"What are you guys doing back here?" I gasp once Ellen stops trying to squeeze all the air from my lungs.
Ellen gives a shrug, and manages to look embarrassed and pleased all at once. "We're a conspiracy, of course."
"We're the FEMS!" adds Suki happily.
"The femmes?" I ask.
"It's the Free Eliza Moon Society," Ellen explains, and I gawk in wonder.
"You made an entire conspiracy just for me?" I ask.
"Well, no," Jacob says, frowning at Ellen. "Some of us thought we should be the Iris Academy Liberation Front."
"That's a terrible acronym!" Ellen snaps back.
"We're not getting into the acronym argument again!" shouts Donald over the rest of the group, which for a moment appeared to be on the verge of an epic multi-party bicker fest. "We had a vote, and we're the FEMS."
Ellen gives Donald a grateful smile over her shoulder, and the tips of his ears go aubergine.
"After you got - well, after you left, things got really weird," Ellen explains. "Professor Terrec told the entire school that you'd nearly killed Professor Potsdam, as like, a rebellion thing, and he just took the entire place over. Well, we knew you'd never hurt Professor Potsdam, so right away we knew something was going on."
The faces behind Ellen have gone grim and serious. I glance from one to the other - even Suki has lost her spacey expression.
"He's really been cracking down on us," Ellen continues, "ramping up the exam difficulties and giving huge demerits to anyone that fails. A lot of the wildseeds got expelled after the last one. And then he made this rule that student clubs aren't allowed to meet unless there's a teacher present, to supervise. And no more than two students can hang out together on mall trips - he sends teachers to watch and break up the groups if there's more. He was threatening to not let us go altogether, but Mr. Abelard - who owns the magic shop - put his foot down. I guess he's pretty influential around the magical leaders in the area since he's been selling stuff to them as students for ages." Ellen shrugs.
I shift uncomfortably, thinking of poor Mr. Abelard talking to the astrolabe on the shelf outside - I hope Hieronymous sets him back to rights soon. "So that's why he let you meet back here? Away from the teachers?"
"Ellen's the one who thought of asking him," Donald says, and Ellen blushes hot pink.
"I just noticed that he was getting annoyed at the limits on mall trips," Ellen explains. "He was losing business, with only two students being able to shop here at a time. But," she bursts, "what about you? Jacob told us you were going to get put on trial!"
"I heard my dads talking about it over Thanksgiving," Jacob interjects. "Papa was pretty upset - Dad holed himself up in his office over the holiday and barely came out to eat Thanksgiving dinner. They had a huge fight, and that's when Dad told him that he was working on your trial." Jacob shrugs, looking at the group nervously. "It was a huge breach of the council confidentiality rules for him to even tell Papa, if they found out I heard them talking about it-" he shakes his head briskly. "Just don't tell anyone," he says, speaking more to the rest of the group than to me.
"Your dad was really amazing," I say. "He stood up for me when no one else would." Jacob gives me a shy, half embarrassed smile at that, then quickly turns back to Minnie, who looks from him to me anxiously.
"But what happened?" Minnie asks. "Did they acquit you or-"
"Well, no," I say. "I got convicted, so my defense attorney kidnapped me."
Everyone else blinks at me as they take this in.
"Is that him?" says Virginia, who had been sitting and glaring at me in silence through this entire exchange. Now she's pointing at something over my shoulder, and I realize that the something is Hieronymous. I glance at him in time to see him step forward from where he was standing near the door curtain, still in his convenience store clerk glamor.
"Heya Grabby," Virginia says dourly.
Hieronymous drops the glamor. "Miss Danson," he says, his voice as stony as Virginia's. "Good afternoon." He ignores the squeaks of surprise that the rest of my classmates make
"How did you know it was him?" Logan says.
"Easy," Virginia replies. "Any time Eliza disappears without explanation, she's with Grabby, right?"
I frown, alarmed. "Virginia, I was in jail," I say, but she just scowls at me.
"I don't think this is very productive," Ellen says, glancing nervously between Virginia and me.
