~ Nine Lives ~
When I woke up, I was surprised to feel someone’s arms wrapped around me. I lifted my head and found Luke watching me, looking more like his old self. “Luke!” I said, pulling my arms free so I could wrap them around his neck.
He gave me a kiss and said, “Your friends are waiting out there for you to wake up, but I’d rather keep you to myself for a little longer.”
“What time is it?” I asked.
Luke leaned over laboriously to look at the clock on the wall. I sat up and looked for my headmaster, but he wasn’t there. “Three o’clock.”
“In the afternoon? How long have you been awake?”
“Not very long.”
The door opened and Harmony peeked in. She gasped and threw it open. “She’s awake!” Sassy and Nadine burst into the room with her and they all came to give me a hug.
“We thought you’d run away with Luke and we’d never see you again,” Sassy said into my hair.
“I wouldn’t do that. We’re sisters,” I said, pulling my legs toward me so they would all have room to sit on my bed.
“I told them that,” Harmony said, pretending to give Sassy and Nadine reprimanding looks.
Then she dropped my purse in my lap. “I brought you something. Headmaster said you’d be staying here until Luke leaves, and the doctor said Luke has to stay overnight for observation. Now you won’t get bored.”
I looked in the bag and saw a fashion magazine, my gold notebook, colored pencils, beef jerky, and a coke. “Thanks, Harmony.”
“I brought your favorite,” Sassy said, holding out a napkin wrapped around a bunch of bacon. “It’s from this morning, though, so it might not be good anymore.”
“That’s okay.”
“And I didn’t want to be the only one to come empty handed—” Nadine said, going to get something from the hall. She came back carrying two small plates, each with a big piece of chocolate cake on it. “I know how much you love cake, Kristine. Hopefully you do, too.” She handed one to me and one to Luke. “Sorry I thought it was you,” she said to him. “I should have believed Kristine when she told me you didn’t steal all that stuff.”
Luke shrugged indifferently and sat up slowly so he could take the cake from her.
“I’ll go get Hunter so he can take an x-ray of your foot,” Sassy said as she stood up to go find him.
“Could you shut the door, Nadine?” I asked when Sassy was gone.
“Sure.”
I waited for her to come back to ask Harmony my question. “Do you still have Luke’s safe?”
She and Luke looked at each other.
“Yeah,” she answered. “When you both came up missing, I thought the Cinders might come looking for it, so I hid it under the sinks in the bathroom. I wrapped a robe around it and put my shower bag in front of it. That way everyone would know it was mine. You can have it back whenever, Luke.”
He gazed at her solemnly. “I owe you one. Seriously, let me know if you ever need a favor.”
“You saved Kristine. I’d say I’m the one who owes you.”
He grinned as the door opened and Hunter walked in with Nadine. “Ready to get your picture taken?” Hunter asked me.
“You bet.” I left my things on my cot and grabbed the crutches.
All three of my friends fussed playfully over helping me all the way to the x-ray room, even though I would have been fine on my own.
“Which room is Roman in?” I asked Hunter as he walked us back down the hall.
“None of them. He’s in surgery right now and then Headmaster’s having him locked in a room upstairs until he decides what to do.”
I really hoped my headmaster wasn’t so naïve as to let him roam freely around North Haven again.
When my friends and I got back to the room, Luke was pretty quiet until Bane came to visit. “So, you survived even with our entire school out for your blood,” Bane said, coming to pat me on the back. “You’ve got nine lives. You know that, Fayre?”
We laughed and he went to sit by Luke so Luke could tell him everything that had happened since he was imprisoned. I did the same with my girls while trying to listen to everything Luke was saying. It was impossible, though, so I figured he could tell me what his last thirteen days had been like later.
Everyone left pretty quickly after that. On their way out the door, Bane asked Harmony if she wanted to hang out later. Maybe they understood that Luke and I needed each other after all we’d been through.
“Your headmaster came by while you were gone,” Luke said when we were alone.
“Really? What did he say?”
“He offered to make me a Havener.”
I gasped so loud that I coughed a few times. “That’s great!”
“I turned him down.”
The excitement instantly drained out of me. “You said no? I thought you wanted to be with me.”
“I do, but I wouldn’t belong there. Not as a Havener, anyway.”
“But we could see each other every day, like now. We could go to classes together and go out on the balconies. North Haven’s the most beautiful place on earth.”
“I like it here, though. I like it dark and underground with these guys. I’d rather be with you, but...what if my headmaster asked you to be a Cinder? Leave your friends and school to be one of us? Would you say yes?”
“No.” Southland Cinder High was the last place I’d ever want to live. And I understood what he was saying.
“I’ll still come see you every chance I get.”
“I know.”
A knock came at the door. Luke let out an irritated sigh. “When will everybody leave us alone?” he said.
“Come in,” I called out, hoping they hadn’t heard Luke.
“Sorry to bother you,” Hunter said, opening the door enough to stick his head in. “I wanted to let Kristine know her x-rays were fine. I’m still recommending you use those crutches for the next two weeks.”
“Thanks, Hunter.”
“So,” Luke said in a near whisper once the door was shut. “How did you get to the prisoner’s cells?”
I’d sworn on my life I would never tell anyone what Thorn did for me, but I’d also never kept anything from Luke and I knew he would take my secrets to the grave. So I told him the story, the whole story, filling in the gaps from that morning, since he couldn’t remember anything after passing out while he was chasing Roman.
“I can’t believe you did all that for me,” he said, lying down when I was finished, and cringing with the stab of pain on the way down.
“Roman would’ve killed you if I hadn’t and that would have been a hundred times worse.”
“Guns don’t scare me.”
“They should.” I leaned over to kiss him. “You’re not immortal, you know.”
“I know.” He put one arm behind his head and used the other one to pull me down next to him and keep me there. “But the way I love you is immortal. It makes guns and anything else that tries to come between us seem trivial.”
“Yeah.”
Just thinking about the last two weeks made me feel exhausted. That very morning, I was still chained to a wall, convinced the guy beside me was dead. I didn’t want to think about it anymore.
“I got my con back. We could watch something.”
“Sounds good.”
I took it out of my pocket and let it rise from my open hand. “Kristine Con, play the SpongeBob Christmas special, please.”
For Luke and me, a good cartoon was always the best medicine.