The Invisible (13 page)

And Jax—if I ever told them what she did to me—Jax could become a very successful doctor. Or a liability, if they decided what she’s figured out how to do was far too dangerous for any one person.

But so far, it seems like my secret is still safe.

In the elevator an hour later, my mother’s sugared lemon perfume fills the space. She’s wearing a gray silk shirtdress with heels. Her collarbones jut out, and she looks thinner than ever. She’s insisted I go with her to her tailor to get a dress made for the masquerade ball, which is back on, now that Invisible has been captured. The ball will now raise money for the museum, and it’s even being held there, since their ballroom wasn’t damaged. I don’t care what I wear, but I’m willing to do what she wants, if only to try to get back to normal.

She stares up at the lowering numbers, but when we get toward the bottom she reaches out to grab my hand. It’s a surprising gesture. I can’t remember the last time I’ve held her hand.

“Everything will be all right now,” she says, her words ever so slightly slurred even at this hour. “School will be back on tomorrow.”

“That’s great,” I say, squeezing her thin fingers back. Though I don’t know what “all right” means for me. I can’t stop thinking about the look on Ford’s face last night, the terror in his eyes when he pulled away from me so abruptly and told me to leave. “You must be relieved.”

“I’m relieved.” She nods, wisps of her ash-blond hair moving around her face. When she faces me, her eyes have a haunted look that lasts only an instant before they’re blank again. “That the person who killed Martha is going to be locked away forever. It was terrifying knowing he was out there. Waiting.”

I nod, realizing how shaken she still is. She’s still dousing her fears with extra-large doses of Vivirax, I would guess, judging by her flat monotone.

The elevator door opens into the lobby, full of brilliant sunlight shot through with rainbow hues from Fleet Tower’s colored glass walls.

“Enjoy it out there, you two.” Cass, the morning doorman, smiles and tips his hat as we pass.

“Thanks.” I smile back.

And on Foxglove Court, the soft spring sunlight feels yellower and warmer than it has all year. Lots of people have left their buildings to go out walking. The eerie quiet in the streets these past three days is over at last. An older woman waves hello to my mother. “Isn’t it wonderful?” she says.

“It is,” my mother replies. She smiles wide, and even through the Viviraxed haze her relief is palpable, along with a few more wrinkles than I’ve ever seen around her eyes and mouth. The Invisible fears and all the curfews have prevented her from getting her usual injections, and she’s starting to almost look her age, or as close to it as I’ve ever seen. “Will I see you at the masquerade party, Leora?”

“Oh, yes,” the woman says. “We would not miss it. And such a good cause.”

We keep walking down Foxglove Court. The whole neighborhood seems to be out today, everyone smiling and dazed in the bright sun. Two uniformed doormen slap each other a high five. A little girl chases a smaller boy around a tree in the center median. She must be six or seven and wears a glittery black mask. Is that because of me?

“How about something green?” my mother is saying. “For your dress. You look so good in emerald. And it’s spring-like, the color of new life and all of that.”

I pull a newly popped leaf from a sycamore tree as I walk, admiring its softness. “Green sounds nice.”

Of course, green makes me think of Ford. His silly name for me.

And then I get the craziest idea. It unfurls slowly, a tiny wisp of a thought that grows larger until I’m convinced it’s right.

“Mom,” I say shyly. “I might want to bring a date to the ball. Would that be all right?”

My mother stops dead in her tracks, and for a second a fear I’ve said something to dampen her mood, made her afraid for me again because of what happened with Gavin, the boy she never approved of, the boy who caused me to vanish for days on end.

“I don’t see why not,” she says hesitantly. Then she clears her throat as if getting ready to say something important. “I . . . it wasn’t right to try to convince you to stay with William. I see that now. And I know you went through so much with that other boy. The one who . . .”

She can’t say it.
The one who was kidnapped. The one we wouldn’t pay the ransom for.

She knows so little about what happened with Gavin. I told my parents he was released and we broke up. And, desperate to believe me so they could stop worrying, they bought it.

This is my mother’s way of trying to connect. I nod. “Gavin,” I say, my voice tiny.

“Of course. Gavin.” It feels wrong to have his name rolling around in her mouth, even if it turned out to be a fake one. “Anyway, darling, yes. Bring whomever you like to the ball. Someone from school?”

