Falling (The Falling Angels Saga) (19 page)

*

“I got an eh… an eh… an eh…” I couldn’t even say it.

I was at my locker between classes, tears bubbling in my eyes like a volcano about to erupt, trying to tell Maudrina of my test-taking disaster.

“A what, Megan?” I fanned the paper in front of her face. Her eyes found the big red F in a big red circle atop the page. “Ooh!” she said with a pained expression.

“I have never gotten en eh… an eh.” The letter continued to get stuck half way up my throat.

She eased the paper from my hand and looked it over. “It seems it’s the essay that did you in.”

“I can see that!” I said, snatching the paper back. “This is going to totally ruin my GPA. There goes my chance at Harvard, at medical school.”

“Megan, you’re overreacting. Lots of students get—” I shot her a look, defying her to allow the letter F to fall from her lips. “Lots of students get a few bad grades and still go on to have great college careers,” she said, amending her statement.

“I’m not lots of students.
I
don’t get bad grades.”

That was true. I hadn’t gotten a bad grade since kindergarten when I punched Bianca Thompson for stealing my snack cookie when my head was down. And that bad grade was for sportsmanship,
not
a real subject. For the record, it was Bianca who was the bad sport, not me.

I waved the test paper through the air like a defeated soldier wielding a white flag. “This has got to be a mistake,” I moaned.

“Of course it is. Have you talked to your teacher about it?”

“Mr. Percival wouldn’t stop to talk to me. He said to see him during his office hours.”

"Then that’s what you’re going to do. I'm sure once you talk to him, he'll give you the grade you deserve. Teachers make mistakes too, you know."

Maudrina was right. All I needed to do was plead my case. My essay was based on random variables. With all the random variables I’d been dealing with in my own life, I couldn’t help but know random variables backwards and forwards. I was sure I'd done A work. Once I pleaded my case, I was equally sure Mr. Percival would look at me with his easy eyes and agree.

I took a deep, cleansing breath. "Thanks," I said, again grateful for Maudrina's unyielding friendship.

I recalled how she had defended my position when I announced I wanted to attend the conclave as a man, and the care she'd shown when I returned from the conclave so distraught.

I’ll believe it for both of us for now. Give you a little break.

In that moment, thoughts of Erin fired through my consciousness. We’d been so close since Miss Kane’s class in the fourth grade where we'd planned our weddings together, both of us in flowing white gowns and matching diamond tiaras. The silly musings of little girls, yet my thoughts of Erin reached down into my soul, squeezing it until the guilt nestled there came oozing out, thick and black and sticky with remorse.

"Why are you staring at me like that?" Maudrina asked, her words quieting my mind.

"Like what?"

"You have this washed away look in your eyes, like you've been dipping into the cooking sherry."

My expression darkened. “I was just thinking about Erin.”

“I thought we were talking about a test paper?”

Soft, melancholy laughter rolled from my lips. "We were. But you’ve been so supportive, I started thinking about friendship.”

“And friendship led you to Erin.”

I nodded. “She still has no idea I thought she placed the gris gris in Aunt Jaz’s hospital room.” My mood began sinking once again, like a rock drifting to the bottom of the sea.

“Does she need to know?”

I blew out a long, breathy sigh. “Yeah, she does. I’ve got this thing about lies of omission. I’d feel like a hypocrite if I let it go.”

That wasn’t entirely true. I mean, wasn’t I clinging to a lie of omission myself about Orthon’s feelings for me? Of course I was. But that was a thought for another time.

“Okay. No lies of omission,” said Maudrina. “We’ll tell her together. After all, I’m as guilty as you are. The only thing I’m not guilty of is saying it out loud.” A dry smile crossed her lips.

The bell rang, and like a zombie in a horror flick, I shuffled off to class. I was right about my school day taking my mind off the conclave, although I hadn’t realized that the day would come with its own hornet’s nest of issues.

Maudrina and I agreed to meet Erin at the mall after school. Maudrina would be there to bolster me. Again.

