Page 46 of Nobody in Particular

“Even though I was obviously in the middle of something?” She says it teasingly, wearing a broad smile. Well, in my defense, she always seems to be in the middle of something, and at least she hasn’t promised the piano to exclude me from their time together.

I fold my arms. “Are you telling me you’re reneging on our bargain? You did promise to make me a brilliant pianist if I taught you to skate, if I recall correctly.”

“Ahh,” she says with a wry grin. “So when you say you want to teach me, what you mean is you want me in your debt.”

“I ask for very little from you, you know.”

I’m still smiling, but at this, her expression loses its mirth. She studies me for a beat too long. Just long enough to confirm shecaught the double meaning in my words. Of course she did. She never seems to miss the unspoken layers behind my words. “I know,” she says. There’s guilt there. I’m certain of it. “But I actually promised Caroline I’d practice every night this weekend.”

I hover by the seat until she shuffles to one side to make room for me to join her. Sitting, I lean my head against her shoulder and speak in my very best wheedling tone, just as I would have weeks ago, before she ever vanished. “Counterpoint: you like me more than Caroline, so don’t you want to keep your promise to me more?”

“Who said I like you more than Caroline?”

I lift my head up, indignant. “Don’t you?”

“Well, yeah. But that’s not the point.”

“What is the point?”

We’re pressed together tightly, even more so than when we sat side by side at the palace, because the school’s piano bench is rather more narrow. So, when Danni turns to look at me, her face is closer to mine than it’s ever been before. Almost as close as Alfie’s was, right before he kissed me. But where this level of closeness with him had made my stomach clench with discomfort, with Danni, it gives me a pleasant, swooping sensation.

“I don’t remember,” she says, her voice softening and her eyes scanning my face from eyes to lips.

“So?” I ask, swallowing, and it’s a thousand questions in one.

She looks at me for a little longer, and time starts to feel weighed down.

“Screw it, let’s do it,” Danni says, and for a confused, scattered moment I don’t know what she’s referring to. But then she collects her music books and closes the piano, and I remember the reason I’m here. Ice-skating. Of course.

Cheeks blazing, I’m halfway to the door before she finishes collecting her stuff. “Chop chop,” I say over my shoulder. “Lots to do.”

She gives me a rueful smile and hurries to catch up.

TWENTYDANNI

My heart is a fucking traitor. I know it is, because even though my mind knows damn well that space from Rose is a smart move, I’ve never felt as high in my life as tonight, now that she’s sought me out.

Even worse, my heart’s actually trying to convince my brain that the situation here is more nuanced than my brain figured. Because even though this morning it seemed really obvious that the distance has been doing me wonders (for example, it’s now been forty-nine hours since I last visited Alfie’s profile to look at photos of him and count the ways he’s better than me), and I should tell her I have a date with a med drama tonight and I’m too busy to see her, I can’t. Because now that Rose is here, and I remember the richness of her voice, and the way her eyes crinkle when she looks at me, and the timbre of her laugh, I’m done for. I’ll do whatever she wants. I’ll do anything to feel happy like this. Especially after some of the lowest weeks I’ve ever lived.

The school’s ice rink is right by the edge of the forest, far enough away from the closest building that it’s kind of eerie to head over to it in the dark. It’s hard to be too freaked out when Rose’s bodyguard—the shorter one, who Rose told me once is her favorite—is hanging out a stone’s throw away from us, at least. He stops outside of the door to guard it, and Rose and I head on inside, where she flicks a switch and floods the small rink with light.

“I’m surprised we’re allowed to be in here,” I say as Rose passes me a pair of skates in my size. They’re made of leather, and they look a hell of a lot more beat up and cheap than Rose’s personal pair, but they’re still a step up from the plastic rental ones I used the couple of times I tried ice-skating as a little kid. “We are allowed to be here, right?” I ask, suddenly suspicious.

Rose glances up at me as she ties her laces. “Yes, Danni,” she says. “The rules are a minimum of three students have to be here at all times if there’s no adult supervision.”

I know I said I’m fine. And I am, I swear. But my stupid freaking heart skips a beat when she says my name.

“Three?” I echo.

“Yes. Presumably one to collect the severed limbs from the hypothetical skating accident while another runs for help and the third loses consciousness.”

“That’s not what I meant,” I say. “It’s just the two of us.”

Rose gestures behind her, at the door with her guard standing on the other side.

“But he’s not in here,” I say, “so we’re breaking the rules. What if something happens and we can’t get his attention?”

“Danni, he’s not even fifty feet away.”

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