Page 24 of Queen of Nothing

We’re running out of time.

A few times now, we have stopped to give her a break—like just outside of Geneva, and here, in Texas. But it’s not enough.

Serena needs real rest, which she can only have once we reach the shield witch.

All I know is that the shield witch is in Mexico.

Serena didn’t share more than that. And I’m certain she only told me that we need to go to Mexico in case the lassitude limit wipes her out completely, unconscious, and I’m forced to take charge—that way, at least I know the direction I have to take.

Problem with that backup plan of hers, is that I can’t drive. So it will be taxis all the way to Mexico, and a lot of aimless wandering.

I keep things as easy for her as I can—because neither one of us can risk her exhausting.

I don’t even argue against the car she picks out.

Not the worst one on the lot, but not the best, either.

I say nothing about the stench of stale cigarettes inside. Nothing as I consider the scratches along the silver paint, the dent on the boot, and the other on the hood.

I skim the tag.

It says ‘hatchback’.

I don’t know what that is, I just know that the car I’m looking at is very small. Cramped. The seats inside aren’t leather, aren’t clean, and the steering wheel material is peeling.

Serena waves over an attendant.

“How do you know how to drive?” I ask.

Serena’s lashes are almost halfway down her eyes, like she’s drunk out of her mind and about to pass out right here on the hot concrete ground. Only, it’s a man in a royal blue tracksuit who wipes his sweaty brow opposite me.

“Abuelo Salvador,” she tells me, and spares me an exhausted, sickly look. “He was a collector. I practiced on vintage cars around the estate when I was a child.”

“I didn’t know that about you.”

There’s an edge of accusation in my tone—but maybe that’s the fatigue and the heat, and how slowly that car salesman is moving towards us across the lot.

“He never let me take them off the grounds,” she adds, wiping the back of her hand over her brow. “But he did let me drive the Alfa Romeo around town.”

I scoff. “He let you drive the Alfa Romeo?”

“The SUV,” she tells me with a pointed look. “Not one of his prized cars.”

I run a look over the silver ‘hatchback’, whatever that means. “This might be a little different.”

Serena agrees with a faint, unenthused hum.

And still, we buy the car. For just a few hundred US dollars, too.

That’s how much my manicures cost. No pedicures, just the hands. And I don’t get French tips, like some of the older Videralli women do. I only ever choose a satiny pink, or a light gloss, or a faint blush, and that one time, coral—but that didn’t look too nice with my complexion, so I never got it again.

But it is strange to look at this dented car and see the price of a manicure, like I thought I understood money—but I don’t, not at all.

I’ve pranced through the shops of London, waved and tapped my black card, like it was nothing. Like it meant nothing.

The bill went to Father.

Even if I went over my allowance, he never told me to stop spending.