Once Erin confirmed she’d meet us, a sense of relief came over me. I don’t know why. The hard part was still ahead of me. I had to tell one of my best friends that I’d suspected her of a horrible act against Aunt Jaz. Yet, despite what I knew I had to do, thoughts of the Glendale mall gave rise to memories of the old days when Erin and I patrolled the mall together looking for romance and adventure in the eyes of cute boys.

Perhaps she’ll laugh it off. Perhaps we can get back to some form of how things used to be.

When I reached the top of the escalator, I was surprised to see Erin already seated in our old spot in the food court. I thought I’d arrived early, but there she was. A swell of nostalgia surged over me like floodwater. We’d been coming here since middle school. Erin smiled when she saw me and waved. More nostalgia. I’d seen that smile, that wave a hundred times.

Curly fries.

I suddenly had a craving for them. Curly fries were more than a fun food we’d shared when we came to the mall. Curly fries tethered me to my past, to a friendship that began in the third grade and carried all the way into high school, a friendship I’d risked my life for.

I smiled and waved back.

“Hey there, early bird,” I said as I approached. She rose and we hugged. If I had a penny for every time we’d hugged in the Glendale mall, I’d be a very rich young lady. Yet this hug seemed different, more clingy, more protective.

“Hi,” she said softly. “I’m so glad we’re getting together. I miss you.”

A clump of thick, guilt-ridden mucous formed in my throat. “Umm, me, too,” I replied, choking on the words. I began looking around, hoping to spot Maudrina moving in our direction.

“You okay?”

“Parched,” I croaked. My eyes scanned back to the escalator.

Maudrina, where are you?

“I’ll go get us a couple of lemonades. On me,” she said, her voice filled with content. I knew it was because we were together again—like the old days. “Feel like sharing an order of curly fries?” she asked.

At the mention of curly fries, the smile materialized back onto my face as the nostalgia once again flowed. I relaxed. “What’s a trip to the mall without curly fries?” I replied.

She laughed. It was laughter right out of the third grade—high and silly.

“But why don’t we wait til Maudrina gets here to order,” I added.

“Oh… that.”

I stiffened. I don’t know why I stiffened. Something about the shift in her tone. “What?” I asked.

Her smile faded just a little, like the sun ducking briefly behind a dark cloud. “Umm, she left.”

The skin on my arms began to dimple with goose flesh. I wasn’t exactly afraid. I wasn’t sure if I’d heard her right, and feared that if I had, there was more coming that I wasn’t going to like. “She was already here?” Instinctively I began looking around.

“Yeah. We’d been meaning to get together and talk for some time. We figured we’d get it out of the way before you got here,” she replied dismissively.

A faint smile was inching its way back onto her lips, a smile that I could tell was as fleeting as a summer storm. I knew there was more to it, a lot more, because while she was smiling, she was looking everywhere but at me.

“What happened between you two?” I demanded, my voice getting raspy.

“We talked, and… she left.” Still no eye contact. She was now staring at the food vendors as if discovering them for the first time. “Why don’t I grab those drinks. You sound horrible.” She started away.

“Erin! Look at me.”

The force of my words froze in her tracks. She turned slowly around.
Slowly I turned.

The smile was gone. The good-natured mask had been removed, tucked away for another time. Her face was now an open wound, her eyes moist with pain. “What?” she said, cocking her head to the side with a hint of defiance.

“What happened between you two?” I repeated slowly, emphatically.

I was losing it. I could tell I was losing it because I wanted to run up to her and shake her like a piggy bank until all the answers I was looking for came jingling out like pennies.

“We talked, Megan. It was long overdue.” She started back toward me. “I like her. I really do. I can’t believe how much she’s changed. Remember when we used to make fun of her because she smelled like a dog?”

Guilt knifed into me, ripping at my heart. I’d tried to forget that I’d ever been mean to Maudrina. “That was horrible of us,” I said.

Maybe,” she replied softly. “Or maybe we were just keeping it real.” She looked toward the escalator, as if half expecting Maudrina to reappear, and then back at me. “If someone had asked me who’s the last person at G.U. who’d wind up being your friend, you know who I’d say?”

Maudrina had come into my life so suddenly. I’d nearly forgotten she’d been the object of our ridicule. She never held it against me, though. She knew about it, could hear our purposefully loud remarks ringing out behind her in the bathroom or stairwell—mean girls on patrol—yet found a way to hold her tongue against me. And now we were friends,
best
friends.

