“Okay, fine.” Her answering hug is as enthusiastic as always. “But I will be in the room—with ice cream—at exactly four fifty-nine. I expect you to be there.”
“Scout’s honor.” I hold my hand up in what I think is a close facsimile of the three-fingered pledge.
Macy isn’t impressed, though. She just shakes her head and laughs. “Don’t let Jaxon talk you into any shenanigans between now and then.”
“Shenanigans?” I repeat, because just when I think Macy can’t get more ridiculous—and fabulous—she does something to change my mind.
“You know exactly what I mean.” She lifts her brows up and down suggestively. “But if you want, I can spell it out for you in the middle of the foyer here. You shouldn’t let Jaxon take you up to his tower to have his—”
“Okay, I got it!” I tell her as my cheeks burn.
But she said the last loud enough to be heard halfway to Jaxon’s tower, and as a result, there are a whole lot of snickers going on around us. “Art. I’m going to art. Now.”
But as I make my way to my room to change and then hustle out the side door into the frigid March air, I can’t help but wonder if Jaxon’s even going to try to “shenanigan” me again. And what about my gargoyle is so against it.
15
Let’s All Play Find
the Homicidal
Maniac
Art goes really well—Dr. MacCleary waives the first two assignments of the semester and gets me right to work on my third—a painting that reflects who I am inside. And since art has always been the thing that helps me figure out the world, it’s definitely an assignment I can get behind.
Normally, I’d spend a bunch of time planning out the composition and light source, but after an hour of sketching a bunch of nonsensical nothingness, I decide, Screw it. I pick up a brush and spend the last half an hour of class giving my subconscious free reign on the canvas. What it comes up with—for now—is a swirling dark-blue background that looks a lot like if Van Gogh and Kandinsky had a baby.
Not my usual style, but then neither is dating a vampire and turning into a gargoyle, so…I’m just going to go with it.
At one point, I need to wait and let some of the colors dry a bit, so I grab my laptop from my backpack and log in to my wireless-provider account and activate my new phone. Minutes later, dozens of texts flood my screen.
I frantically begin scrolling through the texts from Heather that start with “How’re you doing?” then move on to more concerned texts to a final, sad, “I hope you haven’t texted back cuz you’re so busy loving your new school. Just know I’m here if you ever need a friend. And I’d love a ping just to know you’re alive.”
I am officially the worst friend ever. My hands are shaking a little as I finally send a much-needed text to Heather.
Me: OMG I am soooooooo sorry.
Me: Long story. Lost my phone and Alaska shuts down in the winter
Me: Jut got a new one and I’m so sorry. FaceTime this week?
I don’t know what more I can say other than, The shitty friend award clearly goes to me. I hate that I can’t tell her the truth, but I hate the idea of losing her even more. I just hope she texts back when she sees my message.
I put my phone in my backpack and return to my painting, which I think is the beginning of a room or something.
Other than that, art is completely uneventful—and so is the walk back to my dorm room. Thankfully. I mean, yeah, people are still staring at me, but sometime in the last hour and a half, I’ve decided to take the screw-it approach to more than just my art. So when I pass a group of witches who don’t even bother to lower their voices as they talk about me—proof that mean girls really do exist everywhere—I just smile and blow them a kiss.
What do I have to be embarrassed about anyway?
I make it back to my dorm room by 4:31 and figure I’ll have ten minutes to start my “Find the Homicidal Maniac” to-do list before Macy gets back, but the second I open the door to our room, I get showered with a spray of confetti.
I shake off the colorful pieces of paper as I close the door behind me, but I’m smart enough to know I’m going to be pulling it out of my curls for the rest of the night—maybe even longer. And still, I can’t help grinning at Macy, who is already dressed in a purple tank top and her favorite pair of pajama pants—tie-dyed rainbow, of course. She’s cleared off her desk and covered it with a spare sheet (also rainbow), before setting up a smorgasbord of ice cream, Skittles, and Dr Peppers with licorice straws.
“I figured, if we were going to celebrate your return, we were going to do it in style,” she tells me with a wink, right before she hits play on her phone and Harry Styles’s “Watermelon Sugar” fills the room.
“Dance!” she shouts, and I do, because Macy can get me to do all kinds of things I would never do for anyone else. Plus, the song reminds me so much of my first night at Katmere that I can’t resist. It’s wild to think that was almost four months ago. Wilder still that it somehow feels so much longer and also way shorter than that.
When the song finally finishes, I kick off my shoes and collapse on my bed.
“Um, I don’t think so. It’s facial time—I have these new masks I’m dying to try out,” Macy says as she grabs my hand and tries to drag me off the bed. When I refuse to budge, she sighs and walks over to the bathroom sink. Then adds over her shoulder, “Come on. One of us was solid stone for nearly four months.”
“What does that mean?” I ask as a horrible thought occurs to me. “Does being a gargoyle do something to your skin?”
Macy lowers the array of sheet masks she’s been studying like they’re a map to the Holy Grail. “What makes you think that?”
“I mean, I’ve seen a lot of Gothic cathedrals in my time. Gargoyles aren’t exactly the prettiest creatures.”
“Yeah, but you don’t look like a monster.” If possible, she seems even more confused.
“How would you know? I probably have horns and claws and who knows what else.” I shudder at the thought—and at the knowledge that Jaxon saw me like that.
“You do have horns, but they’re adorable.”
I sit straight up. “Wait. You saw me?”
I don’t know why, but I’m a little appalled at that revelation. I mean, did they just leave me on display in the middle of the hallway or something? My breath catches as another horrible thought comes to mind. Does every mean girl in the school have a picture of me on their phone?
“Of course I saw you. You’ve been in a back room of the library for months, and before that you were in my dad’s office.”