Prologue

Penny

Someone is trying to break down the front door of our apartment.

The sound is intense enough to jolt me out of my deep sleep. A shotgun blast, I think at first, or maybe some kind of battering ram threatening to burst through the cheap wood separating us from the chaos just outside.

But with each strike, it sounds less like an invading force and more like steady hammering.

I piece things together slowly. It takes a lot of brainpower, which is currently in short supply, but I finally finish processing it. What my poor, hungover mind had taken for cataclysmic danger is merely someone trying to get one of us to answer the apartment door.

I groan dramatically from where I’m sprawled out on the living room couch and look around for someone more lucid to put a stop to it. I attempt to say something coherent, like “Ah, I believe we have a visitor, but it would seem that I am presently indisposed! I should very much like to show them the socially acceptable level of warmth, to greet them with a smile, but to move from my current situation would no doubt cause me undue pain and stress. Please, could someone check on them, perhaps ask them to return at a later time such that we might be able to host them properly?”

What comes out is a pathetic, garbled noise, something between a groan and a whine.

From the floor next to me, with his head resting on a balled-up sweatshirt, comes a similar noise. My poor twin brother, Theo, is in much the same state as me. He’ll be no help either.

I see our roommate Kai walk past to answer the door. My friend. My savior. There’s a good lad. A sweet, young boy of twenty-and-nine, with his dark tousled hair and his almond eyes. He’ll know just what to do.

“Mr. Callahan, hey, what can I do for you?”

“You can pay me the rest of your rent.”

Ah. Crap.

Kai is silent for a few moments. “Sure thing. Let me rouse the troops and see what we can do. Uh, what’s our…timeline?”

I hear our landlord give a beleaguered sigh. “Friday, end of the business day. After that, well…” He lets the unspoken threat hang silent for a moment.

“Yeah, I got you. Don’t worry, you’ll have it.”

“That’s what they always say. But you’d be surprised.”

The door shuts—another noise that feels apocalyptically loud. Kai walks into the living room and looks down at me and my brother in our sorry states and lets out a sigh of his own. “Penny, Theo. You two were out getting plastered while we’re on the edge of eviction? Real classy.”

“In our defense,” I reply groggily, my voice coming out like gravel, “most of our drinks were courtesy of other people. Birthday libations. Gifts from friends.”

“Pretty sure that’s not the point he’s trying to make, Penny,” my brother says from the floor, sounding equally gravelly.

“He’s right, it’s not. I feel like we go through this every month.” Kai moves over to the recliner and slumps into it. “Are we screwed, or can you two cover your half of the rent?”

Kai is so good at just saying this stuff outright. It’s not a skill Theo or I ever really learned. Growing up, it just wasn’t the Hartwell way to talk things out. You could talk around things, tiptoe daintily in a circle about them. But having A Talk was a thing that required a great deal of buildup, pomp, and circumstance. We’re at even more of a disadvantage because he’s the only one in the room who isn’t hungover.

“My next paycheck drops Thursday, and I’ve got some commissions I’m finishing up in the next few days,” I say, already knowing it’s not that easy but trying to offer something so Kai won’t give us that pitying look.

Theo somehow manages to push himself up to a seated position. “Mm. I’ll move some funds around. Besides, the band was gonna do some busking this week. The leech will get his share of lifeblood.”

It’s not much, but it’s enough to put a relieved smile on our friend’s face. “Cool. Thank you.” He looks both of us over for a moment. “Sorry, I know this stuff isn’t fun, and doing it on your birthday stings worse. Just…y’know. None of us can really afford to get evicted. Meagan and I could probably crash with family for a bit, but you two—”

He leaves it at that, thankfully letting the rest go unsaid. That we could never find a place as cheap as this one without moving into a shadier neighborhood. That we’d probably be forced to move back home. That moving back home would be monumentally traumatic. We’re already having one hard conversation, better not segue into family shit.

With no small amount of effort, I manage to get myself off the couch and onto my feet. The room only spins a tiny bit, so that’s probably good enough for now. “Water. Meds. Art.”

“Hell yeah,” Theo says weakly, doing his best to cheer me on.

I go into the hall bathroom and grab my pill divider, carefully removing the small collection of medication from the Monday slot and tossing them into my mouth, chasing it with water from the tap. Then, very hesitantly, I take a look in the mirror to survey the damage.

