The Uncrossing

by Melissa Eastlake

  Luke laughed to himself at Jeremy’s texts, so detailed and neatly punctuated, as he walked into the kitchen. He replied: Free both days.

  “I swear to god, are you already texting him again?” Camille said.

  She sat at the table with Yuri, who peered over his newspaper. In addition to working in the family store and supering the apartment building upstairs, Yuri sold magic on commission for the Kovrovs. He spent every morning looking for coincidences and connections that might lead to clients. He went online, too, but he started with the New York Times religiously.

  Luke waved the phone. “Jeremy Kovrov. About work.”

  Camille pointed two fingers between her eyes and Luke’s.

  “Work!” he insisted.

  “Lukonya,” Yuri said, stone-faced. A knot slid down Luke’s stomach. He had expected yelling, but this was so much worse. Camille slipped away down the stairs.

  “I stopped it, all right?” Luke said. “He won’t come around anymore.”

  Yuri tapped the table, and Luke sat down. “You deserve to be treated with respect.”

  Luke hid in his coffee. Yuri loved to talk about respect. It meant all kinds of things—kindness, integrity, worth, honor. He could have used any of those words, but he always said respect.

  “I believe you’ll earn that respect if you treat others with the respect they deserve,” Yuri said.

  Luke started to burn—his face, his spine. “Max didn’t want anything serious. It doesn’t always have to be a whole relationship.”

  “I won’t hear that. What kind of man are you going to be, hmm?”

  Luke sat and ached while his dad flipped through the paper. He was saved by his buzzing phone. Jeremy: Great, 10 tomorrow at Sergei’s.

  “Jeremy says I’ve got Kovrovs tomorrow at 10,” Luke said.

  Yuri frowned. “How is he related to the Kovrovs, anyway?”

  Luke studied him before answering. The confusion, the dawning question. It was the broken binding, jostling the idea loose in Yuri’s head.

  “I asked Jeremy that the other day. He said he’s their brother. Ivan adopted him when Sergei and Alexei were teenagers.” He probably shouldn’t have shared that. After Alexei got around to fixing the binding, Yuri would either know a secret or Alexei would go digging around in his brain to take it out.

  “Really? How odd.” Yuri’s voice was distant. “Well, I missed a lot when you and Camille were little babies.”

  “Right,” Luke said, though it wasn’t that. It wasn’t his business how Alexei monitored—or didn’t—the bindings he made, but he did wonder if it might have been his own power making this one stay broken. Perhaps Alexei had tried to rebuild it, but Luke was stronger, or he had moved so subtly to unwind the binding that Alexei hadn’t perceived it. “That’s probably it. I’ll go see if Mom needs help in the store.”

  He found her, and an unexpected crowd, in the back room. He stopped on the stairs. “You got the whole crew here.”

  Helene, Camille, and Luke’s best friends, the Wesleys, sat around the big table. Helene worked busily over a group of poppets, pausing to cut a glance at Luke. Camille had a plastic cup of gold-white horchata and Short Wes draped his arm on the back of her chair.

  At once, she said, “Short Wes brought me horchata!” and Straight Wesley said, “Wes wanted to flirt with the hurricane.”

  The hurricane—that was Camille—shimmied contentedly. Helene snapped a stalk of sage in half.

  “Man, I don’t get horchata?” Luke pulled out a chair and sat, realizing his mistake too late.

  Short Wes gave him a look both gleeful and regretful, his face asking, Why do you make me hurt you? as he said, “I think Max is getting you one.”

  Helene snapped the sage again. Straight Wesley muffled a grin by rolling it into his lips, and Camille looked innocently at the ceiling, taking a noisy sip.

  Luke drummed his fingers on the table and, twice as decisively as he felt, said, “Not anymore. It’s over.”

  Short Wes made a skeptical sound.

  “See? I knew you’d do the right thing. Even when you were a baby, give you some space and you’d make the right decision.” Helene sounded happier and tucked the last scrap of abused sage inside a poppet.