"You're defending her?" Virginia says. "After what she did?"
Now it's my turn to gawk at my roommates, and I suddenly remember that neither of them had been speaking to me since the first month of school. "Fine," I say, trying to keep my voice from trembling with rage. "One of you had better tell me what I'm supposed to have done, because apparently I'm too stupid to figure it out myself."
Virginia stands, arms folded across her chest, looking coolly at me "You lied to us," she says.
For a moment, I'm too surprised to say anything - I just stare at Virginia until I manage a stuttery "w-what?"
"I called your house," she says, "to invite you to stay at my parents' with me and Ellen for the first week of August, and your parents told me you were on some school trip, replacing Minnie because she was sick? Well I'd just talked to Minnie, and she wasn't sick. You'd just disappeared on us. It wasn't til the start of the school year that Ellen finally told me you'd gone to England to see your husband."
The amount of disgust Virginia puts into the word "husband" makes my stomach squirm. I turn to Ellen, whose face has gone from hot pink to a furious brick red.
"Professor Potsdam told me," she says, not quite meeting my eyes. "When I said I was going to go stay at Virginia's, she said it was a good thing I was, because she was taking you to England to see Gra- Professor Grabiner. And that she hoped things were going to go well for you two considering the way you'd kissed each other on the night of the May ball."
I freeze in sheer horror - and then realize that none of the group of students around me looks even remotely surprised at this.
"So - what, you all knew?" I sputter. "You've all been gossiping about me behind my back?"
Ellen looks up, stricken. "Wha- no!" she yelps. "I only told Virginia!"
I look at Virginia, who shifts her eyes away and gives a hard little shrug. "I only told Pastel," she says.
I look at Pastel, whose wings are quivering. "I only told Minnie!" she says.
I look at Minnie who stares at me, eyes wide. "I only told Jake!"
I look at Jacob, who meets my eye and shrugs. "Don't look at me," he says. "I didn't know it was supposed to be some big secret."
I squeeze my eyes shut, unable to look my classmates in the eye. They'd known - all of them - all the stuff that I was trying to keep secret. That I thought was just between Hieronymous and me. And they'd known for the whole school year so far. Ellen might be right that I'd never hurt Professor Potsdam, but right now, I find myself harboring some serious thoughts on the subject. I take a deep breath. "I don't believe you-"
"I don't believe you," interjects Virginia. "You're supposed to be our friend, but the only thing we can count on you to do is disappear on us and then lie about it. Even when Ellen asked you straight out where you'd been, you wouldn't tell us the truth!" She makes a disgusted, scoffing sound low in her throat. "You are a liar, Eliza Moon, and I'm sick of it!"
All at once, Virginia's declaration sends me shooting back to last April, when everyone found out about my marriage - when my husband had threatened me, and when I'd been cowering in my room in sheer terror. Back then, I'd insisted that I was not a liar, and I open my mouth now to say the same. But what comes out is a thin, quavery "I know."
This, at least, seems to surprise Virginia as much as it does me. She stares, mouth open as though she had been about to continue the argument, but that I'd stolen the words right out from under her.
"I know," I repeat, louder and more steadily. "I'm sorry. But - what else was I supposed to do? If I told you the truth, I betray his trust-" my shoulders tighten, and I can't bring myself to say Hieronymous' name. "And if I keep the secret, I betray yours? What kind of a choice is that?"
"So you picked him," Virginia says, still scowling.
"Virginia," says Minnie interjects, "he's her husband."
Virginia rounds on Minnie her eyes sparking. "Yeah, and she's in high school. And he's her teacher. It's weird and creepy and probably illegal-"
"And it saved my life," I interject.
"That doesn't mean you have to go around kissing him!" Virginia shouts.
"Virginia, enough," says a voice, loud and decisive, and it takes me a moment to realize that it's Ellen. I stare at her, bewildered - and so does Virginia.
"You know that I agree with you that this is weird and creepy and illegal," Ellen says, directing her words to Virginia. "But there's a point where we just have to let that go."
