Chemistry (7 page)

She blinks. “You.” She recognizes me, though she most likely can’t recall my name. Then she sobs and pushes past me. “I don’t care any more! Let him have her! He deserves that… that slut!”

Just like that, Lily is gone, and she’s taken the beauty of the moment with her. My stomach turns with every breath I take. I want to fool myself into believing her vague pronouns could refer to anyone, but I can’t. It’s Phoebus and Esmeralda. Dear God, it’s Esmeralda.

I half-run, half-stumble up the staircase. Phoebus is here, somewhere, preying on my destiny. I pray she won’t give in to him, and I start opening doors. They have to be here somewhere. Then Phoebus comes storming down the hall. “Lil!” he calls. “Lily, come on! You’re overreacting!” He brushes past me without even seeing who I am.

I rush in the direction he came from, but my feet won’t cooperate. I stumble over something in the dark and hear a familiar groan. It’s my brother, half-conscious and sprawled out on the floor.

“Gene,” I mutter.

He says something incomprehensible back and then passes out. For a moment, I’m conflicted. I bend over him and catch the smell of vodka on his breath. He’s soaked.

Then I hear Esmeralda say, “It’s okay, Djali,” and my concern for my brother vanishes.

At the end of the hallway I catch a glimpse of her, crouched down in the master bedroom. She’s petting her little goat, stroking it between its horns. She’s only a silhouette, but still she turns my blood to fire. I’m so close to her. So close, I can almost touch her. And the way she moves—it’s like she’s dancing, even now.

I stand behind her, but she can’t tell I’m there. The rattle and boom of the music downstairs penetrates everything. The night wind sweeps into the room through an open balcony door, pushing past the sheer curtains like a ghost. The moon is so bright I need no other light to read what’s written on the tiles Esmeralda crouches over.
Phoebus,
they say. And I know that her little goat has spelled the wrong word for the wrong person, that it has unknowingly unleashed the storm in Lily Darling. A broken lamp lies in a heap on the floor just beside a slatted closet door. Lily must have thrown it. Who would have guessed that girl could be such a force of nature?

“It’s okay, Djali,” Esmeralda says again. She sniffs, and I can tell she’s trying not to cry. “You didn’t know. You only did what you were taught.” She scratches its little head. “Good girl,” she says. “Good girl.”

I close my eyes to savor her voice like it’s one of Valentine’s compositions. For a moment, I want to tell her I’m here. I imagine myself touching her shoulder, assuring her that everything’s going to be fine. I imagine her tucking her head under my chin, wrapping her arms around my waist, weeping into my shirt.

So sweet and weak and mine.

But then I hear Phoebus cursing in the hallway. He’s lost Lily and now he’s coming for Esmeralda. She stands, and she’s so close I have to take a step back so I don’t touch her. But I shouldn’t have taken that step. I should have taken her by the hand and marched her out of this place. I should have told her everything. I’m such a coward. I tell myself how cowardly I am with every backward pace. Even as I close myself behind those slatted closet doors, I whisper the word
coward
again and again until I’m sure I’ll never believe I am anything more than that.

Phoebus is here. “Emily,” he says, “I’m so sorry about that.” Emily? He still doesn’t know Esmeralda’s name? “We broke up a few days ago. She hasn’t taken it very well.”

He’s such a liar. I know, not because I have some unusual insight into his relationships, but because Lily is still wearing the ring he gave her. And she wouldn’t be if he had cast her off.

“I’m sorry.” Esmeralda picks up her tiles and slips them into a little bag that hangs around Djali’s neck. “I swear I didn’t do it on purpose.” She’s no idiot. She knows why Lily reacted so violently. She knows there’s no way Phoebus already ended the relationship. And I want to be sure of her strength, but the tremor in her voice gives me reason to doubt. “You… You must hate me now.”

I can’t believe it. She’s weak. She’s weak for
him
.

Phoebus grins, and in the moonlight, his teeth practically glow. “You’re right.” He pauses long enough for Esmeralda to hang her head. “I hate you because you took so long to talk to me, and I might never have known how you felt about me.” Then he pets her hair like she’s his favorite dog. “Why didn’t you say something sooner?”

It’s everything I can do to keep quiet. I think I’m going to punch ten holes into my thighs with my own fingers because he’s wrapping his arms around her waist, she’s tucking her head under his chin, and she’s weeping into his shirt. He tells her not to cry. He tells her everything will be okay. His hands drift over her body. He bends over her and kisses her mouth.

