Ever had the urge to write about something and have no idea why or how the idea came into your head into the first place? That's what happened to me. All of a sudden, I had an overwhelming desire to write about hands. So I acted on my desire, and ended up with this sweet little one-shot ;)
It's set during School's Out Forever, and the flock is still living at Anne Walker's. A little taste of the subtle Fax that went on during that book :)
Thanks for reading! (BTW, Max's point of view.)
I'm a pretty happy chick.
I mean, I get annoyed ridiculously easily. And I get angry a lot. But in general, I figure it's pointless to be depressed because my life is basically a hellhole, when any one of my flock or I could be captured, drugged, and killed at any moment.
Plus, you know, I don't have time for therapy.
But these few weeks living at Anne Walker's have opened my eyes to something that I just could not shut down with tough words or hitting things. And I tried both. That thing is Fang. Or, more accurately, Fang and Lissa. Or, even more accurately, Fang going out with aforementioned Red-Haired-Wonderbitch. I saw them making out behind the fake rock wall today, and I nearly threw up, my blood boiling and my vision turning red like a dribble of thick Eraser blood had run into my eyes.
I don't love Fang, before all of you start gushing and combining our names into something stupid, like Brangelina or something. I mean, you know, I love him, but not like that. I don't love him more than, say...Iggy. Or Angel. Or Total. He's like my brother. And sisters don't like brothers sucking face with miniskirted witches. Right?
Homework is probably one of the worst forms of tortures I've ever had to endure, and I'm counting all the crazy that went down at the School. However, in order to stay in the preppy school that Anne has thoughtfully picked out for us (that was sarcasm, in case you didn't catch it), it's necessary. Though if Iggy sets off one more firework on the back field, we're all going to get thrown out anyway. Not to self: drop all of Iggy's bomb supplies from a height of ten thousand feet.
I pick up my pencil again and stare at my math textbook. Damn. The memory of Fang and the Red Haired Wonder feeling each other up has driven the law of coefficients straight out of my head. I flick a few pages till I find it again, then start on problem ten.
Then the she-bitch herself waltzes into my kitchen.
Well, not really my kitchen, but that sounds more dramatic than "Then the she-bitch herself waltzes into my-but-actually-Anne's-but-since-I'm-living-here-for-an-unknown-amount-of-time-technically-can-be-called-my kitchen."
Fang follows her, his face light and easy, not smiling but obviously content. He opens the fridge, takes out a Coke for himself, tosses one to me, then tries to do the same to Lissa. She misses it and it slides down her skirt and falls to the floor, leaving an awkward wet streak that I want to applaud Fang for. Then I remember I'm mad at him. I hold the applause. He picks the can up off the floor and hands it to her.
"Thanks!" she bubbles, grinning like the Cheshire Cat, popping it open and taking a tiny sip. I crack mine and gulp half of it. Fang gives me a half-amused, half-disgusted look.
"So...what are you guys doing here?" I ask Fang, trying to keep from jumping up and kicking the ginger out of the house as they both sit down across from me.
"I live here," Fang says. "And Lissa's staying for dinner." I try very hard to keep my face straight and uncaring.
"You're Max, right?" the Thing asks, her red hair flipping attractively and not on accident as she pulls a textbook identical to mine out of her light purple backpack. "Nick's sister?"
"Uh huh. And you're Lissa."
"Yep!" It's one of those sentences that doesn't need an exclamation point, but for some reason gets one anyway. "Anne is so nice, letting me stay. I get to do homework and hang out with you guys, and then Fang and I are going out for ice cream!" I shoot Fang a split-second look, but I can't tell anything from his face.
"Cool." I turn back to my homework as Fang takes out his math textbook too, and then the awkward silence is filled with the scratching of squeaky mechanical pencils. I hope for Fang's sake the Thing isn't going to do something total cliché, like ask him to—
"Nick? Can you help me with this problem? I don't get it."
Thought too soon.
Fang's muttering filled the small kitchen, leaning over way too close to her. "See, you have to set up the equations with the graph they give you. Then you just solve for x and y. See, here's one of the equations, right next to the line. You have to figure out the slope of this one, and the y-intercept is two. And you just go from there." He writes a few numbers in his scratchy, spiky handwriting.
"Thanks so much," Lissa gushes, and I have to restrain myself from doing a facepalm right then and there. Fang's mouth quirks and he goes back to steadily filling up a sheet of notebook paper. I hope you fail, I think hard at the Red Haired Wonder.
"Max?" A voice behind me makes me look up and turn around.
"Hey, Ang—Ariel," I say, smiling as warmly as I can manage. Total's at her feet, regarding Lissa with his coal-black eyes and sniffing the air dubiously. Even he can smell the ass-ton of perfume she has on, from all the way across the room. "What's up?"
"Can me and Gazzy and Iggy and Nudge go to the pond?" she asks me, her blue eyes hopeful. I wonder for the thousandth time if there was a way to tell when I'm being voodoo-six-year-old-mind-controlled.
"Are you kidding? It's almost freaking November!"
"But it's warm, and we won't stay out long." Even Total is looking at me now, boring into me with his mournful gaze.
"Okay, fine. You finished your homework, right? All of you?"
"Uh huh. Thanks, Max!" She starts to turn and walk off, but stops for a second when I think as hard as I can at her, No flying. Fang's girlfriend is here. She gives a tiny nod, her blond ringlets moving just a little, and keeps on going toward the pond out back. No sooner has my flock disappeared than Anne reappears, carrying a bunch of grocery bags and balancing a coffee cup on one hand.
