“I’m hungry.”
She leaned forward, inspecting at his eyes. “Are you drunk?”
“No. I don’t drink. Big Alcohol is singlehandedly—”
“Good. I’m too tired to drive myself. Drive me and I’ll heat you up something.”
He nodded resolutely and followed her down to the parking garage.
As soon as she was in the passenger’s seat of his classic VW Beetle, she knew running into Jeremy was a godsend. Well, not literally … probably.
She struggled to keep her eyes open until they pulled up to the food trailer park, at which point, yeah, her eyes were wide open.
“What the hell!” She jumped out of the passenger’s seat before he’d finished parallel parking, tossing her blanket off her shoulders as she sprinted toward the flames.
Jessica’s Gluten-Free Treats was the only one on fire. She stood ten yards away, staring in shock. The service window was opened—she suspected by force, since Judith always locked up—and while the whole structure wasn’t yet ablaze, through the open window she saw flames licking up toward the ceiling, and a gray cloud billowed out from the oven vent.
Maybe there was still something she could salvage inside. She had to try. Every penny counted.
But she hardly got a step forward before she felt arms wrap around her waist, holding her back.
“Jessica, stop!” Jeremy shouted. “You can’t go in there! You’re dressed like a goddamn wick!”
“No! Maybe it’s not all ruined yet! Let me go!” She struggled against his firm grasp. “God won’t let me die! I just need to see what I can save!”
Jeremy continued to hold her, though, and eventually the fire spread to the interior siding of the metal structure, smoke billowing into the night sky against the backdrop of high-rise hotels and condos.
“How could this happen?” she asked weakly as Jeremy loosened his grasp and she slumped into a pile on the trailer park gravel, staring at what would soon be her former business.
Jeremy sat down next to her, pulling his knees up to his chest. “Judging by the spray paint, I’d say arson.”
“What spray paint?”
He motioned at the ground between them and the fire, and Jessica crawled to kneeling and tilted her head to get the right angle.
Antichrist.
Wow, it’d been a while since she’d had anyone call her that in earnest. Once White Light had dropped that campaign a few years ago, the term had slowly disappeared from her life. Seeing it again almost made her nostalgic for simpler times.
She flopped back down next to Jeremy and watched her dream continue to burn. “We should call the fire department.”
Jeremy nodded, pulled out his cell phone, and dialed 911.
“This is what I get,” she mumbled to no one in particular. Not two days after her interview with Maria had aired, and already someone saw fit to burn down her business. This was exactly what she was worried would happen. She’d even said as much to Miranda, hadn’t she? Granted, she’d assumed it would be Jimmy Dean who would come through with a well-timed sabotage, not some Austinite with an overdeveloped sense of moral outrage, vigilante justice, and entitlement.
Or maybe Jimmy had something to do with this after all? The word spraypainted in front of her trailer was one of his go-tos for years. But he’d moved on, hadn’t he? Wasn’t his new ploy that the two of them were coconspirators? That she was not the antichrist, but Jessica Christ?
It was anyone’s guess, really. And at the moment, it didn’t matter. Her trailer was being reduced to ashes either way.
If this is what happens when I’m open about my life, it might be time to start hiding again. Otherwise, I’ll never accomplish anything.
Two car doors slammed behind her, and she assumed the neighborhood was starting to arrive for the show.
“Jessica?”
She twisted around and the chaos of the evening prevented her from making sense of Miranda’s sudden appearance. Quentin wasn’t far behind, and he stared at the flames openmouthed.
“How are you here?” Jessica asked dumbly as she stood and dusted herself off.
Miranda shook her head vaguely and shrugged. “Quentin had a bad dream or something, and said he needed to come here?” She grimaced apologetically. “So I told him he wasn’t going without me.” Her eyes moved to the fire. “Jess, this is— Are you okay?”
“No.”
Miranda pulled Jessica in for a tight hug.
“She wanted to run in, but I stopped her,” Jeremy said from the ground.
