Flicker & Burn: A Cold Fury Novel (16 page)

That’s why their competitive preening toward Heather caught me off guard.

Rarely separated, always conspiring, they were going nose-to-nose over Heather.

Even from where I stood, I could see hearts in their eyes for her, and daggers for each other. A competition had begun between Ken and Kendra for Heather’s attention. The two people whom the Fep Prep masses admired, who secretly hated everyone, looked like they would kill each other to be her BFF, or GF, or some whole new BFFGF-I-HEART-U combination. Whatever situation was blooming between the trio, it was, to paraphrase Heather, not easily labeled. The three of them were staring at me now as Ken patted a seat between him and Heather, saying, “Hey-o, SJ! Park it!” while Kendra slid her butt a bit and said, “Sit here, SJ! Plenty of room!”

I felt my fist curl into a rock at being called familiarly by my initials by people who, yesterday, hadn’t even known my name. I stifled a desire to use their beaming faces as speed bags and turned to Heather. “Everything going okay?”

“So far, so good,” she said breathlessly, with no trace of nerves.

I thought of the tense way she’d spoken to her mom, of her anxiety as we entered school. She was so electrified now, so coolly in control, directing the crowd’s oohing-aahing attention with the flip of her hair or twist of her hip that she seemed like another person. Her voice hummed like a mermaid’s, her smile radiated sex and benevolence, and
oops!
—there was that thong again. Heather hadn’t been the focus of starstruck fans in a while (it had been three years since she was on TV) and the adoration was clearly energizing, transforming her right before my eyes. In fact, her own blue eyes glowed faintly, the gold flecks twinkled ever so slightly, and for a moment it was impossible to tear my gaze away. The world narrowed to an azure pinpoint, flattened out, and opened again, and I floated weightlessly into my subconscious. I shivered, staring at what was not my wildest fear but something more wrenching—my greatest desire. It wasn’t a perfect nose or Ken and Kendra White levels of popularity, or even harmony with Max.

It was my family, safe at home, with me in their midst.

My mom smiled, caressing my face with her whole, delicate hand, and my dad pulled me close while Lou hooked my pinkie, eyes shining smartly as he whispered, “Remember, we’re Rispolis. We stick together even when we’re not together. All or nothing.” I felt my mom’s touch, opened my arms to my dad’s embrace, basked in my brother’s presence. It began to seem possible that my family would actually materialize before me if I kept my gaze locked on Heather’s—that she could make it come true, and if so, I’d do anything she commanded, anything at all because, God, she was perfect and beautiful and generous. I’d lie, steal, and kill for her if only she would—

By force of will, I broke free with a psychic-suction
pop!
gobbling fresh air as if I’d been trapped underwater but knowing that barely a split second had passed. When I glanced at Heather, she seemed as confused as she was dazed, having seen my desire and not understanding what the vision had been or what was happening to her. She may have been experiencing flickers of cold fury, but clearly she’d felt its full force when she connected with me. And then, slowly, her confusion softened like hot lava, ebbed, and began to harden into something like secret self-knowledge. I could see it—that blast of cold fury through her brain and body felt like the most vital, valuable part of her that had been absent until now—and she could see that I recognized it.

I saw something else, and it was as much about me as her.

A torrent of fear, rage, and desolation caused cold fury to flicker and burn inside me; it was those same feelings that drew my victims’ worst fears to the surface and locked them under my control. Now, not only witnessing but
feeling
Heather’s power, I understood that while ghiaccio furioso is in the DNA, the emotions that activate it are unique to the carrier. Heather wanted nothing more than to be desired, using people’s greatest desires to place them in her mesmerizing command. I felt my legs moving, backing away in survival mode as she shook her head and licked at her lips, trying again to catch my gaze. By then I was pushing through a circle of admirers, enduring more greetings of “Hiya, SJ!” until I was alone in the hall outside the cafeteria.

After catching my breath, I peeked through a window in the door.

A throng of kids stared fixedly at Heather like she was a messiah relating the universe’s most closely held secrets of showbiz and rehab. She had their complete, mesmerized attention—disturbingly similar to what I received from homicidal mobsters. The difference was that they weren’t quaking with fear or silently sobbing as my audience did; they were worshipping her. It was plain now that she possessed ghiaccio furioso but wasn’t in control of it, or even had a clue what it was. The oddest part was that her internal triggers were so obviously different than mine. Instead of duress, fear, and injustice, her flame appeared to flicker when she was overcome by the twin emotions that seem to drive so many actors—nerves and neediness—and was paid off not with subservience from criminals, but idolization by the masses. I was sickly fascinated at the display, feeling its inherent threat, hoping she wouldn’t see me looking at her.

