The Healing Power of Sugar: The Ghost Bird Series: #9 (The Academy Ghost Bird Series) (29 page)

“And he’ll know it was me,” Luke said. We got into line, and he released me to rub hands together. “Don’t guilt trip me now; I’ve been looking forward to this all week. It’s the one day North doesn’t yell at me about eating too much.”

Once we were in line, it moved really quickly. I was handed a plate, and all I had to do was hold it. Victor stood to my left, Luke to my right, and they took equal turns putting food on my plate. Luke loaded it with extra piles of mashed potatoes meant for him after his plate got too full to hold any more halfway down the line.

“We’ll have to come back for desserts,” Luke said, carefully supporting the bottom of his plate so it wouldn’t collapse under the weight of his food. I couldn’t believe how high he’d piled the turkey, ham, gravy, biscuits and marshmallow-topped sweet potato.

“You can come back for seconds, too, don’t forget,” Victor said with a chuckle. “There’s no need to try to get it all in one go.”

“This is just firsts,” Luke said. “Seconds is coming. I’m not forgetting.”

I couldn’t imagine his stomach holding what was on his plate, let alone any more. Where would it go?

I was thinking at first we would all be sitting together, but the boys spread out among the different tables. I hesitated, unsure who to follow. I tried to follow Luke since I carried his extra food, but he and Gabriel weaved into a spot with two seats open and nothing beside them.

As I hesitated, scanning the tables for a spot, Victor urged me to the opposite side of the table, where there were three empty chairs. I’d be sitting across from Luke, which made sense. Still, I would be sitting beside someone I didn’t know.

I was hesitant, but was at least grateful that Victor would be next to me. He moved ahead of me, put his plate down, and then reached for mine. As his slim fingers covered my hands, he brushed at them gently and held onto his light smile, the spark in his eyes a gentle simmer. He took the plate and placed it down before pulling out the chair for me.

“My, my, what a gentleman you turned out to be,” said a voice behind me. I looked over my shoulder, finding the woman with the yellow bandana in her hair. She placed her plate down and pulled out the empty chair beside mine, sitting heavily into it. She shoved the escaped lock of hair back behind her ear and unfolded a napkin, placing it in her lap. “Victor, you’ve grown up a few inches since last year. Last time I saw you, you were such a cute thing.”

Victor’s eyes flared with amusement, and his cheeks reddened. “You haven’t changed a bit.”

She laughed. “You get to a point in your life, right around thirty, I think, and then you seem to stop growing up, or growing old. You just get through life.” She started spearing her spoon at her food, mixing some gravy into her mashed potatoes. She looked at me. “And who is this girl? No one’s told me her name yet.”

“This is Sang,” Victor said, waving a hand in my direction. “Sang, this is Mackenzie.”

The woman held out a hand. “Call me Mac,” she said.

I held out a timid hand shortly, and instead of shaking, she simply held it in a strong grip, releasing quickly.

I was going over if I should say hello, or what to say, but she tuned into her plate, and then to the people on her other side, still smiling.

I sat down and delicately picked up my fork. Mac kept her conversation about the food in the plates of other people at the table. I kept one hand constantly in my lap, tucking my elbow into my body on her side so I wouldn’t accidentally bump into her. I leaned into Victor a lot. I wanted to relax, but I’d spent all morning with a rush of people—strangers—and had used up a lot of courage and energy to get through it. I wasn’t so sure I could get used to this type of Thanksgiving.

It was a little easier after I’d started to eat. Most everyone else around us focused on their plates, clearly hungry, too. With my mouth full, I wasn’t bothered for conversation.

Shortly after we’d started, Victor looked around and then frowned. “I forgot to grab something to drink,” he said. He wiped at his lips with his napkin and stood up. “Would you like some water?”

I did, but I panicked a little at the thought of him leaving. I nodded, though, knowing he was going anyway.

Once he was gone, I focused on my plate. Luckily Mac was in a heated debate with some of the men near her. There was an awkward feeling of being around friends who all knew each other but being new and not knowing anyone. My head dipped down, and I picked at a piece of turkey.

There was a nudge at my foot, and I slid it back, afraid I’d knocked into the woman next to me. I looked up in a shock to find Luke looking at me, his dark eyes intense and somewhat curious. Quietly we exchanged something of a conversation. He was asking me if I was okay. I nodded slowly, trying to tell him that I’d survive, but was a little uncomfortable.

He kept his foot on top of mine and then reached over, speared a piece of ham from my plate and brought it to his mouth with a grin.

That forced a small smile from me and I was grateful for the distraction.

He moved one hand up where I could see, and he started to sign. “Is the food not good?” he signed.

I cringed. I shook my head and then quickly signed back to him. “The food is great. It’s just a lot of new people. I wasn’t expecting this.”

“Save your energy. We’ve got a long night ahead of us.”

“What will happen later?” I asked.

He smiled wickedly. It was his plotting smirk, the one he’d worn when he wanted to draw over North’s face. Had he planted a trick somewhere here?

My heart raced, but as much as I prodded him through signing to tell me what would happen, he refused to answer, instead busying his hands with his utensils and loading his mouth with food.

Victor returned with a soda for himself and placed a bottle of water in front of me. When I looked back at Luke, he was talking with Gabriel again.

Victor opened my bottle of water for me and then gazed at me, lifting a curious eyebrow. “Something wrong?” he asked.

“No,” I said. With everyone talking around us, I couldn’t really hear what Luke and Gabriel were saying. I assumed that meant neither of them could hear if I talked to Victor. “I think Luke is planning something.”

“He’s always planning something,” Victor said. “Ever since I met him.”

“In elementary school, right?”