"Hey, guys," she says, plonking the bags on the counter, where they tip over and throw up their contents onto the floor. Anne leaves them to pick up later and leans over the table, inspecting Lissa, who smiles up at her with a perfect-toothed witch grin. "You're Lissa?"
"Hi," Lissa says, holding out a hand. Anne takes it briefly before turning to the mess of stuff all over the linoleum.
"I'm going to cook dinner in here in a minute," she says, picking up the last of the disaster and getting out a pot. "How are you doing on your homework?"
"Fine," all three of us say at the same time, not even looking up. Fang wipes the graphite off the side of his hand on his black jeans and takes a sip of his Coke.
"You have pretty hands," he mutters to Lissa, and I almost laugh, because it's such an un-Fang-like thing to say. However, the soppy look she then gives him paired with the dazzling smile drives off any laughter like the plague. Then, of course, since it's basic human (avian?) nature to check out anything anyone says, I can't help myself. I look at Lissa's hands.
She's running her nails over the olive skin of Fang's hands, and they're perfectly glossed with shiny pale pink nail polish, a rhinestone on the perfectly rounded index finger of each hand. The hands are small, almost half the size of Fang's, the skin smooth and soft-looking. The bones of her wrist stick out attractively, even the wrinkles on her knuckles looking like she put them there on purpose. Her fingers are long for how small her hands are, and they're elegant and thin, like a piano player or what a dancer should look like.
I hide my own under the table.
Dinner is basically hell on earth, or more specifically Virginia. Lissa's gabbing to Nudge and Angel the entire time about God knows what. I pick at my mashed potatoes unenthusiastically, eating much less than I normally would. Seeing the Wonderbitch brush her leg against Fang's every few minutes makes me want to fling my glass of apple juice and stickify her perfectly groomed hair.
Before you comment, no. I am not jealous, and I do not love Fang. How many times do I have to tell you this?
Lissa and Fang leave after dinner, and I don't watch them go out the door, bending my head over my already-completed math homework just so I won't have to. Angel's looking at me funny, so I escape upstairs as fast as I can and lay on my bed, turning up the cheap music player Anne got me all the way, blasting music into my fevered brain. I go through my meager playlist and then, with nothing better to do, take a hot shower that calms my anger somewhat, though I'll know it'll fire right back up next time I see Fang. After changing into holey sweatpants and one of my various t-shirts, I sit on my bed and stare at nothing, letting stupid thoughts wave over me. A movie plays behind my open eyes of Fang and the Thing, touching, kissing, grabbing each other's hands...and I remember Lissa's perfect hands, and how Fang had said they were pretty.
I try to resist it, but eventually I can't stop myself from stretching out my hands and looking at them against the ratty dark grey of the sweatpants.
Whereas Lissa's hands are small and dainty, mine are big for a girl. My nails are stubby and ragged, permanently encrusted with a faint layer of dirt that won't come off with any amount of washing, a pale skin color that somehow looks childish against the Wonderbitch's pale pink gloss with a perfect rhinestone glued to one nail. My fingers are long like hers, but bony in all the wrong places. Random spots and wrinkles clash with the pale blue of the veins that stick out of the back of my hands. Scratches and scars cover them, and the effect is gruesome.
My hands are absolutely hideous.
Ever had the feeling where something that you know doesn't actually matter to you makes you crazy? That's about it. I rub the skin on the back of one of my hands, trying to make it smoother, not knowing why. I pick at a nail and then throw the sliver away, aggravated that it just made it even more messy and ragged. Then I crack my knuckles and wince at the popping noises...Lissa probably never cracks her knuckles.
Not like any of that matters, of course.
My door opens slowly, and I jump, instinctively curling my hands into fists and subconsciously preparing for a fight.
But, of course, it isn't an Eraser or any other diabolical experiment turned out by the sadists at the School. It was Fang.
"You're back." My voice sounds a lot less hostile when it's just him.
"Uh huh."
"Did you have fun?"
He pauses a moment before nodding, sitting down next to me and lounging against my headboard, and I remember that through my hatred, he's still my best friend, so I don't push him off. "What did you do?"
"Nothing interesting." He nods, and silence falls between us. I find myself staring at my hands again, trying to rub out the discoloration that mars them. I don't realize that Fang's watching me, and only remember that he's still there when he puts his big hand over mine, picking it up.
"You okay?" he asks, looking straight into my eyes and getting straight to the heart of the matter without even speaking, just like he always does.
"Yes," I lie, but I know even then that it's pointless to even try. Fang sees straight through me, though he doesn't press the issue. He turns my hand over in his grip, and I decide that I'll let him. He inspects it for a while, then envelopes it in his own, and his hold is warm. He doesn't look at me, so I don't have to keep the expression of shock off my face.
"Lissa has pretty hands," he murmurs, his hair obscuring his face so I can't see the expression in his eyes. He traces one of the red scar-marks on the skin. I try not to shiver, because he'd feel it. Then he says one more thing before he leaves, before he stands up and exits my bedroom, leaving me frozen and confused on my bed, my hair making the headboard and my t-shirt wet. Leaving me awake that night wondering.
"But your hands tell a story," Fang says, getting up and closing the door behind him with a barely audible click.