In the end, she looked way more foolish than me, because the small crowd that gathered found a woman screaming about demons to be the only commotion.
I couldn’t help the feeling of despondence that came over me like the deep gray clouds Teal pulls into town when she’s sad. My grand idea to be just as mean back to these rude bullies, to be the pinecone and all that…all it ended up doing was drawing more attention tome. More attention to the fact that I am the town’s number one outcast. Maybe they were looking at her this morning. But all day today, I am the one who is going to be gossiped about by inadvertently adding to my own rumor mill. Not everyone will think I’m possessed when they hear what happened, but theywillthink to themselves,What is that lying freak going to do next?
I open my phone to text my sisters but stop when I see that Teal still hasn’t gotten back to me. I can’t double-text my sister, can I? That is literally the one person you shouldn’t have to double-text. I probably wouldn’t have hesitated to write her again even a year ago, but now the fear comes over me that Teal will see my name in her notifications and roll her eyes. I toss my phone back in my purse.
I take one last long, deep breath. I can do this. I can. Who cares if people at the bar think there’s a demon residing in my body? Maybe they’ll leave me alone for once. And on that thought, I should probably just roll with the rumor. Dress in all black. Put on vampire fangs with a hooked tail attached to my ass under a long, velvet cape. Get some contacts in the color of hellfire. If they’re scared I’m going to devour their souls, they’ll stop being mean to me, right?
I turn the car back on and check the time. That freak-out onlytook four minutes, so I’m not too behind Anise. I’ll just tell her I caught all the red lights if she asks, that way I won’t have to explain anything about this morning or why people are going to start crossing themselves and tossing holy water my way once they encounter me now.
When I step into Lost Souls, for about seven seconds, no one notices. I can take a moment to take in the décor—the realistic skeletons pinned on the walls, grinning at me. The tealights lighting the skull candleholders in the middle of every table, the way the flickering flames wink in the eye sockets. I can pretend, for one moment, what it would be like to be seen as a normal, boring woman who just stepped into an establishment oddly obsessed with bones. Who I might’ve become if I hadn’t fallen eight years ago. At the time, I wanted to become a radiologist at the local hospital. I wanted to do ultrasounds on pregnant people and see their happy faces when I told them the baby’s sex, or how wiggly and cute their baby looked that day.
I had planned on marrying Ramón and having a family of my own. I imagined getting together with my sisters and watching the little cousins all play while we sipped margaritas or some equally fancy-sounding alcoholic beverage to my teen mind. Teal was the only one of us who didn’t want kids. Sage and I have always wanted them.
I smile, thinking of little Oak and all the rolls on his chubby little legs. I need to see him and Sage this weekend. Maybe I’ll surprise her and bring something good to eat, and maybe the buffer of food will stop more weird suggestions from Sage, too.
By the time I’m done with these internal musings, I realize that everyone is either directly staring at me with scowls on their faces, or they are trying and failing to pretend not to notice me. Iclose my eyes briefly and scan the room once more. Anise waves her hand at me from the way, way back. Good. Maybe in the shadows, people will forget I’m here.
First, I order a blueberry-flavored beer at the bar, which makes the men next to me laugh and laugh about “girly drinks.” The bartender, a gorgeous woman withSwation her name tag and intricate tattoos going up and down her arms, yells, “Shut up, assholes,” at them as she hands me my frosty glass.
I keep my eyes down as I make my way toward Anise, who is drinking a martini with extra olives. She hands me a menu. “Want to share the loaded chips?”
I glance down the long list of appetizers. It doesn’t hit me how hungry I am until I realize that literally everything looks good, from the garlic Parmesan tater tots to the deep-fried mac and cheese balls. “I didn’t realize they updated the menu so much.”
“Oh yeah, they expanded it months ago. They got a new chef and everything.” Anise laughs. “It even made the news. Where have you been?”
