The Towering Sky

“He’s so strict that he won’t even let you go on dates?” Brice asked, incredulous.

“Not with you,” Calliope said, then immediately worried she’d gone too far.

“Once again, my reputation precedes me.” Brice said it jokingly, but underneath, Calliope heard a vein of sadness. “Where did you say you were going tonight, rescuing puppies at the animal shelter?”

“Close. Reading to children at the hospital.” Calliope realized, as she said it aloud, how ridiculous it sounded. But how else could she have gotten out of the apartment?

“Did your mom date anyone else, before Nadav?” Brice asked.

You have no idea. “A few people,” Calliope evaded. “No one very serious.”

“What happened to your dad?”

She looked down into her drink, idly stirring the surface with the stick of ginger. “We don’t really talk about him. He left when I was a baby.”

“You aren’t curious about him?”

“No,” she said defensively, then sighed. “I used to be, though. When I was little, my mom and I played this game—every time I asked her where my dad was, she gave a different answer. One day she would say that he was a doctor and was busy curing some terrible disease. The next day, that he was an astronaut living in the colony on the moon, or that he was a famous actor, busy filming his next movie.”

“Now I know where you get your flair for the dramatic,” Brice said with false lightness.

“There was always a different answer, no matter how many times I asked the same question. But none of those million answers were true. I guess eventually I stopped caring. What did it matter, anyway? We were perfectly happy without him, just the two of us. Except it isn’t just the two of us anymore,” she added in a softer voice.

“I know the feeling,” Brice said quietly. “I’m very used to it being just the two of us—just me and Cord. Which was why I refused to let our aunt and uncle from Brazil adopt us after my parents died.”

“You did?” Calliope hadn’t known that.

“Yeah,” Brice said gruffly. “They wanted us to leave everything behind, move to Rio. But we didn’t need them, you know? I could tell, even back then, that Cord and I were just fine on our own.”

Of course the Andertons could afford to take care of themselves financially. And yet Calliope’s heart went out to them, two boys trying to live on their own, with no adult guidance. No amount of money could make up for that.

“I didn’t mean to upset you about Nadav,” Brice apologized. “I think it’s great that you care so much about your mom’s happiness.”

“Thanks.” Calliope was suddenly afraid that she’d said too much. She kept offering these real, unvarnished reactions to Brice, allowing a dangerous amount of her real self to bleed through. It just felt like such an unexpected relief, lowering the weighty shield of her public persona and actually telling the truth for once.

“I guess I didn’t understand why you were trying so hard to be anonymous, when you could be the one and only Calliope Brown.” Brice gave a verbal flourish to her name, like a sportscaster, and she broke into a smile. “How did you end up with a name like Calliope, anyway?”

“I— My mom wanted me to be a goddess,” Calliope replied, almost slipping up, because Calliope was a name she had chosen for herself. Her real name she kept secret, as if it were imbued with some intrinsic and mystical power.

“In that case, it fits you perfectly.”

They sipped their drinks for a while longer, letting the sounds of the bar settle over them, talking about slightly less loaded topics—Brice’s work and the recent mayoral election. Eventually Calliope realized that her mug was empty.

“So, not Altitude,” Brice declared. “Where should we go for dinner, then? Maybe Revel?”

Calliope started to nod, but some perverse instinct made her pause. “Actually, I was hoping we could try Hay Market.”

Brice laughed. “Hay Market has a two-month waiting list. I don’t think we’ll get in, even if I try to bribe the ma?tre d’.”

Calliope knew that. Hay Market was the hottest new restaurant in the Tower, which was exactly why she had picked it. She wanted to walk into a glamorous, exclusive restaurant on the arm of a dangerously good-looking boy—a boy she was starting to like far too much.

And she was in the mood to show off a little.

“You’ll get in because you’re with me,” she promised.

Brice opened his mouth to protest, but Calliope lifted a finger to her lips, already pinging the restaurant. “I’m going to need a table for two, right away. Under Alan Gregory,” she said, settling into the con with familiar ease. Her voice had instantly transformed into something clipped and businesslike, utterly unlike her typical low, throaty tones.

Ah, it felt so good to tell these small lies, to dance lightly around the edges of the truth. To force the world to bend to her will, just a little bit.

“He’ll need the full tasting menu, of course,” she said, over the hostess’s stammered protests. “No, not the window. The table by the fireplace. Thank you.”

Brice shook his head, his eyes glinting with admiration. “You never do anything halfway, do you?”

“Would you still be here if I did?”