The Mirrors of Fate (5 page)

Maria looked up at the tall figure. Her chest tightened and her body seized. He was the same new student, staring down at her with those piercing green eyes. How ironic. She escaped sheer embarrassment with him earlier that morning and now God had to screw her over just once more before she could leave.

“
Are you okay?” His gaze searched her face for a moment and then a charming half-smile appeared on his lips. “Did I startle you that badly? I don’t look like a ghost, do I?”

“
Uh, sorry, no, I’m fine. I didn’t mean to stare,” she said, moving around him.

“
I should be sorry. I nearly hit that pretty face of yours.”

The heat she felt rush into her cheeks from his comment, a comment she was sure was given out of courtesy, not honesty, took more than just a little effort to ignore. She walked toward the exit door at the end of the hall, expecting to leave their conversation at that, but he reached the door before she did, pausing long enough to drop a book out of the stack he was holding. The obvious ploy to gain her attention worked in halting her. Of course, his tall body suddenly in front of her was a pretty effective means of stopping her as well.

“
Damn, sorry. Clumsy, clumsy me. I’m never usually this careless.” And his gaze upon her confirmed that for him this was a special occasion requiring such clumsiness.

Flattered by his bold gesture, she smiled and bent down to pick up the thin book. She felt it between her fingers. “Very light. I can see why you would drop it,” she teased with a slight grin.

“
Something’s come over me today, I suppose.” His Icelandic accent, noticeable but faint, struck her as being somewhat unusual, not precisely foreign, but rather like an artist who knew his craft. That subtlety worked to his advantage, she was sure. A thicker accent perhaps would have made him the butt of every joke rather than the centerpiece of every girl’s conversation.

“
Hey, question. Aren’t you
the girl I saw this morning with Mr. Lohan?”

Maria’s grin faded quickly. “Yeah. I—”

“
It’s just that I never forget a face.”

Maria looked away from him. “Yeah well, if that door had hit me just now I would’ve deserved it. Just to let you know, I’m not
always like that.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Oh, so I caught you on one of your off days?”

“
Yeah, you could call it an off day.”
And every other day.

“
Don’t worry about it. We’re sort of similar. I’ve been known to have a little temper myself.” He moved in close, bent his head to her and whispered quietly, “But I won’t tell your secret if you won’t tell mine.”

Her ear lit on fire. “G-Good then.”

He leaned away now with a sexy grin, revealing that he saw and fully liked the effect simply breathing near her ear had on her. “But anyway, let’s put that beginning past us. Hi, my name’s Alan Kristinsson.” He offered a hand and she took it.

“
Maria.”

The innocent skin-to-skin contact made her palm tingle. Being this close to him made her see even more why Gina and Ellie had been so excited. His face was so easy on the eyes. She did in fact notice the presence of Asian ethnicity in his slightly unrounded eyes, as they had said. The arrangement of his messy blonde locks fit him well, and while the style might have looked sloppy on other people, on him it added a finishing touch to his striking appearance.

And Lord, how he looked good in his clothes. Loose-fitting dark blue jeans flattered already lengthy legs, and a long-sleeved green sweater over a black shirt hugged a well-built, well-proportioned frame. She wondered if underneath all those store-bought manacles of freedom he had a trim chest and stomach to go along with those strong, broad shoulders.

“
Sooo, it’s very nice to meet you Maria,” he said with a teasing lilt that snapped her fast out of her admiring daze.

“
S-Sorry. Was I staring again?”

“
You tell me.”

A quick-dodge effort of nervously averting her gaze to the floor was the only way to avoid lightheadedness. “So, anyway, how does it feel to be the one everyone is talking about around here?”

“
Oh? Is that the case? I wasn’t aware. Is it because I’m new?”

For the first time in a long time Maria smiled so broadly she forgot to conceal her peeking gum line. “Well, what do
you
think? That could be the reason. And you’re older than most guys here. A plus for girls.”

He smiled modestly. “Mm, bad seeds like me get the luxury of repeating grades. Truth is, I’m just a regular guy. I doubt there’ll be a fuss because of me.”

She doubted he really believed that. Anyone as good-looking as he was had to be used to people making him painfully aware of that fact wherever he went.

“
So you’re from Iceland, my friends told me,” Maria said.

“
That’s right.”

She had barely heard of Iceland more than a few times on television, but at least the small northern country could not have been worse than the small White Crest City. “Well, for whatever reason you came here, you’re better off going back.”
I’m just kidding! Stay! For the love of God, stay!
“It’s really boring here, you know. Everyone just really wants to leave as soon as they finish school.”

“
Is that what you want to do?”

“
More than anything,” she said with a resolute tone. “So, why did you come?”

His expression hardened slightly, and with that hardening, came hesitation. “I guess you could say I’m here for school. I have other intentions for this place, though...and for people here.”

She didn’t know what he meant but chose not to question the mask he had put on. Everyone had their own reasons for hiding things. She was no different.

“
Well, I’m sorry but I kinda need to get going. Home. Parents. Freaking out. You get the drift.”

“
It’s all right. Now that we’re acquainted, I’ll be able to start a conversation with you easier next time instead of my nifty book trick.”

She giggled and shook his hand one more time. Finally Maria left the building, the most overpowering feelings of elation, nervousness and excitement bubbling in her as she did.

As Alan watched her make her long journey to the parking lot and to her SUV, the smile on his face faded. Implacable anger knit like needle and thread into the lines of his face and wove his expression hateful. When dark coldness reached him he felt a small rush go to his scalp. He brought a piece of hair from the side of his head and over into his line of sight.

