Lonely Hearts (26 page)

Baz blinked. “Autograph?”

The kid's face was blotchy, and not just from blushing. He was lanky, skinny and underwhelming in the skin-care department. He had a hard time making eye contact, and when he spoke, his voice wobbled. “If it's okay. I…read about you. Online. And I saw the video interview on your mom's website.” Now the red was all blush, and he glanced briefly at Kelly before frowning. “Are—are you still with Elijah?”

“Yes, he is.” Kelly smiled a very manager kind of smile. “I'm Kelly Davidson, Sebastian's friend. He's keeping me company while my husband is at work. What's your name?”

“Chris.” He stared at the pad, crushing pages as he worried the edge.

Kelly's expression was something of a cattle prod. Baz cleared his throat and reached for the paper and pen. “Sure, I'll give you my autograph. If you give me yours.”

Chris ducked, rubbed his ear. “Oh—okay.”

Feeling weird, Baz scrawled out an official-looking
Sebastian Acker
, then realized he'd fucked up. He needed to sign it
to
the guy. Trying not to make it seem crowded, he added,
To Chris, my pizza hero.
He passed the pad over, pulling off the sheet he'd scribbled on, revealing a new page. “Your turn.”

Chris put the pad on the table, clearly writing more than his name. When he handed Baz his paper, he folded it in half. “Thanks.”

Gathering his autograph and pad, Chris took off. Baz opened the paper. When he'd read it, he placed the note on the table so Kelly could see it too.

Every day at school kids tease me, but reading about you standing up for your boyfriend and overcoming your disability made me feel brave. I'm trying to get a scholarship to go to Saint Timothy when I graduate. Thanks for being my hero. Love, Chris.

“Wow,” Kelly said.

Baz felt queasy. “I'm such an idiot. I signed it
to my pizza hero
.”

“That's cute. He'll probably put it in a frame.”

“It's stupid. Pizza hero, when he wrote
that
? What am I supposed to do with this?”

“Be
his
hero. Be the reason he doesn't let the turkeys get him down. Be the guy who let him express how much you being an example means to him.”

Christ.
“And you're saying you want me to do
this
for a living?”

Kelly leaned back in his chair, smiling. “I want you to keep doing what you're doing. Being you, being out there, letting people see you. Being the little thing getting people through their day.”

It sounded wonderful. And terrifying. And destined to fail. “That's a lot of fucking pressure.”

Kelly winked as he pulled a piece of pizza onto his plate. “I think you can handle it.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

The evening before upperclassmen choir tryouts, Elijah was a wreck. Part of it was he couldn't smoke, since Aaron and Giles and Mina had all pointed out smoke and vocal cords weren't the best of friends. He told himself he didn't give a fuck, but now that they had him all worked up about it, he
did
want to get in to choir. Not in to Ambassadors, no matter how they bugged him. But the chorale, yeah. He kind of wanted it.

“I wish you were trying out,” he told Lejla as they sat together in her room.

She drew her knees to her chest with a sigh. “I know. Me too.”

“You still could.”

She shook her head.

The first few days of classes had been rough. She wasn't out as trans beyond the White House, and apparently being Lejla at home made being Lewis to the world much harder. She'd resumed her genderfuck wardrobe, unisex clothes with added female adornments, and when she wasn't getting out-and-out hazing, she at least got funny looks.

She went with him to his audition, though he told her she should stay home. “I want to be there for you.” Since Aaron and Giles were deep in the music clique, they managed to sneak her into his audition.

Elijah had what Aaron called a part voice, perfectly fine for a group but not appropriate for a heavy solo. He did his best to project the way they told him to, but he was nervous. Baz, who was on the student selection committee, had to treat Elijah like anybody else, but he did smile and tip his glasses down for a quick wink as Elijah left.

“I think I sucked,” he said as they exited out the back door of the choir room.

Lejla hugged his arm. “You were fine.”

They took the skywalks to the coffee shop outside the library, where they planned to hunker down until Giles texted it was time to come see the results. Most students had tried out during freshmen orientation, but Elijah was part of the few returning students auditioning. Once the last prospectives were through, the committee would meet, and the results would be posted. That would be in about an hour.

“It's no big deal if I don't get in.” Elijah spoke this lie into his coffee.

“It is a big deal, and you'll get in.” Lejla tugged at the hair in the center of his forehead. “You were great.”

“I sound all wheezy.” He wrapped his hands around the mug. “
You
sound great. I've heard you singing to yourself in your room. It should have been you.”

“It will be me. Later.”

She sipped her drink, and Elijah studied her. She was in Lewis clothes, but he could always see her now, even if she left the femme at home. Today she wore a hint of eyeliner and lip gloss, which went nicely with her
My Little Pony
Fluttershy tee. Aaron had taken her to some fancy stylist friend of Walter's in downtown Minneapolis, giving her a flirty androgynous cut which reminded Elijah of the
Black Butler
, all angles and blunt edges and asymmetrical swoops.

