The Museum of Heartbreak - Meg Leder Page 0,61

strung around the top of the room.

“So I’m thinking I’ll turn the lectern over to Grace as soon as everyone’s settled,” Mr. Garfield said as I joined them.

“And I’ll introduce you guys and Oscar,” Grace added, nodding toward Miles, May, and me.

“Perfect!” Miles said, standing at complete attention, not teasing, not distracted, on his best behavior.

Though neither of them had said anything to the rest of us, clearly Grace and Miles had talked. Over the past few days, every time she suggested something, Miles agreed exuberantly. There hadn’t even been any arguing when we had our first meeting for the next Nevermore issue. May, Oscar, and I had secret wagers on how long it would last.

I was glad, though, that things were, if not back to normal, at least closer to it.

“Where’s Oscar?” I asked.

“Here!” Oscar ran in, his cheeks pink from the chill outside. In his arms was a stack of printed journals, fresh from the bindery.

“Oooh!” Grace said, grabbing a few and handing them out.

“Our baby’s all grown up!” Miles said.

“No typos I can see yet,” May muttered, anxiously scanning the pages.

“What did you finally decide to use to fill that space? Did you pick the nature poems?” I asked, scanning the table of contents, double-checking that Keats’s name wasn’t on there.

It wasn’t.

But someone else’s was.

“We got some great art at the last minute,” Oscar said to me. “Grace said you know the guy?”

I flipped to page seventeen.

There, in meticulous, amazing detail, was one of Eph’s dinosaur drawings.

“Oh,” I said automatically, because it took all my other little words away.

He had drawn two small brontosauruses, their necks long and calm, peeking into the old wooden attic at the museum where they stored the giant elephant skulls, light skimming in from one of the alcove windows. It was titled Part I: Things Begin.

Grace stood next to me. “He dropped them off when you weren’t there. He also apologized for being an ass when he met me.”

“He did?” I asked, unable to take my eyes off the image. Eph had managed to capture the wonder I felt the first time I saw the attic at the museum. The dinosaurs were clearly modeled after us—down to the Superman cape one of them was wearing. And it was all there: the sunlight, the sense of magic, the feeling I’d opened the wardrobe to Narnia.

I flipped to his other piece.

It was the last page in the journal and showed a solitary brontosaurus, also in a Superman cape, craning his neck over racks of clothes in what looked suspiciously like a thrift store.

It was titled Part II: Things Change.

I pressed my fingers against my lips. I smelled mint; I tasted salt.

“You know, your friend’s not so bad,” Oscar said, admiring the image over my shoulder.

Before I could respond, there was a rough-lipped kiss on my cheek.

“Hey, Scout,” Keats said.

I smiled, giddy with the journal, with Eph’s art, with Keats at my side. “I’m so glad you could come,” I said, handing him my copy. “Check out how gorgeous it is!”

Keats opened the journal, scanned the table of contents, an eyebrow raised.

“These are all that’s in there?” he asked, his face not entirely readable.

I nodded carefully. “Yeah, that’s it.”

“Whatever,” he scoffed, tossing his copy on a table without spending any more time with it.

I knew he was disappointed his piece hadn’t been chosen, but I wanted him to be twelve-hours-on-a-bus selfless, just for a few seconds, just for me. “Um, what was that about?”

“It’s . . . I don’t know what I expected in the first place. It’s only a high school journal—not exactly the Paris Review.” He shook his head, like he was so above the whole thing he was in his own galaxy.

Asshole.

All my excitement about the evening and the journal and our work whooshed out of me. I hugged myself, stepping back.

“I’m sorry—I didn’t mean anything by that, Scout.” He tried to put his arm around me, but I jerked my shoulder away.

“You know, we worked really hard on this.”

“Oh, damn, did I offend you?” he said. “I’m so sorry. I’m such an ass.”

I realized three things then: One, Keats spent a lot of time asking if he offended me; two, I spent a lot of time assuring him he hadn’t; and three, I wasn’t going to this time.

He waited for me to disagree, to console him, but my face felt ugly and mad, and I couldn’t say anything.

A flash of bright pink near the door caught our attention.

Cherisse, in her ugly