My brain is on fire. My heart is threatening to punch its way out of my chest. I am absolutely spiraling, but externally? I could use a whole day of reading, specificallyCarmillaover and over againuntil I forget that this is my entire crazy, completely fucked up life.
I look at Aleksandr—because what else can I do?
He finishes his tea with a slow sip, sets the mug down gently on the counter, and finally—finally—looks at me with those gorgeous, clear grey eyes.
"Let's get married."
5
LILY
Ten YearsAgo - Junior Year of High School
"For the millionth time, I don't do Sadie Hawkins, Lils," Nadia sighs, slamming her closet door with the kind of finality that makes it clear she's already done with this conversation. Her high ponytail whips as she spins around, nearly smacking me in the face.
"Who doesn't do Sadie Hawkins? It's Sadie Hawkins!" I trail after her across the plush cream carpet, clutching the glitter-covered flyer I made her take home. It's slightly crumpled now, but the glittery lettering still screamsAsk Him First!in hot pink gel pen. "It's literally built for girls like you. Tall, terrifying, unreasonably pretty—boys would kill to get asked out by you."
"Exactly," she says, flopping onto her massive canopy bed like a bored heiress in a teen drama. The scent of jasmine, expensive candles, and something vaguely vanilla lingers in the air, mixed with the subtle tang of teenage funk from the laundry she hasn't washed. "I don't ask. I get asked. Preferably with flowers. Or a tattoo."
"Okay, but what if he's shy?" I press, dropping onto the beanbag near her bookshelf—because sitting on her bed feels too regal and I'm not trying to mess up her seventeen throw pillows. "What if your soulmate is out there right now, secretly pining, waiting for you to make the first move?"
Nadia snorts, reaching for a remote to turn the volume down on the Bluetooth speaker playing my favorite R&B song,The Boy Is Mineby Brandy and Monica, as if that is going to make me drop this conversation. "If my soulmate's afraid to ask me out, he's not my soulmate—he's a baby and I will not have a grown man sucking off my teat."
I roll my eyes and grab a gummy from the little glass jar on her nightstand, because this bedroom might look like a luxury hotel suite, but it's still Nadia's room. "So you've never asked a guy out? Not even once?"
She pauses, then glances at me with a smug smile. "I have no trouble asking boys out, and neither should you, Lils. You're gorgeous."
I scoff, leaning back into the beanbag like it can shield me from the sheer force of Nadia's delusion.
Am I nicer than her? Absolutely. I mean, most people are. Nadia radiates the kind of intimidating confidence that makes grown men blink twice and apologize for existing. Me? I say "sorry" when someone bumps into me.
Am I pretty? Yeah. I mean, Nadia looks like she belongs in a moody European perfume magazine. She is like undiscovered-model pretty with cheekbones that could slice glass and eyes that could freeze you on sight from their enticing blue haze.
I, on the other hand, look 'regular high school' pretty. The kind of pretty that's more about soft curves, clear lip gloss, and knowing your good angles in a yearbook photo.
On any given school day, I wear oversized v-neck sweaters—not because it's trendy—but because I'm still trying to hide the fact that I've jumped from training bras to full C-cups, and my dad hasn't caught on that shopping in the juniors' section no longer works. My school-regulated uniform doesn't help: grey and blue plaid skirt, knee-high socks, and those shiny black shoes that make every hallway echo. I look like I stepped straight out of a prep school catalog where the only requirements are awkward posture and a deep fear of cafeteria mystery meat.
But I know how to pull it together. A little eyeliner, a half-decent hair day, and a well-timed smile, and I can pass as confident. Maybe even radiant. At least until Nadia has boys left and right falling in love with her, and that's even after she threatened to skin a boy alive in the middle of PE.
"You're only saying I'm gorgeous because you'd be a total bitch if you didn't," I tease, reaching for a second gummy.
"No I am saying you're gorgeous because it is a fact. If you were ugly I would say nothing, or buy you plastic surgery for your sixteenth birthday in two weeks," she winks.
"Ha ha very funny," I throw her pillow at her, and she dodges with the agility of a cat.
"Now, if you want to stop trying to set me up and just ask me if you can askhim, that would be amazing," Nadia groans as she rolls over on her back and looks up at the sheer cream draping hanging from her ceiling.
"I have no idea what you are talking about," I say, biting my bottom lip, right before I start humming the vocal break down towards the end of the song.
"Lils, you literally stop functioning when he enters a room. Just go downstairs and ask him."
Nadia rolls over on her side and gives me a bored look.
"You won't be mad?" I squeak sitting up in the beanbag chair, and the hope in my voice is so apparent I can feel the tips of my ears getting hot with embarrassment.
"No, I promise," Nadia sighs, dragging a magazine off the floor and lazily flipping through the pages. "You have my permission. And my condolences—because why you find him attractive is beyond me."
I don't even let the rest of her sentence finish before I launch myself across the room and throw my arms around her, squeezing her like I've just won the lottery and she's the prize.
