Unearthly

Chapter 5 Bozo

Christian and I only have one class together, so catching his attention is no easy task. Every day I try to pick my seat in British History so there’s a chance that he’ll sit next to me. And so far in the span of two weeks, the stars align exactly three times and he ends up in the desk next to mine. I smile and say hello. He smiles back and says hi. For a moment, an undeniable force seems to draw us together like magnets.

But then he opens his notebook or checks his cell phone under his desk, signifying that our Nice weather we’re having chitchat is over. It’s like, in those few crucial seconds, one of the magnets gets flipped around and pulls him away from me. He’s not rude or anything; he just isn’t all that interested in getting to know me. And why should he be? He has no idea the future that awaits us.

So for an hour each day I secretly watch him, trying to memorize everything I can, unsure of what might be useful to me someday. He likes to wear button-down dress shirts with the sleeves rolled casually to his elbow and the same version of Seven jeans in slightly different shades of black or blue. He uses notebooks made from recycled paper and writes with a green ballpoint pen. He almost always knows the right answer when Mr. Erikson calls on him, and if he doesn’t he makes a joke about it, which means that he’s smart plus humble plus funny. He likes Altoids. Every so often he reaches into his back pocket for the little silver tin and pops a mint into his mouth. To me that says he expects to be kissed.

On that note, Kay meets him right outside class every day. Like she saw the way the new girl looked at her man that first day in the cafeteria, and she never wants him vulnerable to that again. So all I have are the precious pre-class minutes, and so far nothing I’ve done or said has elicited a significant response from Christian. But tomorrow is T-Shirt Day. I need a shirt that will start a conversation.

“Don’t stress about it,” says Wendy after school as I parade a line of T-shirts in front of her. She’s sitting on the floor of my room by the window, legs curled under her, the very picture of the BFF helping to make a huge fashion decision.

“Should it be a band?” I ask. I hold out a black tee from a Dixie Chicks tour.

“Not that one.”

“Why?”

“Trust me.”

I pick up one of my favorites, forest green with a print of Elvis on it that I got on a trip to Graceland a few years before. Young Elvis, dreamy Elvis, bending over his guitar.

Wendy makes a noncommittal noise.

I hold up a hot-pink shirt that reads, EVERYONE LOVES A CALIFORNIA GIRL.

This could be the winner, a chance to play up what Christian and I have in common.

But it will also clash with my orange hair.

Wendy scoffs. “I think my brother is planning on wearing a shirt that says, ‘Go back to California.’”

“Shocker. What’s his deal with Californians, anyway?”

She shrugs. “It’s a long story. Basically my grandpa owned the Lazy Dog Ranch, and now some rich Californian owns it. My parents only manage it for him, and Tucker has rage issues. Plus, you insulted Bluebell.”

“Bluebell?”

“Around these parts, you can’t disrespect a man’s truck without dire consequences.”

I laugh. “Well, he should get over himself. He tried to get me burned at the stake in Brit History yesterday. Here I am minding my own business, taking notes like a good little girl, and out of the blue Tucker raises his hand and accuses me of being a witch.”

“Sounds like something Tucker would do,” admits Wendy.

“Everybody had to vote on it. I barely escaped with my nun’s life. Obviously I’ll have to return the favor.”

Christian, I remember happily, voted against burning me. Of course his vote doesn’t count much because he’s a serf. But still, he didn’t want to see me dead, even in theory. That has to count for something.

“You know that’ll just encourage him, right?” Wendy says.

“Eh, I can handle your brother. Besides, there’s some kind of prize for the students who can last the whole semester. And I’m a survivor.”

Now it’s Wendy’s turn to laugh. “Yeah, well, so is Tucker.”

“I can’t believe you shared a womb with him.”

She smiles. “There are definitely moments I can’t believe it either,” she says. “But he’s a good guy. He just hides it well sometimes.”

She gazes out the window, her cheeks pink. Have I offended her? For all her playful talk about how much of a pain Tucker is, is she sensitive about him? I guess I can understand why. I can make fun of Jeffrey all I want, but if somebody else messes with my little brother, they better watch out.

