Brenden lets out a short laugh while he squeezes lime into his drink, but I think he’s too choked up to explain the memory to Zhen.
I sip my whiskey. “Brenden was six,” I explain to our friend, “and he told our dad to rename his novel Two Summers of Rashes & Doo-doo.”
Zhen coughs on his wine and then starts laughing with my brother.
If it weren’t up to his publisher, I think Neal Wright, New York novelist of contemporary literature, would’ve without a doubt titled his book Rashes & Doo-doo.
Just because he loved his kids that much.
I stare off and take a bigger swig. I find myself reminiscing way too often. Not just about my dad, but my mom—she’s everywhere here. As a music composer for Aerial Ethereal, she still lives in the circus. In me.
Shit. My eyes water, and I wipe the creases. I sense the concern in their sudden silence, so I don’t meet their gazes.
Thankfully, my phone pings.
“AE email notification,” I tell them, and they start checking their phones.
Date: January 25th Subject: First Practice - IMPORTANT
From: Geoffrey Lesage, Choreographer CC: Baylee Wright, Brenden Wright, Dimitri Kotova, Zhen Li
Good Evening.
We’re less than a month away from the first meeting / practice of Infini. I need you four to arrive twenty minutes early. You’re the only artists that weren’t recast in the recent shakeups—and there’s a likelihood that you’ll carry over bad habits from the previous choreography.
So I’d like to discuss my methods.
Also, if you think being an original Infini cast member carries prestige, think again. IT CARRIES A BURDEN. You’re a burden to me and the clean slate that I asked Aerial Ethereal for. This is your opportunity to prove me wrong. Don’t waste it.
Twenty minutes early.
No exceptions.
Geoffrey Lesage Infini Choreographer [email protected]
“He has a bad attitude,” Brenden says, pocketing his cell.
Zhen swishes his wine. “And a love of caps-lock.”
“He’s supposed to be a genius,” I remind them. “If he saves Infini from being retired, then his prickly personality will be worth it.” I hate uttering the words retired in the same breath as Infini.
My heart, my soul—it’s in this show and this show alone. I can’t imagine losing it too. I’d do anything possible to save it from extinction. Including putting up with a stubborn choreographer.
Zhen fixes his sunglasses atop his head. “He’s beyond prickly.”
“Thorny, then,” I offer.
“Only if you’re referring to him being a thorn in our asses.”
Brenden chugs his tequila and licks his lips. “A deep, agonizing thorn. He just told us we were burdens, and he hasn’t even met us yet.”
“And what a shame,” Zhen adds. “We’re very likable.”
“The most likable.” Brenden raises his glass. “Everyone likes us.”
“If Aerial Ethereal had a congeniality award, they’d have to split it in half to give us both a piece.” Zhen clinks his wine to Brenden’s tequila.
I love bursting their bubble. “I doubt a congeniality award would go to two guys who occupied an eight-person booth at Angelo’s. You let a family of six wait two hours to be seated.”
Brenden shuffles beside Zhen, just so they can do this we’re-older-than-you-and-staring-darkly-down-at-you thing. It’s ineffective on me, and I usually just laugh in the end.
“She doesn’t think we’re likable,” Brenden tells Zhen.
“Unbelievable,” Zhen teases.
“You realize, Bay, that we’ve been eating our pre-show meals at that booth since we arrived in Vegas.”
“It’s tradition,” Zhen confirms.
“You mean superstition.” I laugh because eighty-five percent of the cast is superstitious in some way. Before a performance, one of the clowns eats ten green jelly beans and does five jumping jacks backstage.
“And,” Brenden continues, “the restaurant gave us that booth. Now what do you have to say?”
“You tipped the hostess. If you’re waiting for me to say you’re the most likable in the entire universe—and to bow at your feet—it’ll never happen.” I like this back-and-forth too much to ever concede.
Zhen turns to Brenden. “Got to love your little sister. Always keeping our egos in check.”
“There’s a word for that,” Brenden says, looking directly at me.
“What?” I wonder.
“Prickly.”
I shove his arm lightly while they both laugh. After a few moments, our humor dies out, and I notice something on my brother’s mind, a darkness shadowing his face.
He actually acknowledges Zhen and physically blocks me out.
They start speaking in Mandarin, and I’m guessing their conversation is about me. The easiest way to make them switch to English is to try and change topics.
“Shouldn’t everyone be here by now?” I ask, half expecting the door to whip open, but it stands still. I check my watch.
It’s almost ten.
“Baylee,” Zhen says, capturing my gaze. “Brenden thinks that Luka was the one who stole your box.”
My jaw drops, and my heart palpitates and clenches. I haven’t heard his name out of my brother’s or Zhen’s mouth in a long, long time.
“What?” I breathe.
Luka. Luka.
Luka.
His name blasts in my head like fireworks spelling out L.U.K.A.
It sends my pulse into a worse tailspin. I can’t say anything more than what. I shouldn’t feel all of this after years of silence.
Brenden clutches his glass tighter. “I’m not the only one who thinks it.”
I frown at Zhen. “You too?”
“It makes the most sense. He has a history of stealing.”
“Useless things,” I emphasize, suddenly guarding someone I haven’t seen in forever. Luka would’ve known how much that box meant to me. I truly believe this. For context, I add, “Aerial Ethereal gave him a warning for stealing a chess set when he was thirteen, and he didn’t even play chess.”
“Maybe he thought your box was useless,” Brenden retorts. Off the hurt on my face, he says, “He’s a bad guy. So why the hell are you defending him?”
Because he’s not bad.
I’m not trying to support theft by defending Luka. I just wish I could tell Brenden that there’s so much more complexity to Luka’s issues. But I can’t really talk about him.
I shouldn’t even be having this conversation.
I shouldn’t even be thinking about his name.
But in one moment, Brenden cracked the floodgates of my mind, and the surge of memories gushes through—I doubt I’ll be able to stop them that easily.
Luka.
Luka.
I wonder if Brenden can tell I’m fixated on his name. On this “bad guy” who’s not as bad as he seems.
When my brother heard that AE nearly suspended me for using cocaine (allegedly), he directed all of his anger towards the person he believed corrupted me. That hate hasn’t extinguished.
It still boils in his eyes.
The worst part of everything: I can’t tell my brother the truth. I risk the jobs of every minor in Aerial Ethereal, and so I have to lie to his face. Over and over.
Plainly, I say, “I just know he wouldn’t steal my box.”
“We’ve been living with him for three days,” Zhen tells me, “and he’s already stolen my carton of egg whites from the refrigerator.”
I don’t believe that, I want to say, but how can I know the truth? Years and a stringent contract have separated us, and maybe in that time Luka Kotova changed. Maybe he’s less the boy I loved, and he’s now become a man I’d hate.
No.
I don’t want to believe it.
The thought alone hurts. I swallow and then sip my whiskey, the liquid burning my throat. I glance cautiously at my brother. “Did you…you didn’t fight with him, did you?”
Brenden bears down on his teeth.
Last time Brenden and Luka spoke, fists were flying. My brother may be a couple inches shorter and a few pounds lighter, but he busted Luka’s lip and left bruises.
Luka didn’t even try to block him. It almost looked like he wanted to be hit.