Envy (Volume 2) - Couverture souple

Miles, Elizabeth

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 144242222X ISBN 13 : 9781442422223

Editeur : Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2013

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Envy CHAPTER ONE

“You say you wanna play around with other boys. You tell me that it’s over, but all I hear is WHITE NOISE!” Crow grabbed the microphone and leaned forward, and for a second Em was sure he was looking right at her.

She leaned back into the beat-up armchair and wrapped her puffy down coat more tightly around her as she watched Crow practice his latest song, “White Noise.” The sound of crappy, hand-me-down instruments and boys who love to play them reverberated through the garage. For the past several weeks Em had been spending more time with Drea Feiffer and her friends; as a result she was getting used to the buzzing electrical feed from the amps, the heart-pounding drum rhythms, and the screaming guitar solos. In addition to loving coffee and obscure movies, Drea’s alternative crowd loved music, especially the kind they created themselves.

Tonight they were at Colin Robertson’s rehearsal space in Portland—if you could call a rug on a concrete floor, some ratty old couches, and a secondhand drum set a “rehearsal space.” Colin’s name had long ago been shortened to C-Ro, and that nickname had soon morphed into Crow. Em had never heard him called anything else. Well, except for when she and Gabby and some of their friends had referred to him as the Grim Creeper, back before he left Ascension. Not graduated, just . . . stopped coming. He was the only high school dropout Em had ever known.

Now Em knew he’d left to play music.

Crow strummed his guitar, licking his lips in concentration before opening his mouth to sing a verse. His longish black hair (it used to be bleached blond; this was better) often fell into his gold-green eyes, which always seemed just the slightest bit squinted—like he was still waking up, or like he had just gotten high.

Technically there were four guys in Crow’s band, the Slump: Crow, who sang lead vocals and played rhythm guitar; Jake, the drummer; Patrick, the bassist; and Mike, who played lead guitar. They couldn’t afford new instruments, but there was no question about their abilities. Other local musicians hung around the roomy old warehouse in South Portland, which Crow and the band rented for a cheap monthly rate. There was one guy who played the xylophone and another famous for his “found instruments”—a paintbrush on a metal tray, a wrench scraping against a birdcage.

Em couldn’t believe this whole other world existed. And she really couldn’t believe how cool it all was.

“Yo, Em, you want any of this?” From her perch on a ratty couch, Drea held up a Styrofoam cup of microwaved ramen noodles. Little-known fact that Em had learned recently: In Ascension, Maine, where Em and Drea lived, alternative types apparently subsisted on papery noodles in way-salty broth.

She made a face and waved her hand. “No thanks. Not hungry.”

The room was starting to warm up—it was freezing when Em and Drea had first arrived—and Em started shedding layers. She unwound a thick burgundy pashmina from around her neck, shaking out the waves of her long, dark brown hair. As she stood up to take off her coat, she tugged at the belt loops on her jeans to hitch them up—they kept getting looser.

Her opinions of Crow and guitar solos weren’t the only things that had shifted over the past few weeks. In fact, thanks to Drea, Em was seeing a whole new side of Ascension and its surroundings—and not just the green chai tea at the Dungeon, a hippie café downtown and a much preferable alternative to the watered-down Crappuccino next to the old mall. She was getting to know Ascension’s “dyed-hair freaks.” That’s what she and Gabby used to call them, anyway. She didn’t like thinking about that side of herself. Especially not since Drea had recently dyed her hair purple.

These days she felt like she was straddling two worlds, often more comfortable amid Drea’s friends and their loud music than at the Ascension parties.

Crow’s gravelly voice hit the notes of a chorus—“And my voice,” he growled to the beat, “it’s white noise.”

Em pulled out her journal and wrote down some of Crow’s lyrics. They really were good. Em had recently started bringing her journal with her everywhere. She’d kept one sporadically in the past, but these days it was like she couldn’t keep her pen off the paper. Now that everything had changed—now that she’d changed—writing was the only way to keep her grip on reality . . . or what was left of it. It was the beginning of March; the showdown with the Furies had happened more than a month ago. She’d only recently begun to emerge from the practically comatose state she’d been in for weeks.

The royal-blue notebook was full of poems about love and regret. The snow. The cold. Her best friend, Gabby. And, of course, the Furies, who sought to punish wrongdoers for their sins. Em was a victim of their intractable wrath; the three beautiful-yet-hideous girls had exacted revenge on her because she’d spit in the face of love and trust by hooking up with Gabby’s boyfriend. Now she was swallowing the bitter consequences. The worst part was that the guy, Zach, hadn’t even been worth it. Nowhere close.

