“No one who isn’t a member is supposed to touch her,” Harry explained. Hands in his pockets, he strolled over to the armoire, worshipfully gazing up at the idol. “It could be dangerous.” Graham hissed for him to be silent when it was too late to actually shush him.
Viv wrung her hands. “Maybe we should just tell them. Izzie?” Her stage voice flooded the rafters, perfectly inflected with anxiety. “Amanda’s already half guessed.”
That’s how it was decided. No talk. No vote. The four of us working in symphony, invisible threads lengthening from our brains, linking to conspire. We would win the Order its foot soldiers and appease Amanda’s lot into silence.
I shook my head hard, faking alarm. “Vivy, you know there’s a process. The initiation. It’s against the rules just to tell.”
“The rules are there for our safety—your safety,” Graham said, pointing to Jess. Her lips parted. “It would be too risky otherwise.” He plucked one of his suspenders over and over, pretending to rack his brain. “You’d all have to swear to follow the rules too. You’d have to prove”—a brief pause—“no. Forget it. Dangerous idea. The initiation would be too much for you guys.”
“Way too much,” I muttered, grabbing the dagger off the table and indiscreetly slipping it on top of the armoire with the idol. I fought a smirk turning around to face them.
It was possible they’d call bullshit. Amanda, fellow actress, would recognize theater.
“An initiation wouldn’t be too much,” Amanda pleaded.
“We’re game to follow the rules,” Jess promised.
Viv had reclined, adopting a blasé posture and an evasive frown.
“Yeah,” Conner said. “I’d be dope as fuck at whatever you guys have going on. I’m a badass getaway driver and Campbell knows how to pick locks.”
Campbell coughed, surprised. “Only the lock on my door when one of my sisters locks me out of my own room. But I know a dude who sells fireworks.” He sounded relieved to have something to offer. “The illegal ones from China that can blow out walls and set stuff on fire. I’ve never used them myself.”
Graham stroked his jawline, encouraging them, Convince me.
“Once I used a wire hanger to unlock my car,” Trent offered eagerly.
Rachel huffed. “Forget that. I can lift a wallet.”
Harry snorted.
“She can,” Jess said. “She lifted three wallets off guys at the Harvest Festival. Ghost hands.”
“I brought the wallets to lost and found,” Rachel said with a toss of her hair. “I don’t need the money or anything.”
Amanda, not to be outdone, claimed, “I’m the stealthiest. We TP’d a hundred houses in middle school and never got caught.” She flushed, possibly remembering she’d hit our houses. “And I mean, that’s kid stuff . . . Conner and I broke into one of his dad’s developments and trashed a house.”
“Amanda,” Conner said, standing suddenly, knocking an empty bottle over on the floor.
“Relax. We busted the bathroom mirrors and Con broke the counters in the model home.”
My pulse raced. Our initiates were trying to convince us of their worth.
“And we all know you’ve got street cred,” she continued, leveling a finger around at the four of us. “IV. You guys are seriously twisted.”
We traded dramatic stares. Took our time. Deliberated. Harry was all hands in his hair. Graham had retrieved his spectacles and was polishing them on his shirt, looking deep in thought. I worried the gold necklace at my throat. At last, I whispered, “Okay. But we need a few days before telling you how this will work.”
“Thank you,” Amanda murmured with so much reverence I nearly laughed myself to the floor. Viv drew me over to sit with her on the blankets. The mosaic of green cider empties expanded on the table. I participated halfheartedly in a debate about pledging to a sorority next year. Harry and I caught each other’s eyes as he went for the fridge. He motioned to a bottle, then to me. I shook my head and was about to mouth that we should go when Conner blocked Harry’s path from the fridge.
“Hey, sport.” I strained to hear Conner over the other conversations. “You and me calling a truce. That shit is something. It’s cool though, I guess. I don’t mind that you’re poorer than dirt.” Conner cuffed Harry’s neck. “Or that if this were medieval times, I’d basically own you and your family. Feudalism was boss.”
Harry removed his car keys from his pocket, angled one, and popped the lid off his cider. He took a sip and licked the bubbles from his upper lip. Conner’s hand stayed on him. “Sure, Con. I’ll try to forget that you’re an arrogant, privileged waste of space.” He took another sip. “And that if this were medieval times, the rest of the serfs and I would jump you and probably leave you disemboweled in your father’s field. But I’ll make you a deal.”
Conner’s face pinched between amusement and scorn. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. Don’t put your hands on me again.”
“What’re you offering?”
“I’ll keep mine off you.” He left Conner staring after him. Harry winked at me as he perched on the table by Graham and Campbell.
? ? ?
? ? ?
A little while later, Graham tapped me on the forehead. “Walk?”
Graham and I emerged into a black-and-white world. The ’90s hip-hop faded behind us. He was a timeless portrait, hair lifting in the breeze, shirtsleeves hiked up past his elbows, one black suspender swinging at his thigh, the other hooked on his shoulder,
“Not anachronistic,” I whispered.
His head dipped. “Come again?” There was a trace of his dimple.
“Not anachronistic, exactly,” I told him. “You look timeless, like you could always exist and you always have. Like a vampire.”
He tipped his head back and barked a laugh. “You’re yammed.”
“Am not.” I rubbed my stomach. “Delirious with hunger, maybe.”
He unbunched the jacket in his hand and offered it. I waved it off.
“We can sneak into Viv’s kitchen,” he said.
“Nah. I’m fine.” The barn’s door was a tiny caramel rectangle behind us. “What are we going to tell them? I mean, all that in there, it was brilliant.”
His mouth pursed and then he shook his head. “No idea—yet.”
The trees along one side of the pool bowed in the wind. Viv’s house was lightless. Graham settled on a poolside lounger and I sat next to him. He tried to pluck my hand from my thigh. I wouldn’t budge it. Holding hands right then wouldn’t have felt friendly and innocent.
“You’re pissed,” he said.
My thoughts staggered backward and I remembered our dance and what he’d said about Viv and the kiss and my secret. “I’m not.”
“You’re angry that I kissed Viv, which is selfish.”
I faced him. “Excuse me?”
Clouds blew across the sky, muddying the light. “You hate that I was both of your first kisses,” he said, his voice having lost some of its chilliness.
“You were not her first kiss,” I said, loud and clearly. “She was confused or kidding or—I don’t know what she was—but you were not her first kiss.”
He smirked. “You think I don’t know about her theater camp trysts?”