Page 12 of All's Fair in Love and Blackmail
The house will smell like cupcakes for the next week, but I think we’ve emerged on the other side of the emotional baking crisis—just in time for me to start my own batch of baked goods, or maybe go on a good long run. Because thanks to Felix, nowI’mthe one in emotional distress.
Don’t think about that right now,I tell myself.
I give Aurora a fleeting thumbs up before sitting down at the other end of the couch, patting Juliet’s leg gently.
“How’re you feeling?” I say.
Juliet casts a sheepish glance at me. “Better,” she says. Her hair, the same blonde as Aurora’s, is stuck to the side of her face, and her nose is pink, her eyes still watery.
The three of us don’t look as much alike as we could, even though Juliet and Aurora have the same long, blonde hair. Juliet has the lean frame of a dancer, slim but fit, and everything about her is sweet—from her freckles to her dimpled smile to the unending kindness that basically shines from her eyes.
Aurora, on the other hand, has never been calledsweet,although she can be. She’s a couple inches taller than Jules and me, with stronger features, and she exudes a sense of self-confidence I think I was born without. She’s the fire to my water and Cyrus’s earth.
The element Juliet most resembles is cotton candy.
“Did you get rid of all the cupcakes?” Juliet says now—when I arrived home earlier she wasn’t coherent enough for conversation.
“Yep,” I say. “I got some complaints that there was no chocolate. People liked the sprinkles, though.”
Juliet nods vigorously. “Sprinkles are my favorite.” She pauses and then covers her face with her hands. “I’msorry,” she wails. “I was just so worried about finding another job and it was stressing me out?—”
“And you’re on your period,” Aurora says.
I frown at her.
“Well, she is,” she mutters with a knowing look at Juliet’s outfit—a tank top and sweatpants, her go-to monthly lounge clothes and a far cry from her usual sweet, feminine attire.
“I am,” Juliet says in a miserable little voice. “It was a perfect storm.”
“You’ll find another job,” Aurora says now, still stroking Juliet’s hair absently. “There are other dance studios around. We’ll help you look. You can apply to some places in Boulder too if need be.”
I nod and give her ankle a quick squeeze. “It will be fine, Jules.”
“I know,” she says with a sigh. She sniffles again. “I’m just worried.” Her eyes dart to me. “Is Cy mad? He sounded so annoyed on the phone.”
“Cy always sounds annoyed,” Aurora says with a snort—she and Cyrus butt heads constantly—and I nod.
“Cy does always sound annoyed,” I say. “But he’s fine. He says thank you for the cupcakes.”
Aurora shoots me a skeptical look, which is spot on, because in no way did Cyrus thank anyone for anything.
But hewouldhave, if it would have occurred to him to vocalize his feelings. He’s not a barbarian. So I’m sticking to it.
“Let’s get up,” I say, standing. “Let’s go somewhere or do something. Come on. It’s what Agnetha and Anni-Frid would do.”
Aurora begins humming “Dancing Queen” at the mention of ABBA’s female members, and I hum along. We were raised on Their Royal Highnesses Agnetha and Anni-Frid—their male counterparts too, I guess—and ABBA accounts for at least half of what we listen to.
I hold my hand out to Juliet, because it’s not good for her to wallow here. “Come on. Let’s go see Mom and Dad, okay? They leave tomorrow morning.”
Juliet’s lip trembles as she takes my hand and muddles to her feet. “I’m going to miss them so much,” she says as fresh tears well in her eyes.
“I know,” I say, wrapping my arms around her and patting her back gently. “So let’s go see them, okay?”
My phone buzzes in my shorts pocket; with one arm still around my sister, I use the other to dig out my phone.
It’s a text from Aurora, who—now that I look—is frowning at me from the couch.
Aurora Borealis
