Hello again! This chapter is in need of some serious tearing-apart because some parts are very awkward. Here it is.
***
Chapter Two
Later in the day, when Sky is out on the veranda with Rory on Lex’s orders to prepare Rory for the Pilgrimage, Brinn decides to go down to the lake and feed the ducks. Of course, she recruits both Hannie and me to join her for the job, which means I have to bring Cupcake along.
We pass by Sky and Rory on our way out. Brinn waves goodbye to them. I stick my tongue out. Cupcake skips the entire way there, holding my hand so my arm swings along with hers. Cupcake is a thirteen-year-old girl not much taller than me with green hair and pale skin and long eyelashes over purple eyes. She is all color, which was why we decided to give her the nickname Cupcake. We asked her many times before about her hair and eyes, but she never seemed to want to talk about life before she came here. Brinn and I had a hunch why she didn’t, judging from the fading bruises we had found on her when we were giving her a bath a year ago when she arrived. But we never pushed her, just let her be herself, which happened to be someone with the mind of a seven-year-old.
Cupcake isn’t annoying, per se. Just hard to keep up with.
“Where are we going?” she asks as we make our way down the hill which is the backyard.
“The lake,” Brinn answers, waving at Blake and Teddy, two other occupants of House. “We already told you that before.”
“Oh, right, right! To feed the duckies!” She giggles and pulls on my arm so hard I wonder if she’ll rip it right out of the socket. “Don’t you love feeding the duckies, Divvy?”
Although I have to admit, her nickname for me is the cutest thing ever. “Uh-huh. That’s how I always spend my free time.”
Brinn glares at me. “Do not make fun of me.”
“It’s difficult not to, darling,” Hannie points out.
The only other person down at the lake is Lila, our newest tenant. She glances up when we arrive. Brinn smiles kindly at her, but Lila just looks away and scoots further from where we position ourselves. Lila is having a hard time coping with the fact that she’s never going home. She was too frightened to go on with the Pilgrimage and after she refused, she spent two whole weeks locked up in her room, only surviving because Brinn dropped off meals in front of her door. Only in the past few days Lila has started to come out more, although she does spend most of her time here at the lake on her own. I’m beginning to wonder if she’ll ever get used to this.
We crouch down at the water’s edge, at least, all of us except for Hannie. She claims her dress will get dirty. We take turns reaching into the bag of duck feed and toss it into the water. Sure enough, the ducks begin to congregate around us. Cupcake gets snapped at by a hungry one, but instead of freaking out like I would have, she giggles and pulls on my sleeve.
“They are so cute!” she squeals.
“Mhm,” I agree.
I turn around to check on Hannie, and nearly fall into the water when I find her standing right behind me.
“So what do you think of the new guy?” she asks. Her perfectly symmetrical features kill me once again with their beauty. For not the first time I think of what I would give to trade my face for an older, more mature one. My own oval, pink face seems to not have aged past eleven.
“Rory?”
“Uh-huh.” She grins. “He’s pretty cute, isn’t he?”
I sputter. Brinn, the evil thing, chuckles under her breath.
“Well, I-I guess so, yeah.” I turn away to hide my flushed face. “He has a girlfriend, though. Back home.”
“Ah, I see.” Hannie sighs. “But what the girlfriend doesn’t know won’t hurt her, right? Rory and I could have a little something. It’ll only last as long as the Pilgrimage takes.”
Out of nowhere, I feel something rising in my chest, something that makes me feel like snapping at Hannie. So I do.
“He shouldn’t have any distractions on the Pilgrimage, Hannah,” I tell her, knowing my use of her full name will irk her.
Hannie is quiet for a second.
“I don’t think that-“
“And we’re not supposed to try to sway his wishes,” I add.
Hannie harrumphs behind me.
“You’re jealous, aren’t you? You want him for yourself?”
“Of course not!” I whip my head around to glare at her. “Not everyone is always jealous of you! I’m just reminding you of the rules and trying to keep Rory’s best interests in mind.”
Hannie is frowning at me, her arms folded, the skin on her shoulders flushed. “He might not even make it through the Pilgrimage, anyway.”
“Most do,” Brinn notes quietly.
“Sky didn’t.”
All of us, even Cupcake, are silent. We all know exactly why Sky didn’t make it. I wasn’t here at the time. But he had come about eight months before me, and attempted to go on the Pilgrimage. He was fourteen years old, and Brinn and Lex were the only ones with him on the trip. He had a little crush on Brinn which didn’t really affect his decision until one night, he started to cry, and Brinn was his available and willing shoulder. After that, he decided to stay. No one knows if he had fallen in love with her or if it was just because of her kindness, but something about her made him want to stay. It’s a touchy subject for both him and Brinn, so no one talks about it much.
