Page 21 of House of Hearts

I tune out their conversation, my eyes drifting beyond Ms.Austin to the wall behind her.

Despite the clearly new boats and dock, the boathouse itself is a relic.

The brick wall behind Ms.Austin’s back might be aged, but a black-and-white portrait paints a picture of when it was newly erected.

There’s a team of students standing at the forefront, each one with an oar in hand and their name scrawled in thin cursive.

Phillip Green, Martin Hoadley, J. Wellington Wales, Oleander Lockwell.

Oleander. Before he became immortalized in this school forever, was he really just another student?

Calvin’s voice continues beside me. “You could swim it again this year.”

She rolls her eyes. “With this bad hip? Not likely.”

“Pat Gallant-Charette swam it at sixty-six. You could beat her record.”

Her eyes brighten at the possibility. “I do miss it. Winds were wild that day, and not even halfway in, I was stung by a jellyfish. Don’t even get me started on the dehydration—”

She’s prepared to recount her story for the tenth time when Calvin interjects.

His hand splays convincingly behind me, his fingertips hovering an inch above my skin.

Heat radiates from his almost-touch, and I stiffen to attention.

“Ms.Austin, this is riveting, truly, but I hope you don’t mind if we finish up next time?

I’m not one to keep a girl waiting on a first date. ”

She reluctantly waves him forward, but shouts “no more than fifteen minutes” at our backs.

“I wouldn’t dream of taking longer!” he replies, and something in my gut tells me we’ll be at least thirty.

Ahead of us, two flocks of swan boats wait at the end of the runway to the pier. They’re poised like ballerinas, their wooden necks arched gracefully my way. Calvin helps me into the first one on our right, and I glare up at him from the bench.

“Tell someone we’re on a date again, and I’ll send you overboard.”

“You can always tell them it was the worst date you’ve ever had,” he retorts sweetly, his eyes meeting mine beneath a canopy of dark blond lashes before he directs the boat away from the pier.

“You heard that one, huh?”

“I hear everything, Violet.”

All around us, the world is alive in wet color—it’s a painter’s palette of leafy green lily pads, lavender water willows, and deep, shadowed water.

I can easily envision a Shakespearean Ophelia draped in a garland of wildflowers, still singing as the water drags her under. The perfect canvas for a poetic death.

“It is peaceful out here,” I admit.

“Percy loved it, too,” he mumbles, shy suddenly now that he’s not being a smug jerk.

For a long moment, neither of us speaks. The only sounds are a toad bellowing in the duckweed and the soft churn of our boat cutting through the water.

“I know that was a lot to soak in back at the House,” he says. “It couldn’t have been easy for you.”

Huge understatement, but I don’t fight him. I focus my energy on the space beyond his shoulder. The sun has melted into the silhouette of the trees.

“You know why I came here,” I say finally.

He hums in response. “I assumed your mission was to personally drag me down to hell.”

“A lovely thought,” I acknowledge, “but no.”

Against the storybook backdrop, Calvin looks like a prince. A crown of golden hair and a regal brow, looking down on me like I’m a frog he’s supposed to kiss. “You did come to ruin me, right? Or at the very least, my family?”

I ignore the frenzied beating of my heart. “I wanted to haunt you, actually.” I clutch the pendant slung around my neck. He tracks the movement with a bob of his throat. “I just never expected to get haunted in the process.”

“As I recall, you don’t believe in ghosts.”

“I didn’t, but—” The words are small through my teeth.

“I had every intention of leaving this campus today, but Emoree wouldn’t let me.

She wanted…” I swallow and blow out a breath.

“She wanted me to find your brother. That’s what she sent along with this locket, but I don’t know how I’m supposed to do that now or why, if it’s true, he’s not fully to blame. ”

He’s fixated on the sway of cattails in the distance.

“Our goals aren’t so dissimilar, Violet.

You want to find Percy. We want to find Percy.

