10.
My cell phone buzzes me awake on Sunday morning, jolting me out of a deep sleep at ten after five with demanding vibrations that jostle it off the nightstand and send it clattering to the floor.
I groan and press my pillow over my head, wishing I were the sort who could just roll over and slip back to sleep once again once the alarm's gone off in the morning. I've been trained out of that kind of indulgence, however, too many years of waking bright and early to open Tea and Strumpets ruining my ability to sleep in even on weekends or holidays.
Shoving the dark heavy mass of my hair away from my face, I slither over the edge of the bed to snag the cell phone from under the edge of the bedspread where it's landed in the wake of its tumble. A quick check of the screen reveals a text message from my mother.
Parade @ 11, party @ 10, remember your bells! :D
She cannot possibly be serious.
Wait, what am I talking about? Of course she's serious. Why wouldn't she throw a spontaneous party to celebrate Morris's sudden death? She'd probably even give up precious beauty sleep to make all of the little paper hats herself.
And now that I've jammed my foot back in the door to my old life, she's apparently decided to latch onto my ankle and haul me in.
There's no such thing as saying “No” to my mother.
“I hate my life,” I declare to my bedroom.
After giving myself an appropriate length of time to mourn my tragic existence, I finally crawl myself out of bed with the lure of hot tea, warm muffins, and my usual cold shower to jolt me awake. Caffeine never works quite as well for trashing the still-fresh memory of my toasty bed as the icy splash of chilly water across my back.
I'm almost enjoying the leisurely stroll of my morning routine, my mind stubbornly avoiding any thought of my troubling family situation. It's easier to focus on brushing out my hair until it gleams, humming along to Eddie Cochrane as I scrub the breakfast dishes, and whatever else passes for inconsequential in my daily routine.
Today will be hard enough for my mental stability, as far as I'm concerned. I might as well take it easy while I still can.
I'm fine until I get to my closet, nibbling at my bottom lip as I scan the contents. My mother will want me in Cynthia Rowley or Isaac Mizrahi, something current and striking, preferably a dress that makes me cross my eyes and silently calculate the dent its cost could put in my rent. She'll want the posh socialite she used to pretend I was, right up until I stopped fitting into even the largest sizes of whichever designer disaster she brought home and refused to starve myself anymore to squeeze into them.
Showing up in a low-cut poison-green wiggle dress is tempting, but I imagine I'll get farther with honey than vinegar in this instance. Sighing, I rifle through a colorful array of dresses before picking out the one least likely to get me disemboweled for my troubles.
By the time I saunter into Tea and Strumpets thirty minutes later, decked out in a red satin swing dress with its hem flaring out around my knees and a pair of black patent-leather heels with ankle straps on my feet, my nerves have finally started to crawl up on me. Luckily we're two hours away from the lunch rush, all of the booths empty save one, so if I do indulge in a minor nervous breakdown while I'm here I won't embarrass myself all that badly.
Troy shoots a sideways glance my way from his seat in booth two, the tip of his pen between his teeth, the only sign that he's affected by my outfit the slight slackening of his jaw as I head into the kitchen.
My cheeks warm with color as he stares my way. I'm almost grateful Dixie's not there to witness it and douse us both in a massive amount of playful teasing.
All conversation in the kitchen – the grand sum of it coming from Tara, one bubbly flirtatious stream of jokes – deadens as soon as I walk in. Benny lets out a low whistle, and Tara says, “What in heaven's name are you wearing?”
I swish the dress from side to side, barely concealing an uneven smile. “I know this might come as quite a surprise to you, but this is what's commonly referred to as a dress.”
“That's not a dress,” Benny rumbles. “That's a Frank Sinatra song.”
My smile brightens. “I'll take that as a compliment.”
“You'd better.” He shakes his head, turning back to the pile of dishes he's working his way through washing.
“So where's Dixie?”
Tara frowns. “You don't remember? Her niece's bat mitzvah is next weekend. She went to pick up a dress at the mall while she still had a chance.”
“Oh, right.” I can't help but blush as I shoot a worried glance towards the dining area. Dixie mentioned something last week about possibly being late on Sunday, the only day this week she could afford to be late between the cafe and the two college classes she's taken this semester. Suddenly I feel like a horrible boss, sucking up all of Dixie's free time when Lord knows she doesn't have much to begin with.
“Oh, don't get your fancy panties in a wad,” Benny snaps as soon as he sees the look on my face. “We can handle this hole-in-the-wall just fine for one morning. I know this place means a lot to you, princess, but it isn't half as complicated as you make it out to be.”
