Something True (16 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Darla

Standing on Wallace’s doorstep was just weird. I hadn’t been there in forever, and nothing had changed. They still had the elaborate welcome mat with the cursive
B
at its center. There were still two planters next to the door with no plants in them—just dirt—like always. When I rang the doorbell and it sang that familiar classical song, it took me right back to those summers in grade school when we used to go swimming in his pool with his babysitter and get locked out and have to run around to the front of the house, shivering in our wet bathing suits, to ring the doorbell.

But it was also weird because I wasn’t entirely sure what I was doing there. Did I really care about Wallace Bracken enough to come check on him? Did I really give a crap if he hated me?

I saw him peek out the side window, and my heart caught. Okay. Maybe I did. He opened the door.

“Hey,” he said plainly.

“Hey.”

I could see the grand piano on the other side of the foyer and smell something amazing baking in the kitchen at the back of the house. I waited, but Wallace didn’t invite me in.

“So, I’ve never seen anyone bolt out of their classes as fast as you did today,” I began.

He nodded, one hand in the pocket of his plaid hipster pants. “Yep. I kind of didn’t want to talk to you.”

That was the thing about Wallace. He didn’t sugarcoat things.

“If this is about yesterday, I’m sorry about what Veronica said,” I began, fiddling with the rings on my right hand. “She can be such a bitch.”

It felt brave to say that out loud, even though she wasn’t there.

“True. But she was also right,” Wallace said, putting his hand on the door handle. “You really shouldn’t be seen with me.”

My brow knit. “What?”

“I took a poll today, and while most of the unpopular kids would still vote for you if they saw you hanging out with me, a majority of the popular kids—and the kids who really want to be popular—said they’d be less likely to vote for you.”

I felt like my heart was being squeezed like an orange. He’d asked people this? He’d actually gone around school and made people tell him whether he was ruining my chances at homecoming queen and they’d said yes? To his face? What was wrong with people?

Somewhere deep inside the kitchen there was a crash. We both flinched. “I’m okay!” his mother yelled. “I’m fine!”

“Wallace, that’s insane,” I said finally, because I didn’t know what else to say.

He shrugged, averting his eyes. “Maybe, but from the beginning this has been about getting you elected, and if you want to get elected, you should stay away from me. Go be with your boyfriend. You know that’s what you need to do if you want to be queen.”

He made me sound so callous. Like homecoming queen was the only thing I cared about. Which, okay, it was something I cared about in a huge way, but right at that moment, standing there with him, it seemed so dumb. Why did he have to have his feelings hurt just so that I could get a plastic crown?

“Wallace, come on,” I said. “I wouldn’t even be in this thing if it weren’t for you.”

He chuckled. “You are so wrong. You were always in this thing. And Orion is a much bigger asset to you than I am.” His eyes flicked past me toward my house. “And there he is now.”

I glanced over my shoulder and sure enough, Orion’s car was pulling into my driveway. We hadn’t seen each other much today. I’d heard about the intense conversation he and True had that morning in the hall—the second in two days—and I didn’t know how to bring it up with him and not end up in a fight. So I’d spent most of the lunch period avoiding the table by walking around, handing out my Facebook cards. Then, when the bell finally rang, he’d bolted. It was like we’d made a mutual avoidance pact. But now, there he was, rising out of his car like some supermodel, slipping his sunglasses from his eyes as he squinted over at us.

“Go talk to him,” Wallace advised me. “Get this thing back on track.”

I gave Orion a quick wave, telling him to stay there and wait for me. “Wallace, I’m—”

But I didn’t get a chance to finish my apology. The door had already closed in my face.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

Orion

I held my breath as Darla cut across the lawn next door to hers—the lawn that apparently belonged to that Wallace kid—her arms crossed over her chest. She was so beautiful. Beautiful, smart, energetic, creative, funny. True was right. She didn’t deserve to be treated the way I was treating her. Something that was going to end right now. I had picked Darla. Of all the girls at Lake Carmody High, I’d asked her out. I’d asked her to homecoming. I wasn’t going to screw this up by letting True become a distraction.

Which I couldn’t do anyway, considering she wanted nothing to do with me.

I smiled when she got to the driveway, ready to be the perfect boyfriend again.

“Are you finally going to tell me what’s going on with you and True Olympia?” Darla demanded. Her brown eyes flashed as she lifted her pretty chin. No one could do righteous indignation like Darla Shayne.

“I’m sorry . . . what?” I asked.

“It’s a small school, Orion. People talk. They text. They tweet. I know you went to visit her at work yesterday before I got there, and I know you had some kind of fight with her this morning. You’re making me look like a total idiot.” She paused, and something shifted in her expression. “No, you know what? I don’t care about that. You’re making me
feel
like a total idiot. And I don’t like feeling that way.”

Okay. This was not good. I wasn’t sure what I was expecting when I came over here, but it wasn’t this.

“I’m sorry,” I said earnestly. “There is
nothing
going on with me and True. I promise. She doesn’t even want to be friends with me anymore, and she’s right. We have nothing in common.”

Darla sniffed and flipped her hair off her shoulder, staring off across the driveway. Her body language was arctic.

