Marianna
I don’t realize I’m gripping Blake’s hand until his fingers loosen and fall away from mine. I tuck my hands behind my back, taking a deep breath to rein myself in while he stuffs his hands in his pockets–a very uncharacteristic motion that I notice, like he’s nervous.
But of course he is.
He hasn’t seen Skye since the day she was born, and I feel… awful about that now that I can see his face as he looks at her, seven years later, cautiously taking her in.
And Skye is looking right at him. She slides off the chair, her hands resting at her sides. She chose her outfit today. Denim overalls, a black shirt, her hair loose and falling down her back. The only pop of color she wanted was her shoes, which were a birthday present from her grammy in hopes Skye would start liking color again.
Skye inspects Blake from head to toe while I hold my breath for both of them.
I know Blake. I used to, at least. Maybe he’s changed in the seven years we’ve been apart, but what hasn’t is that immovable social anxiety that I can taste. Skye peers up at him, looking him right in the eyes–eyes exactly like hers.
Blake doesn’t like new people. He’s not a social butterfly by any means. Conversation is hard for him. He’s a listener, not a talker. And if he does speak, it’s guarded.
It took him… years… to open up to me. To joke with me, and when he did, he was so funny. So kind and… charming.
But otherwise, he’s emotionless. A void in a room full of people who are normal, I suppose, and able to just say something, anything, in the moment.
I look down at my daughter and finally understand some of her social quirks as well. She’s just his daughter. That’s all.
I pinch my jaw to try to relax the strain from gritting my teeth. Skye turns to look at me, noticing I’m not relaxed in the slightest.
Blake turns toward me, whispering under his breath, “We need to talk.”
“I know,” I reply, closing my eyes against the sensation of his breath lacing through my hair, tickling the top of my ear.
“Mommy,” Skye says, her hand sliding into mine. “Can I have a coin to toss into the fountain?”
“I don’t think it’s that kind of fountain, Honey–”
Blake turns back to us, removing his wallet from his back pocket, and cracks it open. Skye’s eyes light with the promise of what ends up being every loose coin in the center zipper pocket, which he deposits into her waiting hand.
Skye immediately squeezes between us and tears into the hallway. I follow, breathless, about to call out to her to come back and say thank you, but… she’s gone.
“She can’t get into trouble here. She’s fine. They won’t whisk her away again.” Blake’s voice is completely, utterly monotone–unaffected–but his eyes betray his true feelings as he strains to hear her receding footfalls.
He turns into the corridor, walking briskly, his eyes honed on Skye while she skips ahead of him. I have to jog to follow his long strides, but when we reach the mouth of the foyer, and sunlight illuminates the wide, marble space, he stops, his shoulders relaxing just a touch.
I swallow my pride because I have to. This… defensiveness, this choking feeling about Skye, and what’s best for her… I have to set it aside for a moment.
Because I’m… terrified of how much I need him right now.
We watch Skye toss a penny into the fountain, leaning her body over the edge to watch it spiral toward the bottom of the crystal pool.
“When did this start? The summoning?” Blake asks, his eyes holding on Skye like he’s in a trance.
I scan his profile, drinking in his new details. I hadn’t gotten a good look at him at the concert, admittedly, because seeing him there, just feet away, had been a total shock to my system.
But here, in the sunlight… he’s just as handsome as he was when we were younger and less burdened. Now, that youthfulness has bled into a hard, icy kind of attractiveness. A promise of violence, I suspect, that lingers in the muted dark circles under his hooded eyes. His cheeks are high and proud, and his nose is still perfectly straight and reminds me of those statues at the temple in Crescent Falls of the old warrior gods–high bridged and regal.
His jaw is sharper than it used to be and brushed with the beginnings of a dark, five o’clock shadow. His hair is still that dark brown tinged with a hint of wine red, at least in this light. In the shadows, his hair is nearly black.
He’s grown a few inches, I think. He lost the… puffiness of youth, the baby fat, and is now lean and built, his shoulders broad. He flexes his hands, curling them into fists at his sides while he waits for my answer.
“About a year ago. I mean, she started changing a year ago.”
His jaw tightens, but he doesn’t look at me. He’s still looking at her, and I give him space to do it, despite the tightening in my belly. I move to the other side of the archway and lean against a marble pillar, crossing my arms under my chest.
“The Mystics,” I continue, glancing at him, “began to appear a few months ago. I held them off for a while, and they respected that, but…” I close my eyes. “Blake, she’s… she’s struggling. She’s been kicked out of three schools, and she just turned seven.”
“I am aware of how old she is.” His voice is cold. I guess I expected that, the ice in his tone. This was my decision, after all, keeping them apart.
I swallow past the knot in my throat. “I received another summons yesterday evening, and it said to come here in the morning. I thought I’d be talking to someone in charge, but they just… took her, and I didn’t know what to do.”
“I am in charge here,” he says and looks at me for longer than a few seconds. He really looks at me, and I feel a blush, as well as a rush of guilt, spiral into damning heat when his violet eyes trace new lines, new divots and curves that weren’t there before. He looks away, first down at his polished loafers, then slowly at Skye, who’s now dangling her little fingers in the cool water, a pile of coins waiting for her wishes on the moonstone wall of the fountain beside her. “You shouldn’t have come all this way for this. She won’t be an acolyte. I won’t let them separate you from her. You have my word.”
“Is that what they would have done?”
