Rush (23 page)

What if it’s not Jackson? What if it’s a Drau? A shell?

For a second, I have this horrific thought that Mrs. Gertner’s a shell. And the girl at the bookstore. Maylene. Any of the kids or even the teachers at school. Any of the neighbors on my street. The postman. The—

They’re not. I’m being ridiculous. I need to keep a grip because if I don’t, I won’t survive this. And I mean to survive. It’s as simple as that.

I ditch my shoes, drop my bag in my room, but I’m too edgy to sit. Instead, I run the vacuum through the house, taking my time, following my pattern, doing each room in small, rectangular sections.

“Making chicken casserole tonight,” Dad says when he gets home. It’s his night to cook. Maybe he reads the hesitation on my face, because he offers a sarcastic smile. “Low-fat cheese, lots of broccoli, diced tomatoes, and mushrooms.”

“Sounds great.” It’s still not the healthiest thing ever, but he’s trying.

After I finish vacuuming, I throw together a salad to go along with the casserole. Dinner’s actually not half bad. We talk about a couple of movie trailers that interest us both, and I start to relax, the edge of my anxiety dulling. At least until Dad gets done talking about the trailers and starts on a new topic.

“So, that boy . . . Luka, right?” Dad says. “You want to talk about him?”

I fork in a mouthful of food to avoid saying anything. But Dad just keeps looking at me as I chew and swallow, and I finally say, “He’s just a guy I know from school.”

“Do you, um . . .” Dad carefully sets his fork down on his plate. Then he reaches for his water glass and moves it a quarter inch to the right. He clears his throat. He moves his water glass a quarter inch to the left.

I shovel in another forkful of casserole. If my mouth’s full, I won’t have to speak.

“I was about your age when I . . . Well, there was this girl. She was a couple of years older, and she had these—”

I hold up my hand, palm forward. “Don’t do it, Dad. Once you say it, you can never unsay it.” No matter how much I might wish he could.

He purses his lips and nods. “Did you, um . . . Did Mom ever . . . I mean, do you have classes about, uh, health . . . in school? I think you’re too young to . . .”

Oh no. No, no, no. My day has been bad, but this is worse.

I lift my hands and dip my head down. “Yep. School. Classes. Health classes. Got it covered.”

“Well, there are things you need to watch out for. Diseases and—”

“Wow, I forgot to tell you I saw Mrs. Gertner today on the driveway. She told me all about her hemorrhoid surgery. Fascinating stuff.”

Dad stares at me. His mouth twitches. “Preferable to what I’m trying to talk to you about?”

“Pretty much.”

He lifts his head and stares straight into my eyes. I want to crawl under the table and stay there. He takes a deep breath. “I think you should wait before you . . .” He gives a decisive nod. “I think you should wait until you’re fifty.”

“Fifty.” I sigh. “Dad, we do not need to talk about this. I know the basics.”

His expression darkens.

“Not because I have any experience,” I hasten to reassure him. I don’t. Not really. When other girls were starting to date, I was mourning. Oh, I played spin the bottle in sixth grade. Didn’t everyone? I still remember my first French kiss. I spun. The bottle pointed to Roland Davis. I puckered up and put my lips to his and he unexpectedly put his fat tongue in my mouth. I squawked like a chicken and almost hurled. Carly laughed till she cried, and in the end, I laughed too. Thinking back on it, I feel sort of sorry for Roland. I don’t think he laughed.

I got to the hand-holding stage and a few okay kisses with Sam Pitt when we went steady for a month in eighth grade. And that’s the sum total of my personal experience.

Except for Jackson, who’s never kissed me, but who’s held me in his arms and made me wish he’d kiss me.

The second that thought surfaces, I squish it like a bug. Thinking like that will only win me trouble and heartbreak. Jackson Tate is as dangerous as they come, and I’m more of a careful sort of girl.

“Just the basic textbook concepts, okay?” I add when Dad keeps staring at me.

He nods and starts eating again.

