RPOV
The screen went white and a familiar red text glared at me.
"Natalie I've done it again."
"Just hit the arrow at the top, like I showed you."
I do, after a moment of trying to direct the little white arrow. The screen reverts to the search engine. I suppress a groan as I realize what I'd typed into the search bar has gone. Great, it would take another three minutes to type it out. That's where Natalie had gotten exasperated with me. The keys on the laptop weren't in alphabetical order, they didn't seem to be in any kind of order and it took me a minute to find the right letter. It had gotten to the point where Natalie had kept taking over but then voiced what had been needling me, that I wouldn't learn if she kept doing it. So she resigned herself to throw herself down on my bed with her glossy book. No, a magazine, which told stories about well-known people, and celebrities, and it was something Natalie found fascinating.
I didn't understand how she could be so excited about people she didn't know and how she knew things about them when they knew nothing about her. That and they were all human.
"Think of it like when you read a history book." She had explained. "You know about those people and their great accomplishments. These people are my kind of history."
That sorta made sense.
I finally hit the last letter and double-checking I've spelt everything right I hit search.
Dimitri had suggested, in a rare moment when he wasn't moving around the house like a dark cloud, that there be a button I hit that took me straight to the websites I needed but wanted to learn. I wanted to know how to find the answer to any question I had with the only problem being whether the child block would allow me to know it.
I am not a child.
"It's only on because the internet can be really weird." Natalie explained. "Like things can sound innocent to search but then some sicko has completely twisted it."
"Like what?" I had asked.
"Like 'white dragon'."
Daringly when I had been alone I'd typed it in but all that came up was pictures of large white lizards breathing fire.
The site, where I now did the grocery shopping, lights the screen. I grin triumphantly and feel the small surge of power course through me. I'm entrusted with this, me, I had control. It's great.
"Remember more chocolate chips and the chocolate syrup." Natalie says over my shoulder. I hadn't felt her sit up but I'm glad I hadn't flinched. I did that less frequently now because it was either become immune to Natalie being behind my door in the morning, popping out from behind corners, blasting her music or have heart failure.
"It's the first thing I was going to put in the basket."
"You have your priorities in order." Natalie says approvingly and flops back down.
Her perfume lingers over my shoulder, floral and sweet. She'd offered to buy me some, under the pretence it would be a necessity but I already had a lotion that smelled great. I didn't need more.
I have far too much already, so much so that it makes me dizzy recalling the list of products decked out in my bathroom. Natalie hadn't let Dimitri's choices slide and thirty minutes after the clothes had arrived another delivery came bearing so many bottles and potions that I thought they must have made a mistake.
It's hard to adjust to and to remember the things that Natalie said had to be 'routine' but I couldn't help the small part of me that is…thrilled about it. That part that had always been dark and selfish. I had access to food all the time, I had more items of clothing than I knew the others would have between them and I had a body butter that smelled like white chocolate and raspberries. I had things that smelled edible to slather on my body to make it smell enticing.
It's terrible selfishness and I'm indulging in it.
I tried not to think about the Others. I tried not to think about my mother. I tried to think about the present and how I had to survive it. Also, this was not forever. Victor had told me that and somewhere in future I would be on my own so this selfishness had an expiry date. I tried to argue with myself that it would be more selfish to withhold from the kindness and generosity. That it would be taking it for granted and it would be stupid.
It wasn't a completely stable argument.
I click on the chocolate chips and double the quantity. Two things I had learned over the past three weeks were Lissa loved cookies, my cookies specifically she said and Dimitri loved hot chocolate, which was apparently an odd choice of drink in July according to Natalie. But he drank coffee so I didn't really see the difference except that hot chocolate tasted miles better.
It was also something that I could bring him when he was particularly broody looking, if that's the correct word to use. I'd look it up later.
He hated that he'd been left here while Victor and the other two Guardians are at Court, well that's where they were as far as I knew. I felt a little bit guilty about it, that he had to stay here to look after us but I was learning more and more about what he and the other two saw as their duties and it was vastly different to what I'd always known. Although Dimitri didn't like being here I knew he didn't resent it, he saw it as his duty to look after his charges but there was something in him that called to be more action-orientated.
"He's not angry." Lissa told me quietly, her green eyes intent on where he sat in the living room as she helped me prep vegetables. "He's restless. Pent up energy with no outlet."
I had stopped chopping to peer at Lissa and then at Dimitri, trying to see what she did. All I could see was Dimitri's left profile as he watched the TV until he felt our stares and turned around. I dropped my gaze as Lissa, without hesitation, asked if he would like rocket through his salad.
"How do you know that?" I asked, moving the veg to the colander to wash.
Lissa shrugged and looked up at me, smiling. "I'm intuitive. Besides, it all adds up. He's a Guardian who has to watch the action from the sidelines and he seems like an intense sort of person, one who always wants to act. It makes sense that he's agitated, no?"
And I had thought I had some sort of special gift that allowed me to gauge Dimitri's mindset.
"That makes sense." I said.
Lissa smiled. In that instant, she looked glowy and I think I would have run the knife through my hand if she asked.
"Is Lissa coming over today?" I ask Natalie, clicking through various fruit and vegetables.
Natalie hums behind me. "I don't know. If she does I hope she's lost her mood from earlier. You know it's really upsetting to have someone snap at you first thing in the morning, like it throws off your energy."
"Maybe she was tired."
"Then have a cup of coffee, don't tell me my 'fashion crisis is a microscopic blip in the grand scheme of her life'. Honestly, who can be that dramatic in the morning? All I wanted to know was if she had my gold pumps."
I frown and bite my lip.
