Light as a Feather, Cold as Marble

Chapter 5

Mischa dropped us off at the corner of Martha Road, and Trey and I intended to hurry down our block quietly, hoping not to catch the attention of any slumbering dogs or parents carrying out Santa's duties. Our street looked magically beautiful in that calm, safe way that residential streets only seem at Christmas time. Glowing plastic figurines of Santa, Rudolph, and Frosty the Snowman decorated every front lawn, and although the snowfall had lightened, tiny flakes were still falling, adding to the few inches that had accumulated on the ground. Trees heavily wrapped in lights and garland stood in every front window, and even the Blumenthal family across the street had put an enormous plywood dreidel and plastic menorah in their yard, on which a spotlight shown. The quiet beauty of it all seemed surreal, especially because as soon as I heard Mischa's car speed away behind us, I grew fearful. I had no reason to believe that Trey would ever hurt me, but I was thoroughly confused about what he was hiding from me, and what his reasons were for doing so.

Whatever he knew, it must have been of dire importance for Jennie to have brought it up during the one precious time we'd been able to exchange words in the eight years that had passed since the fire.

Of course we were aware that we were leaving footprints in the fresh snow from the corner to our respective windows, but there was nothing we could do about that other than hope desperately that the early risers on our block would do a decent job of covering our tracks with their own when they arose to shovel snow at daybreak.

We ducked around the side of my house and lingered outside my window for a moment. Although we'd made a habit of sneaking into each other's rooms earlier in the fall as a way of coping with the relentless haunting of my bedroom, I knew that expecting Trey to follow me through my window that night was unfair since the punishment would have been severe if we were to get caught. Still, I'd been missing him so terribly during the time we'd been away that even despite the "T" I'd just wiped away from the window of Mischa's car with the elbow of my coat, I longed be closer to him, even just for a few more minutes.

"This is probably not a good idea," I said, tilting my head toward my window.

"I know," Trey agreed. "My mom will be up in about four hours, anyway."  He was right. It was rare that there weren't any lights on in the Emorys' house. Mr. Emory was a night owl, watching television until the wee hours, and Mrs. Emory was an early riser.

He kicked at the snow at his feet, seeming nervous. When he looked up, his gaze drifted off down the street before it returned to my face. "Hey, McKenna? Remember that day, outside the gym?"

"Um, that day? Are you serious? How could I forget that day?" I teased. Of course, he was referring to the day we'd executed our plan to grab Violet's locket, the day we'd landed ourselves in hot water.

"Do you remember like, right before Violet came out of the gym and you went after her, how you were acting?" Trey asked.

I blushed, and thankfully it was too dark for him to notice. Of course I remembered. We had been so focused on keeping track of Violet's whereabouts that day so that we could attack her when she least expected it that it had never occurred to me that she, or the spirits who were helping her, were probably very aware of what we were planning. Just when we were about to make our big move and surprise her as she and the cheerleaders wrapped up their half-time routine during the game against Angelica High School, I became uncontrollably and very inconveniently physically attracted to Trey. While of course I liked Trey and he was basically my boyfriend (even though it felt strange to call him that), I was not exactly, by nature, the type to normally be into public displays of affection. My behavior had been so sudden, so ardent, and so extremely out of character that even he had questioned my instant lust.