The Fire and the Veil (Veronica Barry Book 2) (4 page)

She couldn’t think of anything to say. She
wanted
to think of something to say, though. Anything, really.

“Hey,” he said softly. “You okay?”

“Um, sure. Of course,” she said.

“It’s just that you seem… nervous.”

Veronica attempted to laugh lightly. Even in her own ears it sounded maniacal.
Oh, kill me now,
she thought.

“You like me, right?” he asked. “Women don’t go out on three pity dates, do they? I mean, one I’ve heard of. But not three. This isn’t pity date number three, right?”

For a moment Veronica still couldn’t make her voice work. Then she took the hand he’d been holding her fingers with in both of her own hands and squeezed it. “I’m sorry, Daniel,” she said.

His face fell. “…Sorry?”

“I’m sorry! I’m such a basket case. I feel like I’m thirteen years old. I don’t know what’s the matter with me!”

Daniel frowned in confusion. “Okay. So for a second there I thought you were going to tell me it
is
a pity date, or something to that effect. But I’m not seeing how being thirteen years old fits in with it.”

Veronica closed her eyes and gave an agonized whimper.

“Hey, it’s okay. Come over and sit for a second and try to tell me what’s wrong.”

He guided her to the couch and they both sat down, angled so their knees touched. He held on to one of her hands.

“What’s the matter?” he asked gently.

“I feel like such an idiot.”

“You’re not an idiot.”

“God, listen to me. I
sound
like a thirteen year old. This is so ridiculous.”

“Just tell me what’s going on.”

All of her insecurities flashed through her mind: that he thought she was weak, that she
was
weak, that she was a silly prude, that she was stuck in the mindset of forties movies, that she was a freak with psychic powers, that he was going to figure out sooner or later that he was making a mistake seeing her, but what came out of her mouth was, “I haven’t had sex in three years.”

If she’d felt flushed before, it was nothing compared to the fire that caught in her skin when she heard herself blurt that out. She pulled her hand out of his and buried her face.

“Oh my god,” she muttered. “I’m such an idiot.” She shook her head, her face still covered by her hands. “I can’t believe I said that. I just assume that’s where all this is headed, and I’m freaking out about it, and what do I know, maybe you just wanted me over here to show me your fish—”

“Veronica.”

She stopped talking and peeked at him through her fingers.

“I didn’t just invite you over here to see my fish,” he said. “I did have ulterior motives. I mean, I wasn’t sure you’d be spending the night or anything. But I was kinda hoping for at least second base.” He grinned.

She smiled back, but her face was still burning.

“Let me get you a glass of water,” he said.

She nodded. He stood and stepped into his small kitchen area, getting a smoked glass from his cabinet and filling it with water from a bottle in the fridge. He returned and sat by her side, giving her the glass.

She took a long swallow. The water did help. It was chilled and as it cooled the inside of her mouth and throat, she felt better. “Am I a complete nerd in your eyes, now?”

“No, of course not,” he said seriously. Then he smiled. “Three years. Man. That’s a dry spell. I’d probably be as nervous as you if I went through a dry spell that long.”

“It’s not easy, you know, when you realize things about a person on the first date… it usually means no second date,” Veronica said quietly. She took another sip.

Daniel’s eyes widened. “Your visions. You have them about people you date?”

“Sort of,” she said. “It’s more like I just know stuff. The visions don’t happen that often. But I’ll know a lot more about a person than they intend for me to find out. You know, when you go on a first date you usually aren’t really trying to lay all your cards on the table right away.”

Daniel nodded, eyebrows raised. “Very true. You’re just trying to make a good first impression.”

“Yeah, it’s too weird, knowing things. One guy was a teacher: he had a crush on one of his seniors. Yucky.”

Daniel nodded again. “That’d kill it for me.”

“Another guy had just spent the night with an ex-girlfriend. I mean, the list goes on. And I didn’t used to even acknowledge to myself that I knew these things, that they were really true. But I’d think, ‘I just have a feeling there’s something like that going on.’ And it didn’t matter if I accepted it or not. It made it impossible to go further. I just couldn’t do it.”

“I don’t blame you,” he said. After a moment, he shifted a bit in his seat. “So, uh. What about me?”

“What? What about you?”

“What do you know, about me?”

“I, uh… what?”

