“I have a letter to read,” Lucy replied, and she pushed her way past Cass and out into hallway. The smell of coffee followed her as she went.
“I don’t hold a torch for Ethan,” Cass said, peering out her door. Somehow it seemed unconvincing.
Lucy looked back. She was ten feet down the hall now, standing in front of someone else’s door. The name was in Chinese and she couldn’t read it. “Who says things like that, Cass? You don’t hold a torch? Just stop with your silly ways of saying things, and your flighty kindness like everyone’s your best friend. Why can’t you just be honest with me? Spit it out. Just admit it. Ethan was new and mysterious and fun—”
“Ethan,” Cass raised her voice, “was dismissive and terse and rude.”
“And yet you wanted to spend time with him instead of me?”
“You’re jealous?”
Lucy’s nostrils flared and her jaw clenched tightly.
Cass bowed her head, and when she looked up, she was smirking, but not kindly. “I love you Lucy King,” she said. “But please stop sounding like such a teenage drama queen.” Then she took a step back inside her apartment and slammed the door; the echo of it carried down the hallway and hit Lucy like a slap.
Cass’s words haunted her. Drama queen. Those were words used for Salem or the other flighty girls who reigned supreme back at Pacific Lake High School—the girls fueled by gossip and the need for attention. She was the one who dealt with the drama queens, who stayed in the background of the messes they created and hoped to rise above it all. She could be called so many things, so many barbs would have stuck, and yet Cass chose that one. The one that didn’t.
She had a right to be jealous, didn’t she? She had a right to be upset about the secrets Cass kept. But she didn’t have anyone to talk to about it. No one whose guidance and counsel she could seek.
Holding Grant’s letter, Lucy slipped out into the main tower of Kymberlin and stood where the party had been the night before. The space was now clean and empty, and it boasted a woman in a blue pantsuit with a button that said New Arrival Liaison. Ask me about your day! A young couple with a weepy toddler stood at her table. The woman pointed toward the elevator and then leaned down, holding out a sticker to the boy, who snatched it tentatively.
As the family walked away, Lucy walked up.
“Good morning,” Lucy said, her voice dry. She swallowed and cleared her throat. She was wearing the same dress from yesterday. It felt itchy against her skin. “Good morning,” she tried again.
“Good morning, Miss King,” the woman replied. “May I direct you to a specific location this morning?”
Lucy stood there, her hands dangling by her sides, and she tilted her head. “Oh,” she said, taken aback. “I just—” she brought her hand up over her neck again. Her eyes scanned the atrium, and she spotted the tiny domed camera, like at a Las Vegas casino, positioned above the arrival liaison’s head. The woman smiled, a bleached-white grin, and kept her eyes trained on Lucy. “I need—” Lucy started again and then she shook her head. “I’m fine. I’ll just explore.”
“Of course,” the liaison said. “May I recommend floors one through five? The museum of North American artifacts is quiet interesting. Or, of course, there’s always the library. And if you need anything, Lucy, please don’t hesitate to come back.” Without missing a beat, the woman turned her attention to a man standing behind Lucy. “Ohayou gozaimasu, Tanabe-san. May I help you find your way?” The man spoke in Japanese and the woman bowed and made murmurs of understanding; Lucy shook her head, confused, and began to walk backwards, but she stumbled when she hit someone walking behind her. Hot liquid traveled down her back and she shrieked, spinning, to see Gordy standing there, his coffee cup now half-empty, brown streaks of liquid dripping off the sides. There was a puddle of coffee on the carpet beneath them.
“This is brand new,” Gordy chastised, looking at Lucy and the mess with disdain. He snapped his fingers toward the liaison, and she pushed a button on her table and nodded at him with a smile.
“I’m so sorry,” Lucy said, and she bent down to the spill. Digging in her bag, Lucy felt a hot flush in her cheeks, and she tried to eke out another apology, but it came out mangled. “I have...maybe...some...” she stammered. Lucy pulled out a t-shirt, her last remaining clean clothes, tossed it on to the coffee, and rubbed the stain with flustered vigor.
“Stop, stop,” Gordy said, pushing her hands away. “Don’t grind it in.” He tossed the t-shirt back to her—a stain had formed under the armpit and across the right arm. Besides her sundress and her Kymberlin sweat suit, that t-shirt and a pair of jeans were the only clothes she owned. She hoped that their ocean view home had a washing machine. She doubted it. “Stand up.” Lucy obeyed.
“I’m sorry,” she said again, looking down.
“You’re a mess,” Gordy replied.
“Like always? Or just right now?”
The question made him pause and offer her a hint of a smile. He motioned to the stain, “I overreacted. It’s nothing. Just a spill. Tatiana will get someone up here to clean it up...but you...your shirt.”
“I’m fine. It’s fine.” Lucy shoved the t-shirt back into her bag and began to walk away toward the main elevator. The coffee-soaked dress clung to her back and felt lukewarm against her skin. She pushed the button and the glass elevator greeted her, and when she stepped inside, she saw Gordy sneak in right behind her. She shoved herself into the corner, and busied herself looking down at the floors of shops and signs below.
“Do you just want me to choose?” Gordy asked and Lucy looked at him.
It was the first time she had ever really looked at the man who saved her life back in the System. He had gray hair around the temples, and a soft baby-face that belied his actual age. Gordy had to be closer in age to her father, but he seemed younger, less tired. His skin was shiny and clean, the beginnings of a beard neatly trimmed, and Lucy caught a vague whiff of his fruity aftershave from the other side of the elevator. Not a drip of coffee had found its way to his tailored khaki pants, white shirt, and argyle sweater vest. And instead, Lucy stood there reeking like coffee with her unwashed hair clinging to her neck.
Still, there was something unsettling about Huck’s son. While he had been the one to pull Lucy from the tanks, she had always felt like that had been to save Blair, not her.
“I’m sorry?” Lucy said, confused.
“The floor. Do you want me to choose the floor?” Gordy asked, his hand hovering over the buttons.
Before she had time to answer, Gordy pushed the button that read LL, and the doors shut with a definitive click. The elevator began to descend. Through the windows, Lucy could see everything—the other elevators shifting around the floors, the open expanse of shops and offices. The entire city was located within the first tower of Kymberlin. It was a bustling metropolis of commerce (which Lucy didn’t understand, yet. If she wanted to buy a new shirt, how would she pay for it?) and government. They moved quickly, like Charlie Bucket’s fast-moving ride through the sky, except their elevator was plummeting; although, Lucy could concede that both Wonka and Gordy shared a strangeness: both exuded a calculated air of eccentricity coupled with an arbitrary set of rules.
“Where are we going?” Lucy asked. She scooted herself even further into the corner and wondered if her toothbrush could be used as a weapon.
Gordy smiled. “The lower level, Lucy.”
She looked down. Beneath them was the glass floor of the tower, and underneath that: the ocean. The elevator was not slowing down, not stopping. They risked crashing into the glass and plummeting into the cold, icy waters of the Atlantic. Except they didn’t. The cylindrical box dropped them down past the floor, and instead of people, shops, and government offices, now Lucy was staring out at the ever-darkening waters of the sea.