“Daniel,” William said. “Chill.”
“I’m chill. I am totally chill. Clean, sober, happy, and chill.”
“I’m just saying, if we let you-know-who get under our skin, he’s not gonna let up. He’s learning how to be like us.” William reached behind his head and knocked on the window. “Aren’t you, buddy?”
“Is that why you broke up with me, Fabes?” Daniel asked. “So you could get down and dirty with Ash Granger? Hey, Otto, got a hot phone sex clip you can play for us?”
“Hey!” William said, stunned by his friend’s words. “Not cool.” He’d never heard Daniel say anything so hideous to Melissa, and the gulf between them that had opened with Daniel’s We’re just four people, man took on a vast new dimension that frightened him.
“No, it’s okay,” Melissa said. “I’m glad you’re all seeing this. Daniel Benson, everybody. Boyfriend of the century.”
“Ex,” Daniel said. “Ex ex EX!”
Christina clamped her hands over her ears, closed her eyes, and leaned into William’s shoulder.
“You know what, Daniel?” Melissa said. “Ash Granger wasn’t even a real person, and he still cared more about *DIYfashion365* than you do.”
“You never talk to me about it!”
“You never listen! You just want to play Edward Fortyhands and come over on Wednesday nights and—”
“Both of you, stop, this is pointless,” William said.
“How am I the one getting yelled at, anyway?” Daniel said. “You’re the one who almost got us killed in a drug den.”
“You’d know all about drug dens, wouldn’t you? What’s Jamie Lynn’s place like?”
“Why does nobody believe me when I say I AM NOT ON DRUGS.”
“Yeah, well, you were a lot nicer when you were.”
“Believe me, Melissa, I know.”
The floor of the car began to ripple. RenderLux dilated on the underside of the bench, and Daniel’s bag spilled its contents across the floor: two bottles of pills, a few square mini-ziplocks of white powder, a sandwich bag of twiggy little mushrooms, and a thin black vape device.
“Oh man.” Daniel frowned. “I forgot about those mushrooms.”
“Quite the stash you got,” William said, nudging the vape pen with his toe. “Glad to see you came prepared.”
“I wasn’t gonna need it all,” Daniel said. Then he corrected himself. “I don’t need any of it.” He looked at William. “I swear, I stopped after New Orleans. I did it for you. So I’d remember this forever.” He laughed. “Doesn’t seem like there’s much chance of forgetting it now, anyway.”
“How about all the days before this?” Melissa asked, kicking a bottle of pills. “Do you remember those?”
“Do you?” he snapped. “Does anybody?” He folded his arms and leaned back into the seat. “I’m done talking about this.”
Next to William, Christina curled up tighter, pulling her knees to her chest and burying her head in his side. He reached for her hand and held it.
“You guys,” William said, as gently as he could, “a crazy thing just happened and we’re all a little bit out of our minds. We should all just be happy that we’re okay.”
He told himself it was going to be fine. Daniel and Melissa needed to vent, but the truth was too powerful to ignore: they’d all pulled together to escape from a place that now seemed dreamlike in its terror, shaded with impossible colors and off-kilter angles. He found that he wasn’t even angry with Melissa. She was so obviously humiliated and upset. He mostly just wanted to give her a hug. He probably should—that was the kind of behavior Otto needed to see.
Otto. Patricia. Dr. Diaz. Whatever.
He took comfort in the fact that he’d only owned the car for a week. There was still plenty of time to mold its personality. In a few years, the road trip would be nothing more than a blip on Otto’s emotional learning curve.
Besides, Otto would probably spend most of next year hanging out with William and Christina, driving back and forth from Fremont Hills to Buffalo. Instead of watching a couple’s unraveling, Otto could study the evolution of two humans’ love union, or whatever ridiculous thing he wanted to call it.
He gave Christina’s hand a squeeze. Outside, a gray band of dawn hugged the eastern horizon.
Can I borrow your bike pump?
He smiled to himself. How about that: Otto had been joking when he’d asked William to teach him, but the AI was going to learn something about love after all.
Suddenly, all the windows that lined Otto’s sides glowed with the off-white crispness of a text document. Behind Melissa and Daniel, William’s eyes picked out Epheme chats, arranged side by side.
SewWhat and Ash.
DB837651 and xoxoPixieDustxoxo.
Underneath the chats were neat blocks of text in an ornate medieval font. Christina began to read out loud.
“‘The Chronicles of Fremont Hills Royalty: Part One.’”
William glanced down at her. She was still burrowing into his side, hands pressed over her ears. One of her cuticles was torn where she’d been picking. Her eyes were closed. She definitely wasn’t speaking, and yet her voice rang out inside the car, reciting the flowery text.
“‘Let this humble blog be nailed to the doors of Fremont Hills Cathedral to herald the arrival of a new scribe in your midst. For who amongst our miserable number does not wish for the curtain to be parted on the majestic intrigues of our noble betters, Princess Melissa and Prince Daniel, those royal personages whose boots and basketball shoes carve great pathways through the hallowed halls of Fremont Hills High School and tread deep, everlasting lines in the fields of time itself, whose loves and betrayals comprise the greatest tragedies and comedies of our age?’”
Her voice had a mildly synthesized quality, like Dr. Diaz. But Otto was a good mimic.
“Come on, Otto,” William said. “Nobody wants to hear your bullshit right now.”
“It’s not bullshit,” Melissa said, pointing at Christina. “It’s her.” At his side, she seemed to shrink into herself.
“Yeah, I guess Otto’s starting to do voices,” William said, “which is probably not good.”
“No,” Melissa said, “I mean it’s her. Christina. She hacked our phones. That’s
