by Russo, Jessa
“What?” Toby?
“Yeah, baby, he helped Frankie get a driver’s license with a new name. Stuff like that.”
Oh. “Well, thank you, Mom.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I think we both knew this was coming. I just… I love him, I really do, but I don’t know if it’s the kind of love that moves you forward or holds you back. Does that make sense?”
“More than you know. When did my little girl become so wise?”
“I’m not wise, Mom.”
“You are, baby. Have a little faith in yourself.”
She pulled me to the couch and we sat down a few feet away from each other. Simultaneously, we tucked our feet up underneath us and turned to face one another, our actions proving to anyone outside of the two of us how very related we were.
“Ever, honey, I’m so sorry for lying to you all these years. What can I tell you? What do you want to know? I’ll answer any questions you have.”
My first question was why Ariadne of all people, but obviously I couldn’t ask that. And I didn’t want to make my mom feel bad about how shitty her other daughter was. It really wasn’t her fault, since she didn’t get to raise her and everything. I mean, for all my mom knew, she was…
“Wait. Did you really think Estelle—I mean, Ariadne—was dead all these years? Or was that just part of the lie?” The questions came out slightly snarky, which wasn’t my intention, but there they were.
Sadness smoothed my mother’s features, cloaking her in softness. She looked down at the ground, then squeezed my hand. She didn’t have to say anything; I knew the answer. She truly thought her daughter had been dead all these years. Wow. I thought back to my idea of Ted being the devil, and now it didn’t seem too far-fetched. How could he do that to her? How could he let her hurt like that all these years? Then I remembered something he said. ‘We developed a plan.’
Oh my God. We.
“Dad knew.”
Tears welled up in my mom’s eyes again. “Yes. It would appear that he did.”
So, Ted wasn’t the only one at fault here. “Oh, Mom, I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay, don’t you start apologizing to me. Daddy shouldn’t have been lying to me, and we shouldn’t have been lying to you. I’ve raised you to be honest, always, and here I was lying to you the entire time.” She looked down again. “I don’t even know where to begin.”
“I hate her, Mom.” My hand flew over my mouth, but the words were already out.
“Oh, honey, this isn’t her fault, you must understand that. Estel—Ariadne—is just as innocent as you are in all of this.”
Innocent and Ariadne had no business being in the same room together, let alone the same sentence. They didn’t even share the same plane of existence.
“But that’s just it, Mom. She’s anything but innocent. She’s horrible.”
“Well, I know that she’s Toby’s ex-girlfriend, and that’s never a good way to start a relationship, but you have to give her a chance. We both do.”
“I can’t, Mom. It’s more than who she is to Toby, who she was—that part doesn’t matter. What about what she did to Frankie? What she did to me?” My thoughts were all over the place. My mind raced in an effort to understand why my mom had so easily accepted this, how she’d so easily forgotten the fact that Ariadne was the reason I had less than a year left to live. “And now, with the Seekers…she’s the cause of all of this, Mom. And so much more. There’s so much you still don’t know. Stuff about Toby, and his mom.”
“I know a bit more than you realize, but those things can wait. Right now I want to focus on us. I want us to be okay, Ever. I need us to be okay.”
She squeezed my hands, watching me with wide, pleading eyes. A loud, pounding on the front door stopped our conversation dead in its tracks. My heart thumped in my chest as Toby’s frantic voice carried through the house.
“Ever! Are you home? I need to talk to you! Please open up!”
My mom quickly left my bedroom for the front door, and I followed her, stopping in the doorway to the living room as Toby rushed inside. He stopped just a few feet away from me, his wide eyes searching my face, then tightening as he probably noticed the dried tear streaks and redness around my eyes. I’m sure I was a mess.
“I’m okay. What’s up?” I wasn’t completely okay. But I would be.
“They’re almost here. The Seekers. Ever, we have to get you out of here.”
“How do you know?”
Toby scanned the empty room around me, and I realized with a shiver that he had a direct connection to the world of lost spirits and wandering ghosts.
