Disclaimer: From here on out, the events belong to either me or LCV Productions, though of course everything still belongs to those amazing musical/movie people. :)
Note: This chapter references events in my fic, her fair judgement, so though you shouldn't need to read it, it might prove useful if you're confused. And finally, this chapter makes fta the longest West Side Story fic existing, which means absolutely nothing except that more people need to write for this fandom, plz? :D
For: Lea Salonga, for her non-overenunciated London recording of Miss Saigon. I've apparently been on a Schönberg and Boublil inspiration kick. :)
—viennacantabile
fell the angels
sixteen : this small space
.
"Every shot that kills ricochets."
—Gilbert Parker, Romany of the Snows
.
Not Helen now, but Penelope,
in whom a single noon was as long as ten years,
because he had not come back, because they had gone
from yesterday.
—Derek Walcott, Omeros
.
He is gone in the morning when she wakes up, and though this is not unusual, Velma knows that his absence says everything that he couldn't. I'm sorry. I love you. But I can't.
Resting her hand on his side of the bed, Velma moves into the hollow left by his body and draws the sheet close around her. She wants to imagine that it's warm—that he's just left—but she knows better. If not for that faint impression of his weight, she wouldn't have even known he was here. And in the end, she can't blame him, Velma supposes, because it's not his fault. Or theirs. Nothing is. All they were ever guilty of is the belief that what had always happened always would, and that they would be all right. She doesn't think it's a crime to trust in the way things are. In good intentions, and in love.
Velma lies in bed for the longest time, staring at the fading shadows across the ceiling and concentrating on just breathing in and out. She doesn't want to get up, doesn't want to face the day and what it will bring. She doesn't want to believe it could be real. But even though she tries not to think about it, she keeps seeing their faces. Riff. Bernardo. Tony. And Maria.
(In the back of her mind she wonders where their bodies are, exactly, and if she will ever see them again.)
It's not until the the phone rings, loud and abrupt in the silence, that Velma stirs and reaches for the receiver. It can't be anyone else but Graziella, and it isn't. When she answers, Riff's girl is sobbing and wailing from waking up and remembering that this isn't some sick awful dream. Velma just listens, tries to help her best friend, hears her out and says everything that she is supposed to: that it isn't Graziella's fault and Riff really did love her and it will be okay someday, it really will. Which is harder than she'd think because Velma has heard her best friend screaming and ranting before but she has never heard Graziella like this.
Talk is all very well, Velma realizes after half an hour, but the only thing she can really do is go to her friend and be there with her. And it's only when she assures Graziella that she will be there in two minutes—when her feet hit the floor and her gaze meets the open empty window—that Velma finds the will to face it: They are dead, she thinks, the words heavy and solid in her mind. Just like that, three boys who were planning and hoping and loving and so alive yesterday aren't even here anymore. Gone. Wiped off the face of the earth. And they are never coming back.
Never is a long time, Velma imagines. Even longer than forever.
She is just edging out the front door when a voice stops her.
"Vilhelmina."
Velma winces. "Dad," she says, turning.
His face is solemn and grave. "We should talk about this." He doesn't have to say what. Again Velma remembers that her father is friends with a police officer, and again, there is nothing she wants to do less than talk to him about this.
"I have to go," she says, wishing she'd thought to climb out the window. She already knows what he is going to say, but it doesn't make the prospect of discussing the previous night any easier. "Graz called, an'—she needs me."
Dr. Andersen considers this, his face softening, and puts his hand on her shoulder. "Later, then," he says, voice soft but firm. "And if there's anything we can do, just tell us. I'm sure your mother will be sending some food over later."
Velma nods, unable to look her father in the eye. "I will. Thanks." And as she leaves her home, Velma takes a deep breath. Just another complication, another problem, she thinks, tracing the familiar path down the stairs and across the street to the Spanella apartment. Just another thing to worry about.
"Oh, Graz," she says quietly as she enters that shadowed room where her best friend lies curled up on her bed. She's said it before, but she can't say it enough. "Graz, I'm so sorry."
