Chapter Text
Artwork by the Amazing Mexfan!
“She did it, Emira,” the girl clenched her fists as she stalked toward the door. “She figured out a way to steal my work!” She shook out her hands and rubbed her palms together as she turned, crossing her arms tightly over her chest, trying not to cry, “She knows I can’t renew my grant without a shareholder demonstration, and she picked a venue across the country!” She shot a glance toward her sister and hissed, “She’ll sabotage it on the way there! I just know it!”
“I won’t let that happen,” Emira replied as rapid footfalls crossed the room—again!—and stopped in front of the floor-to-ceiling window wall, her sister’s slim shadow falling across the hardwood floor. Emira looked up to see Amity backlit and shining in the bright morning sun, and practically vibrating to pieces in her office. “Mittens, I swear,” Emira promised, her emerald green hair falling over her shoulder as she leaned on her desk, the thick plait swinging between her straightened elbows, “This transportation company is good.”
“Is it, though?” Amity whirled about, her golden eyes wide with barely suppressed panic, her slender hands shaking and fidgeting with the hem of her gray sweater, “Is it good enough? Emira, I— I love you for trying to help with this, but—” The pale girl started to scrape her fingers through her short, chin-length mint-green hair, pulling it back between rigid knuckles to tug on her scalp, her breath whistling harsh and swift through her teeth.
“But you’re freaking out,” Emira spoke with a calm voice as she stood to walk around her desk and clamp her hands over her younger sister’s shoulders, holding the twitchy girl in place. Amity opened her mouth to protest, and Emira cut her off, “Ah! You are!” She gave Amity a stern look, and then pulled her down into a gentle hug, “Breathe with me, okay? Just for a minute.”
Amity briefly considered stomping on the shorter girl’s foot and running away, but she really needed that hug. Help! I really need Emira’s help! She corrected herself as she sank into her older sister’s warm embrace. Her mind felt like a whirlpool, thundering and drowning everything in a rushing swirl of dark water, but this? Emira’s hug was a life preserver. “Thank you,” Amity whispered against her sister’s collarbone.
“Anytime,” Emira hummed. “Listen, this company comes highly recommended word-of-mouth, alright? It’s also woman-owned and operated, and you know I have to support our sisters out there.” Amity snorted, but she did know. Emira was fiercely loyal to any and all women business owners she could find—corporate “lowest bidder” guidelines be damned. She wouldn’t even haggle for better rates! What did it matter? It wasn’t her money she was spending.
“Okay,” Amity gulped, “I— I trust you, I do! I’ll— I’ll check them out.” She leaned her head against Emira’s shoulder and sighed.
“I know this is important to you, Amity,” hearing her real name slip from her sister’s mouth was unexpected, and she looked down to meet her sister’s familiar golden gaze. “You’ve spent years on this project,” Emira smiled, “Just let me know what I can do to help.”
The taller girl nodded, and said, “I’ll need to go talk to them, get them the container specifications. I— Today, if possible.” Her arms and back felt cold when Emira pulled away to walk around her desk, leaning over her laptop to tap at the keyboard for a moment before scribbling a note on a piece of paper. Amity folded her arms over her chest as she waited, chewing on her lip.
“Here’s their address,” Emira handed the note over and smiled, “Good luck.”
~
Amity stepped out of the taxi beside a nondescript three-story brick building; two large white rolling bay doors sat closed on the right half of the structure, while normal, everyday windows occupied the left half of the building’s face. No sign on the building, she noted, Not even a business name on the door. Had the street number above the main entrance not matched her sister’s handwritten note, the pale girl would have had the taxi take her right back to the Blight Industries campus. She gulped and nodded, furrowing her brow, I can do this. She nodded again as she tucked her briefcase under her elbow, smoothed down the front of her sweater, and closed the taxi door behind her. She pulled a few slightly crinkled bills from her handbag and passed them over to the taxi driver with her thanks, and then she turned to face the black framed glass door as the taxi motored away. It’s only your life’s work at stake, Amity. Nothing to worry about! You’ll only lose your funding and your lab if the demonstration fails… She moved her hand toward her mouth to chew at her nails, but she paused and made a fist instead, stepping toward the building.
She pushed through the door, and a bell above her head gave a cheerful ding, drawing the attention of the tall gray-haired woman standing behind a chest-high counter with her back to the door. Amity blinked; for a second there, she thought the woman’s head had rotated all the way around to look her way. Amity began to take a hesitant step forward as the other woman opened her mouth—perhaps to call out a greeting—when the phone on the counter rang. The tall woman groaned, her shoulders slumping as she rolled her eyes. “Sorry,” she whispered as she picked up the receiver, and Amity gave her a gentle wave.
“Y’ello, Night-Owl Trucking… Yes, this is Eda,” the gray-haired woman said, her eyes flicking back to Amity to beckon her forward with a large, pale hand. Her fingernails had been painted a golden orange to match her eyes and the large round earrings she wore. Amity glanced down at her own hands folded in front of her waist, wrapped around her briefcase handle. Her black nail polish was chipped from tapping at her teeth and biting her nails. She pulled out the single barstool on her side of the counter and sat down as Eda made a noise in her throat. “Yes… Yes… Ye-huh what?...... No… No,” the gray-haired woman’s eyes narrowed. “No! Why?... Why would y— Oh, ya heard about us online?” She laughed, a full-bellied chuckle that ended with a snort, shaking her head, “Sorry pal, you shouldn’t believe everything ya read on the internet… Oh really?” She leaned on the counter, her free hand curling into a fist, “Yeah, no shit, Sherlock!” She slammed the receiver onto the base of the phone and shoved her face into her hands, bending over the counter on her elbows as she groaned.
She popped back upright with a grin, throwing her arms wide, “Welcome to Night-Owl Trucking, I’m Eda, what can I do ya for?” Amity blinked up at the woman’s sudden change of mood and flapped her mouth for a moment. “Can I get ya somethin’ ta drink?” Eda asked, a little less exuberantly, probably sensing the younger woman’s confusion. “Coffee? Redbull?” She waggled her eyebrows, “I could whip up an Irish Cream.”
Amity shook her head and said, “Uh, no? um, No thank you.” She cleared her throat and ran a hand back through her mint-green hair, and set her briefcase down on the countertop in front of her. “I’m looking to hire a truck to transport some prototype equipment to a product demonstration.” She folded her hands over the briefcase for a moment, then decided to open it and pull out a details sheet, just to have something in her hands.
Eda grunted a noise of affirmation as she pulled a notepad close with the eraser of her pencil, “Uh-huh, and when is the— wait, prototype?” The gray-haired woman had leaned over her paper to start scribbling notes when that word caught her attention. She stood upright and raised her chin slightly, narrowing her eyes at the green-haired girl, “It’s not gonna explode, is it?”
Amity blanched, “What?!” She shook her head in confusion, “Why would— no?” Her project wouldn’t explode! But would father’s crate? The girl looked down at her hand for a moment, then squinted at the woman across the counter, “No. I’m not— no?” She hated the apprehensive tone in her voice. She sighed, “It shouldn’t.”
Eda gave her a half-smile and scribbled a note, “That’s fine. It’s just a rule of ours, is all—” She pointed to a plaque hanging on the half-wall behind her. It had an embossed picture of a long-nosed big rig with a halo and angel wings driving away from a mushroom cloud, and below were three lines of text: R.I.P. THE BAT QUEEN / NO EXPLOSIVES ALLOWED / KIKI THIS MEANS YOU! The tall woman sighed, “—Especially after… The Incident.” A smaller, black-and-white printed sign hung underneath, labeled Days Since Dismemberment. There was a “42” written in marker on a sticky note slapped against the corner of the sign.
“The— the incident!?” Amity paled when a hysterical giggle slipped out of her mouth at the implied capitalization in Eda’s last statement. The gray-haired woman raised an eyebrow, and Amity cleared her throat and shook her head, “Sorry, no— it’s just robotics.”
Eda leaned down onto her elbows and narrowed her eyes, “Could they explode?”
Amity was fairly certain the woman was messing with her, so she decided to take a chance. “Couldn’t your truck explode?” She asked, keeping her voice steady despite her thundering heartbeat. She felt like she would explode, but what was one more step outside her comfort zone after a morning like this?
“Not my truck!” Eda laughed, patting her hands in a rhythm on the countertop, “But yer technically correct.” She gave the girl a wide grin, and Amity breathed out a sigh of relief. “Alright,” the gray-haired woman said, tapping her pencil against her paper, “Where’s this truck goin’, and when does it need ta’ get there?”
“Boston, and by Friday,” Amity handed her the details sheet, pointing at the address in the corner, “Well, just east of Boston, but—”
Eda nodded, “—but close enough, gotcha.” Her eyes swept across the page, “By Friday? I’m guessin’ you’ll need time to set up and troubleshoot?” She glanced up at the girl across the counter.
Amity nodded, running a hand through her hair to push it back over an ear, “Yes, Friday morning, as early as possible. The demonstration will be in the evening, but,” she shrugged, “I’ll… I’ll need time.” She exhaled shakily, “I don’t know how much time I’ll need.”
The gray-haired woman hummed as she copied information from the details sheet to her notepad, jotting down a series of quick numbers. “Well, let’s see… What size truck do you need?”
Amity sat up straight, slipping back into her comfort zone of numbers and materials, “There will be four large crates—each six feet wide by eight feet long by six feet tall—and a few smaller crates with spools of wiring, computers, that sort of thing.” She tapped her fingers on the counter as she considered her laboratory, “Maybe five or six of those, and three would fit on a hand truck, so, three-foot square at most?” The golden-eyed girl frowned, “I’ll have to see how the technicians are packing the peripherals, I’m sorry.”
“No worries, kid,” Eda said with a smile as she scribbled notes, “Sounds like a regular forty-eight-foot trailer. D’ya need a dry van or a flatbed?” She looked up to see a blank stare, “Ha, sorry. Ya need a normal box trailer? Waterproof?” Amity nodded at that, making a soft mm-hmm, “Alright,” Eda nodded, “Pretty standard so far.” She scratched at her long mane of gray hair as she thought, “Let’s see… Do ya need climate control?”
Amity made a soft ah sound, “Yes,” she nodded, “It’ll need to be refrigerated, if possible. Humidity controlled, at least.”
“Gotcha,” Eda scratched another note, “Forty-eight-foot freezer box.”
“And—” Amity said before her throat closed. This was it. This was why she couldn’t—wouldn’t—let her mother transport it for her. She didn’t trust her or her people. “And… I…” Eda watched the girl gather her courage before finally admitting, “I need to ride with the prototypes. I just…” She sighed and trailed off, looking down at her hands and rubbing one thumb into her other palm.
“Oh?” Eda said with one eyebrow raised, “Not gonna fly out there and save yourself a long road trip?”
Amity shook her head, her neck and shoulders tense, her hands shaking on the countertop, “No— I— I can’t—”
“We’re talkin’ four days on the road,” Eda said kindly, leaning on her elbows to peer at the girl sitting across the counter. The poor thing was wound tight. “Maybe you should go to a spa for a three-day massage.”
“I have to— I can’t—” Amity huffed, growing frustrated with herself, her inability to articulate her feelings, “I need—” She paused to take a breath as she tapped the edge of her hand on her briefcase, “I need this to work, and I can’t… can’t trust my fffam… uh—” She hunched her shoulders and shrank down in her seat on the stool, feeling small. “It has to work,” she whispered.
Eda watched her for a moment before gently clearing her throat, drawing the girl’s eye, “Got a lot riding on this, huh?” The green-haired girl nodded with a timid mm-hmm. “It’s hard to trust other people with your life’s work,” the tall woman said, “Isn’t it?”
Amity nodded and whispered, “Yeah.”
“Welp,” Eda stood up straight as she slapped the counter, “You’re in luck. My best driver just wrapped a job.” She leaned on her elbow and gave the green-haired girl a warm smile, “She’ll take good care of you.”
“But— I thought—” Amity stammered for a moment, “Aren’t you the driver?”
“Yeah, I own the joint,” Eda said waving her hand, “But my curse is acting up, so I’m on desk duty for a while.”
“Oh…” Amity said, confused, “Okay?”
“It’s this sciatica that flares up every now and then,” the gray-haired woman rolled her eyes and gave the girl a warm smile at her look of concern. “It’s alright, kid. Let me get this written up, we can discuss routes in a minute,” Eda said as she glanced up at the clock, “I’ll let my driver know so she can start getting prepped.”
~
She glanced between the instruction book in her hand and her dashboard radio-slash-entertainment system. “Alright, uh…” she scanned the page again, reaching out to press a button below the screen, “Add device… menu, menu, enter, down… down again?” She paused, “then Bluetooth pairing? Shit.” She fumbled for her new phone with one hand, not wanting to lose her place in the instructions, tapping at the screen to get to its settings.
“Hey, Luz,” a familiar warm, scratchy voice called up into her open window, drawing her confused brown eyes away from her center console, “Here’s your next assignment.” A clipboard bobbed up into view, and the tanned woman reached out of the truck to snag the paperwork, dropping her phone on the passenger’s seat. “It’s a hot delivery, gotta leave tonight. Sorry!”
Luz glanced at the top sheet of paper, “Boston? huh…” She blinked, “Friday morning? Yikes.” Then her eyes popped wide, “Solo?!” A thrill of excitement and fear started circling in her stomach, leaving her queasy.
“Wait, Eda!” Luz called as footsteps moved away from her truck, and—mirrors were clear—she quickly kicked the door open, “Eda, are you sure?” the brown-haired woman said as she hopped down out of the big rig, turning to slam the dark brown door behind her before she tapped her knuckles against the clipboard, “I mean, this job seems real important.” She adjusted her navy blue jacket, patting at her pockets to nod at the jingle of keys as she followed the tall woman with the massive mane of gray hair. “Not that I don’t think I’m ready for a cross-country solo job—”
“Kiddo,” the gray-haired woman turned to face her young protégé, her wide golden eyes kind and sure as she interrupted another self-deprecating spiral, “You’re ready. I have my reasons for giving you this job.”
“Are you gonna tell me what they are?”
“Nope!” Eda called as she turned and walked away, waving a hand over her shoulder.
Luz followed Eda through the mechanical bay into the office, shouldering the heavy metal safety door open as she messed with the zipper on her jacket, “C’mon Eda, not even one little hint?”
The tall gray-haired woman looked back over her shoulder and smirked, “Alright, I’ll give you two reasons,” She paused just inside the front office, and leaned against Lilith’s desk. She held up one finger, “Reason number the first: you’ve been workin’ real hard lately, and this job—” she tapped at the clipboard Luz held under her arm, “—will take you close to home. I might’a forgot to tell ya, but I decided the next time I could send you by Camila’s, you could have a few days off to visit.” Luz gasped, her eyes growing wide with excitement, but Eda steamrolled her response, “And razón número two-no—” She cackled at Luz’s scrunched look of disgust at her butchered Spanish, then sighed, lowering her voice in a hushed confession, “—you know my curse has been acting up lately, with this weather we’ve been having. I can’t stomach a four-day drive right now.”
“Oh, Eda— should I stay? When’s Lily coming back?” Luz pulled the clipboard out from under her arm to look at the details, “Maybe we can postpone this a day or two if you need me around—”
“Kiddo, I’ll be fine,” Eda laid her hands on Luz’s shoulders, giving her a squeeze, “I appreciate your concern, I really do—as obnoxious as it is sometimes—but this job’s a priority. You’ll leave as soon as I give the old freezer box a once-over, so you’d better go get ready.” She put her arm over Luz’s shoulder, walking her toward the front desk, “But first, there’s someone I’d like you to meet.”
Amity had been sitting on the stool just out of sight, hidden by the filing cabinets on the other side of the countertop. She couldn’t help but listen as their conversation played out. Her anxiety had flared when this new female voice had suggested delaying the trip, but her heart had also squeezed at the care and concern she heard over the older woman’s health. She breathed out a sigh of relief when the woman—Eda, she reminded herself—had told the driver that her delivery was a priority. She heard two pairs of footsteps approach, and she smoothed down her sweater in nervous apprehension. I have to make a good impression, she nodded, I’m going to spend four days in a truck with this person. She quickly schooled her face into a neutral expression. At least they sounded kind. Her lips pulled into a soft smile at the thought just as she looked up.
Eda and a shorter woman stepped around the filing cabinets and Amity caught sight of large chocolate brown eyes, flawless tanned skin, a wide, kind smile, and the most adorable button nose. She shook her head and whispered, “Oh shit.”
Luz and Eda stepped past the filing cabinets and mint-green hair and golden eyes left her stunned, wide-eyed and blushing. Delicate elfin features on pale, porcelain skin, a rosy shine on high cheekbones, and soft, pink lips? Luz gasped and whispered, “Quien es esta belleza?”
Eda watched the two girls stare at each other, and rolled her eyes. She put a hand on the brown-haired girl’s shoulder and looked at Amity, “This is Luz, my best driver.” Luz blinked and looked up at her, eyes sparkling as she whispered aww, your best? Amity smiled. Then Eda motioned toward the green-haired girl, “Luz, this is Amity, our newest client.”
Luz looked back across the counter to the pale girl and flashed a brilliant smile, “Nice to meet you, Amity, I’m Luz!” She laughed to herself, This girl is a client and out of your league, so just make Eda proud on the road. She held out her hand, and Amity looked down at it for a long moment before reaching out to clasp her tanned fingers. The pale girl’s face turned pink as she gently ran her thumb across rough knuckles and calluses, giving her hand a gentle shake. Luz gave a breathy chuckle as she watched the slender girl stare at her fingers, her mouth slipping out of neutral before her brain could step on the brake, “Wow, I love your hair, it’s so pretty— ha ha— uh—” Their eyes met again and they locked gazes, “I, uh, didn’t—um—mean to say that out loud,” Luz stammered as a blush crept up her cheeks, “But you probably hear that all the time.”
“I don’t,” Amity whispered, staring at her, her heart hammering in her chest. Maybe this was a mistake after all. That three-day massage sounds like a good idea.
“Well— uh— you should!” Luz laughed, glancing between the dazzlingly adorable girl turning bright red and her face-palming boss. “Help me,” she hissed at Eda, who just put her fists on her hips and snorted.
The gray-haired woman gave her a long-suffering look and a slow, wicked grin. “She’ll be riding with you to the delivery site,” Eda said lightly, as if commenting on the weather.
“What?!” Luz gasped, her eyes slowly tracking sideways to land on the gray-haired woman, her fingers going rigid in Amity’s hand. “Why would she want to do that?”
“Client prerogative,” Eda grinned at the shorter girl’s astonished expression, “She’s concerned about her equipment, and needs to keep an eye on it while it’s in transit.” She waved a hand, “We’ve already discussed it, so it’s fine.”
“I— I— But—” Luz ground to a halt, and then hissed, “I can’t have a pretty girl like her in my truck!” Eda glanced at the green-haired girl and smirked when her face turned a truly luminous shade of red. Luz didn’t notice. “I snack like a pig! I belch all the time! I’ll smell by Friday!” The brown-haired girl’s eyes went wide, “OMIGAWD I just said all of that out loud?”
Eda laughed and waved toward the red-faced girl, “After four days in the truck, she’ll probably smell too.”
The golden-eyed girl looked put out, “I will not!” She sent a worried side-eye glance toward the other girl.
The gray-haired woman chuckled and looked over to Amity, disbelief on her face, “Truck stop showers are questionable.”
“Yeah!” Luz bristled with second-hand outrage, “No she won’t!” She glanced at their hands, where the girls had yet to let go of each others’ fingers, and pulled Amity’s knuckles up to her nose, “She’ll smell perfect, like—” She paused and sniffed Amity’s hand again, “Holy shit, what is that, vanilla and lavender?”
Amity squeaked and managed to nod. Something in her face, some profound fear in her eyes, caught Luz’s attention, and the brown-haired girl realized that she was almost kissing this blushing stranger’s knuckles. She let go and stepped back, palms up and worried, “I am so sorry—” she gasped, waving her hands. Amity clutched her fingers to her chest just below her chin, and shook her head, hoarsely whispering, It’s okay, as Luz continued to panic, “I’m sorry, Miss Amity!” She glanced between the golden-eyed girl and Eda, who had just clapped her hand over her eyes in disbelief.
“It’s—” Amity coughed and tried to smile; Luz leaned away from the twisted grimace. “It’s okay, Luz,” the pale girl managed to say.
“I— I— need to think, sometimes, ha ha— uh, before I act, as you can see,” Luz gave a nervous smile. “And hopefully it won’t bother you, but I sing along with the radio. It helps pass the time.” Her eyes lit up, suddenly, “Oh! You could sing along too!” She fanned her hands in excitement, “We could do the different parts when a duet comes on!”
“Me?” Amity sat bolt upright, her back and arms rigid, “Listening to music with you?” She gasped, “SINGING?!” Then she snatched her briefcase up in both hands and stumbled off the barstool, “I gotta go!”
