all Jules said when she saw me on the sidewalk in the sickly pre-dawn light wearing the ridiculously short shorts and synthetic top I’d bought yesterday was, “Let’s go.”
No “Hi.” No “Here are the basics of jogging technique.” No “I’m glad we have this chance to catch up.” She got going and I trailed her, frantic, like she’d stolen my phone.
“How long have you been with your boyfriend?” My voice was shrill from trying to keep it level as I ran, but I still felt a shiver of glee saying the word boyfriend. Like maybe, possibly, it could belong on my lips.
Jules blinked hard at me. “What?”
“Your . . . boyfriend?” I smiled, polite.
It had become hard to smile, though, let alone talk. We’d crossed the road, onto the park paths where runners go and I was now one of them, and it had felt weird and loose and awkward at first, but now it was starting to hurt. My ankles were wobbling, my throat raw, and I could feel everything—knee joints, rib bones, the skin on my face. I’d run before, of course, in gym, but only the bare minimum, and I didn’t do sports, I did orchestra, used to, anyway, and this was a million times more excruciating because I was in public and trying to keep pace with Jules and she wasn’t even sweating yet.
“If you want to catch up on all the time we’ve missed, that’s completely cool,” she huffed, in rhythm with her stride. “Just not . . . right . . . now . . .”
“Right,” I said. “Good idea.” But my breath felt like lava, so it came out, “Gun . . . duh . . . I can’t.”
I stopped. I had to. Spots were gathering.
She glanced over her shoulder with a thumbs-up. “Good start!”
I couldn’t tell if she was being sarcastic.
Falling onto a park bench, I retied one squeaky new sneaker, tugged up the sock, and looked at my watch. It was 6:09. I’d been jogging for four minutes.
The park felt weird this early in the morning, like if you weren’t exercising, you didn’t have permission to be here—until dawn, it belonged to animals and homeless New Yorkers. Right on cue, I looked at the treetops and saw a hawk swoop by on his way to his aerie in one of the high-rises bordering the park, the luxury apartment buildings where Sarahs and Lydias and Noras lived.
What did that hawk do all day? Did he have a mate? What was my squirrel up to? Were they mulling their destinies, their talent, their impact, or were they just watching the sunrise?
What was Oscar—?
Stop. I stood and brushed myself off, trying my best to plod home, not skip.
The lights were on at the house, so Oscar and Dad were up and working. I smoothed my hair and pulled down my sweaty jogging shirt before unlocking the front door. But the music greeting me was muffled—they were in the study, noodling music on Dad’s upright. I recognized the snippet Oscar had hummed last night and felt like I was in on a secret.
Then I glanced at Mom’s Steinway. She was supposed to have collected it months ago for her “new place,” which she hadn’t even started looking for yet, as far as I knew. The piano had stayed put, along with a box of other bits and pieces—an antique hand mirror, a copy of The Goldfinch with a bookmark stuck fifty pages in, the tea mug I’d bought her for Mother’s Day when I was seven.
I wondered what she was doing right now. But the answer was obvious. Wherever Mom was, she was practicing. She played every morning for two hours, took a break, played again in the afternoon for two more.
I’d done it too, every day.
My fingers were resting on my own piano’s keys. I’d walked to it without realizing. I looked at my hands, slowly pressing, gently enough not to make any sound but a near-silent thump. There was something kind about the curve of the instrument, an old friend welcoming me back—but the keys beneath my fingers were as indifferent as ever. I pulled away, feeling tricked.
There came a shock of furious playing upstairs—gorgeous, dazzling flurries raging into a snowstorm. I couldn’t tell if it was Dad or Oscar. It didn’t matter.
I shut the lid and walked away.
“Re: Met tmw—no dress code! Business casual, no fuss. Museum not Opera, YES, buuuuuut I do have a table for that other Met’s gala(!) tonight if interested in making an appearance? Might need a stylist for this one so let me know asap. xoxoxo nora”
My stomach clenched until the second I hit send. “Thank you SO MUCH, but I already have plans tonight. Excited for tomorrow! xo Ruby.”
I did not, in fact, have plans beyond writing back to Farrah, running around with the vacuum, giving the bathroom a quick clean, showering the Lysol smell off my skin.