Well, no. The worst part was what had happened with JD Fount, her quirky neighbor, her childhood friend, and the boy she loved. The Furies had tried to kill him to teach her a lesson about lost love. She’d done what she had to in order to save him. But that included promising never to tell him, or anyone else, the truth about what had happened that night at the new mall, the Behemoth. And keeping those secrets put an impossible barrier between them. How could she apologize to JD without explaining what had really happened—and risk losing him all over again?

She wrote short entries in the journal every night, venting the uncontrollable feelings of sadness and hostility that seemed, sometimes, about to consume her. Writing eased her insomnia a bit, although it couldn’t cure it. She cursed her pale skin, which made the dark circles under her eyes even more prominent.

Em blinked a few times, trying to snap back to attention. She wondered if Drea would want to go home soon—it was Sunday night, after all, and Em still had a chemistry lab to finish before third period tomorrow.

“We keeping you up?” Crow sauntered over, towering above the couch and raking his hand through his hair. “I know a pretty girl like you needs your beauty sleep.”

“Sorry for blinking,” Em said, sitting up straighter. While Crow had ignored her at first, he’d recently started to notice—and tease—her.

“Ah. The princess awakens!” Crow’s eyes gleamed.

“I’m not a princess,” Em blurted out. She’d been defensive lately, wary of people assuming that she thought she was better than everyone else. Like JD had. They’d only communicated once since that night at the Behemoth, the night she’d saved his life. One email, from him to her: I’m not willing to be your Chauffeur anymore, Em. I won’t be taken for granted ever again.

Since then, nothing. No eye contact in the hallways, no waves from his driveway, where JD was apparently working on his dad’s Mustang. Most days when Em came home, she glimpsed him lying halfway underneath the car, an open toolbox next to him on the freezing pavement. He never poked his head out to shout hello. Without saying a word, he was communicating clearly: JD wanted nothing to do with her anymore.

Telling him she loved him would be meaningless without an explanation about that night. Still, she thought about him constantly. His absence only made her realize how intense their connection had been, and how right he was—she had taken him for granted. One thing was for sure: Her feelings for him weren’t like what she’d felt, or thought she’d felt, for Zach. Things with JD had never been tinged with betrayal. What they shared was warm and right. Or at least, it could be. It had been.

“Seems like you’re slumming it, to me,” Crow said stonily, raising an eyebrow. He was egging her on, and she took the bait.

“I didn’t realize I needed your permission to be here,” she said. “We can go.” She tried to keep her tone light—flirtatious, even—but she was surprised at the pricks of tears she felt at the backs of her eyes. She stood up and turned to find Drea.

“Whoa, no need to take off.” Crow threw up his hands in mock surrender. “Never mind. My bad. You’re a plebeian just like the rest of us.”

Thank god Mike chose that moment to come over and discuss chord progressions with Crow. Em hoped Crow didn’t see her face, which she could feel was burning bright red.

She leaned toward the couch where Drea sat with Cassie, an Ascension sophomore Em had never spoken to before last month. “Drea, are you ready to go soon? I’ve got chem homework.” She crossed her arms and hoped her ears weren’t turning red too.

“Sure, lemme just finish this up,” Drea said, motioning to the tattoo drawing she’d started for Cassie on the back of an envelope. Em nodded and crouched down, pretending to dig in her bag for something.

“Hey, Em,” Crow said, turning away from Mike.

She refused to look up at him, and instead kept her eyes on the toes of his ratty Converse sneakers. “Yeah?”

“Listen, I didn’t mean anything by what I said. I was just thinking, you know, Sleeping Beauty and all.” He tapped her knee with the tip of his Converse, and she finally looked up. “Are you one of those hot girls who can’t take a compliment or something?”

“Oh, please.” Now Em was really blushing.

“I’m serious. Look, I didn’t mean to call you out for being here. I really hate that kind of shit—groups and types and all of that.” He said it vaguely, but Em couldn’t help but think of how many times she’d called him the Grim Creeper or stared at him and whispered as he walked down the hall.

“It’s totally fine,” Em said, embarrassed. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Drea picking up her bag. She searched for something else to say to Crow, to convince him that things between them were cool.

“Awesome. So does your chem homework involve spewing blood?” He smiled at her.

Em stiffened. “What are you talking about?”

“Remember that badass volcano you made in sixth grade? I thought of it the other day. The lava just came pouring out, and you said it looked like spurting blood? That ruled.” He laughed. “Emily Winters, mistress of gore. Put that on your prom queen résumé.” He made a fake-scared face. “Just kidding. No princesses. No queens.”

Em rolled her eyes. “Yeah, I’m thinking of submitting one volcano with each of my college applications,” she said.

He snorted and shook his head. “Good stuff.” And then Jake called out to him; break was over. “See you around.” He touched her shoulder lightly with two fingers and she smiled shyly. Maybe she fit in with Drea’s friends better than she thought.

Or maybe not. As she and Drea walked toward the door, she heard Crow call out her name. She turned.

