“Spoken with the vast wisdom of a thirteen-year-old,” Oliver says. I glance at him and see that he’s smirking at us. Now this is the attitude I expected from Oliver.
“Hey,” I say, putting my hands on my hips and attempting my best glare. “I happen to be seventeen and have had barely any romantic experience either, but that doesn’t mean I don’t understand feelings and relationships. Women are intuitive about these things. Your sister is right. Colton is the dream, Jonah is the reality. And reality doesn’t have to be a bad thing.”
Oliver puts his hands up in mock surrender.
“Again, just when I think you couldn’t possibly get any more awesome,” Emma says, shaking her head. She sticks her tongue out at Oliver. “It’s not like you’re one to talk about experience, Ollie. How many times do I have to tell you, secretly watching a few episodes of The Bachelor doesn’t count as actual real-life dating experience.”
I grin, resisting the urge to demand another high five. Her praise makes me proud—too proud, probably. But she likes the me that she’s meeting right now, not just the me that she thinks wrote the book she’s currently obsessing over.
“So what else do you like to do, besides writing?” Emma asks. “I’ve read loads of blog interviews and other posts that you’ve done, and you talk a lot about your writing life and whatnot. And I know you’re homeschooled. But what about the rest of your time?”
“I, uh…” I have no friends, really, so I spend most of my time talking to my dog, talking to my garden, or talking to the boy next door. Occasionally kissing the boy next door, but that’s a new development. I’m fairly certain this isn’t quite the answer she’s looking for, though. So instead: “I read a lot of YA…besides Lemonade Skies, that is. I get a ton of advance reader’s copies, so my shelf is always well stocked.”
“You’re so fucking lucky! I would never want to leave my room.”
“Okay,” Oliver says. “I think you’re taking advantage of this rule right now. It’s supposed to be when you’re in pain and life at the hospital sucks. It doesn’t suck right now.”
“I don’t remember that clause, Ollie,” Emma says, shaking her head. “Take it up with the judges.” She turns back to me, one very inquisitive-looking eyebrow raised. “Besides reading, though, I mean. Something that doesn’t involve words or ink or paper.”
“I have a garden in our yard,” I say lamely. “Well, yard is a stretch. So is garden, really. I grow a few plants out there. Let’s say that.”
Emma nods, smiling encouragingly.
“And I…watch a lot of TV? I’m on a Sherlock kick right now. But yeah, I’m afraid my life isn’t that glamorous, really.”
“Huh. And here I was, picturing you traipsing around the globe with other famous YA authors, taking selfies in front of some pyramids or hiking around Loch Ness, looking for Nessie. But this is okay, too. I kind of like that you’re really just as boring as me.”
I want to laugh. Of course I don’t have any author friends. For obvious reasons. They’re friendly enough at events, sure, and some have reached out about grabbing a coffee when they’re in town. But I always have an excuse, some deadline or other obligation.
“Em,” Oliver says, leaning in closer to the bed. I glance over to see him frowning at her, wagging his finger. He looks adorably parental.
I laugh. “It’s fine. Really. That’s the first time anyone’s ever called me boring as a compliment. But I’ll take it. There are worse things.”
Much worse things, I think. Like dishonest. Fraudulent.
My good mood disappears. The conversation isn’t fun anymore. Emma isn’t just a nice girl who laughed at a few of my jokes. She’s a nice girl who would be horribly disappointed if she knew the truth about me.
“I should go,” I say, probably too abruptly. Emma’s face falls at the words, but she recovers quickly, forcing a small smile.
“Of course. You must be ridiculously busy.”
I nod. “I’m glad I could come, though. I’m really happy we could meet. I—I hope you feel better and get out of here soon.”
“Me too. But at least I have Marigold with me to help the hours go faster.”
“At the rate you’re going, you’ll need something new before this afternoon unless you want to read Between Two Worlds for a third time. Oliver may have to make a library run for you.”
“Oh, sure,” Oliver says, grinning at me. “But she’s getting Jonathan Safran Foer this time. Or maybe some Neil Gaiman.”
