Chosen - Каст Филис Кристина страница 3.

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"I like snow globes," Jack said softly, looking like he was about to cry. "The snowy part makes me happy."

"Looks like Heath knows more about what you like than we do." Erik's voice was flat and emotionless, but his eyes were dark with hurt, which made my stomach clench.

"No, Erik, it's not like that," I said quickly, taking a step toward him.

He moved back like I had some kind of awful disease he might catch, and suddenly it really pissed me off. It wasn't my fault that Heath had known me since I was in third grade and had figured out the mushed birthmas present issue years ago. Okay, yes, he knew stuff about me that the rest of them didn't. There was nothing weird about that! The kid had been in my life for seven years. Erik and Damien, the Twins and Jack had been in my life for two monthsor less. How was that my fault?

Purposefully, I made a show of looking at my watch. "I'm supposed to meet my grandma at Starbucks in fifteen minutes. I better not be late." I walked over to the door, but paused before I left the room. I turned around and looked at my group of friends. "I didn't mean to hurt anyone's feelings. I'm sorry if Heath's note made you guys feel badbut that's not my fault. And I did tell someone that I don't like it when people try to mush my birthday together with ChristmasI told Stevie Rae."

CHAPTER 3

The Starbucks at Utica Square, the cool outdoors shopping center that was right down the street from the House of Night, was a lot busier than I'd thought it would be. I mean, sure, it was an unusually warm winter night, but it was also December 24, and almost nine o'clock. You'd think people would be home getting ready for visions of sugarplums and whatnot, and not out looking for a caffeine buzz.

No, I told myself sternly, I am not going to be in a bad mood for Grandma. I hardly ever get to see her, and I'm not going to spoil the little time we have together. Plus, Grandma was totally hip to the fact that birthmas presents were lame. She always got me something as unique and wonderful as she is.

"Zoey! I'm over here!"

At the far edge of the Starbucks sidewalk area I could see Grandma's arms waving at me. This time I didn't have to plant a fake smile on my face. The rush of happiness seeing her always brought me was authentic and had me dodging through the crowd as I hurried to her.

"Oh, Zoeybird! I've missed you so, U-we-tsi-a-ge-ya!" The Cherokee word for daughter wrapped around me, along with my grandma's warm, familiar arms that held the sweet, soothing scent of lavender and home. I clung to her, absorbing love and security and acceptance.

"I've missed you, too, Grandma."

She squeezed me one more time and then held me back at arm's length. "Let me look at you. Yes, I can tell that you're seventeen. You look so much more mature, and I think a little taller than you did when you were merely sixteen."

I grinned. "Oh, Grandma, you know I don't look any different."

"Of course you do. Years always add beauty and strength to a certain type of womanand you're that type."

"So are you, Grandma. You look great!" I wasn't just saying that. Grandma was a zillion years oldat least somewhere in her fiftiesbut she looked ageless to me. Okay, not ageless like vamp women who looked twenty-something at fifty-something (or one hundred and fifty something). Grandma was an adorable human ageless with her thick silver hair and her kind brown eyes.

"I do wish you didn't have to cover your lovely tattoos to meet me here." Grandma's fingers rested briefly on my cheek where I'd hastily patted the thick concealing makeup fledglings were required to wear when they left the House of Night campus. Yes, humans knew vampyres existedadult vamps didn't conceal themselves. But the rules for fledglings were different. I guess it made senseteenagers didn't always handle conflict welland the human world did tend to conflict with vampyres.

"That's just the way it is. Rules are rules, Grandma," I shrugged it off.

"You didn't cover the beautiful Marks on your neck and shoulder, did you?"

"No, that's why I'm wearing this jacket." I glanced around to make sure no one was watching us, then I brushed back my hair and flipped down the shoulder of the jacket so that the sapphire lacework on the back of my neck and shoulder was visible.

"Oh, Zoeybird, it's just so magical," Grandma said softly. "I'm so proud that the goddess has Chosen you as special and Marked you so uniquely."

