He pushes the seat forward. “Awhile.”
“Why didn’t you just wake me up?”
“Because I knew you were tired and I thought I’d let you sleep. In fact, if you want, you can go lie down in one of the spare rooms.” He ducks out the door and climbs out of the backseat.
“I think I will.” I scoot toward the door and he offers his hand to help me out, but I decline, moving around it, and put my feet onto the cement floor.
“You’re mad,” he states. “At me?”
I cross my arms over my chest. “Why would I be mad?”
“I have no idea,” he says as I proceed towards the steps. “That’s why I’m asking.”
I twist the knob and push the door open. “I’m not mad. I was just painfully reminded of what and who I am to you.”
His fingers encircle my elbow and he stills me. “And what do you think you are to me?”
I look directly into his eyes and utter the truth. “A star.”
His fingers prod deeper into my arm, but he presses his lips together, not denying it. I feel my heart fracture down the middle and a tiny fragment chips off. Where it will end up, I don’t know.
***
After I change out of the leather dress and back into my clothes, which Aislin washed, I go to sleep like Alex suggested. He makes me keep a knife on the nightstand next to the bed in case something happens while he’s gone. I find images of cloaked monsters, a glacier world and an eerie lake haunting my head as soon as I shut my eyes and, soon I’m wide awake.
I lie in bed for a while before I force myself to get up. It takes me even longer to decide to go find Laylen, but, finally I tuck the small knife into the back pocket of my jeans and step out into the hall. The house is enormous and it takes a while to find him. He’s in a small room with black walls, no windows and a corner lamp. There is a trivial bookshelf in the corner and a stereo is on top of it, playing the soft tune of “Into the Ocean” by Blue October. In the center of the room is a red sofa where Laylen is lying down, reading a book. I feel uncomfortable just walking in so I stand in the doorway, deciding the best way to interrupt him.
He’s fully engaged in the book and doesn’t seem to notice me. I start to back away, deciding to let him be when he turns the page and calls out, “You can come in, Gemma. I promise I don’t bite.” He glances at me with a sparkle in his blue eyes. “Then again, maybe I should say that I do. That might entice you to come in.”
I press my lips together and step over the threshold. “I’m not that fascinated with biting. Just curious.”
He smiles, shuts the book and sets it down on a rectangular table in front of him. Then he sits up, lowers his boots to the floor and pats the spot beside him. I take a seat and he studies me, like I’m a foreign creature.
“What?” I run my fingers through my hair and wipe my face self-consciously. “Do I have something on my face?”
He shakes his head and sucks his lip ring between his teeth. “No, it’s just that you look so much like her.”
“Like who?”
“Like your mom.”
Every single one of my nerves unites with my heart; it bounds in my chest and dispenses eagerness through my body. “You knew her?”
He nods as he pushes up the sleeves of his black shirt. “I did and you look so much like her. Except for the color of your eyes. Hers were blue.”
I picture a woman with long brown hair like mine, lengthy limbs and eyes as blue as the sea. “What was she like? No one’s ever told me anything about her and I can’t remember a single thing.”
“She was really nice and she was one of those people who you knew you could trust,” he says it like it’s the simplest thing in the world to tell me and I decide Laylen might be the one person who can teach me what the term friend means. “You really can’t remember anything about her?”
I shake my head, bring my feet up onto the couch, and bend my legs to the side of me. “But I was only one when she died.”
“No, you weren’t,” he says with a pucker at his brow. “You were four. Who told you that you were one?”
I pierce my fingers into the palms of my hand until the skin splits open. “Marco and Sophia.”
“Why would they do that?” Laylen reclines back in the sofa, pondering. “Why would it make a difference whether you were one or if you were four?”
“Maybe to torture me?” I flop my head on the back of the chair and stare at the ceiling with my hands lifelessly at my side. Is there anything in my life that isn’t built on a lie? “I’ve never understood them or much of what they did, other than they seem to really hate me.”
His fingers graze the inside of my wrist. “I’m sorry, Gemma.”
I elevate my head and look at him. “You don’t need to apologize. It’s not your fault it happened.”
“That’s not completely true.” He lets out a stressed sigh and his muscles flex as he folds his arms. “I knew what the Keepers were doing with you and I didn’t do anything to stop it.”
