She hummed for a moment, a thoughtful noise, before she took it off once again and set it back on the right hand, third finger. This time she had to use more pressure to get it to slide over my knuckle. It fit once it was over the bone.
“That’s a gorgeous ring.” She moved it, watching as it caught the light and seemed to rise and fall for her too. “A bit pricey for a promise ring.” Her eyes met mine, too fast for me to look away.
I did, though, not able to meet her interrogative gaze.
“A man doesn’t give a woman jewelry for no reason. He gives it to her to make his mark. To claim her for his own.”
You have no idea, I wanted to say, but didn’t.
She continued on. “Especially a ring of that caliber. That’s an engagement ring, Scarlett. Be honest with me. Are you married?”
I waved a hand in her direction, dismissing this. “Of course not. You would’ve been there.”
She gave a subtle nod. “You broke a lot of hearts the moment this ring slid on your finger. Brando Fausti is officially off the market. I doubt he ever was on it.”
We became quiet for some time. She dug around in the bag on the counter, and her eyes caught mine in the mirror. “You okay?” Her words were soft, her worry for me clear and true in the tone of her voice, in her questioning. She uncapped my pink lipstick, applying it to my lips. “Are you playing it safe?”
There was no such thing where Brando Fausti was concerned, but I held that thought in too.
Placing my hand over hers, I stilled her movements. Our eyes connected. All was fine with me. Actually, more than fine, but I was still worried for her. She looked tired. And I wondered, not for the first time, if splitting her time between two brothers was to blame. But any time the subject was broached, the sub rosa exposed, she shut down, taking her secrets and burdens with her.
Over the course of our time at the house on Snow, both Mitch and Mick would occasionally stop by to help. I watched my best friend, not knowing what else to do, become a different person when she was alone with each of the brothers, but someone else entirely when both were present. She became a shy, watchful person.
I didn’t like it.
I didn’t like how she seemed to be split in three. The girl she was with Mitch, the girl she was with Mick, and the girl who couldn’t decide between them. She was tortured. She had two balloons; I had one, and one was enough to send me floating into the abyss for longer than my candle was to burn on this earth.
Keeping up seemed to be taking its toll on her. A desperate need to help stole over me every time I felt her struggle, but I wasn’t sure how. Our relationship had always been based on helping each other by just being there, not offering advice or strategies.
She searched my eyes. “Are you zoning out aga—”
“No.” I took her other hand, and the lipstick pointed at me like a weapon. “I was just thinking.” I decided on a whim to share with her, in hopes that she would share with me. “I’ve never been in love before, Violet. So I have nothing to compare my feelings to. But naïve or not, my instincts tell me that what I have with Brando is unusual…a once-in-a-lifetime deal.”
She was quiet for some time.
“I know,” she said at last. “The most unreachable girl has finally been reached.” She went silent again, her eyes intent on mine. I could sense her deliberation. Then she blinked. “It’s just that I hear things, you know? Between—” She waved her hand back and forth in a motion that I assumed symbolized her relationships with the brothers. “I understand the depth of Brando’s feelings for you. He might be a hundred shades of enigmatic, but love is the simplest language. Anyone can read it. That’s what scares me, Scarlett. I can read the depth of yours too. Your internal has run over into the physical. I’ve never seen that in you before—not with dance, or with your family. Maybe Elliott, but this is a different kind of love.
“And right now, Brando is behaving like a self-sacrificing kind of man. A self-sacrificing kind of man will set you loose before he takes from you what he honestly thinks you deserve. They make all of the decisions because their convictions are hard and powerful. Even more powerful than their will to have. I don’t want to see your black balloon turn blue. Black is solitary, and yes, a bit sad. But in its own peculiar way, it can also serve as protection. It numbs the blow. People lie about blue. Blue is a prison. You can see through the color. It taints. It allows you to see everything you can’t have.”
Her truth hit me square in the chest. She had put into words the honest thoughts that had been trying to make their way to my heart. I decided to leave her words with the crack in my armor. She had to be reached as well.
“Is that what happened to you?” I asked. “Is Mitch self-sacrificing? Is that why your mystic purple balloon turned blue?”
With Violet, if you smothered it in humor, she was more likely to share.
She laughed, but the sound came out bitter. She turned to the mirror, glaring at herself, putting the lipstick on the counter with a hard slap.
“Oh, Scarlett,” she sighed. “There are three people in the play of my love life: the self-sacrificing, the selfish, and the damn jester, but the trouble is the roles keep rotating. No one knows who the hell they are anymore. I’m hoping one day the rotation will cease, the play will come to an end, and I’ll know my place, and those of others. Normal life will resume once again.”
She lifted her shoulders and let them fall.
“Until then…blue balloon it is.” She pointed at herself in the mirror with an angry finger, like she was about to give herself a stern pep talk. Instead she said, “Fucking blue balloon. Fuck. You. I’m going to pop you so hard one of these days.”
I took the vibrant pink lipstick and wroteAlwayson the mirror. With the weight of those things on my mind, we left.
* * *
The next day came, and I struggled to release Violet and our truth session from my thoughts. Turns out, the party in the country didn’t help matters.
