The Candidates (14 page)

Our lockers were in the basement, spread in narrow rows around white support pillars. We weren’t allowed to go to our dorm rooms during the school day, so we had lockers to stow our books in between classes. Hennie and Esther and I had each been assigned a locker in a different area, so after quick hugs, we split up and promised to find each other whenever we had a break that afternoon.

With visions of melting brown eyes dancing in front of me, I blinked furiously and tried to focus on my combination lock. Classes. I did have classes today. But what were they?

“Where’d Prince Charming go?”

I froze at the sound of Jack’s voice floating over my shoulder. I jerked the lock open, grabbed a book from my locker, and threw it into my backpack. The Cam-induced haze abruptly melted away.

What was I supposed to say to him? I was jolted back to my utter confusion of the morning and the terrifying realization that once again, I’d used my powers to protect him. Or at least I’d tried. The scary thing was, Jack inspired some kind of protective instinct in me that I couldn’t ignore. He seemed determined to get into trouble, and I seemed just as determined to get him out.

And then there was the whole scene on my porch the night before, and the maybe-almost kiss. Or had I imagined that too?

I turned around and tried to play it cool and friendly. “Hey, Jack, what’s up? Sleep through the alarm this morning?”

“Forgot to set it.” He had one hand looped around a couple of books, the other deep in his pocket, and he slouched in a lazy, relaxed way against the bank of lockers behind me. He was wearing dark, baggy jeans and a snug black T-shirt.

“That’s ridiculous. How could you forget to set your alarm? Are you trying to get yourself in trouble?”

He flipped his hair out of his eyes and walked over to my side. “What are they going to do? Suspend me? I don’t think so. Then Prince Charming and the rest of them couldn’t keep an eye on me.”

I nibbled my lip uneasily. “What do you mean?”

“You know, holding us here—behind those gates—makes it awfully easy to keep an eye on us.” He held up his ID card. “They track our every move, Dancia. Trust me, they’re not going to suspend me.”

I sighed. “We’ve been through this before, Jack. They have to do that. It’s for security.”

“They keep saying that, but what’s the big danger they’re securing us from? Most kids seem to survive just fine without being kept behind a locked iron gate.”

“How should I know? Terrorism? Weird people who try to abduct kids?”

“If you say so.”

“What do you think Cam has to do with it?” I wasn’t sure what “it” might be, but when I talked to Jack, it seemed hard to pretend that things at Delcroix were business as usual.

“Have you seen the way he looks at me? You’d think he’s expecting me to plant a bomb or something.”

I threw my backpack over my shoulders. Truth was, Cam did look at him funny. Cam didn’t trust him. If Jack knew half the things Cam had said to me, he’d be even more convinced that they were plotting against him.

“Whatever. You’re crazy. Can we just go to class, please?”

He shrugged. “Sure. By the way, thanks for dinner. It was nice to have actual food for once. And someone other than my stoner roommate to eat it with.”

I made a face, relieved that he’d accepted the change of subject. “Grandma thinks you’re sweet.”

“Oh no, really? She called me sweet?” He laughed. “After the cold shoulder I get from her granddaughter, I was beginning to think I’d lost my touch.”

I winced. Jack
had
been trying to kiss me last night. I had hoped we could forget all about that awkward sitting-on-the-porch moment. Even if a tiny part of me had been curious as to what that might have been like, the bigger part of me wanted Cam. I couldn’t let Jack think something might develop between us. I steeled myself to be frank.

“Jack, it’s not that I don’t … I mean, it’s not that I don’t like you, it’s just … well, you know Cam and … well …”

He laughed as he shifted his books and put one arm around my shoulders. “What?” he said in a dramatic voice as he pulled me closer. “You mean Cinderella has already found her prince? And it isn’t me? I am crushed. Truly, deeply crushed.”

“Jack!” I shrugged out of his grasp and tried to ignore the fact that he smelled good, like cinnamon and coffee, and that it felt rather nice to have his arm around me. I tried to focus instead on his reaction. What I said didn’t seem to bother him. Maybe I had misinterpreted him after all.

“You don’t really think I’m going to let that pretty boy stand in my way, do you?” He winked at me and kept smiling. “Darling, you and I were meant to be. That’s all there is to it.”

What was that supposed to mean? He sounded like he was kidding, but was he serious? Every word out of his mouth just confused me more.

“Jack—”

“Forget about it, Danny. Don’t worry that curly little head of yours.” He gave me another squeeze and raised his hand at Hector on the stairs.

“Wassup, Jack. Dancia.” Hector nodded at us, raising his eyebrows a little as he passed. I hung my head. Damn! Now Hector was going to think Jack and I were going out.

