Kylie Cantrall's Arc

Chapter 41 of 78

The song was safe. Now Kylie walked the manor and saw the truth. Every room was hers. Arianna had a key, a necklace, a heart-shaped bed in a guest room. But a guest room was still a guest room. Arianna lived here, yet nothing in the house was only Arianna's. Kylie wanted her to feel she belonged, not that she was visiting. She found Arianna in the kitchen, feeding the puppy scraps. "Come with me," Kylie said. She led her up the stairs to a small room at the end of the hall. It had a wide window and bare walls. "This is empty," Arianna said. "Not for long," Kylie answered. "It's yours. Not ours. Yours." Arianna frowned. "You already gave me a room." "I gave you a bed I picked," Kylie said. "I chose the color. I chose everything. This one you choose." She held out a blank pad and a pen. "Write what goes in it. I won't add a single thing you don't ask for." Arianna sat on the floor. She stayed quiet a long time. Kylie almost spoke, then stopped herself. She had spent a year planning surprises. This time she waited. Finally Arianna wrote. A desk under the window. Her grandmother's lemon cake recipe framed on the wall. A shelf for her own letters, the ones she wrote but never sent. A lock on the door. Kylie read the list. Her chest tightened at the last line. "A lock," she said. "So even I can't come in?" "So I can choose when you do," Arianna said. "That's different." Kylie understood. In her whole house, Arianna had never had a door she controlled. Kylie had given her access to everything and a space of her own in nothing. They worked all afternoon. Kylie carried up a desk from a storage room. Arianna set it under the window herself, refusing help with the angle. Kylie framed the recipe. Arianna hung it, moving it twice until it sat right. Kylie installed the lock last, then handed Arianna the only key. "Now it's real," Kylie said. Arianna stepped inside and shut the door. The lock clicked. Kylie stood in the hall and heard nothing else. For a moment fear rose in her, the old fear of being left out. Then the door opened. "Come see," Arianna said, and pulled her in by the hand. The room was small and plain and entirely Arianna's, and Kylie had helped build the one place she wasn't allowed to control. They sat on the floor together. "This is the first thing that's mine here," Arianna said. "Not a gift. Mine." Kylie nodded. She had wanted Arianna to feel at home. Now she saw that home meant Arianna needed room to shut her out sometimes. The house belonged to both of them now. But this door belonged to Arianna, and Kylie had to learn to knock.