“They talk to you?” I whispered.
“No, not really. Not always. But they’re agitated”—his eyes darted around my living room once more—“We have to keep moving. We’ve stayed in one place too long.”
My mom pulled me to her in a strong embrace, then kissed me on the head and quickly pulled away. “Go with Toby, honey. You have to. I’ll find you soon.” She released me and headed to my room. “You have to pack some things. Come on. I’ll get started.”
“What? Mom? Wait!” I looked at Toby. “What’s going on? She’s not even upset?” I shook my head, trying to clear my mind and make sense of everything.
“Ted was here late last night, Ever. I think your mom knows more than you thought,” Toby answered, mimicking similar words my mom had spoken just a few seconds earlier. “And she’s right. Either way, you have to pack, and we have to go.”
“What? I don’t understand. Where will we go?”
It was what I had planned all along, to run away with Toby, but now that it was actually happening, I couldn’t control the shock…or the fear…that now gripped me.
“There’s no time. If the Seekers are almost here, we have to go. We need more time to figure out how to beat the clock, and you have to stay hidden until we figure it out. As long as we keep moving, not staying in one place for too long…I can’t let them take you. You understand that, right? I’ve failed you so many times.”
“No, I mean, I can’t leave yet. I still have to—”
“Dammit, Ever!” Greg shouted as he entered the front door. “Just go with Toby, okay? You don’t have a choice right now, and we don’t have time for you to be stubborn!”
Jessie entered behind Greg, her eyes rimmed with redness and tears.
“Greg? Jessie? What are you guys doing here?”
“I called them. I knew you’d want to say goodbye. But there’s not much time. Where’s Frankie?”
“He’s gone.” As if you didn’t already know that…
“Ever!” my mom shouted from my room. “Hurry up and come pack!”
Jessie grabbed my hand, pulling me toward my room. “Come on, Ev!”
I followed Jessie down the hall, meeting my hurried mother in my room. I heard Greg and Toby in the kitchen opening drawers and cabinets and talking in a hushed, urgent tone.
My mom had two large duffle bags open, both of them overflowing with clothes. Jessie wasted no time running into my bathroom to collect my toiletries and makeup.
As I watched the chaos around me, I realized I hadn’t even had a chance to unpack after the Mexico trip from hell.
“Wait!”
My mom and Jessie both turned to me, stunned by my outburst.
“I haven’t even unpacked yet. And where am I going? Do you know? Because I sure don’t! I don’t even know what I’ll need!”
A silly worry for a silly girl, but this was all I could muster. Everything was happening too fast, and it seemed like it happened around me, but I wasn’t actually a part of it. My life whipped around like a tornado, and I was helpless to stop it.
Jessie stepped forward and took my face in her hands. “Ever, I love you, but you have to stop being stubborn, and you can’t worry about what you’ll wear at a time like this.” Says my fashionista best friend. “Your mom is packing everything you’ll need, and Toby will take care of the rest, okay? Gr
eg says we’re going to meet up with you soon, if we can, but for now, you have to go alone.”
“Jessie, how are you so calm? What do you know?”
“I don’t know much more than you, if anything, but I trust Greg. And if he says you and Toby have to go, then I believe him.” She handed me jeans, a tank-top, and a hoodie, without meeting my eyes.
She was hiding something.
I opened my mouth to argue with her when she held an outfit in front of me and said, “Here, put this on so I can throw your jammies in one of those bags.”
I did as I was told, pulling on jeans and a gray hoodie over a white tank-top, and Jessie handed my discarded pajamas to my mom, who in turn stuffed them into one of the duffels.
“Honey?” My mom stood up and walked over to me with two bags that would barely close because of all the contents. “I promise you that I will find you guys soon. And I promise that when we meet again, we will talk about everything and I will tell you all that you wish know. But for now, you have to trust me. And you have to go with Toby.”