  Luke shut his eyes. Space, in this case, had meant six months and a pile of hurt, not an hour to choose his own bedtime. He knew why it was hard to talk shit with Max, not only because Max was needle-mean, a white boy from a nice suburb who didn’t take anything seriously. It was because, even if Max had played by the rules, Luke wasn’t looking for a game from someone he kissed. He loved playing conversation-roulette with his friends, and even his family, but the hope of intimacy was that maybe he’d get to put those weapons down. He’d never felt calm with Max. It was right to end it.

  It was Max who had done the right thing.

  No, it was Luke. Or, it was Luke, too. Upstairs, his father had asked a question, and downstairs, his mother had answered it. And now he had a job to do.

  He pointed to the poppets. “What’s that about?”

  She waved a hand at the Wesleys. “These two. Look at them.”

  Luke looked at them. They seemed normal to him. He nodded to Straight Wesley. “Looking good.”

  Straight Wesley rubbed a hand over the back of his head, his fade a little tighter than usual. “Thanks, man.”

  Helene hmphed and dropped two poppets in front of Luke. “Seal those for your friends.”

  Luke brought one tiny doll to his forehead, hit with the cherry-pie-and-dirt smell of patchouli. He moved his lips but was too exposed, with the Wesleys sitting right there, to say the words out loud: Defend Short Wesley. Defend Wes. Defend Wes.

  He sealed the second doll for Straight Wesley and handed them both over. “Keep track of those,” Helene said. “Get Luke to burn them when they get ratty. Don’t throw them out.”

  They yes, ma’amed, and Helene dropped a third doll in front of Luke. “That one’s for you.”

  It was a little too dense for its weight, but not heavy. The mojo had a warm vibe, like his mother’s hand on the back of his head.

  Camille finished her horchata with a slurp and dropped the cup in Short Wes’s lap. “I’m going to open up.”

  Short Wes followed her out of the room, and Straight Wesley clapped Luke’s hand and hugged Helene before he left. Luke sank in his chair, the poppet solid in his pocket. He traced its contours through the fabric with his thumb, Max’s words spinning in his head. I never asked you for anything else.

  Another thought cut the thread, his earlier question popping up with its own answer. Jeremy had said he needed to talk to Alexei, to explain what had happened so that Alexei could repair the binding. It had been days—he’d seen Alexei yesterday afternoon—but he hadn’t done it yet.

  Helene stopped on the stairs. “Honey? Are you going to sit there all day?”

  He sat up. “Sorry, Mom.” It wasn’t his problem. He could just leave it alone. “Hey, do you know how Jeremy is related to the Kovrovs?”

  “He’s a cousin or—no, wait.” Her expression clouded. “That can’t be right.”

  It played out on her face, too, the empty space where a secret had hidden filling up with confusion. Jeremy knew that secret was vulnerable and had chosen to leave it exposed. “He’s their brother,” Luke said. “Adopted. It seems like there’s something weird about it.”

  Everything about it was weird. If there was a good reason to adopt a child and then go through a whole magical hassle to hide him, Luke couldn’t think of it. Jeremy was always trotting around after Sergei and Alexei—he didn’t even go to school. He prickled at the simplest questions and didn’t talk in company.

  “Those people.” Helene shrugged and moved up the stairs. “Weird is the least of it.”

  Luke nodded in the empty room. He turned the memory of the fight in the car to a new angle: Jeremy’s tightly crossed arms and flushed face. He hadn’t been pissed—he’d been afraid. What had he said? If that’s all you
’re worried about…

  A strange way to say it, unless there was something else he wanted Luke to worry about. Something was wrong.

  And he had left the clues for Luke to find them.

  Chapter Twelve

  Luke sat with Jeremy at a pale wood coffee table in Sergei and Marta Kovrov’s living room to build protection bags. They made an assembly line, Luke filling bags with juniper and soap and Jeremy tying them off with his whispered prayers. It was sunny and cool, dotted with the kind of candles that didn’t burn anything except money. Jeremy put some dark, confusing British show on a TV as big as a street mural, and laughed at it a lot, though Luke couldn’t figure out the jokes.

  Jeremy wore red track pants and a yellow T-shirt. It was possible that he would finish the outfit with something as horrible as shutter shades, or a vinyl children’s backpack, if he had to leave the house. Sergei’s sons ran in and out of the room, playing cops or soldiers, and Jeremy tackled them every time they got within arms’ reach. Marta, a tall blonde in purple yoga pants, floated through with sodas and chips.

