Wild Swans (19 page)

My voice wobbles on that last one. Alex reaches out a hand, then lets it fall halfway between us. “I didn't know.”

“Because you didn't ask!” I throw my hands in the air. “You're supposed to be my best friend, and you haven't been there for me at all.”

He leans a hip against the couch. “Why do you need me? You have Claire and Abby. And Connor.”

“They're not
you
.” I struggle to find the right words. “They don't live here. They don't know Granddad—not the way you know him, because he raised you too. They don't know how weird it is, walking in and hearing the TV on all the time, or finding empty wine bottles in the trash, or having to eat in the dining room because we can't all fit around the kitchen table. I know you don't want me to think of you as family, but I do. It might not be in the way you want, but I love you, Alex, and I need you. Having a boyfriend doesn't change that.”

There's a long silence.

“It does,” Alex says finally, rubbing a hand over his stubbly jaw. “For me, it does. I don't want to be your brother, Ivy. I meant what I said before. I need some space. It's not forever.”

“So my feelings don't matter? I don't get a say in this?” I ask. He doesn't meet my eyes, just shrugs. The utter carelessness of the gesture makes me furious. “Fine. Take your space. But you can't disappear when all these huge things are happening and then come back in a week or a month and expect that our friendship will be the same. Because it won't.”

“Whatever,” he says. Like he can throw fifteen years of friendship right out the window. Like my feelings
don't
matter. All that matters to him is that there's another boy in my life, and he's punishing me for it.

“
Whatever?
” I echo. “Seriously? Go to hell.”

I stomp out of the house, letting the screen door bang shut behind me. I don't know how I expected that to go—for him to apologize? To care that he's hurt me? To see that there's room for both him and Connor in my life?

I make my way to the main house, apologies on my lips for being late. But no one is there. A plate of cold banana chocolate-chip pancakes sits on the counter with a note from Granddad explaining that he's sorry he missed me, but he had to register Isobel for her first day of theater camp and then he's taking Gracie for a playdate with Professor Campbell's daughter. Luisa added a PS that she had to run out to the market but she'll be back soon.

I sink into a chair and prop my chin in my hands, blinking back tears.

So much for my special celebration.

I'm still pushing cold pancakes around my plate when Connor rings the doorbell. He's a little early for work. He must notice that Granddad's car isn't in the driveway because he bends down and kisses me right there on the front porch.

“Good morning,” he says.

I muster up a smile. “Hi.”

“So what's the exciting news?” he asks as I lead the way to the library.

I forgot that I texted him a hint. It doesn't even feel worth celebrating anymore.

“That poem I submitted was accepted.”

“What? That's fantastic!” He takes in my Eeyore face. “Isn't it? What's wrong?”

“Nothing. I just… I thought Granddad would be more excited.” I drop into Granddad's big leather recliner. Connor sets his bag and his coffee down and sits on the edge of the couch. “It's dumb, but I guess I expected a magical moment where he'd say he was proud of me and I'd stop feeling so
inadequate
.”

“You are not inadequate.” Connor reaches out and traces his thumb over my ankle. Even in my despondency, his touch makes my heart race. “Can I read it? The poem? You never told me what it was about.”

I play with the frayed edge of my red shorts. “Well, it's kind of about you.”

He grins. “Now I'm
really
curious.”

I grab my phone and pull up the poem in my email. “Here. Just don't tell me if it's terrible, okay?”

“I'm sure it's not terrible,” he says.

I get up, pacing back and forth, back and forth, in front of the french doors.

After a minute, I look over at him. It's not a very long poem. Why isn't he saying anything?

“When did you write this?” he asks.

My heart races at the strain in his voice. “Last week. That day we had lunch. What's wrong?”

“Ivy…” he starts, then trails off. He stands, putting my phone down on the coffee table.

“Is it terrible? It's terrible, isn't it?”

“It's not terrible. It's just… The last line—” Connor goes to the bookshelf and retrieves Dorothea's first journal from the bottom shelf. He pages through it, his brow furrowed. “Ivy, that last line isn't yours.”

“What do you mean,
not mine
?” Even though I'm standing in the middle of a patch of sunshine, I feel icy cold.

He holds the journal out to me, pointing to Dorothea's words spiraling across the page in faded blue ink. I take it from him with a sinking stomach and read. There, at the bottom, Dorothea talks about Robert Moudowney. About sitting across from him at a picnic in the town square and wanting so badly for him to take her hand.

And she uses my words.

Except, they were her words first.

I fumble and Connor catches the journal before it hits the floor.

