I failed her. I still feel that way about Zac too, though he quit the game of his own volition after he and Liva broke up. But I hated how much more comfortable—how much more at ease—I was without him there. It made me feel like a terrible friend.
So now I can’t fail the others. Maddy has risen to her feet and leans against the mantle of the fireplace. Carter pushes the effect dice back and forth on the table.
When Liva has left the room, he sighs. “This is it, right? We knew this game would be the hardest one yet. One down…three to go.”
Maddy immediately swings around and glowers at him. “What on earth is wrong with you, C? Why would you say something like that?” She shakes her head wildly, then she stomps out to the porch.
“Hey, not cool,” Finn says softly.
Carter shrugs. “I’m just saying, it’s the truth.”
I pluck the dice from Carter’s hands. “The idea is to end this on a positive note. Not to kill you all.” Still, he has a point. Liva’s character’s death is a stark reminder of how everything can change from one moment to the next. It’s a reminder of how this weekend will bring everything to a close.
Carter stands and moves into the kitchen, ignoring us. Finn and I exchange a look and then follow him through the door.
“The chances this would happen are infinitely small,” Finn argues. “It was bad luck, nothing more.”
“Sure. Maybe the dice are haunted too.” Carter reaches for the cabinet that holds the drinking glasses. For all he tries to make light of the situation, his hands are trembling.
Finn seems about ready to ram his crutches into something. “Oh for the love of—”
“Ouch!” Carter pulls his hand back from the kitchen cabinet and stares at it like it bit him.
I rush over to him. “What happened?”
“The cabinet knob was red hot,” he says, waving his hand around like that will cool it.
Tentatively, I reach out to touch the knob too, but it’s a normal temperature. “Are you sure?”
Carter pushes his hand at me, and there’s a clear red mark on his fingers.
“Maybe you shouldn’t have tempted the ghost,” Finn grumbles.
“Oh for the love of goblins…” Carter starts.
I breathe out hard. I can’t deal with this arguing anymore. Damien was right; I can’t fix everyone’s problems. I still want to make this experience memorable. Just…perhaps not in this way.
“Right,” I say. “We’re taking a ten-minute break, because apparently everyone needs time to cool off. I expect everyone to get their heads back into the game when we reconvene.”
With that, they head back into the living room, and I follow Maddy onto the porch. Maddy’s already in the yard, zigzagging through the trees in the grove and darting away from the shadows, as if they might snap at her. She keeps the weight off her bad leg. She doesn’t stop until she comes to a place at the trees’ edge.
I move down to where she’s stopped, and the whole world blinks into existence. The first stars are appearing in the dark night sky, the sliver of the moon rising into it. The mountains loom on the horizon, with the light pollution glow of the city filling the valley beneath us.
Wow.
“It used to be my favorite place,” Maddy says. I didn’t realize she’d noticed my presence; I must’ve gasped at the sight.
“Mind if I join you?”
“Nah.” She sinks slowly to the ground, which is still covered in pine needles from last year’s fall. She wraps her arms around her knees and rocks back and forth. “I needed a breather.”
“We all do. But I think you found the border between Gonfalon and Flagstaff.”
“Yeah.” She doesn’t sound like she necessarily appreciates it.
I kneel next to her and stare out at the mountains. “So, while Finn and Carter are fighting about ghosts… Who are you angry at?”
Maddy goes as prickly and untouchable as a hedgehog. “The dice. Carter, for being absolutely insufferable. And myself, most of all. I was so sloppy. I messed up there.”
“You did.” I could tell her she didn’t, but what would be the point of that? If she had been paying attention, Liva’s character would still be alive. “But it wasn’t just you.”
“Does that matter?”
“Did you do it on purpose?” I ask, point-blank.
Maddy sniffs. Her jaw sets. “Of course not. Doesn’t mean I’m not responsible.” She shakes her head violently. “I need to be better. Anger isn’t going to stop me from feeling terrible.”
I take a chance. Maddy appreciates directness. “Good.”
She glances up at me, confused.
I half shrug and keep my voice level. “This is how we gain experience, both in this game and in life. We win some battles. We lose others. We learn and we keep going.”
“I hate that life has gotten so complicated.”
I smile. “I’m not sure it was ever uncomplicated.”
Maddy shrugs. “I don’t know. It was, at least, less complicated. It feels like everything is falling to pieces. And I don’t know who I am without this game. I don’t know where I can find other safe spaces that let me be myself.”
She curls up. I can see her mouth work. I can see all the things she doesn’t say yet or doesn’t know how to say yet.
“It’s hard, isn’t it? Trusting others with the whole of you?”
She smiles bitterly and shakes her head. “It’s so much easier to lie. You know that. You lie too.”
“I…” No, I don’t, I want to say. Out of habit. But Maddy’s eerily observant. She once said she taught herself to be as fluent as possible in all the things people don’t say, and it shows.
And she’s right. “Yeah, I do.”
“So what do you lie about?”
The question is so straightforward, I can’t help but answer. “I lie about being okay.”
She nods. “Yeah, me too.”
I
