Noelle nodded and, in a voice like honey, said, “Okay.

Whatever makes you most comfortable.”

“Thank you,” I whispered. Her words and the kiss had left me feeling warmed from the inside, but as another gust of wind took hold of us, both of us shivered. “We should go inside.

You’re going to catch a cold from staying out here for so long.”

To my surprise, Noelle got up without complaint. Her fingers were icy when I slipped my hand into hers, prompting me to make a little detour to the kitchen when we went back inside.

There, I managed to make a cup of tea without waking everyone in the castle up and even found some leftover dessert from dinner that I brought back to our room.

Noelle waited on her bed, wrapped in two blankets and wearing one of my woolen sweaters over her shirt. The sheer feeling of fondness that settled in my chest at the sight only grew when she smiled at me and held the mug of tea to her cheek to feel its warmth.

On the floor in front of her bed lay one of the magazines I had looked through, still open to one of the pages about Crystal Danell.

I closed it and placed it back on her desk, facedown.

16

Seth

On Sunday, Jasper was the one who seemed to have swallowed a tornado. It didn’t have anything to do with me though; it was the day of the play.

The play. Last night I had lain awake thinking about what would happen afterward, when I wouldn’t have rehearsals as an excuse to hang out with him anymore, to see him several times a week, if only from afar. The thought was one of the bad ones I sometimes had, the ones that were like bees or wasps or hornets, something stingy in any case, that kept buzzing around my head so loudly I couldn’t focus on anything else.

Now, in Jasper’s presence, the buzzing had momentarily stopped. We were in the backstage area of the auditorium, leaning against one of the tables filled with props while the other members bustled around us, each in varying stages of panic. It was a tiny room that was stuffed with racks of old costumes, the air thick with the smell of dust and hairspray. By hanging up a few dark bedsheets, the left-hand side had been converted into a changing room where the actors could get into outfits while next to it, people were crowding in front of the mirror.

Jasper’s fingers were drumming against the table, his face a dark cloud as he asked, “We only have fifteen minutes left, where the hell is Gina?”

“Still searching for her wig,” I said.

“She still hasn’t found it? Mon dieu, this is awful,” Jasper said, more to himself than to me, and nervously glanced at his watch for what felt like the twentieth time in only the last two minutes.

“Don’t worry, she’ll find it,” I said with much more confidence than I was actually feeling. “I think Alissa said she had it a few minutes ago.”