“I should go get started on dinner,” Brinn says abruptly, getting up. Her face and neck are red. It’s endearing.
Cupcake looks up at her with wide purple eyes.
“Time to go already?” Her puppy dog look works on everyone. Except for Brinn.
“Yes. Come on.” Brinn holds out her hand for Cupcake to take. “You can make the pudding.”
“Yay pudding!” Cupcake hops up with all the energy of a young rabbit and follows Brinn back up the hill.
Hannie and I lag behind, walking in an awkward silence. Hannie is my best friend besides Brinn and I hate arguing with her. We don’t argue much, but when we do it’s the strangest feeling. It’s a feeling like I’m being held back from something. We don’t talk when we’re mad at each other and it seems like at that one time is when I always feel the need to speak to her. When people say “You don’t know what you have until it’s gone,” I understand it with a completeness I wasn’t even aware of. Brinn is good for talking to, but not about things like clothes and boys and parties. Brinn is more on the serious, kind side. Hannie is the fun-loving, gossip side. If one of them is missing it’s like I’ve lost a limb, and it makes me feel terribly dependent, something I definitely do not want to be.
Sky and Rory have not moved from their spot when we return, but Rory looks up when we pass by. He flashes a hesitant smile and I smile back, and then stop, wondering if Hannie is also smiling at him. Hannie goes in the kitchen to help with dinner and I, not feeling well enough to deal with that, go up into the room I share with Cupcake. Once in, I close the door and open the window all the way. Then I search through the records collection before picking out a French album and putting it on the phonograph between the two wardrobes.
I sigh. I take off my sweater and my jeans and pull on an old pair of Sky’s shorts that I stole months ago before collapsing on Cupcake’s bed. Her bed is right by the window because she likes to sleep with the breeze so when she’s not here I like to lie there on my stomach with my eyes closed, willing myself to go to sleep. This time, I focus on my breathing and let the soft voice of the French woman lull me to sleep.
I supposed I actually do finally take a nap because the next thing I know, Cupcake is shaking me awake saying that dinner is ready. I let her drag be downstairs, knowing I look a complete mess in the tank top with shorts and my platinum blonde hair an absolute mess. But of course, when we reach the dining room and I spot Rory in the seat right next to mine, I become immediately embarrassed about my appearance. However, he doesn’t seem to mind, as he nods and grins at me while I help Cupcake into her seat. I hardly look at him as I sit down.
Dinner is a loud affair as always, what with two dozen people from the age of ten to twenty-two sitting in the same room with one thousand different conversations going on. And of course, we can’t have one meal without one of the boys throwing food. Lex scolds them tiredly. I can see dark circles under Lex’s eyes and his reading glasses teeter on the edge of his nose as he reads some papers at the head of the table. I wonder for a moment if they’re letters from Miss Georgina.
Miss Georgina is another person like Lex; she takes in Poor Ones as well. She lives in town, which is about a forty-minute walk from here, and has about half the number of Poor Ones as Lex does. All of us have this speculation that she and Lex used to be in a relationship when they were younger. Miss Georgina, whenever we see her, likes to tease Lex, who tends to look at her far longer than he should. Everyone knows that Lex is in love with her except for, perhaps, she herself. No one talks to him about it, though, because even though Lex is, for all purposes, our surrogate father, it would be weird to get involved in his love life. After all, kids don’t get involved in their parents’ love lives.
Lex’s handsome face turns into a grimace and he sets the papers to the side gently. He swallows and catches my eye. I smile, and when he smiles back I’m assured that my charm hasn’t worn on him. I’m just as much of a Daddy’s girl as I’ve always been, even back on Earth.
“Sky,” he says, turning to his first assistant. “Can you do me a favor?”
“Nope,” Sky replies with his mouth full of mashed potatoes. “You already told me to go find that Tuesday fellow.”
I jerk back in my seat as if I’ve been punched. What in the world does Tuesday have to do with anything? If I never saw him again, it would be too soon, but this soon and I would get whiplash. Not that Tuesday is any sort of exciting; in fact, he’s the most boring person I’ve ever met. Boring people are, well… boring. I don’t like boring people.
“Oh, right.” Lex sighs, his eyes cutting to the papers by his plate before focusing them on me. “Div, then.”
