07 | je m’appelle

The house is tall and imposing and silent when Miss Rochelle and those animals she calls children drop me off on the front lawn, leaving me to stagger up the porch steps lugging my suitcase. I bang on the door about eighty times before I hear feet move from inside to open it. “About damn time,” I snarl, ready to see Isolde or my brother, but it’s not either of them. Instead, it’s a girl with long pink hair and a thick layer of makeup on. As I get closer, I can see that the underside of her hair is cropped short and dyed white. She is wearing blue print leggings and loose tank top with one of those racerback designs, and I can see the nude straps of her bra on her thin shoulders. She looks, for lack of a better word, cool, making me feel all the more disgusting.

She stares at me for a while, and I’m starting to wonder if I have something on my face, but then I realize that I haven’t said a word. “Um, is Isolde home?”

She frowns. “Duchess Greanleefe went out a while ago. Who are you?”

“Oh, she didn’t tell you? I’m Oceania.” Seeing her blank look, I say, “You know, her stepdaughter? From Valorian?” Now she’s narrowing her eyes suspiciously, so I hastily add, “Look, just get Llenwi, will you? He’ll know it’s me.”

She motions for me to come inside, and I follow her. The house is dark and big and badly decorated. “So, you’re the new maid?” I ask, then regret it instantly when she narrows her blue eyes at me.

“No. I’m Trainee Agent Danica Kesley. From Olympia.” she spits.

“Sorry,” I say, but the damage is done. “Er, Olympia? What are you doing here?”

“My team and I have been assigned to a top secret mission. It’s classified.” she adds self-importantly.

“So you and your team are staying with us?”

“Of course. Your senator requested it personally.”

Since when does Cielaré ask favors from Greanleefes? But I have no time to ask, because in comes my brother. “Hey,” he mumbles.

“Hey,” I reply. From his expression I can tell he hasn’t quite gotten over me telling him he was a waste of space last summer.

“Your room is upstairs-” he tells me, and then I throw up on him. I don’t do it maliciously, although that is my motivation for many other things. Rather, my nauseousness has been growing for some time, and it’s really now or never.

“Fuck, I’m so sorry,” I tell him. He just sits there, looking sad and gross and scowling. “Uh, want some towels or something?” What’s left of the macaroons is all over his Brass Mannequins shirt.

“I’m FINE.” he snaps, ears going red. “Just go upstairs, okay? Before you ruin something else.”

“I’m trying to be nice! Why are you being such a bitch?”

“You threw up on me! How is that nice?” He waves his too-long arms emphatically, looking like a cartoon character drowning.

“Whatever. Brass Mannequins suck ass anyway.” I tell him, then stomp upstairs. It has to be an older brother thing, Anni and I decided, this love of atrocious music, where instead of perfectly good, if a bit clichéd pop tunes, one found a love for obscure indie bands that no one actually gave a damn about. Her brother did it too, played Zombies of Centaurii, Klexa & The Demons, and my personal favorite, Zaina Kate’s Survival Guide to Hell, until we begged him to please, please, put on some Pippi Silk or Tylenol.

I wonder if he’s still listening to those songs. If they help, at all, with this.

As I thump up the stairs, I am nearly killed by the scariest short woman I’ve ever seen. She has warm brown skin and eyes, and a long rope of black hair, which may make her sound like a nice aunt, but she’s wearing leather and gold jewelry, and is carrying a legit real actual pistol on her hip. I almost scream as her hand goes to her weapon, but then, perhaps realizing that I am a minor who does not need immediate death, she lets me pass. I sprint to the third floor much faster than is necessary, in case she changes her mind. She must be another one of the special agents, though she appears quite at a contrast to the pink-haired, non-threatening Danica.

My room is on the left, and when I open it, it looks like it’s been painted by a small child. It’s a nauseating shade of bubblegum pink, with a pale blue bed and white daybed set. There’s a dresser, some shelves, and a soft pink couch, complete with an old TV that I’m pretty sure doesn’t work. The bedspread looks like the one I had from when I was six and only liked pastel colors. As I approach it, I see that it is, pdown to the fruit punch stain in the left corner.

The closet is hardly better. I have a whopping two sets of pajamas, in eye-watering neon brights. One has grey leopard-print booty shorts. I make a mental note to throw them out when no one’s looking.

••

Dinner is awkward. First of all, Isolde returns, which is weird enough, considering she never seems to have time to connect with any of us. She’s probably trying to make a good impression on our visitors. To make matters worse, my brother decides to cook for us all. Which would have been a really thoughtful gesture if Llenwi could cook, but quite honestly, no one wants red water poured over limp noodles.

