The Graces Read Free Page A

missing.
    I’d worried about my conversation with Fenrin that whole day and well into the night, turning my words over again and again, wondering what I could have done better. In my mind, my voice was even and measured, a beautiful cadence that positioned itself perfectly between drawling and musical. But in reality, I had an awkward town accent I couldn’t quite shift, all hard edges and soft, dopey burrs. I wondered if he’d heard it. I wondered if he’d judged me because of it.
    I ate and read my book, this particular kind of fantasy novel that I secretly loved. It was my favouritething to do – eat and read. The world just shut up for a while. I’d just got to the bit where Princess Mar’a’tha had shot an arrow into one of the demon horde attacking the royal hunting camp, and then I felt it.
    Him. I felt him.
    I looked up into his face, which was tilted down at my shit, embarrassing book and my shit, embarrassing lunch.
    ‘Am I interrupting?’ said Fenrin. A long wave of his sungold-tipped hair had slipped from behind his ear and hung by his cheekbone. I actually caught a waft of him. He smelled like a thicker, manlier kind of vanilla. His skin was lightly tanned.
    I hadn’t lowered my fork; I just looked at him dumbly over it.
    It worked. I told him the truth and it worked.
    ‘Eating in the library again, when the rest of the school uses the cafeteria,’ he mused. ‘You must enjoy being alone.’
    ‘Yes,’ I said. But I had misjudged it because his eyebrow rose.
    ‘Er, okay. Sorry for disturbing you,’ he said, and turned away. I lowered my fork.
    NO, WAIT! I wanted to shout. You were supposed to say something self-deprecatingly witty at this point, weren’t you, and get a laugh, and then you’d see it inhis eyes – he’d think you were cool. And like that, you’d be in.
    But nothing came out of my mouth, and my chance was slipping away.
    The only other person in the library was this guy Marcus from Fenrin’s year (always Marc us , never just Marc, I’d heard someone say with a sneer). He had the kind of presence that folded inward, as if he couldn’t bear to be noticed. I understood that and gave him a wide berth.
    So I found it interesting when Fenrin turned to Marcus and locked eyes with him instead of ignoring him. And instead of trying to be invisible, Marcus held his gaze. Fenrin’s mouth drew into a thin, tight line. Marcus didn’t move.
    After a moment more of this strangeness that wasn’t quite aggression and wasn’t quite anything easy to read, Fenrin snorted, turned and caught me watching. I tried to smile, giving him an opening.
    It seemed to work. He folded his arms, rocked on his feet.
    ‘So, at the risk of looking like an idiot coming back for another serving,’ he said to me, ‘why do you enjoy being alone?’
    My mouth opened and shut and I gave him a truth, because truth had got me this far, and truthseemed like it would endear him to me more than anything else ever could.
    I forced myself to look straight into his eyes. ‘I can stop pretending when I’m alone.’
    Fenrin smiled.
    Bingo, as my mother often said.

CHAPTER 3
    There was a story about the Graces, a story so woven into the fabric of this town that even my mother had already heard about it from someone at work. It was about Thalia and Fenrin’s eighth birthday party.
    Grace birthday parties had been legendary up until then. Most of the mothers around town would pray that their child would get an invitation, so they could come, too, and lounge in Esther Grace’s spacious French country kitchen, drinking cocktails in slender flutes and stealing glances at her pretty husband, Gwydion, as he passed by with his easy, loping stride.
    The party had been fairly standard all afternoon. The mothers had put on their most carefully chosen outfits, their most vibrant shades of lipstick, and had lingered in the kitchen drinking freshly made mojitos with mint from Esther’s sprawling herb garden. Their tinkling