Page 65 of You’re So Vein

Please. Yell at me. Call my ideas absurd. Throw that bedazzled scarf at my head. Do something that tells me you feel a small spark, too?

I haven’t told him about Dante’s warning, but suddenly, with my chest being torn open, I can’t bear to be in the same room as him.

“Well.” I swallow hard. I taste the coppery blood on my tongue. “I hope you make a full recovery. I wouldn’t want you to hallucinate during the big debate this week. I’d have more fun crushing you knowing that you’re at your best.”

I turn before he can respond, before he can say something else that sounds sensible but feels like a stake between the ribs. And I make it all the way to Reginald’s death trap before I burst into tears.

22Komal

Beth: I’m going to give Lilac a voucher for a free vampire facial to say thanks for the “information” she gave us the other night. My clients get talkative when they’re relaxed. Maybe she’ll say something incriminating.

Isis: I’m so jealous you got to experience an actual vampire spell!

AFTER MY NIGHT-TIME VAMPIRE shenanigans, I catch a few hours’ sleep before I have to wake up to help Preeti get the twins ready, go over my debate talking points with Papa, fix the twins’ helicopter, brainstorm some more terrible ideas for the Uncurse November Festival, and inform the Nevermore Coven about Dante’s warning. Then I crawl back into bed for a few hours, definitely don’t have a filthy dream about Augustin that makes me sad when I awake in the evening. I make myself a chai with honey while I consider my next move.

I need to tell Augustin what Dante said about Kael. I draft a text message, but my finger hovers over the SEND button. I hate this. It doesn’t feel right. But I don’t know if I can face talking to him in person, not after he took back his words. Everything between us is broken, and I don’t—

BANG BANG BANG.

Someone pounds on my sliding door. “Komal Massi,” Kiaan cries through the glass. “Nikhil wants to know if you fixed our helicopter yet?”

“No, Kiaan wants to know. I’m being good and patient. Can I have some chai?”

Sighing, I fling open the curtains to find two cherubic faces pressed against the glass door, raindrops rolling off the tips of their noses. Behind them, Papa waves at me as he shuffles around the conservatory, straightening the furniture. I slide open the door and hand them the helicopter. “Be careful with this. Don’t use it inside. Get your mamma to take you to the shaded part of the playground so you don’t catch a cold in this awful weather.”

“Mamma says she’s too tired from last night, since you were supposed to babysit. She wanted us to ask you to take us.” Kiaan bounces on his feet.

She can’t play with her own kids for two nights in a row? I don’t owe her endless free babysitting.

I shove down the uncharitable thought. Preeti works long hours doing important work, saving people’s lives. Her cheating husband walked out on her, leaving her to raise the twins on her own while running her clinic. She was just about coping with lots of help from Mamma and Papa and the auntie network, and then Papa got sick.

So yeah, sometimes she’s insensitive and ignores the boys. Sometimes she pretends to be dumb to get out of doing things. But she’s my sister, and I’m here to help, after all. It’s why I came home. So I force a smile, even though my head is spinning and all I want to do is sort out this Augustin thing. “Sure, just give me a second to get dressed and I’ll—”

“She also said to tell you that your friend left his jacket behind at the party.” Kiaan holds up a black wool peacoat.

That’s Augustin’s coat. I can smell his distinct scent from here, all woodsy and mossy. “Oh, well, thank you. He’s not my friend, but—”

“Why’d you yell at him?” Nikhil asks. “He was the funnest adult there. He played with us for ages.”

“It’s true,” Papa says as he comes up behind them. “The boys found him out in the garden, weeding the flower beds, and he spent all evening playing with them. Before I recognised him, I honestly thought he was a hired babysitter with a rather nice arse.”

“Papa! You can’t say he has a nice arse!” My cheeks flare with heat.

“Why not? I may be an old man, but my eyes still work.” Papa sets down the outdoor broom and hobbles up the steps to my tiny porch. He moves a lot slower now, after all the chemo. Rain droplets roll off his bald head as he hugs Kiaan against him. “Augustin kept shooing away all the reporters. I overheard him telling them that he couldn’t discuss the ageing stormwater system because he was running for his life from a T-rex.”

He’s good with kids. He likes kids.

He can’t have kids.

He held me when I was frightened.

He scared off two terrible dates.

And he said all those things, and he looked so desperate and lost… I know what that feels like.

“I saw his marriage resume in my stack,” Papa says gently. “I thought you might listen to your friends instead of your old Papa if they told you that you cared for him. Instead, you tear it up?”

I nod. I can’t trust myself to do anything else, or I might start crying again.