Chance to get my friend backstole all her words from her.
Then the wordtookremoved any breath she had left to say them, anyway.
And both of those things seemed to take a million years to come back. She had to really fight against a thousand conflicting feelings to find her voice, and even when she finally managed, it just sounded so small. So threaded through with tears she didn’t want to shed.
“You didn’t want to make a deal, then,” she said, as one of them spilled down her cheek. He didn’t seem to care, however. Hewatched her swipe it away with eyes so full of wounded warmth it almost made them worth it.
“Not even remotely,” he said, in a voice as hoarse as hers.
“All you wanted was to be friends and to help me.”
“That is exactly, one million percent the case, yes.”
He nodded firmly. He didn’t have to, though.
For the first time in years, she believed him. She knew she did, because the urge to hold back was gone. “Then I guess I should probably tell you that I want that too. That I think I’ve wanted it for a while but just couldn’t say it. Like when we talked about me forgiving you so you wouldn’t go to hell, and I didn’t know how to tell you I already had. And that time you suggested you come in the house and I almost said sure come in, just because that sounded nice. And other things, things you said that made me cry and feel happy, and I forced it all down. But now I don’t want to force it down,” she babbled, as his expression got warmer, and warmer, and more struck by what she was saying, until finally, god, finally, the way his gaze reached for her.
She was amazed he managed to push out words, to say:
“What do you want to do then?”
Instead of just doing what he clearly wanted.
So she did it for him. She stepped forward, and slid her arms around his waist.
And she hugged her friend, hard.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
One of the best things about being friends again was definitely all the stuff Cassie got to tell Seth. About Nancy and the shelf she couldn’t see, and the creatures that were suddenly visible, and the tiny Hogarth with its saddle. Plus there was all that weirdness with Hannigan, and the feeling she’d had that he somehow knew. “I think it might just be that sweater and the way it keeps revealing your scandalously nude shoulder,” Seth said.
And then she got to laugh about it, instead of feeling anxious.
Heck, she didn’t even feel anxious about Seth noticing it. Because even when she caught him looking a second time, she knew it didn’t mean anything. Like at the quarry, and in the closet, and when they had seen the fairies doing all of those sweaty things.
It was just how their friendship was. Sometimes they got a little mixed up.
But they always went right back to being normal again. Like right now—they just went right back to cleaning. She wiped down counters with a lemony, super-powerful cleaning potion she’d created; he scrubbed soot off the walls. Then they both tackled the pots, and the pans, and thedefinitelysentient microwave.
Its readout now said,What am I?
Plus it got mad when Seth tried to clean it.
Put your hand in me again and I will boil it, the digital letters spelled out. And it didn’t seem to make a bit of difference when they unplugged it. They had to hold it open with a broom, and squirt cleaning potion inside using a spray bottle. Twice it tried to snap the wooden handle in two. Once, it almost succeeded.
Before it finally gave in. It let them finish.
And then it had the nerve to say it felt much better.
All of which was much more fun to deal with together.
Everything was more fun to deal with together. And so much so that she had to tell him about the potion she wanted to try, once the kitchen was pretty much done. She just saw him holding up an almost-clean pan, wearing an apron she didn’t remember him grabbing, face all grubby and a grin as big as the world, and there it was. The almost inescapable urge to go ahead.
“Okay, so don’t freak out when I explain this,” she started.
But of course he immediately did just that.
He stopped dead in the middle of trying to scrub the last stains from a pan that now had an extra handle that hadn’t been there before. And his eyebrows were already at alarmed. “If you say your television is also alive I’m definitely going to. Just FYI,” he said, and really she couldn’t blame him. It had started making disturbing noises about half an hour ago.
