Kady Cross - Sisters Of Salt And Iron

“It’s prettier than I thought,” I said, my voice a little hoarse.

“This is how I choose to see it,” Noah told me. “Rationally, I know that it’s a ruin now, and that soon it will either collapse or they’ll tear it down, but in my heart, it will always be a grand old girl to me.”

“What will you do if they tear it down?” I asked.

“I suppose I’ll have to learn to like whatever they build in its spot, or find someplace new.” He smiled, but I could tell it was forced. “Perhaps I’ll move on. Whatever happens, I suppose it shall be an adventure.”

I think I fell in love with him at that moment, watching him trying to be brave when faced with losing everything he had left in the world. Someday, everything I held dear would be in ruins, as well.

I squeezed his hand in mine, and in that moment I made a decision. I looked him in the eye and smiled. “Would you like to go to a party with me tonight?”

LARK

“Oh, my gawwwwd!” Roxi squealed. She was dressed in a Day of the Dead costume complete with elaborate face makeup and roses in her hair. “Your costume is amazeballs!”

I did a little twirl on the back step of my grandmother’s house. I was wearing the long pink slip dress I’d bought earlier that day. It was covered in fake blood—fabric paint, so I didn’t have to worry about getting red on everything. I was also wearing a “blood”-splattered long strawberry-blond wig, a tiara and a sash that said Prom Queen.

“Did you do the makeup yourself?” I asked as we climbed into Nan’s car—a purple Volkswagen Beetle with flower-shaped brake lights.

The wreath in her hair brushed the ceiling of the car. “Yeah. I watched a couple videos online first.”

I fastened my seat belt and started the engine. “What’s Gage going as?”

“Baron Samedi,” she replied. “I know it’s hokey to do the matching thing, but it was his idea.”

“I think it’s cute.” And it was, which suited the two of them.

“What’s Wren’s costume?” she asked as we pulled out onto the street.

“I’m not sure,” I replied. “She said she’d meet us there.” To be honest I thought it was really weird that she wasn’t with me now. She’d been acting a little off lately.

“Oh, hey. I meant to tell you that she showed up in a few more photos from the dance. Like, fully visible.”

“Really?” My mother used to accuse me of doing “something” to make it look like there was someone beside me in photos when we were kids. She never believed me about Wren. She thought I talked about my sister to upset her.

“Yeah, she totally photo-bombed a couple of shots. Want to see?” She started digging through her purse for her phone. The purse wasn’t much bigger than a tablet—how hard could it be to find a phone in it?

I pulled into the local middle-school parking lot. I wanted to study what Roxi had to show me, and I couldn’t do that and make sure I didn’t drive into a tree.

I turned on the dome light just as Roxi found her phone. It took her a few seconds to get into the photo album and find what she was looking for, but finally she handed me the phone.

The image on the screen was of me, Sarah, Gage and Ben dancing. Mace was out of frame. And there, just behind me, was Wren dancing with wild abandon.

My throat tightened. I don’t know why it choked me up to see her, but it did.

“Scroll to the next one,” Roxi instructed. I did.

And burst out laughing.

It was the whole group of us, clustered in for a dance-floor selfie. There, sticking her head in by mine—while standing practically in Roxi—was Wren, making duck lips.

How the hell did she know about duck lips?

Roxi grinned as I handed the phone back to her. “Awesome, huh?”

I nodded. “Can you text that to me?”

“Already on it.”

I was still smiling as I steered the Beetle out of the lot and back onto the road.

New Devon wasn’t a big town—like most places in Connecticut it just sort of melded with the other small towns around it. Kevin lived not far from Haven Crest and the town cemetery, where he used to take care of Wren’s grave. He didn’t do that anymore—I did. I never asked Wren why he stopped, and she never offered to tell me. Kevin’s house was in a neighborhood that had a lot of space between homes, which was great for a party. The brick house with its white trim was supposed to look warm and homey, but it still screamed money! which I found a little intimidating. Not that I’d ever let Kevin know that.

There were already several cars parked in the drive and on the street when we arrived. I pulled in behind Mace’s car.

Kevin answered the door a few seconds after Roxi rang the bell. He was dressed as the main character from Kick-Ass. It suited him. He grinned when he saw us, but he didn’t hold my gaze. “You guys look awesome,” he said, stepping back so we could enter.

A Taylor Swift song was playing when we walked in. I arched a brow. I hadn’t taken Kevin as a fan, but when we walked into the living room and I saw Sarah by the stereo system, shaking her head and butt to the beat, I understood who was in charge of the music. Sarah was dressed like an old-time female gangster. Not far away was Mace, looking very gangster-ish. Bonnie and Clyde had won out after all.

I looked around the room. There were easily twenty or so people there already—an assortment of “sexy” cops, Disney characters, superheroes and guys dressed as horror-movie villains. What—or rather who—was Ben? I didn’t see him. I had offered to pick him up in case he planned to drink, but he’d turned me down.

It made me anxious. Was he tired of me already? My heart told me that was stupid, but my head couldn’t help it. I didn’t trust in good things. And I didn’t trust myself to be able to keep a guy like Ben around. He was good and nice, while I thought of myself as something of a hot mess—emphasis on mess.

Gage—or rather, Baron Samedi—showed up and claimed Roxi, leaving me standing alone by the snack table. The huge bowl of chips looked so tempting now that I was all anxious. I grabbed a can of soda from the cooler instead and made myself walk away rather than dive headfirst into salty, greasy temptation.

“Nice costume,” came a familiar voice as I leaned against the wall—far away from food.

I turned to smiled at Mace. “Thanks,” I said. “You, too.”

He made a face. “When Sarah gets her heart set on something, it’s easier sometimes just to go with it.” He gestured at my head with his own soda. “Weird to see you with different hair.”

Self-consciously, I touched the “blood”-soaked wig. “Weird-bad, or weird-good?”

Mace shrugged. “Weird-different. You always look good.”

I blinked. The compliment was so unexpected I wasn’t sure how to take it. “Oh. Thanks.”

He looked away. I followed his gaze and saw that Sarah and Kevin were standing together by the stereo, and she was laughing at something Kevin had said. Mace didn’t look too happy about it.

“I hate Taylor Swift,” he said, turning his gaze back to mine. I could tell he suspected there was something between his best friend and his girlfriend, but I wasn’t going to ask. Not here.

I watched as his expression brightened. He was looking at a point over my shoulder, a grin spreading across his face. “That’s too cool.”

I turned. Practically everyone had stopped to watch the guy who had just entered the room. He was tall and dressed entirely in black as Neo from The Matrix. The costume was perfect—long black coat, boots with silver buckles, cargo pants with weapons strapped on. His black shirt was snug enough to cling to his defined chest and abs. Even the hair and sunglasses were perfect.