Page 19

NINETEEN

ROSE

Months.

It’s been years since Danni last spoke to me.

The longest decade I’ve ever slogged through.

Made all the worse by the fact that in reality, it’s barely been a fortnight.

I had a terrible feeling when I first received her text that it would be difficult to adjust to life without her friendship, but I was sorely underestimating how hard “difficult” would hit. Danni’s abrupt disappearance from my daily life sits like a hole dug into damp sand. Perhaps the walls will dry out and cave inward to fill the chasm one day, but in the meantime, it’s gaping.

I hadn’t quite realized how much my happiness had come to correlate with the amount of time spent in her orbit.

That, and I can’t shake the fear that if she takes a large enough step away from me, she, too, might come to notice that my eyes are empty.

For now, at least, that doesn’t seem to be the case. Though she’s now sitting at a table next to Molly at the back of the class each day, she smiles and greets me at the start of our shared lessons. And though she goes directly to Molly’s room after lessons finish, she gives me a pleasant nod whenever we pass each other in the hall.

But still. We’ve stopped texting. And I don’t think we needed to stop texting in order for her to be there for Molly.

“I just hate it,” Eleanor grumbles to me as we pass Danni and Molly shooting a post for Molly’s social media by the oval. They’re laughing, so heartily Molly bends over for breath. I wonder what the joke was. “It’s like we’re dead to them out of nowhere.”

The two of us are on our way to the performing arts auditorium, where the cast list for Macbeth is being posted in approximately five minutes. Eleanor has been a bundle of nerves all day. I’ve never seen her want anything this desperately before, except for, perhaps, Santi’s attention. Which, now I think about it, isn’t necessarily extricable from this.

“It’s not entirely out of nowhere,” I admit. “Molly made it quite clear weeks ago she didn’t want to continue our friendship. I suppose this is her… not continuing it.”

Eleanor raises an eyebrow. “Molly spoke to you?”

“She did.”

“You didn’t tell me that.”

Well, no, I didn’t. I do my best to forget the conversation happened at all wherever possible. “The details aren’t important. Besides, I thought it was clear this was about me. You’re an unfortunate casualty.”

“I mean, I figured. But what’s Danni got against you?”

“Nothing,” I say. “I hope.”

“Maybe you should apologize to Molly.”

“Wait—that’s genius,” I say with mock excitement.

“Oh. You have already, huh?”

“No, it truly never occurred to me to try saying I’m sorry for killing her best friend. Eleanor, I think you’ve just solved everything.”

Eleanor gives me a sharp look. “You didn’t kill anyone, any more than I did.”

I shrug blithely in response.

“Anyway, if it was about that, she’d be just as mad at me, right?” Eleanor asks. “So, maybe there’s something else.”

I simply can’t tell Eleanor what Molly said about me. I’m not sure why, exactly. Perhaps I’m afraid that if I speak it aloud, Eleanor will notice everything Molly has. What was it Molly said? Once you see it, you can’t unsee it?

Please, don’t let Eleanor see it, whatever “it” is. She’s all I have left.

We reach the auditorium, where a small crowd of students has gathered in the entrance. One girl is in tears, a few others look thrilled, and another is clapping her friend on the back. The list must be up already. We weave our way to the front, and scan the piece of paper stuck to the wall as one.

Santi Moreno—Macduff

Sits many, many lines above:

Eleanor Kowalczyk—Soldier #3

We studied Macbeth in English last year, and I’m fairly certain there’s no character called soldier number three. Which implies the school has created a number of non-speaking background roles to include more students. All that work on the Lady Macbeth audition piece, wasted. I turn to Eleanor, ready to offer my condolences, but realize just in time that she’s lit from within.

She places a hand over her mouth. “I got in,” she says. “I got in ! I’m going to hang with Santi twice a week! Four hours a week, Rose!” She throws her arms around me in ecstasy and starts to jump up and down in place. I keep my feet planted firmly on the ground to anchor us and wait for her to calm down. “This is the start of something huge. I can feel it.”

“I’m thrilled for you, Eleanor,” I say. “You’ll be the best soldier number three the theater world’s ever seen.”

She’s so elated, she misses the air of irony in my voice. Or, perhaps, she just accepts it.

On the way back to Dewitt, we have to pass the oval. My fists clench by my sides as we approach in anticipation of seeing Molly and Danni, and as I suspected, they’re still there. They’ve finished filming now, and are sitting on the grass, their legs stretched out before them. Molly has her back to me, but Danni notices us almost as soon as we round the corner. Her gaze roves past Eleanor and lands directly, intensely, on me.

I hold eye contact, and keep my face carefully blank. It’s not a crushing sadness I feel. I’m not sure I even have the ability to catch fire like that anymore, for better or worse. Rather, it simply feels as though there’s far less of me than there used to be. And I was never all that solid to begin with. If souls were corporeal, I suspect mine would look rather a lot like honeycomb.

It aches, this new absence. And I can’t shake the feeling that if I could close the space between us—a hundred feet that might as well be a chasm—the aching would vanish. But I can’t, can I? In order to respect her boundary, I have to pay the price of my own comfort. She comes first, because she must.

Still. It doesn’t stop me from wanting and wishing and hoping, right down to my honeycombed soul, that she will close the space for me.

Days later, after yet another dinner with Danni and Molly sitting tables and tables away from the rest of us, I discover over a slice of apple crumble and cream where my breaking point lies.

Danni said she wants to be there for Molly, and I don’t intend to impede their quality time together. But that doesn’t mean I can’t seek out Danni while she’s by herself, does it? If I’m not stealing her from Molly, then why does it matter? It shouldn’t.