Another thing I'd learned was that Lissa, despite being so lovely, thoughtful, kind and gentle, could swing the other way. I'd only ever witnessed her become withdrawn, quiet and utter singular words to conversation. It had only happened twice but Natalie's words made me think about those times.
"Bloody teenagers." Natalie mutters.
"Should I text her?"
I felt self-conscience about asking like I was overstepping or doing something that I didn't have the right to. Talking to a Moroi, having a friend.
The day after Natalie had come home she had bounced into the kitchen as I was making pancake batter under Dimitri's watchful eye. His fingers had been tapping the counter, like counting the seconds Victor, Spiridon and Ben had left. She had presented me with a rectangular black object.
"My old phone." She grinned. "Now you can join the real world."
I still wasn't 100% sure how to work it and startled myself when the screen had become a mirror when I'd been playing with it on my bed.
I was slow at texting but sometimes the phone would know what I was thinking and fix the words. Sometimes it changed it to utter gibberish. I preferred talking to the other person through it but that only happened when Lissa called me. Or when Natalie had called me from upstairs to ask what was for dinner.
"Sure." Natalie says, flinging her magazine from the bed to the floor. "Remind her she has to help me choose a party outfit and if she mentions the grand scheme of her life again tell her I'm applying to Jerry Springer."
It would take me three solid hours to type that out. Maybe two if the phone wanted to help.
Who the hell was Jerry?
I type out 'Are you coming over?' and send it. Natalie had told me I could use 'text speak' which meant using a single letter to present a word but that seemed lazy. My mother hadn't risked teaching me to spell for me to devalue it.
No reply comes in the time it takes me to complete the grocery shopping.
"Do you think she's okay?" I ask, turning to find Natalie scrolling through her phone.
"Lissa? Yeah, she'll be fine. Probably hasn't seen it yet." But the girls always had their phones close to hand, just like the Guardian's, although the reasons were very different. "She could be with Aaron. Maybe he makes my gold pumps seem like a dismal subject."
She really was offended on behalf of these shoes.
"What's Aaron like?" I say, shutting off the computer and shimming around to face her.
"Cute, Royal, blue eyes, blond, popular." Natalie rhymes off not looking up from her phone. It was a slimmer version of the old one she'd given me. I almost wanted to snatch it from her.
"That doesn't really tell me anything. Actually, you could have described Andre." I say.
Natalie does look up, a peculiar look pinching her face.
My heart sinks.
My tone had been out of line.
"You know, your right." Natalie says and then laughs. "I love when you say things like that. Except Andre is not cute."
Feeling reassured I was still on level footing with her I relax.
"He kind of is though. I mean, he's pretty looking." I say, trying to connect things I'd heard the girls say and correlate with their meanings.
Natalie scrunches up her nose which makes me laugh.
"Well, he's not bad looking but he's not attractive. WAIT! Do you think Andre is attractive?"
I'd reeled back at her shout but thankfully the rest of her sentence hadn't been lost to me.
"No! I just meant that Lissa's pretty and her family's pretty so he's pretty, for a boy, like boy pretty."
Luckily Natalie is nodding along with my garbled response. "Just never, ever, let him hear you say that. You'll never hear the end of it and he really doesn't need a bigger head."
"What's wrong with his head?"
"It's an expression. Basically, if you give someone like Andre a compliment it gets stuffed inside his head and stays there. The more compliments the bigger his head gets, it's a wonder it hasn't exploded. Anyway, I'm hungry. Lunchtime."
She rolls off the bed and I follow her, trying to recall if Andre's head was particularly big.
"What would you like?"
"Soup I think. Is there some left?"
My heart swells. Yesterday I made a simple pot of Vegetable soup with chicken stock we had leftover. Dimitri and Natalie had said they'd liked it but hearing Natalie prefer it over something else made me proud.
"Yeah."
"Cool."
I follow her downstairs marvelling at how someone could skip while descending stairs in heels. She looks almost graceful except on the last stair when she trips. My heart clenches and I grab for her before she topples forward. The marble floor wouldn't make a soft landing.
"Woah!" Natalie says, looking to where Dimitri stood on the edge of the living room. He had been sitting on the couch but had moved like lightning to volt over it as soon as Natalie slipped. It was impressive but he wouldn't have been fast enough. Natalie looks over her shoulder at me. "Nice save. If I'd busted my face it would have totally ruined the old glamour look I'm planning."
She moves out of my grasp making me realize I hadn't released my hold. I uncurl my other hand from the bannister, blood pulsing in my fingertips.
I find Dimitri's eyes.
"You were three steps behind." He says like a question.
I shrug. "Lucky."
I tail Natalie to the kitchen where she's eating cheesy crackers from a box at the breakfast bar.
"These are so addictive." She says, her cheeks bloated.
Warmth caresses my bear arms.
"Do you still want soup?" I ask her, ignoring the tingling. She nods and I turn to Dimitri standing behind me in the entry. "What about you?"
He nods. There's still something ticking behind his eyes, wondering. I turn away and fetch the soup from the fridge and the French rolls. I pop the rolls in the oven to warm and ladle the soup into a bowl for the microwave. The control courses through me and seeps into my brittle bones, I relax.
I set out their cutlery, butter and pepper. Neither of them liked adding more salt.
Natalie crams her hand into the box before proffering it to me and then Dimitri. My fingers twitch as I reach inside it.
I murmur a thank you but I don't think she hears me, partially because she's crunching on the savoury goodies and reading the box, and partially because my voice was lighter than a breeze. I hated that I did that, lost the volume and looked like someone who needed subtitles.
