Back at Evan’s house, Michelle drops us all off before driving herself back home. I reflect for a moment on how much gas she must be using up, shuttling us all back and forth across town like this. Those Land Rovers are not known for their efficiency, but given that Michelle’s rich, I’m sure she can handle it.
“You okay?” Evan’s about to follow Adele and Rachel back into the house, but she turns around to talk to me some more.
“Yeah,” I say, edging aside so Kevin can get past me and into the next house over. He lives next door to Evan? I didn’t know that.
“You sure?” Evan asks. “You look disturbed.”
“No more so than usual,” I say. “Trust me, I’m fine.”
“Look,” Evan says, stepping closer to me, “I can see you’re bothered by what Elena told us today. If you wanna talk about it, I’m here.”
“Me too,” Harris says. “But not really here, ‘cause it’s freezing. Anyone else wanna go inside?”
“Yeah,” I say. “Good idea.”
Evan takes us inside and sits us on the living room couch. “Either of you guys want anything to eat?” she asks.
“No thanks,” I say. Harris agrees, and then Evan sits next to me.
“I feel like I’m in an intervention,” I say.
“An intervention for your feelings, probably,” Harris says. “Hey, I know. It’s not every day you hear your dad’s workin’ for some evil Dark warlock.”
“I know,” I say. “And the funny thing is, even if Dad has no idea what he’s doin’, chances are he’s still doin’ bad stuff to help these Scaler guys out.”
“It’s like he’s in SD-6 or something,” Evan says. Seeing Harris and me both returning shocked stares, she says, “What? It’s not like you guys can be the only members of our generation to have seen Alias.”
I hug myself a bit. “Now, see, my problem is, I wanna bring it to his attention, but if he’s already aware and willingly workin’ for the Scalers, I’ll just make myself a target.”
“Well, neither of us know your dad,” Harris says, “but if he’s any level of reasonable, I’m sure he’ll at least listen to what you have to say.” He laughs harshly. “But if he’s really evil, then you’ll only find out when he guts you like a fish in your sleep, like the goddamn sociopath he is.”
“Thanks for the help,” I mutter.
“Don’t mention it.”
I turn to Evan. “Would you have any helpful advice to give me, love?”
Evan pushes her bangs out of her eyes - she tends to do that when she’s thinking hard. “It can’t hurt to go to him, can it?”
“You really think it’s a good idea?” I ask.
“Come on, what are the odds he’s really evil?” Evan asks. “You said it yourself, your dad always says he could be laid off anytime. Sounds to me like he wouldn’t be evil enough for Marten Drake, and that’d be their excuse when they can him.”
“Every other working stiff in the country wishes their bosses were evil like that,” I say, laughing. Evan’s assessment of the situation has really cheered me up.
“So are you gonna go and ask him?” Harris asks.
“I dunno,” I say. “Probably not tonight. I’ll save that particular line of questioning till tomorrow. Today, all I’m gonna ask him is his permission to go on a campout with you guys this weekend.”
“Interesting idea for a cover story,” Evan muses. “Just make sure he’s aware we’re gonna have separate tents for the boys and girls.”
I laugh again. “Yeah, that’s what he cares about the most, making sure my virtue is intact.”
“His heart’s in the right place, then,” Evan says, smiling. “My dad thinks along the same lines. What about yours, Harris?”
“He doesn’t care what happens to my body, unless it’s one of two things,” Harris says, raising two fingers. “One, that I bulk up a lot - preferably with natural methods, like protein-loading or workin’ out or real world labor. Two, that I don’t end up losin’ it, ‘cause it’s the only one I’ve got, and I gotta treat it like a temple, yada yada.”
Evan and I both laugh hard at this. “Does this mean you don’t care about your body?” I ask.
“I care enough to shield it from prying eyes,” Harris says.
We all start laughing now, to the point where Adele emerges from down the hall and hisses at us to be quiet, saying Mr. and Mrs. Michaelsen are trying to sleep.
“Are they really?” I ask.
“No,” Adele admits, raising the volume of her voice back to normal. “But Rachel and I are tryin’ to listen to the latest One Direction single, so could you please be quiet and not disrupt the good vibrations? Thank you.”
“Okay,” Evan says.
“Thanks!” Adele skips merrily back to her room.
“One Direction, huh?” Evan mutters as Adele leaves. “They don’t do boy bands, usually. I guess times change, though. And I mean, they’ve never had this much time together before, so…”
“So you figure they’re tryin’ to bond as much as possible?” Harris asks.
