The applause this time goes on even longer, and it’s so strong it pounds against me and Thomas like crashing waves. We link our hands and raise them, inciting the crowd to even louder clapping. Thomas’s palm is sweaty.
My father’s speech has surprised me. He is a con man and a blackmailer, a leader of thugs. Head of a political party that controls half of Manhattan. To him, love is something you use to manipulate the weak.
But now he is saying that true love trumps all. Ha.
“Which brings me to my next point,” my father continues, the applause dying away. “There are enemies out there bigger than either of our families, and the only way to confront them is to follow the lead of these two lovers—to stand united! A radical mystic named Violet Brooks has been gaining power. The poor nonmystic families in the Depths mistakenly think she can offer them higherpaying jobs, and the registered mystics support her for obvious reasons: she’s one of them. This woman threatens to destroy everything we’ve built here in the Aeries. As you know, there hasn’t been a third-party mayoral candidate since the Conflagration.
“So tonight, in addition to this engagement, George Foster and I are announcing our political union. In times of danger and mystic threat, we must all come together. Now that Mayor Greenlorn’s term is approaching its end, George and I will both be endorsing one candidate in the upcoming election: Garland Foster.”
Garland, Thomas’s older brother, appears next to us and gives a confident wave. He looks like a more mature version of Thomas, only with blond hair and a thinner and slightly more sinister face. At twenty-eight, Garland is ten years older than Thomas, but he’s still quite young for politics. His wisp of a wife, Francesca, stands slightly behind him, a delicate hand on his shoulder.
“So please,” my father finishes, “raise your glass and let us drink to the beginning of a new era: for my family, for the Fosters, and for this glorious city!”
The string quartet begins playing again, and my father whirls my mother into the middle of the room, which has been cleared of furniture for the party. George and Erica Foster follow.
My father’s words echo in my head: mystic threat.
Once lauded for helping to enhance and strengthen our city, mystics are now feared. Uncontrolled, a powerful mystic’s touch can kill an ordinary human.
Personally, I don’t understand what all the fuss is about. These days, nearly two decades after the Mother’s Day Conflagration, the mystic-organized explosion that took so many innocent lives, all mystics are required by law to be drained of their powers twice a year, rendering them harmless. Most live far away from us, among the poor, in the lower level of the city, known as the Depths—a place too terrible and too dangerous for anyone from the Aeries to even visit. The mystics in the Aeries are servants or waiters or government workers who don’t care about revolution or power. All they care about is earning enough to survive.
But not all mystics are harmless, I know. There are those who went into hiding, who refused to register with the government and be drained of their magic. Who are lurking in the Depths. Waiting. Hiding. Plotting.
Thomas’s arm drops from my waist. “I haven’t seen Kyle yet,” he says.
“Neither have I.” My brother, Kyle, despises the spotlight. Parties are not his thing. He’s probably holed up somewhere with his girlfriend, Bennie.
“Would you like to dance?” Thomas asks. He looks like he really does want to dance, and too many people are watching for me to say no. I hand my clutch to Kiki and step into the middle of the room.
Thomas’s hands are slightly clumsy, as though they’re unfamiliar with my body. I suddenly wonder whether we’ve seen each other naked, and feel my cheeks warm.
“I was really worried about you,” he says, rocking us gently back and forth. His cologne smells of cedar and the slightest hint of vanilla. The quartet is playing something beautiful and slow by Górecki. “You hurt yourself so badly.”
“Other than some headaches, I feel completely fine.” Except for the fact that you’re practically a stranger. I push that thought away, letting the music fill me. Maybe if I dance long enough, I’ll remember what it felt like to dance with Thomas for the first time. Surely we’ve danced together before? My skin tingles with a feeling I can only call anticipation. Thomas is eligible, handsome, and clearly attracted to me. If I’m as in love with him as everyone says, then I’m quite lucky.
“How did we meet?” I whisper so that no one else can hear.
