by Emma Mills
I drop my sewing. Lower my head into my hands and squeeze my eyes shut.
“Why are you doing this to yourself?” comes Del’s voice from the corner.
“Are you ever not listening? Seriously.”
She doesn’t dignify that with a direct response. “Is this about whatever Lena said to you at Brunati’s?”
“No,” I say. I hear Del move across the room.
When I open my eyes, she is standing on the other side of the worktable, leaning against it and looking right at me. “Say it again to my face.”
I look away.
Del just shakes her head. “I don’t understand why you would listen to her.”
“It’s not about listening. It’s just … I just…”
“What?”
He loves something until he doesn’t. “If someone says the thing that you’re afraid of … If someone thinks it, and you think it, too, then it has to be at least a little bit true, right?”
“That’s bullshit,” Del says.
“Is it, though? It’s like … someone agreeing with you. It’s like validation.”
“Maybe you’re both wrong. Did you ever think of that?”
I don’t reply.
It’s not about Lena, not really. It’s just easier to never start something than to have to see it end.
* * *
We break for dinner.
Iris comes to the shop, and we split the Pinky’s sub I brought. Four point five inches of sandwich apiece. She tells me about tech thus far, which involved a lot of stopping and starting and people forgetting their lines. She says people emphatically.
“Lena?” I say.
She shakes her head, a wrinkle between her brows. “Paige.”
“Really?”
“She was having trouble.”
“Huh.”
“I hope everything’s okay,” Iris says quietly, pulling a piece of shredded lettuce out of her sandwich and frowning at it.
“There’s nothing wrong with that lettuce.”
“I meant with Paige.”
“I know, but you’re giving the lettuce a suspicious look.”
“What makes you the lettuce expert?”
“Well, I do work at Pinky’s.”
Iris blinks at me, still frowning. “You work at Pinky’s?”
“Yeah…”
“Seriously? What else are you hiding? Do you also work for the CIA?”
“I’m not hiding, I just … it’s never come up. I haven’t been working much since we’ve been doing the show anyway.”
“Oh.”
It’s quiet.
“What?” I say.
“Just. I don’t know.” She looks up, almost hesitant. “I … am sorry. For the paper. That we had to do this because we—because I—fucked up the paper. I’m sorry if it, like … disrupted your life.”
I blink down at the Pinky’s wrapper, having already decimated my four-point-five inches of sandwich.
“Yeah, no.” I look back up at Iris. “I think I’m kind of glad the show happened. Even with…” Everything. Even with everything.
“Me too,” Iris says. “A little bit. Maybe.”
I smile.
Noah comes by after the dinner break to practice getting the donkey head on and off for his big transformation scene. One of us will need to be backstage during the show to help him with it, so we all run through it a few times.
They’re about to start teching this scene, so Del turns to me when we’re finished. “Claudia, why don’t you go back up with him?”
I glance at Noah, who is fumbling with one of the ears.
“Yeah, sure.”
So I get custody of the donkey head, and we head back up together.
As soon as the door to the shop closes behind us, Noah speaks. “Hey, so it’s probably none of my business, but … did something happen with Gideon?”
“No,” I say, starting down the hall toward the stairs.
“Because he’s been acting weird since Homecoming.”
“I thought he told you everything.”
“He does. So it’s particularly weird that he hasn’t said why he’s being weird.” We reach the staircase and head up in silence. But Noah stops at the top. “Look, I just … I’m just worried about him.”
I think of the babies in sailor suits, and did you ever want a brother too?
I already have one, remember?
“He asked me out,” I say. “I said no. That’s all.”
Noah blinks. “I thought you guys liked each other.”
“That doesn’t really matter.” I start toward the auditorium.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
I pause as we reach the door to the theater. “He doesn’t know how to like something for more than ten minutes,” I say. Lena’s words on my lips. “He refuses to go to parties because of the cups. He remembers the presents people give him but not the people themselves. That’s just … it’s just how he is, right?”
Noah just shakes his head. “You don’t know him at all.” He starts through the door but then turns back. “For real. If you think that, then you don’t know him at all.”
Then he walks away.
forty-seven
Tech runs mostly smooth on Tuesday—they make it all the way through to the end of the show, at least—and Wednesday brings the first dress rehearsal.
Paige comes into the shop for a costume fix after school, before everyone’s due in the auditorium for the run-through. Del and Caris are occupied, so it falls to me to help her. I try to chat about the show while I adjust the straps on her top, but she seems distracted.
When I finally give up on conversation, she speaks.
“Are you, um.” Paige looks up at the ceiling and then says in a rush, “Are you and Iris dating?” Before I can answer, or even react, she goes on: “I know I’m being unfair, I know we broke up, and I don’t have any right to know her business but, like, do you like her, are you guys dating?”
“No,” I say.
“But … she seems really … happy. Around you. And I noticed, at Homecoming…”
“What?”
“I noticed that you came with Gideon, but you left with Iris. And then he seemed kind of upset when I saw him later.…”
“Does he think I turned him down for Iris?”
“No, but I sort of just … figured. Wait, so you did turn him down?”
