Don’t come over I’m super-contagious.
No response.
Besides I won’t be here. My mom’s driving me to the doctor’s. I’ll text you later. Swear on a stack of spellbooks.
Binx finally replied:
Okay fine, even though you’re totally lying. Call me, okay?
Ridley waited to see if Binx might fire off another text. She didn’t. Still, what if she ignored Ridley’s orders and came over, anyway? It would be just like her.
Ridley needed a Plan B (besides memory-erase spells, which would be her Plan C). Her mother was not the problem, since she would likely be asleep for a while; she’d been spending a lot of her time in bed since Daniel died.
Her father, though. Would he be out of here in time should Binx defy Ridley’s orders and come over? He’d said something last night about his shift starting at nine thirty this morning. Or was it ten thirty?
Ridley swung her feet over the side of her bed and stood up. The sudden motion made her head throb. Pressing her index fingers against her temples, she crossed her room (which she loathed; it was such a boring suburban boy room, with its charcoal-gray walls and blond fake-wood floors and black IKEA furniture) and poked her head out the door. “Dad, did you leave yet?” she called out.
He appeared at the bottom of the stairs. He was dressed in his paramedic uniform: dark green pants, matching polo over a white undershirt, and steel-toed boots. His hair was damp, probably from his shower, and there was a small piece of bloody tissue stuck to his neck. “Just finishing up my coffee. How’re you feeling, son?”
She should have been used to the son after all these years, but she wasn’t. “Kinda crappy. Does Harmony have her raincoat?”
“No, why?”
“I, uh, saw on the weather that there might be rain later,” Ridley fibbed. “Do you have time to drop it off? They do outdoor recess even when it’s rainy, and you know how she is about getting wet.”
Darnell Stone frowned at his watch. “If I leave right now, maybe. Her rain boots, too. Oh, and about later… so I’ll pick her up at one and drop her off back here, then I’ve gotta head back to work. I’ll try to be home with dinner by six, seven latest. Maybe Chipotle.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
Ridley stood at the door and waited. After a few minutes, she heard him grab his keys and head out to the garage.
She went over to the window and parted the blinds. The metallic-red Chrysler Pacifica backed out of the driveway and turned west onto Santa Ana Street, in the direction of the Growing Tree Preschool. Afterward, Daddy would have to drive all the way to the hospital via a totally different route. So no chance of running into Binx if she should show up on their doorstep.
Whew. Mission accomplished.
Why was Binx asking questions about Colter Jessup and his family?
And then Ridley remembered about Agent Smith’s breakfast. Plucking her daily angel card out of Daniel’s old Cleveland Browns mug (today she got Courage), she headed downstairs to the kitchen—slowly, because she still felt weak and headachy. Once there, she gathered some carrots and kale from the vegetable bin. On the other side of the dining room, she saw that her mother’s bedroom door was closed, and that her father had left a laundry basket of clean, neatly folded sheets and towels next to the doorway.
Back in Cleveland, everything had been different. Her mother, Joyce, had been the multitasker, the organizer of all things domestic, while juggling her high-stress job as a communications manager at City Hall. Daddy had been the deputy chief paramedic at one of the big hospitals and proudly ignorant about how to work the washer and dryer, sew a button, or prepare a simple meal.
Daniel had been a high school senior, straight A’s, waiting to hear back from a dozen colleges. His first choice had been Howard University, which was Momma’s and Grandpa Henry’s alma mater; his second choice had been Case Western Reserve, which was near home and also where his best friend, Victor, was a freshman.
His best friend and secret boyfriend. Daddy had walked in on the two of them kissing one day and practically given himself a rage heart attack. Daddy and Daniel had fought for days, with Daniel insisting that he had the right to date anyone he pleased, boy or girl, neither or both. Daddy had become even more enraged by this; in his bigoted mind, you were either straight or gay, and if you were the latter, you weren’t welcome in his home. (Momma had tried to intervene and negotiate a truce, but Daddy had insisted that she stay out of it.)
And so Daniel had packed a bag and taken off one night in his beat-up old Chevy Impala that he’d bought with money saved from his lifeguarding, Domino’s delivery, and other part-time jobs.
And then he’d gone to the quarry to blow off steam with his friends. Ignoring the NO SWIMMING/NO DIVING sign, he’d cannonballed off a cliff into the water below and crashed into a boulder, smashing his spine.
After the funeral, Daddy had decided that the family should leave Cleveland forever and move to Sorrow Point, where there was an opening for a chief paramedic at the local hospital. A fresh start. Ridley had decided that it would be a fresh start for her, too. Back in Cleveland, she’d been able to live as Ridley only occasionally, and in the privacy of her room (although she did have an elaborate Pinterest board with pictures of her dream self and dream life). But no one at Sorrow Point High knew that the new girl, Morgan Ridley Stone (who now went by Ridley), had been assigned “male” at birth. All Ridley had to do was use magic to alter her school records and also her appearance (face, hair, body, clothes, etc.) twice a day. And to intercept any e-mails or
