Description: Oblivion 1 A Valentine Dear Varen, After putting your name on paper, it seems I can hardly hold my pen steady. So this won''t be neat. I''m not good with words like you are, so it won''t be eloquent, either. Valentine''s Day is this weekend. I''m in English class, and Mr. Swanson wants us to work on composing romantic sonnets. He''s gone over the format twice, but thinking about iambic pentameter and quatrains makes me feel like I''m trying to solve a math word problem. At least, I''m pretty sure my poetry reads like one. If you were here, I know you''d already be done with yours. I also know it would be beautiful. I can see your desk from where I''m sitting. I won''t find you there even if I look, but part of me is always afraid that I will. Sometimes I wonder if that''s what you wanted. For me to be afraid of you. For everyone to be afraid, so no one would try to get close. They tell me that I died. They say that I was dead, and I want to tell them I still am. At least that''s how I feel. Because I know where you are and what''s become of you. Because I couldn''t stop it and I couldn''t bring you back. Because Reynolds was right when he told me I couldn''t reach you. Everything''s broken. And yet here I am, writing you what must be a Valentine. Because even though I know I shouldn''t still love you, even though I know that is the last thing I should have room to feel for you, more than anything, I want to tell you I do. * * * Isobel lifted her shaking pen from the vein-blue lines of her notebook, wondering how the confession had managed to escape her. She''d never written like that before, where the words just poured out, unstoppable. The final line burned into her retinas, echoing a truth that she''d hoped to keep hidden away, locked inside with everything else. She smacked a hand on the paper, crumpling it. What was wrong with her? Why couldn''t she let go? Why, when he had let her go? The lunch bell rang, the noise shredding her already frayed nerves. "Okay, folks," Mr. Swanson said, standing from behind his desk, his wooden rolling chair sliding back to bump against the chalk tray. "I''d like to go ahead and collect these today, even if you''re not finished. I''ll hand them back tomorrow, so you''ll have the first few minutes of class to do some revising, and then I''ll grade them over the weekend." Everyone got up, papers flapping, and the unanimous flutter in the room reminded Isobel of a flock of birds taking wing. Tekeli-li . . . Afraid someone might catch sight of Varen''s name, Isobel ripped her own rumpled paper free and stuffed it into the middle of the notebook. Glancing up, she saw that Mr. Swanson had moved to the door. Like a ticket taker, he collected papers as her classmates filed into the hall. "Another reason I should gather these now," he said, "is the simple fact that many a great work of literature has been lost by remaining tucked haphazardly into the pockets and knapsacks of young, carefree scribes such as yourselves. Wanderlust wayfarers, cavalier bards, wistful wordsmiths--" "And phat rappers," Bobby Bailey said as he handed Mr. Swanson his sonnet. "And portly rappers, why not?" Mr. Swanson conceded with a nod, adding Bobby''s paper to the accumulating stack. Isobel rose. She tore off the top sheet of her notebook and, gathering her things, kept her head down as she approached the door and its guardian. Handing in the blank paper, she ducked past him into the hall. "Ah, Miss Lanley," he called after her, his voice carrying over the rising chatter and banging of lockers. Flinching, Isobel stopped. "I see thou hast submitted parchment free of words, and thus error. How very avant-garde," Mr. Swanson said, talking in that way he sometimes did, like a Shakespeare character who had somehow clawed his way out from the press of musty book pages. The power of words . . . "Fear not, fair leader of cheers," he went on, "I both recognize and appreciate the temperament of the artist who feels her work is, as yet, unfit for the scrutiny of another''s eye. So how about I grant thou till the morrow to turn in yon magnum opus I saw thou scribbling on mere moments ago?" She clutched her books tighter. "No offense, Mr. Swanson," Isobel heard Katlyn Binkly interject, "but I think you read too much." Grateful for the momentary distraction, Isobel slid alongside Bobby and his basketball friends. Hiding herself between their lumbering forms and the wall, she used them for cover while they headed for the cafeteria. "Alas," she heard Mr. Swanson sigh as she