Page 24 of The Puck Chase

Artists know artists.

Not even bothering with any further denial, I reach into my bag for my sketchbook and hand it over to her. Her smile only widens in excitement, as she grabs it from me and instantly starts flicking through it, until she finds my latest creation. When she reaches it, she pauses, her eyes flying across the page at the half-drawn faceless man, her fingers brushing delicately along the lines. I’m not sure, from what I have so far, if she can tell that the object of this drawing is more than familiar to her, but I don’t bother pointing it out, not when I am still denying it myself.

“Daemon, this is amazing,” she praises, flicking her eyes from the drawing to me, and back again in disbelief. “Like, you are so talented it makes me crazy that you don’t show more people,” she adds with a shake of her head, studying every inch of the page like she is committing it to memory, and I’m almost certain I see a flicker of recognition flash across her stare.

“People and their opinions are overrated,” I muse, making her smile, and before she can start flicking through the rest of the book, I hold out my hand. “Come on, you know the rules, I show you mine, you show me yours,” I tell her, repeating the agreement we created, and her eyes light up with excitement, as she digs into her bag for her own sketchbook, passing it over to me.

As she flicks back to the beginning of mine, I open hers and come face to face with the thorn in my side. The first page is a fully finished and completely detailed picture of Archer, lounging by a pool with his head tipped back, as if he is looking up at the sky. She has captured him perfectly, from the lines of his body, to the edge of his jaw, it’s as accurate as a photograph, and if she wasn’t sitting across from me I would study it a lot longer. Yet I force myself to turn the page, coming across more sketches of different people, some of them familiar as I recognize them from her social media, and I know her talent is only going to get better as she gets older.

There are multiple sketches of her older brother, and I force myself not to linger, but still my eyes stay a little longer on his than the others. When I look up to find Aurora watching me, I see she is paused on yet another sketch that I could deny was inspired by her brother, but she isn’t blind, so I don’t say anything, not wanting to lie to her.

“Can I ask you something?” she questions, her eyes still on the sketch, and before I can even respond she adds, “My brother posted a very interesting photo the other day.” Her stare finallydancing up to meet mine, and there is a knowing smile pulling at the corner of her mouth. “It was a picture of a bruise on his neck, that looked a lot like a hickey,” she muses, watching me closely, and once again my heart starts to race.

“Was there a question in there?” I ask carefully, and her smile only grows.

“Was it from you?” she asks boldly, not breaking my stare for even a second, and I know I should deny it. That no good can come of me admitting it, yet something inside calls at me to claim him. To let someone know that the mark he wore so fucking proudly for all his bullshit fans, was actually from the person who hates him most. It’s that thought that has me nodding slowly in confirmation. “Oh my freaking god, I knew it!” She squeals, bouncing up and down in her seat, and I can’t help but smile gently, her excitement infectious. “I just knew I sensed something between you two, and then when you and I talked on Halloween you mentioned a drunken hookup, and then Arch was asking these questions earlier to Diana at dinner, and ah, I just knew it, this is amazing.”

I listen to her ramble on, ingesting all her words, but only a few snag my attention. “What questions? And who the hell is Diana?” I interrupt without thinking, and Aurora pauses, looking at me with another kind of knowing smile.

“Diana is Nova’s mom. Archer and I had dinner with her before I came here,” she tells me gently, no doubt seeing the relief on my face before I slam my mask back into place. “And he was asking her if she ever experimented with the same sex in college, if she liked it, if she considered herself bisexual, you know, those kinds of questions,” she adds with a smirk, probably thinking such things would excite me as much as they do her, but they don’t, in fact, they do the opposite.

Fuck.

Trust Archer fucking Gray to kiss one guy and have a sexual crisis. Isn’t he a grade A, womanizing man whore? Why can’t he treat it as what it was, a drunken mistake, never to be repeated again?

Before I can even muster up a response to what she just said, she quickly asks, “Are you bisexual, Daemon?”

My eyes widen in disbelief at her audacity, which I shouldn’t be surprised at given her last name, yet still I choke on my own breath. “What, no, I mean yes, I don’t know,” I rush out, reaching for another sip of my tea, as I think about her question.

