Page 20 of Seasonal Fears

For the first time, the little girl looks alarmed. “You can’t go to the dance,” she says.

“Well, not directly,” he says. “We have to go to my house first. My parents are waiting to take our pictures.”

“If she’s willing to listen to me”—Jack hooks a finger toward Melanie, indicating her—“something must have changed. Something big enough to get her attention.”

“It’s my father,” says Melanie. “He called and asked me to have Harry take me home. Said his pager went off. But I carry a pager too, and if they were only planning to call one of us, they would have called me.”

“He’s heard about William, then,” says Jack. “Damn. I’d hoped that with the Alchemical Congress in shambles, it would take longer for the news … Well, it can’t be helped, and what can’t be helped shouldn’t be dwelt on any more than absolutely necessary. I hope you like those shoes, because they’re the only ones you’ve got now.”

Melanie blinks. “What?”

“You can’t go back there, and you can’t go to the dance. He’s supposed to have his own guide, but I don’t feel any other unclaimed Jacks or Jennys in this area, so I guess I’m filling in until we can get things a little more nailed down. Lucky me.”

“Mel, get in the car,” says Harry.

Jack looks even more alarmed. “Where are you going?”

“To my house, to get pictures with my parents, and then to the dance,” says Harry. He gets back into the car, slamming the door with a decisive bang, and waits.

Mel looks from the car to Jack, hesitating. Then she shrugs, says something he can’t hear, and gets back into the passenger seat. Harry waits for her to fasten her belt before he starts the engine and pulls away from the curb.

“What was all that about?” he asks.

“She came to my room before,” says Mel. “When I ran home from the school.”

“You mean when you ran off and left me for the paramedics?” Harry shakes his head. “My folks almost didn’t let me come get you, they were so worried there might be something wrong with me. I managed to convince them it was just dehydration, and they bought it, even though it’s February.” He’s never gotten dehydrated, not even in the dead of summer, but every coach he’s ever had has worried about it, like it was some terrible specter hovering above all blond boys everywhere. It became a running joke a couple of years ago, one of those things that can’t be avoided and hence needs to be laughed at whenever possible. Out of Gatorade? That’s fine, steal Harry’s, he’ll never notice.

“Really?” asks Mel, voice flat with disbelief.

“Yeah, well, the paramedics said I was fine and I didn’t want to tell them you’d been there, and even if I had, I don’t think ‘sympathetic fainting’ would have come off as all that believable.” Melanie’s phone is buzzing—she must have turned the ringer off—over and over, like it’s demanding her attention. Somehow it manages to sound ominous, like the rattling of a snake or the droning of a wasp.

Harry gives her purse a wary look. “You going to answer that?”

“No, and you’re not going to answer yours, either.” As if she’s become some sort of oracle, her phone stops buzzing and his begins to ring. Harry doesn’t want to take his eyes off the road, but he does, pulling the phone out of his pocket, and the name displayed is MR. MELANIE’S DAD, SIR, a joke Roland has never appreciated but Harry considers a useful reminder that it’s important to be polite when he’s speaking to his girlfriend’s father, and not try to talk the man in circles the way he usually does when he has to deal with an unwanted adult.

He drops the phone on the seat like it’s bitten him. He’s never seen Mel dodging her father’s calls before. That’s been one of the cardinal rules of her life as long as she’s been carrying a phone, and she was the first person his own age who got one and was allowed to have it at a school, since in her case it’s considered a medical necessity. If she wants to be allowed to leave the house unsupervised, ever, she answers when her father calls. It doesn’t matter what she’s doing. He’s seen her answer the phone during tests and during cheer practice and during dates and when he’s known for an absolute fact that she doesn’t want to talk to her father. When he calls, she answers.

Dr. Cosgrove never calls Harry, because he never needs to. Melanie always gets there first.

“What’s going on?”

Mel doesn’t answer.

“You’re telling me you don’t have a heartbeat and weird kids are appearing out of the shadows, and now you’re dodging calls from your dad? Mel, this isn’t like you, and this is all way weirder than I thought the night was going to be.”

“You told him you don’t have a heartbeat?” Jack’s question is mild but interested, and it comes from the backseat.

Melanie yelps. Harry outright yells, slamming his foot down on the brake and bringing them skidding to a halt. However that kid got into the car, she didn’t bother putting her seatbelt on, and the momentum of their stop slings her forward into the front seat, where only the iron bar of his outstretched arm pulls her to a stop before she can go crashing through the windshield.

Touching her, even glancingly, is like shoving his arm into a bucket of cold slush, the stuff that forms in puddles at the bottom of the driveway during the middle of the winter, the stuff that makes goosebumps break out across his entire body. He turns to stare at her, and she looks shamefacedly back, visibly embarrassed by her abortive flight.

“Um, sorry,” she says, peeling herself off his arm and using her hands to shove herself back into the backseat. “Should have done up my belt, I know. Didn’t mean to startle you.”

“Oh, that makes it all okay,” says Harry, a bubble of hysterical laughter forcing its way up his throat. “The weird kid who can’t possibly be in my car says she’s sorry for startling me, and my girlfriend doesn’t have a heartbeat! This is such a good, normal night! I’m having a wonderful time!”

“I said sorry,” says Jack, more peevishly. “And I can be in your car because she’s in your car, and anywhere she can be, I can be too. So I’m here.”

“Fuck this,” mutters Harry. He hits the gas, and they start moving again.