Divine Rivals: Part 1: Letters Through the Wardrobe: Chapter 8

Roman Kitt was late.

Not once in Iris’s three months of working at the Gazette had he been late. She was suddenly keen to know why.

She took her time fixing a fresh cup of tea from the sideboard, expecting him to arrive any minute. When he failed to appear, Iris walked the route to her cubicle, passing Roman’s on the way. She paused long enough to rearrange his tin of pencils, his small globe, and the three dictionaries and two thesauruses on his desk, knowing it would irk him.

She returned to her station. Around her, the Gazette was coming to life. Lamps flickered on, cigarettes burned, tea was poured, calls were taken, paper was crumpled, typewriters clacked.

It felt like it was going to be a good day.

“I love your hair, Winnow,” Sarah said as she came to a stop at Iris’s desk. “You should wear it like that more often.”

“Oh.” Iris self-consciously touched the wild curls that framed her shoulders. “Thanks, Prindle. Did Kitt call in sick today?”

“No,” Sarah replied. “But I just received this, which Mr. Kitt would like published in tomorrow’s paper, front and center in the announcements column.” She handed Iris a message sheet.

“Mr. Kitt?” Iris echoed.

“Roman’s father.”

“Ah. Wait a minute, is this a…?”

“Yes,” Sarah said. She leaned closer to add, “I hope it doesn’t upset you, Winnow. I swear, I didn’t know he was courting someone.”

Iris tried to smile, but it failed to reach her eyes. “Why would this upset me, Prindle?”

“I always thought the two of you would make such a striking pair. A few of the editors—not me, of course—cast bets that you would end up together.”

“Me and Kitt?”

Sarah nodded, biting her lip as if she feared Iris’s reaction.

“Don’t be silly,” Iris said with a half-hearted laugh. But her face suddenly felt hot. “Kitt and I are like fire and ice. I think we’d probably kill each other if we had to be in the same room for too long. And besides, he’s never looked at me in that way. You know what I mean?”

Gods, shut your mouth, Iris! she told herself, realizing she was rambling.

“What do you mean, Winnow? Once, I saw him—” Whatever Sarah was about to reveal was cut short when Zeb hollered for her. She cast a worried glance at Iris before she hurried away.

Iris sank deeper in her chair as she read:

Iris covered her mouth, only to belatedly recall she was wearing lipstick. She wiped the red smudge off her palm and set the message down like it had scalded her.

Roman Coddled Kitt was engaged, then. Which was fine. People got engaged every day. Iris didn’t care what he did with his life.

Perhaps he had been up late last night with his fiancée, and she had made him run late.

As soon as Iris imagined that, she recoiled from it with a grimace, returning to her typewriter.

Not five minutes later, Roman walked into the office. He was dressed impeccably as usual, in a freshly starched shirt, leather braces on his shoulders, and black trousers without a speck of lint on their pressed front. His dark hair was slicked back, but his countenance was pale.

Iris watched beneath her lashes as he set his messenger bag down with a heavy thud at his cubicle. She waited for it—for him to notice the disorder at his desk. To frown and cast a glare at her. Because she was the only one who took the time to annoy him in such a way.

She waited, but Roman made no response. He was staring at his desk, but his face was frozen. There was hardly any light in his eyes, and she knew that something was wrong. Even dressed to the nines and only a few minutes late, something was eating at him.

He walked to the sideboard, selecting one of the teapots—there were always at least five brewing at a time—and poured the biggest cup he could find, carrying it back to his chair. Once he sat, she could no longer see him, and even though the office was humming with noise, Iris knew Roman Kitt was sitting there, staring blankly at his typewriter. As if all the words had vanished within him.

She typed up her stack of announcements and classifieds by noon, setting them on the corner of Zeb’s desk. And then she grabbed her bag and stopped at Roman’s desk.

She noticed two things: First the paper tucked into his typewriter was woefully blank, even though his handwritten notes were scattered across his desk. Second, he was taking a sip of tea, scowling at that blank piece of paper as if it owned him.

“Congratulations, Kitt,” said Iris.

Roman startled. The tea spewed from his mouth as he coughed, and then those blue eyes of his cut upward to where she stood, pinning her with a furious gleam. She watched as that anger burned away into shock. His gaze traced her long, wild hair. Down her body, although she was wearing her typical drab raiment. And then back up to her cherry-red mouth.

“Winnow,” he said carefully. “Why are you congratulating me?”

“Your engagement, Kitt.”

He winced, as if she had hit a bruise. “How do you know about that?”