Tara shoos him away with a warning look, her sun-browned arms casually crossed as she approaches to take a closer look at my outfit. I'd love to show off my dress for her to fawn over, but I'm more concerned about the day-to-day operations of Tea and Strumpets that I've been missing out on. “We're not a hole in the wall,” I blurt out, mildly offended.
Tara ignores the change of subject. “We're fine, Vera. We've had to scare off a few reporters who thought they were all sneaky, but Benny's been waiting to slip laxatives into the soup for ages now.”
“Please tell me you're not being serious about the laxatives.”
She just grins, snapping her gum until the chemically-produced scent of cherries wafts through the air. “Look, we'll call you if things really go haywire. You handle what you have to handle.” She tilts her head just so, her crystal-blue eyes locking with mine as she tones down the sugar in her voice. “You holding up all right?”
I try to shrug good-naturedly, but in the end all I can manage is a fidgety squirm. “I'm not having a nervous breakdown. That's an accomplishment, right?”
“I hear your brother got out of the clink this morning,” she offers. “At least you've got that going for you.”
It's hard not to pull a disgusted face at that announcement. If Tara knows Graham is free to move about the planet as he pleases, his face must have been plastered all over the morning news the moment Hollyoak spit him back out into the world like an unwanted watermelon seed. I'd like to think that my mother didn't bother to text me the news of his release because she assumed I already watched the news, but then again I have met the woman before. With my luck, she'll probably spring him on me at the party with an enormous bow wrapped around his neck, at which point both Graham and I can share something in common for once and wish incredibly hard that we'd both been adopted.
“Oh, good, one less thing to worry about,” I say, my lips pulling into a pained smile that makes my entire face feel tight and numb.
Something outside draws my attention – a honk of a car horn, the wail of someone's toddler; I'm not entirely sure – and I glance over my shoulder in time for a shock of platinum blond hair to catch my eye as it moves past the front window. For a brief distressing moment I picture myself at the party, hovering next to the catering table as I try to avoid my delighted parents, silently seething as I poke holes into an innocent plate of flan with a silver fork.
Nobody says I have to go into this mess alone. And to be completely fair, my parents did encourage me to bring someone. It's just a question of whether or not that particular someone would be willing.
“I'll check in on you guys later, all right?”
I don't wait for an answer, rushing out of the cafe in a swirl of red satin and dark curls.
Hazel's almost halfway down the block before I reach her, unused to moving any faster than a brisk walk in heels. She finally slows after I call her name, clenching her fists before she turns, already prepared for the argument I can't blame her for expecting out of me.
One look at me and all of the fight bleeds out of her in an instant.
“Hot damn, Vera, where the hell have you been hiding that thing?”
The lingering blush in my cheeks from Troy's open gawking at my outfit flares to life again at her reaction. “Is that a thumbs-up or a thumbs-down?”
“It's a lethal weapon, is what it is,” she says, almost sounding aggravated. A moment later the bagger from Danielson's Grocery stumbles past with his raging case of cystic acne in full force and his jaw on the ground as he gapes at me. The warning sneer she shoots his way makes me feel far better than it probably should considering the current state of our relationship.
“Thanks,” I murmur.
“You're welcome.” She stuffs her hands in her pockets, shifting her weight to side to side, playing things casual. “I heard about your brother.”
I frown. “Yes, you and everyone else, it seems.”
Hazel knows me well enough to recognize the exhausted tone in my voice. “They didn't tell you he was out?”
“They texted me with the time and place for the party they're giving to celebrate Morris's untimely death. Does that count?”
“Wow, tacky.”
I tilt an absent nod her way, taking a quick assessment of the sidewalks on Main Street. It's a warm day, late spring sunlight toasting away the morning chill and gilding the angular edges of the buildings' facades. But it's still early yet for the rush of people taking their lunch breaks, a few weeks away from school's end and the inevitable spill of excited kids down the sidewalks. Only a handful of people can be seen meandering the streets, enjoying leisurely walks to the bank or the mini-mart or the library, all of them faces I recognize. If there's a reporter anywhere nearby waiting to pounce on me and wheedle out my opinion on Morris's demise, I can't see them.
I take a step closer to Hazel anyway and lower my voice just the same. “What are you doing today?”
Hazel's sharp, I'll give her that. It only takes a glance at my attire and a bit of quick sloppy mental arithmetic for her to connect the dots, holding up her hands in hasty defense. “Oh, not a snowball's chance in hell, gorgeous.”
“I doubt they know we're not a couple anymore, so it's not like it would be much of a shock.”
“You didn't tell them?”
