Page 137 of Saint Céline
For twenty minutes, nothing changed. Then slowly, the panic loosened. The room returned to its proper size. My heartbeat stopped, trying to escape through my throat. My hands stillshook, but less violently now. I could breathe without thinking about each breath like a task I might fail.
Sophia took the bottle from the pharmacy bag and handed it back to me after checking the label.
“Keep it somewhere safe.”
I took it. The small bottle felt heavier than it should have.
“I will.”
* * *
Later, after Sophia and Anya finally left me alone because hovering had become too obvious, I sat on my bed with Miss Astoria curled beside me and emptied my bag.
Wallet. Keys. Lipstick. Notebook. The prescription bottle. I looked at it briefly. Then I placed it carefully into the inner pocket of my bag and zipped it closed.
My phone buzzed once more before midnight. This time it was Vincent.
Vincent:Has he contacted you again?
I stared at the screen. I should not answer. Still, my fingers moved.
Céline:Yes.
His reply came immediately.
Vincent:Come to me.
I closed my eyes. There it was again. The door. The cage. The answer. I typed back slowly.
Céline:No.
For once, he did not answer right away. When he did, the message was short.
Vincent:You will; I’ll wait for you.
I turned the phone facedown, but the words stayed with me long after the screen went dark.
28
Katherine (Past)
I used to think Céline belonged to me because I had made her.
That sounds ugly now, and it sounded ugly even then, but back then I had enough pain to dress it up as something almost noble.
Loyalty. Investment. Friendship. Love.
I told myself I had saved her from the small, humiliating life she was born into, and because I had saved her, some part of her should have remained mine. Not all of her. I was not unreasonable enough to think that. Only the important parts. Her afternoons. Her secrets. Her gratitude. The first version of every smile before she decided who else deserved it.
I had found her when she was still Selena Martin from the staff cottage, all sharp eyes and secondhand clothes and restless hands that were always drawing something in the margins of paper she was supposed to be using for homework. I was the one who looked at her and saw potential. I was the one whonamed her Céline, taught her which fork mattered, which shoes looked cheap, which girls to flatter, which boys to ignore until they begged for attention. I was the one who corrected her essays until they sounded like someone raised around books instead of shouting. I was the one who made Bellamont possible for her.
Then Bellamont chose her.
Not me.
Her.
It was humiliating in a way I could never explain without making myself sound monstrous. I was Katherine Montgomery. I had the house, the name, the grades, the parents on donor boards, the kind of life girls like Selena learned to imitate by watching girls like me. I should have been the center of the story. I didn’t just need popularity in some shallow, desperate way, but that was the order of things. The world had been arranged around girls like me long before either of us was born.
