Love Charms and Other Catastrophes (10 page)

“In fourth place,” Bram said, “is Metamorphosis.”

Clea gasped. Mandy chewed her nails.

Detective Archambault took the mic and said that third place belonged to Heartwrench. Her voice was deep and husky.

Ryker shrugged and pretended to dust off his shoulders. Gage followed his nephew's lead but wasn't as convincing with red-rimmed eyes.

“Two more,” Mirthe said, bouncing on her toes.

Bram plucked the mic back. He looked upset for a moment. Then his expression smoothed. “Second place goes to Grimbaud High's charm theory club.”

Hijiri's ears itched. Had she heard right?

“You know what that means,” Bram said.

Detective Archambault drew close to the mic. “After fairly being counted, the winner of the most votes is Love For All.”

“Come on up, Sanders,” Bram said. As the cheering commenced, he added, “Who knew that talk of spinach mustaches would win the day?”

Sebastian groaned. “That's not right. It should have been about the
best
question, not the funniest.”

“It's a popularity contest,” Martin said.

Nico grimaced. “Seems like it.”

Hijiri blotted out the noise of the crowd as Sanders shook hands with Bram and Detective Archambault. He looked as bewildered as Hijiri felt, but he managed to give an awkward wave at the townspeople.

“Hijiri,” Ken called her. “Hijiri, Martin's right. Don't get discouraged.”

“I'm not,” she said, even as her mouth ran dry. “This challenge had nothing to do with love
charms
. There's no reason for me to be upset.”

The words poured out of her, but she felt their falseness as easily as she saw it on her friends' faces. They didn't believe her.

*   *   *

The sound of canal water lapping at the bank could be calming. Sometimes. Hijiri rested her elbows on the ledge as she peered down at the water. She chose a bridge with a rough ledge, the rocks uneven and catching her sleeves. Behind her, bicyclists whizzed by. Leaves parachuted to the ground.

The hurt of losing the challenge was a barb lodged in her heart, unfamiliar and unwelcome. She hated how mangled she felt inside.

When the rebellion had found out that she was a love charm-maker, Hijiri felt validated. Her knowledge aided Nico in negating Camille's hold on Martin. The twins asked her for advice. They used the charms she created. Nothing made her prouder. Once cracked open, her secret became her way of making real friends.

Back home, she shared her love charm creations with her neighbors, if she shared them at all. Privacy was key to her crafting, so hiding her talent when she came to Grimbaud for her freshman year had come naturally. She had no reason to assume she was a good love charm-maker. After all, she only had herself, her parents, and her friends to attest to her skills.

Love
believed
in her. Love had even offered her Zita's old position, had she wanted it. That counted for something, right?

“But other people exist in the world,” Hijiri muttered, resting her chin on the ledge. “And they have opinions too. I better get used to it.”

This competition gave her a new perspective. Showed her that maybe she wasn't as good as she had thought.

Since the bridge was close to the Barnes Canal Cruises main booth, Hijiri walked the short distance to see if Nico was inside. A line of people waited to book cruises for the day. The booth was striped white and pink, with an old statue of a mermaid squeezing a heart in each hand. Hijiri thought the mermaid looked a little too happy holding those hearts. No one in the Barnes family remembered the significance of the mermaid, so she fell into the habit of theorizing each time she passed the booth. Did the hearts belong to a pair of lovers who threw themselves into a canal? Not that mermaids had ever lived in the canals, not even in Grimbaud's mythology.

One of the cruise boats returned. As the tourists disembarked, Hijiri spotted Nico behind the wheel with his father. He wore his trademark windbreaker, his damp hair sticking on end. No matter what kinds of plans her friends made, Nico always had to go running back to the canal cruises afterward; his parents expected him to use his free time working the booths or helping on the boats. Only a few hours before, Nico had been with the rest of the club at the challenge.

Seeing him back at work made her sad but also comforted. This was normal. Losing the challenge hadn't changed everything.

Nico waved at her when he saw her.
Hold on
, he mouthed, before turning back to his father.

