The Scapegracers

by Hannah Abigail Clarke

  “Daisy,” said Yates, who had lain herself across the seats and rested her head in my lap. Her hair was soft against my thigh—I felt it through a rip in my jeans—and I put a hand on her shoulder, gave it a squeeze. She stuck her tongue in her cheek. “Why were you floating? Like, how did you do that?”

  “I don’t remember,” said Daisy. She pulled the hair off her cheeks and gathered it into a knot at the top of her head. “I don’t remember what happened. I just remember the feeling. God, it’s like paradise, floating like that. I wish I remembered how I did it. I’d do it again.”

  “If I walk into school tomorrow and find you floating around the ceiling, I swear to God, I’m getting a broom,” said Jing. “I’m literally going to bash you out of the rafters, you hear? And then I’m going to stab you sixty times with a pencil and leave your buoyant ass in a dumpster somewhere. No more fucking floating. Particularly when you’re alone. I’m putting a ban on floating.”

  “Don’t be mean, Jing,” said Yates. “Only ban, like, public floating. If we’re all there, maybe we could make it safe. We got her down, didn’t we? I don’t know. A Daisy balloon could make for a stellar party trick.”

  Jing sighed, and her bristling gave way to thought. “You know, you might be right. But still, it’s banned unless we vote on it. All in favor?”

  Yates and I mumbled agreement.

  Daisy snorted, stretched her arms above her head. “Let’s just go home.”

  “Agreed,” said Yates. She toyed with the rips in my jeans, plucked the threads like strings on an instrument.

  Jing revved the engine and rolled out of the lot, away from Delacroix House. I leaned my forehead on the window. Yates pulled herself off my lap, and I pretended it didn’t make me feel a little lonely. There weren’t any stars above us. The car vibrations drilled my temple, and I shifted, tried to find a place where I was comfortable.

  I don’t think cars are ever going to be comfortable again.

  Especially not now that it’s dark.

  Daisy twisted in her seat so that she could leer at Yates and me. She wagged her eyebrows. “I don’t regret anything. Tonight was awesome. I’m fucking pleased. We need to do more shit like this. The four of us are special. We make things happen. Even if you didn’t find your books, we proved we can make magic on our own. The party wasn’t some fluke. You know what? I say we find some place, hold another party Friday night. We can pull out all the big guns. Scare the fuck out of the whole student body. We’re gonna be legends. They’ll talk about us forever.”

  “You think so?” Jing slapped her dashboard, and her radio flickered on. “We’ll start planning as soon as we think of a protection spell for the four of us. We brought Daze down. We should be fine without the book. We’re naturals. Speaking of . . . hey, Daisy, find something to fucking listen to. I hate driving without music.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Daisy turned away from us to fiddle with the radio. After three stations of staticky ads, she reached for the AUX cord and sent us all back into sleazy pop hell, which I’d protest, if I had the energy.

  “Hey, Daze,” said Yates, scooting forward in her seat. “That choker is pretty.”

  “Oh?” Daisy’s hand flew to her throat, and a grin broke over her face. The choker in question was a thin strip of velvet, from which a little silver pendant dangled like a grape. I hadn’t noticed it before. Daisy gave it a pat. “It’s new. I think it suits me.”

  “Daisy fucking Brink, tell me you didn’t steal a damn necklace from the Delacroix House.” Jing rolled her shoulders and curled her lip into a smile. “You are such a prick.”

  “I didn’t steal anything,” Daisy said indignantly. She scrunched up her nose. “It’s mine. Can’t steal what belongs to you.”

  “I mean, sure, it belongs to you now. But it didn’t ten minutes ago. I’m right, aren’t I?” Jing snorted. “I don’t know if I should clap you on the back or knock you upside your head.”

  “It’s not stealing if your name is on it.” Daisy ran her fingertips over her pendant and lolled back her head, fluttered her lashes. Her face was serene. Her serenity was anxiety inducing. “My name was on it. It’s mine.”

  “Shut up,” said Jing. “No way.”

  Daisy popped fresh bubblegum between her teeth and leaned back, stretching her neck so that Yates could examine the pendant. Yates reached for it and scooted closer, brought her nose to the smooth metal. She furrowed her brows. “Sideways. Flashlight, please.”

