Kylie started crying in earnest now. Not just for Della, but for herself. "I know," she said. "I miss it, too."
* * *
The next morning, Kylie woke up staring at the back of Della's head. Because Della was the only one with a full-size bed, they had ended up going to Della's bed and talking until they'd fallen asleep. Something moved at Kylie's back and she quickly rolled over and stared at a yawning Miranda.
"What are you doing here?" Kylie asked.
"I thought it was a spend-the-night party and I wanted to come," she said. Then she popped out her bottom lip. "You two didn't even wait up on me."
"You were late," Kylie said, and yawned.
"I know." Miranda grinned. "We had such a good time. We went swimming at the lake. Just the two of us. It's almost a full moon and it was so romantic."
"You went skinny-dipping?" Della asked, and rolled over, sounding half-asleep.
"No. But he did. Only because he thought I was going to." Miranda giggled. "I wore my bathing suit under my clothes, because he said we were going to the lake. And when I started pulling my jeans off, he thought I was taking it all off and he took his off and dove in really fast."
Kylie and Della started laughing.
"But I didn't see anything. Plus, he made me turn around when he got out and pulled his shorts back on."
The three of them stayed in bed, giggling, until they were almost late for breakfast.
It was a good morning. Not quite as mind-easing as being with Lucas, but Kylie had to admit that Della and Miranda were becoming her touchstones as well. Right now, she felt capable of facing another day of problem solving.
But the good mood took a nosedive when they walked into the dining hall and everyone turned and stared at them.
No, not at all of them. Just at Kylie. Or rather, they gaped at her forehead while tightening their brows. Obviously, her pattern was doing something weird again.
"Damn!" someone said. There were several gasps, a couple of whispers, and a few people even dropped their forks. Then came the dead silence-the kind of silence that screamed disbelief.
Della and Miranda both turned toward her and tightened their brows.
Miranda's eyes widened in shock. "Oh, my!"
"Shit," said Della.
"What is it?" Kylie asked.
Della swallowed and leaned in. "You finally opened up. Your ... your pattern is readable."
Chapter Thirty-two
"What am I?" Kylie gripped Della's arm. "I need to know." Holy hell, she'd been waiting for the answer to this question for months. "Please, Della!"
"You..." Della shook her head. "You're human. One hundred percent human."
"Not funny." Kylie wanted to believe Della was teasing her, but the look on her roommate's face said otherwise. But how could she be human after everything that had happened to her? She remembered crying last night and telling Della she missed being human. Missed being normal. Had she willed it to happen?
Kylie darted out the door and ran as fast as she could to the office.
Not even Holiday's closed office door slowed her down. She barged in. Burnett and Holiday jumped apart as if ... they'd been kissing. Oh, my God. The image of what she'd seen for a flicker of a second played in Kylie's head.
Burnett and Holiday were kissing. Any other time, Kylie might have yelped with joy.
Not now.
"We were ... we were just...," Holiday stuttered.
Kylie didn't care. Her heart pounded. Her mind tried to make sense of the fact that she was fully human. How was that even possible? What did it mean?
Even as she asked herself the questions, she knew the answer to the last one. Being human meant leaving Shadow Falls. Holiday. Burnett. Miranda. Della. Lucas. Perry. Derek. Jonathon and Helen. All of them. It meant walking away forever from her new life.
Tears filled her eyes.
"What's wrong?" Holiday asked.
It meant never helping another lost soul. It meant going back to her old life, where she never felt as if she belonged.
Okay, she had missed her old life. She had. But right now, she knew with twenty-twenty clarity that she would miss her new life more. These last few months, as hard as they had been, she'd come closer to knowing her true self than she ever had before. Maybe she still didn't know what she was, but in so many ways, she knew more about who she was.
"Kylie? What is it?" Holiday insisted.
"What the hell does this mean?" She pointed to her forehead.
Holiday and Burnett looked at her and their eyebrows twitched. The shock she saw in both their eyes didn't help Kylie's confusion. The knot in her throat grew to the size of a large frog.
* * *
Thirty minutes later, Kylie still sat on Holiday's sofa, with her legs pulled up to her chest, her forehead against her knees. She was dry-cried out.
The camp leader sat beside her. Holiday's hand rested on Kylie's back and sent waves of calm washing over her, but it didn't chase away the fear that swelled in her chest. She'd caused this herself. Brought this on herself. She'd somehow tapped into a power she didn't know she had and turned herself back into a human. Was it irreversible?
Kylie lifted her head. "I didn't mean to do it."
"Do what?" Holiday asked.
Kylie's throat felt raw. "Della and I were talking about how we wished ... we wished we were human again. That we missed being normal, and-" Her breath caught. "And I do miss it, but right now it's so clear that I would miss this new life more. I don't want to be human, Holiday."
Empathy filled Holiday's eyes and she smiled. "I don't know what's happening. I don't understand it. But if there is one thing I'm certain about, it's that you are not human, Kylie. Well, not just human."
"But what if the death angels are trying to teach me a lesson? What if they got pissed at me for being ungrateful and this is my punishment?"
Holiday shook her head. "I've never heard of them turning someone into a human for punishment. And believe me, there isn't a supernatural alive who hasn't had moments of wishing they were human. That's perfectly normal."
"Really?"
"Of course. We live in the human world. The grass always looks greener on the other side. Truth is, sometimes it is greener. But we can't change what we are simply by wishing it was so."