Marisol stretched and sprang up onto her knees, addressing the two actors. “Hey, since I live right by school, I should drop you guys off at the lot to get your cars. It’s only a few blocks to my house from there.”
Then, to my surprise, she signaled Asher. “Could you give Darcy a ride, since she’s on the other side of Adams, like you are? Then neither of us will have to double back.”
How does Marisol even—I cut myself off. Marisol usually knew whatever needed to be known.
“Sure, no problem,” Asher said. He looked at me. “Maybe we can clean up, so they can get some sleep?”
“Um...sure. Of course.”
The next few moments flew by at sound-like speed. I counted only a handful of blinks between everyone agreeing and saying goodbye. Then it was just me, alone with Asher and the remains of the best party ever.
He was filling a trash bag with empty bottles, so I found another and stuffed in plates and napkins. I rolled the tops of a couple of chip bags and put them aside.
“Before we go, do you want to see the inside of the Piper?” Asher asked as we worked together to fold blankets.
“I’ll admit I’m curious. Can’t say I’ve ever been in a private plane.”
“Give me a sec.” He unlatched the large door on the right side of the aircraft, then disappeared inside. The cockpit and the remainder of the interior lit up through the windows before he stuck his head out. “Come on up.”
I entered the hangar and climbed three riser steps into the center of the cabin. Four passenger seats, trimmed in smooth, honey-colored leather, faced each other. Asher was already seated in the left captain’s chair. I inched my way to the front seat at his right. “It’s incredible. Bigger than I thought, too.”
“One of the reasons my dad splurged on the Meridian. We use it a lot for family vacations. My sister, Avery, is away at Emerson College—Boston. When she’s home we usually take trips together.”
“Does Avery fly, too?”
He cocked his head. “All Fleets can fly. My dad wouldn’t have it any other way. My mom and Avery don’t care about being licensed, but either of them can land this baby in a storm with no control tower.”
“That’s so amazing,” I marveled.
The cockpit wrapped around us in an overwhelming array of lights and buttons and levers. Three illuminated monitors spread across the front, as big as laptop screens. I glanced across and down; my side also had a smaller control wheel and a set of wide foot pedals, just like Asher’s. “You can fly the plane from my seat?”
“Sure can. First time I took the stick, I was in your seat in our old Piper Warrior.” He pointed to the floor. “Those are rudders for steering on the ground when you taxi. And there’s the brake. Very important.” He touched the center section, tapping his hand over a set of levers. “Here, we have the throttle.”
I pointed to the endless dials and switches on the dash and overhead. “How do you keep all of these gadgets and gizmos straight?”
He laughed out a breath. “These gizmos keep you alive. You learn them until you start seeing them in your cereal bowl. After a while, it’s second nature.” One shoulder popped up. “Like all those stories and words in your head. If I saw all that inside, it might look just as scary and complicated.”
Now I laughed until a thought sobered me. “Is it hard being here? Now?”
“Is it difficult for me, sitting here with a license to take this baby up, but without the health to keep it up?”
“Yeah.” Why was he so easy to talk to?
“At first, I couldn’t handle even coming to the airport for maintenance. But as I healed, I missed the planes too much. I missed this plane. Just after sunset is my favorite time, when it slows way down and the tower closes.” He traced the edge of the gray control wheel. “My dreams are here. I don’t want to be afraid of those anymore. My big plans changed, but I know I’ll get back some form of flight. And right now, this seat is as close as I can get.”
His words soared with the nimble freedom of hope, touching down on the surface of my skin with a gentle bump, bump, glide. But they hurt—stung—because of what I still wouldn’t...couldn’t admit to myself. Me, spending midnight in a copilot’s chair, put me so close to a reality I was too afraid to even call a dream.
It wasn’t that I never longed for a repaired family and future, or someone to love. But I spent so much time battling the clutter scaffolding my life, so much time hiding. Dreams came, settling inside me. When they did, I lived in a new house, clean and free. I kissed the prince and danced with the hero, maybe even one like Asher Fleet. But I had to move those dreams out, every time. Evicted.
