I forgot how striking they are. He’s wearing a gray tux. She’s wearing a glittering fuchsia gown and bright makeup. Unlike last time, her locs aren’t pinned up. They cascade around her shoulders.
“Fifi didn’t bully you into doing this, did she, dear?” Archibald asks.
“I am not bully,” Fifi protests.
“Did she guilt you?” Maggie asks.
“No bullying or guilting,” I say. Maybe my suspicion from yesterday is right. The studio does need money. “I just thought this would be fun.” And it’s true that I think it could be fun, but that’s not why I’m doing it.
“Well, that’s wonderful, dear,” says Maggie. “I want you to know there is no pressure for you to win.”
“There is itsy-bitsy little bit of pressure,” Fifi interjects.There eez eeetsy-beetsy leetle beet of pressure.
“Fiona Karapova, don’t you dare—”
But before Maggie can start scolding Fifi, the studio door opens behind me.
“Ahh, here is partner now,” Fifi says.
I turn around. It’s the boy I met in studio five the first time I was here. Xavier. X.
“It’s you,” I say.
“It’s me,” he agrees.
“But why?” I ask.
“You mean that existentially or what?” He smirks and raises an eyebrow at me, displaying not one but two Classic Romance Guy Characteristics.
Maggie interrupts our staring contest. “You know each other?”
“No,” I say.
“Yes,” he says. “Yvette, right?”
“He stole my bike,” I explain, stomping out the infinitesimal and completely uncalled-for spark of happiness I feel that he remembered my name.
“Borrowed it,” he clarifies.
“So he could break up with his girlfriend,” I explain some more.
“We were already broken up,” he clarifies some more.
“She bought a prom dress,” I remind him.
In my periphery, I see Archibald and Maggie watching us with mouths slightly open.
I know how this looks. It looks like we’re bantering, like sparks are flying between us like in witty, old romantic comedies. It looks like the start of something. But I promise you, there are no sparks. Nothing here is on fire.
Archibald chuckles. “Well, Evie, this is our grandson, Xavier.”
“It’s just X, Gramps,” X says. He gives Maggie a hug.
“Come,” Fifi says to X. “Stand next to girl so I can see you together.”
By “girl” she means me.
X walks his long legs over to me.
