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Her words make me bristle. “Like me? Gian ironed this shirt before he hung it in my closet.”
“We are flying over your private island in the family helicopter,” she sniffs.
“I work hard for what I have. I came from modest beginnings.” I grip the clutch tighter. “Nothing was handed to me.”
“Same,” she says. “Except for what was handed to me,” she corrects herself. “The scholarship for the school, of course, and the stolen tuition that doesn’t need to be mentioned again. But I work hard at school, and when the opportunity arose to learn building skills, I jumped on it.”
“That’s brave,” I say.
“Yeah, as you can imagine, all the boys signed up for carpentry, and the girls signed up for gardening. There were a lot of jokes about ‘banging’ aimed at me, but I ignored them and worked hard.” She gives herself a nod of approval. “And it was the first class I aced.”
“I might have to pick your brain when I finish the housing phase of this project,” I say, pointing out into the water. “The second phase of building is out there.”
She stares over the sea. “In the ocean!”
“A place of protection for any Bachman who may need a safe space to hide out or lay low for a while—” I stop myself.
I’ve already shared too much. There’s a limit to what I can tell her. She’s not family—not yet.
I think of the futuristic prototype stored in my phone, a structure in the water, one large white circle in the center, four smaller ones outside of that, the edges of all the circles the same as our emblem. The first layer of housing is above water, with walls ofwindows to bring in the sun. The lower level will be a bunker, a safehouse underwater.
We're silent on the car ride home, enjoying the forest's peace. I like the fact that we can be quiet together. We’re pulling up to the house now. The porch light shines warmly over the navy blue door, illuminating the gold Villa emblem. Pulling into the drive, I relax, knowing we’re home.
We’re home. That’s a strange thought. Cutting the engine, I glance over at her. I trust her. I want to share with her. I pull out my phone, handing it to her. “Want to see the prototype for the structure in the water?”
She takes the phone. “You’re asking the queen of biology class here. I haven’t got the grade back yet, but after that essay, I'm sure I have a solid C in the class. Of course, I want to see this.”
I have a passcode I can give her that will allow her to log in to a separate profile I keep on my phone for when I want to share something with a non-family member. I share it with her now. “The password is one—two—seven—capital B—five—nine—four.”
“Okaaay. Got it. We’re in—” Her tone completely changes to an icy chill. “Haze. What the hell? How did you get this?”
I glance down at the illuminated phone screen. My stomach lurches to my throat. I’d forgotten the screen saver I’d applied.
A four-line poem that I still can’t get out of my mind.
It was the one that made me feel close to Leah, the one that gave me hope, thinking that I could find someone like me in this world.
The void inside grows deeper still.
I search and seek but cannot fill.
Did I create the chasm on my own?
Or was I born to be alone?
My throat feels tight. My voice breaks as I speak. I reach out to take the phone back. “I meant to delete that.”
She holds it away from me, her wide blue eyes filled with confusion, locking her eyes on my face. I stare out at nothing but feel her gaze on me.
Finally, she demands, “What are you doing with this?”
Whatever delicate trust we’ve built between us seems to disappear as quickly as it formed.
My gut roils. I stare out the window. “I don’t want to say.”
The color drains from her face as she stares at the phone in her lap. “I have a journal I write in when I feel lonely or out of place. I’ve never shared any of my writing. No one has ever laid eyes on what I’ve written. You know why? Because I don’t want them to. So why on earth is my poem on your phone screen?” She huffs out an angry breath. “Well, four lines of it, anyway. And it’s not even the best four.”
Wait…