by A. M. Castle
When I tried to imagine my future after college, walking out of those doors with a diploma in Fine Arts, I couldn’t see my art displayed on the walls of some fancy exhibition … Maybe I’ll teach.
But the thought of standing in front of a classroom, even a small one, was terrifying.
No. That’s not an option either.
“Hey, I hope I didn’t hurt your feelings. I admire it. You’re all about the art, glory be damned. Fuck what the powers that be are saying or doing …” Scarlett nudged me.
A flicker of a smile must have shown on my face.
“Yep. I was right about you,” Scarlett teased. Before I could ask what she meant by that, she was inviting me to lunch.
Lunch, for me, usually involved grabbing a quick sandwich in the commons, then hiking the mile back to my car, where I would sit in the AC and scarf down my food, hurrying to start the trek back across campus to my last afternoon class. There was a cafeteria in the commons and an outdoor patio, but I never knew where to sit. I preferred eating alone in my car, anyway.
“Okay. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in the commons before, though,” I said, skeptically.
Scarlett released a bellyful of laughter, loud and snort-worthy, catching the attention of classmates nearby. We were all waiting wearily for Mr. McDaniel to show up for class; he was often late, sometimes drunk, and he liked to keep us over while he finished his lesson, as though he had no concept of time.
“Nah, silly. Nobody eats in that shithole! There’s this Irish pub downtown, a few blocks from campus, and Tuesdays are dollar beer days.”
I thought about my next class, less than forty-five minutes after lunch. Would I be able to make it back in time? I hadn’t missed a class all semester. But one thing that reassured me: Scarlett was in my next class. If she had to be back on time, then surely, she would make sure we both were.
So that’s how it started.
Trailing behind her in the school parking garage, I was happy to climb in the passenger seat of her yellow Mini Cooper, Billie Eilish blaring all the way to the Irish pub, O’Malley’s on 11th Street, nestled between a boarded-up bookstore and a hemp shop.
When Scarlett told the hostess that two more were coming, I couldn’t hide my surprise and disappointment. As an introvert, it was hard enough connecting with one person, let alone three.
“Don’t worry. Sammy and Mia are cool. You’re going to love them, I promise,” Scarlett said, as though she could sense the bubble of anxiety that lived under my skin. It’s always there, brewing and bubbling, waiting to be squeezed until it explodes from within.
But in the end, Scarlett was right. Mia and Sammy were cool, and I was excited, in particular, to meet Mia.
After that day, afternoons at O’Malley’s became a regular thing, even sometimes on our days off from classes. It was a tiny, claustrophobic space with slabs of wood for tables and the faint smell of beer and piss embedded in the mothball-colored carpet.
But it was less about the atmosphere and more about the company. These three women intrigued the hell out of me.
Mia, with her feathery black hair dipped in blue, her shapeless paint-stained tops, she wore the uniform of “artist” well. She was gorgeous, stunning even, with the type of beauty that seems reckless and easy. The kind that feels unfair.
Sammy was different. Neatly pressed, she often sported button-down shirts and starched khakis, never a hair out of a place in her neat brown bob. She wore thick black glasses. No makeup. Despite her lengthy school hours, she maintained the books for a popular smoke shop in town, and I could often smell the tangy aroma of nicotine on her hands. I still wasn’t sure why she chose art instead of accounting. She liked numbers and she was the most organized of the group. Scarlett joked once that Sammy was our “Velma” of the group, which of course made her our “Daphne”, seeing as she was the only redhead of the gang.
Mia and I had looked at each other then. “If they’re Velma and Daphne, who’s that make us?” she’d teased. We were both dark-headed, Mia and I, but unlike her with her natural, fuck-it-why-try beauty and strange blue stripes, I had to work hard just to look presentable with my thinning hair and ruddy complexion. The extra pounds I’d been carrying for months didn’t help either. The freshman fifteen, they called it. More like the “freshman fifty” for me.
“I guess we’re Scooby Doo and Shaggy, unless you want to be Fred?” I had teased, surprising myself when I got a laugh out of her. Hell, maybe I can do this friend thing after all. Mia had a great laugh; she would tilt her head back and open her lips as wide as they would go, then laugh from her belly.
Mia had taken an instant liking to me, which pleased me more than I cared to admit.
It was silly, the way the four of us acted. Getting sloshed during the middle of a weekday, cracking jokes about cartoons that showed our age, and listening to Scarlett’s latest online gossip as though it were gospel. She liked to joke that Tuesdays were “church”: “Come listen to me speak now, children,” she often joked, taking the pulpit behind a table in a corner booth, lining up rows of tequila and bottles of beer.
