Book of Shadows (3 page)

“No,” I said impatiently. “Romantic news.” I raised my eyebrows.

Janice’s pretty face turned pink. “Oh.You mean Cal?”

“Of course I mean Cal!” I practically exploded. “I can’t believe you didn’t say anything.”

Janice shrugged. “We just went out once,” she said. “Last weekend.”

Tamara and I waited.

“Can you embellish, please?” I pressed after a minute. “I mean, we’re your friends. You went out with the single best-looking guy on the planet.We deserve to know.”

Janice looked pleased and embarrassed. “It didn’t really seem like a date,” she said finally. “It’s more, like, he’s trying to get to know people. Know the area. We drove around and talked a lot, and he wanted to know all about the town and the people. . . .”

Tamara and I looked at each other.

“Hmmm,” I said finally. “So you’re not hooking up or anything?”

Tamara rolled her eyes. “Be blunt, why don’t you, Morgan?”

Janice laughed. “It’s fine,” she said. “And no. No hooking up. I think we’re just friends.”

“Hmmm,” I said again. “He
is
friendly, isn’t he?”

“Speak of the devil,” Tamara said softly.

I looked up to see Cal ambling toward us, his lips curved in a smile.

“Hey,” he said, crouching on the grass next to us. “Am I interrupting anything?”

I shook my head and drank my soda in an attempt to look casual.

“Are you getting settled in?” Tamara asked. “Widow’s Vale is pretty small, so it probably won’t take you long to figure out where everything is.”

Cal smiled at her, and I blinked at his supernatural face. By now I expected to have this reaction when I was around him, so it didn’t bother me as much.

“Yeah. It’s pretty here,” Cal said. “Full of history. I feel like I’ve gone back in time.” He looked down at a patch of grass, absently stroking a blade between his fingers. I tried not to stare, but I found myself wanting to touch what he touched.

“I came over to ask if you guys would come to a party this Saturday night,” Cal said.

We were all so surprised that we didn’t say anything for a second. It seemed gutsy for a relative stranger to throw a party so soon.

“Rowlands!” Bree called from across the lawn, then came and sank down gracefully on the grass next to me. She gave Cal a beautiful smile. “Hi, Cal.”

“Hey. I’ve been going around inviting people to a party this Saturday,” Cal said.

“A party!” Bree looked like this was the best idea she’d ever heard. “What kind of party? Where? Who’s coming?”

Cal laughed, leaning back his head so I could see the strong column of his throat, with its smooth tan skin. In the vee of his shirt hung a worn leather string with a silver pendant dangling from it, a five-pointed star surrounded by a circle. I wondered what the symbol meant.

“If the weather’s all right, it will be an outdoor party,” Cal said. “Mostly I just want to have a chance to talk to people, you know, not at school. I’m asking most of the juniors and seniors—”

“Really?” Bree’s lovely brows arched.

“Sure,” Cal said. “The more the merrier. I figured we could meet up outside.The weather’s been beautiful lately, and there’s this field right at the edge of town over past Tower’s market. I thought we could sit around and talk, look at the stars. . . .”

We all stared at him. Kids hung out at the mall. Kids hung out at the movie theater. Kids even hung out at the 7-Eleven when things got really slow. But nobody ever hung out in the middle of an empty field out past Tower’s market.

“This isn’t the kind of thing you usually do, is it?” he asked.

“Not really,” Bree said carefully. “But it sounds great.”

“Okay.Well, I’ll print up some directions. Hope you guys can come.” He stood smoothly, gracefully, the way an animal rises.

I was shocked that my brain had formed the thought. I’d never felt that way about
anyone.
And Cal Blaire was so out of my league that wanting him seemed stupid, almost pathetic. I shook my head. This was pointless. I would just have to snap out of it.

When he was gone, my friends turned to one another excitedly.

“What kind of a party is this?” Tamara wondered out loud.