“No. I didn't…” I feel like I'm going to throw up. I can't meet his eyes. Instead, I stare at the portrait of Dorothea above the mantel. She looks unbearably smug in her little gloves and smart navy shirtdress and neat, pin-curled hair.
She
would never make this kind of mistake. “I thought I made it up. I didn't realize—”

“It was an accident,” Connor says. “It's just that one line. I only remembered because the phrase really stuck with me. It was such a great image.”

“The editor said it was ‘sharp and evocative.' That's what she liked best about the poem. The part—the part that wasn't really mine.” I bury my face in my hands. “I am so stupid.”

“Hey.” Connor takes my hands and moves them away from my face. “Don't beat yourself up. It was an honest mistake. At least we caught it before publication. You can still pull the poem.”

Pull the poem. Of course. Otherwise it'd be plagiarism.

But that means I'll have to tell Granddad what happened. What I accidentally did. Whatever pride he mustered up for my persistence—my effort, if not my talent—will disappear. I cheated. I didn't mean to, but I did.

“He'll be so disappointed,” I whisper. “And he'll be right. I'm not a poet. I'm not
anything
.”

“Ivy, I have to ask. Do you
want
to be a poet? Are you doing this for you or for him?”

I don't answer.

Connor tips my chin up with one finger until I have to meet his pretty, golden eyes. “I see you jumping through hoops to try to earn his approval, to measure up to some Milbourn ideal, and it's making you hate yourself. Is it really worth it?”

“I can answer that.”

We both whirl around at the low, smoky voice. Erica. She strides into the room, her spiky blond hair still wet from the shower, her makeup perfectly applied—the slash of red lipstick, the cat's-eye black eyeliner. She's dressed in a long, striped black-and-gray tunic and black capris, her hands laden with silver rings and a silver necklace draped around her throat. She looks sleek and powerful, like some elegant cat waiting to pounce.

“Sorry for interrupting,” she says with a smile that's not sorry at all.

“Connor, this is Erica. Erica, Connor.”

Erica takes one look at us—at the distance between us, or lack thereof—and taps her long, taupe fingernails against her pointy chin. “So
you're
the reason she's not dating the housekeeper's kid.”

“His name is Alex,” I say through gritted teeth, “and I'm not dating him because he's like my brother. But yes, Connor is my boyfriend. And one of Granddad's students. We're working together to—”

“Archive Dorothea's journals. I heard.” Erica flutters a hand at the bookshelves, her silver rings catching the sunlight. “If it were up to me, I'd set the damn things on fire; I'm that sick of hearing her name.” She gives a rich, throaty laugh as Connor's jaw drops in horror. “Oh, look at you. You
are
one of Dad's disciples. Are you dating Ivy for extra credit?”

Because that's the only reason a boy like him—brilliant, ambitious, gorgeous—would ever date
me
.

Logically I know it's not true. Connor wouldn't use me like that. But somehow I don't trust
myself
to—what, exactly? Be the kind of girl people won't leave?

The fight with Alex sticks in my head. In my throat, an ever-present ache. In a spot below my ribs, caught between fury and tears. He's my oldest friend. He knows me better than anyone—or used to. How could he cut me out of his life so easily, like chopping off a bad limb?

Connor takes my hand. “I don't care what her last name is.”

“Good. I know his students idolize him, but my father is not perfect. Far from it. The man is so haunted by his own mediocrity that he's become a vampire feeding off our talents. A… What are they called? A succubus. Are there male succubuses?”

“Succubi,” I correct automatically. “And that's not true. He just wants me to be my best.”

“Really? Is your best ever good enough?” Erica sits on the couch, crossing one slim, tanned leg over the other. “'Cause mine never was.”

I'm silent, struck by this, and she continues. “I wonder what you've been told. Let me guess: how reckless I am, how selfish. Not just for leaving, but for throwing away the talent God gave me. I think maybe it's time you heard the story from my point of view, Ivy.”

I still don't like the way my name sounds in her mouth.

“Why, so I can hear what a monster Granddad is? No thank you.” I straighten my shoulders. Pretend that part of me isn't hanging on her every word.

Erica ignores what I want, like always. “He's a vain, egotistical old bastard and he'll destroy you if you let him. He cares more about this family's precious reputation than your happiness. He'll take the thing you love most, the thing that makes you
yourself
, and he'll push and he'll push until you can't remember why you ever loved it in the first place. For me it was singing. One solo in the concert? Why not two? It's never good enough, and it's always your fault for not doing more or better. It's damn near impossible to please him, and you'll only twist yourself into knots trying.”