“What do you want me to say?” I asked. “I like you, Darla. A lot. I really do. You know that, right?”

“Do I?” She looked me up and down, shifting her weight from one high-heeled shoe to the other. “So prove it. Actions speak louder than words.”

Prove it? How? I felt like I was being quizzed on some awful TV show, and my life depended on whatever answer I would give. Prove it. Okay. I leaned in to kiss her. She leaned back. Honestly, she looked disgusted.

“That is
not
what I meant!”

I let out a groan of frustration. This was nuts. Maybe I should just give up on girls. Clearly, I didn’t understand them. Clearly, I had no clue what any of them wanted. One minute True was all over me, the next she was shoving me away and running. Meanwhile, Darla had been basically pawing me ever since I met her, lately even telling me what she wanted and where to be and when, and now she was keeping me at arm’s length and expecting me to figure it out myself.

Desperately I looked around, as if the sky would somehow offer up an answer, and then I saw the pom-pom hanging from my rearview mirror. Something True had tied to my first spirit basket.

“I’ve got it!” I announced.

I whipped out my phone and hit the speed-dial button for Peter Marrott. He picked up right away.

“Hey, man,” he said. “What’s up?”

“Hey, Peter,” I replied while Darla eyed me like I was cracked in the head. “Are you with Claudia right now?”

“Yep.”

“Can I talk to her?” I asked.

There were some muffled noises, and then I heard a huff of air. “Orion?” Claudia said. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing. I just want Darla Shayne to be my booster from now on.”

Darla stopped breathing. I saw the light return to her eyes. A little bit, at least.

“Ooookay. So you want me to, what? Fire True?” Claudia asked.

“If you don’t mind,” I said. “If not, I can tell her. It’s not a problem.”

Which was a lie, of course. Telling True I was replacing her with Darla would mean getting her to talk to me, which didn’t seem like much of a possibility anymore. But I’d find a way if I had to.

“No, it’s fine. I’ll take care of it. Anything else?”

“No, that’s it. Thanks, Claudia.”

I hung up the phone and looked Darla in the eye. “So?”

A smile finally broke across her face. She flung her arms around me and buried her nose in my shoulder. “Thank you,” she said. “That was perfect. You are perfect.”

I tried to shrug, which didn’t really happen what with her clinging to me. “I have my moments.”

Then I leaned in to kiss her, and it was a perfect kiss. We were a perfect couple. And from now on, I was going to concentrate on that. True was not a part of my past, she was not a part of my present, and she would never be a part of my future.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

True

My eyes were sore as I stared out the front window of Goddess Cupcakes on Monday evening. As hard as I tried to take Hephaestus’s advice and put Orion out of my mind, I’d kept randomly leaking sorrowful tears all day long. To make matters worse, Wallace had spent the entire lunch period polling with his iPad, and when I’d tried to ask him how things were going with Darla, he’d scurried off with his head down, muttering something about crunching numbers. I’d made no progress with my couple, and I couldn’t seem to pull myself up from this pit of despair into which I’d sunk. As I watched families trot by toting pizza boxes, groups of friends texting and laughing, and couples strolling without a care in the world, I couldn’t help thinking of something Orion—
my
Orion—had once said to me.

“I’d rather spend whatever short time I have here with you than hang among the stars, watching life go on without me. Watching you go on without me.”

At the time, we’d laughed over the extreme melodrama of his words, but now I felt them to my core. The only thing I wanted was to be with him. And now I was watching the world go by without him by my side.

I was just about to drown my sorrows in a black coffee when Wallace walked in. Deep within my chest I felt the slightest sparkle of hope. News. At least I was about to get news.

“I’m done,” Wallace announced. “Stick a fork in me.”

My heart sank. “What do you mean, you’re done?”

Wallace plucked the napkin dispenser off the counter in front of me and fiddled with it, pushing the napkins all the way in until they bounced back out again.

“Darla and me? We’re never gonna be together,” he said. “I thought we were from different social worlds? Turns out most people think we’re from two different species. It’s not gonna happen. I already told her I thought she was better off with Orion.”

No. No, no, no. He couldn’t give up now. He and Darla were meant for each other. It was written across their faces whenever they were together. I could feel their connection in my bones. How could they just ignore it? Because other people didn’t approve?

“But Wallace, you can’t let others dictate your life . . . your happiness,” I said desperately. “Please don’t do this. Don’t give up. You have to—”

“I don’t want to talk about it, True,” he said, replacing the napkins with a clatter. “I just came to tell you it’s over. And to order a triple chocolate to go.”

He hazarded a smile. I felt like I was going to throw up. What was I going to do? How was I going to fix this? Gods, if only I had my arrows. Then this would be a done deal, and I’d know I’d done the right thing by matching them. But that was not an option. I needed a new plan. I needed to regroup. I needed to stop hyperventilating.

“True?” Wallace eyed me with concern. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Yes. I’m fine.” I took a deep breath. “One triple chocolate, coming up.”

