Page 111 of The Towering Sky
It took a moment for her mom’s meaning to dawn, and when it did, Calliope felt stunned. “Stay... without you?”
Elise cupped her hand under Calliope’s chin and looked directly into her eyes. “You’re ready, sweetheart. You don’t need me anymore.”
The import of those words seemed to bounce around Grand Central. Calliope imagined them repeating over and over; she imagined them in bright neon like the signs above the food stalls.You’re ready.How long had she waited for her mom to say that? And now that it had happened, she wasn’t sure she actually wanted to hear it.
“Where would I go?”
“You’ll figure it out. You’re spontaneous and resourceful.” Elise smiled, but Calliope barely saw it through her blurry vision. “You learned from the best, after all.”
“Train 1099 to Lisbon departs in two minutes,” an electronic voice boomed over the speakers.
And then they were both crying: real, ugly tears, not the soft dewy ones they used during cons. Calliope felt the other Rail Iberia passengers swerving around them, shooting them looks of irritation or pity, or ignoring them altogether. Those were the genuine New Yorkers, Calliope thought, the ones who could see something unpleasant—like a mother and daughter crying at Grand Central—and skip right over it.
She wanted to be one of them, she realized. A genuine New Yorker. She wanted to stay, to keep building a life here, even if it meant she had to do it alone.
“There are a lot of solo cons you can run, you know,” Elise was saying. “The one-handed flapover works well, and ghost crown, and you can always adapt the runaway princess to—”
“It’s okay, Mom. I’ll be fine,” Calliope assured her, and they both knew in that moment that her mind was made up.
Calliope felt her mom’s arms closing tight around her, her heartbeat hammering through her ribs. “My darling girl. I’m so proud of you,” Elise said fiercely.
“I’m going to miss you.” Calliope’s statement was muffled against her mom’s shoulder.
“I’ll let you know where I end up. I’m thinking the Italian Riviera. Who knows, maybe you can come meet me in Capri for New Year’s,” Elise replied in a passable approximation of her normal tone.
“Thirty seconds,” interrupted the canned voice of the automated reminder.
“Be safe. I love you,” Elise said, and then it was one last hug, all elbows and tangled coats, and a tear exchanged from one cheek to another; and with that Elise was stepping onto the train, her enormous suitcases floating ahead of her toward the luggage compartment.
“I love you too,” Calliope answered, though her mom couldn’t hear. She stood there waving, her eyes glued to the bright red of Elise’s sweater, long after the train had sped away on its whispering rails.
Finally she turned and lifted her eyes toward the ceiling, wondering where in this massive city she would go now.
LEDA
LEDA STEPPED UPto the NYPD headquarters, queasy with anxiety.
Her contacts lit up with an incoming ping, and she turned quickly aside, hoping for a split second that it was Avery—but no, it was Watt. Again. Leda let the ping roll on, unanswered.
Watt had been trying her practically once an hour for the past day. Leda kept on ignoring him. She had nothing to say to Watt right now.
Because she still loved him. And Leda knew that if she let herself speak to him, if she heard his voice for even a single instant, she would lose her nerve and back down from what she was about to do.
She tried Avery one final time, her heart hammering. She’d been so certain that Avery would be here—Avery hadpromisedshe would, late last night, when Leda had pinged her in twisted,cold fear. “Of course I’ll be there,” Avery had assured her. “Let’s meet at the station at seven.”
“Can you come here first, to my place?” Leda asked, her voice small. She wanted to be walked to her murder confession, like a child being walked to school.
“I’ll meet you at the station, I swear,” Avery answered.
Now it was almost 7:20, and Avery still hadn’t shown. Leda was starting to think she wasn’t coming. She couldn’t blame her: Avery had plenty to deal with right now; she didn’t need Leda’s mess piled on top of her own.
Still, Leda wished she didn’t have to do this alone.
She’d barely made it through breakfast with her parents. They had coptered back from the Hamptons late last night. Leda could tell that things weren’t completely resolved between them—she could see the questions in her mom’s eyes—but she also knew that her mom hadn’t left. And when she came downstairs this morning, her dad was cooking waffles: the delightfully fat kind, loaded with chocolate chips and whipped cream. The way he always used to, back when they ate breakfast as a family.
When her mom came down and started to set the table, Leda realized that it would be okay. Her family might not be anywhere near healed yet, but it would be, eventually.
She almost—almost—changed her mind about confessing.
