two birds to the sky and started to sing “Highway to Hell” with the stereo somewhere in the distance. Then he turned to Violet and me. “What do you say, Violet? I’m getting there.” He winked.
Mitch had been extra taunting tonight, especially toward Violet, almost to the point of manic. I didn’t like the way he openly appraised her, then would smile a slow melting smile, or the fact that he wouldn’t stop making obnoxious comments—about the Gin Blossoms concert, about the crowd being too chill (he almost started a mash pit), and about his date—Penny.
She had gone to collect her friends, and since she wasn’t around to take some of the heat, it all seemed to be directed at Violet.
“Grow up, Peter Pan,” Violet muttered, not meeting his eyes.
The hot and serious look Mitch gave Violet when she called him Peter Pan made me entwine our arms together, pulling her closer. The Polaroid camera strapped around her wrist swung like a pendulum.
I hadn’t seen much of Violet because of my dance schedule, teaching the toddlers, Maggie Beautiful, and my own schoolwork. Not to mention all of the time I had been spending with Brando. She had been spending a lot of time on the school newspaper and our final yearbook.
Since she wanted to shake things up a bit, she picked seven seniors who all had different paths ahead of them, and she was doing in-depth articles about each. I was one of the seven. Hence why she carried around her camera at all times. Her spare time was spent with Mick.
The beautiful thing about Violet and me was that our friendship was not built on co-dependency. We could go weeks without hanging out and then pick up just where we had left off like no time had passed between us. There were times where I had traveled the world for months on end. We had boxes of letters and trinkets we had sent each other during our time apart.
In all the ways that counted, Violet had become my sister.
When I saw her at school after our time at the cabins, I had tried to coax whatever happened between her and Mitch out of her to no avail. She’d clam up, then laugh it off, and then become so silent that I would have to touch her to get her to participate in the conversation again.
I couldn’t complain about her silence. I had given her the same sort of treatment over the years, and even then, she only knew the bare minimum about Brando and me. Her privacy had to be respected until she felt it was the right time to confess whatever it was that was going on. If she ever would. She had changed. Something about her seemed more mature, quieter in a way that unsettled me.
“Yeah, what’s up with you tonight?” Mick said, catching up to us, throwing his arm around Violet’s shoulder. He pulled left, I pulled right, and she seesawed between us.
Mitch walked backward, spreading his arms wide. “Nothing at all, lil brother. What would make you ask such a question?”
“I know what it is.” Mick laughed. It was such a smooth sound, so different from his brother’s. “You’re a grumpy old man now.”
“Grumpy old man?” Mitch stopped walking and waited for us. When we were close enough, he threw himself on his brother, breaking Mick and Violet’s connection.
Mitch rubbed his knuckles over Mick’s head in a Three Stooges move. Not long after, they started to wrestle like two young boys. Both of the cigarettes tucked behind their ears fell to the dusty ground.
Violet and I kept walking toward the fire. We said nothing for some time, the party revved up around us, and I pulled her closer. Her body heat warmed me—Brando’s jacket was sufficient, but the thin, black, long-sleeve t-shirt underneath, paired with a short, blue velvet skirt and black stockings, didn’t seem to be warding off the cold as much as needed. At least my feet were good in Doc Martens.
I bumped her with my hip.
She grinned, but her eyes seemed glossed over, far away. She seemed to be reaching for something she couldn’t quite grasp. “Did I mention how utterly Medusa-like your hair looks tonight? Those wild curls are on pointe.”
The grin on my face matched hers. “No, but you created this look, so I thought you would have noticed.”
“Right,” she extended the word. “At any rate. I love the look on you. It brings out the tamed, but tortured, ballerina