Lizzie’s texts were coming fast and furious as Anne made her way to the headmistress’s cottage. She was scheduled to meet Mrs. Wright to photograph the locations she’d decided to recommend for preservation, and she was trying to get Lizzie off her back so she wouldn’t be forced to listen to a buzz from her phone every few minutes.
Have you red-posted yet?
I can feel you freaking out. Stop it and just do it.
Are you getting these?
You better think of something!
Anne groaned and finally shut off her phone. The idea of stealing something—even something that had originally been hers—was tying her up in knots. What if she got caught? What would the Board think? Could she be putting the preservation project in danger? Risking her family’s reputation?
She was so caught up that she was almost at the cottage when she noticed the soft crunch of stones behind her and turned.
Rick froze. The wind rustled through his hair. A bird called to its friends, who answered in kind. It was only a moment, but felt like ten. Then he lifted the single-lens camera slung around his neck. It was new, not the one she recognized from years ago. “My mom sent me instead. She wasn’t feeling well.”
“Is she okay?” Anne pressed a hand to her chest. “Should we—”
“It’s just allergies from being outdoors.” He let the camera drop and ran a hand behind his neck. “She’s fine, but it would be better if she stayed inside.”
He looked tired, and she’d bet he had stayed up all night worrying about his mom. He probably would rather be anywhere else. As much as she would never hear the end of it from her own mother, she had to give him an out. “Let’s reschedule. Or if you give me the camera, I’ll take the pictures.”
A rueful grin lit up his face. “I’ve seen your pictures. I’ll stick it out.”
She smiled, too. They were twenty feet apart, but she felt closer to him than she had any right to feel. “Your mom said something about a list?”
“I’ve got the list.” He pointed to his head. “We should head back to the school. It starts there.”
They walked in silence, and she couldn’t help but realize that he’d followed her halfway to the cottage without stopping her or making her turn around. He’d walked behind her for ten minutes not saying a thing. She wanted to ask him why, but she also wanted there to be a real reason… and for that reason to mean more than it probably did.
They entered the school together, and as they walked toward the stairwell that circled beneath the Murano chandelier, she felt her breath hitch. They went to the same school, but had never been together in the places that used to matter to them. She watched his face carefully for any trace of emotion, but he was all focus. She stood to one side so she was out of the way of passing students and teachers, and he took his position five steps up.
She loved the way he took pictures. The crinkle in his brow as he stared through the viewfinder. He would tilt his head to the right, then back. After a few shots, he’d adjust the lens and fiddle with the knobs.
Once, he’d been that focused on her. Being adored was an easy thing to get used to and a terrible thing to lose.
Rick looked down at her expectantly. “Want a look?” He held the camera out but left it on its leash around his neck. She walked over to him, her fingers trembling. The neck strap was short, so she had to lean against him in order to get a look. He thumbed through the photos. Rick smelled just as she remembered, clean and spicy. The back of her shoulder rubbed against his chest, and she felt his breath sluice against the top of her head.
“They look great,” she said, even though she hadn’t noticed a single picture.
“Did I miss anything my mom might have brought up?”
“Nope,” she said, moving away quickly. “What’s next?”
So went the afternoon as they moved to the library, the academic offices, and classrooms until it was time for the tree, and going to the tree meant the meteor field was next. She’d never been back there with him since the day she’d broken up with him. She didn’t know if she could handle it. It would’ve been hard even without adding in the memories of that place, without the sight of the tree he’d destroyed.
How could he be so unflustered?
They walked out to the central courtyard, where she wasn’t surprised to find some of their friends lying beneath the apple tree. It was one of the last remnants of the orchard that had been on the property before the Academy was built. Most apple trees didn’t live more than one hundred and twenty years, but this tree seemed as ancient as the earth. Part of Anne believed—hoped—that it would live on forever.
Fanny, Tran, and Josh were sitting beneath the tree. Lucy sat nearby, the way she always did, trying to be part of the group but never quite fitting in.
Fanny and Tran were in tracksuits and sweating, probably from their morning workout. Normally, Fanny and Josh ran together, but Anne knew Tran was jealous of his girlfriend’s morning sessions with the famous actor, so he’d started joining them even though he hated being up early, hated jogging even more, and had no hope of keeping up with Fanny. He didn’t seem to mind being passed, though.
Fanny gave Anne a questioning look as she wiped the sweat from her brow. Her gaze darted to Rick and then back. “You need any help, Anne?” she asked.
“No, we’re fine. We’re documenting the historically significant parts of the property for the new developers,” Anne explained. “Rick’s mom is the liaison to the Board.”