Hijiri sat on a bench overlooking the canal while she waited.

“Did you shake off the second-place blues?” Nico asked, warming his hands with a cup of coffee from the booth.

“I think I'm beginning to,” she admitted. “It's not easy.”

Nico sipped his coffee. “You're pretty competitive.”

“A trait I didn't know I had.”

He stared thoughtfully at his feet. “You know, I never thought of myself as competitive either. I didn't have time to, keeping up with learning the ins and outs of the family business. As an only child, I don't have any rivals for inheriting the business someday. But then, I've been competing with myself the whole time, with my father as judge. It gets exhausting.”

Hijiri competed with herself too. No one else had served as her judge before. Her parents hadn't evaluated her love charms. As a sophomore without an apprenticeship lined up with a love charm-maker, and no plans to choose one, she was lost. Only her heart and head could guide her.

“We were all worried about you after the challenge. You didn't have to run off.”

“Sorry.”

“Ken even went looking for you.”

Her heart jumped. “I didn't see him.”

“Must have gotten lost.” Nico tapped on the lid of the coffee cup. “Martin's coming over tonight to study.”

Grateful for the subject change, Hijiri said, “So you
do
have time to spare for him.”

“My dad and I argued about it during the summer, but he's okay with me being a normal teenager sometimes,” Nico said with a laugh. “Especially after he and Mom met Martin. They both like him.”

“That's good.”

“It won't last though.”

His morose response startled her. Hijiri looked up. “What do you mean?”

“This is our last year together. Martin graduates in May,” Nico said, fiddling with his coffee lid. “He should be going away to college.”

“Should?”

“I don't know. He hasn't told me anything.” Nico sighed. “I've tried asking him, but Martin refuses to talk about it. Says he'd rather focus on me than think about post-graduation.”

“That's flattering.” Hijiri frowned. “Kind of.”

“Not really. He's thrown himself into student government, now more than ever. I wonder what he's trying to run from.” He shook his head. “It seems like only yesterday that we saved him from Camille. But come May, I might have to say good-bye to him.”

Hijiri buried her hands in her shirt, twisting the hem. She wanted to devise a charm for Nico and Martin. Her fingers itched. A communication love charm. But neither boy would accept her charm, no matter how well-meant. “What did Fallon tell you?”

“To keep chipping away at Martin until he caves.”

“Well, there you go.”

Nico finished his coffee. “It's not that easy. Martin clams up whenever I mention the subject. I don't want … I don't want to lose him, just because I'm curious.”

“You have a right to be curious. He's your boyfriend. You need to know what's going to happen after May.” Hijiri fought the itch to craft by rising to her feet. She circled the bench, pacing.
I wish they would accept a love charm. I don't know how else to help.
After the challenge, she wasn't sure if her instincts alone were good enough to rely on.

“Oh, look who's here,” Nico said with a smile.

Hijiri looked to her left, seeing a familiar boy leading a couple across a bridge. Ken was walking backward, talking excitedly to the couple—Sofie and Lars. Her heart thumped with a startling mix of fear and surprise. What was Ken doing with them?

Ken whipped around as they came close. “Hijiri, you wouldn't believe the luck I had, running into Sofie and Lars on their first date.”

“First date already?” Hijiri asked without thinking.

“Why wait?” Sofie said. She was holding hands with Lars, her energy positively glowing.

“The first of many, I hope,” Lars said, his eyes soft behind his gold-rimmed glasses.

Hijiri wished she could have felt happy for them, but her eyes burned with unshed tears.
Sanders's question brought them together. I didn't do anything.
Seeing the happy couple only made her hurt worse.

Nico asked them if they were considering Sunday's romantic night cruise. The couple exchanged glances and said yes at the same time.

A second date
, Hijiri thought, sinking back down on the bench.

If anyone noticed her discomfort, they didn't give any indication. As Nico led Lars to the Barnes booth, Sofie took a seat next to Hijiri. “I'm sorry about how the challenge turned out,” Sofie said.

