From a Dream: Darkly Dreaming Part I (16 page)

My dad wandered into the kitchen just as I finished putting together the salad. The sauce was already simmering, and I asked if he could keep an eye on things while I got ready. He settled at the kitchen table with the paper, and I reminded him that Darcy was outside before I raced upstairs to grab my robe from the bedroom.

By the time I stepped into the shower, I was really hoping that the hot water would calm my nerves and slow my pulse, which sped up every time I thought about Will. After a few minutes, I grudgingly turned off the hot water and stepped into the chilly bathroom, where I took the time to blow-dry my hair. Self-consciously, I dabbed on lip-gloss and some eye shadow before inspecting my appearance in the mirror, trying my best to ignore the scruffy robe.

In the bedroom, I slipped on one of my nicer bras and underwear and hastily cut the tag out of my never-worn top. After sliding the shirt over my head, I pulled on my pants and the pair of black ballet slippers I had worn to the party from hell. Finally, I wound my hair in a bun and clipped it with a pin.

I checked the clock again as soon as I reached the living room. It was almost seven-thirty. When I got to the kitchen, my dad was still in the same spot as I had left him with Darcy at his feet. After I put on a pot of water to boil and grabbed silverware and napkins for the dining room table, my dad looked up, his expression surprised.

“You look nice.”

I blushed.

“Thanks,” I said with a crooked smile before walking to the small space adjacent to the living room that served as our formal dining room.

I found some pathetically burned-down candles from the hutch and began hunting for matches. From where I stood, I could hear the windows and back door rattling in the wind. The sound made me shudder. My mom had always said the howling wind sounded like banshees, which made me wonder what she would have thought of Oregon’s weather.

“Dad, are you going to pick up Mrs. Hendrix?” I called.

“Sure, I’ll head over in a second. When is your friend supposed to come over?”

“Any minute,” I said, trying to keep the edge of panic out of my voice.

My dad stopped and turned back when he reached the front door.

“Remind me again. What’s our guest’s name?”

“Will Kincaid.”

“Kincaid? Same as the street?” my dad asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“All right. I’ll be right back with Mrs. Hendrix … and Angel. I hope your study partner isn’t allergic to obnoxious little poodles,” my dad said with a laugh.

I turned to get drink glasses from the kitchen. Mrs. Hendrix, who had a terrible sweet tooth, always had a soda, and I got my dad his favorite beer. Not sure what to get for Will, or if it even mattered since he never seemed remotely interested in food, I settled on sparkling water for both of us. I sighed. There was a good chance that he wouldn’t touch anything at all, considering lunch at Ford’s had been the first and only time I had seen him eat anything.

When my dad returned with Mrs. Hendrix, she was exclaiming about the wind and fussing with her hair as my dad escorted her into the kitchen. I smiled. As usual, she was dressed for a night out on the town, complete with pumps and a small purse. Angel skittered into the living room and curled up on my dad’s chair. A minute later, right at seven-thirty, our seldom-used doorbell rang, causing my heart to leap out of my chest.

“I’ll get it!” I called, tripping over my feet in my haste to reach the door before my dad.

I glanced back, but he and Mrs. Hendrix were engrossed in conversation. When I looked out the small window at the top of the door, my heart took off at a ridiculous gallop at the sight of Will’s tall form through the frosted windows. Trying to keep my breathing even, I swung open the door. My heart stalled and then started again even faster. Will wore a charcoal gray V-neck sweater, a blue dress shirt beneath it, and a gray jacket. He was breathtaking—which just pissed me off.

It took an extra second to comprehend that Will’s look of surprise mirrored my own, but his expression bordered on furious as his eyes met mine. Realizing that I had probably turned a volcanic shade of red, I stepped aside to allow Will to join me in the entryway. By the time my dad appeared behind me with his hand extended, Will’s expression had melted into one of total ease.

“Dad, this is Will. Will, this is my dad, Aaron.”

“Mr. Casey, it’s very nice to meet you,” Will said, his melodic voice charming, but subdued. “You have a very nice home.”

