Cold Kiss Part 3

And what's more dangerous than bringing the dead to life? the voice in my head whispers, too sweet, like sugar icing on a poison cookie.

"And why did you think I would be happy you could sense that?" I whisper back. My arms are folded so tightly across my chest, the muscles are beginning to twitch, and I can almost see the flare of panic snapping in the air around me, hot blue fingers pointing the way to run.

"Because I'm different, too." He sounds so urgent, so honest. "How do you think people feel when they realize I know what they're feeling, if not what they're thinking exactly? When I can reach in and find the memory of them wetting their sleeping bag at a sleepover in third grade? Or getting blown off by the guy they like? Or seeing the creepy uncle who touched them the wrong way?"

"But they don't have to know," I hiss at him. "You just don't tell them, and that's the end of it. If anyone catches me..." I let the words trail off, hanging there in the sour air of the cafeteria between us, heavy enough to crash.

He doesn't even blink, and his gaze is so steady, so calm, I let it soothe me a little. "I'm not going to say anything, I promise. And we don't ... I mean, it's not like I'm holding it over your head. It just surprised me. It was cool to find someone else who was sort of like me."

"Freaks of a feather, you mean?" I say, raising an eyebrow, and he rolls his eyes.

"You're really a gla.s.s-half-empty person, aren't you?"

"For now I just want to keep my gla.s.s to myself," I tell him, but I'm smiling. I can't help it. He looks relieved, like he just stopped short of falling off a cliff.

Or driving his car into a tree, that same voice in my head whispers, and with a bang, it all comes back. Danny's still in Mrs. Petrelli's garage loft, and I'm still the only thing he has in the world.

I haven't even eaten my yogurt or my sandwich, but I push my tray across the table to Gabriel. I'm not hungry anymore.

"Save it for later," he says, and hands me back the sandwich. "Dorsey's cla.s.s will probably be better with a snack."

I snort, but I stuff it in my bag. The period's almost over anyway, and Gabriel grabs my tray when we stand up. I let him, and I let him walk out of the cafeteria with me, too. It's not a big deal-we're just walking together, not even touching.

Except when we go through the double doors into the hallway, there's Jess, sitting on the window ledge that overlooks the courtyard. David Starger is sitting next to her like the adoring puppy he is when she's around, and Alicia Ferris is venting about something to do with the yearbook-she's the photographer this year, which means that every other page will feature pictures of her.

Jess doesn't look happy. She looks shocked. Even worse, she looks betrayed.

And despite the way my heart sinks, for just a second I feel like telling her to get used to it.

By the time I get to World Lit, all I can think about is damage control. Jess might be a lost cause, but Darcia doesn't deserve to be hurt, not any more than she already has been, anyway. And I know Jess will have told her I was with Gabriel at lunch, when I haven't even been eating with her.

I used to be the one Jess came to when someone had done something outrageous or horrible, like Melissa Schine sleeping with Geoff Dormer before he'd even broken up with Sophie Mathis, or Sketch Harris tras.h.i.+ng the music room piano one day when he'd gotten some bad c.o.ke.

Jess's sense of justice is pretty bulletproof. For her, there are certain rules everyone is supposed to follow, and they're all unbreakable.

According to Jess's code, I'm pretty sure someone who's still grieving over her dead boyfriend isn't supposed to be walking around school with the new meat, especially when he's as good-looking as Gabriel is. And really especially when she's apparently too depressed to hang out with her best friends.

I slide into my seat next to Darcia, who's already got her notebook out and a pencil between her teeth as she highlights her notes with a bright pink marker. She gives me a sideways glance and something that wants to be a smile but doesn't quite make it.

"Hey," I say, dropping my backpack on the floor and stretching across the aisle to toe at her leg with one foot. My Doc looks huge and ugly against her faded jeans. "What are you doing after school?"

She blinks twice, and when her mouth opens the pencil falls out, clattering against the desk and into her lap. "Um, what?"

"I am speaking English, right?" I tease her, going for light and joking, the way we've talked to each other forever, until this summer.

But it's too late-her eyes flash confusion at me, like I haven't been her best friend for the last ten years. And it hurts.

