“I thought Mom was going to straight up murder me,” I said, dragging my fork through what I thought might be spaghetti but had the weird consistency of soup. “Like, for real.”
Lunch had just started on Monday, and Heidi sat across from me, beside James, who was brown-bagging lunch because he was obviously smarter than the rest of us.
We were waiting for Zoe to join, but she was still in the lunch line, looking like she’d rather throw herself out the nearest window.
Heidi handed my camera back to me. She’d been looking through my pictures. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault,” I told her, placing the camera next to my tray. “You didn’t make Luc show up at my house.”
I’d told them about what had gone down, leaving out the part where my mom had pulled out a shotgun and I’d thrown a candleholder. I also didn’t tell them all the secret stuff Mom had told me. Didn’t take a rocket scientist to know that I needed to keep that to myself. James had also kept quiet about Saturday morning, which I appreciated.
Mom had shut down any further conversation by sending me to my room, where I stayed, the rest of Sunday.
Which sucked, because I still had so many questions. Like, for example, how did Mom, once upon a time, work for an organization responsible for assimilating Luxen, which was how she and Dad—aka former national hero, now apparently a really bad dude—met Luc, but Luc remained an unregistered alien? And if Mom knew he was unregistered, then why hadn’t she reported him? We all were required to do so, especially her, considering Mom still worked for the military. What would happen if someone found out she knew him and that he was unregistered?
Was it guilt? Guilt for what my dad did to Luc?
I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was so much more than what Mom had told me.
James picked up his peanut butter sandwich, and envy filled me. That looked so much tastier than what was on my plate. “I can’t believe he just showed up like that. Man, my dad would’ve called the police in a heartbeat.”
That sounded like the reasonable thing to do.
“How did he find out where you lived?” Heidi asked, fiddling with the lacy collar of her shirt. “Because I so did not tell Emery anything like that.”
Unsure of how to answer her question, I shifted in the uncomfortable plastic chair. “I really don’t know.”
Her brows lifted. “That’s kind of creepy.”
“How long are you grounded?” James peeled the crust off his sandwich, dropping a long section of brown bread on his bag.
I sighed as I fantasized about knocking James out of his seat and stealing his sandwich, but that would be kind of mean. “Here’s the bizarre thing: I’m not.”
“You’re not what?” Zoe dropped into the open chair beside me as a teacher shouted at someone in the back of the cafeteria. Zoe had a slice of pizza on her tray. I shuddered. I hated pizza. James said that meant I had no soul, but whatever. It was just gross.
“Evie is somehow not grounded,” James answered, now pulling his sandwich into tiny pieces. He literally had the eating habits of a three-year-old.
Zoe’s dark, naturally curly hair was pulled back in a tight ponytail today, highlighting her cheekbones. Those suckers were high and sculpted. “Not grounded?” She sounded confused. “Is that a problem?”
James finally popped a piece of sandwich into his mouth. “I’m wondering the same thing.”
“It’s not. It’s just weird.” Truthfully, I thought Mom felt so bad about the whole Dad Is a Monster speech that she decided not to ground me after sending me to my room. Or she’d forgotten, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to remind her. I glanced over at Heidi. She was tapping away on her phone, and I was nosy. “Are you texting someone?”
“Yeah.” She peeked up, grinning a little. “Emery wants to get together tonight.”
“Like a date kind of thing?” I asked, excited and hopeful. “Like you and her having dinner together?”
Heidi nodded, and I swear, her cheeks started to turn pink. “Yep. She wants to grab dinner at that new Thai restaurant downtown.” She paused. “And no, we’re not going to Foretoken.”
I dropped my fork and clapped my hands like an overexcited seal as I saw April heading our way, her long blond hair swinging around her shoulders. “I expect minute-by-minute updates.”
Heidi laughed as April sat down across from Zoe. “I don’t know if it will be minute by minute, but I will keep you updated.”
“Awesome. I really wish I had a chance to meet her Friday night.” As I picked up my fork, I vaguely heard April snapping at Zoe.
“Me too,” she replied. “But you’ll get a chance now. Especially since your mom really didn’t kill you and you’re not grounded.”
