“Why don’t you go keep Eliza company,” she said.
As he walked up the stairs, he could feel Sarah’s headache as she woke. He didn’t want to feel it anymore and it stopped. Which was new. Maybe he was getting hold of his own brain.
In Hank’s apartment, Eliza drank hot cocoa with marshmallows for breakfast, ignoring her oatmeal. He sat beside her until her mom came to collect her. She held his hand as they went downstairs. The rain had settled into a steady drizzle, the clouds low and grey. Olive gave Jared a hug goodbye. Eliza tried to hand him her stuffed Olaf, but he put it back in her hands.
“Stay safe,” Jared said.
“Love you,” Eliza said, hugging him.
“Love you back,” he said.
Olive did up Eliza’s seat belt. Eliza waved and waved and the minivan honked before they pulled into the street and drove away. Dead Aiden flickered into view but didn’t follow them. He turned to glare at Jared, then Dead Aiden was in front of him, a furious whirl. He shoved Jared and he stumbled.
“You turned them against me,” Dead Aiden said.
“Are you okay?” Mave said.
“Tripped,” Jared said.
Dead Aiden’s head whipped back and forth so hard he blurred. Jared knew he was trying to be intimidating, but behind him, Bob sank down from the sky, twitching. Dead Aiden blinked away.
Thanks, Bob, Jared thought.
—
Dead Aiden followed Jared to a meeting. Kota felt something and kept looking behind him, but he couldn’t see the ghost. They had coffee at their usual place after, but Kota was not in a sharing mood and they simply drank up and went straight back to the apartment.
“Later,” Kota said.
He wasn’t driving his not-boyfriend’s truck and headed for Commercial Drive and the bus. Kota hated taking public transportation, so even if he wasn’t talking, he’d made the effort to be there for Jared, and that meant a lot.
Halfway up the stairs, Dead Aiden emerged from the wall. Cold hands shoved him and Jared tumbled backwards, ass over teakettle. He lay at the bottom, panting, his back spasming in protest, an overwhelming shriek of muscles bent in ways they weren’t meant to bend. Dead Aiden waited at the top of the stairs.
“Bob?” Jared said.
Dead Aiden vanished.
Jared unbent himself and stood. His back cracked as he straightened, pain radiating like knives jabbing him. He wondered if he would have survived the fall if he wasn’t a Trickster. There might be some perks to it after all. He decided to take the elevator.
He found Sarah curled into the recliner. He’d never seen her with sunglasses before. They were Mave’s large Jackie O ones.
“Dead Aiden’s mad he got left behind,” Jared said.
“Ha,” Sarah said. “Serves him right. Neeka’s coming over to banish him. She didn’t want to do it in front of Eliza.”
“She better be careful. He’s pushing people.”
“I’ve never had a migraine before. Everything’s so loud. And bright.”
“Where’s Mave?”
“She’s taking a bath. She says pee off the balcony if you need to, but don’t disturb her.”
Jared snorted. He wanted to know what Sarah was thinking, but he didn’t, and he made himself listen to his own heartbeat to ground himself.
“Have you seen the fireflies around?” Sarah said.
“No,” he said. “I’ll tell you the second I see them again.”
“ ’Kay,” she said, radiating disappointment.
Jared was through with the day already. He went to lie down and saw the Big Book on his desk. He opened the cover and found himself sitting at the desk. He wasn’t sure how he’d gotten there. Georgina. Damn it. He couldn’t seem to tell his mom, so he took his cellphone from his back pocket, thinking he would take a picture of the letter from Georgina to show her.
—
“Jared,” Mave said, shaking his shoulder. “You have a perfectly good bed right beside you.”
She had a white towel wrapped around her head and was in her Canucks bathrobe. She smiled at him. Jared had fallen forward onto his desk, his phone under his cheek, cracked.
“Damn it,” he said, trying to turn it on.
“It’s under warranty, or it should be,” Mave said. “Do you have the receipt?”
“Mom does,” Jared said.
“I’ll text her,” Mave said. “Just rest, Jelly Bean. Okay? I’ll make us some sandwiches.”
“I’m missing something,” Jared said. He rested his hand on the Big Book. He began flipping through the pages and then forgot why he was doing it.
Mave closed the book and led him to the bed. She lifted the blanket for him. Dead Aiden pressed his face against the window, sizzling like something touching an electric fence.
—
He woke to laughter. When he followed it to the living room, he found Neeka on the couch flanked by her two nieces, the twins with identical eyes in matching faces, the ones he’d first met when they were blasted. Lala wore camouflage shorts and a Raptors jersey cut into a crop top, the bottom of her black sports bra showing. Her rainbow-haired sister wore a flouncy pink dress and a black jean jacket with sparkling letters that spelled out Eat the Oppressors. Mave sat kitty-corner to them in the recliner, her face covered in green mud, her hair thickly plastered to her skull and covered in a see-through shower cap. Sarah’s wooden dividers were closed and non-blinking. He felt for her, but she was deeply, deeply asleep.
“There he is,” Mave said. “Good morning, sunshine!”
“Hey,” Jared said.
“Mave has been getting to know Lala and Lola,” Neeka said. “And they’d like to get to know our baby Trickster.”
Jared glanced at Mave, who laughed.
“Isn’t he, though?” Mave said.
Lala and Lola studied him with undisguised curiosity. He didn’t sense them prying into his mind.
“I’m sick of my nickname,” Lola said. “Call me Lourdes.”
“Mom named me after one of her best friends,” Mave said. “I hated my name for so many years, but now I love it.”
“Lourdes
