Lost in Thought (7 page)

“I’m proud of you, Lainey,” she said one night, kind of abruptly, since we’d been talking about a project I’d barely started working on and had produced nothing to be proud of yet.

“Thanks, Auntie. That means a lot to me. But why?”

“You’ve really taken to your new environment, sweetheart, in a way that impresses me and Uncle Martin too,” she explained. “It’s not that I didn’t know you were adaptable; God knows if I’ve made you anything besides a little crazy, it was that.” She gave a small laugh. “But you haven’t just adapted. You’re flourishing. And it was
you
who chose to take this step in your life. I didn’t want you to. But I see I was wrong, and I’m so glad to have been.” After a pause, she added, “I love you, Lainey. No parent ever wants to see her baby grow up, but I couldn’t be prouder of how you’re doing it.”

I admit I got a bit teary after that little speech, but it was the good kind. Mostly. I couldn’t help but be unnerved by her “a little crazy”

comment. Even though it was in jest on her part, I knew it to be true.

Or at least I had been sure it was true before I started at Northbrook.

I’d been mercifully headache-free since my arrival. They’d come at least once a month since I was thirteen, and I was going on six weeks with no dizziness, no visions, and no headaches. I was beginning to

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believe, just a little bit, that maybe the doctors had been right and all I really needed was stability and structure.

The best part of that whole stretch of first weeks was Halloween.

I’d trick-or-treated as a kid, but nothing compared to the production Northbrook put on for the town. It was
incredible
. For the entire week beforehand, all of the students dropped their assigned service work and transformed the campus into a giant haunted Halloween spectacular.

We prepared spooky stations and funny stations, hayrides and bon-fires, ghost stories and face painting. We filled bowls with every candy imaginable, plus healthier options like apples and little bags of pop-corn. A sophomore girl named Brooke, who was part of Queen Alexis’s court and therefore usually shunned me, got to run a gypsy-style fortune telling booth. The gold and green striped tent was lit only by battery powered candles and filled with brightly patterned pillows and rugs along with a low wooden table topped by a crystal ball, giving the whole thing a very authentic, very exciting feel. Plus Brooke was really, really good. I almost swore she was telling real fortunes.

She “practiced” on the Academy students—even some of the faculty—and as we saw our friends come out wide-eyed and convinced, of course we all wanted a turn. I dutifully waited in line with everyone else. Amy went in before me and was nearly bursting with pleasure when she came out a few minutes later.

I gave her a speculative smile. “How’s your future looking?”

“Brilliant, and chock full of yummy treats for Halloween, but that’s all I’m telling you,” she said before practically floating back to her task.

My turn, I poked my head in tentatively and exclaimed, “Oh wow, Brooke, this is fantastic! You look awesome.” She was in her gypsy costume, complete with long skirt, layers of wispy scarves, and heaps of undoubtedly expensive gold jewelry, plus heavy dark eyeliner and mascara that made her lashes look impressively thick and long. She

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might have shunned me because of Alexis, but I didn’t get the impression she was as mean as the rest of that clique. She was in character too.

“Velcome, Elaine Young, to my fortune parlor,” she said, with a convincing accent full of r’s rolled in a way I could only describe as sensuous. Between that and her gorgeous face, I suddenly understood why there were so many guys in line outside. “You vould like to hear your future, yes?”

“Sure,” I replied. “Lay it on me.”

Her berry-stained lips curled up into a mischievous smile and she glanced down at her swirling crystal ball. As she did this, for only a second, I swore her usually gold-flecked brown eyes appeared to flash a radiant shade of amber and I gasped. She looked up at me quickly, a hint of surprise showing in what were her perfectly normal, mostly brown eyes, before she said in her normal voice, “Oh. Uh, you okay?”

“Yeah, sorry,” I mumbled, and offered the first, and lamest, excuse that came to mind. “Thought I saw a spider.”

She rallied. “Ve shall proceed.” She briefly looked down again, and then focused on me with a smile. “More than anything, you vant to know what brought you here, yes, Elaine Young, and vhat causes your headaches? It is because you are special, Elaine Young, and you vill find that out soon, I am certain of it.”

“Whoa,” I breathed. I didn’t really tell people about my headaches, though Amy had warned me there were no secrets here, but Brooke was right. That
was
the question in my mind I most wanted answered.

There had been no more clues to my unusual Legacy and no crazy visions so far, but her calling me “special” brought to mind my first meeting with Headmaster Stewart. And the strange trick of the candles that had caused me to see Brooke’s eyes as a different color also reminded me that I had seen—or thought I had—a similar strange effect in my first meeting with Carter Penrose. As I mulled over her weird

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prediction and the strange connections, she brought me back to reality, also as if she’d truly been reading my thoughts.

She dropped her excellent accent and leaned over, whispering con-spiratorially, “And there’s a certain local boy you hope will finally move past the flirting stage, yeah? I think you’ve got that one locked up too, but you didn’t hear
me
say that.” She giggled and switched back to her gypsy persona. “Your fortune is done now, Elaine Young. Be gone and send me the next vaiting truth-seeker.”

I waved and smiled on my way out, but then dropped it immediately once I was by myself. She was
also
right about the local boy. The more time Amy and I spent at the bookstore, the more I too came to like Carter Penrose, as a friend, and yeah, maybe a little more than that. Not that I admitted it to anyone. I had always thought he was good-looking, sure, but I wasn’t the kind of girl who was immediately interested in someone just because he was hot enough to make me blush or give my stomach little somersaults.

I was, however, very much interested in a guy who was incredibly smart, brilliantly sarcastic in a way that was both funny and sharp-witted, and who was genuinely polite and nice. To
everyone
. Frankly, I was the tiniest bit in love with the boy from the bookstore. Despite Amy’s pronouncement that she was trying to hook us up, she never really pushed anything, and I didn’t try to do more than be myself and flirt back when he flirted with me. But it was getting a little frustrating.

