Page 66 of Have a Bear-y Little Christmas
“I already ate,” Ana said. “I’m gonna do some last-minute stuff at my place. I’ll meet you at your cabin at three?”
“You got it.”
“Sap!Lookin’ forward to it.” She hurried off. While I wasn’t the biggest hiker and never really had been, I had to admit I was looking forward to it too.
Chapter 16
Adelaide
Lining Up the Dominoes
“Is she gone?”Max asked, cracking an eye open from the couch about a minute after Miss Jeannie. I looked up from my book in surprise, because I totally thought he had been sleeping.
Man, I couldn’t wait until I got my enhanced senses so I could pick up on things like heartbeats and someone’s breath increasing as they switched from stone-cold asleep to wakeful.
“She is,” I murmured softly. Although Miss Jeannie was entirely human, all the rest of the adults in the room were not. I loved my family, but I wasn’t sure about their ability to keep a secret. As well as how many of them would approve of what we were planning. “Stay there. I’m gonna peep out the window.”
“Heard.”
Noting the page number I was on, I closed my book and headed over to one of the many,manywindows in the main cabin, which was part of how I could read in the middle of the room with no light directly above me. I preferred it like thatsince Ihatedthe buzz that came with some of that fluorescent illumination.
Sure enough, I could see my auntie and Miss Jeannie a few feet from the main entrance before they turned to the opposite side of the building.Perfect.
“They’re headed to a blind spot, which is good, but I’ll give them another minute before I head out.” I said once I returned to Max’s side.
“Can I come with you?” Eva asked, popping up from where she had been playing with her dolls. I didn’t really like Barbies or stuffed animals like she did, but I enjoyed the hare-brained dramas she acted out. It was like my own personal soap opera—much better than the stuff that used to show on the TV when my mom had to go to the hospital.
“Sure, but remember you can’t say anything about what we’re doing.”
Eva rolled her eyes. “I know. I get it.”
“Yeah, Eva’s smart!”
“Yes, she is.”
And I would never argue otherwise.
I knew how my sister came off to people because she was quite shy and didn’t enjoy verbalizing her thoughts like I did, but that didn’t mean she wasdumb.In fact, it made me angry when people thought that. If they just played with her or really listened to her when she got going, they’d understand there was a whole world in her head. A cool one at that. But most people never even cared to try to get past the gates.
“Do you want my book while I’m gone?” I asked, changing the subject. One thing I really liked about Max was that he had already proven that he would defend Eva from those very people who underestimated her. He understood her, and he also understood me, which wasn’t always the case with other people,especially now that Eva and I were getting older and becoming more…Us.
I liked how we were, and although I knew we would change when we were all grown up, I never wanted either of us to be different just to fit in. Daddy did a good job of encouraging us to be us, but sometimes it could get kinda lonely. Sometimes, I felt like the only person I could have coherent and fulfilling conversations with at school was Symphony. She was like me—always asking questions, always hungry for more info, more knowledge, and fiercely competitive. I was grateful for her, but one friend did not make a healthy social circle, especially since she got burnt out on interaction really fast and needed time to recoup.
“Won’t that mess up where you are in the book? You don’t have a bookmark, right?”
“I memorized the last page I was on.”
I braced myself out of habit, prepared for him to tell me that was stupid. He wouldn’t be the first person. Many people had pointed out to me in my short life that using a bookmark or—heaven forbid!—dog-earing a page would be a much more simpler and consistent way of finding my spot again, but they didn’t get it. It was like a little challenge. A way toearnmy return to whatever I was enjoying. If I didn’t remember, then I hadn’t absorbed the information well enough, so I deserved to reread whatever I needed to get back to where I had left off.
“Really? That’s kinda cool. Do you use a mnemonic device, or is it just raw memorization?”
I should’ve known better, because Max was never like that. Ever. Even that first moment we met and my whole mind was locked up with that awful, awful, bright red, he never told me and my sister we were weird. He just accepted us. And sometimes he even agreed with us, which told me we weren’t the freaks I felt we were.
After all, kids were supposed to have a mommy, right? I didn’t have that anymore. And a daddy, which Max didn’t have either.
Really, it was only logical that if we both lacked parental sets, we should combine. Synergy, I think I had read about it or something.
“I just kinda memorized it.”
