Second Thoughts

by Cara Bertrand

  When Amy finished her work, she playfully turned my head from side to side while we watched in the mirror. “You know I like your hair down best, but this hairdo is going to look awesome when they crown you.”

  “Ugh. Would you stop with that? It’s not going to happen.”

  “You wait. It is.” Before I could protest, she wrapped her arms around my shoulders from behind in a fierce hug. “I love you, Young, you know that, right? I can’t even imagine what it would be like without you anymore. Happy birthday.”

  “Love you too, babe.” We stayed like that for a few moments. Then I bit her on the forearm and she jumped away with a squeal.

  “Bitch!” she yelled, giggling. “I’m going to return your birthday present.”

  “Too late!” I gave a languid stretch of my arms over my head. “And it was awesome. Thank you. Again. Even though I asked you not to get me anything.”

  “You didn’t ask me to get your other present either…”

  “What?!”

  She reclined on her bed, carefully spreading the fluttery tiers of her skirt, and patted an overnight bag I hadn’t noticed next to it on the floor. “I’ll be gone tonight, so you, you know, have the place to yourself.”

  I laughed. “You know what? It does feel like last year all over again.”

  “Not really. This time I’m wearing black and I know you’ll actually take advantage of an empty room.” She was wearing black, a color she rarely chose, so it made her look extra dramatic. Her halter dress enhanced her already sizable assets, and had an asymmetrical skirt of chiffon ruffles that made it fun instead of severe. I’d missed dress shopping with her this year, but she never needed my help anyway. “Plus,” she added, “I mean I’ll be gone all night.”

  “What? How?”

  Very fast, as if all one word and with at least two exclamation points, she said, “Wegotaroomatthehotel!!”

  “What? How?” I repeated, just like an owl.

  “Caleb’s leaving in the morning for a college trip and he got permission.”

  There was still something missing. Knowing Amy as I did, she should have been talking about this for weeks. Instead, she was springing it on me now, moments before we were leaving. I knew some other students got rooms; their parents gave permission and they took cars or cabs home in the morning. But Amy’s parents weren’t the kind who’d do that.

  Bingo.

  “What about your permission?”

  Amy tapped her perfectly painted nails—they were black with sparkly silver stripes and I wanted to copy them immediately—on the wall and cleared her throat. I wondered if she thought by telling me at the last minute, I might not ask. “Who’s going to notice?”

  “Ame…” I started and she sighed dramatically, but I continued. “I know, I know, but it’s not a good idea. Just stay there for a while and come back before morning. Is it really worth the risk?”

  “For an entire night and the chance to wake up together for, like, the first time ever? Yeah. Besides, there’s no risk.”

  “That’s not—”

  “Lane,” she said and her tone told me there was no convincing her otherwise. “I’ll see you in the morning sometime. Drink your champagne and relax, okay? Now it does feel like last year again,” she added and giggled, our moment of disagreement was forgotten. I knew anything I said would be wasting my breath, so I finished my champagne like she suggested. I wouldn’t, however, let her pour me another glass.

  THE BALLROOM WAS just as beautiful as last year, though entirely different, in a color scheme of royal blue and cream with tiny hints of maroon in some lights and decorations. Naturally then, Alexis was in a dress of vibrant red that shined as if she’d been spotlit. The satin hugged her like skin, with a sweetheart neckline and a long skirt that looked impossible to move in but so sophisticated. In comparison, my simple green dress suddenly felt plain.

  “Wow, over-the-top much?” Amy said when she saw where I was looking and I squeezed her hand in solidarity.

  From behind me, Carter whispered in my ear, “Not even half as beautiful as you.”

  “Besides, I bet she can’t even dance in that thing!” Amy added.

  “You guys are the best.” Sometimes a girl didn’t mind a few little white lies.

  Alexis was a sure standout, but Brooke’s short dress was probably the best one in the whole room. It looked almost vintage, with a fitted strapless top that made her waist look impossibly small and a flouncy skirt that didn’t quite hit her knees. Under the top layers of the skirt was a bohemian sort of pattern that was so unique and all Brooke. The gold sparkles matched the amber in her eyes.