  God. I groped at my phone and shone the light at Daisy’s throat. It cast shadows when she swallowed. Vampire vision.

  Yates tilted her head, narrowed her eyes, brushed the velvety fabric with her thumb. “She’s half right,” she said. “It says Daisy. Daisy Stringer. You’re Daisy Brink. Doesn’t really work, sweetie.”

  “My mother’s name was Daisy Stringer. So, it’s mine.” Her eyes glistered, and I understood. All my arteries filled with the understanding, the link we had now. It was like iron.

  If I focused on Daisy, it almost wasn’t like I was in the back of a car in the dark in the woods. If I looked at Daisy, I’d be fine. Daisy who was like me.

  I cleared my throat. It was filled with nothing, but still felt gunky. Nerves made my whole body feel grimy thick. “How’d she die?”

  “Vicodin overdose.” The car fell silent, but Daisy looked at me long and hard, and something magnetized between us. Yates tensed up. Jing’s eyes flashed in the rearview mirror. Daisy blew a bubble. “Yours?”

  “Train crash,” I said.

  Daisy nodded. “Helluva way to go. Flashier, but less bored housewife. Was she a bored housewife? Mine was.”

  “No.” I paused, made myself think for a second. What had she actually done for a living? My mom often went off to work, but I couldn’t for the life of me remember what exactly that work was. She saw customers, and she complained about them sometimes, told me coy little stories about who did what that day. But not what her job was. I shrugged. “She was a salesperson. She would’ve been a really bad housewife. She wasn’t even a wife to begin with.”

  “You two can borrow my mom,” said Yates as she fiddled with the hem of her skirt. “She’s a professor of Molecular Physics. She’s boring, but I love her. And she’s, you know, alive.”

  “Mrs. Yates is a hell of a woman. I fucked her good last Tuesday. We’re getting married after I graduate and moving to Paris. Delicious,” said Jing. Her eyes flashed up, and the crooked smile fell off her face.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the red-blue flashing. My guts wound up in knots.

  “Shit,” Jing said, and she spun the wheel, pulling the car to the side of the road. The car rolled to a stop, and she killed the radio, letting us all sit in hovering silence.

  Jing fixed her hair in the mirror, fluffing bangs and smoothing flyaway. “Daisy Brink, if you say a single word, I will personally hand feed tiny pieces of you to Yates’ Yorkie-poo.” When she deemed herself to look appropriate, she rolled down the window and beamed at the approaching officer. Her lashes batted like a butterfly caught in a web.

  The officer, a pale white man, swaggered over to Jing’s car. He smiled at us as he approached. He was tall, broad, but very trim, and the way he walked suggested something predatory, something purposeful. They were hunter’s steps. I’d seen the likes of those steps before.

  “Oh, God. He’s not a traffic cop,” said Yates, who pressed her nose to the back window. “That’s a sheriff’s car. Jing, why would a sheriff want to talk to us?” She shrank in her seat, wrapped her fingers around her knobby knees. “God, he has the hat and everything. I hate the hat.”

  “Hush,” I said. I swept my fingertips over Yates’ forearm. Jing was hot. Jing would be able to flirt her way out of this. I told myself how hot Jing was like a chant, and I made myself hold still against the seat behind me.

  “Good evening, ladies. It’s a bit late for a cruise, don’t you think?” The sheriff bent over, peering inside Jing’s convertible as though he tho
ught he might find something. His blue eyes scanned back and forth—blue, ridiculously blue, blue like rat poison—and I felt them trace my shape for a moment. He showed us his teeth, which was meant to be charming, but wasn’t.

  “Oh, we’re driving home from dinner.” Jing dimpled, and she pushed a lock of hair behind her ear. “Is there a problem, sir? Anything we can help you with?” I hadn’t ever heard Jing use that tone of voice. It was thicker than any customer service voice I’d ever heard. It was coquettish, sweeter and more viscous than cough syrup. I had a toothache by proxy. My jaws ached. I made myself unclench them.

  “There’s been strange activity around these parts lately. We’ve been doing random stops to see if we can gather any information. Have you ladies seen anything unusual?” He swept his eyes around the car again, and I made myself stare at my shoes. I didn’t like him. I didn’t really care for cops, or anyone with too much authority, but there was something particularly off with this fuck. Had he blinked yet?