“I wonder if there’ll be a keg or something,” Bree said.

“I think I’m going out of town this weekend,” Janice said, looking half disappointed, half relieved.

The four of us watched as Cal approached Bree’s other friends, who were hanging out on the benches at the edge of the school grounds. After talking to them, he headed to the stoners clustered by the doors to the cafeteria. The funny thing was, he looked just like each crowd he spoke to. When he was with the brains, like me and Tamara and Janice, he was totally believable as a gorgeous, brilliant, deeply inquisitive scholar type. When he was with Bree’s friends, he looked cool, casual, and hip: a trendsetter. And when he was standing next to Raven and Chip, I could totally imagine him as a stoner, smoking pot every day after school. It was amazing how comfortable he was with everyone.

On one level I envied it since I’m comfortable with only a small group of people, my good friends. In fact, my two closest friends, Bree and Robbie, I’ve known since we were babies and our families lived on the same block. That was before Bree’s family moved into a huge modern house with a view of the river and long before we’d split up into different cliques. Bree and I were two of the only people at our school who managed to be close despite belonging to different groups.

Cal was . . . universal, in a way. And even though I was nervous, I wanted to go to that party.

The porch light cast a shadow across our lawn. Before me, on the crunchy, dried-out autumn grass, a smaller, darker me walked to my car.

“What’s wrong with Breezy?” I asked.

“She’s making a weird pinging noise,” Bree said.

I rolled my eyes, hoping she could see me. Bree’s expensive, sensitive car was always doing one thing or another. So much for fancy engineering.

I opened the driver’s side door and eased onto the cool vinyl seat of Das Boot, my beautiful white ’71 Chrysler Valiant. My dad likes to joke that my car weighs more than a submarine, so we named it Das Boot, the German word for
boat
and the title of my dad’s all-time favorite movie. Bree climbed in the other side, and we waved good-bye to my dad, who was putting out the trash.

“Drive carefully, sweetheart,” he called.

I started the engine and glanced out my window at the sky. The waning moon was a thin, sharp crescent. A wisp of a dark cloud drifted across it, blotting it from the sky and making the stars pop into prominence.

“Are you going to tell me where Chris is?” I asked as I turned onto Riverdale Drive.

Bree sighed. “I told him I’d promised to go with you,” she said.

“Oh, jeez, don’t tell me,” I groaned. “I’m afraid of driving by myself at night; is that it?”

Bree rubbed her forehead. “Sorry,” she muttered. “He’s gotten so possessive. Why do guys always do that? You go out with them for a while, and suddenly they own you.” She shivered, though it was barely chilly. “Turn right on Westwood.”

Westwood headed right out of town, northward.

Bree waved the piece of paper that had the directions. “I wonder what this will be like. Cal is really . . . different, isn’t he?”

“Uh-huh.” I took a swig of seltzer, letting the conversation die. I was reluctant to talk to Bree about Cal, but I wasn’t sure why.

“Okay, okay!” Bree said excitedly a few minutes later. “This is it! Stop here!” She was already scrambling out of her seat belt, grabbing her macramé purse.

“Bree,” I said politely, looking around. “We’re in the middle of freaking
nowhere
.”

Technically, of course, you’re always somewhere. But this deserted road on the outskirts of town didn’t feel like it. To the left were acres of cornfields, tall and awaiting harvest. To the right was a wide strip of unmowed field edged by thick woods that led back toward town in a large, ragged vee.

“It says to park under that tree,” Bree instructed me. “Come on.”

I eased Das Boot off the side of the road and glided heavily to a stop beneath a huge willow oak.That was when I saw moonlight glinting off at least seven other cars that hadn’t been visible from the road.

