Pointless actions become crucial, even compulsive.
Actually, I see a little of this in Dean Yenin. I see how he lines up his notebooks and pencils on his desk. How his clothes and person are always scrubbed clean. How he washes his hands again and again after Marksmanship or Chemistry classes.
It’s plaster over cracks. I see it and recognize it. I don’t know what his damage is, but I see how he tries to right his universe, desperately and ineffectually. I’d feel sorry for him if he wasn’t such an asshole.
Even my first year at Kingmakers, I tried so hard to follow the rules.
And for what? Did I believe, deep down, that my father would take pity on me and set me free from Rocco?
I know he won’t.
Enter Miles Griffin. He’s not just a rule-breaker, he’s a rule-smasher. He subverts every order, dances around barriers as if they’re not even there.
I should be horrified by him.
Instead, I feel like a caveman who just saw a campfire for the very first time.
Miles takes the forbidden and uses it to his advantage—wields it as a tool.
I admire him. And god, how I envy him.
I wait behind the Solar for Miles, dressed in a skirt and heels borrowed from Chay, a blouse borrowed from Anna, and my own academy jacket overtop. It’s chilly tonight—still and windless, with a hard, frosty bite to the air. The grass is crisp and sparkling under my feet.
I’m not the only one who dressed up and snuck out tonight. I’m pretty sure Chay has been seeing Ozzy on the sly since Halloween. She won’t admit to them dating, but on the two occasions I saw her sneaking back to the dorms with obvious JBF hair, she admitted that they’d hooked up again and it was the best sex of her life.
“He’s so fucking kinky,” she groaned, trying to comb the knots of her hair. “He does things to me I’ve never even heard of before.”
“So you like him?” I said.
“Well . . .” She shrugged. “He’s sweet and funny. Smart, too. I just picture myself with more of a Henry Cavill type.”
Chay’s certainly beautiful enough to snag anyone she wants. But I feel bad for Ozzy all the same, because in other respects—humor, cleverness, persistence—he’d be a great match for Chay.
He’s not unattractive—just unique. Call him an Adam Driver or a Benedict Cumberbatch, if not a Cavill.
Attraction is a funny thing. I always thought Miles was good-looking. But with each day that passes, everyone else seems to fade away, and he becomes the standard of perfection. I don’t like blue eyes anymore, or brown. I only want eyes that look foggy in the morning and silver in the moonlight. I only want 6’2 with a crooked smile and a wicked laugh.
I hug my arms around my body, bouncing on my toes to keep warm.
I wore the skirt because I wanted to dress up, but if Miles plans to go for a walk outside the grounds, or sit somewhere outdoors, I’m going to freeze.
I don’t have long to wait. Miles arrives directly before nine, jogging over the crunching frost. He looks effortlessly stylish in a way that’s rare for a man. Men don’t often seem to understand the fit and drape of clothing, the best ways to highlight their most attractive features. Miles’ pullover and his sage-green trousers cling to his body in all the right places, over his chest and shoulders and the bulge of his thighs.
“Come on,” he says to me, making a move to take my hand, and then remembering that he shouldn’t do that while we’re still outside where someone might see us.
“Where are we going?” I ask.
“This way,” he says, his smile gleaming in the starlight.
He takes me west across campus, past the old wine cellar that leads down to the Undercroft, past the infirmary, the library, and the Rookery. I know, from Miles showing me, that he’s got a satellite hidden in the roof of the Rookery, giving him full access to the internet whenever he likes. For a moment I think he’s going to take me back up the steps of that tower, until he pulls me into the cathedral instead.
I almost expect Anna to be waiting for us inside. She’s the one who comes here most often—it’s her favorite place to practice ballet.
Instead, the cavernous space is empty and echoing, the faint starlight filtering down in colored patterns from the stained-glass windows, and the tiled floor rippled in places from tree roots pushing up from underneath. A pomegranate tree has sprouted in the chancel, and vines encircle the support pillars.
There’s no religion at Kingmakers. The cathedral has been intentionally permitted to fall into ruin. It’s the only part of the school where the roof isn’t patched or the windows repaired after winter storms. It’s a deliberate rejection of one of the many systems of authority to which mafia families will not bow.
Even the other students shun this place. Anna is one of the few who finds the cathedral soothing instead of off-putting.
There’s little to entertain anyone inside these walls. The cathedral is cold and dark, unheated and without any electricity.
I’m not sure why Miles brought me here. Until I see that he’s dragged in the green velvet couch from the stables, the one that reposed in the Chancellor’s office until its ignominious retirement to the pile of discarded furniture, files, and boxes heaped up at the far end of the stables.
The velvet couch isn’t the only addition. Miles has brought blankets, drinks, snacks, and a piece of machinery I don’t recognize—squat and rectangular, it sits on a pile of crates.
“I had a hell of a time finding one of these that would run on battery power,” Miles says.
“What is it?” I ask.
“Take a seat and I’ll show you,” he says, gesturing toward the green sofa.
I sit down, impressed to see that Miles has even fixed the issue of the missing sofa leg, propping the couch up on a wooden block so it no longer wobbles.
Miles hands me a bowl of popcorn. The popcorn is fresh and crisp, doused in real melted butter and sea salt.
I laugh. “Where do you get these things? How did you pop this?”
“The kitchen staff love me,” Miles says. “Nobody enjoys drugs more than line cooks.”
Miles fiddles with the little machine, twisting the dials on the side. It whirs into life, shooting a brilliant beam of light across the open space. The opposite wall illuminates, the space where the altar would have been transforming into a wide, bright movie screen.
I gasp as the Paramount Pictures mountain flashes across the screen. The opening credits announce that we are about to behold “VistaVision” for the very first time. Even before Irving Berlin’s iconic score begins, I already know the film is White Christmas.
“Miles!” I cry. “I can’t believe you!”
He drops down on the sofa next to me, draping his arm around my shoulders. He pulls a blanket over our laps, saying, “I’ve got Milk Duds, too. They were a bitch to find, but I wanted you to have to the full theater experience.”
The opening sequence begins with Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye in their war uniforms. The last time I watched this movie was at my Abuelita’s house. Instead of popcorn and the dusty smell of the cathedral, the old-timey music recalls the scent of Lita’s perfume, the orange blossoms in her garden, and the sugar-crusted pestiños she would fry in her ancient cast-iron skillet.