The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, page 42
“I accept,” she says, and the darkness smiles, and then dissolves around her.
She stands on the sidewalk, alone, until her heart steadies, and then walks back into the Merchant.
But Henry is gone.
* * *
She finds him at home, sitting in the dark.
He’s on the edge of the bed, the blankets still tangled from their afternoon nap. He stares ahead, into the distance, the way he did that summer night on the rooftop, after the fireworks.
And Addie realizes that she is going to lose him, the way she has lost everyone.
And she doesn’t know if she can do it, not again, not this time.
Hasn’t she lost enough?
“I’m sorry,” he whispers as she crosses to him.
“I’m so sorry,” he says, as she runs her fingers through his hair.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” she pleads.
Henry is quiet for a moment, and then he says, “How do you walk to the end of the world?” He looks up at her. “I wanted to hold on to every step.”
A soft, shuddering sigh.
“My uncle had cancer, when I was still in college. It was terminal. The doctors gave him a few months, and he told everyone, and do you know what they did? They couldn’t handle it. They were so caught up in their grief, they mourned him before he was even dead. There’s no way to un-know the fact that someone is dying. It eats away all the normal, and leaves something wrong and rotten in its place. I’m sorry, Addie. I didn’t want you to look at me that way.”
She climbs into bed, and pulls him down beside her.
“I’m sorry,” he’s saying, soft and steady as a prayer.
They lie there, face-to-face, their fingers intertwined.
“I’m sorry.”
And Addie forces herself to ask, “How long do you have left?”
Henry swallows. “A month.”
The words land like a blow on tender skin.
“A little more,” he says. “Thirty-six days.”
“It’s after midnight,” Addie whispers.
Henry exhales. “Then thirty-five.”
Her grip tightens around his, and his tightens back, and they hold on until it hurts, as if any minute someone might try to pull them apart, as if the other might slip free, and disappear.
Occupied France
November 23, 1944
VII
Her back hits the rough stone wall.
The cell grinds shut, and German soldiers laugh beyond the bars as Addie slumps to the floor, coughing blood.
A handful of men huddle in one corner of the cell, slouched and murmuring. At least they don’t seem to care that she’s a woman. The Germans have noticed. Though they caught her dressed in nondescript trousers and coat, though she kept her hair pulled back, she knew by the way they scowled and leered that they could tell her sex. She told them in a dozen different tongues what she would do if they came near, and they laughed, and satisfied themselves with beating her senseless.
Get up, she wills her weary body.
Get up, she wills her tired bones.
Addie forces herself to her feet, stumbles to the front of the cell. She wraps her hands around the frozen steel, pulls at it until her muscles scream, until the bars groan, but they do not move. She pries at the bolts until her fingers bleed, and a soldier slams his hand against the bars and threatens to use her body as kindling.
She is such a fool.
She is a fool for thinking it would work. For thinking that forgettable was the same as invisible, that it would protect her here.
She should have stayed in Boston, where the worst she had to worry about was wartime rations and winter cold. She should never have come back. It was foolish honor, and stubborn pride. It was the last war, and the fact she ran away, fled across the Atlantic instead of facing the danger at home. Because somehow, despite it all, that’s what France will always be.
Home.
And somewhere along the way, she decided she could help. Not in an official sense, of course, but secrets have no owner. They could be touched, and traded, by anyone, even a ghost.
The only thing she had to do was not get caught.
Three years of ferrying secrets through Occupied France.
Three years, only to end up here.
In a prison outside Orleans.
And it does not matter that they will forget her face. It does not matter, because these soldiers do not care about remembering. Here, all the faces are strange, and foreign, and nameless, and if she doesn’t get out, she is going to disappear.
Addie sags back against the icy wall and pulls her ragged jacket close. She closes her eyes. She does not pray, not exactly, but she does think of him. She does, perhaps, even wish that it were summer—a July night when he might find her on his own.
The soldiers have searched her, roughly, taken anything she might use to hurt them, or escape. They have taken the ring, too, snapped the leather cord it hung on, cast the wooden band away.
And yet, when she rifles through her ragged clothing, it is still there, waiting like a coin in the crease of her pocket. She is grateful, then, that she cannot seem to lose it. Grateful, as she lifts it to her finger.
For a moment, she falters—twenty-nine years she has had the ring, with all its strings attached.
Twenty-nine years, and she hasn’t used it.
But right now, even Luc’s smug satisfaction would be better than the eternity in a prison cell, or worse.
If he comes.
Those words, a whisper in the back of her mind. A fear she cannot shake. Chicago rising like bile in her throat.
The anger in her chest. The venom in his eyes.
I would rather be a ghost.
She had been wrong.
She does not want to be this kind of ghost.
And so, for the first time in centuries, Addie prays.
She slides the wooden band over her finger, and holds her breath, expects to feel something, a stirring of magic, a rush of wind.
But there is nothing.