Natalie hated subtitles. She said it was the only bad thing about her father calling her from Court, he always rang during the best part of the show.
"So what's your next experiment then chef?" She asks.
I grin as I take the bowls from the microwave.
"I was thinking maybe Carbonara for dinner." I murmur, recalling one of the recipes I'd seen in the cookbook last night.
"Chicken or bacon?" Natalie asks, biting her grinning lip.
"What would you prefer?" I ask, setting the bowls down in front of them.
I make a point of looking at Dimitri, hoping maybe he'd contribute.
"Both." Natalie decides, pulling her bowl to her.
"What are you having?" Dimitri asks so suddenly that Natalie's spoon pauses mid-air.
"A sandwich." I retort, turning away. It annoyed me that he did that. It annoyed me he was always watching but it annoyed me more that I looked to see if he was.
I didn't get it.
I take the rolls out of the oven, the tops all golden and crusty. The smell of warm bread floats around the room. I deposit the rolls onto a plate in front of them and fetch turkey, cheese and tomatoes from the fridge.
We eat in comfortable silence and I marvel again at how much Natalie could eat despite her lithe figure. On top of finishing the box of crackers she ate four bread rolls, two she made sandwiches out of like I did, and a candy bar for 'early dessert'.
She holds one out to me and like always the guilt, the unworthiness, and a splash of delight sweeps through me, almost keeping my arm pinned to my side.
I take it and thank her.
Dimitri declines dessert and asserts himself into my role by loading the dishwasher but it was hard to be annoyed as chocolate and peanut butter glazed my tongue. When I come out of my daze I realise Natalie has left and Dimitri is watching me. My cheeks flood with heat and my mouth is too slick with chocolate, making me crave water.
I looked like an idiot. I looked greedy. He must think –
"It's refreshing to see the pleasure on your face." He says quietly, his lips quirking into a small and rare smile. "True appreciation, joy. I haven't seen it in a while."
I swallow thickly.
"Sorry. I didn't mean to make you self-conscious."
"It's just a candy bar." I murmur, trying to believe in the 'just'.
"I believe eating candy should be one of life's little joys, always." He tells me in his quiet and inflected voice, the voice that always seemed to have a lot more going on beneath it.
He pushes away from the counter signalling our little conversation is closing. Something jumps in my chest, like a nervous bird.
"But you didn't have one." I say.
"I'm going to go for a run and then I will, and it will be one of the best things I have ever tasted."
I follow him out of the entry.
"You went running yesterday."
He'd been gone for an hour and a half and come back in that tight, black material looking like he'd just come out of the shower. The sensation of my stomach falling out of place had been an odd reaction.
"I'm aware."
My cheeks heat again but this time it's not a weakness.
"Does running help your anger?" I ask. My voice is tinged with demand.
I had no right to demand. To question why he'd been more withdrawn these past weeks, more like the Guardians I was used too. Silent, watchful…contained. It was in the way he sighed at his phone, drummed his fingertips on his knee, and put his mug down a little too forcefully. The tells were there and I had noticed them.
He stops on the stairs to look back down at me.
"What anger?"
The voice in my head was telling me to be quiet.
I straighten my shoulders and stare back at him.
"Because you're here. Because they left you behind."
"They did not leave me behind."
The brave part of me starts choking on itself. "You know what I mean."
He turns to me fully and I feel myself shrinking. It has nothing to do with him being further up the stairs.
"Are you concerned Rose? Am I making you uncomfortable?"
"No."
"Is there a problem with how I'm governing the house in Victors leave?"
"No, I meant –"
"Then I would like this conversation to be over. We both have things to do."
He turns and in a blink of an eye, his bedroom door is closing with an amicable and awful thud.
I stand there stupidly for a moment. The urge to race up the stairs and bang on his door almost becomes a reality but he was right. I did have other things to be doing. Dimitri had his own form of training to keep his place and I had mine.
I stomp to the utility room and grab the vacuum cleaner. I wheel it out into the hall and yank out the cord.
I'd stepped out of line, spoken when I had no right to, no ground to and no credibility to. I didn't have to worry about Dimitri's retaliation or anybody else's but I'm still stuck with my own. This stupid hot feeling was an undercoat beneath my skin and made me wish even more that I could escape my body or learn to be what my mother always wanted me to be, quiet.
But now he's probably up there thinking about what an idiot I was. A stupid girl with a big mouth, ungrateful and spoiled.
I hadn't meant to make him more irritated. I had wanted to have a… understanding with him or to show him the same empathy he had with me. I knew he felt like a caged animal here and I wanted him to know Natalie and I appreciated it. That we knew we were safe because he was here and I'm sorry that it was causing him to be frustrated.
No, I had come across as a little brat needling him and -
"What did the vacuum cleaner do to you? And remind me to never do it."
Lost in my own head I'd been manhandling the machine a little too roughly. The whirlwind quietens down so I regain some sense. Natalie is leaning over the bannister grinning down at me.
"If you don't want to do it then don't. I won't tell anyone."
"No, no. I want to."
She props her chin onto her hand still grinning. "Doesn't look like it."
I had to earn my keep. This was my job. I look around but I can't avoid her grin and then I can't stop looking at her for different reasons.
"Did you change?"
It's obvious she had. Her tight blue jeans and the pink and white polka-dotted blouse had been replaced by a dress. A dress of glittering, pale gold that looked like sundrops had been sewn into it. There's a sliver of it missing around her chest but it didn't look bold, it actually served to show how pretty her pale skin is and maybe that is a subtle boldness because I couldn't stop staring at it. Around her slim hips, the dress then began to taper down softly into a floaty mesh layered skirt.
