Dating : The Sounds of Love

Overwhelming silence. The house and its residents breathe and move, but my ears have shut them out. At the top of the stairs, my toes curl over the top step and my fingers pull at my tulle dress. The party-goers wander on the floor below, oblivious to me and focused on the drinks in their hands. Eloise made her exalted homemade punch, spiked with the perfect amount of brandy and blended with fruits and unfamiliar spices. The people down there, ghosts waltzing towards the next frolic or fancy, they know the punch well. They know the purple-nailed hands that crafted it even more.

The black tights and maroon tulle that wait atop the stairs, though, they’ve never seen those, let alone the one who wears them. Last night I dreamed of how they’d laugh when they saw me, how they’d find Eloise still cooking party treats in the kitchen and tell her what a riot I was. They’d laugh at how much effort I put into my look for the night, with the long hair only half-curled because I burned my fingers and cried in the bathroom for thirty minutes because of it.

With magenta eyeshadow so strong I might fall face-first down these stairs with the weight of it.

Sooner or later I must walk down. I promised Eloise, though she didn’t ask me to. She insisted I didn’t have to if I was uncomfortable, that she would cover for me. My comfort matters most, she said. This is our house, not theirs.

She painted my nails the same shade of purple as hers. Doesn’t go with the dress, but it’s her favorite color and a reminder she’s only a few rooms away if I need her every time I look down at my hands to avoid eye contact with one of the ghosts, if their shadowed eyes scour my body with too much dreadful curiosity. I look at them now, at the crispness of the lines, and remember the softness of her hands as she painted them. The way her hair fell over my arm, and the exact shape of her lips when she smiled because it tickled and I squeaked.

“You look magnificent,” she told me as I stood in front of our bedroom mirror, deciding whether or not to hide my face from the world. Magnificent. I couldn’t hide after that.

I release my dress and place my fingers on the banister. Gently, they glide over the wood as I descend one careful step at a time. No one looks at me from their wandering, from their stations in the hallway like coworkers around the water cooler. As both my feet touch down on the ground floor, as people pass in front of me with a quick pardon, no one really notices me.

Then I step one second sooner than I should have and crash into a gliding ghost. Punch spills over his shirt and he catches himself on the banister. No, not a ghost: human, with cheeks crimson from alcohol. I want to apologize, but my mouth gapes silently.

He laughs. The only sound I’ve been able to hear since I left my bedroom.

“Sorry ‘bout that,” he says with more ease than I’ve ever had in my whole life.

A gleam enters his eyes, the thinking kind, and my whole body goes rigid. I don’t know this person. I’ve never seen him before now. Eloise would never have invited anyone she knew would be cruel, consciously or not, but the unknown lines of his face, though smiling, scratch at my nerves.

“Have we met?” he asks. “Lorenzo High?”

My mouth closes and I just stare. So awkward, he must be thinking. So weird.

“Class of 2014,” he continues with growing certainty. “Mr. Garland’s creative writing class. Your name was…”

The name my parents still call me. The one they used more frequently than is normal in conversation when I told them everything three months ago. After which, Eloise, her voice scarier than I’ve ever heard it, told them they couldn’t speak to me unless they used my real name.

Today’s the day I find out if everyone else prefers the old name too.

I look down at my hands. At the purple. The shape of her smile. Eloise hugged me when I told her, tighter than she ever had before. And then she asked if I wanted to go get ice cream and walk along the beach, holding hands.

“Wait, no, that was definitely not you,” the guy says. “Do you have a brother?”

Slowly, I shake my head.

“Well, my memory’s shit,” he says with another laugh. “My name’s Trevor. Eloise and I hung out for a semester at Lorenzo when we had the same French class. Bunch of paired assignments, so we just stuck to each other. Group work usually sucks, you know? Hard to find a good partner. I was kinda surprised when she invited me to this. Thought she’d forgotten me.”

My belly warms and I look up at him. “Eloise never forgets anyone. She’s a wonderful partner.”

Trevor smiles pleasantly. “No way, you and her?”

A nod this time. Not as shy as before. “We, uh, started dating a couple years ago. I commissioned some art from her and she dropped it off in person, and well…” I gesture to the house.

Trevor gestures the same as I did, but with a more dramatic flourish of his arm. “‘And well’ indeed. Damn, that’s sick. Y’all make a good pair.”

I smile a little, my cheeks hot, and that makes him laugh some more, so pure and joyful.

“Sorry, what’s your name again?”

My smile grows at his own disarming one, and then I pinch my skirt, fluttering it a little like I’ve seen girls do in the movies. As all the sounds of the house and peopleㅡnot ghostsㅡwithin it finally bless my ears, I say, “I’m Sophia.”