Page 39 of The Luminaries
Winnie’s teeth start clicking. There’s something off here, something she doesn’t quite trust. The problem is, she knows Jay would never lie to her. She squints at him from behind her glasses. “When can you show me?”
“Tomorrow. It’ll be best if it’s fresh in your mind before the trial. Now, come on.” He jerks his chin toward the trees. “It’s time to finish our session with a run.” He sets off before Winnie can protest, and though the thought ofany more runningtoday makes her want to die inside, she also knows she asked for this.
She chases him into the forest.
The sun has already begun its descent by the time Jay leads Winnie back to the Friday estate. If she’d thought her legs were made of rubberafter Coach Rosa, it is nothing compared to their absolute uselessness after a jog through the forest. She had to hop over roots, duck under branches, leap and sideswipe, and at one point wade through a stream that reached above her knees and made her bones hurt from the cold.
But now she and Jay are back at the estate, and Winnie can’t deny that, even if everything hurts and tomorrow it’s going to hurt even worse, she has enjoyed herself. She spent so long careening around an empty house or jogging through neighborhoods trying to shave time off her mile—now she’s finally using her bodyin the forest.
It’s like a plug clicking into a socket: she feels so completely switched on. She is surging and sparkling with power.
Jay leads her around to the front of the estate, where Mathilda no longer awaits. Instead, it’s his motorcycle—or rather, Aunt Lizzy’s motorcycle that he gets to use and tinker with. Clearly, it’s back from Gunther’s.
Jay heads for it. “The spare helmet is under the seat.”
Winnie stops dead in her tracks. “I’m sorry, what?”
He repeats, louder, “The helmet is under the seat—”
“I heard you. I meantwhatin an incredulous way. In an ‘I’m not getting on that death machine’ way.”
He laughs, that surprised puff of air he always offers, and looks back at her. “You, a Luminary untrained, who went into the forest with only a trap to protect you, but now my bike is too dangerous for you?” He retraces three steps to stand before Winnie. The memory of bergamot and lime still clings to him, but mostly he smells of sweat and forest and fog.
It’s not unpleasant.
“I don’t like motorcycles, Jay.”
“Your house is five minutes away, Winnie. I promise I’ll go the speed limit.”
“Idon’tlike motorcycles.”
Another bark of laughter, but this one is exasperated. “Win, this is it.” He waves at the bike. “That’s all I’ve got right now. Lizzy took Mathilda for the afternoon, so if you want to go home, then you’ve got to ride the death machine.”
“When will she be back?”
“Really?” The exasperation spreads through his body, sending hisshoulders toward his ears. “Really?You trust me so little?” When Winnie doesn’t answer—it’s a trick question anyway—he says, “She won’t be back for a while, and I can’t waste any time. I’ve got a show tonight at Joe Squared.”
“Oh.” Winnie blinks. It’s Saturday. She totally forgot that Jay and the Forgotten always play on Saturday. “What time does it start?”
“We go on at nine, and I need to shower before then.” He unzips his hoodie, as if to demonstrate just how filthy he is…
But Winnie only finds herself eying the way his T-shirt hangs on his frame. It is disconcerting that he can be so extremely well-proportioned while also being,ugh,Jay. Part of her genuinely misses the boy he used to be.
Most of her, though, is just impressed by what he’s grown into. Hunter training clearly suits him. Not just physically either, but emotionally. In that clearing, on that tree trunk, he’d been more alert, more alive than she’d seen him in years. This is the Jay she can never quite translate onto the page.
It takes Winnie a moment to realize she is, yet again, ogling him. And that this time, he has asked her a question and is waiting for a reply.
“Huh?” She shoves her glasses up her nose. There’s so much dirt around the lenses. “Did you say something?”
He sighs. “I said you can come inside and call your mom—if it’s really that big a deal.”
“Mom’s working,” she answers absently.
“Okay, option two. You go with me to Joe Squared. Lizzy will be back right before I need to go. We can shower now, and then—”
“Jay! I’m not showering with you!”
He flushes pure scarlet. All the way to his hairline and practically into the hair itself. “I did not mean together, you perv. I meant separately. Separate showers.”
