forty-one.
She waited there for a few moments—heart in her mouth, pulse thick and painful in her veins—and heard nothing but her own shallow breathing. The summer sun was a ball of flames, but she was so frozen, she wondered if she’d ever thaw out. Alongside her, the river gurgled and giggled and made her shiver.
When she’d read all the old fairy tales as a kid, she’d sometimes imagined herself as one of their princesses in trouble. Just waiting, sure she would be rescued by her special prince, whether it be from a dragon-guarded castle or moat-encircled tower or forest thick with poisonous trees. All she had to do was wait, and he’d come.
But no tale had ever covered being rescued from the shore of a river that was the color of mud. Or a covert stained with old blood. Or a town that was pitted with greed, made into a trap by its own people.
And Marsden especially couldn’t think of a single story about someone being rescued when they were the ones who messed things up in the first place.
She was the dragon, the moat, the poison.
Jude wasn’t coming back. His fury had been alive, absolute, his certainty of her guilt without a single doubt. He wasn’t suddenly going to understand what she’d done, turn around on the road, and say Marsden, you’ve been lying to me ever since I came to you for help, have just destroyed what I have left of my big brother, and made me think you were someone you weren’t just so I wouldn’t hate you, but I’m actually okay with all that. So you want to keep digging in the covert together?
She got on her bike, swung it out onto the shoulder of the highway, and headed toward the center of Glory, moving as fast as she could.
To find him.
• • •
By the time she got downtown, road dust in her mouth and on her skin like a coating of ash, the sun had dropped past the midway point, shining down on the back of her neck instead of the top of her head.
Late afternoon. She should have been at the covert with Jude, dragging Rigby’s old metal detector over the ground. Her chest pounded, was spiked with nerves as she biked along the streets and down the blocks, her eyes looking for him. She passed Evergreen, passed Seconds, and nearly rode right past the café, where his work truck was parked.
Theola.
Resentment for her grandmother’s old friend rose in her, black and tidal. Wasn’t it bad enough that Marsden had been born into a family with an ancestor so infamous that simply saying his name aloud gave people the chills, sure they’d just invited the devil into their homes? That her grandmother also had to be friends with a person who gazed at palms and read their secret lines? Someone who glanced at mushed-up dregs in the bottoms of cups and then claimed they spoke of the future?
She leaned her bike against the outer wall of the café and strode inside.
It was the business lull between lunch and the late-afternoon snack rush, and she was the only customer in the place. No sign of Jude at all.
Theola sat in her booth in the back, her ever-watchful eyes fixed on Marsden. As though she’d been waiting for her, had known she would return to hear what had been left unsaid in the presence of Jude. The thought came bitterly, her wondering how Theola kept it all straight, the desperation of the people who came to talk to her, how to best price their ghosts and guilts and tragedies.
The psychic beckoned to her—her hat was especially flashy today, gold and wide-brimmed, and the smoky black feathers on it bobbed deeply with the gesture—and Marsden, sure she was making a mistake, walked over.
“Phoenix feathers,” Theola said, pointing at her hat as soon as Marsden sat down. “The man who made this hat for me—Lewis, who owns the costumer’s shop a few blocks away? He still has such a crush on me, the old sweetie—said he did it after dreaming of the sun being set on fire, before it let itself be burned up so that it could glow even brighter. How coming from ashes only made it stronger.”
“I’m not here to talk about the sun.” Why was she there when she should be looking for Jude? He wasn’t there—she should have turned right around and left already. Had she really wanted a reading but couldn’t admit it to herself? Did she need to find out what was in store for her now? “Or about phoenix feathers.” Or the ashes of her past.
In her smoker’s rasp, Theola called to the order counter for banana smoothies. An old man emerged from the kitchen, cursing someone named Darby for calling in sick and griping about how the hell was he going to get any of the paperwork done if he was out there cutting up damn bananas.
The mysterious Oliver Finney, Marsden guessed, finally willed into existence in order to work the blender. She would have to remember to tell Jude about the rare sighting, then she realized he wouldn’t want to hear anything from her at all.
Theola pushed aside her crossword puzzle—it was the same one she’d been working on last time, Marsden saw—so that only the elephant teapot and a set of cups sat between them. “You’re looking for Jude.”
“How did you know?” Her dark eyes already giving up her thoughts, when she’d always counted on them.
“His truck’s parked right outside,” Theola said.
“Oh.”
“And you wouldn’t ever come to see me on your own. I have come to be, thanks to your mother, somewhat of an enemy to you.”
Marsden’s face flamed as she wondered again just how much her eyes were revealing. Hadn’t she just had hateful thoughts about the psychic before coming inside?
“Shine wouldn’t approve of this visit,” Theola said.
“I’m not my mother.”
“No, you aren’t. You’re much more like Star.”
“I am?” Because Marsden had never heard the dead, not even once in all her hours spent in the covert.
“You’re sitting here, aren’t you?”
The storm in Marsden’s stomach churned. Could anyone ever really be ready to hear about the rest of their life? “I want to request a reading. Because I have something to ask you.”
Theola moved the elephant teapot to the side. The white ceramic cups, too. “I don’t need to do a technical reading to answer your question. And I can’t ask you to pay—not for something so obvious to me.”