She hugged me again, and I clung to her, incredibly glad that I had her in my life. She accepted me for me. It didn't matter to her that I was turning into a vampyre. It didn't matter to her that I was already experiencing bloodlust and that I had the power to manifest all five of the elements: air, fire, water, earth, and spirit. To Grandma I was her true u-we-tsi-a-ge-ya, the daughter of her heart, and everything else that came along with me was just secondary stuff. It was weird and wonderful that she and I could be so close and so much alike when her real daughter, my mom, was so completely different.

"There you are. The traffic was just awful. I hate leaving Broken Arrow and fighting my way to Tulsa during the holiday rush."

As if my thoughts had somehow tragically conjured her, my mother's voice threw cold water on my happiness. Grandma and I let go of each other to see my mom standing beside our table, holding a rectangular bakery box and a wrapped present.

"Mom?"

"Linda?"

Grandma and I spoke together. It was no surprise that Grandma looked as shocked as me by my mother's sudden appearance. Grandma would never have invited my mother without letting me know. Both of us saw totally eye to eye about my mother. One, she made us sad. Two, we wished she would change. Three, we knew she probably wouldn't.

"Don't look so surprised. Like I wouldn't show up at my own daughter's birthday celebration?"

"But, Linda, when I talked with you last week you said you were going to send Zoey's birthday present to her through the mail," Grandma said, looking as annoyed as I felt.

"That was before you said you were meeting her here." Mom told Grandma, then she frowned at me. "It's not like Zoey invited me to come herself, but then I'm used to having an inconsiderate daughter."

"Mom, you haven't talked to me in a month. How was I supposed to invite you anywhere?" I tried to keep my tone neutral. I really didn't want Grandma's visit to deteriorate into a big drama scene, but my mom hadn't said ten sentences and she was already totally pissing me off. Except for the stupid Christmas-birthday card she'd sent me, the only communication I'd had with my mom had been when she and her awful husband, the step-loser, had come to parent visitation at the House of Night a month ago. It had been a complete nightmare. The step-loser, who was an Elder for the People of Faith Church, had been his usual narrow-minded, judgmental, bigoted self and had ended up basically being thrown out and told never to come back. As usual, my mom had scampered along after him like a good little submissive wife.

"Didn't you get my card?" Mom's brittle tone started to crumble under my steady look.

"Yes, Mom. I did."

"See, I've been thinking about you."

"Okay, Mom."

"You know, you could call your mother once in a while," she said a little tearfully.

I sighed. "Sorry, Mom. School's just been crazy with semester finals and all."

"I hope you're getting good grades at that school."

"I am, Mom." She made me feel sad and lonely and angry at the same time.

"Well, good." Mom wiped her eyes and started bustling around with the packages she'd brought. In an obviously forced cheerful voice she added, "Come on, let's all sit down. Zoey, you can go into Starbucks and get us something to drink in a minute. It's a good thing your grandma invited me. As usual, no one else thought to bring a cake."

We sat down and Mom wrestled with the tape on the bakery box. While she was busy, Grandma and I shared a look of complete understanding. I knew she hadn't invited Mom, and she knew I absolutely hated birthday cake. Especially the cheap, overly sweet cake my mom always ordered from the bakery.

With the kind of horrible fascination usually reserved for gawking at car wrecks I watched Mom open the bakery box and reveal a small square one-layer white cake. The generic Happy Birthday was written in red, which matched the red poinsettias blobbed at each corner. Green icing trimmed the whole thing.

"Doesn't it look good? Nice and Christmassy," Mom said as she tried to pick off the half-price sticker from the lid of the box. Then she froze and looked at me with overly wide eyes. "But you don't celebrate Christmas anymore, do you?"

I found the fake smile I'd been using earlier and replanted it on my face. "We celebrate Yule, or Winter Solstice, which was two days ago."

"I'll bet the campus is beautiful right now." Grandma smiled at me and patted my hand.

"Why would the campus be beautiful?" Mom's brittle tone was back. "If they don't celebrate Christmas, why should they decorate Christmas trees?"

Grandma beat me to the explanation. "Linda, Yule was celebrated a long time before Christmas. Ancient peoples have been decorating Christmas trees," she said the words with a slightly sarcastic intonation, "for thousands of years. It was Christians who adopted that tradition from Pagans, not the other way around. Actually, the church chose December twenty-fifth as the date of Jesus' birth to coincide with Yule celebrations. If you'll remember, the whole time you were growing up we rolled pinecones in peanut butter, strung apples and popcorn and cranberries together, and decorated an outside tree that I always called our Yule tree, along with our inside Christmas tree." Grandma smiled a kinda sad, kinda confused smile at her daughter before turning back to me. "So did you decorate the trees on campus?"

