by Orchid Leigh
I stared back down at the ice cream, all beady and wet on the counter. I huffed a little and picked it up. I scooped another spoon out for Peter and put the lid back on, then put it away in the fridge.
“You okay?” asked Peter, standing rigid where I left him.
“Yeah,” I said with a weak smile. “I’m fine.” I went back to fiddling with my pie crust.
Peter leaned sideways into me, bumping my shoulder. “Here taste this,” he said, holding up a spoon of apple crisp to me. “It’ll make you feel better.”
I took the bite compliantly.
“Did it help?”
I smiled at him. “Yeah,” I said. “Short-lived, but yeah.”
“Why don’t we do something to get your mind off of things?” he suggested.
“Yeah, okay,” I said. “Can we go to your house?” He still hadn’t let me meet his mom, but the nerve-wracking scene of meeting her for the first time seemed like the perfect distraction to me.
Peter slumped. “I don’t want to go there.”
I finished crimping my pie and frowned at him. “Come on,” I petitioned. “Your mom’s going to start thinking I’m imaginary.”
“She already does,” he said with a laugh. He thought for a second and shook his head. “Not today. She’s too stressed out. She didn’t even want me there.”
“What’s she so stressed about?”
“Money,” he said with a sigh. “Like always. She wants to go back to nursing school so she can get a better job, but that takes money she doesn’t have.”
“That sucks,” I said. I put my pie in the fridge. “Puts my problems into perspective, I guess.”
Peter smiled. “There you go.”
“Do you want to go hang out at the lake?” I asked.
“Is that a good idea?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
Peter shrugged. “I was thinking something to distract you from Glacia, not remind you of it.”
I rolled my eyes a little. “It’s the lake, Peter. I’ll be fine.”
Peter scrunched up his cheek, looking unsure. I saw the struggle on his face. He was obviously debating on whether or not it was worth arguing about. He folded with a sigh and smiled at me. “Let’s go,” he said.
~
“What are you thinking about?” asked Peter.
“Huh?”
“You’re thinking about something,” he said. He reached over and patted my head. I looked up from the trail to him.
“Oh, nothing,” I said, realizing we’d made it all the way back home without a word between us. “These trails kind of hypnotize me.”
“You’ve been quiet all day,” he said. “What’s up?”
I stopped and turned to him but focused my attention on some new baby buds forming on the branches near his shoulder instead.
He had been right. The lake was a bad idea. Instead of getting my mind off of things, it did exactly the opposite, and I had spent all afternoon thinking about the one thing I had meant to distract myself from.
“What?” he asked after a moment of me just staring into the thickets.
I moved my eyes to his and took a nervous breath. “I want to go back,” I said.
He narrowed his gaze but didn’t say anything.
“I know you think I shouldn’t, but I want to.”
“Ellie.” He sighed. “I really think it’s a bad idea.”
“Why?” I asked. “Why is it so bad to want to help them?”
Peter studied me with troubled eyes. “Because . . . we don’t know what could happen there. We don’t know what that evil queen Razora wants. What if she tries to hurt you?”
“I don’t think she can hurt me,” I said weakly.
“You believe that?”
“I don’t know.” I threw up my arms, exasperated. “But . . .” I trailed off and started walking again.
“But what?” asked Peter, following after me.
I stopped and turned to him. “You’re going to think I’m crazy,” I said.
“I’m not going to think you’re crazy. Just tell me.”
“I feel like I can help them. Like I’m supposed to or something.”
Peter slumped. “You don’t need to worry about them,” he said. “They’ll manage without you.”
“What if they can’t?”
“Then it’s not your problem.”
“But if I can help?”
“Look, Ellie,” he said with growing frustration I could see in his eyes. “They’ve survived how many years without you? They’ll figure it out.”
“What if they don’t? And you heard what Levvi said. I’m running out of time.”
Peter sighed. “Can’t you just forget about it?”
“Fine,” I said, turning to walk home.
