Is that what he wanted?
“Hey,” Vane says, turning my chin toward him and forcing me to
look in his eyes. They’re wide and worried and focused only on me.
“I promise, I dreamed about you the entire time.”
“You did?” Solana and I ask at the same time.
I’m mildly triumphant when he ignores her and tells me, “I
dreamed about the day I tried to run away when I was seven. Do you remember that? It was snowing and I got lost in the woods and then I fell and couldn’t get up and I thought I was going to die out there all alone. But you found me, and you called your dad and he brought me home. And even though we weren’t friends, you stayed with me that night by the fire until I fell asleep. I asked you to stay
and you stayed.”
I hear Solana mumble the word “stay,” but I can’t pull my eyes
away from Vane.
I’d blocked out that moment with everything else about that
time in my life. But I do remember finding him in the woods, trembling like a fallen fledgling and clinging to my hand like I was the
only thing that mattered in the world. And I remember staring
at him later that night, as the firelight danced across his skin, and
thinking he had a nice face.
I was seven and I didn’t even know what that thought meant. But it was there.
Before Raiden’s Stormer broke our lives apart and the Gales
made their grand plans for Vane.
“Vane—is that you?”
Vane grumbles something under his breath as his mom bursts
into the room. “Thank God—I’ve been so worried. . . .”
Her words fade away when she notices me.
“Oh.” Her eyes dart from Solana to Vane. Then back to me.
“Oh.”
“Don’t start, Mom,” Vane warns as he reaches for my hand. “It’s
been a long day.”
Start what? I wonder as his mom steps closer to examine the bruise on his shoulder. It looks so much more painful in the bright light—though the one on his side is worse. I can’t even look at the
wide blue-black splotch without feeling my eyes burn.
“What happened?” she asks, her voice shaking as she reaches
for the cut on his cheek. “I thought Gus was taking you somewhere
safe—where is he? And when did Audra—”
“Can we save the twenty questions for later?” Vane interrupts.
“I’m fine. Gus is waiting for the other Gales, and the rest is a really
long story I don’t have the energy to tell right now. But it involves
Raiden. And a giant haboob.”
“You saw Raiden?” Solana whispers.
He nods and she shivers and wraps her arms around herself—
which makes her dress cut even lower on her chest.
I glance at Vane to see if he noticed, but he’s not looking at her.
He’s looking at me—at the wound on my side.
He leans down, lifting the hem of my shirt, and even I can’t help
gasping when I see the gash in the light. The Westerly is keeping it
clean for me, but the cut is deep and the jagged skin is practically
shredded.
I try to cover the ugly wound, but Vane grabs my hands to stop
me. “Do we still have a first aid kit, Mom?”
“She needs to go to the hospital. You both probably do. I’ll go
wake your dad—”
“We can’t do that, Mom. The doctors would have all kinds of
questions about how we got hurt. Plus human medicine makes us
sick, remember?”
“Right,” she mumbles. “Not human.”
She stares at the three of us, looking lost and helpless. “I’ll be fine,” I tell everyone, lifting Vane’s hands and draping his
arms around my shoulders, which I know he won’t resist. He takes
my cue, pulling me against him, and I can’t help glancing at Solana. She glares at me before she looks away.
She still wants him.
“Please let my mom treat the cut,” Vane whispers, his breath
grazing my cheek. “I’d rather not have it turn into a giant, gangrenefilled hole in your side.”
I shudder, unable to stop myself from thinking of Aston. “We have to do something,” his mom chimes in. “Come on, I’ll
get you the gauze and ointment.”
I hate the idea of leaving Solana and Vane alone. But I feel better
when I see Vane’s sweet, worried eyes focused completely on me as I
follow his mom out of the room.
She leads me to a cluttered bathroom that has to be Vane’s.
Everything about it screams “guy,” from the musty clothes and towels piled on the floor to the streaked mirror speckled with dried
flecks of water.
“Sorry about the mess,” she says as she bends and removes a
white box marked “First Aid” from the cabinet under the sink. “You
know how Vane is.”
I don’t realize she meant it as a question until she turns to face
me, waiting for my response.
“I . . . do” is the best I can come up with.
Her face is impossible to read as she soaks a clean white towel
with steaming water from the faucet. I reach to take it from her but she doesn’t let go. “Don’t worry. I’ve treated plenty of scrapes and cuts
over the years. Vane was a very accident-prone kid.”