Nothing, and she wonders if, after all this time, it was just another trick, a way to lift her hopes, only to drop them, in the chance they might shatter.
She has a curse ready on her tongue, when she feels the breeze—not biting, but warm, cutting through the prison cell, carrying the far-off scent of summer.
The men across the cell stop talking.
They slouch in their corner, awake but inert, staring off into space, as if caught in the throes of some idea. Beyond the cell, the soldiers’ boots stop sounding on the stones, and the German voices drop away like a pebble down a well.
The world goes strangely, impossibly quiet.
Until the only sound is the soft, almost rhythmic tap of fingers trailing along bars.
She has not seen him since Chicago.
“Oh Adeline,” he says, hand drifting down the icy bars. “What a state you’re in.”
She manages a small, pained laugh. “Immortality breeds a high tolerance for risk.”
“There are things worse than death,” he says, as if she does not already know.
He looks around at the prison, brow furrowed in disdain.
“Wars,” he mutters.
“Tell me you are not helping them.”
Luc almost looks offended. “Even I have limits.”
“You bragged to me once about the successes of Napoleon.”
He shrugs. “There is ambition, and there is evil. And as much as I’d like to create a roster of my past exploits, your life is the important one right now.” He leans his elbows on the bars. “How do you plan to get out of this?”
She knows what he wants her to do. He wants her to beg. As if donning the ring were not enough. As if he has not already won this hand, this game. Her stomach knots, and her bruised ribs ache, and she is so thirsty she could cry just to have something to drink. But Addie cannot bring herself to fold.
“You know me,” she says, with a tired smile. “I always find a way.”
Luc sighs. “Suit yourself,” he says, turning his back, and it is too much; she cannot bear the thought of him leaving her here, alone.
“Wait,” she calls desperately, pushing into the bars—only to find the lock undone, the cell door swinging open beneath her weight.
Luc looks back over his shoulder, and he almost smiles, turning toward her just enough to offer up his hand.
She stumbles forward, out of the cell and into freedom, into him. And for a moment, the embrace is only that, and he is solid, and warm, folded around her in the dark, and it would be easy to believe that he is real, that he is human, that he is home.
But then the world cracks wide, and the shadows swallow them whole.
The prison gives way to nothingness, to blackness, to the wild dark. And when it parts, she is back in Boston, the sun just beginning to set, and she could kiss the ground in sheer relief. Addie pulls the jacket close around her, and sinks onto the curb, legs shaking, the wooden band still wrapped around her finger. She called, and he came. She asked, and he answered. And she knows he will hold it over her, and but right now, she does not care.
She does not want to be alone.
But by the time Addie looks up to thank him, he is gone.
New York City
July 30, 2014
VIII
Henry trails her through the apartment as she gets ready.
“Why would you agree to this?” he asks.
Because she knows the darkness better than anyone, knows his mind if not his heart.
“Because I don’t want to lose you,” says Addie, pulling up her hair.
Henry looks tired, hollowed out. “It’s too late,” he says.
But it’s not too late.
Not yet.
Addie reaches into her pocket and feels the ring where it always is, waiting, the wood warm from being pressed against her body. She draws it out, but Henry catches her hand.
“Don’t do this,” he pleads.
“Do you want to die?” she asks, the words cutting through the room.
He pulls back a little at the words. “No. But I made a choice, Addie.”
“You made a mistake.”
“I made a deal,” he says. “And I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t ask for more time. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the truth sooner. But it is what it is.”
Addie shakes her head. “You may have made peace with this, Henry, but I haven’t.”
“This won’t work,” he warns. “You can’t reason with him.”
Addie tugs free of his grip. “I’m willing to try,” she says, slipping the ring over her finger.
There is no flood of darkness.
Only a stillness, a vacant quiet, and then—
A knock.
And she is grateful that at least he didn’t invite himself in. But Henry stands between her and the door, his hands braced across the narrow hall. He doesn’t move, his eyes pleading. Addie reaches up and cups his face.
“I need you to trust me,” she says.
Something cracks in him. One hand drops from the frame.
She kisses him, and then she slides by, and opens the door for the dark.
“Adeline.”
Luc should look out of place in the building’s hall, but he never does.
The lights on the walls have dimmed a little, softened to a yellow haze that haloes the black curls around his face, and catches slivers of gold in his green eyes.
He is dressed in all black, tailored slacks and a button-down shirt, the sleeves rolled to the elbows, an emerald pin driven through the silk tie at his throat.
It is far too hot for such an outfit, but Luc doesn’t seem to mind. The heat, like the rain, like the world itself, seems to have no hold on him.
He does not tell her she looks beautiful.
He does not tell her anything.
He simply turns, expecting her to follow.
And as she steps into the hall, he looks to Henry. And winks.
Addie should have stopped right there.
She should have turned around, let Henry pull her back inside. They should have shut the door, and bolted it against the dark.