He pulls back slightly. “You really can’t remember anything?”
I shake my head.
Ever since I was a little girl, I have wanted to fall in love. The love you see on TV or read about in books, where you find your missing half—the person you were meant to be with forever—and suddenly you’re complete. That’s the sort of love my parents say I share with Thomas. Why, then, when he touches me, does it merely feel like a touch?
I thought true love would sear me.
My mother appears, slipping her hand between us. “Aria, I need to borrow your fiancé for a moment. Governor Boch wants to speak with him.”
Thomas chastely kisses my forehead. “I’ll be back.”
I watch them go. Is this what my future with Thomas will be—business, meetings, and our parents? My chest suddenly feels constricted, like my gown is too tight.
I need to get out of here.
I scurry along the far wall and press the panel by the balcony. It reads my biometrics and the door disappears, then reappears behind me. Outside, it’s blazing hot. My arms and neck and legs are immediately damp with sweat.
The heat, they say, is because of the global climate crisis, the melting of snow and ice around the world and the rising sea level that swallowed Antarctica and all of Oceania. Global warming is also to blame for the canals that line the Depths, filling what used to be low avenues and streets with seawater. Soon, the scientists say, the rising waters will overtake the entire island.
No one knows exactly how soon soon is.
I walk forward to the edge of the balcony. Before me is all of the Aeries, so high above the surrounding water it sometimes feels like a city afloat, not even tethered to the earth. A few dozen stories below me are the light-rails; sleek white cars blink in and out of stations, bright blurs between the shadows of the skyscrapers. The skyline is jagged and spectacular, illuminated by the city’s mystic light posts: super-tall glass spires full of the mystic energy that fuels all of Manhattan—the only useful thing about those freaks, my father always says.
The spires pulse and glow; there seems to be a rhythm to the way they brighten and fade, a kind of visual music. They almost look alive—more alive, anyway, than the guests here tonight.
I carefully roll up the hem of my dress, step on the iron railing, and then swing myself over. I’ve done this before, a dozen times when I was younger. It relaxes me. The wind tosses my hair and I can barely see, my hands tight on the railing behind me. Slowly, I lean out, the canals thin ribbons of silver in the darkness below me, the hot wind buffeting me until I am reminded: I fought for true love, and I won.
Now I just have to remember it.
I picture Thomas grabbing my hand, Thomas catching me as I run into his arms, Thomas kissing me in dark corners or in light-filled solariums, but it just doesn’t compute. I glance back at the party. From here, it’s just a jostle of dark suits and bright dresses, barely visible through the condensation on the glass doors.
Behind me, the updraft catches my skirt, and I laugh as the material billows around me. Enough. Time to climb back onto the balcony, where it’s safe.
This is when I see him—a face in the corner that startles me.
I can’t tell who he is; the light from the wall sconces barely reaches him. “Hello?” I call. “Who’s there?”
I’ve started to bring my leg back over the railing when my other foot slips.
And just like that, I’m falling.
There is the sharp pain of my knee cracking against the
ledge, my chin hitting the railing, my body slipping heavily backward. At last I catch a railing with one hand and clutch it tightly.
My body slams against the building’s side and I almost let go, but no: I am suspended over the city. I squeeze tighter. Only my five fingers clenched around an iron bar are saving me from plunging thousands of feet to my death.
I feel sweat slicking my palms, my grip loosening. My heart pumps ferociously and I pray silently, Please don’t let me die. Please don’t let me die.
Then the boy is there. I am crying and my vision is blurry, and it’s as if he is there but also not there, like a ghost.
“Grab my hand,” he says, lowering his arm.
“I can’t! I’ll fall.”
“I won’t let you,” he tells me. I blink away my tears but I still can’t see his face. I hear the sound of his breath, his exasperation, his fear. “You have to trust me.”
With one hand still around the iron bar, I swing the other toward the mysterious boy. He catches it and pulls me up, but my legs still dangle below the ledge. His touch feels incredibly warm, like his fingertips are going to scorch my skin.
