Stupid cryptic rational Hayden. “You’re wearing that?” I asked.
He looked down. “What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?”
Nothing, really. Jeans, sneakers, and a Vampire Weekend T-shirt. He actually looked all right—maybe he’d even lost a little weight? Had he been trying and I hadn’t noticed? “Didn’t know you were into those guys, that’s all. Aren’t they a little poppy for you?” Hayden usually liked sad, whiny music. Vampire Weekend was my thing.
“Maybe I’m feeling more upbeat today.”
“Well, good for you,” I said. Sure, now he was feeling upbeat. I’d been trying to get him to go to parties forever, parties with people that we might actually like. And now, the one time he was willing to leave the house, we were stuck with the Stephanie Caster crowd. I knew I should just be grateful that he was willing to branch out, but for some reason it annoyed me. Why did everything have to be on his terms?
“Why are you being such an asshole?” It wasn’t like Hayden to get all confrontational. He must have been really excited about the stupid party to get so irritated with me.
“Didn’t mean to pee in your Cheerios. Sorry.” I got up from sitting on his bed and sat at the desk, scrolling through iTunes on Hayden’s fancy MacBook. “Here, you want upbeat? We’ll do upbeat.” I clicked on “Diane Young.” “In honor of your shirt,” I said.
“That’s pretty aggressively upbeat,” he said.
“Lyrics are still a downer, though. Saying someone’s got the luck of a Kennedy is harsh.”
“Are we going to sit around talking about lyrics all night? We should probably get out of here.”
No. I forced myself to snap out of the daze I’d been in. I wasn’t at the party with Hayden; I was home, alone, in my room. And I wasn’t ready to think about this yet. I tried rebooting the computer to make the music stop, but nothing happened. The song kept playing, its rapid-fire drumbeat echoing against the walls.
Creepy. Almost creepier because the song was so happy sounding. Almost like it was mocking me.
My Gchat window pinged.
ArchmageGed: Come on, you can remember the whole thing.
It wasn’t going to happen. Not now. I couldn’t handle another night without enough sleep; that had to be why all this was happening. None of it was real.
And yet the song kept playing.
I tried shutting down iTunes again, clicking out of Gchat. Nothing.
It sounded as if the song was getting even louder. Which was impossible.
My heart was pounding and when I looked down I realized my hands were shaking. Finally I slammed my laptop shut. The music ended as abruptly as it had begun; the silence seemed almost loud. Loud enough to keep me awake, but I really had to go to sleep.
Except when I turned around, someone was sitting on my bed.
I opened my mouth to scream but nothing came out. The person on the bed was a man, young but not handsome, with long reddish-brown hair that almost matched his skin.
ArchmageGed.
Or at least someone who looked almost exactly like the wizard figurine I’d bought. I looked up at my shelf—but the figurine wasn’t there.
It made no sense. I felt myself starting to panic. How did he get in my room? There was no way this could really be happening.
“Who are you?” I asked, finally, but he didn’t say anything. He just looked at me. Then the air around him seemed to shimmer, and the room got cold, almost like there was a breeze blowing in, though my windows were closed. And yet I was sweating.
I closed my eyes and felt my head pounding, almost like my brain was trying to come out my ears. This was not real. It couldn’t be.
I tried to monitor my breathing, to keep from panicking. In. Out. In. Out. Slowly. I had to find a way to be rational. Hayden’s vision of ArchmageGed was, I knew, a kind of dashing magician, a glamorous alternative-universe David Blaine. If he were really ArchmageGed, wasn’t that who I would see? I’d always pictured him as more like Gandalf, a tall old man with long gray hair and flowing robes; if this were all my imagination, the person on the bed would look like him.
I was a little calmer now. I opened my eyes again.
The figurine was there.
But the wizard was gone.
Remember, the party’s tonight. Come early.
All day Friday I stared at Astrid’s text. She’d really meant it when she said I should come. It was Friday afternoon, and though I hadn’t forgotten about the party, I just wasn’t sure it was a good idea to go.
I’d spent the rest of the week completely freaked out about the Archmage situation. What had really happened in my room that night? I’d been so wired that I hadn’t slept at all, and I’d been up most nights since trying to figure it out. Now I felt like a zombie. I needed to talk to someone about it, but there was no way I would even consider Astrid, and the only other people I could imagine—Mom, Mr. Beaumont, Jimmy—would all think I was crazy. Which I was starting to think I was. No, I had to put it out of my mind. I knew I should probably just stay in, especially given what happened last time I went to a party, but maybe this was the kind of distraction I needed.
Kind of presumptuous of you to assume I’m going, isn’t it? I read it over before I sent it and realized it sounded rude, so I added a winking smiley face and hoped it was enough. ;-)
Oh, you’re going. Trust me, it’ll be a good thing.