But it was fun. Hell, it was so fun that I didn’t mind missing the occasional class or being late anymore. I enjoyed feeling part of the “gang”, even if it was only during school hours.
Mia was a painter, and the second she had walked in the pub, on that first day, I recognized her. How could I not have put two and two together? Mia was THE Mia Ludlow. Daughter of Cristal Ludlow, the famous local sculptor and painter whose work was easily recognized all over the country, and even internationally. But it wasn’t just her mother’s legacy that made me recognize her: no, Mia’s work stood for itself. She had been spotlighted many times all over campus, and in some local papers as well. She was already well regarded in the art world because of her mother, but the work itself justified the attention. Destined to outdo her mother, one headline had read, featuring a nightmarish portrait of Jesus she had made on lithograph paper.
But according to Scarlett, there was more to Mia than met the eye. More than the talent and the famous name—she had a reputation. Everyone knew that scandal followed the rich girl, but nobody seemed to care.
Sammy and Mia, despite looking and acting like polar opposites, had been friends since grade school, growing up in Cement Ville together and competing against one another in local art contests and fairs. Now, they were no longer rivals, but best friends and roommates, they liked to proclaim.
Sammy liked to keep Mia’s humility in check. “Oh, get over yourself, Mia,” she often teased, rolling her eyes and smirking as Mia shared photos of her current works in progress, a dilapidated version of Monroe Institute, our school. It resembled the campus, buildings and landmarks easily recognizable, but everything was lopsided and distorted, the upside-down, creepy version of real life. And it was done in dark gray acrylic paint.
Mia had this style beyond compare; she took normal everyday objects and destinations and turned them into hideous versions of themselves. For me, viewing her art was like seeing my own soul on display, although I’d never admit that to her.
When you live with anxiety and depression, it alters the view on everything. Looking at her work made me feel seen; there’s no other way to explain it.
All her work was hauntingly beautiful and a little disorganized, like Mia herself.
“Mia’s a genius,” Scarlett explained that first day (although I already knew that, as I’d been following her work on campus and in the papers for years). “We love her, but she’s always in her own head, working through next steps, planning her next project … We like to keep her in the present, and of course keep her humble.” Scarlett winked across the table at Sammy. We all knew Mia had gotten into some trouble in her freshman year of college and she’d had to come back and do her freshman hours all over again … but we never talked about that. I waited for the others to bring it up, but they never did. Her talent and legacy overshadowed any of the hidden parts of herself …
/> All three were different, yet there was something about each of them … Mia’s careless beauty and dark genius. Sammy’s snarky jokes and studious, know-it-all attitude. And of course, Scarlett, with her gossip and wink-y smiles. The girls didn’t kiss each other’s asses, but I could tell they were close; teasing often, but in a way that you knew meant love.
I couldn’t help wanting a small piece of that for myself.
By the time our sandwiches and beers showed up that day, it was half past noon. Still nervous about the time, I drank my beer too quickly, feeling loose in the lips and warm to the touch within minutes of receiving my meal.
“There’s no way we’ll get back on time,” I told Scarlett. Is that a slight slur in my voice? I had wondered, cringing.
“No worries, Rye. We’ll just have a couple more, then finish our food. We’ll be twenty minutes late, tops, I promise. And, hey, what does Grossman care anyway? It’s not like he takes roll. Plus, it’s college. We pay for these stupid classes. We shouldn’t have to go to every single one if we don’t want to,” Scarlett said.
“Huh. I never thought of it like that,” I burped, slugging down another beer. It tasted awful and flat, lukewarm on my tongue, but at that point, I didn’t care.
As usual, Scarlett was right. Grossman didn’t notice when we snuck in late that day, or any other day after. She flirted with him, batting those hideous, spidery lashes, and he always let us slide. I quickly learned that Scarlett didn’t follow rules—as fun as she seemed, she was also impulsive. A few days into our friendship, I found her in the bathroom on campus, crushing up a pill with a razor. She snorted the entire thing in one fell swoop, then offered to chop me a line.
I shook my head and said, “No, thank you.”
As the weeks went on, our Tuesday lunches turned into a regular thing. I stopped worrying about being late and started worrying about my friends. It’s not that I was lonely or desperate for friends—the opposite, actually. The degree with which these women intrigued me was baffling, even to me.