“Wait.” James had moved on to a small bag of potato chips. “Who is Emery? Does she go here?”
Heidi shook her head. “No, she graduated high school last year, but she’s from Pennsylvania.”
He popped a chip into his mouth. “Is she hot?”
I shot him a bland look. “Really?”
“It’s a valid question.” He offered the bag to me, and I grabbed a chip or five out of it.
“She’s hot,” Heidi answered, glancing down at her phone. “And she’s smart. And funny. And she likes cupcakes and Thai food.”
And she hangs out with a giant jerk-face, but I kept that to myself. I was not going to crap all over Heidi’s happy parade. And besides, maybe I should cut Luc a bit of a break considering what I’d learned from Mom.
Which wasn’t exactly a lot.
“So . . .” April drew the word out, waiting until everyone had focused on her. “Just a friendly update that one of our classmates is still missing.”
Oh hell, I’d completely forgotten about that with all my own personal drama. That meant it was official. I was a terrible person. I also hadn’t even thought about that poor Luxen who had had the crap beaten out of him.
“But is she really missing?” Zoe asked, glancing around the table. “I mean, maybe she ran away.”
“To where?” April challenged. “To join the circus?”
Zoe rolled her eyes. “Wasn’t Colleen dating some guy who was a senior last year? And he went to a college in a different state?”
“She was dating Tony Hickles,” James answered. “He ended up going to the University of Michigan.”
“So maybe she ran away to see him or something,” Zoe suggested.
April frowned. I guessed to her that wasn’t as exciting as someone going missing for nefarious reasons. “Well, that’s stupid.”
James attempted to change the subject by asking Heidi for a picture of Emery, but it didn’t work.
“You’re so ridiculous,” I heard April say, and I started praying to the cafeteria food gods that April wasn’t about to drag me into argument number 140,000 with Zoe. For some reason, she always did. I had no idea what they were talking about.
I picked up my camera, pretending to be engrossed in it even though I wasn’t looking at anything. Maybe I’d get lucky and be randomly sucked into some kind of vortex before—
“What do you think, Evie?” April demanded.
Crap.
The cafeteria food gods had let me down yet again.
James ducked his chin, hiding his grin, and then he twisted, angling his body so he was fully focused on Heidi as she pulled up a pic of Emery on her phone that she’d taken at the club on Friday night.
“Yes, Evie, what do you think?” parroted Zoe.
I’d rather shave off all my hair than answer any question posed in that manner. Knowing how April hated it when I took photos of her without her having checked her makeup and hair first, I lifted my camera and pointed it at her.
“You take a picture of me, I will throw your camera out the window,” she warned.
I sighed, lowering that camera. “That’s excessive.”
“And I asked for your opinion.”
I picking up my fork and stabbed my noodles, pretending I basically had no idea who these people I was sitting with were. “Huh?”
It didn’t work.
April stared back at me with light blue eyes as she threw her hands up, nearly elbowing a guy squeezing into the seat behind her. She wasn’t even aware of him, but that was typical April. God love her, but she wasn’t aware of much of anything she didn’t believe affected her.
“Have you not heard a single thing I’ve said?” she demanded.
“She probably tuned you out.” Zoe plopped her cheek on her arm and sighed. “It’s a talent I wish I had.”
While James was distracted, I reached into his bag, stealing another chip.
“You know what I wish, Ms. Zoe Callahan?” April cocked her head to the side. “I wish you didn’t dress like a toddler who got to pick out her clothes for the first time.”
A noodle slopped off my fork. “Wow.”
Heidi got quiet.
James suddenly decided that the people sitting behind us were more interesting, and turned completely in his seat. Hell, he was practically sitting with them now, which meant I couldn’t reach into his bag of chips anymore.
Zoe leaned back, her dark eyes narrowing. “What’s wrong with how I’m dressed?”
“You’re wearing a onesie,” April stated coolly.
Zoe was totally wearing a onesie.
“You look super-cute,” I told her, and that was the truth. I, on the other hand, wouldn’t be caught dead in a romper. I’d look like someone who needed Child Protective Services if I stepped out in public wearing that, but with Zoe’s deep brown skin, she was rocking the pink frock.