Even I could see that Carter hung out with Amy and me more than anyone else, and though I could tell he was naturally flirtatious—which is exactly what, according to Amy, caused hope to burn eternal in all the Academy girls—he definitely devoted extra attention to me. Don’t get me wrong, I liked it. A lot. But I would have liked to get beyond that and, oh, have him ask me on a date or something.

I’d gotten a few other offers from guys at the Academy, one of which I accepted. I went with a senior named Garrett, a friend of

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Caleb’s who played with him on the baseball team. He was quietly funny and tall and a little bit shy, which was actually what I liked about him most. We’d gone to—where else?—the bookstore lounge for a coffee by the fireplace. I imagined about a million first dates had happened in the very seats where we sat, since the bookstore and the Academy were both over a century old. Of course, back then, first dates were chaperoned, and I almost felt like mine had one too.

In my peripheral vision, and in the periphery of my mind, I always knew where Carter was in the shop. And he spent more than a necessary amount of time in my direct line of sight. Stoking the fire.

Repeatedly stopping to chat with the group across from me. Wiping non-existent dust off a few of the coffee tables. He didn’t speak to me, except to say a friendly hello to both of us—he knew Garrett, of course, because he knew
everyone
. However, I did catch him, more than once, while he performed whatever task he’d devised to get into my vicinity, watching me. One time he scowled openly. I took a little smug satisfaction that Carter seemed bothered by my date, and maybe I played up my flirtation with Garrett the tiniest bit.

Garrett didn’t seem to mind. In fact, I had a good enough time that I let him kiss me goodnight when we got back to campus. Turned out my shy boy was pretty good at it, and I think I let it go on a little longer than I should have, since before I realized, the curfew bell was ringing and I was rushing off with a little bit of a flush and a, “Thanks, I had a great time!” thrown over my shoulder.

I hung out with Garrett a few more times, but he didn’t seem to be in a hurry to make me his official girlfriend, and I was not in a hurry to be in a relationship. With Garrett anyway, I finally admitted to myself and to Amy when she pressed. I enjoyed Garrett’s company, and I
definitely
enjoyed the few times I kissed him, but when I thought of the term “boyfriend” in my head, he was not who I pictured.

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I tried to tell myself I wasn’t interested in being in
any
relationship, but I’d never been a particularly good liar, and especially not to myself.

Things were unchanged between Carter and me, hovering at a stage of casual friendship and go-nowhere flirtation, so right before our Thanksgiving break, I decided to try something different.

THE HOUR RIGHT after classes ended was the quietest time at the bookstore, since most of the Academy students were at team practice or service hours. I took a moment when I stepped through the door to close my eyes and inhale the gloriousness that was Penrose Books. It never failed to smell amazing. I let out my deep breath slowly then opened my eyes. And literally felt them widen in surprise.

“Oh!” I gasped. Carter was standing mere inches from me, regard-ing me with a measured, thoughtful look I noticed from him on a regular basis. It meant he was deciding whether or not to say something.

“I do that too sometimes, when I come down first thing in the morning,” he said softly. “One of my favorite moments every day.”

Then he switched back to his usual flirtatious self. “Except for when
you
come through the door. To what do we owe this pleasure? Since your first week, you haven’t been here so early in the afternoon.”

Shit. I hadn’t come up with an excuse. “I…had someone ask to switch hours with me at the library, and I…couldn’t study in my room because they’re fixing our window. I thought it might be quiet over here this time of day. I remembered that it was practically empty the first time I came in.” There, that didn’t sound too bad.

But Carter smiled at me, and if his smiles were usually dangerous, this one should have been illegal. He looked at me for a moment with obvious, knowing delight, as if I were wearing a blouse as see-through as my excuse. “Well you’re right about that; you have the place, and me, mostly to yourself. I recommend today the couch by the fireplace,

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always your favorite, I believe,” he said and gestured grandly to the empty lounge area.

Or almost empty. At one of the small tables by the windows sat Jill, as inconspicuous and quiet as always. She had some books open in front of her, but at the moment she was studying Carter and me with the curious, weighty gaze I’d become used to. I gave her a small wave and took up my favorite couch by the fireplace, as suggested.

If I enjoyed studying at the bookstore when it was busy, I doubly enjoyed it when it was empty. I didn’t know why I hadn’t tried it sooner. The store was quiet, except for some crackling of the fire and the occasional jingle of the register when the one or two customers checked out. Jill made almost no noise whatsoever, so I could almost imagine that I
was
alone, with my books and my covert studying of Carter. He seemed to make everything he did look effortless and as if he enjoyed it, including mundane tasks like shelving the new magazine issues.

As he was hauling off the last stack of outdated magazines, I heard him say, “I’m going to take a break now, Aunt Mel,” when he passed where she was perched at the counter, reading a newspaper.

She actually glanced at me, which necessitated a quick duck of my eyes into my book, laughed, which told me I hadn’t been quick enough, and said affectionately, “No problem, Cartwright. I’ll hold off the hordes of customers.”

Melinda Revell bore a good amount of family resemblance to Carter. She had the same naturally wavy, not-quite-blonde-or-brown hair, a sort of caramel color, and similar blue eyes, plus a dusting of freckles that made her more cute than pretty and very approachable.

She smiled often, and genuinely, her eyes crinkling at the corners in a way that made her even more likeable.

When Carter reentered the lounge area for his break, he headed straight for me, carrying a small load of firewood under one arm and a

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book under the other. “Penny for your thoughts,” he said mildly, as he set his book, a thick tome of what looked like short stories by Russian authors, on the table and stacked the logs in the low-burning fireplace.