But they didn’t.
They don’t.
Addie glances back over her shoulder at Henry, who lingers in the doorway, a cloud shadowing his face. She wills him to close the door, but he doesn’t, and she has no choice but to step away, and follow Luc as Henry watches.
Downstairs, he holds open the building’s door, but Addie stops. Looks down at the threshold. Darkness coils in the frame, shimmers between them and the steps down to the street.
She doesn’t trust the shadows, she can’t see where they lead, and the last thing she needs is for Luc to strand her in some far-off land if and when the night goes bad.
“There are rules tonight,” she says.
“Oh?”
“I won’t leave the city,” she says, nodding at the door. “And I won’t go that way.”
“Through a door?”
“Through the dark.”
Luc’s brows draw up. “Don’t you trust me?”
“I never have,” she says. “There’s no use starting now.”
Luc laughs, soft and soundless, and steps outside to hail a car. Seconds later, a sleek black sedan pulls up to the curb. He holds out his hand to help her in. She doesn’t take it.
He does not give the driver an address.
The driver does not ask for one.
And when Addie asks where they are going, Luc does not answer.
Soon they are on the Manhattan Bridge.
The silence between them should be awkward. The halting conversation of exes too long apart, and still not long enough to have forgiven anything.
What is forty years against three hundred?
But this is a silence born of strategy.
This is the silence of a chess game being played.
And this time, Addie has to win.
Los Angeles, California
April 7, 1952
IX
“God, you’re beautiful,” says Max, lifting his glass.
Addie blushes, eyes dropping to her martini.
They met on the street outside the Wilshire that morning, the creases from his bedsheets still pressed into her skin. She was lingering on the curb in his favorite wine-colored dress, and when he came out for his morning stroll, he stopped and asked if he could be so bold as to walk with her, wherever she was going, and when they got there, to a pretty building picked at random, he kissed her hand, and said good-bye, but he didn’t leave, and neither did she. They spent the whole day together, strolling from a tea shop to a park to the art museum, finding excuses to continue in each other’s company.
And when she told him that it was the best birthday she’d had in years, he blinked at her in horror, shocked at the idea a girl like her would find herself alone, and here they are, drinking martinis at the Roosevelt.
(It is not her birthday, of course, and she’s not sure why she told him it was. Perhaps to see what he would do. Perhaps because even she is getting bored of living the same night over again.)
“Have you ever met someone,” he says, “and felt like you’ve known them for ages?”
Addie smiles.
He always says the same things, but he means them every time. She toys with the silver thread at her throat, the wooden ring tucked into the neckline of her dress. A habit she cannot seem to break.
A server appears at her elbow with a bottle of Champagne.
“What’s this?” she asks.
“For the birthday girl on this special evening,” says Max brightly. “And the lucky gentleman who gets to spend it with her.”
She admires the tiny bubbles rising through the flute, knows even before she takes a sip that it’s the real thing; old, expensive. Knows, too, that Max can easily afford the luxury.
He is a sculptor—Addie has always had a weakness for the fine arts—and talented, yes, but far from starving. Unlike so many of the artists Addie has been with, he comes from money, the family funds sturdy enough to weather the wars, and the lean years between them.
He raises his glass, just as a shadow falls across the table.
She assumes it’s their server, but then Max looks up, and frowns a little. “Can I help you?”
And Addie hears a voice like silk and smoke. “I do believe you can.”
There is Luc, dressed in an elegant black suit. He is beautiful. He is always beautiful. “Hello, my dear.”
Max’s frown deepens. “Do you two know each other?”
“No,” she says at the same time Luc says, “Yes,” and it’s not fair, the way his voice carries and hers does not.
“He’s an old friend,” she says, a biting edge in her tone. “But—”
Again, he cuts her off. “But we haven’t seen each other in a while, so if you’d be so kind…”
Max bristles. “That’s quite impertinent—”
“Go.”
It is just one word, but the air ripples with the force of it, the syllable wrapping like gauze around her date. The fight drops out of Max’s face. The annoyance smooths, and his eyes go glassy as he rises from the table, and walks away. He never even looks back.
“Dammit,” she swears, sinking in her seat. “Why must you be such an ass?”
Luc lowers himself into the vacant chair, and lifts the bottle of Champagne, refilling their glasses. “Your birthday is in March.”
“When you get to be my age,” she says, “you celebrate as often as you like.”
“How long have you been with him?”
“Two months. It’s not so bad,” she says, sipping her drink. “He falls for me every day.”
“And forgets you every night.”
The words bite, but not as deeply as they used to.
“At least he keeps me company.”
Those emerald eyes trail over her skin. “So would I,” he says, “if you wanted it.”
A flush of warmth sweeps across her cheeks.
He cannot know that she has missed him. Thought of him, the way she used to think of her stranger, alone in bed at night. Thought of him every time she toyed with the ring at her throat, and every time she didn’t.
