“I’m going to tell him my name,” I whisper.
At first, she has no answer except to kiss my forehead. “He’s going to love it, the way I did when I named you, the way I still do.” She rolls into me, fingers tracing my arm softly. “Do you remember what it means?”
“What? No, actually.” (Oops.) “It means she who brings victory.”
I close my eyes, starting to drift at the sound of her voice. “Ah, victory. Just within my grasp.”
She laughs. “You’ll be fine, Bernice. Yours is the only other love I’ve ever been so sure of.”
“Yeah.” I embrace her words, along with the meaning of my name, and the surety of her heartbeat. “I think we’ll all be just fine.”
Chapter 51
The afternoon of the fundraiser, I pull my new dress out of its bag and lay it out on my bed.
The room (filled with my sisters and mother and Elle) gives a collective gasp.
“Bee,” Millicent whispers in awe, “you’re going to look like a princess in that.”
I run my hands over the soft fabric. It’s truly charming: shimmering gold, lightly pleated, long enough to drop to my feet. It’s beautiful in that Greek-goddess way that requires gold sandals and possibly a shiny, gold wreath crown. (Too bad the crown would be overkill.) “You think?” I ask, grinning.
“Bee,” Mama says, “you’re going to be so beautiful in this dress, The Boy is not going to know what to do with himself.”
I blush. “Mom.”
She smiles and brushes my hair away from my eyes. “Astrid, time to tackle these locks.”
Astrid holds up a brush and comb and spray bottle full of water. “Yes, ma’am.”
Then she squirts a spray of water into my face.
After the hour it takes to do my hair, my mom helps me into the dress, careful to make sure it doesn’t snag on my crown braid (adorned with gold pins). I swear I do feel like a princess as the soft fabric touches my legs like liquid gold and the straps rest on my shoulders at the perfect length.
I wait until Mama zips the dress in the back before turning to the mirror. I’m assailed by sudden happiness, so strong I can’t help the squeak that comes out of my mouth. The dress cinches in the middle, creating a loose-fitting bodice held up by paper-thin straps. The skirt drops straight down, but when I move side to side, it also moves, flowing like it was made for me.
Mama grins behind me, nodding. “I’m glad you got this one.”
I tried on seven dresses total, and this was the one I wanted from the beginning. It was pricey but worth it. “Me, too,” I say.
“Are you nervous?” she asks, reaching into her jewelry box. She pulls out a gold chain with a leaf pendant and sets it around my neck.
“Not for the speech,” I say.
“Levi?”
“Yeah. I’m a wreck.” Truth is, I’ve been rushing with nerves all day, imagining how the evening will go over and over again. It’s never perfect in my head; I always manage to screw something up before I have the chance to get it right.
“You’ll be fine,” Elle says from the closet, where she’s trying on her own newly-purchased dress.
“You will be,” Mama confirms. “You’re not a wreck, Bee.” She wraps her arms around me from behind, our cheeks pressing together. We’ve always looked alike in a sort of distant way, like we could be cousins or niece and aunt. But here we look lovely, a little like angels, with my dress casting golden shadows on our faces through the mirror.
Her embrace starts to ease away my worries. “Thanks, Mama,” I whisper.
She kisses my cheek, and I wrap my hands around hers. I glance down at the copy of Crime and Punishment lying on my nightstand, the cover torn and abused, flapping in the wind from my ceiling fan. I press my lips, then say, “I wish Papa was here to send me off.”
Mama closes her eyes, a tear rolling down her cheek. “Ah.” A tiny gasp of a word, and it tears right through me. “He loved Levi so much, Bee. If there’s anything you could do to make your dad proud, it’d be this.”
I dab my mom’s eyes to stop the tears, then kiss her nose, and stand. “Well, then. I should get going.”
“Excuse me!” Elle squawks from the closet. “You can’t leave without your date!”
Chapter 52
The hotel hosting the event is gorgeous, big and marble and fountained, unlike anything I’ve seen. But I barely get a glimpse of it before Elle (who looks fabulous in her skinny black dress) takes me around to the back door, so we can avoid Levi and other Important People. She deposits me right at the edge of the stage, her blue hair flouncing. “Stay. Here.”
I stay there, situated behind a speaker and in the center of a bunch of cords, and wait.
For nearly twenty minutes. The room fills and fills, and everyone is wearing outfits even nicer than mine, and I’m starting to feel queasy, in the best possible way. (Is there a good way to feel queasy? If there is, I’ve found it.) I have a paper full of words in my clutch, words I will say tonight, in front of all these people. I almost get it out to read over it again, but I know that’s futile—I was repeating it in my sleep last night.
Apparently, I’ve been ready for this a lot longer than I realized.
I’m beginning to worry Elle forgot about me when she finally rounds the corner again. “I’m going to introduce you now. Ready?”
“Hell no.” I smile. “And hell yes.”
“I’m right here, cheering you on.” Elle squeezes me in a hug for a split second before hurrying up the steps. The audience claps sparsely when she grabs the microphone and starts to speak. “Welcome, one and all, to what we hope will become the first of many annual banquets!”
More applause. I smile, bouncing from foot to foot. I’m so ready to climb those stairs.
“Levi Orville, our local saint, asked me to give the welcome speech tonight, but as I am highly unprofessional, I asked someone far more capable and deserving of the job to help us out.”
(I wish I could see his face right now.) “I’m not going to introduce her because I think she can do that best for herself.” She waves to me. “Come on up.”
Letting go of every reservation I could possibly have left, I climb those stairs. I step into the spotlight, squinting for a second before my eyes adjust. The ocean of people makes me briefly dizzy. They are waiting—for me.
I take in a lot of faces in a few seconds. Mostly unfamiliar, but some are so wonderfully familiar they give me a touch of heartache. I see Clary-Jane, and Albert, and Missy. (This is the only acceptable place to wear those shoes.) I see Nikita and Suhani, whispering things to each other, smiling, waving at me. I see Keagan, with his dimpled smile and his wild curly hair and his bright eyes that tell me they’re happy I’m here.
Then, because he is sitting near the front and I can easily spot him, I meet Levi’s gaze and think about how perfect he is in that stupid (gorgeous) suit and that I could stare at him all day. I register his surprise and confusion and his sadness, too.
I smile and take the microphone from Elle.
I put it close to my lips.