“Your father wants it announced in the paper tomorrow,” she replied. “Front and center.”

Roman glanced away, back to his blank page. “Wonderful,” he said drolly. “I cannot wait.”

This wasn’t the reaction she was expecting from him. It only heightened her curiosity.

“Do you need help with your missing soldier article?” she asked on a whim. “Because I can give that to you.”

“How?” He sounded suspicious.

“Because my brother is missing at war.”

Roman blinked, as if he couldn’t believe those words had come out of her mouth. She could hardly believe it either. She thought she would instantly regret telling him something so intimate, but she discovered the opposite. It was a relief to finally voice the words that constantly shadowed her.

“I know you hate sandwiches,” she added, tucking a curl behind her ear. “But I’m going to a deli to buy two, to eat on the park bench. If you want my help, then you’ll know where to find me. I’ll try to resist eating the second sandwich, in case you decide to come, but I make no promises.”

She began to stride to the door before the sentence had even cleared her mouth. It felt like a coal was smoldering in her chest as she waited for the slow-as-tar lift. She was halfway mortified until she felt the air stir at her elbow. Iris knew it was Roman without looking at him. She recognized his cologne—some heady mix of spice and evergreen.

“I don’t hate sandwiches,” he said, and he sounded more like his old self.

“You dislike them, though,” Iris stated.

“I’m simply too busy for them. They’re a distraction. And distractions can be dangerous.”

The lift doors opened. Iris stepped inside, turning to look at him. A smile teased her lips.

“So I’ve heard, Kitt. Sandwiches are quite troublesome these days.”

She suddenly had no idea what they were discussing—if it truly was about sandwiches or about her or about how he regarded her or about this tentative moment they were sharing.

He hesitated so long that her smile faded. Tension returned to her posture.

You’re a fool, Iris, her mind railed. He’s engaged! He’s in love with someone. He doesn’t want to share lunch with you. He only wants your help with his article. Which … why on the gods’ bloody earth are you helping him?

She turned her attention to the switchboard, pressing the button repeatedly, as if the lift would hurry up and carry her away.

Roman joined her just before the doors closed.

“I thought you said this place had the best pickles,” Roman said, twenty minutes later. He was sitting on a park bench beside Iris, unwrapping his sandwich from its newspaper. A thin, sad pickle rested on top of the bread.

“No, that’s the other place,” Iris said. “They make the best everything, but they’re closed on Mir’s Day.”

Thinking of the gods and the days of the week made her mind stray to the letter, currently hiding in her bag, resting on the bench between her and Roman. She had been shocked when she had woken up to it. A literal pile of paper, full of a myth she was hungry to learn. A myth where the eithrals were mentioned.

She wondered who this correspondent was. How old were they? What gender were they? What time were they?

“Hmm.” Roman set aside the pickle and took a bite of his sandwich.

“Well?” Iris prompted.

“Well what?”

“Is the sandwich to your liking?”

“It’s good,” Roman said, taking another bite. “It would be better if that sad excuse of a pickle hadn’t made part of the bread soggy.”

“That’s high praise, coming from you.”

“What exactly are you implying, Winnow?” he countered sharply.

“That you know exactly what you want. Which isn’t a bad thing, Kitt.”

They continued to eat, the silence awkward between them. Iris was beginning to regret inviting him until he broke the quiet with a shocking admission.

“All right,” he said with a sigh. “I feel compelled to apologize for something I said a few months ago. When you stepped into the office for the first time, I let my prejudice get in the way, thinking that because you failed to graduate from school you would give me no trouble.” Roman paused, opening his sandwich to rearrange the tomato and the cheese and to toss away the slice of red onion. Iris watched him with slight fascination. “I’m sorry for making assumptions about you. It was wrong of me.”

She didn’t know how to reply. She hadn’t anticipated Roman Condescending Kitt ever apologizing to her. Although she supposed she never thought she’d be sitting beside him in the park, eating a sandwich with him either.

“Winnow?” He glanced at her, and for some strange reason, he sounded nervous.

“Were you trying to run me off?” she asked.

“At first, yes,” he said, brushing imaginary crumbs off his lap. “And then when you nabbed the first assignment and I read your article … I realized you were far more than I had imagined. That my imagination was quite narrow. And you deserved to be promoted should you earn it.”

“How old are you, Kitt?”

“How old do I look to you?”

