The version of myself I saw in his eyes isn’t all of me, is it? It’s the version who treads the line between the darkness and the light, not the Other Flora who couldn’t get out of bed, who couldn’t even speak or think or breathe without it hurting, who wished more than anything in the whole world that everything would just stop…And it’s not the Flora who ran full-speed and headlong into the light and left everything behind, even her mind, even herself. Sad Flora is the long dark shadow that the blazing light of Mad Flora casts, and both are part of me – but they aren’t the parts I’ve let him see.
How could I? Should I? No.
I can’t – because what if they’re not what he wants to see? What if he saw, and was afraid of them, of me? As afraid as I’ve been? What if he sees them, sees the condition, the label…and that’s suddenly all he can see?
What if I took this moment, this thing, this glorious all of it, and just as it was spreading its wings to fly, I knocked it down to earth with a perfect, perfect bombshell?
There are footsteps on the gravel path behind the hedges circling the glasshouse, somewhere near and getting closer, which means I don’t have time to think about it. Hal’s face says he’s been watching me, and he wants to ask something – I can feel it – but he doesn’t. Instead, he smiles. “Listen, I really want to go and write all this down. I feel like if I don’t get it out of my head and into a notebook, I’m going to forget something – and I want to be able to tell Pa all of it.”
“Not all-of-it all of it, though – right?”
“Okay.” His ears turn scarlet. “Maybe not all of it. But most of it.”
“The important parts.”
“No.” He shakes his head. “The stuff I wouldn’t tell him is just as important.” He beams at me again. “Are you okay walking home, or…?”
“While I would absolutely love for you to walk me home again, I get it. You go.” I laugh, and shoo him in the direction of the hotel. My heart tugs at me to follow him, like it’s a balloon on a string and he’s holding the end – but I watch him turn the corner of the path, rounding the hedge and, just for a second, stopping to look back at me. I wave and smile, and then he’s gone – leaving me with one searing thought that crowds out all the others.
I need a new dress.
Because Hal Waverley asked me to go to the party with him.
He asked me.
I hold the thought to me, tucking it tightly around me like a pair of folded wings.
“…know you’re just trying to protect her…”
The crunch of feet on gravel is closer and Felix’s voice drifts over the hedge.
“Of course I’m trying to protect her!”
That’s Charlie.
Charlie and Felix are heading for the glasshouse…and they’re talking about me.
“And I understand, I do, but…”
“But what, Fix? What?”
I duck behind a stack of old planters at the side of the glasshouse, pressing myself back into the shadow of the hedge. Whatever they’re saying, I want to hear it. Felix, closer now, sighs.
“You want to keep her safe, and make sure she’s stable.”
“That’s my job! I’m her brother, and I promised…”
“You promised your mother, I know. But it’s not your job to keep her on the level. That’s Sanjay’s job – and now she’s better at it, it’s Flora’s. Your job is being her brother.” They reach the path right in front of the glasshouse, and I hold my breath. “I want to protect her just as much as you do – I love her too, and that’s what I’m trying to say. She needs to be normal, and this place…” He sighs again, banging his hand on the glasshouse frame. The panes rattle even louder than they did earlier and I pray that one doesn’t fall out on me. “College, a life. Friends. That’s what she needs.”
“And when she’s ready, I’ll support her doing that.”
“She’s ready, Charlie. You know she’s ready. She’s so much better. Think how she’s been since that kid turned up with the research project! You said it yourself – it’s like seeing her before. She’s ready. And you need to help her see that.”
There’s silence, except for a quiet scraping sound. My brother’s picking loose splinters of wood away from the door frame. He does it when they fight at home sometimes, leaning against the wall or the stairs and picking.
But he only ever does it when he knows Felix is right.
The glasshouse door creaks open as Felix speaks. “Listen to me, Charlie. You want what’s best for Flora, yes. But she’s been treading water – and people can only do that for so long before they sink.”
They close the door behind them.
I lean into the hedge, barely daring to breathe in case they notice me, watching their shadows move as they head for the back of the glasshouse, where Hal and I were, what now feels like a lifetime ago.
She’s ready.
Ready for what, exactly?
But even as I try to draw the safety, the familiarity of Hopwood closer, something deep inside me – just like Charlie – knows Felix is right.
She’s ready.
Does ready mean not being scared?
Because I’m still scared. More scared now than I was before…because I know what can happen. I remember that I didn’t see it coming when I broke.
College, a life. Friends. That’s what she needs.
A life.
Like the one Mira’s making for herself? She knows where she wants to go, and what she needs to do – and she’s doing it. She’s going. She’s leaving me behind, because how can I go anywhere when I don’t know where it is I’m meant to be heading? How can I have a life when life is the thing I can’t seem to handle?
It’s like seeing her before.
I’d forgotten what it felt like to be me before. But I think, just maybe, I remember now.
The old me, the Flora I was, who didn’t always second-guess and doubt and worry about moving too fast or too slow…The one who just was, who didn’t need to be afraid that what she felt might not be real or right. She just felt it.
Suddenly I think I might have been more like her again than I realized – ever since Hal arrived. Not because he’s some kind of handsome prince, riding in to rescue me from my tower, but because he reminded me I don’t need that.
You don’t seem like the kind of person who needs rescuing.
He even told me. He believed it, so why didn’t I?
Because I never know if it matches, if it fits. If my mood matches the moment, whether what I feel is true or not – and whether I can even tell the difference.
The memory of the library at Fallowmill crowds into my head, pushing everything else out. The orderly rows of books, all lined up and locked behind their wood and wiremesh doors. Caged to keep them safe.
Who decides what safe means?
Me.
I do.
Me.
My head. My doors, my locks.
I keep my own keys.
I guess it’s time I used them.
Charlie walks past my open bedroom door, carrying a basket full of laundry…then stops and takes two steps back to poke his head round the frame and stare at me.