Human (3 page)

"Possible, yeah." I nodded. Amadeo's worry for me touched me deep inside, chasing away all the uneasiness I'd been feeling.

"Sure," I said, getting out of the car and grabbing my backpack from the backseat. I offered him a smile as he brought the engine back to life and waved at me. This turned out better than I'd expected. Amadeo wasn't thinking I was crazy, at least not completely, and there was a chance that maybe, just maybe, Devin was some creature out of space who had toyed with people's brains this morning before I got to school.

"I'm fine, Mom," I said for God knows what time. "It was nothing. I was cold and wet, and got into the hot classroom and fainted. The nurse didn't want to risk anything, so I just stayed in the infirmary. But I'm fine, really."

"Are you sure, honey?" My mom's green eyes were full of worry. "Your sister is feeling better, but maybe you got it from her... We should take you to the doctor."

Yeah, probably. Just not to the ordinary doctor, more like a psychiatrist or something.

"No, there's no need," I said, breaking off a big piece of chocolate and stuffing it in my mouth. "I'll go if I start feeling sick."

"All right." My mom sighed, going for the stairs. "I'm going to check on your sister."

I settled on our soft cream couch in the living room and turned on the TV, switching through the channels. But I couldn't get Devin out of my thoughts. Who was he and why had he come here? And more important, how had he made people believe he'd been with us all the time? I closed my eyes. Did I believe in magic? I wasn't sure. What if things like this had happened before and I wasn't even aware of it?

A beautiful woman with
a long red hair and huge blue wings with golden strikes walks across the white marble floor, her long white dress fluttering in the wind. She looks up at the clear blue sky, the sun caressing her olive skin. A tall man with the wings identical to hers and a short dark brown hair approaches her, wearing something similar to a toga.

"He's working on it," the man says,
putting his hands around her waist.

"I don't want our son anywhere near that demon," she sp
its out, her body shaking with anger.

"He won't go near, but he'll get the girl."

"Good. But do you think she'll believe him?"

"He is smart, our boy. He'll know what to do."

She turn
s around, her violet eyes boring into his. "Why did it take us so long to find her?"

"We couldn't have known.
She was too young, our blood in her veins too weak to show." He runs a finger down her face. "But what bothers me is that we can't find out who her parents are."

"What about her sister?"

"We don't know
. Our son hasn't been in contact with her yet, and I doubt it they are real sisters."

"The girl could as well be a half-breed. Our kind
loves to mingle with dirty humans." She snorts. "Maybe that is why she wasn't raised here or made known to us."

"We'll find out, my dear." The man kisses the top of her head.
"We just have to be patient."

"I only hope demons won't get to her first. There's a rumor they will try to take an angel to
Hell. And what is easier than getting an unprotected one from the human world?"

"True. It can't be a coincidence that a demon appeared there right now. But there is nothing we can do if we don't want to start a war. We can only put our hopes into our son. After all, he grew up in the
human world. He'll know what to do."

"I have a feeling we are being watched," the woman says, shuddering.

I woke up with a gasp and found myself still lying on the couch in the living room. What was going on with me and winged creatures? Just who were these people and what had they been talking about? It must have been a dream since my mind was still stressed out from today's events. I got up and went to the kitchen for a glass of water.

Christina was sitting on her bed in her favorite pink pajamas with little red hearts on it, looking healthier than ever.

"Were you actually really sick at some point?" I frowned at her. Mom was downstairs making dinner, so we didn't have to worry that she would overhear us.

"Well, I'm glad you're not sick anymore." I smiled and went for the door. Just as I was about to close the door behind me, I glanced back at my sister and froze. Her green eyes were violet, almost identical to the eyes of the people, or whatever they were, that I'd seen in my dream. Only a heartbeat later, her eyes were back to normal and assessing me curiously. I closed the door before she could ask anything.

I was trying really hard to concentrate on studying when my cell phone rang, its distinctive melody announcing it was my best friend, Italia. Instantly relieved that I could pause studying for a moment, I grabbed my cell phone in a flash and answered it.

"Hey, just wanted to check how you're feeling," Italia's cheerful voice filled the line.

"I'm fine," I said, feeling like a parrot. Maybe I should get one and teach it to repeat 'I'm fine' all over again. But the question was, was I really fine?

"Glad to hear it." There was a short pause. "Umm, listen, my brother mentioned something related to Devin."

"What?" My shoulders stiffened instantly as I waited for her to say something. She hesitated, and that couldn't be good. "Just tell me."

"This might sound crazy," she said, "but my brother asked me who Devin was, and I must have mentioned him to my brother at least a thousand of times. I remember it. Besides, I wrote this paper with Devin and I have it here, but my brother swears it was Alice who worked with me and not Devin. He actually remembers Alice being here at my place, but I don't."

"Did Amadeo tell you anything else?" I didn't know what to think. If Amadeo was sure of what he was saying, then there really was something strange going on and not just in my head.