  When Dr. Stewart made her way to the podium to announce Winter Queen my stomach began to flutter. I realized I was repeatedly smoothing my dress across my legs and stopped. Amy caught my eye and gave me a thumbs up.

  “Dork,” I muttered, but her goofy grin made me laugh. A year ago, I wouldn’t have thought it possible that I could even be a candidate. But tonight, I might win. A lot of me didn’t want that, but I’d be a liar if I said it was all of me. Carter squeezed my hand as we waited.

  Next to us, Caleb said, “Where’s the crown?”

  Exactly what I was thinking, but pretending not to. Something was up. Last year, someone had carried the little tiara onto the stage behind the headmaster. In her best headmaster voice, Dr. Stewart welcomed us and thanked us and commented on the long tradition of the Winter Ball and after not very long it all sounded to me exactly like radio static. I just wanted her to get it over with and announce my name or not.

  Finally, finally she said, “And it seems that this year, for the first time in the Ball’s long history, we have no Winter Queen.” Gasps and murmurs filled the air and my stomach plummeted. Alexis’s jaw dropped perilously close to her knees. After a pause long enough to make us all uncomfortable, she said, “We have two.”

  Two sophomores carried two matching tiaras up to the front, while Dr. Stewart called, “A return queen, Miss Alexis Morrow, and new queen Miss Elaine Young,” and my whole face became one huge grin. I’d never have guessed the headmaster had any sort of flair for the dramatic, but boy did she.

  “Shit,” Amy muttered, but I wasn’t even trying to hide my delight. A tie! I’d sort of won! But I hadn’t completely taken the crown from Alexis and she cared way more than I did.

  “Please congratulate them both,” Dr. Stewart continued, “and also, wish Miss Young a happy birthday!” It dawned on me that she’d probably known about this all day. My visit to her office seemed so long ago.

  “Guess I really should have voted for myself,” I mused as I started toward the front. I could hear Amy groaning behind me. But then she had to get up and follow, because despite her worries and mine, she was elected to the court too. When they called Brooke’s name, I was even more thrilled.

  The only person not thrilled was Alexis. I could see it in the stretch of her smile and the shine of her eyes. She was proud and beautiful, waiting for her crown, but also disappointed. I took my place next to her on the little stage and whispered, “I voted for you. Just so you know.”

  She was surprised. More surprised than the tie. I didn’t think it crossed her mind that her competition might support her. After a longer pause than even Dr. Stewart’s she said, “Thanks. I guess I wouldn’t be up here if it wasn’t for you.”

  “Not really,” I said. “It’s not like I cast all the votes. And I voted for the girl who I thought made the best queen.”

  After she’d leaned down to receive her crown and I’d done the same, during the whoops and applause of our classmates, Alexis surprised me. “Just by saying that you proved yourself wrong. But thank you anyway. This”—she cleared her throat—“means a lot to me.”

  “I know,” I said, and to both our continued shock, I hugged her. A stiff second later she hugged me back. But not for too long.

  “Your cast is giving me a bruise,” she said and pulled away. I smiled, because that was Alexis.

 
; After that, we danced. And laughed, and shouted along to the music, and partied, and by the end, hugged and cried. It was the Winter Ball of our senior year and it was amazing. Everything I’d hoped it would be. It felt like nothing bad could possibly happen, tonight or ever again, and I realized I’d been wrong earlier: last year actually could be topped, except in a good way. A whole night dancing in the warm safety of Carter’s arms, surrounded by friends and even a few enemies who were having just as much fun as me—it was so perfect it didn’t seem real. But it was.

  Before it ended, Amy and Caleb were ready to sneak upstairs, and I gave them each a last hug goodbye. “Be careful, and don’t be too late,” I told Amy.

  “You be careful,” she said, laughing. “‘Night, Lane. Night, Penrose. I love you guys.” She gave her dress one more twirl before she slipped out the door.