I don't want to hear this. But as unkind as her words are, they're also sort of…true.

I look to Connor, but he's quiet. He won't step in and speak for me like Granddad would. He won't sling an arm around me and make a joke like Alex would. But he's here. Listening. Letting me figure things out. Trusting that I can—that I am smart enough, capable enough on my own.

“Is that why you quit singing?” I ask my mother.

“I didn't quit singing. I quit the school chorus and the church chorus and the town chorus and the voice lessons.” Erica eyes the open french doors, then pulls out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. Granddad would have a fit about her smoking in the house, especially here, with Grandmother's paintings and Dorothea's portrait and first editions. You don't smoke in a museum full of precious artifacts. “Some friends and I had a band, and we were pretty good. We got some gigs playing at parties for beer or weed, that kind of thing. It was fun. But it wasn't impressive enough.”

“Or maybe,” I suggest, “it was the beer and weed he had a problem with.”

Erica narrows her eyes and blows a plume of smoke in my direction. “You are a judgmental little thing, aren't you? You must get that from him. I'm trying to
help
you, kid.”

Jesus, could she be any more patronizing?

“Since when do you give a damn about me?” I pull away from Connor and stalk closer to her. For once I'm grateful for my height. I like the way I tower over her. It makes me feel powerful. “It's a little late for motherly advice, don't you think?”

“Maybe.” She ashes her cigarette onto a pretty tile coaster that Amelia gave us, a souvenir from a trip to Madrid. “But I don't want you making yourself sick like I did. You know what I weighed after Mama died? Ninety-four pounds. And what was Dad worried about? What people would
think
!”

I remember the picture of her at the English department Christmas party, six months before Grandmother died: already rail thin, her long limbs poking out of the black velvet dress that swallowed her up. There aren't any photos of her at her high school graduation or the summer afterward or pregnant with me. Nowhere in the house. I've looked.

I remember Granddad praising my healthy appetite.
I can't abide girls who pick at their food.

But I also remember Isobel slumped at the kitchen table, staring miserably into her bowl of grapefruit. That's not Granddad. That's all Erica.

“I don't think I'm the kid you need to have the eating disorder talk with.”

“Iz?” Erica shakes her head. “She's fine. She could stand to lose a couple pounds and get off her ass instead of being on her phone all the time. She didn't grow up with all these expectations. You're the one wound up tighter than a tick. I know a miserable Milbourn girl when I see one, and you're headed for a meltdown.”

Ready for a meltdown? Me? I am not the type of girl who melts down.

“That's ridiculous. I'm not miserable,” I scoff. “I'm fine.”

But it doesn't sound convincing. Not even to me.

“Are you?” It's Connor who asks, not Erica.

I can't believe he's siding with her. I whirl on him and he takes a step back.

“Look, maybe I should go,” he says.

“No, I'll go.” Erica rises and saunters toward the door. She pauses. “You need to get the hell out of this town. You're a smart girl, right? Good at school. I never was. You want to go to college, go somewhere else. No one out in the world cares that you're a Milbourn. They don't even know what a Milbourn is.”

“That's your advice? To run away?” I snap. “Leave my family like you did?”

“You'll come back,” she says. “Holidays. School breaks. Vacations. You don't owe him any more than that. Dad's not a saint for you to devote your life to.”

“I never said he was a saint, but he's the one who
stayed
. He raised me. He
loved
me.”

There's a look on her face that I've never seen before. Regret? Guilt? Whatever it is, it doesn't last. She walks away, and a minute later I hear the fridge opening. Probably time for her morning Bloody Mary.

I go stand in front of the french doors, trying to catch the breeze coming in off the Bay. The air is suffocating. It feels more like August than mid-June. “Don't you ever take her side again. That was not okay.”

“I'm on
your
side. Always,” Connor says. “But I'm not sure Erica's the enemy here.”

“Are you kidding me? She straight up said she doesn't care about me or my feelings. I don't know where this urge to give motherly advice came from, but it's not because she wants what's best for me. She just wants to stick it to Granddad.”

“What if sticking it to him
is
what's best for you?” Connor suggests. I open my mouth to protest and he puts up an ink-stained hand, forestalling my argument. “I don't believe that the Professor's half as bad as what she said. But what do you think will happen when you tell him you have to pull the poem? If you tell him that you don't want to be a poet? What is the worst possible outcome?”

“He'll think I'm like her.” I whisper it like the curse it is. “That I'm selfish.”

“Because you made a mistake? Because you don't want to live your life to please someone else?” Connor shakes his head. “Ivy, that's not selfish.”