Peter stood still as I walked ahead on the trail, and I was glad for it. I had been in a rotten mood all day and I knew arguing about this was going to make me cry. I didn’t want him to see me like this.
“Wait up,” he called after me. His footsteps were catching up, but I kept walking. “Wait, Ellie. Wait.” He pulled on my arm to stop me. “I’m sorry. Don’t be mad.”
I stared at the ground, hiding my teary eyes from him.
“Are you crying?” he asked, pulling my chin up.
“No.” I wiped at my eyes, feeling stupid.
“Oh, geez,” said Peter. He pulled on his sleeve and wiped it across my cheek. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
“It’s not you, Peter,” I said, cutting him off. “I don’t know what it is.” I turned away from him again and kicked at the ground. “I just feel so strange lately. So freakin’ lost or something.”
Peter circled around to face me. “Hey,” he said. “You’re going to be okay. You just need to give it some time, ya know?”
“But I don’t have time.”
He sighed and reached for my hands, pulling them into his. “We should never have gone,” he said.
I pulled away. “What do you want me to say? That you were right? I’m sorry, but how was I supposed to let all that go?”
“No. That’s not what I meant. I don’t know.” He grabbed at his hair in frustration. “I just wish none of this ever happened.”
“Well, it did,” I said, feeling new tears stinging my eyes. “And now I’ve got to deal with it.”
Peter sighed wearily, staring at me with his lips pressed tight. He tried for my hands again, but I pulled back and folded my arms over my chest.
“Look, maybe you should just go,” I said. I didn’t really want him to go, but I was exhausted and tired, and I didn’t feel like talking about this anymore.
“Yeah, okay,” he said, but he stood still and stared at me with his hands in his pockets.
“What?” I asked, feeling thin and papery and like my crabby, grumpy self was going to crack and bleed if scraped at too much longer.
“Ellie,” he said, shrugging. “Just remember . . . they’re not the only ones that need you.”
I took a deep breath and pondered that thought quietly.
He shrugged at me again. “Okay . . . I guess I’ll talk to you later.”
Peter turned away. I stood alone in the forest and watched him walk until he faded among the trees and was out of sight.
~
I walked back home in a foul mood. It was still early, and a Saturday, and I only had myself to thank for the lonely evening I had to look forward to.
Dad and Millie were in the kitchen when I entered.
“What’s this?” I asked, eyeing the counter with curiosity. There were about fifty empty beer bottles lined up on top of it.
“Your dad’s getting into the beer business,” said Millie. She was fiddling with the spout of a large white bucket sitting next to the bottles.
“Yep, brewing up some ale,” said Dad.
“Now that’s something I can see you doing,” I said with a smile at Dad. “What are you going to call it? You’ll need a good name if you want to stand out.”
“It’s just a hobby,” said Dad.
I shrugged him off. “How about Old Papa Jim’s Brewsky? Or . . . Jimmy’s Over the Hill Brewing Company? Or Ol’ Papa Hearts Best Brew.”
“Ha . . . ha,” Dad said without a smidge of a smile on his face.
Millie leaned into Dad and patted his back warmly. “Hey, fifty’s not that old,” she said. “You’ll see when it starts creeping up on you.” She winked at me.
“I’ll keep thinking,” I said, laughing at them. “Can I taste some?”
Dad eyed me sedately, mulling the thought. “One sip,” he said and pushed a bottle to me.
I brought it to my lips. “Eww . . .” I stuck out my tongue and shuddered the vile taste away. “No offense, but is that how it’s supposed to taste?”
“Yep,” said Dad flatly. “And that’s how it all tastes.” He lowered stern eyebrows at me, warning me to stay away.
I put up my hands, happy to yield on this one.
“Where’s Peter?” asked Millie.
I glanced at Peter’s apple crisp, which still sat on the counter, cold and left. “Ah . . . he had to go home,” I said, hoping I had managed to keep out any telltale signs there could be more to that story.
“Your dad and I are going to be watching a movie in a bit if you want to join us.”
