Sweetblood by Pete Hautman

Author:Pete Hautman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing
Published: 2003-07-06T16:00:00+00:00

16

Wine Red

His red cheeks dimple like a little kid’s. His teeth are small and short. I think if they were normal-size I might run, but those stumpy little teeth and red cheeks make him look harmless.

“Victim of what?” I ask.

“Your fate,” he says, all serious. Now his voice is that of a priest: soft and pleasant and insidious. Then he laughs, deep and warm. He points to the sofa. “Have a seat!”

Dylan and I sit down.

“Who do we have here?” he asks, looking at me but talking to Dylan. His eyes are dark brown—so dark that I can’t distinguish pupil from iris.

Dylan says, “This is Lucy.”

“Ahhh!” He is looking at me so hard my skin feels hot. “My name is Wayne,” he says. “I live here.”

“It’s very… nice,” I say, trying to be polite.

“Be honest, now.” He sips his wine.

I notice a large black and yellow striped caterpillar crawling across his knee. “You have a worm on your knee,” I say.

Wayne gently removes the caterpillar from his knee, walks it over to the trough full of weeds, and sets it carefully on a leaf. “They eat only milkweed, you know.” He watches the caterpillar hunch across the pale green leaf.

“Are you a professional butterfly rancher?”

He laughs. “It’s just a hobby. Do you have any hobbies?” He sits down.

“Sometimes I pretend to be a high school student. I guess you could say that’s my hobby.”

“I suppose school takes up most of your time. You are at Seward High, yes?”

“How did you know that?”

“I like to keep track of all the young goths.”

“I’m not goth.”

“Of course you’re not—no more than I—but you do share a certain fashion sensibility with them.”

“I like black.”

“It’s a very practical color.”

“Exactly.”

“Is it interesting, pretending to be a student?”

“Rarely. Not that it makes any difference.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I mean, it doesn’t matter how boring or not boring it is at school. At the end of the day I’m still myself.”

Wayne’s eyebrows go up. “That is very astute. We are all trapped that way, are we not?”

“Is that a rhetorical question, or are you looking for an answer?”

“You are intelligent. Would you care for a glass of wine?”

“No, thank you.”

“A reading, perhaps?” He gestures at the table.

I look down at the deck of cards spread across the table. I’ve never before seen a real deck of tarot cards. They are slightly larger than regular playing cards. Each one has a colorful illustration. The scenes on them are quite strange—devils, magicians, bloody swords, and characters dressed in medieval clothing.

Wayne gathers the cards and slowly mixes them together. “Looo-seee,” he says, stretching my name out. “What shall we learn today about Looo-seee.”

I feel my thighs tense. I am one second away from standing up and walking out of there when Wayne spills out his nice deep laugh and says, “I’m sorry! I should know better than to mess with people’s names.”

“That’s okay,” I say.

“No, it’s not okay.” He is serious again. “Names are important. Our names are who we are.

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