How could I hold real love inside an invisible heart?
Asher, though—he was nearly there. He only needed a string of seven healthy days to fly again. In the same leather chair, with the same controls at my hands and feet, I felt eternities away from takeoff.
Not real. Just make-believe. Breathe it away.
I changed the subject, something safe and dangerous all the same. “Thank you again for the party. The cupcakes.” I risked a look at him. “You made it really nice for us.”
A soft, flat smile. “Good friends are hard to find and worth celebrating. Your birthday story with Marisol was so...” I watched him struggle for the right word. He tapped his chin, eyes circling the cockpit, peering out the angled windows built for flight.
I had enough words for both of us, but just said, “I know. It was, and still is.”
“Ever since that day, I’ve wanted to ask you one thing.”
“What?”
“When you guys told me the school party story, you never said what happened when you went home. You know, with your mom?”
I felt my eyes close over the memory. “Mom remembered right before she came to pick me up. She was in tears when I got into the car. She brought a grocery store cupcake she’d grabbed on the way.” My hands itched for a steadying book to hold. “She tried her best to make it up to me, taking me to dinner and the mall.”
The only way she knew how to fix anything—shopping.
“Wow,” Asher said, forehead creasing.
“She’s never forgotten since. Today—or yesterday, I guess—she gave me this.” I showed him the silver charm bracelet.
“Nice,” he said. “What about your dad?”
My whole body tensed, like someone had zipped up the skin from my feet to my face.
Asher must’ve noticed, because he leaned in, wincing. “Sorry, is he a touchy subject? Nasty divorce or something?”
I shook my head. “My parents never married. Kind of a volatile relationship. My dad left for Thailand for work before learning my mom was pregnant, and he never came home.” I spoke to the orderly rows of dials in front of me. “He knows about me, but has never seen me.”
I swore I could hear Marisol in my ear, urging me to tell Asher about my mom. About the hoarding. But I—
Asher sighed so loudly my thoughts backed away. “Last week,” he said, “I was going on and on about my dad and his grudge about the accident. His disappointment and ‘what-ifs.’ And here you’ve never even met your dad.”
“Nah, you didn’t know. And this will probably sound weird and maybe cold, but the idea of him is kind of a numb spot with me because I’ve never known anything different.”
“Would you ever want to meet him? If you could?”
“I...can,” I said, two words of pure truth I hadn’t told another soul. Not even Marisol. Immediately, my hand pressed over my ribs, trying to hold in all the rest. But my mouth kept moving, the words fleeing my body without my permission. “After all these years, he finally sent a letter to my grandmother for me.”
Asher’s eyes waxed bright and wide as moons. “That’s huge, Darcy. What did he say?”
I felt the words flow stronger, clearer. I couldn’t have stopped them now. “Basically, how guilty he’s felt. That he’s spent the last eighteen years being a coward, and he’s planning a trip back to
California next year. And maybe we could meet. But no pressure, and it’s my choice.”
“What is your choice?”
“I haven’t made one yet.” More truth. More upon more—a hoard of truth. Then a jolt of panic. “Could you keep that information quiet? It’s kind of on a need-to-know basis.”
“Of course.” Asher held up one palm, placed the other on the throttle. I imagined it was the most sacred thing he knew. “Piper swear.”
Nineteen
This, Too?
“Thus with a kiss I die.”
—William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
I shut both my locker and my eyes, leaning against the metal door. Most of my classes were honors level, which made for a difficult enough Monday. But trying to survive calculus and AP Government while I was the living definition of the word distraction had been too close to impossible. I exhaled, long and steady. Classmates scurried past me as I replayed the two-minute loop my brain refused to forget.
Me, telling Asher Fleet about my father.
I still hadn’t told Marisol—couldn’t, until I figured out what to do about the letter in my bookshelf and the man who’d written it. Marisol was the most important person in my life, but Asher was all kinds of never-be. He was neutral, an impossibility, and I’d come to realize that was exactly why I’d spilled my secret to him in that midnight cockpit.
I knew my way around words. And I understood, more than anyone, that sometimes they just needed a safe place to go.