  “Nothing unusual, sir. We haven’t even seen any deer this evening. Sorry if that doesn’t help much.” Jing stuck out her bottom lip, a distinctly Daisy-ish expression, and I wanted to smother everyone with a pillow. Seeing Jing like this was as impressive as it was nauseating. I genuinely felt queasy. There was bile in the back of my throat.

  “Not a problem at all, miss. I’d rather you not see anything and be safe than the other way around. You ladies drive home safely, alright?” He patted Jing’s wrist and turned away, straightening himself back up to full height. He walked back toward his car, and the four of us collectively exhaled.

  “I just died a little.” Jing threw back her head and whistled, eyes popped wide as coins. “I thought he was pulling me over because he recognized my license plate. Oh. My God. That could’ve been so many kinds of bad.”

  “Why would he have recognized your plates?” I coughed until I smiled, and the smile turned into my infamous nervous laugh. The bile taste was overwhelming. I swallowed it, muffled myself with the back of my hand. Was I going to have a panic attack in this convertible? Likely.

  “Uh, because I’m into drag racing and I haven’t paid a fine in my life,” Jing said matter-of-factly.

  My laughter pounded out harder. I clutched at my sides and howled. I mashed my forehead against Daisy’s headrest and laughed until I couldn’t breathe, then I bit my tongue, forced myself to stop. My lungs weren’t deflating. My head swam with little lights.

  “That could’ve been bad,” said Daisy. There was an odd look on her face. I couldn’t place it. Her mouth shaped an inverted rainbow, and her eyes were bright as July. “Did you catch the name on his tag?”

  “No.” Jing creased her brows. “Why would that even matter?”

  “Because his tag said E. Chantry,” Daisy said. She turned the radio back on. She switched songs, skipping a tame break-up ballad in favor of a raunchy clubbing track. She opened her mouth and sang. She danced in her seat, twisting and snaking and rolling her wrists, and she shouted each profane lyric like she was chanting for cheer. The pendant drifted in the hollow of her throat, never quite resting where gravity commanded.

  FOURTEEN

  THINGS THAT SPREAD LIKE WILDFIRE

  We had a hell of a time thinking of protective sigils that didn’t feel stupid. The four of us sat in a circle scribbling on pieces of paper until it was so late that Yates nearly fell asleep sitting up. Jing was determined to make a spell tonight, though, and so we shook Yates awake and focused harder on the computer paper, like that would make it any easier to think of something succinct and potent and powerful and honest.

  I shoved my paper under my bed for a moment, because looking at my scratched-out ideas was making my stomach hurt. It already hurt. It and my lungs were worn ragged from the ride home, and the nerves didn’t just ice themselves when I got out of the car. They were still here. Still with me.

  Under the bed, the piece of paper swam with ink. Lines bubbled up in the pulp, made neat little arcs, clean lines, soft loops. A few phrases unfurled below the blooming shapes, emerged letter by letter on the center of the page. The three of them didn’t notice, busy drawing and cussing and yawning and shoving each other, but I couldn’t tear my eyes away.

  The sigil that had drawn itself had given itself a little signature.

  Keep the incantation. This should hold for a little while, I think. All my best. Keep safe.

  —Your friend, S

  I didn’t tell them about the signature. I didn’t tell them that I felt like I was going insane. But I did tell them about the sigil, that I’d thought of something that would maybe work.

  We drew what Mr. Scratch had given us, spoke an invocation, and rode out the rise and crash that magic brings. It felt appropriately staticky and it ached the right amount. We were satisfied. Jing took everybody home.

  All the while, I felt my eyes flicker to the corner of my bed, to the dark space just beneath. I thought I might see movement. I caught an inky smell.

  I dreamed about Mr. Scratch that night. My brain couldn’t pick a singular face for it. Him? Her? Them? Fucking zir? It was a Mr., so I guess he/him would do. Anyway, I tried to put a shape to what he looked like. I stole masks off Hollywood slashers and internet creeps, hollow eyes and long pale faces, double-wide grins with yellow teeth. Horns and scales and slimy bits. Hooves and a barbed tail. I made it look like a relatable monster. A boogeyman I understood was less intimidating than some shapeless indescribable monster. What had it really looked like? What on earth had I done?

