learned that yet?"
Jenny was raging on. "What gives you the right to play with us this way? How can you justify it?"
"I don't need the right. Listen to me, Jenny. The worlds-all nine of them-are cruel. They don't care anything about you, or about right. There is no ultimate goodness. It's the law of the jungle. You don't need right-if you have strength."
"I don't believe you," Jenny said.
"That the world is cruel?" There was a newspaper on the bench; he picked it up. "Take a look at this and tell me that evil loses and good wins. Tell me that it's not the law of the jungle in your world."
Jenny didn't even want to look at the headlines. She'd seen too many in her life.
"Reality," Julian said, flashing a smile, "has teeth and claws. And since that's true, wouldn't you rather be one of the hunters than one of the hunted?"
Jenny shook her head. She had to admit the truth of what he was saying-about the world, at least. But she felt sick to her stomach.
"I'm offering you a choice," Julian said. His face had hardened. "I told you before that if I couldn't
persuade you I would force you-somehow. If you won't agree I'll have to show you what I mean. I'm tired of playing, Jenny. I want this settled-one way or another."
"It is settled," Jenny said. "I'll never come to you. I hate you."
Anger flared like a twisting blue flame in Julian's eyes. "Don't you understand," he said, "that what happened to Summer can happen to you?"
Jenny felt a wave of coldness. "Yes," she said slowly. "I do."
And she did, at last. She probably wouldn't have believed it before. Wouldn't have believed Julian was capable of it, or that she, Jenny, could be vulnerable to it. Dying was for old people, not kids her age. Bad things-really bad things-didn't happen to good people.
But they did.
Now she knew that emotionally. In her heart. Sometimes bad things, the worst, happened to people who didn't deserve it at all. Even Summer. Even her.
Jenny felt as if she had learned some secret, been initiated into some worldwide club or community. The community of sorrow.
She was now one of the people who knew. Strangely, it gave her a sense of comfort to know that there were so many others, so many who'd had friends die, or lost parents, or had other terrible things happen that they never asked for.
There are a lot of us, she thought. Without realizing it, she'd begun to cry. We're everywhere. And we don't all turn hunter and take it out on other people. All of us don't.
Aba hadn't. Jenny suddenly remembered that Dee's grandmother had lost her husband in a racial incident. And she remembered something Aba had taped to her bathroom mirror, incongruous among all the glass and marble and gold fixtures. It was a handmade sign that said:
Do no harm. Help when you can. Return good for evil.
Jenny had never asked Aba about the sign. It didn't seem to need explaining.
Now she felt the community of sorrow strengthening her from all over. As if they were sympathizing, silently. Bad things-the worst-might happen to Jenny, right now. Jenny understood that.
She said, "You're right. Maybe things are that bad. But that doesn't mean I have to give in. I won't join you willingly, so you might as well try force."
"I will," he said.
It started so simply. Jenny heard a whining buzz and a bee landed on her sleeve.
It was just an ordinary bee, dusty-gold. It clung with its little feet to her tissue-linen blouse. But then she heard another buzz, and a second bee landed on her other sleeve.
Another buzz, and another.
Jenny hated bees. She was always the one at picnics shrieking, "Is there one in my hair?" She wanted to shoo these bees away, but she was afraid to provoke them.
She looked at Julian. At his wild, exotic sapphire eyes and his beautifully sculpted face. At that moment, wearing Zach's lackluster clothing, his beauty was so unearthly it was frightening.
Another buzz and a bee was in her hair, its wings a blur of motion as it tangled and clung. She could see it in her peripheral vision.
Julian smiled.
Jenny heard a deeper sound, a thrumming, and she looked automatically for the source. A swarm of bees was clustered on one of the rafters of the garage, hanging down like some giant, pendulous fruit.
Jenny took a step backward and heard a warning buzzzzz from her hair. The ball of bees