Miranda let go of Jess glared sharply at him. “Thanks. And who are you?”
“I’ve told you about him. He’s Jeremy, my neighbor,” Jessica said. “He gave me a ride.”
Miranda continued eyeing him suspiciously. “Ah. Okay.”
Once the firetrucks arrived, the firefighters herded them back to the sidewalk and out of the way. The flames were already dying by then, but containment was probably still a good idea.
“Moses was right!” Chris came jogging up the sidewalk in boxers and a robe, his eyes wide.
Miranda looked to Jessica, presumably for an explanation. “It’s just a weird expression he’s been using … I think it’s a football thing?”
Chris to swooped in, wrapping his arms around his girlfriend. “I’m so sorry, Jess. I’m so, so sorry.”
“If you keep apologizing like that,” she spoke into his exposed chest, “I’m going to start wondering if you set the fire.”
He jumped back, staring at her face, trying to get a read. “Of course I didn’t. You know I was asleep. I heard Moses’s warning, too, that’s why I’m here.”
“Hold up,” Quentin said. “He visited y’all, too?” But then his sleepy mind must have caught up with his mouth, and his eyes darted over to Miranda, his face slack.
Jeremy rested his hand under his chin and inspected the conversation thoughtfully, but Miranda didn’t remain as passive. “Wait, Moses … all three of you had a dream about Moses, then you wake up and come out here?”
“No, no,” Quentin corrected. “You misunderstood me. I didn’t have a dream about Moses. They did.” He pointed at Jessica and Chris. “I said, ‘y’all two.’ He visited the two of them.”
“Ah,” she said. “That makes more sense.” But her frown didn’t disappear.
Jeremy bobbed his head and stepped forward. “I know what’s going on here. It’s the subliminal messages on channel six, isn’t it?”
“And who are you?” Chris asked, squinting at Jeremy like he’d only just noticed him, which was probably the case given the narrow scope of Chris’s attention at any point in time.
“It’s my neighbor, Chris. He gave me a ride.”
“Why are you hanging out with your neighbor at two in the morning?”
Jessica rubbed her fingertips over her eyes. “I wasn’t. I ran into him in the hall. You know where I was at two a.m., Chris, so reel it in.”
“What subliminal messages on channel six?” Miranda asked.
Before Jeremy could explain, Jess jumped in. “None.” She turned back toward the fire. “My business just went up in flames and the word Antichrist is spray-painted on the ground. I tried, but I just have zero fucks to give for any of y’all’s theories and concerns right now.”
She started wandering down the sidewalk away from the fire, unsure what her next move was, but knowing there was no longer a point in standing around.
Quentin caught up to her. “Jess, fake love of my life. Hold up.” He stepped in front. “You say someone spray-painted antichrist in front of the trailer?”
“Yeah.”
A grin bloomed on his face and then he chuckled. “This is good. It’s obviously arson, and more than that, it’s such a clear hate crime—”
“As opposed to another kind of arson, Quentin? Have you ever loved something so much you burned it?”
He steadied his expression. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to get excited. It’s just that whoever did this actually d
id you a favor with the spray-paint. You’ll get insurance. And if you get a good lawyer, you might even collect on pain and suffering.”
“Wait. Really?”
“Yes,” he said, opening his arms to her.
Appreciating his reassurance and feeling her frustration subside, she walked forward and let him hug her. When she was close against him, he brushed the hair away from her ear and leaned his lips close. “Swear on your life you won’t explain the Moses thing to Miranda.”
Jess tried to jerk away, but he pulled her close again, whispering, “If she finds out about me, it’s over. She wants a normal life, not one with an angel.”
Jessica felt his grip loosen and stepped back.
He yanked her close again. “Promise me.”
“Yeah, fine. I won’t say anything. But you do realize that while you’re over here with me, you’ve left Chris alone with her to answer whatever questions she might have, right?”
Quentin gasped, shoved Jessica away, and sprinted back toward the others.