  I dreamed it had crawled inside my backpack and devoured both of my spell books. I pictured it wriggling around in my drawers like a slick black eel, awaiting reaching fingertips to gnash on. I imagined it hiding in the darkness under my covers, curling up beside me with its fluid, massless body. I made myself bolt my closet with a chair before I went to bed. I shut my blinds, locked my door.

  But it’d helped me, hadn’t it?

  It’d helped keep me safe.

  I woke up without prompting. It was dark outside, nighttime dark, and my arms and legs were tangled in three different blankets. My hair clung to my face like an itchy scarf. Across the room at eye level, glowing red, was my alarm clock. I really, truly hated my alarm clock. It was going to scream like a nuclear microwave in T-minus two minutes. Six thirty in the damn morning. Who thought it should be legal to make a bunch of teenagers do algebra after waking up at six thirty in the morning? A significant part of me wanted to throw things at my alarm until it broke. That way I could sleep forever, and Julian and Boris wouldn’t make me go to school.

  But they totally would make me go to school. Also, I recalled my imagination’s warped rendition of what Mr. Scratch might look like, and the thought made school sound almost appealing.

  I dripped off my bed and onto the floor and laid there for a second, relishing the cold hardwood against my back. That is, where I could feel the cold hardwood. There was something else under my back, and I wasn’t quite sure what it was. In a room like mine, there’s never a decent way to tell. I heaved myself upright, peeled something that didn’t smell like death off the floor, and threw it on.

  What I’d peeled up turned out to be an enormous sweater that had belonged to Boris, once upon a time. It was a black cable-knit riddled with gashes, and the sweater paws it provided me were divine. I was swimming in a wooly Shangri-la. No matter that it was kinda sticky and smelled a little sour. Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt, or something like that. I found a pair of jeans and wrangled them on.

  I grabbed my school bag, slung it over one shoulder, and wandered into the bathroom. I splashed my face, scrubbed my teeth, ran cheap liner around my eyes. I tried not to look too closely. I wasn’t a fan of mirrors. I avoided them whenever possible. Mirrors meant looking at myself, and I hated my face, because it wasn’t mine. When I was little, I would pretend my reflection was my mother, alive again in a smaller body. We’ve always looked startlingly similar. Julian used to say so all the time, befo
re he knew what it did to me. He almost never talked about her, but he would say that much. You and Lenora could’ve been twins, he’d say. If you miss her, look in a mirror. Biology is a strange, uncanny thing. Mirrors scratched the scar tissue off old wounds. I’d see her eyes again, her cheeks and jaw, her nose, and the curve of her mouth. Now the wounds are past picking, but it still reminds me that they’re there in the first place.

  I am not worthy of her bone structure.

  It was too early for fucking angst.

  I scribbled my eyeliner on a little thicker and headed toward the kitchen. That’s where Julian usually was, and it always smelled utopic when he was there. He liked nursing sauces and simmering fragrant stews and doting on soups for hours on end. He woke up at six every morning to make coffee and breakfast and drive me to school, because he’s a stupidly good person, I guess. This morning wasn’t any different. He was already dressed, looking like a Gorey sketch come to life, flipping crepes and sipping tar-black coffee out of a moon-shaped mug. He didn’t look up, but he glanced at me out of the corner of his eye, and I found myself wandering to his side.

  “G’morning.” I pressed my forehead into his side, which was my non-sappy way of giving him a hug. “Food smells delicious, Dad. Thanks for that.”

  “Good morning, Lamb.” He took another sip of his coffee and furrowed his brows. “Did you have a good outing last night? Did you talk them into lending you another volume or two?”

  “It was . . .” I hesitated, yanked on a lock of my hair. “It was a night, that’s for sure.”

  “Oh. That doesn’t sound good. I’m sorry about that, then. Well, I made crepes. And blueberry sauce, but I’m afraid it isn’t sweet enough. There’s ricotta for them, too. I figured you could wrap it up like a burrito and carry it with you. Portable breakfast. Oh. There’s coffee. It’s Boris coffee, though, so it’s flavored. He’s a weirdo. Sorry about that.”