“So, Elvis then? I’m running out of options here.”

“Sure.” She leans back against the wall and stretches her arms over her head, as if the conversation has exhausted her. “Nobody really cares.”

“Yeah, well, you’ve been here forever,” I remind her. “You’re accepted. I feel like if I make one wrong move, I might get chased off school property by an angry mob.”

“Oh please. You’ll be accepted. I accepted you, didn’t I?”

That she had. After two weeks I’m still eating lunch at the Invisibles lunch table.

So far I’ve identified two basic groups at Jackson Hole High School: the Haves — the pretty people, comprised of the wealthy Jackson Holers, whose parents own restaurants and art galleries and hotels; and the much smaller and less conspicuous Have-Nots — the kids whose parents work for the rich Jackson Holers. To see the great divide between these groups, you only have to look from Kay, in all her coiffed perfection and Frenchtipped manicured fingernails, to Wendy, who, though undeniably pretty, usually wears her sun-streaked hair in a simple braid down her back, and her fingernails are polish free and sports clipped.

So where do I fit in?

I’m quickly starting to figure out that our large house with a mountain view means that we have the big bucks, money Mom never mentioned back in California.

Apparently we’re loaded. Still, Mom raised us without any idea of wealth. She lived through the Great Depression, after all, insists that Jeffrey and I save a portion of our allowance each week, makes us eat every morsel of food on our plates, darns our socks and mends our clothes, and sets the thermostat to low because we can always put on another sweater.

“Yes, you accepted me, but I’m still trying to figure out why,” I say to Wendy. “I think you must be some kind of a freak. Either that or you’re trying to convert me to your secret horse religion.”

“Darn, you got me,” she says theatrically. “You thwarted my evil plan.”

“I knew it!”

I like Wendy. She’s quirky and kind, and just solidly good people. And she’s saved me from being labeled as a freak or a loner, as well as from the sting of missing my friends back in Cali. When I call them, already it feels like we don’t have much to talk about now that I’m out of the loop. It’s obvious that they’re moving on with their lives without me.

But I can’t think about that or whether I’m a Have or Have-Not. My real problem has nothing to do with being rich or poor but instead with the fact that most of the students at Jackson High have known each other since kindergarten. They formed all their cliques years ago. Even though my natural inclination is to stick with the more modest crowd, Christian is one of the pretty people, so that’s where I need to be. But there are obstacles. Huge, glaring obstacles. The first being lunch. The popular crowd usually goes off campus. Of course. If you have money, and a car, would you stay on campus and dine on chicken-fried steak? I think not. I have money, and a car, but the first week of class I did a 180 on the icy roads on the way to school. Jeffrey said it was better than Six Flags, that little spin we took in the middle of the highway. Now we ride the bus, which means I can’t go off campus for lunch unless someone gives me a ride, and people aren’t exactly lining up with offers. Which leads me to obstacle number two: apparently I’m shy, at least around people who don’t pay much attention to me. I never noticed this in California. I never needed to be outgoing at my old school; my friends there kind of naturally gravitated to me. Here it’s a whole different story, though, largely because of obstacle number three: Kay Patterson. It’s hard to make a lot of friends when the most popular girl in school is giving you the stink-eye.

The next morning Jeffrey wanders into the kitchen wearing his IF IDIOTS COULD

FLY, THIS PLACE WOULD LOOK LIKE AN AIRPORT shirt. I know that everyone at school will think it’s funny and not be at all offended, because they like him. Things are so easy for him.

“Hey, you feel like driving today?” he asks. “I don’t want to walk to the bus stop. It’s too cold.”

“You feel like dying today?”

“Sure. I like risking my life. Keeps things in perspective.”

I chuck my bagel at him and he catches it in midair. I look at the closed door to Mom’s office. He smiles hopefully.

“Fine,” I tell him. “I’ll go warm up the car.”

