he had his little cielo. I couldn’t tear you away from that, Katja. How could I ruin that?” For a minute he stared away from me, into the darkness of the cabin. “I did what I had to do. For you, Katja.”

“I know,” I said. I was tired and close to tears. “Thank you.” I sniffled a bit.

I closed my eyes and nuzzled into my seat. He covered me with a blanket and patted my forehead. “Sleep, Katja. You won’t get much rest at The Coven.”

I woke to the sounds of Heike saying what I believed to be a long string of Dutch curse words. He was on the phone and, when he saw that he had woken me, mouthed an apology.

I smiled and stretched and looked out the window. Outside there was nothing but clouds below and blue sky above. Yesterday, I was terrified of being this high – over an ocean, no less – but, on the second day of the trip, it seemed peaceful being this close to the heavens.

Sometime during the night we switched planes, but it was quick and I hardly remembered it. All I could recall was Heike propping me and Braith up under his massive arms as we left one plane to habit another.

“Katja,” Heike said, palm placed firm over the phone. “Sit with Braith. I need this chair, okay?”

I nodded and climbed around to Braith, who seemed awake but didn’t look very good. His face was grey and his eyes were red. “Are you okay?” I asked.

He groaned. “Don’t speak. Too loud,” he whispered.

“I’m too loud?” I asked. Braith groaned and placed his arms around his head. “You know, if you didn’t drink so much you wouldn’t feel like this in the morning.”

He replied with a very crude gesture, which I ignored. I turned on my TV but Braith groaned even louder, shut the TV off, and handed me Bram Stoker’s
Dracula
.

“Family history,” he said. I glared at him but he didn’t notice. Instead, he slouched in his chair and covered his face with his jacket.

For a few hours we sat like that, Braith huddled in his chair bed trying to block out noise and lights, and me sitting there, partly reading but mostly listening to my iPod. I really didn’t want to read about vampyres, especially if Braith was suggesting that
Dracula
was nonfiction.

At some point during this time, it started to hit me that I wouldn’t see my family for a very long time. I tried to figure out what I would be doing if I were at home, but I was too tired to calculate the time difference so I assumed I’d be finishing up with some sleep or, maybe, my dad would be waking me up for a run. I’d run and then shower and Gaby would start singing outside the door to make me hurry up - she had an awful voice. After I dried and slipped some clothes on, I’d take over feeding the twins so my mom could get ready for work. Dad would come down and kiss us all and Gaby would run down, still soaking wet with her hair in a towel, and kiss our papá goodbye. I always got the twins ready for daycare, finishing up breakfast and washing their faces and combing their hair and trying to get them to use the potties. I loved my mornings with them - it was the only time they were tolerable as the “terrible twos” hit them full force as soon as soon as they hit three.

After the twins were ready, I’d load them in either my or my mother’s car - depending on how early she had to go to work – and yell at Gaby to hustle. She would run to the car and always – like, literally every day - forgot something and had to run back into the house for whatever precious something she left behind.

Suddenly, I felt a tap on my shoulder and jumped a bit. “You’re crying,” Braith said, still huddled in his chair avoiding the lights. I shook my head at first, but then I felt the tears on my face and shirt.

“I didn’t mean to,” I whispered.

He closed his eyes again. “Washroom’s back there,” he said.

I spent quite awhile in the bathroom, sobbing my eyes out. Once, a stewardess knocked and asked if I was okay. I mumbled a “just a minute” and spent another 20 trying to calm myself.

Eventually, I quieted and washed my face and went back to my seat. I saw life had returned to Braith, as he was surrounded by food - lots of food - from the doting stewardesses. The ladies gladly fawned over him, so excited that he was finally back to his old self. And by “old self” I mean self-absorbed, conceited, misogynist jerk. He called the girls “lovely,” and “sweetest little things” and “gorgeous,” and flirted to the utmost extreme - terrible, awful, overabundant flirting - although I’m not sure if he did it just to get faster service or to get in their pants or just because he could. I sat next to him and my stomach rolled as I stared at his show.

“What now, mum?” He asked. I blushed because I had been caught staring. “You want some?” He offered me some French Toast. I shook my head. “Well, what is it?”

“You’re like a peacock,” I said.

“What’s that, now?”

“Displaying your charms to attract a mate,” I snarled.

“Don’t want to mate with no one,” he grinned and gulped down some orange juice.

I sighed and rolled my eyes. “You treat them like they’re objects,” I said.

“The girls?” I nodded. “Naw, they love it.” He shoved an entire piece of toast in his mouth and pursed his lips to kiss me in the air. I groaned and had to look away. That was the beginning and end of our conversation on feminism.

I didn’t really feel like talking to him after that so, even though he attempted to make conversations, I didn’t really respond. He annoyed me so much and I was still upset about everything – not seeing my family, Braith acting like a chauvinist, not knowing what’s going to happen for the next year. It was all bearing down upon me.

“You’re upset with me,” Braith startled me. “I’m perceptive like that. My charms come at you and you can deflect them with ease. Hm, let me think...”

“I’m not,” I whispered, but he didn’t hear me because I was facing the window and, to be honest, I don’t think it was true. I was kind of mad at him because, let’s face it, he was getting joy out of my misery. And, on top of him acting like a dick, I was so embarrassed since he caught me crying and I was mortified that he had been stalking me for two years. He probably saw things - in fact, I was certain that he had seen things - that I would be horrified over.