Natalie skips down the stairs, today's incident had taught her nothing then, and twirls when she hits the marble floor.
"What do you think?"
I was feeling a lot of things right now, things I didn't understand but I knew what I was thinking at least.
"You look like a dream."
Her smile brightens. Natalie had many different smiles in her arsenal I'd learned over the past few weeks. This one was proud and something inside me glows at knowing my response had meant something to her.
"It's Valentino." She gushes, twisting side to side so the dress floats out around her. "I knew it was thee dress as soon as I saw it. This dress is going to help remind everybody who's in charge this year. It's my dress, it's my party, it's my senior year and nobody is going to mess with that."
I didn't know what a dress had to do with school. As far as I knew they wore uniforms.
The sound of the door opening and the rapid footfalls of Dimitri saves me from having to answer.
Natalie turns to him expectantly, holding the skirt of her dress out. I look down at the black yoga pants and oversized thin sweater that had arrived as part of Natalie's mission to fill the wardrobe in my room. They were comfortable and I loved them but they weren't woven with sunlight.
Dimitri glances between us both before averting his gaze to the ground as he uses the newel to balance as he stretches.
"New dress?"
"Uh huh." Natalie grins.
"It's lovely."
"Thank you." She says in a way that sounds the same as 'I know'. "I'm going to wear it to my party. I just need to alter it the tiniest bit –"
"Your party?"
"Yes, on Saturday. The caterers coming with the samples tomorrow, didn't daddy remind you?"
Dimitri straightens up and his face holds a shadow of discomfort.
"I thought you knew. You're party's been cancelled."
Natalie stops swishing her dress from side to side. "Pardon?"
"With everything going on and your father being at Court, it's not ideal to have so many of your classmates here. I thought he discussed it with you."
Red is spreading up Natalie's neck and staining her cheeks. I kind of wanted to go hide in the utility room.
"Come again?" She says quietly. It's scary how her lips hadn't even moved and she was staring at Dimitri in a way that made me conscious not to make any sudden movements.
"The party isn't happening, I'm sorry Natalie."
"I don't quite understand what you're saying."
Dimitri sighs. "You should speak to your fath-"
Natalie holds up her hand in a sharp motion. "I don't quite understand. I have been organising this since April. I have had the guest list locked since May. I have the colour scheme and arrangements coordinated with the decorator. I have a caterer coming with two chocolate fountains, a fondue station and a mocktail bar. I have a DJ. So I don't quite understand what you are talking about."
Dimitri looks unfazed. I on the other hand was cringing at the strain in Natalie's voice, a rope pulled too tight and fraying down to a tendril.
"Your party is cancelled." He says flatly.
Natalie blinks and begins to shake her head. "No, no. You're mistaken. You have to be mistaken. There's no possible way," To my surprise, she pulls her cellphone from inside the slit of the dress. Is that why she had the gap, to improvise pockets? "He wouldn't…he would have told me. No possible way."
"Would you like some water?" I ask.
Dimitri's watch lights up blue taking my attention off Natalie.
He looks down at his wrist. "Are you expecting Lissa?"
Natalie puts her phone to her ear and the other one to her forehead, still muttering under her breath. I steer her toward the couch as a silver car pulls into the driveway. Natalie sits down as Lissa's blonde head pops out from the back of the car. Her Guardian gets out of the front and they head toward the house. Dimitri is already waiting on the threshold.
I sit down beside Natalie and rub her back. It seemed important to do that.
"Good evening Vasilisa." I hear him murmur.
"Dimitri." She greets brightly.
She has her hair up in a high ponytail today, leaving her pretty face and big green eyes open for the world's admiration. She smiles at us as she comes into the living area and I can't imagine her having snapped at Natalie this morning.
Her smile falters as she takes us both in. "Whaaat's going on?"
Natalie doesn't answer but furiously taps her phone before putting it to her ear again. Lissa sits down on the coffee table and crosses her legs. She raises an eyebrow at me. I glance at Natalie to see if she's going to offer up an explanation but her jaw is locked. She punches redial again.
"There's been um, a problem with, er, Natalie's party." I say quietly.
Lissa frowns. "The party? Surely it's not going ahead."
Natalie's hand drops away from her ear and she stares at her. Lissa takes this as an incentive to continue. I start rubbing Natalie's back again, in soothing circles, like my mother used to do for me when I was small.
"I mean, what with everything happening and um, Rose being here now."
I stop rubbing her back and stare at Lissa too.
"Did you know?" Natalie demands.
"I just assumed-"
"Well don't." Natalie snaps. "With everything going on everyone needs this to take their minds off it and daddy hasn't said anything to me. He would have discussed it with me."
She starts tapping furiously on her phone screen.
"Girls I'm going for a run. Neil will stay with you." Dimitri calls from the hallway where he'd been talking in low voices with the other Guardian.
"Enjoy." Lissa calls.
Dimitri nods at her and spares me a glance before disappearing into the kitchen.
Natalie swears under her breath making me start, it was weird hearing someone so sweet cuss.
"I don't want to – I don't want to be part of the problem." I tell Natalie quietly, in between her furious typing and putting her phone to her ear.
"Oh, you're not a problem." Lissa says. "The circumstances are just different."
"It's not a circumstantial problem." Natalie growls.
I slide a little bit away from her.
"I brought your shoes back." Lissa says, holding up a carrier bag. "Sorry about this morning. I had a fight with my mom."
"Again?" Natalie manages to reply.
The Guardian, Neil, is a living statue at the front door. It was strange seeing him so immobile when I'd become so used to the other three men. It was like being thrown back into the Ozeras dining room. A shiver runs down my spine.