“So, how about this warm weather?” I ask, and launch into a pretty one-sided discussion of the sun and blue sky. Every once in a while, Dad adds a word or two, but I can see he’s still thinking about our last topic. After a few minutes, I jump up and clear the plates and have a genuine reason to turn my back to him as I stack the washer and scrub the pots. By the time I’m done, he’s settled in front of the TV and I can escape to my room.

“Going up to do homework,” I mumble.

I close the door behind me, sink back against it, and breathe a sigh of relief. The day’s almost done. Tomorrow has to be better. Tears sting my eyes at the thought. How many times have I told myself that? How many times have I forced myself out of bed in the morning, trying to believe that this is the day everything will be fine?

Hasn’t happened yet. Well, except for moments in the game. If I’m honest, there are times that I do feel normal there. And how messed up is that? The only time I feel really okay is when I’m in an alternate reality fighting aliens. That’s just wrong on any level.

Except, maybe it isn’t. Maybe I feel like I’m okay in the game because I’m doing something bigger than me. My sadness, my loss, they seem small compared to an alien invasion. Jackson seems to think we’re saving the world. Four teenagers, saving the world. I roll my eyes. Right.

I drag on an old T-shirt and flannels and haul out my math homework. I wish I could talk to Jackson. I wonder if he’s doing it on purpose, avoiding me so he doesn’t have to answer questions.

I laugh out loud. Of course he’s doing it on purpose. He knows where I live. He knows when I run. All he’d have had to do was show up and run with me this morning. We could have talked. He could have explained. The fact that he hasn’t done that tells me all I need to know.

Turning my attention to my math homework, I try to get it done. It takes forever because my concentration isn’t the best. I’m tired. No surprise there. I didn’t sleep well last night. I dreamed of Jackson’s eyes and the shells and the dead girl that Jackson killed, even though she was already dead. Just trying to get my head around that makes me dizzy. I’m exhausted, and by ten o’clock, I’m fighting to keep my eyes open. I’m in the place between awake and asleep when I hear a weird tapping. A couple of minutes later, there it is again, a light tapping from . . . there. The window.

A shiver chases up my spine.

And the sound comes again.

Wary, I cross to the window and peer out. My heart slams hard against my ribs.

Dark clothes, dark shades, pale hair gleaming in the moonlight, Jackson Tate’s outside my window, sitting cross-legged on the porch roof.

I SHOVE THE WINDOW OPEN. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” I WHISPER the words too fast, stunned and alarmed and secretly thrilled that he’s here.

“Visiting.”

“Now?” I shake my head. “How did you get up here?”

“Climbed.”

I stare at him, at a loss. Should I go out to him? Ask him to come in to me? I look frantically up and down the street to make certain no neighbors are out there watching. I don’t see anyone, not right now, but that doesn’t mean someone won’t come out any second.

“Get in here,” I order in a whisper as I step back from the window. “Take off your shoes. And be quiet.”

The next thing I know, Jackson’s inside my bedroom, less than a foot away from me. I leave the window open just in case he needs to make a quick exit, but pull the curtain halfway to shield him from street view.

“My shoes?” He looks baffled.

“No shoes in the house. My mom had this thing about that.”

“How about we pretend this is the front hall and I just stay in this spot and not move? Okay if I keep my shoes on then? I don’t love the idea of having to dive out your window barefoot if your dad comes in.”

The image of that makes me feel ill. I can just picture Jackson diving out the window, his shoes staying behind like beacons of my transgression. “Fine. Keep them on. But don’t move.”

“You sure? I’ll take them off if it’s a big deal.” He sounds both amused and sincere.

I strain my ears, trying to hear if the TV’s still on downstairs. If not, it means Dad’s already gone to bed. I can’t hear anything, but what if he’s up here and not yet asleep?

“Keep them on,” I whisper. “I’m sure.”

True to his word, Jackson stays rooted to the spot as he looks around, taking his time. My bookshelf is right beside him, and he runs the tips of his fingers along the spines of the books on my keeper shelf. They’re eclectic, I admit it. Alcott’s
Little Women, Ender’s Game
by Orson Scott Card,
Frankenstein, The Giver, The Catcher in the Rye
, everything ever written by Christopher Moore, the complete works of Jane Austen, a scarred and well-loved set of Harry Potter, my mom’s old dog-eared Stephen King titles,
The Last Wish
and
Blood of Elves
by Andrzej Sapkowski.

