Aprilynne Pike: Destined

“I did,” Chelsea said quietly.

David’s eyes darted from Chelsea to Laurel and back again. “You what ?”

“How else was I supposed to justify running off in the middle of the dance… with you,” she added in a mumble.

“I was kidding!”

“I wasn’t. I was going to do it anyway.”

David looked to Laurel. “Did you know about this?”

Laurel glanced at Chelsea before nodding.

“Why?” David asked. “What went wrong?”

Chelsea opened her mouth, but no sound came out.

“It was just time,” Laurel said, coming to the rescue. This wasn’t something anyone needed to talk about yet. Certainly not right now.

David shrugged, his face a mask of nonchalance. “Whatever. We’ve got to get back there. It’s going to be a long night.”

“So you just sit here?” Chelsea asked Tamani, her voice cracking a bit as she tried to hide a yawn.

The apartment was dark and quiet. Shar had taken the opportunity to lean his head against the wall and was getting a little much-needed sleep. That left Tamani chatting quietly with Chelsea, who had insisted on taking the first shift.

“Pretty much,” Tamani replied. “You can get some sleep if you want to; the carpet is soft. Sorry the furniture is so…”

“Nonexistent?” Chelsea offered, straightening up in the simple wooden chair that normally sat, unused, at the kitchen table. “It’s OK, I’m really not that tired. Just kinda bored.” She paused before leaning close to Tamani. “Doesn’t she ever talk?”

“Yes, I talk ,” Yuki hissed before Tamani could respond. “It’s not like you haven’t heard me talk a million times before. Remember back in the day, when we went to school together? I know last week must seem like ancient history now, but I thought you humans could at least remember back that far.”

Chelsea was still with her mouth agape before snapping it shut and muttering, “Well, sooor-ry!”

“Don’t feel sorry for me,” Yuki said, fidgeting in her seat. “I’m stuck here for a couple days at worst. You’re stuck for the rest of your life.”

“What do you mean?” Chelsea asked, turning more fully toward Yuki.

“Don’t listen to her,” Tamani warned. “She just likes to get under your skin.”

“Chelsea Harrison,” Yuki continued, ignoring Tamani. “The perpetual third wheel. Always so close to what you desperately want, but never quite there.”

“Really,” Tamani said, shifting to place himself between Chelsea and Yuki. “She has nothing to say that you want to hear.” He couldn’t help but feel protective. The human girl had wormed her way into his good graces the last few months and he didn’t want her to be hurt by whatever was going to come out of Yuki’s mouth next.

“You really think you can compete?”

But Chelsea’s curiosity was almost as infamous as her honesty and she leaned forward so she could see Yuki again. “Compete with who ?”

“Laurel, of course. Fact of the matter is, she doesn’t have to choose David — which she will,” Yuki added, doubtless for Tamani’s benefit. “But even if she doesn’t, you still lose. Let’s say everything happens like you dream. Laurel leaves David behind, and one day he turns around and realises, for the first time ever, that you’ve been standing there the whole time, just waiting to be noticed.”

Chelsea’s face flushed red, but her eyes never left Yuki’s.

“Suddenly you’re everything he never knew he always wanted. He adores you and — unlike your flaky boyfriend — is willing to go to college anywhere you want.”

“Who told y—”

“You go to Harvard, you move in together, maybe you even get married. But,” she said, leaning forward as far as she could, “Laurel will always be there in the back of his mind. All the adventures they had, the plans they made. She’s prettier than you, more magical than you, just plain better than you. Face it, you have no hope of ever being anything but a rebound. And you’ll have to live your life knowing that if it had been up to David, he would never have even gotten a chance to be with you. Laurel wins.”

Chelsea’s breathing was ragged. She stood, avoiding Tamani’s eyes. “I… I think I need some water.”

Tamani watched her disappear into the kitchen, just out of sight. He heard the tap start to run — and run. And run some more, much longer than necessary to fill a cup. After a full minute he stood and shot a glare at Yuki, who looked smug.

Shar lifted his head at the sound of Tamani’s footsteps. But Tamani waved a be right back sign at him.

Keeping Yuki in the corner of his eye, Tamani followed Chelsea to the kitchen, where she stood, facing away from him, arms braced on the sink. There was no cup in sight.

“You all right?” Tamani asked quietly, his voice just louder than the hiss of the tap.

Chelsea’s head jerked up. “Yeah, I…” She gestured aimlessly. “I couldn’t find a glass.”

Tamani opened a cupboard right in front of her and retrieved one, handing it to her wordlessly. She filled it under the flowing water and started to reach for the tap to turn it off, but Tamani stopped her. “Leave it on. Less likely she can hear us.”

Chelsea looked down at the running water — probably fighting the urge to not waste it — then nodded and withdrew her hand. Tamani stepped a little closer, half an eye still on Yuki’s blossom, barely visible around the corner.

“She’s wrong,” he said simply. “She makes everything she says sound true, but it’s twisted until it’s not really truth at all.”

“No, it’s absolutely true,” Chelsea said with surprising confidence. “Laurel is so much more than I will ever be. I hadn’t thought about how her effect on David could linger like that. But it will. Yuki’s right.”

“You can’t think that way. Laurel is very different from you, but you, you’re amazing all by yourself,” Tamani said, surprising himself by how much he meant it. He hesitated, then grinned. “You’re funnier than Laurel.”

“Oh, good,” Chelsea said dryly. “I’m sure a couple of well-timed jokes’ll win David’s heart over to me forever.”

“That’s not what I mean,” Tamani said. “Listen, seriously, you can’t compare yourself to a faerie. We’re plants. Our perfect symmetry is something you humans value for some reason. So on the outside, yeah, she’s going to look different from you. But that doesn’t make her better, and honestly, except for maybe in the beginning, I don’t think that’s what David saw in her.”

“So she’s better on the inside, too?” Chelsea muttered.

Now she’s being deliberately knot-headed . “No, listen, I just want you to understand what makes Yuki so wrong. In Avalon, everyone has the same kind of symmetry Laurel and I have. We do have a range of… beauty, I guess, but there’s nothing special about Laurel’s appearance. She even has a friend at the Academy who is practically her mirror image. If David somehow met Katya, or some faerie more beautiful than her, do you think he’d stop loving Laurel?”

“I gotta say, you’re really bad at this,” Chelsea grumbled.

“Sorry.” Tamani grimaced. “I didn’t mean to imply that he would never stop—”

Chelsea interrupted him with a small, pitiable sound. “It’s OK, I know what you’re trying to say. Really, the last thing you need to be doing is trying to convince people that Laurel’s nothing special. I don’t believe it; you don’t believe it. And considering the fact that you stealing her away is my only hope for any chance with David in the future, I hope you never do.”