A much-deserved meltdown.
For sixteen years she'd tried to figure out who she was. And while she'd always known she'd had a ways to go, she'd felt pretty confident in her discoveries. But today she realized not only was she wrong about who she was, but she didn't even know what she was. Talk about an identity crisis.
Her phone buzzed again. She looked at the cal er ID and saw her dad's name.
Her dad who'd left her.
Her dad who hadn't picked her up at the police station.
Her dad who hadn't visited her before she'd been forcibly shipped off to camp.
Her dad who obviously didn't love her near as much as she'd thought he did.
Her dad who in spite of everything, Kylie missed with al her heart.
If that made her a daddy's girl, so be it. Besides it was probably just a temporary condition. Sooner or later she'd give up loving him so much like he'd given up on her. Right?
Her throat locked up. The temptation to answer and beg him to come get her was so strong that she tossed the phone onto the foot of the bed. She listened to the buzz and knew if she answered that cal she'd tel him about supernaturals and about her being one of them-about running into Lucas Parker the potential serial kil er.
Keeping secrets from her mom had always felt easy, because it seemed her mom kept her own secrets; but keeping things from her dad was algebra-damn hard.
So instead of taking the cal , she plopped her head on the pil ow and gave in to another bout of tears. When someone knocked on her bedroom door, Kylie stil wore the watery evidence of tears on her cheeks.
Before Kylie could decide what to do, the door opened and a nose peeked through the crack. "Are you awake?"
Since Kylie sat up on the bed and saw Miranda's eyes right above the nose, Kylie didn't lie. "Yes."
Miranda stepped in-uninvited.
"Hey, I just..." Miranda's hazel gaze lit on Kylie's face and the girl's mouth dropped open.
Kylie knew exactly what had the little witch gaping. Kylie envied the girls who could cry and barely smear their mascara, but she lacked that particular skil . When Kylie cried, her fair skin broke out in big red dots and her eyes swel ed so much that she didn't look human. Wait. According to Holiday, Kylie wasn't human. Who knew?
"Are you okay?" Miranda asked.
"Fine." Kylie forced cheeriness into her voice. "Al ergies."
"Should you go see a nurse? Seriously, you look terrible."
Thanks. "No. I'm fine. It'l go away in a bit."
"It's not contagious, is it?" Miranda stopped a few feet into the room.
"I sure as heck hope not," said a voice at the door. A voice that belonged to Del a, who stil wore her dark shades, and who Kylie had learned during the introductions was a vampire. Yup. A real vampire.
"I'm not contagious," Kylie said, and realized she should have said yes so they'd leave her alone. Miranda moved in and sat on the foot of the twin bed, and Del a fol owed her but didn't sit down. Instead, the girl removed her sunglasses and eyebal ed Kylie up and down. Her dark expression reminded Kylie of a how a person on a diet stared at a Girl Scout cookie right before it became mouth mush.
Kylie's skin crawled at the thought of becoming mush in anyone's mouth.
"You are coming to dinner and the campfire, aren't you?" Miranda asked.
"Is ... is it mandatory?" Kylie asked, hoping her reaction to Del a didn't show.
"Are you scared of me?" Del a blurted out, axing al of Kylie's hopes of hiding the fact that Del a scared the pee out of her.
"Why ... why would I be scared of you?"
"Because I have sharp teeth?" She opened her mouth and exposed her pearly whites that did indeed showcase two sharp canines. "Because I might suck your blood out?"
It took effort not to cringe at Del a's words, especial y when the girl ran her tongue over her lips.
"Quit teasing her." Miranda laughed and rol ed her eyes.
"That's just it." Del a waved at Kylie. "Her heart is racing and her pulse is running off the chart. Look at the vein in her neck, it's throbbing. I don't think she knows I'm teasing."
The fact that Del a mentioned Kylie's veins had her blood pumping harder. "Of course I do," Kylie lied. "Holiday said everyone here was good ...
people."
"And you believed her?" Del a's black eyes accused Kylie of being dishonest.
Kylie decided right then that Del a's ability to read her vital signs surpassed her ability to lie. "I want to believe her. But I'l admit it, I'm stil trying to wrap my mind around the fact that ... that supernaturals exist."
"But you're a supernatural," Miranda said. "How could you not know-"
"Holiday thinks I'm a supernatural." Yeah, somewhere in the last few minutes Kylie had gone back to hoping Holiday's analysis was meritless.
"You are a supernatural," both Miranda and Del a said at the same time, both their eyebrows twitching ever so slightly.
"Or at least, you aren't al human," Del a said. "We can tel that by looking at your brain pattern."
"And you guys are never wrong?" Kylie clutched her knees tighter to her chest.
"Everyone's wrong once in a while," Miranda said.
"But not very often," Del a added.
Nevertheless, their answer spurred Kylie's hope. "But it does happen. Right?" The heaviness in her chest lightened.
"Yeah, there are the people with brain tumors," Del a added.
Kylie dropped her forehead on her knees. She was either a supernatural or dying of a brain tumor; she didn't know which was worse.
"And a few whose brains are just loopy," Miranda added.
Kylie raised her head. "Loopy?"
"Yeah, like a frog's hair from being loco."
"Then maybe I'm just loopy. I've been accused of that before."
"No, wait," Miranda said. "Didn't Holiday mention you had gifts?" Miranda and Del a both raised inquisitive eyebrows. Kylie shrugged. "Yeah, but that could just be because I'm dealing with a super-charged ghost."
"Ghost?" Miranda and Del a said in unison.
Kylie could be wrong, but both girls looked appal ed and scared. Their shock reminded her of Derek's reaction earlier when she'd asked if he could see ghosts.