Because It Is My Blood (Birthright #2)(18)

My feelings about Charles Delacroix were nearly as complex as the ones I had for his son. On some level, I admired Win’s father. He had been a worthy adversary. But I hated him, too. That seemed a rude thing to say to someone’s son however. I decided to keep my mouth shut.

“I wish I could hate him but he is my father,” Win said. “And I think, despite everything, that he’ll be a very good district attorney. Campaigns…” His voice trailed off.

“Yes?”

“They seem like they last forever, but they don’t, Annie.” Suddenly, he reached across the table and took my hand, which I immediately pulled back.

“Are friends not allowed to shake hands?” Win asked.

“I think you know why I can’t shake your hand.”

I stood up and grabbed my tray. I slammed it down on the conveyor belt that led to the kitchen and a little bit of sauce ended up on my sweater.

The bell rang. As I was leaving the cafeteria, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned. It was Dr. Lau, my Forensic Science teacher. She was the only member of the faculty who had spoken up in my defense last spring and, not coincidentally, the only one who seemed glad that I had returned. “Anya,” she said. “I wouldn’t.”

“Wouldn’t what?” I asked innocently.

I made my way to Twenty-First Century History, where we had just begun studying the events that had led up to the second prohibition. I was familiar with several of the boldface names.

IV

I AM SURPRISED; I AM SURPRISED AGAIN

FRIDAY NIGHT, I was planning to stay in, but Scarlet insisted that I come out with her and Gable. “You haven’t gone out once since you’ve been back from Liberty,” she said to me on the ride home from school. “You can’t spend the rest of your life at home with Natty and Imogen. We’ll get dressed up and go to one of our old places. How about your cousin Fats’s?”

There was nowhere I wanted to go less except possibly Little Egypt.

“Or maybe you’d prefer Little Egypt?” Scarlet asked.

“Fats’s is fine,” I said.

“I thought you’d say that. Meet us there at eight. And, Anya?” she added just before we parted, “Don’t wear your school uniform!”

Around seven thirty, I changed per Scarlet’s instructions, then took a bus downtown.

“Hey, kid,” Fats greeted me. “Your friends are in the back room.”

Fats had lost quite a bit of weight since I’d last seen him. “You’re skinny,” I said.

“Gave up sugar,” he informed me.

“Cacao, too?”

“No, never cacao, Annie.”

“Maybe we should stop calling you Fats.”

“Nah, it’s got a nice bit of irony now.”

I went into the back room.

“Surprise!”

The place was packed, and it took me a second to realize I knew everyone there. Scarlet, Gable, Natty, Imogen, Mickey and Sophia Balanchine, Mr. Kipling and his wife, Simon Green, Chai Pinter, and several other of my classmates. Even Alison Wheeler was there, though she had come solo.

As you already know, I was a fan neither of surprise parties nor of parties in particular. Still, I could not help but appreciate that so many people had come out for me. Scarlet came up and kissed me on the cheek. “What kind of best friend would I be if I let you come back to Trinity without a party?”

I made the rounds, talking to everyone, thanking them for having shown up.

“Win really wanted to come,” Alison Wheeler whispered in my ear.

In the back of the room, a bit separate from everyone else, stood Mickey and Sophia Balanchine. They were talking to a third person. How could I not have noticed him before?

“Yuji Ono!” I exclaimed, throwing my arms around him in a manner I’m not entirely sure was dignified or appropriate. But, well, he had saved my brother’s life.

He smiled at me in his shy way.

“What are you doing here?”

“Business, of course,” he said.

“Had you returned any of my calls, you would have known this,” Mickey Balanchine remonstrated me.

Yuji Ono gave me a look. I could tell he was disappointed in me.

“It took me longer to resolve my high school situation than I would have liked,” I explained. Even as I was saying this, I knew how pathetic it sounded.

I turned to Yuji Ono. I wanted to ask about my brother but not in front of Mickey and Sophia. “Will you come see me at the apartment tomorrow?”

“I don’t know if I will have the time,” he said. “I am only in town for three days and my schedule is inflexible.”

“I could come see you, then. Where are you staying?”

“I will try to come to you,” Yuji said coolly. It annoyed me that he didn’t trust me enough to tell me where he was staying when I had trusted him with my whole life.

“Give the child a break, Yuji,” Sophia teased him.

I didn’t like being referred to as a child. “Come or don’t come,” I said. I turned to Mickey. “How is your father?”

“Any day now,” Mickey said glumly. Sophia took his small hand in her large one.

I thanked the three of them for coming and then I went to talk to Simon Green, who had not managed to integrate himself into the rest of the party.