“Mr. Spencer stayed at the party?” the woman asks me.
“Yes.”
“And the fight?”
“You’ve seen the video.”
“Yes. I have.” Her smile is so cold that I can’t help but remember that the last man who held her job wanted me dead. I start to wonder if that’s one of the responsibilities that comes with the position.
“There. Was that so hard?” the prime minister says. “However, I do also need to ask you to control your people, Mr. Ambassador. These things do have a tendency to turn ugly.”
“They are not my people. And they are not out of control.”
The woman laughs. “There is a mob outside, sir, who would disagree with you.” She pierces my grandfather with a glare and reaches for the door. “Valancian police will monitor the crowds and keep the peace on our side of the fence. I strongly urge you to do what you can from your side.” She shifts her gaze onto me. “Grace, it has been so nice to meet you. Now, I’m afraid I should be going.”
“Of course,” Grandpa tells her. “It’s a busy day. I appreciate you taking the time.”
When she reaches the door she stops and looks back. “We’ll reach a solution, William. And the US will be happy with it.”
As soon as the prime minister is gone, I look at Grandpa. I’m pretty sure he’s already noticed that it wasn’t a question.
After I leave my grandpa’s office I lie on my bed for hours, wondering what’s worse, the chanting of the mob outside or the pounding that fills my head. Over and over and over. I know that it can’t kill me, and yet I think it might. Maybe a part of me wishes that it would. Anything to make the pounding stop.
I have to make the pounding stop.
Before I realize it, I’m bolting from my room and down the stairs at the back of the building. They’re only used by staff, so no one sees me as I push out into the courtyard, chasing the pound, pound, pound that beats like a telltale heart, reminding me over and over that something is terribly wrong. After all, it’s not the first time I’ve found Jamie shooting hoops behind the embassy. It’s just the first time I’ve ever found him here alone.
“Jamie!” I yell, but it’s like he doesn’t even hear me.
“Jamie!” I shout again, but my brother keeps dribbling the basketball, bouncing it hard against the pavement. He doesn’t even look in my direction.
At the back of the embassy, the noise from the mob is softer, but I can still hear the chanting — the steady roar that rages, demanding justice be done. But no one asks for the truth.
When I walk closer, Jamie stops dribbling long enough to take aim at the basket. The ball swooshes through — nothing but net — and my brother grabs it, starts dribbling again. Pound, pound, pound. It makes me want to scream.
“Hey!” I shout. When Jamie shoots again, I grab the ball as soon as it drops through the net and hold it just out of my brother’s reach.
“Give me the ball, Gracie.” It’s like he’s just now noticed that I’m here.
“How are you?”
“How do you think I am?”
He’s right. He doesn’t have to answer my question. I can see the truth in his dark eyes and the set of his jaw. There’s an anger in my brother that I have never seen before. He’s pulsing with it. And a part of me wonders if that was really the pounding that has filled my head all day.
“Spence’s parents called Grandpa today to make arrangements for claiming his body. I’m going to have to shake his father’s hand and salute his mother and … Can you imagine that? They have to bury their son.”
Three years ago Jamie and Dad brought our mom’s remains here. To Adria. Now the Spencers have to make the opposite journey with their child. I can’t imagine anything worse. And by the look on his face, neither can Jamie.
“I can’t tell them that their son died a hero. I can’t hand them a folded flag and say it was all in service to his country. No. He died because he trusted me enough to follow me to that island.”
There’s a chink in Jamie’s armor now. He is vulnerable and flawed and it’s the most terrifying thing that I have ever seen. I need Jamie to be perfect. I need it so badly — so I don’t have to be.
“Jamie, it’s not your fault.”
“Spence was alive when I left him, Gracie. When I left him.” Jamie looks away and shakes his head. For the first time, I realize how much he looks like Dad. “I left a man behind. Do you know what that looks like? What that feels like? I’m going to have to go back to West Point and tell my teachers — tell my classmates — what happened here. Someone is dead because of me. Do you have any idea what that —”
I do know what that feels like — better than anyone. And Jamie just remembered. “It wasn’t your fault,” I tell him, but Jamie just shakes his head.
“He’s never been here before. He doesn’t … he didn’t know his way around.” Jamie grimaces as he remembers his friend is in the past tense now. “He didn’t speak the language.”
“Every person on that island goes to an English-speaking school, Jamie. And you know it.”
“He’s dead, Grace!” Not Gracie. “And when I left he wasn’t.”
Three years ago, on a dark night in a smoky building, I pulled a trigger and someone we loved died. What Jamie did — or didn’t do — is different. But guilt isn’t smart. It isn’t logical. It doesn’t only live in the places it belongs.