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Outside, she marches me across the parking lot. The moment the doors whoosh shut behind us, she turns, her face going serious.

“I know why you’re here,” she says quietly.

A spike of adrenaline arcs from my neck to my knees. “You—how?”

“You’re not the only one with a search engine, Bear. Besides, you booked the hotel through that travel account you’ve had since college. You changed the password years ago, darling, but you never changed the recovery email.” She smiles. “It was so poorly hidden I almost called you just to say, ‘Good job. Nice try.’”

I stare at her, speechless.

She holds up her hands, palms facing me. “I just want you to protect your energy, okay? Work like this leaves residue. You spend enough time carrying other people’s darkness around, eventually your spirit forgets which parts belong to you.”

My throat tightens. I want to snap at her, to reach for something clever and cutting, the old reflex that used to turn anything too sincere into an argument before it could get close enough to hurt. The words still come easily. They just don’t feel useful anymore. So I swallow them, let her concern be concern without finding a way to fight it, and nod. “Okay, Mom.”

25

UNSCHEDULED GUEST

BARYN

My mother has never met a boundary she couldn’t breach in under ninety seconds, so the moment we’re back at the inn she’s already halfway up the stairs, balancing the grocery bags on her forearms like she’s scaling Everest with nothing but vegan protein bars and the power of positive self-talk.

“I love what you’ve done with the place,” she announces, waving a hand at the mass of tangled cables, stacks of paper, and abandoned hard drives. “It’s got a real—” she searches for a word, and settles on, “post-apocalyptic monk vibe. Very chic.”

“Please don’t touch anything,” I warn, watching her eyes track from the desk to the bed and back. “Some of it is mid-edit.”

She’s already picked up a ribbon mic from the desk. “You should ground your energy before you start a session, you know,” she says. “I know you don’t believe in frequency cleansing, but I brought something just in case.”

She drops the mic (I die a little inside), digs through her tote bag, and produces a plastic-wrapped bundle nearly the size of a baguette. She unwraps it: a sheaf of dried lavender and rosemary.

I suppress a groan, and Faun takes that as an invitation to wiggle maniacally in my arms. “It’s a central HVAC system, Mother. You burn that in here, and every room on this floor is going to smell it.”

“It’s a lovely smell, I’m sure they’ll appreciate it,” she says. She produces a lighter from the bottomless bag and sets the bundle ablaze, waving it in circles above her head as she drifts around the room. “It’ll just take a minute.”

I clamp my mouth shut and watch as the smoke starts to curl through the room. At this point, I’m not sure whether I’m witnessing a cleansing ritual or a fire code violation.

She pivots, eyes narrowed, and holds the burning stick an inch from the black screen of the television.

“The resonance in here is very bone-dry,” she says, frowning at the monitor. “I can tell you’ve been here too long without any air flow. And these wires,” she flicks a hand at the tangle behind the PC, “they’re holding a lot of stagnant energy.”

I stare at her, uncertain if she wants me to untangle the wiring or call a priest.

She sets the bundle of herbs in a mug, where it continues to smolder, sending up a thin, steady spiral of fragrant smoke. Then she drops into my chair, swiping the trackpad on my laptop to bring it out of sleep. “Show me what you’re working on.”

“I can’t believe you’re here.” I’m still disoriented.

She shrugs, self-satisfied. “Mothers know. Trees know. Also, your voice carries through the quantum.”

I almost retort, but it’s not worth it. For all her talk of quantum frequencies and ley lines, she has a terrifying habit of being right about things she has no way of understanding. And right now, after days of staring at the same pixels until my eyes bled, I’m desperate enough to take insight from a woman who talks to oak trees.

“I will show you,” I say, shifting Faun into one arm and pointing at her with the other before she can touch anything else. “But I need to use the bathroom first. Please do not open any files, answer my phone, reorganize my hard drives, or attempt to cleanse the laptop.”

I set Faun on the bed, where he immediately circles twice and collapses onto the comforter.

She looks offended. “I would never cleanse electronics without permission.”

“Great. Hold on to that.” I escape into the bathroom and lock the door.

For a minute, I just stand there with both hands braced on the sink, staring at myself in the mirror.