“Can’t imagine why not,” Evan says.
“That’s really sweet,” I say.
“Isn’t it?” Evan stretches her legs. I hope she’s not too aware of the fact that my eyes are tracing the shapes of her calves under her jeans.
A few minutes later, Harris and I decide to leave - it’s dark now, and we’re both sure our parents won’t want us to be out too late, even if they’re as unaware of the Fire gang problem as we think they are. We walk in silence, devoting our attention to keeping an eye out for said Fire gang, but they’re nowhere to be seen tonight.
When I get home, as Dad and I start cooking our microwave dinners along with Jeremy, I bring up the subject of the planned “campout.”
“So,” I say as casually as possible, “my friends and I, we were, uh, thinkin’ about goin’ up to Mount Hamilton this weekend and-”
“Oh, you guys wanna watch the party at the Ice palace?” Dad asks.
“How’d you guess?”
“It’s only natural,” Dad says, smiling. “I remember I wanted to go to the Norwegian Ice palace every year when I was in my teens, but I never did until I was eighteen. You’re lucky, there’s an Ice palace right near here for once.” He loads his ziti parmesano diet dinner into the microwave. “But how’d you and your friends get a campsite? I heard they were all taken up.”
“One of us has...erm...connections,” I say, thinking of Michelle. And Evan, because it’s her father who’s responsible for having us go on this...excursion, as it were.
“I see,” Dad says.
“What are you lookin’ at?” I say to Jeremy, who’s eyeballing me in a funny way. “This is none of your bees’ guts. Shoo!”
Jeremy puts on a sullen face as he leaves his penne pollo on the counter. “Let me know when the microwave’s free,” he says, slinking out of the room.
After Jeremy leaves, Dad starts on his line of questioning again. “So, you and your friends...would this Evan girl be one of those friends, by any chance?”
“Yes,” I say innocently. “Why do you ask?”
Dad’s smile turns diabolical. “Now, you wouldn’t be planning anything stupid, would you? Because, Jason, if you are, I might have to subject you to the-”
“Oh please,” I groan. “For heaven’s sake, Dad, I’m not gonna do the do with this girl. What?” I ask as he snickers under his breath.
“‘Do the do,’” he says. “Where did you pick that up? If I remember correctly, that’s how teens of my generation would say they were having sex.”
“I thought teens of your generation said ‘doin’ the nasty,’” I say, adding a British accent just like Dad’s to the last part of that sentence. Having imitated it for years, I can do it almost pitch-perfectly.
“You could be right,” Dad says. “But the point is still the same, regardless of how we’re going to say it. You don’t intend to ravish this poor Evan, do you?”
“God, no,” I say. I’m starting to lose my appetite from this sex talk. “We’re all gonna be there just as friends. Nothing else. I swear.”
Dad holds out his hand, extending his index finger and pinky.
“No,” I say, backing away from his metal horns. “You’re not serious.”
“I want to make sure you’re telling the truth,” Dad says, that horribly familiar mischievous smile on his face. I haven’t seen that smile since the night I first brought Dani home.
I roll my eyes. “Fine.” I complete the Dark bond with Dad, flinching as the spark of energy escapes into the air. “I swear, no do will be done on this campout. At least, not by me.”
“Good boy,” Dad says, ruffling my hair like I’m five years old again. “I’m trusting you now, so don’t go and abuse it. Be good on this camping trip!”
“I take it that’s a yes?”
“Of course.” Dad smiles again, this time less mischievously and more good-naturedly. “I can’t just let you pass up any opportunity to socialize. God only knows you’ve not had enough, Jason.”
“Gee, thanks for the reminder,” I say. “I bet next you’re gonna say how you were just the same when you were my age.”
“How’d you guess?” Dad asks. The microwave finishes, and he removes his steaming pre-packaged pasta dinner.
“It’s about the only thing in your parenting playbook,” I say, taking the time to put my own dinner into the microwave. “It means you’re tryin’ too hard to relate to me.”
Dad nods sagely. “Er, you do realize if you stand in front of that thing too long, it’ll make you sterile, right?”
“Don’t change the subject,” I say, but I move away from the microwave anyway. I need to conduct a bit more research into that, see if it’s really true or just bullshit waiting for the Mythbusters to debunk it.
