Page 59 of Us in Ruins
“Take your pick,” Margot said to Astrid.
A hum. “The middle one.”
Ruffles it was.
Astrid shimmied into the ivory jumpsuit, wiggling it up and over her narrow hips. The legs ruffled out capri length, and bell-shaped sleeves landed right above her wrists. It hung a bit loose on her—she was all bone where Margot rounded—but with a belt, no one would ever know.
“That’ll do, Donkey,” Margot said in an admittedly terrible rendition of a Scottish accent.
There was a knock at the door, and Suki hightailed it out of the bathroom. Topher’s voice filtered in, saying something about a Ping-Pong championship happening next door, and Suki shouted a quick goodbye along with a “knock ’em dead!”
“I need to tell you something,” Astrid said as soon as Suki clicked the door shut. “Suki can’t keep a secret to save her life, but you should know.”
Margot’s curiosity piqued. She loved a juicy secret as much as the next girl. Her raised eyebrows spoke for her.
“I know Chad isn’t who you’re saying he is.” Astrid watched Margot’s reflection in the mirror as she coated her lashes in liquid black. And Margot’s reflection was trying its absolute darnedest not to look like Astrid had just ripped a very large metaphorical rug out from under its feet.
“What do you—what do you mean?” Margot asked. Her fingers traced the smooth green beads around her wrist.
“A smirk that could knock a lesser woman dead. A shock of sun-bleached hair. A row of freckles arched over his left brow and a smattering of unruly ones across his cheeks. He could only be one man. Van Keane.”
Margot gasped. She didn’t even try to hide it. The words had been stripped straight from her application essay and used against her.
“How did you do it?” Astrid asked. “Don’t tell me Suki’s creepy Ouija board is real.”
“No, no,” Margot said, surprised by the sudden relief coursing through her. Necromancer she was not. Didn’t have the stomach for it, for starters. “He... well, it’s a long story.”
Astrid tapped her phone on the counter. The background was a photo of her holding a blue ribbon. Typical. “I’ve got twenty minutes.”
Unfortunately, there was no succinct way to say “Well, I stole a magical artifact and a historical text from the school’s archives, which led me to a secret temple I’m definitely not telling you the location of, and while I was down there, the cursed statue of Van reanimated.”
Astrid watched her think. Waited. “Nineteen minutes.”
Margot busied herself with Astrid’s eye shadow palette, dusting one of the matte grays onto a brush. “Close.”
Obliging, Astrid closed her eyes. It didn’t stop her from grimacing. “Fine, don’t tell me. But aren’t you supposed to be on a flight back to the middle of nowhere by now?”
The brush stilled in Margot’s hand. “How do you know about that?”
“I’m observant.” Astrid popped one lid open. “And I saw your phone on the sink this morning when we were rushing for the train. Your dad double texts.”
“That’s a total invasion of privacy.” Margot sounded more like Van every day.
“I thought maybe it was an emergency.” As if. “All I’m saying is it would be a downright shame for Dr. Hunt to find out your father requested for you to be removed from the program on such short notice.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“Wouldn’t I?”
Margot’s jaw tensed tight enough to crack a molar. “What do you want?”
“The truth.” Astrid wore a winning grin, sly with the upper hand.
As Margot swirled the shadow into the creases of Astrid’s lid, she spoke the way she imagined people would share clandestine information: hushed and a bit hurried. “He was cursed. A hundred years ago, when he was searching for the Vase of Venus Aurelia, everyone thought he’d died when his dig site caved in, but he didn’t. He’d been turned to stone.”
Astrid scoffed. The sudden movement sent a gray streak halfway to her brow bone.
“Quit wiggling,” Margot scolded. She dabbed off the errant shadow with a makeup wipe. “You asked for this, remember? The point is: I found him.”