“See,” he says as we slowly make our way down the long road to school. “You can handle this driving-on-snow thing. Pretty soon you’ll be like a pro.”

He’s being suspiciously nice.

“Okay, what’s up with you?” I ask. “What do you want?”

“I got on the wrestling team.”

“How’d you pull that off if tryouts were back in November?”

He shrugs like it’s no big deal.

“I challenged the best wrestler on the team to a match. I won. It’s a small school.

They need contenders.”

“Does Mom know?”

“I told her I’m on the team. She wasn’t thrilled. But she can’t forbid us from all school activities, right? I’m tired of this ‘we better lay low, or someone will figure out we’re different’ crap. I mean, it’s not like if I win a match people are going to say, who’s that kid, he’s a really good wrestler, he must be an angel.”

“Right,” I agree uneasily. But then Mom isn’t the type to make rules simply because she can. There has to be an explanation for her cautiousness.

“The thing is, I need a ride to some of the practices,” he says, shifting in his seat uncomfortably. “Like, all of them.”

For a minute it’s quiet, the only sound the heater blowing across our legs.

“When?” I ask finally. I brace myself for bad news.

“Five thirty a.m.”

“Ha.”

“Oh, come on.”

“Get Mom to drive you.”

“She said that if I was going to insist on being on the wrestling team, I’d have to find my own ride. Take responsibility for myself.”

“Well, good luck with that,” I laugh.

“Please. It’ll just be for a few weeks. Then my buddy Darrin will turn sixteen and he can pick me up.”

“I’m sure Mom will love that.”

“Come on, Clara. You owe me,” he says quietly.

I do owe him. It’s because of me that his life is upside down. Not that he seems to be suffering much.

“I don’t owe you squat,” I say. “But. okay. For like six weeks, tops, and then you’ll have to get someone else to be your chauffeur.”

He looks genuinely happy. We might be on some kind of road to recovery, he and I, like it used to be. Redemption, isn’t that what they call it? Six weeks of early mornings doesn’t seem like too big a price to pay for him not hating me anymore.

“There’s one condition though,” I tell him.

“What?”

I put in my Kelly Clarkson CD. “We get to listen to my tunes.”

Wendy’s wearing a shirt that reads, HORSES ATE MY HOMEWORK.

“You’re adorkable,” I whisper as we slip into our seats for Honors English. Her current crush, Jason Lovett, is staring in our direction from across the room. “Don’t look now, but Prince Charming is totally checking you out.”

“Shut up.”

“I hope he can ride a horse, since you’re supposed to ride off into the sunset together.”

The bell rings and Mr. Phibbs hurries to the front of the classroom.

“Ten extra credit points to the first student who can correctly identify the quotation on my shirt,” he announces. He stands up straight and rolls his shoulders back so we can read the words written across his chest. We all lean forward to squint at the tiny print: IF SCIENCE TEACHES ANYTHING, IT TEACHES US TO ACCEPT OUR

FAILURES, AS WELL AS OUR SUCCESSES, WITH QUIET DIGNITY AND

GRACE.

Easy. We only finished the book last week. I look around, but there are no raised hands. Wendy’s trying not to make eye contact with Mr. Phibbs so he won’t call on her. Jason Lovett is trying to make eye contact with Wendy. Angela Zerbino, who can usually be counted on to chime in with the right answer, is scribbling away in her notebook, probably composing some twisted epic poem about the injustice of her life. Someone in the back of the room blows his nose, and another girl starts to click her fingernails on the top of her desk, but nobody says anything.

“Anyone?” asks Mr. Phibbs, crestfallen. Here he’s gone through all the trouble to have the shirt made, and none of his fine Honors English students can identify a passage from a book they just studied.

Screw it. I raise my hand.

“Miss Gardner,” says Mr. Phibbs, brightening.

“Yeah, it’s Frankenstein, right? The irony in the quote is that Dr. Frankenstein says it moments before he tries to strangle the monster he’d created. So much for dignity, I guess.”