I nodded. "Yeah, they look amazing, and the birds and squirrels are going totally nuts, too."

"Well, why don't you open your presents, then we can have cake and coffee?" My mom said, acting like Grandma and I had never spoken.

Grandma brightened. "Yes, I've been looking forward to giving you these for a month now." She bent and withdrew two presents from under her side of the table. One was big and tented with brightly colored (and definitely not Christmas) wrapping paper. The other was book-sized and covered in cream-colored tissue paper like you'd get from a chic boutique. "Open this one first." Grandma pushed the tented present to me and I eagerly unwrapped it to find the magic of my childhood underneath.

"Oh, Grandma! Thank you so much!" I pressed my face into the brightly blooming lavender plant she'd potted in a purple clay pot and inhaled. The aroma of the wonderful herb brought visions of lazy summer days and picnics with Grandma. "It's perfect," I said.

"I had to rush grow it in the hothouse so that it would be blooming for you. Oh, and you'll need this." Grandma handed me a paper bag. "There's a grow light inside there and a mounting for it so that you can be sure it gets enough light without having to open your bedroom curtains and hurt your eyes."

I grinned at her. "You think of everything." I glanced at my mom, and saw that she had the blank look on her face that I knew meant she wished she was someplace else. I wanted to ask her why she had bothered to come at all, but pain closed my throat, which surprised me. I had thought that I had grown up beyond her ability to hurt me. Seems the actual truth of being seventeen wasn't as old as I'd imagined.

"Here, Zoeybird, I got you one other thing," Grandma said, handing me the tissue-paper-wrapped present. I could tell that she'd noticed Mom's stony silence and, as usual, she was trying to make up for her daughter's crappy parenting.

I swallowed down the clog in my throat and unwrapped the present to reveal a leather-bound book that was obviously old as dirt. Then I noticed the title and I gasped. "Dracula! You got me an old copy of Dracula!"

"Look at the copyright page, honey," Grandma said, eyes shining with delight.

I turned to the publisher's page and could not believe what I saw. "Ohmygod! It's a first edition!"

Grandma was laughing happily. "Turn a couple of pages."

I did, and found Stoker's signature scrawled across the bottom of the title page and dated January, 1899.

"It's a signed first edition! It must have cost a zillion dollars!" I threw my arms around Grandma and hugged her.

"Actually, I found it in a very junky used book store that was going out of business. It was a steal. After all, it's only a first edition of Stoker's American release."

"It's cool beyond belief, Grandma! Thank you so much."

"Well, I know how much you love that spooky old story, and in light of recent events I thought it would be ironically funny for you to have a signed edition," Grandma said.

"Did you know Bram Stoker was Imprinted by a vampyre, and that's why he wrote the book?" I gushed as I oh-so-carefully turned the thick pages, checking out the old illustrations, which were, indeed, spooky.

"I had no idea Stoker had a relationship with a vampyre," Grandma said.

"I wouldn't call being bitten by a vampyre and then put under his spell a relationship," my mother said.

Grandma and I looked at her. I sighed. "Mom, it's way possible for a human and a vampyre to have a relationship. That's what Imprinting is about." Well, it was also about bloodlust and some serious desire, along with a psychic link that could be pretty disconcerting, all of which I knew from my experience with Heath. But I wasn't going to mention that to Mom.

My mother shivered like something nasty had just run its finger up her spine. "It sounds disgusting to me."

"Mother. Do you not get that there are two very specific choices for my future? One would be that I become the thing that you're saying is disgusting. The other would be that sometime in the next four years I die." I hadn't wanted to get into it with her, but her attitude was seriously pissing me off. "So would you rather see me dead or see me an adult vampyre?"

"Neither, of course," she said.

"Linda," Grandma put her hand on my leg under the table and squeezed. "What Zoey is saying is that you need to accept her and her new future, and that your attitude is hurting her feelings."

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