Chapter 23

Waiting game.



Nathaniel insisted I stay until the evening. I didn't have to be at work until Wednesday. His phone kept ringing, but I noticed that he kept sending the calls to voicemail.
"She keeps calling you, doesn’t she?" I asked trying to keep the sound of jealousy out of my voice. I tried to imagine how Quentin would react when I revealed to him that I’d been sleeping with my ex-boyfriend, who was also a client.
He didn't reply straight away, and his silence only confirmed it.
"I'm ready to talk to her, but you keep telling me to wait," he said sounding angry. I bit my lip, telling myself that he should just tell her. I didn’t know what I was waiting for.
"Yeah, but Quentin should know the truth before anyone else. What I’m doing to him is completely unfair.” I sighed remembering how kind my giant truly was and the way he always wanted to make me happy.
Nathaniel was silent for a moment. I could sense his anger before he finally spoke.
"All right, I think you should let me talk to those guys. What if they’re using your energy, only pretending they’re trying to help?”
I was surprised when he didn’t disagree with me about Quentin. Maybe he finally understood that we both needed a bit more time.
"And what are you going to tell them? Oh, yeah, I fuck Julia from time to time and those training sessions aren’t helping at all, huh?"
"I say, look into their backgrounds, find out if they’re really who they say they are, then you should talk to your father. Ask some of his men to leave a police car outside your apartment."
"You’re joking, right? My father has no idea what kind of mess I'm in," I hissed, folding my arms together. Nathaniel touched my hair folding it around his finger.
"In that case, I’ll hire someone, and stop arguing. Gordon won’t let his people forget that you got away. For some reason he wanted to keep you and he caught your scent."
"He doesn’t know who I am and in order to avoid blackouts I’ll spend every free evening I have training with Tron and Alex."
"You do what you want but if you think I’ll stand by and watch your magic kill you, then you’re wrong. I love you and I know you think it’s too late for us, but I was a coward before."
“It’s not like that. I love you too, it’s just that I’m afraid I might hurt someone and when we’re together my magic explodes. We have to do this delicately and ending a relationship over the phone isn’t right. We went about this all wrong.” I put my head in my hands wishing I could start things over.
Nathaniel wrapped his arms around me, removing my hands from my face, then tipped up my chin so we were eye level. “I’ll do whatever it takes to help you and if that means we have to wait, then so be it. But my heart belongs to you; it always has.”
In that moment, my heart skipped a beat. I knew he was right and we’d had a connection since the moment we met. Regardless of what happened between us, we were always drawn to one another. We just had to figure out how to do things the right way this time around.
“All right, but you have to understand where I’m coming from. Breaking up with someone over the phone is just cruel. Quentin and Meredith deserve better than that,” I paused taking a deep breath looking into his hazel eyes. “When the time is right, we can start over. I don’t want to hurt them any more than we already have.”
After our talk, Nathaniel finally agreed to wait for me to get my blackouts under control. He said he would be there if I needed him and I only needed to ask for his help. I still felt guilty that we were sneaking around, but at least we now had a plan. I was going to tell Quentin about my affair in person and not take the chicken shit way out by calling him on the phone. I just had to find the right time once my blackouts were under control.
Nathaniel dropped me off two blocks from my apartment but walked me partly the way there just to be safe. Quentin’s car wasn't outside my apartment and for some reason I felt a sense of relief. I felt agitated walking up the stairs still afraid someone would snatch me up. As soon as I got inside I found my phone. I had several missed calls from Quentin and Kate. My stomach tied itself in knots and I wasn’t sure if I was ready to lie to Quentin any more than I had to.
Then I heard a loud knock at my door and nearly jumped off my feet.
"Come on, Julia, it’s Kelsie. Open up!"
My heart was in my throat and for a second there I thought I was going to have to call my dad. I unlocked the door and Kel entered, fortunately for me, she was alone.
"So, you’re alive? Great, thanks for letting me know. Now I can leave," she shouted.
"Hey, hold on, I just walked through the door a minute ago."
She placed her hands on her hips eyeing me suspiciously. She was stunning as usual, although she looked like she’d run all the way to my apartment.
