FenceStriking Distance - Sarah Rees Brennan Page 0,88
had previously believed.
“I knew it, I knew horrible things were happening at Kings Row,” Jesse muttered. He stopped tugging persuasively and pulled at Seiji’s wrist hard enough to hurt, so Seiji’s sleeve was disarranged and the dying light caught his watch. “And what ghastly object are you wearing on your wrist?!”
“That’s my favorite watch,” Seiji snapped, and twisted his arm free.
Jesse lunged forward, but Aiden stepped in, standing shoulder to shoulder with Seiji. Jesse paid no attention to Aiden, but Seiji knew he was there.
“What?” Jesse asked blankly. “How can that be? Seiji, I feel like I can’t even recognize you right now. Who even are you?”
“Kings Row’s team will be fencing against Exton’s one of these days,” Seiji answered. “My school against yours.”
He laid claim to Kings Row the same way he’d laid claim to the watch, without thinking. He couldn’t justify doing so, but he didn’t want to take it back.
“What are you saying?” Jesse demanded.
“You don’t know who I am? Find out on the piste,” Seiji suggested, and turned away.
He felt slightly unsteady, probably due to the fact the ground was uneven and riddled with treacherous hidden tree roots, but Aiden threw a careless arm around his shoulders as they walked over the forest floor together. That helped with the unsteadiness.
Aiden urged, “That’s right. Make him chase you.”
Aiden’s voice was encouraging, but his actual words were confusing.
“We’re fencers,” Seiji pointed out. “We’re not running relay races.”
“I truly cannot imagine why your painfully literal milkshake brings all the boys to the yard,” said Aiden, “but work with what you’ve got, I guess.”
“I don’t drink milkshakes,” Seiji told him. “You’re probably thinking of protein shakes. I drink those.”
Aiden appeared reduced to silence by this statement.
They made their way through the trees in silence for a while. Seiji preferred a companionable silence to a difficult conversation, but he felt he should say something. Even though he didn’t know how to express how relieved he’d been when Aiden showed up.
“Aiden? Thanks,” offered Seiji with a small, shy smile. He was embarrassed by the sound of his own voice, sounding almost as young as he actually was. “You were really cool back there.”
“Oh,” said Aiden, looking vaguely startled. “No problem.”
Seiji walked back to Kings Row with a teammate by his side.
29: HARVARD
When Harvard walked into their room, Aiden was standing by the window, getting changed out of his fencing gear. Aiden paused, hands tugging his jacket closed in a swift, nervous movement, when Aiden was never anything but sublimely and blithely self-confident in any possible stage of undress.
The bear from the fair was in the trash. Harvard guessed he knew what that meant.
He had really screwed up.
“Harvard!” Aiden exclaimed, jolting as though he was trying to move forward and stay absolutely still at the same time. “I thought you weren’t coming back.”
“This is our room? And I told you I was coming back,” Harvard reminded him. “I just wanted to go see my mom.”
Aiden nodded, blinking rapidly. It was so strange to see the most familiar and dear person in Harvard’s world in a new light. To recognize the light he saw Aiden in, for what it had always been. Sunset gilded Aiden’s lashes and the wings of his collarbone, while the hollow of his throat was left in shadow. The curved bow of his mouth, usually curling, laughing, mocking, was today in an uncertain shape. Harvard had been such a fool.
“Right,” Aiden whispered. “That never occurred to me. It should have. I know you, and I know your mom. But it didn’t. I would never go home if I didn’t have to.” He gave an easy, looping shrug. “Of course, my home’s a nightmare.”
“I know,” Harvard whispered back, shocked.
He knew, but Aiden never talked about it. He wondered what was different today.
Aiden was wearing a strange, cracked-open, and almost vulnerable expression. Broken, but not entirely in a bad way. Like a mask breaking, or a shell breaking, so something new could be born.
Oh God, Aiden knew, didn’t he? Aiden had seen what had been written all over Harvard’s face last night. Harvard had been afraid of this.
“I have to tell you something,” said Aiden.
“I know—I think I know what you’re going to say,” Harvard told him.
Harvard didn’t want to hear it.
Aiden’s mobile mouth worked for a moment, finding a crooked path to a smile. “Just the truth.”
Harvard especially didn’t want to hear that.
“Can I tell you what I have to say first?” Harvard begged. “Can you please just listen for a