How could I argue with that? I started getting ready. I brushed my teeth so many times my gums bled, and I accidentally put too much gel in my hair and had to wash it twice to get it out. I spent what felt like an hour staring at a drawer of T-shirts, before deciding on a Raygun shirt that said MAKE AWKWARD SEXUAL ADVANCES NOT WAR. Mom had rolled her eyes when I bought it, but I guess she thought the odds were against me getting to make the advances in the first place. She was probably right; I had a feeling the shirt could do more harm than good. But I liked it.
Hayden’s mix wasn’t exactly filled with party music, but I was finding it hard to listen to anything else these days. I didn’t think I’d ever be able to listen to that Vampire Weekend song again, so I opted instead for a song we’d rocked out to together before. It felt a little bit like an homage.
But it made me even more conflicted about whether I should be going out. I couldn’t imagine what Hayden would do in my place, but I’d never have put him in this place. And I wouldn’t be in this place at all if he were still here. Bitter, maybe, but true.
The party was on my side of town, which was already a point in its favor. The jock jerks tended to stay on their side, where there was always action because their parents traveled so much. “I’m kind of nervous about this,” I admitted to Astrid, when she called to give me the details. “I haven’t been to that many parties, and the last one . . .” I couldn’t finish the sentence. Not out loud.
“I know,” she said. “Why don’t I come to your house first and we can walk over together? Then maybe you won’t feel weird about going.”
“That would be great,” I said, exhaling. I’d wanted to ask her if we could meet up first, but I’d been too nervous. So much for awkward sexual advances—I couldn’t even make awkward friendly advances. “Eric won’t mind?”
“Not at all! He can drive us home.”
For a second, I’d hoped she’d say that he wasn’t coming, that they’d broken up, but I reminded myself that she was my new friend, not my future girlfriend. Even if that might have been nice. Or amazing.
Now I just had to wait for her to show up. Of all nights for Mom to be working the graveyard shift, this was the worst, because she hadn’t left the house yet.
“Look at you,” she said, and messed up my hair.
I ducked back. “Cut it out!”
“Don’t worry, it still looks . . . I’m not sure what it is you’re going for here. It still looks messy. Is that what you want?”
“It’s not messy,” I said. “It’s spiked.”
“Sweetie, your hair’s a little too long for that. But it looks great. Really.”
She totally didn’t mean it, but I didn’t care.
“Now I have to get parental. Where is this party, and who’s going to be there? What time are you coming home?” She said it all rapid fire, like she was joking, but I knew she was serious.
I didn’t see that it mattered, given that she’d be gone all night, but whatever. I gave her the details I knew and told her I had no idea who would be there or when I was coming back.
“You’re just daring me to give you a curfew, aren’t you?”
“Would you really do that?” She never had before. Then again, there hadn’t been much of a need.
“Do I have to?” She frowned and put her hands on her hips.
She didn’t, really—the town already had a curfew of midnight, so it wasn’t like I could stay out any later than that. Which I reminded her.
“I guess that will do,” she said. “It’s already after eight. You should get going.”
“I’m waiting for someone.” Crap, I could feel myself blushing.
“You are?” Mom looked excited. “That’s great! Who?”
“Um,” I said, “just someone.”
“A male someone or a female someone?” She looked more intrigued than concerned. It was true that I’d never so much as mentioned a girl to her before; we’d had the talk years ago, the first time I’d asked her a question about babies, but other than that we’d steered clear of conversations about dating other than to make fun of Rachel’s choice of suitors.
The doorbell rang before I could answer her question. I ran to answer it but Mom was closer and beat me there. “Hello,” she said, “I’m Sam’s mom. You can call me Sarah. And you are . . . ?”
“Hi, I’m Astrid. Nice to meet you.”
She didn’t seem at all annoyed to be meeting my mom, which was nice. And she looked fantastic—her whitish-blond hair was down and glittered with silver, gold, and bronze streaks, and she was wearing a silvery top and shiny gold pants and carrying a bronze backpack.
“Is this a costume party?” Mom asked. “I think Sam might be a little underdressed here.”
“Mom!” I yelled, but Astrid just laughed.
“No, it’s just a regular party. I felt like getting fancy is all. This isn’t the kind of outfit I can wear to school.”
“No, you’re right about that,” Mom agreed. I listened for her tone but she seemed amused. “Well, you’re very sparkly.”
“That’s what I was going for,” Astrid said, and laughed again. “Sam, we should really get going.”
“Okay. See you later, Mom.” I prayed she wouldn’t do something annoying like try to kiss me before I left.
“Have fun,” she said. “And make sure to keep your phone on. You never know when I might need you.”
I rolled my eyes as I shut the door behind me.