I served Wallace his cupcake, and he headed out just as Tasha came in, tugging off her jacket. Perfect. My replacement. I needed to get out of this place, stat. I needed some air, some time to think. I pulled my phone from my pocket and texted Hephaestus. Tasha was here to relieve me, so it was time to go home. Goddess was in walking distance to the house, but he and my mother had insisted that I shouldn’t walk around town on my own anymore, not after Apollo’s threat. Hephaestus had essentially volunteered to become my driver and bodyguard.

DONE FOR THE NIGHT. CAN YOU COME?

He texted back almost instantly.

FIFTEEN MINS.

I trudged into the back room, where Dominic sat at his desk, crunching numbers with a calculator and pencil. Over in the kitchen I could hear a couple of the bakers laughing and banging around, cleaning up after today’s work and prepping for tomorrow’s. I clocked out on the computer, then headed to the break room to exchange my apron for my jacket and my duffel bag. The bow and arrows clattered around inside it as the door closed behind me.

“Headed out?” Dominic asked, swiveling around in his chair.

“Yep. See you on Thursday.”

Dominic’s eyes narrowed at my bag. “You keep bringing that to work. What’s in there, anyway?”

“Just some workout gear,” I told him, patting the side of the black canvas bag self-consciously. “Headed to the gym.”

His eyes traveled suspiciously away from the bag and up to meet mine. I held my breath. He would be well within his rights to look inside the bag. This was his business. I was his employee. He held my gaze for a long ten seconds, and I knew he didn’t believe me. Then, finally, he returned his attention to his ledger.

“Have a good night!” he said, lifting a dismissive hand.

I breathed out. “You too!”

The back door had just slammed behind me when I saw something move out of the corner of my vision, and then I was on the ground. Pain crackled down my right cheek as it collided with the hard asphalt, and I skidded sideways, slamming the top of my head into a solid metal drainpipe. When I looked up, I saw flashing stars and behind them, the hovering figure of my good friend Apollo.

“This ends now,” he growled.

He dragged me to my feet and pulled back a hand, but as he shifted his weight forward, I ducked and spun, getting behind him. I lifted a foot, let out a guttural cry, and kicked him as hard as I could in the small of his back, sending him sprawling face-first on the ground. I turned and lunged for my bag to get my bow, but Apollo grabbed my hair at the top of my head and yanked me backward.

“What are you doing?” I demanded.

He flung me away and I faced him, my fingers itching for my bow and arrows, but Apollo stood between me and my bag now. I had no chance of getting to them unless I incapacitated him first.

“I can’t take this place anymore,” he spat, “and as far as I can tell, if you die, I get to go home. So now you’re going to die.”

He attempted a roundhouse kick to my head, but I ducked and swept his standing leg out from under him. His head hit the ground with a crack and he stared at the sky, breathless. Finally he coughed.

“You can’t kill me,” I hissed. “Hera wants me to fight Artemis, not you.”

He laughed through his heaving rasps and brought his hands to his chest. “As if I care what the queen wants.”

He stood up slowly, and I took a few paces back, glancing left and right. My instincts told me to flee, but he would only chase me down, and by then we might be out on the street, sparring in public. I couldn’t have that. I couldn’t put people in danger.

“You’ve been practicing,” Apollo said.

“There you go again,” I said. “Stating the obvious.”

With a sudden growl, Apollo threw himself at me. I tried to duck out of the way, but his shoulder collided with my jaw and he drove me backward into the brick wall, knocking the air out of me. Then, for good measure, he drove his fist into my gut, right in the center of my rib cage. The pain as I tried to suck in air was beyond all comprehension.

“Turnabout’s fair play,” he said in my ear.

I heaved in one breath, finally, and he hit me with a cross punch so hard I heard my cheekbone crack. When I fell sideways, I took the garbage can with me. At that moment, the back door flew open and Dominic stepped out.

“What the hell is—” His eyes widened when he saw me there, lying on my side on the ground with Apollo hovering above me. “What are you doing?” he shouted at Apollo. “Get out of here or I’ll call the police.”

Apollo rose to his full height, which was a good foot taller than Dominic, and sneered. “You dare command me, mortal?”

“Don’t!” I said through my teeth.

“Get the hell out of here!” Dominic shouted again, pulling his phone out and starting to dial.

Apollo looked down at me with an evil smile on. “I suppose we can finish this another time. Looks like it’s going to be even easier than I thought.”

Then he ran off, jumping over the upended garbage can and disappearing around the corner of the building.

“True?” Dominic asked, crouching in front of me. “True? Are you all right? Can you sit up?”

I nodded and, ever so carefully, pushed myself up so that I was leaning back against the wall. I breathed in, but the air got caught inside my tight chest and I coughed, holding on to my ribs as my cheek radiated pain through my skull.

“I’ll get you some ice. And water.” Dominic hopped to his feet, surprisingly spry for a mortal of his age. “Who was that guy?”

A million possible answers flitted through my mind. Old friend. Old enemy. But I wasn’t sure I could explain any of it to his satisfaction, so I simply lifted my shoulders, which hurt like hell.

“No idea,” I lied.

He didn’t believe it. He’d heard what Apollo had said to me. But he let it go. As soon as he was inside, I heard the singular rumble of Hephaestus’s van and allowed myself to go limp. The cavalry was on its way.