“Good,” he says. “Now the other.”
“I don’t think I can,” I say. My whole body is aching.
“You’re stronger than you think,” he says.
I will myself not to look down. I take a deep breath and shift my right hand from the railing into his grip, noticing a starburst tattoo on the inside of his wrist. Then I am up, up, and over.
My feet touch the balcony, and I begin to sob—tears that have been welling in me all night. “Shhh, you’re safe. You’re okay,” he says, and even though it’s a billion degrees outside and I’ve probably ruined my most gorgeous dress, I believe him.
Finally, I feel the pressure of his grasp lighten, and I hear him stepping away. Who is this boy who just saved my life?
I whip my head around, searching for him, but he’s gone, as if by magic. I have no clue what he looks like. I never even learned his name.
Just then, a familiar voice calls out. “Aria? Is that you?” It’s Kiki.
“What are you doing out here?” she asks, approaching me. “I’m burning up.”
I decide to keep what just happened to myself for now. “I was just thinking,” I say.
“Well, stop thinking and start dancing! Thomas is looking for you. He says they’re playing your song.”
“We have a song?” I ask stupidly.
“Apparently. Come on,” Kiki says, handing me back my clutch.
I’m almost at the door when I hear a rattling sound and realize that something unfamiliar is in the clutch. I open it and peer inside—it’s a locket I’ve never seen before. Silver and shiny, but there’s something old-looking about it. I take it out and feel a jolt of energy run through me. A memory, a feeling, flashes in my head: this locket is mine.
There is a tiny piece of paper inside the clutch, too. I unfold it. Written in handwriting I do not recognize is one word:
Remember
• II •
The next morning I wake before Davida comes to help me bathe and dress. My chin is sore from last night’s fall, and my knees are bruised, but otherwise, I’m fine. More than fine, actually—I’m elated to feel something besides a crippling sense of memory loss.
Thomas.
I’ve been taught my entire life to despise him, but he actually seems … nice. Concerned. Sensitive. Maybe if my memory doesn’t return, I could learn to love him all over again.
I roll out of bed and splash water on my face in the bathroom. Luckily, I’ve been endowed with my mother’s dewy skin and my father’s big brown eyes. As I purse my lips in the mirror, I have to admit I look pretty good for a girl who almost died.
I find my clutch and shake out the locket, turning it over in my hands. Nothing about it seems extraordinary. It is smooth, for the most part, with tiny grooves in a sort of swirling pattern. No clasp. It’s completely solid.
Maybe it’s not a locket at all, just a seamed heart.
I take out the note. Stare at it for a moment. Then I drop the locket and the note back into my clutch, closing them away in my armoire. Remember.…
Then I sit down with my TouchMe. My parents took it away after my overdose but gave it back to me last night before the party.
I scroll through the various applications to my email. I search for “locket,” but nothing comes up. Then I search the messages by date, starting with the most recent ones. A few congratulatory notes regarding graduation and the engagement, but that’s it—nothing from Thomas or Kiki or any of the other girls at Florence Academy who graduated with me about two months ago. And there are no texts whatsoever—the memory is almost completely blank.
There’s a knock on my door. Davida. I cross the room, my feet sinking into the soft gray carpet, and press the touchpad.
“May I come in?” she asks as the door retracts.
“Of course,” I say, and put my TouchMe down. Davida is, as usual, in her uniform of all black: long-sleeved blouse with a dramatic collar, tapered pants tucked into well-polished shoes with no heels, thin black gloves.
The gloves are her personal touch. She has always worn them—since she was eleven, anyway. That was when she suffered a tragic cooking accident at the orphanage where she grew up. I’ve never seen her hands, but Kyle gave me nightmares when I was younger by imagining what they must look like: scar tissue halfway to her elbows, the skin marbled and stiff and shiny, like the hands of a movie monster.