For once in her life, Riff's girl says nothing, just gazes at her with pleading, reddened eyes and holds out her arms. And Velma, wishing there was something, anything she could do, climbs under the covers with her best friend and puts her arms around her as Graziella cries helpless, anguished tears.
"I thought it wasn't real," the redhead sobs. "Vel, I actually—I saw him in my dream, an' he was fine, an' when I woke up, I thought he was okay an' it was them dyin' that was the dream an' oh, God, Vel, I thought it wasn't real."
"Shh," whispers Velma, pulling her closer. She doesn't know what else to say, what else to do. "Shh."
They stay like this for what might be hours, Graziella just clinging for dear life as Velma tries to be strong for her. She doesn't speak, just holds her best friend as the tears pour down that pale face and Graziella mourns the death of the only boy she has ever loved. It's not much, and it might not even help, but it's all Velma knows to do.
"Lemme get you a glass-a water," she finally says when her best friend has been silent for a few minutes. She is still crying—Velma is afraid she'll never stop—but at least that heartrending hopeless whimper has died down.
Graziella just nods. And Velma, untangling herself slowly, gently from her friend, hurries to the kitchen where she reaches for a glass and gazes, unseeing, at the counter. How? she wonders. How did it come to this?
"Is she okay?"
Velma turns to see the owner of that small, scared voice. "Fred."
The red-haired boy shifts his bare feet, freckled face sober over his pajamas. Fred has always been enthusiastic and eager-to-please around his older sister's best friend, but there is no sign of his crush now. "Ma told me last night."
"I don't know," Velma tells him as she fills Graziella's glass. She stares at the stream of water, watching the liquid reach the top. She can't keep her hands from shaking. "As okay as she can be." She hesitates. "Y'know how she felt about Riff."
The boy's face twists, and Velma is reminded of Graziella's complaints about Fred hero-worshipping Riff from what seems a lifetime ago. "Yeah. I know." He sighs. "Whadda I—how can I—"
"Just be there for her," Velma says, reaching a hand forward and resting it on his shoulder. "She—she loves ya, y'know."
Fred glances at her hand and gives her a tentative smile. "Thanks, Velma," he says, a hint of the old giddiness coming back into his voice. "I knew ya'd know what to do."
Before she can say anything, Fred has already disappeared from the kitchen. Velma stares after him, wondering where everyone is getting this idea. The truth is that she has no idea what it is they are supposed to do and where they are supposed to go from here. All she knows is that this cannot happen again, ever, because if it does it will break them all.
As she reenters Graziella's room, her best friend sits up and stares at her, eyes hopeless. Taking the glass, she holds it, but doesn't sip. "Tell me it ain't true," the redhead chokes out after a shuddering breath. Her voice, cracked and dry, is so unlike her usual high, laughing tone that Velma starts. "God, Vel, I'll do anythin', just tell me it ain't true."
Velma looks away. She has never wanted to say anything more in her life. "Graz—"
Her best friend's voice is desperate. "Vel, please."
Velma sits down next to her friend and raises the glass in Graziella's hand to her lips. "C'mon," she says quietly. "Drink."
Graziella does as told, for once obedient as she gulps the water down. Then she stares at Velma, a portrait of a very young, very sad child. "Please."
Velma takes the glass back from her friend and sets it on the bedside table. "I wish I could," she whispers, wrapping her arms around Graziella again. She wonders if anything will ever be the same again. "Oh, God, Graz, I wish I could."
.
When she sees him later that afternoon, the scared lost boy from the night before is gone. In his place is Ice, cool, collected leader of the Jets, and Velma knows without words that no matter what has been said, his needing her—loving her—will have to be enough for now.
.
Along with the mourning there's a certain amount of housekeeping to be done in the days after the rumble. Mundane, ordinary things only made remarkable because they wouldn't have been necessary without the gaping absence in their midst. Meetings. Treaties. Reassignments. And the big problem, the elephant in the room. Anita.
It doesn't take long before Anybodys tells Ice what happened after he left Doc's store that night. What happened, and what almost happened. It takes a lot of courage to go against nine boys and tell the truth, Velma supposes, and after that it's hard to regard the little tomboy with quite the same careless scorn anymore. Ice, too, rewards her with his respect: Velma never sees him make it official, never sees him hold a meeting and say it or even tell A-Rab and Snowboy to quit ragging on her, but what she does notice is that he stops shooing her away. He gives her assignments. He accepts, it seems, that Anybodys is theirs now.