My heart is racing like I've been swimming long distance. Sweat pools at the small of my back and I sweep my hair into a ponytail. “You don't know what it's like to be part of this family, Connor.”

He sips his iced coffee and watches me. “No, I don't. But every family comes with its own expectations. I didn't play sports. Didn't want to study business or accounting. I was never popular, not the way my sister is. You have to figure out who you are away from your family, and if you can't do that here in Cecil—”

“You don't understand.”

He shrugs. “Maybe I don't. But maybe your mother does. She can be a jerk and still have some insight on this, you know? She grew up here, in the same house, with the same man.”

“He's a good man,” I say.

“I know. He's given me some incredible opportunities. But if he's pushing you so hard that you're about to break—”

“I'm not!” I prop my hands on my hips. “I'm not the kind of girl who breaks.”

Connor shrugs again. “Everybody breaks at some point. It's how you patch yourself up that counts. If he's trying not to make the same mistakes with you that he made with your mother, maybe he doesn't realize how hard he's pushing you. Maybe it's not about you at all. It sure as hell isn't because you're inherently flawed.”

But I am. I feel like I am.

Connor moves toward me slowly, like I'm some wounded animal he might scare off. I hate that he sees me being so insecure. I want him to see me as strong and confident and clever. But as he wraps me in his arms and holds me close, I feel like I can be all of those things.

“Just think about it, okay?” he asks. “Think about what
you
want. You, not your granddad. What would you do if you weren't a Milbourn?”

But I can't even imagine that.

• • •

That evening, after supper, Granddad and I walk into town for an open mic night at Java Jim's. Connor helped organize it and he's going to read two new poems. When Granddad heard that, he decided to come support his star student. Which puts me in the awkward position of pretending that Connor and I are just friends.

I guess, technically, I put
myself
in that position.

It's nice to be out of the house though. When we left, Erica and Gracie were watching a movie in the living room and Iz was sulking upstairs. She was not a fan of the first day of theater camp. She called Miss Saundra a pretentious asshole and Granddad threatened to extend her grounding. It made me laugh though. I tried theater camp the summer I was ten, at Granddad's insistence. I had major stage fright, and Miss Saundra's constant barking to “e-nun-ci-ate” did not help matters. I spent most of my time painting sets.

Granddad pushes open the door to Java Jim's and we're greeted by a blast of air-conditioning, followed by the scents of espresso beans and chocolate. The couches and chairs at the front have been shifted to create a small performance space. Connor's coworker Katrina is perched on a stool, a mic in front of her, her guitar across her lap. With her short, ivory lace dress and bright-pink hair and nose ring, she totally rocks the quirky singer-songwriter look. Peyton Cavanaugh, a girl from my class, is sitting on one couch with two of her friends, nervously clutching a black-and-white composition notebook. I don't recognize the girls on the other couch. Maybe they go to the college?

Connor's going to be thrilled with the turnout. The tables against the brick wall are filled with people chatting over iced lattes. I spot him at the end of the line, talking with Jay and Josh as they wait to order drinks. Connor's talking with his hands, shifting from foot to foot. I wonder if he's nervous.

Granddad hesitates as we pass the clipboard with the sign-up sheet. “Are you sure you don't want to read your poem?”

“Very.” My voice is curt.

“It would be good practice,” he wheedles, and ghosts of departmental Christmas parties past come parading through my memory. I was too young then for Granddad to take my reluctance seriously. He always chalked it up to stage fright.

“I would really prefer not to,” I say.

“Maybe next week? You could practice reading it out loud to me first.”

His voice is so hopeful. Jesus, I hate disappointing him. “Maybe,” I agree, though I know I am just prolonging the inevitable. I have to tell him about the poem.

Two women leave, grumbling about the noise, and Granddad snags the now-open table along the wall. “Decaf?” I ask, and he nods, handing me a rumpled ten-dollar bill.

Connor grins when he sees me. I'm wearing red shorts and a black tank top printed with ladybugs, with my hair in two braids courtesy of Gracie. I worried it looked too childish but didn't have the heart to take the braids out. Considering the way Connor's eyes trail over me, I guess I look okay. I squeeze his forearm in greeting, but it's hard not to kiss him. His mouth is just so kissable.

The rest of him looks pretty kissable too. He's wearing jeans and a black T-shirt that hugs his broad shoulders and skims the muscles of his chest. His ink trails out from beneath the sleeve of his shirt and curves over the smooth, brown skin of his forearm. I let my hand linger there, my thumb tracing the Langston Hughes quote. He seems to relax a little beneath my touch.