Covet (Clann)

all this time?”
    Dad grinned. “You let me work on that. Just focus on healing up as fast as you can, and we’ll get you all the field time you can handle next fall.”
    “Thanks, Dad.”
    * * *
    My family went home to get some rest and returned later to bring me a few things to clean up with as best I could in bed. When Mom answered a call on her phone, Dad quietly leaned in to mutter that he’d had a mechanic look at my truck and the brake lines had been ripped loose, but they couldn’t tell if it happened before or as a result of the wreck.
    Dr. Faulkner also stopped by later that afternoon to show me my X-rays and talk about the recovery plan. When I saw the X-rays, I realized why everyone had been so freaked out. I hadn’t just broken a bone or two. When my truck’s driver’s side door had crunched in on me, it had practically shattered my left wrist and my left leg below the knee. I’d also gotten several deep cuts from broken glass, one gash across my forehead, and two or three more on my left shoulder and forearm where apparently I’d tried to hold on to the steering wheel while being tossed around like a sock inside a dryer.
    Even with my family and the local descendants helping with long-distance spell work, it was going to be at least a week before they could reknit my bones enough to allow me to leave the hospital, and a month in casts and on crutches. That was the last time I ever used magic while driving. Just in case it was the reason my brake lines blew out.
    By Monday afternoon, I was sure it was going to be the longest week of my life. I’d never realized how much I needed two hands until I temporarily lost the use of one of them. I couldn’t play video games. Shaving, even with the help of a nurse to hold a mirror for me, was a joke and left me with nicks all over the left side of my face where I couldn’t seem to angle the razor correctly. There was nothing worth watching on TV. And I’d already seen all the movies they had in the nurse station’s library.
    And my last plan to find a solution for Savannah and me had failed. Big-time.
    So when a familiar girl poked her head in the doorway, I was pretty happy about it. Even if the girl was a blonde instead of a certain redhead, at least Bethany was someone to talk to who could distract me from the frustration brewing inside my skull like a spring twister.
    She returned my smile as she came into the room. “Hey, champ. How are you feeling?”
    “Better now that you’re here. You wouldn’t believe how boring this place is.”
    Sinking down into the chair, she opened her Charmers bag. “I brought you your homework for the week. I hope you don’t mind? Your mom asked me if I could pick it up for her from the front office.”
    “She called you?” Mom sure was turning on the matchmaker skills lately. Either she really liked Bethany, or she was pretty worried about me.
    “Um, no. I called her to see how you were doing and asked if it would be okay to stop by.” She took out a stack of books, each one with several loose pages stuck inside. I tugged one paper free, glanced at the notes, and groaned.
    “Oh man, this is going to suck.”
    “Having trouble in history class?” she teased after glancing at Mr. Smythe’s notes.
    I thought of Savannah, how her long legs looked tucked up under the desk beside mine in that class. “Always.”
    “If you need a little help this week, I could work with you on it.”
    I debated for about two seconds, just long enough to remember how ticked off Emily was at me right now. No doubt she was going to be too ticked off to offer much help with homework this week.
    “Sure, that’d be great. Thanks.”
    She grinned, her cheeks turning pink. “It’s no problem. The Charmers don’t have practice this week or the next so we’ll have more time to study for finals. So I can come right after school. And in the meantime…want to start with today’s lineup?”
    I sighed. “Yeah, why not? It’s not like I’ve got anything else planned.”
    Laughing, she pulled a textbook from the stack and we got to work.
    * * *
    Bethany turned out to be a much better tutor than my sister. For one thing, she had way more patience when the deeper context of the English lit reading assignment was lost on me. She also didn’t whack the back of my head if a certain redhead came to mind and I spaced out every so often.
    When somebody came in with a tray of food at six o’clock, followed by my mother, I think we