Chapter 16
The following Monday it was rainy and the whole world seemed to droop. The sun hid behind moody, grey clouds and refused to show even the least bit of light. The weather was an accurate reflection of how Lily felt that day. The recent events were looming over her like a mother hen watches over her chicks when she senses a wolf nearby. Lily’s mood had been much lighter over the weekend. The time she had spent with Landon had temporarily made her forget how much her liberty, and perhaps her life, was in danger. Now that she knew how he felt about her, every time she thought about him her heart fluttered as if there were a butterfly trapped inside. The dreaded talk with Malaya had gone surprisingly well. She had worried incessantly about how Malaya would feel about this new, or not so new, development, but she shouldn’t have worried. When she had told Malaya that morning at their normal meeting place outside the school, she didn’t seem too surprised.
“Well, it was bound to happen; I mean, look at you! You’re gorgeous Lily!”
“So are you,” Lily smiled, still concerned for her friend’s feelings.
“Really, it’s okay, Lily,” Malaya insisted. “I don’t think I really ever thought he liked me in that way. I had just hoped.” Malaya stretched her legs out as far as they would go, and wiggled her feet clearly ready to move on with life. Malaya didn’t dwell on things.
“Oh, good,” Lily said letting out a sigh of relief. “I only started liking him recently, and I never would have done anything about it because I knew you liked him. I wouldn’t have brought it up at all if he hadn’t told me he liked me.”
“I knew that he had a thing for you from day one. The way he looks at you is totally different from the way he looks at me. It always has been.” While Lily hadn’t noticed the difference before, in hindsight she could see that it was true. How could she not have seen his admiration for her? Was she just too inexperienced in the boy arena to know the signs that seemed so apparent to everyone else, or was she just too preoccupied with her bizarre set of circumstances that she didn’t have any room left for the intricacies of romance? Maybe it was a little of both.
***
After her talk with Malaya, Lily felt tremendously relieved, but as the day wore on she felt increasingly worried about her situation. Throughout the day she felt waves of fear rush over her entire body whenever the worst possible outcomes popped into her head. She didn’t know what that strange man wanted. Clearly he wanted to kidnap her, and he wanted to use her gift somehow, but she still had no clue as to what he would want her to do and for how long. If he did succeed in kidnapping her, how long would he keep her? Would it be for a month, a year, or for the rest of her life? That was probably what scared her the most. Not knowing. Every day she tried to clear her mind in an attempt to hear his thoughts, but she was never successful. She knew that he had found a way to evade her, but she always tried anyway. She had also attempted numerous times to hear Dean’s thoughts, hoping that she might prevent some of the physical and emotional damage he inflicted almost daily. She hadn’t had much success with that either, because most of his harassment was unplanned, and it was nearly impossible for Lily to get there in time to do anything. At first she felt like a failure. Lily wanted to use her gift for good, but she couldn’t seem to intervene in even the simplest issues.
“Lily?” Lily jumped slightly as her English teacher, Ms. Moore, called her name. “Lily, what are your thoughts on the poem?” Clearly her teacher had noticed she hadn’t been paying attention.
“I… I thought it was good, and was a perfect example of….typical American literature.” Normally Ms. Moore wouldn’t have let her off the hook with such a vague answer, but luckily that day she must have been feeling generous because she didn’t question her any further. For the remainder of class Lily doodled Landon’s name across a page in her blue spiral notebook. She wanted to pay attention, but between her thoughts of her relationship with Landon, and the man who wanted to kidnap her, she just couldn’t. After class Ms. Moore pulled her aside.
“Lily, you are one of my best students in this class, but I’ve noticed you’ve been a little distracted lately. Is there anything wrong?” What could Lily say to her? She certainly couldn’t say anything about her gift or the man who wanted to throw her in the back of his black sedan.
“I’ve had a lot on my mind,” she said hoping it would suffice.
“This isn’t normal behavior for you. Is there anything I can do? Are you having problems at home? Is the situation with your aunt not working out very well?”
“No, it’s nothing like that.”
“Well what is it then,” she said staring at Lily over her silvery rimmed glasses. She wasn’t going to give up.
“Um, I seem to have my first boyfriend. Well, maybe I have a boyfriend. I’m not entirely sure we’re official yet, but it’s headed in that direction I think,” Lily replied hoping Landon was okay with revealing their relationship to her teacher. It wasn’t like she was announcing it over the intercom for the whole school to hear, and it was an emergency. Sort of.
“Oh, that’s wonderful dear,” Ms. Moore exclaimed grinning excitedly. “Is he someone I know?”
