Page 105 of Loaded

Before I can even answer, a little girl pops around the end of the row and starts to cry. “Mom!”

Her mother’s right behind her, thankfully. “What’s wrong, sweetie?”

“Look,” she says. “It’s a monster. Amonster.”

I’m horrified. The little girl’s pointing right at Octavia.

“Don’t look at her, sweetheart. Mom won’t let her hurt you.” The woman grabs her little girl’s shoulder and starts to steer her away.

“Excuse me,” I say. “How dare you?—”

But Octavia’s hand drops on my forearm, and she shakes her head. It’s small. It’s tight. But her eyes don’t even look distressed. They lookresigned.“Kids say stuff. It’s fine.”

“But that mother should not have told her?—”

“Bea, I love that you care, but really. It’s fine.”

My heart’s racing so fast that I can hear a ringing in my ears. “It’s not fine.” And then, like a big, fat baby, I’m crying in the middle of the store. “How could she say that?”

Octavia tilts her head, her eyes welling with tears, probably in response to my own. “It happens a lot. It’s really okay.”

But it’s not.

It’s really, really not.

The world is such an ugly place, but not because of Octavia.

Because of mothers who say the wrong thing. Because of children who are taught the wrong things. Because of people who only look at the superficial. Because of beauty standards that don’t recognize anything but the ideal.

Then I remember what I said to Easton when thosewomen made fun of my pajamas. Maybe, like I felt then, she’s just tootiredto address it. Why should it be her job to fix all these ugly people?

But I feel the need to make sure she knows it’s not her fault. I have to make sure she knows that she’s not the problem. “I love your face,” I say. “I love it so much, I could marry it.”

A single tear rolls down Octavia’s cheek, but she swipes it away so fast, it’s almost like it was never there. “Thank you, Bea.”

Then we walk to the register, pay for our batteries, and leave. We’re all the way to the car when I realize that she didn’t buy her lip gloss. I almost suggest we go back in, but I think that maybe, just maybe, she had lost her interest in it.

What kind of person rubs salt in that wound?

I leave it be.

When we get back, the microphone works just fine, thankfully. If it had been some other kind of problem, it could have derailed everything. When Octavia sings the words?—

All the joy inside of me,

All the hope for a brighter day,

The monster consumed it all,

I became beast and also prey.

Istart to cry all over again. Luckily, it’s not time for my part yet. And when that time comes, I’ve gotten myself together enough to do my lines. Octavia’s voicesinging the harmony rises, higher, higher, higher, so high in parts that I’m not sure how she can sound so gorgeous at such a high pitch, but the words ring truer to me than ever before after one tiny moment in what must be the entirety of her life.

The world is dark and terrifying.

That much, at least, was true.

But those who spoke of beauty,

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