I pinched up my cheek, unsure. “Thanks . . . maybe,” I said. “I think I’m just going to try and get some homework done, though.”
“Okay,” said Millie, perhaps sensing something was wrong, but thankfully she didn’t ask.
I got up and reached across the counter and pulled the apple crisp to me. I grabbed the aluminum foil that was already out and pulled a piece over the top.
“This is Peter’s,” I said, putting it in the fridge.
“You’re going to make apple crisp and not share it with your ol’ father?” grumbled Dad.
I closed the fridge and walked back over to him. “There’s an apple pie just for you, Dad,” I said, kissing him on the cheek. “Four hundred degrees for forty-five minutes.”
He patted my back. “Thank you, sweetheart.”
I left Dad and Millie with their task of bottling the beer and headed to my room. I wasn’t feeling like a movie night. I wasn’t feeling like doing much of anything, really.
I flopped on my bed and gazed up through the skylight at the cloudless blue sky. There was a lone hawk hovering high in the air. He looked so free and so sure of his spot in the sky up there, and I watched, envious, wishing I could join him in his certitude.
I was feeling anything but sure these days. Restless, pulled, drained: that was how I was feeling. And the worst part was I couldn’t do anything about it because I wasn’t sure what I should do.
My unhelpful heart kept playing tricks on me. It was tugging, relentlessly, in both directions. It wanted Glacia. And it wanted home. At some point, it had split into two. I had split into two.
I felt now that maybe it was a long time coming. Maybe, somehow, Levvi was right and I did belong in Glacia. It was a strange idea that—with each passing day—was seeming not so strange after all.
And now that the split was complete, I was having to wrestle with these two sides of me. It was unsettling and frustrating, and I wanted—needed—it to stop.
I sat back up in my bed and looked across my room with wistful thoughts of Glacia. I slumped down and buried my head in my hands, wishing they’d go away.
22
“Is Peter coming to my party tonight?” asked Jenny.
We were at lunch, and I had been lost in a daze again. I rubbed at the corner of my tired eyes and glanced up at Jenny, who was tapping her pen at me. She had her notebook out and was busy making a playlist for the party.
“Oh, I’m not sure. I’ll have to ask him after school. Is that okay?”
I had failed to mention that Peter and I hadn’t spoken to each other in four days. He called me when he got home that night, but we both sat quietly, unsure of what to say, and it was just an uncomfortable, awkward mess the whole time. When he called the next day, I didn’t pick up, and he hadn’t tried again since. I was now feeling altogether like a lost dog, lonely and sad and very far from anything that resembled home. It sucked.
“Yeah, that’s fine,” she said, jotting down another song.
“What’s wrong?” said Bethany. “Is he too scared to come hang out with us normals?”
She was sitting in the chair beside me, licking a spoon of yogurt. I turned a slow head and glared at her. I wasn’t having it today. I was already on edge. I was already in a bad mood. And I had a pounding headache that would not stop, and now, thanks to Bethany, it just got a whole lot louder.
I steamed like a bull in her direction. “What’s your problem, Bethany?” I snapped.
My sharp reaction caught her off guard. She turned slowly from her spoon to me. She lowered it to the table and kept hardline eyes on mine. “Sorry, I don’t get it, Ellie,” she said, raising her hands, looking incredulous. “I just don’t understand why you like him.”
“Why wouldn’t I like him?” I shot back. “Do you even know him at all?” I wasn’t bothering to control my volume, and a few kids from the tables beside us looked up. Good. They could stare for all I cared.
“Yeah, I know Peter Evans,” she said, matching my volume. Her eyes rolled heavily in their sockets. “Everyone here knows Peter Evans.” She made a gesture toward the crowded cafeteria. “He used to go here. Didn’t he tell you?”
No. Peter never told me that.
“Yeah,” she said, noticing my look of surprise. “And there’s a reason he had no friends here. He’s a loser like his two-timing, belligerent drunk of a father. I’d stay away from that family if I were you.”
