This was her opening. “You’re right,” Leda said, her voice dripping with false sympathy. “And I imagine it’s been extra hard on her, because she won Eris’s scholarship, and of course we all miss Eris so much.”
Silence settled over the room. Leda’s family knew she’d been on the roof, of course; they’d picked her up from the police station that morning after everyone provided their witness statements, and had reviewed it with their lawyer in excruciating detail. Eris’s death was one of those things they seemed to have collectively decided not to talk about. As if all their family’s dirty little secrets could be wrapped up and buried, just the way Eris herself had been, and then they would disappear.
Leda watched her dad’s face closely. Looking for what, she wasn’t quite sure. An acknowledgment of his relationship with Eris, she supposed.
She saw it right away. He flinched at Leda’s words, just barely, but it was enough. She quickly looked down.
Leda had expected to feel pleased at seeing the proof, right there on her dad’s face—yet all she wanted, suddenly, was to cry.
For the rest of the meal she pushed her food around, letting her dad and Jamie talk about lacrosse and some great save Jamie had made and whether or not the school would hire a new coach next year. As soon as she could, she mumbled an excuse and escaped down the hall to her bedroom.
A knock sounded at her door. “Leda?”
“What?” she snapped, wiping at her eyes. Didn’t her dad understand that she had no desire to see him?
He tentatively pushed the door open. “Can we talk?”
She swiveled her desk chair around but stayed where she was, her legs crisscrossed beneath her.
“I just wanted to check on you,” he said, fumbling. “You haven’t spoken about Eris much, since she died. And then what you said, at dinner …” He trailed off awkwardly. “I just want to make sure you’re okay.”
Of course I’m not okay, Leda thought. She almost pitied how clueless her dad was. She’d mentioned Eris at dinner because she wanted to provoke him, because she was sick of pretending that everything was fine, that a cozy pasta dinner could fix things the way it had when she was little. He was the one who’d started sleeping with her friend, and had betrayed everything their family was built on.
But more than that, Leda was disgusted with herself. She’d been keeping it a secret too, and that made her as culpable as he was.
So many times since Eris’s death she had wanted to confront her mom with the truth. She would march up to Ilara, ready to spill it all: that Dad was a two-timing scumbag and that they needed to leave him. “I have something to tell you,” Leda had said, on more than one occasion, “something important—”
Yet Leda could never bring herself to actually say the words. Eris was already gone, she told herself; what good would it do to tear her family apart now? Each time Ilara looked at her with those dark eyes, so full of love, Leda wavered and fell silent. She didn’t want to be the one to break her mom’s heart.
The child in Leda couldn’t bear the thought of her parents splitting up. Her family might be riddled with secrets and betrayals, but it was still her family. And she would rather keep them together, even if it meant sitting on this secret for the rest of her life.
She had earned this, she thought darkly. This twisting, tormenting guilt was her penance, for what she’d done to Eris.
“I’m fine,” she said tightly, in answer to her dad’s question. What else could she say to him, anyway? Hey, Dad, remember how you were having an affair with my friend, and then she fell off the roof? Guess what? I’m the one who pushed her!
“You and Eris were close, right?” her dad persisted. God, why couldn’t he just go away? And why did everyone keep asking that? Just because she and Eris had some friends in common didn’t mean they were attached at the hip.
“We were friends, but not best friends.” Leda was ready to end this conversation. “Actually, Dad, I have a lot of studying to—”
“Leda,” her dad interrupted, and now he was the one who seemed to be desperate, “There’s something I want to tell you about Eris—”
No, no, no. “Sorry!” Leda stood up abruptly, knocking her chair to the floor, and began frantically throwing items in her massive tote bag. She was wearing floral yoga pants and a black zip-up, but it didn’t matter; she needed to get the hell out of here. She absolutely could not stay and listen to her dad’s fucked-up confession about how he’d been sleeping with her so-called friend. “I’m late to study at Avery’s. Can we talk later?”
Understanding, and a little bit of hurt, flashed in her dad’s eyes. Maybe he knew that she knew. “All right. We’ll talk another time.”
“Thanks! See you later!” she said with false brightness, and ran blindly out of the apartment.
Only after she’d slipped inside a hover did Leda realize she had no idea where she was going. Of course she couldn’t actually head to Avery’s. It was too late for a workout class at Altitude, though she could go to the coffee bar there … but then she might see Avery or, worse, one of Eris’s parents … Leda was far too angry and shaken up for that.
The hover started beeping angrily, indicating that it would charge her for the delay if she didn’t enter a destination soon, but Leda couldn’t be bothered to care. God, what had her dad been thinking, bringing up Eris? Why would he make that kind of confession to his own daughter?
Leda felt like everything was spinning wildly out of control. If she hadn’t sworn never to touch drugs again, she would be searching for a xenperheidren right now; but it had become a matter of pride, and Leda’s pride was matched only by her stubbornness.
She hated thinking about that night. Of course, Leda knew that she was safe: no one could prove what she’d done to Eris. There’d been no cameras on the roof, no way for anyone to find out that it was Leda’s fault. Nothing except her three witnesses.
Come to think of it, maybe she should check in on them, make sure they were sticking to their story.
Suddenly Leda knew exactly where to go. She entered an address in the hover’s system and leaned back, closing her eyes. This would be fun.
WATT
WHAT IF YOU compose the first draft, then I tweak it to sound like me? Watt begged Nadia for at least the tenth time.
“May I remind you that last fall, you gave me firm orders never to write anything for you again. These are instructions from your past self.”
Last fall Watt had been called into the school office for plagiarism, because Nadia’s essay had come out a little too perfect. He’d been more careful since then. These are extenuating circumstances, he thought huffily.
“I’m just the messenger. Take up the fight with your past self.”
“Nadia—”
“That’s it. Per your past instructions, I’m turning off. Wake me up when you have a draft,” Nadia replied, and beeped into silence.