Page 32 of House of Hearts
It’s the only explanation for why my clothes are on the floor.
The fine print here is that this is the third time I was absolutely, undeniably positive I put everything in my suitcase and the third time that my entire wardrobe has somehow ended up back on the floor. So I pack it all up again. But like clockwork, I blink or spin around or breathe wrong and boom, everything scatters on the ground.
“I really am losing my mind,” I say, first to myself and then to a folded pair of socks I’ve just placed in my bag. I say it out loud like some sort of countercurse, and then I stand there and wait with my eyes wide open. A second passes. Ten seconds pass. I’m about to laugh to myself that I reallyamlosing it, and then a dry gust of air hits my eyes and I blink and the socks are on the floor by my feet.
And this time the entire suitcase has not only tipped over onto its side, but it’s been flung impossibly across the room and landed facedown on Birdie’s bed.
This doesn’t bode well for keeping it together. Forget thesuitcase, then. I stagger back out of the room and scratch “packing” off my mental to-do list. I choose to hightail it out of there instead, swinging the door back behind me and ignoring Amber’s confused calls as I stumble my way into the courtyard. The sun is low in the distance, but it’s a welcome sight compared to the harsh fluorescents of my dorm room and the static crinkle of electricity.
The damp lawn squelches against my heels, wet grass soaking into my black tights as I maneuver off the cement path and trudge through the lawn. It’s quicker to cut directly across to the main parking lot, and all I want is to be out of here this very second.
I cradle my phone to my ear and count the rings as I try to call my mom. Each ring has me gritting my teeth harder, my fingers clammy against the sides.
VOICEMAIL FULL
Goddamn it, Mom. I could be dying over here. I try again. Nothing. Knowing her, she likely skipped her break and chose to let someone else take her fifteen instead, which means I’m shit out of luck until her shift ends at midnight.
I’m ten seconds away from chucking my phone in the lake when I hit the wall. One moment I’m walking, and the next I’m flat on my ass, wincing as I recover from the impact. I guess that’s what I get for not looking where I’m going, but Mom’s going to freak out when I tell her I spontaneously want to go home this very second, and, oh, by the way, I’ve also got a black eye.
I hiss at the lingering waves of pain before risking a peek up at the wall that did me in.
Except…
Except there isn’t a wall.
The space before me is a wide stretch of absolute nothingness. Open air for miles on either side of me. That’s not possible.
I lift shakily to my feet and take an experimental step forward, and all at once I feel the sudden, inexplicable rush of air pulling me back. Just like in the dorm room. Again I step forward, and again I’m flung back. Gentler this time, like a child getting scolded for standing too close to a hot stove.
“Sorry I didn’t catch you this time,” a familiar voice says behind me. I turn, and Calvin is there, an infuriating shadow in the shape of a man. “You look…”
I gesture at the force field of pure nothingness before me. The words leave my throat in a sticky heap: “I was trying to pack my socks but they kept falling out of my bag and now there’s this wall but it’s air and I can’t leave and I feel like I’m losing my mind and…and…”
I must look extraordinarily pitiful because Calvin lowers himself to the ground and offers me a hand I hesitantly take. He pulls me to my feet and steers me in the opposite direction.
“Where are we going?”
He uses his free hand to rustle through his hair. “Somewhere I always go to clear my head.”
Nothing says “my daddy owns a yacht” like attending a private academy with a boathouse.
“This is where you clear your head?” I ask, staring up at the sun-bleached building at the same moment I register that we’re still holding hands. I rectify that sin immediately and yank my arm away. Clearing my throat, I fight to keep my voice even as I say, “On a swan boat?”
“The alternative is lying on the ground, hyperventilating,” he returns. “Personally, I prefer my panic attacks with a nice view.”
“You’re right, it’s much better to hyperventilate on open water.”
He doesn’t let my sarcasm phase him. He yawns like he’s tired of our banter. The end of his shirt lifts to expose his navel, and because I’m a human being with eyes, I notice his sun-kissed skin and the particularly hypnotizing freckle beneath his belly button. I make a point to look anywhere but at him.
“Fine,” I say. “On to the swan boats.”
The only living soul inside the boathouse is a Black woman in her late seventies. Her thin hands clutch aSwimming Worldmagazine, and she regards us with a lift of her right brow. It’s not lost on me that she’s sporting a boatneck top in a nautical blue-and-white sailor’s print, complete with a sterling silver sailboat pin.
“That’s Ms.Austin, the boat keeper,” Calvin whispers conspiratorially to me. “She swam the English Channel thirty years ago—I know that because she’s told me nine times.”
“Will she even let us take a boat out this late?”
“Believe me,” he breathes, flashing me a wink. “I’m basically like a grandson to her.”
