Twenty minutes after I’ve stormed out of SynthoTech, I’m still all worked up, gripping the steering wheel like it’s the only thing that’s keeping me from flying off the handle. Fucking Axe MacKenzie. I swear to God, I’mallergicto that man. My phone rings, and I see Mom’s name pop up. I answer even though I’m driving and I don’t really feel like chatting. But she’ll take my mind, and other blushing body parts, off Axe.
“I hope I’m not overstepping your boundaries,” she starts, which is basically her calling card forI’m definitely about to overstep your boundaries. Same energy asI hope you don’t mind my sayingandI’m your mother, so I know.“Josie, are you listening to me?”
“I’m here, Mom.” I try to keep my sigh from becoming a groan, and my foot presses a little harder on the gas. Like going faster might let me outrun this conversation.
“So, since you weren’t handling it, I went ahead and posted to your socials—and yes, I know we had an agreement, sweetie pie. But, Josie, this is for Alan and me, too. We’re really trying to help you get back on your feet. And you know the medication costs are outrageous. I could show you the stack of bills, all the extraexpenses insurance refuses to cover. We were counting on renting out that apartment unit this spring, and since we’re not—”
“Shit, okay. I get it,” I snap.
I’m now stuck behind a bus coughing exhaust into my AC. My hands are sweaty on the steering wheel as annoyance sweeps through me.
Silence.
Mom hates any kind of “rough language” from me. At some point, my JosieFightsOn personality—the sunshine-and-sunflowers daughter I needed to be for donations and crowdsourcing—seemed to merge, in Mom’s head at least, with the real me. Anything outside the margins upsets her.
She’d be literally gobsmacked if she saw how I popped off on Axe.
Come to think of it, I am, too.
To be fair to Mom, even I can’t always tell where JosieFightsOn ends and the real Josie begins. You tell a story about who you are long enough, and it starts to feel like the truth.
“It’s no big deal, Josie. And don’t use profanity with me,” she snaps, all frosty. Because obviously the issue here is my use of the wordshit. Not the fact that she steamrolls over my personal boundaries.
“Dammit!” I yell, but this time my cursing is not actually aimed at my mom.
My car just made a noise. A clunking noise. “Shit! Shit! Shit!”
“Josie! What’s wrong?” Of course she goes straight to panic.
“I’m fine. I’m fine. A small car thing. We’ll talk later.”
I pull the car to the shoulder and get out. Yup. Flat tire. Looking as deflated as I feel. There’s no spare in my trunk—Gertrude, my car, is currently being held together with duct tape and optimism. I also don’t have AAA, because I’m twenty-six years old,live with my parents, and can barely afford a microwave burrito let alone roadside assistance.
And right on cue—just like my tarot reading warned me—this day takes another turn for the worse. I’m pulling out my phone, debating who to call, when I feel the first raindrop hit my face.
“You have GOT to be kidding me,” I mutter to absolutely no one. The highway roars with passing cars, and then, of course, the heavens open up like I’ve been personally chosen for a cosmic dunk tank.
Within seconds, I’m soaked.
Perfect. Just perfect. Nothing like a surprise rain shower to top off a total shit show of a day. Right now, I’m about as far from JosieFightsOn as I can get.
I feel the rage bubbling up. Rage at Bryan, at Axe, at the universe that decided to swipe my childhood and leave me with debt I can never pay back. Rage at my mom for never getting how humiliating and wrong it is to have your life turned into a crowdfunding campaign.
And then a memory hits me like another sudden storm, but this one’s from deep inside, dark and heavy: I’m a kid in a hospital bed, tubes running into my arms. I can’t move, can’t even turn my head without feeling like razor blades are scraping against my spine and the base of my skull. I’m boiling with anger at the unfairness of it all, at the people who put me here. At the body that betrayed me. At myself, most of all, for not being strong enough to crawl out of that bed and rip the tubes out.
I’ll never forget this. I’ll never forgive it.
Just as quickly as the rage floods in, it drains away as I give myself a shake and reset. Who can I call for help? Definitely not my parents—I’m not ready for round two with Mom. So…who,then? Honor, maybe? She had to borrow my car for months before Strike gifted her that shiny new Audi convertible for her birthday.
If anyone gets it, it’s her.
I shoot a text to Honor, and she promises to call a tow truck and swing by to get me ASAP. I climb back into Gertrude, soaked to the bone and shivering like a wet dog. I sit there, staring at my phone, debating whether I’m brave enough to check my socials. It can’t bethatbad, right? Besides, this day—no, thisweek—can’t get any worse. I’ve already sent out 130 emails canceling my wedding. Surely I can handle a quick scroll through Instagram.
I take a cleansing breath, make a wish even though it’s not anywhere close to 11:11 and I have no loose eyelashes, and click.
Oh no. No. No. No. No. No. I feel nauseous.
The post from my account is sugary and begging—a straight-up cash grab—and my mom’s imitation of my voice makes me sound like I’m fifteen years old.