"What? What do you mean? Where the hell have you been since Sunday night and why did my boyfriend call your ex to come and rescue you?"
I understood Kelsie’s questions and if I was going to talk about this to someone other than Nicky, Kelsie was the girl. I opened my mouth to start my pathetic story when she slammed her hands over her face.
"Oh, my God, you’re sleeping with him!"
"Kelsie, listen you need to sit down. The situation is very complicated."
"Julia, no. Please tell me I'm wrong? From our pack, I'm the one who sleeps around, not you? I mean, that was before I met Michael, but you’re good, kind and you kick arse," Kelsie shouted moving around like a lion. "Why would you do this to Quentin?"
Okay, this wasn’t going the way I had planned. It was easy to predict that Kelsie would ask questions about Nathaniel. Why did everything have to be so complicated?
"Come on, you need to come in. We can't talk like this," I said closing the door and pointing at the sofa.
Kelsie sat on the sofa talking loudly under her breath and I only hoped that she wouldn’t mention anything to Kate.
"Well, I'm listening. What happened to you?"
"I didn't plan it. He kept stalking me and I kept saying that he made a mistake. Then I went away for a romantic weekend with Quentin, but he had to leave, and Nathaniel showed up." I started explaining feeling a chill spread over my spine when I recalled our first meeting. "He barged into my hotel room and said that he’d been in love with me all this time, but he was too afraid to admit it."
Kelsie shook her head.
"Julia, come on. He chose another woman. What does that tell you?"
"God, Kelsie, please stop judging me. I fucking love him, all right, and I can't help it, even if he isn't right for me. Sometimes we love people who are destructive and wrong, even if we have to fight against our feelings."
"You two are never going to be serious enough to end up together. If you don’t end this, he won’t stop stepping on your toes. One day, you’re going to wake up but then it’s going to be too late, because La Caz will be your obsession and you won’t let anyone else in."
"He’s going to leave Meredith, but I need more time. Quentin—"
"You fuck guys like Nathaniel and end up with guys like Quentin and that’s all I’ve got to say," she said. "Now I have to go. I have a date with Michael."
"Hold on, what about—"
She didn't even let me finish because she flew across my living room and was out the door. I threw my shoe across the room thinking I’d feel much better if I punched someone, but I didn't, instead I just went to bed.

***

The next day was my day off, so I spent it trying to make Quentin feel special. He didn't answer the phone at all that day. I couldn't not see him and even though our relationship was pretense I had to at least show him that I cared. The guilt was eating me up.
I went to his house instead of trying to talk to him over the phone. He didn't look too happy to see me. Gomez wasn’t helping much when he asked if I was planning to ditch Quentin because he wasn't satisfying enough. After that comment Quentin threw Gomez out into the garden and didn't let him back in until midnight. By that time, he’d already forgiven me for ignoring him. We spent a nice evening together and the subject of moving in together remained unresolved.
On Wednesday I walked through the door reluctant to tell Kate about Sunday and my recent blackout. Kate deserved to know but I was scared that she might be the next person I would hurt.
Thoughts about the fire, blood and the recent murders were on my mind all day. Even though I had no idea how to prevent what was happening to me, I tried to find an answer online in a digital library that specialised in old school spells. Tron kept telling me it was my dark side that was taking over my energy, but I failed to understand why I continued losing long hours of my life. I was afraid that I would have to get my grandmother involved. After all, she was a talented elf and her power never let her down.
I didn't find anything in the library, and my energy kept pressing down on my forehead, causing me to lose concentration. I was losing faith in Tron and Alex’s training. Nothing had changed since I started seeing them, on the contrary, everything was falling apart. Living with the knowledge that my power was only going to get worse, that I would continue to hurt people who were close to me? I hated feeling so useless and wondered if there was anyone else who could help me.
Kate went home early; she had a doctor’s appointment, and when I was left alone with Sara, I couldn't even concentrate on the emails Lucinda was sending through. Later that evening I discovered that the mermaid murder had been leaked to the media. I squeezed the remote control tighter watching as my father talked about Cheryl Kazemi.