Luz and Eda watched in shocked confusion as the slender green-haired girl dashed out the front door. “Um,” Luz began as Eda turned to face her, “Kiddo, that… that was something.” Brown eyes turned a faintly wounded gaze up to meet a blank golden stare. “I have never in my life,” the tall, gray-haired woman shook her head, one hand rubbing at her temples, “seen a sorrier display of flirting than what I just—” Luz’s loud gasp cut her short.
“I wasn’t flirting!” the brown-haired girl exclaimed, her cheeks aflame, “That was— that wasn’t—”
“Kiddo, that—” Eda sighed, “Whateverthefuck that was, goddamn.” She shook her head, “Try not to give that poor girl a heart attack.”
“I won’t!” Luz was pure indignation.
“If you say so,” Eda scoffed, unlatching the countertop gate and swinging it open, “Go get ready for your trip, lady-killer.”
“I’m not a— dammit!” the brown-haired girl hissed and stomped away.
Eda shook her head as she walked through the shallow lobby, pausing to grab a spare company jacket and hat from the locker in the corner before she pushed out the front door. Amity stood there, just beside the doorway, pressing herself against the wall as she clutched her briefcase to her chest. “Listen, Amity, if you wanna reconsider—”
“No!” Amity yelped, then squeezed her eyes closed and hissed out a breath before shaking her head, “No, I— I have to see this through.”
Eda watched her for a long moment before responding, “Alright, if you’re sure…” She trailed off, watching the green-haired girl breathe noisily out her mouth, cheeks puffing with air as she squeezed her briefcase until it groaned. “You’re a mess, ain‘t’cha?” the gray-haired woman said as she tossed the jacket over her shoulder.
Amity tried to glare at her, which earned her points in Eda’s book. “So what if I am?” the girl sighed, looking down at her feet as she kicked the toe of her boot against the sidewalk.
“Hey, I’m a bit of a mess, m’self,” Eda said, leaning against the wall on the other side of the door, crossing her arms over her chest, N.O.T. hat dangling from her fingers. “Nobody’s perfect, don’t stress about it.”
Amity gave a hollow laugh.
“Here’s the thing,” Eda said, her voice growing soft, “Luz is a sweet kid, and she’ll be able to tell you’re a mess.” She heard Amity stiffen, and the tall woman chuckled, “She’s gonna want to help. Do yourself a favor and let her. If nothing else, she’s a good listener.” She turned to catch the pale girl’s eye, “She’s gonna annoy the shit outta you until you do, so, be warned.” Amity snorted, then blushed and covered her nose with her hand. Eda stepped away from the wall to turn and face the green-haired girl, “You need this stuff in Boston by Friday morning, that means you gotta hit the road tonight.” Amity paled, and Eda grinned, “So make your phone calls, get your crate guys moving. Luz will come by later today to load the truck.”
The gray-haired woman held out the hat and jacket, waiting for Amity to lift them from her hand. “Go on, take ‘em. You’ll wanna blend in on the road. Wear some comfortable pants—khakis, not denim—and short-sleeved shirts; don’t count on showers being available; pack light, but bring a cozy blanket and sweatshirt.” Eda sucked in a breath and said, “Okay, you’re gonna hate me for saying this now, but you’ll thank me later— bring a pack of baby wipes.” Amity scrunched her face in disgust and Eda laughed, “Trust me, sister. Better to have and not need, ‘n all that shit.”
“...Thank you, Eda,” Amity said softly, looking at the logo on the jacket in her hand. She gave a heavy sigh, “What am I doing?” she whispered.
“You’re doing your best,” Eda said, and gave the girl a smile when she turned watery eyes up toward her. “Good luck, Amity. Knock ‘em dead.”
Notes:
This is a super serious work, just chock-full of angst!
Chapter 2: Monday, 5:12pm
Chapter Text
Luz watched the loading dock slide close in the mirrors as she eased the truck backward, feathering the brakes just before she punched the pedal down at the gentle bump of the spring-buffers mounted on the concrete bay. Her left foot popped the clutch as she worked the stick shift and slipped the gearbox into neutral, then she flipped a switch and killed the engine. She pulled her keys from the dash and slipped them into her jacket pocket as she checked the fish-eye mirror below her window. All clear, she grinned before she kicked the door open with her foot. She held the vertical bar beside her door and swung out of the cab, sliding down to the ground.
The docking bay was an empty, cavernous secret hidden behind the imposing steel-and-glass tower in the center of the Blight Industries campus. Luz had circled the central set of buildings twice before finding the quasi-hidden service road leading deep under the tower; the sharp-edged shadows from the late afternoon sun had helped disguise the entrance from unfamiliar eyes. Luz glanced around in confusion as she swiftly climbed the yellow ladder at the end of the dock. Where are all the…? At least a dozen truck bays sat empty, a handful of forklifts and paletted, plastic-wrapped boxes littered the other bays and peninsula, but she didn’t see any workers. Her soft footfalls were the only sound echoing from the concrete. She knelt at the doors to the trailer and unlocked the padlock, working the latch & pins, and swinging the panels wide open.
Luz put one hand on her hip and ran the other through her brown curls, pushing her battered cowboy hat slightly to one side as she scratched at her scalp. She had been right; the loading dock was entirely empty—but she could see a group of men glaring at her through a window off to her left. She raised her hand in a hesitant wave and gave them a questioning smile. One man in a short-sleeved white button-down and a striped tie took a sip from his coffee mug, then pointed to a set of double doors at the back of the loading dock.
By the time she turned her head, the doors had already been pushed half-open by a green-haired man pulling a hand-dolly loaded with a stack of small crates, “—already here, Mittens, I saw her pull in on the security feed.”
A musical voice answered back from the hallway beyond the dock, but Luz couldn’t make out the words. The man laughed and glanced over his shoulder as he pulled the crates through the doorway and around, out of the way of a green-haired woman with a similar load of crates. She looked just like— Luz blinked, Twins?! caught completely by surprise as the two tall, good-looking people walked her way. Oh god, pretty twins. She gulped at the feral grin on the woman’s face and the predatory gleam in the man’s golden eyes. “And who do we have here?” they asked in unison with an identical smirk, and Luz felt an embarrassing heat rush to her cheeks.
“Uh, I’m— uh—” Luz stammered before a mint-green distraction appeared in the hallway.
“Luz!” Amity called as she power-walked into the loading dock, an excited flush darkening her golden eyes, “you’re— you’re here!”
“Miss Amity!” Luz waved and gave a nervous laugh, sweating under three pairs of piercing golden eyes. The two forest-green-headed twins shared a curious glance, the man mouthing Miss Amity? to his sister, who smiled at the breathless girl swiftly walking their way.
“Please, Luz,” Amity said as she approached, her hands heavy with a large backpack and a well-worn laptop bag, “just Amity.” She shrugged and chuckled as she rubbed her feet on the ground. Almost against her will, she found herself looking away from the brown-haired girl whenever their eyes met, her face coloring a shade darker each time it happened.
The green-haired Gemini shared another incredulous look, the sister tilting her head and copying Just Amity? to her brother, who rolled his eyes at the wide-eyed, grinning girls trying—and failing—to look at each other. The woman with the long green braid leaned down and gently cleared her throat, “uh, Mittens, would you introduce us?”
Amity glanced her way as her brother leaned over, his voice a throaty growl beside her pale ear, “Yes, introduce us, who is this adorable little—” Luz watched, perplexed and frozen in the headlight-like glare of the twins’ hungry eyes as Amity purpled and whirled to face these strangers with strangely similar eyes, stepping back to plant herself in front of the shorter, brown-haired girl. Luz wasn’t quite sure why she ducked into the taller girl’s shadow for a moment before peeking over her shoulder—her heart had been pounding after the sudden appearance of these two beautiful strangers, and now some primal instinct was telling her to hide. They were staring at her with eyes that promised to pierce and pin and take. No one had looked at her like that in… well… ever.
“Oh look,” the delicate twin said to her double, “She’s bashful.” Her face bent with a wicked grin, “How curious.”
“Leave her alone,” Amity exhaled a frosty note and her siblings shivered in delight.
“Oh look, she’s possessive,” the male twin said to his match, “How interesting.”
“Who are they?” Luz grabbed a fist full of Amity’s jacket sleeve as she squeaked her question up toward the taller girl’s neck.
Amity shuddered at the hot breath drifting across her ear and looked down over her shoulder, “My idiot brother and obnoxious sister,” she groaned with a lopsided sneer. The twins gasped and each feigned a dagger wound to the heart.
Luz gasped as well and tugged the taller girl to lean to one side, hissing loudly, “Is your whole family gorgeous?!”
“You— I—?!” Amity made a startled choking noise as her face turned a bright, cheery red, and her siblings laughed and laughed.
“Oh, I like her,” the man said, his steamy disposition evaporating as he wiped a tear from his eye, a lanky-framed goofball replacing the simmering charmer, “I’m Edric,” he offered as he pushed his stack of crates past Luz and the Amity-shaped bonfire still emitting a shrill, whistling sound.
“Good job— Luz, was it?” the woman said, “You broke her.” She laughed as well, still cool and confident, but no longer pinning the truck driver in place with her seductive gaze. “I’m Emira,” she grunted as she levered her stack of crates into motion.
Luz swiveled back and forth between the twins and the blushing girl beside her, mouth gaping in confusion, before asking, “Miss Amity?” in a gentle voice, stepping around to stand in front of her.
The girl with the mint-green hair turned her eyes to the floor, slowly swallowed, and croaked, “J-just Amity.”
Luz examined her for a moment before grinning, “Alright, Miss Just Amity—” and snickered as the taller girl turned a golden glare and a frown her way, “Sorry if I upset you?” She gave the taller girl a small nod when Amity shook her head. “Can I put your bags in the truck?” The brown-haired girl put out her hands and smiled, “Where’s the rest of your equipment? Do I need to pull a forklift over?” She pointed a thumb toward the break room window filled with glowering silhouettes, “Hey, why are all the—”
A cool, calm demeanor fell over Amity’s face as she switched back to business, stuffing her emotions back down into Far-Future-Amity territory, “Yes, please, Luz, if you can put these in the truck, I’ll bring out the crates.” She shrugged off the backpack as she handed over the laptop bag, “No forklift needed, you’ll see— wait here and watch?” Luz blinked at the weight of the bag the girl dropped on her arms. “Thank you,” Amity jogged away with a grin on her face, and Luz blinked and watched her go.
“Like what you see?” The unexpected voice in her ear made her jump clear off the floor, almost dropping the pretty girl’s—No, bad Luz—her client’s bags.
Luz spun on her toes and hissed, “What the fffflip, dude?!” and Edric laughed as the girl pulled the backpack on to better hold the laptop bag in both hands, “I almost dropped her stuff!”
The green-haired man chuckled as his twin walked over to lean an elbow on his shoulder. “My bad,” Edric said as he ran a hand back through his hair, “Really.”
“So, Luz,” Emira’s tone was coy and playful as she glanced at her fingernails, “How long have you been driving truck?” Both twins looked at her with a curious—identical—tilt of their heads, and Luz had to laugh.
“Almost five years now,” Luz replied as she scratched the back of her neck, fidgeting under their inquisitive eyes.
Emira made an expression that read both impressive as well as I already knew. She polished her fingernails on her brother’s shirt and examined them again while Edric fussed a Hey! and brushed at the fabric. “Do you like your work?” The woman with the long green braid asked, blinking twice before spearing Luz with her eyes.
“I— uh… Yes?” Luz managed to ask before involuntarily apologizing.
“That’s good to hear,” the green-haired woman purred as Amity jogged back into the loading bay with a handful of stickers.
“Luz, can I put these on the trailer?” the tall girl asked, then waggled the pile of decals in her hand, “They’ll come right off.”
“Oh?” Luz asked, feeling a bit dazed, “uh, sure.”
“And what does Luz like to do for fun?” Edric asked in a hushed, meddlesome tone as both twins leaned close, grinning like sharks circling their prey. The meal in question continued to watch the mint-green-headed girl as she flipped through the stickers in her hand.
“Oh, you know,” Luz coughed, “Reading, long walks on the beach, climbing, uh—” She watched as Amity reached up to slap a pair of patterned rectangle stickers on the top edge of the trailer. She’s so tall! Luz gulped, her voice dipping to a hoarse whisper, “…trees.”
“Indeed,” Edric agreed with a solemn nod, adding, “I know a birch,” before Emira slapped his shoulder.
Luz looked their way and blinked, “—Rock climbing! Sorry, what?”
“Nothing,” Emira assured her as Edric pointed over her shoulder, grinning, “Oh look!” Luz turned so fast her neck popped.
Amity walked through the double doors beside a six-by-eight-by-six metal-and-wood crate rolling on a strange purple and black frame, black orb-like caster wheels humming near-silent in the wide concrete space. A boxy Roomba-like contraption paced the tall girl on her other side: a purple oblong rectangle on a trio of those same casters with a shiny black dome in the middle of its top. She spoke quiet words down at the rolling purple block, and an oozing purple face swiveled to glance at Luz from inside the dome. Pixelated goop dripped from the green-and-black eyes and gray mouth in an exaggerated, cartoon-like animation, and as it moved closer Luz could see the black dome was a curved screen under clear plastic or plexiglass. She watched as Amity pointed toward the open trailer doors and said, “Abe, scan the trailer for the others,” in a loud, clear voice.
The rolling shoebox made a zombie-like wheeze of affirmation and zipped forward to spin to a halt in front of Luz and the twins. A small hatch popped open on the top of the little robot, and a laser grid painted the trailer opening for a moment before separate beams flicked over the stickers Amity had placed around the doorframe earlier. Luz crouched down to look at the purple and black creation more closely, and the goopy rounded face turned her way. She tilted her head and grinned as the digital eyes and mouth matched her movement. Hi, she whispered as she waved. It blinked and groaned, then trundled forward into the trailer, the laser grid spinning across the walls and ceiling as it slowly rolled to the far inside wall. It reversed its direction and scanned the floor on its way out, then spun in a circle and rolled back to Amity’s feet.
“Did you find the retention brackets?” the mint-green-haired girl asked the little robot, and it moaned another ghoulish wheeze. “Good job, tell Min to set her crate in place.” She stepped over to stand beside Luz and the twins, and they watched as the rolling box chattered a rapid set of beeps and chirps to the purple-and-black frame holding the metal-banded wooden crate. The frame swiveled to align the long crate-side parallel with the trailer itself, then carefully rolled in and centered itself between two pairs of ratchet-strap tie-ins. Luz leaned forward to watch as the frame split apart, sections of it spinning and whirring as it broke loose into separate pieces holding the crate by its corners, the machinery swiveling as the crate was settled gently to the floor. The frame was still connected in a long multi-segmented line, Luz could see now, as it curled up and over the crate to twist itself around another purple rectangle with a round, flat black screen in the middle of its upper surface.
The pieces that had been the frame now formed spider-like legs around the flat-topped boxy robot center, ending in the black caster wheels. It rolled smoothly out and chittered at the first robot as another goopy face drew itself on its rounded screen. “Good work, Min,” Amity said, patting the robot as it drifted over to her knee. “Alright Abe, bring the others in, just like that.” The dome-topped robot spun quickly and zipped out the double doors with the faint squeal of rubber on concrete.
Amity glanced over at Luz and asked, “Well, uh, what— what do you think?” Her voice was soft and timid as she worried her fingernails in the bottom edge of her jacket, clearly expecting her work to be dismissed.
Edric and Emira crossed their arms as they carefully watched the other two girls, and the green-haired woman frowned at her little sister’s slumped shoulders, her already-defeated posture. Emira knew their father and mother were the only other people who had seen Amity’s project in action, and neither one had reacted well; father expressed the barest interest, and sent her a few stacks of documentation and new components—a frigid, absent-minded acknowledgment, at best—but their mother had belittled and criticized everything she could find. Amity’s work was excellent, as always, but she couldn’t bring herself to believe her or her brother when they told her so.
Luz inhaled long and slow, reaching out to grasp the elbow of Amity’s N.O.T. jacket sleeve with one shaky hand. The brown-haired girl tipped her head up toward the taller girl, Amity catching a glimpse of misty eyes and quivering lips as Luz took a second shuddering breath. “Luz? Are you—”
“They’re so cute!” Luz almost squealed, shaking Amity’s arm, “Oh my god, Amity! They’re just the most adorable little goo babies!” She dropped to her knees, still clutching the taller girl’s laptop bag to her chest, as she leaned toward the spider-shaped robot. “Is your name Min?” Luz asked the purple metal box. The digitized face on its screen tilted up to look at Amity before looking back at Luz. The robot made a stiff shrugging nod with its whole body, and the tanned girl squealed in delight, clapping her hands in excitement, “Omigawsh, can you understand me?”
The robot made a wheezing groan, and Amity replied, “She said yes, sorry, they only have a rudimentary speech package, and—”
“Rudimentary my ass!” Luz interrupted, glaring up at the tall, pale girl, “These pequeño bebes are amazing!” She turned back to Min and patted the robot on the, well— “She called you rudimentary,” Luz huffed, “that’s rude— imentary!”
Edric snorted and Emira scoffed, Oh my god, as Luz patted the robot again, “I’m sorry Min, I can’t quite understand you, but,” she tapped at the black screen, and the goopy face slid away from her fingertips as she traced the chamfered glass edge, “you can control your image here, right?” Luz tapped her chin, then snapped her fingers, “Could you flash your mouth green for yes and red for no?”
Amity pursed her lips and hummed, “I don’t think—” The words caught in her throat as Min’s mouth flashed a bright green.
Luz cooed, “Oh, you brilliant little lady, can you show me a number? How much did that crate weigh?” The three siblings watched in surprise as the robot’s mouth flashed green, then the goopy face scrunched down to the bottom left of the screen as a comic book speech bubble appeared with 6,283 lbs., 09 oz. written inside. The brown-haired girl gasped, “Three tons?! You’re friggin’ Supergirl, Min!” The tiny mouth flashed green-red-green, and a speech bubble said Maybe. Luz chuckled and repeated, “Maybe? You know I’m right, missy.” She smiled at Amity as the other girl knelt beside her.
“Min has heavy-lift components, the other crates don’t weigh nearly as much,” Amity said in a strangely strained voice. Three more crates drifted through the doorway on similar purple-and-black roller frames while Abe brought up the rear.
Luz flashed her a brilliant smile before looking back to Min, “How much can you lift?” she asked, and a series of question marks began fading in and out within the speech bubble.
“She should be rated for eight tons,” Amity’s voice was soft, and Min flashed a green-green-red. The golden-eyed girl made a confused face, “What do you mean? Your components were—”
“How much do you think you could lift?” Luz grinned wide, accidentally interrupting the other girl in her excited curiosity. Min chittered for a moment, and the other robots chirped in response as they hummed into the trailer.
Best-possible configuration and leverage, 37,000 lbs. before structural failure.
The twins exchanged worried glances as their younger sister went rigid in surprise. Luz fussed happily, “Oh! You’re amazing, Min! Up top!” She raised her hand, fingers extended, and waited. Min’s goopy face moved back and forth across the screen as if looking between Luz’s hand and her face. The purple robot leaned slightly to one side in confusion. “Up top, y’know,” Luz repeated with a grin, “For a high five.” The robot straightened and gingerly raised a wheeled limb to tap against the tanned palm. Luz laughed and turned to the girl kneeling beside her, “Amity, these little guys are so cool! And eighteen tons, holy shit,” the brown-haired girl extended a hand toward the robot, “She could lift Hooty off the ground!”
“Uh, who?” Edric asked as Emira spoke at the same time, “Who’s Hooty?”
“Who are these guys?” Luz ignored them as she looked at Amity, her eyes dancing in wonder.
Amity blushed and stammered, “Uh— um— t-that is Nate—” she pointed at the frame lowering the second crate into place in the trailer, “A-and this one—” she motioned toward the closest purple-and-black robot carrying a pair of crates on a long Z-shaped frame, “is Shawn.”
Luz laughed and watched as the two frames pulled themselves apart and reassembled into a long three-sided tent shape with both of the rectangular purple robot bodies hanging from the top bar. She glanced between the four robots and their goopy purple sludge faces and the pale girl kneeling beside her, “How did— uh,” Luz laughed, waving at one robot who rotated its face upside down, “How did you pick their names?”
“Oh,” Amity frowned and looked down at her fingers, picking at one chipped black-painted nail, “My mother… came into my lab one day when I was first working on their actuators, and they were lurching all over the floor.” She paused and sighed, “She… she said, What is that abomination, like it… like they were just garbage.” Luz frowned and made a noise in her throat as she muttered, I’m sorry, and Amity blinked her way with a tentative smile, “Yeah, she’s… yeah. So, once their modules were working correctly, separately, I, uh… heh,” She chuckled.
