I can have them back to you tomorrow, I write. Is that okay?
He reads that and nods, smiling again.
Just a little.
CHAPTER 7
How I look has never seemed that important. Not the clothes I wear or the poor hairstyle choices I make, but my actual body. I’m not especially tall or short. No rampant acne or unfortunate placement of facial features. I’m not fat—Mom says my BMI is probably below what it should be, whatever that means. People don’t point out how I look, but I’ve never been more aware of it than when I’m next to Wallace.
We walk back to the cafeteria together at the end of lunch. His legs are longer than mine, but he moves so slow we walk at the same speed. It’s a weird kind of slowness; a lot of people move slow because they meander, like they don’t know where they’re going, or don’t want to get there. Wallace moves slow the way those giant mechas move slow: there’s so much to move it takes a while to get it going. But he knows exactly where he wants to be.
We walk, and I am acutely aware of my arms and legs, and what direction my feet point on the floor, and all the hair on my body. I wish there was something strange about the way I look so I could focus on that, assume he’s focused on that, but there’s just me.
We don’t speak. Wallace folded up our conversation paper and put it in the pocket of his jeans, along with his pencil. We get a few looks from the tables we pass as we go to dump the trash from our trays. I imagine the looks are more for him than me, but maybe new-kid strangeness has worn off already. When he turns around, I notice for the first time the words in neat handwritten Sharpie along the bottom of his backpack:
THERE ARE MONSTERS IN THE SEA.
It’s a fan-favorite Monstrous Sea quote. Dallas Rainer. He did say Dallas was his favorite character, but I always find it interesting when fans send me pictures of which quotes or pictures they put on their walls or their clothes, or even what they get tattooed on their skin. Though usually people do it because they think it sounds cool, sometimes it means something.
I don’t get a chance to say good-bye to Wallace. We leave the cafeteria with the tide of students and get separated at a hallway, and he disappears.
I see him again later, waiting outside on the bench. Travis and Deshawn are nowhere in sight. I hesitate by the doors, then creep toward him. He has headphones in, and he’s writing something. Always writing something.
I tap him on the shoulder. This time, he’s the one who jumps and rips out his headphones. I clench my fists tight around my backpack straps and press them into my stomach to stop them from shaking.
“Do you . . . do you need a ride?”
He shakes his head and scribbles quickly on the top of his paper. My sister is coming to get me.
“Oh. Okay.” Of course he didn’t need my help, stupid to ask. Not like he wasn’t sitting here every day last week and managed to get home fine. “Well . . . see you.”
I don’t wait to see if he says anything back. I hurry to my Nissan and barricade myself inside. Then, finally, I smile.
I’ve never met a real live fan before. I didn’t think about it until now, and it’s a strange thing. All these people who love Monstrous Sea—they’re numbers on a screen. Comments, views, likes. The bigger the numbers get, the less like people they seem. It’s easy to forget they’re humans like Wallace. Like me. Finding someone who likes it—who loves it—enough to make their own art about it and actually hand it to me themselves, instead of sending it to a P.O. box or emailing it, is surreal to the highest degree.
But he doesn’t know I’m me. He doesn’t know he handed his fanfiction to LadyConstellation. That is definitely wrong. It feels wrong. But it’s not like I’m going to use it to hurt him. And what was I supposed to do? Maybe if he knew who I was, he’d have shoved it at me and forced me to read it. I’ve never met fans in real life, I don’t know what they’ll do if they meet me.
I know, if I had ever met Olivia Kane, author of Children of Hypnos, I would have probably burst into tears and collapsed on the floor at her feet. I doubt Wallace will do that, but I don’t want to take the risk.
Interacting with Wallace would be so much easier if he knew who I was. I would control every conversation. Every meeting. Every action and word that passed between us. LadyConstellation is a god who creates currents in her own world. Eliza is a guppy getting tugged along by those currents, unable to even see where they take her.
LadyConstellation will have to wait. For now—with Wallace, at least—I’ll have to make do with Eliza Mirk.
CHAPTER 8
Two things wait for me at home.
The first is Emmy’s care package, a neat little box taped with hearts and frosted with glitter.
The second is Davy. When I step through the door, his big white body careens around the corner and slams into my legs and hips, knocking me off balance. He never jumps, but stands there, tail wagging, waiting for me to pet him. Which of course I do, because who can resist petting their dog when he offers himself up like that?
I fall on him. Davy holds me up, panting and shedding and being adorable.
“Somebody’s back from doggy camp!” Mom comes around the corner after him, wearing her baby-talk face and making pouty lips at Davy. “You had a fun time with your friends, didn’t you, Davy-Dave?”
“You don’t have to talk to him like he’s a child,” I mutter into Davy’s fur.
“What was that?” Mom says.
I straighten up. “Nothing.”
“He got a nice long week running with the pack, and now he’s back with us in time for Halloween. Aren’t you, bud? Oh, Eliza, you got a package. I put it on the kitchen counter.”
The way she says it, you’d think it had a bomb inside. She only puts things on the kitchen counter when she isn’t sure if she wants to keep them or take them out to the garbage cans in the garage.
“It’s from Emmy, Mom,” I say.
She frowns. “From Emmy. What is it?”
“I don’t know yet.”
I release Davy; he follows me into the kitchen, Mom trailing not far behind him. I grab a pair of scissors and tear open the box.
Inside is a note from Emmy and a pile of assorted goodies one might expect to receive from a fourteen-year-old college student: hard-lead drawing pencils she probably got at a steep discount from the campus bookstore, or charmed out of some art student; a picture of a man made from a collage of body parts she must’ve found in magazines and online, who somehow manages to be anatomically correct; and of course a few packages of ramen. Mom makes a face at the man picture and the ramen. I ignore her and open the letter. It’s handwritten; Emmy likes to dot her I’s with hearts. Ironically, she says.
E!!!
You better like your care package! I know you said you needed some new hard pencils, so I hope you haven’t bought any yourself yet. The ramen is for eating, because I know you forget to do that sometimes. But of course we both know the best part of this is the Mr. Greatbody. Yes, he has a name. I have taken everything you’ve told me about your perfect man over the years and I have created him for you. Marvel at my masterpiece. Feast your eyes on my fantastical creation.
Speaking of eyes . . . if his eyes fall off, it’s because I ran out of glue. I’m a civil engineering major, not a craft supply store.
Love you lots!
Emmy
I look at Mr. Greatbody again. Strong jaw, striking eyes, lean muscle—honestly, it’s the sort of thing anyone could find attractive. I’ve never been picky about what guys look like, and I think Emmy buried a joke about that in here somewhere. I laugh anyway.
“What is that?” Mom asks. I taste the disdain in her voice.
“Nothing,” I say, gathering up the box and its contents. “Inside joke.”
“Is Emmy . . . Emmy’s a girl, right?” Mom follows me again as I leave the kitchen and head up the stairs.
“Yes, Emmy’s a girl. When have you heard of someone named Emmy not being a girl?”
“I don’t know, but with these internet people, I thought I’d ask. . . .”
I clench my teeth to keep my mouth shut. I don’t think she means to offend me anymore—she probably never did—but whenever we get into this conversation, one of us ends up too angry to continue. I jog up the stairs, Davy on my heels, and turn down the hall for my room.