Now I was wondering what giving a god that book would do. What kind of damage could be done to the world, to the people I loved.
“How do you know that?” Abbi asked.
Eunice spread her hands, beads sighing. “Because I am what I am.”
Whatever that meant.
“Why did I fall?” Abbi pressed. “You said I fell.”
Eunice lowered her hand, fingers hovering above the table.
I held my breath. There needed to be a song. Somehow I knew there needed to be a song for Eunice to tap to, a way she could remain anchored in this reality, this possibility. Or maybe a way she could remain clear-sighted beneath the scattershot futures shifting under the waves of free will.
She was song, or connected to song in a deep way I could sense, but didn’t have words for. What did she mean when she said she was what she was? A seer?
The sound of aclick, like a record arm swinging to drop a needle into a vinyl groove, filled the store.
But there was no one playing records here.
Eunice’s finger dropped, sharp nail tapping the Formica, and a new song poured out over the speakers, this one a little slower, but strong: The Five Satins were crooning what they were going to do in the still of the night.
“You must answer that, Moon Rabbit,” Eunice said. “I see…I can feel so many reasons you fell, so many times. Loneliness? Curiosity? You were looking for something too. Have you found it?”
“They have grass soda,” Abbi said, as if that were any kind of an answer.
“Yes,” Eunice agreed. “They do.”
“And, I don’t know.” Abbi picked up the huge sunglasses in the middle of the table, her gaze darting to Lu, then to me. “They have other things too. Nice things. Nice…people.”
“Yes,” Eunice agreed. “They do. Do you understand?”
“I don’t know. I just…you said I fell for him.” She frowned, then leaned her head toward Hado, who looped his arm over her shoulder, taking her scant weight.
Eunice still stared at some far-off horizon, her finger rising and dropping on beat. “Maybe I was right.”
“Who do you work for?” Lu asked.
I startled, because I hadn’t thought of that, but I nodded. It was a good question. A great question.
“No one. Well, not as how you are asking. No one told me to find you other than my own self. No one pays me for my time, since time and me are a mess, mostly.”
“No god?” Lu asked.
Eunice shifted her way, the light through the window throwing broken-glass colors like flower petals across her snow white hair. “No god, lost daughter. No monster, no human. I follow my own road, pay my own tolls. The book is not mine, nor do I want it.”
“What do you want?” I asked.
It was her turn to startle. Her finger lost the beat again, and it took several more for her to pick it up. But now, oh, now she was smiling as she twisted toward me.
“That, Brogan Gauge, is exactly what I wanted to hear.”
She snapped her fingers.
Everything in the shop stopped.
Lu, Abbi, Hado, our server who was coming our way with a tray of food, the kids running down the candy aisle, the two middle-aged men loading up on soda flavors that could only be intended as a dare—all froze.
Eunice stood. “There isn’t much time in this time, not even a whole beat. I need to show you something. Quickly.”