Luz snapped her fingers, “Abomination? Abe, Min, Nate, and Shawn?!” She laughed, a bright, cheerful sound in a harsh gray loading dock, “That’s awesome, Amity!” The pale girl gave her a smile, growing wider as Luz added, “You took that negative thing and made it your own, that’s— ugh, that’s so good.” Luz nodded at the taller girl, “You are incredible.” Amity flushed crimson as she folded her arms over her chest, ducking her head to look down at her knees.
Edric tapped Luz on the shoulder and repeated his question when she looked his way, “Uh, Luz, who’s Hooty?”
“My truck,” Luz said, pointing a thumb over her shoulder. The twins stared at her as slow grins spread across their faces.
“I’ll— uh—” Amity coughed, rubbing her hands on her sleeves as she looked away from Luz, “I’ll have them climb into their crates.”
The brown-haired girl nodded, “Let me put these in the truck, then I’ll help get the crates secured,” Luz said, motioning toward the bags in her hand as she looked at Amity, the pale girl giving her a quick nod and a steady hand at her elbow to help her stand. “Thanks,” the shorter girl said, her cheeks darkening slightly as she walked away from the girl with the mint-green hair. Luz nodded toward the twins and said, “C’mon, I’ll let you see inside the cab.” The curious pair followed her to the stairs down to ground level at the end of the peninsula, and the brown-haired girl motioned toward her truck, “This is Hooty.”
The twins slowly walked toward the shiny vehicle. The rear of the cab was a glossy dark brown, with a lighter shade of brown on the sides of the squarish nose and the top of the hood. A row of yellow lights ran across the top of the cab, and a polished black sun visor sat just above the slightly tinted two-piece angled windshield. A mirror-bright chrome bumper sat beneath a shiny tan hood crown, clear rounded headlights mounted above the light brown fenders. Chromed exhaust stacks stood straight up on either side of the cab, curving gently back toward the trailer. A stylized owl-in-flight hood ornament glistened above the yellow oval Needham badge centered above the grill. Edric slowly walked toward the nose of the truck, letting a long, slow whistle out through his perfect white teeth— bad Luz, no! The green-haired man scratched his head and said, “This thing’s pretty old, huh?” his tone sounded unimpressed.
“Hooty’s an ‘81 Needham,” Luz said with a defensive note in her voice, raising her chin as she glared at the golden-eyed man, “He may not look like much, but he’s got it where it counts.”
“Did you just quote—” He began, then glanced at the truck again and recoiled. “What?” Emira said, walking over to stand beside him.
“I— There!” Edric said pointing, “The shape of it, it’s like a face!” Emira cocked her head to one side and blinked.
“Yeah, that’s Hooty,” Luz said with a nod.
“I don’t see anything,” Emira glanced at her brother as she shook her head.
Luz chuckled, “Hooty must like you.”
“It’s… it’s like he’s disappointed in me,” Edric frowned and shuddered.
“Sorry, brother,” Luz shook her head, “You must need to work on yourself.” She laughed as the man yelled Hey! Luz pulled the driver's door open and stepped up into the cab. She slid across her seat and swiveled her legs around, half-standing up to lean into the sleeper compartment. She pushed her duffel bag behind the passenger seat with her foot and set Amity’s surprisingly heavy backpack beside it. She turned and laid the laptop bag on the passenger dashboard, then waved at the twins through the windshield, “C’mon in!” she called. Edric clambered in first and scooted across to the passenger seat while Emira slid behind the wheel. They both sighed and made curious noises as they glanced around, then as one, they turned to face Luz. She leaned back in concern.
“This is a big deal for Amity,” Edric said, glancing at Emira, “I’m sure you could tell.” Luz nodded.
“We’re behind her one hundred percent,” Emira added, “But we’ve… not been the best siblings in the past, and she doesn’t really trust us.” Luz wrinkled her brow.
“Anything we can do to help, just let us know,” Edric said, slipping a satellite phone from his pants pocket to hand to Luz. She looked at it, then back up to the twins.
“She’s gonna worry herself sick about every little thing,” Emira rolled her eyes, “that’s just how she is.” She pulled an envelope out of her pocket and handed it to Luz, “That’s three thousand dollars in mixed bills, use it for anything you need.”
The tanned girl’s brown eyes almost popped out of her head, “Three thou— are you insane?!”
Edric shrugged, and Emira chuckled, “Look, use it for meals or snacks, incidentals, get a good night’s sleep in a hotel if you can—” Edric leaned in, chortling, “—separate rooms of course!—” and Luz blushed a furious red as the green-haired woman laughed, faking a horrified look at her brother, “Oh no, Amity, there’s a single vacancy, and—” Edric joined in, and the twins crowed in unison, “—there’s only one bed!”
“Omigawd, kill me now,” Luz groaned into her wrists, “Let me out,” she hissed.
The twins laughed again, but Emira added softly, “We’re just… we want to help her, in any way we can.” Luz stared at her, brown eyes flitting left and right as she examined the other woman’s face before the brown-haired girl nodded.
“So, we’ll get out of your hair,” Edric said as he chivvied his sister out the driver’s door, “and you two can get a move on.” Luz sighed and tucked the sat-phone and envelope in the pouch on the back of the passenger seat, then climbed out of the cab behind the twins.
She walked to the trailer doors and found the four large crates placed in the trailer. Luz slipped on a pair of gloves, then began hooking ratchet straps into the anchor points and tossing the lines over the metal-and-wood boxes. She worked to fasten the cargo in place as the twins quietly spoke to Amity, the three siblings standing near the trailer doors. Soon, all the crates were secure, and Luz walked out of the trailer brushing the palms of her gloves on her pant legs. “I think we’re ready to go,” she said to the twins. She gave Amity a nod, “You ready to saddle up, partner?” Luz flicked the brim of her cowboy hat and waggled her eyebrows.
Amity breathed out, clapping her hands together as she looked between Luz and her siblings. “Yeah, I— I think I’m ready.”
Chapter Text
“Go on up, I’ll be there in a minute!”
Amity slowly climbed up into the open passenger door of the truck and peered inside. Soft red leather wrapped around the two seats in the cab, as well as the extra armrests attached to the inner door panels. The same soft leather covered the bottom half of the doors and stretched across the ceiling, while dark brown stitching held it all neatly in place. It looked well-cared-after, but the sheer amount of the red leather surprised the golden-eyed girl. What did I expect? she wondered, Bare metal and rivets? She reached out to gently run a pair of fingertips over the leather, pressing down to feel the spongy padding underneath. Perhaps the leather helps with the acoustics? She had a feeling it would be loud in the cab while they were on the road. Amity looked down at the door beside her and blinked at the black metal crank on the inside of the door, confused for just a moment. Right, this truck is older than I am, she chuckled. A dark red matte fabric—more burgundy than maroon—covered the floor, with textured black plastic floor mats in front of the captain seats. The wooden dashboard probably wasn’t the truck’s original instrument panel, but it was an impressive addition to the cab’s design; the slab of oak had been lacquered and polished to a cherry-red shine. Gold-trimmed dials and gauges littered the gently curved wooden panel, clustered on the left side for the driver’s benefit. Amity gently ran a hand over the smooth, warm wood. Aside from air-and-heater vents, she only had two vertically-stacked glove compartments on her side of the dashboard.
A cluster of knobs and toggle switches were mounted on the headliner above the driver’s seat, with a smaller cluster in the middle aisle behind the seats. Half were labeled with old, black sticker strips with white typewriter text, but she couldn’t read them from where she stood. Near the middle of the dash was the cab’s only concession to modern technology—a relatively new GPS and entertainment system couched in a custom-made wooden housing that closely matched the rest of the dashboard. A positively ancient CB radio was bolted atop the dashboard, set back toward the windshield, its small handset mic with a curly-cue cord dangled from its notch on the radio’s faceplate. The speaker hissed softly in the hush of the rig, the volume knob turned down low. Her laptop bag was resting beside the CB’s squat, black metal casing. Where’d Luz put my bag? Amity wondered as she looked around, then put a knee in her seat and turned to her left to peer over the headrest.
A sleeper compartment hid behind the two stand-alone captain seats, and Amity felt her heart thud painfully in her chest at the sight of the cramped single mattress tucked under the overhead storage bins. A small stretch of floor space separated the captain’s seats from the cabinet-and-bed structure, just enough for a person to possibly lay down. There’s only one bed, she thought as she winced when she realized her siblings had already been in the truck. They know, Amity sighed. She leaned forward to peer into the back and nodded to herself when she saw her backpack sitting behind her seat, eating up a large fraction of the open floor area. Eda had cautioned her to pack light, to travel light, and she had done her best. She’d packed the barest minimum of clothing and toiletries, but she’d tucked a few unfinished components and tools into her backpack before securing her lab.
“Okay,” Amity muttered softly, turning to drop gracelessly into the passenger’s seat, “Okay… We… We’re doing this.” She exhaled and reached up to grab the seatbelt. She glanced out the still-open door and saw Edric and Emira standing a few long strides away, at the end of the next truck bay’s peninsula. They gave her a wave and a smile, and she raised a hesitant hand in return.
Then her siblings glanced at something—or someone—near the back of the trailer, and they both gave her a wicked grin. Emira held both hands up next to her face and pretended to fall asleep, eyes closed and snoring, as Edric pointed at her with both hands and hissed, “Luz!” He pointed at Amity and hissed, “You!” before curling up behind his twin and throwing an arm across her stomach. “Like this, see?” He wiggled closer as he looked at Amity, “Big spoon!”
Amity felt her mouth fall open as she gasped, “Shut up!”
Luz walked up to her open door, wiping her hands on an oil-stained rag before scratching at her neck. “You alright?” the trucker asked before she glanced over at the twins and tilted her head in surprise to see them pretending to sleep while standing up. Luz watched them for a moment before she asked, “The hell are you two doing?”
The twins popped awake and apart, and gave her a sly look, “Oh, we were just—”
“Nothing!” Amity didn’t mean to hit that high of a note, but she needed to get them off this subject. “They were making fools of themselves,” she snarled in their direction. She buckled her seatbelt and huffed as she crossed her arms. Those damn idiots! She shot the twins a glare as she slouched in her seat, and as soon as Luz stepped clear Amity slammed her door to block out their annoying laughter. Edric waved goodbye, still laughing, but Emira gave her an apologetic smile and a thumbs-up. Amity frowned slightly but returned the thumbs-up. Emira pointed down with a hopeful look on her face. Amity rolled her eyes but leaned forward to begin cranking the window down. After a moment’s effort, she leaned her elbow out of the truck cab and gave them a flat, “What now?”
“You got this, Mittens,” Emira’s voice was as firm and confident as the look on her face, “You’re gonna blow everyone away.”
Edric leaned against the railing, “We tease, but we love you, Mittens.” Amity scoffed and rolled her eyes. “Okay,” Edric added as he ducked his head in concession, “We tease a lot.”
“Better,” Amity growled.
“And we love you a lot,” he added with a grin.
Amity hummed and offered, “Okay.” She pulled the hat from her head and examined the white stitched N.O.T. logo as she turned it around and around in her hands. She wanted to believe her siblings when they said nice things to her, she wanted to take their nice actions at face value, but they’d pulled so many pranks on her with a straight face… It was hard to trust them. She was constantly looking for the real joke hidden in every phrase or gesture. She snuck a side-eyed peek at the twins and saw that faintly hurt, solemn expression she’d seen them wear more and more over the last few years. It won’t kill you to be kind, even if they aren’t, she thought as she sighed. You will miss them. “Thanks,” Amity said with a shy half-grin, “I love you guys, too.”
The cab rocked and she turned her head to see Luz pull herself up and into the driver’s seat. She flashed a brilliant smile at Amity before leaning out to pull her door shut. “Hey! Pre-ride checks are done,” the brown-haired girl patted the dashboard, “We’re all good. Need to grab anything before we go?”
Amity shook her head and hummed, “Nope, I— I have everything I need.”
Luz nodded and pulled a set of keys from her pocket, sliding one into the dashboard and giving it a twist. The truck hummed in anticipation. The brown-eyed girl turned back to Amity and gave her the worst serious expression she’d ever seen. “You ready to hit the road?” Luz asked with a slight growl in her throat.
“Oh god,” the golden-eyed girl let loose a shaky breath and shook her head, “I’m not sure?” —why that worked for me.
“Hey, Mi— Amity,” Luz chuckled once then swung her legs around to the middle aisle to face the other, slightly panicked-looking girl, “This is an important thing for you— so important, you’re here, and— like—” She gestured in vain as she struggled to find the right words, “You’re— okay —” Luz rubbed at her face and whispered, shit, then she tried again. “You’re stepping up to the challenge, right?” She looked at Amity until the green-haired girl nodded, still quiet, and Luz continued, “You’re stepping up, you’re out of your comfort zone, and I’m here, okay? I’m on your side. We’re a team. I want you to know you can count on me.” She held her hand out and waited a moment before saying, “C’mon partner, we gotta shake.”
Amity scoffed lightly, but she reached out to grasp the tanned hand hanging over the middle aisle. Luz gave her a wide, sparkling grin as they shook hands. “This is gonna be hard, I’m not gonna lie. Thirty-three hundred miles in four days is a rough first run,” Luz said, still holding Amity’s hand, their eyes locked, “But I know you can do it.”
“uh, Thanks, we’ll— um, we’ll see if I can,” Amity couldn’t help but look off to the side and wish for once she could keep her face from betraying every little emotion.
“I believe in you.” It wasn’t just confidence she heard in Luz’s voice. There was something else, something deeper, that made Amity blush bright red and stammer something unintelligible in response.
Luz chuckled as she turned back toward the steering wheel. “Speaking of belief, uh…” The brown-haired girl paused as she fished a pair of leather gloves from a side pocket on her seat, “I’ve seen some strange things while I’ve been on the road, and… uh …” She paused to run a hand through the hair on the side of her head, pushing her curls back behind her ear under the brim of her cowboy hat, “One thing I’ve learned is that Hooty is… temperamental.” She gave the cherry-wood steering wheel a gentle pat. “After some trial-and-error, I figured out if I sing along to one of his favorite songs before starting the trip, things… go better.”
“Oh?” Amity blinked twice and turned her highly-trained mind toward crafting the perfect response. “Huh.” Dammit.
“Yeah,” Luz glanced out her window to check her mirrors. She didn’t notice the other girl slapping herself on the forehead. “It’s not like… I don’t think I’d call myself superstitious,” she gave a nervous laugh as she looked over at her passenger, “But my time on the road has left me… open to the idea of…” She trailed off, waving her hand in the air as she settled on, “unexplainable things?” She gave Amity a cautious look.
Amity stared back at her, smiling silently as her brain helpfully supplied a dial tone. “Okay,” she managed. She squeezed her eyes shut. You’re doing so well at this.
Luz sighed, looking down for a second, “You probably think— I— yeah,” she coughed, “that sounds stupid.”
Amity’s chest hurt at the expression on the other girl’s face, “No!” she almost yelled, reaching out to the other girl, “I mean—” She ran a hand back through her hair and then pulled her hat back on her head. Luz gave a small grin as she watched. Amity motioned back and forth between them, “I am a scientist… but… I’ve noticed things in my own laboratory.” Luz snickered gently at the way she pronounced it, lah-bor-ah-tree, but then she saw Luz raise her eyebrows as she finished with, “Too many odd things consistently happening to be called a coincidence.”
“Oh yeah?” Luz had perked right up, her gorgeous chocolate-brown eyes sparkling, a bright smile on her full— No, bad Amity! “Like what?”
Amity had to blink before answering, “I… I have an EEPROM and microcontroller programmer that… won’t work if a— a plush bunny isn’t sitting next to it.” It sounded ridiculous when she said it out loud, but she’d struggled for weeks to get it writing data correctly after one of the twins had walked around the room holding the bunny, setting the plush down somewhere else.
Luz looked delighted, “Ha ha, awww,” she cooed, “It needs its stuffie!”
Amity snorted and covered her nose with one pale hand as she laughed, “Yes… and if my filament printer starts acting up, I tap it with a little plastic wizard figure, and it… Then it’s fine.”
“See?!” The brown-haired girl was overjoyed, “That’s awesome! Machines have so much personality!” She gestured behind them, toward the trailer and the crates inside it. “Like, your robots are amazing. You take care of your machines, you pour your— your positive energy into them, and they’ll take care of you, too.” She nodded as she put her thumb to a button on the dashboard, “If you haven’t yet, you’ll see what I mean, one day.”
Luz pressed the button and a deep growl shuddered beneath their feet as the big truck roared to life. Amity had guessed right, it was loud. She hastily rolled up her window and, Yup, the soft leather all around them did help dampen the throaty rumble of the diesel engine. “So, like I said,” Luz had to raise her voice slightly as she flipped a few switches overhead, and pressed a button on the entertainment system, “I have to play one of Hooty’s favorite songs and sing along. I, uh…” She made an apologetic face at Amity, shrugging, “Sorry in advance.”
Luz watched a light blink on the radio with a hesitant grin on her face, “It, uh, it’s random, the song Hooty picks, um— oh god, one time?” She looked over at Amity with a horrified face, “One time I was giving Kiki a lift over to the depot and he started with Marvin Gaye, it was awful!” She paled, then pointed a finger at the steering wheel and hissed, “Do not do that to me today!”
A pair of guitars ran up and down an octave as a bass guitar drove a chunky note in time with the drums, the hollow clack of a cowbell ringing out a four-four beat. “Oh good, this one’s not too bad,” Luz smiled as she bobbed in her seat, nodding her head and moving her elbows and shoulders to the beat as she glanced at Amity. “I gotta sing the first verse, at least, then we can—” The bass guitar ran a short upward-pitch progression and Luz belted out the lyrics with the recording:
Sugar lay-daayyy, be my savior~
She glanced at Amity—just for a moment—and her face darkened.
‘Cause I’m tiiiired, I’ve been eight days on the road~
Amity watched, awestruck.
That’s riiight, eight days on the road~
They were barely acquaintances, and she could sing like this in front of a near-stranger?
Travelin’ through the night~
The green-haired girl blinked at how apropos the lyrics felt.
There ain’t no town, ain’t no town, ain’t no rest toniiiight~
As she held that last extended note, Luz went into action; right foot pressing on the throttle as her left foot tapped and tapped again at the clutch bar, her right hand slipping the gear stick through its motions as the truck smoothly pulled out of the bay and under the raised loading dock gate, the roar of the engine temporarily drowning out the hard-driving classic rock. Luz followed the road around the building, and the girls saw three people standing on the sidewalk beside the main entrance staircase, a steady stream of business-casual employees walking around the trio with shocked expressions. Amity scrambled to roll her window down before she leaned out to wave at her siblings and the tall, auburn-haired man in a rumpled suit. Luz glanced over at her passenger for a moment, waggling her eyebrows with a grin as she said, “Check this out,” before reaching up to tug at a leather-wrapped handle above the driver’s window. The truck rattled as an ear-shaking HOOT—HOOOOT echoed up into the evening sky. Both girls laughed as the rig coasted toward the solid red light at the entrance to the Blight Industries campus. The light turned green, and Luz wheeled them through a wide right turn, then pointed their nose southeast toward the I-80 East onramp a mile away.
~
Luz assured her several times that the worst part of delivery runs were the actual pick-up and drop-off. The rest is smooth sailin’, the brown-haired girl said, motioning out toward the horizon with her free hand. Just stick ‘im in the paint and keep the hammer down. This stretch of the business district before the interstate was a brake-lit parking lot this time of night, and the stop-and-go traffic felt strangely exaggerated in the big truck. Amity had pulled her laptop bag from the dashboard to have something familiar in her hands. She stared out the windshield and jumped every time a taxi laid on their horn. She knew Luz was sneaking the occasional concerned glance her way.
“So, did you, uh, have any questions for me?” the tanned girl asked, easing off the accelerator as a minivan slipped in front of their truck.
“Um,” Amity played with the zipper under her fingertips, “Any rules I need to follow?” She gave a hollow laugh and jumped in her seat as another horn sounded beside her door, “Any— uh— heh, rules of the road?”
“Well, common sense stuff, I guess?” Luz replied, pausing to scratch behind her ear as she considered, “If you’re sittin’ up here, ya gotta have your seatbelt on while we’re moving. If you’re layin’ in the sleeper—” the tanned girl jerked a quick thumb over her shoulder toward the back half of the cabin, “—there’s a safety web you can fasten to keep from falling out of bed.” She glanced around before she eased forward as traffic advanced another sixteenth-car-length. “Be careful around the stick when you’re climbing in and out of your seat?” Luz patted the gear shift lever under her right palm as she glanced over at the golden-eyed girl, “It’s easy to trip on.” She shrugged, “That’s about it, I think.”
