The Hidden

don’t have a mother to deal with anymore.”

He didn’t respond.

I looked up, regretting the words already. He was sitting at my desk, hands folded. “Sorry. I didn’t mean …” I sighed loudly. “I keep doing this. Keep saying the wrong things. I don’t know what it is, but it’s like I’m all straight corners and bad angles.”

He came over and reached for my face. I sat still, unsure if he was actually going to try to touch me, or was going to keep some space between us. I felt the faint buzz on my cheek, and I turned my face toward him. “Is it November first yet?” I whispered.

Caspian shook his head and mouthed a silent No. But he held his hand there a bit longer. “Just let her get over everything, Abbey, okay? Give her some extra time. And space. She’s going to need it.”

“I know, I know. When did you get so smart?”

“I’ve always been this smart. Wait, are you into smart guys?”

“Definitely into smart guys.” I smiled at him, then looked away. I didn’t know how much more of this not-touching I could take. It felt like this invisible wall was between us every time we got close, and I couldn’t tear it down. I got up and walked over to the window.

The window Vincent Drake had escaped from.

I traced a line down the glass. It made a soft rubbing noise as my finger slipped down it. An invisible trail left behind.

“Don’t you think it’s kind of messed up that the Revenants want me dead, while Vincent wants me alive?” I mused, keeping my fingertip on the glass pane.

Caspian came up behind me. “What did you say?”

“Vincent doesn’t want to kill me. In fact, he even told me not to do anything stupid.”

“What does he want, then?” he asked.

“Me. Alive. Why? I don’t know.”

I stared out the window, lost in my thoughts. I couldn’t stop the scene with Vincent from playing out again and again in my head. If I’d only done something different … defended myself somehow, or made him pay for what he’d done to Kristen … If only I could make it all go away …

I turned, and my eyes landed on an old perfume notebook gathering dust on the corner of my desk. I couldn’t even distract myself with a project; all of my perfuming supplies had been inside the cabinet Vincent had destroyed.

“I wish I had something new to work on,” I said. “Maybe it’s time to take Mom on a little shopping trip for some perfume stuff. Spend some quality time together. That should make her happy.” I crossed over to the chair and rested my sling on the desk.

“You could always learn to draw,” he replied.

“I could? Know anyone who would teach me?”

“As a matter of fact, I do.” He picked up his drawing pad and a charcoal, then sat down on the bed. “Come here.”

Quickly abandoning the desk, I went to go sit beside him. Caspian flipped to a new page and pointed to it. “Draw a tree,” he instructed.

“I can’t. It’s not going to be any good. I can barely hold a pencil, let alone draw anything.”

“So? Just try.”

I sighed, then grasped the charcoal carefully. It left black streaks on my fingers. Conjuring up all of the things my elementary school art teacher had once said about basic shapes and “becoming one with the object,” I tried to sketch the barest outline of a tree.

It looked like a squiggle.

My hand shook as I tried to smooth it out, tried to press the charcoal down harder and make the branches take shape, the trunk appear, the limbs extend outward.

It still looked like a squiggle. Only … worse.

“Yeah, I got nothing.”

Caspian looked down at it. “That’s not true.”

“I have some black smears. Hardly anything to get excited about.” I turned the page sideways and studied it, putting the charcoal down. “Hey, if you look at it this way, it kind of looks like a giant monster hand or something.”

He laughed. “Let’s see what we can do with this.” Picking up the charcoal again, he set it to the page and started making quick, short strokes. Dark magic seemed to flow from his hands and settle right onto the paper. Long, smooth lines were next, and I could see something taking shape.

“Is that a forest?”

He nodded and kept working, transforming my pathetic, spindly attempts at a tree into a dark, twisted stump. The background came together, and trees started springing up, gathering around the edges in a wild dance of abandon. Some of the trees had spiky, forked branches, a stern warning to pay attention to what they had to say- while others pointed whimsically this way and that, their arched spines and flowing limbs swaying in time to some unheard beat.

“That’s amazing,” I breathed. “You’re making it all so real. I can see the story there.”

He kept working, smoothing and shading, until the edges were perfect. The lines sharp where they needed to be sharp, and soft where they needed to be soft. I didn’t speak, barely breathed, not wanting to interrupt him.

Finally he finished.

When he looked up at me, his eyes were bright and happy. He nudged back the sweep of hair that had fallen into one eye, leaving a charcoal smear on his forehead. Overwhelming gratitude filled me to have this chance, this perfect moment, to witness his happiness.

His passion.

“What should we call it?” he asked.

Without hesitation the words flew out of me. “Dance of the Forest.”

“Perfect.” He scrawled the name on the bottom of the paper, and then ripped the page out of the art pad, placing it on the covers beside me. “For you. See what a good team we make?”

I snorted. “Yeah, right. Without my terrible tree you totally couldn’t have made that brilliant drawing.”

“I wouldn’t have had anything to start with,” he corrected. “So, I wouldn’t have ended up with that.” He began another piece as he spoke, this one just a simple river. It was finished quickly, and he flipped the page again. Next a garden came to life, and he filled it with flowers.

I could have watched him draw all morning, but eventually he broke the stillness. “You know, you’re not completely out of perfume supplies, if you want to make something.”

“Yes, I am. Vincent broke everything.”

“What about your supply briefcase?”

My briefcase? I got up and went to check under my desk. “It’s still here! You’re right! I can make something with the supplies I have in here.”

I propped it up on the desk and opened the latches. Delight filled me as I ran my uninjured hand over the rows and rows of shiny amber glass bottles. I grabbed vanilla essential oil, butter CO₂, basil essential oil, and oakmoss absolute to start with. Then I plucked up a handful of transfer pipettes and a mixing glass, and sat in the chair.

After pulling out a bottle of jojoba oil, I poured twenty drops into the mixing glass and flipped open the nearby perfumer’s notebook to write down which oils I was using.

“Did you know that the art of perfume is one that goes back to ancient times?” I said to Caspian. “Perfume was commonly found in the Bible. Cypress, sandalwood, myrrh, frankincense, cinnamon, and Balsam essential oils were used in the preparation of anointing oils and were burned as incense for sacrificial offerings.” I carefully measured out ten drops of basil oil and mixed it with the jojoba carrier oil. Five drops of oakmoss came after that. And then five of vanilla.

Caspian watched over my shoulder.

“There was even a bunch of perfume on the Titanic,” I said. “Adolphe Saalfeld was