“How are your classes?” Elijah asked. “Are you doing okay, going as Lewis?”

She shrugged. “I feel like people treat me differently, but it might be in my head. I can butch up, and they still whisper and give me side eye. Which sometimes I think, fuck, I'll whip Lejla out and be done with it, but I always get cold feet.”

Giles texted to call them back because results were going up, and as Elijah watched his friend walk to the music building, he thought he might have some insight on why everyone was able to see through Lewis in a way they hadn't been able to before. The feminine movements Lejla had let herself indulge in at the White House had crept into her on-campus persona. The way she walked, the way she moved, the way she, well,
was
. It wasn't like the deliberate Lolita stuff that had brought on the beets. He would bet money none of this was intentional. This was Lejla's new version of subconscious takeover. The more she let herself be authentic, the harder it was to stop.

As Elijah moved with her through the herd of hopeful choir auditioners to get a peek at the printout on the wall outside the practice room, he realized he was having the same problem. She was right. It
was
a big deal for him to get into choir. He wanted it, and it would hurt if it didn't happen. He wanted a lot of things now, and the hope that he might actually get them was a cancer he couldn't eradicate. It twisted his gut as he moved toward the announcement sheets. It burned his heart, promising pain if hope turned out to be a lie. Which it would. He knew
better
than this, why had he—

He stopped, the burning in his heart pinching before blooming as he stared at the listing of tenors. Specifically at the sixth name down.

Elijah Prince.

That was his name. On the choir sheet. He was in the Saint Timothy Chorale.

He was in.

As Lejla hugged him tight, more hands fell on him. Mina, Giles, Aaron—they were all around him, beaming.

“I'm in the choir,” he whispered, still staring at the paper.

The thought kept ringing as they led him away, congratulating him. This time it was
Elijah
waltzing across the skywalk out of the music building surrounded by the cool kids. He was one of the cool kids. Hope hadn't let him down. It was a moment of victory, of joy, of normality, of rightness, a world where good people were rewarded and good things did come to those who wait and people did live happily ever after. The joy inside Elijah practically vibrated, ready to explode like a goddamned rainbow over his life.

As they rounded the corner by the student union lounge, someone called out, “
Freak.
”

Elijah could almost hear the record scratch. The call was little more than a murmur rising above a din, but it shafted their happy moment, a sharp edge leaching out the air. Giles tripped. Aaron hunched his shoulders, moving closer to Lejla. Lejla herself seemed the least affected—her smile dimmed, her head dipped, but she soldiered on. She put a hand on Giles's shoulder, and Elijah could hear her whisper, “It's all right.”

It wasn't. It wasn't fucking all right.

The rest of them kept walking, but Elijah stuttered to a stop. The football assholes were across the lounge, and the beet-dumping fucker looked smug. Elijah admitted he couldn't know the comment had been directed at Lejla, or any of them. And yet in his bones he knew they addressed her—or at the least, they
could
be addressing her. They
would
be. He'd been too absorbed in freaking out over singing in front of people to notice in line for auditions, but Lejla had probably fielded some glances. She would absolutely get some more.

It wasn't like Elijah hadn't gotten the well-placed accidental elbow in the hall, either, or hate glances from the Bible group he'd attended as cover last year until he gave up his charade of
gay converted
. Through the window of the lounge, Elijah could see the street where he'd stood with members of the choir, where Howard Prince had tried to gun down his own son, would have succeeded if Baz didn't have a hero complex as part of his luggage. Somewhere at the edge of campus, or possibly
on
campus, reporters scoured Sebastian Acker's backstory, hunting for dirt. They might be trying to tie the umbilical cord of that story to Elijah's family scandal. At any second they could leap out of the bushes, figuratively or literally, to make his life a circus.

Laughter trilled in the distance as Elijah remained frozen in place. He felt cracked open and vulnerable.

Giles pulled him close while he whispered, “Don't make a mountain out of this. Lejla is fine. She's not letting it wreck her day. Don't you, either.”

Elijah wanted to say it was so much more than a
freak
comment, that he was barely holding it together on his best day, but he nodded instead. He pushed his panic aside as best he could, papered over it with a fake smile and did his best to be happy.

But the bad feelings didn't go away. He was starting to think they never would.

Baz thought a lot about what Kelly had said as September wore on. He started his internship September fifteenth, Walter's birthday, and he went with Elijah afterward to Pizza Lucé to celebrate with the gang—everyone from the White House, Walter, Kelly, Marius, Damien, Rose. While Elijah and Lejla talked about how much they loved their English classes, Damien talked about his first days on his job as a music therapist with Giles, and Marius and Walter gave grisly tales of graduate school, Baz shared stories about some of the kids he'd worked with on the first day at Halcyon Center. He felt like he'd begun to find his place. Maybe he didn't have all the answers, maybe he still had things to figure out, but for the first time he believed he
could
figure it out.

