Read Online Random Acts of Sorcery by Karen Mead - Free Book Online Page B

listened to her .
    Of course, it made sense that a woman like that would have a dark side, but that didn’t make hearing about it any easier. Cassie hugged her shoulders, though it wasn’t cold.
    “So…did you ask her to stop? To let you have a normal life?” she asked, although she felt she knew the answer already.
    “Only a million times. But my opinion on the matter was not considered relevant,” he said, with a cold bitterness that seemed to slice the air between them in two. “Eventually, I realized the only way I could get back at her was to fail. I tried failing my classes, but the teachers passed me anyway because they were scared—more of her than of me, I think—so that didn’t work. When I took a job at a gas station though, that’s when I really started to get to her,” he said, smiling at the memory. “The lower the job was on the social scale, the more it bothered her. It became my perfect revenge: take everything she’d given me, and do nothing with it.”
    Despite the wonderful meal, Cassie felt slightly nauseous. Helen turned him into this, because she’s crazy. He’s had a horrible life because she never let him just be himself. This is sick, this is just so sick.
    She cleared her throat, trying to find a way to phrase what she wanted to ask next without offending him.
    “So, even now...even though you haven’t lived with her in years…you’re just living to get back at her?”
    He cocked his head as though the question intrigued him. “That would make me pretty stupid, wouldn’t it?”
    “That’s not what I meant,” she said quickly.
    “No, it isn’t just about her. I find I’ve adapted to this…lifestyle.” He said, moving to lean forward in his seat. “Never having a secure job means never being tied down to any one place…I can leave at a moment’s notice. Which is just common sense for me, really. Everyone knows I don’t belong, so they mostly leave me alone, and I can keep to myself with my books and be reasonably happy.” He finished with a shrug, as though daring her to contradict him.
    She didn’t though; she sat back in her chair, awestruck. After a moment’s pause, he broke the silence again.
    “Do you want to run out the door screaming now?” he said with a weak smile.
    “No, I just…I mean, I thought my Mom was bad,” said Cassie looking at the floor. He laughed then, but there was no real humor in it.
    She was about to speak again, to talk about how Annette put so much pressure on her to do well in school that she could relate to Sam’s situation at least a little bit, when he surprised her by interrupting.
    “It’s not an excuse,” he said, looking down again. “What she did to me isn’t an excuse for how I treat other people, how I treated you when we first met. That’s a choice I made. But…” he said, finally looking at her again. “…maybe you can see why it’s so hard for me to be what other people want me to be.”
    “And what is that?”
    “Someone…reliable. Someone who can be trusted with other people’s safety. All I ever wanted was to be left alone,” he said, so quietly she could barely hear.
    Cassie didn’t remember her eyes welling up, but before he had even finished speaking, hot tears were running down her face. She was sad for him, true—but as he said, how he lived was his choice. She believed that. It was more the idea that someone could have so much, yet be rendered completely incapable of enjoying it, that made her cry. She wiped her eyes on her sweater, even though she knew it would just make her eyes itch.
    Through her blurred vision, she saw Sam stand up. “Let me get you some tissues,” he said. When he came back, he knelt in front of her place on the couch and began wiping her face himself.
    Acting on a sudden impulse, Cassie put her hands on the back of his head and pulled him close so she could kiss him. It felt strange, tasting the saltiness of her own tears as well as his mouth, but her heart started