My Blood Approves (8 page)

“
Going out?” Milo didn’t
look away from the computer screen, and his voice was too flat for
me to decipher.

“
Yep.” I nodded. I really
didn’t appreciate the lack of communication between us, but I
didn’t know how to fix it. “With Jack. I won’t be out too late.
Cause of school in the morning.”

“
Whatever,” Milo said
noncommittally. There was no lecture or disapproval, and I
sighed.

“
Okay. I guess I’ll see you
later.” I started walking towards the door, but he didn’t say
anything, so I waited to leave until he responded. He grunted
something that sounded vaguely like “bye,” but I figured that was
the best I would get, and I headed outside.

Jack had driven the Jetta again, and I
wondered how he decided which car to take. He was singing along
very merrily with Kanye West to “Stronger,” and he barely seemed to
notice me when I hopped into the car. We sat outside the apartment
building until the song finished, and then he turned down the radio
and grinned at me.

“
So, I was thinking we
would take a walk tonight,” Jack said brightly.

“
Okay. Where?” The night
was a bit chilly, but it wouldn’t be unbearable. He wore a hoodie
and pants today, forgoing his normal tee shirt and shorts combo
that seemed highly inappropriate for March.

“
Loring Park.” He had
started pulling away as soon as he said it.

The park was only about
half a mile from where I lived, but because it was on the other
side of the highway, it made it almost a necessity to drive to it.
I-94 had split it in half, but it used to be connected to the
Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, where they had that giant spoon with
the cherry (
Spoonbridge and
Cherry
) along with lots of other fancy
little sculptures.

We ended up going to the actual Loring Park,
without all the sculptures but with lots of paths and trees.

After he parked, I got out of the car and
admired the stars shining brightly above us. They were usually hard
to see, thanks to the city lights, but the cold, spring air made
them stand out sharply.

I looked around for Orion, the only
constellation I really know, but Jack started walking down a trail,
so I followed him, vowing to search the skies later on.

“
So you really have school
tomorrow?” Jack asked grumpily once I caught up with him. He shoved
his hands in his pockets and stared down at his Converse as he
walked, while I tended to admire the scenery and the
stars.

“
Yeah,” I
grimaced.

I had a whole paper due on the War of 1812,
and I hadn’t done anything. In fact, the only thing I knew about
the war was that it had happened in 1812. If Milo and I had been on
better speaking terms, I’d probably go home and bug him about it
until he just gave in and did it for me.

“
So what time do you have
to be home?” He kicked a stone with his foot, reminding me very
much of a little boy who had just been told he’d have to go to bed
early because he’d been bad.

“
I don’t know. Before
midnight, I guess.” That really wasn’t that much earlier than when
I normally went home, but Jack sighed and grumbled something
unintelligible. “What?”

“
Nothing,” he mumbled,
still looking at the ground.

“
Did you have some big
plans for tonight?” I asked, trying to figure out what had him so
depressed. I was the one that had to get up at seven in the
morning, not him.

“
No. I just don’t like it
when things are finite.” He sighed again, and then looked up at the
sky.

“
That’s kind of weird,” I
said. Milo had a phobia of wet sand, and Jane hated the word
kumquat (it sounded too perverse, even for her), but it was pretty
strange to dislike anything that had a definite ending. “Everything
ends.”

“
I know. I mean, we don’t
hang out forever anyway. It’s just…” He shook his head, and then
stared off at the Basilica of St. Mary. It was this huge, beautiful
cathedral, and we could just see the top of it, arched out into the
sky above the trees. “Mae wanted to get married there.”

“
What?” I asked, confused
by his sudden topic change.

“
My brother’s wife.” He
nodded at the church. “But Ezra didn’t want to.”

“
Why not?” It was a
stunning piece of architecture, so I understood the urge to marry
there. I personally wouldn’t want to, but most of the time, I
wasn’t even sure if I wanted to get married.

“
They’re not Catholic, for
one thing.” There was more to the story, but Jack seemed hesitant
to tell me about it. Finally, he continued, “It just didn’t seem
right. It was Mae’s second marriage. So they found something else,
and it worked out better anyway.”

“
How long have they been
married?”

“
I’m not really sure,” he
shrugged.

Pulling my hoodie tighter around me, I
shivered. Jack glanced over at me, and he didn’t seem even slightly
bothered by the cold. Nothing really seemed to bother him, except
my bedtime.

“
Do you want my
sweatshirt?” He started pulling on his sleeve, like he was going to
take it off, but I held up my hand to stop him.

“
No, I’m okay.” Since he
had actually bothered to put on something warmer today, I wasn’t
about to take it from him because I thought my jacket was
ugly.

“
Are you sure?”

“
Yeah, I’m fine,” I
insisted. Flipping up the hood over my head, I smiled up at him.
“See? Fine.”

“
If you say so.” Jack
pulled on his sleeve, adjusting it back to normal. “Let me know if
you change your mind.”

“
I won’t.”

“
I know,” Jack said,
sounding a little exasperated. “You never change your mind about
anything.”

“
You haven’t known me for
that long,” I scoffed. “How can you be so sure?”

“
I’m just very certain of
things,” he replied simply.

That was true enough. He didn’t always have
an answer for everything, but the things he knew, he really knew. I
was about to ask him what the deal was with his sixth sense about
everything, but then his head shot up sharply.

“
Watch out.”

“
Watch out for what?” I
tried to keep my voice even, but the instant he got nervous, I was
terrified.

He stepped in front of me to shield from me
something, but I peered around him, looking into the dark for some
lurking danger.

- 6 -

At first, I thought it was a giant grizzly
bear barreling towards us. Then it ran underneath a lamp on the
path, and I saw it was just a massive brown dog. There was a dog
park on the other side of the park, so I wouldn’t have thought
anything of it if Jack hadn’t been on such high alert.