“Thank you.” Zoe flashed a bright smile in my direction and then turned a glare more powerful than the Death Star on April. “But I know I look cute.”
April’s brows lifted. “You may want to rethink that assessment.”
I honestly had no idea how Zoe and April were friends. I swore they bickered more than they ever complimented each other. The only time I saw either do something nice for the other was last year. Some guy had bumped into April in the hallway, knocking her into a locker. Zoe put the fear of God in that boy in, like, under five seconds.
Zoe responded to April with something that was about as friendly as a kick in the throat. I started to intervene, because both could get loud, and I really didn’t want our table to be the center of attention yet again, but a tray clattered off a nearby table, causing my stomach to pitch.
Classmates milled from table to table. Behind me, I could hear them talking about a party on Saturday night. Burnt food mingled with the scent of lemony disinfectant. Teachers lounged by the doors and at the back of the cafeteria, by the letters CHS painted on the wall. Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, people sat on gray stone walls, laughing and talking, and the sky . . . I could see the September sky. It was blue and endless.
My gaze landed on the table near the door. That was where they all sat. The Luxen who attended our school. Ten of them. All of them beautiful. It was kind hard not to get a little lost looking at them, especially when they sat together like that. I was sure I wasn’t the only one gawking at them. I knew it wasn’t polite, but I wondered why they didn’t sit with anyone else.
Luxen siblings always came in threes. Two boys and a girl. Or at least that was what was said, but I’d never seen a full set of Luxen triplets in my life. We knew how many humans had died, but no one knew the number of Luxen. I imagined that was why I’d never seen a set of triplets.
I always thought they had been part of the invasion, just like everyone else believed, but now I knew differently. That entire table had probably been here since they were born, never once harming a human, but we . . . we were all afraid of them because the truth had been kept hidden.
That wasn’t fair or right.
For some unknown reason, as I stared at them, an image of Luc formed in the back of my head. I could easily see him sitting with them. Well, I could easily picture him sitting at the end of the table like he was ruling over them.
Did any of his siblings survive the invasion? Were there three Lucs?
Oh dear.
“Stop staring at them,” hissed April.
Feeling my cheeks heat, I swung my gaze back to her. “What?”
“At them—the Luxen.”
“I’m not staring at them.”
“Yes, you totally are.” She lifted her brows as she glanced over her shoulder. “Ugh. Whatever. I don’t have that big of a problem with them being here, but do they really have to be? Can’t they have their own schools or something? Is that too much to ask?”
My grip tightened on my fork. “April . . .”
Zoe closed her eyes while she rubbed at her brow like her head was about to implode. “Here we go.”
“What?” April said, glancing at the table by the doors. “They don’t make me feel comfortable.”
“They’ve been going to our school for almost three years. Have they ever done anything to you?” Zoe demanded.
“They could’ve before they started going here. You know that when they’re in their real skin or whatever you want to call it, they all look alike.”
“Oh my God,” I groaned, placing my fork on my plate so I didn’t turn it into a projectile. Now I knew the answer to my only question about why the Luxen sat together and didn’t really mingle with the rest of us.
Because of people like April.
“I’m out.” Heidi picked her bag off the floor as she rose, sending me a sympathetic look. She knew I wouldn’t leave Zoe to fend for herself. There was a good chance one of these days, Zoe would snap and knock April into next week. “I got to run to the library real quick.”
“Bye.” I wiggled my fingers, watching her skirt the table and then go dump her trash.
April was completely undaunted. “That’s the truth. You seriously cannot tell them apart. They all look like glowy human-shaped blobs. So maybe one of them did something when they first got here. How would I know?”
“Girl . . .” Zoe shook her head. “They don’t give two craps about you. They are just trying to get an education and live their lives. And anyway, what can they do to you? Nothing.”
“What can they do? Jesus, Zoe. They are like walking weapons. They can shoot bolts of electricity from their fingertips and they’re super-strong—like, X-Men-level strong.” The centers of April’s cheeks turned rosy. “Or have you forgotten how they killed millions of people?”
