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Freddie cracks in seventh grade, which is—she maintains—not her fault. Seventh grade is a horrible, hormonal time, and everyone is pretty much the worst, and so when she sees Grace holding hands in the hallway with Tom Delaney? It might as well be the apocalypse. It shatters her heart into a million pieces. She’ll never be the same again.
Oh, beta, her Ma says, it will be alright. Her Ma is usually right about things, but not about this.
This is Grace.
She avoids Grace for three whole days—three whole, agonizing days, which she spends wondering if Grace is okay, if she’s doodling in class, if she’s lonely at lunch (if she’s not lonely because she’s with freaking Tom Delaney)--but Grace corners her on the fourth day. Also not her fault; Grace corners her in the library. She loves Grace with so much of her seventh-grade heart it’s stupid, but that girl does not come into the library.
“Freddie,” Grace says, “what’s wrong?”
Freddie’s initial plan is not to say anything. To keep this secret forever, swallow it down, ignore the pain. Maybe it would fade (it wouldn’t); maybe it would hurt less with time (she couldn’t imagine that happening); maybe she could learn to live with it. It’s better not to risk their friendship—better to have some of Grace than none at all.
That’s Freddie’s plan, anyway. But the one factor she doesn’t account for is...well, Grace.
Grace, with her big brown eyes and her new leather jacket and her voice that’s somehow raspy and tender at the same time. Grace, her best friend. Grace, the one she’s been in love with since third grade.
Grace makes her so unfathomably giddy and reckless and stupid that Freddie blurts it out, right in the middle of the Young Adult dystopian section: “I’m in love with you, Grace!”
As soon as the words come out, Freddie attempts to contort her body in a snake-like fashion to run away, or possibly melt into the floor. Her cheeks burn. This is worse than the apocalypse; it’s a dimensional catastrophe, a galactic meltdown, a screwup only fixable via exile or time travel. It’s—
Grace’s hand firm on her wrist. Her smile, slow and curling. The gap of her teeth. “Oh,” she says, like she’s—happy? Breathless? Shy? Freddie has seen Grace be a lot of things, but never shy; never like this, with pink blooming on her cheeks.
“Oh,” Grace whispers again. “Um. Me, too, actually. I mean—I feel the same way.”
“Oh,” Freddie repeats, feeling struck dumb. She pauses, half-twisted in Grace’s grip. Then, instead of saying something romantic like all this time... or I can’t believe this is real, she says: “What about Tom?”
Grace cocks her head—it’s so cute it sends a fizz of electricity straight to Freddie’s heart—or maybe gay to Freddie’s heart? “You mean Sam?” she asks.
“Whoever he is,” says Freddie mulishly. Half-resentful and half-embarrassed, she admits, “I wasn’t really paying attention.”
Grace’s smile turns smug, and she laces her fingers through Freddie’s. “His name is Sam, and I promise, he’s nothing compared to you.”
And really, what can Freddie do but kiss her?
—
Grace breaks up with Tom or Sam Delaney, and Freddie and Grace become the annoying middle school sweethearts, then high school sweethearts. On their first date, Freddie’s Ma drives them to the ice-cream shop and stares at them knowingly in the rearview mirror; it makes Freddie blush, even though they’re not doing anything but holding hands under the seat.
(I told you it would be alright, beta, Ma whispers to Freddie when they get out of the car. Her eyes are twinkling. It makes Freddie want to melt again, or learn teleportation just so her Ma doesn’t have to drive them ever—but then Grace is turning to her, her face bright, and all Freddie can do is follow.)
Freddie holds Grace’s hair and kisses the crown of her head when she gets drunk for the first time. Grace tucks Freddie in after her first all-nighter, grinning. They kiss under the mistletoe on Christmas, and Freddie’s sister throws popcorn at them.
When Grace brings her hair dye, her expression angry and trembling, Freddie’s the one who rinses it through. Then she takes Grace’s face in her hands and kisses her, gentle, until the trembling stops.
When Freddie works herself to a razor-thin point, running on old coffee and paper cuts, Grace drags her from the desk and bandages each finger. Then she lies down with her, their chests so close Freddie can hear her heartbeat, and holds her until she finally sleeps.
They’re both ambivalent at best about prom, but Grace asks her anyway. They wear suits, because they look good and it’s less expensive to rent tuxes. (Freddie still loses her breath when she sees Grace in the porchlight, and Grace still trips when Freddie takes her hand, wide-eyed and bashful.
Dorks, her sister says.
Grace kisses the corner of Freddie’s mouth. My dork, she says, eyes so soft that Freddie can’t help but imagine years from now, taking Grace’s hand, bringing her home.)
Their first time is awkward, but it’s Grace, and it’s Freddie, so it’s perfect. After, Grace laughs into her shoulder, her lips buzzing against Freddie’s bare skin. Her eyes shine in the dark. “Sorry,” she whispers, “it’s stupid.”
“No, it’s not,” Freddie whispers back. “Unless it’s a Brooklyn 99 joke, in which case it is.”
“Brooklyn 99 is good! And you’re the one who made me watch it!”
“Sure, but,” Freddie kisses her collarbone, moves her lips to the curve of her throat, and thrills when she hears Grace swear, “do you really want to be talking about it right now?”
“Mmm—point made,” Grace gasps, and tugs her closer.