I’ve always struggled with my sexuality, in the sense that I never understood why I had to fucking label it. Why can't I just like who I like without giving it a damn name? I can fuck anyone without truly thinking about it, regardless of their gender, yet for me to truly like someone and form a connection, it takes a lot more that just whether I find them physically attractive. I need to relate to them in an emotional and intellectual way too, and to this day I have never truly had that.

“I’ve never really thought about it,” I finally breathe out, the truth seeming the best form of action. “I just like who I like, I don’t see a need to put a label on that just to make others feel better.” I shrug, feeling nervous under her watchful stare, as I admit that for the first time to someone.

“And do you like my brother?” she asks hopefully, and all I can see in her eyes is the happiness of someone who has never known heartache or pain, just so like her brother in every way.

“Your brother is like the sun,” I start slowly, thinking about my words carefully. “He wants to shine everywhere, and people are addicted to his light, they are drawn to it. It’s why he has friends like Darkmore and Reign, they feed off his light and shine theirs on him, they’re a perfect fit.”

I’m not sure if I am even making sense, yet Aurora nods as if she understands me completely, as she replies, “And you’re not?”

Her question shouldn’t catch me off guard, but like her brother she is perceptive, almost too perceptive to the point of being annoying, yet still I nod. “I’ve known for a long time that I’m broken,” I start, and she opens her mouth to disagree with me, but I hold my hand up, as I force myself to push on. “No, trust me, it’s true, and I won’t bore you with the traumas of my childhood, not when you’re one of the first people to ever look at me without pity or regret,” I tell her truthfully, and she smiles softly, yet that look of pure happiness from before is gone, and I’m sure she sees it now.

The shadows that lurk beneath my skin aren’t easily contained, which is why I don’t invite people in, because when you do it brings questions. Questions that then bring answers, which they have probably never fathomed until they no longer look at me in the same way anymore. So now I don’t even try. I’m already drowning, why steal someone's life raft and drag them down with me?

“I did kiss your brother, but that’s all it was, just a kiss, a drunken mistake that won’t ever be repeated,” I add firmly, and I prepare for some backlash or disappointment, for the retreat of her offered hand of friendship, but I get none of that.

Instead, she reaches for the large cookie on her plate and breaks it in half, putting one of them on a napkin and sliding it across the table towards me. “My brother’s friend, Harden, is like you. He lives in the darkness of his past, he lets it mold him, and like you I don’t think he realizes that darkness can’t exist without the light, they are a true pair, even if one never appears at the same time as the other.”

Her words are delivered so casually, that I barely even register her meaning, until she has already eaten most of herhalf of her cookie. “Your brother is not my light,” I scoff, wanting to defend the meaning of my earlier words, but all she does is smile, like Archer does when he knows he is getting under my skin.

“Sure, and I’m not Harden’s,” she tosses back playfully with a shrug, and focuses back on my sketchbook like the conversation we just had didn’t happen. “What pencil did you use for these lines here?” she asks, not so subtly changing the subject, as she appraises one of my pencil drawn sketches of Josh playing hockey.

“4B,” I reply mindlessly, still stuck on her earlier comments, and for the next hour, my responses pretty much follow the same pattern. By the time we leave, I am feeling heavier than I have in a while, and can come to only one conclusion.

Kissing my teammate was a big fucking mistake.

My resolvefor the next few practices is like fucking steel, as I treat Archer fucking Gray like he doesn’t even exist, no matter how many taunts he throws my way. Which is harder than it sounds given we have just endured our first away game of the season, but thankfully his attention was pulled in the direction of his best friend. Whatever was happening between my captain and my best friend’s sister on Halloween, came to light while we were away, and now everything is falling apart.

There was an engagement announcement in the paper, for Madeline Peters to some football jock, that sent Josh through the roof, but he’s not the only one affected. Nova got so drunk when he found out that both Archer and Reign had to carry his ass back to the hotel, and based on the screaming coming fromCoach’s office right now, as Darkmore misses his second practice this week, I’d guess things aren’t getting much better.

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