The Thousandth Floor by Katharine McGee

Author:Katharine McGee
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2016-06-10T04:00:00+00:00

RYLIN

RYLIN STOOD AT the back of the Ifty car, clutching an overhead metal railing as the train slowed to a stop at Bedton. The Tower narrowed as it got higher, so unlike Cord’s floor, which was only several blocks square, the 32nd floor was enormous. It stretched the whole breadth of the Tower’s base, from 42nd Street all the way up to 145th, and from East Avenue to Jersey Highway in the west. Hiral lived on the same floor as Rylin, but almost thirty blocks away, at least fifteen minutes on the Ifty.

A giggling posse of twelve-year-old girls piled onto the railcar, and Rylin turned her music up louder, trying to drown them out. She needed to think. Her mind was jumbled, everything from yesterday morning onward all blurred together and confused. But from the tangled knot of her feelings she’d extracted a single crucial thread.

She didn’t love Hiral anymore.

She hadn’t loved him for a while now. Maybe she never had. She’d certainly thought she did, back when they were so young that words like love and grief described burgers and exams. Back when their biggest problems were things like the air regulator in Rylin’s apartment breaking—Hiral had climbed up into the vents to fix it for them—or when Hiral forgot his brother’s birthday and Rylin helped him bake a cake last minute. Before Rylin’s mom died, and they both became harder, flintier versions of themselves.

She’d arrived home from Paris last night and stumbled straight into bed. For once Chrissa’s snoring didn’t even keep her awake. This morning she’d woken to find Chrissa already at volleyball practice, a bacon bagel in the toaster and a pod of coffee in the brewer. Rylin sat for a while at the kitchen table, picking the bacon chunks from the bagel like she always did, thinking over everything that had happened. Finally she stood up with a sigh and got dressed.

After all this time, she was going to break up with Hiral. Yet she didn’t feel guilty, or even very sad—only relieved, and vaguely nostalgic for the way they used to be. She knew Hiral wouldn’t take it well. He didn’t like change; he would’ve been fine staying with her indefinitely, if only out of sheer inertia. He would agree with her eventually, though, wouldn’t he?

The Ifty slowed to a stop again, and Rylin swayed forward, toying with her Eiffel Tower necklace. She didn’t quite understand what was going on between her and Cord, but whatever it was, she wanted to see where it headed. She’d been surprised at how much fun she had had with him yesterday—of course she’d loved Paris, but it wasn’t just that. It was being in Paris with Cord.

She got out her chunky gray MacBash tablet and tried pinging Hiral again, but he didn’t pick up. Are you awake? I’m coming over, she wrote, biting her lip in impatience. She’d thought about waiting till this afternoon, tomorrow even. But she hated delaying any action once she’d decided on it. As her mom used to say, better now than later.

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