She studied his face, the slight stubble on his chin. Now that she was sitting so close to him, she could see the cracks in his “perfect” appearance. He hadn’t shaved that morning—she figured he had run out of time—and her eyes moved to his shock of sable hair. It was thick and wavy. She could also tell he had risen from bed and sprinted to work, which made her envision him in bed, and why was she thinking about that?

Her silence had taken too long.

Roman met her gaze, and she glanced away, unable to hold his stare.

“You’re nineteen,” she guessed. “But you have an old soul, don’t you?”

He only laughed.

“I take it that I’m correct,” Iris said, resisting the temptation to laugh with him. Because of course he would have one of those sorts of laughs. The ones you couldn’t hear and not feel in your own chest. “So. Tell me about her.”

“Who? My muse?”

“Your fiancée. Elinor A. Little,” Iris said, although she was intrigued to know what, exactly, inspired him. “Unless she is your muse, and in that case, how utterly romantic.”

Roman fell quiet, his half-eaten sandwich on his lap. “No, she’s not. I’ve met her once. We exchanged polite pleasantries and sat across from each other at dinner with our families.”

“You don’t love her?”

He stared into the distance. Iris thought he wouldn’t reply until he asked, “Is it possible to love a stranger?”

“Perhaps in time,” Iris said, wondering why she was giving him hope. “Why are you marrying her, if not for love?”

“It’s for the good of our families.” His tone became cold. “Now. You’ve graciously offered to help me with my article. What sort of assistance would you like to give me, Winnow?”

Iris set her sandwich aside. “Can I see the notes you’ve gathered so far?”

Roman hesitated.

“Never mind,” she said with a wave of her hand. “That’s rude of me to ask. I would never show you my notes either.”

He wordlessly reached into his bag and handed her his notepad.

Iris began to sift through the pages. He was methodical, organized. He had plenty of facts and numbers and dates. She read a few lines of his first draft, and she must have made a pained expression because Roman fidgeted.

“What is it?” he asked. “What have I done wrong?”

Iris closed the notepad. “You haven’t done anything wrong yet.”

“These notes are verbatim, Winnow. I asked the parents about their missing daughter. Those are their answers. I’m trying to express such in my writing.”

“Yes, but there’s no feeling. There’s no emotion, Kitt,” Iris said. “You asked the parents things like ‘When was the last time you heard from your daughter?’ ‘How old is she?’ ‘Why did she want to fight for Enva?’ And you have the facts, but you didn’t ask them how they’re doing or what advice they would give for someone experiencing a similar nightmare. Or even if there’s something the paper or community can do for them.” She handed him his notepad. “I think for this particular article, your words should be sharp as knives. You want the readers to feel this wound in their chest, even though they’ve never experienced a missing loved one.”

Roman flipped his notepad open to a fresh page. He rummaged for a pen in his bag and then asked, “May I?”

Iris nodded. She watched as he wrote, his handwriting turning her words into elegant ink.

“You said that your brother is missing,” he said. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“He enlisted five months ago,” Iris said. “Forest and I were always very close. So when he promised to write to me, I knew he would. But week after week passed, and his letters never came. So then I waited for a letter from his commanding officer, which they send when soldiers are killed or go missing at the front. That never came either. So I’m left with this fragile thread of hope that Forest is safe but unable to communicate. Or perhaps he’s engaged in a dangerous mission and can’t risk contact. Those are the things I tell myself, at least.”

“And what does that feel like?” Roman asked. “How would you describe it?”

Iris was quiet for a beat.

“You don’t have to reply,” he hurried to add.

“It feels like wearing shoes that are too small,” she whispered. “With every step, you notice it. It feels like blisters on your heels. It feels like a lump of ice in your chest that never melts, and you can only sleep a few hours at a time, because you’re always wondering where they are and those worries seep into your dreams. If they’re alive, or wounded, or sick. Some days you wish that you could take their place, no matter the cost. Just so you can have the peace of knowing their fate.”

She watched as Roman wrote everything down. He paused after a moment, staring at his script.

“Do you mind if I quote you for the article?”

“You can quote me, but I’d prefer to remain anonymous,” Iris replied. “Autry knows my brother is fighting, but no one else at the Gazette does. I’d prefer to keep it that way.”

Roman nodded. And then he said, “I’m sorry, Winnow. About your brother.”

Two apologies from Roman Kitt in the span of an hour? This day had truly caught her by surprise.

As they began to pack up to return to work, a cold breeze blew through the park. Iris shivered in her trench coat, glancing up at the bare branches that creaked above her.

She wondered if she had just inadvertently given the promotion to Roman Kitt.