Crystal Caves (16 page)

Then I decide, screw it. I’ll walk.

I text Ron and tell him what route I’m taking. He can pick me up along the way.

I shove the phone into my purse, mostly because I don’t want to see his response, then I let myself out the gated door on the side of the pick-up area.

This entire part of the side street smells like exhaust. Dozens of cars (and limos) are double-parked, engines running, as they wait for students to come out. I walk past all of them, deliberately not looking at them, and deliberately not looking behind me, even though I hear (or think I hear) someone calling my name.

I make it to the cross street and turn left. It’s amazing to me how the streets in this city all look the same—taxis going by, lots of fast-moving cars, people walking in suits or jeans with their heads down, not making eye contact—and yet the streets all look different, with the different shops and restaurants. Each neighborhood has a feel to it, and this neighborhood isn’t quite as posh as the one I live in. There are some delicatessens that always smell good when I walk by them, and a few coffee shops, some neighborhood grocery stores, and some clothing stores that Melanie always said were too “low-brow” for us, whatever that means.

(Okay, I know it’s not good, but I don’t know what it
means
. It’s amazing how much I’ve learned from context and tone and how much I miss by not asking questions.)

I shove my hands in my pockets and move with the flow of the people going in my direction. I have my purse and book bag slung over opposite shoulders, like Ron taught me, so I won’t get mugged.

I’m halfway down the block, near a small bakery, when Daddy appears about two meters ahead of me. He’s shorter than I remember, especially around all of these New Yorkers, and looks more like a bull than I’ve ever noticed before. Squat face, dark coloring, snapping black eyes. He’s wearing black pants and a white linen shirt that balloons around him. His hands are on his hips.

No one really notices that he has just appeared out of thin air. They just walk around him, like water in a river flows around a rock. (A big, giant, pain-in-the-ass bull-faced rock.)

“You’re ignoring me, little girl,” he says loudly.

One or two people do look at him now, apparently trying to figure out who he’s talking to.

I pivot and join the traffic going the other direction. He still doesn’t know my name. He’s calling me “little girl,” instead of “Crystal.” I think he’s said my name all of three times since I was born.

Tears prick my eyes. I’m not going to let him know that he’s upset me. Because that’s just what I need. Daddy, on top of everything else that’s happened these last few days.

He pops in front of me again. This time, some woman in a power suit and tennis shoes walks right into him.

“Hey,” she says, “watch where you’re going.”

And then she steps around him.

Daddy, of course, ignores her. And everyone else walking by.

“Crystal,” he snaps. “I should not have to call after you like a member of the Faithful.”

The Faithful. Daddy doesn’t have any Faithful any more. No one worships Zeus. Athena has some who still show up at her temple, and Aphrodite has several, mostly because she’s in the cultural zeitgeist, but the Faithful are—at least to me—as mythical as the Greek myths are to my fellow students.

I pivot again, so I don’t have to talk to him.

He pops in front of me a third time, and some guy in wingtips curses as he almost stumbles into Daddy.

“Watch yerself, bub,” the guy says.

“You watch yourself, ‘bub,’” Daddy says. “I’m trying to talk to my daughter here.”

But the guy has already moved on, which seems to anger Daddy. He turns around, hand raised. He’s going to do something stupid.

I grab his fist and pull it down.

“Not here,” I hiss.

“I can use magic anywhere I want,” Daddy says.

I pull him off of the sidewalk toward a tall round table on a small patio in front of one of the delis. As I sit down, a guy in an apron says, “You sit here if you get food. This table’s for customers.”

“I know,” I say.

I pull Daddy onto one of the tall stools, and point at him.

“You stay,” I say, like he’s a dog or a little kid or something.

Then I go inside and get us both toasted bagels with cream cheese (take that, Mother!) and some regular coffee. I use Mother’s credit card to pay for it all, and I’m tempted to add like half the stuff in the dessert display—partly so she sees how much I’m spending and partly so she can see what I’m spending it on. Then I remember that she probably doesn’t even look at the bills. She has People for that.

The guy behind the counter (wearing a similar apron to the guy outside) hands me paper plates with my toasted bagels, napkins, and then looks at me and how I’m about to carry it all.

He sighs, grabs the coffee cups, and carries them outside for me, plunking the cups down in front of Daddy, who looks surprised.

I thank the guy, set the bagels down, and hand Daddy a napkin.

“I didn’t come here to eat, child,” he says. “I came to talk to you.”

“Lucky me,” I say for like the eighth time today. “As if my day isn’t going bad enough.”

I take a bite of the bagel. There’s a lot of cream cheese on it, and beneath it, butter, and it drips on my chin, and I don’t care because the damn thing tastes so good.

After I take my giant bite, I clean off my chin.

Daddy’s watching me like he doesn’t recognize me. Maybe he doesn’t. I doubt he’s ever seen me eat.

“What do you want?” I ask as I chew.

He doesn’t yell at me for talking and eating at the same time. (Take that, Mother!)

“I hear you’re pretty miserable here.” He opens the coffee lid and tentatively sniffs at it. He puts the lid back on the cup.

“Who told you that?” I ask, kinda stunned that he knows something about me, especially something like this.

“A little birdie,” he says.

“Really?” I ask. “Because I wouldn’t have believed that even when I was little.”

Although sometimes, people can make birds talk. I just know that birds don’t really care about what humans are going through, and besides, I haven’t spoken to or even seen a bird (that I remember) since I came to New York.

“Does it matter?” Daddy asks. “It’s true, right? You’re not happy here.”

“Yeah, well, I agreed to it,” I say, just in case Megan’s found a way to listen in or something.

He wraps his big hands around the coffee cup. “I’m sorry about your mother.”

I take my fingers off my bagel. “What about her?”

