The Fallen Star

“I don’t know…” I trailed off. Honestly, I didn’t have an answer to give him. At least not one I could share without seeming like I belonged in a straitjacket. I picked at a loose string sticking up from my comforter. “It’s just how I’ve always been, I guess.”

“And it doesn’t bother you being by yourself all the time?”

I shrugged, staring at the floor. “Not really. Well, maybe lately it has a little.” The room quieted except for the low hum of the music. I heard the chair squeaked, and the next thing I knew, Alex was climbing off the chair and walking toward me. His hands were in his pockets, and the lack of uncertainty he carried looked out of place on him.

When he reached my bed, he slid the pile of books out of the way and sat down beside me. We were sitting so close to one another that the only thing between our knees was a 178/695

whisper of air. My head started buzzing as every single one of my nerves sparkled with electricity. I became hyperaware that Alex was sitting next to me on my bed. Holy crap.Never in a million years would I have thought that would ever happen.

“What do you think the sudden change came from?” he asked, continuing our conversation right where we’d left off.

I had to mentally prepare myself before I spoke, otherwise I would have stammered like an idiot. “I’m not sure.”

“So what? You just basically woke up one day and decided you wanted to have friends?”

Yeah….there was no way I was going to tell him the real reason—that part of the sudden change stemmed from his arrival. “I know it’s weird, isn’t it?”

“Not necessarily weird, but it is kind of interesting,” he said. “But I find you interesting all together.”

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I traced the circular pattern of the comforter with my finger, feeling extremely uncomfortable with so much of his attention fixed on me. “Trust me, there's nothing interesting about me.” I was kind of lying, I guess, if by interesting, he meant the stick-you-under-a-microscope-and-study-you kind of interesting.

“I think there is.” He paused, casting a brief glance at my computer as the song switched. “I mean for one thing, I find it interesting how long you put up with me being a complete jerk. Not a lot of people would’ve done that without getting mad and telling me off.”

“Oh trust me, I got mad.”

“Is that what you call it?” he teased.

“Hey,” I said defensively. “Need I remind you that you’re the one who said I have a temper on me?”

“Yeah, but it’s more entertaining than anything else.”

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I crossed my arms and stared him down, trying to look as tuff as I could. “Oh really.” He laughed. “Yeah really.” I sighed and dropped my arms onto my lap. I guess acting tuff wasn’t my forte.

A fu

“Yeah, you do.” He leaned in closer to me. If he did it again, our heads would probably be touching. “You can trust me, you know. You can tell me anything.” As much as I wanted to believe that was true, I didn’t. Yes, he was being nice to me, but I hadn’t forgotten how he’d treated me in the begi

conversation I’d overheard between him and Aislin in the library.

He moved even closer. Our heads didn’t touch like I thought they would, but they were close. Oh God, we were so close.

“Gemma, I promise you can trust me.” Every inch of my body hummed, and my brain was getting foggy. Maybe I could trust him….

“Gemma! What are you doing?” Sophia’s sharp voice cut through my thoughts like a sharp knife, and it popped the tension between Alex and I like a needle to a balloon.

I turned around and found her standing in my doorway, her hand gripped so tightly around the door knob that her knuckles were paper white. I could only imagine how much this scene looked out of place to her.

Heck, it seemed out of place to me.

“Umm…this is Alex,” I told her, motioning at Alex. “We were just working on a project for school.”

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She narrowed her eyes at Alex. “Hello Alex.”

Oh, my God. This was so embarrassing.

Alex seemed fine, though. He held her gaze steadily, never wavering beneath the burn of Sophia’s glare.

Man, to have such confidence.

Sophia moved her eyes on me. “It’s time for di

I stared confusedly at her. Eat di

She looked like she wanted to strangle me. “Since now.”

“Fine,” I said, my tone clipped. “I’ll be down in a minute.”

“Well, hurry up. I don’t want the food to get cold.” She shot another death glare at Alex, and then stormed out of the room.

I turned back to Alex. “I’m so sorry.

She’s been kind of crazy lately.” 183/695

He laughed softly. “Yeah...I bet.” He got to his feet and grabbed his jacket off the back of the chair. “Well, I should probably go. I’ll see you in class tomorrow, okay?” I nodded. “Yeah, okay.”

He put his jacket on and started for the door, but stopped in the doorway and turned around. It looked like he wanted to say something, but he couldn’t find the words.

Finally, he just waved and walked out.

For a minute, I just sat there, feeling torn. Part of me felt relieved that he’d left because, if he’d stayed, I might have broken down and told him things I didn’t want him to know. I almost had until Sophia had walked in. The other part of me, though, wished he’d stayed; felt sad that he’d left.

I let out a sigh. When did life become so complicated?

I got up, shut my music off, and headed downstairs for “di

picture the three of us sitting around the table like a normal family. In fact, I couldn’t even picture it. It was that strange. But whatever. I guess I was about to find out firsthand was it was like to be part of a family.

Halfway down the stairs, I thought I heard voices coming from the foyer. I didn’t think much of it at first, until I realized who the voices belonged to. Sophia and Alex.

Great. She’d probably cornered him and was saying God knows what.

This was so freaking embarrassing.

I sped up down the stairs—I needed to end this quick. But just before I reached the bottom, I heard something that made me slow down.

“You know the rules, Alex.” Sophia’s tone was razor-sharp. “So you should know better than to be getting close to her.” I stopped dead in my tracks. Rules?

What was going on here?

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“Yeah, I know the rules.” The sharpness of Alex’s tone matched Sophia’s. “But need I remind you that Stephan sent me here to get some answers from her. And in order to do that, I need to get close to her.” Stephan. There was that name again.

The same one I’d heard him mention during my eavesdropping session in the library.

“That’s not what you’re doing,” she snapped. “You’re crossing a line Alex. A very, very, thin, dangerous line.”

“I think you’re forgetting that I don’t take my orders from you.” Alex’s lowered his voice, and I had to lean forward on my tiptoes in order to make out what he said. “I’ll do what I need to do in order to get her to—” I lost my balance and, being the graceful queen that I was, stumbled forward, banging my elbow into the wall, hard. “Ah!” I cried out, and then threw my hand over my mouth. Crap.

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A few moments of silence ticked by. Had they heard me? Of course they’d heard me.

They weren’t deaf.

“Gemma,” Sophia called out.