Mia wasn’t the only genius in the group. Over time, I learned more about Sammy and Scarlett’s passions as well. Sammy had a knack for computers and graphic design, creating some of the most incredible images; you’d never know they weren’t sketched by hand. And Scarlett, for all her talk of gossip and scandal, and her small drug problems, had quite the impressive social media following. I didn’t sign up for Instagram, but I googled her. Nearly 50k followers, and she posted day and night. Discussing technique and the latest trends in the art world; she always had something to say that drew people in. Did she create her own art, or spend all her time talking about it? I often wondered if it mattered anymore. She had a way with people—a skill so foreign to me, I’d prefer to recreate the Sistine Chapel than try to imitate Scarlett’s presence online.
Weeks became months, and somehow, the friendships continued until the end of the semester, much to my surprise and delight.
I’m not sure how our hangouts evolved from weekly lunch sessions into weekend sleepovers … Well, that’s not true. I do.
Again, it started with me. My suggestion.
“Tomorrow is Friday, y’all. Got any big plans?” Scarlett had asked one Thursday afternoon. We were piled into our normal booth in the back of the pub. The table was dirty, elbows sticking to the plastic placemats. Sammy, as usual, set to work, using her own pack of disinfectant wipes to clean off her space.
Scarlett nudged me, hard, in the ribs. “What are you doing this weekend, Rye?”
I tried to imagine how Scarlett spent her weekends. Images of that straw in her hand, residue fringing her nostrils, came to mind. I shrugged.
For them, weekends probably meant freedom and fun. For me, they were lonely. I looked forward to weekdays because I got to attend classes and see them, although admitting that seemed rather loser-ish now.
“Probably going to finish my puzzle,” I said, finally. Normally, I wouldn’t have brought up my puzzle craze, but I was tired, and too depressed about the impending weekend to care.
I expected them to laugh at me. After all, who spends their time doing puzzles? Little old ladies, that’s who, I could imagine my old friend Sierra saying.
“Oh, damn. I love puzzles. I haven’t done one in, like, I don’t know … a decade,” Mia exclaimed.
“Me neither,” Sammy chimed in as she smudged the disinfectant wipe in a slow, methodical circle. “I like doing them online sometimes. Have you guys tried that puzzle photo app? You can take any of your photos and turn them into puzzles, then work them online …”
“Nah. I’d rather do a real puzzle. And a hard one too, like ten thousand pieces,” Scarlett said, signaling for our waiter to bring another round of shots.
“You all should come over to my place. We could do a puzzle together,” I said, an edge of hopefulness in my tone. It was like someone else talking, the words not my own. Did I really just invite these girls over to my place—my tiny apartment with no working windows and few personal effects—to do puzzles together?
I’d imagined inviting Mia over a thousand times, and the others too, but never this soon. And not like this.
“Hell yeah. I’m down. How about tomorrow?” Scarlett suggested.
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Acknowledgements
Thank you first of all to Abigail Fenton, Head of Digital at HQ, for spending these past months on Mount Tregowan with me. I am so grateful for all your support and encouragement. Thank you, too, to my wonderful, eagle-eyed editor Dushiyanthi Horti for all your patience and care and to Belinda Toor, Helena Newton and the team at HQ Digital.
As ever I’ve relied on my nearest and dearest to help bring this story to life. Thank you so much to my mother, Anita Freeman, for her uncanny ability to spot a mistake, to Lucy Woollatt for all her wise counsel, and to Clare Pillman and all my friends, for chats, dog-walks, Zooms and laughs along the way.
A letter from A.M. Castle
Thank you so much for choosing to read The Invitation. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I loved writing it.
I started The Invitation during the first coronavirus lockdown in the UK. It was born out of my longing to escape from the hot, dusty city, at a time when travel was impossible. I’ve visited Cornwall many times but a couple of years ago I chanced on St Michael’s Mount, and fell in love with it. Like my fictional Mount Tregowan, it has a tidal causeway and an atmospheric castle … though any similarity ends there! If you’re lucky enough to find yourself in that part of the world, do go and visit this wonderful place and perhaps you, too, will see Rachel’s light shining from the highest turret on a stormy night.
I love hearing what readers think of my stories, so if you’ve enjoyed The Invitation, please leave a review. You can also get in touch here:
Website: https://www.alicecastleauthor.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/alicecastleauthor/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AliceMCastle?lang=en
And do watch out for my next book …
Bye for now, and happy reading,
Alice
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