My phone dinged. I retrieved it from my pocket.
Marisol: Still on campus?
Me: Yup
Marisol: Come to auditorium. Emergency
I didn’t reply, just swung my leather tote over one shoulder and bolted through the hallway and across the grassy quad. No police officers or yellow caution tape met me in the auditorium foyer, only the smells of mildew and lemon-pine floor cleaner. I pushed through one of the old wooden doors. Stage lights flooded over the set; the rest of the hall felt dim and too quiet for an emergency. I spotted Marisol speaking with Mrs. Howard while the Shakespeare cast members sat on the lip of the stage, feet dangling.
Halfway down the aisle, I felt everyone’s eyes clinging to my approaching form. Marisol turned and waved me over. “Alyssa had an accident.”
A jolt buzzed through my body. Lately, the word accident held more meaning than ever before. “When? What happened?”
“This morning. Alyssa was wearing socks on her wooden staircase,” Mrs. Howard said. “She slipped and broke her arm in two places. She’s having surgery tomorrow and can’t perform in closing night on Friday.”
Jase and London hopped down from the stage, edging closer. I thought of Alyssa, a girl I’d hardly known before the weekend. She’d tagged along to my impromptu airport birthday and helped make it special. “I should send her a card. I can help with some class notes, too.”
Marisol shook her head and cracked a wad of peppermint gum. “That’s really nice, D, but not why I called you here.”
A static jolt again, stronger this time. I volleyed from my friend to the director.
“Darcy, I was short actors this year,” Mrs. Howard explained. “We had one understudy, but I already used Lily to fill in for Megan’s part of Margaret, Hero’s maid. Megan’s down with a terrible sinus infection. No voice. So we thought...”
“Wait, me?” I sputtered. “I may know Shakespeare, but I’m not an actress!”
Mrs. Howard’s expression was full of understanding. “That’s the magic of Shakespeare. The words do much of the work. Get them right and feel them, and they guide you through the role and straight into the character.” She eyed me knowingly. “And Marisol tells me your language skills are far greater than you let on before.”
I shot Marisol a look full of needles, which she returned with an innocent smile.
“No one else at Jefferson can do what you do. Actually, I’ve never met anyone who can do what you do.” Mrs. Howard motioned toward Jase. “The theater director at UCLA will be in town this weekend, and Jase applied for a seminar scholarship program there. She’s coming to see him act out the Benedick role.”
Jase stepped up, wincing. “All true.”
“But...” I looked around. Even London Banks was eyeing me with something resembling hope.
I took the script from Mrs. Howard with shaking hands. Beatrice’s parts were already highlighted. So many yellowed passages. “The performance is only four days away. And I work after school.”
“We’ll hold extra rehearsals, all around your schedule. You’ll be able to practice plenty with Jase,” Mrs. Howard assured me.
“I’m going to need a few minutes.” I dragged Marisol far up the aisle and into two seats.
“How can I make time for a play when I’ve already got so much going on at home?” I asked. “Remember the manager and the lease? Trying to push my mom forward?”
“Darcy, breathe. I understand about your mom, but in the big scheme of things, it’s only a few days. You can do this.”
Marisol was probably right, but still, my nose wrinkled. “I’ll have to act with London, though. London!”
“Yeah, but London’s spotlight goes poof unless you’re there to play her vibrant cousin, Beatrice. Trust me, she’ll be thankful.”
Could I even look at London without picturing her boyfriend against a rough alley wall and my body against his? Guilty thoughts pelted me from every direction until my insides stumbled into a muddy haze. I needed something. Books—no, not even books this time.
My eyes locked on to Marisol’s purse. “Gum. I need gum.”
“What kind?”
“All the kinds.”
Marisol’s eyes widened. She methodically opened her bag and pulled out packs, one by one, fanning them out on her palm.
I opened a stick of cinnamon, shoved it in, and started chewing. “Tell me, how can I even pretend to be Alyssa?” I took a stick of orange, popping it into my mouth. “She’s tiny. Nothing like my shape.”