If my dad was thrown off guard by Will’s wholly un-high-school-student-like appearance, he hid it well.

“Thank you, Will. Come and meet our neighbor, Mrs. Hendrix—and prepare to be dazzled by my daughter’s culinary skill,” my dad said, winking at me.

I shot him a terrible look. Why of all nights did my dad have to choose tonight to be a goofball? As we entered the kitchen, Mrs. Hendrix rose from the table to greet Will. Before anyone could speak, Angel appeared out of nowhere, barking furiously. The little poodle skidded to a stop just before reaching Will and continued to yap, baring her teeth as menacingly as a ten-pound dog could. Darcy sauntered into the kitchen and gave the situation a dismissive look before wandering back into the living room. I shook my head.
Poodles
!

“Oh, dear. I am sorry,” Mrs. Hendrix said, moving forward to scoop up Angel, who was still shaking and growling at the intruder.

When Will extended his hand to Mrs. Hendrix, she took it and held it, pausing to peer curiously at him.

“Have we met before, young man?” she asked, her expression searching.

“I don’t believe so,” Will responded pleasantly. “I’m Will. I have a class with Aven. I’m very pleased to meet you.”

He smiled at her as their eyes locked.

“Oh, it’s very nice to …” Mrs. Hendrix trailed off.

I smirked as she began to lose the thread of her thought. So it wasn’t just teenage girls he could hypnotize, I thought smugly.

“It’s nice to meet you,” she finished before sitting at the kitchen table looking slightly dazed.

I watched Will while his back was to me. He looked relaxed—much more at ease than I would have been coming to dinner with strangers. Before I could turn away, his gaze shifted to me, and I took half a step back. The look in his eyes left me fumbling, and I quickly looked away, embarrassed to have been caught staring at him. Again.

“Why doesn’t everyone go to the table, and I’ll bring everything out,” I said, needing a moment alone to gather my thoughts.

“I’ll help you,” Will said immediately. “Mr. Casey, Mrs. Hendrix, please go ahead. We’ll join you shortly.”

I scowled at him as my dad and Mrs. Hendrix walked into the dining room, leaving us alone. Will’s smile had faded by the time he turned to me. He looked pissed.

“Aven …” he growled, stepping toward me. “Are you trying to destroy me?”

“
Wh-what
?” I asked, completely unnerved by his bizarre question.

My hands were shaking, and I took a step back, unsure of what to do. Suddenly Will was standing right in front of me, his hands gripping my shoulders. I looked up at him. The bright blue of his eyes was gone, replaced by an eerie slate-gray, like his irises had been drained of color. Suddenly it started to feel like I was falling, and the next thing I knew, I was sitting on one of the kitchen chairs.

“Are you all right?” Will asked.

“I-I’m fine. I just felt … dizzy. Wait, why were you being such a psycho a second ago?”

He smiled quizzically like he had no idea what I was talking about as I stared up at him.

“I’m
not
crazy. You’ve been acting insanely pissy the past two days,” I muttered, relieved to finally say it out loud. “Have you lost it?”

“
Pissy
?” he laughed.

“Yes,” I said stiffly as I stood up, wobbling slightly on my feet.

He laughed again and turned away. I watched as he methodically retrieved plates from the cupboards without being told where they were kept and quickly filled each dish with pasta and sauce. After expertly balancing all four plates at once, he disappeared into the dining room. I followed with the salad, trying desperately to make sense of Will’s transformation from comic-book hero to psycho to courteous dinner guest to short-tempered psycho to amnesiac—all in the span of days.

As soon as I set down the salad, Will held out my chair for me before taking a seat across from me. I blushed at the formality of his gesture, and as I sat down, I realized this was the first time we had used the dining room since moving from California. Having a fourth person added to our usual threesome felt strange, but it was even more surreal with Will as the extra guest. He looked out of place, like royalty at the peasants’ cottage. At least, though, he was acting calmer than a few minutes ago. Reassured that he wasn’t going to turn into a complete psycho during dinner, I took a shaky breath, and my nerves slowly began to settle.

