Page 71 of Us in Ruins
Because he’d picked her up off the pavement after refusing to learn how to ride a bike with the training wheels on. Because he’d held her when she accidentally sucked salt water up her nose during their first beach vacation. Because she’d always, always, jumped first, thought second.
She’d wanted him to fight. To tell her she was brave and tough and capable. That she’d made a mistake but could still fix it, could stick things out for once even though it had been hard.
He didn’t.
Margot should have let it go. Instead, she pressed harder. “What do you mean, you know?”
“You’ve always had quite the overactive imagination.” He said it the way someone would say You always have liked sardines on your pizza for some ungodly reason. “This was just another phase, but you’ll get over it. And I’m trying, Margot, but I swear, you and your mom are so alike.”
“How would you know? You barely know me at all,” Margot said, her words filed to a point. Could he tell how the pit in her stomach threatened to eat her alive? How suddenly her bones squeezed around her lungs? Did he even care?
Being like her mom wasn’t inherently a bad thing. Parker Rhodes was the kind of mom who wouldn’t just read bedtime stories—she’d act them out, costumes and all. She always volunteered for bake sales, even if she’d sometimes forget until ten p.m. and turn their galley kitchen into Iron Chef stadium overnight. Everything with her was an adventure; they’d pretend to be swashbuckling pirates in the drive-through line or fairies foraging in the grocery store, anything for a little extra magic.
And then, one day, she left. On purpose. And decidedly without Margot.
Love could be cruel and thankless. It could leave when you least expected it. It could haunt your heart like a creaking staircase, the sound of someone coming home but never actually arriving.
He clicked his tongue. “Don’t know you? That’s hardly fair. I know you went to Italy because of a book.”
“How—” Margot stuttered. When had he realized she’d salvaged it from the donation pile? “What do you know about Relics of the Heart? You tried to get rid of it.”
A quick burst of surprised laughter burbled from the other end of the line. “Who do you think bought it for your mom on our first date? It was beaten-up back then before it spent every night crammed inside your pillowcase.”
An embarrassed flush rose on Margot’s face. Maybe her hiding spot wasn’t as clever as she’d always thought.
“She loved that book,” she said, and the words came out pinched.
Loved. Past tense. The same way her mom had loved Margot. Enough to leave them behind.
It was like that rift between her parents extended to Margot, too, marooning her on an island between both of them—somehow both theirs and yet not wholly belonging to either. Not enough and yet somehow too much entirely.
He quieted before, again, saying, “I know.”
Those two syllables wormed under Margot’s skin, parasitic. They had teeth, leeching venom into her veins. “Then you also know why I’m here.”
“She’s gone.” Her dad raised his voice, saying, “Nothing you do is going to make her come back. Not even some make-believe magic treasure.”
“And what about you?” Margot asked. She tried—and honestly failed—to disguise her sniffle as a cough. “What’s your excuse? I know you didn’t leave, but you aren’t there for me either. I’m surprised we’ve talked this long, honestly. Don’t you have an open house to host or something?”
A bloated silence hung between them. As dusk settled outside, Margot’s reflection stared back at her in the window. Patchy red painted her face and neck.
“That’s enough, Margot. I’m booking another flight,” he said with finality. “No more questions.”
She hung up on him while a haze of blues swept past the window and didn’t bother scrubbing the tears from her cheeks. Coming here and piecing together the Vase was supposed to make everyone love her so that she could finally, finally, feel whole again. Instead, she was more broken than ever.
Her dad’s exhausted tone filtered through her head—his disappointment like a stake through her heart. Van was somewhere in Naples with a single fragment of painted clay the only thing keeping him alive, and the sting of betrayal every time she thought about him was like lemon juice in a paper cut.
She honestly wasn’t sure if she liked herself right now.
Not even the Vase of Venus Aurelia could fix that.
24
By the time Margot made it back to Pompeii, far past curfew, Hotel Villa Minerva was dark and quiet. Giuseppe glared at her as she walked in, but she carved a straight line for the elevator without making eye contact.
He cleared his throat.
Oh no.