"Buh-" Virginia says, one burst of sound from her mouth that dies as soon as it exits her mouth.
"Sorry Eliza," Ellen says, ignoring Virginia's outburst and turning toward me instead. "I was really mad about you lying to us about this stuff. But-" and here she stops, chewing at her upper lip and looking at Hieronymous. "I guess - if it's a choice between Eliza with Professor Grabiner or no Eliza, I'm going to pick Eliza with Professor Grabiner."
I half smile, trying to thank Ellen with my eyes because I don't know how to say it with words. "I'm sorry too," is all I can say. "I didn't want to lie about it."
We both turn to Virginia, and she's looking at the both of us though she's about one second away from bursting into tears - something I've never seen Virginia do.
"Fine," she says in a tight little voice. "You just - both of you - fine. You're both going to leave me alone, right? Just because I don't want the same stuff you want?"
"Virginia," I say, astonished. "I'm not going to leave! I'm trying to get my magic back so I can come back to school!"
This disclosure causes the entire group to switch their focus from Virginia to me in a hurry. "What do you man, 'get your magic back?'" asks Minnie in a shivery squeak of a voice.
"Did I skip the part where Professor Terrec de-magicked me in front of the entire council?" I try to make this disclosure sound lighthearted, but I only manage to sound strained.
The entire group bursts into astonished noise, everyone talking over each other at once and surging towards me en masse. Ellen reaches me first, looking aghast. "They wouldn't!" she says. "They couldn't-"
"Professor Terrec's been doing this all year," I reply. "And anyway, he got my magic, but not my memories, so technically I'm not expelled yet… I think."
"But how are you going to get it back?" gasps Minnie, "before they-" she stops, looking as though she might not be able to continue. Jacob puts an arm around her shoulders, and it only mildly irritates me.
I glance back at Hieronymous again, but he's leaning against a stack of boxes, arms crossed and watching me. "Well," I say, "I guess there might be some information at Iris that might help me get my magic back. So we need a way to sneak in and take a look."
"I don't-" Jacob starts, but he's drowned out by a chorus of enthusiastic voices speaking over each other.
"How are you going to get in?" asks Donald, who manages to be louder than the buzz. Everyone quiets at the sound of his voice.
"Well, since the wards get triggered by someone non-magical going through them and getting onto school grounds," I say, "I need to go through with someone else who isn't magical, but who's expected."
Everyone else stares at me, blinking.
"The van driver?" I say. "He - or she - they aren't magic, are they? So if we just ride with you in the vans…"
Silence greets this suggestion, and I'm terrified that everyone already knows some loophole - the van drivers have a special exemption tailored just for them, or something else completely obvious.
"That's… kind of perfect," Jacob says, then looks around at the rest of the group. "Right?"
Everyone nods and starts talking again in agreement, and I let my breath hiss out of my lungs.
"Okay, so that's how you get in. What do you do so you don't get caught?" Virginia asks, and her voice - and eyes - are still hard.
"Well," I say, "maybe that's where you guys come in." And I raise my eyes, hopefully, at Donald.
We wait for the vans in a huddled cluster, me blinking in the afternoon sun, trying to quash my terror of being exposed in the middle of all these students. Not that anyone's likely to recognize me by sight, of course. Before leaving the confines of the magic shop's showroom, we'd all conferred over who Hieronymous and I should be disguised as. It would have to be someone who'd stayed at school, we'd decided, but who hadn't had detention. So now I'm in the form of a black haired junior girl, while Hieronymous is disguised as the senior musician with the green-grey hair and wire rimmed glasses. We stand apart from each other so as not to arouse further suspicion, but I can't help glancing behind me every once in a while, to see what he's doing. Mostly it's standing around and looking aloof.
When it's my turn to get into the van, I do so with commingled relief that I haven't been caught yet, and a tightening dread that I'm about to walk right into a nest of figurative scorpions. Still, there's some comfort that I'm able to board the van surrounded by my friends - Donald, Ellen and Virginia in front, Minnie, Pastel and Jacob behind.
