Abandon - Meg Cabot [80]
Coming to his office, I realized, had been a bad idea. What had I really accomplished, anyway? Nothing good. Except that I had gotten my necklace back.
My necklace that, I had learned, killed whoever touched it. Great.
“Look,” I said to the cemetery sexton, dropping the chain back down over my head. When I felt the pendant’s heavy weight thump against my heart, I felt a little calmer. Which in and of itself was depressing. “Never mind. It’s fine. I understand.”
He looked at me in the lamplight. “Do you, Miss Oliviera? Because I get the feeling I haven’t been any more successful at getting through to you than I’ve ever been at getting through to John.”
“Well,” I said, “now you know why I wasn’t so thrilled at the idea of spending all of eternity with him. Because he’s impossible.”
The cemetery sexton looked thoughtful.
“Impossible, yes,” he admitted, after a few seconds. “But interesting. Like you. And eternity is a long time. So if you have to spend it with someone, I could see wanting to spend it with someone impossible…but interesting.”
As turtle-doves, called onward by desire,
With open and steady wings to the sweet nest
Fly through the air by their volition borne.
DANTE ALIGHIERI, Inferno, Canto V
Honey, some boys stopped by to see you. They had wood.”
That’s the first thing Mom said to me when I got home. It took me a minute to figure out what she was talking about. Then I realized what must have happened.
“Sorry, Mom,” I said, when my anger at Seth Rector had abated enough to allow me to speak. “I didn’t tell them they could do that. I said I had to ask you if it was okay first.”
“That’s what they said.” Mom was in our new kitchen — which I guess wasn’t so new anymore — making pasta. “But they said they couldn’t get through to you. Since your phone was in your book bag in the garage — as I found out when I tried to call you, too, and that’s where I finally heard it ringing — I’m guessing that’s probably why.”
I winced. I couldn’t believe I’d spaced this. Actually, I could. No wonder there was so much speculation over at Grandma’s about me.
“Mom,” I said. “I’m so sorry. But they shouldn’t have just —”
“Honey, it’s all right,” she said, sliding a bowl in front of me as I sat down at the counter. “They explained that it was for Coffin Night, so I told them it was fine and let them come in. They seemed very nice. Even if they ma’amed me.”
Mom mock scowled as she took a seat next to me in front of her own bowl of pasta. She hated being called ma’am. She said it made her feel old, and wondered when she’d gone from being a miss to a ma’am.
She didn’t seem to hold it against Seth and his friends, though, nor did she give me her usual lecture about forgetting my cell phone.
I found out why after her gaze fell on the chain around my neck.
“Oh,” she said. “You’re wearing it. That’s funny. Today in the New Pathways office, I could have sworn that horrible old man from the cemetery —” She made a face, then took a sip from the glass of wine she’d poured herself. “You know what? Never mind. Maybe I need bifocals. Anyway, I assumed it was all right to let them in. It was, wasn’t it?”
What could I say? I’d been intending to tell Seth and his friends that, unfortunately, my mom had said no. Too bad, so sad.
How had they known this was what I’d been planning on doing? No wonder Alex hated them so much. The dirty sneaks.
I put a fake smile on my face and said, “No, Mom. It’s great. Super, in fact. Exactly what I wanted.”
Oh, well, I told myself. At least this way I could enact Phase One of my plan: Steal Serena’s cell phone, find incriminating photos on it (she seemed like the type who’d have them), then blackmail her into leaving Kayla alone.
“Anyway, you’ll never guess what happened,” Mom said. “You know that guy Tim from your New Pathways program? Well, he asked me out.” She winked. “That’s why I don’t really mind so much that those friends of yours ma’amed me. I guess