“Yeah? What do you want to think about, then?”
“Snow angels. I’ve never made one.”
“Really? You guys don’t do angels?”
“It’s not the angels. We only moved to Virginia for a few months, so I’ve never lived anywhere it snows.”
An hour later, we were soggy and wet and sitting around the kitchen table. Amma had gone to the Stop & Steal, and we were drinking the sorry hot chocolate I had attempted to make myself.
“I’m not sure this is the way you make hot chocolate,” Lena teased me as I scraped a microwaved bowl of chocolate chips into hot milk. The result was brown and white and lumpy. It looked great to me.
“Yeah? How would you know? ‘Kitchen, hot chocolate, please.’” I mimicked her high voice with my low one and the result was a strange cracking falsetto. She smiled. I had missed that smile, even though it had only been days; I missed it even when it had only been minutes.
“Speaking of Kitchen, I have to go. I told my uncle I was at the library, and it’s closed by now.”
I pulled her onto my lap, sitting at the kitchen table. I was having trouble not touching her every second, now that I could again. I found myself making excuses to tickle her, anything to touch her hair, her hands, her knees. The pull between us was like a magnet. She leaned against my chest and we just sat there until I heard feet padding across the floor upstairs. She bolted out of my lap like a frightened cat.
“Don’t worry, that’s my dad. He’s just taking a shower. It’s the only time he comes out of his study anymore.”
“He’s getting worse, isn’t he?” She took my hand. We both knew it wasn’t really a question.
“My dad wasn’t like this until my mom died. He just flipped out after that.” I didn’t have to say the rest; she’d heard me think it enough times. About how my mom died, and we stopped cooking fried tomatoes, and we lost the little pieces of the Christmas town, and she wasn’t there to stand up to Mrs.
Lincoln, and nothing was ever the same again.
“I’m sorry.”
“I know.”
“Is that why you went to the library today? To look for your mom?”
I looked at Lena, pushing her hair out of her face. I nodded, pulling the rosemary out of my pocket and placing it carefully on the counter. “Come on. I want to show you something.” I pulled her out of the chair and took her hand. We slid across the old wood flooring in our damp socks and stopped at the door to the study. I looked up the stairs to my dad’s bedroom. I didn’t even hear the shower yet; we still had plenty of time. I tried the door handle.
“It’s locked.” Lena frowned. “Do you have the key?”
“Wait, watch what happens.” We stood there, staring at the door. I felt stupid standing there, and Lena must have too because she started to giggle. Just when I was about to laugh, the door began to unbolt itself. She stopped laughing.
That’s not a Cast. I would be able to feel it.
I think I’m supposed to go in, or we are.
I stepped back and the door bolted itself again. Lena held up her hand, as if she was going to use her powers to open the door for me. I touched her back, gently. “L. I think I need to do it.”
I touched the handle again. The door unbolted and swung open, and I stepped into the study for the first time in years. It was still a dark, frightening place. The painting, covered with a sheet, was still hanging over the faded sofa. Under the window, my dad’s carved mahogany desk was papered with his latest novel, stacked on his computer, stacked on his chair, stacked meticulously across the Persian rug on the floor.
“Don’t touch anything. He’ll know.”
Lena squatted down and stared at the nearest pile. Then, she picked up a piece of paper and turned on the brass desk lamp. “Ethan.”
“Don’t turn on the light. I don’t want him to come down here and freak out on us. He’d kill me if he knew we were in here. All he cares about is his book.”
She handed me the paper, without a word. I took it. It was covered with scribbles. Not scribbled words, just scribbles. I grabbed a handful of the papers closest to me. They were covered with squiggly lines and shapes, and more scribbles. I picked up a piece of paper from the floor, nothing but tiny rows of circles. I tore through the stacks of white paper littering his desk and the floor. More scribbles and shapes, pages and pages of them. Not a single word.
Then I understood. There was no book.
My father wasn’t a writer. He wasn’t even a vampire.
He was a madman.
I bent down, my hands on my knees. I was going to be sick. I should have seen this coming. Lena rubbed my back.
It’s okay. He’s just going through a hard time. He’ll come back to you.
He won’t. He’s gone. She’s gone, and now I’m losing him, too.