We meet the rest of the team. There’s the scary woman, a brother and sister who look like twins, Danica of the pink hair, an earnest-looking young guy who’s wearing a tactical vest, a dude with a shaved head that looks like a terrorist, a pretty woman even smaller than the scary woman, and their leader, a thin man with sad eyes. Isolde eyes the men appraisingly. Gross, but not as bad as the dinner. I end up scavenging Sheila G’s Brownie Brittle from the cabinet, smearing black cherry ice cream on it, and eating that instead, all the while pushing Llenwi’s foul meal around and making encouraging noises.

I swear, I am a born actress.

The Olympia people are silent, concentrating on their food as if it is going to vanish the second they stop staring at it. Isolde addresses herself to the leader guy. “So, how long do you expect to stay with us?”

“As long as we need to.” interrupts the pretty woman, pursing her lips in irritation. The other man flashes her a dirty look.

“Ah.” Isolde smooths her blonde hair back. “Oceania. How was your trip?”

“It was god-awful, actually. Thanks for asking.” I say.

There is silence. The brother and sister exchange nervous glances. Llenwi looks like he is going to keel over and die. In our classic family hierarchy, we, the plebeians, know we are not to complain, for Isolde, as she always says, is very busy and works much harder than we know. So when she asks “How was your trip?” we are to say, “Fine,” and nothing else.

But liars never win, and the New Oceania always tells the truth. Lies, after all, are what got us into this mess. “That bitch you put me with had these two shithead brats who kicked me and tried to steal my shit the whole way here. It’s amazing I still had the clothes on my back when I came in, really. They made me eat shit food, and quite honestly, I’m pretty sure those kids didn’t know the first thing about dental hygiene. I realize you’re trying to save money on your embarrassing stepdaughter, but that doesn’t mean I have to pretend like we’re some happy little family.”

“Oceania! Not in front of the guests.” Isolde hisses, lovely face flushing, but I am done.

“May I be excused? This food is inedible.”

“No, you may not-” Isolde starts, but I run upstairs before she can get the last part out. Fuming, I slump on my bed so absolutely furious I could spit. How was my trip? Seriously? Not how are you; are you okay; did they treat you right at the institute? She doesn’t care about me unless I’m winning awards to make her look like some supermom.

At the bottom of my suitcase are two braids the color of straw. I take them out, fold them, stick them under my pillow. Then I stare at the ceiling until I fall asleep.

Why did you do this to me?

••

The next day, Isolde leaves early for work, not saying a word to me or Llenwi. The agents keep to themselves upstairs, leaving a note that the last room on the fifth floor is not to be disturbed for any reason. Isolde leaves a second note on a bright yellow sticky note informing us that the agents are in charge when she is gone. She also threatens us with certain death if we break this rule. Oh, and there’s money for lunch in the kitchen cabinet.

Llenwi refuses to talk with me, thumbs moving like wildfire over a cracked phone screen. I decide to take a chance. “What are you doing?”

“Texting.”

“Who?”

He doesn’t answer, and I live in mystery for about two hours while trying to set the Internet up on my tablet, a shitty Modulus-77 that barely does anything. I’ve had it since about the fourteenth century.

At twelve (Earthen time runs on cycles of twelve, like ours) there’s a knock at the door and I go to get it (Llenwi’s upstairs). I about keel over from the shock. A very pretty girl with an abundance of red hair and big blue (or green, maybe?) eyes waits outside, stylishly dressed in flame-printed silk pants, a white tank top and red leather stiletto boots, her toe tapping impatiently. I can’t help but notice how…prodigious…her butt and boobs are.

Her face wrinkles when she sees me, like biting into a sour berry. “Oh, hello. Is Llenwi in?”

If my jaw had dropped any lower it would have fallen off my face, and I would have needed some mad surgery to take care of that one. Since when do pretty girls ask for my brother? I just manage a nod, and she shoves past me. I yelp as her ass nearly decapitates me. “Put this here, won’t you?” she demands, thrusting a red leather purse at me.

Anger rises in me, and I shove it back at her. Who does this bitch think she is? “Hold your own damn purse.”

Confusion spreads over her face. “Wait, you’re not the help?”