“Yes, it is quite ironic,” chuckles Mr. Phibbs. He marks down my ten extra points. I try to look excited by this.

Wendy slips a piece of paper onto my desk. I take a moment to unfold it discreetly.

Smarty-pants, it reads. Guess who’s not here today? She’s drawn a smiley face in the margins. I survey the classroom again. Then I realize that nobody’s trying to glare a hole in the back of my head.

Kay isn’t there.

I smile. It’s going to be a beautiful day.

“I brought the brochure for the veterinary internship that I was telling you about,”

Wendy tells me as the bell rings for lunch. She follows me as I dart into the hallway, hurry down the stairs, and book it for my locker. She has to jog to keep up.

“Whoa, are you starving, or what?” she laughs as I fumble with my locker combination. “They’re serving the meatball sub today. That and the baked potato bar are the best things on the menu all year.”

“What?” I’m distracted, scanning the sea of passing faces for a set of familiar green eyes.

“Anyway, the internship is in Montana. It’s amazing, really.”

There. There’s Christian, standing at his locker. No Kay anywhere in sight. He puts on his jacket — black fleece! — and picks up his keys. A jolt of quivery excitement shoots straight to my stomach.

“I think I’m going out for lunch today,” I say quickly, grabbing my parka.

Wendy’s mouth shapes into a little O of surprise. “You drove?”

“Yeah. Jeffrey roped me into driving him for the next few weeks.”

“Cool,” she says. “We could go to Bubba’s. Tucker used to work there, so they always give me a discount. That’s good eating, trust me. Let me get my coat.”

Christian’s leaving. I don’t have a lot of time.

“Actually, Wen, I have a doctor’s appointment,” I say unsteadily, hoping she won’t ask me which doctor.

“Oh,” she says. I can tell that she’s not sure if she believes me.

“Yeah, and I don’t want to be late.” He’s almost to the door. I shut my locker and turn toward Wendy, trying not to gaze directly into her eyes. I’m a terrible liar. But there’s no time for guilt now. This has to do with my purpose, after all. “I’ll see you after school, okay? I’ve got to go.”

Then I practically sprint for the exit.

I follow Christian’s silver Avalanche out of the parking lot, keeping a couple of cars between us so I don’t appear to be tailing him. He drives to a Pizza Hut a few blocks from school. He climbs down from the cab with a guy I faintly recognize from my English class.

I plan my approach. I’ll pretend like I just stumbled into them.

“Oh hey,” I murmur to myself in the rearview mirror, feigning surprise. “You guys come here, too? Mind if I sit with you?”

And then he’ll look up at me with those swimmable green eyes and say yeah in that slightly husky voice, and he’ll scoot to make room for me at the table, and the chair will still be warm from the heat of his body. And I’ll somehow untie my tongue and say something amazingly witty. And he’ll finally see who I really am.

It’s not a foolproof plan, but it’s the best I can do on such short notice.

The place is packed. I locate Christian at the back, squeezed into a round booth with five other people. There’s definitely no room for me, and no way I can casually wander by without making my intentions pathetically obvious. Foiled again.

I find a tiny table in the front corner across from the arcade. I choose the chair facing away from Christian and his pals so they can’t see my face, although I’m sure they’ll recognize my wild orange hair if they give me more than a cursory glance. I need to come up with a new plan.

As I wait for someone to come take my order, Christian and the other two guys at his table jump up and run to the arcade like little boys out for recess. I suddenly have a clear view of them as they gather around a pinball machine, Christian in the center putting his quarters in. I watch him lean into the machine as he plays, his strong eyebrows drawn together in concentration, his hands flicking rapidly against the sides. He’s wearing a long-sleeved navy tee that says, WHAT’S YOUR SIGN? in white letters; then there’s a white stripe across the chest with a black diamond symbol, a blue square, and a green circle. I have no idea what it means.

“Oh, man.” The other guys grunt like a bunch of sympathetic cavemen as Christian apparently lets the ball slip past the paddles, not just once, but twice, three times.

