The Rivals

by Daisy Whitney

  I could be him but for one bad landing. That is all that separates us.

  When he raises his head, shaking it, twitching his nose, then inhaling deep down throughout the far reaches of his body, filling his tissues, his bones, his sinews, I take a step back, almost stumbling.

  My skin is tingling, crawling. I take a deep breath and try to center myself. I don’t know why he’d be so careless, so casual, when it’s not that hard to look in his window. But maybe this is what happens when you lose everything you love.

  You no longer care.

  I watch Theo again, and he lifts his shoulders up and down a few times, then reaches both his hands high up in the air, like he’s smacking the ceiling in triumph with those long, muscular arms. He stuffs something in his pocket, looks at a sheet of paper on his desk, then turns off the lights and leaves. I walk quickly to the other side of Richardson but peer around the edge so I can see when he walks out. A few seconds later he’s walking down the steps and then nodding to someone. I half expect it to be Delaney meeting up with him for another side-of-the-building rendezvous.

  But it’s Sam.

  Sam from the list.

  Sophomore Sam, wearing jeans and a hoodie, his hands stuffed into his front pockets, his curly brown hair poking out from under the hood.

  Theo reaches into his pocket, hands something to Sam, then Sam digs back into his pocket and gives something to him. They shake hands, laugh, then walk off together.

  I want to spring from my hiding post, run across the quad, and tackle Theo. I want to whale on him, beat my fists into his chest, his arms, his face, his stupid injured knee that has turned him into this.

  But I don’t. I stay where I am, tucked against the wall of his dorm.

  With Sam beside him, Theo resumes his route to Morgan-Young Hall, where the debate team is meeting for its regular practice. I notice there’s a slight change in his walk as he enters Morgan-Young Hall, as if he’s more confident, more excited. I count to ten and then head in after him. I’m dangerously close to Maia’s territory, so I have to be even more cautious. But I can’t turn back now.

  I walk past the classroom where the team practices. I glance in and it’s as if Theo’s a new man here—gregarious, patting students on the back, a beacon of energy. I pace myself, walk to the end of the hall, lean down to the water fountain for a drink, then chance one more peek. I walk past the room again and see Maia, her back to the group, writing something on the board. Theo’s next to her, like a lieutenant, ready for duty. Beat’s there too, standing at attention as well. Most of them are standing. Most of them are on high alert. Even from the hall, the room is practically buzzing. It’s almost as if I could get a contact high just being near that much energy.

  “See anything good?”

  I jump and make a sound. It’s Jones.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  SPARKS

  “You scared me!”

  “I can tell,” he says, a look of mischief in his dark blue eyes.

  I walk toward the doors, motioning for him to come along. “What are you doing here?” I ask.

  “I missed English today, so I was picking up the assignment.”

  “Why did you miss English?”

  “My mom called this time. She wanted me to know my dad’s being summoned to a hearing tomorrow and that she fully expects me to be on board with whatever he says.”

  “What do they think? That you were going to call up the New York Times or something and say he’s lying?”

  “Yeah. I think they do think that. And I would never rat out my own family, but trust me, it’s tempting when they give me their whole be quiet or else routine. So oddly enough, I didn’t feel like going to class. Anyway, why were you checking out Debate Club practice is the more interesting question.”

  I shrug in return.

  “Yeah, that’s not really going to fly. You’re spying.”

  I hold up my hands in admission.

  “What’d you find out?” he asks as we hit the quad.

  “Where are you headed right now?” I ask, deflecting.

  “Wherever you’re going.”

  “Music hall,” I say.

  “Cool. I left my guitar there earlier today. So tell me, what’d you learn?”

  I don’t name names, but as we head into the music hall I do tell him I saw the real dealer dealing. We sit down and Jones takes his guitar from its case. The silver gleams, almost like he’s polished it. “How can I prove this guy should be on trial too, Jones? God, I wish you were in the Mockingbirds,” I add wistfully. “You would be the perfect person to help me get to the bottom of this case.”

  “I have no doubt you’ll figure out how to get this guy on trial, whatever it takes.”

  “But isn’t whatever it takes what your dad did?”

  Jones laughs deeply. “Well, I’m not suggesting you take advantage of the unemployed and hire teams of them to buy up all the Annie in Rhode Island,” he says, then punches me on the shoulder.

  “Really?” I tease. “Because I was thinking of doing that and then redistributing it to the uninsured.”

  “Then you are Robin Hood. And it is fine,” he says, and holds up his index finger in the air to punctuate his point.

  But the wheels are turning and the words whatever it takes are clicking. Because now I know the next thing I need to do, the next person I need to see—Beat—and it’s a visit I’ll make alone tomorrow. Whether it makes me Robin Hood or not, I don’t know. But it’s what I have to do.

  “Jones,” I begin, “do you ever think about why your dad did what he did? I mean, I’m not condoning it. I’m totally on your side. But do you ever think what you would do in that situation?”

  “I would never have to lie at a government hearing because I never would have covered it up in the first place.”

  “Right. But what drove him to that? Why did he feel like hiding the truth was his only option?”

