A/N: only one review on last chapter…. Guess I won't rush to update in the future.
Maggie
If a clock could reach infinity, I'm sure it passed by twice. No one moved. No one uttered a sound. They awaited my reaction. It was like a Mexican standoff.
"Wha—how did you know?" Way to call her bluff, even though we both knew it was true.
"We had our suspicions, but the matter over the ballet uniforms confirmed them."
Christine stood up with Meg, who explained, "No man would ever make a sensible and fashionable decision at the same time."
"Not to mention, you're really not all that masculine for your age."
"And you and Joseph were nigh inseparable."
Well, there it was in a nutshell. In a sense (at least the female side of me) I felt relieved; relieved that someone knew, which meant two less people I had to play this charade on. But now my identity was at stake.
"Are you—or have you—"
"Oh, Lord no! We figured you had your reasons." Christine assured me. "Your secret's safe with us."
"Thank you."
We chatted longer. During that time I explained my story as well as Joseph's and my decision to place me in disguise. I didn't mention anything about Danny, however. That subject was better left untouched. Meg excused herself to go in search of another ballet rat, Jammes. Christine promised to join her later. We took our time strolling through the corridor.
"…It was just easier to pretend I was a boy. He never explained why. I suppose he just couldn't deal with the humiliation of being shadowed by a tomboy sister. It's always been that way."
"You may be wrong, Maggie. The way you talk about him and how the two of you looked when you were together suggests otherwise.
"Yea…I was boy."
She laughed. "Even so, I'm sure there must have been other reasons…logical ones."
I nearly snorted. "There's nothing logical about a Buquet."
"Well, you've both proven that enough." We walked on in silence before she brought up the subject of her father again.
"I remember how difficult it was to go on after my father died. For a long time I was just an empty shell. I made no attempt to socialize or gain attention. I built up wall after wall until they surrounded me on all sides. Walls I was sure no one could get through."
Her eyes welled up again, but she hastily wiped them away and her features took on an expression of rapture.
"But suddenly, I wasn't alone anymore. There was my Angel."
Angel. I vaguely recalled the conversation I had heard earlier between Christine and Meg.
"Maggie, you must promise never to speak of this to anyone else. You'll probably think me crazy."
Something along those lines…
"You see, Papa used to tell me stories from our native land, Sweden. A little girl named Lotte was told tales about a special angel, the Angel of Music, and how he would come at night and sing songs to her. I believed in fairy stories so much back then, I suppose my father took advantage of it.
On his deathbed, he held my hand and promised me that the minute he walked through Heaven's pearly gates, he would find the Angel of Music and send him to me. That way, it would seem like Papa was right here with me. Well the Angel of Music did come. He's been giving me lessons for nearly three months, now."
I could hardly believe what I was hearing. "Not to sound condescending, but are you certain it's not just someone playing a trick or joke on you?"
She vigorously shook her head, a few gold curls bouncing in the process. "No, this is no joke. He's very real, more so than I could've ever imagined."
"What do you mean?"
Her hands flew to her mouth. "Oh, dear. I've said far too much. He doesn't like to be talked about, you know. They say that's what got Joseph Buquet into trouble. I've most likely put you in danger as well if he's been listening!"
I abruptly froze and narrowed my eyes. "What did you say? What do you mean it "got Joseph into trouble"?"
Christine looked at me as if I were an axe-murder. "Oh, God. You must forget everything I've told you. I wasn't thinking, forgive me."
She sprinted ahead before turning to face me again.
"Know this, that the Angel of Music is not a spirit but a man. A dangerously remarkable man."
And she disappeared before I could demand anymore information out of her. If this angel of hers had anything to do with Joseph's death, there would be hell to pay. First, I had to search him out.
I saw her again not much later, talking with Meg and another girl whom I assumed to be Jammes. She caught me staring, but quickly looked away as if my eyes would scorch her into the ground. One of them said something that sent the three of them into a fit of giggles. I felt a slight sting of jealousy at the fact that although Meg, Christine, and I had all lost someone dear, they still had someone else. Meg had her mother, Christine had her so-called Angel. I still had no one.