"What is that supposed to mean?" Lissa says.
Natalie doesn't look up from her screen. "You can be so mardy sometimes Liss. They know you don't mean it though. Everyone bickers with their rents – DADDY!"
She springs up from the couch, away from Lissa's vexed face, as Victor's voice carries through the phone. Natalie walks away as she starts rapidly telling him the event of the past hour and what each individual has 'said'.
Lissa looks lost in thought.
"Are you okay?"
She looks up. "Me? Fine."
I trace a pattern on my knee. "It's not a nice feeling arguing with your parent."
"No, it's not." She sighs. "But Natalie is right. I have been…I can be difficult."
I cock my head, studying her troubled face. "What makes you difficult?"
She licks her bottom lip. "Normal things, teenage things yano? I mean like being moody and waking up early…maybe I need to feed a little more. Sorry, I know you don't like it."
I hadn't meant to recoil at the mention of the feedings. I was actually adjusting to the idea of them, the 'civil' idea, and had even brought Alice some sweet tea on her last visit before a car came to pick her up. Feedings weren't the focus here and I clear my head of Alice. Lissa is important, she's troubled and her reasons sounded more like an attempt to convince herself.
"I have to count to three. When I don't sleep well and Natalie's always so…happy. I have to count to three before I speak."
Lissa's perked up at my garbled string of words that weren't really conveying my thoughts.
"You have to count to three?"
I press my lips together but that doesn't stop it. "So I don't tell her to shut up."
Lissa's lips crack into a smile. "She wouldn't take offence if you did."
I take a restorative breath and pull at the hem of my sweater. It was a dark grey and had loopy, white writing on the chest that read 'Not Sorry'. I don't really know what I was stating I wasn't sorry for but after I'd felt how soft it was I stopped caring whether it was disobedient or not. That and Natalie had chosen it so it had to be okay. And it hid me.
I look up and Lissa's smile has faded.
"I don't know what happens sometimes." She says quietly. "I lose control and I'm just speaking, saying things without having thought about them. Nasty things sometimes. Things I can't take back. Other times I feel like I'm full of the dark, of all those things you were scared of when you were little, all the things that could hide in there. Sometimes I'm full of that."
The anxiety in her voice propels me to take her hand and I'm the one saying things without thinking.
"But you're full of so much light too. I see it all the time. Just remember that when the dark comes."
"What if it's not enough?" She asks.
"It is. I'll remind you."
Her bright eyes search my face and I somehow feel exposed and strong at the same time. I'd spoken like what I had to say mattered and Lissa had listened like it had.
She squeezes my fingers.
Something behind her head catches my eye. Lissa turns around, dropping my hand.
"It doesn't look like it's going well." She says as Natalie starts stamping the ground out in the garden, the phone still pressed to her ear.
"I hope she doesn't get her dress dirty."
Lissa looks back at me and we giggle, all dark things turning to shadows before disappearing as she becomes bright again.
"She coming." I say.
Sure enough Natalie comes barrelling into the hall and toward us. Neil's eyes follow her.
"We need to move it to your house." Natalie says breathlessly.
"Move what?" Lissa says, moving from the table to the couch.
"The party. Daddy says Eric will be home Saturday morning and he can arrange three more Guardians from school to come and chaperon."
"But then my parents and the Guardians could just come here and chaperon - " Natalie's head cocks sharply to the right like she had a nervous twitch. "Oh but, um, I suppose it could double as Andre's leaving party I suppose."
"Okay!" Natalie's lips bursts into a smile. "Can you ring them? Now. And ask."
Lissa shuffles her legs. "I haven't exactly apologised yet…it would be better to get Andre on board. Otherwise, it will look like I'm apologising because I want something."
"Yeah! My happiness." Natalie says and then huffs, tapping furiously on her phone again. "What were you fighting about anyway?"
"Doesn't matter." Lissa shrugs.
"So you're going to apologise right?"
Lissa exhales and nods.
"Okay, good. Can you do it now? Please. It's just if Rhea's happy that her unruly daughter has come to her senses then she'd more than likely to say yes."
"She wouldn't say no to Andre anyway."
"But she could." Natalie's phone beeps and scans the message before scowling. "Your brother is so annoying."
"What's he saying?"
"That he'll only hang with us 'kids' if promise to provide champagne."
"Please ask Camille to steer clear of my brother. It's … weird."
"I'll try." Natalie sing-songs and looks up from her phone. "Vasilisa. Ring Rhea. Now please."
Lissa rolls her eyes and bumps Natalie's shoulder as she stands. She walks off to the kitchen with her own phone to her ear. Natalie takes her vacated seat and turns to me.
"You're okay with not coming to the party right?" She asks in a mild voice.
"Me?"
"Yeah because….well there will be a lot of people there and you're not good around people. Yet. A lot of people. It might just be overwhelming and to be honest, some people that are going can be a bit bitchy and I wouldn't want to have a catfight before schools even started."
I really didn't understand why she sounded so nervous. It was making me nervous.
"That's okay. I'm glad your parties happening and you're happy." I venture.
She looks relieved and startles me by pulling me into a hug. Cautiously I put my hands on her back.
"How are things at Court?" I ask when she pulls away.
"Huh? Oh, fine I think. Daddy sounded less stressed. They should be back on Sunday, even better reason to have the party at Lissa's. He won't be coming home to the smell of bleach or asking me why someone's undergarments' are hanging from the tree in the garden."
"Why were someones –"
"Sorted. I am an angelic daughter once more." Lissa announces, leaning over the back of the other couch.