  “I think he picked it because it was the easy option. Or so he thought at the time.”

  I close my eyes, wishing there were a right way, a simple and honest way, to tie up all the loose ends on this case, but I don’t know anymore what that’d be. The whole thing is a haze, a blurry mirage on the horizon. Now you see it. Now you don’t.

  “Jones, will you play Adagio for Strings?” I ask, because music is the only thing that is exactly what it is.

  Jones drifts into Samuel Barber’s piece, and I just listen to the haunting music, to what many have called the saddest piece of classical music ever. For tonight it’s fitting, and as I listen the Mockingbirds slip away. The trial, the crime, the enemies—they are gone. All that exists is all there should be—music, just music, filling me up.

  Jones finishes. “I think music exists to express all the feelings we can’t put into words. All the feelings there aren’t words for,” he says quietly.

  “I was thinking the same thing,” I say.

  He bumps my shoulder with his own, and I feel the strangest sensation.

  I feel a zing.

  Jones turns his head to tune one of the strings and I sneak a peek at him, not his face, but his hands. His long fingers. His musician’s hands. Hands that can do everything, hands like mine. An image flits through my mind. His hands on mine. Two musicians’ hands, fingers against fingers.

  Then I look the other way, my cheeks burning. No wonder Martin was cold earlier. Because Jones is like a flame.

  *

  I call Martin on the way back to my dorm. He doesn’t answer. But before I reach the steps, a text comes through.

  In science lab. What’s up?

  It’s weird that he’d text me back rather than just answer, since he’s usually alone in the science lab.

  Want a visitor? I type, and then wait for an answer. For a minute, then another, then another.

  Finally it comes: OK.

  That’s it. Just OK. Not even Okay.

  I double back to the science lab. Martin’s alone, hunched over a microscope.<
br />
  “Anything interesting happening there? Cells dividing or something? What’s that called? Metamorphosis?” I joke.

  “Something like that,” Martin says, and looks up from the microscope. His expression is chilly.

  “Or maybe you’re splitting the atom,” I suggest.

  “John Cockcroft and Ernest Walton beat me to that years ago,” he says, then peers back into the microscope and scribbles something in the notebook next to him.

  There’s a silence in the lab, and it’s clear I must go first.

  “You’re mad at me,” I say as I walk over to him and put my backpack on the floor.

  “Why would you say that?”

  “You’re not denying it.”

  “How’s Jones?” he asks, looking up. He’s icy again.

  “Fine.”

  “So you did see him after all.”

  “I ran into him,” I say.

  “Convenient.”

  “Convenient? What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You said you weren’t going to see him. Then you ran into him. That’s convenient.”

  “Yeah, it was convenient, since we were able to practice playing music then.”

  “I’m sure. Is he still going through stuff?”

  “Yeah, as a matter of fact.”

  “And were you able to help him?” Martin shoots back.

  “What the hell? What are you trying to say?”

  “Nothing. I’m not trying to say anything,” he says through gritted teeth. He looks away from me and grips the edge of the black counter with hands pressed so hard against it I swear for a second the counter buckles under them.

  “What is this about?” I ask, pushing the memory of the zing far out of my mind. “I’ve been friends with him the whole time I’ve been here. The whole time you and I have been together.”

  “I know,” he says, clenching his jaw, then breathing out hard.

  “So…?” I ask.

  “It’s just, you’re always slipping off to see him. Running into him. Practicing with him. Talking to him. He texts you when we’re together. You write back right away. You leave me to see him,” he says, rattling off a litany of my sins. The day in the caf, the afternoon after the Faculty Club, the night in the library. That’s why I don’t say anything, because he’s right. I don’t defend myself because it’s all true.

  “I’m sorry,” I say softly. “But I see you too.”

  He turns his gaze to me now, locking his eyes on me. His hands are still gripping the counter but not quite as tight, not quite as firm. Still, I can sense the strength of his whole body resting on those hands.

  “I see you too? That’s it? Most of the time I see you it’s with the Mockingbirds. I want to see you without them. Do you want to see me without them?” he asks, and now his anger has turned to hurt. I step closer to him and take his hand.

  “Yes,” I say quickly. “Of course I do. How can you even doubt that?”

  He laughs for a second and lets me hold his hand. Then he says, “Because I am not the superhuman person you think I am.”

  Now it’s my turn to laugh. “I always suspected you had superpowers.”

  “But I don’t,” he says, and he runs a hand through his shaggy brown hair. “And I am insanely jealous of how much time you spend with him. Alone. And I don’t want to be jealous. I don’t want to be that guy. But I am. And I hate it.”

  “I kind of like it,” I say softly. Martin’s always been the pillar of integrity, honor, and character, and sometimes I can forget he is just a guy, a normal guy who gets jealous when his girlfriend hangs out with another guy. “I just kind of like seeing how normal you are.”

  “Oh, you do?”

  “Yeah. I kind of do,” I say as I reach for his other hand. He lets me lace my fingers through his. I look down at our hands together and though they’re not musician hands, they’re his hands. They’re the ones I want to be holding. He’s the one I want to be touching. He’s the one I hurt. But even more than that, he’s the one I want. And I want him. I want him now. “It’s kind of sexy.”