Brake lights flickered in the road ahead, and Luz gently applied pressure to her own pedal. “Okay—” Amity twitched when another brace of horns erupted from a nearby cluster of taxis, and she loosed a shuddering exhale as the brown-haired girl gave her a careful look. “Any— anything I can do?” She met Luz’s eyes and said, “You— you said we’re a team,” she spoke quickly, in a rush, “So what do you want me to— what can I do?” She hated the desperation she heard in her voice.
“The most important thing is honesty,” Luz’s voice was firm, “We have to trust each other. If I’m too tired to drive, I’ll let you know. If you need to stop for food or to stretch, or if you need to use the bathroom, let me know. I don’t want you sitting over there suffering.” She gave the green-haired girl a quick shake of her head before she moved to inch the truck forward, “Doesn’t matter why ta’ me. If you gotta go, ya gotta go. We’re only human.”
Amity felt herself growing pink at the thought of admitting she needed to use the bathroom. “I’ll…” She had almost the entire floor of the building to herself and had grown accustomed to her privacy. You’re almost twenty-five, Amity, she scolded herself. “I’ll try.” Luz caught her eye for a moment, and Amity looked down at the floor, “I— I promise.”
“I’ve got your back, Amity,” Luz’s voice was warm and kind, “Teammates look out for each other.” Amity nodded, then scratched her fingernails across her laptop bag as a horn blared just beside her window. The constant noise, the slow starts and stops? Amity felt jittery and shaken; she was an exposed nerve that kept getting prodded. She tried to take a deep breath, but her heart was racing in her chest. She heard a warbling sound, then shook her head when she recognized it as the other girl’s voice saying her name.
“Amity?” Luz repeated, “Look in the top glove box.” The green-haired girl fumbled at the latch with a clumsy hand, then growled before her fingers finally worked the twist-handle open. “Amity, how many containers of gum are in there?”
Amity blinked a few times, feeling as if her thoughts were wrapped in cotton. “Eight? No… Nine.”
Luz nodded, then said, “How many are blue?”
“Three,” Amity replied with a distant, distracted voice, flinching away from her window at the sound of another horn.
“Pick up one of the blue ones, okay? Shake it, do you hear any gum inside?” Luz had a soft, gentle tone that made Amity’s throat feel funny. The green-haired girl pulled one of the blue-labeled containers out and held it in both hands. She rattled it next to her ear until Luz said, “Now, open it and tell me what you smell.”
An icy, cool scent filled her nostrils and made her eyes water. “Peppermint?” Amity guessed.
“Do you like peppermint, Amity?” That same gentle tone made the green-haired girl suck in a harsh breath, but she managed to nod. “Go ahead and chew on a piece?” Luz made it seem like a request, but Amity could tell it was a command. A fiercely cold sensation spilled over her tongue when she bit into the cube of chewing gum, and she felt as if she’d had a frosty bucket of water dumped on her head. The fuzzy fog in her thoughts burned away as the taste and tang of peppermint filled her senses.
Luz guided the truck onto the on-ramp and accelerated, Hooty’s engine growling as he slowly gained speed, the throaty rumble drowning out some of the outside noises around the rig. “You alright, Amity?” Luz asked, unable to spare a glance at the other girl.
Amity nodded, then gulped a “Yes,” when she realized the trucker hadn’t seen her nod. She felt much better than she had a minute before. Was I… did she notice that? For a brief set of heartbeats, she felt appallingly vulnerable, but Luz just nodded and mumbled good, her attention on handling the big rig as she worked the pedals and the gears. Warmth pooled in Amity’s chest when she realized that was all the other girl was going to say about it. What had they been talking about? “But—” she drummed her fingers across her bag, “Being— being honest isn’t a job.” She managed a wet chuckle before clearing her throat.
Luz laughed, the bright, lively sound filling the cab as she checked her mirrors to change lanes. “That’s true! God, you’re so smart, gonna hafta watch myself around you,” the brown-haired girl said, only half paying attention to what she was saying, “uhh, Not that— I— Wasn’t trying to trick you or anything—” she stammered as Amity snorted. Luz groaned for a moment before admitting, “You have a very important job, Amity. Two, really.”
“Oh?”
Their truck merged into the eastbound traffic on the bottom deck of the San Francisco Bay Bridge. The early evening sun slanted over Luz’s left shoulder, sending long shadows stretching out before the vehicles filling the multiple lanes. Brake lights and high beams flashed, setting sparse clouds of exhaust ablaze in brilliant reds and whites; the sun’s golden rays glittered across the waves Amity could just barely see over the next lane of cars and trucks, between the thick concrete-and-steel bridge supports. The air around the bridge glowed in the sun’s warm, yellow gaze.
“You’re my navigator,” Luz said, briefly motioning toward the GPS screen between them, “I can’t always look at the screen, so you’ll need to call out turns and lane changes when we’re in slow traffic.” She glanced at Amity and grinned, “How long ‘til our next heading?” She turned her eyes back to the road and pointedly ignored the on-screen map.
Amity leaned forward slightly, “Six-point-seven miles until you bear right onto I-580 East.” She tapped at the screen, then added, “After we pass Treasure Island.”
“Excellent work, Miss Amity,” Luz said with a slightly smug tone of voice and a horrible British accent, “I had a good feeling about you.”
“Miss Amity?” the golden-eyed girl echoed with a false frosty tone, “I’ll overlook it this time…” She glared at the side of Luz’s face until the tanned girl glanced over and avoided her eyes. “What’s the second job?”
Luz hummed a distracted Hmm? as she shifted gears, then she clicked her tongue, “Two jobs, right. Okay,” Luz sighed, “Normally, a rush, long-distance job like this, Eda and I would take shifts driving.” Amity opened her mouth to apologize, but the brown-haired girl continued, “It’s fine, Amity, I’m okay. I can do this, but you’ll need to help me stay alert.” She quickly glanced over to catch the pair of golden eyes before she turned back to the road. “I might be asking a lot from you, I dunno,” Luz said with a chuckle, “I won’t pretend to know how well you handle small talk in the wee hours of the morning, but you— uh—” Amity watched as the other girl’s cheeks darkened just a smidge, “You’ve been really easy to talk to so far, so—”
Amity blushed and spluttered a response, which made Luz giggle. The bridge ended ahead, plunging into a tunnel on Yerba Buena, the artificial Treasure Island sparkling in the water off to their left. Luz smiled as Amity craned her neck to watch the tunnel swallow the rig, the faded yellow lights flashing on and off patterns over the pale girl.
“I have a basic mileage goal in mind for each night,” Luz said, then added as an afterthought, “We’ll find a place to park when we get close. Eda and I usually sleep in the truck.”
“Oh?” Amity said before it registered. “Oh.”
Luz glanced her way and grinned at the wide-eyed stare the other girl was sending her way. She tipped her head back over her shoulder, “You’re my guest, so you’ll have the sleeper to yourself.” She patted her armrest, “This baby reclines.”
“What? Luz,” Amity sounded horrified, “That can’t be comfortable!”
“It’s fine,” Luz shook her head, “I let Eda have the bed when we’re team-driving, with her curse and all. She mentioned that, right?” Amity made a noise and nodded, and Luz continued, “It’s not a big deal,” she caught Amity’s eye for a moment, “Honest.”
“Okay,” Amity appreciated the other girl’s thoughtfulness, but it still didn’t sit right with her. Luz is doing all the work, and I’m stealing her bed? “Tomorrow, though,” the green-haired girl tried to sound undeniable, “Tomorrow night you’ll take the bed, and I’ll sleep in my seat.” Luz started to protest, but Amity interrupted, “No! It’s fair! We’re a team, remember?”
Luz grumbled, but had to admit, “I did say that, yeah.” Amity hmmph’d as she pretended to brush long hair back over her shoulder, and Luz chuckled. “Fine,” the brown-haired girl groused, “We’ll swap tomorrow night.” The golden-eyed girl pointed out the window at the fork ahead, and Luz nodded, downshifting as she flicked the turn signal on. Hooty rolled down the onramp to Interstate 580 and merged with the flowing traffic.
“Forty-five miles until we hit the I-5 to Los Angeles,” Amity hummed as she straightened up from checking the map. She glanced over at Luz, who was singing along softly with the radio. “What’s your plan for tonight?” she asked when the other girl trailed off before the chorus.
“I’ve had ramblin’ fever all alooong~ Tonight?” Luz blinked as she thought, “I figure if we can reach Richfield tomorrow morning, we can stop to sleep.” Amity stared at her for a moment and Luz added, “Richfield, Utah.”
“How far is that?” Amity wondered aloud as she pulled her phone from her jacket pocket, ready to open Maps.
“About eight hundred and ten miles,” Luz hummed along with the singer’s notes.
“Eight hundred and ten?” Amity could see the numbers as easily as she could see the other girl, “Thirty-three hundred miles in four days, that’s eight hundred twenty-five miles a day. The Richfield stop will have us at eight hundred thirty the next three days.”
Luz blinked twice and tilted her head, “Give or take, yeah.”
“Thirty-three hundred miles by sixty-five miles per hour,” Amity hardly paused to consider, “that’s fifty-point-seven-six hours drive time.”
Luz looked impressed, “Well, maybe an average of sixty-eight.”
“That would be forty-eight-point-five-two-nine hours.”
“Seventy-two?” Luz asked with hesitation before laughing at the incredulous look she received.
“While a forty-five-point-eight-three-repeating drive time would be impressive,” Amity snarked, “I wonder how fast you’d actually be going to make that an average speed.”
Luz snorted, “Gotta make up for all this stop-and-go, don’t we?” She waggled her eyebrows at the pale girl and Amity scoffed. Hooty rambled along the interstate, the Oakland city center shining in the distance out Amity’s window and the suburbs glowing golden in the evening sunlight out Luz’s side of the truck. The song on the radio changed and Luz turned the volume down slightly as she aimed a shit-eating grin in Amity’s direction.
“Alright Missy,” Luz cackled when Amity bristled at the miss and instantly deflated when the full word registered. “Time for some awful icebreakers!”
“What?!” Amity paled, “No.”
Notes:
Chapter Text
Luz fired a grin over at the other girl, a gleeful expression lighting up her face, “Icebreakers are the key to building a strong friendship—they tell us all sorts of things about ourselves, mi nueva amiga.”
Amity frowned, worry crinkling her eyebrows, “Luz, no.”
“Luz, yes,” the brown-haired girl countered, pulling a folded piece of paper from her inner jacket pocket with a flourish. “I’ve got a list of great questions here, and… Amity?” She held it out for a moment but crumpled it into her palm when the green-haired girl crossed her arms over her chest with a darkened frown on her face. Luz faltered, stuttering, “Amit— hey— it’s not—”
“I said no, Luz, I don’t like— it’s—” Amity started, staring down at her knees. “I can’t just—”
“No, no, I’m sorry, Amity,” Luz quickly interrupted, “I didn’t mean to push?” She glanced over at her passenger, but the other girl was still looking down at the floor. “I wanted it to be a fun little thing where we get to know more about each other.” She shrugged, “Some silly questions to talk about— but— I was wrong to ignore your first ‘no’, I’m sorry. I-I get—” Luz sighed, “I get excited a-and take things too far.”
The Interstate curved to the right, around a hill out Amity’s window that sloped sharply upward, the dense thicket of green trees and vines scattering the evening sunlight into sharp rays painting the pale girl’s profile. Hooty’s tires hummed around the bend as another old country song strummed out of his speakers. After a minute of thick, uneasy silence, Amity held her hand out. Luz watched it for a moment until the pale girl wiggled her fingers impatiently. The brown-haired girl quickly placed the paper in Amity’s hand, then said, “I wrote that list the other night— you can ask me any of those; you don’t have to answer unless you—”
“Luz,” Amity’s voice was soft, and the brown-haired girl closed her mouth with a click. “I am… not used to… people wanting to…” Luz gave her a worried glance before focusing her eyes on the road. A pained silence fell inside the cabin for a long moment before the pale girl sighed. “People who want to talk to me— they’re usually trying to steal company information.” She turned her golden eyes on Luz as the tanned girl furrowed her eyebrows and muttered, Jerks, what the hell, before Amity spoke again, “So I… I got… defensive.” Luz got the impression the other girl had almost said something else. “I’m sorry,” Amity added, “You’ve done nothing to warrant my response.” Luz waved a dismissive hand and breathed, s’okay, I’m sorry too, as Amity began to unfold the paper. Abruptly, her shoulders slumped and she hung her head like a deflated balloon. Luz glanced her way, but before she could speak, the pale girl had offered a quiet, “Thank you, Luz. For… for understanding.”
“Of course,” Luz replied.
The green-haired girl sniffed and wiped under her eye, then she cleared her throat as she unfolded the paper twice. She muttered something under her breath as she finally exposed the list. Luz had ripped a sheet of notebook paper in half, top-to-bottom, then taped the short ends together when she ran out of room; her cramped penmanship covered one full double-length side and most of the other. “Why did you—” Amity covered her mouth with one hand and snorted, turning the paper over to glance at the scribbles marking both sides, rotating it lengthwise.
Luz glanced her way twice, then chuckled, “What?” the third time she looked at the green-haired girl.
“You wrote this?” Amity asked with a laugh, her golden eyes shining, absolutely delighted.
“Yeah?” Luz smiled and breathed out a chuckle, waiting a moment before asking, “Why, what’s up?”
“This is— heh,” the pale girl flipped the paper over and folded it once, looking over the questions more carefully. “This is your handwriting?”
“Yeah? Why.”
“So you didn’t pay a serial killer to write these down for you?” Amity laughed harder when Luz gasped, then held the list up for Luz to see, tapping at a particularly violent scrawl, “This is the handwriting of an unhappy mind.”
“Hey!” Luz frowned, “I resemble that remark!”
“Did they stop teaching handwriting in school?”
“Did they stop— Aren’t we the same age?” Luz felt that old bullied-on-the-playground bitterness bubbling up in her chest, but she knew Amity wasn’t trying to be cruel. She’d turn that sting into snark. “Mrs. Hruska taught us standard cursive, thank you very much.” Luz stuck her tongue out and blew a raspberry at the other girl, grinning when her pale passenger giggled. “And my mind is plenty happy, just you wait and see.”
Amity chuckled in disbelief, giving the tanned girl an understanding nod, “Sure, Luz, if you say so.” She glanced at the paper again and grinned, “Pink, by the way.”
Luz sounded scandalized, “What? Nooo, Amity!” as the green-haired girl laughed, “What question was that for? Amity! We have rules in this society!”
The pale girl made a mwuahaha as she rattled the papers against her fingertips. “That’s for me to know,” Amity gave Luz a wicked grin, “and you to lose sleep over.”
Luz scoffed, loudly, and gave the other girl an incredulous, “Oh, really?” before she narrowed her eyes, “That’s how it is, huh?”
Amity preened for a moment, then she lifted the paper. “Alright, first question… um,” Amity slightly turned in her seat to watch Luz, smiling, “What’s your third-favorite color?”
The brown-haired girl laughed, “Third favorite, that’s great— Um, let’s see.” She blinked and muttered for a moment before she answered, “Green.” Luz glanced at her mirrors, then clicked her tongue, “No, wait… Red.”
“Red?” Amity repeated, then said, “And just for clarity’s sake—” and Luz copied her, Oh yes, clarity, “—what are your first and second favorite colors?”
“Purple and yellow.”
Luz grinned at the gentle gasp she heard slip from the pale, golden-eyed girl. “Purple is my favorite, too,” Amity admitted, hiding a smile behind her fingers as she laughed.
“All right, color buddies!” Luz said with a grin as she held up a hand for a high-five, getting a gentle slap from the taller girl’s larger palm.
“Black and Pink are my next two choices,” Amity said softly.
“I should have guessed from your fingernails,” Luz said, waving toward the pale girl’s hands. “Thanks for sharing that with me,” the brown-eyed girl’s voice was softly serious, “You don’t have to tell me anything you’re not comfortable with sharing. Everyone needs their privacy.”
The other girl stared at her for a moment, then nodded, “Thank you, Luz.” Then she glanced at the paper and smiled, “Favorite kitchen utensil?”
“Utensil?” Luz repeated, raising an eyebrow. Amity nodded and hummed an mmm-hmm, and the brown-haired girl chuckled, “Well, since it asked for a utensil, I guess that would be my tiny fork.” At the pale girl’s stare, Luz held out her thumb and forefinger, “It’s about this long, and it’s just so cute. I love it.” She looked over at Amity with a laugh, “I especially love using it for things like steak or meatloaf, because there’s this unbelievable tension like, will she even be able to cut her meat with a knife and this fork?” Amity huffed and Luz chuckled, “I know it’s stupid, trust me! The tines are only so long, and if the food you’re cutting is too thick, you can’t even get a knife in there.” She pantomimed sawing into the top of the steering wheel with a knife and fork—pinkies out—then grinned at Amity. “How ‘bout you, amiga?”
The green-haired girl wrinkled her eyebrows and blinked up at the ceiling. “Uh… no?” she asked, hesitant, “I don’t really… eat in my… place… I just use plasticware from the cafeteria.”
Luz tilted her head slightly as she gave her passenger an incredulous stare. “Plasticware?” she asked, and Amity nodded. Then the pale girl’s face flickered with some brief emotion, and she opened her mouth to protest. “Ah, makes sense,” Luz said, interrupting the other girl, “Less dishes for you to wash, eh?” She drummed her fingers on the steering wheel as she hummed, “I bet you have a favorite coffee mug?”
Amity’s eyes lit up and she nodded with a wide smile. “Oh yes! I have a white mug with the logo for the G— uh, my favorite book series… um, and I… it’s so heavy, and it keeps my tea warm for a long time.”
“Tea, huh?” Luz asked, then added, “Tea or coffee?”
“Both,” Amity assured her, “Coffee while I’m working—in a spill-proof travel mug,” and Luz snorted, Mood, “but tea in the evening when I’m… when I’m trying to… relax.” She looked down at the list in her hands, and the brown-haired girl caught a hint of long, lonely nights with sleep impossible to find.
A steel signage frame flashed overhead for I-580 Stockton, and Luz rode the middle lane onto a bridge that curved up and to the left, a gentle rise of hilltop houses scrolling past the brown-haired girl’s window. The onramp sloped down to merge with another concrete ribbon, six lanes narrowing to five across, clusters of vehicles heading away from the city center thinning after the heavy evening traffic. Luz hummed along to the radio as she worked the gears and pedals, glancing at Amity with a grateful smile after she settled Hooty in with a line of other trucks. “Thanks, sorry about that, had to concentrate,” Luz said, scratching at her jaw, “did you ask me a question?”
“No, uh,” Amity cleared her throat as she shook her head, neck stiff from staring, “How about… what was the worst haircut you ever had?” She blinked when Luz burst out laughing.
“Oh my god, Amity, you’re going to love this, so—” Luz paused to laugh again before grinning wildly at the other girl, “I got super into this one book series when I was younger; I spent months begging and pleading with Mamí to take me to a convention in the city.” She paused when Amity gasped Nerd! and narrowed her eyes, glaring at the pale girl. “You look jealous,” Luz accused and gave a dark chuckle when Amity’s face flushed pink, “You are!” Luz gasped and laughed, pointing, “You’re super jelly! Duh, you build robots, of course you’re a nerd!”
“I am not!” Amity bristled.
Luz sounded nearly as smug as she looked, “The prequels were better,” she crooned, her voice oozing with liquid condescension. She laughed and laughed when the other girl purpled in anger. “I knew it!”
“They are not— just agony captured on film,” Amity hissed as she crossed her arms under her chest.
“Pequeña Luz would have fought you on that, but I have matured, I have grown-up tastes now—I eat my broccoli too—and—” Luz grinned when Amity scoffed, “You’re right, the sequels were better.”
The pale girl groaned, “No!” and slapped her hands over her eyes, “Stop it! You went to a convention?”
“Oh yeah!” Luz returned to her tale, her voice bright and cheerful. “Finally wore Mamí down, and one weekend we went. Not sure what her deal was, you’d think she’d never seen people in costume before. She was all…” the tanned girl shrugged after a moment, “I dunno, like, wide-eyed and sweaty? She was real jumpy too, it was weird. Anyway!” Luz paused, too busy laughing to continue. “I bought a sword. It was a replica Sword of Wretched Souls from—”
“From Spirit Devourer?!” Amity gasped and said the name at the same time as Luz. They just looked at each other and started laughing.
“Yeah, that’s the one. I bought the sword, right? I’d been saving my birthday money. It was awesome. We get home, and I’m practicing my, y’know, soulsword-jitsu or whatever.” Luz leaned forward and motioned toward her back, just above her waist, “My hair is really long, like, down to here, and it keeps getting in the way.” She glanced at Amity, “Do you see what’s about to happen?”
Amity’s mouth fell open, “You didn’t.”
Luz nodded, grinning, “I did. I started hacking at my ponytail with the sword. Oh, this is sharp, this’ll be a piece of cake, said little me, most likely. Then things got outta hand.” She laughed, “I’ll show you a picture later, it was so bad. You have to see it.” She shook her head as Amity covered her mouth, choking back laughter, “No, go ahead and laugh, it’s a funny story.”
