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“How do you know?” I ask, curiously.
“It was pink,” he says with a shudder.
“So,” I reply, a panicked giggle bubbling from my throat.
“You’re not a pink bedroom kind of girl. Plus, it smells like someone smashed a bottle of your sister’s dreadful perfume.”
He moves to open the next door, but I stop him. Sighing, I point toward the farthest door. “That one’s my room.”
His stormy, dark eyes twinkle for a moment, and I wish I knew him well enough to interpret what it meant, but instead I just let him take my hand again and pull me along the hallway and into my bedroom.
The familiarity of the space settles something inside of me, and when he loosens his hold on me, I pull my hand free from his and step further into my bedroom. Kicking my shoes off, I unbutton my blazer and hang it over the back of my desk chair.
Lowering myself onto the edge of my bed, I watch him as he takes in my space. His eyes run over the shabbily painted walls to the shelves full of music and books. This room says so much more about me than anything else he’s seen so far, and I find myself holding my breath and bracing myself for his reaction. It shouldn’t matter what he thinks of my space, but for some reason it does.
His sigh is audible, and when he looks at me, he smiles, a genuine smile that has me smiling back. “I like your room.”
“Thank you, me too,” I tell him a little breathily.
“It’s nothing like Penelope’s room, and it’s all the way down the hall. I guess I figured identical twins would either share space or at least want to be close to each other,” Gulliver muses as he moves to look at the piles of CDs and vinyl.
“Our relationship isn’t like that,” I admit quietly. Him being in my space, close to all the things that make me, suddenly feels stifling. Even though it must be obvious that Penelope and I aren’t close, admitting it to him is the tiny pebble that topples the whole pile. I wish he’d leave; his presence is too much, and I need him out of my space so I can breathe again. “You should probably go and explain things to my parents.”
“I’ll help you pick an outfit first,” he says, ignoring my discomfort as he crosses the room to my closet.
“You don’t need to do that. I’m sure once you explain things, I won’t need to attend this dinner, so I won’t need an outfit,” I protest, standing up from the bed and moving toward the door.
“Why wouldn’t you attend?” he asks gruffly, pulling open my closet and taking a step inside.
“Why would I?” I counter, crossing the room to stand in the closet doorway.
He ignores me as he sorts through my clothes, pushing hangers to the side quickly as he paces along the rail. “Where are the rest of your clothes?” he asks.
“There,” I say, motioning to the rail full of clothes next to him.
“No, where are your dresses, your formalwear?”
“I don’t have any.”
Closing the distance between us, he looks down at me, a quizzical expression on his face. “Izzy, you’re from one of the richest families in the country, your parents are socialites, you go to one of the country’s most prestigious high schools, of course you have formalwear.”
Unable to meet his eyes, I look past him and into the closet that’s full of ripped jeans, threadbare sweaters, and cropped T-shirts. “I don’t attend formal occasions,” I admit.
“You really are a ghost, aren’t you?” he whispers. “So that dress you wore on Friday?”
“One of Penelope’s, or something my mom bought for Penelope.” I shrug.
“Okay, come on,” Gulliver says with an angry snarl, grabbing me again and rushing me from my room and down the stairs so quickly it takes all of my coordination not to fall.
“Where are we going?” I cry. “Gulliver, stop! I’m not wearing any shoes.”
Spinning around, he lifts me into the air, carrying me bridal-style across the foyer, only pausing long enough to open the front door before he whisks me down the steps and back into the passenger seat of his car.
“What are you doing?” I cry when he climbs into the car, starts the engine, and skids away from the house. “Gulliver,” I hiss. “Where are you taking me?”
“We’re getting you a dress, a closet full of dresses,” he snaps, accelerating quickly down the road.
“I don’t need a dress.”