Natalie claps her hands together. "Perfect. Okay, we're going to assume Andre has got the proposal handled –"
"Which he will. They'll give him anything now he's going away to college."
"So we just have to let everybody else know."
Silence descends and then Natalie leaps up. "So much to do! I'm going to have to order more food if Andre's going to invite more of his friends."
"I guess we should start calling people." Lissa says.
They both nod and Lissa retrieves her handbag from the floor. They both pause to look at me and then between each other and back at me. I feel like a spare part they didn't know what to do with.
"I'll get back to work." I say standing up and trying to smile.
"You could come and um, help us?" Lissa says.
"I have things to do and it sounds like you have a lot to do as well."
"And time is ticking." Natalie chimes, taking Lissa's hand and pulling her toward the stairs. "Rose, come upstairs in a little while!"
"I will."
I watch them run up the stairs and the shadows from early start creeping onto my shoulders. I go back to the abandoned vacuum and get to work.
I wipe the sweat from my brow and start climbing down the ladders. I step back to admire how clear the glass wall looks, so clear it's like it isn't there and I could almost feel the breeze ruffling the roses.
I hold up the ladders and put them and the other products back in the utility room before going in search of more water. I absentmindedly fix myself another sandwich as I skim over the recipe for the spaghetti carbonara. It seemed straightforward enough. On the next page is a recipe for a devil's fudge cake which puts Natalie's chocolate bar in my mind. I rifle through the cupboard until I find the box and the only candy bar left. I put the box in the bin and tear open the wrapper, the faint and enticing smell of chocolate drawing me in like a magnet. I sit at the breakfast bar happily munching as I flick through the book.
I was going to have to start prepping the ingredients if it was going to be ready for dinner. I hoped no one would be secretly disappointed it would be bacon and not pancetta. I was also pretty confident we had the correct cheeses too. Victor had so many different cheeses that they took up three shelves on the inside of the fridge door.
I finish the candy bar and take a long drink of water when the backdoor beeps open. Dimitri comes in, a sheen of sweat covering his tan skin and trickling over his brow. He nods by way of greeting and crosses to the sink to splash water over his face. The contours of his back-shift and ripple under the black material. It was darker between his shoulder blades, right down the middle really, all the way down to –
He turns around and I choke on a peanut.
"Are you alright?"
I nod and reach for my water. He doesn't question me any further and goes to the fridge to retrieve his own. I pop the last piece of candy into my mouth and chew. The kitchen fills up with an awkward silence and I wonder if he's still annoyed with me.
"Did you have a good run?"
"I beat my best time." He replies flatly. I would take it as a positive answer, despite his tone.
"Well done."
He drains the whole bottle in two more gulps, the bump in his throat bobbing up and down. I drop my eyes back to the book as the silence bears down. I start committing the measurements and ingredients to memory as I hear him move around the kitchen. Why didn't he just leave to shower? He usually did and I found myself thinking too much about it.
I peek up and see he's gathered some snacks together. A banana, some trail mix and now he was scanning the shelves for something that he obviously couldn't find. I look down at my empty candy wrapper as he closes the cupboard doors.
The wrapper crinkles in my fist.
Dimitri's walking by the counter when I confess. "I ate the last one. I'm sorry."
"Okay." He replies simply, dropping the banana skin into the trash.
I swallow and wait for some other reaction from him. Something to make the weight balanced on my ribcage crush down or disappear in an exhale.
"But I know you wanted it and I didn't think. I didn't even think about it being the last one and –"
"Rose, I said its okay. It was as much yours as anyone's."
No, no it wasn't.
I wipe my itchy palms on my thighs. I had deprived someone of something for my own greed. It wasn't okay. It wasn't wasn't wasn't wasn't-
"I'll let you in on a secret." He says, snapping me back into the room.
I watch him cross the room back toward the door and crouch down to put his hand in the gap between the wall and the dishwasher. He pulls out a thin tupperware container and I feel my eyebrows shoot up. He carries it over to the counter.
"You can't tell the others about this okay?" He says putting it down between us. The heat from his body presses up against me, much hotter than usual which I guess is due to the exercise. He smelled like sweat and zest.
I lean forward with anticipation and he pulls the lid off to reveal…
"Is that chocolate?"
The container was full of various different candy bars, some ridiculous sizes like actual blocks and they were coloured and named things I hadn't seen before. Dimitri hums and leans down on his forearms, putting us on the same level.
"British chocolate. The best."
A memory clicks in my head. "Ben said you hid things, like a squirrel. Do you have more?"
He looks up from under his lashes. "A few."
He picks up one of the shiny purple ones and holds it out to me.
"I just had one." I say, the guilt swelling in my stomach.
"So keep it for later."
I take it from him and try to smile. He must not be angry anymore. He takes a matching bar out before putting the lid back on and returning the box to its hiding place.
"Our secret?" He asks, pointing the candy bar at me.
I didn't need to try and smile now. "Our secret."
I trace my fingertip over the 'dairy milk' bar.
"Where are the rest stashed?" I ask.
He stops in the entry and looks back. "Now, I can't give away all my secrets can I?"
He walks out leaving me grinning with the rich purple bar in my hand.
Spaghetti Carbonara was pretty straightforward to make but the whisking made my arms ache. It made me think about Dimitri's arms and more to the point his muscle. I would have to do a lot of whisking to get to his standard. Then I started thinking about his promise to train me and show me how to defend myself.
