Bird Song (36 page)

Robert looked down at me and he frowned.
 
“This isn’t your mistake, Grace.
 
If I had been there, if had not been…elsewhere, I would have been able to tell you what you needed to know and then none of this would have happened.
 
This is my fault.”

“Don’t try and take away my guilt, please.
 
As much as I would like it, it’s not what I need.
 
I just wish that this were easier.
 
I messed up and now I have to fix it, but it’s Mr.
Branke
.
 
How can I apologize to
him
?”
 
I eased myself out of Robert’s arms and sighed.
 
“Whatever the solution, we’ve got to get going or else we’re going to be late.
 
I’m already in enough hot water.
 
I don’t need to add tardiness on top of everything else.”

Robert flashed a grin in my direction as he climbed onto the bike.
 
He held out his hand and helped me to seat myself behind him.
 
“I’m glad you have your priorities in order.”

“Ha-ha.”

With a turn of the key, the bike started up and we were flying down the street.
 
I had forgotten to put my hair up and it whipped around my face, lashing at my wind-bitten skin.

I felt Robert’s hand grab mine and pull it into the confines of his jacket.
 
With movement that I could not see, he had somehow removed my glove and my bare hand pressed up against his abdomen.
 
I could feel the warmth through his shirt and my fingers itched to be closer to the source of that heat.

Robert’s hold on my hand allowed him to push it inwards and I nearly fainted when I felt it slip between the edges of his shirt and touch the bare skin of his waist.
 
The immediate jolt of electricity between the two of us caused Robert to swerve the bike and instinctually I held on tighter.
 
This sent my hand deeper into the pocket he had created in his shirt and I felt the sinew of his belly clench as he moved to control the bike’s actions.

The contact, like any other flesh-to-flesh contact between us, sent an influx of thoughts and visions into my head, but I had learned to stave them off over time.
 
This contact wasn’t meant to share his visions with me.
 
It was meant to heal me, reverse the damage that might have been caused by my fall as well as from the short ride to school.

But I would have gladly gone to school looking like some royal brat’s whipping girl if it meant I could remain this close to Robert for a little while longer.
 
I’d gladly endure it and I knew that despite my earlier revelation, this had nothing to do with Robert’s angelic charm.

As we pulled into the school, Robert took a detour that brought us into the faculty parking lot.
 
I didn’t need to ask to know what his intent was.
 
We hadn’t shared a single thought about what I would do once we got to school, and yet he knew what I had wanted.
 
I have to know what you want, Grace.
 
Your happiness and well-being are paramount.
 
If you’re not safe and content, I can’t be.

With a defiant sigh, I pulled my hand out of his shirt and allowed him to put my glove back on, then climbed off the back of the bike.
 
He’s in the alcove to the left smoking a cigarette.
 
I’ll be waiting right here if you need me; I can hear everything that’s going on so if he tries to harm you in retaliation, I’ll be there in less than a nanosecond.

I nodded and looked towards the alcove that Robert pointed to.
 
I could see a faint puff of smoke trailing out from behind the wall and started walking in that direction.
 
I began to repeat a silent mantra, imagining myself as the little apologizer that could, focused on forgetting my own self-consciousness and instead remembering that I had hurt Mr.
Branke
and insulted him with my accusation.
 
Whatever it was that I was feeling was nothing compared to what he must be going through.

As soon as I could make out his outline in the shadows of the alcove, I began to rehearse my opening lines.
 
“Mr.
Branke
, I wanted to apologize for what happened yesterday.
 
I was wrong and I will do my utmost best to ensure that everyone knows that you had nothing to do with what happened to me.”

It sounded good.

Too bad though, because it was looking like I wouldn’t get a chance to say anything.
 
As soon as Mr.
Branke
saw me approaching, he flicked his cigarette onto the ground and gave it a quick stomp before rushing towards the side entrance, his hands rammed deeply into his pockets.

“Mr.
Branke
!” I called out, my pace picking up to try and get to him before he could escape me into the crowded halls of the school.
 
“Mr.
Branke
, wait!”

The doors closed just as I reached them and I could make out Mr.
Branke’s
silhouette through the glass as he continued to walk very briskly down the hallway, finally disappearing around a corner.

“Damn,” I exclaimed.

I turned around and headed back towards Robert.
 
I felt my shoulders hunching down in defeat and disappointment, and when Robert stood up to comfort me, I knew I wasn’t imagining it.
 
I had lost a couple of inches in height.

“He doesn’t want to have anything to do with me,” I mumbled into Robert’s jacket.
 
“He ran away from me, Robert.
 
You’d think I was infected with the plague or something, he was moving so fast.”

Robert’s hand pressed against the back of my head, he pressed a kiss to my ear and laughed softly.
 
“I cannot exactly feel too sorry for you.
 
You always did want him to leave you alone.
 
Now you’ve gotten your wish, albeit not exactly in the way you probably wanted.”

I said something that was so muffled by my close proximity to Robert’s chest, I was certain he didn’t hear it, but he did.
 
Of course he did.

“That wasn’t very nice, Grace.”

“Sorry.”

He chuckled again and then gently pulled me away from him.
 
I tried to hold on with all of my strength, but I might as well have not been trying, his motion so effortless.
 