“Morris talks to them more than I do,” I say. I try not to think about that, or that I can't seem to kick the habit of referring to him in the present tense, or just how many times I've attempted to call his cell phone since leaving the morgue and how there's unsurprisingly been no answer. “Look, everything is complicated and I don't really understand what's going on right now, but I need another pair of eyes with me right now.” I cut her off before she can start making a vocal list of alternates. “I need someone there who's on my side, and the only way I can guarantee that is by bringing someone with me.”
“You sure I'm on your side?”
I can't restrain myself from huffing a derisive breath. “You're not on theirs.”
For a long moment she pins me in a place with a pinched look that makes me wish I could read the thoughts currently tumbling through her head. Her tongue piercing taps out a rhythm against her teeth.
“Fair enough,” she says. “Okay, fine, I'll need a ride back to my grandmother's house to change.”
She takes my hand with a pointed stare, a clear cue for me to pop us over there with a wink and a thought, and it suddenly strikes me that she's never seen my powers at work. She's never witnessed the lightning-quick ghostly fade of my body as I teleport from one place to another. Not once has she held on and come along for the ride. I can do it, of course, and the worst she might experience is a headache that'll fade after a stiff drink, but mostly mere mentions of my abilities have been enough to send her flying off the handle.
She doesn't look particularly thrilled by the prospect of traveling this way, but she's still holding my hand.
“You look fine the way you are,” I say.
Her brow furrows in confusion, even when my fingers lace through hers. I can see why she might want to put on something dressier than a pair of baggy khakis belted with thin chains around her slim hips and a layered pair of tank tops stained with tattoo ink. She's dressed for her day off, not for mingling with a roomful of cheerily drunken superheroes, and maybe that's her advantage. She'll certainly be a hell of a lot more comfortable in this than she will if she has to court my parents and their friends in her fanciest clothes.
“You sure?” she asks.
I smile. “Trust me?”
It's a cheap shot and she knows it, rolling her eyes with all of the drama of a temperamental teenager. Her fingers tighten their weave through mine, and she grins in spite of herself. “Well, come on, then,” she says. “Hi, ho, Silver.”
11.
We arrive – because that's exactly my sort of luck – in the unlit closet of my old bedroom at my parents' place.
Hazel stumbles over a discarded pair of candy-pink suede boots I don't recognize, presumably refugees from one of my mother's charitable shopping sprees through the fashion district in my name. Hazel's hands snap out to clutch at my forearms, blunt nails digging into my skin out of reflex.
I frown, reaching out to steady her. I don't often carry passengers. Even when I'm in tiptop shape, teleporting with someone else tends to be more trying on them than it is on me. “You all right?”
She takes a deep cleansing breath. “You need a license to do that superhero shit, right?”
I nod.
“Yeah, it shows,” she grumbles.
Frustrated, I let go of her, ignoring the worrisome dip in my stomach when she sways and bends forward to put her hands on her knees to catch her balance. “I'm still a bit rusty,” I point out. “What do you expect after five years between jumps, pinpoint accuracy?”
“From you? Damn straight.”
I'm not quite sure how to take that. Elsewhere in the penthouse echoes the thrum-drum of the Mexican folk music my mother tends to play to fill the background during her cocktail parties, and I can't help but focus on that. It's easier than staying in the here and now, where Hazel's attempting to keep from hyperventilating and still managing to needle me at the same time.
I mentally debate flipping on the lights in the closet but dismiss it as a waste of time. “Come on,” I say, heading over to the door and opening it a crack to peer out into my room. Luckily, it's empty of drunken guests looking for a quiet place to make out or masked henchmen decked out in all-black outfits spying on the revelers, which happens more than you'd think at my parents' parties.
A moment after I step out of the closet and into the bedroom, shaking out my curls and smoothing down my dress when I've gotten more elbow room, Hazel follows. Her breathing's finally steadied and calmed, but her eyes narrow in confusion when she takes in our surroundings.
“Whose room is this?”
“Mine,” I murmur, my cheeks warming under the weight of her gaze. “Or at least it used to be.”
She says nothing, and I thank God for that much. Instead she gives the room a critical once-over, searching with a curious eye for a personal touch she won't find anytime soon.
I used to try sometimes to imagine the girl my mother believed lived in my room and slept in my bed when she decorated it. Whoever that girl was, she loathed movie posters and art prints, didn't care for prominently displayed photos, hated bright colors and did something with her free time that didn't involve books, television or music. She preferred bare gray walls and pristine white carpeting, kept her room as neat as a pin, and wouldn't know a personal touch if it bit her in the ass.