Now I understand how Danica felt yesterday. “No, I’m not the fucking help. I’m Oceania Greanleefe. I’m Llenwi’s sister. I live here.” My voice is getting progressively louder and louder. “Next time, do your research before you come at me with this bullshit. God, you actually thought that, you privileged asshole piece of shit-”

She steps toward me menacingly, but I’m at least a head taller than her, so I don’t back up. “I don’t know who you think you fucking are, talking to me like this. I hate to pull the seniority card on this one, but I’m the Lady Vielene of House Onyx, so compared to me, you kind of are the help, little girl.-”

“Get the hell out if all you’re going to do is be a condescending prick. I don’t think me or my brother want to deal with petty s-”

“Vi!” It’s my brother, coming down the fucking stairs with a huge-ass grin on his face. I could kick him. “You came!”

“Of course I fucking came!” She grins broadly, and I have to admit she is really hot. It’s too bad she’s such a bitch.

“I have so much I want to show you-” He leads her upstairs, looking more animated then I’ve seen him in years. I hang back, feeling jealous and lonely and hating this girl more than is necessary.

••

Vi and Llenwi go out for lunch, leaving me to fend for myself. I am eating Sheila G’s again when there is another knock at the door. Probably Vi and Llenwi back, I think grumpily.

But instead, it is an overweight, voluptuous redhead who throws herself at me with a bear hug that about kills me. “Ermf-” I grunt as she slams into me with enough force to break a rib. “Who the hell are you?”

She separates herself from me and I get a good look at her. Large, placid green eyes with an expression of complete innocent stupidity, fashionable blue striped skirt, flip-flops made of wicker, and an Environmental Club tank top. “Hey, Ocie. I’m Candie.”

So this is the girl who mailed me the suitcase with the cookies. “Oh, thanks,” discomfited for the moment by her far-too-liberal use of my childhood moniker. “And it’s Oc-ea-an-ia.” I say, making sure to sound out each syllable of my name.

She claps her hands excitedly. “Ocie. I get it.”

Sweet Jesus, this kid is dumb.

“Anyway, Ocie-O-M-G, what are you wearing?!” she screeches. I blush, realizing I’m in my pink plaid pajama bottoms and blue top, which has a suspicious stain from last night’s garlic-whatever on it. Still, there’s no need for the extreme reaction.

“My pajamas.” I tell her.

“You need a makeover,” she tells me, and with surprising strength, drags me to a fancy green car. “We’re going to my house.” she tells the driver, and we’re off.

On the ride there, I learn way more about Candie then I actually want to know. She is fifteen and a half (she seems about five), likes to ride horses, and actually enjoys temple services (She’s a devout Seven Angels believer.) Her parents are wealthy House Diamond counts who made their fortune playing the stock market. She finds school very difficult, loves helping animals, and thinks homosexuals are going to hell. I honestly don’t know what to say. Also, she is the president of a “VERY VERY IMPORTANT” club that sells baked goods to help various charities, and I am the newest member.

“What?” I never signed up for this.

“Your mom thought it would be a good idea. It’s called the Je M'appelle club. It’s French.” she explains. Candie pronounces it “juh maple.” From my brief stint of French, I know “je m'appelle” means “I am,” so all in all, it’s a pretty dumb name for a club. But Candie seems to think it’s very cool.

“We have uniform days on Wednesdays-that’s those clothes I sent to you-and every week we donate to a different animal rights charity. Isn’t it nice? You wear your uniform to school, and everyone knows how committed you are to helping animals.”

“I’m not going to your school.” I tell her, making a mental note to ask Isolde about all this.

“You will soon,” she tells me.

“Yeah, sure. Whatever.” I say. We pull up in front of a fancy brick townhouse, then go inside. It is ridiculously clean, so clean it looks like a furniture showroom. It is the sort of clean that cannot be accomplished by human hands. But Candie tells me that they have “a lot of servants.”

We meet Candie’s mother in the model kitchen. She is round-faced pretty and looks a lot like her daughter. You can tell she really wants to talk to me, to see if I am the right kind of friend for her daughter. To prevent from getting kicked out of the house, I say as little as possible. I do not think she would take kindly to having a mental patient in her scarily tidy home.

She offers us some brownies, which admittedly look delicious. But Candie says they’re “nasty” and that she’s on a diet, and leave us alone, Mama. When she’s not looking, I snitch some. They taste like heaven.

Candie’s room is perfect and pink and screams “Candie.” from the motivational posters on the wall to the abundance of stuffed animals. She insists that I try on some of her clothes, which although quite fashionable, do not fit me at all. This amuses her greatly, and I’m praying to God she gets bored of this soon when my prayers are answered and she tells me she is going to introduce me to her “boyfriend.” I am picturing someone bespectacled, dressed like a choir boy, acne-faced. So when she leads me downstairs to a stunning guy with white-blonde hair, piercing blue eyes, and a killer jawline, I’m more than a little stunned.

