Only Everything (26 page)

“I never noticed those things,” I said flatly.

Hephaestus tilted his head, considering me. “You know, for
someone whose entire job revolves around understanding the human condition, you are entirely clueless.”

My face burned. “I never had to notice these things before!” I whisper-shouted. “I could always read people’s hearts. I knew everything about them in a snap. Do you know what it’s like to suddenly not have that ability to rely on?”

“Then I suggest you start honing your powers of observation, and fast,” Hephaestus replied through his teeth. “That is, if you still want to save Orion.”

“Of course I do,” I replied, reaching up to touch the silver arrow hanging from my neck.

“Good. And you’re also going to have to work on your social graces,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest. “Because your problems at this school go way past your fashion faux pas.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“I mean, I’ve been here five minutes and you’ve already completely ignored a woman in need, tried to cut a line, and treated Mrs. Leifer like a piece of dirt,” he replied. “You need to accept that you’re not a goddess anymore,
True
,” he said pointedly. “You’re not special. You’re not entitled. You’re going to need to learn to treat these people as equals.”

The bell rang, and the hallway outside the office flooded with students. I watched them go by, the shrieking, texting, chest-bumping, moping, chatting, gossiping mass of them, and gritted my teeth.

Hephaestus laughed under his breath. “And we’re also going to have to do something about that sneer.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

Katrina

“Miss Ramos?”

I froze at the sound of my name. Mrs. Roberge handed me a piece of paper, folded at the center. She smiled. “Nice work yesterday.”

Cara and Stacey stared from their seats in the front row. I ducked my head. “Thanks.”

I didn’t open the paper until I was seated, safe in the back of the class. I definitely hadn’t expected to get my grade back this fast. I held my breath and unfolded the page.

PREPARATION: A

DELIVERY OF MATERIAL: A

PUBLIC SPEAKING: B

OVERALL GRADE: A−

Holy crap. An A−! I couldn’t believe it. A huge smile broke across my face as I folded the paper again, then unfolded it to make sure I’d read it right. I’d gotten an A− in honors English. On the project I’d been terrified of from the moment it was assigned. Not only was it over, but I’d aced it!

I glanced around the room, wanting to tell someone, wanting to scream, but there was no one there to tell. At least, no one who would care. Cara might, but she and Stacey were busy whispering and I didn’t want to interrupt. Then Charlie walked in. He came right to the back of the room and hovered in the aisle next to me.

“Hey.” His eyes widened when he saw my face, the paper in my hand. “Is that your grade?”

“Yep,” I said with a grin.

His blue eyes were bright. “Well? What did you get?”

From the corner of my eye I saw True take a seat on the far side of the room. She looked over at us curiously and I was about to wave, but then Darla and Veronica walked in behind her. Darla shot me a look of death, and I felt myself shut down. First Stacey, now Darla. How many girls were in love with Charlie Cox anyway?

“It’s no big deal,” I said, folding the paper away.

“Are you kidding? It’s a huge deal. What did you get?” he asked, sitting down next to me and shoving his bag under his chair.

At the front of the room, Darla and Veronica were now whispering too.

I bit my lip. “An A minus.”

Charlie’s whole face lit up. “I knew it!” He reached out and shoved my arm like we were old friends. “I told you you were awesome.”

My heart felt like it was overflowing. “Thank you,” I told him. “Honestly, I couldn’t have done it without you.”

At that moment, Darla arrived. She pressed the fingertips of one hand into my desk, the fingertips of the other hand into Charlie’s.

“Couldn’t have done what without him?” she asked with a sour smile.

“Nothing,” I said, staring down at my desk.

“Oh, hey, Darla,” Charlie replied. “I just helped her out with her English project yesterday.”

“Oh, really?” Darla said. “That’s so sweet! Isn’t my Charlie so sweet?”

I hated her. In that moment I fully hated her. Because it was so obvious what she was doing, and the fact that she thought it would affect me meant she thought I was an idiot. I pulled out my phone and looked up at her. It took every ounce of strength inside me to meet her gaze.

“I think I’ll text
my
boyfriend and tell him about my grade,” I said pointedly. “He’s going to be so excited.”