She quickly kissed my cheek, then pulled back to look at me once more. I knew arguing with her—or any of them—would be useless.
“Now, baby,” Mom whispered.
I turned and headed down the hall, my pace quickening as I saw Toby’s expression, his eyes narrowed as he scanned the room around me, watching things—beings—I couldn’t see. He met me at the doorway to the living room and grabbed the bags from my hands. Jessie filled my now empty hands with my toiletries bag and a beach bag she’d filled with a jacket and whatever else she’d deemed necessary for my unknown travels.
“We love you,” Jessie said as I flew out the door. “Stay safe! And Toby, if anything happens to my best friend, I will kill you myself.”
“She won’t need to, James, because I’ll do it for her,” Greg said.
When I glanced back at them, my mom looked more worried than I could remember ever seeing her before. Jessie rubbed my mom’s back, and Greg stood with his hand protectively gripping Jessie’s shoulder. My mom’s eyes were wide, and her forehead was creased, and I knew that with that determined, worried look in her eyes, if anything happened to me, she’d kill Toby before Jessie or Greg could think to do it.
As I climbed into the Mustang, Mom inhaled a deep breath and squared her shoulders. With a curt nod, she told me everything would be okay.
I hoped her strength would spread to me soon…because I felt anything but okay.
“Are you okay?” Toby asked.
“Are you serious?”
“No. I mean…never mind. That was a stupid question.”
We’d been in the car for four or five hours. Toby had tried a few times to talk to me, but I’d only answered with one or two word responses, and the occasional pit stop request. A girl could only ride in silence for so long, though, and I was about at my limit.
We were driving through Bakersfield or Barstow or some other brown, deserted place that started with a B, and I was starving. My stomach announced my hunger before I could speak up about it.
“You’re hungry?” asked Captain Obvious.
“Yes, obviously. Can we find a place to eat? Is it safe to stop and sit down?”
“Um,” he stammered. His eyes flicked to the rearview mirror for about the nine-thousandth time since we’d left Orange. “I don’t think we’ve been followed, but you know a Seeker could be anywhere. We could be spotted if we stay in one place too long.”
“You mentioned that, but what, we don’t even get to rest? Or eat? Toby, how long is that really going to work? Nothing but driving, until what, my birthday comes along or a Seeker finds me and kills me right here in the passenger seat of the Mustang?”
“No, it’s not like that. We can stop to eat, and of course, there are these things called drive-throughs…heard of them?”—he grinned—“I just really want to get you out of state. Greg, Jessie, and your mom are trying to lead the Seekers in different directions while we head north. Greg and Jessie are heading back down into Mexico, and your mom and Ted are heading north like us, just a bit more inland. Ariadne is heading east with—”
“Ariadne? Are you serious? She’s probably leading them right to us!”
“No, she’s not. She’s actually helping us, Ever. I really believe her. Apparently we assumed incorrectly about her reason for being in Mexico. She wanted to warn you. That’s why she’d been there. She was looking for you.”
“Yeah, right. To find me so she could turn me in herself.”
Have they all lost their minds?
“I know it seems that way, and even I had my doubts, believe me, but I think she’s sincerely trying to help. I don’t think she had any idea what she was doing when she brought Frankie back and promised to collect your soul instead.”
“What? Are you freaking kidding me right now? Oh look,” I said in a mock-sweet voice, “I found some black magic, maybe I should play with it and cast some spells on my friends! Weee! Or, oh I know, look at this awesome looking gun, maybe I’ll go shoot it as if I don’t know what will happen when I aim it at someone’s face! There’s a plan!”
“I know you won’t believe me, but I don’t think she truly meant to brand you, Ever. I think she acted in anger and jealousy and made a stupid, ignorant mistake.”
“Oh, well, no big deal, right? I mean, it’s just my life on the line.”
I didn’t want to argue with him anymore, especially not about what a completely horrid person his ex-girlfriend was. I pointed to a sign on the side of the freeway. “Barbeque. That’s where we’re eating.”