As Wendy paced back and forth across Jessica’s living room, Dr. Bell scrolled through her phone, and Jess was allowed to remain on her back on the couch, where she’d spent most of the past twelve hours since returning home from the fire.
“Are you truly set on waiting for her?” Wendy asked for the third time.
“Yes,” Jessica said. “She has a stake in this. She should have a say, too.”
A knock on the front door announced Judith’s arrival, and Wendy was quick across the room to answer it. “You’re late.”
“I didn’t realize we were under a time crunch,” Judith said, sauntering in. “Not like the trailer is going to get any more fucked.”
Pulling a bar stool around to the living room, Judith sat and looked at Jessica. “How you holding up?”
“Wonderful,” Jessica grumbled.
“Such an optimist.”
Wendy clapped her hands. “Shall we dive into it now?” She looked at her watch. “I have a meeting in two hours that’s a three-hour drive away.”
“Fire whoever does your scheduling,” said Judith.
Wendy pressed her lips together firmly, inhaling deeply through her nose. “I’ve called this emergency meeting because—”
“We know,” Judith interrupted. “Some dipshit lit Jessica’s business on fire.”
Wendy shot daggers at Judith. “Yes. And now we have to come up with a plan for how we address it. So. There are two paths here. Either Jessica gives up on the bakery dream and tries something else, or we bounce back bigger and stronger in the patisserie industry.”
Judith groaned. “I was with you on the second option until you used the word patisserie. I’m majoring in English and minoring in French, and even I think that’s overly pretentious for what Jessica does.”
Dr. Bell cleared her throat, drawing all eyes to her before Wendy could respond to the critique. “It’s possible that all is not lost.”
Jessica rolled her head toward her professor. “Go on.”
“Barring any unfortunate turn of events”—she held up a hand before Judith could speak—“more unfortunate than the present one, you’ll be receiving quite a bit of insurance money. I looked over your ledger before I came, and it looks like you were only seventeen thousand shy of hitting your target before you could sell the trailer and move to phase two where you open a permanent location.”
Jessica threw her arm over her eyes. “Don’t remind me. I was only a month or two away.”
“Yes, but with the insurance money, you’ll likely make back that plus more. Insurance doesn’t take into account your intent to sell the trailer, so they’ll give you enough money to rebuild it and outfit it with all the appliances, which is much more money than you would have gotten selling it used to someone else. Plus, as Wendy and I were discussing earlier, it was technically a hate crime, so there’s a civil suit in this along with a criminal investigation.”
“Right. Quentin said basically the same. What does that mean, though?”
Dr. Bell wove her fingers together in her lap. “You could make a lot of money off of this, Jessica.”
She propped herself up onto her elbows. “Wait. I could make money because someone burned down my trailer? How does that make sense?”
“It doesn’t,” said Wendy, “so don’t bother worrying about it. Also, it’s not a done deal. But I’ll get to that.” She rolled her shoulders and stretched her neck. “The first problem is that there will have to be an investigation, which takes a while, then an insurance claim once the investigation ends, assuming they conclude someone else set the fire and it isn’t an attempt at insurance fraud.” She paused, her hands on her hips as she stared intensely at Jessica. The condo was dead silent.
Why is she looking at me like that?
“Wait, you think I set the fire myself?”
“Well? Did you?”
“No! Are you out of your mind?”
Wendy nodded, apparently taking no offense. “Just had to clear the air. I believe you, Jessica. No one knows better than I how much people hate you. Honestly, I can’t believe we haven’t encountered arson sooner. Anyway, insurance will take its sweet time on issuing you the check, meaning it could be literally years before you see that money, and I don’t think you want to wait that long before getting back in the saddle again.”
“Of course not. But what are my options?”
“Well,” Wendy said, avoiding Jessica’s eye, “we could rustle up some support from social media. After all, everyone loves a victim from afar.”
“This sounds a little like exploiting a tragedy,” Judith said. “Not that I’m against that. I mean, morally, yes, but everybody’s doing it, you know?”
