The grin on Lottie’s face lit up the whole screen, and the glow of the sun seemed to surge around her.
“Will you tell Ellie?”
“I want to,” Lottie admitted after a long pause. “I think we did the right thing by coming here, but . . . it’s complicated. She thinks my failing grade is her fault and she’s still refusing to realize we’re a team, that I want to be there for her. It’s like she’s pushing me away.”
Another pattern.
“Lottie,” Binah said, seeing the story unfold in her head, “I can’t pretend to know what you’re feeling, or what happened, but if Ellie wants to share in this mystery, she needs to share something of herself first, and she has to figure it out herself. She can’t always rely on you to guide her.”
The patterns were so obvious, and they revealed a puzzle with one clear solution. She could see it in her mind as a garden. Lottie was a rose, straightforward, valiant, blooming clearly, with a scent it shared with the world, both recognizable and comforting. Ellie was more difficult, a western underground orchid that required digging through the earth to reveal its sweet, fragrant flowers. But they were there just the same.
So here was the puzzle, and she shared it with Lottie: “If there are roses in the garden, how can you encourage the orchid, which has spent its whole life hidden away, that it is worthy of the rose?”
“I don’t think I understand,” Lottie said eventually.
Smiling through the screen, Binah took one final sip of tea. “I’m saying,” she offered calmly, “if you and Ellie want to get past this, she needs to stop blaming herself for everything bad that happens.”
“But what if she can’t? What if she keeps pushing me away?”
“Then I guess we’ll all just have to hold on tight.”
13
EVERY TIME LOTTIE THOUGHT NO one was looking, she’d check her phone. What’s she waiting for? Ellie wondered.
Lottie was still giving her the silent treatment, barely exchanging more than a few words when necessary. It was like she expected something of her, and it wasn’t even angry, it was hopeful, and it only made Ellie feel like she was letting her down even more.
Saskia laughed after a slurp of her ramen. “That’s probably why she won’t speak to you. She wants you to figure out how to fix it on your own. Ask Anastacia.”
Saskia’s skin had grown even darker in the Japanese sun, glowing gold and radiant, but Ellie’s Maravish genes simply gave her a pinkish brown stripe across her nose and cheeks that made her feel like a little kid.
“It’s true,” Anastacia replied, breezing over to the table and taking a seat by her girlfriend. “I’m a terrible communicator.” Chestnut hair billowed behind her with a dismissive swish of her hand, but Ellie was sure that wasn’t it. Lottie was the best communicator she knew.
On the other side of the room Rio made a comment and everyone laughed. Even Lottie and Jamie had the shadow of a smile over their lips, and the two of them looked at one another, some kind of unknowable understanding passing between them, and it made Ellie feel like spitting her food back onto the plate in disgust.
Why did it bother her so much? To see Jamie talking to Lottie again?
It was like she was staring at the happy ending, an alternate dimension where neither of them had ever worked for her family and they could be happy and live normal lives without her.
“You should ask Micky. Ever since he and Percy started dating they’re as perfect as chocolate and strawberries,” Lola trilled.
“We don’t have that problem,” Micky replied casually, sticking his third chocolate biscuit in his mouth.
“See? Perfect.” Lola giggled, and Micky stuck his tongue out playfully back at her.
“No.” He smiled, his blue eyes turning dozy and enchanted as a pink blush crept over his cheeks that reminded Ellie of Lottie. “Because Percy always knows exactly what to do. We couldn’t talk when we met as kids, so we learned how to read each other in different ways.” Micky spoke so candidly, with not an inch of irony or doubt about his boyfriend, that it made Ellie feel awkward. She could never be so open with her emotions.
“Urgh, sometimes I feel like I barely know Lottie at all,” Ellie groaned, planting her forehead on the table with a painful thump. It was too hot in Japan, and their new tiny “time-out” room only made her feel more sticky and out of place.
This is Sayuri’s fault, she thought, but she didn’t really believe it.
“Rosewood students.” Ellie nearly jumped out of her skin as Haru’s breathy voice blew around her. “My apologies, I did not mean to startle you.”
He’d appeared in front of them, dressed a little more sharply than usual, with fitted trousers and a tank top, but his hair was as fluffy as ever.
“Not at all,” Ellie said, trying to compose herself.
“If you would all please come with me to Chiba Sensei’s office. We have a gift for you.”
Nodding reluctantly, Ellie got to her feet. Right now she didn’t feel worthy of a gift.
Chiba Sensei’s office was located on the northern side of the pond by the boys’ dormitory and nestled beside Kou Fujiwara’s museum with its bronze statue of the founder outside brandishing a deadly sword, challenging all who entered her domain. Ellie felt her watching them on their way past, the blade aimed directly at her heart.
As soon as they got to the office, the refreshing scent of sandalwood incense hit them like a bolt of energy. The room was only just large enough to fit all the Rosewood students, with Haru and Sayuri perched at either side