Amity guffawed, then clapped her hands over her mouth and blushed. Luz chuckled and shook her head as Amity snorted again. “Oh my God, Luz? What did your mom do?”
“Oh, Mamí loved my long hair, she would braid it for me every few days,” Luz sighed, “but by that point in my life she’d perfected her disappointed-but-not-surprised expression, and just tried to rescue what she could.” She chuckled, “It was the shortest boy-cut I’ve ever had; practically a buzz on the back and sides with a choppy mop on the top.” She glanced over at the strangled noise Amity made. “You good?”
“Yeah,” the pale girl wheezed, fanning herself with the paper in her hand.
“You look warm, d’ya want me to turn up the air?”
“No— no, I’m good,” Amity took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, “Sorry, just— anyway— what is one article of clothing… someone…” she squinted and pulled the paper closer, her lips moving slightly as she read the question to herself, “Oh, that says— okay.”
“I should have typed it up, huh?” Luz kept her tone dry, “Printed you a copy. Thirty-point font.” She pointed toward the dashboard in front of the passenger’s seat, “Oh, Eda might have a magnifying glass in the glove box.”
“That would take the fun out of decoding these hieroglyphics,” Amity replied as she peered at the handwritten scrawl in the fading daylight.
Luz rolled her eyes, “I’ll be sure to email you, next time.”
“I hardly ever check my email,” Amity replied, “You should text me instead.” Her jaw snapped shut with a clack and she turned wide eyes toward the other girl.
Luz glanced her way and chuckled, “Maybe I will. I’d need your number first,” she grinned at the other girl, and crinkled her eyes in amusement at the red blush running up the pale girl’s neck and ears. She was having fun teasing the other girl a little bit, just to be friendly, of course! Just a couple’a friends in matching jackets, traveling cross-country together. “Word of warning, if I get your number, you’re gonna end up with a lot of 2 AM memes.”
Amity breathed out a laugh and ran her fingers over her ear, “That— that sounds fine to me,” she said softly. “I don’t… I don’t really text anyone, so… it’d be nice.”
“Oh?” Luz questioned, suddenly aware of her heart thudding in her chest, “No, uh, special someone waiting for you back home?”
The green-haired girl laughed once, an incredulous half-gasp of air leaving her chest, “No, I’m not— seeing anyone right now. I have my work, I can’t—” Amity waved a slender hand, “I’m too busy.” She gave Luz a wary look, then added, “I also… don’t want to deal with Mother and her opinions.”
Luz made a noise and gave Amity a soft, understanding smile, “Yeah, I get that, amiga. I’m not dating right now either, I’m on the road so much y’know?” She sighed and turned her eyes back to the road, missing the hopeful expression that flashed across the other girl’s face. “Like today? I was in ‘Frisco for half a day, won’t be back for at least a week.” Luz looked at the green-haired girl and shrugged, “Not too many people I know would put up with that, so why bother with the heartache?”
Amity nodded. “I get wrapped up in my work and just sleep in the laboratory. I… usually… don’t know what day it is.”
“Damn, girl!” Luz gave her a sharp look, and Amity almost flinched, “You better take care of yourself. You gotta get out, get some fresh air!”
The pale girl rolled her eyes, “I’ve got too much work to—”
“Too much work? Amity,” the worried tone in Luz’s voice caught the other girl’s attention, “You’re letting life pass you by, chica! Have you done anything on your bucket list?”
“My…” Amity blinked, “What?”
The brown-haired girl scoffed, “You don’t know what a bucket list is?”
Once more, the pale girl’s cheeks flushed red, this time high and tight around her golden eyes, “I know what a bucket list is! It just…” she trailed off, muttering, “took me a second to remember.”
Luz nodded, “Have you checked anything off yet?”
“…No?”
“No?! Not one thing?” the brown-eyed girl was shocked.
“I don’t really… have a list?” Amity cringed with the admission as she hunched her shoulders under her ears.
Luz blinked, “You don’t have a— Well!” She gestured toward the windshield “You’ve come to the right place! Where better to find bucket list items than the open road!” Both girls paused to look at the heavy traffic rolling along the Interstate ahead of them, tail lights thick and bright in the evening dim. Luz sighed, “Admittedly, poor timing on my part—”
“What sort of things are on your list?” Amity asked, curious now, folding the paper in her hands as she tilted her head to listen.
“A few of the usuals, y’know: Drive Route 66… Drop out of a marathon… See the Eiffel tower… Go skydiving and bungee jumping…”
Amity laughed at the last two items, “Skydiving? I would— mm-mmm nope— that would be terrifying.”
“Exactly!” Luz laughed, “That’s exactly why it’s on my list.”
“What?” The green-haired girl was lost for words for a moment, “How can you just… decide to— to do that?”
“Part of life is conquering our fears, proving to ourselves that we actually can do,” Luz waved her hand, “whatever it is. Really, the only difference between jumping out of a plane and what you’re doing right now is the amount of time it takes.” She looked at Amity and saw the pale girl’s confusion. “So, you jump out of a plane, it’s hella scary, but it’s over in— what? Thirty minutes?” She shrugged, and Amity shrugged in return. “You’ve got this project demo—you didn’t jump out of a plane, but you jumped up into my truck.” Luz smiled at the pale girl who had begun to blink rapidly, “You’re facing this down for a few more days. I’d say that’s scarier than skydiving.” She gave Amity a soft look when the other girl sniffed. “Right?”
Amity nodded, wiping at her eye, “Everything I’ve worked toward over the last few years could get taken away. I… I’ve poured so much of myself into this project and…” She took a halting breath, “I’m terrified.”
“Hey, I didn’t mean to upset you,” Luz said, glancing over at Amity as the pale girl shook her head and whispered, It’s okay, “But like I said earlier, I’m on your team.” She held Amity’s gaze for a moment, before turning back to the road. “If there’s anything I can do to help, just let me know.” Luz smiled at the green-haired girl, “Even if it’s just a listening ear… I’m here.”
“Thank you, Luz,” Amity responded, hesitantly, “Truly.”
~
Traffic thickened as they rode through the dry hills approaching the next leg of their journey. Occasional stands of trees stood out lush and green against the dead gray grass and brown scrub marching up the slopes on either side of the Interstate. The sun had slipped to the edge of the horizon, painting the sky behind them with brilliant red and shimmering orange brushstrokes. Large turbines stood atop the ridge out Amity’s side, and the pale girl watched the giant blades turn in the sky, red lights flashing at their tips and at the top of the turbine towers. Luz sang along with the radio, hoping her voice was a soothing sound amid the rumbling diesel engine at their feet. Amity had gone quiet after their conversation turned to her fears, and they rode in a companionable silence. Luz could tell the other girl was thinking. About what, exactly, she could hardly begin to guess, but she wanted to give her as much time as she needed.
Neither had needed to stop at the first rest area they came across, and the second was closed for repairs. A sign flashed by, REST AREA 5 MILES, and soon another, NEXT REST AREA 59 MILES. “Do you need a break?” Luz asked, gently breaking the cabin’s hush. “Coalinga Southbound’s a pretty nice place to stretch your legs.”
“No, I’m fine,” Amity had to clear her throat before adding, “It’s up to you.”
“Let’s keep at ‘er, then?” Luz asked, and the pale girl nodded, whispering, Thank you, before she turned back to watch the landscape crawl by.
Night had well and truly fallen by the time another sign flashed in Hooty’s headlights. REST AREA 3 MILES. Luz hummed to herself as she glanced over at her passenger. While she was still sitting quietly, Amity had been shifting in her seat more and more over the last half hour. “Coming up on a rest area, d’ya need a break?” Luz asked, but she had a feeling she knew the answer.
Amity cleared her throat and shook her head, “N-no? I’m… I’m fine.”
The companion sign flashed past. NEXT REST AREA 63 MILES. Luz grunted a huh, “Next stop is sixty—”
“Sixty-three miles at sixty-five miles-per-hour is one-point-oh-three miles-per-minute, and—”
“Probably splittin’ hairs,” Luz interrupted, “but we’re going sixty-eight.”
“One-point-oh-seven miles-per-minute, that’s fifty-five minutes away…” Amity wrinkled her eyebrows and bit her lip. “I can… I can make it.”
Luz laughed, and pointed at the lights up ahead, “We’re stopping there, ya dork.”
“Oh thank god!”
~
Luz guided Hooty into a parking space, leaving an empty lane between her truck and the next. There were a few other trucks parked there, one cab darkened, the other two lit with the engines running as their drivers relaxed. “Okay, rule of the road for ladies,” Luz said as she set the parking brake, flipping a switch to kill the engine, “Bathroom buddy system.”
“What?!” Amity looked horrified, which, fair. Luz had had a greasy breakfast, and didn’t look forward to destroying a public toilet in earshot of the pretty girl sitting beside her, but, safety first.
“We go in together and make sure it’s safe, no creepers or whatever,” Luz assured her, raising her hands to calm her down. “I can wait in the lobby for you if you want.” The green-haired girl looked surprised and gave her a warm smile as she nodded. “Oh, let me get you your bag…” Luz grunted as she swiveled in her seat, standing up to pull a pair of small one-strap backpacks out of a storage bin. One was green and one was purple. The brown-haired girl crouched as she turned back around and slid into her seat. “Here,” she said as she handed the purple bag to Amity, “They both have the same stuff.”
“What— what is it?” Amity asked in surprise as she tugged at the zipper to look inside.
“Oh, like, hand sanitizer, liquid soap in case the dispensers are empty, flushable wipes in case the toilet paper is missing, uh—” Luz chuckled, “Some supplies in case you’re on your, y’know, moon-time. Advil, Tylenol, Imodium, uh, disposable gloves. Peppermint oil. Bandaids. Can’t… can’t think of anything else.” She glanced over to see dots of moisture shimmering in the corners of the other girl’s eyes.
“That’s… that’s so sweet of you,” Amity said softly, “Thank you.”
“No problemo,” Luz said, checking her mirrors—All clear, she thought—before kicking the door open. She bleeped the truck as they walked across the shallow parking lot, stars glittering overhead above a wispy track of clouds. Swarming insects buzzed around the lampposts as they approached the short, concrete building with its small glass-wrapped lobby and two steel-framed glass doors. Amity ran ahead, pushing into the lobby when Luz was still several steps away. The brown-haired girl watched as the taller girl jerked back with a horrified expression, turning to shove her way out the other door, coughing and gagging as she staggered away from the building. She bent over her knees and gasped for air.
“That bad, huh?” Luz asked, scratching under her cowboy hat.
“I’m gonna— go— find a tree,” Amity gasped, pushing herself upright.
“What? No, they’ve got cameras everywhere these days.” Luz chuckled, pulling her cowboy hat from her head. Amity watched with one eyebrow raised as the other girl pulled a purple bandana from the inside of the hat, where it had been tucked into a fold of the white leather. “Here, try this,” Luz said as she snapped the bandana out, then folded it once into a triangle before pulling a little squeeze bottle from her green shoulder bag. “If we put some of the peppermint drops on here…” the tanned girl carefully put several clear droplets on the fabric, then motioned for Amity to lean forward. Luz grinned as the taller girl turned a pretty shade of pink while she carefully tied the scented bandana around the bottom half of her face, like a mask. “There,” Luz said, “Now let’s go rob this bank.”
Amity laughed, her eyes crinkling above the purple fabric triangle, “Thank you, Luz, I…” She paused for a moment, her voice soft, “I couldn’t do this without you.”
“I got’chyer back,” Luz said with a grin as she pushed into the building, “Now let’s— oh GOD!”
Notes:
Chapter Text
Amity stared out the windshield, still and silent, hardly blinking as she watched the tiny darting insects flit around the lampposts along the sidewalk in front of the Buttonwillow Rest Area. Motion caught her eye, drawing her gaze to the side view mirror on her door; a small pool of light traveled the length of the trailer, and the short silhouette drawn by the flashlight disappeared around the back of the rig. Another minute later, the truck rocked to one side as Luz clambered up into the cabin and pulled her door shut with a slam and a sigh. “So… that happened,” the tanned girl said with a frown, sending a hesitant side-eye toward her new friend.
The pale girl nodded.
Luz watched her stare with vacant eyes toward the small single-story building just beyond the curb and gently asked, “Are you okay?”
Amity looked at her, her golden gaze narrowing slightly as she caught sight of Luz’s face, noticing her sitting there, then she hummed a questioning note.
“Are you alright, Amity?” Luz repeated, then asked, “Do you… want to talk about it?”
The green-haired girl shuddered and said, “Can we not talk about it?”
Luz opened her mouth twice, and both times words failed to appear. “But, we can’t just—” she began, when Amity interrupted.
“Ever.”
The brown-haired girl turned slightly to face Amity, “We should discuss what we—” she cut herself short at the savage back-and-forth shake of the taller girl’s head.
“We should take this to our graves!” the golden-eyed girl hissed through clenched teeth. She had a wild, frantic look in her eye.
“Whoa, Amity, listen,” Luz held out a hand toward the other girl, a calming gesture that caught the wide pair of golden eyes. “I’m not proud of what happened in there, but we shouldn’t—”
“I will never,” the pale girl shivered as she spoke, “ever forget what we saw.”
“I’m sorry,” Luz said, sorrow heavy in her voice.
Amity looked up and saw the heartbreak written on the other girl’s tanned features, the failure weighing down her shoulders. It wasn’t her fault! she thought as she shook her head, catching those shining brown eyes. “It’s not your fault,” Amity repeated aloud quickly, longing to reach out and hold the other girl’s hand that hung out over the aisle. She wished she could give Luz the comfort she needed, but was it her place? Would it be welcomed, or had she let her little crush on the tiny brown-haired girl cause her to misread all of their interactions this evening? She probably had; love-struck Amity was notoriously unreliable. She had proven it scientifically back in high school. She blinked— Luz was talking, and you weren’t even paying attention!
“—know that, I’m just… embarrassed.” Luz sighed, slumping back in her seat as she looked down at her hands. “At my reaction!” she groaned, shaking her clawed fingers in the air.
“It could have been me,” Amity pointed out, her voice soft and gentle.
Luz had begun examining her fingernails as she muttered, “I thought I’d seen everything by now.”
“It should have been me,” Amity pressed, “I’m sorry, Luz.”
“You hired us for our expertise,” Luz sneered, then scoffed as she sighed, “Some expert I am. I failed you.”
“No!” Amity raised her voice—just enough—to catch Luz’s eye, “You didn’t fail me!”
Luz rolled her eyes, “If you say so.”
“I mean it, you’ve—” Been wonderful? Been perfect? Amity gulped, “—You’re not a failure!”
The tanned girl looked at her for several long heartbeats, her brown eyes flicking left and right as she examined Amity’s face for… what? What does she see when she looks at me? the pale girl wondered as she swallowed heavily under Luz’s intense scrutiny. Ever so slowly, the brown-haired girl smiled. “Thanks, I… I…” Luz huffed a breath and shrugged, “Thanks.” Amity blushed and looked away; her chipped black fingernails were suddenly the most interesting objects in the world. Eventually, she felt the truck driver’s gaze move away.
They sat in silence for a moment. Amity continued to examine her fascinating fingernails, and Luz patted a gentle rhythm on the leather-wrapped wooden steering wheel. Luz sighed, deeply, and Amity let out a long breath she hadn’t realized she was holding.
Amity glanced back up at the concrete bathroom building, and a burning question sprang fully formed out of her mouth before she could stop herself: “How long had it been there?”
Luz flinched at the thought and turned wide, fearful eyes on the other girl, “Wait,” she said, shaking her head, “I changed my mind—”
Amity stared at the squat, block building, her voice hollow and haunted as she whispered, “I’ve never seen a possum that big.”
“—I don’t wanna think about this anymore,” Luz finished with a frown. She watched as Amity continued to stare out the windshield, then she turned her own eyes forward. Both girls watched as the outline of the bathroom building glowed in the moonlight, vanishing for a long moment while a thick line of clouds swallowed the bright orb in the midnight sky. The tanned girl took several shaky breaths before the clouds drifted on to the west, the pale moonlight painting the scene silver before them. She heard Amity open her mouth to speak, and Luz shook her head, “Amity, don’t—”
“Where did it get the burrito?” the pale girl wondered aloud, drawing a pained hiss from the other girl.
Luz squinted as she rubbed a hand across her forehead, pushing her cowboy hat up and away from her face, “Remember what I said about unexplainable things?” The shorter girl turned worried brown eyes on Amity, “This is just one of those. Liminal spaces attract oddities, you can’t let it live in your head.” Slowly, Amity turned her head to face Luz, and they locked eyes. Then Luz smiled, “But if I had to guess? I’d say UberEats.”
Amity pinched her mouth closed to stifle a laugh, and snorted, “UberEats?” she repeated in an incredulous tone, leaning her head back to laugh at the leather headliner. “Oh my god, Luz!” she grinned and covered her eyes with her hands, “That’s… that’s perfect.” She chuckled while Luz shimmied in her seat, muttering, Thanks, I know, in a sassy tone of voice. Amity looked down at her lap, at the half-folded list of icebreakers laying there, and she picked it up as she cleared her throat. “I deciphered more of your rebus while you were doing your inspection.”
“Oh yeah? Wait, should I take offense at that?” Luz questioned her with a grin, “That’s great! Anything to take my mind off death-by-mexican-food.” She gave Amity an upwards nod, “Hit me.”
“What is one article of clothing someone could wear that would make you walk out on a date with them?” the green-haired girl recited from memory, watching the other girl’s face light up.
“A monocle,” Luz said with a curl of her lip, “Like, we get it, only one eye is bad. Don’t be a try-hard.” Both girls laughed, but then Amity gave it some thought.
“That’s more of a—” Amity started, pausing for a moment, “Yeah, an accessory than a piece of clothing.”
“What?” Luz asked, her mouth moving faster than her mind, “You don’t— no, wait, that’s fair.” She paused to tap a fingernail against her lips as she reconsidered her choice, and Amity’s eyes zeroed in on the motion. She stared as the other girl said, “Let’s see… an ascot.”
Amity made a decidedly unladylike snort and covered her nose. “An ascot?” she repeated with a laugh.
Luz grinned and laughed too, “Yeah, have you seen those things?”
“Okay, but what if it’s part of a costume,” the green-haired girl asked, “or a period-piece ensemble?”
Luz rolled her eyes, “I could understand cosplay or, like, a… workplace… uniform?” She shook her head and waved, “I’m sure there’s a pirate-themed cafe somewhere. Nah,” she turned to face the taller girl, “I’m talking legit, like, fashion-choice-ascot. I’m talking, a guy who looked at himself in the mirror, wearing an ascot, and said—” she tugged at her jacket collar as she dropped her voice into a gruff manly tone, “Hell yeah, this will seal the deal.” Luz laughed and shook her head, “That’s a hefty no thank you.”
Amity had been listening along with a grin, but felt a sharp, stinging pain in her chest at the words ‘a guy who looked at himself in the mirror’. She struggled to keep her expression steady, to keep the hurt from climbing her throat and pouring from her eyes. She’s perfect, but not for me. “H-have you—” Amity coughed and looked down at her hands, blinking so fast, “Have you ever seen a man wear an ascot?” She took a sharp breath, then held it.
“I’ve never seen a woman wear an ascot, but I wouldn’t have dinner with her, either,” Luz said with a nonchalant tone, her eyes resting on Amity in a subtle, knowing way.
Amity smiled at that, the painful tightness in her throat lessening as Luz looked at her. “Does anyone else know about your disdain for napkin-based neckwear?” she asked with the beginnings of a grin, drawing a bright laugh from the girl in the driver’s seat.
“No!” Luz snorted, “Most people I know have self-respect. It’s never had to come up.”
Amity gave her a sly side-eyed grin, “What if I was wearing an ascot?” She wasn’t sure why she asked. Why did you say that?! The pale girl held her breath again, frightened of having pushed too hard, too fast.
Luz sighed heavily and glared at her, “Bustin’ my balls here, missy. Fine. You get a pass.” She paused to stab a finger toward the pale girl, “But only you. I’m a big girl, I can handle an inside joke at my expense.” She patted at her jacket pockets, and fished out her keys, adding, “I know you’d just be wearing it to fuck with me.” She blinked and froze, turning a worried gaze on Amity.
The pale girl had turned red.
“Ah shit,” Luz said quickly, “pardon my french.”
Amity lifted her chin and shook her head, pretending she wasn’t imagining a dinner date gone well, “tout va bien,” she said with what she hoped to be a charming smile.
Luz paused, blinked, and laughed, “Gesundheit.” She slid the key into the dashboard and gave it a twist, the truck’s cabin humming to life around them. “You don’t have an ascot in your bag, do ya?” the brown-haired girl nodded back toward the sleeper compartment and grinned at Amity’s laugh.