“No. I mean, yes, I did, but not for Iris. We’re not together.”
Only because I am actively working on Paige’s torso do I note the little breath she releases at that. A small sigh of something that can only be relief.
I have to tell Iris. Iris, who was sitting on the bleachers at Homecoming in that pink dress, several months too late to be wearing it, but wearing it all the same.
Del suddenly appears at my shoulder, batting my hand away. “Not like that. Let me. Look at Josie’s hem, will you?”
I nod. Josie is busy admiring herself in the mirror. Her fairy costume is pretty awesome, if I do say so myself. Not that I had any hand in designing it, but I did sew the shirt and collar, and the petticoat that Del constructed looks awesome. But Josie snagged a hem during rehearsal yesterday, so I make her stand still, and I start pinning.
I finish with Josie, and she leaves just as Iris arrives.
She spots Del and Paige, laughing about something, and scowls instantly.
“Hey, come here,” I say, but Iris barely gives me a glance. “I have to tell you something important.” There is no way to communicate Paige is still into you with my eyes, especially not when Paige and Del are standing so close together and Iris can’t rip her gaze away from them.
“How’s it going, Del?” Iris says loudly.
Del glances up, looking decidedly put off. “Fine, Iris. How are you?”
“I was wondering if you heard from any other design schools yet, or if you had just been rejected from the one so far.”
Oh shit.
“What’s your pro
blem?” Del says, lips curving into a smile that is zero percent friendly and 100 percent bad news for Iris. “Seriously.”
“I don’t have a problem,” Iris replies.
“Literally everyone who’s ever met you would beg to differ.”
“Um,” I say, awkwardly loud. “Del, will you help me with—”
“I mean, isn’t that why things didn’t work out between you two?” Del looks between Paige and Iris.
“Hey, how about we not?” Paige says with false brightness.
“Oh, wait, I remember why,” Del continues. “It’s because you’re selfish as fuck. That seemed to be your main problem. Because she wanted you to be better than you are.”
“Del,” Paige says.
Iris just blinks. “What did you say?”
Del doesn’t repeat it, but she doesn’t have to. We all heard.
For a second, I think Iris might go at Del. Like seriously have a go at her. It would be a bit like a terrier taking on a Great Dane, but I have no doubt that Iris could inflict some damage if she wanted to.
But instead she turns to me, and there’s color high in her cheeks.
“You told?” she says, and her voice is choked. “You told her?”
I blink. And then it registers. Of course it does. I was the only one who heard Paige say that. The only one besides Iris, that is. “I didn’t,” I say. “I wouldn’t tell, I wouldn’t—”
“You’re so full of shit,” Iris says, and then leaves.
My legs move almost of their own volition, carrying me out into the hall after her. She’s moving swiftly away, and I have to jog to catch up.
“I didn’t tell, I swear,” I say, and there’s desperation to it. My heart is beating faster, and it feels like all the blood is rushing up my neck, up and around my head, every nerve ending suddenly alight with panic, with the way that Iris looked at me in there. Like I’m the ultimate betrayer. “Iris.” I put a hand on her shoulder to stop her, and she turns, but she wrenches away from me.
“I knew it,” she says, and even though she’s crying, her words come out quick, clear, harsh: “I knew it from the start but I didn’t listen to that voice telling me to not bother with you, because you were nice to me, and I was lonely, and that’s on me. But being a lying piece of shit? That’s on you, Claudia.”
She didn’t lay a finger on me, but it hurts like she did, like she laid a punch right to my solar plexus.
“I didn’t” is all I can say.
“Go screw yourself,” Iris replies, and leaves.
This time I don’t follow.
forty-eight
As I return to the shop, Paige bursts through the door.
“I’m sorry,” she says, eyes wide and sad. “I’m sorry, I’ll talk to her. I’ll tell her the truth.”
“What truth?”
“That it was me. I told Del.”
“This isn’t like a broken picture frame—you can’t just take the blame for it.”
“But I did. I told her. After Iris and I broke up, I … talked to Del about it some, and it helped. I’ll tell Iris. I will.”
I take a deep breath. Then I shake my head. “It’s fine.”
“No, Claudia—”
“Really. It doesn’t matter.” That’s a lie. “I don’t care.” And another.
I walk past her and into the shop, grab my bag off one of the worktables and ignore Del, who has paused in front of a dress form with Hippolyta’s wedding dress on it. Worth it, not worth it. Worth it, not worth it.
“That was mean,” I say finally. “And really unnecessary.”
Del doesn’t reply. Doesn’t acknowledge that I’ve spoken at all.
I leave.
* * *
I walk around the Grove for fifteen minutes.
It seemed reasonable to storm off, but rationally, I need to be there for rehearsal. I have to do last-minute fixes on the costumes. I have to be on hand to take care of the donkey head.
So I go back. And I suffer through the last-minute fixes and rehearsal, standing backstage to claim the donkey head after Bottom has been officially restored to his original self.
When it’s all over—late into the evening—I go home and log into Battle Quest. I start a side quest for a blacksmith in the capital city, journeying out into the Blaze to collect some rare ore from a miner.
