Made to Love by DL Kopp Read Free Book Online

There was no way she would let me step foot out of
the house.
    Despite my protestations,
she pushed me upstairs, into my room, and into the layers of cushy
sheets.  I wouldn't deny that I wanted a little more shut-eye,
but I had more important concerns.
    “ Mom, I just started
school.  I can't just--”
    “ Yes, you can,” she
said.  “It's only for a day or two.”
    “ But Mom --”
    She hurried out of the room
and closed the door.  I heard the lock click.
    Lock?
    I jumped out of bed and ran
to the door.  A lock had indeed been placed on my door, but on
the wrong side.  I couldn't choose when to bar entry to my
room, but whoever had the key could prevent my exit.
    I was a prisoner in my own
bedroom.

Chapter
Fourteen
     
    I shook the handle, but it
wouldn’t budge.
    “ Mom?” I asked, but her
footsteps receded on the other side.  “Mom!  You can’t do
this to me!”  I threw all my weight into trying to open the
door, but the fever got the better of me.  My head spun, and I
had to sit down on the bed.
    My parents had always been
overprotective, but this… this was new.
    Last night’s exchange swam
to the forefront of my memories once more—almost kissing Octavius
in the apple orchard, and then a bright light, and my dad yelling
at us.  I’ve told you before your kind isn’t welcome
here .
    Was I locked up because I
was sick and they didn’t want me to get out, or because they didn’t
want someone to get in?
    “ This is ridiculous,” I
muttered, pulling open my bedside drawer and removing the jewelry
box.  I didn’t wear much jewelry, so I mostly kept junk in my
jewelry box—including bobby pins.  I’d never picked a lock
before, but I’d seen it on TV enough to know the theory.
    One pin goes on top of the
other to move the tumblers, the other is for leverage.  It
never took longer than a couple seconds on TV.  Easy,
right?
    A half hour later, I flung
the bobby pins back in the drawer and sat on my bed.  “Okay,
not so easy,” I muttered.  Especially not when I still felt so
sick.
    Someone rapped a knuckle on
the door.
    “ Breakfast, Calliope,” Mom
said from the other side.  Keys jingled, and I hurried to get
under the covers.  The door unlocked and she came in bearing a
tray of food and an apologetic smile.  “How are you
feeling?”
    “ Better,” I said. 
“Why don’t I go to school now?  I’ll only miss my first
class.”
    “ Oh, hush.  You know
that’s not a good idea.”  She sat on the side of the bed,
placing the tray on my lap.  The food looked entirely
unappetizing.
    “ Why?”
    She gave me a stern
look.  “You know, most kids are happy to stay home from
school.”
    “ I’m not a kid
anymore.  I want to go to school.  I want to
learn.”
    “ Cal,” she sighed, setting
the ring of keys on the bed beside her.  I tried not to eye
them too obviously. Most of the keys I recognized—they went to my
parents’ variety of cars and the front door.  But one was
unlike the others: large, silver, antique.  It kind of looked
like it might match the lock on my door.  “We’re just trying
to protect you?”
    I swallowed the bile that
rose in my throat.  “Yeah.  Okay.  But can I go to
school tomorrow?”
    She leaned over and hugged
me, and I slipped my hand around to tug the silver key off the
ring.  Too big for the loop to hold it, the ring was on a
separate clip.  “Maybe,” Mom said, and then she ruffled my
hair.  “We’ll see tomorrow.  I’m going to go to your
father’s office at the university for awhile—try to relax and enjoy
your breakfast.”
    Mom left, shutting the door
and locking it behind her.  I nearly drowned in my
disappointment.  I had grabbed the wrong key.
    I took a second look at the
one I had snatched, turning it over in my hands.  It was
heavier than it looked, and ornate.  Definitely not a normal
house key.  Maybe it went to the basement door—not that it did
me any good, since I couldn’t get down to the