“Well, something turned you off. What was it? Was it the baseball card collection? I know it’s kind of juvenile, but those are actually worth money—”

“Daniel, nothing turned me off,” Veronica said. She realized it was true. In fact, she didn’t have any extra information about Daniel, unless you counted the bit about how he didn’t mean her any harm. “They haven’t told me anything about you.”

“They?”

“The voices in my head, Daniel. You know.”

“They haven’t told you anything about me? Why not?” He almost sounded disappointed.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I think maybe… cause they like you. I think they warn me when someone’s not good for me. They think you’re good for me.” That was something. If the spirits liked Daniel, maybe she should pay attention to that. But was she really going to let ghosts dictate who she should date? What kind of life was that? And why did they like him, because he would take care of her? Did the
ghosts
think she was weak, too?

Daniel seemed pleased, however. “They like me.”

“I guess so.”

He nodded. Then his face grew serious. “That’s nice,” he said. “It really is. But what about you? I mean, that’s what matters. Do you like me?”

Veronica gazed at his beautiful face. “Yes, I like you.”

He leaned forward and kissed her, his mouth soft against hers. She hadn’t seen it coming, and hadn’t tensed. The kiss was sweet. He put his hands carefully on her shoulders, and she leaned closer as his lips opened and she felt his tongue. Her body relaxed and she was in his arms. He felt strong and warm. She could feel herself melting against him. All thoughts of being weak and what the spirits said and whether it was good that he was a gentleman left her mind, and all that remained was sensation.

Chapter 3

It was night, and cold, and she was in a group of about eight people. Teenagers. She recognized one of them from French III: Caitlin Garrity. The others she didn’t know. She thought she recognized some of the faces from Eleanor Roosevelt, but not all. It was hard to tell, anyway, because the only light was from a street lamp. She could hear the freeway nearby. Glancing over, she saw it was two blocks away, behind a high chain link fence.

Four of the kids were smoking a joint, passing it between them, but the others seemed uninterested. One of the four offered the joint to her, and although Veronica would have refused, she took the joint and sucked in the smoke. That’s when she realized she was seeing through someone else’s eyes. One of
those
dreams.

“Where are we going next?” one of the girls asked. She had heavy make-up around her eyes, long, wavy blond hair, and a pouty mouth. “I’m freezing my ass off out here.”

“We can go to my place,” a boy said. He was one of the ones who hadn’t been smoking. His brown hair was combed straight and purposefully over his eyes. He wore rumpled jeans and a tuxedo jacket over a thin, striped tee-shirt.

“How far is it?” Caitlin asked. Her over-bleached bangs hung in her eyes, the rest of her hair pulled back into a ponytail. She was wearing a tiny skirt that barely covered her tush and boots with impossible heels. She had a little hooded jacket on, which she clutched closed over her chest.

“Just over there,” Tuxedo Jacket said, gesturing towards the freeway.

“We have to cross?” Caitlin whined.

“The nearest bridge is like, a mile that way,” said the girl with the pout.

“I can’t walk that far in these heels,” Caitlin said, rolling her head back in frustration.

“I’m not carrying you,” a boy with a mass of curly hair and caramel skin said.

“Who asked you?” Caitlin snapped.

“Just sayin’,” Curly said.

“We don’t have to walk to the bridge,” Tuxedo Jacket said. “That would be stupid. My house is like, right there. Just on the other side.”

“So?” Curly asked.

“So, we climb over the fence and run across. No big deal,” Tuxedo Jacket said.

“Are you crazy?” Caitlin said.

“There isn’t even a fence on the other side,” Tuxedo Jacket said. “I’ve done it a hundred times.”

“Shut up,” Caitlin said.

“I’ll do it.” This came from Veronica’s mouth. Or at least the mouth of the person she was seeing all of this through. The words chilled her. She knew she was watching something happen to someone else. But what if she was meant to stop it? She didn’t know where these kids were. She couldn’t see any signs or landmarks. Were they really going to run across a freeway?

“Shut up,” Caitlin said, turning on her. “You’re full of shit.”

“I said I’ll do it.”

“We’ll all do it,” said Pouty. “Like Rich said, it’s no big deal. Come on, we’ll see if there’s even any cars.”

The group all walked to the chain link fence and looked through it at the freeway.