You want to get revenge for Em, and honestly, so do we.

This curse has been tearing us apart for generations now.

It quite literally forces us to hurt the ones we love the most.”

My chest pangs at the idea of that. It’s a world away from the picture I had of Percy a week ago: a conniving, two-faced killer ready to kiss her and discard her without a care in the world. It’s nearly impossible to imagine him genuinely caring for Em.

I stare miserably at the water as it darkens minute by minute, burning away to a deep, fathomless black. “If Percy knew about the curse, why did he let himself fall in love with Emoree?”

“I don’t think it works that way.”

I shrug. “Doesn’t it?”

“No,” he retorts quickly, “that’s why it’s called falling. You’d have to be insane to jump in the first place.”

I flinch at his wording, and it takes a split second for him to catch why.

He winces apologetically before shifting directions.

“I don’t think Percy meant to fall for Emoree; it’s all part of this curse business.

The curse knows what’s bound to happen before it even begins, and once it starts, there’s no stopping it.

Though it didn’t stop my mother from trying to—never mind. ”

“To what?” I pry, turning back to face him.

He bristles like he’s been snagged on a thorn.

“She was planning an arranged marriage,” he explains, a stiffness to his voice. “Funny thing about being cursed, it doesn’t stop your family from playing matchmaker. I think it might have incentivized it, actually.

“She knew there was no getting around the curse once in love, but she let herself believe she could end it. In a horrible way it makes sense, right? Mom picks out a daughter-in-law like a pedigreed broodmare, and no one has to die because Percy doesn’t love her.

A win-win. Except there’s no dodging fate.

Percy met Emoree when she transferred last year, and… well, you know the rest.”

We’ve reached the other side of the lake now, and Calvin expertly steers us back toward the pier. “I assume you’ve got a wife lined up, too? Or did your mom give up on that?”

He snickers. “Why? Are you interested?”

“In no way, shape, or form.”

Calvin lets his free hand hang over the edge, his fingertips skimming across the water.

“No, it was always ‘the heir and the spare’ with me and Percy. Percy is not only the oldest; he’s also the smartest, the most talented, the most, well, everything—which means everything hinges on his continued success.

The rest of us? Psh . As long as our mug shots aren’t plastered on the news, the family doesn’t care.

But, for Perce, Mom had big hopes for him.

And let’s just say scholarship girls are great for charity and statistics, but they’re not marriage material. ”

“She didn’t like Em?”

He examines a speck on his sleeve. “She didn’t like the fact that he was doomed to kill her—as most mothers wouldn’t, I imagine. But even beyond the curse business, it was all about what Emoree represented. Her mother works at a laundromat. Her father, the mill. It was out of the question.”

If this were a cartoon, you could count on me to have smoke out of my ears at this point. “So that’s it, huh? She’s not good enough for your family?”

He winces at my tone, but I’m not done. “Her mother slaves away at her job—wakes up at the crack of dawn to get to the laundromat and takes care of everything. The owners live out of state, and they don’t lift a finger for that place.

And if we’re speaking of fingers, her father has lost two to the machines at his factory job.

They’re hardworking, good people; their jobs are a lot harder than your mother’s. How dare she? How dare you—”

He lifts his hands up. “Don’t shoot the messenger.

I don’t care how many fingers the man has or doesn’t have.

It’s my mother. She’s obsessed with image and the ‘betterment’—notice the air quotes, Violet; her words, not mine—of the family.

I thought Emoree was perfectly lovely and I was happy for Percy.

“As long as it’s a fling and nothing serious, she doesn’t care. Percy was out here with heart eyes, and, trust me, no one expects that from me. No one expects anything from me at all, actually. I’m the resident fuckup of the family.”

I’m still fuming, so there’s no chance of me breaking out the world’s smallest violin for him. “Excuse me if I don’t feel bad for you.”

Calvin looks at me like I’m not seeing him, or at least not the full scope of him. Like I’ve got some caricature in my mind.