“Ahh.” Fanny gave her a sympathetic smile. “Do you want company anyway?”
“We’re okay.” She did want company, a buffer between herself and Rick. But she wanted to be alone with him, too.
“I need a shot of the tree,” Rick said. “Do you guys mind moving out of the photo?”
The trio got up and dusted the grass and dirt off the backs of their legs. Josh ambled over to Anne and casually rested his arm over her shoulder. “We should coordinate outfits for prom. I have a vest that will go with the hot red number you’re wearing.”
“Only if you want to wear it,” Anne said. “You should wear what you like.”
“What if I like looking good next to you?” Josh said.
Anne rolled her eyes. Typical Josh response.
Still, she knew his attitude was as much for his benefit as hers. The only way he seemed to cope with Fanny being with Tran was by being a complete flirt with anyone and everyone else. So she let him flirt. Where was the harm? The two of them must be the saddest students at the Academy.
“I think we have enough pictures,” Rick said, setting the camera to lie against his chest.
“But you only took a few shots.” Anne had watched him carefully plan and shoot every single photo thus far, as if it were the last preservation photo that would ever be taken. Which was probably the case. Why would he take only a few minutes with the tree?
“There’s a picture of the tree in every Academy brochure. Between my photos and the others, we’re covered.”
“I’m sure Rick knows what he’s doing,” Lucy said, joining the group without an invitation. “You really know how to use that camera. I just use the one in my phone. All the knobs and spinning parts confuse me. I don’t get it.”
“It’s not too hard,” Rick said. “Once you figure out whether moving a part left or right gives you more or less light or more or less zoom or focus, it’s pretty easy.”
“I’d love it if you showed me sometime,” Lucy said adoringly.
“Uh, sure. But this camera’s just a loaner for the day.”
“I can rent one.”
“Next?” Anne said loudly after clearing her throat. “Or did we get everything?”
“Not everything.” Rick held her gaze, his lips frozen in hesitation.
Her stomach clenched. Of course they weren’t done. She knew that. But now they had an audience. “The meteor field,” she said.
Tran’s eyes lit up. “Meteor field? What’s that?”
“It’s this field in the forest where a meteor must have hit years ago,” Anne said.
“That sounds so cool,” Lucy said.
Tran eagerly turned to Fanny. “We need to check that out.”
“Actually,” Fanny said, her gaze darting to Josh, “I’ve already seen it. Josh took me there a few times when we were rehearsing for the school play.”
Tran digested this information while sucking on his lip ring, a move that Anne now knew meant he was nervous or angry and trying not to show it.
“I asked her to keep it a secret,” Josh said by way of explanation.
The ensuing pause made it clear that this revelation had not made things any better.
Josh tried again. “It’s where I go to rehearse all my stuff. I kind of need it quiet.”
“Yeah, no problem,” Tran said, turning away. But judging by the work on his lip ring, he didn’t mean it. Fanny looped her arm through Tran’s, but he didn’t pull her into him like he usually did. “Let’s go check it out,” he said instead.
* * *
They made their way slowly through the woods. Anne could tell that Fanny wanted to run ahead with Tran so they could be alone and she could explain why she’d never told him about the meteor field. Anne hadn’t known Josh knew about the field—or how he’d even found it. She’d always assumed it was her and Rick’s special spot.
Now even Anne wanted to run ahead. But they were all forced to walk at a snail’s pace because Lucy’s cranky ankle had decided it was injured again. Rick stood on Lucy’s left and Josh on her right as they helped her over fallen branches and loose stumps.
“She’s good at being a damsel in distress,” Fanny murmured to Anne.
Anne resisted the urge to turn around, but her mind filled in the blanks: Lucy clutching Rick’s shoulder, and Rick holding her tightly at the waist.
She walked faster, and Fanny kept pace, a surprised lift to her brow.
“Just one more set of photos,” Anne said. “Then it can be over.”
“Has it ever been over?” Fanny asked. “As long as I’ve known you… it’s been Rick.”
“Everything will be over soon,” Anne said. “Whether we like it or not. At least that’s one good thing about the school shutting down.”
“Anne!” Fanny’s eyes rounded with shock.
“Don’t tell Lizzie I said that.”
“Don’t worry. I value my life too much, and she’s bound to kill the messenger.”
“I don’t mean to sound whiny or ungrateful. But I feel like I’ve been spinning in the same circles for the past few years. Except for making friends with you guys—which has been the best thing in my life—I’ve been stuck in the same rut. Maybe with the closing of the Academy, my life can finally change.”