They go to college together. They move in. They fight, sometimes, but not often; when Grace starts thinking about dropping out, Freddie buys three tubs of ice-cream and starts Googling jobs you can get without a bachelor’s degree.
They’ll be okay. They’re always okay.
And then a Muse dies in their doorway.
—
Grace becomes a Muse and a murder suspect in the same day.
And yes, Freddie is extremely worried—not least because Pan, the god of lust and mischief, somehow broke into their apartment? But when Grace collapses onto the couch, burying her head in the crook of Freddie’s shoulder and murmuring something about stubborn gods, she can’t help but laugh.
“Should I sing you a love song, babe?”
Grace cracks a grin. She can feel it against her skin, the shape warm and familiar.
“If you want. I don’t think you need the Muse powers for that, though.”
“Aw, you’re not gonna back me up?”
Grace draws back to look at her, tired but serious. “Always,” she says, and Freddie feels the warmth burst within her, more grand than Olympus, more golden than gods.
The truth is, she’s been singing her love for Grace since she was thirteen.
—
In the split second before the knife hits, Freddie remembers:
Her Ma, wise and warm. It will be alright, beta. Her eyes twinkling over the curry pot, in the rearview mirror. The way she wrapped Freddie so fully in her hugs, nothing bad could ever touch her. How she hugged Grace the same way.
Grace. Grace is a whole world in herself: her grin. The tooth in the back that’s still a little crooked. The rasp in her voice before she prepares to sing, before she wakes up, when she runs a hand through her hair and it poofs up from the static. The way she likes to dry dishes more than she likes to wash them, and the way she melts into Freddie when she kisses her, like she trusts her more than anything, like she wants to be soft for her.
To lose all of that would be an apocalypse.
In the light glinting off the edge of the blade, Freddie spares a thought for herself—the drum kit in their apartment, the evenings kissing Grace on their couch, the ring in Ma’s bedroom that she won’t get to ask for—but she’s made her choice. Freddie made her choice in third grade. And in seventh grade, and here, in the hallway of ancient pasts and glimmering futures.
At least Freddie had time. At least she'd confessed, and gotten eight precious years. She can't imagine what it would have felt like, going to her grave with all of that love still her in throat.
This hurts so much as it is.
“Freddie, no!” Grace cries, tugging at her arm.
Freddie almost grins. Grace has always made her so unfathomably happy, and reckless, and stupid.
The knife lands, and Freddie—
—cracks—
—
Grace comes to get her.
Of course she does. Since when has anything stopped Grace?
Not death. Not the end of her world.
—
Who knows what comes next, Grace sings to her, but I will face it beside you.
Yes, Freddie thinks. The gold seeps into her skin: Grace’s song, Grace’s heart. Grace smiles, her face broken open in hope and joy, like maybe this was always how it was supposed to go: a piece of Grace’s soul, nestled in Freddie’s.
The light fills her, bears all of them up like one of Hermes’ portals. Freddie feels the press of Grace’s arms around her before her feet touch the ground, and she laughs, breathless, full of breath.
Thank you, she wants to say, or something romantic like, You brought me back or We have a second chance. Instead what comes out is, “Guess you did sing me a love song after all.”
Grace snorts wetly into Freddie’s shoulder (real, solid). Then she draws back and kisses Freddie, until they’re both dizzy and glowing and breathless again, and then Freddie can only say, “I love you. I love you. I love you so much, Grace.”
Grace says it back, over and over, like they’re making it real between them: a shared heartbeat. I love you, I love you, I love you.
They calm down eventually. When the fear and giddiness dissipate into something more along the lines of tired and sore, Grace tries a tiny grin. “You told me you loved me in seventh grade,” she says, “but you’ve gotta keep going. I’m not letting you off the hook yet.” She ducks her head, the shy bloom of pink on her cheeks. “Your, um. Your Ma gave me a ring.”
“Oh,” Freddie says softly.
“And I know—maybe it’s bad timing, and it’s not a good idea to propose after something crazy and traumatic like this. But I would really like to—someday. If that’s something you think you would want.”
Freddie cocks her head, and Grace’s smile turns helpless—like Freddie’s the sun, and she’s speechless in the face of it. “Are you proposing?”
“More like—pre-proposing,” Grace says awkwardly.
And oh, Freddie loves her—loves her with all of her seventh-grade heart and her eight years of muddling through and her god in her chest. “Come on, Grace,” she grins, “are you proposing or not?”
Grace’s expression firms. She reaches into her jacket pocket and produces the ring box, her fingers careful and soft on the velvet. She looks at Freddie like nothing else is around them—like they’re not in the middle of some remote parking lot, surreptitiously emptied by Hermes.
Like this is their universe, the two of them.
Grace gets down on one knee, still looking up at Freddie. She was right to say this is a bad idea: too early, too adrenaline-fueled. But maybe Freddie makes Grace this way, too—unfathomably happy and reckless and stupid. Maybe they make each other brave.
Or maybe, like Freddie, Grace has already made her choice. Made it in seventh grade when Freddie blurted out I’m in love with you, Grace! in the middle of the library, jealous over Tom/Sam Delaney.
“Farishta Bandi. Freddie,” Grace starts, the whole question that isn’t even a question held in her name. “You’re my best friend. My compass. I’ve loved you for so long, and I hope—I hope I get to do it for the rest of my life. Will you marry me?”
“Yes,” Freddie says, and feels the future crack wide open, a whole world full of light.