From the Stars, to the Stars

From the Stars, to the Stars: Chapter Nine

My phone's touch screen blinks; I swipe a finger over the surface to see Bronwyn's texted me while I was in the shower, asking to meet up at the snack patio before classes. She says it's important. I glance at my alarm clock. It glances back, smirking, so I get ready for school faster than I ever have in my life. Half my hair comes off in my brush. I forget to put on socks, but by George, when the second hand on my watch drops over from seven-fourteen to seven-fifteen my rear end is planted on a patio bench, shivering.

Bronwyn shows fifteen minutes later, wearing layers and layers of draped clothing, but no coat. That much, and that many kinds of fabric should, by all that is right and just, make her look like a sack of potatoes, or at the very least an anemic bag lady. Instead, it sways and rests against her form like colorful whorls of ink, diffusing into water. All in all, it's lovely. It occurs to me her eye-- an intense, cloudy Jade spectrum--are shaped just like her mother's, at least, what I've seen in photos.

She drops her bag at her slouchy-booted feet, kicking the strap under the table so no one might trip over it, and settles down next to me. I don't have a clue what she needs me for, but I don't push to know. I figure she'll tell me sooner than later, so I concentrate on jabbing at a rogue piece of gravel wedged in the table's grating. It's got a sharp point that's already poked me in the thigh once. It pops out with a plinking sound, sailing into the parking lot where it hits the passenger side door of an older Taurus. I wince, but I stare hard at the spot and don't see any damage.

We sit, not talking, staring out into parking lot, up at the sky, the concrete, wherever for thirty minutes. At one point I offer Bryn a handful of shelled sunflower seeds, but she declines, not wanting to get salt on her fingerless woolen mitts, and that's all that's said until the first bell rings, and even then Bronwyn smiles enigmatically at me, bumps her shoulder to mine, and says thanks.

"But I didn't do anything. You needed me for something important, right?" I ask her.

"Yes to both counts. I wanted to see you, and now I have. Are you ready to go in? Let's take the shortcut through the JROTC hall, shall we?"

I hesitate, but say "Um . . . sure?" not pointing out that taking the JROTC hall is the long way around.

Bronwyn takes my arm and links it through her own. I see there are at least three different pairs of sleeves ending at or near her wrists, not counting the mitts. The heat of her seeps through the material. No wonder she isn't wearing a jacket, I think. She must have a fire demon for a temp regulator, same as Sebastien, lucky duck.

Bronwyn pulls me along a little faster than my height usually allows for, and almost before I know it we're at my homeroom door.

"Do me another favor and wait for me here before you go to class," she says before relinquishing my arm.

"Okay, now things are just getting weird. What's going on, Bryn?"

She rolls her eyes up to stare at the ceiling and sighs. "Let's just say, with my brothers, I have Arkham on speed dial. Though usually it's Tristan I have to make the call for."

"Geez, Bryn, cryptic much?"

She smiles, small and a little tired. "Not even. Now, on your toes, Oliviero," she says. She then kisses the top of my head, and gives me a little nudge over the threshold.

Sebastien hasn't shown, yet. He remains conspicuously absent.

The next bells screams, the speaker rattling against its plastered anchor. In the daily chaos of trying to manage all the crap in my life, like a magician pulling a bunny from his hat, I forget to wait for Bronwyn, plunging headlong into the waves of bodies sloshing around in the hallways, instead. The louder-but-less-doom-ridden fire alarm goes off. Thinking it's too early to just be a drill, I follow as the sound alone herds kids into another direction, the sea pouring outside. For a moment I'm jarred and jerked from side to side, but then something insistent tugs at me like a rip current, yanking me into sudden darkness with a loud BANG!