Back in my room, my hair still dripping, I gazed at the dusky sidewalk below—and saw Oscar leave the basement apartment wearing a tuxedo. It fit him loosely in the shoulders, but still looked as natural as a T-shirt on him. I pulled my soft robe tighter in case he happened to look up. Then I felt the front door shut downstairs, seconds before Dad joined him on the curb, dressed to the nines himself.
A black sedan pulled up and Nora got out, auburn bob and LEGO posture telltale even at this distance. She lightly touched Oscar’s shoulder, smoothed the sides of her little black dress, and motioned to the car.
I rested my head against the glass. Dad was the Met’s musical director and Oscar was his pet protégé. Why hadn’t it occurred to me that they would be going to the gala?
Because Dad didn’t invite me.
Nora glanced up at my window. I stepped back, feeling caught in my lie. By the time I dared look, the car was gone, leaving me in an empty house.
Empty’s good. Empty’s the plan. I stretched my arms over my head—but the silence didn’t feel like a balm. It was heavy, dusty, full. The house sounded like it had the night after Mom left. Like we were all in the process of moving out.
I dropped my arms. I’d said I had plans.
I was going to get some.
I tugged on clothes, knotted my hair into a bun, grabbed my bag, and hurried down the block—two stoops away, Jules’s building.
I scanned the row of buzzers for the name Russo, to no avail. Which apartment was hers? She lived with her grandmother, who must have had a different last name . . . which, of course, I couldn’t remember. I hadn’t even been this close to her building’s front door since I was ten.
Just as I was about to give up, I saw Jules tromping down the stairs inside and waved.
She cocked her head, frowning as she came out. “Are you looking for me?”
“You said we should catch up later. So I thought I’d give you a try.” I kept smiling, feeling more like a stalker than ever.
“That’s sweet,” she said sourly. Her eyes dropped down my body. “You don’t look terrible.”
“I don’t look terrible. Um.” Black leggings, gray silk flats, random, ill-fitting T-shirt. “I didn’t even look at these when I put them on.”
“That explains it.” Jules pressed her cherry-red lips together as if in concentration, and I took the awkward beat to check out her outfit—blousy short-shorts, black ankle boots, a floppy T-shirt bearing the image of a fishing lure under a paper-thin blue leather jacket. Her hair was loose, jagged at the edges like a craft project, and she appeared to be wearing no makeup except for those lips. And yet it worked. She was art.
She blinked like she was clicking her face out of safe mode. “Listen, I’m going out. With some friends.”
“Oh, okay.” I started to back up.
“I don’t have anything remotely in your size, but let me grab you something . . .” She waved at me, squinting. “Yeah. And then we’ll go, okay? I’ll be two seconds.”
“Oh.” We.
She was already back inside her brownstone, taking the steps three at a time. In what felt like no more than the two seconds she’d promised, she was back downstairs, holding a drapey red tank dress out to me.
“Um . . .”
“It goes over . . .” She glanced wistfully over her shoulder at a passing taxi. “Let me do it.”
Before I could protest, she was shoving this thing over my head and I was pushing my arms through like a toddler and blinking down at my getup and . . . holy hell, it worked. I looked like someone who went out at night.
She flagged the next taxi and waggled the door until I joined her inside.
“Fifty-first and Eleventh,” she said, then pulled out her phone to text as we glided away.
“Where are we—?”
“My friend’s brother tends bar at this club in Midtown, so we get to sneak in. It’s terrible but we’ve made it our own. The music is awful.”
She beamed like that was a selling point.
My heart hammered louder the farther west we drove. Out. To a club. With strangers. I knew this was normal, this was what everybody did at all the schools around me—this was a real-life experience—but it felt jarringly like a dream where you’ve woken up in Spain with no shoes on.
We got out of the taxi in front of a nondescript bar with a bored-looking bouncer manning the steel-gray door. My outfit gave me a burst of courage. This was a costume. I was someone else. I drew a breath and started toward the door.
Jules grabbed me from behind and steered me away, face frozen casual.
“Oh.” I glanced back. “Is that not—?”
“Do you have a fake ID? Didn’t think so. We go in the VIP entrance.”
She made air-quotes around VIP. I soon realized why. We got into the bar through the back alley, walking past an overflowing dumpster to squeak open a staff door kept open by a bent MetroCard someone had slipped into the lock-catch. Jules motioned me inside, carefully replaced the card as she shut the door, then strode ahead with renewed bounce.
The evening had begun.