“What are you looking at?”

I jumped like a cat on a hot plate. “Max,” I said, catching my breath. “I . . . where have you been all day?”

He looked through the window and said absently, “Who’s that?”

“Her?” I said, unable to shake the guilt from my voice, unsure if it was from peeping or purposely avoiding him. “My cousin . . . Heather Richards.”

“So that’s her,” he said flatly. “The one who’s causing everyone to wet their pants. She was on TV or something?”

“
Two Cool for School,
” I said. “The original Becky. She was . . .”

“I never watched it. It always seemed so stupid,” he said. “She’s pretty, I guess. In a Barbie doll sort of way.”

“Yeah, she’s . . . from L.A.”

He faced me, a corner of his mouth lifting in a humorless grin. “Funny. I just got invited to move there.”

“What? What are you talking about?”

He looked back through the window. “My dad wants me to live with him. My stepbrothers miss me, and my dad knows I don’t get along with my mom’s boyfriend.”

“Gary the dentist? You don’t? Why haven’t you told me that?”

“It’s not like you tell me anything that’s going on in your life.”

I was suddenly so tired of hearing that, as if I had any choice in the matter, and a wisp of electricity crept along my shoulders as I said quietly, “You know your problem, Max? You’re a goddamn baby.” He turned with anger and confusion in equal measure, his lips separating but nothing coming out as I said mockingly, “Why won’t you tell me, why can’t I meet your family,
why, why, why
?” I was shocked at the animosity behind my words, but continued with, “You’re such a hypocrite . . .
you’re
the one who actually cheated! How does it matter if it was
with
me or
on
Chloe? Mister I’ll-never-lie-to-you was perfectly fine lying to her! Maybe I flirted a little, but I didn’t cheat!”

Max stood motionless and spoke deliberately, saying, “How the hell do I know
anything
you say is real? You’re a shadow, Sara Jane. Holograms give up more information than you do.” He took a step closer with his eyes locked on mine. “But I know one thing. Your little rant just helped me make up my mind.”

Trembling, I squeezed my lips against my teeth, feeling the ridges of my braces. “So you’re leaving? You’re going to California?”

“You know that I . . . you know how I feel about you. I think you like me, but—”

“It’s more than like, Max! I tried to tell you on the phone yesterday!”

“It’s not enough. Being with you is like dating a stranger. So yeah, it’s time for a change. When the semester ends, I’m gone.”

“No . . . I won’t let you . . . ,” I muttered, feeling my jaw muscles ripple and my hands squeeze into fists, blinking once as the cold blue flame ignited deep in my gut. I snared his brown eyes, held tightly, and watched terror spread through them like fingers of blood in clear water. I refused to let him leave me—I’d force him to stay using power that he couldn’t resist, and eventually we’d work out our problems, and—and then I saw his worst fear flickering like a black-and-white film that had been retouched in screamingly bright colors. It was myself as I am nearly every day, in jeans, Cubs T-shirt, sneakers, my dark hair long and loose, and eyes shining violently blue as the camera went close on my face. I smiled and said softly, “I love you,” and moved in for a kiss.

When I pulled back, the boy I’d embraced was not Max.

He was tall, masculine, and faceless, and spoke deeply, saying, “I love you too.”

Max’s worst fear was me with someone else—I’d planted it there. What I knew then was what I’d always known, that like he’d said, he wasn’t too good to be true, but he was
true
—Max was honest with me because he loved me. It wasn’t complicated but I’d made it that way, and I blinked quickly, unlocking his gaze from mine. He bumped along the wall, rolling his fists in his eyes as if they’d been scorched by sunlight. I knew then that I would never use cold fury to force Max to do or feel anything.

Instead, I would let him go.

It was the moment I’d been dreading, and now that it had arrived, it wasn’t anything like the poems or rom-coms said. There was no sense of freedom or relief, and no weight lifted from my shoulders. It was burdensome and painful, but I had to because he was right—I would never allow him into my deadly life and I refused to endanger his with the truth. And so I did the only thing left. When he opened his eyes, seeing me again, I pulled him close and kissed him hard, until it hurt.

It was so sweet, and it felt like death.

He parted his lips as if there were something to be said, but closed them again.