We started up the stairs together, and my eyes landed on the cover of the book Jack was holding under his arm:
Essays in Ethics.

“Oh no!” I whacked myself on the forehead. “I forgot my ethics book in my locker.”

“No problem.” He grinned and handed me his. “You know who’s really got your back around here.”

THE CAFETERIA
at Delcroix was similar to my middle school’s. Long tables filled most of the space, and a lunch line with hot and cold food snaked along the back wall. Kids yelled at each other across the room, and irritated-looking teachers who were unlucky enough to be on lunch patrol leaned against the walls, trying to tune them out. Unlike my old cafeteria, though, Delcroix’s had huge windows overlooking green rolling hills and a thick forest in the distance. Of course, no one paid any attention to the view. The wildlife inside was much more interesting.

I’d been eating in the cafeteria for almost two months now, and I’d long since tuned out the incredible view. But today everything was going to change.

Today I was eating lunch with Cam.

The minute I walked through the doors, I started to feel light-headed as I considered having to approach Cam and Trevor and Anna by myself. My knees actually trembled, and I looked around anxiously for a table to sit at before I collapsed.

“Dancia, there you are! You aren’t getting away this time. Come on over here and I’ll introduce you around.”

It was Cam, looking gorgeous, as usual, as he made his way through the crowd toward me. I watched him take hold of my elbow.

With the touch of his hand, my throat momentarily swelled shut, but I swallowed hard and gave myself a stiff internal shake. I decided not to risk speaking, and simply nodded.

We crossed the room toward a table where five other beautiful people were seated. Trevor was there. I had to admit he was handsome in an austere, frightening sort of way.

“You know Trevor and Anna, and this is David, Claire, and Molly.” Anna jumped up and landed at my side the instant Cam and I reached the table.

From the look on her face, it became clear to me that Cam might think he was just friends with Anna, but Anna did not feel the same way.

“Dancia, how sweet of you to join us for lunch. Why don’t you come sit over by me? We can talk about strategy for this week’s meet.” She practically dragged me away from Cam and plopped me down in a chair.

“Thanks,” I managed to spit out.

“No problem.” She turned a sunny smile back to Cam. “You probably can’t stay long, anyway, can you? Didn’t you say you had to check in with Mr. Judan before Ethics this afternoon?”

“I’ve got time to eat,” Cam said. He shrugged apologetically at me. “I do have to leave a little early. But we’ve got time to hang out first.”

Cam sat down next to me. I nudged my chair closer to his and farther from Anna’s.

Anna narrowed her baby-doll eyes. “Super.”

“Hey, you’ve got Mr. Fritz for Ethics, don’t you?” Cam gestured around the table as he spoke. “We were all in his class our freshman year. He’s pretty cool, isn’t he?”

“Yeah, he’s okay. He sure does love Kant, though.”

Trevor groaned from the other side of the table. “You aren’t kidding. Too bad you can’t understand anything he’s talking about.”

It was the most human thing Trevor had ever said, and I found myself actually smiling at him. “I spent twenty minutes just trying to read one sentence the other day,” I agreed. “It’s like the guy was speaking in another language half the time.”

Anna sniffed. “I didn’t think it was that complicated.”

Trevor laughed. “Even for you, that’s insane, Anna. No one understands Mr. Fritz’s class. Especially not Kant.”

“At least the activities are cool,” Molly said. “Like that spaceship thing—did you do that?”

“You mean the one where we all had to get on a little platform with some medicine to save the planet Earth?” I tried not to think about how I had ended that day in the bathroom, vomiting. “Yeah, we did that one.”

“I remember that,” Cam said. “Anna and Claire nearly broke my toes when we tried it.”

Anna gazed at Cam with an air of fond remembrance. “I loved that game.”

Trevor rolled his eyes. “You loved anything that required standing on Cam, Anna.”

Claire and Molly giggled. They spent a few minutes reminiscing about how they had tried to get all the girls up on piggyback, but everyone ended up falling down, and none of them managed to get back to Earth with the cure.

“How did your group end up, Dancia?” David asked.

I froze. I didn’t want to tell them how I’d gotten sick, or draw unnecessary attention to Jack. “Someone in the class suggested we leave certain members of our group behind.

Once we did that, everyone else fit on the platform.”

“Who did that?” Cam asked.

“Jack,” I said reluctantly.

“Landry did what?” Trevor asked.

Why did they insist on calling him Landry? Like he wasn’t worthy of being called Jack? For some reason it bothered me.

“We tried a bunch of different things, but eventually realized we couldn’t get everyone to fit. Jack said we should leave some people behind rather than giving up our mission and letting everyone on Earth die. I guess it made sense.”

