“Shut up!” I fire back.
“Funnel that anger into packing bags, girl,” Mom says. “We’re out of time.” The softness I glimpsed a moment ago is already a distant memory. “We got to leave because of you. Folks are probably gonna try to skin us alive. We won’t be able to return to Harlem in the 1940s for a while.”
The worry and panic in her voice sends a chill through me. I think of the mob searching the circus grounds looking for us.
Mom lifts her arms. The dresses, costumes, shoes, and hats jump into the open suitcases and trunks, arranging themselves in neat rows as Mom looks on.
For a moment, I wish I had Mom’s telekinetic power, but when I see her eyes water, it’s a reminder of the pain it causes.
The trunks and suitcases snap closed and lift in a train behind Mom. All of our things ready for transport.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“Are you?” Mom challenges. “Because you’re acting reckless as if you don’t know anything about the past. That mob who witnessed the travesty that you called a show could be waiting outside. Emma, do you know what they would do to you? In Harlem? In 1943? A Black girl accused of killing a white man? The riots are coming any day now. A Black man named Robert Bandy will be shot by a white police officer, and this city will ignite. You know that. We discussed it. You were prepped. Your show might have detonated that bomb sooner.”
I wonder if tonight would have been easier for my family if I had been the one who’d been killed, instead of Grace. My shoulders roll forward, guilt making me smaller. “I am truly sorry, Mom. I thought I was doing the right thing.”
“So many people tell themselves something’s right when it’s wrong and it just suits them.” She hustles us forward. “Let’s go,now! Your father is waiting.”
“I can’t believe you did this, Emma,” Demetri grumbles as we make our way to the cars.
I ball my fists. “You’re keeping secrets from me.”
Mom whips around to face me. “What did you say?”
“You don’t tell me anything. Only performances night after night, hours of practicing with stardust until my hands are raw and I can barely see straight.” I grit my teeth. “You haven’t told me how the magic truly works, how we got it in the first place, or why that fog showed up. Demetri was terrified.”
“Fog?” Mom turns pale. She looks at Demetri. “What happened?”
His face is unreadable. “There was none. She’s just trying to deflect attention from what she did.”
“Why are you lying about something we both saw?” I call him out.
He scowls. “Let it go, Emma.”
Mom’s eyes narrow, and she frowns in a way that lets me know the fog was real, even if she and Demetri haven’t said so.
“Get him to tell the truth for once!” I yell.
“Enough!” Mom throws up her hands. “You’re wasting time we don’t have. Keep moving.”
We’re heading for the exit when I see a shadow out of the corner of my eye. It transforms into a black snake slithering across the floor, way too close for comfort. We all freeze.
“Mom!” I whisper.
“Don’t move,” she replies.
The snake’s silver-flecked body unfurls and rises to coil tightly around my wrist.
Demetri stares at the serpent. “What the—?”
The snake flicks its forked tongue. My heart thuds. It opens its pink mouth wide, hissing. I freeze.
Mom creeps closer. “Stay still.” She strokes the snake’s satiny scales. “You’ve done it now.” She carefully lifts the snake away from me. It shrinks into a shiny gray envelope with scalloped scales.
“Relax,” Mom replies. “You couldn’t tell it was a messenger?”
After the night I’ve had, I can’t recognize anything right now.