“You were like, what, eight when all this was going on?” I say. “Besides, it had to be done to me, right? So the world can be saved and all that; or, whatever the f**k the point was?” I loathe the bitterness that drips into my voice.
He’s lost in thought, nibbling on his lip ring and making these soft sucking noises. “Maybe, I guess… Gemma, what has Alex told you?”
I give him a quick recap of what I’ve been told. The one thing I keep quiet about, though, is the electricity and what it does to Alex and me. That’s just too complicated. And too personal.
“I don’t even know what to say,” he says when I finish. He gives me a sympathetic look and I feel pathetic. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize how bad things were for you.”
“Again, it’s not your fault,” I repeat, plucking at a loose string on the armrest.
“You know, Stephan made this big plan to keep you from feeling or whatever,” he expresses. “But what I never got was how the plan actually worked. How Marco and Sophia were supposed to make you become emotionally detached.”
“Alex told me it was because if you raised someone to never know what happiness and sadness and love are, then they wouldn’t know how to feel them. It was working great, too, until a couple of months ago when I snapped out of my zombie trance.”
“And you don’t know what caused that?”
I shake my head. “I have no idea, other than the fact that I remember it felt like someone was watching me right before it happened.”
He contemplates everything for a concise moment. “None of this makes sense.” He brushes his blue-tipped bangs out of his eyes with his fingers. “It’s like when your mom disappeared. Not much about that made sense, either.”
My heart strikes in my chest as my eyes enlarge and I verge on a panic attack. “I—I thought she died? I was told my mother and father are dead.” My voice squeaks at the end.
“They figured she must have died because of what happened.” He scoots closer so we’re huddled together, places a hand on top of my thigh and my heart settles. “I overheard my parents talking about how Jocelyn was pissed off when she found out you had to go live with Marco and Sophia so the star could be protected and she was planning on running away with you. As soon as Stephan found out he went to stop her. I guess he found you standing up at the top of this hill in the forest, but he couldn’t find your mom. The Keepers looked for her for about a month, but they never found her.” My blood boils. “So they just assumed she died because they never found her?”
A look of loathing shadows his face. “That’s how the Keepers are—secretive and confusing.”
“But that’s bullshit!”
“A lot about the Keepers is bullshit.”
I clutch at my chest as I hunch over, trying to breathe normally. “What if she’s not dead and she’s out there somewhere… alive?”
“That’s the exact same thing my parents thought,” he says and runs a hand down my back to comfort me.
I take a few deep breaths and then sit back up. “Maybe we could talk to your parents and try to get more details.”
His eyes dim as he lounges back in the chair and rests his arm on the armrest. “My parents are dead, Gemma. They died in a car accident a few months after your mother disappeared.”
Me and my Goddamn uncensored mouth. “Oh my God. I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it. It was a long time ago.” He acts like it isn’t a big deal, but he can’t even look at me.
“Does Alex know about any of this stuff?” I change the unpleasant subject. “About my mom and how she supposedly died?”
“The thing about Alex is… he’s kind of been brainwashed.” His voice carries hesitancy. “He’s got it in his head that the Keepers can do no wrong, but, yeah, I’ve mentioned it to him and he didn’t believe me.”
My mind is spinning. There’s so much I don’t know and so much Alex hasn’t explained.
“Hey, I have an idea.” Laylen rises to his feet and tugs down the sleeves of his shirt so they cover his arms and mark. “Why don’t we take a break from all of this deep talk and go into the kitchen and get you something to eat?”
I nod and follow him out of the room, wondering what to do next and who I can trust. It seems like the world is full of unsolvable mazes and liars trying to direct me through them.
***
I might have been witnessing the strangest scene I’ve ever come across. A vampire/Keeper is making my breakfast and it’s nothing simplistic, either. He’s cooking bacon, eggs, French toast and pancakes because he says I need choices. No one has ever cooked me anything before and I’m in awe.
I’m sitting on one of the barstools that border the island, breathing in the fresh scent of cinnamon, bacon and the aroma of a brand new experience. We haven’t talked much, but I’m enjoying watching him move around the kitchen. The way every time he ducks his head and his hair falls in his eyes, the way his limbs stretch as he walks and the way he keeps sucking on that lip ring of his.