Page 88 of The Towering Sky
Avery didn’t know what he meant by that. She was afraid to ask.
She stalked now through the middle of city hall, which her dad had transformed into a gilded and hologrammed wilderness, filled with a herd of overdressed New Yorkers. Her parents stood near the stage, greeting people, smiling their empty politician smiles.
She glanced around, wondering where Max was, even though a strange part of her felt reluctant to see him. She kept replayingthat moment in Oxford—when he gave her the key-chip to the apartment and imagined out loud the life they would build there. If he’d handed her the key to his heart, she couldn’t have felt more guilty or undeserving.
Avery tried to set out looking for Max, but every few feet, someone stopped her. Lila Donnelly, who’d started the marathon on the moon, where everyone ran in weight-additive shoes to simulate Earth’s gravity. Marc de Beauville, one of her father’s greatest donors, who owned the midTower multilevel golf course. Fan PingPing, the Chinese pop star. They were all here, old money and new money, the curious and the bored, the businesspeople and the wide-eyed clusters of friends who had bought a ticket just because they had a weakness for glamorous parties.
She nodded at each of them, murmuring a few words of thanks before swishing past in her gown of gold tulle. It fell in frothy folds from her nipped-in waist, the edge of each tier lined in pale gold sequins and shimmering embroidery. With her hair pinned up in delicate curls and her mom’s five-carat canary diamonds blazing in her ears, Avery knew she looked glittering and expensive. She hated it.
“Avery!” Leda pushed determinedly through the crowd toward her. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”
“Hey, Leda,” Avery managed, her smile still affixed to her face, but it felt a little wobbly. Leda wasn’t fooled.
“What is it?”
“I can’tescapehim,” Avery said helplessly. The words fell from her lips before she’d given them thought.
“But why would you want to?” Leda’s eyes narrowed. “Is it the apartment thing?”
Avery’s lips parted. Her mouth felt sandpaper-dry. Her eyes had darted reflexively toward Atlas.
Leda followed her gaze. Avery watched the comprehensiondawn on her face, that moment of tacit understanding mingled with shocked disbelief.
“Oh” was all Leda said at first. “I thought you meant Max.”
Which was understandable, because sheshouldhave meant Max. If Avery was going to use a vague, antecedent-lesshim, it should have been her boyfriend she was talking about.
Neither of them spoke Atlas’s name.
“Look, Avery,” Leda said slowly. “You and Max are good together—calm, stable. No drama.” Somehow, the way she pronounced it made it sound as though a world without drama was as dull as it was safe.
“Max and I have drama!” Avery protested. “And sparks and fireworks. Whatever you want to call it.”
“Of course you do,” Leda said, too quickly to be convincing. She heaved a sigh. “You’ve just been so happy lately with Max. I don’t want you to lose that.”
“You seem happy too.” This time Avery’s smile came out more genuine. “Is Watt here tonight?”
She didn’t miss the telltale way that Leda’s cheeks flushed at the mention of him. “He was supposed to be here, but he couldn’t make it at the last minute. Something urgent came up,” Leda said, and shrugged. “He told me not to worry.”
Avery nodded. “I’m glad that you two are... you know.”
“Yeah.” Leda’s eyes skimmed over the crowded room. “Can you believe that we’re here? Senior year, at your dad’s inauguration?”
Avery knew the feeling. Time kept slipping through her hands, too quickly for her to snatch it. “If only we could go back, do things differently. Fix all our mistakes.”
“I wish,” Leda agreed. “But I think the only thing to do is keep going forward, the best we can.”
Maybe Leda was right. Maybe the secret to growing up wasturning away from the ugliest parts of yourself. Pasting a smile on your face, and pretending thatit—the kiss, the confession, the night you watched your best friend die—never happened.
Avery wondered if maybe sheshouldtell Leda that the police had questioned her today. She didn’t want her to worry or spin out of control again. But maybe it was foolish to hide it from her. Maybe Leda had a right to know.
Avery started to open her mouth, uncertain how to bring it up, just as Max appeared at her side.
“Here you are,” he exclaimed, dropping a kiss on Avery’s brow. He looked crisply handsome in his tux.
“I was just going to go grab some dessert,” Leda announced, taking her cue to leave. She shot Avery a meaningful look before swishing away. Avery watched her go, the exaggerated V of the back of her dress drawing attention to her tiny frame, the stark black-and-white pattern of her skirts.
“Sorry. I was doing interviews.” Avery willed herself to seem normal, to refrain from looking in Atlas’s direction. Because even now she knew exactly where he was. She kept trying not to, but she’d been following his movements all night out of the corner of her eye with that silent pulsing radar that operates just under the surface of one’s mind.
