Page 60 of Until the Stars Fall

Eyre’s voice came over the intercom. “Is everything okay down there? We just had a power outage and lost gravity.”

He pulled me to my feet and replied to her. “We’re all good now, just a problem with my spell I didn’t expect. Got it fixed now!”

That was almost the end of us all, and it would’ve been all my fault. My defective magic.

He came back and peered down into my eyes, speaking gently. “Hey, it’s okay, no one got hurt, we fixed it. I’m more worried about you than artificial gravity.”

I shook my head. I couldn’t let him make excuses for me. “It’s not okay. I messed up the spell. I could have hurt everyone on the ship.”

“We don’t know it was you—”

“Of course it was me!” I cried. “Who else would screw up a backup spell so bad that it affected other systems?” Beck tried to pull me into his arms, but I pulled away. I didn’t deserve his comfort. I had to tell him.

His shoulders drooped. “Gemma, you know as well as I do that those systems are wired in tandem. An interruption to the centrifugal motion of the water drums affects the artificial gravity.” He threw his arm out to encompass the whole room. “Everything’s interconnected, and these spells aren’t easy to do. They take practice.”

But I knew in my heart that my hesitation put everyone at risk. I shook my head. “I know it’s me, because when I do magic, bad things happen.”

“You healed my face and nothing bad happened. You saved my life on the spacewalk, and we were all fine. Listen, did I ever tell you that I’ve always had this fear that I’d die in space? But you saved me in the spacewalk. With your magic. Your not bad, very good magic saved my life.”

My blood ran cold, and I took a step back. “Wait, what? You divined that you’re gonna die in space, and you let me do these spells?” I pushed past him down the steps. I had to get away from him. Being around me put him in too much danger.

His footsteps followed after me. “No, it wasn’t a divination. Those are more…precise? This was just a fear. But you didn’t let it happen.” He stepped in front of me, pointed at his tattoo. “You did that. You saved me from the abyss.”

“We’re still in the abyss, Beck!” I nearly shouted. “We’re about to go through a fucking wormhole on this decrepit ship! And you’re letting me do spells?”

“But the spell wasn’t that bad. I fixed it. You should’ve seen my first spells. They were a disaster.”

Tears streamed down my face, and I shook my head again. “But this isn’t one of my first spells. I’ve been pushing my magic down for a long time now, but I didn’t always. You want to know why I lied to Hannah, to everybody about my magic? Because it’s shit. My magic is cursed, Beck. I’m cursed.”

Beck took a breath as if he would interrupt me but bit his lip instead.

“When I was a kid, and my magic came in, when I realized I could do things other kids couldn’t, I couldn’t wait to show my parents. I practiced for weeks. I thought they’d be thrilled, finally proud of something I did. But my magic was shit. It was so unpredictable. Of course it wouldn’t work in front of them.” I sputtered an incredulous laugh. “Did you know they put me in therapy for months for telling stories? It wouldn’t show up for the therapist either. I had to confess I’d been making the whole thing up just so they wouldn’t make me go anymore.

“I tried to ignore my magic after that. But it was too tempting. And I thought I could get better. I hid what I could do from everyone, even Hannah for a while, until she caught me. I worked hard at my magic, like I do everything.

“But it didn’t matter. The boy I liked in eighth grade invited me to the dance but then invited Sarita Jones a week later to replace me, without even telling me? I tried to make his suit too small so he couldn’t wear it to the dance that night, but instead I gave him a full-body itching rash for a week.

“When I found out Lara and Dashana talked about me behind my back, I did a spell to make them—just for a day—get tongue-tied every time they spoke. But I gave them speech impediments that they had to go to therapy for. I was petty, Beck. I was vindictive. And messing up the spells never made me stop trying to do them.

“And then—” I sobbed harder and choked it back. “And then when I was sixteen, we came home from school one day. My parents were leaving for a play, but they’d waited in the foyer for us. They’d found my hidden box with all my magic things. I’d never seen them so angry. I tried to take my things back,” I cried. The storm that night had been heavy and wild, with loud gusts of wind sheeting the rain in every direction.

“But they told me they knew what was best. They took my box and threw it in the trash compactor. My crystals, cards, everything. They told me they were sending me back to therapy for my delusions and my lying.

“After they left, I ran up to my room.” I hiccupped a sob. “I threw myself across my bed. My magic was at a boiling point. I know it was ready to act. And I screamed, ‘I hope you never come back!’”

I wrapped both of my arms around myself, sobbing. I couldn’t bear to see whatever horror I knew would be on his face now that he knew the truth about me. “They never made it to the theater,” I choked out. “They died, and I caused it.”

“Gemma,” Beck started, his voice heartachingly gentle.

“No!” I pulled away from his reaching arm and walked towards the door. “Stay away from me. I’m only going to hurt you.”

He hurried after me. With his long legs, he got in front of me again and put his hands out. “Please, Gemma,” he begged, his own voice ragged. “Please don’t walk away from me. Please stay and talk to me.”

“No,” I cried. “I’m a monster, and you deserve to know the truth about me.”

“You’re not a monster. I’m so sad you’ve carried this guilt all this time. Please, just come talk to me,” he pleaded.

Here he was with his ridiculous good heart trying to make me feel better, like I knew he would. But I couldn’t fall into the loving trap that was his arms. He needed to hear it all.

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