“This is Adrian.” Candie tells me happily. “Adrian, meet Ocie.”

“Hello, Oceania.” he says. His voice is silk and honey, soft and mesmerizing. If I were the sort of girl to obsessively drool over guys, I’d be falling in love right now. But I am a girl on a mission, and so such distractions only have so much effect on me. Besides, I already am in love with someone. And it’s not Adrian.

His relative normalcy compared to Candie’s bubbly outpourings leaves me a little tongue-tied, however, so I can only stammer out a quick “nice to meet you.” He takes it well enough, though-he seems nice. I wonder what he sees in Candie.

Candie’s mom bursts in to tell us that my mom is here. “Stepmom,” I correct her. Candie and Adrian say their goodbyes. For some inexplicable reason, they seem to like me. As I leave, I can see him plant a beautiful kiss on her lips, so utterly full of passion it leaves me amazed and full of the same longing that I felt when I saw my brother with Vi.

I wanted that. More than anything. And I could have had it, too. But life, as my friend Sheila used to say, has a funny habit of fucking you in the ass when you least expect it.

••

In the car Isolde gives me a long lecture. Apparently, what I did was very irresponsible, running off like that, I could have been killed, etc, and I was only saved by the good graces of Candie’s mom, who called her to tell her where I was. The fact that Llenwi and Vi went off without me to do whatever is irrelevant.

“Why do you care?” I demand. “I’m making friends-since when was that a federal crime?”

“Since the Duchess of the Rublex returned with news of a galaxy held hostage by terrorists.” Isolde snaps.

“Wait, what?!”

“Oh, watch the news once in a while, Oceania, you’ll be amazed at what you’ll find. The point is, it is no longer safe for you to roam around, especially now that you are on Earth.”

“So Llenwi can go wherever the fuck-”

“You will watch your language in my presence.” Isolde warns, one long red fingernail raised.

“Or what? You’re not even my real mom-don’t tell me what I can or can’t do.”

“You’re right. I am not your mother.” Isolde snaps. “I am not your father. I am not your friend or one of those idiot teachers who worshipped the ground you walked on at your fancy school. I am, however, the woman who paid for your schooling and dance lessons and God knows what else, who payed that lawyer so you wouldn’t have to be branded a juvenile delinquent. So when I say jump, you say how high, get it?”

When Isolde is mad, you can hear a hint of Centauriian street under her crisp diplomat’s voice. That is enough, I know, to get me to shut up.

••

At dinner everyone is talking about the Rublex takeover. It turns out some no-name Duchess saw the whole thing, and her bodyguard too, and they survived some sort of massacre and an assassination attempt besides. It is all very dramatic, and everyone has an opinion. The agents, who were so quiet last night, are in an uproar, and Isolde, too, has to get her voice heard. I sip my watery soup and pretend to be elsewhere.

After dinner, I make a big show of going to bed, turning off my lights and everything. Then, silent as sin, I slip upstairs to the fifth floor. Call it snooping, but something is going on in that room. I am on the last stair when I hear voices. I freeze, afraid I’ve been seen, but no matter, it’s just the leader guy and the scary woman talking about something.

“The duchess is a real character.” the man laughs. “Her kids are a little off, too. This should definitely be interesting.”

“Who? Seonid?”

“No, Isolde Greanleefe.” The man laughs again, harsher. “Can you believe it? I’ve devoted my life to this, and here I am, guarding a dead body.”

I lean in, curious.

“Shh, Ramon, not so loud! What if they hear?”

“And what would be the matter with that? I don’t know why it would possibly be such a secret-the very fact that they ruled it a suicide is an insult to the intelligence of anyone who’s actually seen the evidence…It’s mind-boggling.”

“I know, but we can’t say anything. Complete confidentiality.”

“I don’t see why not. What was her name? Annifrid Lar-something.”

“With what’s happened in the Rublex…you know what her parents did. This confirms what we’ve thought…it may have been premeditated, but we can’t talk about it. You know that as well as I.”

“Ah, but see, now you’re talking about it.” he says. She protests, but it is too soft for me to hear, and by then I am already creeping downstairs like a thief, my head full of what I just heard.

Annifrid Larsson was murdered. There was no suicide, which is heartening in a way, to know that I did know her enough that she would not do such a thing without calling me. But why would anyone murder Anni? Beautiful, brilliant Anni, whose laugh was sunshine and summer, who could kill you with a smile.

And her body is here…in this very house. I shiver. There is nothing to it. This changes nothing. I have someone to blame now, a concrete villain who I can point my finger at, a killer. and when I catch him…

May God have mercy on his soul.