“What did you guys do?”
Another shrug.
“Vane! That’s not an actual answer.”
Dang—only three. Usually she lets at least four or five go. She must be especially interested. Or especially worried. Can she tell how freaked out I am?
Her pale blue eyes don’t blink as they watch me. They’re the only feature we have in common, the only thing that makes people think maybe, maybe there’s a family resemblance between the tall, dark-haired boy and his short, blond mother.
I try distraction. “Hannah was great. In fact, we drove to Vegas and got married ’cause she needs an American visa and I figured, why not? She’s hot. She’s packing her stuff right now. Hope you don’t mind sharing a roof with a honeymooning couple.”
My mom sighs, but I can tell by the way her lips twitch that she wants to smile. I let her off the hook.
“Hannah was nice. We went to dinner. Then I took her home. It was all very exciting.”
“How come you’re home so early?” she asks.
“We . . . didn’t really hit it off.”
It’s sort of true.
“But you’re okay?” The lines deepen across her forehead.
“Of course.” I smile to sell it. “Just tired. I think I’m gonna play a few games and hit the sack early.”
My mom relaxes. If I’m okay enough to play video games, there’s no reason to worry—Mom’s parenting rule number fifty-three. It comes right after As long as the principal isn’t calling, there’s no reason to worry about his grades, and right before If his eyes aren’t bloodshot, he’s just hungry—it’s not the munchies.
That’s why I love her. She knows when to keep me in line, and when to let me be—both my parents do. I totally scored in the adoptive family department. Even if they don’t look like me and live in a town where the weather can be considered cruel and unusual punishment. They even let me keep my last name—which is awesome because Weston is way better than Brasier. It rhymes with Frasier, but I know I’d have been Vane Brassiere to every kid in school.
Plus, it leaves me something from my “other life.”
My past is this giant void that makes me want to bang my head against the wall until I knock the memories loose. I don’t care how many doctors tell me it’s normal for trauma to repress painful experiences—I don’t buy it. How can it be normal to completely forget your entire childhood?
And what kind of selfish jerk erases his family just because it hurts to think about them?
I feel my smile start to fade, so I head down the hall before my mom can notice. Once I close my bedroom door, I switch on the old tube TV I inherited when my parents finally invested in a flat-screen and log online, cringing when one of Isaac’s war games starts up.
Isaac doesn’t understand why I hate playing the first person shooters. I don’t really get it either. The blood turns my stomach for some reason—not that I’ve told him that. Like I need to give him another thing to bug me about.
But I’m not playing anyway. I join the first match I find, crouch my guy in a corner and crank the volume up so my mom can hear the explosions in the family room. Hopefully that’ll keep her from checking on me.
Gunfire blasts, and I sink to the pile of blankets I kicked off my bed last night—is my mom insane? Blankets? In the summer?—and close my eyes. Cool air from my ceiling fan brushes across my face and my shoulders relax. The breeze always makes my head clear. Which is good, ’cause I have some serious crap to figure out.
Sure, I’ve caught quick glimpses of the girl before—but I was never sure I’d really seen her, and not some dark-haired girl who looked like her. Those times were nothing like this—with full eye contact and everything.
And I’ve heard whispers on the wind outside my dreams. But they’ve never been words I could understand or a voice I could recognize—and they’ve never used my name.
Not to mention I’ve never had the wind attack me before. Sudden breezes flaring up at odd times—sure. Winds that seem drawn to me—occasionally. But those never freaked me out. I know it sounds weird, but the wind doesn’t scare me. Even after what happened to my parents. Even after what happened tonight. The wind calms me somehow. I’ve never understood why.
So the crazy, cold wind isn’t the reason my hands are shaking.
It’s because I know the girl called that wind to me. Controlled it somehow. Attacked me with it. The strange hiss I heard before the wind overpowered us was her voice.
Which means what?
She’s magical? Some sort of wind god? An angel?
I laugh at myself, even though the last word makes my stomach squirm.
She was there the day I survived the tornado. A tiny part of me has always wondered if she somehow saved me. How else could I have lived?
Is she my . . . guardian angel?
Nah. I don’t believe in that crap. Plus, she wasn’t trying to protect me from anything tonight. I was on a freaking first date—where’s the danger in that?
So, what?