"No." She sighed. "I'm waiting for mom to come home so I can ask her what she remembers."

I bit my lip, debating whether I should tell her or not. After all, she was my best friend and would do anything to help me. So even if I was losing my mind, I wanted her to be my support.

"There's something I need to tell you," I said, "about Devin."

"What?" Her voice was spiked with curiosity. Was she going to laugh at me when I told her? Well, only one way to find out.

"I don't remember Devin. Not even a tiny little detail," I said. "I think I haven't seen him before at all. That's why I asked you if he was new."

There was no laughter on the other end of the line, but there wasn't any sound either. I had to strain my ears to hear Italia's soft breathing.

"What do you mean you don't remember him?" she finally said.

"I don't know him, and I don't know anything about him. It's like he appeared out of nowhere, and everyone seems to know him except me."

"I know what this is," she said, annoyed. "You and my brother decided to play a trick on me! I shouldn't have left you two alone in that car, should I? Well, you almost had me fooled."

"Ita..."

"Oh, you're not going to convince me the whole school is under some kind of mass spell except you."

"I'm telling you the truth!" I said, feeling a bit desperate. "If your brother is lying, then I might as well be having memory problems or losing my mind. I also have these weird dreams or visions or whatever they are, and it's all freaking me out. You have no idea how that feels!"

There was an edge of hysteria in my voice, and I was confident Italia knew I wasn't such a good actress to pull that off, even over the phone. Every time I tried to play a prank on someone I ended up laughing like a maniac and ruining everything.

"You are having visions?" I could almost picture Italia's eyebrows shooting upwards in surprise at that. "You're joking, right?"

"I wish I was," I said, sprawling on the bed.

"So, what did you see? The future? Is the world going to end? Oh, the questions of our next exam?" She sounded hopeful for the last one.

"Nothing like that," I said. "Only some creatures with red and blue wings, with feathers and all."

"Angels?"

"Could be, but these didn't look friendly," I said, the image of that man killing Melissa still fresh in my mind. "They didn't even seem angelic."

"Doesn't mean they're not angels. It's not like someone caught one on camera."

So she believed me or at least pretended to believe me until she figured it out. Yup, she was a true friend; there was no way she'd ever hurt my feelings.

"It's probably a product of my imagination." I sat up, running a hand through my hair. "Do you know any brain diseases that make you see things like that?"

"Oh, don't be so sure about it." She wasn't fazed by my skepticism. "Don't you believe in magic and supernatural beings? Come on! Maybe there's more to all those inexplicable events."

"Ok, let's just consider for a moment that I have supernatural blood in me." I sounded ridiculous to myself as the words left my mouth. "Why would it show right now and what Devin has to do with it? Do you think he triggered it?" Suddenly all the supernatural talk made much more sense. And yes, I'd rather be a freak of nature than have a brain disease.

"Possible," she said. "But what is he then? And why did he come? Of course, that would mean I'm under his spell or something. God!"

"Wish I knew. But it's weird. What do you actually know about him? Do you know where he lives?"

"Let me think." The line went quiet for a minute. "Well, I know he's 17 like us, goes to class with us like everyone else,... He's an average student. I worked on that paper with him and I've seen him a couple of times at Deeli's... Actually, I don't really know much about him. It's strange. I thought I'd know more about a guy
that
hot."

"Umm, it's not like we're close friends with everyone to know much," I said, "but yeah, you should be able to tell more about him."

"Yeah, I should. And I can't even remember how we wrote that paper. I only know I wrote it with him and that he came over, but I don't actually
remember
it happening, if you know what I mean."

"So, no idea where he lives? Where he goes after school?" I went over to my chair where my backpack was and fumbled through it to find that mysterious paper I'd supposedly written with Devin. We all seemed to have written a paper with him. How had he managed to make that paper appear in my notebook in the first place? That was definitely more than some mind trick.

"No, not at all." Italia sighed. "How can that be?"

"I have no idea, but I'm going to find out." I felt the paper I was looking for under my fingertips and pulled it out, hoping I wouldn't have a bad reaction like with that notebook. Nothing happened. Oh well, maybe that thing with the notebook had been accidental and totally unrelated to my fainting.

"How? Are we going to talk to him?"

"Talk?" I said, surprised. "And what would we achieve with that? Get a nice mind wiping? I'm sure his spell or whatever didn't work on me because I got late to school."

"Ook, not gonna talk to him then. But what are we going to do?"

Indeed, what were we going to do? We couldn't ask him and we certainly couldn't tell anyone else. We had no idea what we were dealing with.

"Observe him, I guess." And hope he wouldn't notice it or realize we knew there was something off about him and his presence in our school. I had no idea why anyone with powers strong enough to make at least a hundred of people think they knew him would need to go to school, but maybe the school's magic appeal was hidden to me.

"Yeah, but that could take months!" Italia whined. "And I really want to know!"

"In my vision I saw a guy who looked a lot like him, and he killed some woman," I said, determined to stop her from any rash decision that could get us all in trouble.