Words cannot begin to describe the mindless enthusiasm I experienced upon moving into my very own dorm room in college, a room I wasn't ordered to keep modest and sterile just in case Seventeen decided to stop by and spontaneously photograph the place. I may have bought enough multicolored bean bags chairs to make the room resemble a psychedelic and particularly squishy version of Mars, but don't quote me on that.
Hazel tugs open the top drawer of the only curio in the room, unable to keep from barking out a laugh at the lingerie I'd never bothered to take with me when I left the city. If I remember correctly, most are demure numbers in flowery satin and lace, ridiculously uncomfortable to wear under costumes, each piece a few hundred bucks a pop. Hazel can certainly attest to the fact that I don't wear those anymore, preferring garter belts and leopard-print corsets. Hey, when I commit to a look I commit, damn it. “I thought you didn't talk to your parents anymore,” she says.
“I don't.” I crack open the door to my bedroom, peering down the hallway to the living room. Sultry acoustic guitar pours around me, low-slung Spanish lyrics twisting a sordid tale of lost love that tests my gag reflex. “Not a lot, in any event. Doesn't stop my mother from keeping my bedroom intact just in case I decide to stop throwing my never-ending temper tantrum and return to the loving bosom of the public eye.”
“I commend your restraint in not using air quotes when you said that.” She sneaks up behind me and peeks around my shoulder, just in time to spot the Winter Witch stride past holding a nearly-empty glass and wearing a flimsy silvery frock that skims her pale thighs and presumably costs more than six months' worth of my rent.
Hazel makes a disgusted noise, pulls me back, and yanks the door shut. “I can't go out there,” she hisses, and darts back into the closet before I can blink.
The muffled rattling of clothes hangers being shoved aside carries out into the bedroom, and I start to feel the first twinge of guilt at not giving her a lift home to change before bringing her along. “Now you get nervous?”
“There's a news photographer out there,” she snaps.
I frown, a bit disappointed in myself for not catching sight of Chester while I'd still been propping the door open. Chester Weeks has been flitting around my mother's holiday parties and society shindigs since before I could walk, all ninety sweaty hairless pounds of him. I grew taller than him by the time I was ten, and was lucky enough to have a simple if superhuman escape option for when he attempted to flirt with me when I was a teenager. I definitely haven't missed Chester at all. “Do you honestly care about that?”
“I care about my grandmother not giving me shit if I end up in the tabloids wearing a dirty tank top to a party full of rich people.”
“Okay, fine,” I say, stifling a growing spark of exasperation. “Come on, there's a ludicrous amount of designer outfits in there, you should be able to find something --”
Hazel stalks out of the closet with a frustrated grimace, designer shirts in muted colors streaming from her clenched hands like dangling banners. “Vera, are you on crack? I can't fit into any of these.”
Rolling my eyes, I rescue the tops she's trying to throttle into submission and toss most of them onto the eggshell-white bedspread. Thanks to my mother's deliberate ignorance of my correct size or her hopefulness I'll find something pretty enough to diet for, Hazel's right. Everything fitted or sporting sleeves gets thrown into the heap, and I finally settle for a simple olive-green wraparound top. “Look, I can get us over to my mother's room, but we can't rob my mom's closet. She'll notice. My clothes are the only ones left, and besides, baggy is in.”
“Not that baggy,” she mutters, but strips out of her layered tank tops without prompting. I casually keep my gaze trained away from her chest, praying I'm not blushing as she tugs the wraparound top on. ”The shit you talk me into, I swear to God.”
I rest my hands on her shoulders and turn her around. I picked up a few tricks at my mother's knee, most of which involve properly applying makeup if you intend to wear a mask or the perfect demure smile to slap on for the paparazzi. But one of the many things I learned but never got a chance to put to good use was the quick and neat guerrilla alteration of clothes that won't fit. I still keep rubber bands, a sewing kit, bobby pins, and paper clips in my purse for just such an occasion. “Oh, would you calm yourself, Hazel,” I say, grabbing a thin cream scarf from a coat hanger to repurpose as a belt, “it's just a change of clothes.”
“You would think that,” she grumbles.
I finish twining the scarf in a crisscross around her midsection and feed it through the shoulder straps of the top, tying it off at the end in a loose bow so it will swing behind her. “You'd think I asked you to perform brain surgery in public or something.”
“It isn't hard, Vera. It's fucking humiliating, is what it is.”
“Yes, well, you didn't have to come.”
“You're the one who asked me to come,” she snaps.
My mind's already picturing the rest of the conversation and the inevitable screaming match. I sigh and rest my hands on my waist. “Can we postpone the argument until we go back home? Please?”