"I just thought you might want to come downtown with me, maybe go to the cafe and hang out for a while," I say, pulling my foot back and sitting up straight. "You wanted to yesterday, so..."

It takes her a minute to understand that I'm not kidding, I guess, which hurts even more, and when she smiles, that hurts the most. For a second I wish I could throw my arms around her and tell her I'm sorry, for not being around, for ignoring the fact that she needs me as much as I need her, for everything.

But I can't do that here, so instead I let the sudden bloom of my own relief brighten the dull fluorescent lights and smile back.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

SHE'S WAITING BY MY LOCKER WHEN I GET there after last period, earbuds in and her ancient iPod clutched in one hand as she scrolls through the menu. For a minute it all feels so familiar-I can't even count the number of days Darcia or Jess or both of them met me just like this after school, here and in junior high, before we headed off for slices of pizza at Cosimo's or to crash in one of our bedrooms.

But when Darcia looks up at me, I can see the uncertainty in her eyes, and it hurts just as much as it did earlier.

"It's a good day for mochas," I say, fixing my best normal smile to my face. Maybe if I pretend nothing has changed, she'll start believing it.

"That's true," she says, glancing down the hall at the door. It's gray and windy, and the trees are nearly nude now, s.h.i.+vering as their cast-off leaves swirl along the ground. "I could go for some of Geoff's carrot cake, too."

"No, no, you have to try the pumpkin m.u.f.fins," I tell her, slamming my locker shut and shouldering my backpack. "He just came up with some new recipe last weekend, and I'm pretty sure they're illegal, they're so good."

She ducks her head when she grins, but she turns off her iPod and pulls out her earbuds as we head outside. Our shoulders b.u.mp companionably as we walk, and I hold my breath. This will work, I tell myself. I can do this. I don't have to disappear out of my own life, not completely.

Well, I don't want to. I don't know if that matters very much, but it's true. And as we make our way to Bliss, just like we have so many other afternoons, I ache. It's like a limb I hadn't realized was missing, a really vital one, has suddenly grown back.

The bell over the door jingles when we walk in, and Trevor looks up from his stool behind the counter and grunts a h.e.l.lo. His laptop is open, and he stares at the screen as if it's personally responsible for everything wrong in the world.

If he ever finishes the novel he's apparently been working on since, like, birth, I'm not sure I want to read it.

Darcia takes the table by the window while I wander into the back in search of Geoff. He's taking something out of the oven, and straightens up with streaks of flour like eraser dust on his dark cheeks.

"Hey there, Birdie." He slides the tray onto the nearest counter and leans over to kiss my cheek. "You're not working today."

"Nope. I'm here with Darcia." I poke at one hot m.u.f.fin and bend down to sniff. Pears, I think, and something else I can't identify, but it smells delicious.

He lifts an eyebrow and dusts off his hands. "Really? You two haven't hung out in forever."

"Spare me the drama." I roll my eyes and s.n.a.t.c.h a plate of almond cookies off the counter. "Can I make us some mochas or will Trevor have a meltdown?"

"Loverboy's too busy with chapter whatever the h.e.l.l it is to do much of anything today but glare at decent paying customers. Go for it." He winks when I grin, and I can hear him humming something as I walk out front again.

I set the plate of cookies in front of Darcia, who's hiding behind her hair and her earbuds from Trevor's suspicious glances. I've told her a million times that he's, well, not nice exactly, just permanently cranky, but she always gives him a pretty wide berth anyway. I'm used to him, since I've been working part-time at Bliss for more than a year, and Geoff has taught me every trick in the book for handling him.

"Mocha?" I ask her, removing one earbud.

She bites into a cookie happily and nods. With her feet tucked up beneath her in the window seat, she looks exactly like the Darcia I've known for so long, and I feel relief bubble up inside me again. The zydeco coming out of the cafe's speakers swells higher for a second, and Trevor looks up and frowns.

I manage to tamp it down and walk behind the counter to start the mochas. The only other customers in the cafe are two soccer moms who seem to be coordinating some kind of playdate on their BlackBerrys, and a college kid who's deep into The Riverside Shakespeare and keeps mouthing the dialogue as he reads.

