Kylie sat on her haunches and closed her book. Gideon gazed up from his text, concerned when he saw her expression. He knew Kylie was sensitive and could often tell what was to come. She could foretell when it would rain and when classes would be canceled. She’d phoned the school police before a fire started in the entranceway, and rang them again a few months later, a full hour before a quiet girl down the hall attempted to take her own life. Gideon didn’t call it witchery, but instead referred to her premonitions as her talent, as if the sight was no different than an aptitude for music or dance.
“I’m going to fail, right?” Gideon said when he saw the dread on her face.
Kylie had a flash of vision. A blank paper, an empty chair, a day of scarlet rain, a lake with no bottom, a man with black hair.
From her expression it was clear the future contained something worse than a failed exam.
“I’ll be expelled,” Gideon guessed.
“No, it’s nothing like that. Let’s go.” Kylie herself didn’t know what it meant. She had never seen that sort of aura before. Violet, gray, silver, ash, black, scarlet. None of it boded well. She stood and reached out her hand to him. She didn’t know if other people loved the way that she did, completely and utterly, and she didn’t much care.
Gideon rose from the grass, and when he did his height blocked out the sun and he saw that there were black tears in Kylie’s eyes. She never cried. Or at least rarely. He thought she’d shed tears at her aunt Jet’s funeral, but that was to be expected.
“Did I do something wrong?” he asked.
Kylie looped her arms around him. “Never,” she said. And then she leaned up to whisper that she loved him and always would. It was the first time she’d said so aloud, and she immediately felt flushed with raw emotion.
“I’ve always loved you,” Gideon told her. “From the first day we met.”
The weather was changing. It was turning wicked. As they crossed Mass Ave, Kylie had the chills, as if the west wind had cut right through her. The sky had begun to glaze over with windblown clouds, as if it were the witching hour rather than three in the afternoon. Kylie decided she wouldn’t let Gideon out of her sight. Curse or not, nothing could happen if she watched over him.
They went to Dunster House, took three strides to cross the room, then fell into bed. That was when the rain started to pelt down on rooftops and roads, but Kylie didn’t hear the torrents of rain because she was kissing him. She was kissing him the way you do when you’re afraid you will lose someone, when you need their breath and life inside you, when your souls melt together in the act of kissing. The silence was broken by a slow, methodical clicking, somewhere in the wall, the sound anyone with any knowledge never wishes to hear.
Dunster House had been built in 1930 as a student residence, and people were charged by the floor they inhabited, with the poorer students required to walk up six flights. There was a great deal of old, dead wood, and deathwatch beetles were wood borers that could infest old buildings. Kylie heard one tapping now, a sound people said could portend a death. She had never been told about the deathwatch beetle, and was too young to remember her mother tearing the floor apart in search of just such a horrid creature before her own father met with his accident. Kylie hadn’t been told that there had been the same clicking in the stable where Gary Hallet had kept his horse, although Gary had insisted it was the echo of wood settling, refusing to believe it marked the time of his death. Still, the sound itself was unnerving.
Kylie had once overheard her aunts discussing that a black aura meant death and destruction and danger, wickedness in a world where there had previously been none. When this happened, an individual must place salt on her windowsills and in the four corners of her house. Now a black cloud rose up toward the ceiling of Kylie’s dorm room, but she didn’t intend to search for packets of salt. She didn’t believe in the curse, why should she? All the same, she would keep Gideon close to her, until the circle dissipated. If they missed finals, so be it. If they stayed in bed for a week, well, they’d done that before. While she slept Kylie dreamed of rain, for by now it was pouring buckets. The Common was flooded, and the birds hid in the bushes and under the eaves, doing their best to avoid the deluge. The women in the Owens family were attracted to water, even though it could be dangerous for them, for water always revealed the truth about who they were. That had been a problem for Kylie and Antonia Owens, for their mother feared that a single glimpse of the truth would rock their lives. Kylie and her sister had never been allowed to go to the town pool for swimming lessons, but every summer their aunt Gillian had brought them to Leech Lake on the sly, permitting them to break the rules and float in the cool, glassy water for hours. Still, there were some issues even she refused to discuss. When asked why they could never remain underwater and always popped up, as if made of cork, Gillian would tell them that some gifts should never be questioned. Be happy you can’t sink! she would cry. Enjoy every minute!