Boundless (Unearthly, #3)(24)

“But you were brave, Jeffrey,” I say. “You proved yourself. You had to decide whether to trust your visions, whether to trust the plan, and you did. You were faithful.”

He shakes his head. “And what did it get me? What did I become?”

A fugitive, he thinks. A high school dropout. A loser.

I reach across the table and put my hand on his. “I’m sorry, Jeffrey. I’m really, really, ridiculously sorry, for everything.”

He pulls his hand away, coughs. “It’s fine, Clara. I don’t blame you.”

This is news, since the last time I checked, he was all about blaming me.

“I blame God,” he says. “If there even is such a thing. Sometimes I feel like we’re all chumps, doing stuff from these visions just because somebody told us to, in the name of a deity we’ve never even met. Maybe the visions have nothing to do with God, and we’re just seeing the future. Maybe we’re all just perpetuating the myth.”

Those are some big words coming from my brother, and for a minute I feel like I’m sitting at the table with a stranger making somebody else’s argument. “Jeffrey, come on. How can you—”

He holds up his hand. “Don’t give me the religious talk, okay? I’m fine with the way things are. I am currently avoiding all large bodies of water, so my vision won’t be a problem. We’re supposed to be talking about you now, remember?”

I bite my lip. “Okay. What do you want to know?”

“Are you dating Christian, now that you’re—” He stops himself again.

“Now that I’m broken up with Tucker?” I finish for him. “No. We hang out. We’re friends. And beyond that, we’re figuring stuff out.”

We’re more than friends, of course, but I don’t know what more really means.

“You should date him,” Jeffrey says. “He’s your soul mate. What is there to figure out?”

I almost choke on my orange juice. “My soul mate?”

“Yeah. Your other half, your destiny, the person who completes you.”

“Look, I’m a complete person,” I say with a laugh. “I don’t need Christian to complete me.”

“But there’s something about you two, when you’re together. It’s like you fit.” He grins. Shrugs. “He’s your soul mate.”

“Whoa, you have got to stop saying that.” I can’t believe I’m having this conversation with my sixteen-year-old brother. “Where’d you even hear that term, anyway—soul mate?”

“Oh, come on….You know, people say that sort of thing.”

My eyes widen as I feel the flutter of embarrassment from him, the image of a girl with long, dark hair, ruby red lips, smiling. “Oh my God. You have a girlfriend.”

His face goes a charming shade of fuchsia. “She’s not my girlfriend….”

“Right, she’s your soul mate,” I croon. “How’d you meet her?”

“I knew her before we moved to Wyoming, actually. She went to school with us.”

My mouth drops open. “Get out! So I probably know her, then. What’s her name?”

He glares at me. “It’s no big deal. We’re not dating. You don’t know her.”

“What’s her name?” I insist. “What’s her name, what’s her name? I could go on like this all day.”

He looks mad, but he wants to tell me. “Lucy. Lucy Wick.”

He’s right; I don’t know her. I sit back in the booth. “Lucy. Your soul mate.”

He points a warning finger at me. “Clara, I swear….”

“That’s great,” I say. Maybe this will turn him around, give him something positive to think about. “I’m glad you like someone. I felt bad when—”

Now it’s my turn to stop myself. I don’t want to dredge up his ex or that horrifying scene in the cafeteria last year when he dumped her in front of the entire school. Kimber was clearly not his soul mate. She was a cute girl, though. Nice, I always thought.

“Kimber was the one who called the police on me, I think,” he says. “I guess I shouldn’t have told her I started the fire.” I open my mouth to bombard him with questions, but he doesn’t let me get them out. “No, I didn’t tell her what I am. What we are. I only told her about the fire.” He scoffs. “I thought she would think it was badass or something.”

“Oh, she did. She really did.”

We’re quiet for a minute, and then we both start laughing quietly.

“I was kind of an idiot,” he admits.

“Yeah, well, when it comes to the opposite sex, it’s hard to keep your head on straight. But maybe that’s just me.”

He nods, takes another drink of OJ. Looks at me hard.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about Tucker,” Jeffrey says then, which catches me off guard. “It’s not fair to him, what happened. I’ve been putting some money aside. It won’t be a lot. But something. I was kind of hoping you’d give it to him, once I get it together.”

I don’t fully understand. “Jeffrey, I—”

“It’s to help buy a new truck, or put a down payment on one. A new trailer, a saddle, trees to plant on his land.” He shrugs. “I don’t know what he needs. I just want to give him something. To make up for what I did.”