Page 20

FALL EQUINOX PARTY

20

If it hadn’t been for Rose’s insistence, she doubted that Hart would’ve gone to his own fall equinox party. But then, he never even claimed the parties at all. “You’ve been to one, you’ve been to them all,” Hart said, totally ambivalent.

But Rose, having been to literally one garden party, remembered how it felt. And the memory pulled her like a rip current. Fighting it was the wrong approach. From Hart’s bedroom window, she could see the guests arriving—kids she now recognized from school, flowing across the lawn below toward the far end of the grounds. Rose tugged on Hart’s hand, beseeching him. “Come on,” she said. “Let’s have fun. Get wrecked.”

It was all Rose had to say to get him to stand. Smile. Surrender.

Rose had to give Heather props. The girl knew how to throw an epic party. Music seemed to blare from the trees themselves, their leaves swishing to the beat. The drinks flowed so freely that not a soul was parched. Everyone was happy and no one was sad. And when Heather, ever the good hostess, stopped before Hart and Rose with her tincture full of “naturally sourced” potion, they stuck their tongues out dutifully, waiting for the dropper’s kiss.

Lowell was there, too, of course, once again in his ridiculous winged jacket. Rose jumped and laughed and danced with him until she blinked and he was gone. But Hart was there, his arms around her middle and his chin lazy in the dip of her neck. Rose spun in his arms as the party spun around them, whirling along with the streaks of light and sparks. Her boyfriend was the only steady thing in the dizzying blur and Rose pressed her lips to his, drinking him in like an elixir. When they pulled away from each other they still spun, hands gripping forearms, fighting for purchase on slippery skin. They clutched fast until they snapped apart. Hart caught her before she fell, and though Rose finally stilled, the flurry of movement continued around them. People mid-leap, mid-fall, mid-laugh, mid-scream.

Now Rose and Hart were in the grass too, rolling. Hart seemed to forget where he was, fondling her out in the open like this. Or maybe the vibes of the party had rubbed off on him. At this point in the night, most of the other guests lay horizontal, too. On their backs, eyes closed but laughing, or on their sides, making out with whoever was within reach. Or facedown, drooling dreamily on the softest verdant blanket.

Tangled together with Hart, Rose nuzzled into him and into the lawn itself. “It’s different at the parties,” she said of the grass.

“Hmm?”

Rose sat up slowly, watching the grass all the while. When she moved, it followed, magnetic. When she touched it, it clung to her, almost sticky. She pulled her hand away and the grass separated from her, but it seemed to stretch just slightly before it let go, like strands of glue. She scanned Hart’s head, how his hair reached for the green blades, mingling, intertwining. “Why is the grass like this at the parties?”

“The parties are special,” Hart murmured.

Rose’s eyes went wide, like maybe if she could see him better, she could hear him better. Believe him better. “They are?”

Hart nodded. “Because you’re on something.”

No, that couldn’t be it. Rose hadn’t been on something at the first party and the garden had still felt different, heightened somehow. “It’s like Velcro,” she said.

“Sticky willies,” Hart murmured.

“What?”

“Cleavers. Catchweed. Sometimes plants stick to you.”

Yes, that made more sense. Rose had walked through enough wooded areas now to know that sometimes spiky plants clung to clothes. But still, it felt like Hart had said something true a moment ago—something secret—and then taken it back. The parties were different. She could feel it in her bones, in the grass, and when she spotted a boy lying close to the tree line, she could see it in the vine twined around his ankle. As she continued to look, Rose could swear it encircled his limb like a snake.

She shook her head and blinked the glaze out of her eyes. She looked back down at Hart and set her mind on something. “Come,” she said in his ear, “let’s go somewhere private.”

Hart was happy to oblige, and they helped each other up. He held on to Rose’s hand and navigated them away from Hemlock Pond. It was nearly impossible to see anything in the dark, but Hart wove through the trees like they were soldiers standing sentinel, under his command. It was easy to find the golden gravel path. Rose grabbed a handful of the pebbles as they walked, shaking them in her fist as casually as if they were sunflower seeds to snack on. But she pocketed them without Hart noticing.

She heard the sound of trickling water coming from one of the many fountains that dotted the grounds. It was strange how in the daylight the sound was soothing, but at night it was more of a threat. Something unseen, in the distance, coming for you. She gripped Hart’s hand tighter, and they wandered into Statue Walk. Hart became distracted by the statues lining the path. He let go of Rose and laughed as he sidled up to the statues, throwing his arm over Ares’s neck and poking Apollo in the ribs. Rose tried to avoid looking directly at them, but that only made them scarier somehow—featureless figures in human form. She glanced at Venus and the statue seemed to smile at her. Rose blanched and nearly stumbled back, and Hart frowned drunkenly. “Oh, I forgot these guys creep you out,” he said.

Had she told him that? Rose didn’t recall ever mentioning it.

“Remember that night you bumped into Neptune in Fountain Field and screamed so loud Heather thought—Heather thought—” He doubled over laughing, leaving the story hanging.

“That never happened,” Rose said.

“Yeah, it did,” Hart said. He took her hand and they sped up, leaving the line of statues behind. But he slowed every few seconds, unable to properly walk and kiss her at the same time. And though she was tempted to stop, lean against the stone wall beside this part of the path and return the favor, Rose dragged Hart along, determined.