Then I turned my back on both of them and did just that. Unfortunately, I was shaking so hard I had to type it three times over, but by the time I faced forward again, Darla was gone, class was starting, and I didn’t dare look at Charlie.

“Are you okay?” he whispered to me as the latest victim of Mrs. Roberge’s evil project took the podium.

“I’m fine,” I told him, forcing a smile. “Thanks again. Really.”

He looked like he was going to say something else, but then Mrs. Roberge shot us a glare and we both faced forward. I felt sick to my stomach. Like Charlie and I had been on the verge of something and now it was somehow ruined. But what could we have been on the verge of? I had a boyfriend and he clearly had a girlfriend.

Suddenly a folded note skittered across my desk. I grabbed it before it could fall off the other side. With a surreptitious glance at Charlie, I carefully unfolded it.

THIS TOOL IS NOWHERE AS GOOD AS YOU WERE.

I snorted and slapped my hand over my nose as the lecturer looked up.

“Sorry!” I whispered.

“You’re doing great!” Charlie called out.

And then we spent the rest of the class period trying not to laugh.

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

True

“Hey, True.”

Charlie caught up with me as I followed Hephaestus through the door into our econ class, the only class we had together aside from lunch, since he’d made himself a senior and I’d made myself a junior. Hephaestus wheeled over to Mr. Chin to show him his schedule, and I moved to a desk near the wall.

“Hi, Charlie,” I said. “How are you?”

He seemed surprised I’d asked. “Good. So you’re still talking to me? After last week?”

I blinked. “Right! Last week. Our . . . argument. Don’t worry about it,” I said. “I’ve had a lot going on. I’ve barely even thought about it.”

“So you’re not gonna try to set me up again?” he asked. “Because I kind of have this thing going with Darla. . . . You know, Josh and Veronica’s friend? We spent the whole day together on Saturday and most of Sunday, too.”

I hesitated. Little did he know he was with Darla because of me. And that she was totally wrong for him.

“Oh, yeah?” I asked. “How’s that going?”

“Pretty good, I think,” he said with a shrug. “She’s cool.” He angled himself toward me and lowered his voice. “You know her, kind of, right? What do you think?”

My eyebrows darted up. “You want my opinion? Really?”

He smirked. “Don’t let it go to your head. But yeah, I guess I was curious . . . what my friends thought about it.”

I grinned even as I couldn’t believe how excited I was to be called his friend. And now I could tell him what I really thought. That Darla was okay, but shallow and superficial and totally blind to half his awesomeness.

But then I saw Hephaestus eyeing us over his shoulder and remembered this morning. Perhaps blunt wasn’t the way to go. Charlie clearly liked Darla, so insulting her might upset him. But he wasn’t gushing about her, so I didn’t think I had to either.

“Well, she’s pretty,” I said carefully. “And nice.” This was not a lie, considering how she’d warned me about the True-ly Awful website. “But she’s a bit more into clothes and stuff than you, isn’t she? Like always worried about how she—and other people—look?”

Charlie’s face fell. “Yeah, maybe. She does keep asking me to come to her boutique and shop.”

“Me too!” I said.

“Maybe she runs a secret makeover program for new students,” Charlie said with a laugh.

“Maybe,” I replied. “But anyway, if you’re happy . . . I’m happy.”

But you’re not, so I’m going to find you the right person. I swear,
I added silently. If I could possibly figure out who that person was.

Powers of observation,
I thought, looking at Hephaestus.
Hone your powers of observation.

“Well, thanks,” he said. “That’s really . . .”

Charlie was distracted as Katrina walked by us, clutching her black notebook to her chest. Her gaze was trained on the floor as she brushed by him, and I saw his muscles tense. He followed her with his eyes but didn’t turn. There was something about that body language. . . . I felt a subtle tingle down my spine.

“Nice, I meant to say,” he finished, chuckling at himself. “That’s really nice. So, I’ll see you after class?”

Then he turned and grabbed the seat next to Katrina’s at the back of the room. She tucked her hair behind her ear and smiled, not exactly in his direction, but there was a definite darkening of her skin as he sat next to her. The tingling intensified. I felt like I was under some kind of spell, and I couldn’t move lest I break it. Then Darla came in, saw where Charlie was sitting, and huffily took a seat in the third row.