“YA isn’t intellectually stimulating enough for you?” I try to play it cool, to reclaim some of my boldness from earlier, but I mostly end up sounding annoyed.
“I’m not saying that! I just like to diversify.”
“I’ll read this Jonathan guy when you read some Thistle,” Emma chimes in.
Oliver nods solemnly. “I will. When I get home tonight, I’ll find the first one. I have to start properly.”
“That’s really not necessary…” I don’t want to picture it, but the image flashes across my mind anyway, Oliver curled up in his room—probably with black sheets and black pillows, black walls covered in posters for bands that all look cool and edgy, long hair and beards and tattoos—cracking open the cover of Girl in the Afterworld. The cover that says By Thistle Tate.
“I’m a wannabe writer,” he says, “short stories mostly. It’ll be good for me. Give me something to aspire to.”
Not me, I want to say. No one should aspire to be like me. Ever.
“This was really great,” I say instead, already stepping backward, closer to the door. I’m waving my hand in jerky circles as if I’m cleaning an invisible window. I can’t seem to make myself stop, though, and for whatever reason my instinct is to add a farewell curtsy, too. Just to make it even weirder. Oliver and Emma are watching me with eerily identical expressions, orangey-red eyebrows crooked up in amusement, deep dimples in their left cheeks, hands raised in slow, normal waves.
“Bye, Thistle!” Emma calls as I back out of the room, my legs still in some strange curtsy-like crouch. “You’re the fucking best!”
I leave the hospital, hail a cab. I fight tears the whole way home.
Liam was right.
I shouldn’t have gone there.
seven
Marigold was sitting in the rocking chair, her eyes just about to close, when he called out. Her name sliced through the warm summer rain.
“Dad.” She tripped out of the chair in her rush to stand, steadying herself before she stumbled into the wobbly porch railing.
“What are you doing here?” he said. “I called Abby. And Sam. They said they haven’t hung out with you in ages. Is this where you’ve been spending your time?”
“Maybe,” she said, sighing. “Yes.”
“Why?” He looked so tired, so old. So empty.
“I—” Marigold started and then she stopped. This was her chance. This was her moment to tell him the truth. But before she could say anything, a bolt of lightning flashed in the near distance. Thunder rumbled.
“We need to go home,” her dad said, reaching out for her hand. “It’s time for you to stop dwelling on the accident. It’s time to move on.”
—EXCERPT FROM LEMONADE SKIES, BOOK 1: GIRL IN THE AFTERWORLD
Liam doesn’t ask about the visit, and I don’t bring it up. Which is great, because I’m not ready to talk about it. It hurts too much. It hurts knowing that even if Emma and I had genuinely hit it off, felt a real connection for a few minutes, none of that really mattered. It meant nothing when the whole basis for me being there was a lie.
I spend the rest of the weekend hanging out with Liam, and if anything even slightly negative tiptoes its way into my thoughts, I squeeze his hand tighter or lean in for a kiss, focus on his eyes, his lips, his fingers.
We’re watching Goblet of Fire Sunday afternoon—in the living
room, because Harry deserves the big screen, not my laptop—when I hit Pause and turn to him, saying, “Let’s tell my dad. About us. That we’re together.” I feel as surprised as he looks, but I do tend to get emotional during the Yule Ball scene. Hermione looks so beautiful in that pink dress with her hair all fancy. Her grand entrance! Her fight with Ron! So many feelings.
“I guess we can,” he says, his eyes looking somewhere an inch or two above mine. “If that’s what you really want.”
“He’s not dense,” I say, suddenly feeling defensive. “I’m sure he’ll pick up on something being different soon enough on his own. Right?”
“Yeah. Maybe.” He still isn’t looking at me.
“But if you’re not ready, then…” I let it fade out, hoping that he’ll jump in and save me, assure me that yes, of course he wants to tell my dad—he wants to tell the whole world, by golly!
“I—what are we going to say, exactly?” He’s put an emphasis on exactly that I don’t like, a lilting twist that draws out for a beat too long. I like the silence that follows it even less.