moved down the hall, "''tis entirely possible. But would you have me forfeit my adoration of the written word for such folly as reality TV?" Isobel steered herself away from Bobby''s group and past a senior couple kissing behind an open locker door meant to hide their PDA from Mr. Nott, the hall-slash-lunchroom monitor. The girl had her arms thrown around the boy''s neck. In one hand, she clutched a small bouquet, bundled together with baby''s breath and wrapped in clear plastic. Isobel halted when she caught sight of crimson buds through the glossy film. Three red roses. Taking notice of Isobel, the girl broke the kiss. Following his girlfriend''s gaze, the boy turned his head to see what had interrupted their embrace. "What are you staring at?" he asked. An infamous question, Isobel thought. One she''d been asked before. "Taking notes?" the girl chimed in. Notes. Isobel moved on without responding. "Freaking head case," she heard the boy mutter. The whispers didn''t bother her anymore, though. Not like they used to. Bypassing the entrance to the lunchroom, she made her way to the side door that led to the courtyard. She wanted to avoid the displays of cardboard-cutout arrow-pierced hearts, dart-shooting cupids, and dangling red-and-white streamers. That meant steering clear of the cafeteria and the gym, both of which had been festooned in decorations. Isobel shoved open the door, and February greeted her with icy breath. As she walked to one of the courtyard''s empty stone benches, gathering the escaping wisps of her hair and tucking them behind one ear, her fingertips brushed the cheek that bore a slanted, needle-thin scar. Though the wound had healed, and though she took care to mask it every morning with concealer and powder, Isobel still felt the scar''s presence. It carried with it a constant, low-grade pain she could never be certain was real or imagined: a by-product of lingering nerve damage, or a sensation produced from the lasting memory of how she''d received the gash. We are ever and always home now. Pinfeathers''s final words bubbled up through the mire of haunting echoes in her mind. In spite of herself, she checked the oak tree limbs and scanned the school''s roof ledge, searching for any sign of ebony feathers, or the black stare that longed for . . . what? She doubted even he knew. Had known. Isobel set her things down on the bench, unsure of what to do with herself. Wanting to avoid Gwen, she hadn''t stopped by their adjacent lockers to pick up her parka or the sack lunch she''d made that morning. Since today was Trenton''s annual Valentine''s Day luncheon, she had told Gwen the previous afternoon that she wanted to spend the lunch break on her own. She''d done so as a favor to both of them. So Gwen could be with Mikey without feeling guilty about leaving her alone, and so that Isobel wouldn''t have to endure Gwen''s sympathetic glances and well-meaning attempts at condolence. Even though Gwen still knew nothing about what had happened after Isobel disappeared through the open tomb door and into the dreamworld, there was one thing her friend could deduce through observation alone. Isobel had failed to return with Varen. As far as Gwen knew--as far as anyone knew--Isobel remembered nothing. And whether or not Gwen bought the amnesia act, Isobel didn''t think her friend had any real inkling as to what had actually occurred. She must have assumed that Varen had been determined to stay. Or worse, that Isobel had found him dead. In a way, it felt like she had. Whatever conclusion Gwen had drawn this time, though, she wasn''t asking questions or pushing for answers. Maybe she had learned her lesson in that regard. Maybe now that Gwen had her own losses to take into account--a fractured arm and a shattered sense of reality, perhaps even her own nightmares to contend with--she would simply give Isobel the slow fade. Like Isobel''s crew--Stevie, Nikki, and Alyssa--Gwen would find a way to bow out and extract herself from Isobel''s life. Or, like Brad, she might even convince her family to move to another state. "Special delivery," came a voice from behind her, its clipped and all-too-familiar Brooklyn accent instantly negating all of Isobel''s theories. Turning, she found Gwen standing a few yards away, her left arm free of its cast but still supported by a navy-blue sling. In her other hand, she held up a small paper basket of food. "Mummified cucumbers and petrified potatoes," Gwen said. "I hear pickles an

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