It's good. It's right, to be here with Darcia, with Trevor scowling and Geoff baking, and for once I feel like I used to. Normal, or as close to it as I ever get.

But when I sit down, sliding Darcia's mocha across the table toward her, I realize I have no idea what to say. I don't know what she's been doing since school started, if she's still taking guitar lessons or if she ever talked her mom into letting her get a job. I don't know what new bands she's discovered or what boys she's crus.h.i.+ng on, and there are always a few, all admired from afar.

Even when Danny was alive we spent most of our time together. Even when Jess was dating Tyler Ford or that a.s.shole J.D. Springer, and Dar was starting to worry about getting into college. We'd started having weekly sleepovers when we were still young enough to be thrilled that Jess's mom had made Rice Krispies Treats and when staying up past midnight was still a big deal. By the time we were in high school the only difference was that we were talking about how J.D. didn't know that tongue in a girl's ear wasn't a good thing instead of which one of us was going to marry the lead singer of Fall Out Boy one day.

I knew when Darcia got her period, and she knew the day that Jess and I tried smoking. Jess heard all about the time I threw up wine coolers on Will Zorger's shoes, and Dar confided to us that she stole a lipstick from the drugstore downtown. Despite all that history, I suddenly have no idea what to say to her.

I can tell it's not any easier for her. She's put the iPod away again, but she's got her lit notebook open on the table like a s.h.i.+eld, and she keeps doodling in the margin instead of looking at me. When she speaks, it's such a surprise I almost spill my drink.

"So you're doing better now?" Her voice is soft, as tentative as always. "About ... Danny, I mean?"

And there it is. The reason everything is different, even if she doesn't know just how true that is.

"I guess?" I can't help making it a question, because I don't know what else to say. I can't tell her it's really so much worse now.

"I'm sorry." She swallows, looking anywhere but at me, a half-eaten cookie in her hand. "I mean, I'm not saying it's okay now, or that you're okay, that's not what I meant." Her words hang awkwardly in the warm, mocha-scented air. She looks miserable.

"I know what you meant, Dar," I tell her, even though I can feel the sharp edges of all the words I can't say, jagged and painful in my throat. "I'm trying."

That's the truth anyway.

"I know you loved him," she says, and puts down the cookie. It lies like a dusty half-moon on the plate. "How much you loved him. It's not a question of that."

I blink at her. "I never thought it was."

"I know!" She's flushed now, cheeks hot and pink. "I just meant..."

"You meant it's a question for Jess because she saw me at lunch with Gabriel." It sounds so stupid out loud. A boy sat with me at lunch and suddenly I'm on trial. G.o.d, if either of them knew what was really going on, you could probably hear the screams in Siberia. No, in s.p.a.ce.

"Wren." It's only my name, but I can hear questions and explanations and apologies in it. I ignore it, though. I'm too angry to worry about her feelings anymore.

"Don't, okay?" The lights overhead flicker and buzz, but I ignore them, too. "I didn't ask him to sit with me. I didn't ask him to keep talking to me. I don't know what his deal is, okay? It's not like I'm looking for a replacement for Danny, so you can tell Jess to back off."

"Wren." This time it's pained, surprised, almost breathless, and the sound of it is a dart, quick and sharp.

Don't go too far, that voice in my head whispers. Hold on. You have to hold on to her, to them.

"I don't mean it like that." I scrub a hand through my hair, and I know it probably looks like demented feathers now, but it doesn't matter. "It's just been a really hard time for me. There aren't rules for this, you know? Do X, Y, and Z and you'll be over it. It doesn't work like that, Dar. And I hate that Jess is judging me for something I haven't even done."

It's a cheap shot and I know it, but it works. Her expression is startled and defensive when she glances up at me, but I can tell the person she wants to defend is me.

"I can talk to her," she says too fast. "She misses you, too. And we don't know what to do, Wren. How to help. And you seemed to want to be alone, so we did that, but ... well, we miss you. Jess just gets mad about it."

"I know." And I do. Jess hates to be upset, especially when she feels like she can't do anything about it. And that makes her mad. She's been mad at me a lot the last few months.