“That we’re…dating?” I finally say, unable to bear the awkwardness of the moment any longer. “Aren’t we?”
“Yeah. Of course we are,” he says. “I just mean, do you think we’re ready to put a label on it? Official boyfriend-girlfriend status? It’s been a few days. There’s no rush. Especially since this is the first time you’ve ever dated anyone.”
“The first time I’ve ever dated?”
“Well, I mean, you know I had a few dates last year, at least. Arianna. And Riley.”
Yes, he had told me about them.
Yes, I had promptly deleted the information from my brain.
“Okay, so you went on a few dates. That hardly makes you more experienced than me.”
“Fine,” he says, reluctantly nodding at me. I’m relieved to see that he’s uncomfortable, too. It shouldn’t just be me. “So we’re both new to this whole thing. Even more reason to take it slow and not get our parents worked up. Right?”
I think about the conversation I overheard between Liam and his mom and decide he’s probably right. There’d be rules, boundaries.
“Okay,” I say. “But I wasn’t going to tell my dad to start putting aside my dowry or anything like that.”
“Dowry?” he asks, but he’s smiling again. “Sounds a bit outdated for a self-proclaimed modern woman such as yourself.”
“I did let you pay for me at Juan José’s. I guess I’m not totally progressive. Because I’d be a liar to pretend I didn’t like it a little bit. Feeling like a delicate lady and all.”
“You can be my lady any day,” he says. “Or you can be my person, if you prefer that.”
I edge a few inches closer on the sofa, and so does he. There’s a moment—or just a second, maybe, it’s all one lovely blur—of staring into each other’s eyes, Liam’s palm brushing my cheek. And then we’re kissing, faster and harder than we have before.
Just as Liam’s hand starts to graze under my shirt, the tips of his fingers spreading warmth across my entire back…my dad walks in.
“Cough, cough, cough,” he says, not even bothering to fake an actual coughing sound.
Liam flies off me so fast that he loses balance as he stands, tripping over a previously sound-asleep Lucy and slamming down hard against the wooden floor. Lucy is wide awake now, howling up at the ceiling. Amidst the chaos, I cover myself with a pillow, as if I have anything to actually hide. My shirt is snagged maybe an inch above my waist, but otherwise I’m perfectly decent. On the outside, at least. On the inside, I feel wildly, wonderfully indecent.
“So I suppose this means you two aren’t just friends anymore?” Dad leans against the door frame, arms crossed.
“It’s…recent,” I say.
“Is it?” he says, his right eyebrow very purposefully cocked for effect.
“It really is,” Liam says, wobbling slightly as he pulls himself up to stand. “Less than a week, actually.”
“I see.”
Liam looks explosively red. He turns, his eyes pleading for me to take over.
“Don’t worry, Dad.” My voice is surprisingly steady. All those readings have prepared me to handle anything with composure, I suppose. “We’ll go slow. Okay?”
Dad opens his mouth, closes it again. His gaze flits everywhere but at me. I feel bad for him, like I always do when these monumental life conversations come up—my first bra, my first period, my first razor.
“We’ll be fine, Dad,” I say, more gently now. “You can trust us.”
I’m not sure exactly what I mean by that. Trust us to not have sex? I can’t promise that. Trust me to not get pregnant? That sounds more reasonable, with a tiny margin for error.
“We’ll figure it out together.”
My dad looks relieved as I say it, even flashing a very brief smile.
“So I’ll just head back to the office then. I want to…catch up on your latest draft. Maybe give you some notes.” A lie for Liam’s sake. Completely unnecessary, of course. “But maybe we can have dinner together, then? Sushi? Thai?”
“That would be great,” I say. “And I vote sushi.”
“Sounds good,” Liam chimes in. “Thanks, Theo.”
My dad leaves, and after a moment passes, Liam sits back down next to me. Not as close this time, though.
“Busted,” I say.
“Busted or not, it’s still probably good to take things slowly.” He reaches out for my hand. “We have too much to risk. I care about our friendship too much to mess anything up.”