“Change always seems to happen in traumatic ways,” Fanny said as they cleared the trees and entered the meteor field.
No matter how many times Anne came here, she was always awed by the way it opened up into white-barked desolation. The shift in energy from greenery to gray.
It was clear that Tran and Lucy, seeing it for the first time, were just as affected.
Lucy seemed to have forgotten her injured foot as she ran out into the sand and dropped to her knees. Her good hand scooped up sand, and she let it fall through her fingers.
Tran pulled Fanny against his cheek. “You’re going to pay for keeping this from me. I’m not sure when or how, but I’m going to be very creative.” He kissed her, and she laughed.
Josh turned to Anne and sighed. “There goes our spot.”
“I wasn’t aware it was our spot,” Anne said.
“Ours in that both of us were selfishly keeping it to ourselves.”
“How could you have asked Fanny to keep it secret from Tran?” she said, a little reproachfully.
“Technically, I didn’t. They weren’t dating at the time. Although…” He gave a rueful smile. “I did like having the secret with her after they started dating. We had a lot of memories here, just me and Fanny. I wanted to keep those for myself. You can relate to that, can’t you, Anne?”
Instead of answering, she watched Rick set the camera to his eye. He walked the perimeter of the tree line, moving away from their tree. She didn’t even know why he needed her here. He hadn’t asked her about whether he was capturing the things his mom had brought up during their tour. He hadn’t even looked at her since arriving at the field.
She dug the toe of her ballet flat into the sand and traced out a circling labyrinth.
Lucy flipped onto her back. “The sand is so warm,” she said.
Tran and Fanny walked along the field with their fingers intertwined. He tried to lash out to grab her at the waist, revealing a flash of tattoo along his beltline, but she was too fast and kept sidestepping him. “Give in, Fanny,” he said.
“I will, if you catch me.”
“You’re going to have to give in eventually. You need my help.”
“I can do it on my own.”
He cocked an eyebrow. “Mayhem and mischief on your own? Not on this scale.”
Anne asked, “What’s he talking about, Fanny?”
“My red Post-it,” Fanny said. She kept a vigilant eye on Tran and ran around him when he made a move to tickle her.
“Are you getting texts from Lizzie too?” Anne asked.
“Texts. Calls. Midnight visits.” Fanny rolled her eyes. “I know what I’m going to do, though.”
“What we’re going to do,” Tran amended.
“What are you red-posting?” Anne whispered.
Fanny sighed and stood still. “Fine. You’re right, Tran. I need your help. So two seconds of tickling. That’s it!”
Tran grinned like a predator and stalked toward her. He tickled her at the waist, and she screamed. Then he lifted her up and tossed her over his shoulder and ran. That lasted about a second before she jumped off him, giggling.
Fanny ran back to Anne and caught her breath. “I’m stealing the track, Anne.”
Anne must have misheard. “Excuse me?”
“The running track. I’m taking it. It’s mine.”
“But… you can’t steal an entire track.”
“Not on her own,” Tran said, stopping beside them. “But together? Not a problem.”
Great. Anne couldn’t come up with one thing to steal and Fanny was going to steal an entire oval track. Lizzie would eat that up. “I’m not clear on how it’s even possible.”
Tran tapped the side of his head. “This is the brain that MIT wants. Trust me, it’s possible.”
“You got in?” Anne asked. “Congratulations!” Tran was a senior and heading to college, which made her wonder what would happen to him and Fanny since she was heading to Olympic training camp in Southern California.
Josh’s head popped up at Tran’s announcement. “MIT? Nice. Will you move over the summer?”
“MIT wants this brain. I didn’t say this brain wants MIT,” Tran said. He glanced at Fanny, who was staring at the dirt, tracing lines with her sneaker next to Anne’s labyrinth. “My mom’s company has an opening for West Coast tour logistics. I help them over the summers, but could take it on full time.”
“Your mom is letting you ditch college to run band tours?” Josh asked. “MIT’s kind of a big deal.”
“So’s this job,” Tran said. “Sound engineers would kill to get on my mom’s tours.”
“You’d be traveling, though,” Josh pushed. “Heading up and down the coast with the tour.”
“No more than traveling for a movie role,” Tran said coolly.
They stood, facing off in silence. Anne looked for a reason to break in, but it was Lucy who inadvertently ended their standoff.
“You guys!” she called. “Come look at this.”
Anne’s relief was tempered when she turned and saw Lucy touching her tree. She stood as though rooted to the ground as Josh, Fanny, and Tran walked over to Lucy’s discovery.
“Whoa.” Tran tilted his head to look up to the top of the tree, where the bare white branches clawed the sky. “Unreal.”
