Oh. My. Gods. (10 page)

But I can’t forget what Stella said about Mom agreeing that I should stay here—or the fact that it’s Mom’s fault I’m in this mess in the first place.

“No, I’m exhausted,” I say. “I’m just going to check e-mail and go to bed.”

“You would feel better if you got things off your chest.”

“Really,” I insist. “I’m fine.”

I can tell she isn’t satisfied. Maybe if she were just in parent mode I would talk to her, work through things rationally. But I’m in no mood to unload my issues—especially not on Super-Therapist Mom.

“You know, I’ve been thinking.” She smiles big, in a way that means she thinks she has a fabulous idea. “Why don’t we have a mother-daughter day? We could go to the village and browse the little shops and have sundaes at the ice cream parlor.”

“I don’t know, Mom. I’ve go so much going on—”

“You can’t run and do schoolwork all the time.” She brushes a loose lock of hair off my face. “How about Saturday? It might be tough, but I’ll clear my hectic schedule.”

For a second, it’s like the old Mom and Phoebe are back. She’s joking with me and I’m rolling my eyes at her corny humor. Maybe it would be good to spend some time together. Besides, I haven’t seen the village yet, except for from the dock. Who knows, it could actually have a cool shop or two. I could get souvenirs for Nola and Cesca.

“Sure,” I say. “Saturday.”

With a quick wave, I leave her alone in my room and retreat to Damian’s study and my electronic connection to the civilized world.

I click open my e-mail. The little smiley faces next to Cesca and Nola’s e-mail addys are bright yellow. They’re online!

Two mouse clicks later I have my IM open.

LostPhoebe: hi!!!

GranolaGrrl: Phoebe!

PrincessCesca: finally! been waiting online all day

GranolaGrrl: no we haven’t

LostPhoebe: glad ur here

LostPhoebe: did you get my e-mail?

PrincessCesca: of course

GranolaGrrl: things can’t be bad as you think

GranolaGrrl: nothing ever is

PrincessCesca: have you been to the beach yet?

LostPhoebe: just for a quick run

GranolaGrrl: I bet they’re polluted anyway GranolaGrrl: all those years of combustion powerboats cruising the Mediterranean

PrincessCesca: ignore enviro-freak

PrincessCesca: dish on the guy scene

GranolaGrrl:

LostPhoebe: well there are a couple of really cute guys

GranolaGrrl: I resent being labeled an enviro-freak

PrincessCesca: which one is taking you to homecoming?

GranolaGrrl: I prefer to be called environmentally active

LostPhoebe: I don’t think they have a homecoming

LostPhoebe: besides, one of them already hates me

GranolaGrrl: hate is the mirror of love

PrincessCesca: what about the other guy?

I pause, thinking about Troy. He’s cute. And nice. And a good

friend. And nice. And thoughtful. And nice. Sigh. Nice is not necessarily boyfriend material. Not even crush material. At least not for me.

LostPhoebe: Troy is just a friend

GranolaGrrl: boy friends make the best boyfriends

PrincessCesca: what about the other?

LostPhoebe: the one that hates me?

GranolaGrrl: he doesn’t hate you

PrincessCesca: yes, him

What can I say about Griffin Blake?

That he zapped my shoelaces together? Oops, can’t reveal the whole secret-island-of-the-Greek-gods thing.

That he makes Orlando look like a Troll? Nope, that would give away too much of my unwanted interest in him—why do I always crush on jerks?

That I’ve been commissioned by my evil stepsister to break up him and his girlfriend? Stella is the last thing I want to chat about. Besides, that leads me down the path of thoughts about my real reason for accepting her deal—something to do with how my heart pounds like a bongo every time I see him—and those are thoughts best left unexplored.

Somehow, none of these seem appropriate.

LostPhoebe: nothing to tell

LostPhoebe: promise

PrincessCesca: you only promise when ur keeping a secret

GranolaGrrl: we should respect her privacy

PrincessCesca: for crying out loud PrincessCesca: don’t you want to know about the guy our best friend is crushing on?