“You want to eat in a town called ‘The Bathroom?’”
“What?”
“Look at the sign. Los Baños means the bathroom.”
“Oh. Well, yeah. I guess I do. I want barbeque, and they’ve got the ‘World’s Best.’”
Well, that’s what the sign said anyway, and I was tired of sitting in the car.
Toby glanced over at me, so I squared my jaw and crossed my arms. On this, I would not back down. He shook his long bangs out of his face with a huff and turned on his blinker. Then he did something even more surprising: he exited the freeway. My pout worked. Amazing.
My surprise was quickly replaced by excitement. I was about to have a belly full of brisket. Thank you, Los Bathrooms. I had to enjoy the little things, seeing as how I was marked for death and running for my life. No biggie.
The city—if it could even be called a city—was small and dead. I wondered if I’d left the world of soul collectors and jumped right into the zombie apocalypse. Why not, right? Signs everywhere boasted world’s garlic capitol, or world’s largest artichokes. Frankly, I couldn’t imagine how anything could be grown in such a brown, dead-looking place.
Hog Heaven BBQ was almost as empty as the town itself, but the restaurant was open, and I could smell the smoked meat from the parking lot next door. Toby was fidgety and nervous, his eyes darting all around as we walked inside. Though seeing him behave in such a paranoid manner made my stomach sink, I tried to ignore it, knowing he could see things I couldn’t see. I wondered briefly why I’d never noticed him scanning the area around him so much…were the ghosts so agitated, as he put it, that they behaved in a way he’d never seen before?
I’d ask him about that later. I mean, we were just stopping for a quick dinner and would be on the road again in under an hour. What could go wrong?
We entered an old western-style restaurant with wooden everything—tables, floor, walls—and a dinky little salad bar was the focal point of the room. But I wasn’t there for the salad bar, and I figured no one else ever visited for that reason either. Lassos and cowboy paraphernalia decorated the walls, and an ancient man worked behind the counter. His skin was as leathery as the old saddle that hung in one corner, but his smile was sincere and the sparkle in his eye told me he loved his little restaurant. The pictures on the wall, with him and about every celebrity you could think of, told me this was in fact his restaurant.
> When we approached him, he began cutting off small bites of meat for us to sample. I didn’t know if he was just lonely and excited to see customers, or if this was how he treated every guest, but I definitely didn’t care. The second that sample of brisket hit my taste buds, I instantly knew I’d never want to eat barbeque anywhere else again.
“Ohhh mah gohd,” I said around a mouthful of heaven. I smiled at Toby, and he just shook his head. Then the old man handed him a hunk of meat and I watched as his face lit up the same way I imagine mine had. His eyes closed, and I smiled widely as he experienced the same heaven-sent goodness that I savored. We sampled some chicken and ribs as well, but both ordered the brisket. I don’t know why Cowboy Grandpa even made that other stuff—I couldn’t imagine anyone ever skipped the brisket.
We ate in happy silence, and for a second, as short-lived as it was, I pretended we were just on vacation.
Absently, I focused on Toby as he ate, and I didn’t realize I stared at him until he winked at me. Of course, my cheeks heated up in response.
“I’ve missed you.”
I smiled and looked down at my nearly-empty plate. All that was left was a huge hunk of white onion, and frankly, I’m not really sure why that had been on my plate in the first place. I ignored Toby’s statement, which was cowardly of me, yes, but I wasn’t ready to acknowledge him yet. At least not as anything more than the person driving me to Timbuktu and trying to keep me alive.
“You’re blushing.”
“Duh.”
“Are you going to eat that?”
I looked up at him quickly, my lips curling into a scowl. “Eew, no way…why, do you want it?”
“Um, no. I think I’ll pass.”
I looked down at his plate and noticed his onion was the only thing that remained as well.
“What’s up with the onion?” I asked.
“I have no idea. But I’m glad you made me stop here. That was ridiculous.”
“I know, right? Best brisket ever. I’m stuffed.”