Page 9 of Crown of Thorns
My phone buzzes with a message from Amadou. Flicking through the first results of his research, my grin widens. Nice.
Let’s flip his world inside out. By the time I’m done, he won’t know if he wants to kiss me or kill me. Either way, he’ll still beg.
3
NOAH
"You look just like her."
Melo lounges on the sofa, clay stains smudged across her honey-brown cheeks and under her short, bitten nails. She’s wearing one of her old linen morning gowns, the sleeves pushed to her elbows, revealing wiry forearms dusted in flour and dried glaze. Her curls, thick, reddish-brown, and wild, are barely held together by a worn scrunchie. She looks like a painting unfinished, eyes sharp and luminous behind wide-frame glasses, and a mug of chamomile tea tucked into one hand.
“Like who?” I ask, my brows drawing together.
“You know who.”
I shake my head. “How can you tell that? We’ve barely spent time together.”
She shrugs. “A few weeks. And all those years before.”
“Well, I’m nothing like her.” Clicking my briefcase shut, I head for the coat rack.
“You so do. All pent-up, hard on yourself, a loner. Let me guess, you’re always early?”
I give her a pointed look through the mirror. “And you base that on…?”
“The time. You’re supposed to be there at eight. It’s a five-minute drive. It’s seven now.” She juts her face toward the clock that hangs on the wall above the fridge. It’s the one she made for Father’s Day when she was seven years old, two months before I left.
“I prefer to call it punctual.”
Melo snorts. “If you’re looking for your phone, it’s next to the coffee machine.”
“Right. You could have said that before.” I snatch it off the counter.
“It was too funny watching you. You know you’re going to be okay, right?” She gets up from the couch and strolls my way.
I have to be.But I don't say that.
Instead, I glare at my reflection in the mirror. Navy-blue suit with a white shirt, no tie—since it wasn’t obligatory—and at my feet, brown sneakers. Our eyes meet. “I hate my hair. And I’m nothing like her. Not in the way I cringe at my reflection, not in the way this suit feels like borrowed pride, like armour I haven’t earned.”
“You didn’t know her.” Melody runs a brush through my strawberry-blond curls, smoothing them out.
“I didn’t want to.”
“That’s because you didn’t want to know yourself. It’s not too late to change your mind. Got your wallet?” My baby sister only reaches my shoulder, but her eyes make me yield every time.
“Yeah.” But we both know that it’s empty. I think of last week, of walking past a bakery, stomach hollow, calculating which coins I could spare. My first paycheck won’t come until the end of the month, and we’ve already used most of Melody’s small artist allocation to pay for the house and groceries.
“You’ve got to eat, Nooms. Why don’t you take that fifty euro note you hid in the couch the other day? Mom used to do that, too.” She smiles knowingly.
“What? Stash money away behind pillows?”
“Hmm. Told you, you’re just like her.” She brushes away another lock.
“I doubt that very seriously. She never—” I clamp my mouth shut.
The brush halts. “She never what?”
“Nothing.”