Frankly, it’s not as bad as I feared. I feel worse than I look—though I definitely look thirty. My eyes have noticeable bags underneath, and they’re a tiny bit bloodshot. The green of my irises seems like it’s faded over the years, but that’s probably just me being dramatic. Once upon a time, my black hair had been a pretty decent fringe bob, but now it’s growing out weird and uneven. And I didn’t do it—or my spine—any favors crashing on the couch like I’m still in college. I’m going to be feeling this particularly stupid decision for the next few days—or, more realistically, weeks.

All in all, could be worse. Could be a lot better, granted, but you get out what you put into it, and I haven’t exactly been taking the best care of it. Her. Me.

That’s probably just about all the self-examination I can do before the dysphoria sets in, so I leave the bathroom and swing through the kitchen. I grab two bottles of water and the painkillers from the top of the fridge, and go back to join Theo.

Kai has already disappeared back into his bedroom, and my brother is sitting on the couch cradling his face in his hands. “I feel like an asshole.”

“Ditto,” I say, popping two pills before passing two more over to him with the other bottle of water.

“We gotta do better, Penny,” he mutters, taking them with a large glug.

“How?”

“Terra Vertebrae is taking some more gigs, and like I said, we’ll try to play more in the stations downtown, or out at Boston Common. The battle is coming up, and we have a really good shot of getting in this year. First prize would be a big deal—we could get some actual studio time, maybe put out a real album.” He looks at me with a shrug. “And you’ve always got your commissions and shit. You could take on a few extras. I know you can knock them out in no time.”

Like it’s all so easy. I can do them when I’m not exhausted from work. And the only way I can get people to buy my art is by charging a fraction of what it’s worth, drawing the things they want, not my own stuff.

Besides, I remember us having this same conversation five years ago. Has anything really changed? We’ve just been coasting by. Debt and late rent are enough to light a fire of desperation under you. But they’re not really conducive to making good art. It’s all just…getting by. Cinders by comparison.

It’s enough to make a woman wonder if mumsy and papá were right. Being a starving artist is all fun and games when you’re a twenty-something, but it doesn’t have quite the same ring to it when you hit the next decade marker. “So we just do…more?”

“Art harder,” he says with a serious nod.

“Art smarter?”

“Art like the wind.”

“Fart out that art.”

There’s a beat, and then we’re both laughing like it’s the funniest thing in the world, even knowing that we’re just hungover and loopy. We slump back on the couch and continue to giggle together like we’re kids again. All these years later and it’s still the really stupid stuff that gets us going.

Only after we’ve gotten out all of our giggles and we’re only occasionally bubbling with light chuckles do I finally relent. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Okay. We got this.”

“The only other option is—” He stops and shakes his head. “Well, it’s not an option.”

With another herculean push, I manage to get myself up to my feet. My task is before me, my path laid clear.

Time to fart out that art.

Anthea

I’m awoken by the shrill ring of my phone, and I strongly consider not answering it. I already know who is on the other end of the call, and I already know what she’s going to say.

But because of that, I also know a third, much more important thing. She will not stop. She’s been waiting ten years, to the day, for this. And despite the fact that we quite literally have all the time in the world, she won’t wait another minute.

Family, right?

Finally, I relent and answer. “Hello, Matilde.”

She’s several hours behind me, which means it’s even earlier for her. And yet her voice is so bright and chipper you’d never know. “Anthea, darling! It’s a bright, beautiful world outside and my sister is going back to work!”

“Exactly. I’m going back to work. You’re not my warden, surely you trust that I won’t shirk my sacred duty.”

I can almost picture her—towering high with that mane of golden locks, making her trademark little pout, checking her nails as though they aren’t already perfectly manicured and painted. “I most certainly am not your warden. I’m your loving, older sister.”

She’s never once let me live down the fact that she has a few decades on me. As if that’s not the equivalent of a few seconds by comparison, in the grand scheme of things. We can’t all be lucky enough to have been born from a song. Some of us had to wait for the discovery of fire. “And as such, I am personally invested in your well-being. It was perfectly understandable that you needed to take a constitutional, all things considered. I supported that.”

“You put a time limit on it.”

“Because the Work is important, Anthea. Because it gives us life and fills our hearts with song. You’ve spent ten long years denying that.” She’s quiet for a surprisingly long time. Matilde doesn’t normally go in for long silences, unless she’s being dramatic, in which case she can go quite a while without speaking. “How was your time away? Any grand discoveries? Any earth-shattering revelations?”

