If You Find Me(59)

“Can I show you something?”

I nod.

“Like this,” Ryan says, falling backward into the snow. I copy him, falling into a spot next to him, my arms and legs outstretched, my head lifted so I can see his movements. He makes long, sweeping arcs with his arms and legs, open and closed, over and over, his boots thudding against each other.

I do as he does, grinning like a fool. Maybe he’s crazy, but this kind of crazy is fun.

“Now, stand up like this.”

I watch him extricate himself by first sitting up, careful not to mar the form. He gets to his feet and leaps to the side. I do the same.

He meets me where I stand, reaching for my mitten with his puffy glove.

“See?”

I stare at the markings.

“Snow angels,” he says.

And they are. “Ooooo. They’re beautiful.”

He squeezes my hand, and I look at my mitten cradled in his glove. Before tonight, the only hand I’d ever held was Nessa’s. I wish he’d never let go.

All in the blue unclouded weather

Thick-jewell’d shone the saddle-leather,

The helmet and the helmet-feather

Burnd like one burning flame together,

As he rode down to Camelot.



I turn back to the angels, marveling. Just like the china angel on the mantel at home. The sweeping robes. The arc of wings.

“My sister would love this. I’ll have to show her how to do it.”

And I have something to show him, too.

“See up there, in the east? Those three stars in a row?”

I point, and he nods.

“That’s the bridge. See those two stars above, and two below? That’s the body. Those weaker stars beneath? They make up the neck. It’s my constellation. The violin constellation.”

Ryan laughs. “I’ll be damned. It does look like a violin!”

“I used to tell my sister when she was younger, ‘If we ever got separated, meet me beneath the big violin.’ ”

Hand in hand, we walk around the house, where he deposits me on the porch. I want to go back to our angels, to the soothing pressure of my hand in his.

“Do you want to know what us less visionary folk call it?”

I nod.

“Orion. Orion the hunter.”

“Orion,” I repeat. I can’t wait to look it up on Melissa’s laptop.

“They do have one thing in common, though.”

“What?”

“They both use bows.”

We grin at each other.

“Will you be okay?”

He motions with his head toward the door and the sound of laughter, music, and nonlethal screams. I’ll never understand why teenage girls like to scream, minus strange men or bears approaching.

“Yeah. I’ll be fine. I’ll find Pixie,” I tell him, my voice ringing out with a confidence I wish I felt. I glance at my watch. “It’s almost time for Mrs. Macleod to pick us up anyway.”

“Then I’ll see you in school Monday. No hiding, you hear?”

He leans down and kisses my forehead, cocooning me for a moment in his puffer arms before stepping back.

“I almost forgot. I have something for you. Close your eyes.” He unzips my coat partway, then stuffs something flimsy into the inside pocket before zipping me back up. “Don’t look until you get home.”

I watch him walk backward, holding me in his eyes, until he trips on something—a rock, a slick of ice—and his arms flail. I chuckle.

Once he’s in his car, we stare at each other through the window as the car warms up. I smile when he traces CC into the condensation on the window, and when he pulls out, I wave until the tail-lights disappear, like stars plunging over the horizon.

She knows not what the curse may be,

And so she weaveth steadily,

And little other care has she,

The Lady of Shalott.


[page]
And then I’m back where I started, my teeth chattering, staring at Marie’s front door.

I’m about the only teenager alive without a cell phone, as Delaney pointed out a few days ago, and I reckon at the time I didn’t care. Now I’m wishing I had one something fierce. I’d call Pixie on hers and have her meet me out front.

Back inside, I scan the crowd. I don’t see Delaney or her court. I wave back when Ainsley and Sarah wave, dancing with two guys who look vaguely familiar. Pixie isn’t among them.

Newly brave, I find the wall and follow the smooth cream paint through another doorway into a spacious living room with leather chairs and couches and an entire back wall lined with books. People laugh and talk, and there’s a group of girls sitting on guys’ laps in front of a black woodstove, roasting marshmallows and hot dogs speared by long metal forks.

A folding table set up against the side wall holds a huge crystal bowl, from which a pretty girl with glasses and a sorrel ponytail ladles a red liquid into blue plastic cups. She motions for me to come over.

“Punch,” she says, holding out a cup, “to get you into the spirit.”

I take the cup gratefully, my throat scratchy from the cold, dry air.

“How much?” I ask nervously.

“Free. Or as much as you want.” She giggles.

I take a big swig and instantly choke, white lightning spraying through my mouth and nose. The girl jumps back in disgust.