“Mate. My future requires management.”
There! He’s engaged. Totally off the market, has been since he was five. Naturally, it’s more crazy Alpha tradition, but what matters is it crushes any little daydream I might have had. The disappointment is sour but necessary, just another reason why a world where he and I could be together doesn’t exist, since fear of being killed by an angry mob was clearly not fazing me all that much.
“Oh,” I say. “But you love her, so it all worked out. Right?”
Please say yes. If you say no, then I’m not going to be strong enough to push you away. Just tell me you love her so I can tell you I’m happy for you, go home and have a good cry, and then wash my hands of all this.
He looks into my face and nods. “I do.”
Ouch. That hurt.
“I’m happy for you.” I say. You lie.
I feel pressure in my forehead and flashing lights in the corners of my eyes. A migraine is coming. I have to get out of this heat and away from this boy. Just as I lean over to collect the books, ten kids on bicycles race under the scaffolding and stop. I peer at them closely, wondering if any of them go to my school, but I don’t recognize their faces. All I need to see is their Niner shirts.
“You two got any money?” the first boy shouts at me. He’s riding a low-rider bicycle, droopy jeans, and a face full of wickedness.
“No,” I say. “I didn’t bring my purse.”
His friends boo me.
“I think she lying,” another shouts.
“She definitely lying!”
The first boy points his phone at us. He is making a video, something he can post on the Niner web page. They like to show off, and the million hits they get a month mean other people like it too. We’re their next stars.
“Maybe you could go get some. Maybe we can come with you,” another one says. His face is shadowed beneath the brim of his hat, but I can still see his sharp eyes.
“Move on,” Fathom says.
They all turn their attention to him.
“What are you going to do if we don’t, fool?”
“My father is a policeman,” I say nervously.
“Oh? Where he at?” another boy shouts, and the others roll with laughter like I just announced that my daddy can beat up their daddies.
Fathom stands and pulls down his hood. “It would be smart of you to leave.”
“Don’t talk to them, Fathom,” I say.
“Fathom! Yo, he’s one of those fish heads,” one of the boys cries.
The others hop off their bikes and let them fall. The smallest of the group steps forward and is handed a knife. It flashes like his eyes.
“Make yourself famous,” says the one recording us on his phone. “Stick a mermaid and you’ll be the man.”
The boy puffs out his chest, mustering the twisted courage the others expect of him, but he’s afraid. His heart isn’t in it.
Shhhtikkt! The noise burns my ears. There’s a flash and the sound of the knife bouncing on the pavement and the smell of salty blood. The boy screams, looking down at his mangled hand. Fathom raises his arm to strike again.
“Fathom, no!” I scream. He looks at me, confused, and the gangstas jump on him, punching and kicking and forcing him into the street. He takes a fist to the jaw and a kick in the ribs.
I shout for help, and it comes in the form of soldiers. Bonnie is there, dragging the Niner kids off of the prince, subduing them with a hand-held Taser when they refuse to stop fighting. Others are pulled away and handcuffed. Police cars are everywhere, and cops rush around snatching smart phones out of the hands of anyone taping the event.
My father arrives and leads me away from the shouting.
“It wasn’t his fault.”
“There’s no excuse for all this blood,” my father says.
Chapter Nineteen
My father has a long conversation with Doyle—a long, loud, profanity-filled conversation. He tells the principal he can shove my mother’s identification . . . well, we all know where you shove things. It ends with him slamming his phone on the table so hard, it cracks the screen.
“He’s not going to take no for an answer,” I say.
“He’s going to have to,” my father steams.
As if on cue, my phone rings. It’s him. My father reaches for my phone, but I pull it away.
“You’re not breaking mine, too,” I say.
“Let your father know that the problem solved itself,” Doyle says when I answer. “The prime has canceled the meetings. He doesn’t want you in the camp.”
“I’ll try not to take it personally,” I say. “So, I’m done?”
“You’ll continue when school opens.”
I whisper a bit of my own profanity.
“When does that happen?”
“Two days. Don’t worry, Lyric. Things are going to be different when you come back. You’ll see. Everything is going according to plan.”