Chapter 63
WREN
“YOU’RE FUCKING DAMAGED. You know that, right?”
Most kids were fascinated by the fact that Mercy and I were twins. How unusual, their parents used to coo. They look so similar, too. It isn’t normally that obvious when you have a girl and a boy, but they’re just like two peas in a pod. Mercy’s my female counterpart, which is highly disturbing most days, and fucking annoying on every other. No one should have to look at another person and know, without a shadow of a doubt, what they’d look like if they were born the opposite sex. It’s just wrong.
She flutters her eyelashes at me, resting her chin on my shoulder. “Don’t worry, big brother. I resent having to work with you, too. But it’s time we swept all of this hostility under the rug, don’t you think? It’s getting a little old. Our parents are beginning to suspect something terrible happened between us. We wouldn’t want Father taking it upon himself to investigate now, would we? He just retired. Plenty of time on his hands now. He might be blind to what’s right in front of him most of the time, but he’s very good at solving puzzles when he puts his mind to it. I think I take after him in that way.”
“Yes, we both know how great you are at sticking your nose in where it’s not wanted, don’t we.” Not a question. A statement. A fact.
She preens like I’ve paid her a fucking compliment.
Fitz goes around the room, handing out assignment sheets, which means we’re all doing different presentations. He visibly flinches when he stops in front of us, offering Mercy our assignment. She rips it out of his hand, baring her teeth in a smile so terrifying that the muscles in his throat work overtime as he hastily heads back to the front of the room.
“You shouldn’t have hit him,” she says to me. “He wasn’t doing anything wrong.”
I’m not listening to her, though. I’m too busy side-eying Pax, trying to silently threaten him into behaving. Elodie’s back to me, so I can’t see the look on her face, but I know she must be hating this. Pax is a daunting prospect, even to those of us who claim to like him.
“So, big brother, care to tell me what’s been going on since I’ve been away? Any new and interesting developments you’d like to share with me?” “They stopped serving spaghetti on Wednesdays,” I growl.
“Oh, wow. You’ve got all the good gossip. I should have come to you first instead of Damiana.”
I give up glaring at Pax and glare at her instead. Not before I catch the sour, smug smile on Damiana’s face, though. “That girl’s poison.” That’s all I say because that’s all I can say.
Mercy fans herself with our assignment. “Why’d you fuck her, then?”
“Jesus, Mercy. Don’t you have a fucking play you’re supposed to be performing in or something? In New York? Far, far away from here?”
“Michael tried to make me an understudy. I’m not an understudy, Wren. I’m the leading lady, or I’m nothing at all. Damiana said you dropped her like a hot coal the moment the new girl came along. That can’t be true,
though, surely. She’s so...” she wrinkles her nose, “...average.” “Just stay away from Elodie, Mercy. Ten feet at all times.”
“Or what?”
“Or I’ll make your life a living hell. You’re not the only one who’s good at piecing together people’s secrets.”
“Oh ho ho, holy shit. I didn’t think it was possible, but you...oh my god, you like her, don’t you?”
She twists around to face me, hooking her leg underneath her like she’s settling in for a good girl chat. “Wren Jacobi, I never thought I’d see the day. I assumed, after all these years of lashing out and breaking people, that there was something fundamentally broken inside you. It’s a real shock to learn otherwise. Fuck!”
I snatch the paper out of her hand, scanning the information typed on it, pointedly ignoring the shit-eating grin she’s wearing. “We need to write an essay on an unsung hero in literature and present it to the class. You can choose.”
“Really?” For an actress, her attempt at fake surprise is pretty piss poor. “You’re usually so protective over your literary heroes, unsung or otherwise.”
God, this is gonna be such bullshit. I crack my knuckles with a vicious enthusiasm that shuts her up. For five whole seconds.
“Look, I think it’s great that you like someone. I know you don’t believe me, but I care about you, Wren. And if this mousy, strange little girl blows your hair back, then I say go for it.”
This is a trick. A lousy trick that I’m not stupid enough to fall for. I bare my teeth, dropping the paper into her lap. “Pick the subject for the assignment. Then stop fucking talking, Mercy, or so help me we’ll have problems.
She picks Sydney Carton. Of all the characters in all the books, she picks Sydney Carton from ‘A Tale Of Two Cities,’ because she knows how much it’ll irritate me. Sydney’s my guy. He’s a wretch, the very worst and the very best. I identify with him on so many levels that it’s not even funny. If she were anyone else, I’d be surprised that she picked him out of thin air as the topic of our assignment, but since she is who she is, I’m entirely unsurprised. We’re twins, after all. Our fucked-up brains work so similarly that I despise her almost as much as I despise myself.
The moment the bell rings, signaling the end of class, I take out my phone and power it on. I tap out a message as I bolt out of the class.
Me: Lunchtime. Find me. I’ll be hanging with the poets.