It should have been obvious.
“Because—?because I’m her brother.”
“But . . . you’re not related by blood . . .” she said.
I gaped at her, unable to breathe.
“Is that what Juliet told you?”
And something inside me snapped then. As if I were a lock. Finally coming undone after just the right combination of clicks.
Chapter Fifty-One
Beas’s bicycle is leaning against the fence by the time I arrive at George’s. I find them both in the clearing behind his house, laying a kindling foundation for the bonfire.
“Did you walk here?” George asks, eyeing my muddy shoes as he breaks a stick over his knee.
“I needed to stretch my muscles,” I say.
“How very Elizabeth Bennet of you,” Beas says. Her hair is pulled up in a knot on her head, her bangs poufed in a wave that grazes her eyebrows. They stand and clap for me as I set my bag in the grass. “Stop,” I laugh, waving them off.
George rolls up a newspaper and sticks one of Daisy’s articles about the tournament between the slats of kindling.
“George, I saw you making amends with Margeaux today,” Beas notes, sharpening a stick with a Swiss army knife. “Did you manage to bury the hatchet?”
“Hardly. I’m pretty sure she still wants to cut me,” George says, stuffing in another tight ball of newspaper.
“I’m pretty sure that’s not what she wants to do to you,” I mutter under my breath.
“What?” Beas breaks out into hysterical laughter. “Are you serious? Margeaux Templeton is keen on George?”
“Almost certainly,” I say, settling on the stump of an old tree.
George’s jaw falls open. “You think Margeaux is stuck on me?” He taps a book of matches against his palm, then adds thoughtfully, “She’s actually kind of cute, I guess . . .”
Beas and I catch each other’s side glances. I smother a merciless burst of laughter.
“So are you ready for Variant Innovation?”
“I wanted to do the music Variant, obviously, but working with Dr. Cliffton disqualified it. So I have something else,” he says, lighting the match to the paper. “Underwhelming.”
Beas raises her stick threateningly toward him. “Show us, Mackelroy.”
George pours us two mugs of tea from his thermos and spreads several pouches of Variants at our feet before picking one up and dusting it over a sprig of mint. When he dips the mint into the tea, it instantly hisses and crackles, like ice cubes clinking together, and the mugs become frosted and chilled. “Voila,” he says. “Mint iced tea. Try it.”
Beas and I clink our mugs together and then take a sip.
“Mmm,” I say.
“Amazing, George,” Beas echoes.
“It’s really just a glorified version of ice,” George says, kicking the dirt. “But I’m hoping to make a version for human use. A companion to the Warming Variants, for cooling off in the summer.”
“Impressive. How did you do it?” I ask.
“Mint root,” he says.
“Mint root,” I note. I’ve taken to hauling my Shakespeare book with me everywhere, and I pull it from my bag. “I bet I’ll find it in here.”
