Mirror in the Sky by Aditi Khorana Read Free Book Online

of smoke into the air. Veronica and Halle were best friends, but I had always sensed a rivalry between them, and Veronica was the only person in school who wasn’t afraid to disagree with Halle in public.
    â€œBreak up with Nick? But why? He’s so great. And you have no idea how much it sucks to be single,” Alexa said.
    I raised my head slightly so I could hear them better, bumping my arm into the edge of someone’s iPhone.
    They were about six feet away, sitting calmly on a stone wall, eating their lunches, oblivious to the crowds around them. Even in the midst of a fire drill, they had found the VIP seats and claimed them. Halle was picking sushi out of a plastic container with her fingers, her legs swinging back and forth, while Veronica artfully swirled noodles on a pair of chopsticks. She was tall and angular, prettier than Halle, but there was something about the severity of her face, her no-nonsense attitude, that made her intimidating. She was wearing a pair ofelectric-blue heels with red soles. She had always been the most fashionable of the bunch.
    Alexa, who used to take dance lessons with my mother in middle school, was rumored to have an eating disorder. She sipped on a plastic bottle of green juice, one of the many she often carted around. She kept adjusting her loose-fitting yellow halter top, tugging at it with her long, skeletal arms. None of them even made an attempt to hide the fact that they were openly eating on the grounds, literally right next to a sign that said: NO FOOD OR DRINK ON THE GR OUNDS . Hiding was for people like Moira. If you were a certain type of person, you could break the rules in public and no one would stop you.
    I tried again to remember the dream I had about Halle and Nick the night before, but trying to remember a dream is like trying to thread a needle. It requires that same exquisite concentration that can only be developed if the granularities of daily life don’t keep getting in the way.
    â€œWhat are you guys doing after school?” Alexa asked Halle and Veronica.
    â€œBitsy and Walter are going to some charity event in the city. You guys should come over,” Halle said, a strange eagerness in her voice.
    â€œCan’t. My parents always want to have dinner together on first day of school,” Veronica responded.
    â€œSure you don’t want a romantic evening with me?” Halle teased, linking her arm through Veronica’s.
    â€œThat’s Nick’s job. Not mine,” Veronica coolly responded, unlinking her arm.
    Halle looked down at her tray of sushi. “Bitsy was like, ‘I can’t miss this.’ It’s for the Brooklyn Botanical Garden. Or maybe the Greenwich Yacht Club? I can’t remember. Anyway, she’s the committee chair, she can’t
not
go.” Bitsy was Halle’s mother. She was a petite blonde who always wore sunglasses indoors and had cheekbones that looked like they were sharp as knives. I saw her at school events occasionally, and she always flashed my mother and me fake veneer smiles from a distance.
    â€œCome over for dinner, Halls. My mom was asking about you,” Veronica said.
    Halle shook her head. “I wouldn’t want to intrude on a Hartwicke family tradition.”
    â€œWhat are you going to do?” Alexa asked. “I
hate
being alone.”
    â€œWe’re well aware of it,” Veronica snorted.
    â€œI’m going to tell Nick I have a ton of work to do, pour myself a finger of whiskey, and start looking over college applications.”
    â€œYou’re a
junior,
Halls.”
    â€œDoesn’t mean I can’t get a head start. I should start looking over that Stanford application.”
    I watched Alexa roll her eyes at Veronica, but Veronica didn’t look back at her. She jumped off the edge of the wall, her eyes scanning the crowds. She was looking for a waste bin, holding the empty noodle container with the tips of her thumb and forefinger.