"If you could just talk to her...," Darcia begins, and turns those big green-gold eyes on me. She's so hopeful, even when everything looks c.r.a.ppy. I think she was supposed to be a Disney princess instead of a normal kid in a middle-cla.s.s family.

"I tried that, and she told me to go f.u.c.k myself," I say, but there's no heat in the words.

"You didn't try very hard, if she told the story right." She crosses her arms over her chest, and I sit up a little straighter. Darcia doesn't get tough very often, and when she does, she's more pit bull than princess.

And there's that bone-deep hum again, vibrating through me, but this time nothing happens except for the way I open my mouth and speak before I can think twice. It's not magic, it's pure panic.

"Come over next Friday night," I say, and even I can hear the reckless edge to the words. "We'll have a sleepover, just like we used to, all three of us."

Darcia lights up like someone plugged her in, and then it's too late. She blinks at me and swallows hard, and G.o.d, if she starts to cry, I'm going to sink into the floor right here, but she holds it together at the last minute.

"I'll help you," she promises, reaching across the table to touch my hand. "I'll talk to Jess first, okay? But you have to call her, too."

"I will." I'm nodding, barely listening as she starts planning. All I can see is Danny, sitting alone on his bed, face twisted into confusion and maybe even panic. Friday nights, or some of them anyway, are his, the one night I can stay in the loft with him if I'm creative with the lies I tell Mom.

Mom, who thinks I've been with Darcia and Jess a dozen or more times since Danny died. That'll be fun, trying to keep them away from her so she doesn't ask any awkward questions about all the other nights I've allegedly been at one of their houses. And then there's Robin, who'll jump all over them like a lonely puppy, looking for the kind of attention they used to give her. All I need is for her to open her mouth about the times she's caught me creeping upstairs late at night when I was supposed to be in bed hours before.

Panic tastes a lot like metal, too bright and cold, and it freezes me in place, one hand curled around my mug and a weak smile on my face as Darcia chatters on about next week.

I figure I should probably get used to the feeling.

Darcia hugs me, one-armed and fierce, on the corner of Elm and Dudley where we always split up to go our own ways home. It's nearly five now, getting darker earlier and earlier every day, and the wind lifts her hair into a tangle of dark brown corkscrews as she walks away. She's facing backward, waving with her free hand, and I can't help smiling.

But the moment I turn around to head up Dudley toward home, my smile falls away. There's Gabriel, hunched into an ancient denim jacket, waiting for me on the next corner.

"Hey," he says when I reach him, and he sounds so easy, so casual, like we're best friends now, that for a second anger p.r.i.c.kles just under my skin.

I'm too tired to feed it, though, so I simply nod at him. He falls into step beside me, and suddenly I wonder if he can feel how confused and terrified I am about what I agreed to with Darcia.

"On your way home?" I ask, because distracting him seems like the best option.

"Yeah. I live up on the north end of Prospect."

Not far from me. Naturally. I swallow a sigh. He doesn't seem inclined to say much more, though, so I ask the next thing that comes to mind, "Where'd you go after school?"

"Downtown." He shrugs, and I realize he doesn't even have a backpack. "Looking for a job."

"Oh yeah? Find anything?"

"The guy at the bakery said he'd get back to me, and the manager at the movie theater gave me an application." He gives me a tight smile and turns his head to let the wind blow his hair off his forehead. "It's just me and my sister, so I could use some extra cash."

"Oh." I'm not sure what else to say, and in the thinning light, his eyes are hard to read.

"My mom died a long time ago. My dad isn't around right now."

"Oh. Wow." G.o.d, I sound like a complete idiot when I could be telling him I at least know how the second part feels.

"You don't have to be sorry," he says, and he smiles then, a wry and twisted grin that makes me laugh. "I mean, I know it sounds weird, but it's a good thing. My dad being gone, anyway. I miss my mom sometimes, but she was really sick, and she's not now, so... I think it's harder for Olivia."

"She's your sister?" We've slowed down, kicking idly at the muddy drifts of leaves on the sidewalk.

"Yeah. She's a bartender at Bar Car, that place down by the train station, and she teaches yoga at the Y some mornings."