“You all right?” Hephaestus asked, maneuvering his chair in next to me.

“I’m exercising my powers of observation,” I told him. Slowly I lowered myself into the chair, keeping one eye on Charlie and Katrina as the bell rang.

“Listen up, everyone, today’s the day!” Mr. Chin lifted a stack of papers from his desk. “These are your compatibility tests! You’re going to spend today’s class period filling these out, and tomorrow I will announce the names of your soul mates.” He paused as he dropped a few of the papers on the first desk. “For the purposes of this class, anyway.”

Katrina and Charlie exchanged a fleeting glance, and now Charlie’s skin was the color of cooked lobster. Katrina wrapped the fringe on the end of her blue scarf around and around her finger. Darla glanced over her shoulder at Charlie and he froze, snagged. It was a split second, but I saw it. He was worried that Darla had
seen him getting googly-eyed over Katrina, and he forced a smile.

Apparently that was enough for Darla, because she faced forward again, grinning. Charlie, however, reached across his desk and gripped the far edge like a marooned pirate clinging to a piece of driftwood for dear life.

This was great. This was
beyond
great. Charlie was interested in Katrina. Now if only Katrina would dump that brutish meathead she was living with and wake up and smell the adorable . . . Gods, this could really be it.

The boy in front of Katrina handed her a blank test.

Please let me get matched up with Charlie.

Katrina’s voice. As clear as day. Inside my head. I almost fell out of my chair. Had I really
heard
that? Two weeks ago, when I had my powers, I would have had no doubt. Hearing the voices of the lovelorn was something I lived with every day of my eternal existence. It was something I could tune in to or out of intrinsically, with as much thought as I gave to breathing. But now . . . was it possible? Had I used my power?

I stared at Katrina and concentrated as hard as I could.

Say something,
I begged silently.
Please, please give me something else.

Silence. Awful, disappointing silence. It was as if a wall of ice had gone up between us. I tried Charlie, too, but the only sounds were pencils scratching on paper, and that relentless clock ticking above the door. I must have imagined it. The disappointment was deep, but I chose not to focus on that. For the first time since I’d been on Earth, I felt a match to my core.

Katrina and Charlie.

Charlie and Katrina.

They were both kind and mature. Both artistic. Both considerate.
Both in need of true friendship—true understanding—and looking for it in all the wrong places—Katrina with her so-called friends, who clearly didn’t care about her and her clueless boyfriend, Charlie pursuing the popular crowd like being in with them would somehow make him whole.

But if they could get together, if they could be there for each other, they could make
each other
whole.

There were, of course, a few roadblocks. Katrina did have a boyfriend with whom she was currently living, but he didn’t hold a candle to Charlie. And Charlie was with Darla, but that was four days old if anything, and he didn’t seem particularly excited about it. I could do this. I could fix it. I could spark true love between them. I was sure of it.

Hephaestus had already taken out a pencil and started to fill out his test. I grabbed his arm, my fingers squeezing the hard leather of his jacket.

“Write Charlie Cox at the top,” I hissed.

“What? Why?” Hephaestus asked.

I glanced back at Charlie, who was breezing through his test.

“I have an idea.”

Hephaestus followed my gaze, then tilted his head. “If you say so.”

He filled in Charlie’s name and started in on the multiple-choice questions. I wrote Katrina’s name at the top of my test and waited for Hephaestus to finish. Then, while Mr. Chin was busy reading, I grabbed Hephaestus’s paper. I copied down his answers, making my answer sheet a duplicate of his save for two responses. Then I sat back to watch the clock. With three minutes left in the class, Mr. Chin looked up.

“Everybody finished?” he asked.

There was a general shuffling of feet, but no one said a word.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” Mr. Chin said. “Any volunteers to collect the tests?”

I jumped out of my chair. “Me! I’ll do it!”

Mr. Chin’s eyebrows shot up. “Thank you for your enthusiasm, True. Go to it.”

I walked around the room, gathering the test papers, making sure to keep mine and Hephaestus’s on the top. When I got to Katrina and Charlie, I put theirs on the bottom. Mr. Chin was still reading, and the students were starting to dissolve into conversation.