Pinball is clearly not his forte.

“Dude, what’s with you today?” says the guy from my English class, Shawn, I think his name is, the one with the unhealthy obsession with his snowboard. “You’re off your game, man. Where are the lightning-fast reflexes?”

Christian doesn’t answer for a minute — he’s still playing. Then he groans and turns away from the machine.

“Hey, I’ve got a lot on my plate right now,” he says.

“Yeah, like making chicken soup for poor widdle Kay,” teases the other guy.

Christian shakes his head. “You mock, but women love soup. More than flowers.

Trust me.”

I try to summon the courage to go talk to him. In California it was a well-known fact that I could play a mean game of pinball. I’ll be that cool chick who rocks at video games. That’s loads better than showing up at his table like a lost puppy. It’s my chance.

“Hey,” says Shawn as I’m standing up to go over there. “Isn’t that Bozo?”

Who?

“What?” says Christian. “Who’s Bozo?”

“You know, the new girl. The one from Cali.”

What’s sad is that it actually takes a minute for me to understand that he’s talking about me. Sometimes it sucks to have supernaturally good hearing.

“She’s totally staring at you, dude,” says Shawn.

Quickly I look away, the name settling into the pit of my stomach like wet cement.

Bozo. As in, the clown. As in, I may never show my face (or my hair) in public again for the rest of my life.

And the hits just keep on coming.

“She’s got big eyes, doesn’t she? Like an owl,” the other guy says. “Hey, maybe she’s stalking you, Prescott. I mean, she’s hot, but she kind of gives off that crazy chick vibe, don’t you think?”

Shawn laughs. “Dude. Hot Bozo. Best nickname ever.”

I know he’s not trying to be mean to my face; he reasonably assumes that I can’t hear him from the other side of the noisy restaurant. But I hear his words like he’s speaking into a microphone. A flash of intense heat darts from my head to my toes.

My stomach churns. I have to get out of there fast, because the longer I stand there, the more certain I become that one of two things are going to happen: I’m going to puke or I’m going to cry.

And I’d rather die than do either in front of Christian Prescott.

“Cut it out, guys,” mutters Christian. “I’m sure she’s just here getting lunch.”

Yes, yes I am. And now I’m leaving.

British History, thirty minutes later. I’ve parked myself at the desk farthest away from the door. I try not to think the word Bozo. I wish I had a hoodie to pull up over my clown hair.

Mr. Erikson sits on the edge of the table, wearing an oversize black tee that reads, CHICKS DIG HISTORIANS.

“Before we start today, I want to assign you to your partners for the special projects you’ll be doing,” he announces, opening his grade book.

“Together you’ll need to choose a topic — anything goes as long as it’s related in some way to the history of England, Wales, Ireland, or Scotland— research it thoroughly over the next few months, then you’ll present what you’ve learned to the class.”

Someone kicks the back of my chair.

I dare a glance over my shoulder. Tucker. How does this guy always end up behind me?

I ignore him.

He kicks my chair again. Hard.

“What is your problem?” I whisper over my shoulder.

“You.”

“Could you please be more specific?”

He grins. I resist the urge to turn around and bash my hefty Oxford Illustrated History of Britain textbook across his skull. Instead I go with a classic:

“Stop it.”

“Is there a problem, Sister Clara?” asks Mr. Erikson.

I contemplate telling him that Tucker’s having a hard time keeping his feet to himself.

I can feel all the eyes turning toward me, which is the last thing I want to happen. Not today.

“No, just excited about the project,” I say.

“Good to be excited about history,” says Mr. Erikson. “But try to contain yourself until I’ve assigned you a partner, okay?”

Just don’t pair me with Tucker, I pray, as serious a prayer as I’ve ever had. I wonder if the prayers of angel-bloods count more than regular people’s. Maybe if I close my eyes and wish with all my heart to get paired with Christian, it will miraculously happen. Then we’ll have to spend time together after school working on our project, time when Kay can’t interfere, time when I can prove to him that I’m no owl-eyed crazy Bozo chick, and I will finally get something right.

