I didn’t have enough time to explain my intentions to Michael before the room started buzzing with cel phones containing Facebook invitations from Vanessa. Leaning down, I quickly strapped my shoes back on. I reached into my purse and slid out my brush and lipstick. As Michael stared incredulously, I hurriedly fixed my hair and makeup. If I was going down like a phoenix into the ashes, I wanted to look presentable—even good—
doing it.
I gave Michael a kiss, and whispered, “I’m so sorry that I’m about to ruin our night.”
Turning toward the stage, I heard him cal out, “El ie, what’s going on?”
I could hear the apprehension in his voice, but I couldn’t look at him. His concern would only make me hesitate, and I couldn’t afford to falter.
Squaring my shoulders and taking a deep breath, I walked to the front of the gym. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Vanessa and Keith preparing to go on stage. Ignoring them as best I could, I started up the stairs. A couple of kids and at least one teacher tried to discourage me. But I just smiled and plowed ahead.
Once on stage, I searched around for the mike. The white-knuckled student council president held it tightly in his hand as he reviewed the note cards for his speech. I sidled up to him and said, ever so sweetly, “Can I borrow that for a minute?”
Surprised at the request, he said, “Um, I’m about to make a speech.”
Smiling agreeably, I said, “I know. I just have to make a quick announcement first.”
“Sure,” he said with a smile and handed me the mike.
“Thanks so much. You can have it back in a second, I promise.”
Mike in hand, I stared out at the crowd. My self-assurance—real and pretend—left me as I surveyed the nearly two hundred kids on the dance floor. But I couldn’t succumb to my fears; I had to move forward. I was moved by a compulsion that was more powerful than anything I had ever felt.
Even my desire for Michael.
I cleared my throat and said, “Hi. For those of you who don’t know me, I’m El ie Faneuil.”
Even though the kids had stopped dancing, they continued to mil around and talk. They appeared as uninterested and unimpressed with the Fal Queen and King crowning ceremony as Michael. I half-waved and tapped the mike. A loud screech reverberated from the speakers, and suddenly I had everyone’s attention.
“I’m sorry to interrupt your night. In a few minutes, you wil al receive a Facebook invitation from Vanessa Moore, our Fal Queen. If you accept the invitation, you wil be directed to a Facebook page that contains several pictures that seem to be of Vanessa and some posts al egedly by her hand. But the page is complete fiction. The pictures are Photoshopped, and the entries are made up.” I paused; the next words stuck in my throat. “I created the entire thing.”
In the crowd, I saw Ruth’s face staring up at me in disbelief. The magnitude of my actions hit me, and my voice cracked. “I want to apologize to Vanessa and everyone else named on the Facebook page. Even though I know none of you wil ever be able to forgive me.”
Before I handed the mike back to a stunned student council president, I glanced out at the crowd. There, at the center, I saw Missy, murderously furious that her plan had been thwarted. At her side stood a guy—a blond, good- looking guy who had to be her date. A guy who had to be the shadowy Zeke from the flashes.
Something about him seemed familiar, and not just from the visions I’d gotten about him. In the split second before I left the stage, I looked at little closer, and realized that he was the guy from the coffee shop. He noticed my stare, and smiled that strange, bemused smile of his. As if he’d expected me to be up there on that stage al along.
I dropped the mike and ran.
Chapter Twenty-five
Over the next few days, darkness seeped into my soul.
Maybe it came from the hatred of me I saw in my classmates’ eyes and minds. When I returned from my three-day suspension for my Facebook prank, as it was dubbed by the administration, I’d become the object of loathing for every student at Til inghast Upper High School. My locker was vandalized, my homework destroyed before it reached the teachers’ hands, my face spit upon. God forbid that I accidental y touched someone; the abhorrence seared my fingertips. But I could speak not a word in my own defense: I conceded that right on the gym stage.
Maybe the darkness came from the evil that I’d witnessed in Missy’s heart, or the blood I’d sampled from her via Piper. In the flash from her blood, I saw the desire for such unspeakable acts that I couldn’t al ow myself to revisit the images. It was like becoming a character in one of Hieronymus Bosch’s paintings of hel .
I didn’t know the source of the darkness. I knew only that the Good Samaritan compulsion al but disappeared the night of the dance. Looking back, I had no idea why I did what I did. Once I’d realized that I had the capacity to spare al those kids al that pain, I just had to take the fal . Was this part of who I was? It certainly didn’t sound like the impulse of a vampire. But real y, what did it solve, my taking the fal ? Although it wouldn’t have fixed anything to point the finger at Missy.
Regardless, al that had vanished. I fil ed the void left in its wake with me and Michael.
Ruth hadn’t spoken to me since the dance, and I wasn’t sure why. Since I was certain that she must know that I didn’t create the Facebook page, I could only guess that she was furious that I’d ruined her dream night. I couldn’t even tel her why. Whatever her reason, her abandonment of me made my own submission to the darkness easier. It was one less tie to my old self.
The only ones who didn’t detest me outright were Piper and Missy, who were uniform in their disbelief and confusion even though they were no longer in league as friends. Instead of hating me, they seemed to be frightened of me. And with my urge to act charitably gone, I certainly felt no impulse to reach out toward Piper and encourage her better nature.
Only Michael stood by my side, even though part of him wished that I’d tel the truth about Missy’s act. Only he understood what I had done and why. The knowledge brought us closer. So close that there was no longer any