When Virginia swings into one of the seats, I grab Ellen before she can do the same. "Hey," I say, "can I sit there?"
"Oh-" Ellen says, "I thought you'd want to sit next to-" she nods to where Hieronymous is stepping into the aisle.
"Not right now," I whisper. "Seriously - I wanna sit there."
Ellen shrugs, then sits down next to Donald in the seat behind Virginia. Donald gives me a startled look, then a grin.
I slide into the seat next to Virginia, keeping my head down as the rest of the students file into the van. Once it's filled, and we begin the drive to Iris Academy, I let out a cautious breath. I can't help glancing out the window to the parking spot where I'd parked the convenience store clerk's truck. But true to Hieronymous' word, it isn't there anymore - he must have teleported it back to its owner.
Well that's one less theft on my conscience, at least for today, I think as we pull out of the parking lot and onto the mountain road.
Virginia is looking determinately out of the window, intent on pretending that I'm not there. I tense up, running my hands down my skirt, still feeling the odd dissonance of feeling the skirt under my fingers but seeing an Iris Academy school uniform instead.
"So," I say, wondering where I could possibly begin. "Virginia."
"I don't want to talk," she snaps without looking at me.
"Okay," I sigh, "but if you're one of the ones helping sneak me into school, I'd feel a lot better if you just told me what you meant by me and Ellen leaving you."
Virginia squirms a bit in her seat, still looking out the window.
"I'm not going to leave," I say. "Not if I can help it, anyway."
Now Virginia rounds on me, scowling. "Everyone leaves," she snaps. "Don't you think I know that? That's what you're supposed to do. Everybody does it. They fall in love, they pair off - or whatever number of people they pick - and they start families together. Everyone does it! Everyone wants to do it. Except me. And I'm gonna get left behind."
I open my mouth, then shut it again. I'd been about to tell her not to be silly, that everyone finds someone that they like eventually. But then I begin to understand what she's trying to say - that she doesn't want any relationship at all. I try to think of something to say that won't make me sound like a jerk, but all I come up with is "oh."
To my surprise, Virginia smiles at this, although a little ruefully. "I used to try to overcompensate so much," she says. "Like, when I was a kid I promised Jacob we'd get married when we turned eighteen, and didn't that cause me some problems last year. And when we got older and Minnie and Pastel used to come to stay at our house, they'd always giggle about some boy or girl they had a crush on. I had to pretend I liked Logan Pheiffer just so they'd leave me alone!"
I laugh out loud at the picture in my head of Virginia and Logan, and Virginia laughs too, her voice sounding easier and less strained than it has all day.
"But you know," she says soberly when we finish laughing, "when I got to school, I thought about meeting all these new people, and I thought for sure I'd find someone like me. And maybe we'd eventually decide to be just... friends for life, or something. Keep each other company after everyone else paired off. So far I haven't found anyone like that, but I thought I'd at least have time. Because high school is where you have fun with your friends." She frowns. "And then you got married."
Now it's my turn to squirm a little. "Not by choice," I say, but Virginia shakes her head.
"Married is married. Just because you didn't have a choice doesn't mean you don't have, like, responsibilities to him, right?
The words seem to float, unanchored and free of context, around my brain. Wisdom. Kindness. Courage. Protection. "Right," I say.
"And then Ellen and my own brother," Virginia continues, making a gagging sound.
"Ohh," I say, making a supreme effort not to look behind me to see if Donald and Ellen can hear what Virginia is saying about them. "Donald told me about what happened this summer. It wouldn't be that bad if they got together though, would it?"
"He's my brother," Virginia repeats. "He didn't have to pick my own roommate to have a crush on."
"That's not the kind of thing you can really consciously pick," I suggest.
"I guess," Virginia says. "Remember how Minnie went off the rails with that Katsura kid last year?"
"I think Kyo was the one who went off the rails," I say, but Virginia ignores me.
"And then this year with Jacob," she says. "If he has his way, they're gonna get married on his eighteenth birthday, you know?"
I blink. "Seriously? I mean - they're pretty intense, but I didn't think they were, like, married intense."
