Aven's Dream (9 page)

I needed time to think. So far my encounters with Will Kincaid had been bizarre to say the least. Was he some kind of spooky guardian angel? Random do-gooder? Boy scout? Stalker? And realistically, what were the chances of someone like
him
noticing me
except by accident? Whatever the reason, I was beginning to think that running into him in the park and then his arrival at the party had been a cruel joke by the universe. I thought about the feeling of riding on the back of his motorcycle, the feeling of his arm around my waist as I closed my eyes, the heat I felt when he looked down at me with his startlingly deep blue eyes. Shivering, I quickly decided that these were not good thoughts to dwell on if I wanted to retain my sanity.

“You’ve
gotta
stop doing that, Aven,” Sean said, waving his hand in front of me.

I had been leaning against my locker, completely unaware of Sean’s approach. I smiled weakly.

“What?”

“You know. Zoning. It’s creeping me out.”

I rolled my eyes.

“I was just thinking.”

“About your boyfriend?”

“Sean! I’m seriously going to deck you the next time you say that.”

My cheeks flushed in embarrassment, and I advanced on him with a binder I had been holding in front of my chest.

“Easy, Casey. It was a joke. Funny. Ha, ha. No need to get all psychotic on me. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you that shade of red before. It matches your hair.”

I blew out the breath I had been holding and realized that Will Kincaid’s jacket was in the locker behind me. I had brought it to school with the intention of returning it, and now I had no idea what to do with it. Sean would have a field day with that particular detail, and I was desperate to avoid further questioning.

The rest of the week passed by at an excruciatingly slow rate. Finally, desperate for a distraction, I even let Sean convince me to have lunch in the cafeteria with Matt and Jeff. What a mistake. The minute I sat down across from Jeff, it felt like I was in one of those awful scenes out of the movies where the music screeches to a halt and everyone stares. Jeff just stopped talking midsentence the minute I joined them. I didn’t think he meant it in a mean way, but his silences always made me uncomfortable. I had asked Sean about it after I first met Jeff, but he had just shrugged.

“Hey,” I said quietly.

Matt grinned at me.

“So what happened to you the other night?”

I saw Sean beginning to open his mouth, and I quickly kicked him under the table. He frowned, but didn’t say anything. The last thing I needed was for him to bring up Will Kincaid, like I was some kind of delusional nutcase who made up stories about getting rides from hot strangers who disappeared the next day.

“I left early,” I shrugged.

“Saw you talking to Jason. What’d
he
want?” Matt pressed.

I assumed he meant what was Jason Everett doing talking to the invisible girl, and I had no idea, either.

“I just asked him where the bathroom was. That house was huge,” I said lightly.

I glanced over at Jeff. He looked utterly miserable. I mentally reviewed my few interactions with him trying to determine if I had done something to piss him off. I couldn’t think of anything.

“Hey, Jeff? How’d your soccer game go yesterday?” I asked with a smile.

He sat up and began relating details from the game. Relieved, I smiled and nodded encouragingly, hoping he wouldn’t ask me any questions that would expose my utter lack of knowledge about team sports.

For the remainder of the week, I alternated lunch periods between the cafeteria with Sean and his friends and eating alone at the stairs. I almost preferred the stairs since I didn’t have to worry about coming up with questions about soccer or the pounding in my head. Every morning without fail, I scanned the parking lot in hopes of finding a black motorcycle, and each time I entered fourth period, I held my breath. But Will Kincaid never appeared.

When I thought about it, it was just my luck that he wasn’t coming back. Sean even stopped teasing. We had our exam on the second unit. I had studied like crazy, so I was expecting a good score. When I heard Allison Monroe complaining bitterly about the curve on the last test, I sank lower in my seat.

On Friday Mr. Anderson stopped by my desk to tell me that I could have an extension on the outline for the paper since, with Will absent, I had no partner. I perked up when he muttered something about Will having some type of family emergency on the East Coast. That meant he was coming back, right? It bothered me that I was clinging to such a small glimmer of hope, but I couldn’t help it. I wanted answers. But more than that, I wanted to see him again. Why I wanted to see him was what I couldn’t figure out. Maybe so I would stop feeling insane?

During my free period, I was grappling with a problem from Mrs. Kluman’s class when I looked up and caught the girl next to me staring. She looked away as soon as our eyes met, her brow furrowed like she was debating something. When she cleared her throat, I turned and smiled. I could almost feel the nervous tension coming off of her in waves.

“You’re friends with Sean Murray, right?” she asked, biting her lip.

“Yeah.”

She straightened up.

“I’m Lizzie.”

I extended my hand across the aisle.

“I’m Aven. Hey, do we have Health Sciences together?”

“Second period? You just moved here at the beginning of the year, right?”

I nodded.

“Where from?”

“Southern California.”

“What part? I’m going down to San Diego to visit my aunt and uncle over winter break.”

“Just outside of Laguna Beach,” I said, cringing when her eyes widened. “Irvine, actually.”

“Wow, really? Isn’t everyone, like, loaded?”

“Not everyone.”

Definitely not us. That was part of the reason we moved. My dad hadn’t been able to keep up with the bills on one income in Southern California.

“My dad took a teaching job at the university.”

“Too bad for you. I love the beach,” she sighed wistfully. “Is it really like the TV shows?”

“Definitely not for me.”

“Oh.” She sounded disappointed. “So what do you think of Mr. Morgan?”

“It kind of seems like he’s having a hard time staying awake in class.”

Lizzie laughed.

“Right?”

“So why’d you want to know about Sean?” I reminded her.

She blushed.

