“I’m sorry,” she murmured, tapping him on the shoulder. “I was just wondering … could I have one?”
Watt blinked, a little stunned when she spoke to him, even though he’d been expecting it. She really was the most breathtakingly beautiful girl he’d ever seen. Finally he recovered enough to say something. “Sorry?” He made a confused gesture to his ears, as if he’d been listening to something on his eartennas, though of course he hadn’t. But at least that explained why he’d just blinked silently at her like a complete moron.
Avery repeated her request, and Watt passed her the bag, hiding a smile. Thanks, Nadia.
Ye of little faith.
“What are you listening to?” Avery asked politely, passing back the bag, but he could tell her mind was elsewhere.
“This guy named Jake Saunders. I doubt you know him.”
“No way! You like country?” Avery exclaimed.
Watt nodded, though he’d never heard a country song before in his life.
“What do you think of Jake’s new album?” Avery went on, eagerly.
“I like it,” Watt said carefully, reading almost word-for-word the commentary Avery had sent to Atlas a few weeks ago. “But it’s not as good as his early stuff. My favorite song of his has always been ‘Crash and Burn.’”
“Me too,” Avery gushed, then surprised him by singing the chorus under her breath. “I’m not comin’ over, you and I are long done, you can crash and burn …” Her singing voice was low, with a seductive huskiness that Watt hadn’t expected.
“With another one,” he managed, singing the last few words along with her, and she laughed.
“So what brings you here?” she asked after a moment.
She was mesmerizing: her eyes, her laugh, that unexpected song. “I’m meeting some friends to play Wizards,” he said.
“Oh, that used to be my favorite. You know the part where you get to the sword in the stone, and you have to pull it out?”
Watt opened his mouth to lie—Nadia had pulled up the ARena’s map for him, along with a description of that scene, from a game enthusiast’s website—but for some reason he didn’t want to. “Actually I’ve never been here before,” he admitted.
“Really?” Avery sounded surprised by that. “Well, I won’t ruin it for you. But piece of advice: When the alchemist offers you the potions, take the smallest goblet.”
“Will that one help you win?”
“Oh no, they all get you to the next level. That one just tastes better than the others,” Avery said seriously, and Watt smiled.
“I’m Avery, by the way,” she added, belatedly.
“Avery,” he repeated, as if he hadn’t been on her feeds this whole time. “I’m Watt.”
She looked back at the door, and he realized he might be about to lose her. “What game were you playing in there?” he asked, with a nod at the pistols holstered to her waist.
“Aliens.” Avery shrugged. “I needed some air, I guess.”
Watt nodded, following Nadia’s advice even though he felt like he should speak. But Nadia was watching Avery’s breathing and pulse, and seemed to think there was something else she wanted to say, if given the chance.
“It’s all just so … exhausting sometimes, you know?” Avery looked away, fiddling with her haptic glove.
Watt hesitated. Nadia? he asked. He wasn’t accustomed to being confused by girls, especially ones this gorgeous. In his experience, beauty and complexity were often inversely correlated.
“What do you mean?”
“Do you ever feel like people think they know you, but they can’t, because they don’t know the most important thing about you?”
“Actually yeah.” No one knew about Nadia, yet she was so deeply, inextricably intertwined in everything Watt thought and knew and did. He wondered what big secret Avery felt like she was hiding. Whatever it was, it couldn’t be as bad as having a quant in your brain.
“I’m sorry. I don’t know why I said that.” Avery had reverted to her formal, more distant tone, the one she’d used when she first asked Watt for an M&M. He looked up sharply and saw that she was reaching up to pull her hair back, letting him briefly catch the scent of her lavender shampoo.
She was shutting herself away, hiding away the vulnerable side she’d given him a brief glimpse of. Watt thought frantically of ways to stop her. She couldn’t leave, not yet.
“Avery,” Watt said, just as her wristband beeped, indicating that she’d been out for too much time already. If she stayed in the staging room much longer, the arena wouldn’t let her back in.
“Looks like I should get back in there.” She gave him a smile, but it lacked the warmth he’d seen just a minute ago.
“Before you leave, can we exchange flick-links?” He stood up as he said it, feeling awkward. He hadn’t been this nervous around a girl since before Nadia.
“Oh. Sure.” Avery waited as their contacts connected, enabling them to flicker and ping each other. “See you around,” she added, and pulled her headset on. The doors slid open, giving Watt a glimpse of the arena as it truly was, a series of gray walls covered in misters and motion sensors.
“Good luck in there,” he called out, but Avery was already a world away.
ERIS
“YOU’RE HERE!” AVERY exclaimed, moving down the hallway toward Eris. The crowds instinctively parted to let her pass. “I thought maybe you were skipping. I haven’t seen you in ages.” Avery’s voice pitched upward at the end, turning that last sentence into a question.
“Even I wouldn’t skip the first day,” Eris said lightly, though it had been the absolute worst first day of school ever. She’d actually come upTower early, wearing a plain black windbreaker over her uniform to hide from the lower-floor stares, and showered in the school locker room. Anything to avoid getting ready in that cramped bathroom she shared with her mom.
Normally on the first day of school, Eris’s parents made her take an awkwardly posed picture by the front door, to add to the collection they’d started way back when she was in preschool. “Good luck!” they would both exclaim, hugging her until she finally escaped to the lift, laughing at their silly picture tradition but secretly loving it.
There hadn’t been any pics this morning, of course. Eris wondered if her dad even knew it was the first day of school. At that thought, she felt a sudden, sharp pain gathering behind her eyes. She closed them for a moment, trying to calm the storm of hurt and bewilderment that tore through her. She couldn’t let Avery see.
“Okay, but, Eris—is something going on?” Avery asked as the two started toward the exit. The afternoon bell had just rung. Students clustered in the hallways like flocks of monochromatic birds, all of them wearing pleated skirts or pressed khakis and button-down shirts. For the first time in her life, Eris was grateful for their stupid school uniform. She wasn’t sure how many outfit combinations she could make with the clothes she’d brought down to 103, but she knew they wouldn’t be enough.
“What do you mean?” she asked, pleased at how normal her voice sounded.
“I haven’t seen you at all since Cord’s, you missed the AR game yesterday, and when I went by your apartment to check on you, no one was there.” Avery shot her a look. “Is everything okay?”
Eris didn’t want to talk about any of this. It was too raw and tender; and besides, as soon as anyone knew the truth, it would all be irrevocably real. But she’d already thought of the perfect excuse. “My parents decided to renovate our apartment. Again. You know how they are.” She gave an exaggerated eye roll. “We’re at the Nuage for a while. I’m sorry about yesterday,” she added.