Wolf Sirens: Forbidden: Discover The Legend (8 page)

“Is there anything else you want?” she asked,
opening it. I could see it was a tab as she wrote $4.80
in print on the page, and the date. She then looked at
me. “What’s your name?” I thought hard if this could
work to my benefit. I couldn’t say anyone else’s name,
could I? She knew their faces, I had to assume, and I
didn’t want to say my own name.
“Um, I’m new,” I mumbled, “so, I’ll just, pay cash.”
I fumbled in my wallet, flustered.The store attendant
scribbled the line out and shut the book with a thud.
I saw written at the top: ‘Sam Thompson’s account’.
She gave me change and I rushed out before I
had to try to explain anything.
Sam or her parents were well enough off to pay
for all of her gang’s food supplies and it seemed all
you had to do was mention you were one and you
could rack up a tab, no questions asked.
I sat at the nearest stop then and chewed my
snack, pondering the whole situation. My appetite
was on hiatus; I couldn’t taste the nutty mass in my
mouth. Cresida was a disturbed individual and perhaps I had indulged her. The only thing on my mind
was the clique and Cresida. There was no doubt in
my mind that she was the one who set off the fire
alarm, though I couldn’t imagine how so quickly, unless she had an accomplice with perfect timing.
I thought only about her, trying to put the pieces
together. She was smart, strong for a girl, especially
one still in high school - or anyone, for that matter.
What was her deal? Was she crazed? Had no one
cared to notice? It seemed to me that the school system had failed to notice her. After more long thought
I grabbed the next bus. It wasn’t filled with students
returning home, to my surprise. The alarm must have
been verified as false; everyone was probably already
repopulating the building. Before I could even contemplate whether to return I was interrupted. My
phone rang. I answered it. It was my new best friend,
I thought sarcastically – Sam.
“Hey you, where are you?”
I supposed this was where I was meant to offer a
plausible excuse for my absence from practice.
I cleared my dry throat. “Why are you guys so
interested in me?” I questioned. I felt hostile.
“You’re new! Come on, don’t be all shy on us - we
thought we’d ditch and go to the creek. We’ll pick
you up at your place? And Reid thinks you’re hot.”
I blushed.I decided it was just paranoia; Cresida’s
craziness was rubbing off on me. I had a million
thoughts in my head, Cresida warned me to stay
away and then said I should ‘infiltrate’. Why? I had
a tendency of not doing what I was asked to, it went
against the grain. But I couldn’t stay away. My silence
was broken by Sam’s voice.
“Are you doing something else?” she inquired.
“I’m on the bus.” It seemed now that Cresida had
tried to keep me from them and then seemingly given up and pushed me toward them.
No, I wasn’t doing anything else, but if I was going to be roped into this, I wanted insurance. “Can I
tell my mum first?”
Her reaction was surprised. “Won’t she wonder
why you’re not in school?”
“I’ll tell her it’s closed the whole day.” However
I had guessed it wasn’t and that in a small town this
information would reach her soon, especially at work.
“Okay,” Sam agreed, “we’ll pick you up at your
house.”
“Okay,” I replied, feigning a smile even though
she couldn’t see me.
“Good, see you soon.” She hung up before I could
tell her where I lived. Giny must have been with her.
I wondered if maybe I had agreed to meet them because I needed to get out of my head. I slipped the
knife from my jumper pocket to my backpack. I didn’t
need more time to think about what had happened
to me. What did she mean Reid thought I was hot?
Sure enough, as my bus arrived at the main road
nearest my house, there was the black car on the adjacent street, the clique was smiling, leaning against
the black car and my heart thudded in my chest. I
said “Bye” to my mum whom I had called and shut
the phone. My pulse raced. The boys were there too,
leaning against a blue pickup. Reid and Sky and another boy I didn’t immediately recognize. He looked
strong, too, and maybe he was the boy doing tricks at
lunch? As I departed the bus I could see that he was
in fact the guy doing handstands and acrobatics on
the lawn the day before, for entertainment. The guys
jumped into the sturdy blue pickup and waved as I
approached.
Sam waved at me too. “Jump in!” she called from
the sedan. Lily looked unimpressed, her arms folded.
She got in the car slamming the door. Giny bounded
over and gave me a hug. It felt uncomfortable, though
it was meant to put me at ease. She was cooler than
the others in temperature, normal to cold, I guessed
because she was so thin. I imagined them as beasts,
the way they were in the video. I felt her bones as we
embraced awkwardly. If they were werewolves, Giny
couldn’t be, but she had to know they were, if Cresida