It’s maddening to watch and do nothing. Whatever bars hold the beast in me at bay groan and bend under the pressure of this madness. And I’m sure I’m going to lose myself completely until Esmeralda pulls away.

Phoebus mutters something gentle to her. I don’t believe in his gentleness at all. And she apologizes to him again. I wish she would stop. He doesn’t deserve it.

“What’s wrong now?” Phoebus asks.

Esmeralda is too submissive. With him, she’s another person entirely. It’s as if he has uncreated her. “You’ll think it’s stupid,” she says.

He shakes his head and smiles at her.

“Well… I made this promise.”

“Promise?” He’s impatient. I can see it in the way he moves.

“For my mother’s sake.”

I know where she is going with this because Peter told me, although I wish I had discovered it on my own. This is her superstition. This is the weakness in her. Maybe it’s stupid, but I think it’s beautiful, too. And if I were standing before her right now instead of that clown, I would tell her so. I would tell her all the things I think she needs to hear. I would not push her. I would never push her.

“I never met her,” Esmeralda says. “She left just after I was born. When I was little, I was told I would meet her one day, as long as I stayed pure.”

Phoebus stifles a laugh. He’s uncomfortable; I can see it. He’s feeling guilty, having second thoughts. He’s folding his hands and backing away.

“I told you it was stupid.” She shakes her head. “But I want you to see me and know me for who I really am, stupid bits and all because…” She blushes.

And that’s when I know what she’s going to say next, even before she says it. I know how she feels about him because it’s the same way I feel about her. It’s the same nonsense echoing in my head. Incomprehensible. Impossible.

“I think I love you,” she says.

I slide down until I’m on my knees. My throat burns, and I feel the impact of my tears dripping from my chin to my shirt with a muffled tap, tap. I hate myself so much I can taste it.

Phoebus grins because she loves him, and when people love you, you can get anything from them. He knows this. He uses it all the time. He’s about to use it now. He smiles and pulls her close to him. He slips a hand behind her neck and tilts her head up to his. He wants to kiss her, but she doesn’t let him. She pushes him away.

“You should know all the stupid things about me,” she says. “So it’s fair warning.”

He crosses his arms and leans back, amused, curious. I’m curious, too, waiting here in my cell, surrounded by his parents’ expensive clothes.

She starts to pace. “When I was a little girl, I used to have this dream about a football… I mean a soccer player. I never saw his face, but I had the feeling we knew each other well. I used to believe he was my destiny. I prayed and prayed that I would meet him one day. Then I went to one of your games, and I saw you.” She bites her lower lip and says, “You’re number fourteen.”

He grins like he knows where this is going. “Of course. It’s lucky.”

“It’s the one detail from that dream I can still remember clearly. The player was number fourteen.”

She is in earnest. And he’s laughing at her, but he loves this. He loves her stupid faith, her childish belief in miracles and signs. He hugs her and lifts her until her feet don’t touch the ground. He says, “You are so cute!” like she’s a child. “I adore you!”

And she looks at him like she’s never been this happy. She’s radiant and it’s killing me.

If I were thinking rationally, I would see that maybe this girl is not the perfect creature I took her for. Maybe she’s just a little stupid sometimes. Maybe she gives in to pretty boys easily. Maybe she’s weak and gullible, deep down. But I’m not thinking rationally. I’m not thinking at all.

I.

Am.

Seething.

I imagine I’m still crying when she finally kisses him. Except my fever is so high, my tears seem to dry on contact with my skin.

I won’t lie—to myself or to you. I’m feverish because this moment, while it breaks my heart, also thrills me. I have never felt this way before. That sounds trite, but it’s not. I really mean it. Who would have thought this kind of beast was sleeping in me? I’m not this kind of person, am I? I’m a scientist. I’m “the priest.” But now look at me. I’m a stalker, a voyeur, some kind of sick pervert.

I can’t feel my hands any more. I can’t feel my feet either. I try to close my eyes so I don’t have to see more, but what I see in my head is worse. Because instead of Phoebus touching her—enjoying her, consuming her—it’s me. It’s my hands on her hips, drawing her into me. It’s my tongue in her mouth and my fingers slipping into the back pockets of her jeans. I pry my eyes open and force myself to experience this hell because the heaven behind my eyelids is far, far worse.

