Rise of the Fallen 1 - My Soul to Keep (4 page)

Her thoughtfulness surprised me. Mom and dad might be home, I’m sure
they wouldn’t appreciate me being dropped off by a woman who looked eighteen and
drove a motorcycle. Well dad might, but mom would definitely flip and of the two
parental units, she was the scary one.

Clarisse turned the key and shut off the bike for real. I swung my
leg over the back and got off first, hanging on to her shoulders without thinking.
I won't lie. The skin I touched felt hot and soft, and I liked it. Sometimes being
fifteen really sucked. I'd been staring at her exposed flesh the entire ride home.
As I got off the bike, I didn’t stop staring.

“Did you hear me, worm?”

“Huh?” Her voice snapped me out of my flesh-filled fantasy, the second
time.

“I said to go inside and act sick.”

“Why?”

“Because tomorrow you’re staying home from school. I’ll be back after
everyone leaves. I am not letting you go to school untrained. The first vampire
you see you’ll probably freak out and they’ll lock you up for being a nut job.”

“Vampire?”

“I told you, retard, ever since those books and movies came out I have
everybody and their mother begging to be a vampire. Some of them even asked to sparkle.”

“Don’t they burst into flame?”

“We can grant any wish, but they have to appear human to the rest of
the world. It's one of our laws. That particular one came around in the dark ages
when vampires and monsters ran around openly. The entire human population lived
in fear. Why do you think they called it the dark ages?”

“No shit.”

“No shit,” she replied telling me she wasn’t kidding. “If you'd wished
to be something normal, like a vampire, I would have given you an orb.”

“What’s an orb?”

She reached into one of the saddlebags on the Harley and pulled out
a glass ball. She handed it to me. It felt solid, but light. “What does it do?”

“Hold it to your wrist.”

I set it against my wrist and it melted into a glassy looking blob.
It wasn’t hot, but flowed around my arm like water. Once it completely wrapped around,
it turned smoky and solidified into silvers and browns. I had a watch on my wrist.
“Cool."

“Pull it off and hold it to your ear.”

I did what she said and it turned back into a glass ball as soon as
it left my wrist. I held the orb to my ear and with a little snap, it turned into
an earring. The snapping noise was the sound of metal going through flesh as it
pierced my ear. “Damn it, that hurt!”

She gave a little laugh at my pain. She reminded me of my sister more
every minute. Laughing at pain was definitely something she would do.

I reached up to pull it out, but Clarisse stopped me. “Leave it, it
looks good. I’ve got to get going, stay inside and don’t leave the house. Your body
is capable of things you can’t imagine. Even if it does something weird, the orb
should make you look human to your parents. That’s what they do, make the kids with
desires to be more than human, appear human. It also lets them go into the sun and
not burst into flames, to answer your previous question.”

“Cool. Don’t worry, I’ll behave.”

“You better behave. Trust me. There’s a lot of things out there that
would love to get their mouth on a tasty morsel like you. You need to learn to take
care of yourself before you get turned loose on the world. There’s some scary shit
out there, and not all of it is because of us. Since humans are strictly forbidden
to be eaten, everybody else has to be careful. Stay inside.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said and snapped my heels together. She didn’t get
my humor. I turned and headed up the driveway.

“Hey, worm,” Clarisse called out to me before I got too far away.

“What?” I stopped walking but didn’t turn around.

“Stay away from the cheerleaders at your school. They’re bad news.”

I turned around perplexed, but Clarisse had already vanished.

* * *

I tried to slip into the house unnoticed, but Mom sat on the couch
facing the door reading a book. She set it down next to her and crossed her arms.
I hadn’t done anything wrong, but she looked less than happy.

“What?”

“You told Caelyn you were going to hang out at Jeremy’s. Where have
you been?”

“Jeremy got a job, so I went to the mall and had a couple of pretzels.”

“You and your pretzels. Go wash up. Daddy will be home in a few minutes.
I ordered pizza.”

“Okay, cool. Did you order pepperoni?”

“You know your sister and meat don’t get along. I ordered one veggie
and one cheese.”

“Doesn’t she know cheese comes from animals, too?”

“Don’t start on your sister and don’t tell her about the cheese. I’m
sure she’s mentally blocked it out and I want her to have calcium. I swear she’s
going to break a bone doing those cheerleader flips she does. Oh, my God! What the
hell is in your ear?”

I brought my hand up to my ear and the forgotten about earing. I didn’t
even think how the units would react to their son having a metal stud protruding
from his ear. “I, um, got it pierced at the mall, do you like it?”

“Absolutely
not
! You get upstairs and get that thing out of
your ear before your father gets home! I mean it. If he see’s you with one, he’ll
want one. No way. Get it out now, Connor.”

I laughed and ran upstairs to the bathroom, passing my evil sister’s
closed door. I flipped on the switch and turned on the fart fan instead of the light.
You’d think after living in a house for three years I’d know which switch turned
on what, but no. Whoever wired the house wired the fan to the switch closest to
the door. I managed to get the annoying whirring of the fan off and the light on.
With a sigh I looked at myself in the mirror.

I gingerly touched the earring. I expected it to be tender or sore,
but it wasn't. I pulled the back of the earring off and slid it out of my ear. I
held both pieces in the palm of my and watched them morph back into the largish
glass globe. I thought about putting it back on my wrist, but my omniscient mother
would probably notice my new watch and think I stole it at the mall.

I flipped the switch off and took the orb to my room instead, hiding
it behind my entertainment center. That should keep the creep in the next room from
finding it on one of her little snooping sorties.
I should have exchanged my
soul for the luxury of being an only child
. They say that hindsight is always
20/20. "They" are pretty smart.