“So Will, tell us a little about yourself,” my dad said before taking a bite of pasta.

I stared at my dad, praying that he wouldn’t turn into a parody of the concerned father and interrogate Will throughout dinner.

“Well, to be perfectly honest, I’ve been in witness protection the last few years, awaiting the trial of a high-level narcotics syndicate boss.”

My fork stopped mid-air, and my cheeks reddened. So-freaking-much for not acting like a psycho! The sheer lack of oxygen to my brain was going to cause me to pass out.
Seriously
?

“Oh my,” Mrs. Hendrix gasped.

When Will smiled at me, I gave him a scathing look for repeating what I had asked him about witness protection.

“I’m only joking, of course. I came here from St. John’s to finish school while the rest of my family prepares to come back to Oregon,” Will said.

I stared at him before looking over at my dad. Mrs. Hendrix still looked stunned, but my dad was … smiling.

“Aven, I like this kid.”

What the hell? Had Will just charmed my dad? I blinked and thought about pouring my dad’s drink down the sink, afraid Will had slipped him a mood-altering pharmaceutical. Instead I sat there, dumbfounded, as the two of them began discussing the merits of various universities on the West Coast. Every couple of minutes, I stole glances at Will, still unable to figure out his increasingly bizarre shifts in behavior.

Mrs. Hendrix seemed lost in thought throughout dinner, even after I asked her to explain bridge to me for the hundredth time—something she never got tired of doing. I caught her stealing an occasional inquisitive glance in Will’s direction, but I couldn’t blame her. I was so distracted by him that I barely touched my food. Will’s plate, to my surprise, was relatively clean by the end of dinner. I still hadn’t noticed him actually put anything in his mouth, but the food had managed to disappear anyway. Then I realized what Will reminded me of. A magician. An illusionist.
Now you see him, now you don’t
sort of thing. Everything about him was slightly unexplainable.

When I got up to clear the table, Will again offered to help. I watched as he balanced the dishes like a veteran waiter before disappearing into the kitchen. I joined him at the sink, where I rinsed dishes and set them in the dishwasher.

Suddenly a plate slipped from my hands, and I braced for the inevitable crash. It never came. I turned and saw that Will was standing beside me. Wordlessly, he handed me the dish before moving to sit at the kitchen table while I finished the dishes. Even with my back to him, I could feel his eyes on me as I removed the cake from the refrigerator and sliced two pieces, one for my dad and one for Mrs. Hendrix.

Just the thought of dessert made my stomach churn as Will continued to watch me silently. I set the teakettle to boil and went to the dining room where I set down forks and the slices of cake in front of my dad and Mrs. Hendrix. Will appeared silently beside me.

“Are you going somewhere?” my dad asked, his eyes betraying his shock.

I
never
passed up chocolate. In fact, my dad liked to tease that I would kill for a fix.

“Upstairs. Will and I need to start the outline for our History paper. Do you mind? I put water on for tea.”

“Sure, sweetie. Go ahead.”

I raised an eyebrow, surprised that my dad hadn’t even hesitated at the mention of me going up to my room with Will Kincaid. Before he could change his mind, I leaned over to give Mrs. Hendrix a quick hug. Then Will stepped forward.

“It was very nice meeting you, Mrs. Hendrix,” he said smoothly. “Mr. Casey, thank you again.”

“It’s good to finally meet another one of Aven’s friends,” my dad said.

I quickly leaned in and pecked my dad on the cheek. Then I fled upstairs before he could say anything else. I couldn’t hear Will’s steps, but I knew he was just behind me. As soon as I stepped into my room, I waited for Will to come in after me before turning the lock and whirling around to face him. I faltered when I saw he was already sitting at the edge of my bed. In the time it had taken us to walk upstairs, his attitude seemed to have shifted again.

“What was that about?
My family is in witness protection
?” I whispered angrily. “Were you trying to give my dad a heart attack?”