chapter 45

Kia let herselfinto her cousin’s house and sat down on the sofa next to Lillian, surveying the room. On the coffee table, Lillian’s sketchbook lay open to the picture of Izzy because Lillian wanted to torture herself. A bottle of crème de violette and a pizza box sat on the coffee table as well.

“Lil’ puffin.” Kia put her arm around Lillian’s shoulder.

Lillian shrugged away.

“That nickname doesn’t even make sense.”

Nothing made sense. Izzy wanted her, cared about her. It was so clear. And Izzy wanted commitment, but she had pushed Lillian away. Izzy had left crying about a breakup she caused. Anger surged in Lillian for a second before hurt and confusion doused that flame. Why?

Kia picked up the bottle. “How much have you had to drink?”

“Just that.”

“It’s a third gone. When did you open it?”

“When I got home.”

Lillian had slept on the sofa. The bedsheets were still rumpled from Izzy’s visit, and sleeping on them would break her. Changing the sheets and washing Izzy away would break her too.

“That’s three days,” Kia said.

“Don’t give me shit about it.” Lillian’s head ached. Her eyes ached. Her heart ached. Not the good pain of exertion, the pain of an injury.

“Girl.” Kia let the word out on a sigh. “You drank a third of a bottle of crème de violette in three days?” She looked at the bottle. “If you’re trying to get drunk, it’s not gonna happen like this.”

“I tried, but the stuff is awful.”

Even liking horrible liquor made Izzy special. Everything about her was unique.

“You don’t know how to do this heartbreak stuff, do you? You gotta drink tequila shots.” Kia lifted the pizza box lid. “And you’ve eaten nothing. You’re supposed to binge on junk food. I’m going to open a bottle of wine and we’re going to talk. Then we’re ordering Thai food, and I’m taking you out to go therapy shopping. There’s this great lingerie store in West Hollywood.”

“No one will see it. I’m never going to have sex again.”

“Right.” Kia wandered over to the wine fridge in Lillian’s kitchen and peered inside. “Would you feel better if I opened this fancy Chardonnay?”

“No.”

“Say yes. I want to try it.”

“Yes.”

Kia handed her a glass and sat cross-legged on the other side of the sofa, probably transferring flecks of neon paint from her hand-painted overalls to the leather. It didn’t matter.

“Now tell me what happened with Blue?”

“How did you know?” Lillian asked.

Lillian had crashed and burned. For the first time since she was a teenager, she’d tiptoed into the realm of real feelings and offered her heart to Izzy, and Izzy had said no.

“A, because I’ve loved you since we were, like, two,” Kia said. “And B, you were crying after the show.”

“Everyone was crying.”

“Actually, they weren’t,” Kia said. “We were all trading numbers with Velveteen Crush. We want to do a reunion trip. Maybe meet down in Mexico. But no one could find Blue. Sarah says Blue hasn’t talked to anyone since then. Sarah made her do a proof-of-life live chat, but Blue just said she wasn’t ready to talk about it.” Kia set her glass down and shifted to face Lillian, her sneakers leaving dust on the sofa. The sofa where Izzy had rubbed Lillian’s feet and told her she didn’t have to be perfect. Kia’s expression was dead serious. “Lillian, did you break up with her?”

Kia was supposed to know her.

“How could you think that?”

“Well,” Kia said slowly, “a lot of reasons. You don’t do relationships. You’re moving to Paris.”

Lillian sat perfectly upright. If she let an iota of control slide, she’d cry.

“You’re going to do everything you can to make sure everyone lands in a good place now the company’s broken up,” Kia went on. “You’re going to start auditioning, which means you’ll be training more than ever. I don’t think you lost the competition because of Blue, but I know you, and you’re telling yourself you got distracted and that’s why everything is your fault.”

Harsh but true.

“I think the person you were before you started the show would definitely break up with Blue.” Kia shook Lillian’s knee. “Look at me. I think the person you are now wishes she hadn’t. The show isn’t your fault. The only part of this that is your fault is breaking up with someone you care about because you’re… I don’t know. Driven? Scared? Why won’t you let yourself have this?”

Lillian whirled toward Kia.

“She broke up with me!” She wasn’t mad at Kia. She wanted to muster up anger at Izzy, but she couldn’t when she could still hear Izzy crying in the hallway. She was mad at the world for just… being the way it was. “She said she loved me, but she wouldn’t be with me because I’d always put dance first, and she couldn’t distract me from my career because I’m an… an icon! I told her I’d give up dance.”

“She said icon?” Kia frowned.

“No, Eleanor said icon.” The fire went out of Lillian.

Kia passed her her wineglass.

“That’s bullshit. She doesn’t get to know you better than you know yourself.”

“And what’s worse, I don’t even know if she believes that. She says she always falls for women who leave her for their careers. One of those law-of-attraction things. Her mom left her when she was still in high school. Just picked up with her new husband and her sister and drove away, like, There’s food in the fridge. Have a good life.”

How could Izzy’s mother have done that to her daughter? Eleanor might be overbearing, but she’d give Lillian a kidney. Or her heart.

“She said if we’d stayed on the show, I wouldn’t have wanted to be with her.”

“Would you?”

“Yeah.”

“And given up dance?”

Could she really give up ballet? She hesitated.

“See, you don’t know,” Kia said. “You’re not sure she’s wrong.”

“I want her to be wrong.” Lillian gulped her wine. Why did people drink when they were sad? Sadness made the wine sour. “She doesn’t have anyone to talk to.” Izzy needed someone, even if it was another lover. The thought tore her heart. Most people didn’t know you could tear your heart, but you could. A dancer with a torn heart never recovered. “She doesn’t even open up to her friends.”

“And they obviously love her,” Kia added.

“She thinks they only love Blue Lenox.”

“Blue Lenox is an act.”

“I know. I think they do too.”

“Let me roll this out for you,” Kia said. “She’s got abandonment issues. She doesn’t run her ideas by anyone. She’s afraid you’ll ditch her for your career, and even you aren’t a hundred percent sure you won’t.”

“I don’t want to.” I don’t. I don’t. I don’t. Her life was a river dragging her away from Izzy even though she wanted to cling to her.

“Did you accept Paris?” Kia asked.

“Yeah, I sent them an email.”

Kia raised her eyebrows as if to say, I prove my point.

“If Izzy came back, I’d bail on them. I’d walk out in the middle of class. I don’t care what the school would think.”

“So here it is. Yeah, she should have believed you when you said you wanted to be together. Generally, the whole I-know-what’s-best-for-you thing is some condescending bullshit. But she had enough reason to be scared. And people carry stuff around with them. You walk around like all you want is Eleanor’s love when everyone knows she’d do anything for you.”

Izzy had been touched by Eleanor’s offer of an orchid. What was it like to grow up without love or safety? Eleanor had always been there for Lillian. Always.

“What do I do?”

“What do you want to do?”

She could see Izzy at Bella’s wedding. She’d dress up. Not burlesque up. But something nice that said she tried. She’d stand on the sidelines. There’d be a slow dance. Izzy could have any bridesmaid she wanted, but she wouldn’t ask. Izzy would be too raw, the night too fraught.

“I wish I could go to her sister’s wedding with her.”

“Text her.”

“Just text her and say, If you need a plus-one, I’ll still go?”

“Yes.”

Kia picked up Lillian’s almost-dead phone.

Lillian stared at it until Kia’s body language said she was going to text Izzy for her. So Lillian texted.

Lillian: No pressure but if you don’t want to go to the wedding alone, I’ll still go with you.

It didn’t seem like enough.

Kia looked over. “Just send it.”