There’s a tone in her voice, because she already knows the answer to that. Or she thinks she knows. In her world, the two are one and the same. “No, I’m afraid I did not live, laugh, nor love my way into some kind of nirvana. But it was a pleasant distraction after—” I stop myself, not ready to say any of it out loud. It was a good vacation, but it didn’t actually heal any of my wounds. “Well. After everything. So I hope you’ll temper your expectations for the foreseeable future until I’ve found my sea legs again, yes?”

“Absolutely! I’m not suggesting you jump into the deep end, to muddy metaphors here somewhat. No, no, find yourself something easy—someone easy. Get your feet wet—oh dear, there I go again—until you’re ready to buckle down and inspire something truly great again.”

It’s not a bad idea, really. Start small. Follow the ebb and flow of the city until I find someone worthwhile and give an experimental little push. Simple as that. After all, that’s the saying, isn’t it? All it takes is a spark.

For all my exasperated eye-rolling, I have to give Matilde her due. Most of our siblings would have ignored my pain and encouraged me to get right back out there and play the field again. Matilde was more measured, more understanding, even if she did force me to limit myself to only a decade free from responsibility. Again, seconds on the grand scale of the universe. But hopefully it was enough to clear my head and give me what I needed.

“I can do that. Hmm, I hope I’m not too rusty.” While inspiring art might be our natural inclination, that doesn’t mean it’s easy to do it right. The ideal balance is difficult to find, and it’s different for each artist.

“There isn’t a lick of doubt in my heart. You’ll find your stride again in time, dear sister. Like riding a bike. Oh! No, no, like a duck to water. There, I’ve brought it back around to aquatic theming.”

I just can’t help it. When you get past all her ridiculous posturing, Matilde still knows how to bring a smile to my face, and I begin to chuckle. “Quack quack, darling. I promise I’ll give it my all.”

“You needn’t give it one hundred percent immediately. A solid effort is all I ask. Now get to it! Or I’ll have to catch the next flight out to the East Coast and show you how it’s done.”

Still laughing, I perch on the edge of my bed and ready myself to start my first day back on the clock, so to speak. “I’ll update you soon, I promise. Now don’t let me keep you. I’m sure you have a full day ahead of you.” Matilde is a busy woman. She runs her own talent agency in Los Angeles, ensuring she has no end of performers she can shower with her gifts. She never could be tied down to one human at a time. Not like me.

Perhaps that’s why she never developed a complex. Not like me.

“That line could wrap around the block three times over and I would still make space for you, Anthea.” From anyone else, that would just be a bit of familial hyperbole to sound pretty, but I know she means it.

“Love you.”

“Love you too. Ta.”

As I finally hang up, I think for just a moment about crawling back under my fluffy comforter for a few more hours. Maybe a few more days. I could potentially get away with it. Lie about how things are going the next time she checks in. But I also know she’d see right through me. Matilde knows me too well. And while I’m loath to admit it, for all my fears, some part of me is eager to finally try again.

If I’m going to do this, then I’ll do it right. Start slow. Put on the armor. Keep a healthy distance until I’m ready for the real thing.

First things first, I need to get cleaned up. I head for the bathroom to get in a proper shower. But I stop long enough to examine myself in the mirror first. I’ve had this particular face for several decades now, with the occasional tweak to account for “aging,” so to speak. For those of us who have taken on physical forms, we’ve long since learned all the necessary tricks for staying incognito. Either move around a great deal, or alter your appearance enough to avoid getting noticed. Or, do what Matilde does and lie through your teeth about coming from extremely sturdy stock where all the women look shockingly youthful and similar. It takes confidence to pull off, and she’s got that in spades.

I suppose I could do a full reconstruction in honor of my big return. But I find I’ve grown fond of this version of me. Anthea Corey is a woman who might be in her midforties and probably comes from somewhere vaguely Mediterranean. She has striking features, with just enough imperfections to avoid the uncanny valley—the nose is just ever so slightly crooked in a way that I feel extremely proud of.

But enough self-congratulatory preening. It’s time for me to get ready and hit the scene. There’s a city full of people outside my window. Surely one of them will be a safe bet, a quick and easy job for a muse who’s maybe a little out of practice.