Dad stirs some grated Parmesan into his pasta - not that it needs it, but we’ve both found that double layers of the stuff really improves the taste. “I just want you to know that we’re not so different, you and I. I was a punkish adolescent once. I may not have had too many friends, but it sure didn’t stop me pissing around like the youth I was.”
“Well, good,” I say. “‘Cause the last thing we’d want is you gettin’ a midlife crisis ‘cause you didn’t ‘piss around’” - I add air quotes to these words, along with a British accent - “enough as a kid.”
“I don’t think we need to worry about that,” Dad says. “I’m a little too tied down to you guys for that sort of thing.”
“Aww, you really do care,” I say. “Be still, my beating heart.”
Dad shakes his head. “Well, there’s one thing that makes us different - I was never this snarky to my own father.”
“If that’s your way of tellin’ me to be less sarcastic,” I say with a short laugh, “it’s not gonna work. Just lettin’ you know.”
“Thanks for the warning,” Dad says, laying his bowl on the table. “Now, what have we got on the DVR for us?”
“Erm...The Flash?”
“Oh God, no,” Dad says, shuddering melodramatically. He’s a lifelong Marvel fanboy, and with the exception of Christopher Nolan’s Batman movies, he refuses to have anything to do with DC.
“But he’s awesome! He’s the fastest man alive! Lightning gave him abs!”
“Don’t get any ideas, Jason,” Dad laughs, lightly poking the handle of his fork into my stomach.
I sigh deeply as I take my dinner out of the microwave. “Well, I suppose you wouldn’t mind Person of Interest.”
“You read my mind,” Dad says, grinning as I start the recording from last night.
After dinner, Person of Interest, and The Flash (for which I bring Jeremy into my room), I go to bed, my brain still bouncing around ideas and theories for what’s going to happen this weekend. It takes me forever to fall asleep because of all this humming in my head.
At some point I do end up falling asleep, though, because the next thing I know, I’m dreaming about walking along a snow-covered, Christmas-lit, hedge-lined path with Evan all over again. We don’t talk. We just appreciate the Ice-powered beauty around us. Both of us can see our breath, and we have fun making the vapor trails mingle. And then I lean down, tilt her head up, and kiss her.
I could lose myself in that embrace forever.
But then we break apart as we hear a loud snapping noise nearby, like someone stepping on a twig.
I look in the direction of the sound and see a shockingly familiar face. Familiar, but horribly twisted and screwed-up. Red hair, green eyes, tall...and very definitely rotten, like some kind of zombie.
It’s Dani Cabrera. And she doesn’t look happy, if her screeching banshee wail and outstretched, sharp-taloned fingers are anything to go by.
With barely a thought passing through my head, I blast Dani with the twin-power spiral Harris showed me - Dark and Ice all at once. Because it’s a dream, I can do it perfectly, and Dani is sent sprawling through the hedge, not to be seen again.
I turn around to make a neat little quip to Evan - only to see her clutching my hand tightly, her face dangerously pale and sunken-looking, like she’s being sucked dry.
“Evan? EVAN?!” I cry out. “What’s happening?”
“You...you…” Evan can hardly even speak. “You did this to me.” She waves her free hand, and a tiny wisp of Ice power comes out.
At this point, whatever system is in place to end nightmares as quickly as possible (though not quite fast enough) kicks in, and I wake up shivering, trembling with fear. There’s Ice all over my walls, and tiny snowflakes drifting through the air all around me.
The first thought in my head is, Wow. Who knew my Ice powers were that strong?
This is then followed by, Shit. Fuckin’ shit. What does that dream even mean?
I curl up in a ball, trying to get a handle on my fast-flying brain once again. I still haven’t told Evan about my Ice powers. I’m sure she wouldn’t mind seeing them - especially not if Jeremy and Harris were so impressed.
But then I keep thinking about the fact that she still hasn’t told me if she really likes me. She knows the way I feel, of course. But if I take too long to tell her, will she think I’m holding back on her? That I don’t trust her to know things like that about me?
I decide to move on from the weirdness that was that dream. It was just a weird, random fluke, and I think I know how to make sure it doesn’t repeat itself on me.
The first step is to eliminate the Ice from my room. I simply curl up one fist and it all comes off the walls, wrapping itself around my hand like a misty bandage. Then I toss it out the window, using my night vision so I can target the lawn with precision, just in case Dad happens to cross the concrete path again. I doubt he will, but better safe than sorry.
The second step...well, it’s a little too early in the morning to take care of that. So that’s going to have to wait till later.