“Sorry,” she says, sounding anything but.
“Don't be ...“ I catch myself before I get too far into another rant. Now is not the time to fall backwards through time into some regretful memory bustling with clipped words and shattered knickknacks. My gaze darts around in desperation, finally settling of the arching brush of her hair, the way the color of the top makes her freckles pop.
“That color looks good on you,” I say. I can't even fault her the ink-stained khakis. Paired with the elegant olive-green top, she might have just wandered in from the nearest art studio, if you didn't know any better. People will think my mother's started inviting her favorite starving artists to these parties like some sort of perverse charity.
Hazel releases a derisive snort. “Nice try,” she says, but she's smiling in spite of herself. A moment later she tucks her hand into the crook of my elbow, a maneuver that might have come off classy if she weren't taking advantage of it to steer me towards the door with more force than necessary. “Well, come on. Let's get this dog-and-pony show over with.”
I open the door to the stir of butterflies let loose in my stomach.
When I was little, I used to pretend that my family lived in a glass castle high above the city. I'd prance from room to room with a rhinestone tiara pinned into my curls, wearing some floaty pink number my grandmother picked up on the cheap just to make my mother bristle every time she caught me in it. And yes, before you even ask, I'm equal parts mortified and amused by that particular memory.
I thought I was a princess, and that we lived on the very top of the very tallest building in the city because that's where princesses live. It was more than a bit deflating over the years to discover just why that wasn't the case.
Mom took the growing lack of enthusiastic children living in the penthouse to steer the interior decorations full-tilt into modern stylish sterility. The walls are glass and steel all around, the windows tempered to let light in but stay pitch black and impossible to view into from outside. My parents can watch the world from on high, keep a cautious eye on whichever enormous mutant sea creature is attacking the city and respond accordingly. And now they can do so without turning to fly off to the rescue and tripping over my EZ-Bake oven or Graham's video games.
Or at least they could if they both still lived here.
Nearly everything in the place is cool steel or spotless glass, unmarred white walls and polished ebony flooring. The few spots of color – my mother's collection of genuine Aztec pottery saved and passed down through her family for generations, my dad's framed photos of family members in various skintight costumes that far outnumber the photos of us wearing anything else – pop against the neutral backdrop. I can only imagine what I must look like, a vivid red splash in a sea of neutral outfits. I must look like a walking blood splatter.
Most of the guests mingle out on the balcony. It's late morning by now but they still clasp delicate champagne glasses in their hands as they wave down at the parade passing below. I can pick out my parents milling among them, my father in a perfectly tailored suit, my mother decked out in a creamy Grecian cocktail dress. Mom's head tilts back as she laughs at something my father says which I can't hear, and goosebumps rise on my arms.
The guests staying inside to nurse expensive wine and barely tolerate Mom's playlist are mostly superheroes, that much I recognize even without their costumes. Unfortunately, they don't seem to be having any problem recognizing me right back. When Dr. Platinum spots me, she chokes on her drink and nearly does a spit-take, managing instead to splash pink-gold spots across the front of her ill-fitting herringbone suit dress. The Aphrodite Assembly, the whole dim gossipy lot of them, take one look at me and immediately huddle up to giggle at my expense like the catty wastes of designer shoes that the majority of them are. Shadow's the only one I can see in the immediate vicinity who shoots me what appears to be a warm welcoming smile of recognition, not afraid to stick out considering she's already wearing more fabric than any three other female guests combined between her conservative long-sleeved dress and simple hijab.
Chester, the photographer, spots me from across the room and allows himself to gape for a brief moment before he starts frantically snapping away.
Oh, wonderful. I'd been hoping the reminders of why I left this particular life wouldn't be quite so blatant, but apparently no such luck.
“Deep breaths, Vera,” Hazel orders from behind a tight smile. “All the way up from your knees.”
I nod almost frantically, my head bobbing in a stiff jerking motion until Hazel's hand tightens on my arm.
Mom cuts through the stunned party guests like a laser slicing through a herd of snarling zombies. Before I know what's hit me, her arms sweep me into a hug. “Vera, you made it!”
When I laugh, bursting forth with something that comes off painfully hysterical, Hazel's mouth screws into a confused scowl that she quickly attempts to smother. “This is where I make a joke about the traffic, right?” I say, my voice more shrill than usual.
Mom chuckles as though that's not the same tired joke I always tell after teleporting to prevent someone else being making it first. “And you must be Hazel,” Mom says, taking her hands before Hazel and her personal space issues can duck away. “I've heard such wonderful things about you. Did you do all of the work on your arms by yourself? The detail is magnificent.”