BEFORE (4 page)

“Don’t be so surprised. It’s not everyday a guy gets to dance with Lark Greene.”

I laugh, a long, low rumble. “You’re flattering me.”

“I’m not.” He spins me quickly beneath his arm and catches my free hand again. “Perhaps I could speak to Malin? About visiting you sometime?”

Kyra will die when I tell her about this. Boys actually asking to visit with me! 

“Lark!” Annalise calls from her seat at the main table. “Come join us.”

I drop the boy’s hand. “I’m sorry, I’m needed elsewhere.”

He bows slightly. “It was a pleasure.”

I glide toward the table, buoyed by the music and the celebratory goodwill circling the party. Mother was right. I could learn to like this. After all, haven’t I spent hours wishing I were part of her world? That she would notice me? 

I glance around the room–at the dancers, the musicians, the gorgeous decorations. Every night could be like this if I were a States woman like Mother. Perhaps I can work in Agriculture and still be part of it. Surely they have States people leading that division?

I fold myself gently into the chair next to my new sister-in-law. Her friends surround her like doting housemothers. 

“If I didn’t know better, I’d believe you were having fun,” Annalise says in her musical sing-song voice. 

“I love dancing. At school, we only practice during dance hour.” Annalise nods and I wrinkle my nose. I’d forgotten she was a student not too long ago. “I’ve only danced in public at Founder Day celebrations. Beck’s always…”

I turn my head to look down the long table and then toward the dance floor. Where is Beck?

“You were saying?” Annalise prompts as she touches my arm.

“I haven’t seen Beck. Did he leave?” I swivel my head around, looking past laughing couples and searching into the corners of the room. Why didn’t I think to find him when I first came in? Especially after the way he looked when I left with Mother. 

“Never mind him. You’re here, with us. You don’t need Beck.” Annalise pats my arm, but I wrench it away. 

My pulse races and my breathing grows shallow and fast. “No. I need to find him.”

The chair totters when I push back from the table and it falls to the ground. Normally, I’d blush and hurry to pick it up, but not now. Now, all I care about is finding Beck. 

Each time my foot strikes the ground, my promise to Bethina echoes through my mind. I said I wouldn’t lose him. And I did. Again. What’s wrong with me?

As I run through the crowd, toward the far end of the hall, a hand darts out and grabs me. I shake my arm and spin to see who caught me. 

Beck’s olive green eyes are full of concern and his normally honey colored skin looks ashen. 

“Beck?” I ask in a trembling voice. “What’s wrong? Are you not enjoying the party?”

Beneath his fitted evening jacket, Beck’s chest heaves. He swallows hard as if trying to find his voice. “The party is fabo,” he says. “Did Malin…talk to you?” 

I draw my brows together and frown. “Of course she spoke to me. She’s my mother.” 

“And?” The way he says it, with such expectation, makes me laugh. 

“And,” I say as the beat of the music seeps into my blood, “ask me to dance?”

Beck gives me a strange little smile. One that’s half resignation and half contentment. He takes my hand and guides me to the dance floor. This time, no one backs away from us. Mother’s reprimand earlier must have worked.

We spin across the polished floor, keeping time with the rapid tempo changes. The soft folds of my dress swish around my legs and I feel as though I’m floating. Everything about this moment is perfect: the music, the energy, the way Beck’s hand feels in mine. But most of all, I’m no longer a timid, silly girl.

“This is a disaster. I should have listened to Bethina and not come with you,” Beck mutters. 

His words shatter my feeling of bliss. “What? Why would she say that?” I ask, ignoring the fact that he would even consider it.  

Beck clears his throat and keeps his chin lifted as we spin across the floor. “I don’t know. She said something about needing me to help her with things around the house.”

I scrunch up my forehead. While it’s true Bethina frequently asks Beck to help with home repairs, there are twelve other boys in our house who can clean gutters and swing a hammer. 

“Since when do we go anywhere without each other?” 

The song ends and Beck releases me. “This is your world, Birdie.” He sweeps his hand wide, as if gathering up the entire room. “The parties, the politics, the power. It’s what you want.”

“No I don’t. You know I’ve never wanted any of this.” The words come out of my mouth, but I know he’s right. Something’s changed. I want this life. More than anything.

He tugs on the edge of the sleeve peeking out from under his jacket and I catch a glimpse of his blue wristlet. “You never wanted it before, but you do now, don’t you?”

“Beck, you don’t understand…Mother…she has expectations of us.”

“You. She has expectations of you.”

I hold out the sides of my dress, stretching it wide. “But you want it too, don’t you?” As founder descendants, we’ve been raised for this type of life. It’s what everyone expects from us. My anti-socialness is an anomaly–but Beck’s always been good at this type of thing.  

“Sure.” 

He pushes past people and stops before the floor-to-ceiling windows. His shoulders round forward as he stares at the silent scene on the other side. 

