A Beautiful Dark

the hippie store in town, and Ian had on a beanie with some kind of skater logo on it, like a Martian or devil clown or something.
    “Exactly how much coffee have you had this morning?” I asked, eyeing Cassie suspiciously.
    “Oh, shut up, you know I don’t touch that crap,” she said.
    “But you did have two Mountain Dews on the way over here,” Dan said, grinning.
    Cassie pulled the knit strings dangling from his earflaps.
    Ian smiled at me, which was a relief. I hadn’t really talked to him alone since he and Asher had been trying to mark their territory at the coffee shop Friday night.
    I smiled back. “Ready for a weekend of fun in the snow?”
    “You bet. I’ve been looking forward to this for years.”
    I eased a little closer to him. I felt like I owed him an apology or something. “We missed you at lunch this week.”
    “Yeah, I had a project in Woodshop I needed to get done.”
    “Oh,” I said. “I thought maybe you were mad at me or something.”
    “No,” he said, his face softening into a smile. “Come on, Skye. Never.”
    “Okay. Just wanted to make sure we’re good. You’ve been my friend forever.”
    “Yeah,” he said softly. “Your friend.”
    Dan punched Ian’s shoulder to get his attention, and they started talking.
    I did a quick scan of the parking lot, waving at a few girls who were standing near us. I couldn’t help bristling a little at the sight of Ellie, remembering how Asher had jetted off after her the day before. Then I chastised myself for the pettiness. I’d turned him down, after all. Had I expected him to mope around with a broken heart?
    Just about our entire class was there, standing in small groups like ours, waiting for the driver to put us out of our misery and open the doors of the bus.
    I actually couldn’t find Asher—or Devin for that matter—among the sea of hats and scarves, and for a brief moment, I felt my stomach sink in disappointment.
    The bus doors finally opened. “Come on,” Cassie urged. “Let’s grab some seats together before everyone else gets on.”
    It was the same temperature on the bus as it was outside. Cassie and I slid into a seat toward the back, near Cassie’s bandmates Trey and Evan—cute boys with scruffy hair and plaid shirts. She immediately turned in her seat to talk to them about a new song she’d been working on. “I have it on my iPod,” I heard her say. “I recorded it on my computer the other day.”
    Dan and Ian were two rows in front of us.
    “Turn the heat on!” Josh Brooks called from the back row.
    “It’s not magic, it takes time!” The bus driver shouted back. I could hear the clink of the yellow school bus’s old heating system lurch into gear. I was shivering, trying to generate my own body heat.
    “Crap,” Cassie muttered, swinging back around and rummaging through her backpack. “I left it in my overnight bag. Hold on, I’m going to see if they’ve loaded our bags on yet.” She popped up and I watched her red waves bouncing down the aisle as she hurried off the bus. Absently I waved my hand across the heater duct along the base of the wall, near my boots. Nothing. Great. It was going to be a long, cold ride.
    The heater clanked again, and all of a sudden, a blast of hot steam shot out at my hand. “Ow!” I cried out, pulling it away.
    “Are you all right?”
    I jumped, startled to find Devin standing in the aisle by my seat.
    “Y-yeah,” I faltered. “It was just the heat. It came on really quickly.” I held up my hand to show that it had burned me, but there was no mark, no redness anywhere on it. Devin just stared at it. Then he shook his head slightly. His eyes found mine.
    “Is someone sitting . . . ?” He gestured toward the empty space next to me. “I got here late.” He looked around. Barely any empty seats were left.
    “Yeah,” I said. “I mean—”
    “She means yes, there is,” Asher said, sliding into the seat from out of nowhere. He didn’t look at me; he just kept staring at Devin. Like he was sitting there more to piss him off than to be near me.
    Devin’s face clouded over.
    “Ooh, it’s warm, too.” Asher rubbed his gloved hands together. “Feel how warm it is, Dev? Too bad you’ll have to find another seat.”
    Devin frowned. “Fluke,” I barely heard him utter, and Asher shot him a triumphant look.
    “It’s just a seat,” I said, growing tired of their game.
    “Oh, it’s more than that,” Asher said, his voice low but