Dead Push (Kiera Hudson Series Two#7) (18 page)

On the third day, Isi-bore stuck his head and shoulders out from below the grate. He looked pale and gaunt – like he had been ill in some way. I peered from behind a nearby tree and watched Isi-bore crawl out from beneath The Hollows. He closed the grate, hiding it from view with a handful of dead leaves and twigs. As I guessed he would, Isi-bore headed straight for the lake. The wind was blowing col
d and hard, and his long coat flapped about his shins.

He has a coat at last! I noticed. Perhaps mummy reminded him to wear one, just in case he caught a cold.

I watched him race along the shore, then search the bush where he and Melody snuck away to work themselves into a frenzy over the gardening books Isi-bore stole from the local library. The boy came out of the bush and looked in both directions along the shore. I guessed Melody might be getting herself tattooed up, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. I wouldn’t even if I could. It wasn’t my secret to tell. Pulling his coat tight about himself, Isidor headed back through the woods in the direction of Melody’s home.

The boy lingered by the front gate. Then watching him draw a deep
breath, he finally plucked up the guts to push it open and stroll up the front garden path. He knocked on the door while I hid amongst the trees. After what seemed like forever, the front door slowly swung open a fraction. I could just make out the lined and wrinkled face of Melody’s mother peering out at Isi-bore. From my hiding place it was difficult for me to hear exactly what was being said. With the wind gusting in the tree branches above me, I could only get snippets of the conversation. I heard enough though to understand that Melody’s mother was denying she even had a daughter. Was Melody dead already? Did that mean the photographer was on his or her way to the grate? But the photograph – it was of Melody and Isidor – I hadn’t seen any picture taken of them. So did that mean the girl was still alive? My brain started to ache again and I pressed my fingertips against my temples. I wished now that I had asked more questions of Lilly Blu before I’d accepted this stupid fucking mission.

“You were too busy thinking about killing her,” a voice said over my shoulder, and I didn’t have to turn around to know it was the bride who was taunting me.

“How many ways have I got to tell you to fuck off,” I snarled back at her. She must have finally got the message because she was gone already.

Needing to know if Melody were dead already, I sprang forward, taking on my wolf form. Just like I had in the woods, I slunk from my hiding place and around the side of the house.  

“You do have a daughter, and her name is Melody...” I heard Isi-bore say.

“Yakadee – Yakadee – Yak!” the old bitch cackled. “I ain’t listening because I never had
no daughter! Now get off my porch!”

With my long, black tail arrowed out behind me, I jumped down over the wall and peered in through the basement window. I pushed it open with my long whiskered snout. As a wolf I was far too big to squeeze inside like I had before. I heard the front door slam shut from the other side of the house. I bounded back over the wall, and keeping flat like a lion creeping up on its prey, I made my way around the edge of the house. Peering around the wall, I watched Isidor, make his way back down the front garden path,
then suddenly stop.

Did he know I was here?

He turned around, but instead of looking back in my direction, Isi-bore looked up at the house. A stupid-looking grin appeared on his face.

The fucking retard thinks this is funny, I thought.

Isi-bore then raised his hand and waved up at one of the bedroom windows. Then, without warning he took off his coat.

Another coat lost, I thought. Doesn’t this kid feel the freaking cold?

Isi-bore stretched open his arms and revealed his wings. No sooner had they unfolded, his feet were lifting off the ground and he was floating upwards towards the window. I peered around the wall and looked upwards. Melody was at the window. She opened it.

They spoke, although from the ground I couldn’t hear what it was they said. Isi-bore reached for her hand and pressed it flat against his
chest.

Now that did surprise me. He wasn’t even wearing a T-shirt. The boy was letting Melody touch his bare flesh. Perhaps things were looking up for these two. He then got even more daring as he leant through the open window, took Melody in his arms and swooped away with her in the direction of the lake.

How the fuck was I meant to follow the boy and girl if one of them could fly? I panted, setting off across the fields at great speed. With my long pink tongue lolling from between my jaws, I reached the treeline surrounding the lake. I sat on my giant haunches in the shadow of the trees and watched Isi-bore and Melody standing together on the shore, by their secret camp. With fingers shaking, I watched Isi-bore reach out and slowly remove the girl’s bonnet. Her long hair fell down her back. In the pink light of the fading sun sparkling off the lake, it made her hair shine like glitter.

Isi-bore gently sunk his hands into the thick curls of her hair. His wings rippled in the breeze, swooping down off the mountains in the distance.

“Do you like it?” Melody asked him, looking shy.

“It’s beautiful,” he told her.

Melody tenderly brushed her fingertips over his wings and down the length of his arms. “That’s why you fled that day, wasn’t it?” she said.

“Yes,” he told her. “I could feel myself changing and I thought you would be scared of me.”

Hearing this, I realised the true reason Isi-bore had fled that day on discovering Melody had been whipped by her mother. It wasn’t because he lacked courage. He was going to change into his true Vampyrus self. He’d wanted to keep the fact that he was a monster hidden from Melody.

“You’re not scared of me?” I heard him ask her, now that he had found the strength to truly be himself in front of her.

“How could I be scared of an angel?” Melody whispered, looking up into his eyes.

And again I wanted to be sick. I dropped down, placing my snout on my giant paws. But this time, I didn’t feel sick because of their display of tenderness and love for each other – I felt sick because I envied them.  

“Thank you,” Isidor smiled down at her.

“Thank you for what?” Melody breathed.

“For liking me for who I am. For not laughing at me because I couldn’t read and write,” he told her.

“Thank you for not being cruel to me for how I dress and the way I live. Thank you for taking the loneliness away. I was so tired of being lonely, Isidor,” Melody told him.

