Stained Glass Souls (Wattys 2014, Collector's Dream Award Winner)

Ariel: Completing the Masquerade

(Ariel: unedited)

He walked like a gentleman.

It was the first thing Ariel noticed when she caught a glimpse of a boy striding into The Art Box. Shoulders squared, one foot in front of the other, a rhythmic march that screamed of chivalry. Temptation almost made her jump from the sofa and inspect his features, to see if he looked the part as well as he played it. He passed her by, taking in the lowered head and sprawling textbook, and continued on to the back of the studio. When he stopped, presumably at the counter in the store, his voice was quiet with effort. Calm. Undulating, smooth, like ripples through the surface of the sunlight.

Numbers blurred before her eyes as she focused upon that voice, that memorable voice. She knew him. His confident movements, his tone – entirely too recognizable for a stranger. Was it someone from home? Was it one of Katrina’s old boyfriends, come to beg for advice on how to redeem himself?

He would not be the first. Over the years, she had coached at least ten, telling them the silly things like favorite food, favorite flower, favorite method of forgiveness. Even after five failed attempts, they kept coming back, desperate to win themselves into her friend’s good graces. But Katrina was an obstinate girl, and once she had set her mind to the undoing of something, it could not be redone. Ariel almost pitied them. They were helpless; they didn’t stand a chance.

This boy, though. He did not have the voice of a boy in the throes of heartbreak. He sounded focused, strong, even as she heard his footsteps, clomping over the wood floors to stand beside her.

“Geometry?”

She lifted her head. He was a gentleman, from the toes of his wing-tip shoes to the collar of his crisp, impeccable striped shirt. As she perused him, she realized that it was more of a rumpled thing. Sleeves shoved to elbow, tie hanging in a discordant loop from around his neck. Jeans, instead of khakis, with whiskered fade in the knees that threatened of failure. The strangest thing of all was the bandana, wrapped around his cropped hair. Hiking boots.

She wasn’t quite sure what to think, upon glimpsing those. Wealthy? Another elite, snagged from the country club at Highland Hills? Or another reject, another charity case, plucked from the depths of Katrina’s thorny heart?

“Actually,” she replied, a beat too late, “calculus.”

“Beautiful. That’s the best one to study.” He tilted his head, a smile curving flatly across the tan plane of his face. “Nothing but straightforward.”  

Ariel had a niggling suspicion that he wasn’t talking about Calculus, anymore. As he raised his hand to push the bandana out of his eyes, light caught upon the thick silver band around his index finger. A red stone was set in the center, glowing faintly. She caught a flash of the Highland Hills crest – silver symbols, intricately linked, a circle of Tudor roses. It was a sign of affluence, of breeding.

Judging from the ring, and the shadows underneath his eyes that marred his beauty despite his open smile, he definitely looked to be a cast-away. He was number 11, or 12, thrown into a pile with all the rest. Ariel felt the difference between her and Katrina widening with each new discovery, acutely as a blow. She would have considered herself lucky with one boy. Katrina never considered this – boys were supposed to like her. And how could they not? She was pretty, poised, clever enough to hide her scars, confident enough to know when to reveal them.

“So.” Ariel shut her textbook slowly. She pushed a handful of papers to the side of the couch, so that the boy could sit. Obligatory politeness. Secretly, she hoped that he would not sit. He was fearful looking, a snake among the grass, this rejected boyfriend. “What happened this time?”