“Are you offering to keep vigil all night? No, I didn’t think so. So long as you kids are living under this roof, your parents will make the house rules,” Bernie replied.
Xavier groaned as if to indicate he’d heard this speech before.
“There’s no need to react like that,” said Bernie. “I’ve raised my children to adhere to certain values, and sex before marriage is not something this family condones. I hope you haven’t changed your position on that, Xavier?”
“Of course not!” Xavier declared with mock seriousness. “The very idea disgusts me.”
His sisters couldn’t hold back then, and their explosion of laughter lightened the mood.
They were immediately joined by their younger siblings, who had no idea what they were laughing about but didn’t want to feel left out.
“Sorry, Beth,” said Claire once she found her breath. “Mom gets on her soapbox sometimes, and there’s no telling when it might happen.”
“There’s no need to apologize, Claire. I’m sure Beth understands what I’m saying. She seems a very responsible person. Is your family religious at all?”
“Very,” I said with a smile. “I think you’d really get along with them.”
For the rest of the night, we talked about safer topics. Bernie asked a lot of noninvasive questions about my interests at school and dreams for the future. Xavier had predicted the turn the conversation would take, and I had carefully rehearsed my answers beforehand. Claire brought a thick copy of Brides to the table and asked for my opinion on countless gowns and wedding cake designs. Nicola sulked and made sarcastic remarks whenever spoken to. The youngest ones came to sit on my lap when it was time to eat dessert, and Peter cracked what
Jasmine called “Dad jokes.” Xavier just sat with his arm around me, looking very content and dropping comments into the conversation at random intervals.
That night was as close to earthly normality as I had ever experienced, and I loved every minute of it. Xavier’s family, despite their petty disputes, were so close-knit, so loving, so human, and I wanted more than anything to share what they had. They knew one another’s strengths and flaws, and they accepted one another regardless. It amazed me how open they were and how much they knew about each other—even little things like favorite ice cream flavors and movie preferences.
“Should I see the new Bond film?” Nicola asked at one point during the night.
“You won’t like it, Nic,” Xavier replied. “Too much action for you.”
Gabriel, Ivy, and I shared a bond of trust, but we didn’t really know one another in the same way. Most of our reflections were internal and never expressed. Perhaps it was because we weren’t required to have personalities that were distinctly our own; so we never spent time developing them. As spectators rather than players, there were no decisions to be made, no moral dilemmas to be solved. Having achieved oneness with the universe meant that we had no need for personal connections. The only love we were supposed to experience was a generic one, which encompassed all living things.
I realized with a pang that I was beginning to identify with humans more strongly than with my own kind. Humans seemed to want to be deeply connected to one another. They both feared and craved intimacy. In a family, it was impossible to keep secrets. If Nicola was in a bad mood, everyone knew about it. If their mother was disappointed, they only had to look at her face to see it. Pretense was a waste of time and energy.
At the end of the evening, I felt enormously grateful to Xavier. Allowing me to meet his family was one of the greatest gifts he could have given me.
“How do you feel?” he asked when he pulled into my drive.
“Exhausted,” I admitted. “But happy.”
That night I thought about something that had never occurred to me before. Bernie’s comment about sex before marriage had struck a chord. I knew it was possible for Xavier and me to have sex because I had taken human form and could engage in any physical human interaction—but what would be the consequences of such a decision?
I made up my mind to broach the subject with Ivy—but not tonight. I didn’t want to ruin my buoyant mood.
Warning Sign
I opened the door of the Literature classroom to find Jake Thorn sitting casually on the edge of Miss Castle’s wooden desk, his eyes fixed on her reddening face. I realized they hadn’t heard me come in when neither looked my way. Jake’s glossy dark hair was combed smoothly away from his face. His cheekbones looked razor sharp, and his cat-green eyes watched Miss
Castle intently with the hypnotic quality of a snake about to strike. A red rose lay on the desk, and I saw that his long, slim hand rested lightly over hers. There was no sound in the room other than Miss Castle’s shallow breathing.
“This is inappropriate,” she whispered.
“According to what laws?” Jake’s voice was low and confident.
“The school’s for one. You’re my student!”
Jake gave a low chuckle. “I’m all grown up—old enough to make my own decisions.”
“But what if we’re caught? I’ll lose my job, I’ll never be able to work as a teacher again, I’ll . . .” I heard her sharp intake of breath as Jake pressed a finger against her lips and then slid it teasingly down till it rested in the hollow of her throat.