I try hard to make my laugh as lighthearted-sounding as hers. Where have I been? One of two places: the dusty basement of our work building, and my bedroom—the upstairs attic room Sage occupied until she moved in with Tenn. That’s it. That’s where I have been. Either below the ground, surrounded by old creaking bones and the old creaking earth, or way above, looking down at the cliff jutting right up toward the back of Nadia’s two-story home like a sea-sharpened claw. And that’s how I like it.
“Let’s get the chips,” I say instead of answering the question.
Luckily Anise doesn’t seem to notice, or if she does, she pretends otherwise. We begin with awkward small talk about work. Well, it’s awkward on my end. Anise is warm and friendly as usual, updating me about the ongoing feud she has with theFedEx guy (the man keeps leaving packages in the muddy grass, and Anise has been printing progressively more passive-aggressive signs to direct him to the nearest dry concrete spot by the door). She never seems to question each word and sentence before saying it, like I do. Because of that, small talk is exhausting for me, and so when the chips arrive, I focus mostly on eating and listening.
And eventually, I realize…this whole outing is…actuallyfine. I didn’t need to have a panic attack on the way here after all. I genuinely laugh a few times with her, rare for me since I’m so hypervigilant in public, and I’msmilingas we make our way toward the front door after we finish our meal and pay.
I wonder if this kind of connection would be possible not just with Anise, but the whole town. Or at least, like, half the town would be amazing. Maybe a whole bunch of people will forget they hate me, eventually. Maybe—
“Hey! Hey, Bird Girl!” a ruddy-faced, sloppily dressed man calls to me as I pass his table. “You gonna call your little birdy friends to scare me away?”
“What the hell?” Anise mutters. She places her hand at my forearm and we increase our speed toward the front door.
“Well, guess what? It’s not going to work.” The man lowers his voice, both in volume and tone. “I will strangle each and every one.”
My hackles rise even more than normal when a stranger heckles me. Threatening the animals…it’s as though he’s told me he is going to stranglemein the middle of this crowded bar. I turn my head toward him slowly. “What did you just say?”
He gives me a drunken grin. I don’t recognize the woman he’s with, but she looks mildly embarrassed. “Isaid, I’m going tostrangle—”
“Sky.”
I jump back as another male voice appears, this time behind me. When I turn around, I breathe a sigh of relief, because it’s just Adam Noemi. Although I don’t trust Adam as far as I can throw him, he definitely isn’t the sort to be on the same level of the “I will strangle your birds” dude. Even though, on second glance, Adam does kind of look enraged…but he glances behind me at the drunk guy, and I realize it’s not me he’s mad at. Not at all.
Adam squeezes around me to get between me and the yelling man. Anise then angles her way next to me to get between me and Adam. “You good?” she asks.
I begin to nod, but then decide to just shrug…because honestly, who the hell knows? I can’t remember the last timegoodcould describe anything I was feeling, except maybe when I held baby Oak for the first time, his little fist wrapped around my finger as he slept. And that feels like absoluteagesago.
“Peter. What the hell are you doing?” Adam’s face is red. His jaw is clenched. When he points to the yelly guy, his hand is actually shaking. “What the fuck are you yelling about strangling to Sky for? Jesus Christ, man.”
Peter’s body language transforms so quickly, and so fluidly, I can hardly believe what I am witnessing. He had just been laughing, flexing his arms, puffing his chest as he tried to bring me down. But now? He shrinks into himself. His smile becomes an expression of concern, his eyebrows furrowing. “Adam. Uh. I didn’t realize she was…” He stumbles on his words as Adam continues to give him a remarkable death stare. “I didn’t know you—that you and her—that she…” He’s trying to say,I didn’t knowyougave a shit about the Town Freakbut he’s either too dumb or inebriated or maybe even both to say it without being insulting. Finally he gives up and raises his arms in surrender. “I’m sorry, man.”
Adam shakes his head. “Why are you apologizing tome?”