My eyes burned, hot with tears. I looked down, hating myself for it. I took a deep breath and sucked them up; I would not let her make me cry.
“He’s not his father, Bethany. God!” I said, my frustration with her peaking. “You have no idea what you’re talking about. And you don’t know him. If you did, you would know he’s actually pretty cool.” I shook my head, realizing how exhausted I was. I liked Bethany, I did, but I wasn’t going to keep defending Peter to her. “Anyway, whatever. Think what you want, but he’s my best friend, so I’m sorry, but if you can’t accept him, I don’t think we can be friends anymore.” I turned away from Bethany and stared at my lunch tray, still trying to control my tears.
“I think he’s cute,” said a quiet Jenny from across the table. I glanced up to see her smiling face and was hit with a rush of gratitude. “Come on, Bethany. You’ve got to at least admit he’s cute.”
Bethany glowered at Jenny, then rolled defeated eyes over to me. “Fine,” she said. “Yeah, he’s not bad looking.” Then she grumbled, low and under her breath, “He could use a haircut, though.” She met my gaze. “Look, I’m sorry. You’re right. I don’t know him. I’ll be nice.”
“You’re going to talk to him at the party tonight,” I told her.
“What am I going to talk to him about?” she rasped.
“Just say hi to him. That’s all,” I said, finding my irritation with her once again.
“Fine,” she said, and then more kindly added, “I can do that.”
~
While I was waiting to board the bus after school, Jenny’s crush, Joey Williams, walked past me.
“Hey, Joey!” I called after him.
He stopped and turned to me, confused. We had never spoken before, and I only knew him from science class. He pointed at himself awkwardly, checking to see if I had really meant him.
I nodded impatiently.
“Hey!” I said again, hoping he would hurry. My bus was filling up and the bus driver was starting to tap his foot at me.
“Ellie?” asked Joey, walking toward me.
“Yeah. So, hey, I don’t know if you know this, but Jenny B’s having her birthday party tonight—you should come.”
“Are you asking me out?” he asked, obviously
still confused as to why I was speaking to him.
“Oh, no. I’m sorry. I mean . . . just . . . you know, it would be cool if you came to Jenny’s party.” I tried to emphasize Jenny’s name without being too obvious. “You know who she is, right?”
“Yeah, I know who Jenny is,” he said. Of course he did. Everybody here knows everybody.
“Yeah, so you should come. It’d be fun. Starts at 7:30. Do you know where she lives?”
“Yeah, she lives on my street,” he said.
“Oh, well, then that’s perfect.”
The bus driver waved for me to hurry.
“I got to go. I’ll see you later at the party,” I said, quickly climbing the steps.
“Wait, Ellie!” Joey called after me. The door closed on him as he was still trying to say something. I waved and smiled as the bus rolled away.
23
The key. I know it’s in here somewhere.
I was searching through the top drawer of Dad’s desk. The bus had just dropped me off, and I didn’t have much time. I didn’t know where Millie was, but her new car wasn’t in the driveway. This was the first opportunity I had to try and get my locket since coming back from Glacia, and I needed to take the chance. It was now or never, I told myself.
I closed the drawer. That was too obvious. Where would Dad put it? I thought for a second, then continued my search in the small coat closet. This was where the safe had been hidden, but I hadn’t seen a key anywhere. He had a few business jackets hanging in here. I checked the pockets. Nothing. I looked around the closet. It was fairly empty except for a single shoebox shelved at the top. I opened it. It was filled with letters addressed to Dad, from Millie—from the month they spent apart when she visited her family in Tennessee. Nope, I wouldn’t be reading those. I put the box back.
He had some dress shoes lined up against the back of the closet. I picked one up and tipped it over. Nothing. I repeated this for the other shoes, and on the last loafer, a jangle of metal fell to the heel. I grabbed at the small brass keyring and hurried over to the lockbox.
I inserted the key, twisted, then opened the lid. The sealed envelope containing the locket was at the bottom. I grabbed it and placed it in my pocket.