“
It’s just a dog,” I told
him, hoping that would somehow relax him.

“
I know what it is.” He
seemed to be debating something, probably whether he should run or
stay put, but the dog was approaching quickly, making his decision
for him. “Ah, hell.”

The dog snarled at us, but it never even
slowed down. Drool and slobber spewed from its mouth, and its eyes
had a crazed, intense look I had never seen on an animal
before.

Without any provocation, it suddenly lunged
at Jack. He held one arm behind him, trying to protect me more from
the dog, and he held his other arm in front of him, using his
forearm to block the attack.

The dog latched on it with a loud crunching
sound that made my blood curdle, and I screamed. With one swift
movement, Jack whipped his hand around, grabbing the dog by the
back of the neck.

“
Go back to the car!” Jack
shouted.

He had pinned the dog to the ground by
kneeling on its back and wrapping his hands around its neck. There
was blood streaming down his arm, and all the while, the dog was
snapping and growling viciously.

But I stayed frozen, gaping at Jack and the
dog.

“
Alice! Go back to the
car!”

“
Why?” I felt nauseous, but
I didn’t want to leave Jack. If I did, I knew that something bad
would happen, although I didn’t even know what that
meant.

“
Alice! Just do it!” Jack
growled.

Adrenaline surged through my body, and my
feet were happy to comply when I started running back to the
car.

Before I had even made it there, I heard the
dog yelp, and my stomach dropped. My heart pounded erratically in
my chest, and I wanted to throw up.

I made it to the car, and I fought the urge
to just keep running. I collapsed on the pavement next to it,
gasping for breath.

When I saw Jack walking towards me, I stood
up and hurried towards him, but I stopped sharply before I met
him.

Part of me really wanted to hug him, but
another part of me knew what he had done, and it scared the hell
out of me. Irrational tears streamed down my cheeks, but I tried to
ignore them.

“
Jack, what did you do?” I
wiped at my eyes to erase the tears. “What’d you do with the
dog?”

“
Alice…” He closed his
eyes, as if it would hurt him too much to watch me react. “I didn’t
have any choice. You saw him. He was going to kill somebody! What
if you had been here by yourself or with Milo?”

Everything he was saying was true. The dog
had looked insane and probably rabid, and even before I left him, I
knew that Jack would kill the dog. But it didn’t change
anything.

Hurting any animal for any reason would
always reduce me to tears, especially when I had been some part of
it. He had killed that dog to protect me.

“
I don’t care!” I cried
harder, and I wished I would just stop.

It seemed unfair to me that I would be angry
with Jack for saving my life, but I couldn’t help it. He moved
awkwardly, as if he wanted to hug me, but he knew that I would push
him away if he tried.

“
Alice,” Jack breathed
deeply, looking away from me. He had this agonized expression on
his face, and he took a small step back from me. “Everything just
got so much more complicated.”

“
What are you talking
about?”

I felt something shift, and a whole new fear
ran through me. As upset as I had been over the dog, I hadn’t hated
Jack, or even really been mad at him.

“
This!” Jack shook his head
and walked past me. “Everything! This is so stupid. I am so
stupid.”

“
What are you talking
about?” I ran after him, wondering what I had done that had been so
terrible. I reached out for him, but he pulled his arm away before
I even got close to it.

“
I’m taking you home.” We
had reached the car, but he stood outside of it, waiting for me to
get in. I had stopped in front of it and refused to go any
further.

“
No!” I insisted.
“Why?”

“
Why?” He laughed, but it
was humorless and sent nervous shivers all over me. Then he reeled
on me, his face stone cold, and his voice harsher than I had ever
imagined it could be. “I killed a dog – to save your life – and you
look at me like I’m a monster!”

He rubbed his temple, and I saw blood
covering his hand. Somehow, I’d managed to forget that the dog had
bitten him.

“
Jack, I don’t think that
you’re a monster,” I explained softly. “I just don’t like it when
things die.”

“
Nobody does, Alice,” Jack
replied icily. He bit his lip and shook his head, then mumbled,
“The damn thing was probably rabid. It was gonna die
anyway.”

“
I know that,” I swallowed
hard. “I don’t know what I did that upset you so much, but I’m
sorry. I never wanted to offend you. And I don’t think it’s fair
that you’re going to cut me out of your life because I cried over a
dog.”

“
It’s not because you
cried.” He softened a little, but he still wouldn’t look at me. “It
was the way you looked at me.”

“
I’m sorry!” I insisted. “I
was in shock! The dog just charged at us and attacked you and then…
I don’t know. I’m sorry. It was just because it was a dog. Remember
when you beat up those people in the parking garage? I didn’t cry
then.”

“
No, you didn’t,” Jack
agreed, and he finally seemed to be relenting. I took a step closer
to him, eyeing up the ragged holes in his sweatshirt and the blood
on his hand.

“
We should go the
hospital,” I said.

“
Why?” Jack looked up at
me, his eyes terrified. “Did he get you? I thought I blocked
him-”

“
No, I’m fine,” I cut him
off, and he relaxed again. “I was talking about you. The dog bit
you.”

“
No, that’s fine.” He waved
his arm absently and moved closer to the car, like he would escape
into the car and away from my prying eyes. “It’s not a big
deal.”

“
Yeah, it is,” I continued
towards him. “You shirts all torn up and I can see the blood. Plus,
like you said, the dog’s probably rabid. You’re going to need a
rabies shot.”

“
I’ll go tomorrow. It’s not
that bad.” Jack had stepped so far back that he pressed up against
the door. I reached for his arm, and he pulled it back from me, but
I wouldn’t have any of it.

“
Jack!” I said firmly, and
he let out an exasperated sigh.