“Landon Turner,” Lily said hesitantly. Her relationship with him felt so much more real and final when she declared it out loud.
“Oh,” Ms. Moore said clearly shocked. “Do you mean the Landon Turner at this school,” she said wanting to clarify that one of her favorite students was now dating one of the biggest trouble makers in the school. Ms. Moore had only had Landon in one of her classes, and that was more than enough for her.
“Yes,” Lily responded.
“Well dear, I wish you luck with that,” the teacher said trying to sound sincere.
“Um, thank you,” Lily said as more of a question than a statement.
“You may go dear,” Ms. Moore said turning to a stack of ungraded papers on her desk. “But Lily, please be careful,” her teacher pleaded.
“I will,” Lily spoke quietly as she slipped through the heavy classroom door. Even though Lily knew her teacher was referring to Landon, her words of warning also applied to her other distractions as well.
***
“That looks appetizing,” Landon said eyeing Malaya’s cafeteria tray. He sat down next to Lily who was quickly eating her ham sandwich like there was no tomorrow.
“I woke up really late, so I didn’t have time to pack a lunch,” Malaya replied poking at a lump of thick mashed potatoes.
“You always wake up really late,” Lily commented.
“Okay, I woke up really late for me,” Malaya corrected.
“What’s up with you,” Landon questioned Lily grabbing her nearly devoured sandwich. She had been eating it at lightning speed.
“I’m in a hurry,” she said trying to snatch it back.
“For what?” Landon was dangling the sandwich just out of her reach.
“I have a tutoring appointment.”
“With who,” Landon demanded suspiciously.
“You probably don’t know him. His name is Robert, and he’s in my algebra class.” She gave up on ever reaching for her sandwich, and started on her carrot sticks. “Normally it would be on Wednesday, but he has a dentist appointment, and this was the only time he could do it.”
“Cancel it.”
“Why?”
“Because you’ll be alone with him of course,” Landon stated.
“You don’t have to be jealous. He really is just helping me with algebra,” Lily said looking him in the eye.
“I’m not jealous, Lily,” he said seriously with a hint of that gorgeous smile on his lips. “He can’t protect you. I can. You need to be with one of us at all times,” he said pointing to himself and Malaya, who had made a volcano sculpture out of her mashed potatoes and ketchup. “I’m not sitting in school for any longer that I have to.”
“Neither am I,” Malaya piped in. “Speaking of protection, I got us some pepper spray.” Malaya pulled a small black container out of her backpack and tossed it to Lily.
“Good thinking, Malaya,” Landon said. “I didn’t even think about that.”
“Thanks,” Malaya smiled proudly.
“So what about algebra,” Lily asked her guardians.
“From now on I’ll tutor you.” Landon said handing back what was left of her sandwich. Lily wasn’t going to argue with that. He was right, and it made complete sense because she was going to be spending a lot of time with him anyway. They might as well get some learning done. She hoped Robert wouldn’t feel slighted. This was only her third study session, so she needed a good excuse.
“So what do I tell him?”
“The truth,” Landon said matter of factly. “Your stud of a boyfriend will be taking over all tutoring duties.” A gorgeous grin spread across his tanned face. Lily smiled sweetly in return. Inside her chest her heart nearly melted all over the cafeteria floor. He could have said, “Let’s cut school and bungee jump off the Eiffel Tower”, and she probably would have done it.
“About the whole boyfriend/girlfriend thing,” Lily started, feeling a little relieved that he had been the one to bring it up. “I sort of told my English teacher that we were dating. I was having a hard time concentrating because of everything that has been going on lately, and when she asked me what was wrong, I obviously couldn’t tell her about my gift or the psychologically deranged maniac after me, so I told her about us.”
“I like that,” Landon said, still grinning.
“What?”
“Us.” This was going better that she had thought.
“I like it too,” Lily said blushing slightly.
“Alright you two love birds, I’ve got to go talk to a certain biology teacher about a certain grade. I’ll see you later,” Malaya said as she stood and swung her backpack onto her thin shoulders.
“See you tomorrow,” Landon said breaking the spell Lily had been under. Malaya gave Lily a quick “no, it doesn’t bother me, so enjoy this moment” wink as she scooped up her half eaten lunch tray and headed to a nearby trashcan.
“Well, I guess we better meet up with Robert to tell him the good news,” Landon said standing from his seat.
“Good news?”
“That you’re all mine, of course.”
That morning Lily had entered the cafeteria nearing a state of depression, but upon leaving it she felt as light and as happy as any normal teenage girl could ever hope to be.