did? I was being silly letting her get to me; it was
probably what they wanted. I felt assured that while
Giny was there, alive and well, so would I be. Cresida
had said she was tired of protecting me from them -
that it was fate. I didn’t know what would happen but
I couldn’t just go home. And besides, Cresida James
was unhinged, I reminded myself.
“I wasn’t sure you’d show,” Sam said. I blushed
recalling how I had ditched practice. Her voice wasn’t
spiteful however and she eyed the blue truck as it
swung around and drove past us.
“Woohoo!” screamed a booming male voice out
the window as they drove too fast by the car. Giny
giggled. I jumped at the sudden noise. I thought how
it would have been far safer to see them in school
than out in the middle of nowhere. Against all my
instincts I followed Giny, jumping in the back of the
black sedan.
“What did your mum say?” Sam asked. She was
doing most of the talking. Lily was giving me the
cold shoulder, I couldn’t understand why. I wondered
if it was because I missed the practice.
“Um, not much.” I shrugged shaking my head.
“Jeez, I wish my olds were like that.”Giny laughed
beside me.
“Yeah,” said Bianca from the front. “I would have
had the Spanish inquisition.”
“Mine think I am in Home Ec. right now,” said
Giny.
The chorus of words came then and flowed, the
type that came from excitement of anticipation. We
were headed for the river. When there was a moment
I asked, “Why does Cresida James hate you guys?” I
did my best to sound innocent. There was a sudden
silence.
Giny spoke. “She used to be friends with us, but
she fell in with a bad crowd and started going to
raves and drinking and now she’s like a drug addict
or something,” she said quickly.
“Giny, that’s not nice,” Sam intervened. “She
had a really long depression after she and Sky broke
up and, well, I don’t want to gossip but her parents
aren’t exactly present.” She trailed off. The subject
was quickly changed.
Where were her parents?
For
that matter, where were Sam’s? Too rich to care, I
assumed. It seemed Cresida’s had abandoned her. I
wondered why.
I saw Sam glance at me in the rear vision mirror
as she drove and maybe I felt a little bad for bringing
her up.
“Who wants pizza?” she called, pulling a little
too fast into the pizzeria parking lot. Giny leant
over and flicked on the radio and some dance music
with heavy base thumped in our ears as we waited.
I scoffed when I saw the pile of pizzas. Obviously
these girls didn’t care about their weight.
“Some are for the boys,” Lily said flatly, leaning
over to turn down the radio, the first words she’d spoken since I’d joined them.
I hoped I wasn’t on the menu for desert.
“Where exactly are we going? I told my mum
I’d be back by 3.30,” I lied, because the only thing
Sophie cared about was that I was happy and with
some friends, not getting into trouble. She was good
like that. I felt surprisingly comfortable in the back of
the car surrounded by four menacing girls.
We drove out to a secluded area just off the main
road covered in thick velvet green grass outside of
town. I wasn’t as nervous as I thought I should have
been. The air was warm and there was a contagious
atmosphere of wistfulness in the car. It was a Friday,
we had escaped school and I felt almost as if I was
with old friends. I wanted to let loose and it seemed
they did to. The dirt road blazed with winter sun as
we rolled in. We were headed to the creek. Large pine
trees rimmed it. I knew only that this was the site of
Cresida’s downfall according to Tealy and Monica’s
observations at lunch yesterday. Despite what Sam
tried to spin me on, I was starting to think Cresida
was more coherent than everyone wanted to believe.
I thought about what they had said in the car as we
got out, about how Cresida’s parents were ‘not present’ but I didn’t dare bring her up again and shatter
the mood. The blue truck was there, parked on the
pine needles. My pulse beat again. I was nervous
around boys, whether they were interested in me or
not - especially if they were. Reid was the big darkhaired one. I hoped Sam was just teasing when she
had called me this morning.
I flipped my phone open and called mum, while
the others walked down across the grass through the
trees to the sand at the edge of a river. It was better
they didn’t pay attention to me. It went to voice mail.
“Hi, mum, I’m at the creek with Sam and the
girls, okay?” I didn’t worry that she wouldn’t know
where this was. I just needed to know that she had
a rough idea, just in case. So the police would know
where to find me if this went bad.Though it wouldn’t
save me…I shuddered. Part of me hoped Cresida was
watching. But I knew she was possibly suffering from
some disorder, some mental illness. I felt silly I’d let
her rattle me, but the kidnap was still too real and
violent to ignore and I needed to tell someone other
than Cresida, who wasn’t exactly sympathetic.

