“That you know of,” I said.
She sighed. “Micah was at least a skilled magician . . .”
I dropped the last plate onto the table. “Honestly, Mum. Can you hear yourself? Can you hear yourself in the context ofthisday?”
She frowned at me. “Fair point. I just . . .” She shook her head. She looked tired. Mum looks like she hasn’t had a full night’s sleep since the Mage died. “I want you to have a rich and challenging magickal life, Penelope.”
“I want that, too,” I said, and then I smiled like—well, like someone I’d mock, like a twitterpated pixie. “Give him a chance, Mum.”
After dinner, Shepard came back to my flat with me and slept in Simon’s old room, and then we woke up and went to the British Museum and Westminster Abbey, and now we’re taking an Overground train to check on Simon. (“come hungry,”he texted.“i’ve got 1000 finger sandwiches.”)
“I’m going to miss the Overground,” Shepard says. “And the Underground.” We’re sharing a pole. He towers over me.
“No subways in Nebraska?” I tease.
“We barely have buses.”
“Sounds terrible.”
“It’s not so bad,” he says, smiling.
“No public transportation, no pie . . .”
“We have excellent steaks.”
“I don’t eat steak.”
“Hmmm . . .” He looks thoughtful. “We have pretty good tacos.”
“We have tacos here,” I say.
He laughs. “Is this like your pizza? Because I’ve tried your pizza.”
“You should stay!” I blurt out. Too loudly. A man standing next to us scowls at me.
Shepard tilts his head and looks down at me. He bites his bottom lip.
“You should stay,” I say again. More sanely.
“Penelope . . .” he says quietly, “I’m not even here legally.”
“You know that’s not an issue, Shepard.”
“It never seems to be for you . . .”
I’m holding on to the pole with both hands. “There’s still so much you haven’tseen.Piccadilly Circus, the Tower of London. There are magickal swans in Oxford, we could take a day trip. And then Scotland—great snakes, you could probably bond with the Loch Ness Monster!”
The whole time I’m talking, Shepard looks like he’s getting ready to tell me no. And then he does. “I can’t stay,” he says, his forehead all wrinkled and his eyebrows pulled up in the middle. “I didn’t bring any money. I only have two pairs of pants.”
“So you could get a job,” I say.
“Not legally.”
“Or you could go to uni.”
“How would that work?”
“You’re getting hung up on technicalities, Shepard. If you don’t want to stay, just say so!”