We looked at each other for a long time, and then the bell rang. Max went his way, and I went mine.

I didn’t look back because I would’ve turned and followed him, apologized, and—what? Begged him to be patient without telling him why? Asked him to love me back, because I needed so badly to be loved by someone who really knew me, except that he had no idea who or what I really was? The old Sara Jane, the girl who occupied this body only months ago, would’ve chased Max down and made up an excuse just to stay with him, knowing it was flimsy and temporary but not caring.

Somewhere along the way, I’d left her by the side of the road.

My life is not my own—remember the chauffeur—my life is not my own,
I thought, and I kept walking.

BREAKUP TUESDAY MELDED INTO SHOCK
Wednesday. Tomorrow was sit-down-with-Lucky Thursday, but I was too preoccupied to worry about it. Instead, I spent Wednesday drifting through school semi-blinded by thoughts of myself and forlorn at breaking up with Max. We floated past one another in the hallway and he lifted a chin in a slight hello, and I responded with a mumbled “How are you?” but nothing more.

The split had to happen, but he should not have walked away in silence.

Maybe he believed there was time to reverse course, but I knew that wasn’t true. Time is a liar. Things end brutally, quickly. In the icepick-sharp reality of my life, families vanish in a zephyr of blood, uncles plummet from Ferris wheels, and when you walk away from a boy, you don’t look back, because over is over.

Across a hallway of bobbing heads, I saw Max fumbling at his locker.

From the curve of his shoulders and twist of his mouth, I knew he was hurting.

I tried to remember if the last words I spoke to Lou or my mom were uttered in love, anger, or indifference, but I couldn’t. I recalled my dad’s farewell as he crept away in the Lincoln, but louder and more lasting was that I said nothing in response. I wished then for Max that he would’ve said whatever he held back before I walked away. The way my life was going, he’d never have the chance to say it. Because he was sensitive and smart, I knew that irretrievable moment would cut him.

“Hey, SJ,” Heather said, dragging a fingertip across the back of my neck, leaving a crackling trail as she passed by with the twins at her side. “What do you know?” Her voice was feathery soft and an aura seemed to flare around her. Kids gaped, genuflected, and one of them elbowed me to get near her.

“Heather!” Mandi Fishbaum barked as she and a pair of her look-alikes jostled past me. “We
really
need to talk about Saturday night!”

A pinched look crossed Heather’s face, like a supermodel who’d sipped vinegar. Not loudly but rising above the din, she said, “You just bumped into my cousin.”

Mandi licked her scarlet lips nervously. “Um . . . I did?”

Heather stepped up and put an arm on my shoulder. “Yeah. You did. You must not have seen her, because why else would you be so rude?” She smiled, showering the hallway with sparkles. “I like your hair, Mandi. Do you like it, SJ?”

“I guess so.” I shrugged. “It’s . . . big.”

She squeezed my shoulder and said, “It
is
big, and you are too, Mandi. Not, like, from a body mass standpoint. I mean underneath all of that makeup and stuff, you’re a big person with a generous heart who would love to invite my cousin to your party.”

The hallway was as silent as an empty library. In the history of Fep Prep, no one had ever told Mandi Fishbaum what to do, or for that matter whom to invite to her (notorious) parties. Mandi put on a smile, it slipped, and then she blew air from her cheeks and rolled her eyes. Without looking at me, not even trying to contain a sour-lemon pout, she said, “So . . . I’m having a party this Saturday night and . . . Well, anyway, you can come if you want to.”

“That’s
so
sweet of you,” Heather said in one of those amazing actress tones that convey pure sincerity, and that Mandi’s a bitch, and that the only thing my cousin cared about was me. I didn’t need to be defended—I could kick the world’s ass if I was coldly furious enough—but Heather’s regard for me, her concern, was like adrenaline to the heart, making me feel more alive. She lifted her perfect eyebrows in silent dismissal as Mandi obediently withdrew with an unctuous smile. Heather turned to me, grinning. “Get out your party dress, SJ. Have fun, fun, fun with the people who love you most!”

“I wouldn’t be caught dead there.” I smiled.