Velma has to wonder if this tacit acknowledgement has anything to do with the way his gaze seems to slide over the rest of the Jets except Baby John. Even after the rumble—even after Tony—Velma has never seen Ice so upset in her life as when he comes back from dealing with his gang members. His friends. He doesn't talk about it, of course. Instead, he sinks down on her bed and stares at the ceiling and Velma is helpless to do anything but lie down next to him and just be there for him while he tries to understand how his friends, the boys he has known for years, could have possibly done such a thing.
Velma doesn't understand it, either. She'd been there—she'd seen them in the garage, seen how they'd been bursting with hate and hurt and pain above all else, but she doesn't know how all of that turned the energetic, playful Jets they'd been before into one girl's personal nightmare. She doesn't have to have been there to know how horrible it had to have been—in fact, it's almost worse that she wasn't there, worse that all Velma has is her imagination and the look on Anybodys's face to see what it was, exactly, that they did.
In any case, Ice makes it very clear that whatever else happens with the Sharks and any other gang, the girls are to be left alone. And he tells her, later, that if the Sharks had done it to one of the Jet girls—to her—he would have killed them.
This makes Velma feel very strange. She supposes that now she is in the same position as Anita and Graziella had been in—the captain's girl, and leader by default of the others. That is how a rival gang would define her. That is how their own gang defines her. And it's strange, because all she ever wanted was Ice, and now she's got everything that comes with who he has become. Velma knows a lot of girls would call her lucky, but to her, this is just one more change out of the multitude that ripple outward from that one, pivotal night.
It's a wave that keeps going, sweeping over everything she's ever known and altering it just enough so that Velma never knows where she is. With the change in leadership, there is an empty lieutenant's spot open. And for a few days, Ice holds off. He thinks it through, and though he doesn't tell her, Velma understands that it's because he's doing his best with the gang Riff and Tony have left him. Trying to make sure he does the right thing, and asks the right person. Trying to make sure the same thing doesn't happen all over again.
When it comes time to choose, he doesn't pick Action. Ice is still too angry about what happened with Anita, and Velma can't blame him, not at all. Instead, Ice reaches for the Jet who, after Tony and Riff, has always been his best buddy. He picks Big Deal, who, Velma knows, is just about the least likely to fly off the handle like Action. Even if Big Deal was there, too, when it happened. Even if he didn't stop it. Even if he helped.
It's not something that's so easy to forget. Every other Jet besides Baby John and Anybodys has that shadow of menace over him now. Even big, clumsy, puppylike Mouthpiece, who has no idea what he's done; even the ones who do know, and are sorry. If a Jet could do that to a girl, is the unspoken fear, what else might he do? Suddenly, the girls who have known them for years don't know anything at all. What else might he do?
It's a question that each of the girls considers in the days after. Graziella wonders if Riff would have done it. Clarice swears never to forgive Big Deal. Bernice says nothing, just looks troubled. Pauline laughs it off, acts like she doesn't care through the uncertainty in her eyes. Minnie—well, even Minnie knows that the Jets did something terrible that night, and that none of them can forget it.
And Velma, heart beating always a bit faster these days, is relieved—so relieved—that Ice wasn't there. That he didn't do anything. That he is not to blame. She is almost able to ignore her own question: and if he had been? Would he have stopped them?
"What would you have done?" she whispers at night when he is asleep for a few precious hours before the dawn. "Ice. Would you have stopped it?"
Velma doesn't know if he ever hears her, but he never answers, just sleeps on for as long as he can before he wakes, when instinct tells him is time to leave. In her heart she knows the answer is yes, but so much is different now that her mind tells her she can't be sure. That she can't know. That there is no such thing as certainty these days. Not even when it comes to him. Not even when it comes to love.
.
When it comes time to be questioned, her answer is brief.
"I don't know."
Lieutenant Schrank pauses, sharp eyes narrowed and skeptical. "You don't know."