“Rick, you have to take a picture of this tree.” Lucy rested her palm on the trunk, then smoothed her hand up and down once she realized its texture. “Is it dead?”
“It only looks dead,” Anne said, joining the group from behind. “Inside, the tree is still alive and pulls in water from the roots.”
“Rick, c’mere,” Josh called. “You need to take a picture of this.”
Rick abruptly turned and walked to them. He stared at the tree, right at the crisscrossed edges and hash marks that he’d dug into the trunk. He lifted the camera and took two successive snaps. “There.”
“What happened here?” Lucy poked at the marked-up tree. “It looks like a wild animal ripped into it. Do you think there are wild animals here?”
“It is the woods,” Josh said. “But something capable of doing this?”
Fanny ran her fingers into the grooves. “This wasn’t an animal. The hash marks are all different—different lengths and depths. It doesn’t have the consistency of claws. It’s more like someone…” She stopped and glanced over at Anne. “Or maybe it is some kind of animal. What do I know? Come on, Tran, we didn’t do enough stretching and now we’ve cooled down. We should go. Josh? Want to come?”
“Yeah,” Josh said. He frowned as he looked around the group, but seemed to know when to leave well enough alone. “Sure. I’m coming.”
“Lucy?” Fanny snapped. “Come on.”
“I’m not as fast as you guys,” Lucy said. “I think I’ll wait for Rick to help, if that’s okay.”
“I’ll help too,” Anne said before Fanny could protest or try to maneuver her and Rick alone together. She appreciated Fanny trying to make things easier for her, but she wasn’t glass and she wouldn’t break. She’d been handling Rick’s indifference toward her for years. A few more weeks wouldn’t kill her. At least, she hoped not.
“Do you have enough pictures?” she asked Rick.
“Enough,” he said. He set his arm around Lucy’s waist. While the rest ran ahead, Anne and Rick walked Lucy back into the woods. Occasionally their arms brushed against each other. Anne was hyperaware of the hairs on his arms, the warmth of his skin.
“I’m so sorry,” Lucy said over and over to Rick. “I’m sure you would rather be running ahead than sitting behind and helping me.”
“It’s fine, Lucy,” Rick said, his voice deep and reassuring.
Lucy beamed up at him. “You probably get tired of girls asking you to help them and being expected to be the strong one all the time.”
“It’s not as tiring as you’d think.”
Anne bit back a smile.
“But still,” Lucy pressed, “you probably prefer a girl who can stand on her own two feet. Someone as strong as you are.”
“I haven’t really thought about it.”
“I don’t believe you,” Lucy said with a flirtatious smile. “You can’t like being a knight in shining armor all the time. Or do you? Is there something else, then? Something you need to have in a girl?”
“Yes,” he said, his eyes focused ahead on the trail. “Someone who knows her own mind.”
* * *
Anne sat on the edge of her bed, pressed the phone to one ear, stuck her finger in the other, and yelled, “Where are you again?” She could hear music in the background and loud conversation.
“Florence,” her mother said. “At the gardens at Pitti Palace. There’s a party—Well, you know there’s always a party.”
“But I thought you wanted me to meet—”
“It came up at the last minute, dear. How could I say no? The Pisanos invited me, and they mentioned a chalet in San Gimignano that we can have for a pittance. What do you think of living in Italy?”
She thought it sounded expensive and far away. “Do you want me to email you the final list of historic locations?”
“Just tell me over the phone, dear.”
Anne listed off the locations. At least her mother didn’t interrupt. She felt as though she were speaking to an entire room full of Italians. Their rushed conversation, the honk of car horns, all muted through the phone. “The courtyard tree and the meteor field,” she finished.
“But what of the library windows? Or the theater’s colonnades?”
“I tried, Mom.”
“Can you imagine them all gone?”
Anne did imagine it then. The mall that would stand like a block of buildings. Fluorescent lights and linoleum floors and floor-to-ceiling glass windows. Instead of a sinking feeling in her gut, she felt a strange sense of relief. Because while the colonnades and stained glass and bricks and wood would all be gone, Lizzie and the rest of them—everything that actually mattered—would not.
The door opened, and a sheepish Lizzie stepped inside.
“Call me if you need anything else, Mom.” Anne hung up, a little guiltily, before her mother could continue to mope about the Academy while not wanting to lift a finger herself to change anything.
Lizzie’s eyes were bright and shiny, and she grinned uncontrollably as she changed out of her jeans into a fresh pair. “Did you hear about Fanny’s red-post idea?”