  Carter was standing behind me, arms around my waist, while I leaned into him and swayed to the music. “They were happy tonight,” he said and I nodded my head against his chest.

  “It was a great night.”

  “No. It was perfect.”

  I smiled and tilted my head way back so he could see me looking up at him. “It kind of was, wasn’t it?”

  He leaned down to kiss me, lightly, once on the lips. Silly and awkward, it was the best kiss of the evening. So far.

  “You know what’s even better?” I asked.

  “What?”

  “The night’s not over yet.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  In the morning, I slept late—way late—and lounged in bed for a long time. There was no reason not to; Carter was long gone and I had nothing I had to do. I felt like the longer I stayed there, the longer it was still part of the night before. Amy wasn’t back yet, which would have worried me if I was letting myself worry about a single thing.

  My lips tightened into a surely pouty line across my face. I envied Amy, I realized. I could have gotten off-campus privileges for the night if only I’d thought to ask. But I could still get them today. I decided to call Carter, knowing he’d be up even though he wasn’t working, and have him take me to Dad’s.

  As I reached for the phone, my Winter Queen crown caught my eye and brought back my smile. I plucked it off my bedside table and balanced it on my messy hair. Hidden underneath it, half poking out from under my alarm clock—which Amy said was archaic and I should just use my phone like everyone else—was something that didn’t belong there. An envelope.

  The edge of a bright green sticky note was just visible. On it was my name in Ms. Kim’s handwriting. A birthday card, I thought. Yay! She must have given it to Amy when I was still at the spa, and Amy promptly forgot about it.

  But under the sticky note was a message scrawled by Uncle Martin about how I’d been rushed away before he could give this to me. It was a birthday something, just not from Ms. Kim. This was the envelope from Daniel Astor. Inside was a handful of pages, topped with a note.

  Dear Lainey,

  A very happy birthday along with my gift to you. I saw no reason for you to wait for these. I look forward to learning what you choose.

  Best,

  D.A.

  Folded underneath were personal acceptance letters from all of my top colleges.

  THE LETTERS SLID from my hands and I watched my future scatter across the floor while my heart began to race. When I bent to retrieve the papers, my silly tiara toppled off my head and one of the rhinestones popped loose. I kicked it, sending it to sparkle alone under my bed.

  Hands shaking, I picked up the letters, one by one, and read them again. And again. They said nothing remarkable, Congratulations on your acceptance to…We look forward to seeing you in the fall…, but they were here, all of them, and it was only February. It’s not that I wasn’t expecting to be accepted, but…what? Why was this bothering me so much?

  It wasn’t because of excitement that my hands shook. It was something else.

  For a while now, Uncle Dan had been mentally penciled onto my short list of pleasant thoughts. It was hard not to be caught up in his mystique, flattered by the attention he showed me. How many girls could count a U.S. senator among the people taking an active interest in her life? And that wasn’t even considering all the other things he was. I’d been clinging to the idea that he was a positive in my life when it had felt like literally every other thing was fucked up.

  But lately, everything else hadn’t been so bad at all. The vision wasn’t looming, my friends were mostly happy, and the future seemed like a real possibility again. Maybe that gave me the perspective I’d previously lacked, or purposefully ignored.

  If I’d told Amy, or any one of my friends, about the senator’s notes, they’d have told me it was strange. Maybe even creepy. The only one who’d understand was Alexis, and she wasn’t my friend.

  I’d never taken the time to think about how odd it was that the notes had found me at personal moments. I’d accepted it as part of the senator’s charm that he preferred hand-written gestures, and thought the strange delivery of them was just further proof of that charm. A minute ago, when I’d unfolded the thick pages of stationery from my four favorite schools, signed personally by the presidents of each and delivered by my own uncle, I’d been awed.

  But more than that, I’d been freaked.

  It was like my brain flipped a switch. Just like that, I went from fantasy to reality. Just like in the woods with Carter the day I’d visited the cemetery. One second I’d thought one thing, the next I knew the truth.