Erik
A woman. Sidney Buquet was a woman. That explained a great deal; the missing sister, the sudden appearance of Joseph's "brother," and the small peculiarities of the whole affair. I immediately felt like an incompetent ass, that I had not the foresight to see past the disguise; ever since her arrival, I had sensed something was amiss. I should've recognized the familiarity between the girl and her alter ego. Albeit, it was a great shock, but now the gears had been turning in my head. Now, it made sense what Joseph Buquet had said just before he died. I understood why he was so much more protective of his younger sibling. A man of my word, I would not harm the younger Buquet. But I wouldn't' let her off the hook so easily, either. And now, I had something to bargain with.
Maggie
The lunch hour came and passed on an empty stomach. It's not like I didn't try. Food just lost its taste and I didn't really see any point. Since I had time to kill (morbid, is it not?), I decided to give my hands something to do other than clenching and unclenching. I roamed about the stage, picking up debris and empty bottles. When I finished, I climbed up to the catwalks. It was only my third night here, and so I wasn't as fast at my task as the other stagehands. Perhaps now would be a good time to practice…on second thought, it would be better to leave things as they were. I didn't want there to be any delays of tonight's performance on my account. So, I sat, letting my legs dangle over the catwalk's edge.
Looking out over the multitude of empty seats below, my thoughts drifted elsewhere to another place, another time.
We had gone hiking. The day was sunny and surprisingly warm for early summer in Maycullen, which was near the bay of Galway. We stopped at the Quiet Man Bridge in Oughterard like we always did, and ate a packed lunch. I was 14, Jo was nearly 20. It was one of our last memorable times together before he left home. We sat on that bridge, letting our legs dangle over the edge.
"Look at those cuts and bruises all over your legs," he'd remarked. "No one's ever goin' to want to marry you if you keep actin' like such a tomboy."
I stretched out my legs and swung them back and forth like a small child.
"Good. I don't want to get married, anyway."
"You know that's all mum ever thinks about since you turned 13."
"She's not serious about it, Jo. She just gets…overexcited. Besides, I would give an earful, not to mention a fistful to any half-baked bloke she sends my way."
We laughed heartily over the visual. "That, you would, Maggie. That, you would."
We sat in blissful silence a few moments, lost in thought. "If I got married I would have to leave home. I think I would just shrivel up and die if I had to do that."
I was ever the melodramatic teenager…
"Well, someday, one of us is going to have to go. That's how life is. You go out and live it."
"Then wherever you go, I'll go." The thought seemed so simple at the time.
"It doesn't always work out how you want it, Maggie."
"And why not? I'm just as tough as you, just as quick. I won't drag you down."
"It's not your abilities that concern me, Mags. It's the fact that—well, every man's got to get out on his own. See the world, make a few changes in it, and make his own adventures. Live his own life."
"And a girl like me can't, is that it?"
"No, it's not like that at all. It's—"
"—A man thing. I know."
Neither of us spoke for a long awkward moment, until Joseph had to open his wide, wretched trap. What he said next sealed our fate.
"Besides, think of Mum and Dad. They'd be devastated if you left, especially Mum. She would chase the Devil Himself out of you at such a thought. You know how traditional and old-fashioned she is. It would be best for you to just stay here.
Grow up to be the proper lady I know is in there somewhere, and get married, have babies. Live a simple peaceful life, free of frets and worries, with a good man to take care of you."
My face scrunched up in disbelief and disappointment with each word and I leapt up from my sitting position, rigid with anger.
"No! How dare you! I won't sit around this boring countryside, caring for eight children and a drunken husband, watching my life go out the window!
I'll do what I want, go where I want, and not be forced to live up to other people's expectations. If you knew me at all, you'd have realized that by now."
I turned to hide my pathetic hysterics, not wanting my brother to see me cry, and took off running towards home, ignoring my brother's call. From that day on, I knew he would forever be running away and I would forever be following him as I followed him in everything else.
And so it was, through good times and bad, I was never far from my brother. The world was not big enough to hide him from me. But now he was in a place where I could not find him. Where I could no longer follow. And at that time, it was the worst feeling I thought I could ever experience.
But that was before I met him, and felt a love even stronger than of that between me and my brother. This love filled me with so much, yet emptied me inside-out at the same time.