Christian, I request to the heavens. Please, I add, just to be polite.

Christian gets paired with King Brady.

“Don’t forget that you’re a serf,” says Brady.

“No, sire,” replies Christian humbly.

“And last, but certainly not least, I thought Sister Clara and Lady Angela might make a dynamic duo,” says Mr. Erikson. “Now please take a few minutes with your partner to plan some time to work on your project.”

I try to smile to mask my disappointment.

As usual, Angela is sitting at the front of the class. I drop into the seat next to hers and pull my desk closer.

“Elvis,” she says, looking at my tee. “Nice.”

“Oh. Thanks. I like yours, too.”

Her shirt’s a copy of that famous Bouguereau painting of the two little naked angels, the boy angel leaning in to kiss the girl angel on the cheek.

“That’s like, Il Primo Bacio, right? The First Kiss?”

“Yes. My mom drags me off to see her family in Italy every summer. I got this shirt in Rome for two Euros.”

“Cool.” I don’t know what else to say. I examine her shirt more closely. In the painting, the boy angel’s wings are tiny and white. Highly unlikely that they’d be able to lift his chubby body off the ground. The girl angel is looking down, like she’s not even into the whole kissing thing. She’s taller than the boy, leaner, more mature. Her wings are dark gray.

“So, I thought we could meet Monday at my mom’s theater, the Pink Garter. There’s no show being rehearsed right now so we have a lot of space to work,” says Angela.

“Sounds terrific,” I say with about a teaspoonful of enthusiasm. “So, after school on Monday?”

“I have orchestra. It gets out around seven. Maybe I could meet you at the Garter at seven thirty?”

“Great,” I say. “I’ll be there.”

She’s staring at me. I wonder if she calls me Bozo, too, with her friends, whoever they are.

“You okay?” she asks.

“Yeah, sorry.” My face feels hot and tight as a sunburn. I manage a wooden smile.

“It’s just been one of those days.”

That night I dream of the forest fire. It’s the same as always: the pines and aspens, the heat, the approaching flames, Christian standing with his back turned watching it.

Smoke curls through the air. I walk to him.

“Christian,” I call out.

He turns toward me. His eyes capture mine. He opens his mouth to say something. I know what he says will be important, another clue, something crucial to understanding my purpose.

“Do I know you?” he asks.

“We go to school together,” I say to remind him.

Nothing.

“I’m in your British History class.”

Still not ringing any bells.

“You carried me to the nurse’s office on my first day of school. I passed out in the hall, remember?”

“Oh, right, I remember you,” he says. “What was your name again?”

“Clara.” I don’t have time to remind him of my existence. The fire’s coming. “I have to get you out of here,” I say, grabbing his arm. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I just know we have to go.

“What?”

“I’m here to save you.”

“Save me?” he says incredulously.

“Yes.”

He smiles, then puts his fist up to his mouth and laughs into it.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “But how could you save me?”

“It was just a dream,” says Mom.

She pours me a cup of raspberry tea and sits down at the kitchen counter, looking serene as ever, if not a bit tired and rumpled, which is only fair since it’s four in the morning and her daughter just woke her up freaking out.

“Sugar?” she offers.

I shake my head.

“How do you know it was a dream?” I ask.

“Because it seems like your vision always happens while you’re awake. Some of us dream our visions, but not you. And because I have a very hard time believing that Christian wouldn’t remember your name.”

I shrug. Then, because that’s what I always do, I tell her everything. I tell her about the way I feel drawn to Christian and the few times in class when we talked and how I never know what to say. I tell her about Kay, and my brilliant idea to invite myself to lunch at Christian’s table, and how it had backfired big-time. And I tell her about Bozo.

“Bozo?” she says with her quiet smile when I’m finally done talking.

“Yeah. Although one guy decided to go with Hot Bozo.” I sigh and drink a swallow of tea. It burns my tongue. “I’m a freak.”

Mom playfully shoves me. “Clara! They called you hot.”

