Page 33 of Cashmere Cruelty

“It’s okay, June,” I reassure my best friend as we pack up the last of my clothes. “Really.”

“Doesn’t feel okay to me,” June grumbles. She drops cross-legged on the bed with Mr. Buttons in her lap. “None of this does.”

I go sit near her. Like this, with her cheeks all puffed up, she looks like a very pouty hamster. “It’ll be fine. I promise.”

For a moment, June doesn’t answer—just keeps tormenting Mr. Buttons’s ears like they’re made of playdough. Not that he minds.

“What if you didn’t go?” she blurts out. “What if you stayed?”

I think back to yesterday. To the black van, the way its doors had swallowed me whole. To the men inside, both armed, both violent, both ready to do God only knows what to me.

“I can’t, Jay. You know I can’t.”

“I’ll get a gun!” June tries. “We both will. We’ll splurge on a nice security system and?—”

“And it won’t matter one bit,” I cut her off gently. “These aren’t the kind of guys who’ll let a locked door stop them. And I can’t risk your life, too.”

“I can protect myself,” June objects. “I’ll protect you, too. You and Nugget.”

“From the actualmob?” I laugh, but not unkindly. The image of June Evans guarding the door with a Kalashnikov is certainly one I’d like to see.

“I don’t care if Don fucking Corleone shows up—I can take him.”

“I’m sure you could, babe.” I pull her into a hug. June makes a noise like a kettle close to boiling, but doesn’t resist. “Thanks, Jay. It means a lot to me.”

“But you’re still going.”

I take a breath. “Yeah. Yeah, I am.”

When I pull back, I can see that June’s eyes are watery. Goddammit—she’s gonna make me cry, too.

But then she rubs her face with her sleeve and says, like nothing happened, “Alright then. Let’s go pack your books.”

June Evans.Ever since first grade, she’s been my rock. Whenever the other kids were picking on me, making fun of my name and my proverbial bad luck, June was the only one who stood up for me. She came swooping into the playground like a knight in shining armor, waving a stick like a battle ax and scattering my bullies as if they were just some squawking seagulls.

We became inseparable after that.

When the kids switched to making fun of both of us—the unfortunate combination of our names was just too tasty to resist—I felt so guilty. But June never held it against me.

And so, whenever a kid would swagger up to us, snickering the classroom-wide joke—“Hey, April and June! Where did you leave May?”—June would promptly answer, “Right here,” raise a fist, and punch the little fucker’s lights out.

I can’t count the times that’s gotten us into trouble. But we were never alone, and that was all that mattered.

“Where do you want this?” June calls to me from the kitchen island, holding up my Vivienne Westwood catwalk collection book. Third-hand, but worth every penny.

“Brown box,” I answer distractedly, dusting a pile of old sewing books. Stitching, pattern techniques—you name it, it’s there.

“Roger.” In goes Vivienne, then Vuitton. “You’re taking those, too?”

I falter. On one hand, I might not be at Matvey’s that long. I could keep my treasures where I’ve always kept them: here, safely in June’s care.

On the other hand…

“I think so,” I mutter, brushing dust off the covers uncertainly. Ever since my belly grew the size of a basketball, I’ve neglected them: myotherbabies.

The books Grandma left me.

Wordlessly, June picks up another box. I keep staring at the covers. Some leatherbound, some not bound at all. Yellowed pages fraying at the edges. Books my grandma collected over the years, in a bunch of different languages, including her native French.

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