It did make sense, in a twisted sort of way. I hadn’t wanted to see it at the time, but looking back I could. It was the ease with which Jack had made the suggestion—like it was no big deal to let members of our team die—that had been so disturbing. But it was a game, right? Just a game. I couldn’t remember now why it had seemed so incredibly serious.

A worried crease appeared on Cam’s brow. He and Trevor exchanged significant looks. The more I hung around them, the more it seemed that Jack was right. They did have something against him.

I shook my head. Now I knew I was paranoid. I was starting to think like Jack.

Cam pointed to the tray in front of him. “Do you want anything to eat?”

His plate of french fries and a huge hamburger did not look appealing. “No thanks. I had a big breakfast. I’ll probably get hungry as soon as lunch is over.”

Anna had a little bowl of salad on her tray, and she picked at the contents. “You should really eat something,” she said sweetly. “I don’t want you missing practice.”

I tried not to laugh as I contemplated her ten-calorie salad. “Thanks, Anna. I appreciate the concern.”

Cam picked up his burger and took a big bite. I looked around the room and saw Esther and Hennie a few tables away. Esther winked and gave me a thumbs-up, which I hoped no one at our table witnessed. On the other side of the room, sitting at a long table with a bunch of people from our team, was Jack. He was cozied up next to Allie, who gazed at him with the same adoring expression that I probably wore around Cam.

That was new. Jack and Allie were friends, of course, and had been since orientation, but I’d never seen them eat lunch together. And I’d never seen that particular look on Allie’s face before. Like she was staring at Superman.

Jack didn’t seem bothered by it. In fact, he had a genuine grin on his face, not even his usual ironic half smile.

Jack could talk to anyone he wanted, I told myself sternly.

Allie draped her arm over his. He leaned over and said something in her ear. I forced myself to look away, and as I did, I caught Anna watching me. Her eyes flicked back and forth between Jack and me, and a coldly assessing look crossed her face. Then her lip curled into an approximation of a smile. She picked up her fork and stabbed a piece of lettuce.

“Anything new with the student council?” I forced myself to say cheerfully to Cam, trying to erase the image of Allie touching Jack’s arm. “Aren’t you planning a big dance right before Christmas break?”

“Random Flashes of Genius is playing.” He spoke between enormous bites of meat. “It’s going to be amazing.”

The desire to look back at Jack and Allie was almost overwhelming. I bit my lip and resisted. “Where will it be held?”

Cam dunked a handful of french fries in ketchup. “Here in the cafeteria. But we decorate it. Anna’s in charge of the decorating committee, actually.”

Figured. I nodded as if I cared, and permitted myself a brief fantasy of slow dancing with Cam. Meanwhile, Trevor kept throwing suspicious glances in Jack’s direction, and then whispering to David, the guy sitting next to him. I wanted to lean closer to hear what they were saying, but Anna seemed to be watching, so I gave her a sunny smile instead and relaxed against the back of my chair.

“Where do you race this week, Anna?” Cam asked.

“Saint Mark’s. It’s a tough course. Lots of standing water around the back end. Tons of freshmen didn’t even finish last year.” Anna smirked at me, though she covered it up quickly to smile at Cam.

“Maybe you and Dancia could run together sometime, Anna.”

Anna picked up a cucumber and nibbled at the edges. “I usually run in the morning, on top of our regular practices. I wouldn’t mind giving you a private lesson, Dancia, if you want to come with me sometime. Maybe next week.”

I floundered, unable to think of a single excuse. “Wow, uh, thanks.”

“No problem.” She fluttered her lashes at Cam, even though she was supposedly talking to me.

Cam looked pleased. “That’s nice of you, Anna.”

Nice? Granted, I barely knew her, but I had the feeling “nice” wasn’t a particularly fitting word.

Cam finished his meal and apologized for having to leave early. I waved him off and then told the rest of the group I had some homework I needed to talk to Esther and Hennie about. Not that they cared, but I figured I had to come up with something.

When I got to their table, Esther could barely contain herself. She was convinced Cam wouldn’t have invited me to lunch if he didn’t like me. She thought this was the beginning of something big. Hennie told me that she’d heard Cam and Anna used to go out, but they’d broken up this summer, and no one really knew why. Esther said that meant the perfect amount of time had elapsed for Cam to find someone new. He wasn’t pining over Anna, because they were clearly still friends, and that was good, but he was definitely single, which was also a plus.

I just had to shake my head in wonder. The junior class president, most gorgeous guy in the school, and he wanted to spend time with me? I just couldn’t believe it. Something was seriously amiss. I couldn’t stop smiling and looking down at the pink shirt like it was some kind of magical talisman.