“Feel like a walk?” he asks, with his back toward me. 

At night, when I can’t sleep, we often sneak out and spy on the nightly festivities happening at the row of Senior Official homes across from our school. Tonight we’re part of that world and looking to escape.

“Let me grab my coat.”

#

Jagged shards of ice scrape along my throat and freeze the air in my lungs until I gasp. 

“It’s freezing.” My teeth clack together. I had expected it to be cold, but not like this. When we arrived earlier in the day, the weather was balmy and warm–typical for late spring. But now it feels like winter has decided to wage one last assault.

Beck flips up the collar of his coat and blows on his hands. “Do you want my scarf?” 

I glance down at my outfit. The smart fabric in my stockings automatically adjusts to temperature, as does my coat. “I’m okay. It’s just my face.” He unwraps his scarf anyway and hands it to me, but I wave it away. 

Beck shrugs and drapes the scarf back over his shoulders. “It’s so cold, I don’t think we need to worry about anyone finding us. And if they do venture outside, they’re either trying to escape or insane.” 

“I vote for insane. It sounds more exciting.” 

Beck laughs. “Insane it is. But you’re going to have to be the one to take them on. I’m too delicate.” 

I roll my eyes. Beck is anything but delicate. He’s tall, broad shouldered, and fit from his rabid love of playing sports. 

As we wander farther into the garden, the paths become more twisted and every so often a hiding nook appears in the shrubs. Unlike inside, it’s still and quiet out here, and for the first time all night, I can hear myself think. 

I sigh and marvel at the endless freckles of light stretching high above us.

“Is this what you really want?” Beck asks as he sits on a stone bench beneath a snow pine. “To live like this? Always on display?”

The honest answer is, I don’t know. I never thought I did, and being here, having everyone stare and whisper about me, is upsetting. But I want to make my mother proud. I want to show her I can live up to my ancestry. 

But more than that, I like feeling important. Like I’m more than just a good student. And Beck’s shadow.

“I think so.” When his face falls, I add, “It’s not so bad. Don’t you like feeling important?”

“What would you give up for it? Your privacy? Your friends? What?”

I lay my hand over his bronze warm one. “Why should I give up anything? My friends will always be my friends, regardless of what I do for a living.”

He rakes his free hand through his hair. Why is he so upset?

“Is that what Malin told you? That you can have everything?”

Just as I’m about to answer, Beck presses his finger over his lips, hushing me. It’s a gesture I know too well. Over the years, we’ve learned to guard our conversations in public and to recognize the sound of an approaching news camera.

But this time I hear nothing. Not the familiar hum of the machine, nor the chatter of the newscaster commanding the camera from a remote location. 

Beck tilts his head to the side and focuses his attention on the path leading away from us. 

“Someone’s over there,” he whispers.

My lips form a tight line. The last thing I want is for the cameras to invade this small piece of privacy we have. 

I start to walk away, determined to out maneuver the camera, but Beck wraps his arm around my waist and pulls me back to him. He shakes his head with wide eyes.

Then I hear it. The muffled sound of sobs; a low, unintelligible treble of a man’s voice; and the sound of crumpling fabric–like a ball gown. 

“I can’t,” a woman says with a shaking voice. 

“Why?” The man speaks with a hint of hysteria and I raise my eyebrows. It feels wrong eavesdropping, but I’m frozen to this spot.

“You need to stop making this difficult.” So much sadness in each word. “Malin will flay us if she finds out.”

“Then let her. I don’t care anymore.”

I lean close to Beck’s ear and whisper, “We should go.”

He nods and jumps to his feet. We’re half-way down the path when the crunch of gravel stops just behind us.

“What are you two doing out here?”

My foot hovers above the ground and my heart hammers hard. I know we shouldn’t be out here. And we shouldn’t have eavesdropped. 

I set my foot down and pivot slowly only to find myself face-to-face with Annalise. Her tear-streaked cheeks and mussed hair look nothing like the perfectly coiffed girl I met in the Ballroom. 

“Did Callum send you to spy on me?” Her eyes dart past my shoulder, to Beck, and then around the garden. “Or Malin?”

My mouth drops open and I look to Beck for a suggestion on what to do. He slips off his jacket and holds it out to Annalise, who despite the frigid weather, is dressed only in her flimsy evening gown. No coat, no gloves. Nothing. And yet, she doesn’t appear cold at all.

“Are you okay?” Beck asks her. She eyes the coat suspiciously before slipping it on. “You seem upset.”

Annalise clutches the jacket lapels to her chest. “Why would I be upset? It’s my binding day.” She speaks quickly and a notch higher than normal. “In fact, I need to get to back to the reception.”

She shrugs out of Beck’s coat and tosses it at him. He catches it with one hand and lays it over his arm.