“There's only one winner,” Hijiri said, sniffing.

“No matter how the voting turned out, I want you to know that your question was the one that helped me figure out which man I was interested in,” Sofie said firmly.

Hijiri's lungs stopped working.

“That's not to say the other questions
weren't
helpful,” Sofie said, “but none of those questions were ones I would have asked if I'd had the choice. The museum question was just … perfect. I
needed
to know how the men would answer. I just applied for a volunteer position at Grimbaud's art museum. I know the experience will make me a better teacher. I never thought that meeting a man who shared my love of the museum was something I ever expected or looked for when dating.”

Lars returned with cruise tickets, catching the end of Sofie's response. “My parents used to take me to the museum every weekend when I was a boy,” he added, smiling at Hijiri. “I got bored by the new exhibits, and my parents never figured out why.”

“Maybe they didn't realize how attached you became to ancient clay pots and watercolors,” Sofie said.

Lars sobered. “I hated anything that went away. The more permanent a thing was, the better.”

“Your parents…” Sofie ventured.

“They struggled,” Lars said, forcing the smile back on his face. “The permanent exhibits gave me hope. If they could last thousands of years relatively in one piece for people to admire and enjoy, then I could be just as strong as they were. I know it's an odd thought, but—”

“It's beautiful,” Sofie insisted.

“We're on our way to the museum now,” Lars said.

Hijiri stood up. Her cheeks burned and her heart felt ready to cry. She couldn't believe what she was hearing. “Then it's true? My question really helped you like this?” she asked.

“We're so glad your friend Ken found us so that we had the chance to tell you.” Sofie touched Hijiri's shoulder with her charcoal-stained hand. “I—no,
we
—wanted you to know how thankful we are that your question allowed us to find each other.”

“You've earned our votes, Hijiri,” Lars said.

Hijiri choked back a sob. She covered her mouth with her hand and squeezed her eyes shut. “Thank you,” she whispered.

As the couple went on their way, Nico beamed from where he stood outside the booth.

Ken ruffled his hair, failing to hide his high-beam smile. “See what I mean, Hijiri? You made a difference. You brought two people together using your instincts. And the club's help. You shouldn't ever doubt your abilities.”

Sofie's words echoed in her head. The woman who
actually
fell in love thanked her. The town's opinion on the matter suddenly felt less important. Hijiri started shaking as tears slid down her cheeks.

Her heart broke out of its box and took control. Hijiri threw her arms around Ken, startling him as he stumbled backward. Her forehead bumped his chin, and her cheek rubbed against the scratchy fabric of his sweater.

He said her name, probably a few times. When she didn't move, Ken gingerly drew her close. His hands were warm on her back. She breathed in his cool, evergreen scent.

Using his sweater as a tissue, Hijiri softly cried. She couldn't put into words how she felt. Little by little, her faith in herself came trickling back.

The
thump-thumping
of Ken's heart betrayed him; he was nervous, or maybe just startled, though his voice remained gentle. “What's the matter? Aren't you happy?”

The simple questions made her want to laugh, but it came out more as a strange sob. “I forgot,” she said.

Ken waited.

“I forgot that it's about the person using the love charm.” Love charms weren't supposed to be the stuff of popularity contests. Contests were fun and necessary sometimes, but the power of a love charm was personal. As long as the person or couple using it was satisfied, the love charm-maker did his or her job. She couldn't afford to forget that, no matter how immersed she became in Grimbaud's contest.

Feeling came rushing back into her fingertips. Her skin heated up as she realized how inappropriate her hug was. Hijiri stepped back. “I shouldn't have done that,” she said.

Hurt flashed in his eyes. “Don't apologize for hugging me. I'm glad you did.”

She sniffed.

“You look better already.”

Nico jogged up to them, a curious look on his face.

“I'm
fine
,” she stressed. The tears on her face had dried thanks to Ken's sweater. “I'm just not used to…”
Being exposed. Hugging boys because I needed it. Crying. Definitely crying
. She had never considered herself a crier until coming to Grimbaud.