promising anything to anybody anymore when I can’t even promise to myself that I won’t do what I’m dying to do right now—jump.
“Why do you cover for your mom?” Veronica asks, and the world takes on a red haze.
“I don’t.”
“You do,” she says carefully.
“She’s a single mom who works hard and who has two kids. She shouldn’t have to juggle everything, and it’s not her fault I mess up.”
“It’s not on you to be perfect.”
“I’m not perfect,” I shout. “I’m so messed up in the head that I jump off cliffs, remember? I’m the weirdo of my friends who can’t read right or get his crap together in order to have qualified academically for the state meet last year. I’m the one with the no-show dad. I’m not even close to perfect. I’m not good enough for that.”
Veronica and I stare at each other, her strong-willed eyes never breaking away from mine. But there’s something else there, physical pain, emotional pain, and that causes the anger in me to crack as my own words come back to haunt me. “I didn’t mean weird was a bad thing—”
“Will you allow me to sage your apartment or not?” She cuts me off with a touch of attitude, reminding me of our first interactions back in August. Tonight, I came home angry with her, and now, she seems angry with me. The punches keep on coming.
She’s waiting on an answer and I give her an honest one. “If this doesn’t help Lucy’s nightmares, you have to tell her ghosts aren’t real.”
“This’ll work,” Veronica says. “I care about Lucy, and I don’t want her to be scared.”
I hear what she’s not saying—she’s not willing to make the admission, but she is willing to somehow voodoo Lucy’s nightmares away. A placebo on the illness. “This is a deal breaker for me. If this doesn’t help with Lucy’s nightmares, you have to tell her the truth. And you can’t talk about ghosts with Lucy anymore. Me and you—we’re able to play around with the make-believe, but Lucy can’t tell the difference.”
I hate that Veronica breaks eye contact with me. “I hear you.”
I want Veronica and me to work, but I need Lucy’s nightmares to go away. “I’ll give your idea a try.”
VERONICA
“What are you doing, V?” Mom had whispered in my ear when I had picked up the shells and the sage sticks earlier today. “If you do this, it will drive me out. Is that what you want? For me to leave?”
No, it’s not what I want. It’s the last thing I want, but I have to help Lucy.
“I’m only cleansing the first floor,” I responded. “Go to the third floor and you’ll be safe.”
Mom did what I asked, and now I’m terrified she’s right and I’m wrong. With each second that passes, I shake more from head to toe. From fear, from grief, from physical pain.
This morning, I woke up with a splitting headache. The type that was tough to roll out of bed with, the type that makes my head feel fifty pounds heavier than normal. My spine aches from having to find the strength to stay upright. The migraine has become worse and worse. My vision doubling at times, my stomach sloshing with the promise of future vomiting.
I didn’t want to leave my bed or my room, but this is important. Lucy is important. Sawyer is important. And there’s a bit of selfishness in this, too. If I don’t do this and do it right, Glory will come and sage the entire house and then my mom will be gone for good. I can’t risk that. Her being here is a lifeline, and if it’s cut off, I think I might die.
Glory told me that in order to sage a house, I have to want the spirits to leave or they’ll stay. If I sage every part of the first floor, if I will every spirit away from this house except for Mom, then she should be okay.
My boots are heavy on my feet as I walk through Lucy’s room, the last place in the downstairs apartment I haven’t cleansed. My makeup is heavy, uncomfortable, but otherwise there’s no doubt Sawyer would have picked up on my translucent skin, the dark circles under my eyes—he’d see the pain.
I just need to get this done, drive off Lucy’s monster then make it upstairs before my migraine makes it to the point of no return—before Sawyer sees me at my rawest.