Mike sniffed. “Says the girl who’s dying to get back to Europe. It sounds awesome, and you know it. And maybe I’m being a little selfish. There’s much less chance of Alison flying the whole way to Holland to get you. You’ll be safer there.”
Oh really? Aria thought. Ali had followed her to Iceland last summer, after all. But she considered it for a moment. It would be a great escape—not just from Ali and Helper A, but from the constant reminders of Noel and the relentless press. If Aria remembered correctly, the apprenticeship involved studying with a rotating group of up-and-coming artists. She’d help out in their studios and attend their shows, and there would be time to create her own art. She’d only been to Amsterdam once, for a few days, but she hadn’t forgotten the narrow streets, the relaxed attitude, the huge park on the edge of town. Actually, it sort of sounded like heaven.
She pulled Mike into a fierce hug. “Okay. I’ll give it a shot.”
Mike frowned, looking conflicted. “If you get in, bring me over, too. I bet Amsterdam pot is way better than Colorado’s.”
Aria ruffled his hair. Ever since Colorado legalized marijuana, Mike had been fascinated with the place. “I promise to at least bring you for a visit,” she teased. Then she swept past him into the journalism barn, which had better cell reception. She had an important call to make.
A few hours later, Aria got off SEPTA in Henley, a town ten miles closer to Philadelphia, famous for its liberal arts college and annual film festival. She took a right at the old hardware store on the main street and followed the road past a hospital to the Henley Languages Building. Students swept past her clutching their books and iPads. A bunch of kids congregated under a tree. A long-haired boy strummed a Beatles song near a coffee kiosk.
Aria’s excitement swelled. When Aria had called from school, Ella had given her the number for the apprenticeship’s American contact. The contact had answered and said that today was the second-to-last day for interviews, and the person she was to speak with, an Agatha Janssen at Henley’s Department of Germanic Languages, had an opening this afternoon. It seemed like kismet.
The languages building smelled musty and had a serious echo, and the wall tile was exactly like the kind in the building that housed Aria and Noel’s cooking class. She felt a pang. Should she call him?
Of course not. He lied to you. She set her jaw and swished the thought out of her mind. She should be thinking instead about Amsterdam, and her new life. She hadn’t technically gotten the apprenticeship yet, but she wanted to think positively. She couldn’t wait to begin all sorts of rituals in Holland that Noel would never be into, like watching the sun rise every morning; seeing long, plotless foreign films in which people do a lot of smoking and lovemaking; and going to coffee shops to debate philosophy. There.
Ms. Janssen’s office was at the end of the hall. When Aria knocked, an older woman with frizzy black hair and wire-rim glasses, wearing what looked like a bunch of silk scarves sewn together into a sacklike dress, flung open the door. “Hello, Miss Montgomery!” she said in a Dutch accent. “Come in, come in!”
The inside of the office smelled like apple pie. On the wall were drawings of the dykes around Amsterdam and a photo of a little girl in huge, yellow wooden shoes. “Thanks for seeing me on such short notice,” Aria said, shrugging off her plaid spring jacket.
“Not a problem.” Ms. Janssen tapped on the keyboard, her wooden bracelets knocking together. “As you know, I have the power to recommend a candidate. I’ve interviewed students from New York City, Boston, and Baltimore, but your portfolio is quite strong. And you know a little Dutch, so that’s helpful.”
“I learned when I was in Iceland,” Aria boasted. “I lived there for a few years.”
Ms. Janssen pushed a lock of hair behind her ears. “Well, the apprenticeship would be for two years. You’ll be helping several artists, learning a great deal from each of them. Everyone who has done this apprenticeship has gone on to have a career in the art world in their own right.”
“I know. It’s a remarkable opportunity.” Aria thought of the literature she’d reread this afternoon. The apprentices got to travel all through Europe with their artists.
The professor asked Aria some more questions about her influences, her strengths and weaknesses, and her knowledge of art history. With every question Aria answered, Ms. Janssen seemed more and more pleased, the smile lines at the corners of her eyes deepening. Not once did she bring up how Aria was a Pretty Little Liar. She seemed to know nothing of the stupid movie based on Aria’s life, or how Aria had been on a cruise ship that caught fire, or that she’d witnessed Gayle Riggs’s murder or found her boyfriend tied up in a storage shed only a few days before. In that little office, Aria was only a budding artist, nothing else. The Aria she used to be, before everything went wrong.