Page 33 of House of Hearts
He directs his attention back to the woman behind the counter and rearranges his face into an ear-to-ear smile. “Ms.Austin! Just the woman I wanted to see. You wouldn’t mind if I took a swan out for a spin, would you? We’ll be back before curfew, promise.”
He’s right, she does look at him like a grandson—specifically one she knows is full of shit. “Really, now, Calvin?” She plays along with a tap of her nails against the desk. “You’ll make it around the lake and back in fifteen minutes?”
He rests his elbows on the desk. “Of course. If you could swim the English Channel in, what, five minutes, you don’t think I can paddle across this measly lake in fifteen?”
She scoffs, but I can see that in her mind she’s wading through icy salt water, her chest heaving as she makes the arduous journey across the sea. “More like thirteen hours, young man.”
I tune out their conversation, my eyes drifting beyond Ms.Austin to the wall behind her.
Despite the clearly new boats and dock, the boathouse itself is a relic. The brick wall behind Ms.Austin’s back might be aged, but a black-and-white portrait paints a picture of when it was newly erected. There’s a team of students standing at the forefront, each one with an oar in hand and their name scrawled in thin cursive.
Phillip Green, Martin Hoadley, J. Wellington Wales, Oleander Lockwell.
Oleander. Before he became immortalized in this school forever, was he really just another student?
Calvin’s voice continues beside me. “You could swim it again this year.”
She rolls her eyes. “With this bad hip? Not likely.”
“Pat Gallant-Charette swam it at sixty-six. You could beat her record.”
Her eyes brighten at the possibility. “I do miss it. Winds were wild that day, and not even halfway in, I was stung by a jellyfish. Don’t even get me started on the dehydration—”
She’s prepared to recount her story for the tenth time when Calvin interjects. His hand splays convincingly behind me, his fingertips hovering an inch above my skin. Heat radiates from his almost-touch, andI stiffen to attention. “Ms.Austin, this is riveting, truly, but I hope you don’t mind if we finish up next time? I’m not one to keep a girl waiting on a first date.”
She reluctantly waves him forward, but shouts “no more than fifteen minutes” at our backs.
“I wouldn’t dream of taking longer!” he replies, and something in my gut tells me we’ll be at least thirty.
Ahead of us, two flocks of swan boats wait at the end of the runway to the pier. They’re poised like ballerinas, their wooden necks arched gracefully my way. Calvin helps me into the first one on our right, and I glare up at him from the bench.
“Tell someone we’re on a date again, and I’ll send you overboard.”
“You can always tell them it was the worst date you’ve ever had,” he retorts sweetly, his eyes meeting mine beneath a canopy of dark blond lashes before he directs the boat away from the pier.
“You heard that one, huh?”
“I hear everything, Violet.”
All around us, the world is alive in wet color—it’s a painter’s palette of leafy green lily pads, lavender water willows, and deep, shadowed water. I can easily envision a Shakespearean Ophelia draped in a garland of wildflowers, still singing as the water drags her under. The perfect canvas for a poetic death.
“It is peaceful out here,” I admit.
“Percy loved it, too,” he mumbles, shy suddenly now that he’s not being a smug jerk.
For a long moment, neither of us speaks. The only sounds are a toad bellowing in the duckweed and the soft churn of our boat cutting through the water.
“I know that was a lot to soak in back at the House,” he says. “It couldn’t have been easy for you.”
Huge understatement, but I don’t fight him. I focus my energy on the space beyond his shoulder. The sun has melted into the silhouette of the trees.
“You know why I came here,” I say finally.
He hums in response. “I assumed your mission was to personally drag me down to hell.”
“A lovely thought,” I acknowledge, “but no.”
Against the storybook backdrop, Calvin looks like a prince. A crown of golden hair and a regal brow, looking down on me like I’m a frog he’s supposed to kiss. “You did come to ruin me, right? Or at the very least, my family?”