"Yes," says Velma, putting on her best 'I'm not afraid of you' stare. Ice has instructed all of them on how to respond, and for most of them it's not too hard. They've had their roles for years; all they have to do is bring them out to play. Innocent Minnie doesn't know anything, of course, which has the added benefit of being true. Pauline and Bernice are the boy-crazy airheads. Clarice is just interested in what she can get out of this. Velma is the stuck-up Upper East Side snob who has no idea how she got here. And Graziella—well, Graziella is who she is: the heartbroken gang leader's girlfriend who can't stop sobbing. Even Schrank, they figure, can't be immune to that. "They're a street gang. I don't keep track of what they're up to."
Schrank gazes at her, eyebrows drawn together. "C'mon, you're the new leader's girl. Something tells me you know what he's gonna do to get back at the Sharks. Tell ya what," he says, trying a smile that doesn't reach his eyes, "I won't even tell him ya told me."
Velma shrugs. This is her part, the one she's had available her whole life, and she knows how to play it. "His girl? Yes, for now. And let me tell you," she says, crossing her legs and giving him an unimpressed stare, "I don't know how much longer that's going to last."
Schrank considers this, and scribbles something down on his pad. "Uh-huh."
Ten minutes later, when she meets Ice in the alley behind the stationhouse, she holds his hand and looks up at him. "I'd never give up on ya," she tells him, voice low and intense, as if somehow he knows the lies she has told in there. "Never. You know that, right?"
Ice nods, pale eyes steady and somehow sad. "Yeah," he murmurs, pulling her close. "I do."
.
"Are you sure?" Velma asks, twisting the phone cord around her fingers. "He's said he's sorry so many times, an'—"
"I'm sure, Vel," says Clarice. "I can't let it go. Not this."
Velma hesitates. She has just returned from the Spanella apartment and Graziella's tears for Riff still linger with her. "Even if you love him?"
"I can't," her friend says, voice insistent. "I can't just forgive him. Would you, if it was Ice?"
"I don't know," Velma admits. Which is the truth. But after what has happened it seems to her that if there is love, then everything else doesn't quite matter so much. Of course, she thinks with a sigh, she is not the one whose boyfriend tried to rape a girl. She can't blame her friend at all for hating him.
"Anyway, good riddance to bad rubbish," Clarice says firmly, then lowers her voice. "How's Graz?"
Velma bites her lip. "Still crying."
"Still?" asks Clarice, sympathy evident from her voice.
"Still," she confirms, and sighs. "I know I would. Wouldn't you?"
Clarice hesitates, and Velma remembers, too late, what they have just been talking about. But then Clarice, too, sighs, and Velma can tell that for all her brave talk it is not so easy to just forget about the boy she loves. "Yeah," she murmurs. "I would."
.
After five days of existing in this new unfathomable reality, Velma wakes one morning to hear a small, tentative tap at her door.
"Velma?" comes a quiet voice from her bedroom door.
She checks to make sure her slip is on straight and Ice is gone—he is, of course he is—before getting up to open the door. Velma manages a tired smile at her youngest brother. "Chris."
The tow-headed boy looks her straight in the eye. "Are you okay?"
Velma rubs her arm, self-conscious and reminded of another little brother—Christoffer's best friend—in another apartment, not even a week ago. "'Course. Why wouldn't I be?"
Christoffer's solemn expression doesn't change. "Mamma and Dad are worried about you because you don't want to talk to them. I heard them talking last night."
Velma bites her lip. She wants to snap at him, tell him it's none of his business and maybe then he'll go away and leave her alone and not look at her with that too-innocent gaze. But instead she swallows hard. "Chris…"
"What happened?" he asks, small face anxious. "How did it—you'll be okay, right?"
"It ain't me you should be worried about," Velma says, glancing back at the open window, but Chris shakes his head.
"I know it wasn't your boyfriend who died," he says. "But you're my sister."
A surprised Velma takes a deep breath and stares at him, her eyes filling. It's like he knows that all she wants to do is talk to someone, anyone who isn't connected by blood or friendship to the broken hearts involved. Someone who loves her, and someone who won't say that she should leave. "I don't know," she whispers, and this time her answer is true. "Everything went wrong."
