Open Minds (11 page)

Oh.
My eyes widened a bit. He hadn’t just heard about my coming out as a changeling. Raf had somehow seen the kissing episode with Simon. Of course.Like every other reader in Warren Township High, he had seen it the minds of the rumor-swirling population.

My heart crumpled under Raf’s look of betrayal. I had told him we couldn’t be more than friends because I was
different
, and now Simon had let everyone know I was the
same
. And kissing Simon had made the insult a hundred times worse than the injury.

Raf wanted an explanation, but this time I had trapped myself in a box of lies. From Raf’s perspective, nothing could justify my bizarre behavior. I couldn’t explain what Raf couldn’t ever know—that Simon and I were both mindjacking freaks. If Raf discovered our secret, there was no telling what Simon would do.

Keeping Raf in the dark was keeping him safe, but it was tearing my heart into tiny pieces. As I struggled for something to say, Raf’s face shed anger like the tears that were falling off my cheeks. He seemed to want to step into the room, then changed his mind at the last second. He crossed his arms and remained in the doorway, not caving in to my pathetic display.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked. “About changing,” he clarified.

“I… I…”There was no way out of this hole. “I wasn’t sure it was real. I didn’t expect Simon to tell everyone.” That, at least, was the truth. I wiped away the tears I had no right to have.

Raf drew his thick black eyebrows together and threw his arms out in frustration. “Everyone is uncertain when it happens, Kira. If you had talked to me, I could have told you that.”

“I… I…” Stuttering was worse than not talking at all. “I wanted to wait until I was sure.”

Raf’s face darkened. “Wait. How come I can’t read you?”

I sucked in a quick breath. “Um, it, ah… still doesn’t work all the time. I can’t hear your thoughts either right now.” I bolted off the bed because the agitation in my legs couldn’t be contained any longer. I pressed my fists into my desk while I pretended to look out the window at the thin slices of grass between houses. Should I jack him to stop asking questions? Link in? Could I keep my secret, if I did?

I didn’t realize Raf had crossed the room until he covered one of my hands with his. I closed my eyes. I couldn’t bear the softness of his hand on mine when I had nothing but lies for him.

“That’s how it is, sometimes,” he said, softly. “Changeling abilities flip on and off for a while. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.” He tugged my hand, wanting me to turn. It was bad enough to lie from far away. I opened my eyes and stepped back, pulling my hand from his.

He gritted his teeth. “Why won’t you let me help you?” he asked. “I’m your friend, but you turn to this guy Simon, when you’re going through the change? Why?”

There was nothing I could say without hurting Raf even more.

He stepped closer, and I backed away in equal measure. He fisted his hands at his side. “I don’t care if you’ve changed or not,” he said. “If you don’t want to be—whatever—more than friends, then fine. At least let me help you with this. And stay away from Simon.”

My lies and frustration were fueling a fire inside me. “I can hang out with whoever I want!”

“Kira, I promised Seamus I’d look out for you. Guys like Simon are nothing but trouble.”

“
What?”
I demanded. “You and Seamus don’t get to decide who I date!”

“You’re
dating
him now?”

“So what if I am?”

Raf’s Portuguese accent tortured his words. “So he is taking advantage of you!”

“How is that any different than
you
?”

His face blotched red and his jaw worked, but no sounds came out. He unclenched his fists and stalked toward the door. Pausing at the doorway, he gripped the frame and swayed slightly. He turned his head to the side. “I’ll leave you alone, Kira. Since that’s what you want.”

And then he was gone.

I sank to the floor. When the front door banged shut, I wrapped my arms around my chest to keep the sobs from shaking me apart. My mom appeared and her arms lifted me like I was a child. She nearly carried me to the bed, where we huddled and I cried until there were no tears left. Then I only shook. Mom held me and asked no questions, which was just as well.

I had no more lies in me.

chapter SEVENTEEN

Eventually night came.

I was the worst friend that had ever lived. All Raf got from me was lies and insults to his face. I resembled that sludge, the green stuff that forms a slimy coating on the outside of cheese that was so old it had become hazardous waste.

That was me: toxic green ooze.

There was nothing to do with cheese like that but throw it out. And Raf had done exactly that. Good for him. He deserved much better than I gave him today.

Maybe he would find a decent girl now, like Taylor. Sure, she was a yippy dog, but at least dogs were loyal. You could count on them. They didn’t lie, and they licked your face because they were so happy to see you.

I pressed my face into the pillow. I felt like throwing up.

Raf should find someone better than Taylor. Maybe now that I had pushed him away, he would find a girl who wouldn’t lie and wouldn’t yip. One who would stick by him and not insult him to his face. The tears came back and rolled down my nose and off the tip, adding to the growing stain on the pillow.

Eventually, the well of my ridiculous self-pity ran dry. I burrowed under the covers, still dressed in my clothes. Sometime later, Mom switched off the light. I wished I could call Seamus, but I’d have to tell more lies, and I couldn’t stomach the idea.

A jittery buzzing sound started and then ceased. I wondered if a fly had somehow been trapped in my room. My head cleared enough to realize it was my phone. I dragged myself out of bed and retrieved the dancing phone from my backpack. Its blue glow lit the room.
Simon.

Look out your window.