“We can be discreet.”
Just as he leaned toward her and Miss Castle closed her eyes, there was a loud bang from behind me, followed by a stream of cursing. Ben Carter had just arrived and accidently jammed his bag in the door. Jake sprang up from the desk with a feline grace while a flustered Miss
Castle shuffled papers and tried to smooth her hair.
“Hi,” Ben grunted as he pushed past me to his seat, oblivious of the exchange he had just interrupted. He threw himself into his chair and scowled at the clock. “I’m not even late.”
I took a seat behind Ben as other students began to file into the classroom and stared studiously at my desk. Someone had scratched into the desktop, “English Is Death. Death Is
Crap.” I didn’t want to look at Jake; I was shocked by what I’d seen. I knew I had no right to be.
Jake was eighteen, he was entitled to make a play for whoever he liked. But Miss Castle was a teacher; surely she deserved more respect. I shook my head resolutely; it was absolutely none of my business.
I should have known he wouldn’t let me get away with ignoring him. He slid into the seat beside me.
“Hello,” he said, his voice slick as oil. His eyes were even more captivating than his voice.
When I looked into them, it was hard to look away.
Things were starting to change at Bryce Hamilton. It was hard to pinpoint exactly what had changed or when, but the school felt different. There was cohesion where there had only been disparity when we first arrived. Involvement in school activities had never been so popular, and judging by some of the posters that had appeared around the place, there was a new awareness of global issues. I could claim no credit for these improvements; I’d been far too preoccupied with fitting in and getting to know Xavier to have given much thought to anything else. I knew the change was due entirely to the influence of Gabriel and Ivy.
From the outset, people in Venus Cove recognized Ivy’s commitment to helping others.
Although she didn’t attend the school, she was busy gathering support for various causes from animal welfare to environmental issues. She campaigned for these in her usual soft-spoken manner—she didn’t need to be loud to get her point across. Bryce Hamilton had asked her to speak at assemblies to inform the students of upcoming charity drives and fund-raisers being held in town. If there was a cake drive, car wash, or Miss Venus Cove competition to raise money for a good cause, Ivy was usually behind it. She seemed to have created an entire social service program within the town, and a small but growing number of volunteers opted to help out on Wednesday afternoons. The school had even introduced a volunteer program as an alternative to afternoon sports. This involved helping out at local charity groups, shopping for elderly members of the community, or working at the soup kitchen in Port Circe. Some people, admittedly, feigned interest as an excuse to get closer to Ivy, but most were genuinely inspired by her dedication.
However, with only two weeks left until the senior prom, all social service projects were temporarily abandoned. The mood of the girls at school was bordering on obsessive. It was hard to believe the time had passed so quickly. It seemed like only yesterday that Molly had circled the date in my planner and berated me for my lack of enthusiasm. To my surprise, I now found myself as eager as everyone else for the big night to arrive. I clapped and squealed along with the rest of the girls whenever the subject came up and didn’t care how puerile it looked.
On Friday I met Molly and the girls out front after school for our long-anticipated shopping trip to Port Circe. Port Circe was a large town just a half-hour train ride south. With a population of some two hundred thousand, it was significantly larger than Venus Cove, and many of the people living in our sleepy town commuted there daily for work, while the teenagers went there to shop or to sneak into nightclubs using their fake IDs.
Gabriel had handed me a credit card along with instructions to be sensible and a reminder of the irrelevance of material goods. He knew how dangerous it was to let a pack of teenage girls loose with a credit card, but he had nothing to worry about; my chances of finding something I liked were slim. I was particular when it came to clothing and I had a very clear picture of how I imagined myself looking on the night of the prom. I had set my standards rather high. Just for that night, I really wanted to look as well as feel like an angel on earth.
I was nervous as we headed down the main street toward the station. This would be my first experience on public transportation. Much as I was looking forward to it, I couldn’t help feeling a little apprehensive. When we got there, I followed the others through an underpass and up onto an old-fashioned platform. We lined up at the booth and bought tickets from a gruff man with gray whiskers behind the window. He shook his head at the racket the girls were making, and I gave him an apologetic smile as I tucked my ticket safely into my wallet.
We moved to sit on the wooden benches lining the platform and waited for the four-fifteen express to arrive. The girls continued to talk over one another and typed text messages at
TO
FRAU HALE, FOR TEACHING ME ABOUT