The blonde lock of hair had turned black.

•

The moonlight shone in through her bedroom windows, outlining her body on the floral-sheeted bed. Slowly, very slowly, she allowed her gaze to roam aimlessly around her room. The night cast its melancholic blue-gray sheet over her lavender-painted cement walls and pictures of her art hanging about. So strange how nature knew what you were feeling.

The windows she hardly ever kept closed once again made her feel at ease. Soft sky-blue curtains on each of them comforted her whenever they blew in the open breeze and hovered over her bed from all three sides like one protective, ghostly blanket.

Maria lay stiff and unmoving on her bed, every square inch of skin too sensitive from the hot water she allowed to cascade over her during her shower.

She deserved the pain, she thought.

Scalding water was her own way of punishing herself for the stupid things she had done or said during the day or the course of the week. She was failing miserably in school, her friends probably thought she had...
problems,
and she had shouted unnecessarily at her favorite teacher. And worst of all, she had made a fool of herself in front of Alan when they first met. He may have been smiling with her during their second encounter, but more than likely he was probably thinking,
Wow, and even now she’s still a complete bitch.

Alan. His simple name sounded flowery in her head. Since she got home she couldn’t get his face and the sexy reverberating depth of his voice out of her mind. He had been the one to make an obvious pass at her—something she was quite surprised and flattered by. No boy in her school had flirted with her. She couldn’t believe how her heart had been fluttering in his presence. Her reaction sickened her. As much as she hated to admit it, she was probably no better than Gina and Ellie.

A part of her wanted to go to both of them tomorrow and brag about his attempt to talk to her. But she knew they’d laugh in her face and tell her not to let the attention go to her head. Those two girls—who by any stretch of the imagination were far from pretty—were still confident enough to wrap boys around their little fingers. And Maria had seen such successful boy-baiting happen time and time again. They’d probably soon do the same to Alan. God, what a nauseating thought.

How long had it been since
she
had a boyfriend? Maria tried to think back. The only “relationship” she ever had was a two-week, secret fling with a guy back in the beginning of tenth grade. It happened around the time of the birth of her rebellious phase, but the only thing she had done was mild kissing and fondling, and whenever more was initiated she chickened out quickly. She had wanted to experiment with many things back then and even more so now, but her inhibitions always got the best of her.

Having a life like Gina and Ellie’s would have been nice. They had time to date, time to play, time to do whatever they wanted. With the real threat of an arranged marriage on Maria’s mind since she was fourteen, boyfriends were out of the question. She could not go on dates or mingle casually with guys without prior approval, scrutiny, and meticulous investigation from her parents.

Everything had been so restricted, but she had fought not to let custom stop her. As powerful a thing as her father’s strict, imposed beliefs were, she still tried to resist. Conservative dress had always been expected of her, not only because long skirts and covered shoulders met with his ideas of what was appropriate, but because of what he called “men’s unavoidable reactions.” She detested the idea that a woman had to dress conservatively because she had to think not only for herself but also for the gaggles of men who were prone to acting vulgar due to lack of testosterone control. His ideas were unreasonable.

Maria sighed and closed her eyes. A headache was approaching, a headache stemming from pure frustration and aggravation. Then quite suddenly, without even a knock or a call, Maria’s door opened. Her mother, wearing one of her old tablecloth-looking fruit dresses, entered and stood at the foot of her bed.

Welcome, Stepford wife,
Maria sneered. Her mother’s highly volumized, short blonde bob that curled underneath her newly-sagging white chin made her definitely deserve the title. That and the fact she was particularly known by everyone for striving for perfection but seldom ever getting it.

“
Hello,” was the dry greeting Maria received.

In her adoptive mother’s pudgy hands was a plate of food that she placed down on a side table near the bed. Maria’s gaze rested blankly upon her. Her mother hovered over the bed, staring back at her critically.

“
You know you’ll be able to eat around the table again with your father and I if you just apologize for what you did.”

Maria scoffed. “Number one, I don’t want to eat around the table with you guys. Number two, fat chance I’m apologizing for anything.”

Her mother’s hands went to her hips as they always did when being tested. “You deserve to give him an apology, and
not to mention those
three nice men you treated so badly when they came to see you.” Her mother grimaced when a memory of the occasion seemed to hit her. “Uh, just thinking about it. Are you really not going to say something to your father? He’s completely embarrassed by what you did. And in fact, I’m putting it lightly. I’ve done everything in my power to prevent him from coming up here and murdering you!”

What did she want? A thank you for
protecting
her? Oh please. She was hardly such a saint.

“
What I did was all...necessary.”

Her mother, though short in stature, always seemed to grow in height whenever she got angry. Her eyes widened as she rose upon the balls of her feet like a cat on its paws. “Necessary? Necessary for you to completely ignore the Chopra boy? Slap Singh in the face and cuss like a...like a drunken sailor at the other? You’re lucky your father even brought you three handsome men to choose from. I’m sure most times when
they
choose a partner for you, that’s it. End of story. He was going to give you a choice and you just wasted it!”

Maria sprung up, her eyes glaring at her mother’s pasty white face. “We don’t need to go over this again. Just drop it. Of course I wasted it! I’m not chaining myself to someone I met for a blasted hour. The one I ignored didn’t want to be there once he saw what I looked like. It was obvious! The one I cursed at wouldn’t stop asking me stupid questions about dad’s money. And the one I slapped...” She had to tread carefully. “He was just too self-absorbed and old....That’s all. How can you even think for a moment that I want any man like that for myself? I may not be a beauty queen, but I sure as hell have goddamn standards.”