Her tone is upbeat now, eager. I don’t have the heart to tell her who it is. But I’m hoping he’ll win her over in person.

“I think you’ll like him,” I say instead. I flash for a moment on the vein pulsing in Ford’s neck, the redness of his face when he said
I’m not myself tonight
. I’ll invite him to the ball anyway. And my two worlds will fuse, like a new heart to the tubes surrounding it. Like hummingbird DNA inside human cells. Everything will reconfigure just a little, until it’s something new and better. Something extraordinary, maybe.

“I’m sure I will,” she says. Her ankles wobble in her heels as we turn the corner onto Thorne Street. The tailor is half a block away now.

“He’s a really good guy.” I fling my palmed leaf away and watch it spin through the sunshine.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

..................................................................

Mr. Tanaka, the tailor, made me a gown from emerald green silk shantung, raw and rough in places, smooth and delicate in others. When I walk into the masquerade ball a week later, held in the Museum of Fine Art’s undamaged ballroom, the dress fits me like a second skin, the skirt ragged and long with knots up and down the bustled train, the bodice snug and slightly asymmetrical, the effect body-hugging and slightly cleavage-creating just above the soft-shoe shuffle of my heart.

I’ve worn ball gowns my whole life, but never enjoyed it much. Usually it’s like I’m playing dress-up, pretending to be older and ending up just feeling like a fraud, or when I was much younger, pretending to be a fairy princess. But this time, in this dress, I feel like . . . me. Not like a fraud. Not too young. Tonight I’m a version of myself I can live with.

Maybe it’s the mask I’m wearing. This time it’s silver, the corners sharpening toward my temples into cat-eye points. My hair is in an artfully messy, voluminous pile on top of my head.

We arrive exactly on time to the ball. Immediately upon entering the room, my mother and father are waylaid by an older woman with an electric blue asymmetrical bob and matching eye shadow, her lips injected to clownish proportions.

I wander away from them after giving her a polite smile, and I decide to make a circle of the perimeter of the massive room, weaving around the scattered guests slowly wandering into the ballroom, a napkin in my hand as I pluck various rolls and puffs from the silver trays offered by the cater-waiters.

The plan is to meet Ford here. I made sure to double-check that his name is on the list at the museum door.

The museum ballroom seems to have suffered no bad effects from the bombing. The ceiling is hung with thousands of purple blown-glass orbs; the walls display large pieces of art specially chosen to highlight some of Bedlam’s finest artists. My mother and Fernanda lobbied to change the name of the party to the Heal the City Masquerade Ball, which helped to turn it into a huge benefit to help the museum gain its footing again.

I spot Olive Ann with her mother, Winnifred Bang, the principal of Cathedral Day School. Olive is in a short white cocktail dress, her shiny white mask decorated with albino peacock feathers. Principal Bang is in a dark pink suit with a mask on a stick in the shape of a moon. They are arguing quietly in the corner of the room, near the shrine dedicated to Martha Marks, standing in front of her picture but not looking at it, their mouths pinched and angry-looking in the same unfortunate way.

I avoid the shrine as I wander the room. It makes me too sad.

There are people I recognize from school starting to circulate in the ballroom, masked but a few of them identifiable. I wave hello to Callie Flaunt, wearing a thin glittery strip of red over her eyes, whose mother owns a chain of North Side boutiques, and to Jean Keener, a lacrosse jock who plays on the boys’ team but who looks great in her silver ball gown, a full-face black mask on a stick held in one hand. It’s kind of sad and nostalgic, somehow, seeing everyone dressed up like this. The school year is almost over. Soon most of these kids will just be people I used to know. I wonder how much I’ll miss them.

“You are the hotness!” Zahra’s voice rings out from behind me. I turn around, overjoyed to see her in a typical Zahra boundary-pushing ensemble.

“You are . . . wearing a leather romper.” I state the obvious.

“Yeah, but it’s a
sparkly
leather romper. You hug me too tight, I cut you,” Z jokes, her ringed fingers forming the shape of scissors. She is a giant flashing diamond, a walking jewel, her black leather shorts-and-strapless-top combination all studded with crystals. Her mask is equally studded, covering most of her forehead down to the tip of her nose. And her black hair is set in pin curls. I reach out and touch one, and it’s the texture of concrete, totally shellacked to her head.