“Um, not exactly,” I say.

“Don’t go feeling too sorry for yourself. We should think of some other ones.”

“Other ones?”

“Other names they could call you. So if you ever hear them again you’ll be prepared with a comeback.”

“What?”

“Pumpkinhead.”

“Pumpkinhead,” I repeat slowly.

“That was a major insult, when I was a kid.”

“Back in what, 1900?”

She pours herself some more tea. “I got Pumpkinhead many times. They also called me Little Orphan Annie, which was a popular poem back then. And Maggot. I hated Maggot.”

It’s hard for me to imagine her as a child, let alone one that other kids picked on. It makes me feel slightly (but only slightly) better about being called Bozo.

“Okay, what else you got?”

“Let’s see. Carrots. That’s another common one.”

“Somebody already calls me that,” I admit.

“Oh, oh — Pippi Longstocking.”

“Oh, snap,” I laugh. “Bring it on, Matchstick!”

And so on it goes, back and forth until we’re both laughing hysterically and Jeffrey appears in the doorway, glaring.

“I’m sorry,” Mom says, still giggling wildly. “Did we wake you?”

“No. I have wrestling.” He brushes past us to the refrigerator, gets out a carton of orange juice, pours himself a glass, drinks it in about three gulps, and sets it on the counter while we try to simmer down.

I can’t help it. I turn to Mom.

“Are you a member of the Weasley family?” I ask.

“Nice one. Ginger Nut,” she shoots back.

“What does that even mean? But you, you definitely have gingervitis.”

And off we go again like a couple of hyenas.

“You two need to seriously consider cutting back on the caffeine. Don’t forget, Clara, you’re driving me to practice in like twenty minutes,” says Jeffrey.

“You got it, bro.”

He goes upstairs. Our laughter finally dies down. I wipe my eyes. My sides hurt.

“You kind of rock, you know that?” I say to Mom.

“This was fun,” she says. “It’s been too long since I’ve laughed that hard.”

It gets quiet.

“What’s Christian like?” she asks then, offhandedly like she’s just making small talk.

“I know he’s hotness personified, and apparently he has a bit of hero complex, but what’s he like? You’ve never told me.”

I blush.

“I don’t know.” I shrug awkwardly. “He’s a big mystery, and it feels like it’s my job to unlock it. Even his T-shirt today was like a code. It said, ‘What’s your sign?’ and underneath there was a black diamond, a blue square, and a green circle. I have no idea what that’s supposed to mean.”

“Hmm,” says Mom. “That is mysterious.”

She darts into her office for a few minutes, then emerges smiling with a page she’s printed off the internet. My hundred-year-old mother can apparently Google with the best of them.

“Skiing,” she announces triumphantly. “The symbols are posted on signs at the top of ski runs to indicate the difficulty of the slope. Black diamond is difficult, blue square’s intermediate, and green circle is, supposedly, easy. He’s a skier.”

“A skier,” I say. “See? I didn’t even know that. I mean, I know he’s left-handed and he wears Obsession and he doodles in the margins of his notebook when he’s bored in class. But I don’t know him. And he really doesn’t know me.”

“That will change,” she says.

“Will it? Am I even supposed to get to know him? Or just save him? I keep asking myself, why? Why him? I mean, people die in forest fires. Maybe not a lot of people, but some do every year, I’m sure. So why am I being sent here to save him? And what if I can’t? What happens then?”

“Clara, listen to me.” Mom leans forward and takes my hands in hers. Her eyes aren’t sparkling anymore. The irises are so dark they are nearly purple. “You aren’t being sent on a mission that you don’t have the power to accomplish. You have to find that power inside you somewhere, and you have to refine it. You were made for this purpose. And Christian isn’t some random boy that you’re supposed to encounter for no reason. There is a reason, for all of this.”

“You think Christian might be important, like he’ll be president someday or find the cure for cancer?”

She smiles.

“He’s terribly important,” she says. “And so are you.”

I really want to believe her.