It’s dark out there in the fields, the middle of the night. At least momentarily.
The Aradanian suns have risen and I’ve gotten the ore by the time my chat window dings.
>Gideon Prewitt waves at you
Viola is positioned next to a hillside just outside the capital city. I’m all alone, or so it seems, until I toggle my view around and see Gideon Prewitt, now a level-nine notary signore, standing nearby.
>Gideon Prewitt strikes a gentlemanly pose
>Gideon Prewitt twirls
>Gideon Prewitt does the Horsenfeld shuffle
I don’t respond. Viola just stands, stoic, and there’s no way that Gideon can know that I’m sad, that I feel inside out and upside down, there’s no way that he can tell. But the chat window dings again.
>Gideon Prewitt: you okay?
On-screen, avatar Gideon Prewitt walks right up to Viola. And it’s so stupid, I’m so stupid, but I wish he was here, I wish it was real. I wish I could bury my face in his neck. I want it so bad my fingers twitch on the controller, straining not to make my stupid game character hug his stupid game character so at least some facsimile of it can exist.
I stay still. Viola stands, motionless.
>Gideon Prewitt: claude?
When my fingers finally spring into action, it’s to log off.
* * *
I set my computer aside and lie on my bed, and I can’t help but think of the first day of preschool.
I knew that school was a place that Julia went off to every day. Alex had started going, too, and I knew that he liked it—the coloring and the block corner and the little round tokens you could exchange for treats on special days.
But I wanted to stay home with my mom, who was still just part-time back then, working evenings after my dad got home from work.
On the first day of preschool, my mom held my hand and walked me into the classroom. She got me situated at a table where a couple of kids were doing puzzles and then hung back a bit while I started in on mine. The puzzle was tricky, but I was getting the hang of it—I almost had it—
Then I turned around and saw that she wasn’t there anymore.
I cried and cried and cried when I realized she had left. I cried even as a little girl from one of the other tables came up to me. She was wearing denim shorts and a purple striped T-shirt. Her hair was arranged in little twists, clasped at the ends by plastic flower barrettes in an array of neon colors. The barrettes clicked against one another as she moved toward me.
“She’s gonna come back,” she said as I hiccupped in between sobs. “Your mama. She’ll come back later. Mrs. Parson said.”
Her eyes were very solemn. I didn’t understand solemnity or concern; I couldn’t define the fact that she was looking at me like I was important. Like I mattered. But it stopped my crying, momentarily.
I didn’t know what to say. So I reached out and touched one of her barrettes.
Her face split into a smile. She reached up and unclipped the barrette, and before I could react, she grabbed a hunk of my hair and tried to clip it in. But it was too much, the barrette wouldn’t close. So she just pressed it into my hand instead—a lime-green daisy clip.
I admired it, the perfect flower shape, and then held it out to her.
“You can keep it,” Zoe said. And just like that, we were friends.
I sit up.
And stand and cross over to my dresser, to the jewelry box on top. I slide open one of the tiny drawers, top left. If the jewelry box had a heart, this would be it.
I pick up the barrette. Clasp it hard and hold my fist against my mouth. I know that it will press a daisy shape into my palm, and I
don’t even care.
I cry hard.
forty-nine
I’m crossing through the Grove on Thursday before the start of dress rehearsal. The leaves on the trees have thinned—most have fallen in a carpet of yellows and reds and browns—and I see the figures up ahead before I hear them.
It’s Gideon and Noah, heads bent in conversation.
It reminds me of the first day of school—coming here with Caris and Robbie. Gideon raising his arms in the air like a referee, calling us all over. Asking everyone about their summer like he actually cared.
It’s too late to turn away when they see me. Gideon waves, tentative compared to that first-day-of-school enthusiasm.
I reach into my pocket to clasp the green daisy barrette that I’ve been carrying around today like a totem. Like it will bring me comfort, or peace of mind, like it will help guard me against Gideon and his cautious smile.
Except the barrette isn’t there.
I check my other pocket. I turn them both out. I spin around, in case it slipped out just now.
But the barrette is nowhere on me, nowhere in sight.
I had it in calc this afternoon, I had it at my locker after class, and as I headed over here, I’m certain I did, mostly certain, fairly certain—
“Claudia?”
Leaves crunch as Gideon and Noah head my way.
I’m frantically scanning the ground when they reach me.
“What’s wrong?” Gideon says.
“I lost something.” I can’t keep the panic out of my voice, and it’s stupid, I know it is, but—
“What is it?” Noah says, brow furrowed.
“A hair clip. It’s green, and it’s shaped like a flower—”
The look they both give me says that my reaction is not proportional to the situation. I shake my head. “It’s important. I have to find it.”
“Then we’ll find it,” Gideon says. “When did you last have it?”
“Right before I got to the Grove. It’s bright green and plastic, it’s—” I watch as Gideon starts searching in earnest, but Noah is still giving me that look. “I know it sounds stupid, but I need it.”
He nods. “Yeah, okay.”
We start retracing my steps back up toward school, but there are so many leaves on the ground, I already know deep down that this is basically a pointless endeavor. But I keep looking anyway.