I had put on weight over the last couple of weeks. I noticed at first when I lay down in bed and my skin didn't melt as deep into my bones. Everything still poked out but not as much. I also felt a lot better, which was strange as I hadn't known I could feel better or that I had been living in a constant shade of what this goodness felt like. I had more energy and my limbs didn't feel like they were made of stone. It was like being fully awake now and it scared me to think I hadn't been before. In the small hours of the morning/night, it danced around my head just how much I owed my mother. How she'd kept me safe, exhausting herself and depriving herself, sacrificing, all for me. And there was no one to do that for her now, what I would have done now I was old enough.
I liked to entertain the dream of going back for her. Taking down all those Guardians, hurting everyone who'd ever hurt her and then we'd get away. I'd fall asleep on a damp pillow with my head swimming in the past and aching dreams.
"You are such a good cook."
Lissa's voice brings me back into the present. We're all sitting around the dining table and after Natalie's rundown of the new party plan, this Saturday which is two days away, everyone had been eating in comfortable silence. Except for Neil who had quietly declined my offer and said he was going to walk the perimeter instead. His loss.
"Thank you." I murmur.
"Cafeteria food is going to be crap after this." Natalie pipes up and reaches for the garlic bread. Dimitri slides it closer to her. "I'm going to need care packages, packed lunches, everything."
My fork pauses on its journey to my mouth. "How am I going to do that?"
"She's joking." Dimitri says quietly.
"I am not."
Lissa giggles and shakes her head at me, putting me at ease.
"Is there still ice-cream left?"
"Yes."
"Concentrate on the course you're on." Lissa says bemusedly.
"We should totally try baking something. Make a pie. Oooooh like the chocolate silk pie."
"That's for Thanksgiving."
"Hey." Natalie says and points her fork at Lissa. "Chocolate pie is not confined to a holiday. It is a human right."
"What's Thanksgiving?" I ask.
They do that thing where their current emotions fall off their face and stare at me when I ask a question, although they were getting better with recovering. It only takes Lissa a beat more than normal to answer.
"It's in November, every year. We cook a big dinner of specific foods, turkey, mash potatoes, carrot and swede mash etc and we eat and talk about what we're thankful for."
"It's my favourite holiday." Natalie says.
"I wonder why."
Natalie rolls her eyes. "It's my favourite because it's exclusively American, we're with family and yes, we get to eat LOADS. Three different types of pie on one plate is amazing."
I consider this and turn to Dimitri. "But you're Russian."
Dimitri raises an eyebrow. "Yes."
"Well if it's only for Americans what do you do?"
He actually looks close to being amused. Natalie's giggle draws me away from his face. Her nose wrinkled when she laughed, it's cute.
"What?" I say, resisting the urge to cross my arms.
"You don't have to be American, it's not a rule." Lissa explains smiling. "It's just a tradition in America."
Oh.
"I haven't technically experienced a Thanksgiving yet." Dimitri says to me, making me feel a little better. "Everyone ate at the Dragomirs last year and I was engaged...elsewhere."
"Daddy makes the best stuffing." Natalie testifies, a dumbstruck expression taking a hold of her face.
"And my mom makes the best velvet potatoes." Lissa gushes.
"Sounds nice." I say. The icky cold feeling was back, cool jealousy not bubbling or itchy, it threatened to shift into sadness which is ridiculous. Feelings are ridiculous. I'm about to ask Dimitri where he was but Natalie's voice is already pushing the conversation on.
"It is." Natalie grins. "You'll see for yourself. OH! AND! We play games and believe me it gets brutal."
"Oh?" Dimitri asks a small tug on his lips.
"Oh yeah." Lissa says, looking embarrassed to admit it.
"Last year daddy threw his pen at Andre when we were playing Pictionary."
"That's a pretty tame example, Nat. What about when you threw the whole drawing board at Spiridon?"
Natalie presses her lips together and manages to look sheepish before turning to me and Dimitri. "We're not allowed to be on the same team anymore."
"I'm surprised you still play it." Dimitri says.
"Daddy and Eric have played it every Thanksgiving for twenty years." Natalie explains. "We can't really get out of it."
Lissa twirls her finger at me and Dimitri across the table. "And soon you won't be able to either. Welcome to the family."
Lissa helps me load the dishwasher, despite my protests, and Natalie sits on the counter eating her second bowl of ice cream and asking Lissa questions about her party, and by Lissa's tone, they're questions she's answered more than once before.
"And you're sure that you're fine with it still being my party?"
"Yup." Lissa says. "I'm only providing the venue… well…my parents are."
"Andre better understand that too." Natalie says, sitting up straight and smiling proudly down at her bowl.
"Well, you might have to share. We're selling it to my mom as part leaving party, part going back to school."
Natalie wrinkles her nose.
"C'mon he is leaving. And it will totally be distinguishable. People at St. Vlads know this is your party, the Queen Bee of the senior year who has older college guys there. The girls will be grateful, the boys will bond and feel the need to step up and be alphas or something." Lissa's point hangs in the air and then she shrugs. "You have a chocolate fountain. The people will know who to thank for it."
"Not just one but three." She says, holding up her fingers for emphasis.
"Maybe you should just wear a crown?"
"I could."
"A chocolate fountain sounds messy." I say quietly. "And wonderful."
"It can get messy." Natalie grins and I ignore how Lissa's looking at me. "Especially if Mason has anything to do with it but apart from that we just skewer fruit and marshmallows and stick them in it."
"I have one, a small one. I'll bring it over for a sleepover sometime." Lissa says casually, handing me the washing tablet. I pop it in and shut the machine.
"We could do that the Friday before school starts." Natalie agrees.
Dimitri comes in then, his phone pressed to his ear and his face pinched in concentration. He sets his empty mug down on the counter and goes about making a fresh one. The girls are walking out of the kitchen and I trail behind them, pausing when I hear him speak.
