“Pretty sure I have enough going on for a lot of mornings,” I answer. “For all the mornings, really.”
“Yeah, you do.” He sighs. “That’s actually what I want to talk to you about. You’ve had quite a first week, young lady.”
Talk about an understatement. I wait for him to say more, wait for the other shoe to drop even though it feels like a hundred have already fallen, but time passes and he doesn’t say anything. Instead, he just kind of steeples his hands in front of his chin and stares at me across the desk. I don’t know if he’s doing it because he’s waiting for me to break or if he’s just trying to figure out the right way to say whatever he wants to say. I figure it must be the latter, because I haven’t done anything wrong. I have no secrets to spill, especially not compared to the man who runs a school for monsters.
The prolonged silence does give me time to think, though. About all the wrong things. Including the fact that in the last week, what little control I’ve had over my life has disappeared completely.
I mean, seriously. Death by chandelier has to be one of the most random and bizarre deaths on the planet. The whole thing seems ridiculous, no matter what Jaxon says. But losing my parents the way I did—having them go from happy and alive to cold and dead in the space from one minute to the next—has taught me just how easy it is for life to be extinguished.
As simple as the blink of your eye, the snap of your fingers, making the wrong turn at the wrong time…
I squeeze my eyes shut as the images flood back, desperate to stem them before they fill my head. Before they overwhelm me and bury me in the grief I’m only just learning how to crawl out of.
The pain must show on my face, because suddenly my uncle is breaking the silence to ask, “Are you sure you’re okay, Grace? That chandelier was huge—and terrifying.”
It was huge and terrifying, and I’m not sure how my life has gone so completely out of control. Five weeks ago, Heather and I were shopping for homecoming dresses and complaining about AP English. Now I’m an orphan living with half an encyclopedia of supernatural creatures and dodging death on the regular. At this rate, my only hope is that the universe doesn’t hold a Final Destination–type grudge.
“I’m fine,” I tell him, because physically I am. There’s not even a scratch on me—or at least, not a new one. “Just a little shaken up.”
“Give me a break, kid. I’m traumatized, and I wasn’t even there. I can’t believe you’re only a little shaken up.” He reaches for the hand I have resting on the desk and pats it a little awkwardly. I know he’s trying to be comforting, but his eyes are filled with worry as they search my face.
I do my best to make sure there’s nothing for him to find there, and I must succeed because, eventually, he shakes his head and leans back in his chair. “You’re just like your mother, you know that? She always faced whatever life handed her head-on, too. No tears, no hysterics, just cool, calm resolve.”
His casual mention of my mom now—when I’m missing her so much—destroys me, has me squeezing my hands into fists and digging my nails into my palms in an effort to keep it together.
It helps that Uncle Finn doesn’t stay there, dwelling on my mom’s incredible ability to take everything in stride—something I haven’t inherited, no matter what my uncle thinks. Instead, he pulls something up on the computer and prints it out.
“You really sure you’re okay? You don’t want Marise to check you out?” he asks for what feels like the millionth time.
No freaking way. I know Macy said she bit me so that she could mend my artery, but that doesn’t mean I’m anxious to let her near my throat again—or any other part of my anatomy, for that matter. “I swear I’m fine. It’s Jaxon you should be concerned about. He shielded me from the glass.”
“I’ve already requested that Marise check him out,” he tells me. “And I’ll call him in later to thank him for saving my favorite niece from harm.”
“Only niece,” I remind him, falling into the game we’ve played my entire life. It’s a tiny bit of normalcy in this day that is anything but normal, and I grab on to it with both hands.
“Only and favorite,” he tells me. “One doesn’t discount the other.”
“Okay, favorite uncle. I guess it doesn’t.”
“Exactly!” His slightly strained smile turns into a delighted grin. But it doesn’t last long as silence once again descends between us.