“Can they do that?” Shock flooded her voice
I laughed drily. “This is your planet, not ours. You even said it. And they keep us in place by funding our lives. We have random check-ins, so we can’t hide or anything. Once they know we’re here, that’s it. And that’s not all. We’re expected to find another Luxen and to stay there.”
Her gaze sharpened. “That doesn’t seem fair.”
“It’s not.” I sat up, draping my arms over my bent knees. “It’s easy to feel human. I know I’m not, but I want the same things that all humans want—” What was I saying to her? I cleared my throat as my jaw worked. “Anyway, something happened between Dawson and Bethany. I don’t know what. He never said. They went out hiking one Saturday and he came back late, his clothing torn and covered with blood. They were closer than ever. If Matt and the Thompsons didn’t have their suspicions before, they did then. That following weekend, Dawson and Bethany went out to the movies. They never came back.”
Kat closed her eyes.
“The DOD found him the next day in Moorefield, his body dumped in a field like garbage. I didn’t get to say good-bye. They took his body before I could even see him, because of the risk of exposure. When we die or get hurt, we resort back to our true form.”
Her voice was soft when she spoke. “Are you sure he’s…dead then, if you’ve never seen his body?”
“I know an Arum got him. Drained him of his abilities and killed him. If he were still alive, he would’ve found a way to contact us. Both his and Bethany’s bodies were taken away before anyone could see. Her parents will never know what happened to her. And all we know is that he had to have done something that left a trace on her, enabling the Arum to find him. That’s the only way. They can’t sense us here. He had to have done something major.”
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I know there’s nothing I can say. I’m just so sorry.”
Lifting my chin, I gazed up at the sky. The weight of losing Dawson was like a hundred-pound ball of lead settling in my stomach. It hurt. Still hurt like it was yesterday. Still woke up some nights and found myself in his bedroom, wishing I could just see him one more time.
“I…I miss the idiot,” I said raggedly.
Kat didn’t say anything, but she leaned over, wrapping her arms around me. I stiffened out of surprise. She didn’t seem to notice, because she squeezed me tight, and then she let go, pulling away.
I stared at her, shocked to my very core. After the things I said to her a handful of minutes ago, she did this? Hugged me?
She lowered her gaze to her hands. “I miss my dad, too. It doesn’t get any easier.”
The breath I let out was harsh. “Dee said he was sick but not what was wrong with him. I’m sorry…for your loss. Sickness isn’t something we’re accustomed to. What was it?”
“It was brain cancer. It started off with just headaches. You know? He’d get these terrible headaches and then he started having vision problems. When that happened, he went in for testing and he had cancer.” She glanced up at the sky, her brows knitting together. “It seemed like it happened so fast after that, but I guess, in a way it hadn’t been. I got time with him before he…”
“Before what?” I watched her, unable to do anything but that.
Her smile was sad. “He changed toward the end. The tumor affected things. That…that was hard, you know?” Shaking her head, she lowered her chin. “But I have all the memories of the good times, like when we worked out in the garden together or went to the bookstore. Every Saturday morning we did the garden thing. And then every Sunday afternoon, since I could remember, we went to the bookstore.”
I was beginning to see why she loved gardening and reading so much. It kept her close to her father. We’d both suffered so much loss. “Dawson and I…we used to go hiking together all the time. Dee’s really never been big on that.”
She grinned a little. “I can’t really picture her climbing a mountain.”
I chuckled at that. “Agreed.”
As daylight turned to dusk, and stars started to fill the sky, we…we just talked. I told her about the first time Dawson morphed into someone else and got stuck. She talked to me about how her friendships fell apart after her father got sick. I found it interesting that she took the blame for that. We talked until the air took on a chill, and it was time for us to head back.
Truth be told, I really didn’t want to return to reality. I enjoyed this. Kat. Me. Talking. Never thought I would, but I did. I really did.
Comfortable silence surrounded us as we walked back to our houses. There was a light on in the living room of Kat’s house, so her voice was low when she turned to me. “What happens now?”
I didn’t answer.
I had no idea what happened now.
I spent most of Sunday listening to Dee and Kat talk about books and how book boyfriends were universally better than real boyfriends while they sat in the living room. And since I was a guy, maybe not human, I really wanted to disagree with that statement, but once they started listing the attributes of some of these dudes in the books Kat carried around with her, there was no way anyone could compete with that.
I felt like I needed to warn Adam or something.
Matthew was having a cookout on Labor Day, which Kat had found hilarious that aliens were celebrating Labor Day…up until Dee was leaving. For a multitude of obvious reasons, Kat couldn’t go with Dee. She tried not to show it, but the smile she wore while she sat on our front porch didn’t reach her gray eyes.