He closes his eyes for a minute, then takes a deep breath. “I…um…kinda forgot which one she was when we made this deal thing with Megan.”

My cheeks get hot
again.
Okay, if I ever get my magic back, I’m stopping all uncontrolled visible physical reactions to emotional stimuli (and that sentence alone makes me realize I’ve been talking to E too much).

“She’s making your life hell, isn’t she?” Daddy asks. “That’s the expression, right? She’s making it difficult for you?”

“Actually, no,” I say. “My
life
is fine. Everyone tells me it’s really good. I have all the money I want—which is what everyone wants here, money, money, money. I live in one of the best places in the city, at least that’s what everyone says. I wear the latest fashions and I’m in the best school, so no, my life is not hell. Or Hades or any other kind of underworld.”

Daddy looks up at me. He’s frowning, and not one of those magical I’m-about-to-turn-you-into-stone frowns. It’s a sincere I’m-not-sure-I-understand frown. “But, I heard—”

“She doesn’t want me,” I say. “She’s never wanted me. She didn’t want to be part of this bring-your-daughter-to-the-real-world experiment, and she would really like me to disappear. She didn’t even tell her other kids about me before I got here, although I guess Owen knew.”

“Owen?” Daddy asks.

I wave my hand, dismissing that comment. If I’m going to get this out, I’m going to get it out all at once.

“She doesn’t like me and she’s made it clear that she’ll take care of me until the agreed-on date and then I’m going home. So no matter what I do, she’s determined to ignore it. I didn’t know that until yesterday, and….” I look up at him, realizing this timing is weird. Someone
has
told him about Mother and me. “Who told you?”

He’s shaking his head. “It’s not important. This is Monique, right? The one who—”

“Didn’t want give birth in the first place?” I say. “The one you forced to have me?”

“Oh, hon,” Daddy says, “that’s not as unusual as you think. This maternal instinct that everyone talks about? I’ve found it happens in only sixty-six percent of women who get pregnant. The rest are pretty peeved about it.”

I am about to say something about Mother when I stop. Daddy’s gotten so many women pregnant over so many thousands of years that he probably actually has actual statistics to back up that number. Which is just weird and unpleasant and I can’t think about it right now or my brain will explode.

“Yes,” I say after a minute. “My mother is Monique.”

Daddy rolls his eyes. “I’ve got to stop screwing redheads,” he says, more to himself than to me.

He picks up the bagel, looks at it, pokes the cream cheese with his finger, makes a face, and sets the bagel down again.

“This is my fault,” he says, looking down at the plate. “If I had remembered that Monique was your mother, I would have spoken up and said the plan wouldn’t work.”

I smile in spite of myself. “You
did
speak up and you
did
say the plan wouldn’t work. You just didn’t mention Mother.”

“I did?” he asks, raising his head. Then he grins. “Oh, yeah. I did.”

Now, I roll my eyes.

“The point is, baby girl, you can come home now.” He pushes at the bagel. It’s almost like the food interests him more than I do.

“And then what?” I ask.

He frowns at me. “What do you mean ‘and then what?’”

I’m still feeling contrary. I’m talking back to my
dad
, of all people. So magical that he can stop the world from turning if he wants to. Worshipped as a god (at least once upon a time). Able to quell any dissent with a single glare (unless the dissent comes from his daughters, I guess).

“I mean,” I say, “do I get to choose who I live with or do I have to find new roomies. My sisters are still here, remember?”

“How can I forget?” Daddy says drily. He starts to answer the rest of it, but I talk over him.

“More important,” I say, “do I get my magic back? Because I’ve seen how people who are waiting for their magic to kick in get treated—”

(I did some of the treating, and “treating” really is the wrong word. It was no treat for them)

“—and it’s pretty awful.”

“Well, someone has to do the grunt work,” Daddy says. “It’s good for everyone to learn how.”

“You never did,” I say.

He grins and shrugs. “Some of us are just special.”

“So,” I say, “do I get my magic back the minute I arrive?”

He picks up the bagel and takes a giant bite out of it. His eyebrows go up.

“Hey,” he says around the food. I guess I got my bad habits from somewhere. “That’s pretty good.”

A horn honks on the street—I mean, not a normal New York get-out-of-my-way-you-jerkwad honk, but a get-your-butt-over-here honk. I look.

The car’s there, and Ron’s standing outside of it, staring at me. He’s leaning in so his right arm can hit the horn.

“You have to answer me or I’m leaving,” I say to Daddy.

He has shoved most of the bagel into his mouth. His lips move and he says “wrrymmgnnago?” and sprays some crumbs as he does so.

I think he said,
Where are you going to go?

I point at the car. He looks over, sees Ron, but doesn’t really see him. I think Daddy’s actually looking at the road.

He’s stalling.

“Am I going to get my magic back Day One or not?” I ask.

He licks his lips and makes a smacking sound.

I grab my purse and my book bag and get off the stool.

“No,” he says after a moment. “You’d have to petition.”

“Petition?” I know about petitioning. There were some things in the law books that Tiff made us read (okay, that Tiff read) that said that the Fates couldn’t make the final decision. Someone had to petition the Powers That Be.

Ron beckons me from the curb. I nod at him, then look at Daddy.

“You’re a Power That Be,” I say. “Can’t you make the decision?”

“Oh, I used to be able to,” he says, grabbing my bagel. I reach for it and drag it back. “Not too long ago, I could sway half the members, but I have to be honest, honey, the whole Fates debacle really screwed me over. That plus the diversity initiative. You know what that is, right?”

“I know that a bunch of you have complained about it for hundreds of years. Other so-called gods and magical beings from cultures you don’t approve of are now Powers That Be, and you can’t influence them. They even think you’re passé.”