“And a happy New Year, huh?”
“Just like that.”
A minivan pulled up beside them at the red light. The girl sitting in the passenger seat was probably still in high school, or maybe just out of it. She grinned at Cheyenne’s new ride and pointed, saying something to the woman behind the wheel who looked like her mom.
Cheyenne threw devil horns at the girl and smirked. The girl’s mom leaned forward to see who was driving the Panamera, and her eyes grew wide. She shook her head vehemently, talking way too fast and jerking her daughter by the arm to sit forward again and quit staring at the Goth chick behind the wheel of a fancy car.
“Can you believe that?” The halfling laughed as the light turned green and the minivan sped away. “Even when I’m rolling around in a Panamera, people still get turned off by the whole—” She turned to look at Ember, who’d been pulling at the corner of her mouth with one hand and dragging her cheek down to show the whites of her eyes with the other. Cheyenne burst out laughing. “You’re the one who scared them off!”
“What?” Ember chuckled. “There’s no way me making ugly faces is scarier than a Goth chick driving a Panamera.”
“Yeah, no way.” Cheyenne pulled through the intersection. Her stomach let out an obnoxious growl, and the girls shot the halfling’s gut matching glances of surprise.
“Did we forget the most important meal of the day?” Ember’s fingers drummed on the armrest.
“Not forgotten. Just delayed.” The halfling glanced up the street and nodded. “Ready to fix that before we scour this city for the perfect apartment?”
“Ms. Summerlin!”
Cheyenne scowled and shook her head.
Ember fought not to laugh through her words. “I thought there was no such thing as the perfect apartment?”
“That was before I had a fae sitting in the front seat of my Panamera. Pretty sure there are exceptions to every rule.”
“Then hell, yes. I can’t wait to stuff my face with something I get to order myself that wasn’t made in the hospital cafeteria.”
The halfling nodded and stepped on the gas. “You got it.”
* * *
By the time they’d battled the wheelchair to get out of the car, into the bagel shop downtown for fried eggs and bacon between everything-bagel buns and some of the best coffee Cheyenne had had in weeks, and back into the car again, Ember looked exhausted.
The halfling started the car and took a huge swig of the lavender-honey latte in a to-go cup. “Okay. Nine-thirty.” She set the coffee down in the cup holder and strapped herself in. “I think we’re making pretty good time.”
Ember buckled her seatbelt again and thumped her head back against the headrest. “That’s like half the morning gone already.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Cheyenne turned toward her friend and raised an eyebrow. “That also means we still have over seven hours to find our new digs. That’s a whole damn day!”
“And we’ll spend half of it getting that wheelchair in and out of the car and me in and out of the chair.” The fae girl closed her eyes. “My arms are already sore.”
The halfling smirked. “Not from wheeling yourself around, though.”
Her friend let out a wry laugh. “No, Cheyenne. From propping myself up while you pretend to be a scrawny Goth human trying to lift her friend in and out of everything.”
“Huh.” Cheyenne turned off the engine, and Ember blinked before opening her eyes all the way again.
“What?”
Turning in the driver’s seat to face her friend as directly as she could, the halfling raised her eyebrows and leaned forward a little. “You want to keep going?”
“Today?” Ember shrugged.
“I have no problem going out to find this apartment on my own.” Smirking, Cheyenne tapped a finger on her lips and exaggerated a thoughtful stare. “I’m thinking something like a giant warehouse, right? Maybe a repurposed garage, like the kind they turn into cool new restaurants with the door all the way open in the summer. Except we’ll have all the windows blacked out. I’m sure I could find a couple chandeliers from the 1800s. Complete with cobwebs. Fill ‘em with black candles. We won’t even need electricity.”
Ember laughed and rolled her eyes.
“I’m serious. Maybe even purple velvet on the walls. I mean, don’t get me wrong, black is totally my number one. Purple’s a close second. But the floors, of course—all black, no carpet. Hell, we could find something shiny black and paint the wood floors. No rooms, though. Just one giant, open Goth box with a trapdoor to the toilet.” The halfling cocked her head and frowned. “Might have to install some kind of access lift down into it, though.”
“Okay, stop.” Ember finally looked at Cheyenne. “That is the worst last-minute plan for an apartment I’ve ever heard.”
“Hey, who said it was last-minute? I could’ve been planning this whole thing for months. You don’t know.”
“Cheyenne, you bought yourself a Panamera. We both know you have better taste than a Goth-box garage with chandeliers.”
Lifting one shoulder in coy indecision, the halfling batted her lashes. “This car is Cheyenne on the outside. That awesome picture I just painted in your head of our new apartment, Em? That’s Cheyenne on the inside.”
“Just shut up already.” Finally, Ember let herself smile.
Good. Pulled her back from the edge of that dark pit, at least.
Cheyenne couldn’t swallow another burst of laughter. “All joking aside, we don’t have to do this today if it’s too much. I don’t know what it’s like to go through what you’re going through, but I might know something about pushing myself too hard when I should’ve listened to my gut.”
“No problems with my gut, Cheyenne. I think the issue is all in my head.” Ember tapped a finger against her temple. “Way more than my legs right now, anyway.”
“Fair enough. You wanna keep going, or just call it a fun morning out to breakfast?”
Ember squinted at her friend, then snatched the