“Slow is fine,” I say, resisting the urge to lean in and nuzzle against his shoulder. Slow is faster than I ever thought we would move.
Liam grins. Not neon, but close.
I squeeze his hand and then reach out to tap the remote, the Yule Ball coming back to life, the Great Hall a bedazzled winter wonderland. “But for the record, next date, I’m paying for you.”
* * *
My dad doesn’t mention Liam or our conversation over the next few days. For now, only one thing matters in the Tate house: our deadline, a week from this Friday.
Three more chapters, and a final reread of the whole thing to revise at least the most glaring problems. After that, there will be a few months of fine-tuning with Elliot.
I’m allowed to skip my “classes” until after deadline—at this point, Dad doesn’t have a second to spare for anything but writing, and because we’re a “team,” that means I don’t have time for anything but writing either. Right now I’m expected to dutifully sit next to him at the desk for the entire day, talking through each new passage as “we” write it. I watch him type a string of words, delete them all. Type a few more, delete half. Type again. Pause. Period. Next line. It’s usually about three attempts to hone each sentence. He reads aloud at the end of every paragraph, and then again at the end of every new page. This is where all the reading I’ve done comes into play—I might not be able to write good sentences on my own, but I have a decent knack for recognizing other people’s good sentences, including my dad’s.
By Wednesday morning, our time together is notably less pleasant. I saw the same decline in spirits as the deadlines approached for the first two books—but with this being the last, the stakes vastly upped, tensions are running at record highs.
My dad starts to read: “ ‘Colton,’ Marigold says, breathless as she twists away from the window, the spectacular view of the rolling sky-blue fields of the Afterworld—‘Colton, come with me. We have to at least try, no matter—’ ”
“Nope, none of that,” I say, cutting him off mid-sentence. I push back from the desk a bit too aggressively, my chair bumping into the wooden filing cabinet. Lucy yelps and manages to skitter out of my path just as I bang my knee hard on one of the heavy drawers. My knee burns, but I pretend it doesn’t hurt. �
��I hate that sentence, I hate this paragraph, I hate the whole chapter. And mostly, I hate that Marigold is still even considering bringing her mom and Colton home. First off, she clearly needs to be telling Colton about her and Jonah at this point. But beyond that, why are you so set on this ending anyway? You know this is it, right? There’s no fourth book about Marigold and her mom back in the world living their happily ever after.”
“Jesus, Thistle, stop,” my dad snaps. He lifts his fingers off the keyboard, as if he’s worried he’ll pound it into pieces if he types another word. “This isn’t about another book. It’s about this one. We have it mapped out this way, all the teasers pointing to it. The old house is about to be demolished, the portal will likely close forever, and Marigold is determined to take her mom and Colton with her when she leaves the Afterworld for the last time. But she won’t know if it works until they try. That’s the suspense. If we don’t end this way, so much of the plotline was superfluous and unnecessary and—”
“Nothing was unnecessary,” I say fast, before he can keep rambling on. “Yes, Marigold wonders if it’s a viable option—if maybe she should try to take her mom and Colton back home. But she doesn’t. She doesn’t test out the theory because she realizes it’s ethically wrong to mess around with destiny. It doesn’t matter whether it’s possible or impossible, because the dead aren’t meant to come back to life in our world. It’s against the basic rules of our existence. We need that balance to survive.”
“Honey, with all due respect, I hardly think that one exception will throw the whole world of the living off balance.”
“But it’s not just one exception,” I say, flailing my arms around because I’m way too agitated to stay still. I swipe at the desk and knock a few papers to the floor, accidentally. But it feels surprisingly satisfying, and so I knock a few more off just for effect. My dad furrows his brow and frowns, but I keep talking. “If other people in the Afterworld see this happen, they’ll try to leave, too. And even beyond that, outside of the fiction here, I think it’s more important for the readers to see that Marigold makes this decision. They’ve lost someone, too, I bet. We all have. And we can’t keep wishing that we’ll find a way to undo that, to bring anyone back. We have to come to peace with it. We have to let the past be the past.”
The Undoing of Thistle Tate Page 7
