Page 61 of House of Hearts
Giving up, I slip on a tartan scarf and down some Tylenol for the pain.
“Did you go anywhere last night?” Birdie asks from the depths of her walk-in closet. She’s a ghost of white fabric, her head hidden as she slips on her button-up. “You weren’t there when I woke up.”
Her question from weeks earlier has left an imprint of its own on my mind.Can you promise me you won’t keep things from me again?
I make eye contact with Birdie’s antique Georgian brooch instead of her. She probably thrifted it at an estate sale. It’s a lover’s eye encrusted in pearls and stitched with diamond tears. Immortal andever watching, just like Anastasia. “Were you going to see anyone?”
“No…I, um, I needed some air,” I say, which isn’t a lie but is most definitely not the full truth, either.I’ll tell her, I rationalize to myself,but not yet.
“And you didn’t stop and talk to anyone while you were out? It felt like you were gone for ages.”
I force out a strained chuckle. “Are you my mom?”
With her intense stare and the brooch she’s sporting, there are three eyes glaring down at me when she says, “No, just a concerned friend.”
My throat bobs. “You don’t have to worry about me, Bird.”
“Somehow I don’t quite believe that.”
Too bad Hieronymus Bosch is long dead; he probably could’ve used my day to draw up another portrait of hell. We’re missing bagpipe-playing demons, but otherwise my schedule is complete with a whole host of horrors beyond comprehension.
It begins with breakfast.
“So, it’s a hard no for my Lockwell article?” Amber asks through a spoonful of oatmeal. Swallowing, she shifts direction and uses her spoon as a pointer at Calvin’s empty seat. “He freaked out for days, and now he’s mysteriously out sick. C’mon.”
Birdie’s gaze cuts sharply to me, but she stays silent as Oliver fields his girlfriend’s questions. “What would you even write in your article?”
Amber’s eyes gleam. “Hypothesis number one: mind control. I saw a hypnotist once with my family in Vegas, and he got a woman onstage to think she was a parrot and—”
“Good thing this isn’t Las Vegas,” he retorts, then: “Also, do you hear him squawking like a bird?”
“I’d have to listen to him longer,” Birdie offers unhelpfully.
They keep talking, but I’m not listening. The conversation bleeds away in the background while I’m distracted by the plate beneath me. I could’ve sworn I put a croissant on it, but that’s not what I see there now. It’s aheart, just like the one I saw back in the maze.
I whip around to see if anyone else looks even remotely horrified, but no one so much as bats an eye.That’s because it’s not real, I remind myself. I prod it experimentally on my tray. It’s meatier than I expected, all muscle and no gelatinous fat.
The room is suddenly sweltering as anxiety flames in my gut. I grip the handle of my water glass for dear life and try to get a hold of myself. This is all a product of my imagination. Some sick illusion making me feel like I’m losing my mind. I can’t justnoteat. I have to find a way to stomach it—
The organ twitches, and suddenly there’s one on every plate. The cafeteria is a rat-king chain of hearts, all of them alive and throbbing. The chorus clatters the silverware, rattling the table beneath its weight.
I squeeze my eyes shut until tears spring up.It’s not real. None of it is real.This is what nightmares are made of, terrors that only your mind can cook up. But what I feel next is very, very real, and I gasp at the flare of pain as glass cuts through my palm.
I didn’t even know I was gripping my cup for dear life until it explodes in a sea of shards on my tray.
I risk opening my eyes, and not only has the world returned to normal, but everyone is staring. Gawking. The appropriate response when someone is actively losing their shit in public and breaking glasses.
“Christ, Violet, are you all right?”
It’s Amber.
I take stock of the scene. The heart is no longer a heart at all but a croissant on my plate, crimson blood reduced to a jam spread along the side.
I cradle my hand to my chest. “I-I’m sorry,” I respond, sounding anything but stable, and to be quite honest, I’m not sure Iamstable.
“You’rebleeding.”
“I’m okay, I’m just lightheaded,” I lie, and when I go to stand up, I realize that’s true. My legs buckle beneath me, and I have to grip the table with my good hand to keep from falling.
