I didn't sleep that night. The glow of my Gift would give me away to any enemies who cared to look for me in the dark. I couldn't risk being caught by surprise again. Even without the glow, they probably all knew where I was if Eleanor did. They just didn't need to know that I could use my measly gift.
I passed the night shivering and making false promises that when the sun rose I would have a plan. The sky was turning a yellow to blue gradient and I had no clue what I was going to do when it came up all the way.
The greater part of me wanted to stay in my makeshift bed until my Gift gave out and I froze like any normal human. Then there was the tiny part of me that wanted to storm into town and scream until I lost my voice. Mostly at the people I had considered my friends. I had a line up in my head: Julien, Mona, Lucia, Elliot, Miguel, Eleanor. Because I had trusted them and they didn't care.
But, despite what Mona said before she lit my grandma's house on fire, I'm not an idiot, and I had one sliver of rational thinking left. That sliver told me to find a way out of town and disappear. We had been taught how to do that in the Academy. It was as simple as finding a place that had never heard of me or the Queen of the Misfits. I would integrate myself into their community under a new name, just as I had done here in Summersville.
At that point the Academy would tell me to start with smaller crimes, earn a rep, start a new name.
But I was done with being a vigilante. It would make it too easy for my friends to find me. And I was useless without my team. As much as I loved vigilante life--and as much as it was all I knew how to do--I would have to stop.
The sun was warming my back where the roof was missing. Whatever birds that hadn't migrated south were chirping in the trees. It was a comforting familiar sound. It was time to make a decision. Freezing, screaming, leaving. Those had always been my options.
I unburied my face from my arms. The blue light hadn't stopped, but it was localized in my hands now. My chest must have frozen through. When I flexed my fingers, they still moved despite how cold they were. Overhead a large raven perched on the broken roof. It's feathers were mottled with shades of brown.
My frozen fingers dug up a handful of snow and pressed it into a ball. The bird burst into flight to dodge the snowball. It returned to its seat when the coast was clear. I contemplated throwing another at it, but the raven seemed persistent.
"Go away, Miguel."
The bird hopped away from the edge, disappearing from my view for thirty seconds. Then the fluffy haired visage of Miguel Castillo peeked over the edge of the destroyed roof, smiling.
"I have gotten better at recognizing you, now that I know what your Gift is. That first time just caught me off guard." I was working hard to keep the smile out of my voice because I knew what was coming next. "Did Eleanor send you to try and break me since she couldn't?"
Carefully he lowered his six something foot frame into the motorhome, swaying dangerously in the process. Eventually his feet found the snow covered floorboards and he was looking up at me.
"She was here earlier. Trying to apologize for Mona and Julien."
The smile had fallen off his face now as he got tangled in his lie.
"I wish you would have just told me from the beginning. Or not pretended to be my friend. Or not convinced me that our friendship was special."
He didn't respond. What was new? He was still going to try to play his full deck, anything to get me to forgive him and my other classmates for aligning themselves with Eleanor. Instead of using words, he reached out a hand to put on my arm.
I jerked out of his reach before he could touch me. From the way his eyes sprang open, I could tell he knew.
"You're freezing," he whispered. I hated the way he caught my attention when he spoke. It still made me feel special and stupid all at once. Now more than ever. "When did you get here?"
"After Mona set my grandma's house on fire with me in it." The sniffle at the end of the sentence was unintentional. If Miguel had been anyone else, I would have tried to win some pity and the sniff would have been perfectly timed. I knew that wouldn't work with him, and I could feel my real emotions bubbling up inside me. "I'm fine. Just leave."
"Green." And I felt special and stupid all over again.
I took everything in me to meet his eyes. "Miguel. Please. I'm warning you."
He tried to reach out again. I wasn't fast enough this time. His skin barely made contact with me before he jerked away like I had burned him. More like I had frozen him.
If he knew, then it didn't hurt to tell him. Eleanor would find out either way. When the words stuck in my throat, I just showed him my hands. They were still showing the obvious signs of being exposed to flames. That would leave scars. But over the blisters and raw skin was a delicate layer of frost that still gave off the faint blue light that always accompanied my Gift. "I don't know what's happening to me."
And after everything, I just wanted to hug him. I wanted to find that reassurance that everything would be alright. But he couldn't touch me because I would hurt him and I didn't want him to touch me because he was working for Eleanor like everyone else I knew.
There was only the sound of breathing. He was sucking in deep breath after deep breath. Maybe it was because I had caused him more pain than I thought, maybe he was trying to compose himself. "You'll be fine. Let me help you."
"Let you help me?" I asked, anger rising in my voice. "I can't trust you or anyone else anymore. You watched as Mona tried to burn me alive! You probably walked back to the apartment with her, laughing because of a job well done!" The louder my voice grew, the darker and more frantic the light around my hands grew. "I can't trust anyone and you very well know that."
His face said everything, and I couldn't pretend to not know what he meant.
"You know what you did."
Miguel gulped, thought for a good long while, opened his mouth. "That's what Eleanor wants you to think." He took his time to form the sentences. "Mona said Eleanor set a trap for the two of you. I was so busy with Elliot that I trusted her. She told us to run for help. But it didn't take me long to realize she was lying. I ran for you, and the cabin was in ashes. You were gone. We've been looking for you since Mona disappeared. I knew where you would be." Each of his sentences were punctuated by heavy silence as he worked out the words before he spoke.
If he was trying to spin the perfect lie, then he was failing miserably. Lies should be natural. Not stumbling over each word hoping it's good enough.
"Why should I believe you?" That was the real question. I wanted to trust him because we were friends and friends tell the truth. "I just need one reason."
He looked miserable. My frozen chest folded in on itself. I was the one making him feel awful, but I needed this answer. I needed his reassurance, and if I had to pry it out of him word by word, he would understand later.
He went on in that halting grammar that I expected from him. "I don't talk to anyone but you and Elliot. I only talk to him when he can't understand me any other way. The words stick in my throat like swallowing paper. It started because my English wasn't good when I first got to the academy."
I didn't want to, but I interrupted him. I need to be sure that he was telling the truth. If that meant this would be an interrogation then so be it. "What about Lucia and Diego?"
"I don't speak Portuguese."
"What?" That was a lie if I had ever heard one. There were plenty of times that I had seen Miguel wandering around with his cousins, nodding along to their conversations that I couldn't understand.
"I don't speak Portuguese."
"You're from Brazil."
He let out a little bit of that sunshine kind of laughter that he usually held back. "I was born in Albarracín." When he realized that the word meant nothing to me, he continued, "It's a small town in Spain. I speak Spanish."
"But-" I cut myself off. The more Miguel spoke, the less sense he made.
And that misery his features had been sporting broke into a smile. "Diego and Lucia aren't my cousins. We're not related at all."
"I knew it!" Years of crack theories and attempting to spread the rumor had been right. Everyone had laughed at me. Lucia had scoffed and called me an idiot countless times when I attempted to broach the subject with her. She had been lying the whole time. "Why didn't you tell anyone?"
"Eventually everyone assumed we were all cousins. It was easier than explaining, and no one ever asked if we really were cousins"
"I did!"
His smile grew, and his unused voice took on a teasing tone. "I just liked messing with you."
On instinct I punched him in the upper arm. My punches had never really packed a punch. Not unless I was pulling out every stop during Mr. Forrest's class. Today it sent Miguel tumbling backwards while he clutched at the spot my fist had landed.
I know this might now have been the mostly thrilling chapter but we all need more Miguel and Anna scenes, right?
Should Anna trust him or is this another one of Eleanor's tricks? But the bigger question is do you still ship Miguel and Anna and what's there ship name?
m nicole