“Sorry, I have things to do,” I say quickly.
Lex, Sky, and Brinn raise their eyebrows at me.
“What kinds of things?” Lex asks.
“Oh, you know… stuff. Like, uh, like… like not doing what you’re about to ask me to do.” Not my smoothest explanation ever, but whoever said I was smooth?
“Oh, I see. Well, you’ll have to cancel those plans,” Lex says. He takes a sip of his iced tea and then spits it back into the cup. “Brinn, did you make this?” he exclaims.
Brinn lifts one corner of her mouth up in a half-smile. “No, Cupcake did.”
We look at Cupcake, who is too busy constructing a mini Mount Everest with he mashed potatoes to notice our stares.
“Don’t let her do that again,” Lex orders. “Anyway, Div.” Darn, I had hoped he forgot about me. “Here’s what I need you to do after dinner. Rory needs a suitcase of clothes and a bag of personal items and then show him to his room for the night and the showers. Easy enough?” His gaze dares me to disagree.
“Yes, sir.”
“I knew there was a reason for me making you my second assistant. Besides your charm, of course.”
Sky snorts. He’s convinced I have no charms.
“Shut up, hippie,” I say to him.
“Watch yourself, woman, or I shall bring my whip upon thee,” he shoots back.
“Oh, Sky, you’re the slave master this week? I thought you two were doing the old married couple this week,” Lex comments conversationally.
“Oh, we were, but we got divorced and I made her my slave,” Sky explains.
“I see.”
“Hey, Div!” Hannie calls from a little ways down the table.
“What?” I call back.
She grins at me, red lips curving into that simple yet stunning smile I’m so familiar with. “Teddy threw a red shirt in the wash with our unmentionables. Payback time?”
I grin back. “Payback time.”
And just like that, we’re cool again.
*
After helping Brinn clear off table, I lead Rory into the deepest, darkest corner of the first floor of the house where the huge closet we call the Wardrobe is hidden behind large oak doors. The room is incredibly bright. Everything in it is white. The carpet is white, the walls are white, the drawers and doors and cabinets are white, and the plush couches are white. A large white couch separates the left side from the right side, and on either side of the couch is a white chest of drawers. From the corner of my eye I see Rory looking around in awe.
“This is ridiculous,” he says. “Even my sister doesn’t have this much space for her clothes.”
I chuckle dryly. “Well, when you’ve got people coming nearly every day, you need a big place to stash extra clothes. Know what I mean?”
“I guess.”
“Anyway.” I go over to the left side of room where boys’ clothes are and open the first closet. “What size are you? Sky is about the same as you, and he usually picks clothes from this one.”
Rory comes up next to me and leans into the closet, checking the tags on the shirts and jeans. He is quite close to me so I scoot away a bit. I don’t feel comfortable with boys I don’t know well getting close to me. “This is fine, this is my size.”
“Oh, good.” I get on my knees and reach under the clothes and pull out a black suitcase. “Fill this with enough clothes for about two or three weeks.”
Rory widens his eyes at me. “This is going to take three weeks?”
“Oh, longer than that,” I say as I get up from the floor. “Especially if we run into trouble, which we probably will. But we should get the chance to wash clothes and stuff, so you only need to pack that much.” Sighing and stretching out my calves in order to rid the room of awkwardness, I nod my head toward the chest of drawers on the boys’ side. “There are pajamas, socks, and… you know, underwear. Boxers and briefs.” I smirk. “So, just fill ‘er up and… yeah.”
“Thanks.”
“Mhm.”
I lie back on the couch and count the tiny tiles on the ceiling while I wait for Rory to finish. After counting up to thirty, I get bored and decide to play with my hair. Brinn cut my hair a week ago and made it a bit of a bob right above my shoulders with layers. At first I liked it, but later on I realized it was incredibly difficult to keep up in a ponytail. I’ve never liked wearing my hair down because I don’t like the way it curls when it dries. But Hannie said it looks pretty down and that it makes me look older. Well, forget looking older. I’d rather have my ponytail back. I shake my hair out and comb it through with my fingers, hoping to make it look more presentable. But it bounces right back into place, resting against my cheeks. I groan and deem the project hopeless.
“You know who you remind me of?”
I jump at Rory’s voice breaking the silence and blink at him.
“Huh? Who?” I sit up.
“Marilyn Monroe.”
I flush in spite of myself, flattered at being compared to someone so beautiful. “I’m pretty sure she looked older than twelve.”
“I meant your hair.” Rory looks down into his full suitcase, cheeks turning red.