"I'm sorry," he says, stepping forward to wrap his arms around her. He has gotten taller, she notices, surprised. Just as tall as her now. Maybe even a little taller. "I wish everything could be all right again."
Velma returns the embrace, thoughts whirling in her mind, unable to settle. "I know," she says quietly. "Me, too."
.
"Vel," says Clarice over the phone two days later. Her voice is hesitant, unsure. "I an' Frankie—we made up."
Velma's eyes widen. "Ya did? When?"
"Last night," Clarice admits, sounding a little sheepish. "I an' Bernice was talkin' about a lotta stuff, an' I figured out that even though I don't love what he did, I love him. An' he's sorry, he really is." She pauses, and Velma can hear the worry in her next words. "Only I think about how I'd feel if it'd been me, an' I just don't know, Vel. D'ya think I'm terrible? For takin' him back so soon?"
"What? No, a-course not," Velma says, surprised. "I mean, I know what ya mean about what happened. He made a mistake. They all did." She bites her lip, wondering again how they could have done it. "But…the thing is—he's still Big Deal. He loves ya. An you love him. An' I think right now that ain't something you can throw away." Velma exhales. "It don't make it right, but it don't make it wrong, neither."
Clarice sighs. "Thanks, Vel. I woulda called Minnie or Graz, but I don't want Minnie thinkin' about what the boys did, an' Graz, well—you know."
Velma nods, then remembers Clarice can't see her. "Yeah," she murmurs. "I know."
"D'ya think things'll ever go back to normal, Vel?" asks Clarice, her voice wistful. "Like they were before?"
Velma takes a deep breath. "I don't know," she says, leaning back against her pillows. "But I hope so."
.
Though they meet less and less as the days pass, it is impossible not to see that Ice is changing. Every time they are together she can almost feel the crushing weight on his shoulders, the pressure building inside him. For the most part, he waves her off when she mentions it, but one night, Ice trudges in through her window and collapses onto her bed. Velma sits straight up, alarmed until he sighs.
"God," he says, breathing deeply, face half-buried in his hand. "I don't wanna do this."
Velma, biting down on her lip so hard she feels the mark hours later, is not exactly sure what to say. How to help. It's a familiar feeling, these days, and she still hasn't figured out how to make it go away. So she does what she can for him, wraps her arms around his waist and rests her cheek against the steady heat of his shoulder. "I'm here," she says quietly.
He leans into her body, doesn't look at her, and Velma feels the taut muscles under his skin begin to loosen, just a bit. "I know."
He kisses her, then, and as he breathes faster, tries to lose himself in her, she hears his low voice. "That's the hard part."
But when she asks him what he means, he doesn't answer.
.
It's not til three weeks later that she starts to think that things will be okay again.
Big Deal has just tossed off some cheesy line to Clarice, and as usual, her friend just about swoons. Velma can't help smiling. But when she looks at Ice, her eyes widen. The grin she hasn't seen since the day of the rumble is back on his face—smaller, softer, but there, all the same. And he is laughing—actually laughing.
When he catches her gaze, his expression flickers and he looks almost ashamed. As if he's not sure it's all right to be happy again. But when she doesn't look away, a hesitant smile comes back.
"C'mon," he says, catching her hand in his. "Let's get outta here."
Velma follows him out of Doc's and into the night, her heart pounding, and isn't disappointed when he pushes her up against the wall and kisses her, long and slow. And when they go back through the alleys to her apartment, it's playful and fun and everything that has been lost for so long. When it's just them, safe in her room—they can forget about everything else and just love each other the way they always have.
In the morning she wakes to the sound of the phone, and when she answers, it's with a smile on her lips. He is still there, still tangled up in the sheets next to her for the first morning since before. Last night, she remembers, sliding her hand under the sheet and around Ice's body, was just like old times. Last night, she remembers, he was happy.
But when she hangs up the phone, she bites her lip and glances at Ice. "Graz wants to meet me at The Coffee Pot."
Ice reaches over, glides his hand along her hip. "Right now?"
Velma shivers, but she has heard that tone in Graziella's voice and this is not something that can wait. "Now. Just me," she adds, removing his hand with a regretful yawn.