“Not yet,” the pale girl said airily, holding out her hand to examine the tops of her fingers, “Perhaps I’ll find one at a truck stop.”
Luz laughed and pressed the starter button, chuckling, “Wouldn’t surprise me if ya did.” Hooty roared to life, the truck rattling and rumbling around them as he settled into a steady vibration. She patted a tanned hand on the warm cherry-wood dashboard, “You ready to hit the road, Hooty?” A light flashed on the radio, and Luz reached over to turn up the volume, “Alright, let me see whatcha got.” Both girls glanced at each other as a slight hiss filled the air.
A syncopated drum with a clapping double-beat filled the cabin over the rumble of the brown truck’s engine, and Luz laughed a bright, shocked sound. The rhythm repeated, and this time an acoustic guitar joined in. “Hooty, you bitch,” she scoffed, turning eyes dancing with amusement on her passenger. Amity shrugged; she didn’t recognize the song. After the rhythm repeated again, a pair of voices began to vocalize over the percussion and Luz grinned, crooning along for a moment before glancing at the green-haired girl, rolling her eyes. “The song’s called Dearly Departed,” the tanned girl grinned when Amity barked a laugh before the pale girl slapped a slender hand over her mouth. She watched with wide, golden eyes as Luz sang along with the duet, wishing more than anything that she also knew the words… and that she was a little more… brave.
Welllllll, You and I both know that the house is haunted~
Amity laughed. Luz had sung “the bathroom’s haunted” instead of the proper lyrics.
And you and I both know that the ghost is me
You used to catch me in your bed-sheets just a-rattling your chains
Well back then baby, it didn’t seem so strange~
Both girls blushed slightly at the last couple of lines, and then Luz worked the clutch and the stick shift, drawing a muffled roar from the old truck as Hooty bounded forward into the night.
She’d listened to Luz sing for several hours, and she had enjoyed every minute. Some of the songs were such old, widely played classics that even she had heard them and knew most of the words— but Amity still couldn’t bring herself to sing along. Her mother had been ruthless while she was younger: harshly berating her for her “noise”—snapping and criticizing every time Little Amity could be heard singing in the mansion hallways, at the dining room table, even in the hushed private library on the third floor of the Old Wing. No room had been safe for her to express herself musically, and the fear of her Mother walking in and hearing her had burrowed deep and taken root in her spirit. By the time she had secured a private study room in her high school years where she could hum, sing softly to herself, or play whatever music she wanted at whatever volume she wished… she found herself completely frozen at the thought of doing so.
Luz glanced her way a few times, a spreading grin on her face before she finally waved a hand back and forth in front of Amity’s face and chuckled, “Hey, earth to Amity?”
Amity blinked and jumped a bit in her seat, shaking her head in surprise. “Sorry, what was that?” she tried to pull an innocent tone of voice. Was I staring? Shit.
“I’d said, I’d planned to stop in Tehachapi for dinner. It’s about an hour away.” The shorter girl advanced the stick shift through the gears, working the pedals, “Honestly, I thought we were gonna stop back in Coalinga, which would have had us on the road for two hours before another break, but, plans are fluid, eh?” Luz looked like she was about to say something else, but she paused when Amity began to speak.
“Dinner? It’s… almost eleven.”
“And it’ll be midnight before we get there. Y’know,” Luz snapped her fingers and pointed at Amity with a wink, “second dinner. Fourth meal. Midnight lunch.”
Amity snorted softly, then asked, “You’re hungry?”
Luz managed to look ashamed, “Lord knows I shouldn’t be, but I am.” She shrugged, “It’s not quite halfway for today’s drive, but they have good food there, and I don’t want you to have to deal with Hangry Luz.” She paused for a long moment, then added, carefully, “If you don’t want to stop yet, I understand. You’re the boss on this run. We could keep rollin’ to just past Barstow…” Her brow wrinkled in thought, “I think I know a place there.”
“Luz, I’m— I don’t know anything about driving a truck like this, or the road,” Amity said, turning in her seat to face the tanned girl, “If you know a good place to stop that’s… on-route and—” the pale girl swallowed loudly, “and safe, then I’ll trust your judgment.”
The brown-haired girl gave her a look that she couldn’t quite decipher; she knew it wasn’t bad, but it was a gaze heavy with thought. “Okay,” Luz said, her voice soft. She turned back to the road before adding, “We’ll have about five hundred miles to cover after ‘chapi, I figure we could cover that with a single stop to stretch and—” she shuddered, “—use the bathroom.”
Amity twitched as well, a cold chill running up her spine, “Y-yeah,” she stammered, “that sounds like a plan.”
~
The mood was light and the conversation cheerful when Hooty’s high beams finally tracked across a green sign on Amity’s side of the road, giving them a warning: TEHACHAPI 5 MILES. Perhaps it was the late hour, perhaps it was the excitement of a road trip, perhaps she was just reeling from all the one-on-one time with this delightful new friend, but Amity was laughing harder and louder than she had in… ever. That general sleep-deprived silliness had filled the last half-hour of travel, while a bubbly sort-of lightness had taken hold of her chest and Amity wanted nothing more than to stoke that sensation with each laugh and giggle she could pull from her brown-haired companion. She thought—she hoped—Luz was feeling the same sort of way, what with how her cheeks glowed brightly while telling stories about her time with Eda.
“—and that is why I’m not allowed to shop at T.J. Maxx anymore,” Luz said, then waggled her hand in the air, “y’know, legally.”
“That judgment doesn’t seem like it would hold up under scrutiny,” Amity pointed out, giggling.
Luz shrugged and chuckled, “I’ve never felt like testing my luck.”
They fell silent for a moment, watching the bright moonlight draw shining steel ribbons down the slope to their right, tracing the railway line that ran parallel to the Interstate. High, rolling hills blocked the sky on their left, and beyond the train tracks was another set of hills undulating as they rolled along. Luz pointed forward and slightly to the left, “Tehachapi should be around this next curve, we’ll stop just east of it.” The Interstate hooked to the left, the twin concrete lanes cutting nearly straight east after meandering gently southeast for the last few hours. Amity leaned against her window to look for the lights of Tehachapi, and was mostly disappointed. The Interstate ran fairly level with the town, and all she could make out was a muddy light-polluted glow out her side of the rig.
The pale girl sighed and turned back to Luz, “So, where are you taking me for dinner?”
The simple question, phrased innocently, was more than enough to send the tanned girl driving the truck into a coughing fit. Luz hacked and wheezed into a curled fist, her tear-filled eyes blinking up at the night sky as she struggled to breathe. “Amity! You can’t just say shit like that!” she croaked, sucking in another lungful of air.
Amity had watched her, dumbfounded, but then she suddenly realized how she had come across. “Oh my god, sorry!” she clapped her hands over her mouth and laughed into her fingers. Luz started laughing as well, still coughing occasionally. “But, where are we stopping for dinner?” she asked as her stomach grumbled loud enough to be heard over the growl of Hooty’s engine.
“Ah-haaa! I knew you were hungry!” Luz declared as she pointed a finger at the pale girl. Amity rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. “For your information,” the brown-haired girl said with a smirk, “I’m friends with the family that runs a little pizzeria attached to the Flying-J. They make the best thin-crust flatbread pizzas. They’re not too greasy, they’re crisp; you can pick your own toppings; oh, they’re so good.”
Amity’s stomach rumbled again, drawing a chuckle from the pale girl. “They sound delicious.”
“Oh, they are,” Luz said as she signaled before downshifting, angling the truck toward the offramp. She slowed, following the curve to the right, then made a left turn at the stop sign. “I know I’m taking you out to dinner,” the brown-haired girl said with a cocked eyebrow and a sly side-eye at Amity, “but I don’t think we’ll have time for a movie afterward.” She laughed and blew a raspberry when the pale girl turned red.
“I— what—” Amity spluttered, then managed to regain her composure long enough to fire back, “th— that’s a little cliche, don’t you think?”
“What, dinner and a movie?” Luz asked absentmindedly as she steered into the parking lot, the rig rocking side to side as Hooty bumped up onto the higher asphalt slab, “Yeah, I mean, it’s a classic, but it’s also been done to death.” Amity hummed in agreement. Luz found an empty parking spot near the middle of the lot and smoothly brought the truck to a halt. Luz reached down for the parking brake and muttered, “I wouldn’t take you to the movies on a first date anyway.”
Amity had already turned a shade of pink, but now she was also intrigued. “No?” the green-haired girl asked, lacing her fingers together as she half-turned toward the shorter girl.
Luz sat upright and pulled the keys from the dashboard then froze, her eyes going wide as she realized her mistake. “I—” She turned worried eyes toward Amity. The green-haired girl looked interested, rather than upset, so she swallowed and continued speaking. “Spending hours in a dark, loud room, not even able to see each other? No way,” the tanned girl said, pulling her gloves off and tucking them into the side seat pocket. “I’d have way more fun talking with you, like at a park or a coffee shop. Over pastries, maybe.” She snapped her fingers and said, “Cinnabon!” She shrugged, “Besides, first dates are for feeling out the situation, y’know, seeing if you’re compatible.”
“That's true,” Amity admitted before a sudden impulse made her next thought leap out into the air: “And are we compatible?” It must have been the late hour or the energy of the situation itself; the pale girl had never been so forward before. She smiled as a fierce blush crawled across the tanned girl’s cheeks.
Luz blinked and looked away, examining her fingertips, her eyes and ears burning. “Y-yeah, I think so?” She scrubbed her palms against her pant legs, softly adding, “We have potential. I— I think—” Then she paused and grinned, looking up to meet Amity’s eyes, “I think we could go the distance.”
Amity blinked twice, “Did you— just—” She groaned and clapped her hands over her eyes, “Oh my god, Luz!” The brown-haired girl cackled as she kicked her door open, hopping out into the starlit parking lot.
~
The Blight family had never taken a road trip that would necessitate stopping at a rest area. Her mother would have died before setting foot in such a place. The longest Amity could recall spending in a car had probably been the time it took to get from the airport to the hotel, or from the Blight Industries campus to the airport. Or, sure, city traffic in a taxi. But that was time, not necessarily distance. She was fairly certain this Flying-J Truck Stop was nothing special, in the grand scheme of things, but she had never seen anything like it. She stopped in her tracks and stared when they pushed through the automatic double doors. It was like a miniature department store but with less cashmere and more pine-scented air fresheners. Actually, she nodded, struck by the sudden thought, it’s like the concourse at the airport.
A half dozen rough-looking people walked about, browsing the snack aisles and stand-up drink coolers. Amity had never been one to sneer at blue-collar workers—not like her mother—but she was still wary of people she didn’t know. She wasn’t afraid of them hurting her physically, thanks to Emira, but Amity knew she was more than capable of making an egregious social faux pas all on her own. One grizzled, gray-haired man with a bushy mustache and a plaid western-cut shirt turned and squinted toward the door when Luz raised a hand as she called out, “Heya, Quicksilver!”
The man’s sun-weathered face split in a wide, crooked-toothed grin as he ambled over to shake her hand, towering over both girls. “Well, well, if it ain’t the little Witch herself. How are ya, darlin’?” Amity blinked at the name the man called Luz, but the girl in question didn’t seem fazed by it. That must be a nickname? How… strange.
“Doin’ alright,” the tanned girl said, smiling up at the older trucker, “Got a cross-country run.” The man chuckled and held out a wiry hand at his waist to bump knuckles with the shorter truck driver, muttering, Attagirl. Luz muttered, That’s whatsup, in response.
He tipped his battered blue snapback up as he squinted out into the dark parking lot. “Where’s the Owl Lady?” He looked back down to see Luz shake her head and grin, and he gave her an appraising nod, “Flying solo? Congratulations, kid.”
“Not completely,” Luz nudged Amity with her elbow, “I’ve got a new partner-in-crime.” She looked over at the golden-eyed girl, “Amity, this is Conway, Conway,” Luz looked up at the graying man, “This is Amity, my new friend!”
Amity tentatively held out a hand and smiled, and the mustached man gently clasped her fingers and gave her hand a shake, “A pleasure to make your acquaintance, ma’am,” Conway drawled, before tucking his free hand back into his denim vest pocket, “It’s good to see young blood out on the road.”
“Thank you, sir, it’s nice to meet you as well,” Amity replied, and the tall man barked a laugh and scratched at his stubble-lined cheek.
“Ah, none o’ that sir business, now, ya hear?” He gave a wet chuckle and waved a hand, “It’s either Conway or Quicksilver if ya need t’git my attention.”
“Quicksilver?” Amity repeated as she folded her hands at her waist, tilting her head slightly. She knew truckers had their nicknames, call signs, whatever they preferred to call them. It probably holds some significance to the man: mercury, known as quicksilver; atomic number 80; more explosive than gunpowder when dry; named after the Roman god, messenger of—
“On account of my lead foot and my gray hair,” the tall man winked, and both girls laughed. “What’s your handle?”
“Uh,” Amity responded, intelligently.
Luz patted her on the shoulder, “We hadn’t had a chance to talk about those yet, Conway. She still needs to find hers.”
The grizzled man nodded, sage-like, “Best place to find yourself, the highways.” He raised his 128oz. Biggest Gulp and waggled his woolly bear eyebrows, “I’ve gotta hit the road. You ladies have a fine night, y’hear?” He strode away, then swiveled on the heel of his cowboy boot, walking backward out the door, “Say hi to Eda for me!”
“Ha, will do! See ya, Conway!” Luz called as Amity gave a gentle wave and a soft, “Thanks, you too.” They glanced at each other, and Amity said “He seems nice.”
Luz nodded and bounced on her toes, “Yeah, Conway’s the best. C’mon!” Without warning, the smaller girl grabbed Amity’s hand and pulled her further into the truck stop, toward the delicious grilled scent wafting from the back of the building.
Immediately to their left was a line of cash registers with one bored greasy-haired man staring out at the customers, while an older blonde woman busied herself stocking the cigarette and chewing tobacco shelves against the wall. Several aisles filled the large open space: rows of snacks, toiletries, hats and gloves, motor oil, cow skull decor, dreamcatcher wall hangers, and—in Amity’s opinion—a bizarrely out-of-place display of metal knight statuettes and ready-to-wear Roman Centurion helmets.
Hallways opened on the far side of the aisles, with signs on the wall above labeled for the Men’s and Women’s restrooms, as well as a Locker Room and Showers. Amity thought of what Eda had said about truck stop showers, and while the building seemed nice and clean, she couldn’t imagine stripping down in such a public place.
Fountain drink and slushee machines hummed to their right, stacks of cups and lids filling the countertops along that corner of the building. Dimly, Amity registered the small group of tables and chairs ahead. The entirety of her attention was focused on the tanned, callused hand curled around her fingers. The other girl’s hand was warm, but Amity felt like her arm and upper body were boiling. Luz pulled her to a stop in front of a small counter and waved upward, “And here we are!” her voice was vibrating with excitement, completely unaware of her companion’s impending heart-attack-by-hand-holding, “Porter’s Pizza!”
Notes:
Merry Christmas!
Chapter Text
A single cash register sat to one side of the counter, a menu board beside it with a small metal bell sitting nearby—one of the ones Amity had seen before in tv shows and cartoons. Behind the countertop was a huge blackened metal shape that shimmered with heat, nearly filling the visible kitchen area. Whatever was behind it was completely hidden, even from the taller girl’s higher point of view.
Luz walked right up to the counter and started banging the little bell over and over, and Amity hunched her shoulders at all the heads turning from the incessant ding-ding-ding-ding-ding echoing through the truck stop. Loud groans came from behind the big black pizza oven, a male voice calling out, “Dammit, Luz, I’mma break those hands!” The brown-haired girl turned bright, smiling eyes on Amity, and grinned. The taller girl tried to grin back. A tall black man walked around the pizza oven, wiping his hands on a towel, and tried to take the bell away from Luz. She slammed it again, the ding! louder than before, nearly catching his fingers in the process. He growled and hung the towel over his shoulder as she crouched slightly, her body coiled like a spring, ready for his next attempt. He faked a grab with one hand and she rang one last ding! from the bell before he snatched it away with his other hand. Amity breathed a sigh of relief. The man shook the bell at Luz, “One day I won't feed you,” then set it aside, far away from where the short brown-haired girl could reach.
Luz threw out one arm like she was going to give him a hug, “Gustopher!” When the man smiled and rolled his eyes, Amity could see that he was younger than she had initially thought. He reached out a hand and Luz gave it a loud slap.
“Why you pullin’ up at midnight, Luz?” he chuckled, running his hand over his closely cropped hair, “I mean— b’sides the food.”
“The food, ya ding-dong,” the trucker responded quickly, then his last few words registered, “Oh, uh, I’m on a run to Boston, and I told my friend here that you guys have the best pizza this side of LA.” Luz grinned and turned toward Amity, tugging her a step closer before letting the taller girl’s hand go as she motioned between the two, “Amity, this is Gus. Gus is short for Augustus, as in Caesar Augustus—”
Gus looked at Amity and shook his head, “I’m not named after—”
Luz barreled on, ticking off facts on her fingers, “—first Emperor of Rome, which is in Italy, which is where pizza is from, hence, Augustus Pizza Porter.” She gestured at him with both hands, waggling her fingers.
He turned a flat look on the brown-haired girl, “My middle name is not ‘Pizza’.”
“Well, you never told me what it was, what do you expect me to do when I introduce you?” Luz argued with a growing grin.
“I expect you…” He paused, made a frustrated hiss, and then sighed, throwing his hands up in the air, “To do basically what’chu did, so, jokes on me, I guess.” Gus laughed and held out a large hand towards Amity, “Hi, call me Gus. Please be normal.”
Amity was still a bit rattled by all the noise and the attention, but years of Six Sigma networking and etiquette training took over as she reached out to firmly shake his hand with a laugh and a smile, “A pleasure to meet you, Gus. I’ve heard wonderful things about your work here.”
“Nice to meet you too, Amity,” He gave her a light chuckle and a grin, then looked to Luz, crossing his wrists as he leaned his elbows on the counter, “Amity’s here to teach you some class, right? Eda finally got sick of your table manners?” He laughed at the horrified choking noise the brown-haired girl made, and she balled her fists at her sides.
“I— actually— I hired Eda and Luz to transport equipment for me,” Amity began explaining, and she folded her hands at her stomach to keep from picking at her fingernails. “My sister heard nothing but good reports of their company,” she added, giving the other girl a smile when Luz turned grateful eyes and slightly pink cheeks her way.
“Yeah? That’s cool,” Gus said, “Gotta say, you’re younger than most of their clients,” then he shrugged as he stood up, “The two I’ve heard about, anyway.”
Luz sucked in a quick breath, then leaned close to Gus, “That one guy’s in prison now!”
“You lie.”
“It's for real! I’ll send you the article,” the brown-haired girl nodded, pulling out her phone.
“Bet,” Gus said as he walked to the register, “You want your usual?” Luz gave him a distracted grunt in response, and he cheerfully punched in an order. “What can I get’cha, Amity?” he asked as she looked over the menu.
“Could I get the… hmm… the ‘Lenny’?” Amity pointed at the picture beside him. Asiago, bacon, basil, and garlic? “That sounds good.”
“Sure thing,” he grinned, “It’s similar to the ‘Nicholas’, but that one’s got red onion and sausage, so there’s a bit of a bite to it.” When she shook her head in disinterest, he asked, “No problem, ‘Lenny’ it is. What size?”
Amity shrugged and said, “Uh, I’m not— well, whatever size she’s getting,” the green-haired girl decided, pointing a thumb over at Luz. The brown-haired girl had her nose in her phone, her tongue slightly sticking out of her mouth as she rapidly typed away on the screen. Amity smiled at the sight.
“One large Lenny,” Gus said, pressing a few more buttons. “Anything else?”
Amity looked between him and Luz, then said, “No? I don’t think so?” The heat-blasted air rippled above the back of the pizza parlor’s kitchen.
“Alright, that’ll be twenty bucks, even,” he said as he printed out a ticket stub, pausing to shout over his shoulder, “Two large! One Luz Cannon and a Kravitz!” Another man in the back called out an acknowledgment, then started making a ruckus with pans and ingredients.
The golden-eyed girl snorted at the name of her companion’s meal, then asked, “Twenty dollars?” She pulled her phone from her pocket and slipped a card from the back of its leather case, “I… I expected it to be more expensive, honestly.”
“We gotta stay fairly price-competitive,” he said as he waved toward the side of the building, “There’s a Wendy’s just down the road.” Then he leaned forward and held his hand up in a stage whisper, waggling his eyebrows as he gave the self-absorbed shorter girl a side-eye, “We actually charge her more than usual,” Gus laughed as she handed him the card and her mouth fell open in surprise, “For emotional damages, ya know?” She laughed so hard she snorted, and she slapped her hand over her nose and turned pink. He gave her a wide smile and glanced at her card, “I like you, most customers don’t laugh at my—”
She knew the moment he saw her name printed on the credit card. It was hard to ignore, doubly so when it matched the company name printed just above. He blinked three times, then looked at her in shock. The pale girl held up her hands, “I’m— just— like any other customer,” Amity said, haltingly, starting to cringe. She hated the special treatment her name brought. He gave her a careful look for a moment, his dark blue eyes sizing her up, then he nodded to himself and cashed her out.
