It was a joke. It was how Aiden always talked to Harvard. It made them both freeze. Aiden felt like someone had stabbed him with an icicle that shattered, leaving cold shards working their way through his heart. He wondered if Harvard remembered the time during trust falls when Aiden had been the one who caught Harvard. Aiden had relived that moment far too often. He’d thought continually of how it had been to hold Harvard, warm in his arms, and feel as if he could keep him. Harvard probably didn’t remember anything at all.
Harvard glanced at Aiden, then glanced away. “Look. I’ve been thinking. What if we, uh, do something together tonight after fencing?” Before Aiden could respond, Harvard added swiftly, “You know, as friends.”
The brief bright hope that had winked into light in Aiden’s chest became a black hole. “Sorry, buddy. Busy later,” Aiden lied breezily. “Got a date.”
He left the salle d’armes, left Harvard’s disappointed dark eyes, and went out into the daylight. It was too bright here. It made Aiden’s exhausted eyes sting. He leaned against the cool stone wall, tipping his head back and wishing for peace.
“Oh, hello. There you are. I’m Bastien,” said some French boy.
Aiden opened his eyes and made himself smile.
“Aiden Kane. They post about me on the fencing message boards. The warnings are true.”
The French boy seemed intrigued. Apparently, people at Camp Menton had no sense of self-preservation. Aiden glanced back over his shoulder at Harvard, who was laughing with stupid Arune again. Aiden hadn’t seen Arune since elementary school, when Arune had laughed—gently enough, but it still stung—at Aiden for being Harvard’s small, devoted shadow. Humiliation had a particular charred taste at the back of Aiden’s mouth that he was very familiar with at this point. Had Harvard been in touch with Arune this whole time and just never mentioned it?
Seeing Arune made Aiden feel as if he were still that kid who used to cling to Harvard, when Arune and Harvard were friends and Aiden felt like the hanger-on of the group. But Aiden had changed since then. Arune didn’t seem to have changed much. He still seemed cool.
Arune was as tall as Harvard, and as good at sports, and he was kind in the same way Harvard was, without even having to think about it. Aiden had worried all through elementary school that Harvard would trade up for a better best friend.
There was more to Aiden’s feelings about Arune than petty jealousy, though. Aiden couldn’t set eyes on Arune without flashing back to that incident when they were nine, and feeling his insides curl up hot with shame.
No, Aiden wouldn’t think about it.
The French boy—Blaise?—was talking about welcoming Americans to Camp Menton and some match he had later on. Apparently, it was the first Camp Menton bout of the year.
“I can see you’re difficult to impress,” the French boy was prattling on. “But if you let me try, I think I can manage it.”
“Who knows what I might let you do,” Aiden murmured.
Bernard, or whoever, smiled. “If I win my match, it’s tradition for me to get a reward. So… do you think I could get a date?”
The impulse toward cruelty stirred, the same way it had with the last nameless, faceless boy at Kings Row. Aiden smiled, and it wasn’t a pleasant smile, but the French boy looked fascinated.
“Only if you absolutely crush him,” Aiden purred.
Perhaps Aiden would feel better if he saw someone else feel worse.
The empty motions of flirtation came easy, thank God. The rays of sunlight in France seemed particularly piercing, bouncing off white mountains and azure sea to stab Aiden in the eyeballs. He’d wanted to go to France, but wherever he went, there he was. There seemed no hope of rescue.
Except then Coach Williams said, “A word with you, if you please, Aiden Kane.”
Aiden meandered over to where Coach stood, with a brief feeling of relief. Coach’s vacation clothes appeared to be a blue-and-white hoodie, slightly fancier than the red-and-white hoodie she wore at Kings Row.
The relief dissipated as Aiden grew closer. The way Coach looked at him, reproach in her direct dark eyes, made Aiden want to flinch. So he flung up his head and sneered instead.
“What was today’s performance about? I’m surprised by you.”
“At this point, I can’t imagine why,” said Aiden. “Seems like totally on-brand behavior for me.”
He wondered how Eugene was.
“Are you going to ask me how Eugene is?”
“That didn’t occur to me,” said Aiden. “No.”
“Your teammate’s fine,” Coach told him briskly, and Aiden let out a small sigh of relief. Coach caught him. Her eyes sharpened. “Why are you trying so hard to mess up your life, Aiden?”
He wasn’t trying to mess up his life. He was just trying to be someone who could be content with what he had. He was tired of wanting what he couldn’t have. He’d done it for years. Once he’d started dating around, there’d at least been the relief of distraction, the pleasure of being the one desired. He’d still wanted what he couldn’t have, it had still hurt, but Aiden could think about it less.
Then Harvard had started dating, and Aiden was wretchedly and blazingly miserable, and when Harvard was feeling unsure about how dating went, they’d tried their ill-fated dating experiment. And Aiden was suddenly aware of exactly what he was missing out on—in vivid and soul-destroying detail. He kept thinking if only he’d done it right, if only he’d been better in some way, then Harvard would have wanted to date him for real. Only Aiden hadn’t been good enough.
He had to accept that he wasn’t good enough.
That seemed long and embarrassing to explain, and Aiden had an allergy to being emotionally vulnerable.
“I don’t know what you mean, Coach,” Aiden answered. “My dad? Rich. My face? Beautiful. My personal life? Thrilling. What’s the problem?”
“The problem is, Aiden, that if you keep going on the way you are, you could get in real trouble. Watch yourself. Imagine the worst-case scenario here: If you get expelled from Camp Menton, your father will pull you out of Kings Row rather than have you face any consequences.”
He’d never wanted to be like his father, but perhaps he was anyway. Time to put childhood dreams up on a shelf where he should’ve put his childhood teddy bear years ago, along with those old childish longings to be good and to be loved.
“C’est la vie,” said Aiden.
Coach let out an explosive breath. “You can always make up for any mistakes, Aiden, no matter how bad they are. It’s not too late. All you have to do is try.”
“Sorry, are you a fencing coach or a life coach?” asked Aiden.
“I wish you’d try at fencing!” Coach snapped. “I really thought you were turning things around, Aiden. You were finally attempting teamwork. You were talking to your stepmother again. What went wrong?”
Rosina hadn’t been Aiden’s stepmother. She’d left Aiden’s father—and Aiden—before they’d married. Nobody stayed, except Harvard. Aiden had never trusted anyone to stay and care… except Harvard.
Aiden remembered Harvard standing at their dormitory window back at Kings Row. The only person Aiden had ever really loved, telling Aiden that falling in love with him was the worst thing he could imagine.