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A smile touched my face as I honestly wouldn’t have minded going right in that moment. “Where is it?”
“Downtown.”
“In Summerville?”
“In Charleston. On the peninsula.”
I blinked at him, tilting my head. “I haven’t been there yet. Not that I’ve really been anywhere but you know.”
“The next time we get a chance, we should go. There’s a lot to see.”
Something caught on in my brain about what he just said. “You drive in from the city every day for school?”
“I pick up Gabriel on the way, too.”
“Isn’t it a long drive?”
“Depends on traffic. Sometimes forty minutes, sometimes an hour.”
My lips popped open. “You drive that far every morning?”
“Every morning.”
I traced the edge of the bean chair, feeling the smooth softness, the coolness of the material against my skin. “That’s a long way to go for a school that doesn’t want us there in the first place.”
“I can’t think of it that way,” he said. “We could all quit when we want, but the school would be no better off and we’d feel awkward knowing all we had to do was stick it out for a few months.”
“You only have the one year,” I said, swinging my head back around to look up at him. “I’ve got a couple more years left to go after this one.”
The fire in his eyes faded a little. “You’ve got us now.”
“You’ll still hang out with me after school is over, right?”
He grinned. “Of course. If you’re not tired of us by then.” He lifted a foot to nudge me with his toe at my leg.
“I think I’m supposed to chop you now,” I said, lifting my own leg and nudging him in the thigh.
“You wouldn’t do that to me,” he said.
“Wouldn’t do what?” Kota’s voice echoed to us as he thumped his way up the stairs. He grinned when he spotted the two of us. “I’m going to forget these are here and trip over them in the night.” He fell into another one across from where Victor and I were sitting. Kota tilted his head back, staring up at the ceiling. “Or I could just sleep like this.”
“I like them,” I said, curling up tighter, hanging my feet off the edge.
“We can’t get too comfortable,” Kota said, picking his head up.
I rolled my eyes. “We’ve got work to do, right?”
He smirked. “You’ll get the hang of it.”
“Then what’s my job? What am I doing today?”
Kota opened his mouth to answer but his face changed and he leaned in the chair, pulling his cell phone out of his pocket. He poked at it, scanning the screen. “Well, I, unfortunately, have to go.”
“Where?” I asked.
He typed something into his phone. “Academy.”
Should have known. Did it mean there was something about the school? Other Academy business? Was one of the other guys in trouble? I pressed my lips together to hold back the questions. If he could have told me, he probably would have said so.
Kota released a small grunt, stood up, looking at Victor. “Can you make sure she gets inside?”
“Of course.” Victor hauled himself up until he was standing, dropping a hand down close to me, palm up and open and waiting. “I get to take you home.”
I twisted my lips. I knew I should go home. I’d been gone for so long that it felt awkward to be going back. Has it only been for a day? It felt much longer and yet it all happened so fast.
I put my hand in Victor’s. “So my job is to go home?” I didn’t want to sound disappointed but for some reason I thought there was something else I needed to do. I didn’t want to go back yet. I wanted to be with them.
Victor laughed, gripping my hand and tugging me to my feet. “I’ll take you anywhere you’d like to go. Name it.”
“Take her home, Vic,” Kota said, utilizing his command tone. “No detours.”
Victor rolled his eyes. “But first, we should get you back.”
I caught the feeling that this was the plan in the first place, except perhaps Kota had meant to come along and now he couldn’t.
Victor’s thumb drifted over the back of my hand. Kota collected his green messenger bag and dug his keys out of his pocket. “I should be back tonight. I’ll text to check in, Sang, okay?”
“Okay,” I replied, with my free hand touching my finger to my lower lip. Did I need to be checked in with? Should I be doing something like that?
Kota smiled, catching a lock of my hair between his fingers. He tucked it behind my ear, and it held in place. “Listen to Victor.”
“Was I not going to?”
They both laughed. Kota headed to the stairs. “Let’s get out of here before my mom gets home and she has to ask why I’m not taking you with me.”
He kept secrets from his mother. What would he say later if she asked? Would he lie?
I collected my book bag downstairs as Victor picked up his overnight bag. Now that the house was nearly empty, it felt as if the night before might have only happened in my head. How sad.
I stood with Victor outside in Kota’s drive as Kota started his car and turned onto the street, disappearing around the bend. The sleepover was done. Back to reality.
I walked in the back door to my house with my heart thundering and my knees shaking. Victor was climbing to the roof. We were back to this secret Academy protection. This time I had the disadvantage of being gone for a day and my nerves were on full tilt as I didn’t have a sense of location approximation on my mother. If she was at all awake and anywhere else besides inside her room, I could be in trouble.
My father’s car wasn’t in the garage so I knew he wasn’t home yet. I stood near the back door, listening to movements in the house, trying to re-acclimate. Music from a radio drifted toward me. Was Marie home? It had to be hers since mine was broken. No television, but it could mean my mother was asleep. Or awake and roaming the house.
I slipped up the back stairwell, tiptoeing to my room. I didn’t want to alert my mother I was there before I let Victor inside if I could help it.
When I made it to the upstairs hallway, the sound of music drifted not from Marie’s room, but from mine. I froze in the hallway. Was Marie in my room? Was my mother? Did something happen? I strained to hear any noise, any movement to confirm the location of either my sister or my mother. The only thing that made me hesitate checking with either of them first was the risk of
getting into trouble and leaving Victor on the roof waiting.
My door was pulled open from the inside. I took a step back, pressing myself to the wall as if that would conceal me in some way.
Victor poked his head out. He checked the front stairs and turned to find me against the wall.
I pressed my hand to my heart to try to calm it. “Victor,” I whispered, “you’re not supposed to...”
“It’s okay,” he said. He held out a hand to me and winked. “Come on, princess. You were taking too long. I can’t wait to show you.”
“Show me what?” I asked, reaching for his hand.
His fire eyes sparked and his long fingers enveloped mine as he lured me into my room. He shut the door behind us and stepped away from me, putting his back to the door frame, his eyes expectant.
I sensed differences in stages. The air wasn’t stale, as if left alone for a while, but electrified with warmth of recent visitors. The air smelled of cypress and vanilla and berries and spice, familiar. At first glance though, it was all the same. There was still the single bookshelf against the wall, the broken stereo on top. There was still the same bed next to the window, the bed made with the soft green comforter. Or was it?
I tiptoed closer. It wasn’t the same comforter. The stitching was different and the color was a couple of shades off. It was slight but to me, it was noticeable.
It wasn’t the same bed, either. It was bigger, about a foot wider and a little longer.
I angled my head to try to get a different perspective, unsure of my own memory and my own eyes.
A second look at the bookshelf forced me to turn my attention to it. The bookshelf was the same dark brown color, but it was definitely wider and taller. The books on the shelf had been replaced with new copies, plus additional volumes by the same authors, plus some extra titles I didn’t recognize.
The stereo, too, was different. The music that played was a piano piece. I recognized another song by Yuko Ohigashi, who I’d mentioned was one of my favorite composers, but it was a tune I knew I hadn’t had the chance to download yet.
With my mouth hanging open in surprise, my hand drifted to the edge of the bookshelf. My fingers hovered over the wood but stopped short. The top was intricately carved.
