Victoria Schwab - The Unbound

“Well?” I ask, indulging my mom with a slow twirl. “What do you think?”

She looks up and smiles, but her eyes are shining, and I know we’ve entered fragile territory. My stomach twists. I’ve been doing my best to think around the issue, but seeing Mom’s face—the subtle war of sadness and stubborn cheer—I can’t help but think of Ben.

My little brother was killed last year on his way to school, just a couple of weeks before summer break. The dreaded day last fall when I went back to class and Ben didn’t will go down as one of the darkest in my family’s history. It was like bleeding to death, except more painful.

So when I see the strain in Mom’s eyes, I’m just thankful we’ve gained the buffer of a year, even if it’s thin. I allow her to run her fingers over the silver piping that lines the shoulders of my polo, forcing myself to remain still beneath the grinding sound that pours from her fingers and through my head with her touch.

“You’d better get back to the coffee shop,” I say through clenched teeth, and Mom’s hand slips away, mistaking my discomfort for annoyance.

She manages a smile anyway. “You ready to go?”

“Almost,” I say. When she doesn’t immediately turn to leave, I know it’s because she wants to see me off. I don’t bother to protest. Not today. Instead I just do a quick check: first the mundane—backpack, wallet, sunglasses—and then the specific—ring around my finger, key around my neck, list in my… No list. I duck back into my room to find the piece of Archive-issued paper still shoved in the pocket of my pants. My phone’s there, too, lying at the foot of my bed where I tossed it earlier. I transfer the slip—blank for now—into the front pocket of my shirt and type a quick answer to Wesley’s question…

What are you wearing?

Battle armor.

…before dropping the phone into my bag.

On our way out, Mom gives me the full spiel about staying safe, being nice, playing well with others. When we reach the base of the lobby’s marble stairs, she plants a kiss on my cheek (it sounds like breaking plates in my head) and tells me to smile. Then an old man calls over from across the lobby, asking if the café is open, and I watch her hurry away, issuing a trill of morning cheer as she leads him into Bishop’s.

I push through the Coronado’s revolving doors and head over to the newly installed bike rack. There’s only one bike chained to it, a sleek metal thing marred—Wes would say adorned —by a strip of duct tape on which the word DANTE has been scrawled in Sharpie. I knew a car was out of the question—all our money is feeding into the coffee shop right now—but I’d had the foresight to ask for the bike. My parents were surprised; I guess they figured I’d just take the bus (local, of course, not school; Hyde wouldn’t deign to have its name stenciled on the side of some massive yellow monstrosity, and besides, the average student probably drives a Lexus), but buses are just narrow boxes crammed with bodies full of noise. The thought makes me shudder.

I dig a pair of workout pants out of my bag, tugging them on under my skirt before unlocking Dante. The café’s awning flaps in the breeze, and the rooftop gargoyles peer down as I swing my leg over and push off the curb.

I’m halfway to the corner when something—some one —catches my eye, and I slow down and glance back.

There’s someone across the street from the Coronado, and he’s watching me. A man, early thirties, with gold hair and sun-touched skin. He’s standing on the curb, shielding his eyes against the sun and squinting up at the old hotel as if it’s intensely interesting. But a moment earlier as I zipped by, I could swear he was looking at me. And even now that he’s not, the feeling lingers.

I stall at the corner, pretending to adjust the gears on my bike as I watch him not-watch me. There’s something familiar about him, but I can’t place it. Maybe he’s been to Bishop’s while I was on shift, or maybe he’s friends with a Coronado resident. Or maybe I’ve never seen him before, and he just has one of those familiar faces. Maybe I just need sleep. The moment I let in the doubt, it kills my conviction, and suddenly I’m not even sure he was looking at me in the first place. When he crosses the street a moment later and vanishes through the front doors of the Coronado without so much as a glance my way, I shake it off and pedal away.

The morning is cool, and I relish the fresh air and the wind whistling in my ears as I weave through the streets. I mapped out the route yesterday—drew it on my hand this morning to be safe—but I never look down. The city unfolds around me, a vast and sunlit grid, a stark contrast to the dark tangle of corridors I’m used to.

And for a few minutes, as the world blurs past, I almost forget about how tired I am and how much I’m dreading today. But then I round the corner and the moment ends as I find myself face-to-face with the moss-slick stones, ivy-strewn walls, and iron gates of Hyde School.

MY FAMILY is about to run away.

Ben’s been dead for almost a year, and our home has somehow become a house, something kept at arm’s reach. They say the only way around is through, but apparently that’s not true. The other option, I know now, is to turn and run. My parents have started packing; things are vanishing, one by one, into boxes. I try not to notice. Between struggling to survive sophomore year and keeping my list of Histories clear, I’ve done a pretty good job of ignoring the Ben-shaped hole—but eventually even I can’t help but see the signs.

Mom quits another job.

Dad starts going on trips in his most collegiate suits.

The house is more often empty than full.

And then one day, when I’m sitting at the kitchen table, studying for finals, Dad gets back from a trip—an interview, it turns out—and places a booklet in front of me. I finish the paragraph I’m reading before letting my gaze wander over to the glossy paper. At first glance it looks like a college packet, but the people splashed across the cover in studious poses wear uniforms of black and green and silver and gold, and most of them look a shade too young for university. I read the name printed in gothic capitals across the top: HYDE SCHOOL .

I should say no. Blending in is hard enough in a school of fifteen hundred, and between the Ben-shaped hole and the Archive’s ever-filling page, I’m barely keeping up my grades.

But Dad has that horrible, hopeful look in his eyes, and he skips the speech about how it will “enrich my academic portfolio,” doesn’t bother to tell me that it is “a smaller school, easier to meet people,” and goes straight for the kill. The quiet, questioning, “It will be an adventure.”

And maybe he’s right.

Or maybe I just can’t stand our home-turned-house.

Maybe I want to run away, too.

I say yes.

I should have said no.

That’s all I can think as I straddle the bike and stare up at Hyde School. The campus is tucked behind a wrought iron fence, and the lot in front is filled with fancy cars and peppered with students who look like they came straight out of that catalog Dad brought home last spring. There is a bike rack, too—but the only students around it are clearly freshmen and sophomores. I can tell by the color of the piping on their uniform shirts. (According to the brochure, freshmen are marked by a glossy black, sophomores by green, juniors by silver, seniors by gold.)

I hover at the edge of the lot, leaning the bike against a tree as I dig out my phone and reread Wesley’s text.

I’m pretty sure you can handle private school.