Crush my dreams of looking pretty, why don’t you?
“Huh?” I figure it best to play it stupid.
“It looks like her hair style, you know? And the color, too.”
I squint at him and he shrinks back under my stare.
“Are you metro sexual?” I ask straight out.
He makes a weird noise like a strangled moose. “Wha-“
“Well, you noticed my hair style.”
“I grew up with three sisters, so I kind of pick up that stuff,” he says and then turns to the task of zipping up the suitcase. I take note that his hands are unsteady.
“Oh, I see.” Actually, I don’t see, but anyway. Either way, he is metro sexual. “You done?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Great. Follow me.” Hopping up off the couch, I head over to the back of the Wardrobe where there is a door that I know leads to the items closet.
I fetch a bag for Rory to pack and he does so without making any more random comments. Funnily, I can’t decide if that makes me happy or not. After that, we go upstairs and to the back left corner of the house to where the boys’ showers are.
“Someone should have laid out some fresh clothes for you,” I say with glance at his current attire: a black sweatshirt proclaiming “LAKE KIOWA HIGH” in white letters, a pair of khaki shorts and white sneakers. “After you’re done, your room is straight down this hall and the last one on the right. Got it?”
He nods.
“Need anything else?”
He stares at me for a moment, his gaze switching from my eyes to my shorts, and then finally he answers, “No, I’m fine.”
“Okay, then.” I clap my hands and rock on my feet. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning, then. Bright and early.”
“How early exactly?”
“Ten o’clock sharp.”
With a blink, Rory says, “Apparently your early is very different compared to my early.”
I smirk. “Well, we are in Dream, aren’t we?”
*
Hannie stops by Cupcake’s and my room before we get in bed. She’s already in her pajamas as well, pink checkered shorts with a pink tank top. Her feet are clad in pink fuzzy slippers.
“You guys all packed?” she asks, gingerly sitting down on the edge of my messy bed.
“Yep, yep, yep!” Cupcake answers. “Divvy helped me pack my rhinoceros socks!”
Hannie stares at me in inquiry and I give her a nod that says, “Yes, I did fill an entire suitcase with Cupcake’s fifty pairs of rhinoceros socks.”
“What are you wearing tomorrow, Div?” Hannie asks me.
“My Alice in Wonderland dress, of course.”
“That old thing?”
That dress is the one only thing I’ve kept from my home. My first home. On Earth. I call it that because I liken my experience arriving here to going down the rabbit hole. On that particular day, when I ate the peanut butter cookie that read, “Eat Me,” which transported me here, I happened to be wearing a blue and white dress, and ever since, I have claimed that Lewis Carroll’s book was a prophecy about me. Most people disagree.
“Yes. I love it.”
“Div,” Hannie sighs. “First of all, that dress does not look like Alice’s dress.”
“Yes, it does. It’s blue.”
“No, it’s white, honey.”
“White with blue fabric on it.”
“Anyway.” She glares at me. “Second of all, you’ve got to admit that it’s a bit sad that you can still fit a dress that you wore when you were eleven.”
“Well excuse me, Hannie,” I snap. “I am a bit sensitive about my appearance, if you haven’t noticed.”
“I’m serious,” she says. “It’s like you stopped aging when you were twelve or something.”
“No, I have-“
“Boobs, I know. But Div, you’re only a twenty-something A. And plus, your height-“
“Goodnight, Hannie. We all need our rest for tomorrow.” My mouth is set in a thin line. At least, it feels like it is.
“Okay.” She’s surrendering. Once again. “Goodnight. See you tomorrow.”
We give each other a kiss on the cheek, and Hannie does the same to Cupcake, and then she leaves, closing the door softly behind her. As I get into bed, Cupcake turns out the lights, something we’ve agreed on since we first started sharing the room. The only light comes from the moon outside the open window and it illuminates the side of Cupcake’s face as she turns to look at me. Her round, childish face in the dark makes me think of scary movies, only it seems impossible to picture Cupcake as some creeper dead child.
“Divvy?”
“Yes?” My voice comes out muffled; my head is buried in my fluffy yellow pillow.
“Remember that book you read me before? The Little Prince?”
“Yeah, why?” I turn on my back and arrange my sheets so one of my legs sticks out, bare.
“Could you read it to me again sometime?”
“Sure.”
“Thank you. I like that book very much.”
Trying not to dwell on the reason why Cupcake would like a story that bashes grown-ups, I turn towards the wall and close my eyes.