“Yes,” he says, and his chest relaxes like he’s been holding his breath and finally let it go. “You shouldn’t be here, Marianna. If they contact you again, let our mediator know, and I’ll handle it. The Mystics have no business in Crescent Falls–”
“I live here now, Blake.” The words fall out of me before I can stop them. I wince when he looks in my direction. “I… I accepted a job that brought us here. With the philharmonic. It–it made sense to me to come. She’s–she wasn’t fitting in anymore.” He bristles. I resist the urge to look away from him as I continue with quiet heartbreak, “I had to come here. I had to at least give it a shot, for her.”
He closes his eyes and inhales before letting go of the breath. “Marianna–”
I lick my lips, cutting him off. “She has a hard time making friends. School has been damn near impossible for her. She can’t handle it. She’s so smart. She’s–she’s exactly like you when it comes to academics. She’s years ahead of where she should be, and I think some of the administrators and parents saw that as a threat, but she’s also hard to explain. I don’t know how to explain it–”
“She’s not a Mystic,” he says like he’s trying to force himself to believe it. I think we both know that’s not the case.
“No–yes–maybe that’s what it is, but Blake, she’s…she’s exactly like you.”
He looks at me, just the slightest movement of his eyes.
I lean away from the wall. “She’s quiet now. I’ve been losing her for years. She’s stuck in the stars. I didn’t know how else to help her, but coming here felt like the right choice.”
He looks like he’s on the verge of showing a glimpse of emotion I’m not sure I’m ready to see.
“How long have you been here?”
“A few days. We’re… we don’t even have our furniture here yet. The movers are supposed to come tomorrow.”
“I don’t think it’s wise that you stay.”
“Blake,” I grind out, “you don’t get to make that decision for us. I have an interview with the Magical Arts Academy–”
“She is not a witch, Marianna.”
“No, she’s not, but–”
“Did he come with you?”
Now, I’m the one bristling. I glance at him, quickly looking away and settling my gaze on Skye instead as she lays out every coin he gave her, internally debating which coin she’s going to toss next. “No.”
He chews his lower lip, his body rigid. I know he saw the bruise. I could hear it in his voice when he asked if he did that to me. He never met Dean. Not once. I don’t think I would have allowed it. I think if Dean knew about Blake, things would have been far worse for me, honestly.
“He never touched her, if that’s what you want to know. I… it was just me. He only ever touched me.”
“He hurt you.” There’s a slice of pain in his voice.
“It’s over. There’s nothing else to say about it, but if you’re going to give me a hard time about moving here, just know that I took Dean’s proximity into account and decided to get as far away from him as possible.” I exhale sharply, my nails digging into my skin as I continue to hug myself. “I was offered first chair, Blake. I wasn’t going to give that up to keep her in Crescent Falls for you–”
“I don’t live in Crescent Falls anymore,” he says under his breath, his eyes locked on mine. “I live here, Marianna. I have for almost a year.”
I didn’t know that. I swallow, hating this ice between us, but I’m the one who put it there, aren’t I? I had my reasons at the time. Good, solid reasons.
“She’ll be around people like her. People who are different, who have different skills. People with magic–” I cut myself off, deciding I’m talking in a perfect circle, trying to convince myself more than him that I made the right decision.
“She doesn’t have magic. It’s something else entirely.”
“Why are you acting like this is my fault for some reason? I’m trying to do what’s best for her.”
Blake holds my gaze, and I realize I never forgot how this feels. He doesn’t just look at people. He looks inward, sees everything, feels it like it’s his own emotions. It’s a tangled net he can’t break free of, but for some reason, he’s always looked at me, held my gaze, held my fucking hand if I needed it, like I needed so badly just a few minutes ago. It’s unnerving sometimes, but other times it’s… amazing. It was amazing, at least, until I found out why he was doing it.
He finally looks away and leans against the wall, his normally steely posture slumping into something casual but not quite relaxed, like he’s given up. “I’ll ensure she gets into the academy.”
“She can get in on her own.”
“They don’t accept Mystics. But they’ll accept her. I’ll see to it myself. Where do you live?” His voice is still cold, still stern and somewhat steely.
“Wisteria Way,” I say under my breath, feeling both hot and cold as I measure the space between us. Seven years. Seven long years without a word in person until the concert. Seven years without seeing his face. Now, look at where I am.
He licks his lips, nodding. “That’s a safe neighborhood. That was a good decision.”
“It was an expensive one, but I agree.”
“You have access to my money anytime you need it.”
“I know. I haven’t–I haven’t needed it.” We look at each other, and I can finally see the way seven years of separation has festered between us. We’re both walking on eggshells with every word we say.
“It was all I could offer you, and you never touched it,” he says in a near whisper, and it’s clear he’s offended.
“I’m saving it for her. I figured you’d–you’d move on, have more kids, you know. She could go to college a hundred times over with those funds as it stands.”
“I have no desire to move on,” he says but then corrects himself quickly, “I have no desire to be mated or married, I mean.”
“Yeah,” I say, and it takes an incredible effort to add, “I see that hasn’t changed, then.”
And there it is, that knife wedged between us that’s been cutting us to pieces since we parted ways.
He takes a breath, and after a beat, asks, “What do you think she’s wishing for?”
“Cream soda,” I say without hesitation, and the ghost of a smile tugs on his mouth.
My stomach hollows out and fills with guilt. “Blake… she doesn’t know yet. About you.”
“She doesn’t have to know,” he says, resigned, and adds, “Do not come back here without me, please. This place isn’t safe for someone like her.”
“Is it safe for you? You said you were in charge here.”
“No,” he answers, and meets my eyes for the first time in several minutes before bowing his head and turning into the light, the glare cloaking him from view as he walks away.