“You’re a brave girl, Grace.
 
I don’t understand how you could possibly think that you’re susceptible to my, how did you put it, ‘angelic charms’, when you’re far more often trying to be as rude as possible to me.”

I watched as he pushed my hair back with his hand, his leather gloves so well made, they were like a second skin.
 
“There.
 
All fixed.
 
Maybe you’ll be less frightening to Mr.
Branke
now that your hair looks less like a wild animal and more like something that belongs there.”

“Oh, you-”

This time I shouted the word that I had said into his jacket and laughed at his wide-eyed expression.
 
I was definitely being as rude as possible, that was true.
 
It might have been something that wasn’t entirely a normal, human thing to do, but my body was still human and I couldn’t outrun an angel no matter how hard I tried and as a result, Robert caught me around the middle as I tried to flee, the two of us laughing and appreciating the break in the residual tension.

“I don’t know why you’re so obsessed with being ‘normal’ when the version of ‘normal’ that you seem to be basing this whole artificial goal on happens to deem you anything but,” Robert said as he lifted me back onto the bike.
 
He climbed on swiftly and started the bike with a purr.
 
We traveled the incredibly short distance between parking lots at a leisurely pace, each passing stare causing me to grow redder and redder from the guilt that I had yet to appease.

“Let’s take a look at some of these people whom you would describe as ‘normal’, shall we?
 
Donovan Gleason over there is what you would deem ‘normal’, right?”

He directed my attention to a red-headed boy in our senior class who was on the basketball team and the swim team, not to mention one of Graham’s closest male friends.
 
I nodded when I thought of how normal his life was.
 
He and his girlfriend Kendra had a fairly solid relationship spanning our entire high school career, and he did fairly well in school, though not so well that he’d get singled out for it.
 
He was always where the crowds were, always up for anything, and was never looked at as anything
but
normal here in Heath.

“Would you believe me if I told you he was gay?”

I felt my jaw drop.
 
“What?”

He nodded his head.
 
“How ‘normal’ do you think his friends would deem him if they ever found out about that?
 
How ‘normal’ would he be if they learned that he listens to the same bands as they do because he’s attracted to the lead singers?”

I honestly did not know the answer to that.
 
I had never thought of Donovan as anything but a guy.
 
“I don’t think he’s any less of a great guy, though,” I said as I remembered that he had been the one who helped me bring Graham home one night during our junior year after Graham had snuck a bottle of his father’s whiskey to a study session at the library.
 
He had put up with my panicking and even said that he thought it was ‘cool’ that Graham had a ‘chick’ for a best friend.
 
“Donovan hasn’t changed in my opinion.
 
He’s still a normal guy.”

“Yes, but would he be normal to someone like Kendra?”

I looked over to Donovan’s girlfriend and shook my head severely.
 
“She’d call him all sorts of names do her best to ruin his reputation both at school and in town.”

Robert nodded, glad that I was now seeing his point.
 
“Normal is a relative thing, Grace.
 
What’s normal to you might not be normal to someone else, yet that very person is whom you’re basing your definition of normal on.
 
I have to tell you, who you are ‘normally’ is exactly what I love.
 
Why would you want to change that?”

I looked at Donovan and Kendra again.
 
They were reading something that I hadn’t noticed until just then.
 
It was the local paper and Mr.
Branke’s
face was plastered all over the front page.

“That’s why,” I said, pointing to the paper.
 
“A normal person wouldn’t have done something like that.”

Robert pushed my hand down and sighed.
 
“Grace, what you’re going to have to learn is that normal people play it safe in this world because they’re afraid of the risks involved with being different.
 
It’s a gamble.
 
You gambled when you agreed to get on my bike.
 
You gambled again when you decided to keep my secrets.
 
You kept on gambling even after I hurt you, and Graham hurt you, and life hurt you because you knew that the rewards outweighed the risks.

“Would you take any of that back?”

I looked at Mr.
Branke’s
school picture staring blankly back at me and knew that there was only one thing that I would if possible.
 
However, angel at my side and all, that was impossible.

For the next two days, I failed to get Mr.
Branke
to speak to me or acknowledge me at all.
 
I even doubted that he checked my name for attendance when I showed up for class.
 
He refrained from any contact with anyone during class, the lessons dull and flat, his monotone voice a complete shadow of his old one.

The negative reaction I had expected from the small faction of students who had never doubted Mr.
Branke’s
innocence never appeared.
 
With his demeanor so withdrawn and sullen, his hands were kept to himself which pleased everyone.
 
I had suddenly become a sort of hero to the girls of the school who had endured, some of us for years, the constant touching that went hand-in-hand with being a pupil at a school occupied by him.
 

Of course, any benefit I might have received from this was lost in the fact that for better or worse, I had been wrong about Mr.
Branke
.
 
My mistake was now fodder for a new wave of gossip and bathroom conversation.
 
I was now not only a freak, I was a liar as well.
 
It didn’t matter that I didn’t lie, the end results were just the same.

I tried to speak to Lark about Graham and what he had told me, but she shut me down with each attempt.
 
I tried to talk to Graham about anything but he avoided me with nearly as much determination as Mr.
Branke
, which was quite a feat considering that we lived together.