I suddenly realize that the person I thought I was doesn’t even exist, and that this… This is the real me. “Oh God,” I whisper, “let me die now.” But I hear two voices speaking those words. Esmeralda has echoed me. And her echo wakes me from the nightmare. My agony and her bliss produced the same words at the same moment. There is no more room for doubt. She and I are inexplicably bound to each other. It’s not just my imagination.

Phoebus lifts her in his arms and mutters, “No, live,” between kisses. “Live, Emily. Live with me.”

And it happens again. “It’s Esmeralda,” she and I say together, as though we’re one person—the duel nature of one being.

Phoebus pauses for a moment, questioning what he’s heard, the echo in the room. But he’s drunk, and he laughs it off.

“But you can call me Emily if you want,” Esmeralda says. “I don’t mind… since my name is strange to you.”

“Aw hell, I’ll get used to it.” He smiles. “Emeralba—I like it.”

If I could laugh, I would be rolling on the floor. But I can’t. Neither can Esmeralda. She’s just staring at Phoebus like he’s some kind of god, even though everything coming out of his mouth is ridiculous.

“I think…” Phoebus says. “I think you and I could be good together. I think this could be real.” I can see in his expression that he means every word, which doesn’t make me feel better at all. “We could get a little apartment. Get part-time jobs. It’d be perfect.” He’s desperate to escape his father, and I don’t blame him at all. But Esmeralda is not his ticket out. She isn’t a bridge between his two worlds. She’s something else entirely.

“But… aren’t we too young to marry?” she asks, and I swear even Phoebus looks undone by her innocence.

“Marry?” He laughs.

She backs away from him, confused.

My God, Peter was right. She is a Virgin, with a capitol ‘V’. I can’t tell you how much this excites and surprises me. It excites Phoebus, too, but for a completely different reason. I believe in her purity. I believe she could change me. I believe she could restore my humanity. Phoebus thinks he’s found easy prey.

“Marriage is just a piece of paper,” he says. “I mean do we really need the government’s permission to be in love? And who says we’re too young? How old were Romeo and Juliet, huh?” I suppose Sophomore English has its uses after all. “Come on, Emilia! People who have the government’s permission don’t love each other any more for it, do they? Fuck the system!” He grins at his own illusory rebellion. “Yeah.”

Esmeralda giggles and stands on tiptoe to wrap her arms around his neck. “Yeah,” she says, and she presses her lips to his, as he starts to unbutton her shirt.

I am transfixed. She’s so beautiful, so perfectly wrapped in her own skin. As her shirt falls from her shoulders, I see the white straps of her bra, the silhouette of her breasts, and a glint of warm light at her chest. It’s a gold pendant, shaped like little shoes. She clutches it and pulls away from Phoebus.

“Is something wrong?” Phoebus sounds genuinely concerned, which surprises me.

“It was my mother’s,” she says, glancing down at her pendant, the hidden treasure he’s exposed.

Phoebus pushes her hair behind her ear with more tenderness than I’ve ever seen him use on Lily Darling. “She was so stupid to walk away from you,” he says. “She’ll never know what she lost.”

And no matter how much I hate it, part of me resonates with his words. I know what he means. I feel that way about Valentine’s parents, and his foster parents, too. They have no idea what they’ve thrown away. They have no idea the value of the person they tossed to me. But I do. I’ve seen his wit and his talent. I’ve seen the size and makeup of his heart. And thinking about him—as I crouch in this closet, in this ridiculous position—almost brings me out of my hypnosis.

Almost.

In one quick, arrogant gesture, Phoebus pulls Esmeralda’s shirt completely off and hides it behind his back with a playful smirk. Esmeralda is not amused. So quick I can’t even see it, she’s produced the little stinger Peter told me about. I can’t even tell where it came from, but I see it in her hand now, glinting in the moonlight. She’s pointing it at Phoebus, a fierce expression on her dollish face. And I’m as proud as I would be if she had just recited the periodic table flawlessly for the first time.

“Give that back!” she cries.

For a moment, Phoebus wavers. I can see his confidence flicker like a candle about to go out. He holds the shirt out, and she snatches it back. “I see how it is,” he says. “You’ve just been playing with me, haven’t you? You don’t love me. God, I’m so stupid sometimes.”