Robbie’s distinctive red VW Beetle sat glowing darkly like a giant ladybug under the tree, and I saw Matt Adler’s white pickup, Sharon’s SUV, and Tamara’s dad’s station wagon edged up neatly next to them. Parked in a sloppy circle around them were Raven Meltzer’s battered black wreck, a gold Explorer that I recognized as Cal’s, and a green mini-van I thought belonged to Beth Nielson, Raven’s best friend. I didn’t see any people, but there was a somewhat trampled path through the tall, dried grass toward the woods.

“I guess we’re supposed to go there,” Bree said, sounding uncharacteristically unsure. I was glad she was here with me and that Chris wasn’t. If I’d had to come by myself, I might not have had the nerve to show.

We followed the path of beaten grass, the cool evening breeze filtering through my hair. When we reached the edge of the woods, Bree pointed. I could barely make out the pale gleam of her finger in the forest darkness. Looking ahead, I saw it: a small clearing and shadowed shapes standing around a low fire ringed with stones. I heard low laughter and smelled the delicious scent of wood smoke coiling through the newly crisp air. Suddenly an outdoor party seemed like a brilliant idea.

We stepped carefully through the woods toward the fire. I heard Bree swearing under her breath—her chunky platform sandals weren’t the best shoes for nighttime hiking. My own clogs were cheerfully crunching twigs underfoot. I heard a crashing sound behind us and startled, then saw it was Ethan Sharp and Alessandra Spotford, lurching through the forest after us.

“Watch it!” Alessandra hissed at Ethan. “That branch hit me right in the eye.”

Bree and I emerged into the clearing. I saw Tamara and Robbie and even Ben Reggio from my Latin class. I went over to join the three of them as Bree split off from me to stand by Sharon, Suzanne, Jenna, and Matt. The firelight cast a soft golden glow on everyone’s faces, making the girls look prettier than usual and the guys look older and mysterious.

“Where’s Cal?” Bree asked, and Chris Holly straightened up from where he was crouched by an ice chest, a beer in his hand.

“Why do you want to know?” he said unpleasantly.

She ran her fingers through her hair. “He’s our host.”

Cal appeared almost silently from the edge of the clearing. He was carrying a large wicker hamper, which he set down next to the fire.“Hi,” he said, looking around at us and smiling. “Thanks for coming. I hope the fire will keep you warm.”

I pictured myself snuggling up to him, his arm around my shoulders, feeling the heat of his skin slowly seep through my fleece vest. I blinked quickly, and the image was gone.

“I brought some stuff to eat and drink,” Cal said, kneeling and opening his basket. “There’s food in here—nuts, chips, corn bread.There’s stuff to drink in the coolers.”

“I should have brought some wine,” Bree said, and I blinked in surprise to see her standing right there. Cal smiled at her, and I wondered if he thought she was beautiful.

For the next half hour we hung out and talked, sitting around the fire, maybe twenty of us altogether. Cal had brought some delicious apple cider spiced with cinnamon for people who didn’t want beer, which included me.

Chris sat next to Bree, his arm around her shoulders. She wasn’t looking at him but sent me irritated glances from time to time. Tamara and Ben and I sat with our knees touching. One of my arms was almost too warm from the fire, and the other was pleasantly chilly. From time to time Cal’s voice flowed over me like the night air.

“I’m glad you all came tonight,” Cal said, coming over to kneel next to me. He spoke loud enough for everyone to hear. “My mom knew people here before we moved, so she has a bunch of friends already, but I thought I’d have to celebrate Mabon by myself.”

Bree smiled and leaned forward. “What’s Mabon?”

“Tonight is Mabon,” Cal said. “It’s one of the Wiccan sabbats. Kind of an important day if you practice Wicca. It’s the autumnal equinox.”

You could have heard a leaf land at that moment. We were all looking at him, his face golden and flame-colored, like a mask. Nobody said anything.

Cal seemed aware of our surprise, but he didn’t look embarrassed or self-conscious. In fact, he plowed on. “See, usually on Mabon you have a special circle,” Cal continued, crunching into an apple. “You give thanks for the harvest. And after Mabon you start looking forward to Samhain.”