“Uh-huh. That’s not what I hear.”
“Why? What did Hannah say?” I hear the worry in my voice at the same time I realize my mom’s conveniently forgotten to leave me alone. I give her my Do you mind? look and she reluctantly closes my door behind her.
Isaac laughs. “Nothing, man. She just said she’d be in her room and left us alone. But it sounds like something happened. What’d you do this time? Don’t tell me you laid one in the middle of the date again.”
“No! And I told you that wasn’t me.”
“That’s not what Lauren told Shels. She said you guys were at the Date Festival and you must’ve eaten too many tamales or something ’cause you ripped one so loud it turned heads. Which usually I’d applaud you for, but, dude—not when you’re trying to make your move. She said it was right after you tried to hold her hand. Not the best timing, man.”
Freaking girls have to tell each other everything. “Lauren was just lying to cover up the fact that she farted.”
“Yeah, ’cause girls do that. Dude, I’ve been dating Shels for almost a year and she still hasn’t farted around me—even when my mom stuffs her full of beans and molé. But just take some Pepto before we leave tonight and you’ll be fine.”
I rack my brain for a brilliant insult to shut him up when I realize what he said. “Tonight? What’s tonight?”
“A movie with you, me, Hannah, and Shels.”
“I can’t.”
“Come on—it was Hannah’s idea, so whatever you did couldn’t have been that big of a turnoff.”
“I didn’t do anything!”
And that reminds me. Audra still has to explain why she ruined my date.
Maybe she was jealous.
Hmm. I like that idea. A lot.
“Dude, are you even listening to me?” Isaac asks.
“Uh, what?”
“I said we’ll pick you up at seven thirty.”
“I told you, I can’t. Sorry.”
I’m not sorry, though. Hannah’s a nice girl—and last night I thought she was what I wanted. I don’t anymore. Not when I have a shot with my dream girl.
Isaac half growls, half sighs. “Fine. But you better be spending the night with a hot girl, and she better be worth abandoning your best friend for. Otherwise, you owe me big-time.”
He’s so spot-on that all I can do is mumble something along the lines of, “Call—talk—later, haveagoodnightbye,” and hang up the phone.
Isaac’s right.
She better be worth all this hassle.
But Audra is.
Even though I know she’ll probably throw more bugs at my head and threaten my life and attack me with winds, I’m looking forward to whatever she has in store for me.
So I throw on fresh clothes, splash some water on my hair, and tell my mom I’m going out. I’m not waiting until sunset to see Audra again.
CHAPTER 18
AUDRA
Screams. Horrible, bone-chilling screams whip around me in an unintelligible blur of noise as rocks, dirt, branches, and so many other things I can’t begin to identify pummel my body.
I stumble, fighting to keep my feet on the ground, refusing to let the gusts carry me away. We can’t fight this storm—it’s already destroyed too much. But I won’t leave without my father.
Something tugs at my wrist, yanking me back a step. I spin around, squinting through the pebbles and dirt and blurry wall of wind to find the outline of a boy’s face. Takes me a second to piece together that I know him.
“We have to go back,” Vane yells.
Before I can answer, a bloodcurdling screech pierces the air.
“Mom?” Vane drops my wrist and races deeper into the storm.
I chase after him, arriving at his side in time to see a woman in a blue dress streak across the sky. She thrashes against the winds that wrap around her like bonds, but she can’t break free.
“Mom!” he screams again, jumping, trying to reach her.
She’s too high.
“Vane?” She thrashes harder. “Run. You have to—”
Her words are carried away by a shifting gust. The sudden flurry alters course, rushes past an uprooted tree, and whips it toward her. I close my eyes, but I can’t block the sickening crunch as one of the jagged branches slams into her, and when I look up her body’s bent at an unnatural angle. Her head lolls to the side. Bloodred rain showers around us.
Vane screams, an unearthly yelp of agony and rage and terror.
I do nothing.
I cannot move.
Cannot think.
Cannot do anything except stare at the broken body in the blue dress, trailing blood through the sky as it whisks into the darkness.
“Audra?” my dad shouts, yanking me out of my daze. “Audra!”
His calls get more frantic when I don’t respond, so I turn, searching the sky until I spot him, fighting his way through the drafts high above me.
“You have to get out of here, Audra. Take Vane and get outside the storm’s path.”
“Not without you.” I start to jump the same way Vane did. There has to be a way to reach my father. Bring him back to me.
Everything in me aches to fly up to him. But I’m not strong enough yet.