  They were a happy family, and it seemed like Jeremy was a happy part of it. The shuttered, controlled boy from the car was gone. If he was in trouble, it was invisible.

  But now that Luke wanted to ask, or tell him, or help, it felt like a conspiracy that they weren’t alone. As they were finishing their work, Sergei wandered in with a beer. “This shit again?”

  Jeremy grinned up. “You don’t have to watch it.”

  Sergei growled into his beer, and Jeremy laughed—giggled, even. The tattoo across Sergei’s neck said Marta, which was a tribute to his lovely wife but also meant war.

  “What’s your problem, Melnyk?” Sergei asked.

  Luke rearranged his scowl. “I don’t get this show, either.”

  Jeremy gasped. “You could have said.” He sounded genuinely pained. He tied off the last bag and whispered to it in Russian. “We’re done anyway. Don’t let me inflict culture on you anymore.”

  “This is just trash with accents,” Sergei said.

  Jeremy scoffed and handed him the remote. He packed up the finished bags, and Luke got up to help and took the dishes back into the kitchen.

  Jeremy hovered behind, his voice small and unmistakably wistful. “I guess you’re free to go.”

  “I could hang out.” Tell me, I can help. “Do you have any big plans?”

  Jeremy was looking at the floor. “Reading, maybe.” He dragged his face up and grinned. “Maybe watch more TV that everyone hates. Come upstairs if you’re staying, I can’t anymore with these babies.”

  He led Luke through the living room, Sergei’s eyes tracking them, and up three flights of stairs to the attic. Luke had to play off his short breath as Jeremy opened a door.

  His room took up the whole front of the house, bright with sunshine from two deep bay windows and a skylight over the bed. There were clothes everywhere, and books and cords and half-full cups, the orange running shoes a glowing center in the mess. Luke caught a trace of the oniony, sweet smell that would have made his mom yell at him to clean his room. Jeremy’s unmade bed felt like getting away with something, though all it meant was Sergei kept different rules.

  In the chaos, it took Luke a long second look to absorb what was on the shelves that lined the walls. Hundreds of the tiny lights Jeremy made in the warehouse paled in the full light of day. A dozen fish bowls made trickling sounds—an octopus the size of a tennis ball bobbed in the closest one. It sat next to a stack of slim Batman books, next to a tiny wooden marionette that stood without strings, next to a potted fern with pulsing purple veins.

  “What is all this?”

  “Party tricks,” Jeremy said.

  Luke turned, gaping. Jeremy sat on one of the windowsills, backlit, so he was all shadows and halo.

  “You do this with your breath?”

  Jeremy nodded. “Sometimes I make things out of clay or whatever and breathe them awake.”

  “This is incredible. This is some serious mojo.” If Luke weren’t seeing it all with his own eyes, he would have said it was the kind of thing people who didn’t know anything about magic thought magicians could do.

  “I guess. If you need anything totally useless, give me a call.”

  Luke shook his head.

  Jeremy’s shadowy shape shrugged. “You should see what Sergei can do.”

  Luke almost asked, but he changed his mind. Sergei could go straight to hell. Another shelf: a terrarium filled with neon pink and orange turtles the size of dimes, a boy-doll with a clockwork torso who swung his legs off the shelf like a child in a tall chair, a paperback book with a spine so worn with creases he couldn’t read the title, a mason jar of glittering keys.

  “I think the uncrossing thing is—” Jeremy cut himself off. “I guess I already said that. It’s cool, though.”

  Luke had rehearsed this, and he wasn’t supposed to blurt out, “Let me help you,” but that’s what he did.

  Jeremy froze. “Help me with what?”

  “I know something’s wrong.” Luke sat on the corner of the bed. At an angle, he could see more of Jeremy’s face, still and cautious. “And Alexei hasn’t fixed that binding yet, because you haven’t talked to him.”

  Jeremy winced. “I just haven’t figured out how to tackle it. I keep expecting he’ll bring it up and I won’t have to.”

  “Is that all?”

  Jeremy shrugged again and kept his shoulders up, curling in. “You said you weren’t going to talk about it anymore.”