“I know. That’s why I love you.” She winked, walking away with the twins. At the end of the hall, she turned and waved, and instead of the real Heather Richards—former child star battling a virulent addiction problem—I saw the original Becky, reborn and projected into an alternate universe. It was as if she’d never been dumped from
Two Cool for School,
but rather the show had fast-forwarded to Becky’s senior year where, in a reversal of her character, she’d become everyone’s most beloved student. She had undergone less a transformation than an actualization of what she always wanted to be, not just on TV but in real life. I couldn’t stop looking at her floating away like an electric butterfly, as a thought bubbled through the murk—how amazing it was that she’d attained that level of idolization so quickly.

She’d ditched the green contact lenses, her eyes glittering like blue diamonds.

It was obvious that she was using ghiaccio furioso to make people fawn and follow; her commanding popularity, begun with a trickle of cold fury, had grown into a tsunami. Although I’d been aware of the phenomenon since I was small, the flame didn’t fully flicker and burn until months ago, and even then I had to dig through the old notebook to discover what it was. If Heather remained ignorant of its existence, perhaps she would do nothing more than crown herself Miss Fep Prep—except that experiencing cold fury came with an insatiable need to understand it, and oneself. It was clear she too felt a bond between us, and I couldn’t help but think that I owed her an explanation, which carried innumerable risks. It was a perilous consideration, one that I’d normally talk through with Doug, and it occurred to me then that he’d become invisible.

Our last contact was Monday when he left a note about the creature’s laptop. I knew he was around; he’d erased and re-scribbled the title of the Friday morning film on the Classic Movie Club announcement board. It was his normal ritual, except this time he’d scrawled TBA, to be announced, which was very unlike Doug. Further signs that he hadn’t completely tumbled off the planet existed at the Bird Cage Club, where Harry had been walked and messily fed, used clothes strewn on the floor, and his laptop plugged in to recharge, pinging provocatively. His absence should’ve made me nervous but I was trying to find my feet after splitting with Max, and when I wasn’t at school, I was trying to track down information about Juan Kone. Wednesday night, long after the city exhaled its workforce, I sat typing with index fingers on Doug’s laptop, staring at the glowing screen as if it were a crystal ball. First it revealed that Juan was some sort of genius and second, that he was fat.

Like, circus-sideshow fat.

I followed the trail of his academic and professional achievements, first at Universidad Nacional de La Plata, where he’d obtained degrees in pharmaceutical biology and food engineering. The Internet tagged him next when his dad, Oswaldo Kone, welcomed him into the family business, Kone Química (Kone Chemical), which produced additives for junk food; Oswaldo died a year later and left the operation to Juan. When Juan became CEO, a local newspaper,
El Día,
ran an interview. I scanned it, thumbing my Spanish dictionary, until Juan was asked about his influences and he named just one—his grandfather, Irving Cohen. Electricity tiptoed over my shoulders as I read how Juan’s childhood was spent at Cohen’s knee, “learning lessons from the injustices inflicted upon my poor grandfather that will guide me for life.”

Uh-oh,
I thought,
that sounds like Outfit talk for a vendetta.

I double-clicked on a photo, watching Juan crowd the screen—one more oyster cracker and body parts would be hanging from lampposts. He accepted an award while smiling into the camera, his suit straining to contain legs like bulging sandbags and arms like sugar-cured hams, the corpulence creeping to fingers as taut as twisty balloons. His face—small dark eyes, babyish nose, and oddly delicate lips—seemed to float in a pool of tapioca that spilled into a neck, all of it framed by a mane of black, lustrous hair. A mustache as straight and thin as a thread of yarn sat on his lip, while farther below, somewhere between the first and second chin, a glossy goatee perched. The only other distinguishing characteristic was pinned to his lapel—a yellow rose. It had been the signature of his grandfather, proof left behind that Ice Cream Cohen had robbed the Rispolis. I knew instinctively then that Juan was aware of the deadly rift between his family and my own.

The Kone Química website had been shut down; a later blurb on the
El Día
website reported that the factory had burned and the insurance payout was huge, but it didn’t mention Juan. In my mind’s eye, I watched him waddling from a private jet at O’Hare Airport with a suitcase full of cash and a head brimming with knowledge about junk food and drugs. I sat back and twisted the facts like a Rubik’s cube, from my family’s abduction by tinkling trucks to the creatures’ attempts to capture me to ice cream itself, both the slow-melting type and Sec-C. Step by step, the colored squares lined up—it wasn’t a lesson of injustice Juan had been taught by his grandfather, it was the limitless power of cold fury! Juan may’ve been after revenge, but what he really sought was contained in the brains of certain Rispolis. I had no idea how he could or would use enzyme GF, but there was no denying the fact that he wanted ghiaccio furioso.

