Page 76 of The Winter Princess
She puts her tumbler down. “The doctor is in.”
“I made a promise to help someone with their studies in exchange for their cooperation with the social media campaign.”
She snorts. “You got tangled up with that intern, didn’t you?” For weeks it’s been easier to describe Erik’s eccentricities than talk about Oskar. “Better you than me.”
What luck, a misunderstanding. I infuse my words with exasperation. “If it were up to me, I’d do it the way the Lord intended—flashcards and sharpies—but we’re tight on time and I want to have him prepared before—” The truth. Here it comes.
“The semester ends,” Ella finishes.
My stomach dips and bounces back. Is this what gamblers feel like when the ace turns up at the right time? “I was thinking about that computer thing you drew up—”
“App. It’s called an app, and I wrote it.”
“Yes, the one where you took the biographies of world leaders and made a quiz to help us memorize them. I want something similar, and I don’t know if this is something you can do—”
She raises her hands like a mid-century unionist on a South American balcony. “Let’s assume I can.”
“I wondered if I could give you some textbooks and then your software could, you know…” I make motions as though I’m pulling apart raw wool. This is the zenith of my technical expertise.
She watches my hands with tented brows. “I’m horrified by how you talk about computers.” I open my mouth, but she holds up a finger. “Horrified. The short answer is that I can’t do books, not in your timeframe and not without a team.”
She rests her hand on her chin, tapping the pinky against her lower lip. “If you wanted to glean the info from GroupSource articles where it’s parceled out in more formulaic ways, I could use a lot of the same code as the World Leaders quiz. Even so, it’s going to spit out some strange questions.”
I nod. “I could probably weed those out.”
“I’m an artist. This chop shop stuff hurts my soul.” Ella shakes her head. “Anything else?”
I wish I could talk about Oskar, but he doesn’t fit neatly inside a formula. Boyfriend. Co-worker. Citizen. Friend.
“No. That’s it.”
I head to my own suite, quickly shower, and change for bed. It’s time to sleep. The illuminated clock emits a soft glow, and I turn the face around. Sleep. I need sleep. Or I could think about what happened with Oskar, going over every facet of the night like a Belgian diamond merchant.
Good idea. I snuggle into the bedding, listen to the sound of the storm outside, and think about the banked excitement of getting the invitation and the wild hope I’d see one particular Pavian, the tiny flame of triumph when I coaxed him to come to the party. Touching him.
Maybe he thought he was taking me by surprise, leaning in to kiss me. As if I needed that much help down some stairs. As if his neck could possibly be that cold. As if I could forget my hand was resting on his chest, feeling his heartbeat through the thin material of his dress shirt.
Maybe he thinks he came up with the idea to kiss me all on his own.
Clara says that technique has nothing to do with it, but it must make some difference. Oskar didn’t even try the first time and he was interrupted the second time. Even so, both times left me shattered.
I narrow my eyes at the dark ceiling. Twice is nothing. If we were conducting an experiment, we wouldn’t even have enough information to know what qualifies as an outlier. We need more data points. Sometime around 3:00 a.m., I resolve to ask him on a date. No harm in that. Princesses go on dates. Our brother asks out a succession of models, and none of it seems to mean anything.
Whatever’s happening between Oskar and me has to find an ordinary, pedestrian outlet. A date, with all the awkward fumbling of two people who have to figure out how to split a check, will clear my head, bringing my attraction out of the clouds.
On Monday morning, I walk into the museum to find the Education and Outreach staff practicing a coordinated dance number in the statue gallery.
“Pixy is all about dances right now,” Erik informs me, his voice rising above a looping clip of a Sondish girl group.
My face spasms. He wants us to dance? “NeerVelasquez would never—”
Erik holds a hand up. “Please. Give me some credit. Oskar’s brand is barely restrained hotness, not coordinated hip snapping.” Erik glances over at me and narrows his eyes. Perhaps he sees something in the way my fingers won’t stop doing and undoing my coat button. “Oskar,” he repeats.
Erik sucks in a startled breath. “There. You did it again. When I said ‘Oskar’ you tensed. Did you fight or something? You look nervous.”
“I’m not nervous. I mean, I am, actually. We’ve only got a few weeks, and thatflamenthermometer hasn’t budged in days.”
He turns and claps. “TWO, THREE, FOUR! To the left, Lynda!” and then pivots back to me. “The visitor count is totally dire, and whatever this is,” he says, his palm doing a loose figure eight from my shoulder to my hem, “we can’t afford it. Our main couple has to be rock solid, so do whatever you do to put him in a good mood. Buy him a restoration adhesive or, I don’t know, breathe on him, and be ready to go live in the silversmithing gallery at noon.”