  “I know. My dad said not to go digging around in Kovrov secrets. If you tell me to drop it, I promise I will never ask you another nosy question again.” Luke leaned closer and dropped his voice. “But if you’re in trouble, and you want to tell me, I can help.”

  Jeremy blinked, his lips parting on an inhale, and blinked again, like he was trying to focus on a new distance. Luke made his face mild and patient, though his heart pounded, Come on, come on.

  “It’s not like that,” Jeremy said. “I’m not in any danger.” He pressed his arms across his stomach and avoided Luke’s eyes. His sideways denial was a confirmation, and whatever was going on, he was terrified of it.

  “What’s it like?” Luke was already plotting his next move. Could he sneak something into the house? Or if he asked the right question, the way he broke that first binding, he could keep unwinding it. It was against the rules, but there were principles—like helping someone who had been hurt—that were more important than rules.

  Jeremy started to laugh. Luke was so surprised it took him a double take to place the sound, to be sure Jeremy wasn’t crying. “Oh, Luke. Look at you. It is not that big of a deal.” Jeremy shook his head. “I’ll tell you the truth if you promise that you’ll believe me and keep it a secret and not do anything dramatic. Deal?”

  “Deal.” Luke was comfortably aware that he might be lying.

  “Okay. It’s a long story.” Jeremy stood and walked to the center of the room, opening his arms like a narrator starting a play. “I am a firstborn.”

  Luke waited for details that didn’t follow. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what that means.”

  Jeremy deflated. “Way to ruin my reveal. You know, like, ‘I’m so hungry, I’d give my firstborn child for a cheeseburger.’ Then—” He opened a hand next to his face. “Nine months later, here I am.”

  Luke stared at him, smiling expectantly down as Luke unwrapped all his layers of understatement.

  Had he—?

  Then that meant—

  Luke jumped up, shouting. “What? What? The Kovrovs do that?”

  He hadn’t been overreacting. It was worse than he’d thought, worse than he could have imagined. Jeremy lifted his palms, pushing the air in front of Luke’s chest, and Luke sat back down, hunching into his arms and breathing hard through his nose. He could be of no help if Jeremy was scared of him, and he had to help.

  “I told you,” Jeremy said. “It’s a long story.”

 
Chapter Thirteen

  Jeremy moved to the other side of his bed, shooting up a little prayer—Please help me make him understand—and sitting down against his pillow. Luke smoothed out the covers and stretched out on his belly to listen, his weight shifting the mattress under Jeremy’s back. Oh, that was not what Jeremy had expected. Luke was so close, stretching out over Jeremy’s bed—and he hardly seemed to notice. Like it, like Jeremy, was all just furniture.

  Jeremy shut his eyes. This was a story to tell carefully. He thought, Once upon a time, and began.

  “What you have to understand about the Kovrovs is that firstborns are a big deal. All the firstborn Kovrovs inherit this power, the binding. They can trade a little piece of themselves to hide things and protect them. You can imagine it like a spider’s web—when Alexei put a binding on your place, he wove his web around it, and now he can feel that you’re safe, or when someone is trying to threaten you. Depending on how he does it, he can make it more like a wall that keeps someone in or out, but that takes more out of him. Alexei says there was a magician like him in the court of Ivan the Terrible, but, you know, Alexei says a lot of things.

  “They took this power everywhere. All over eastern Europe. All over the world. Every firstborn was another Kovrov who could follow a famine or a war or a lot of desperate people who wanted protecting. Are you following?”

  “I’m following.” Luke’s face was iron. Jeremy hesitated. Most of the people in Jeremy’s life already knew this story, had understood it before he did—and because of that, he’d never told anyone. Two poles stretched him between an untenable distance: how good it might feel to share this, to be finally known, and how horrible if Luke found it another reason to despise him and his family. This was a beginning, or it was the end.

  He needed to reassure Luke or get some reassurance—he lifted one hand, like a touch might help, but it only twitched in the air before he pulled it back.

  Luke’s expression went softer. “You’re fine. Take your time.” He rolled his head onto one fist and lifted the other hand to nudge Jeremy’s arm. That was close enough.