“See, it’s cake,” Rich—the one wearing the tuxedo jacket—said.

True, there weren’t very many cars. It must be very late. The ones that passed drove fast, however.

“I don’t know,” Caitlin said. “I can’t run in these heels.”

“Why’d you have to wear those ‘fuck me’ boots anyway?” a girl with half her head shaved demanded. She was the only other girl in the group; the rest were boys.

“Shut up, Maricela. You wear heels, like, all the time.”

“No, I don’t,
puta
. Not unless it’s like a dance or something. You’re gonna slow us all down,” Maricela said. “I’m cold. And hungry. You got food at your place, Rich?”

“Yeah,” Rich said, gazing at the freeway dreamily.

“Your parents better not be home, dude,” said Curly.

“Dude, they don’t care about anything. My dad just gets stoned in his room and my mom spends all her time in the neighbor’s house anyway.”

“Let’s go,” the girl Veronica was seeing through said. She saw her hands reach up and grip the links of the fence above her. Across the middle phalanxes of the fingers of both hands were spelled the words “fuck” and “slut.” She pulled herself up quickly, toes finding purchase in the links below, and the others began to climb as well, Caitlin complaining all the way. Veronica swung a leg over the top of the fence as Rich caught up to her. The inner thigh of her jeans got caught and for a moment she couldn’t swing the other leg over. Then she heard a rip and she was free. She and Rich landed on the other side at the same time, and she started to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” he asked.

“I ripped my pants,” she said, and found the hole with her fingers, touching soft skin.

“Whatever,” Rich said. “Come on!”

He started running across the freeway. She would have followed but she got knocked over when Curly came down off the fence and hit her. She grunted with his impact and then again as her knee smashed into the concrete.

“You asshole,” she cried.

“Sorry,” Curly said, giving her a hand up. “My ankle got caught.”

She stood up, testing her leg. The knee hurt. She didn’t think she could run, but Rich had almost reached the other side. A car whizzed by, but he was well beyond it.

“Come on,” Curly said with a grin, and he was off, racing across the freeway.

“This is stupid,” Caitlin moaned, dusting herself off, although another boy had caught her as she jumped off the top of the fence.

“You’re stupid,” Pouty said, and then turned to Veronica. “You coming?” She looked right and left as if she was crossing just any street, and started to run. The boy that had helped Caitlin took off after her.

It looked like Caitlin was about ready to go, and the others would be too, and Veronica’s host couldn’t let them all beat her, not when she’d been the one to say that she’d do it. She looked at the on-coming cars. Three, their headlights just tiny pin-pricks in the distance. She had plenty of time. So she scrambled down the gutter that separated the fence from the freeway, and back up the other side, paying no attention to the foul water at the bottom. She launched herself onto the freeway, moving as quickly as her injured knee would allow.

After four or five steps, however, the knee buckled, and a gasp of pain escaped her. The pin-pricks of light looked more like flashlights, now. She tried to figure out which lanes they were in, but she couldn’t tell. She had to either turn back or get to the oleander bushes in the center divide.

Caitlin pulled ahead of her. She couldn’t turn back, and let crybaby Caitlin win.

She pushed on, limping, trying to hop on her good leg. The lights were coming so fast. She stumbled again, and crumbled to the concrete. A wave of hopelessness washed over her. Why even try? Why not just let the fucking car hit her?

No!
Veronica screamed at her, but she only felt the girl’s despair.

“Come on!” A hand grabbed hers and yanked. It was Pouty. She pulled her hard, and Veronica did her best to keep up and not bring them both down to be smashed by cars. She could hear them coming, they were so close, but in a moment she fell into the oleander bushes, just as the car in the farthest lane laid on its horn. Her heart was pounding so hard she thought it would come through her chest.

Chapter 4

Veronica woke up in a strange bed. The sheets were different from hers, the light was wrong, and she could hear unfamiliar sounds. Blinking and rubbing her eyes, she pushed herself up on her elbows, her heart still hammering. Then it came back to her. Daniel. This was Daniel’s bedroom. She remembered last night. Kissing on the couch. Losing herself in it. His hands—his wonderful hands. Their clothes coming off, and Daniel scooping her up despite her protests for the health of his back, and bringing her in here. And then sex. Oh! She’d forgotten it could be so good.