I headed downstairs for dinner. I needed to start acting sick in front
of the parents or Mom would never buy the whole “I need to stay home” routine. Every
time I
actually
came down with something, she
made
me go to school
anyway. My mother was very untrusting.

I clamped my hand over my stomach and put on my best “I ate something
I shouldn’t have and feel like I’m going to yak on your carpet” face. I even walked
down the stairs slowly, another uncharacteristic thing for me to do. If you want
your parents to think you’re sick, do things out of the ordinary. Like do what they
say. That always throws them for a loop. Mom yelled at me a hundred times a day
for running down the stairs. Most of the time I used the banister to propel myself
down six of them at a time. If they ever made going down stairs an Olympic event,
I’d qualify. Probably bring home the gold, too.

My sister came out of her room when I hit the halfway point. By the
time I reached the bottom, she elbowed me out of the way and passed me.

She stopped and turned to look at me suspiciously. “What’s with you?”
She cocked her head and put her hand on her hip. If all else failed, I could get
into acting when I got older. Even the sister bought it.

“Went to the mall and ate too many pretzels. I feel like crap.”

“Go take one, you’ll feel better.” She laughed and walked off giggling
at her own cleverness.

She thought she was truly hysterical. I thought she was truly annoying.

“Mooom, baby’s sick,” she called into the kitchen as she plopped her
cheerleading outfit wearing butt down on the couch and grabbed the remote. She hit
the power button and started watching some mindless cartoon about bratty kids at
summer camp. I actually tried to watch it once and didn’t get it. If there wasn’t
excessive violence in it or vulgar humor, I had no use for it.

“You okay, honey?” Mom actually met me halfway from the kitchen after
Bratzilla tattled on me.

“I think I ate one too many pretzels. I’m not feeling great.”

Even when you fake a stomach ache the first thing a parent does is
kiss your forehead to take your temperature. I wish somebody could explain this
to me. Mother’s lips, the greatest diagnostic tool ever invented, not. Yes you can
tell if somebody’s temperature is high, but that doesn’t help with a stomach ache.

“You’re hot, honey. Why don’t you go lie down for a while?”

I decided to go for the gold. “My head hurts, but I just thought it
was the stomach ache causing it. Maybe I will. Thanks, Mom,” I said. I did another
uncharacteristic thing; I hugged my mother and then slowly made my way back into
my cave. My sister shot me a dirty look as I passed her on the couch. I smiled and
gave her the bird.

“Mom, Connor flicked me off!”

“Caelyn, leave him alone. Your brother doesn’t feel good.”

She rolled her eyes and continued watching her moronic cartoon. My
smile doubled. It was a small victory, but I’d take what I could get.

I made it to the stairs when my wings sprouted out of my back for no
reason whatsoever. They became somewhat stuck between the walls of the stairway
and I panicked. I spun my head around to see my sister sitting on the couch turning
in slow motion to see what the commotion was. Turning sideways, I tripped on the
bottom of my wing, landing hard on my side. My wings seemed to develop a mind of
their own and started flapping uncontrollably. I winced at the noise they made as
they banged against the drywall. I nearly screamed when the claws started scratching
the paint off. I started scrambling frantically up the stairs as fast as I could
before my sister saw me.

“What the hell is that noise?” Mom’s voice sounded very annoyed.

I looked at my sister and instead of looking at me, she turned around
to look at Mom who walked out of the kitchen. I used my luck and kicked my legs
and pushed with my arms to hurl myself up the last half of the stairwell. I needed
to get out of sight, and I did. I’d hoped to get a couple of stairs out of my frantic
leap. I ended up getting the remainder of the stairs, the landing above, and part
of the wall out of it. I hit it so hard the folding closet door next to me popped
off its track and fell into the other wall with a loud bang. I ran into the bathroom,
slammed the door, and locked it for good measure.

I could hear two individual sets of feet as they ran up the stairs
and stopped on the landing outside the door. “Connor, are you okay?” I could hear
the surprise and fear in my mom’s voice.

“No, my stomach is…” I’ll admit it, it’s childish, but I did the only
thing I could think of. I made gagging noises and slammed the lid of the toilet
up against the tank.

“Let me in, honey.” I just love how when parents say let me in, they
automatically try to open the door. The rattling of the knob only prompted more
violent fake puking noises from me.

“G’way mom, I’ll be fine.”

“Honey, you open this door immediately!”

“Mom, I’m fine. Just give me a minute.”

“Fine, you get into bed and I’ll have your father fix the door when
he gets home.”

I listened to Mom stomp back down the stairs, disgruntled because I
wouldn’t let her mother me to death.

Something wasn’t right. Two sets of footfalls came up the stairs and
only one left. I’d have bet even money my sister stood right outside the bathroom
door hoping to bust me when I came out. I closed my eyes and listened.

The world of sound I knew shattered. Everything started out muffled
by the bathroom door, but the more I focused the more I could hear. My sister’s
moronic cartoon came forward first. I could hear every detail of every voice from
the show and on top of it, I could hear static as the speakers pumped out the background
music. I could hear seven distinct barks from the neighborhood dogs. I could hear
a jet overhead. Then I heard my sister.

She wasn’t talking, but I could hear the rhythmic sound of her lungs
filling with air and exhaling. I watched a show on the Discovery Channel about the
sea caves of California. They used a waterproof microphone to capture the noise
of the air rushing in and out of the caves as the water pushed and pulled it out
and in. That’s exactly what my sister’s breathing sounded like.
What the hell
is going on?

The sounds of Mom moving around the kitchen tidying up came into focus
next. I heard each noise individually and knew exactly what they were. She opened
the trash can and threw away two paper plates. She and my sister must not have wanted
to dirty dishes on pizza. She tossed two empty soda cans in the recycling bin just
outside the garage door, wiped down the counters, and then walked forty-two steps
into the living room to sit down on the couch.