Page 67 of Of Socialites and Prizefights

“Moping over your curse, I can understand. It's a wretched situation. But letting Roz slip through your fingers because you're too proud to hold onto her is unacceptable. She hasn’t done anything wrong, so I'm not going to sit back and watch you fuck yourself over for no good reason.”

“Excuse me, how exactly do you know any of what happened between us?” Deepa demanded, indignantly getting to her feet. “I never shared a thing with you!”

“I was suspicious, what with your history of being a consummate liar, so I asked her directly. Now, get up before I dress you and drag you out of here myself.”

“If you want to break things off with her, that's alright,” Jasmine said gently as Deepa got dressed, angrily zipping herself into her finest dress. “I just think you should tell her that to her face, if that's what you want. She’s as proud as you are. If you want to end it, one of you is going to have to actually come out and say so.”

“Oh, no,” Elizabeth interjected, waving at Deepa’s dress. “Don’t wear one of mine. The last thing you need to bring to a conversation like this is a glamour. Here.” Fishing a little pendant from her purse, Elizabeth pressed one of her handmade good-luck charms into Deepa’s palm. “Take this, instead. You don't want her thinking you’re trying to enchant her.”

“I want her to think I was right,” Deepa said mulishly, accepting the charm to fasten it around her neck, “and admit that her passion for boxing isn't any nobler than wanting to make a living.” As she spoke, she hunted a red-and-cream half sari without any magical embellishments from her wardrobe and began arranging it over her most indecently small choli.

“She makes a perfectly respectable living,” Jasmine said. “A mechanic will always be in work.”

“She might not be old money,” Elizabeth began.

“Or new money,” said Aaliyah.

“But with the two of you working, she could certainly afford to keep you in a better place than this.”

“That's not the point,” Deepa snapped, causing all of them to finally shut their mouths for a second. “I like her. I like how she treats me. But if you’re trying to push me into her arms because you want me to find my one true love, you're too late. Kissing her didn't break my curse, and believe me, we tried it enough times to be certain. She wasn’t the one, even before our asinine argument, and she certainly isn’t the one now.”

“Bullshit,” Aaliyah said firmly.

Deepa froze in the process of fixing her sari’s drape.

“Love is a choice you make every day,” Aaliyah said. “Jasmine and I keep choosing each other, and Jacobi keeps choosing Alphonse, god help him. Elizabeth chose to go after Coxley, and she keeps on choosing to make it work with him and Arthur, and them with each other. To say that Roz can’t be your true love is just letting that pissant Phillip make your choice for you. It’s complete and utter rot. You’re cleverer than that.”

“The curse,” Deepa began, arranging her skirts as Aaliyah’s words tugged uncomfortably at her heart.

“Is just magic! It’s not fate. It doesn’t get to decide anything for you. You can undo it or cut it out or kill him, or you can find a way to live with it, or walk into the forest to live as a cat for the rest of your life. None of that matters! And none of it dictates whether you and Roz are good for each other. If you want to break things off because of personal differences, fine, but don’t use your curse as an excuse for giving up on her.”

Aaliyah glared at her, chin up and arms crossed, and Deepa found that she didn’t much like being on the receiving end ofAaliyah’s tough-love approach to problem-solving. It felt rather like the floor falling out from under her, and all she wanted was for Roz to be at the bottom of her fall waiting to catch her.

She just didn’t know whether Roz was still interested in playing that part.

“I feel like you’re not taking my curse as seriously as I'd like,” Deepa finally said. “If I could just brush it off one way or another, I would have by now.”

“Yes, yes, it's all very inconvenient and life-changing,” Aaliyah said impatiently. “But it’s got nothing to do with Roz. I’m not saying you have to apologise for anything. I’m just saying, come watch her fight, and see if you can't find a way forward with her. Because we’re all still rooting for you two.”

Jasmine, Elizabeth, and Cherie all nodded their agreement.

“Fine.” Deepa swallowed. “But only because I have to give her back her shirt. And Kelly’s, too.”

“How many women have you been borrowing clothes from, exactly?” Aaliyah asked.

“None of your business,” she replied, pulling a wisp of a scarf from her wardrobe to toss around her neck as they departed.

Downstairs, an obstacle blocked Deepa’s friends’ exit from the club. She might have been grateful to postpone her meeting with Roz, but the stars aligned to take her day from bad to worse. It was Appleton awaiting her, unreadable as ever, and speaking to him was hardly preferable to attending the fight. But he was a business associate, not a friend, and she had reneged on their deal. She owed him an explanation, if not an apology.

“Give me a moment,” she said to her friends, walking over to Appleton without waiting for a reply.

“You can't brush this off just because you have business to attend,” Aaliyah began, but Deepa shook her head, not slowing down.

“It’s important, and it won’t take long.”

“There you are,” said Appleton, as soon as she was in range. “You missed my last invitation, but your manager assured me it was delivered, so—”

“Privately,” Deepa said, taking him by the elbow to steer him into the empty dressing room.

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