When they reached the stone circle entrance to the Rose Garden, the bells on the wind chime tinkled, pulling her focus as Hart pulled her body against his. Rose knew what the letters on the chime should have spelled: G-A-R-D-E-N. But they didn’t spell that, and she tried to make sense of it, blaming the dark; the September wind twisting up the strings; the distractingly electric feel of Hart’s tongue in the hollow of her throat. But the letters now spelled something else. D-A-N-G-E-R.

Rose stared at the word like it’d lost all its meaning. Stared at it even as Hart tugged her into the garden room. They stepped into the sudden pool of light cast by the lamppost, sentient, sensing their arrival. The spotlight snapped Rose back to her senses, and she was reminded of what she was here to do. Hart slowed as he realized that Rose wasn’t interested in privacy, not really. He dropped her hand when he saw that she was headed to the opening in the hedge. “What are you doing?”

“I want to see the maze,” Rose said.

Hart only watched her for a moment, then finally shook his head. “You’re… It’s hard enough to get through sober.”

It gnawed at Rose that Hart still didn’t want her in there. She wasn’t swaying, wasn’t slurring her words. Hart’s excuse for not taking her through the hedge maze was just that—an excuse. It was clear now that he didn’t want her to see the hedge maze, which only made Rose want to see it more. And she would, with or without him. “I’ll only get lost if you don’t come with me.”

Hart scratched his eyebrow with his knuckle. In the lamplight, Rose could see the flex in his jawbone. And the seconds that ticked by marked every new question popping up in her mind. The biggest one being, Why doesn’t he want to go in there?

She’d threatened to go through the maze herself, and then, without really thinking, she acted on it, blazing past Hart too fast for his addled brain to catch up. Rose held her breath as she ran through the leafy archway, like she was jumping into deep water. She wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting to find. Did she think she would walk through a portal? Into a new dimension? Nothing felt different, except for the dark. The hedge walls reached high and carved narrow pathways, blocking out what little light the stars and moon cast. She pinched her phone out of her pocket and thumbed the flashlight on.

Beyond the walls of the hedge maze the garden party, Connecticut, even the world completely fell away. Rose grazed the pointed leaves of the plant wall with her fingers, needing to feel more than see her way through. She made turns impulsively, and if she reached a dead end, she didn’t stop to reconsider her steps, just turned abruptly and took the nearest new path.

When she slowed, it was only because the walls seemed to be pressing in on her, growing narrower. She stopped to catch her breath and caught Hart’s eye instead. She ran in the opposite direction, blindly, in a rush to—what, get lost? She didn’t know. Rose was led by her own determination to get farther, deeper into the maze; propelled by the force of Hart clearly not wanting her in here. But he turned it into something playful, a cat-and-mouse game. And when Rose made a hard turn, Hart suddenly stood before her again, catching her. When she tried to yank free of him, he held on tighter. Yearning. Eager.

She’d walked through so much of the maze, but Rose was sure she still hadn’t scratched the surface of it. And yet, when Hart wrapped his arms around her, she melted into him. She didn’t know where else to go. And she wanted him. Rose discovered that the flat side of a hedge wall could be both springy and spiky when Hart pressed her against it. The leaves like a million little hands scratching at her, but still holding her up, encouraging her. They sloughed away all of Rose’s inhibitions. She kissed Hart back and could feel it seep beneath the surface of her, the headiness of this garden, the magic of being with Hart, of feeling and hearing and tasting him. With his mouth on her neck and her hands in his hair, Rose opened her eyes to steady herself. Though they weren’t spinning in the party anymore, it still felt like it. And just like when you’re going around and around, your vision needs to land on a focal point so that you don’t lose all control. Rose’s gaze snagged on something that pulled all her focus.

Past a turn in the hedge wall, she spotted something angling out the side of an archway. Flat and wooden. A door. It was open just enough for her to make out two figures beyond it, kneeling on the ground, close together and engulfed by flowers. Though the murky dark muted everything, Rose recognized the shiny honey-colored hair of the girl, and the yellow wings on the boy’s jacket. Rose narrowed her eyes, then widened them, blinked—anything to make clear what she was looking at through the slit between the hedge and the door. Instinctively, she assumed they were making out, for how little distance there was between them. But no, as her eyes adjusted to the sight, she saw that they weren’t kissing. What they were doing was even stranger.

Hart clutched the back of Rose’s neck, pitching her head forward, but she kept her eyes on Heather and Lowell. Heather’s fingertips dancing on the crown of Lowell’s head, then crawling down his forehead, down the front of his jacket, stopping at his hands, where she placed something that was too small to see. She whispered something in his ear. Or maybe she was biting it.

Rose could see what they were doing, but she couldn’t gauge the meaning. And though Hart was all over Rose—his hands and lips tugging on her clothes and sucking on her skin—he’d become an afterthought. Rose kissed him back absently, her eyes zeroed in on Heather and Lowell. Whatever they were doing, it seemed primal. Lurid. And it made Rose feel all the worse watching, because she couldn’t look away.

Maybe Hart had been right. Rose wasn’t sober enough to be here. Her mind swam, dizzy from everything she’d taken and from Hart’s touch. She felt hot and flushed and out of breath, and she wasn’t in the right kind of mindset to make assumptions about strange happenings in the dark maze.

“Let’s get out of here,” came Hart’s rasp in her ear. And when he pulled her off the hedge wall, back down the pathway from which they’d come, Rose let him.