“Don’t worry, I wasn’t expecting pity from you.” He rolls his eyes and some of that stoicism washes away, and he’s back to being thoroughly amused by the situation. “All I want is your help. If not for me or for Percy, do it for Emoree.”

We’re back across the lake when the wind picks up, and I know immediately that this night will be another cold one.

He’s the first to get out, and when he offers a hand to hoist me up, I reluctantly take it.

“F-fine, I’ll help. Only because I literally can’t leave or pack my things or do anything and there’s only one person in this world who would be trying to hold me back.

It has to be Emoree. She wants me to figure this out.

” I dig my hands in my pockets and stare miserably at the pier beneath me. “Can you tell me something, though?”

He hums in approval.

“How much does the rest of the group actually care about Emoree?” I ask softly. “It almost feels like she’s another face on the wall and not, y’know, Emoree .”

Calvin considers that as he looks back out to the lake.

Water lilies reflect in his pupils, and I have a feeling that if I got even closer, I might be able to peer directly into the heart of him.

“Em was a Card member, sure, but she was more than that. She was a friend, and what happened last year is something that none of us will get over for a long time. For Tripp and my sister, at least, they have a funny way of showing their grief, but if there’s one thing that I’ve learned, it’s that everyone has their own way to mourn. ”

I nod. I learned that the hard way.

Before I can say another word, Calvin shrugs off his crested jacket and flings it my way. It lands in a confusing heap in my arms, and I can’t help the part of me that wonders if it will smell like him. Warm and sharp like spiced cider. “Huh?”

“I’m tired of hearing your teeth chatter,” he says offhandedly. “Plus, you’re no help to any of us if you get sick.”

“Wow, chivalry isn’t dead after all,” I deadpan. My eyes dart between him and the red blazer and then back up again. “Y-you know it’s a myth that cold weather gets you sick, right?”

He shrugs lazily and makes a move to swipe it back. “If you’re not cold, I’ll take it back—”

“Buuut on second thought, clearly curses and ghosts exist, so s-screw science. I’m freezing.” Before he can reclaim it, I burrow into the jacket and relish in his residual body heat. The sleeves are comically long on me, and he snorts at the sight.

“You can give it back to me tomorrow at our first official club meeting. Five o’clock. I trust you know where to go by now,” he teases, already walking away from me down the pier.

I wrap the jacket tighter against my shoulders. I was right; it does smell like him.

I clench my fists at my sides and call him with a taunting “Lockwell.”

“Hmm?” he asks, twisting to look back at me over his shoulder.

“This was the worst first date I’ve ever had.”

Dear Diary,

No one can know what I have created.

My grimoire is the child of several texts from my father’s rare book collection and my own fiendish imagination.

Night after night, I have worked diligently to scour through old Latin and keep my curses under lock and key.

Not only would this secret be my societal undoing, but I fear the reactions of my family if they knew.

Mother would be devastated. Father, irate.

And Helen? There was a time growing up when we were inseparable.

We still wear the same lockets slung around our throats and whisper to one another during Father’s “episodes,” but we are no longer close by any stretch of the imagination.

Still, I fear she would be hurt to know of the secrets I am keeping now.

None of that is enough to stop me.

Last night, I began my first spell to bind the maze to myself.

With my father’s vigilant eye and my sister’s meddling, I need a place where I’m free to meet with Oleander without the nagging sensation of being watched.

No one can follow me here unless I wish to be found.

The maze will be my own corner away from the world.

The ritual was simple enough to perform.

Under the pregnant swell of the moon, I slashed my palm against the hedges and watched, horrified and enraptured, as they lapped my blood up like a newborn calf.

There was no immediate change—the world didn’t burn blue with the tinge of black magic and the wind didn’t whistle my name.

Nothing happened, and yet there was that intrinsic knowing that it had worked.

I knew then that the maze was mine, and I knew it always would be.

—Anastasia Hart