“I don’t care what you’d say. I want to know what happened between you and Maudrina. Did you
make
her leave?” My voice had taken on the oddest tone. The tone revealed my anger, wrapped in a neat little package of good old fashioned guilt.

“Of course not.” She snorted out a laugh. “I’m not the boss of her. I can’t
make
her do anything.”

“You said something to her, didn’t you? You
hurt
her feelings.”

She didn’t respond right away. She stood there, stone still, staring into my accusing eyes. It was as if someone had erected a statue of Erin in the middle of the Glendale Mall. When she finally moved, it was with a near imperceptible nod of her head. “Yes. I did. I didn’t mean to. And I’m sorry. But, Megan, she needed to know.” Her voice was husky, coming from deep in her chest.

“She needed to know
what?”
was my half-crazed reply.

“That I’m back!” she said, her eyes shooting wide, as if she’d been hit by a bolt of lightning, the moisture in them spilling over red rims. “Don’t get me wrong. I appreciate her filling in for me—”

“She wasn’t filling in for you, Erin! She wasn’t your alternate, like on the mathletes, holding your spot until you got over the flu. She was…
is
my friend. My dearest friend.”

“I was horrible to you. I know that,” she continued, barreling past my statement like a bull totaling missing the matador’s red cape. Her red rimmed eyes had taken on a glassy, far-away look. “But you have to understand I wasn’t myself back then. I was angry with you. Matt loved you so much, and you just toyed with his affections… as if they didn’t matter. They mattered to
me
,” she said definitively. “Matt’s love mattered to me. I wanted Matt to love me the way he loved
you
. He would’ve, you know. If he’d had the time, he would’ve,” she said, her voice shrinking to a near whisper.

“Erin, I wasn’t toying with Matt—”

“I got so messed up in the head. That’s how they got me,” she interrupted, and then she smiled. It was a murky smile, a fog on her lips. “But no matter how mean I was to you, no matter what I said, you always knew the truth. That nothing could come between us. Best friends since grade school. Through thick and thin, that’s us. You rescued me because there’s nothing stronger than the bond of friendship. The bond of
our
friendship.
That’s
what Maudrina needed to hear. She needed to hear the truth. And since I knew you’d never be able to tell her. I had to. I appreciate her being there for you while I was gone. But I’m back now. I’m back.”

She was staring at me, damp eyes searching for sympathy and understanding. There wasn’t any. I couldn’t believe my ears. I was so enraged I wanted to shake her. I wanted to scream,
you stupid idiot! You’re not my best friend—Maudrina is. And if you’ve hurt her in any way, I’ll hurt you back, and I’ll hurt you bad!

My plan was to scream those words right into her face with the holier-than-thou expression plastered all over it. My mind was in the process of doing just that, forming the hurtful words. I opened my mouth for them to begin their journey down my tongue and across my lips, but the words somehow got lost on the way between my head and my vocal chords. They hit a detour of some sort and were lost forever.

But something did come out.

And what came out of me was far scarier than any words I could’ve imagined ever saying. The words that came out of my mouth clouded Erin’s eyes with fear while turning the goose flesh pock-marking my arms into ostrich flesh with dimples as big as dimes.

“YOU WILL DIE!”

It wasn’t the words that scared us. My words were hurtful and mean, no doubt about it, but they weren’t scary words. Rather, it was the voice saying them that sent the chill stampeding up my spine.

It wasn’t
my
voice. The voice was like something out of a horror film. It was as if Regan from the old horror classic that Erin, Matt and I had watched one rainy Saturday afternoon when I was twelve—
The Exorcist
—had climbed into my voice box and seized control.

What an excellent day for an exorcism.

It was Regan’s demonic voice, gravelly and masculine and straight from hell, yet coming out of
me,
that had filled us both with terror. We weren’t the only ones who heard it. It seemed everyone in the entire food court stopped what they were doing and ratcheted their eyes in our direction.

A twelve-year-old boy stopped devouring his soft pretzel and looked toward us with approval. “That was so cool!”