Gus handed her card back with a grin, “You put your pants on one leg at a time, don’cha?”
“Well, if I’m in a hurry,” She shrugged, adopting a snooty tone as she examined her fingernails, a sneer pulling at her lips, “The robot butlers lift me up and set me down into the pants.” She held the haughty pose long enough to get a wheezing scoff from the man, then she relaxed and laughed along with him as she tucked her wallet away. He was easy to talk to, almost as easy as it was with Luz. Why isn’t it always this easy to talk to people?
“Aaaand sent!” Luz said as she put her phone back in her pocket. “Sorry, had to find it in my bookmarks, got buried under my fanfic— Um—” She coughed into her fist, “Alright, Gusteban, how much do I owe you?” She dug around in her pocket and pulled out a handful of bills, “It’s twenty-four for two, right?” Amity made a strangled coughing sound, and the man behind the register made a face at her, like, Shut up.
He paused, then, and turned to face Luz. Gus stared at her for a moment, glancing between the two girls as an unsettling grin stretched across his face. “Your friend here already paid,” he practically purred as Luz stiffened. He leaned on an elbow, nonchalant, his head leaning back onto his shoulder. He gave her a near-sideways grin the Cheshire Cat would applaud, “So nice of her to buy you dinner.” His tone was carefully even, his words carefully chosen.
“What, she—” Luz hissed, then spun to face Amity, “I was gonna pay!”
Amity leaned back slightly and watched the shorter girl grind her teeth, then she put her fists on her hips and shrugged, “Too bad.” Then, before she could stop herself, she looked down at her fingernails as she rubbed her thumb against them, adding, “You can pay next time.” Gus chortled at the blush creeping across Luz’s face as she opened and closed her mouth like a fish.
The shorter girl snapped her mouth closed in a frown and pointed a finger up at Amity, “Fine. I am so gonna be the gentleman next time!” She took a step forward, leaning up on her toes, her brown eyes narrowed, “Just you wait and see.” Gus watched, his chin resting on his fists, his eyes sparkling as he looked from one girl to the other.
Amity sniffed and raised her chin, her golden eyes half-lidded, “Too bad I’m not looking for a gentleman!” Gus slapped his hands to his cheeks and gasped with delight as he shimmied from side to side. He turned to watch Luz’s jaw fall open.
“Well— Well!” the shorter girl floundered for a moment. She looked lost at sea; he’d have to throw her a rope. Gus waved to catch her eye, pointed at her with both hands, then crossed his arms like an ‘X’. “Good thing… I’m… not?” Luz said, the man nodding along, waving his hands, like, Almost there. “A gentleman!” She finished with a triumphant look, then she blinked. “Wait—”
Amity laughed—a bright, happy sound—which made Luz’s fresh embarrassment all worthwhile. The brown-haired girl grinned up at her as she covered her eyes with a pale hand and laughed some more, Gus waggling his hand to catch Luz’s eye to give her a stealthy thumbs-up.
He cleared his throat, “Ladies, it’s gonna be at least ten minutes until your pizza is ready.” Gus reached over to the stack of cups and pulled off a pair, bowing slightly as he handed them to Amity, “Here, go grab a drink—on the house, girl, chill—” when Luz lunged for her pocket money, “Grab a seat, I’ll bring ‘em out when they’re ready.” He tugged the towel off his shoulder and walked around the pizza oven, starting to yell something to his coworker.
~
Luz fumed her way to the fountain drink machine and poured herself a truly awful batch of Jungle Juice. “What are you doing?” Amity asked as the shorter girl walked down the row of spigots, pouring some of each flavor into her cup before taking a big sip at the far end of the machine. Luz twitched and shivered in a full-body shudder, her face twisted in disgust. The tall girl couldn’t help but laugh as she poured herself some Dr. Pepper.
“Sorry, had to taste something worse than your utter betrayal,” Luz groaned and wiped at her mouth with the edge of her hand, before turning to face the other girl as Amity scoffed. “I brought you here! I suggest the restaurant, I should have to pay!”
The taller girl walked close and hesitated a moment before placing her fingertips on Luz’s wrist, “I didn’t mean to offend you or upset you, Luz, truly.” Luz looked down at her hand, then up into her eyes halfway through the sentence. When she finished speaking, Amity tilted her head and gave a soft, sad smile.
The brown-eyed girl sighed, and patted the other girl’s hand, “It’s— I’m sorry, I dunno why I got— You didn’t—” Luz paused for a moment, then tried again, “I shouldn’t have been upset, I’m sorry, Amity.” She shrugged and frowned, trailing off in a whisper, “I guess I felt like I was being a shitty date, making the pretty girl pay for our food.”
“But…” Amity hesitated, then breathed the rest with a sly smirk, “You didn’t pay,” and then she waited for the look of recognition to cross the shorter girl’s face. Luz scrunched her nose and scoffed, then a pair of heartbeats later, she stiffened and frowned, a blush threatening to spill across her face.
Luz took a step away, then turned and pointed at Amity, squinting her eyes, trying to stifle the grin that struggled to grow. “I’m getting wise to your tricks, missy.” Amity tilted her head, her face the practiced picture of innocence, while Luz took steps around the taller girl in an arc, pointing and shaking her head. “I see that look in your eye, you’re—” she took a step forward and grinned up at her, “You’re having fun, aren’t you?”
Amity gave her a wide grin and nodded. “Good,” Luz said, a satisfied look on her face. I’m glad. She looked away for a moment, the line of her mouth shifting from one side to the other as she considered whether or not to say, “This morning…” Welp. In for a penny, She thought before she glanced back up to meet Amity’s golden eyes, “You looked… so… upset. Sad. Scared. When I saw you, I wanted to cheer you up.” She cleared her throat and shook her cup in her hand, almost putting it to her mouth to take another sip, “I wished that I could do something for you. So… To see you smiling and laughing tonight? It’s…” She shrugged, “I’m happy.”
“Thank you, Luz,” Amity said, golden eyes locked with brown, neither girl looking away, “It’s been a long time since… I’ve… felt like… I’ve had someone… that I could count on… no matter what.” She smiled, tipped her head, and shrugged, “I can’t even… put… the feeling into words.” She chuckled, “Sorry… but it’s all thanks to you.”
Luz grinned and nodded, “Partners.” She raised her paper cup to tap against Amity’s, but the other girl pulled away and shook her head.
“No, Luz, pour that out first,” Amity pointed at the murky liquid fizzling in the other girl’s cup, “We can do a toast when you’ve got something worth drinking.”
~
“We’re gonna get you some snacks.”
Amity blinked down at the girl in the cowboy hat standing at her shoulder, and swallowed the mouthful of Dr. Pepper she’d been drinking a moment before to ask, “What?” The other girl was staring off into the appallingly spelled ‘Snak Shoppe’ section of the Flying-J.
Luz looked up at her, her lips curled around her straw as she took a noisy sip. She felt the tiniest smug thrill when she caught the taller girl’s golden eyes flit downward at the sound. She pulled the cup away as she swallowed, and made a contented “Ahhh!”—completely unnecessary, but. Amity glanced down again, a fraction of a look, then turned a pretty shade of pink. “I said,” she repeated, the slightest sassy wobble in the way she held her head, “We’re gonna get you some snacks.”
Amity frowned.
“Look, I got snacks in the rig,” Luz half-turned to face her, and popped her eyes wide as she made a world-encompassing gesture with her arms, “Like, hella snacks.” Then she pointed a finger at Amity from the hand holding her drink and took a sip, then, “But you might not like them—which is fine, I’ll judge silently—” and Amity scoffed, rolling her eyes. Luz continued, “so I wanna make sure we have some you do like.”
“If you insist,” Amity motioned toward the shop area and said, “Ladies first.”
Luz tipped her cowboy hat upward with a jaunty flick of her thumb as she drawled, “Wullll, thank ya kindly, ma’am.” And then she grinned and winked, which sent Amity’s heartbeat thundering in her ears.
Luz ambled forward with a loose, loping stride despite the fact that she was nearly a head shorter than her companion. Amity walked smoothly, stiffly, an economy of motion taught and trained over the years by her mother. Her back was ramrod straight, head up, chin and eyes forward. When she was younger, she would slouch like her father, to stay shorter than her siblings. Just for a little bit longer. Her mother didn’t permit that for long, once it had been noticed.
As she walked past a rotating display of sunglasses, Luz snaked out a hand to pluck up a pair of white shutter shades and slipped them onto her face, the four-inch-long price tag dangling beside her nose. She tipped her head toward Amity and adopted a smooth, husky tone as she cocked an eyebrow, “Enchantée.”
“C’était le coup de foudre,” Amity whispered.
“What?”
Amity laughed, sweaty and shrill, “What?! Uh, I said I thought I saw lightning!” Luz turned toward the window as the golden-eyed girl quickly glanced about for a distraction, “This hat—” she grabbed a straw hat from a nearby shelf, “Is perfect.”
Luz stared at her as a slow smile spread across her face, “Perfect for what?”
“Wearing, duh,” Amity scoffed, her cheeks burning red as she set the hat on her head, “Silly.”
Luz nodded, “Y’know what? You’re right.” Then she gasped, her eyes wide through the horizontal slits of her sunglasses, “Oh, brainwave!”
“Pardon?”
“Okay, time for a friendly competition,” Luz reached into her pants pocket and pulled out a small, messy pile of money. “Whoever puts together the best-worst outfit wins,” She peeled off a few bills and folded them in half, and handed them to Amity, “Fifty buck limit,” She motioned at the mish-mash aisles of odds and ends piled high all around them, “This is what we have to work with. You in?”
Amity laughed, once, then raised her eyebrows, “For real?” She lifted her hand, showing Luz the money she’d been given, “I could pay—”
“No!” the shorter girl frowned and raised a finger, “My idea. I can splurge a bit on my friends.”
The thought of Luz thinking of her as a friend made a warmth fill Amity’s chest as she made a calming motion with her hands, “Alright, I get it.” Then she gave the brown-haired girl a fierce glare, “You’re on.”
Luz gave her a wicked grin, then pointed at the Porter’s Pizza dining room, “Meet me there when you’re ready to lose.”
~
Amity looked up when the other chair slid out and spun around. Luz pushed it against the table backward with a scrape against the tile floor, straddling the square black wooden seat as she slouched heavily against the table. She had a Hawaiian shirt layered over her faded gray graphic tee, her work jacket tucked over an elbow. The new, unbuttoned shirt was a riot of blues, pinks, reds, and yellows, overshadowed slightly by the perfectly round garishly-colored feather boa around her neck. The brown-haired girl pushed her shutter shades up to the bridge of her nose with a finger, then used both hands to pop the collar of her Hawaiian shirt. She wore a stretchy wristband on each arm: bright yellow backgrounds sporting a smiley face with a five o’clock shadow, black words proclaiming IT'S A JEEP THING, YOU WOULDN'T UNDERSTAND. Luz clicked her tongue as she fired a pair of finger guns at the green-haired girl, giving a long, drawn-out, “Heeey.”
Amity smiled, “You look… wow.” She huffed air out her nose.
“Thanks, I try,” Luz preened for a moment, then folded her hands under her chin, “Now, let me check out the competition…” The pale girl made a seated curtsey and slid her chair away from the table, to the side, then spread her hands, like, What do you think?
Amity wore a lurid fluorescent yellow safety vest over a tie-dyed shirt three sizes too big, the mint green of her hair tucked into the straw hat she’d picked up earlier. She pulled at something around her neck, a bright pink chain attached to some readers, and she set the thickest pair of coke-bottle glasses Luz had ever seen on her face. Her golden eyes blinked, massive orbs behind the silver-rimmed lenses, and the pale girl squinted. “Uh,” Amity said, reaching out for the table with a hesitant hand, tapping it with her fingertips before she gave a timid, “Ta-daah,” with a small grin. An orange-and-white paisley bandana was tucked into the collar of her tie-dye.
Luz narrowed her eyes and scoffed, raising a hand to point, “Is that supposed to be an ascot?”
“I dunno,” Amity looked down and hissed at whatever distorted view of the world she saw through the reading glasses, and pulled them off to rub at her eyes, “Does it… look like an ascot?”
“You’re pushin’ your luck, missy.”
Luz and Amity sat across from each other at one of the small round tables scattered in front of Porter’s Pizza. Amity leaned back with a smug air, her arms folded loosely across her stomach as Luz leaned forward to rest her elbows on the table, her fingers steepled at her chin. “Hmmmm…” the brown-haired girl hummed a dissatisfied note, “We might need outside counsel.”
“Does this help any?” Amity asked as she turned her feet away from the table, kicking one foot up and over her knee, and Luz caught sight of the huge brown bear-feet slippers pulled on over her black sneakers.
“Holy shit,” Luz barked a laugh, “you win.”
“Oh, ho-ho-ho!” Amity actually cackled into the back of her daintily raised hand, like a female villain in a shōjo anime. Luz felt her cheeks darken at the thought of Amity with crossed arms and an angry pout, It’s not like I like you or anything. Amity scowling down at her as she pressed her against the lockers. Amity— Luz shook her head. Instead, Amity laughed, “I can’t believe you’re giving up!”
“Hey, I know when I’m beat,” Luz gave her a cocky grin and a shrug, “You put together a truly… impressive outfit.”
“Why, thank you,” Amity demurred, letting her half-inch thick glasses hang at her sternum on the bright pink neck-chain, “Where’d you find the, uh,” the pale girl pointed at Luz’s neck, “the feather boa?”
“Oh, this?” Luz looked down at it and grinned, patting it with a hand, “It’s a steering wheel cover, actually.”
They giggled, and Luz watched as Amity closed her eyes and laughed, looking like she hadn’t a care in the world. She leaned her chin on her palm and smiled, when a voice came from the counter, “Order up!”
The girls looked over to see Gus slipping out from behind the counter with a pizza on each outstretched hand, a wide grin spreading on his face when he caught a closer look at their competition outfits. “Wow, you two, I am impressed.” He stood beside their table and nodded, “Amity wins, though,” Gus said as he looked at Luz, “Sorry, those slippers are killin’ it.”
Luz shook her head, “Nah, man, that’s what I said, she won.”
“Oh?” Amity said, feeling a bit wary, “Does she play this often?” Perhaps this wasn’t as special as she thought.
He made a pssshh sound like he'd read her mind, “Don’t even worry. I’ve seen her and Eda do this a few times.” He glanced at Luz, “I saw Eda try to get that short lady to play along one time, holy shit brother, I thought I was gonna see a murder.”
Luz chuckled, “Yeah, that sounds like Kiki.” Amity briefly felt ashamed—was she really feeling jealous because Luz might have played this silly dress-up game with another girl? She was, wasn’t she.
“Here you go, Luz,” Gus said, setting a tray down in front of the brown-haired girl, a fairly large pizza centered on a metal rack. Barbecue sauce was drizzled over chopped grilled chicken, roasted red peppers, and caramelized onions. A thick, red marinara lay underneath all the toppings, and Amity could smell just a hint of herbs and garlic.
“Looks great, as always! Thank you, Mr. Porter,” Luz finished in a posh accent, Miss-tah Pour-tah, with a nasal tone to her voice.
“Good to see you again,” the man grinned and gave her a fist bump before he turned toward the green-haired girl.
“Thank you, Mr. Porter,” Amity repeated in a normal tone of voice, a kind smile on her face.
“No problem at all, Miss Blight,” Gus grinned, “Enjoy your food, and good luck on your trip.” She raised her hand and he gave it a firm shake, then he walked away with a jaunty two-finger salute.
Amity leaned over her pizza and inhaled slowly: asiago cheese over marinara, toasted to perfection; minced basil and garlic spread thin across the cheese; a generous sprinkling of herbs around the rim of the crust; large tomato slices and bacon arranged in a repeating star pattern. It was art. She gently lifted a piece and pulled it loose from the others, the gooey cheese snapping after an inch or two. She took a bite, and hummed, “Oh, Luz,” she said, covering her mouth, “This is delicious.”
Luz stared at her with her mouth open, eyes wide, her food untouched. Amity chewed her mouthful and swallowed, taking another bite before she looked up at the other girl. She chewed slower, swallowing again, then cleared her throat to ask, “Luz?”
The brown-eyed girl blinked once, her mouth still hanging open. “Are… you okay?” Amity asked with a weak chuckle, taking a small bite of her pizza. Eventually, Luz blinked again. Amity lowered her piece of pizza. “Luz, stop looking at me like that,” she said in a sharp tone. She didn’t like the fear she saw in the shorter girl’s eyes.
“You’re…” Luz croaked, and then her mouth moved silently for a moment before the tanned girl covered it with a hand.
“Luz?” Amity asked, “What’s wrong?”
The brown-haired girl moved her hand away from her mouth long enough to suck in a halting breath, then she whispered a hoarse question, “You’re a Blight?”
Amity frowned, still not sure why her cheerful, talkative friend was acting so stunned. “Yes?” she hesitantly answered.
“Amity… Blight,” Luz repeated in a daze.
The pale girl pressed her mouth into an unhappy line, “Yes, that’s me, that’s— that’s my name, why—” she stuttered until Luz interrupted.
“I didn’t know!” Luz yelped, pushing herself upright, her elbows off the table, her hands twitching as if to slap them over her mouth to prevent another screech from escaping.
“What?” The golden-eyed girl asked, completely lost.
Luz looked around, to the left, then the right, “I didn’t know—” her eyes jumping in every direction as she admitted, “Eda didn’t tell me your last name.” Then she gasped, looking down at the table in front of her, through it, just staring into space at the force of the thought that struck her.
Amity was growing worried, “What are you talking about, Luz?”
“I didn’t ask you either,” Luz put both hands on her face and pressed her fingers and palms into her forehead, smooshing her features slightly as she groaned, “Oh my god.”
“Luz?” Amity leaned forward to catch the other girl’s brown gaze, “Luz! What’s wrong?”
The other girl squeezed her face between her hands, cupping her fingers over her eyes to hide, “omigawd, I’ve been flirting with Amity Blight.” Her voice was small, scratched, and trembling, “I thought it was different this time,” she whispered as she hunched her shoulders around her ears.
“Luz, just—” Amity felt herself getting desperate as she pleaded, “Just stop, okay? Talk to me?”
Luz slapped her hands down into her lap as she turned horrified eyes up at Amity, “You think— I’m just a creep, aren’t I?” Her voice was thin and weak, burdened by the heavy words it carried.
“What?!” The green-haired girl quickly shook her head, “No, Luz, I don’t—”
Luz chuckled as she looked down at the table, “I-I— I knew you were outta my league, but— I didn’t know you were that far—”
Something burned in Amity’s chest at that thought, and anger flared across her cheeks, “Luz!” she snapped, harsher than she truly meant to sound, “Stop that!”
Brown eyes met her golden gaze for just a moment, then the shorter girl stumbled to her feet, her hands waving before her in some worried reassurance, “I— I’m sorry! I’ll— be back!” She sniffed, her eyes glittering with tears, and she choked back a sound Amity had never wanted to hear.
Luz ran for the bathroom and didn’t stop when Amity called her name.
Notes:
"coup de foudre" is a French idiom which literally translates to a lightning strike, but the phrase is figuratively used when one falls madly in love at first sight.
Chapter Text
It must have been her lucky night: the ladies’ bathroom was empty when she pushed her way through the heavy door and quickly made her way to the far end of the room. She slipped into the second-to-last stall and flipped the lock over with a thunk. Luz turned to face the toilet, and the small shelf above it holding the general manager’s handpicked decorations. She preferred this stall, not just for the decor—this stall was narrow, and the pair of heavy-duty handrails gave her a place to climb up and sit sideways, feet on one rail, her backside on the other, wedging herself against the back wall. Here, she could lean her head against the shelf and cry.
~
Amity looked up when Gus approached the table, wiping his hands and sweat-sheened arms on a towel. He nodded toward the Hawaiian shirt disappearing into the bathroom hallway, “What happened?”
“I— I don’t know,” the pale girl shrugged off her stunned stupor and began to wipe her hands on a napkin, “She was really upset about— I— I don’t know.” Amity pushed herself to her feet and took a single sliding step forward before she remembered her extra-large bear-feet slippers. She took another unsteady step forward to sit down in Luz’s abandoned chair to try and pull the damned things off. “She seemed surprised to learn my last name? I guess?”
“What?” Gus laughed, a delighted smile on his face, “She didn’t know who you are?” When Amity shrugged again, he scoffed and rubbed his hand over the back of his head, “Classic Luz. How did she not know who you are?”