“You’re up early,” Davida says. Her dark hair is pulled back into an impeccable bun. At seventeen, exactly my age, Davida has the kind of face girls dream of having—wide hazel eyes, high cheekbones, lips that dominate the lower half of her face. Unlike most people in the Aeries, my parents refuse to employ mystics; Davida and the others in our household are all members of the nonmystic lower class. “Magdalena has started a pot of coffee if you’d like some.”
Magdalena mostly serves my mother, and she brews the darkest coffee of any of our help—too dark for me. “No thank you, Davida.”
I watch as Davida goes to make my bed. She leans down and picks up the end of the comforter with one hand, straightening it with her gloved fingers. “How are you feeling?”
I’ve heard that question so many times lately that it makes me want to scream. Coming from Davida, though, it’s a relief. Technically, she’s my servant, but we’ve never had a formal relationship. Being the same age, we grew close quickly. We’re friends. My parents haven’t minded that we get along or that we spend time together, as long as she does her work and knows her role in the household. “I’m not sure. I feel fine physically, but, well … I’m a bit jumbled up.”
Davida squints at me. “What happened to your chin?”
I’m about to tell her about my fall when I notice that the glove of her right hand has left sooty prints on my comforter. She sees them, too, and tries to slap the soot away.
Odd. Davida is never anything but pristine. There’s something she’s not telling me, and soot like that can only come from one place. “Davida, were you in the Depths?”
Just then, my mother strolls in. “Good morning, Aria,” she says. “Davida.”
Davida straightens. “Good morning, Mrs. Rose.”
“Is it?” my mother asks. Her voice is particularly grating today. “Aria, I’m so disappointed in you. We’re lucky the Fosters had too much champagne to notice your behavior last night.”
“Me? What did I do?”
“You went outside on the balcony and ignored people.”
“Only for a few minutes—”
“This was your engagement party! Acting distant only makes people think you don’t want to get married.”
“I thought I was acting nice,” I tell her, “but if I was acting distant … maybe it is because I still don’t remember Thomas. I’ve told you this. You can understand why I might be a little shy.”
My mother perches on the edge of my bed a
nd stares at me intently. I’m tired of constantly having to prove my worth, my devotion to the family and to our political ambitions. I always come up short.
“How am I supposed to marry Thomas if I don’t even know him?”
My mother waves her hand in the air. “Nonsense, Aria. You love him. You snuck around with him in the Depths, betrayed everything our family stood for, and risked your father’s anger—and our downfall. It’s a shame your own poor decisions have confused what you were obviously once so passionate about.”
I’m immediately ashamed. My love for Thomas must have been strong. The Depths are a wild, dark place. Going there is dangerous. I wouldn’t have risked my life for just anyone.
“Really, though, what’s the harm in pushing back the wedding—even just another month?” I ask tentatively. “Maybe my memory will return by then.”
My mother’s lips tighten, and she says her next words slowly. “Your father and I have done everything possible to help you regain your memory—consulted specialists, procured off-the-market pharmaceuticals. I know it’s only been two weeks, but we’re trying, and there is more than just your feelings at stake.”
Two weeks is not a long time, I want to say, but it doesn’t matter. The message is clear: it doesn’t matter that I don’t remember. I’m marrying Thomas no matter what—and it feels like a death sentence.
“Maybe if I just talk to Thomas, have some time alone with him …”
“You had time with him, Aria,” my mother says. “Last night.”
“We weren’t alone! That was a huge party.” If I snuck around in the Depths with him, and they’ve accepted that, why can’t I see him alone now?
“Once you’re married … you can spend as much time with Thomas as you like. Until then, focus on getting better.” My mother claps her hands together, and her scowl is replaced by a sunny smile. “You have a doctor’s appointment tomorrow, darling,” she says, and she sounds like a warmer mother. “We’ll be sure to tell him that your memory loss has yet to improve. We all want you to remember Thomas.”
Mystic City Page 2