“How long did this take?” The knot of nerves inside me loosens slightly. I’m still nervous about Ford joining me here but more at ease now that I’m with Zahra. “I love it.”

“Hours,” she sighs. “It involved actual pins. You look great too—I like your hair all crazy like this.” She pats at my wild updo, tucks a tendril behind my ear, and for a second it’s like we are nine again, and she’s doing my hair. “And this dress! The asymmetry is to die for. I’ve died. I’m dead right now, actually, and have been reanimated in spirit form.”

“Thanks, but don’t die.” My hands flutter out in front of me to pat my knotted skirt.

Within the jewels of her mask, her eyes catch on something behind me. “He cleans up nice, your boxer.”

I whirl around to see Ford lingering by the door, staring straight at me. In a tux he rented. Black tie. And black sneakers with white stripes.

So very Ford.

I feel the blood rising to my face as I walk with Z toward him, taking care not to move too fast, certain I’ll trip over my train. I don’t want to call attention to myself or to him, in case he’s nervous.

But he looks great. Relaxed. Almost like he’s comfortable in the tux, though I know it’s the first one he’s ever worn.

When we reach him, threading our way past ball gowns and tuxes topped with masked heads that could be anyone, close friends or total strangers, he pretends to stop breathing, coughing as he looks from me to Zahra. “Sorry. I can’t really handle how good you guys look,” he jokes, his eyes lingering on me.

“I could say the same to you,” I breathe, enjoying his proximity. We’ve only seen each other twice since the time at Jimmy’s. It’s been chaste, but all the heat and strangeness of that night at Jimmy’s is still between us.

“Will is going to be so jealous,” Zahra whispers in my ear.

“Let’s not worry about Will,” I mumble, my eyes still locked with Ford’s. I don’t care what Will thinks anymore. My only concerns tonight are that Ford has a good time and doesn’t feel too alienated by this North Side crowd, and that when he meets my parents, it’s not a total disaster.

“Thanks for coming,” I say, just to him. “And renting the tux and everything. It fits perfectly.”

He blanches. “It smells a little weird. Sorry.”

I move closer and the smell hits my nostrils, faint but instantly recognizable. “So that’s not
your
Sniff For Men Cologne?” I smile at him. I’d know that smell anywhere—several of the Cathedral boys wore it in middle school, before they realized it smelled like a wet dog rolled in nutmeg.

“Nope. Guy before me used a ton of it, though.”

“It’s not that strong,” I reassure him. “And besides, I kind of like it on you.”

Ford’s smile droops, and he leans in, his mouth an inch from my ear. “Green. About the other night?”

“Don’t sweat it,” I interrupt him. “I’m not. I’m just happy you’re here.”

“I just . . . I want you to know I think everything’s sorted out now. With me, I mean.”

“Let’s just take it day by day.” I don’t want to talk about the other night, not here. I just want to enjoy this one. “It means a lot to me that you came.”

Ford’s about to tell me something else when Z interrupts us.

“We need to make introductions.” Zahra links her arm in Ford’s and starts pulling him away from the doorway. “I’m going to take care of introducing you to our illustrious classmates. Anthem’s too shy and serious—she’ll just botch it or make it awkward.”

That’s probably true, so I follow along, happy to let Zahra take charge.

I watch as she marches Ford over to Serena Swelling and Annette Gotts, both just a little lower in the Cathedral pecking order than Olive Ann and Clementine Fitz. Both of them wear stilettos that are way too tall, and they almost fall over as they shake Ford’s hand, their thick coats of lip gloss gleaming as they flirt with him.

“He’s cute, Anthem.” Annette smiles at me when Zahra starts moving Ford along, baring her oddly small teeth below her gold mask, her brown curls pulled back with a gold feather headband. “Good for you. And I love your dress.” Then she squeezes my hand.

“Thanks,” I say, startled by her warmth, which seems genuine. This is a girl who hasn’t said more than
can I borrow your math homework for a sec
to me since the eighth grade. “You look great too.”

It’s the end of the school year, I realize. Everyone’s loosening up. Some of Cathedral’s petty turf wars and ridiculous labels are falling away, behind us now.