“
Oh
! Seriously?” I asked.

Not that I was surprised that someone liked Sean, but I was surprised in general. She glanced guiltily in my direction.

“You guys aren’t going out, are you?”

I suppressed a laugh.

“Me and Sean? No way—I mean, we’re friends. He’s the best, though.”

Lizzie looked relieved, and I realized that I had neglected to mention his obsession with Allison. Then an idea struck me. Lizzie seemed nice, cute—with wavy ash blonde hair and big brown eyes.

“Sean and I usually head over to Ford’s at least once a week. Why don’t you come with?”

“That’d be great.” She smiled and then paused. “You won’t say anything to him, though?”

I put my hand over my heart.

“Not a word.”

It felt weird playing Cupid, and I had a momentary and utterly self-serving fear about what would happen if the two of them started going out. The last thing I needed was for Sean to disappear next. But I wanted him to be happy. Besides, I couldn’t stand watching him pine over Allison Monroe one second longer.

The weekend passed by uneventfully, and by Monday morning I abandoned any possibility that Will Kincaid was coming back, reminding myself that I preferred to work alone. In fact, I hated group projects, so I couldn’t figure out why I felt slightly disappointed. Or maybe I did know and just didn’t want to admit it to myself. In fourth period, as I was waiting for the bell to ring, I started writing down notes for my outline.

“
I understand we have a paper to write.
”

I nearly flew from my chair, banging my knee into the metal bar under the desk in the process. Rubbing my knee, I turned and found Will Kincaid sitting in the seat directly behind me, his face relaxed, an inviting smile on his perfect lips. I hadn’t heard him sit down. Flushed, I turned to face the blackboard.

“You can’t keep doing that,” I whispered.

The bell rang just as Mr. Anderson finished copying dates on the board and walked to his desk.

“What’s that?” Will responded at a volume I was sure Mr. Anderson couldn’t hear.

“Sneaking up on me,” I hissed.

I couldn’t tell if I was breathless from annoyance or something else. Then the entire class sucked in a collective breath, and I turned to see what it was. I froze, watching in horror as Scott Adams hobbled into class. It looked like a truck had hit him. His arm was in a sling, and from the two black eyes, it was easy to tell his nose was broken. I turned and stole a glance at Will, whose posture and expression remained impassive. I gasped for breath, but the air didn’t seem to reach my lungs.

At any second, I expected Scott to point an accusing finger and scream, “
It was them
!” Instead, he slowly made his way to his seat, his swagger unavoidably humbled. I looked at him, and for a second, our eyes locked. But I didn’t see an ounce of recognition in his expression. Still, my fingers wouldn’t release their grip on the edge of the desk.

Mr. Anderson shifted uncomfortably before clearing his throat and waiting for Scott to arrange himself in the seat next to Jason. I wondered if the teachers knew about what had happened the weekend before. Ten excruciating minutes of Mr. Anderson’s lecture passed before I couldn’t take it any longer, my heart racing as I wondered how many people Scott had told. Raising my hand, I felt my stomach pitch violently as I continued to grip the desk with my other hand.

“Yes, Aven?” Mr. Anderson said.

He stopped and looked at me more closely, his glasses sliding down his nose.

“May I be excused? I-I need to use the restroom.”

Eyeing me uneasily, Mr. Anderson nodded. I got up and took a shaky step toward the door. I was going to be lucky if I didn’t throw up before I made it to the hall. Suddenly an arm went around me. I looked up at Will as he began to propel me out of class.

“What are you doing?” I squeaked as Will guided me down the hallway.

He pushed open the door to an empty classroom and sat me down at a desk.

“Stay here.”

Even if I had wanted to get up, I didn’t think my legs would have carried me. Will disappeared, and I sat back, waiting for my stomach to quit lurching at the memory of Scott’s wrecked face. Will reappeared holding a bottle of water and his jacket, the one that had spent the past week in my locker. He set down the water and reached forward, lifting me under the armpits. He reached around and slid the jacket around me. I hadn’t noticed until just then, but I was shivering uncontrollably, even in the heat of the school. As I shrugged Will’s jacket over my shoulders, I wondered silently how he had gotten into my locker. But I had bigger things to worry about.

“Did you do that?” I asked, my voice shaking as I looked over at Will.

He didn’t say anything, and that was answer enough for me.

“It looked like you almost killed him! What happens when Jason Everett and the rest of his buddies come looking for you?”

Will’s eyes darkened momentarily before he looked away from me.

“Do you truly care what happens to a monster … or are you concerned for
my
welfare?” he asked with a combination of shock and amusement.

My stomach somersaulted again, and I was sure I was going to be sick this time. Looking down, I sat silently for a few moments, concentrating on my breathing.

“I don’t care what happens to him,” I admitted. “And yeah. I was more worried about you.”

When I looked up at him, his expression had hardened into ice, like I had said something awful.

“What?” I asked.

“You have no cause to worry about me.”

I blinked at the coldness in his tone.

“Okay. I won’t worry about you, then. And assuming Scott Adams isn’t going to murder me and leave me under the bleachers any time soon, I guess we—”

“He’s not going to do anything to you,” Will said, cutting me off. “He has no memory of what happened.”

Wow. How the hell did Will Kincaid go from charming to authoritarian and dismissive in two seconds?

“You sound pretty sure of that. What happened to not being able to tell the future?” I snapped.

“If you’ll recall, those arrogant degenerates were quite inebriated.”

That much was true. When Will held out his hand, I stared at it.

“Would you like me to take you home?” he asked.

I shook my head.

“I can’t skip class.”