“Yeah,” Jessica said, sitting up straight despite her sleep-deprivation headache, “using this to make money is probably the kind of thing police are looking out for in their investigation, right? Like, ‘Oh hey, we’ve narrowed down suspects to the twenty-six thousand Texans who think she’s the antichrist, so what now? Look! She’s raising money because her trailer burned! And now she’s opening up a bigger and better bakery. Maybe we should just investigate her!’”
Wendy leaned forward. “Do you really think that’s how the police operate?”
“No?”
Wendy nodded slowly. “No is correct. But I suppose you do have a point about it looking suspect. Not one that convinces me we shouldn’t still do it, but a point nonetheless.”
“There are other options,” Dr. Bell said, pulling her black binder from underneath her chair and opening it on her lap. “Option one. You still have quite a bit of money left so that you could dip in and open another food trailer while you wait for the investigation and insurance to go through. I suspect that what fans you have would make an extra effort to come by and support your business after the attack, and a benefit day would be easy enough to organize, so you may be able to make up the difference in three to four months. Of course, it would take another couple months before we could open. Longer this time, since we got ‘lucky,’ as you’d say, with your first trailer having belonged to a bakery, meaning it had most of the set-up we needed”—she tilted her head toward Jessica, who still wouldn’t admit that the fortunate find was likely her Father’s doing—“so it would be about five to six months if you’re lucky.”
“And if no one burns down the second trailer,” Jessica added.
Dr. Bell cleared her throat. “Yes. That too.” She flipped the page. “Option two is that you get a job. Taking into account the loss of the trailer, which we’d planned to sell, and the amount of money you still needed before we were ready to find a permanent location, you would need to earn roughly forty-four thousand dollars. If we want to cut corners, I think I could get it down to thirty-five. Depending on what job you find, it could take anywhere from one to three years to save that amount, and only if you keep a tight budget.”
“What about Judith? I’m her sole source of income, and I need to make sure she has money,
too. She’s going to school full-time. She has rent to pay.”
But her friend waved that off. “Psh. Don’t worry about me. If you open up again, I’ll come work for you. Otherwise, I’ll just do what every English major does and take on crippling student debt then graduate with practically zero earning potential outside of teaching, which, from what I hear, actually comes out to less than minimum wage when you count all the hours spent working that you don’t get paid for.”
Jessica waited patiently for her to finish before saying, “Judith, that’s insane.”
“I know, but I don’t make the rules. Write to your congressman.”
“No, I mean about taking on debt. What if you sublet your apartment and live here with me?”
Judith scanned the apartment. “Is there a bedroom I don’t know about? Maybe a murphy bed tucked into one of these concrete sarcophagus walls?”
“You can have my bed and I can sleep on the couch. Or we can get two twins and both sleep in the bedroom.”
Judith leaned forward and placed a hand on Jessica’s shoulder. “I love you, but that’s a hard pass. I know what you and Chris do in your sleep. I think it’s beautiful, but I don’t want to share a room with it.” She sat back on the stool. “Besides, I’m already like a hundred grand in the hole. What’s another twenty thousand? Ooo! Or thirty thousand? I could really live it up this semester. Actually … you want in on this sweet indentured servitude, Jess? I could throw you a cool twenty grand.”
“Please,” said Dr. Bell, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Please stop the financial irresponsibility. I’m going to be sick.”
“There’s another thing we need to address,” Wendy said.
When she scooted a tree trunk stool over toward the coffee table and sat down on it, Jessica knew they were crossing into serious territory; Wendy never sat down if she could help it. “For this to count as a hate crime, which, trust me, we need it to for strategic reasons, it must be clear what, exactly, the criminal hated about you. Sure, your reputation is far and wide, but any defense attorney worth his weight in retweets will home in on the fact that you don’t have a clear message. How can it be a hate crime if it’s unclear what you stand for? It holds just enough water that we need to proactively counter it.”
It is Risen Page 17