Suddenly I feel awful for even the accidental slip-up. Even though I didn’t mean to do it, it still had the same result. From the way Damian looks things must be really bad, too.
“Our web scanners flagged a search from a southern California IP address.” He pushes a piece of paper across his desk.
Search string: supernatural powers Serfopoula Greece
Results: suppress
Location: Los AngelesCounty
“Oh.” It has to be Cesca. No one else would even have a clue. But I know she did it with the best intentions. “She must have been worried after I told her I couldn’t tell her anything. We haven’t kept secrets. Ever. It probably freaked her out.”
That makes me feel better about her not responding to the millions of e-mails and IMs I’ve been sending. Even though she’s hurt that I can’t confide she’s still trying to find out what’s going on with me.
She’s a true friend.
“We cannot undo your accident,” Damian says. He sounds resigned, which makes me feel worse. “There might not be anything to worry about. We shall wait and see if there are any more incidents.”
“And if there are?”
“We will have to take countermeasures.”
“Countermeasures?” I picture Cesca, her feet encased in concrete blocks, sinking slowly to the floor of the Pacific. Maybe the Greek gods operate like the mafia.
“Nothing so dramatic,” Damian says, smiling and proving once again that he can read emotions fluently, “I assure you.”
I’m not fully appeased, but I guess I have to take his word for it at the moment. If the time comes to enact “countermeasures” I’ll warn Cesca ahead of time so she can flee the country or whatever.
For now, I just smile and nod as I gather up my backpack to leave.
“Oh, Phoebe,” Damian calls as I walk to the door. When I turn around, he adds, “Try not to accidentally reveal any more of our secrets. If you do, I just might have to try the concrete blocks method.”
My jaw drops. “Hey, you said you could only read emotions!”
Damian, cryptic as ever, just smiles and returns his attention to work. How like him.
I’m lucky I don’t keep a diary for him to read.
As I close the door behind me I hear, “Everything I need to know is stored in your hippocampus anyway.”
Because I can’t think of any better response I slam his door.
Believe it or not, I’m starting to feel sympathy for Stella. She’s had to live with him her whole life.
I only have to endure him for nine months.
“Damian and I have been talking, Phoebola,” Mom says. She’s sitting in my room, watching me try to do homework.
“Yeah,” I answer absently, wondering what Plato meant when
he said, We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light. “I would think you two do that a lot.”
Sure, I used to be afraid of the dark, but who ever heard of someone being afraid of the light? Maybe he’s being metaphorical. Light must be a symbol for something else. How about success? That would be like being afraid to win a race. It would be beyond sad if someone was afraid of winning. I start scribbling down my answer.
I can practically feel her giving me the Mom look.
“You know what I mean.” Mom clears her throat before continuing. Uh-oh. “This is all such a big change—for both of us. All of us. It’s going to get even harder when you go away to college.”
I sit up straight in my chair, the hairs on the back of my neck standing up.
“We think it might be better for you to stay on at the Academy for another year. Maybe even attend college in the U.K. after graduation. That will give you another year to adjust and—”
“What!”
I think my scream can be heard in Athens.
“Now calm down, after everything that’s—”
“Calm down? Are you crazy?” I jump up from my desk and start pacing. “You’re trying to ruin my entire future and you want me to calm down?”
“We are not trying to ruin your future.” She sits on my bed, the picture of calm and collected. “You could really benefit from another year of challenging academics.”
My pacing speeds up—if I had a rug I would probably burn a hole in it. I already know Damian wants this—Stella told me, after all—but my own mother?
“Nola, Cesca, and I have been planning on going to USC together since junior high.” I stop pacing long enough to throw my hands in the air. “How can you ask me to just throw all those years of plan-ning—not to mention my friendships—away?”
I resume pacing, my mind racing just as fast.
“I’m not asking you to do anything more than think about it,” she says calmly.
I hate it when she does the whole calm-Mom-therapy thing on me.
It makes me so mad I do things I might regret.
“It’s bad enough you marry a complete stranger,” I shout, “and you make me move halfway around the world without telling me I’ll be going to school with a bunch of kids with superpowers who can zap me whenever they want. But now, now after all this, you want me to stay even longer than absolutely necessary? This is all his idea, isn’t it?”
“Of course not,” she says, sounding all defensive. “He may be my husband, but I am still your mother.”
“Then why?” I demand. “Why this? Why now?”