  “Is it? Sexy?” he asks playfully.

  “Yes,” I say slowly in a whisper, and pull him near me. “I want to kiss you. And then I want to do more than kiss you. Because you’re the guy I’m in love with.”

  Then he groans, a low sound that tells me he wants exactly the same. But before he gives in to me, he turns around and opens a drawer in the lab. He pulls out one of those long lighters, like the kind for a fireplace, with a blue plastic handle.

  “You going to burn the joint down?” I ask.

  He shakes his head and reaches into another drawer. There’s a bag of cotton balls in the drawer. He takes one out and pulls it apart, breaking off a feathery bit of cotton. He dips his hand back in the first drawer and now he’s got a long metal stick that looks like a barbecue skewer with a bulbous wick of white fabric at the tip. He flicks on the lighter, leans into the wick, and lights it. The next thing I know, he’s moving his other hand into the flame, peeling off a fireball into his palm, then dropping it into his mouth. He keeps his mouth open for a second, showing me his tongue on fire, then closes his mouth and smiles. He turns the lighter off, then takes the cotton ball out of his mouth.

  To say I am amazed would be an understatement.

  “How did you do that?”

  “Simple physics,” he says. “The moisture in your mouth starts to douse the flames. Then you take the air away like this,” he says, closing his mouth in demonstration, then opening it again, “and the flame is killed.”

  “You can eat fire.”

  He nods proudly.

  “My boyfriend can eat fire.”

  “There’s more where that came from,” he says, and proceeds to show me how he can rub the flame against his jeans without setting the denim on fire, how he can shift a flame back and forth between his hands, then how he can lean his head back and eat the flame that’s burning at the end of the makeshift torch.

  “How did you learn to eat fire?” I ask.

  “Alex, I’ve been playing with fire for a long time.”

  “C’mon. Seriously. How do you do all this?”

  He shrugs happily, that familiar Martin shrug. “What can I say? I’m a science geek. You watch a few Web videos, try a few things, you teach yourself how to eat fire. I’ve been doing it since I was twelve.”

  “Amazing,” I say.

  “Want to try?”

  “Not for a second.”

  “You can do it. I’ll walk you through it.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  “C’mon. You’re not afraid of anything,” he says, and I feel myself bending.

  “Fine. But just that little cotton ball.”

  “I wouldn’t let you use the torch. The torch is only for seasoned pros,” Martin says. Then he walks me through the cotton-ball trick. I hesitate the first time, blowing it out. The second time I hand it off to him and he douses the flame with his tongue. The third time I just do it. I pop the lit cotton ball in my mouth and clamp my lips down on it instantly.

  My eyes light up as I take the cotton ball out. “I ate fire!”

  “You ate fire,” he says.

  I put my hands on his face and kiss his lips.

  “Your mouth is warm,” he whispers.

  “So is yours,” I say. But, really, hot would be a much more accurate adjective right now.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  BACKFIRE

  I am a fire-eater.

  I am a stealthy spy.

  I am the defender of the powerless.

  I am the protector of the student body.

  I am Robin Hood.

  That is what I tell myself the next day. All day long. In every class. To steel myself for my mission tonight.

  I say the words under my breath in English class as Mr. Baumann scoots up on the edge of his desk and pushes up the sleeves on his blue button-down shirt.

  “Power,” he begins. “Tell me about the kind of powe
r The Chocolate War addresses.”

  Maia—shocker—is the first one to raise a hand.

  “The power of fear. The Vigils exist solely for the purpose of pushing others around,” she says, referring to the secret society in The Chocolate War that makes other students do their bidding. “Their only mission is to keep other students on edge, and they do it through psychological intimidation. The most masterful and chilling psychological intimidation. I wouldn’t want to cross their leader.”

  “Is that enough to maintain a hierarchy? Fear?” Mr. Baumann asks.

  “Yes,” Maia answers. “The Vigils set the rules. And everyone else follows them. And if you don’t follow the rules, then, like Jerry, you lose.”

  “Mr. Cormier was not one for happy endings, was he?” Mr. Baumann asks.

  Anjali raises a hand, and he calls on her. “That’s where I disagree with Cormier. You said you want us to find truth in fiction, and I think the ending is needlessly depressing. I think you can stand up, you can disturb the universe, without just winding up back where you started. Isn’t that where all good revolutions come from? From someone standing up to the way it’s been and saying, No, let’s change things. Let’s make them better!”

  Maia swivels around to look at Anjali, the sleek, black-haired Brit taking on the wispy, blond French girl. “Are you honestly saying you think Cormier should have written a happy ending where Jerry just trots off without selling the chocolate and everyone follows him, doe-eyed, into the happily-ever-after?”

  “I don’t know that everyone would follow him. But I think some would. I don’t think everyone wants to sell chocolates. And I think people are strong enough to say no to chocolate-selling.”

  Whoa.

  Could there be more of a double entendre to their conversation? I glance around at the other fourteen students in the room, wondering if they too are picking up on all the undertones between Maia and Anjali, who might as well be talking about the Anderin case.