At the end of the month, he got a text from Giselle saying a car would take him the next afternoon to the Saint Paul Hotel, where his mother would be waiting for him.

It annoyed Baz, this royal summons, because it meant he had to call Ed and apologize for bailing at the last minute on a presentation. He was pretty sure he'd miss therapy too, and choir practice. He went to the meeting, though, because his mom never called him unless it was important. He missed seeing her, and found he looked forward to it despite the hassle.

When he got to the hotel, he found out how important it was. His dad was there.

Baz did a double take in the doorway when he saw the two of them seated together on the couch, and he stumbled when he saw they were holding hands. When Gloria saw Baz, she let go of Sean and rushed to embrace him. Hugged him, not exactly hard, but like he'd come home from war.

That's when the flashbulbs started going off.

“The taping got bumped up at the last minute. So sorry to spring this on you,” she whispered in Baz's ear. When she pulled back, she had her political smile on as she touched his face with exaggerated gestures. “Good to see you, sweetheart. Thanks for making the time to come by.” She kept a hand on his shoulder as she turned to the room. “Stephan? Can you find someone to put Baz in makeup?”

Makeup?
Taping?
Baz opened his mouth to protest, but Stephan had already grabbed his elbow and pulled him into an adjoining room of the suite.

“We have a few suits picked out for you, but I can tell you now you should choose the gray. It'll go best with what your parents are wearing.” Stephan gestured to a young blonde woman hovering by the wall. “Giselle's assistant Bess will take you through the layout. I have to go finish seeing what I can get out of the interviewer.”

Baz grabbed Stephan's arm before he could escape. “
What interviewer?
I thought I was coming here to talk to my mom, not sit down with a reporter. What the fuck is going on?”

“Bess will take you through it,” Stephan repeated. He cast a cold glare at the assistant. “You have to get him ready, in every way, in fifteen minutes tops. Understand?”

Bess nodded, and Stephan left.

The assistant smiled at Baz and gestured to a small stool before a makeshift makeup counter. She was no Erika, whom Baz couldn't help notice was nowhere in sight. “If you wouldn't mind, I'll give you a bit of color and powder for the lights.”

Baz wanted to shake her and demand answers, not sit patiently and let her remove the shine from his forehead, but he sat anyway. “Please tell me what's going on because I honestly have no clue.”

“They've been trying to get airtime for a week, and today out of the blue they find out Rachel Maddow is doing some special tour in the Cities. Stephan got the word an hour ago that they were interested in an exclusive. So the rest of the day is run-throughs, a few local spots, and at six we go to the theater.”

They were going on
Rachel Fucking Maddow
? Tonight? After other interviews? Baz felt dizzy, and it wasn't from all the powder Bess was making him inhale. “Why am I going on Rachel Maddow?”

“Because your mom's approval rating isn't great. The focus group determined she needs to increase her family appeal, so your dad is doing lots of events with her now. They'd originally planned the photo shoot this afternoon and the interview with the
Star Tribune
and the Chicago and Hill reporters we brought with us, but now it's all gone crazy. You're a draw for Maddow because…well, you know.”

Because we're both gay.
Christ, Baz already had a headache. “Nobody told me I was getting interviewed. Or photographed. I thought I was having lunch and a lecture.”

He got both those things, but not with his parents. Some new person, a slick advisor who appeared to have been peeled from Uncle Paul's campaign, gave Baz a sandwich and a PowerPoint presentation.

“We need to work on your backstory.” The advisor pushed a button for a new slide. “We're assuming Rachel will ask you about your past, about the attack on you when you were sixteen. We'd like you to draw attention to the fact it happened as an attack on your uncle. The focus groups have responded positively to the martyr angle.”

“The fuck I'm saying that.”

The advisor pursed his lips. “I have it all written out on these slides. We can have someone coach you through it. It's okay if you don't get it verbatim, and if you stammer a little, we think it will go over especially well.”

Baz had skimmed enough of the canned crap in front of him to know he'd offer his ass to the football team before he'd give so much as a summary of that shit. “I need to talk to my mom. Right now.”

His mom had gone off for an interview, the advisor said, but she'd return in time for the photo shoot and the
Chicago Tribune
reporter. So Baz spent the three hours refusing over and over again to memorize shit about his tragic past, and eventually they gave up and moved on to the next talking point.

They wanted him to downplay Elijah.

Baz clenched his hands at his sides and forced himself to speak as calmly as possible. “I'm sorry. I don't think I heard you right.”