I’d give it to him.

I would give him
me
in exchange for my family’s freedom.

It was the only way left. There were too many layers between us—too many creatures, hidden headquarters, and Weston Skarlovs. It was time to step into the bear trap; maybe cold fury would free me from it and maybe it wouldn’t, but either way, the standoff was over. I looked at the screen at Doug’s Friendbook page and found messages he’d recently traded with another Mister Kreamy Kone fanatic.

GoalieMoley:
You were the life of the party. God, you can really samba!

HotDoug:
It’s the life-saving S-C! Makes me feel like dancin’!

GoalieMoley:
And romancin’???

HotDoug:
You should know!

GoalieMoley:
BTW, have you RSVP’d for the MKK Cubs game on Sat.? You can invite a newbie but you’d better not make me jealous!!!

Several things got my attention—Doug as the life of a party, Doug doing the samba—but it was the romance part that stopped me. I knew that a deep self-loathing made my friend believe a relationship with another person was impossible. All I could think was that Sec-C must be pretty potent for such a solid inhibition to be lowered.

The cursor flashed.

I leaned into the keyboard, typing:

HotDoug:
I’ll be there! Bringing a special guest that some in the MKK community may know . . . Sara Jane Rispoli. She can’t wait to meet Juan Kone!

The message was as dangerous as the loaded .45 in my steel briefcase. Juan Kone had spun his sugary web in the shadows, but those few lines would force him into the open. I sent the message just as the elevator clanked to a halt. Carefully I closed the laptop, dropping the room into darkness. When footsteps and a murmuring voice drew near the control center, I snapped on the desk light and said, “It’s about time.”

Someone or something that resembled Doug shrieked, fumbling a phone.

“Sara Jane!” he said. “You’re awake.” He picked up the cell and spoke into it, yanking up too-large pants with one hand. “I’ve got to go. I have to get some sleep, and you do too. Because, silly, tomorrow’s a school day and good boys go to school. Me too . . . bye,” he said softly.

He turned with a smile creasing his sunken cheeks, as I whispered, “Doug?” It was a reasonable facsimile but one that looked more like a deflating bouncy house in the latter stages of collapse than my best friend. I hadn’t seen him in a week and in that time he’d lost enough weight that flesh hung from his body in folds, making him appear loose and melted under his now tentlike clothing. He was still overweight, but his entire being was reduced in a way that revealed an actual skeletal system, and a neck, and a waist. I moved closer, gaping, and said, “Are you . . . okay?”

“Never better,” he said, his eyes pulsing with a rosy glow. “Guess who’s dating an athlete?”

It felt like I was strolling through someone else’s dream. I mumbled, “Who?”

“Me! Doug Stuffins!” he trilled, holding the edges of his flapping polo shirt in his fingertips and curtsying. “A real, live
hockey player
!”

Doug had yet to absolutely self-identify as straight or gay, and I was sensitive about offending him. Tentatively, I asked, “Field or ice?”

He stepped forward and pulled me close. It was like being hugged by a bony bag of pudding. A sickly sweetness poked at my nostrils. “You’re kind, and you respect me. You’re an old soul,” he whispered. “It’s a stupid term, but true. Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For this!” he said, sweeping his hands over his body. “For introducing me to Sec-C! It’s saving my life!” I pulled back and took a closer look at him. His sudden relative smallness had been such a shock that I hadn’t noticed that his face was as pale as freshly butchered pork, his eyes had turned pinkish, and when he smiled his tongue was lavender; all of that plus the model-thin body straining to emerge from layers of cellulite, and a chill went across my skin.

I was staring at someone morphing into a creature, and it was all my fault.

I’d sent him to that Sec-C party to find out about Mister Kreamy Kone headquarters, and those freaky fans recruited and then absorbed him. Every instinct cried out to act now, immediately, and tear him free of that cult and its toxic frozen treat, but the reality was that I needed Doug as an entrée to the Cubs game and to Juan Kone. I was taking advantage of the only person who had truly helped me; it was boldly selfish on my part, but I had no choice. I’d told Doug from the beginning that nothing was more important than saving my family, that I’d use any means possible, and now that included him. So, instead of warning him about the danger he faced, I told him only that I’d made a major breakthrough and that it was essential that I go with him to the game on Saturday.

That’s when I knew for sure that Sec-C was affecting his body
and
his mind.

The world’s most inquisitive kid didn’t ask a single question.