GranolaGrrl: of course, but that doesn’t mean we have to pry

LostPhoebe: I’m not crushing on him

PrincessCesca: yes it does

PrincessCesca: that’s exactly what it means

GranolaGrrl: she has a right to her privacy

PrincessCesca: she has to tell us, we’re her best friends

LostPhoebe: stop!!!

The rapid-fire IMs stop. I stare at the blinking cursor, thinking how much I miss hearing them argue in person. It’s just not the same on the computer. The scrolling IM chat is making me dizzy.

GranolaGrrl: are you all right?

LostPhoebe: why does everyone keep asking me that?

PrincessCesca: well are you?

LostPhoebe: I’m fine

LostPhoebe: it’s late and I’m tired

GranolaGrrl: you should get your rest

PrincessCesca: what time is it there?

I check the clock on the computer. It’s after eleven. Crap, I have to meet Coach Lenny at six.

LostPhoebe: almost 11:15 and I have to get up early

GranolaGrrl: we’ll let you get some sleep

PrincessCesca: but don’t think we’re letting this crush thing go

LostPhoebe: thanks

LostPhoebe: I miss you guys

GranolaGrrl: we miss you, too

PrincessCesca: PacificPark is the pits without you

PrincessCesca: Justin acts like king of the school

PrincessCesca: he’s an a$$

LostPhoebe: not sorry to miss that! -

GranolaGrrl: ’night

PrincessCesca: good night

LostPhoebe: bye

I sign off, sad to be so far away from my friends when I need them the most.

I am lying in my bed, almost ready to drift into blissful sleep when I remember Coach Lenny’s exercises. He’ll kill me if I don’t do them. Jumping out of bed, I dig the note card out of my backpack and start counting sit-ups.

“One, two, three . . .”

Who knew it could take an hour to do one hundred sit-ups, sixty push-ups, and two hundred jumping jacks. By the time I collapse back in bed I’m exhausted. I fall asleep the second my head hits the pillow.

When my alarm goes off I feel like I’ve slept all of five minutes.

It’s going to be a rough day.

“You look like Hades,” Troy says as he sets his lunch tray next to mine.

Through some great miracle of adrenaline or alpha waves, I am still awake despite a pop quiz in Algebra and a documentary on the Ancient Egyptian practice of mummification. But it’s a near thing.

“Thanks,” I mumble, struggling to keep my head from dropping onto my plate of hummus-smothered meat loaf. And I thought there was no way to make meat loaf worse.

Food is the last thing on my mind, though. We are doing pendulums in Physics today and I just know the swinging and circling is going to trigger my motion sickness. I’m trying not to consume anything I don’t want to see again.

“I had a late night,” I explain. “And early morning practice.”

 “I thought practices were after school?” he asks.

“They are,” I say. “But I have to practice extra.”

“Why?” Nicole prods her meat loaf like she’s afraid it might get up and walk off the plate. “You made the team.”

“Only if I finish top three in the first meet.”

Nicole lets out a low whistle. I’ve always wanted to be able to do that. I can’t whistle at all, despite years of secret training and even a hands-on lesson from Justin that I’d rather forget.

“I have faith in you,” Troy says. “I’ll help any way I can.”

I smile at him. He’s so sweet and looks really cute with that goofy grin on his face. And that golden blond hair spiking off in every direction doesn’t hurt his star quality good looks. And he seems to like me. Maybe Troy could be more than a friend, after all.

“Thanks.” I blush even though I know he can’t read my thoughts.

His grin deepens.

Oh yeah, he’s part god. . . . maybe he can. Which leads me to wondering . . .

“I have a question,” I say to both of them.

“Shoot,” Nicole says.

I think about it for a few seconds, trying to get the words right. Trying to figure out how to ask what I really want to know.

“Are your powers unlimited?” I finally ask. “I mean, can you do pretty much anything you want?”

“Yes and no,” Nicole says.

“Great.” I venture a tiny bite of blue Jell-O. “That clears it up.”

Troy swallows a giant forkful of meat loaf before saying, “It’s not a simple question. In one sense, there are no limitations on what we can do. But—and this is a big but—just because we have the poten

tial to do something doesn’t mean we have the ability.”