  I’d convinced myself Dan wasn’t pressuring me to join them, to take up the Marwood family’s mantel. He was giving me solid arguments to help make a difficult decision; he was making my life easier. He was my uncle, this blood relative that only I knew about. Someday I’d have the courage to tell him that, and then he’d love me and I’d have a family, a real family even more than the one I had now.

  These were, I realized, my fantasies.

  The notes, the acceptances, everything—it wasn’t evidence of Senator Astor’s charm and thoughtfulness; it was his power and its reach. It went all the way into the deepest parts of my personal life. I’d spent most of the year feeling unsure who to trust, not even myself or Carter, and thinking that maybe Dan could be the one I did.

  And now, I wasn’t unsure at all. I was certain I’d been wrong.

  Restless, and no longer hungry, I abandoned the plan to call Carter. Instead, I threw on my cold weather gear and snuck off campus. What I really wanted to do was go to the shooting range, except for a few more days my right hand was still in a cast. But what I wanted most was the feeling of concentration and exhilaration that came with the shooting. A long run on a clear winter day would be a close approximation.

  The cool quiet of the forest welcomed me. At first, I counted my steps, like sheep, like it would lull me into a place where all I could hear were the thumps of my stride and the numbers that ticked off my progress. It worked. With every step, I concentrated a little harder on what I was doing and a little less on the rest of my life. By my second mile, I was in a groove, running fast and watching my footfalls on the packed snow.

  No room for the million concerns I’d let creep back into my head. No tingling feeling from any of my supernatural senses. No dawning realization that when my hands shook after I opened Dan Astor’s letter it was because I was scared, not pleased. And most of all, no unwelcome and uncomfortable feeling in my stomach that said I was still missing something. I just ran.

  Eventually what happened was I thought about running. How I didn’t love running, not in the way Carter did. I was halfway decent at it, but because I didn’t love it, I didn’t push myself to excel. For Carter, running was more like an extension of himself. If he couldn’t run, it would be like killing a part of him, part of his very essence.

  And that was it.

  The word essence.

  It was such a pretty word, sibilant and soft, but vital too. Powerful. It was what made things what they were. Made us who we wer
e. It was the heart of who we were.

  Essence. Heart. Essence heart essence heart. In my mind, the two words reverberated with each footfall, faster and faster until I was gasping, crashing to a halt and grabbing a tree to hold me up before my lungs or legs gave out.

  When I caught my breath and the stars dancing in front of my eyes began to fade, I slid to a seat at the base of the tree and forced myself to be still. I’d come out here to outrun my mind, but my mind had other ideas. It had run in a different direction and I needed to listen to it. To think, really think, about all the ideas I’d been chasing in incomplete circles since the beginning of the year.

  I had this great, big puzzle I was trying to solve, with all these different components, but instead of lining up the edges and filling in the middle, I’d been throwing the pieces on the table and watching them scatter. Chasing them around without any real effort. Kind of like running. If I pushed myself, I could do better. If I forced myself, I would figure this out.

  I went back to Jill. She was a piece of the puzzle I’d left dangling at the edge of the table, trying not to examine too closely. But by accident, I’d just found where she fit. It was those two words, heart and essence.

  When she’d been revived, she’d lost not just her life but her Sententia gift as well. Only one of them had been temporary. We’d restored the mechanical piece of heart pumping blood and oxygen and animating the body. But she couldn’t get back her essence. Thought, capital T, had killed that part of her that made her Sententia. A gene or a tiny piece of her brain or whatever our magic was, a connection to God or the greater life consciousness. Something. I didn’t know where it came from, this essential Sententia piece of ourselves. There was something beyond science about what we were, and I had taken it from Jillian. One gift had expelled another.

  I hadn’t meant to. I hadn’t intended to, I realized was the better word. That was the third key to this puzzle: intent. Carter had used it so long ago to describe Thought Moving. Intention. Changing the intention of things. When I’d turned my gift on Jill, I hadn’t known how to use it, how it would work, what it would do except stop hearts because that’s what I’d been told. My intention when I’d made the desperate Thought was to save myself. To let Jill die in my place. It had been good enough to work, and it took everything from her.