“Hope you grace us with your presence again soon,” Crow said over his shoulder, giving a slight bow. She glared at his back.

·  ·  ·

“We need to stop at the Dungeon when we get back to Ascension,” Drea said as she merged onto the highway. “I am in des-per-ate need of some caffeine.”

Em used to think she and Gabby were caffeine fiends, but Drea’s coffee addiction knew no limits. It was like she needed a Red Bull just to have a conversation. “I thought you were trying to cut down,” Em said lightly.

“I’ll cut down tomorrow. Looks like you could use some too,” Drea wryly pointed out.

Damn those dark circles. Em shook her head. “I’m having trouble enough sleeping. I definitely don’t need a pick-me-up.”

“That’s not getting any better, huh?” Drea looked over at her. Their faces were illuminated every time an oncoming car drove by; it gave their conversation an erratic rhythm.

“Not really,” Em said glumly. No need to tell Drea the lack of sleeping had actually gotten worse. She stared out the window. The winter had been a brutal one so far, but Gabby’s mom, local weatherwoman Marty Dove, was predicting a milder end of winter. Em would be grateful for a break from the frigid temperatures, the hard creaking of icy branches outside her bedroom window.

“Well, think about it this way,” Drea said, picking at her fingernails like she did whenever she was thinking hard. “All the creative geniuses in the world were haunted by something. I bet Hemingway, like, never experienced REM sleep.”

Em looked down at the journal in her bag. Its contents were definitely not genius caliber. Nor were her grades, not since the Furies had come into her life. “I might be an insomniac, but I’m no genius,” she said.

They were pulling into the Dungeon parking lot when Em spotted JD’s car. Her stomach flipped. And there he was. She watched him push through the café’s doors and stride toward his car. He had such a specific gait—like his feet had tiny springs in them.

She’d been silent for weeks, but tonight she was feeling feisty—which she could probably attribute to her exchange with Crow. Drea hadn’t even pulled the car completely into the parking spot before Em hopped out.

“Where are you . . . ?” she heard Drea cry out as she hurried to intercept JD before he reached his driver’s-side door.

“JD,” she called, her voice ringing in the night air. He looked up and flinched. “Hold on for a second, okay?” It was better to corner him here, she figured, where there were few distractions.

For the first time in what felt like ages, she found herself face-to-face with him. She was standing between him and the Volvo; he’d have to move her if he wanted to leave. In regular jeans and a black jacket, he looked kind of subdued—only his tousled hair and a pair of thick-framed glasses betrayed his typically eccentric style.

As they looked at each other, trying to figure out who would speak first, Drea walked by, head down.

“Hey, Fount,” she said to JD. “Em, I’ll meet you inside.”

“Hi, Drea,” JD said, not taking his eyes off of Em.

Then, breaking the silence, JD asked coldly, “What do you want, Em?”

“Nice glasses,” she said. Nothing. Stony silence. She sighed and continued. “Please,” she said, pulling the ends of her scarf to make it tighter, “I need to know why you’ve been avoiding me. It’s been weeks.” She thought she was in fair territory—when they’d made their pact with her, the Furies hadn’t forbidden asking questions, right?

“Clearly my strategy hasn’t worked too well,” JD said evenly. “I started coming here because I thought you preferred the Crappuccino.”

“It’s Drea . . .” Em said weakly. “She likes it here.” She swallowed back the tightness in her throat. “JD, please. Please talk to me.”

JD looked at her coldly. “I can’t,” he said. “Could you forgive me if I’d done what you did?”

Em stared back. What did he mean?

“And you want to know the worst part?” He barreled on. “The worst is that you obviously don’t even think it was a big deal. What happened that night . . . I thought things between us were going somewhere. The only place they w...

Présentation de l'éditeur :

“The Furies make pleasingly vicious villains” (Kirkus Reviews) in this second book of a chilling paranormal trilogy where revenge rules the day—and “sorry” isn’t going to cut it.

Spring is coming, and the ice is slowly melting in Ascension...revealing the secrets buried beneath.

Emily Winters knows the Furies have roots in Ascension, Maine—but she’s about to discover that they’re deeper than she ever imagined. With the help of her new friend Drea, she vows to dig them out. But it’s hard to focus when she’s desperate to make up with JD, and to figure out why Crow, a mysterious Ascension High dropout, seems to be shadowing her.

Meanwhile, new girl Skylar McVoy is determined to leave her own dark past behind. So she’s thrilled when popular Gabby takes her under her wing, and the stunning and sophisticated Meg offers to give her a major makeover. But everyone knows what happens to the vainest girl of all...

It’s tempting to be naughty. But beware: the Furies are always watching, and their power grows stronger by the day.

À propos de cette édition

• Éditeur: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
• Date d'édition: 2013
• ISBN 10: 144242222X
• ISBN 13: 9781442422223
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 416