My head whipped around to the darkened window above my desk. I stumbled across the room and dialed the window up to clear. Simon stood in the grassy space between our house and the neighbor behind us.

What are you doing?
I scrit him.

Come down and find out.

I was debating a nice retort, when the floorboards creaked upstairs, giving me a great excuse.
My mom’s still awake.

So jack her to look the other way.

It was a dare. I glared at the dark form below, his face lit up by the blue glow of his phone. I didn’t want Simon to know I still wasn’t jacking my mom. He seemed like a wild thing I should keep as far away from my family as possible.

I could probably sneak out without my mom hearing. I had never done that before, but this week was full of firsts. Besides, sitting in my room and crying over Raf wasn’t making my life any better.

I tiptoed past the stairs to my parents’ bedroom level and stole down the two flights to the ground level. Picking up my shoes on the way, I crept out the front door. Simon’s black panther car waited at the curb. The interior light came on, and I dropped into the passenger seat without a word. As the light faded, Simon’s eyebrows pulled together.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. My eyes must have still been red from the crying.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” He didn’t press, just pulled up the mindware interface for the car and set an autopath. We slid noiselessly away from the curb. A block from my house, Simon mentally commanded on the headlights.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“We’re meeting my crew, but I have a stop to make first.”

We drove a while in silence, streetlights pulsing by. I suspected that we had left Gurnee. It was hard to tell in Chicago New Metro. One town was the same as the next, a seamless flow of spindly houses as closely packed as range ordinances would allow. We passed the Great Lakes Naval Station where my dad worked and pulled up to a convenience store. It was just this side of dangerous and definitely shady.

Simon climbed out of the car, forcing me to follow or be left behind. It seemed safer to go with him. Plasma lights harshly lit the inside of the store. As we stepped through the door, I linked into the head of the attendant. Even though we were out past curfew on the praver side of town, he barely noticed us, instead watching a late night tru-cast whispering from his hand-held screen.

Simon draped his arm over my shoulder and steered us through aisles of ancient snacks and dusty bags of diapers. The only things not coated in dust were emergency boost canisters of hydrogen for hydro cars on empty and an impressive display of beef jerky. We stopped at a refrigerated case. Simon used a mental command to open it and pulled out a four-pack case of green beer bottles.

“What are you doing?” I hissed under my breath and checked the attendant’s thoughts. He was watching Magnum Magistrate interrogate two neighbors in a range infringement dispute.

“Don’t worry, there aren’t any security cameras here,” said Simon.

“You’ve got to be kidding,” I said. The frosted glass door swung closed. Simon steered us back toward the front and set the beers down with a clinking of glass on glass. The attendant still clutched his screen in his gnarled hands. He let out an elaborate sigh, muted the screen, and set it aside as Magnum Magistrate took a break to consider his judgment.

Simon’s command echoed through the attendant’s mind.
We’re going to buy this.

Well, sure you’re going to buy that. But you need some money, friend.

From the tired sound of his thoughts, this wasn’t the first time Simon had jacked him to illegally sell beer. I nervously checked the parking lot. With my luck, one of my dad’s Navy buddies would stroll in to find his friend’s daughter buying alcohol.

Simon handed the man two pieces of white plastic, both small and square. The attendant took the cards and held one up, examining it as if it wasn’t completely blank. In his mind, the card appeared to be a driver’s license with Simon’s picture. He handed that one back to Simon and scanned the other one—which appeared to be a tally card—through the register. It beeped its complaint about swiping a useless bit of plastic, but in the attendant’s mind, a dozen unos were deducted from Simon’s account. He returned the fake tally card to Simon.

Do you want a bag?
the attendant thought.

No, thanks
. Simon grinned as he picked up the beers and walked me out of the store.

When we were back in the car, I crossed my arms. “I am not drinking that.” If Simon’s grand plan was to take me out for a night of drinking, he was sadly mistaken.

“Neither am I,” he said. “I’m not interested in fuzzing up my mind with beer.”

Sometimes the boy was simply demens. “You committed a misdemeanor to buy beer you’re not going to drink?”

“The beer’s for Martin. We’re just going for the fun.”

I was sure Simon’s idea of fun and mine were not the same.

chapter EIGHTEEN

I held my complaints as we wove though a ramshackle suburb that resembled downtown Chicago. People wandered outside ancient apartments that hadn’t been rehabbed to range codes, fuzzed out on obscura or beer, trying to escape their crowded living conditions with distance or intoxication. I breathed a little easier when we left the slums and drove past a forest preserve turned black by the night. It was closed after dark, but keeping with our law-breaking activities for the evening, Simon pulled into the entrance. The car’s beams sliced white blades through the ash trees lining the forest drive.

“Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Suffering in my room would be better than getting arrested tonight.

“Kira, relax. We’re just meeting some friends to do some dipping.”

“Dipping?”

He didn’t answer and pulled to the side of the main road. About fifty feet from the road, pinpricks of light danced in the meadow. Simon shut off the car, and the moonlight painted his face silver.

“Dipping is something readers do,” he said. “One person does the drinking while the rest dip into their fuzz by touching them somewhere on their bare skin.” He demonstrated by tapping my cheek with his fingertips. “They feel all the effects without the actual intoxication or hangover. Except for the drinker. They’re pretty messed up the next day.”