"The entire community is in shock. Cheryl was quiet girl who worked as a recruitment consultant in North London. She was brutally murdered in the early hours of the morning. Unfortunately, the suspect disappeared from the crime scene. We are appealing to the public for any further information regarding this case."
Dad was probably under a lot of pressure. Dead bodies were piling up on him, so I needed to stay away and let him deal with the crisis, praying that nothing was linked to me. This new knowledge was going to kill me one day, but I wanted to protect the people that I loved.
I listened to the rest of the news, munching on a peanut butter sandwich wondering if my life would ever get back to normality. Food tasted like sandpaper and I knew it had something to do with the fact that my stomach was in knots. Nerves were slowly eating me away, as the images of Jennifer and that mermaid girl moved in front of my eyes.
In order to deal with overwhelming anxiety, I started cleaning the house. I went to the wardrobe and took out my massive Hoover. If my grandmother could’ve seen me, she would’ve disapproved, saying that I should use my magic, but I was too self-conscious to even think about using my lethal energy for a basic duty such as cleaning. My excess magic caused too much destruction.
After swearing several times, I heard a knock and jumped losing my balance. I ran on my tiptoes to the door and looked through the peep hole. When I saw Ella on the other side of my door, my anxiety came back. I turned around and tried not to move, wondering what Ella was doing here.
I’d stayed away from her after I put her into a coma. She kept asking about me, but I decided it was better to keep her away, just in case my energy went out of control.
"Julia Taylor, you open this door right now. I know you’re inside!" she shouted with her usual high-pitched voice. I started to panic wondering if I knew any kind of spell that would stun her temporarily, but despite regular training my magic wasn’t stable, and I couldn't risk hurting her.
Taking a deep breath, I unlocked the door trying to think of what I was going to say to her. It had been weeks since she ended up in the hospital and I didn't even call. I felt like shit.
Ella looked like her old self this time around. Her red hair was flowing freely around her shoulders, her spray tan was back along with her fabulous nails.
"Hey, Ella, what are you doing here?"
She marched through the door with her head held high, so I closed the door hoping that none of the neighbours heard her banging.
"You’re kidding me, right?" she asked, narrowing her eyes. "I'm here to find out why you all off a sudden decided to ignore me. I thought we were friends!"
Okay, maybe that statement was a bit dramatic, but it was the truth, and knowing Ella she wouldn’t understand.
"Ella, please—"
"No, no more lies. I know I turned my back on you when you told me you could do spells or whatever, but I’ve kind of accepted that "other creatures" are in this world. Then you show up at my house and I wake up in hospital. The doctors are confused because they have no idea why I passed out and then the only person that I think I'm friends with doesn't even bother to visit me," she yelled throwing her hands in the air.
I wiped the sweat from my forehead trying to tell myself that I was in control and Ella was safe around me.
"It’s not what you think. I did it to protect you," I said wondering if I she would accept such a lame excuse.
"Protect me from what? The doctors told me that I was stressed, and I had an anxiety attack. Nicky came to visit me. She explained that I don’t have to worry about anything, that paranormals didn't interfere with humans’ life anymore."
I wanted to scream, Nicky tried to help but, in the end, she complicated everything. Ella was still fragile, she had no memories of her father, and he wasn’t even planning to tell her the truth.
"Nicky was right, but I was trying to protect you from me. Oh, God, Ella, this is really complicated, and I can't tell you anymore. Just leave before it’s too late," I pleaded.
Ella was stubborn, but she was also careful, and she rarely took any risks, but I was surprised to see that she wasn’t planning to leave.
“I'm staying here and you’re going to tell me what’s going on. For weeks, I’ve been trying to get through to you. I even went to visit you a couple of times, but you were never in. I wasn’t comfortable going to your office."
I paced my living room floor, flexing my fingers. My mind was working hard but I was sick of all the lies. Ella wasn’t too bright, but she’d know straight away if I tried to sell her some crap about “it’s magic business.” I thought about Tron. He could figure something out, he was an elder or whatever that meant, but then I knew he wouldn’t want to get involved. Ella was eyeing me suspiciously tapping her foot against the floor, and I had no choice. It was time to put her through another shock.
"All right, I'm going to explain, but first we need to go somewhere."