More than uncomfortable now, it was all Marsden could do not to avert her eyes. Was Theola prying into her brain right that very second? Seeing through the tops of her hands right down to her palms and all their telltale signs? What did she think she was going to ask?
“I’m not asking about my father,” she said. “You were hinting at him the last time I was in here, remember? Not with words, but I still knew.”
“Of course I remember that. I also remember how on edge you were, skittish as a mouse. And you’re that way now, but over something else altogether.”
“I’m not . . . on edge.”
Theola laughed, a rough tinkle of sound. “You might have your father’s eyes, full of secrets you’re too good at hiding away, but Jude Ambrose is written all over the rest of you.”
The old woman’s gaze was sharp, too aware, and Marsden couldn’t meet it. She glanced out the window, saw a portion of Roadie’s work truck, and considered again why she’d chosen to stay after she’d realized Jude was nowhere to be seen. From behind the front counter came the sound of the blender, the sweet scent of ripe fruit, a hint of what she recognized to be star anise.
She’d have to try that one day, she thought distractedly, however reluctant Wynn was at trying anything new. Maybe the next time she asked for homemade muffins.
Her little sister had to get used to trying new things. The realization came with a spurt of annoyance. When they left Glory, they’d be leaving everything behind, after all. They’d already talked about it, dozens of times once Marsden knew Wynn could keep her plans a secret.
It’d been hard to wait as long as she did, since she’d needed to spin her reasons to suit a little girl simply tired of too many rules. Having to eat hidden away. Not being able to stay inside. Living in a house where certain areas were off limits. Marsden guessed if she waited too long, Wynn would begin to poke holes in all those reasons and demand better ones before agreeing to leave. It would make Marsden have to tell her more about the boardinghouse and how Nina really ran it. She would have to consider telling her sister about their mother.
Wynn was still mostly excited about leaving. Marsden knew she thought of it as an adventure, and that she liked Marsden secretly planning with her. They spoke of how they would decorate their bedrooms, and how they would stay inside all day long if they wanted to. Wynn could finally have pets. And Marsden would cook Chinese food for her. She’d bake Wynn egg tarts, exactly how Star had showed her to make them.
“He’s stronger than he thinks he is, you know.”
She looked at Theola.
“Rigby dying the way he did is leaving him feeling about as helpless as a newborn deer stumbling along the highway. But Jude will get his footing and, eventually, walk away just fine. Same as how you’ve grown beyond Shine by refusing to be blind—by working with the covert instead of fighting it.”
Marsden felt like she’d been fighting her family and its history her entire life. Because if she stopped, she would become her mother, and so would Wynn. If she stopped, she would have to let go of Jude for good, the ruined specter of Rigby forever between them.
“I wish we had nothing to do with the covert,” she whispered. “Just like my mom wishes.”
“Shine ran, has run from the very beginning, and will keep on running. You never have. So however much you hate the covert, you also accept it. Just as some people might always hate their scars, but without them, they’d be different people.”
Marsden heard the echo of Peaches’s words in Theola’s. The idea that someone could fix pain and even settle scores, but it didn’t mean the damage never happened.
Oliver Finney came over to their table, smoothies in tall glasses on a silver tray. His appearance said nothing of his unique ability to hide from a town with too many eyes. He wore a Seattle Mariners baseball cap, an annoyed frown on his face, and impatience in the line of his shoulders. But he’d thoughtfully topped the drinks with a sprinkling of crumbled banana chips, and a dab of almond butter anchored an oversize star anise to the lip of each glass. His eyes were full of affection for his wife as he set the tray down.
“Don’t choke on the garnish,” he grumbled. “Christ knows I can’t run this place myself.”
“I wouldn’t do that to our customers, darling.”
Marsden waited until he was gone before speaking again. She pulled her drink close, let its spice tickle her nose—not wild ginger, at least.
“What does Jude one day accepting Rigby being gone and my not being like my mom have to do with anything?” she asked. “What are you trying to tell me?”
Theola pulled off her star, shoved the sliver of almond butter into her glass with her straw, and stirred alive a milky, fragrant tornado. “I’m trying to tell you, Marsden Eldridge, that you and Jude Ambrose are far from done.”
Marsden’s eyes stung. “You already knew my question.”
“You already knew my answer.”
The taste of sugared fruit still lingered in her mouth as she left the café. She climbed onto her bike, turned it onto the road, and slowly began to pedal home. If Theola was right, she and Jude would meet again soon enough.
She knew choosing to believe the psychic even just a bit was the beginning of a slippery slope. After all, Theola never guaranteed anything, for anyone. She had no real way of knowing if Jude would forgive Marsden, or if they’d ever even be anything close to friends again. Just as there was no way of knowing if Theola was simply a fraud, through and through, and always had been.
But Marsden didn’t think so.
She needed to believe.
And because the world had never been kind to her, she took in what she saw next, and humiliation washed over her, telling her she was still a fool.
Stopped on her bike at the light on the corner, Marsden watched Jude and Abbot in front of the Burger Pit, their faces close together as they held each other, and wanted to disappear.