"They can't be disillusioned into thinking holing up at Court is the solution….yes…It has excellent security but so does most of the schools….but the facilities…"
He pins his phone between his shoulder and ear as he pours and adds a little bit of sugar, that's new.
"No I haven't heard anything…when does Victor want to leave? ….Right. Let me know the minute the manifesto result comes in. Okay, bye."
He pockets his phone and spins around before I can run after the girls or make it look like I wasn't blatantly eavesdropping and being nosey, although my only option would be to examine the wall.
"Uh."
Yes Rose, ingenious.
"Something you wanted?"
"You don't normally take sugar."
I should have gone with examining the wall.
Dimitri hums and walks toward me. "More stress, more sugar."
He passes me in a wave of fresh cotton and his masculine scent. It had to be his shower gel, like how mine smelled of honey and berries. I couldn't place his smell though, something like spice but not quite.
I follow him out into the hall. "Why are you stressed?"
"Reasons that can't be helped."
"Because you're here not there?"
"Partly."
"Why else?" He looks down at me from the stairs he's climbed and before I can start to feel awkward I blurt out, "You said I could ask you anything."
"You can." He says. "But that doesn't mean you'll get answers."
He turns and walks up the rest of the stairs leaving me surprised at how I felt. I didn't feel stupid or want to immediately turn invisible. I felt like following him and asking 'why' again. Instead I wander into the living room and sit down beside Natalie. They had a show I recognised on. They've brought a large, brown throw out from the utility room to drape over their legs. Without looking away from the TV Natalie starts blindly tucking it around my hips.
"Snug as a bug." Lissa says.
"Shhh." Natalie demands.
At first, I think it's the dream that woke me. That the part of me running away from the dream, from her, started pounding at the piece of my brain that kept everything else asleep and eventually succeeded before it could get worse. But lying here, getting my breath back, there's a tremble in my lower abdomen and then suddenly something twists. I gasp and collapse back against the pillows, clutching the mattress with one hand and a fistful of Dimitri's shirt with the other.
My breath comes back in a huge inhale and before I can decide if it's worth calling for help the pain disappears, slithering away and leaving an achy trail behind it. Gingerly I prod my tummy, expecting it to suddenly reel up again like an agitated animal but it doesn't. It was gone.
I push myself up and run a hand over my clammy forehead.
Stupid body.
I shuffle to the side of the bed, ignoring the nip of the bandages and pad into the bathroom. I kept them tight as ever but it was getting harder as my chest had gotten a little bigger. It would be a lot easier if the extra weight had gone to my hips or legs or anywhere else really.
I splash my face, rinsing away the dream and clearing my head.
I hoke around for the lip balm Natalie had given having told me that my lips needed 'tender loving care after being brutalised for most of life'. I thought at first it was a bit dramatic but after studying them in the mirror I realised that they were horribly dry and were almost always cracked. I unscrew the little pot and smooth the appley balm over them. The problem now would be not to lick it off.
I tug out my hair tie and run a brush through the tangled mess. My hair has a lot more shine to it now and the ends weren't as wild, although still broken. I pull it over my shoulder to get at it and then throw it back, still surprised by the length and how it brushes against the bottom of my back. I wonder how it would look at Natalie's length. It would certainly not be as heavy but what if I was so used to the weight that I couldn't hold my head up without it. That would be problematic.
I turn out the light and wander out. I didn't want to go back to bed. The dream still felt too close and lying down in the bed wouldn't let it fade away. I pull on a pair of PJ bottoms and tiptoe out onto the landing. It's dark and quiet, the living room showing no sign that it's the middle of the day and not the middle of the night. Looking at the dark glass it's almost bizarre to see a round white ball in the sky instead of speckling of stars. I tap in the code and push the door open, not anticipating the rush of colour, warmth and light.
I'd stepped into another dream.
It's so unexpectantly pleasant that I stand there with my eyes closed, letting the sun warm my face before dazedly making my way onto the lawn. The grass is soft and tickles my feet. I plop down and drink in the grand array of flowers and their popping colours. How perfectly blue the sky is and how the summer air felt like a snug, warm blanket around me. A million miles away from the blistering, dry heat of Arizona.
I'd missed the sun despite what it used to mean.
I close my eyes and breathe in the warm floral air. To think that somewhere else the same sun is in the sky but angrier, that my mother is among plants and flowers but for a different purpose and she wasn't hungry, she was starving and she was tired and she wouldn't stop being those things.
Did she miss me?
An ache swells inside my chest and up my throat.
I open my eyes and drink in the details of the garden, letting it chase out the images in my mind.
The forget-me-nots in pink and sky blue, the roses in scarlet red, pure white and yellow, jasmine, peonies, lilac and tiger lilies. A single sunflower with its face turned to the sky and sweet peas climbing the only tree enclosed in the garden. I couldn't remember any other name's Natalie may have told me, I'd gotten so distracted with watching her cup her hands around a flower bud and making it bloom.
Without warning that ache becomes more intense and I wonder what my mother would say if she were here. If she would think it's beautiful. if she would permit herself to share a moment with me in admiring it. Probably not.
The ache had spread to my eyes and a tear escapes down my cheek.
"Rose."
I look over my shoulder and find Dimitri has stepped into the dream.
Updated: 14/04/2022
Original note:
I HAVE BEEN SO BUSY OMG. I'll keep this short.
Thanks for being patient. Another update on Sunday (the end of this chapter, Rose and Dimitri alone time…there is touching), I get off this Friday for three weeks so more writing time and updates.
I'm sorry this is a let down after the long wait, it can't be helped and I'm embarrassed by it tbh.