I couldn’t stop the yelping sound that came from deep within me. I buried my snout beneath my paws and tried to block out the sound of my mother’s voice that was now screaming in my ears.

“
Paint! You can’t paint! Even Father Paul was getting sick of you! He kept looking over at me and shaking his head in despair!”

I placed my paws over my ears to block out her voice. Father Paul
had helped me to paint like Melody had helped Isidor to read. He hadn’t laughed at me that night, nor had he looked at my mother with despair – just like Melody hadn’t laughed at Isidor because he couldn’t read or write. It was me who had laughed at Isidor. It was me who had called him a dumb-fuck. It was me. It was me. 

You
ruined Father Paul's evening and everybody else’s. Now get to bed!
My mother screeched inside of me.

I hadn’t wanted to go to bed because I hadn’t liked being on my own. I hated the loneliness I’d felt as a boy. I had learnt what true loneliness had been that Christmas my mother had left me alone in that café. I could still feel the emptiness at being left out of the fun they were having together. I understood Melody’s loneliness. It was like a wide, black hole was sucking your soul out. Like Melody, I’d felt lonely. There is nothing worse than that feeling. Melody was so fucking lucky. Isidor and Melody were both so fucking lucky to have each other. And I couldn’t help but feel myself hate them for that.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Potter

We sat in silence for most of the car journey back to Kiera’s apartment. I was counting down the minutes until she finally said what I knew she had been dying to say since leaving the house of the dead boy.

“You heard what that woman said, didn’t you?” Kiera finally remarked.

“What was that?” I said, lighting a cigarette and opening the window so I could blow the smoke out. The rain had stopped, but the wind battered into the side of her tiny car.

“The woman said that her brother claimed the teachers at the school were check
ing the girls to see if they had wings,” Kiera said, watching the road ahead. 

“The kid was freaking suicidal,” I remarked. “He was delusional. He jumped in front of a train wearing his nephew’s rubber Maggot Foreskin mask.”

“Frogskin,” Kiera corrected me.

“Whatever,” I grunted. “The point I’m trying to make is that who knows what thoughts those wolves put inside those kids’ heads.”

“But what about the others?” she argued.

“What others?” I shot back.

“All those people in those newspaper clippings I’ve collected,” Kiera reminded me.

“How many of those people went to schools like Ravenwood?” I tried to convince her. It wasn’t easy to lie like this to Kiera. I had to keep reminding myself that this wasn’t my Kiera. If she was eventually going to remember then so be it – but I couldn’t be a part of that process. I shouldn’t even be in the car with her right now. Both me and Jack had been warned not to get involved – not to change anything about the lives of the people we had come back to watch. I wondered how Jack was getting on. He had the easy mission. He only had to sit behind a tree and wait for the photographer to show up. How complex could that possibly get? He had no connections to either Melody or Isidor. 

“What about those lumps on my back?” Kiera asked.

“Huh?” I said, pushing thoughts of Jack Seth from my mind.

“Those things sticking out of my back?” she sighed.

“I dunno,” I shrugged. “Have you seen a doctor?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “You’re the only person who knows about them. I haven’t even told my dad.”

“How long have they been there?” I asked her.

“Just a couple of weeks,” she explained. “They look like fingers.”

“They look like tiny little lumps,” I said, trying to play down her concerns. “They could be moles.”

“Moles!” she scoffed. “The lumps feel hard, like bone.”

“Okay so they’re not moles, but that doesn’t mean they’re wings,” I
told her. “If I were you, I’d keep an eye on those lumps for the next couple of weeks, and if they’re still there, go and get them checked out by your doctor.”

“I guess you’re right” she sighed, driving us through town towards her apartment.

I looked away, knowing that she would never know if I was right or wrong or what the lumps truly were. This Kiera didn’t have a couple of weeks left to live. The next doctor to see Kiera would be pronouncing her life extinct.

Not wanting to think about that, I lit another cigarette and said, “Why did you think I’d been working with the wolves?”

“Sorry?” she frowned.

“When you found me hiding in the alleyway, you said that I was working with the wolves,” I reminded her. “What did you mean by that?”

“You went to work with the wolves on that special investigations unit, remember?” she said, glancing at me.

“So?” I shrugged, knowing I was now talking about the Potter who had left Kiera in this
pushed
world and not me.

“That’s why you said you were leaving, because you wanted to work with the wolves,” Kiera said.

“Really? Did I say that?” I said, suspecting that the other Potter must be completely different from me, as I could never imagine myself volunteering to work alongside the wolves. Working against them, yes, but never with them.

“To be honest, you didn’t say much, and that’s why
your leaving hurt so much,” Kiera said. “I just woke up one morning and you had gone.”

“I’m sorry,” I whispered on behalf of the other Potter. Was he sorry? That I would never know.

“Why didn’t you call me?” she asked, sounding hurt rather than pissed off.

“I thought…” I started.

“I tried calling you but your phone was always switched off,” she said. “I called ‘C’ Division and they said you were away on special operations and un-contactable.”

“I’m sorry…” I tried again. Why was I apologising for this other Potter? It should be him, not me. Sure I’d screwed up plenty in the past, but for once this wasn’t one of my fuck-ups! 

“So you keep saying, but you haven’t explained why you’re back,” she said.

“Let’s just say things didn’t work out for me with the wolves,” I said. “They never really have.”

Before Kiera had a chance to question me any further of the disappearance of the other Potter, the sound of Bruno Mars singing
Just the way you are
came from her coat pocket. Taking one hand from the wheel, Kiera pulled out the phone and passed it to me.