She fixed Lizzie with a stern look. “Don’t think we aren’t going to talk about it.”
“About what?” Lizzie asked innocently.
“About you spending the night with Dante.”
She blushed and pulled her shirt over her head. “I just can’t handle Lucy. You know how I feel about her.”
“But you stayed the night with Dante.”
“He slept on the floor!” Lizzie bit her lip. “Most of the time.”
“Lizzie!”
“Did you like my morning surprise?”
Conversation with Lizzie could sometimes be like getting whiplash. “Do you mean Rick?”
Lizzie nodded, then looked around the room. “Where did Lucy sleep?”
And they were back to Lucy. “My bed. I slept in yours.”
“Oh, thank God.” Lizzie flopped down on her mattress. “Uh, did Rick make your bed? He always does his corners like that. I bet he’s great at wrapping Christmas gifts.”
“Next time, give me some warning if you’re going to send him over,” Anne said.
“It’s not my fault he wakes up at the crack of dawn. But fine. If you want fair warning, here it is.”
“Here’s what?” Anne asked. Lizzie was also such a quick-witted speed demon it was hard to keep up.
A knock sounded at the door.
“Fair warning,” Lizzie repeated. “Rick is on his way over here. Right now.”
“Don’t leave,” Anne said between gritted teeth. She tucked her hair behind her ears, took a breath, and opened the door.
“Hey,” Rick said, walking past her and into the room.
Anne spun around. She shouldn’t have been surprised to find it empty. Lizzie had apparently opted to dive out the window. While Emma was a fan of entrances, Lizzie was the master of the parting word and the dramatic exit.
“Are you busy now?” Rick asked. His gaze darted around the room.
She didn’t answer until finally his gaze settled on her, and only then did she say, “A little, but I can make time for you.”
He raised his brow and said, “Thanks.”
She offered him Lizzie’s chair and sat on the edge of Lizzie’s bed so they were facing each other, knees a foot apart. He turned on the tablet he carried under his arm. “I have the pictures. I did a few minor edits, just to enhance the lighting. I want to make sure I send my mom the right ones.”
He held the tablet between them, but she had to lean in close to see the screen. Their faces were inches apart. She could feel his breath against her ear and tried to ignore the heat of it against her cheek. Using this thumb, he sped through the photos.
She wished for something to slow him down, anything. The tablet could break; the memory card could futz. She could break his thumb, she thought with hysterical desperation. Anything to prolong this feeling of him sitting next to her.
“Back up,” she said as he whizzed past the chandelier. “Could you fix the lighting on this one? Your mom mentioned wanting to catch the colors it cast on the walls and stairs.”
He grinned. “She would like that. She’s really into chandeliers.” He set the tablet on his lap and set about adding filters to the photo to increase the brilliance of the colors. “I think it’s something she dreamed about when she was a kid—having a house with chandeliers.”
“And now she has them. Several. She’ll have to find something else to dream about.”
“Or maybe she can just be happy with what she has.”
Anne stopped breathing. It had always felt like this with Rick. Like no matter what kind of conversation she was having or to whom she was talking, every point led back to him. “Will you stay in Merrywood after the Academy closes?”
“I think so. My mom says it’s okay if I go back East, but she’s not at the five-year mark yet with her cancer. I’d rather stay.”
“What about college?”
“Something in state. UCLA has a great arts and photography program.” He whipped the tablet back up to show her what he’d done.
Anne almost sighed at the picture, now vivid and alive with color. She pictured herself beneath the chandelier, arms out, spinning.
“So you’d head back to your old school in Merrywood for senior year?” she asked.
Rick tucked the tablet under his arm and leaned back. “I guess I don’t have a choice. What about you?”
She glanced up sharply. He had never asked her about herself, not since coming back, and he seemed to be holding his breath for an answer. “My mom hasn’t decided where to live yet.”
“Sounds like your mom.”
He said it without judgment or censure, but she heard it just the same. As critical as she felt of her own mother, she stiffened at the idea of someone else saying something bad about her. She and Lizzie had butted heads over less.
The seconds ticked away in silence.
“I’m sorry.” He blew out a long breath and pulled at the ends of his hair. With a shake of his head he looked down at his feet. “I have a hard time with your mom sometimes.”
Her heart beat in slow thuds. They were talking—finally talking. “I do, too. But I love her.”
“That I know.” He stood abruptly. “I’ll email you the rest of the photos.” He started to walk out, but as he passed the end of her bed, he drew his finger over Bunritto’s head and pulled at the end of a red stitch. “Looks like Bunritto will still pretty much endure anything to be with you.”
And then he left.