Page 36 of Reign

Sylvie’s brown eyes shutter. Her hand drops from her hair.

“That’s not what I—it’s been a rough few months, and it’s shocking, but Dad’s been a steady source throughout it all.” I take a breath. Sort my thoughts. Sylvie has no idea about Mom’s hidden history, secret societies, and Briarcliff. She’s a reflection of last year’s life, when I mourned and partied and lost myself in swirls of meaningless, bottomless, blinding glitter.

And she nearly lost her life because of it.

Before I can add anything to this train wreck of a conversation, she says, “But here you are with a baby! It’s great that you call her your sister even though you’re not related. I’m sure Pete’s beside himself with pride that he was finally able to have a daughter of his own. And you don’t feel left out? That’s loyalty right there.”

I literally feel my throat bob as I try to keep my head high. “The opposite, actually. My family feels full.”

Shockingly, I mean it. There will always be a Mom-sized hole in my heart, and maybe it takes confronting my past in the form of a former best friend to realize it, but it’s Christmas Eve and I’m actually looking forward to dinner with Dad, Lynda, and Blair.

“Forget it.” She sighs, pulling on a hank of hair—a habit I recognize, and I’m wondering where I went wrong in the conversation. “Matt should be out of the bathroom soon. I’m planning to have our coffees before closing.” She glances at the register, where one person stands between her and that promise. “If this lady moves her ass.”

The woman hears, and peers over her shoulder to glare at Sylvie and ask her where her Christmas spirit is. Sylvie quips, “It’s at the bottom of the fucking cup of coffee I’d like to order.”

I shuffle uncomfortably beside the stroller.

Sylvie ignores the lady as she huffs and turns back to me. “We were such shits back then, weren’t we? Getting into all sorts of trouble. I’m glad to see you looking so great.”

I cover my surprise at her perspective of me. “You too, Syl. You look…” Fantastic. Bright. Flushed, full, and happy. Yet the words don’t come. Instead, I croak out, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything.”

Space opens up in front of the register, but Sylvie doesn’t move. Just stares at me. Finally, she says, “You never called.”

“I was forbidden. And I … I didn’t know if you even wanted to talk to me.”

“If you’d tried, you would’ve figured out I was desperate to talk to you.”

“God, Sylvie, I—your parents were threatening to sue. Lawyers told me to stay away. Cops warned me not to go near you.” I stop, studying my old friend, a girl so waifish and sallow the last time I saw her now brimming with health and unfeigned joy as soon as she mentioned Matt.

Ivy. In her I see Ivy, and I falter, my death-grip on the stroller’s handle the only thing keeping me upright. The cruel irony isn’t lost on me, how a friend I nearly killed picked herself up and righted her life, and the friend that was killed had her goodness snuffed out.

I am a magnet of misfortune, that much is clear. I look to Blair and choke back a sob. “I never wanted it to be like this.”

“Me neither.” Sylvie’s soft voice drifts closer as she puts a hand on my shoulder and squeezes.

The register opens, but we remain in a stasis of distant comfort. Sylvie’s hand on my shoulder. My eyes to the ground while my arm hangs limply between her squeeze and Blair’s stroller handle.

Grumbling sounds at my back. Sylvie looks over my shoulder, blows the impatient patron a kiss, then drops her hand from my shoulder and steps up to the cashier.

She places her order for two coffees. “You?” she asks me.

“Oh—peppermint white mocha.”

Sylvie smiles, saying to the barista, “If she hasn’t changed since last Christmas, she’d also like whipped cream and candy cane sprinkles.”

I smile wanly. “’Tis the season.”

Sylvia waves away my offer to pay, and there’s too many people behind me to argue the point, so I allow it, shuffling with her to the other side of the counter to wait for our drinks and finagling the stroller to fit between us.

“I forgive you,” Sylvie says.

I glance up from Blair—still snoozing, always oblivious.

“Most of all,” Sylvie continues, “I forgive myself. It took a long time for me to do that.”

Shaking my head, I say, “It was my fault. I pressured you to experiment with me. I hated reality so much, yet I didn’t want to enter a forced dreamland on my own—and I pushed you into a nightmare. I’m sorry, Sylvie. Every time I say it, think it, it doesn’t seem enough, but I can’t find other words. The thought of you on that floor...”

Sylvie shushes me by covering her hand on my own. “I take it you haven’t forgiven yourself yet.”

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