“You don’t have to be Alyssa. You only have to be your version of Beatrice. And Mama and I can alter the costumes. Easy. I still have all the fabric, so don’t worry about that.”
I took two peppermint sticks, stuffing them in. More chewing. Angry, frustrated chewing.
Marisol examined me with great trepidation. “What the hell is wrong with you? You’re scaring me.”
“Well, I’m scared. Terrified.”
“You, my alien friend of planet Book, can memorize those lines in your sleep.”
True. But that wasn’t the whole of it. The entire cast was milling around, waiting on my answer, and I owed them one. I could keep some secrets to myself and boys who didn’t matter, but I had to tell my friend the real reason I was silently freaking out. “Marisol, you read the play.”
“’Course I did. Hello? The costumes?”
“Marisol. You saw the play.”
“I sat right next to you and watched it on your birthday. What are you on about?”
Two more watermelon sticks. “For goss sake, Add Five.” Of course, now I couldn’t talk at all with the gigantic gum wad. I removed half and wrapped the multicolored ball in a tissue. “Act Five,” I said again. “The huge scene near the end of Act Five.”
Marisol nodded. “Okay...that’s the part right before Hero and Claudio’s wedding, right? Where Beatrice and Benedick are squabbling and denying they love each other and there’s all this sexual tension? Great scene. You’ll do fine. I’ll help you with the sass.”
I groaned and chewed, pressing fingers into my temples. “Not the sass. I can fake the attitude. Probably,” I added.
“Then what is the problem?”
“The kiss.” There, I said it, pushing it out through too much gum and even more anguish. “Benedick kisses Beatrice right before the ending. And not a peck on the cheek.”
“No, he grabs her face all dramatic-like. And, yeah, last week Jase landed a good one on Alyssa. Hot.”
“But now I w
ill be Beatrice,” I reminded her emphatically. “Me, not Alyssa. Me, kissing Jase.”
Marisol pursed her lips. “You could do worse, D. He’s really—”
“I know, I know, he’s stellar. But that’s still not the problem.” I spit out all the gum now, my throat itchy with emotion. “You’ve kissed plenty of guys. Alyssa probably has, too. Jase has kissed at least a few girls. But I haven’t,” I whispered. “I’ve never kissed anyone.”
She knew this. But now her bit bottom lip and flushed cheeks told me she was beginning to feel everything it would mean for me.
I opened the script to the final act. “If I play the Beatrice part, the first kiss of my life will be on that stage. If not in the show itself, then for sure in one of the extra rehearsals. That’s not how anyone’s first kiss should be. Besides, everyone will be watching.” I sank into the wooden seat.
Marisol softened. “But it wouldn’t really be your first kiss.”
“Real or not, it’s technically still a kiss. A boy’s lips against mine. And to make it worse, Benedick even speaks a line about silencing Beatrice’s mouth before he lays one on her. They can’t replace the stage notes with ‘Benedick gives Beatrice a warm hug.’”
Marisol curled her fingers around my arm. “I hear you, babe. I get it. Only you can decide what you can and can’t take.” She pointed toward the stage. “But they need you. The whole school does. And—” Her phone buzzed with a text. She read it quickly, then slung her purse across her body. “Of course Mama has a last-minute dress fitting and I have to take the twins to tumbling.” Her face wilted. “Lo siento, amiga. I don’t want to leave you here like this.”
My head rattled. “S’okay, you go. I’ll figure it out.”
“Darcy,” she warned.
“Later. Go.”
When she disappeared up the aisle, I studied the script again.
Benedick: Peace! I will stop your mouth.
I lifted my eyes and searched out Jase, found him chatting with London and Mrs. Howard. Jase was every definition of hot I could come up with. Tall and lean and black-haired, with deep green eyes and a voice like the soft velvet of his costume waistcoat. He was genuinely nice, too. But now the world was asking—begging—me to kiss him onstage, trapping one more piece of my life into ink. Anytime I’d drifted into dreams about my first kiss, I always pictured some heart-stopping version of me, alone with a boy, and a stomach swarming with butterflies.
The Library of Lost Things Page 17