Maggie is lying on her left side. Her head is tucked into the crook of Archibald’s neck. Her right cradles his chest.
The room is dim with amber light. The source of light is not obvious.
The air surrounding them is undisturbed by breath.
CHAPTER 45
The Invention of Language
DAD USED TO say that there was a word for every emotion, but I don’t think he’s right about that. I don’t have a single word for the way Archibald and Maggie’s vision makes me feel. Wonder and fright and astonishment and joy and terrible strange sadness and blossoming hope.
Love is too small, too singular a word for the feeling it’s trying to hold. Just one word isn’t enough, so I want to use them all. Sometimes I think love is the reason language was invented.
When Archibald and Maggie met in that audition line, they had no idea what they were at the beginning of. They didn’t know that their love of dancing would make a place for others to love it too. Or that their love would branch out into the world and make children and then grandchildren. Or that their love would lead to mine.
Maybe the whole point of love is to make more of itself.
I try to fall asleep so I’ll be ready for Danceball tomorrow, but the vision won’t leave me. It plays in my head all night. I watch as Maggie and Archibald begin their lives together in the audition line a thousand times. I watch as they die together in bed a thousand more. I laugh through the happy parts of their lives and cry through the sad ones. Sometimes I do the opposite.
Martin said I was supposed to learn a lesson from my superpower. Is the Archibald-and-Maggie vision the lesson? Maybe what I’m supposed to learn is how big and strong love can be, and how long it can last. Their vision is the only one I’ve ever seen that doesn’t end in heartbreak. Not every couple is Mom and Dad.
I fall asleep thinking about the fact that even though I’ve been trying to deny it, I’m in love with Xavier Darius Woods, and I have been for a while now.
CHAPTER 46
Danceball
DANCEBALL SATURDAY FINALLY arrives. X and I were up talking on the phone, so I only get two hours of sleep before my alarm wakes me up at six-thirty. If Fifi figures out I haven’t gotten a full night’s rest, she’ll kill me with her stilettos.
By the time I’m showered and dressed, I feel more awake. Unfortunately, I don’t look as awake as I feel. I poke at the dark circles under my eyes for a few seconds before deciding I need professional help.
I knock on Danica’s door three times, but she’s either still asleep or ignoring me.
I ease open her door. “Dani,” I whisper-shout.
She groans and buries her head under her pillow. “Go away.”
“I’m sorry. I need makeup help.”
She unburies herself and squints over at me. Her face is puffy and she’s wearing her silk sleep cap, but somehow she still looks great. “I was having a really good dream,” she says.
“Danceball is today and I didn’t get any sleep and I look terrible.”
She sits halfway up and plucks her phone from her nightstand. “It’s seven twenty-three a.m., Evie. On a Saturday.”
“I need you, Doctor Dani,” I say.
She sits all the way up now. “Wow,” she says, “you haven’t called me that in forever.”
It’s true. It’s been so long I can’t actually remember the last time.
When Danica first discovered the wondrous world of makeup, I was the one she did all her experimenting on. I’d pretend to be a patient whose face needed （cosmetic） saving and she’d be the genius young surgeon, the only one with enough guts and talent to help me. She’s made me into a ’60s hippie love child, a ’70s disco diva, an ’80s bubblegum-pop star. I’ve been glam, metal, hip-hop, punk rock, goth and more.
I don’t remember when we stopped playing or why.
“Can you save me, Doc?” I make my voice low and gravelly and clutch at my face, pretending to be sick.
She laughs and bounces out of bed to inspect my face. “It’ll be close,” she says, touching the dark circles under my eyes. “You’re pretty far gone.”
“Hey, it’s not that bad,” I protest.
“I’m sorry, but are you the doctor?”
“No,” I grumble.
“All right, I think I can save you,” she says.
She leads me to her vanity and goes to work on me.
Forty-five minutes later, she spins me around to face the mirror. “What do you think?” She dabs at my cheek with one of her sponges.