“I didn’t forget,” snapped Zoe.
“They can’t do that anymore,” I reminded April even though all I could think of was Luc and the other Luxen I’d seen at the club. They were not wearing Disablers.
April’s foot started tapping under the table, and that was the first sign she was seconds away from really blowing up. “Well, I hope the changes to ARP go through. I really do.”
“April thinks that it’s completely okay to round up people and relocate them against their will. That’s what the ARP changes are.” Zoe leaned back, folding her arms across her chest. “Registering them is no longer enough. They want to move them to God knows where, supposedly to these new communities designed for them. How can you be okay with that?”
I glanced over to where James was, but his seat was empty. I looked up and didn’t see him anywhere. Smart boy. He’d bounced out of here like a rubber ball.
“First off, they’re not people; they’re aliens,” April corrected her with another impressive roll of her eyes. “Secondly, last time I checked, Earth belonged to humans and not glowing aliens who killed millions of people. It’s not their right to live here. They’re guests. Unwanted ones, at that.”
“Hell yeah!” yelled some guy from the table behind her. Probably the one she’d almost elbowed in the stomach. “You tell them!”
Heat now crawled down my throat as I slumped down in my seat a little. April was so loud. So very loud.
“And my third and final point is that these communities aren’t just to keep us safe.” April folded her arms on the table and leaned forward. “They’re to keep them safe too. You heard about them being attacked. Sometimes separate is better. And it’s already kind of like that. Look at Breaker Subdivision. They like being around their own kind.”
Breaker Subdivision was a neighborhood just like any community of homes that literally looked identical to one another. The one big thing that set it apart was the fact that only Luxen lived there.
“You sound like a politician,” I told her. “Like one of those creepy ones who don’t blink when they’re talking into the cameras.”
“I blinked. Like, five times during the very impressive speech I just gave.”
I arched a brow.
Zoe pressed her lips together. “The Luxen don’t want to hurt us.”
“How do we know that?” April shot back.
“Maybe because there hasn’t been an attack in over three years?” Zoe suggested, her tone pitching like she was explaining something to a misbehaving toddler. “That could be good evidence of such a belief.”
“Just like there weren’t attacks leading up to the night they made our planet their bitch?” April widened her eyes. “We didn’t know they existed until they literally came zooming out of the sky and started killing everyone, but that didn’t change anything.”
A dull throb started in my temples as I pushed strands of hair out of my face and my gaze crept back to the table full of aliens. Could they hear April? I looked away, wanting to crawl under the table. “I’m pretty sure they just want to be left alone.”
Frustration heightened the color in April’s cheeks. “I know you can’t be a fan of them, Evie.”
My hands dropped into my lap as I stared at her, and I knew what she was going to do. She was so going to go there.
“Your father died because of them.” April’s voice was low and urgent, as if I had no idea that had occurred. “You can’t be okay with them living next to you or going to school with us.”
“I can’t believe you just brought up her dad.” Zoe grabbed the edges of her tray, and for a second I thought she might smack April on the head with it. “You know, you’re like a test run at having a child who disappoints you on the regular.”
April’s expression was the definition of unrepentant.
“None of this has anything to do with what happened to my dad.” I drew in a shallow breath. “And yeah, some of them are scary, but—”
“But what?” Zoe asked quietly, her gaze latched on to mine.
I shoved my hand through my hair and then lifted a shoulder. My tongue tied up. I struggled to get out the words I wanted to say. I didn’t know how to feel about the Luxen, especially after everything Mom had told me. No matter what my dad did or didn’t do, he died fighting them. And no matter if some of them had been on Team Human for years, they still scared me. What human in their right mind wouldn’t be scared of them?
I just didn’t know.
And I also didn’t know if that was, in fact, worse than having an opinion.
April shrugged as she scooped up a forkful of spaghetti. “Maybe this discussion is pointless. Maybe none of it will matter.”
I looked at her. “What is that supposed to mean?”
A small twist of a smile curled her lips. “I don’t know. Maybe they’ll smarten up and decide there’s another planet out there more . . . accommodating to them.”