Seymour tensed. “Okay. What if they go bad?”
“Won’t matter much to me. I’ll be dead.”
“Oh. Uh, ’cause you’ll be dead.”
Sariel squeezed Seymour. “All of us will be.”
“Well.Fuck.”
From off to the side, Dagobert sighed loudly. “We can worry about dying later.” He gave the crystal a delicate wiggle. “Will someonepleasetake this wretched thing before Ivomit?”
Seymour coughed out a laugh. “What would you even vomit? Blood?”
“Yes,” Dagobert shrieked, his eyes cutting into Seymour. “Understand that unless this is an experience you would enjoy having for yourself and or be on the receiving end of, you will take this awful thing rightnow.”
“Ten-four.”
They leftthe old garage with the crystal, no blood vomit required, and Seymour drove Sariel and Day back through thecity after reattaching the key from his father to his key ring. He honestly didn’t have a destination in mind, only a singular desire to get as far away from that place as possible. Really, he wanted to hit the city limits and keep going, but he knew he couldn’t.
There was no way he could leave now.
Not only was Sariel potentially at risk, but so was every single monster in the city.
There were one or two Seymour wouldn’t have minded so much if something bad was going to happen—cough cough, Mr. Heiss—but there were plenty more who were likely innocent and didn’t deserve whatever nasty fate awaited them.
Like Sariel.
Beautiful, kind, and sweet Sariel.
It was growing late, the sun vanishing behind the buildings towering around them. It felt like a cage, the bars closing in faster and faster, and Seymour’s mind was spinning too fast to think clearly.
“Seymour?” Day asked.
“Mmm? What is it, baby girl?”
Day blinked her big eyes up at him. “I’m hungry.”
Seymour laughed. “Already?”
“Those monsters didn’t taste very good, and I would very much like some milk?”
“Uh…” Seymour scanned the street up ahead. “Hey, uh, do you like McDonald’s?”
“Do they have milk?”
“Yes.” Sariel nodded. “There is also chocolate.”
“Then yes!”
Seymour found a place to park and then they strolled up into the restaurant. While Sariel found a quiet table for him and Day in the corner, Seymour headed to the counter to order. He got more than a few strange looks, no doubt from his raggedappearance. His shirt was torn and bloody, and he figured it was obvious he hadn’t had the best day.
It could have also been the thirty cheeseburgers, ten large fries, and a dozen milks he ordered.
He waited off to the side, glancing back at Sariel and Day at the table.
Day was in Sariel’s lap, and she had folded napkins into an origami cat and some sort of bird. Maybe a swan or something. She danced the cat around and then roared, smashing it into the maybe-swan with lots of growling and snarling.
Adorable.