Virginia rolls her eyes. "They aren't, exactly. Remember how I told you that me'n'Jacob promised to get married when we were eighteen? Well it was a real promise."
I gape at her, then begin to sputter. "But - I mean - that would mean-"
"We have to get married when we turn eighteen," Virginia replies. "Yep. But Jake finally told Minnie about it last spring, and she figured out there was a loophole in the promise," she says with a smirk. "We sort of left out the part where we got married to each other."
It takes me a second to grasp this, but when I do, I say "so you're just going to have to marry someone when you turn eighteen?"
Virginia shrugs. "Yep. What a pain, right?"
"Oh yeah," I breathe, and we both burst out laughing
"So who are you getting married to?" I ask when we catch our breath.
"Oh," Virginia says, "I dunno. I was going to ask Ellen at first. I had it all planned out - ask her over summer vacation, tell her that I only think of her as a friend, and marriage would just be technical, but it'd be easy because we're roommates, right? And then Donald asked her on a date, and I just-" she makes a rough sound at the back of her throat. "One thing about getting married is, you can't date around unless you make contractual arrangements spelling out what you can and can't do at the time of the ceremony and I just didn't want things to be that complicated - not for my brother."
I nod, and Virginia grimaces. "After that, I thought maybe Pastel - she's been my friend since we were kids, but she might not like getting tied down." She shrugs. "I guess I don't really know yet, but I have a couple more months to go, and it doesn't have to be a big deal, right? To get married for the year and a day, get divorced, one and done?"
I shrug. "I dunno. I guess it depends on who you get married to."
Virginia snorts. "No offense, but yours seems a little complicated."
"I guess," I say, and we lapse into silence as I mull over what Virginia's just told me. "So," I say, "this whole marriage thing. You figured it out last spring but you didn't tell me about it?"
"I didn't tell Ellen either," says Virginia. "And I wasn't gonna until over the summer. Marriage, you know, it was kind of… too huge to talk to anyone about it, really."
I don't say anything about this, and we're both silent for a moment.
"So now I sound like a huge hypocrite, right?" Virginia says.
"Well, I wasn't gonna say it, but…" I say with a smirk to let Virginia know that I forgive her.
Virginia seems to think about this for a moment. "I guess what I'm trying to say is, I get it," she finally says. "In my head, I get why you didn't say anything about Grabby. I was just… I dunno, mad? Upset? Thinking you were leaving me behind, keeping all those secrets, disappearing without telling us. I didn't think all this was gonna happen so soon, and I freaked out. I'm sorry."
"I'm sorry too," I say. "But like you said, it shouldn't be that big a deal, right? I mean, if you're just thinking of the one and done marriage, like I've got. I wasn't leaving any more than you will once you get married."
"Yeah but with you it's different," Virginia says. "You like him."
"I guess," I say.
"And he likes you," Virginia continues.
I glance up at her, startled.
"Oh, come on," she says. "It's pretty obvious."
"I don't - it's complicated," I say, thinking that night in August when he'd put his hand on my mouth to push me away from him, the disappointment on his face last night when I'd gotten jealous.
Virginia makes the disgusted sound in her throat again and rolls her eyes. "That's one reason I can't do relationships. Everyone in them thinks it's all more complicated than it actually is. You like him, he likes you - what's the problem?"
"Well, it's weird, creepy and illegal," I say.
"That is very true," Virginia says loftily. "But a couple more years and it's not going to be illegal anymore. Weird and creepy still, sure, but at least you won't be jailbait any more." She stands then. "C'mon, time to go."
"What?" I ask, then turn to see students streaming out of their seats and into the aisle of the van, exiting onto the grounds of Iris Academy. "We're here!" I breathe. I watch as Ellen and Donald pass up the aisles, and then Hieronymous in his glamour passes by without a glance in my direction. "You don't think anyone's going to, like, grab me once I'm out of the van, right?"
"Well," Virginia says, "there's just one way to find out."
She steps into the aisle and I follow, stepping out of the van into cold winter sunlight.
