I turn on her, furious. “That was our best shot!”
“Really?” she says, starting to lose it. “You getting cozy with some guy was our best shot? You totally ditched me. This isn’t my scene. I’ve never traveled abroad. I’m not comfortable wandering around a Euro club on my own. Do you know how stupid I felt?” Her head is in her hands, and she’s turning around in this little circle.
So that’s it. She’s mad that I left her alone. Embarrassed, maybe. “Calm down,” I start. “I’m sorry. We still—”
“Do you even know how hard it was for me to pull this off? For me to be here at all?” she asks. I have no idea what she means. I have no idea what she gave up.
“Just come here,” I tell her. “Let’s go into the bathroom.”
“No.” She jerks away from me. “I’m tired of listening to you, tired of following you.” I’m about to make a joke about how it’s been less than three days, but I bite it back. Instead I draw in a long breath.
“So let’s go outside,” I say. “You can tell me all about it out there.”
Aubrey pushes past me. She doesn’t bother to grab either of our coats from the coat check, but mine’s leather so I have to. I watch her weave through the line that’s still forming on the stairs, other teenagers waiting to get in—it’s only two o’clock—and I shove in past the coat-check people. I slap a five on the counter and hand the girl my ticket.
Let her still be outside. My leather jacket is seeming less and less worth it. It only takes about a minute, though, before I’m shooting out the double doors and gasping deep, cold air. I see her right away, hunched into herself, my dress hiked all the way up her thighs where she squats against the cold brick wall.
“I wasn’t flirting with him,” I tell her, sliding down next to her. “I really was trying to dig. I can’t help that he turned it around. Or that he sucks. Or that my club idea turned up empty. I say yes a lot,” I explain. “Sometimes to my detriment.”
“My parents don’t know I’m here,” Aubrey says quietly. She breathes once, twice, like she might give herself over to panic if she doesn’t focus hard on those breaths.
“Mine don’t either.” I keep my voice light, bubbly. “Mine don’t care what I do as long as I check in every few weeks.”
“Mine care, Lena.” Aubrey turns her eyes on me. “You have no idea. They count on me. I’ve never done something like this in my life. You think I can just run off?” She laughs but it’s hollow. “Your club idea didn’t come up empty,” she says. I open my mouth to ask what she means, but she holds up her hand. “Just wait a second. We’ve got something here, but you’re taking it so lightly, like it’s some kind of joke or adventure. I need to be able to trust you. I don’t have money, I don’t have time, my parents are probably freaking out. I was supposed to be home already.”
“Why haven’t you told them?” I keep my voice quiet, even.
“Because they’d be out here in a second to bring me home.” I look at Aubrey. Her face is serious.
“I’m sorry,” I tell her.
“Why did you ask me to come along?” she wants to know. “I know why you’re doing this. Anyone could see you’re hoping he’s still alive, that ‘body missing’ means he’s out there somewhere. But my own reasons are totally different. So what does it matter if we’re together?”
I can’t look at her. I’m afraid my eyes will betray my secret—the real reason I think Charlie’s alive. So I avoid the question. “I don’t have some grand plan. I’m telling you. I thought Z could help. All he really said to me before you walked up was that Charlie was weird in Bombay, which doesn’t do us a hell of a lot of good.”
“Wait.” Aubrey cuts me off. “How was he weird in Mumbai? What did Xander say about it?” She looks so interested that I feel guilty breaking her heart all over again.
“Just, whatever,” I say. “That he was moody. He was curt and distracted and sometimes he said the same thing twice or contradicted himself. But Z thought it was just stress from school and all.” Aubrey stares at me, thinking.
“So we’re talking about just a few months ago,” she confirms.
“Yep, after exam season at Oxford.”