Ice sighs, too, and shrugs. Leaning forward, he kisses her. "I'll walk ya over."
Velma smiles. Here, at last, she thinks, he is—the boy she loves, happy again. "Sure."
When they get to The Coffee Pot, Ice reaches down and touches his lips to her forehead. "I'll be at Doc's. See ya later."
And Velma feels that rush of love for him that's never left her and never will. "See ya."
Inside, Graziella is tucked away inside a booth, stirring her coffee and staring out the window. And as Velma crosses the distance between her and her best friend, she sees the shadows under the redhead's brown eyes and wonders as they greet each other. Graziella looks so tired. So worn. Please, she thinks, taking her cup of coffee and the pitcher of cream. Let everything be all right.
"So what's up?" she asks, beginning to pour.
Graziella doesn't look up. "I slept with Tiger."
Velma feels the bottom drop out of her stomach. "What?"
"I was drunk," Graziella shrugs. "Watch your coffee."
Just in time, Velma moves the pitcher of cream upright, away from her cup, and back onto the table, her hand shaking. "Well, yeah, you'd have to be, wouldn't ya," she says, unable to believe this, "but—Tiger?" Yes, he's always had a crush on her, Velma thinks, dazed, since kindergarten, the way she tells it, but Graziella has never, ever given him the time of day. And Riff, she thinks, unable to understand. What about Riff?
"He was there," Graziella says, voice flat. "Nowadays, that's all a girl's got."
Yes, Graziella is going through a lot right now, and yes, she's not exactly herself after a drink or five, but Velma, inhaling, doesn't see how this makes sense. "But Graz—"
"Stop lookin' at me like that," Graziella interrupts. "Not all of us have the luxury of fucking the guy they lost their virginity to, y'know."
That one hits her right in the heart.
"That's not what I—"
"I just don't give a damn anymore, Velma," says Graziella. There again is that beaten, lifeless voice. "Don't ya understand? I can't."
Velma tries. She tries to understand how broken and lost her best friend must be, to try and comfort herself with Tiger, of all people, how maybe the wrong person loving you is better than no one at all. She tries. But she can't. "No, Graz," she says, heart aching. "I don't."
Graziella just stares at her. And Velma realizes that no matter what she has said, her best friend never expected her to understand, never even thought she could. And what hurts even more than this is that she was right.
They make small talk for five uneasy minutes before Graziella excuses herself for the restroom, but the damage has been done. There is a distance between them that she has only seen once before, on that night after two deaths and before the third. You don't understand. You don't want to. Don't.
That might be true, Velma thinks, wrapping her arms around herself, but it doesn't mean she doesn't want to help Graziella, all the same. She only wishes her best friend could see that.
Graziella's coffee has been sitting alone on the table for ten minutes when Velma, body heavy as lead, follows her path to the restroom in the back. There is only one door, and Velma waits outside, afraid of what she wants desperately not to be happening right now.
There is a choking, retching sound, almost a sob, and two minutes later comes the sound of water flushing and running. In another moment, Graziella comes out, pale and shining with perspiration. When she sees her best friend, she stops short.
Velma doesn't know what else to say. "It won't help, Graz."
Graziella seems about to deny it, but then she shakes her head. "That's what you think," she says bitterly. "Shows how much you know."
"Well, then, tell me," says Velma. All the fear and worry and anguish she has felt for her best friend in the past few weeks lie in those two words. "I know ya used to do it when you were younger—the twins told me—but how can throwin' up everythin' you eat help?"
"I want him out of me," Graziella says, wiping her mouth in one precise, deliberate motion. She casts defiant brown eyes at Velma. "You'd do the same thing."
And Velma stares at her and remembers another conversation. If it was what she wanted. But can Graziella, in her current state, know what she really wants? And even if she does, doesn't it fall to Velma, her best friend, to stop Graziella from hurting herself?
What is she supposed to do? she wonders, feeling more helpless than ever. What is she supposed to do now that nothing is the same anymore?
Velma sighs. "Come on, Graz," she murmurs, putting her arm around the redhead. There is nothing else to do. Not for her, anyway. "Let's go."