“I’m working on no sleep,” I plead. “Can you please elaborate?”

“Our powers don’t come easy,” Nicole explains. “When we’re born we can’t really tap into them. They’re there, but it takes years—a lifetime, really—of training to learn how to use them.”

“There are exceptions, of course.” Troy sets down his fork to chug a pint of milk. “The closer you are to the god on your family tree, the stronger your powers are from the start. Most of us are pretty far down the branch.”

“How do you train?” I ask. It’s not like I’ve seen classes out in the courtyard working on moving things with their minds.

“That’s complicated.” Nicole pushes her untouched meat loaf to the side. “Part of it is learning how to focus your energies—how to channel the powers into what you are trying to do. But a big part of it has to do with self-knowledge. You have to know yourself, understand yourself so you can sense the extent of your powers. The better you know yourself the more focused your powers get.”

“Wow,” I say. “That sounds so . . .”

“Vague?” Nicole suggests. “It is.”

“I was going to say dangerous. What if someone suddenly reaches a new level of self-knowledge and, like, accidentally blows someone to pieces.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Troy says cheerfully, “there are controls.”

“Controls?”

“Yeah,” Nicole adds. “Since we’re not fully gods, the Mt.Olympus twelve placed a protective order over our powers.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means we can’t kill anyone—either accidentally or on purpose—using our powers.” Nicole stares at the table, like she’s lost in thought. Her voice sounds far away. “Only the gods can act irreversibly.”

Silence falls on our table. Nicole sits lost in thought. I feel like I’m missing something important. Gesturing with my eyebrows, I try to silently ask Troy what’s going on. He just shakes his head and goes back to shoveling down his tray of food.

I definitely get the hint that Nicole has a lot of buried secrets. This is just how they both reacted when we were talking about Griffin the other day. I totally don’t expect them to dish on all the buried past in the first week of our friendship, but I wonder if those two secrets are related?

Still, it’s clear that this is a subject best avoided for the moment.

“I’ve been wondering about the gods,” I say, trying to fill the awkward silence. “Do they come cheer at football games? Or speak at graduation or anything?”

Troy snorts, quickly wipes a napkin across his mouth, and says, “Not likely. They’ve been under the radar ever since man stopped worshipping them.”

“Why?”

“No one knows for sure,” he says.

“They’re pouting,” Nicole says, back to her old snarky self just as quickly as she left.

“They are not pouting,” he argues. “They’re gods. They don’t need to pout.”

“I don’t care if they need to.” Nicole grabs an apple slice off Troy’s tray. “They are.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Troy says, offering me an apple slice and then setting the bowl in the middle of the table.

“Makes sense to me,” I say. “For what I know, anyway. If someone suddenly loses stuff they thought they deserved then they might pout.” Not that I know this from personal experience or anything.

“They aren’t,” Troy insists, though I sense he knows he’s losing the argument.

Nicole leans forward over the table, staring Troy square in the eyes, and asks, “Who do you think is in a better position to know?”

He scowls, like he’s confused. “Why would you know—”

“Have you ever been to MountOlympus?”

He starts to shake his head. Then, all of a sudden, his eyes get real wide and his mouth drops open. “Oh gods,” he says. “I totally forgot.”

“Yeah, well,” Nicole says, returning to her seat, “I haven’t.”

“Forgot what?” I ask.

“Nothing.” Nicole waves off my question. “It’s not important.”

Yeah, and running is just my hobby. I don’t need Mom’s therapy degree to know that whatever they’re talking about—Nicole visiting MountOlympus?—is a majorly big deal. I also don’t need to read minds to know that this is an I’m-not-going-to-find-out-about-itanytime-soon kind of secret.

 “Are you going to the bonfire tonight?” Troy asks out of nowhere.

“Bonfire?”

“Every year,” Nicole looks up, sounding unimpressed by the whole thing. “On the first Friday of school, all the groups come together for a big, raging bonfire on the beach. It’s the only time all the gods get along.”

From what I’ve seen, the god cliques don’t mix. “Why do they get along at the bonfire?”