Lars called to Trinity and, with a delighted squeal that brought her eyes back to life, she turned and ran toward him. He pulled her up against his huge frame and kissed her.
I knew without looking that every eye was trained on them. The kiss was so steamy it was embarrassing to watch. It didn’t belong in public. It belonged in a boudoir on black satin sheets with no one else around. Just as I was about to turn away, not interested in seeing Lars swallow Trinity whole, his eyes popped open and he met my gaze from across the way.
Although warmth did leap to life in my belly, my head was far too aware of what was going on for me to be swayed by his tactics. In a defiant gesture, I hiked my chin up a notch, a silent challenge for him to give me his best shot. I was no easy target.
Abruptly, tossing one last scathing look over my shoulder, I turned on my heel and walked to the gaggle of gawking cheerleaders, snapping commands as I went, spurring them into action.
Slowly, reluctantly, their attention turned back to the task at hand, a difficult half-time routine we’d been practicing for our next game, the Friday after next. When they were all tending to their role in the choreography, I glanced back over my shoulder. As I suspected, Lars and Trinity were gone.
********
The next morning, I lay in bed looking at the ceiling. The first lights of dawn had painted an intricate, shifting pattern on the smooth surface. My heart was still heavy, but maybe not quite as heavy as it had been.
Last night, Mom was more herself. By that, I mean she came stumbling in at 11:45 wasted. I personally believed she was the only person in the history of time who actually drove better while intoxicated. She’d never so much as been in a scrape or gotten a speeding ticket while she was loaded. Sobriety, on the other hand, was a whole different story.
Thankfully, she hadn’t needed much in the way of care. It was one of her fairly self-sufficient and pleasant binges. She chattered on about work-related things, citing people and places I knew nothing about. But she laughed a lot, which was infinitely preferable to the times she came home a crying, drunken mess.
The most important thing I noticed was that she didn’t mention Lars one time. It was as if she didn’t even remember meeting him. In fact, she’d acted confused when I asked her about him. I could only assume that the blood, or whatever he did to her, had worn off and she was once again my mother. Flawed though she was, I was glad to have her back.
Spending the evening without so much as talking to Bo turned out to be extremely unpleasant, but when I compared it to Trinity and her drug-addicted behaviors, I thought my feelings were surprisingly normal for someone who was in deep like, or whatever I was in.
I was hesitant to call it love yet, especially since Bo’s most recent confession. I wanted to know that, when love finally found me, it would be real. I also wanted to know that it happened for all the right reasons. So as long as there was one tiny seed of doubt in my mind about me and Bo, I was going to put off naming my feelings for him for as long as I possibly could.
It seemed that Bo was somehow able to sense my inner struggle. Without me even having to ask, he had graciously given me some space. I gave him huge credit for that, and, though we’d been apart only hours (that felt like weeks), that time had been very revealing.
There was no denying my intense yearning for Bo’s company. There was a physical need, yes, but there was an emotional longing that far outweighed it, by several tons in fact. I’d dissected and closely examined each and every one of my feelings for Bo and it didn’t take me long to realize that I crave his presence and all that comes with it—his smile, his laugh, his confidence, his closeness, his voice, his smell, his touch, the safety that I feel when he’s around.
But I also came to the important conclusion that I was still me whether Bo was around or not. I was happy when he was close and miserable when he wasn’t, and there was no doubt that his influence had made me a better person in many ways. But either way—with or without him—I was still me, unlike Trinity who seemed like a totally different person altogether since Lars had come into the picture.
Sliding out from beneath the covers, I decided to go ahead and take a shower, give myself plenty of time to prepare for the day ahead. I was going on a field trip to see Lucius tonight and somehow—instinctively I guess—I knew it would be a very significant visit.
The day ticked by uneventfully. I passed Trinity on a few occasions and each time, she cast me an odd look that appeared to be a mixture of hatred and curiosity. Beneath her tan, she was even paler than she’d been the day before and I wondered if I’d been too late in my warning.
I was leaving my locker, heading through the empty hall toward the cafeteria, when Trinity sprang around the corner and surprised me.
“Trinity,” I gasped, throwing a startled hand up to my throat where my heart was lodged. “You scared me.”
Trinity didn’t say a word at first; she just stepped slowly forward until she was almost in my face. When she didn’t stop, but continued to approach me, I began taking a step backward for every step she took toward me.
She inhaled deeply, closing her eyes as if in ecstasy. “He’s right. I can smell your blood,” she said. When she opened her eyes to look at me, I saw that Trinity was still in there; she’d just been liberated from the constraints of humanity. “Right through your skin.”
“What?” Even as I stumbled back, away from her, I played dumb. “What are you talking about, Trinity?”
Her lips curled up into a malevolent sneer. “Oh, I think you know exactly what I’m talking about, Ridley.”
“No, I don’t. I think—”
“In that case, would you like me to show you?” Her eyes were wide and innocent for a moment, but then her devilish smile slid back into place. “I’d really like to show you, Rid.”
“Trinity, you don’t have to do this.”
For the first time, fear of Trinity—real fear—lanced through me. I could only hope that she didn’t pick up on the nervous tremor in my voice.
“Oh, but I do,” she said quietly, still stalking me.
“No, you don’t. You don’t have to live this way. You can survive without hurting people.”