.
Velma doesn't see Ice laugh again for a very long time, and as time passes she comes to understand that that was the exception, not the norm.
During the daytime he is busy keeping the Jets in line. Holding meetings. Doing everything he can to distract himself from the reality that it is all on him now. And Velma feels like she only sees him—the real him, not Ice, captain of the Jets—in the evenings when he passes through her window and into her room, beaten into letting his guard down. And in the nighttime, she sees what no one else does.
He is scared.
The hopelessness in his exhaustion frightens her. It's too close to what she remembers of that night. And because of this she keeps silent, doesn't bring up that conversation before dawn. She hasn't forgotten her own fear that the unthinkable will happen. It's just that Velma is afraid that if she mentions it, if she brings it up—she will make it real.
"I keep thinking what if," he whispers one night, staring out the window. "Everything I coulda done to stop it. And if I had, maybe they'd still be here."
Velma climbs into his lap and gazes down at him. For once he is talking, telling her how he feels, but he has to understand that this is not right. "Listen to me." Her voice is soft, serious. "Listen. You have to stop thinking it was your fault. And you have to stop thinking you can fix everything, all by yourself. You can't."
Ice just shakes his head, doesn't look at her. "I shoulda done somethin'."
Velma feels the sadness in him and wishes, not for the first time and certainly not for the last, that they could go back to before. "I love you," she murmurs, turning his chin so he has to face her. "An' you love me. That's enough, remember?"
Ice leans forward and touches his lips to the bare skin of her shoulder. He doesn't say a word.
.
Velma is sitting on a swing in the playground waiting when Graziella walks up, hands jammed into the pockets of her skirt.
"You're late," says Velma with a smile. "Almost gave up on ya, Graz."
But Graziella doesn't smile. "I—need to talk to ya," she fumbles. "It's important."
Velma stands up, takes a step forward, heart sinking. "What—"
"Vel," Graziella says, and her voice shakes just a little bit. "I am late."
There is no question what kind of late it is, and Velma, hand reaching for her mouth, feels sick to her stomach. But still, she hopes she is wrong. "For—"
"Oh, you know," Graz snaps, high voice turned old and hateful. "Don't be stupid. What else could it be?"
Velma just stares at her, helpless as Graziella's pale face wavers, cracks under the weight pressing down on her. Nothing is fair in this life but Graziella doesn't deserve this. Not after everything that's already happened.
"Oh, Graz," she murmurs, reaching forward to pull her best friend close. "Oh, Graz." There is nothing else she can say.
And Graziella, stiff and rigid in her arms, rests her chin on Velma's shoulder and lets out a choking laugh. "I tried to get rid-a it," she says, voice tight. "I tried. Found a real doctor to do it quick an' quiet for a lotta money, an' everythin'. But I couldn't. How stupid is that?"
"It ain't stupid," Velma says softly as she strokes her best friend's bright flaming hair, wishing there was something, anything, she could do. "Not stupid at all."
"It's Riff's," Graziella says, voice laced with bitterness. "I'm seein' Tiger later, an' I ain't lookin' to make him wise to it, but I thought you should know."
Velma inhales sharply. It's not even two weeks since Graziella's slip with Tiger, and just over a month since Riff. "Are ya sure? The timin'—"
"It's Riff's," Graziella repeats, taking a step back. "I know it is."
Velma watches her best friend for a moment, then nods.
"God," Graziella whispers, covering her mouth with her hand. "I'm dumb. So dumb. Oh, Riff." And Graziella hunches over, shoulders shaking, and begins to cry. "Riff."
Velma holds her friend tighter and wishes, for the thousandth time, that things were different. "I'll be with ya the whole way," she murmurs. "The whole time. You won't be alone."
"Promise?" whispers Graziella, taking gulping, sobbing breaths because there is not enough air left in this world for her. "Oh, Vel—"
Velma nods, heart aching. The weeks since the Jets lost what innocence they had left have been long and difficult for Graziella, more than any of them, and this turn they never could have seen coming will be harder still. And if Velma can help, if she can do anything at all—and even if she can't—she'll be here. "I promise," she whispers, meaning every word. "You won't be alone."