As I approached the dry sand creek perimeter,
which framed a stream edged by scattered granite
boulders, I heard a plane fly overhead in the receding
overcast clouds. I could see the remnants of fires
that had burnt there, marked by charred circles in
the grainy white sand. Sky was visible through the
pine trees as he strolled over the bed of pine needles
in our direction. I gazed, thinking he was even more
attractive from a short distance as he approached.
His features weren’t perfect but something about
him drew my eyes. His face was tanned which made
his eyes pop like sparkling sapphires above his cheekbones. He was dressed in the same casual clothes he
wore at school, in a blue striped T-shirt and jeans. He
was tall and as he moved towards the pile of pizzas
Giny and Sam balanced in their arms. I noticed how
broad his shoulders were and how tall he really was.
He looked like a Giant next to Giny in comparison.
Sam was taller, her head came to his shoulders; I noticed this as she hugged him and he patted one loose
arm around her back. The pizzas were placed down
onto the sand as there were too many to balance on
the makeshift logs that everyone used as seats and
there weren’t enough logs for everyone, so I sat on the
gravelly sand. It was dry and not as uncomfortable as
I’d expected.

Conversation was slow. Lily had remained standoffish to everyone it seemed. I wondered what it was
that had dampened her demeanour since they had
ambushed me in the canteen on Tuesday.

I shivered, either because I was scared or I was
cold from the shade that lowered my temperature, as
a breeze rattled the leaves.

I was hesitant to speak. I knew all eyes would be
on me if I did. This made me nervous. I touched the
back of my neck. I felt soreness on my spine, a bruise
from the recent kidnapping.

Reid and Jackson - the new boy that I hadn’t
known was a definite member of the clique before
- sprawled out on the sand as though the hard little
sand pebbles were as soft as couch cushions. They
polished off three very large boxes between them, before I’d eaten two pieces, and it had only been hours
since breakfast. The girls weren’t shy about eating
their share either, except Giny. It was easy to see why
she was so thin. Blue veins were visible through her
arms. I’d only noticed her eat the one piece. Was Sam
the sole cash cow?

Giny offered to show me ‘
the rope’
.
“It’s down that way a bit.” She pointed into the
trees. I dusted off my bum and happily joined her.
The sand crunched under our feet as we headed
down river, no one else expressed interest and I was
glad to be in a one-on-one situation again, especially
if it was with Giny. She was the only one who didn’t
intimidate me – or, for that matter, terrify me.
As we leapt over stones along the river edge on
the way to ‘the rope’ I gazed up at the tops of the
trees. There weren’t many birds where we had been,
but as we got further away from the campsite where
we had eaten they fluttered about noisily tweeting in
the leaves above, more active in the warm sun, as we
seemed to be. They chirped and rustled so much that
I could no longer hear the bubbling stream. I happily
hoped over logs and tree roots along the worn-out
path. I pushed aside branches of bracken and drooping fronds of lime green willows about my shoulders
as I followed Giny.
She showed me the way up over some higher
crested dunes and down again in another hidden
curve of the river where the water pooled and became
naturally deep, flanked at one side by a large pitted
granite rock. A big oak tree overhung the deepest
part. Strung from it was not one, but two, thick ropes:
one from the slope, the other from the middle of the
tree above the water. I imagined the guys scaling the
tree precariously in an effort to swing themselves
above the still dark water.
On the walk back we dawdled along the river
edge rather than the sand and curving path, jumping
over rocks. I ran my bare feet through the clear running water and sank my toes into the fool’s gold dust,
which littered the sand. I prodded the algae with a
tree branch and ran my fingers through the crystal clear water, which was ice cold. A shadow came
over from above. I looked up automatically. A smiling Reid towered over me, his teeth were white and
straight. He seemed in a genuine good mood. I stood
up and smiled back despite myself. He was wearing a
tight black shirt and his physique was cut. I held my
breath.
“It’s so beautiful.” He smiled at me enigmatically.
“The river is,” he added, almost awkwardly.
I smiled and noted his wide muscular frame.
“They must work you guys hard in practice?” I
said, surprised at my own bravery.
“Huh?” he mused with a smile at the corner of
his lips.
“You’re all huge,” I teased, flushing slightly. I
looked about for Giny. She had disappeared - deliberately I thought.
“Oh, I’ve quit football.” He looked a little embarrassed, shrugging.
“Oh.” I felt chagrin, because I had assumed.
As I gazed at him I unfortunately knew then that
I found his friend, Sky, far more attractive, but if he
was seconds, then I was sure I could compromise.
“I’ve seen you around,” he said. Two dimples appeared in his cheeks as his lips pressed together in a
smile.
A yell echoed up the river.
“Yeehaw, whoohooo!” called a distant voice, followed by an audible splash.
“He’s going to drain the river.” Reid laughed; he
had a towel rolled in his hand. “Reid,” he said, introducing himself then with a gentle smile.
And I saw the sunlight reflect in his eyes making
them clear amber. I felt a flutter in my chest.
“Lila,” I returned the greeting. “You’re swimming?” I couldn’t help but smile back as I gestured
toward the towel gripped in his right hand. “- But
it’s so cold?”
The water reflected sunlight across his t-shirt.
“I’m tough enough to handle it, you can watch,”
he said.
Somehow I think if it were Sky I was talking to I
would have been blushing, tongue-tied and nervous.
It somehow made it more bearable to talk to this
ever-so-slightly, less intimidating guy. The fact that
Sam had said he liked me earlier that day gave me
the slightest bit more confidence. Something about
this day was starting to intoxicate me. “What were
you doing with your stick?” he said in his deep voice,
lifting it out of my hand.
A piece of bright green algae hung from the end
and I leant away as he waved it.
“Ewe,” I giggled.“Entertaining myself,” I answered, ducking the spray from the algae. I couldn’t
remember when I had last laughed out loud like that.
“We don’t have rivers like this in Horkum.” I winced
at the possible stupidity. There was no river in the
city and I was sure he knew it. He tossed the twig in
the river with a splash.
“We can entertain you,” he said confidently and
started off towards the others at the rope. He looked
back at me over his shoulder; his tan forehead wrinkled above two black brows. “You want to watch?”