He stops when he gets to those and murmurs, “I haven’t read these. But the game rocks.”

“The graphics kick ass,” I agree, then ask, “But you’ve read the others?”

“Some of them.”

I try to picture him engrossed in
Little Women
.

His fingers dip to the next shelf, where I keep my manga. “You read
Bleach
.”

I nod. “It’s one of my favorites.”

“You don’t have the latest issue.”

“They were sold out.”

He turns away from the books, back toward me, but he doesn’t say anything. I can’t figure out how I feel at the moment. Thrilled that he’s here. Afraid that Dad will find him. Stunned that he came. And a little weirded out that our conversation so far has been too normal. But the thing I notice most is how bright and true those emotions are. It’s like he’s a fresh breeze that blew in and chased the fog away.

Our conversation started out in whispers, but it’s increased in volume until we’re speaking in a normal tone, and that’s dangerous. I drop back to a whisper. “What are you doing here?”

“I’ll answer five questions, then I need to go,” he says, equally low.

“You came just to answer my questions?”

“Yes. And to see you.”

Wow. Okay. I have no idea what to say to that. So I say the wrong thing. “Why didn’t you come last night? Or this morning to run with me? I spent the whole day freaking about stuff.”

“Couldn’t last night. Or this morning. I was out of town until about twenty minutes ago.” He smiles a little. “And that counts as the first question.”

I roll my eyes. “No, it most certainly does not.” I take a breath and just lay it out there. “What are you? Are you Drau? Are you a shell?” My heart’s pounding so hard it feels like it’s going to burst out of my chest.

“I’m a guy, last time I checked.” His smile curls up on one side. “Wanna check for yourself?”

The question is so un-Jackson-like that it throws me for a loop. Then I feel my cheeks heat, which freaks me out because I’m not the blushing type.

He laughs softly and continues, “No, I am not Drau. No, I am not a shell.”

“How do I know that’s true? Why should I trust you?”

For a long minute, he just stands there. Then he grabs the hem of his T-shirt and drags it up. My jaw goes slack and all I can do is stare. His jeans hang low on his hips, baring about an inch of the waistband of his boxers, and above that, there’s smooth skin and ridged muscle, accented by the light leaking through my window. He looks like an underwear ad in a magazine. One that’s been Photoshopped to make it better.

“What are you doing?” I whisper frantically, and shoot a wild look at the door. I’d die if Dad walked in right now.

I grab his shirt and try to tug it down. My fingers brush his skin, making the muscles of his stomach jump beneath my touch. My fingertips tingle, and I feel like I’ve been hit with an electric shock. Dropping my hands, I practically leap away.

“Proving I’m not a shell,” he answers.

“What—” Then I get it. In the middle of all that smooth gold skin and lightly ridged muscle is a belly button, and below that, a thin line of light brown hair. Not looking there. Definitely not looking there. “Great. Thanks. Proved your point. Drop the shirt.”

“You sure?” He’s smiling. I can hear it. But I don’t see it because I have my teeth sunk into my lower lip and my head tipped back so I’m staring at the ceiling.

“I’m decent,” he says. “Shirt safely in place.”

I look at him to find that he’s telling the truth, about the shirt at least. I have a feeling he’s never decent.

“Okay, so you’re not a shell, and you claim you’re not Drau, but your eyes . . . they’re not like anyone else’s eyes that I’ve ever seen. Except . . . theirs.”

“Yes, my eyes are like theirs. No, they’re not like anyone else’s. And neither are yours.”

I freeze. “What? Luka—” I cut myself off. Luka’s eyes are the same indigo blue as mine only in the game, not in the real world. In this world, they’re rich, chocolate brown. And Richelle . . . I think of her picture on the net. What color were her eyes? I can’t remember, but I feel certain that they weren’t the blue that I saw in the game.