“Yup,” he said. He opened his soda and poured it into a plastic cup before taking a sip. “Back when there were only five of us. And no Academy yet.”

I widened my eyes, looking around. Victor said it so openly. Did they all know about the Academy? I turned back to him, wanting to learn more. “What was it like before?”

“What was it like for you before you met us?” he asked. He reached over, covering my hand with his. “Strike that. I was trying to think of a comparison, but it’s not really the same.”

I understood. “So it was normal for you?”

“Just the usual early school life, only we didn’t exactly all have great parents. I think that’s how we became friends initially. We could just look at each other and know something wasn’t right.” He picked at some of his vegetables, scraped them loose from his fork, only to spear them again. “Even back then, we were trying to fix things, in our own way.”

“And Mr. Blackbourne recruited you all?”

He nodded. “He caught us trying to fix a problem. He’d been told we were just causing trouble, but really, we were helping out another student. When he realized what we were up to, he had us all out of school in the next week, and onto something better.” He lifted his head, the fire in his eyes starting to spark with life. “Having that support changes you. Someone believed we were able to do good things, and now we do.”

“What about Luke?” I asked, my voice softer, not wanting to risk him hearing the question. “Did he have a hard time with the change?”

Victor tilted his head an inch. “Luke? Well, maybe. That’s just his personality, though.”

I glanced at Luke and Gabriel again, but they were both in a friendly argument about something with people sitting beside them. They were all smiling, just loud.

I knew they wouldn’t hear, but I turned to Victor again and leaned in to whisper. “He does know about the plan, but I think he’s having a hard time of it. He seems to be into it, but keeps disappearing. I don’t know if you heard about the masks. I don’t know what they mean.”

“I heard something about that,” Victor said. He kept his head close. We were inches apart, whispering, but it might have looked like we were trying to listen to each other with all the loud talking. “Do you think he’s going to go for it?”

“I need to talk to him alone,” I said. “I didn’t get much of a chance.”

“I have the same issue with talking to you, it seems,” he said. “I hope the changes at school will fix that.”

I didn’t know how it would. I wanted to ask about it, but I needed to bring the conversation back. “Have you heard from Luke about the plan?”

“I haven’t heard from anyone except about school and Academy things,” he said. “You’re still good with it, right?”

I hesitated, but only for a moment. I recalled my conversation with Mr. Blackbourne. “We need to try,” I said. “I hope you’ll help me convince the others to at least try.”

His eyes brightened until the flames were like bonfires. He reached up, catching a bit of hair that framed my face and traced it down my cheek. “Princess, all you need to do is ask.”

I was grateful for him. Maybe Mr. Blackbourne was right. Maybe I just needed more courage.

FOOTBALL

I
ate my dinner and then went up for some dessert: a small piece of pie with whipped cream. I thought that would be the end of it, and then we’d start on the cleanup, when a football soared over my head. I followed the ball with my eyes to see Silas catch it and then turned to see who’d thrown it: the Native man. He’d tied his pony tail into a bun at the nape of his neck and had removed the shirt he had been wearing until he now simply wore a tank top.

Silas stood and laughed as he bounced the football between his hands. “Are you ready to get creamed by Kota’s team again this year?” he asked, his voice deep and loud, carrying over everyone at the tables.

There was an uproar of voices at his challenge, people pointing at each other with delight in their eyes. The bustle of comments floated past me, and I tried to keep up, but it was difficult because of everyone talking at once.

“Uh oh,” Victor said and tugged at my arm to get me to stand.

I hesitated, not wanting to leave my plate, but everyone else did as most of them rose from the table.

“Did you want to play?” Victor asked as we weaved around the tables and into the street

“Play?” I asked.

“Football. We play every year,” he said. “Two teams.” He held onto my hand as he edged me toward the grassy front yard of one of the homes. “You could help coach, play, or be on the sidelines and just watch. Whatever you want; I don’t want to pressure you.”

“Coach?” I asked. How could
I
coach? I didn’t know the rules of football very well. And I didn’t think I could play in a skirt anyway. “I might just watch.”

Victor started to undo the tie at his neck, slipping into his pocket. “They might get me to play, or at least join a team to even out the numbers. I’m not very good.”

I was going to tell him he could sit with me, when Mr. Blackbourne approached, along with Kota beside him. Mr. Blackbourne had only removed his jacket, keeping on the white shirt and maroon tie, while Kota had loosened his and was unbuttoning his shirt.

“What do you know about touch football, Miss Sorenson?” Mr. Blackbourne asked me. He draped his jacket over his arm, and then put his hands on his hips as he talked.

“As little as I know about actual football. I’ve seen a couple of games. I’m more familiar with baseball.”

Kota slipped his tie from around his neck and hung it over my shoulder, before he tugged the shirt loose from his body. “I could try putting in more of the younger kids this year,” he said to Mr. Blackbourne.

“We tried that two years ago,” Mr. Blackbourne said, shaking his head. “All the older kids were too gentle, and those younger ones took advantage of it. You’d win for sure.”

I tugged Kota’s tie from my shoulder, holding it in my hands delicately. “You’re trying to lose?” I asked.

“Kota’s team wins every year,” Victor said. “It doesn’t seem to matter who is in the other team.”

“I’ve been really trying to give them a win for two years,” Kota said. “So far, it hasn’t worked out at all.”

“Should I try coaching Mr. Taylor’s team this year?” Mr. Blackbourne asked.

Kota shrugged and took off the shirt, leaving on his white T-shirt underneath. “Didn’t seem to matter when you tried that three years ago.” He pulled at the T-shirt, untucking it, and then handed his folded button up shirt to me before turning to Mr. Blackbourne. “Are you going to play this year? Or do you want to work for the other team?”