Page 22 of Us in Ruins
Van breathed out of his nose. “Like I said. It’s a journal, and I didn’t ask you to come. In fact, I explicitly told you not to.”
She stuck her tongue out at him and retracted it when he glared at her again. “I just saved you. Again. That makes the score two-one.”
“We’re keeping score?” Van asked.
“Only because you refuse to admit I’d make a great partner in crime.”
Street names had been carved into the stone walls, and Van followed them like a breadcrumb trail. The tunnels cut a hard right, just like Van’s journal had said—turn clockwise at the next junction. At least they were on the right path. The thought of adding another shard to her collection made the whole needing a noseplug thing a little more worth it.
As Van led the way, Margot slung her backpack off one shoulder and opened the main compartment. Wrapped up in linen, the first shard had been tucked safely inside a zippered pocket, but Van’s journal... Van’s journal had been right there.
“What did you—”
“Looking for this?” Van asked. He waved his journal in one hand and then slid it into his back pocket. But his head craned downward, reading something.
Not just something. Margot riffled through her backpack—pawing through makeup bags and spare maxi pads and an emergency supply of Biscoff cookies she’d snatched from the airplane—but she didn’t see it.
He hadn’t just stolen back his journal. He’d grabbed Relics of the Heart.
“How do you keep doing that?” Margot asked, shocked.
Van declined to answer. He may have been turned to stone before SCOTUS established the Miranda rights, but he was a pro at remaining silent.
Margot stretched for her book, almost toppling off her pathway, but Van held it out of reach, turning to another chapter. Curse him and his long arms. He flipped through the pages, and Margot braced for impact. She’d heard it all. Romance novels aren’t real literature. Why don’t you read something useful? What a waste of paper. As if the book that made Margot believe in hope after her parents’ happily ever after had shattered wasn’t worth its weight in gold.
After what felt like eons of him examining page after page, he said, “You seriously dog-ear your books?”
Margot’s mouth hung open.
“What kind of Neanderthal doesn’t use a bookmark?” he prodded.
“That’s hardly a criminal offense.”
Van’s eyes widened theatrically. “And you wrote in the margins?”
“That’s none of your business!” she said.
He lifted an eyebrow. “Like how reading my journal is none of yours?”
She gave him a withering look, but it did nothing to stop his finger from skimming the pages.
“Love a golden hour first kiss,” he read, tilting the book sideways to read her scribbled notes. “Here, you underlined brooding love interest thrice.”
Margot reached for the book again, and this time, her fingers grazed the curled edge of the cover. But it wasn’t enough. Her grasp slipped, and Van’s didn’t hold.
Relics of the Heart splashed into the stormwater.
“You’re such a jerk!” Margot said, more a gasp than a sentence. She plucked the book from the sewage sludge and shook it off, praying it was just damp and not destroyed. “You did that on purpose.”
Van hesitated. He stretched his fingers back, popping the bones. “I... didn’t.”
“Yeah, right,” she said with a groan.
“I spent the last ninety-six years as a statue. Give me a break.” His voice was so taut, she almost wanted to believe him.
The chapters stuck together as Margot flipped through them, trying to make sure they didn’t dry like that. If they did, the book would never recover. Her eyes stung with tears when she saw the black ink running, dripping from one page to the next.
Relics of the Heart wasn’t just a love story. It was the only piece of her mom that her dad hadn’t kept from her. And if he’d known she’d taken it, he certainly would have tried.