As wary as I am of putting Danni in an uncomfortable position, I think clarity, at this point, is a necessity. And if Danni does reject an offer to spend time with me, then I’ll know that when she said Molly wanted space from me, she truly meant she wanted space from me, and I can act accordingly.

The only problem is concocting an excuse to spend time together that doesn’t seem like an excuse. After dinner, I walk back to Dewitt within the heavy flow of students, several feet behind Molly and Danni. They say goodbye to each other as Danni stays on her floor, and Molly continues up. For now, at least, they’re spending the evening apart. So it’s fair game, no?

I sit on the edge of my bed and try to construct the perfect opening line, rehearsing potential contenders out loud and striking them down one by one. Finally, I open my messages with Danni to remind myself where we left off, and the answer pops into my mind. Once, I promised to give her an ice-skating lesson. Well, what better time than tonight?

With a spring in my step, I head downstairs and try her room, but she doesn’t respond to my knock. I imagine this means she’s either visited Molly after all, or she’s practicing piano. With any luck, it’s the latter. I head outside the building—via a quick visit to Theodore’s—and into the crisp night air, and have my question answered by the distant sound of lilting music.

The melody is slow, smooth, and haunting. The closer I draw, the more I notice how the piano somehow seems to hang in the air even as each note falls away. It’s as though the vibrations are reverberating in my blood, altering the beating of my heart. I wonder idly if it’s matching time with Danni’s. I ask Theodore to wait outside the building for me, and he agrees. Theodore’s always been my favorite of the two guards for this exact reason. He’s comfortable giving me more space than Sidney. He’s known me for longer, which might have something to do with it. Sidney was only hired a few months ago to replace Elizabeth, who was let go after what happened on her watch in Amsterdam.

The stairwell to the ballroom is enveloped by music. There’s a heartbreaking quality to the song. It seems to be telling a wordless story of grief and loss. I enjoy music, but I wouldn’t call myself an expert in the art. Even I can tell, however, that the credit here goes to the player, not the notes themselves. In less capable hands—mine, for example—I doubt this song would have the same power to move.

I’m not sure if it’s the sight of my feet climbing these dimly lit stairs, or the fearful undertone of the music, or the combination of the two, but suddenly I’m reminded of the time I climbed a similar set of stairs, months ago. I remember Molly walking ahead of me, and the tightening of her voice as she called his name. I remember the thrumming party music, and the sour smell of spilled beer, and the darkness of the hallway above us. I remember Molly opening that door. I remember—

I stop remembering and sit on the staircase landing, clasping my hands together tightly, until the song ends. What follows is a more disjointed series of notes and chords, interrupted with periods of silence, that tell me Danni has moved into a new piece she’s yet to learn. Or is perhaps even composing.

With a deep, steadying breath, I draw myself back to my feet, fix my face into a smile, and enter the ballroom, where the music instantly triples in volume. She hears me enter and swings around in her seat. The moment she sees me, she lights up. She lights up at the unexpected sight of me. I’m so relieved I glow right back at her.

“Rose, hey!” she says. “What’s up?”

“Oh, nothing,” I say, as casual as someone who hasn’t been sitting in uncertainty for weeks. “I have a boatload of homework, and myriad responsibilities, and I’m looking for an excuse to procrastinate on all of it.”

Danni gives me an amused look. “Is that right?”

“Yes, quite right, and then I remembered I owe you a skating lesson.”

“So, you thought you’d come and interrupt my piano practice to see if now was a good time for me?”

“Yes, exactly. Can’t hurt to ask, I thought.”

“Even though I was obviously in the middle of something?” She says it teasingly, wearing a broad smile. Well, in my defense, she always seems to be in the middle of something, and at least she hasn’t promised the piano to exclude me from their time together.

I fold my arms. “Are you telling me you’re reneging on our bargain? You did promise to make me a brilliant pianist if I taught you to skate, if I recall correctly.”

“Ahh,” she says with a wry grin. “So when you say you want to teach me, what you mean is you want me in your debt.”

“I ask for very little from you, you know.”

I’m still smiling, but at this, her expression loses its mirth. She studies me for a beat too long. Just long enough to confirm she caught the double meaning in my words. Of course she did. She never seems to miss the unspoken layers behind my words. “I know,” she says. There’s guilt there. I’m certain of it. “But I actually promised Caroline I’d practice every night this weekend.”

I hover by the seat until she shuffles to one side to make room for me to join her. Sitting, I lean my head against her shoulder and speak in my very best wheedling tone, just as I would have weeks ago, before she ever vanished. “Counterpoint: you like me more than Caroline, so don’t you want to keep your promise to me more?”

“Who said I like you more than Caroline?”

I lift my head up, indignant. “Don’t you?”

“Well, yeah. But that’s not the point.”

“What is the point?”

We’re pressed together tightly, even more so than when we sat side by side at the palace, because the school’s piano bench is rather more narrow. So, when Danni turns to look at me, her face is closer to mine than it’s ever been before. Almost as close as Alfie’s was, right before he kissed me. But where this level of closeness with him had made my stomach clench with discomfort, with Danni, it gives me a pleasant, swooping sensation.

“I don’t remember,” she says, her voice softening and her eyes scanning my face from eyes to lips.

“So?” I ask, swallowing, and it’s a thousand questions in one.

She looks at me for a little longer, and time starts to feel weighed down.

“Screw it, let’s do it,” Danni says, and for a confused, scattered moment I don’t know what she’s referring to. But then she collects her music books and closes the piano, and I remember the reason I’m here. Ice-skating. Of course.

Cheeks blazing, I’m halfway to the door before she finishes collecting her stuff. “Chop chop,” I say over my shoulder. “Lots to do.”

She gives me a rueful smile and hurries to catch up.