“I don’t know!” Amity sat up straight to look up at him, her hands outstretched in exasperation. A panic she had never tasted before began to boil in the back of her throat. “I have no idea! Eda introduced us this morning, and I guess she only used our first names?” The young man laughed again and she scowled, “It honestly never came up!”
“Hey, sorry, I just—” He shook his head and groaned, “It’s just so her, ya know?” He turned back to face the pale girl who had dropped her head in her hands, rubbing her fingers into her forehead, “I heard her voice get loud, but I couldn’t make out what she was saying over the pizza oven… I thought she was calling for me to ask a question,” Gus crossed his arms over his chest, “Did she think she’d been tricked or something?”
Amity inhaled sharply between her hands, her palms pressed over her face, “No— not at all,” She stood again, dropping her hands to look at the young man in the apron, “She seemed scared, or… or hurt, like…” She trailed off, not voicing the rest, like I’d broken her heart. She made to leave, to go find Luz like her instincts were screaming, but Gus reached out to hold up a hand.
“Just— just a sec, okay?” He cleared his throat and looked Amity in the eyes, “I can tell you’re worried. Whatever happened, I can almost guarantee it’s a misunderstanding. I’ve not had a ton of face-to-face time with Luz, but we text and voice-chat a lot during our downtimes, yeah? And she’s— uh—” He paused to look around, considering, then, shrugged with a sigh, “She has a tendency to… to jump straight to the worst-case scenario when something happens? That’s just the vibe I get, based on her stories.”
Amity frowned, her eyebrows curling in confusion, “Okay, I get that, but—”
Gus grinned, but she heard him let slip a pained sigh, “You can get it, but not get it. She just learned you’re Amity Blight, heiress of Blight Industries, richer than—” He laughed and stretched his hands out to either side, “—than I don’t even know! Some European countries, probably.” He rolled his eyes when she made a face and nodded. “Right? So, she finds out you’re in her truck. Her truck? Eda’s company? Your family could buy and sell them a dozen times over before breakfast, and not even notice.” A splotchy red anger bloomed around her eyes as she snarled in protest, but Gus held up his hands and talked over her stuttered argument, “I’m not tryin’a be rude, I’m just tryin’a connect the dots for you, okay?” He paused until she gave him an irritated nod. “Luz probably jumped right to her messing up the job, and your family ruining Eda’s company; her mistake hurting her friends. Okay? Not cool, I know, but—” He tilted his head and shrugged, “She probably just panicked.”
Amity chewed at her fingernails as she considered his line of thinking. Her mother had certainly done similar things in the past; she relished the opportunity to ruin lives and reputations. Gus had something there—she could begrudgingly admit that—but the fear she had seen in her eyes? That seemed like something else. She sighed and nodded, “I… I see what you mean. Thank you for explaining that… I… I would not have even considered that scenario.” She gave a sad chuckle, and admitted, “It would never have occurred to me to be something to worry about.”
“We’re good, Amity.” He shrugged, then waved his arm as if to clap her on the shoulder but reconsidered at the last moment, and slapped his palms together instead. “You got your perspective, and as long as you’re open to seeing others’, you’ll be alright.” Gus glanced down at their table, and gave her a kind smile, “Look, I’ll go grab a couple to-go boxes, just in case you guys want to head out right away.” He waved up at the Flying-J around them, “She may not want to talk… here.”
“Thank you!” Amity half-turned and waved as she jogged toward the restrooms.
~
“...getting to Boston. I don’t know, Remmy? What the fuck is wrong with me? I should have known, it’s obvious who she is! How stupid can I be?” Luz’s watery voice drifted quietly across the bathroom when Amity pushed the door open. It hardly made a sound when it opened, so the golden-eyed girl cleared her throat to announce her presence. She heard an eep come from one of the stalls.
“Luz?” Amity used a gentle voice, “I— I was worried? I didn’t mean to upset you…” What should she say? She had never been in a situation like this before. She would have walked right back out the door if she heard someone crying in her high school bathroom. I must have read something with a scene like this. She could vaguely recall a few stories by professional writers—and several by enthusiastic amateur wordsmiths in her bookmarks—but she was still taken aback at the cold fist of guilt that clenched around her heart. She had caused this, somehow.
“Oh god, Remmy, she’s here; what do I say?”
Amity breathed a sympathetic chuckle when she heard the faint, horrified whisper from a far stall. “I thought I should check on you,” the pale girl called cautiously as she took a hesitant step forward, “But if you’re on the phone, I can— I can go.”
Luz gave a high-pitched, dazed sort of laugh and cleared her throat, “No, no, I’m… not— uh— on the phone.” She giggled again, the sound echoing from the white tiles on the walls and floor, then she whispered again, her voice ringing hollow within her narrow, metal cave, “I can’t imagine you having a phone. What would you do with a phone, anyway? …Why am I still talking to you?”
A row of mirrors and white sinks with shiny chrome faucets dotted the wall to her right, the floor-to-ceiling stalls hiding the wall to her left. She glanced into the first open stall and twitched back a step. A small shelf on the wall above the toilet held a taxidermied turtle in tiny denim overalls, a floppy fisherman’s hat on its head, and a miniature fishing pole leaned over its shoulder. Amity read the name “TIMMY” etched on the nameplate of the turtle’s base. She couldn’t help the unsettled grimace that twisted her face.
She peeked into the next stall. A beaver in what could have been an extra dress and bonnet from the Little House on the Prairie looked down at its hands. It carried a basket full of wax fruits and flowers, and a little browned-paper map, like it—she, Amity corrected, based on the outfit and the “BETSY” stamped below—had been caught mid-delivery. She couldn’t stop the question before it climbed out of her mouth: “Is there one in every stall?”
A sad giggle drifted out of a stall further on, “Yeah,” Luz sighed, “They’re awful. I… I love them.”
“Luz, I just— Are you alright? Is there anything I can do?” Amity asked as she took a few more steps to stand close to the last, largest stall. She gently pressed on that stall’s door, but it creaked open a hairsbreadth—just enough for her to catch a glimpse of HENRY the rabbit’s glassy eyes. Wait, no, not a rabbit. Henry the Hare. Three names all ending in ‘Y’, first letter matching the animal type. Luz said the name Remmy... She frowned when she realized she’d probably cracked the code behind the decorations and their names.
A drawn-out dragging and scraping noise sounded from nearby, then a sigh echoed from the stall beside her as the lock clicked over. Luz pulled the door open. As Amity had suspected, there was a gray, white, and black furred raccoon on the shelf behind Luz wearing a white linen shirt, canvas pants, and a newsboy’s cap. The shorter girl turned red-rimmed eyes up at her for just a moment, then she looked down at the white tile floor and shook her head.
“Do you want to finish eating?” Amity didn’t think Luz would feel up to finishing her food, and she was not surprised by the other girl’s response.
Luz cleared her throat and pushed out a hoarse whisper, “Not sure I can eat.”
“Do you want me to have Gus pack up our food?” Amity asked, her head at a tilt as she tried to see the other girl’s face. Luz stubbornly refused to look up, and the wide brim of her cowboy hat kept her features hidden.
“No,” Luz ground out, then coughed into a quickly raised fist, “You… should… finish eating,” she said in a careful tone, like she was trying not to fall to pieces. Then she whispered, softly, sadly, “That’s more important.”
“Luz, did…” Amity paused to run her tongue across her lips and frown, “Did I do something wrong?”
“It’s not you,” Luz croaked, taking a deep breath, “It’s always me.”
“Luz, that doesn’t—”
The brown-haired girl shook her head, a wet rasp to her voice, “I’m sorry, n-not here.” She took a shuddering breath, then added, “I’ll… I need to use the bathroom, then I’ll be right out.” She bowed her head slightly, still not looking up at Amity, then said, “I’m sorry for disturbing your meal.” She turned back toward the stall, and glanced over her shoulder long enough to add, “We can leave whenever you’re ready.” Then Luz shut the stall door, and Amity heard the lock click over again.
~
Amity walked back to their table lost in thought, rubbing her thumbs against her fingertips as her mind spun in circles. Luz had been crying. Luz was practically deferential when she spoke to her. Luz seemed like a shell of herself. Luz wouldn’t look her in the eye. She had to do something! But what? She looked up to find Gus mid-task as he carefully packed their pizzas into to-go boxes: each slice wrapped separately in some kind of brown paper; a pair of napkins placed in between each little parchment-paper bundle. “Youuu,” he softly crooned as he wrapped another piece, “got my heart inside… of your haa~yeeee~aaannd...” He tucked it into the box, and began wrapping another piece, “Bu’chu plaaayin’ it,” carefully creasing the paper into a triangle around the slice, slipping down to hit a deep, deep note, “doo ba deee~” Amity huffed a quiet laugh when he sucked in a breath and belted out the next line, “BABY IIIII~heee~iiiii have no stuh~reee, oh whoa whoooaaa~” He bent his knees and closed his eyes, feeling the music, as his descending tones filled the room.
He glanced over when he heard her footsteps and gave her a sad shrug, “No luck callin’ her out?” She shook her head and he nodded, pressing his mouth into a crooked smile. “Hey, it’ll be alright,” he said with an optimistic tone. “Give her some time to figure out she’s bein’ hella stoopid—” He grinned when Amity snorted at the voice he used, “—and you two’ll be back to cuttin’ up in no time.” He snapped his fingers and started wiping his hands on his apron, “Speakin’ of, can I get’chyer number?” He pulled out his phone and waved his other hand, “Not tryn’a be a creep; you two looked super sweet earlier and I took a few photos I wanted to share.” He pulled up a picture, then turned the screen in her direction.
Amity looked at Luz, a pale pink dusting across her cheeks and the bridge of her nose, teeth gently pressed around her bottom lip over a hint of a smile. He swiped. Luz mid-laugh, rosy-cheeked and dimpled, her eyes squinted shut with a hand up, waving, No more, as Amity told a joke. He swiped again. Amity listened intently, fingers laced together on the table as she leaned forward to watch Luz talk with her hands. Every photo, the fore- and background blurred into irrelevance, the focus tight on their faces, their expressions. The colors of their dress-up outfits popped against the midnight dark beyond the windows in the distance, the warmth in their gaze meant only for each other. Gus flipped through several more stunning photographs, then handed his phone to Amity at a blank contacts entry. “Email or text, whichever you’d prefer,” He said softly, watching her take a slow breath and blink a few times.
“Okay,” the pale girl whispered. She filled out both, and—after a moment’s thought—put Amity Pizza Blight in the name field. She handed it back with a grin, then remarked, “Text, please. I hardly ever check my email... Those photos look professional, what do you do when you’re not—” she motioned toward the countertop and the hulking black pizza oven simmering behind.
“Sweating to death? Burnin’ my baby-soft skin? Photography’s a hobby,” Gus chuckled, tapping at his phone for a moment before slipping it back into his pocket. “I’ve been taking classes for computer animation and video editing. My buddies and I make these sci-fi videos and post ‘em online, with sound effects and music, the whole nine. You can do a lot with a cheap DSLR these days.” He gave a self-conscious shrug, “We’ve been getting some attention lately, activity on our twitch streams. I’ve made a little extra cash on the side doing voice-over work for commercials and small parts in a couple indie games.”
“That’s great, Gus,” Amity said with a genuine smile, “Is that something you want to pursue?” She felt her phone vibrate in her pocket.
“Oh yeah!” his dark blue eyes lit up, twinkling under the fluorescent lights. “I’d love to do more VA work on games, and being this close to L.A.? Who knows.” He chuckled and shoved his hands into the pockets of his navy blue board shorts. “I’m taking those animation courses because it’d be awesome to do special effects on a feature film. But I can also use those skills to do my own personal projects.”
Amity made a faint hmmm as she thought about what he’d said so far. “Like turning those science fiction videos into the next Cosmic Frontier?” He nodded and grinned, made a pssshh sound followed by, I wish. “Good luck with your passion project, Gus.”
“Thanks,” He said, nudging her gently with his elbow. “If you want, ask Luz to show you the ones she helped with.”
“What? She did?!” Amity gasped in surprise.
“Yeah, she’s good at coming up with plotlines and story settings—goddamn that girl has an imagination!” Gus laughed, “She helped with a few videos, doing some side character and monster voices.” He chuckled and let out a sigh, “She did such a great job. Our regular fans and commenters loved her, but she couldn’t quite believe it was true. She’d brush it off like, nah, they’re just being polite.” He shook his head, “Girl can’t take a compliment.”
“She has already made an impact on my work,” Amity admitted. “I hadn’t shown my project to anyone, not after… a… a bad review, but as soon as she saw it, she asked questions that made me challenge assumptions I’d held for a long time. And…” She turned a bit pink, “she was very… kind and encouraging.”
He chuckled and tipped his chin up, motioning toward something—or someone, she guessed—over her shoulder, “Might not be a bad idea to tell her that, when you get the chance.” She half-turned to see Luz walking toward them, shoulders rounded up next to her ears, her hands shoved deep into her pockets.
The brown-haired girl gently cleared her throat when she approached, and said, “J-just let me know when you’re ready to leave. I’ll get my things together.”
“Thank you, Luz,” Amity watched the other girl for her reaction as she replied, “I’ll go use the restroom. When you’re ready, we’ll go.” Luz gave her a jerky nod, and shuffled from one foot to the other as she quickly shrugged off the Hawaiian shirt to slip into her work jacket. Amity turned back to Gus and raised a hand. He grinned and gave her a firm shake. “Thank you for your time tonight, Gus. You are a true friend.”
He winked and clicked his tongue, “Hey, stop by any time.” He pointed a thumb over his shoulder toward Luz, and he grinned, “Bring this one with you, too!” Amity laughed and turned to walk toward the bathrooms, but she had time to notice the shorter girl’s whole body stiffen at his second comment. Gus shook his head as he turned back to the table, resuming his careful folding and packing of their meal, humming another tune under his breath. He glanced over at Luz, who was standing rigid beside her chair, her whole frame tense as she glared at the floor. “Hey,” Gus said, his voice soft and calm, walking over to stand beside the brown-haired girl. “You good?”
Luz gave a quick, twitchy shrug.
Gus sighed and thought about what he’d observed so far over the last almost-hour, and decided he’d have to be blunt. He put one arm around her shoulders, and tugged her close, letting her lean her shoulder against his ribs, “Girl, I’mma be real wi’chu, but I ain’t tryn’a hurt you. I’m sayin’ this in love, because I sorta, kinda, maybe care a little bit abou’chu, ya hear?” He felt her huff a laugh and nod, and he squeezed her other arm before he took a step away, turned, and pushed the brim of her hat up so he could see her face. “She adores you, why you actin’ like this?”
Luz shook her head and frowned, her brow instantly creasing, “No, she doesn’t.” She glanced up at him with a faintly wounded expression when he laughed.
He crouched slightly to meet her eye, hands on his knees, as he shook his head, “Listen, ain’t no fuckin’ way she’s not head over heels for you, Luz!”
“I can’t—” She began, and waved her hands out away from her body, “I can’t hope for that, Gus!” She let her hands fall and slap against her sides.
He tapped fingertips on her forehead, twice, “You keep that mentality, you’re gonna fuck this up.” He leaned back and crossed his arms as she growled.
“Every other time I’ve felt this way, I’ve been wrong,” Luz spat, her cheeks glowing with anger. Anger at herself, at her inability to connect to people. Her inability to see that fine line between friendly and too much, and the signs of someone rapidly losing interest. Her tendency to cross that line like it was an Olympic long jump competition.
Gus closed his eyes and shook his head, his arms still crossed as he muttered, “One’a these days, we gonna take those insecurities out back and bust ‘em in they kneecaps.”
Luz didn’t hear him as she continued speaking, “—So I have to push it all down. Keep it hidden.” She motioned with her hands, downward, then patted at her jacket pockets, “Stay… professional.”
“You fuckin’ it up already, ain’t’cha?” Gus groaned, rubbing at his forehead with both hands, “Sister, I am tellin’ you, you’re wrong.” He pressed both palms together and pointed his hands toward the bathrooms, “I know a thing when I see it.”
The brown-haired girl frowned again, her eyes shimmering with unshed tears, her hands pushed back into her pockets as she hunched her shoulders, “No, mm-mmm, it’s just wishful thinking.”
“On your part? Sure!” Gus exclaimed, patting himself on the chest, “But I can see it too, and trust,” he scoffed, waving a hand back toward the countertop and cash register, “I sure as fuck didn’t wish for a-a—a goddamn Hallmark channel movie in front of Mama Porter’s pizza parlor!” He took a step closer and hissed, an irritated finger pointed at her chest, “Now you got me all invested and shit.”
Luz scoffed and rolled her eyes.
Gus put a hand on her shoulder, and after several heartbeats, she turned her head to meet his eyes. “Talk to her,” he smiled, “Please. I’mma be worried sick about you drivin’ all night like this.” He let go of her shoulder and brushed the back of his fingers against her collarbone, “You look like shit.”
“Hey!”
“Call me tomorrow,” Gus was firm, his tone of voice gave no room for argument, “Ya hear? Otherwise, I’ll hafta call Eda, and you know—”
“That you’re scared of her,” Luz interrupted with an eye roll and a sigh. “You big baby.”
“That’s right.” Gus nodded, lightly pounding one fist into the palm of his other hand. “Spare me, Luz. I will cry.” He put both hands on her shoulders and shook her enough to make a chuckle fall out, “Don’t leave me down in the trenches!” She groaned, and he added, “Please?”
“Okay! Okay,” Luz put her hands up to push him away, gently, of course, she knew he was just trying to help. “I’ll call you later when we get to Richfield.” She peeked at the clock on the wall, “We’ll probably get in around six or seven,” she glanced at his face and gave him a sharp grin. “You still want me to interrupt your beauty sleep?”
“Yes, you give me a call or I’ll kick your ass!”
“Ugh, fine,” Luz grumbled with a smile. She caught sight of Amity walking toward them, and her face fell.
“Luz, do you trust me?” Gus asked, his voice pitched low. She looked up at him, her eyes dancing left and right as she examined his face. She nodded. “It’s gonna be okay. Just talk to her,” he tried reassuring her one last time.
Amity stood next to Luz and gently bumped her with her arm, “Hey Luz, I’m… ready if you are.” The shorter girl blushed and looked down at the floor, then nodded.
“I packed each slice separately,” Gus said to them both as he put their pizza boxes in a plastic bag, stuffing in a handful of napkins afterward. “Bunch’a napkins in the boxes too, so you don’t make a mess in the truck.” He glanced between Amity and Luz before setting his eyes on the brown-haired girl, “D’ya think I should put a bib in the bag for your passenger?” He shot Amity a small wink as she puffed her cheeks out and huffed. Luz opened her mouth as if she were going to make a snarky comment, but she blinked and shut her mouth, shaking her head, choosing not to take the opportunity. He held the bag out to Luz, and she mumbled her thanks as she reached for it.
~
The night was cold and still. Stars glimmered high above the brush-stroke clouds that gleamed silver in the moonlight. Luz plodded toward her truck, head down, hands in her pockets, and Amity longed for the gleaming source of light that had been shining beside her not even an hour before. They had nearly reached Hooty, and Luz had yet to say a word. “Luz?” the golden-eyed girl asked, softly, then louder again when the shorter girl failed to respond. “Before we go…” Amity trailed off when she heard a quiet sniff, and saw the brown-haired girl quickly rub a hand across her face. That is it, Amity frowned. She broke into a run, then turned and held her arms outstretched, blocking the other girl a few steps away from the truck. Luz had her keys in her hand, preparing to unlock her door, and she slowly let her arm fall to her side. The nearest light pole was beyond the shorter girl; her face was hidden in shadow.
“Luz,” Amity slowly lowered her arms, and made a helpless wave of her hands. “We can’t leave yet.”
Luz shook her head and sniffed, “Please…” she warbled, then cleared her throat, “just… please, get in the truck.” She took a step to one side as if to move around the taller girl, and Amity shuffled sideways to block her again. This time, the slightest edge of her face was visible.
Amity frowned, “I’m not getting in that truck until we can talk.”
Luz looked up at her, her face a blank shadow under her white cowboy hat, but for the faintest gleam of her eyes. “It— It’s not important,” her voice hardly more than a whisper.
“Yes it is, Luz,” Amity shook her head, “You are important.”
Luz looked down at the ground as she gave a quick, savage shake of her head, “We—” she sniffed, and pawed at her face again, “We have a schedule to keep, Miss Blight, we—” She took a half-step back at the snarl that curled Amity’s mouth.
“No!” the golden-eyed girl growled, her eyebrows plunging deep, angry lines in her forehead, “Miss Blight,” she spat, then she waved a hand toward Luz, the shorter girl watching her carefully, “See? I did something to hurt you!” She longed to reach out and hold the other girl’s hand, to press reassurance into her skin. “I need to make it right,” Amity said softly, watching Luz.
The brown-haired girl looked back down to the ground and took a quiet, shuddering breath. She didn’t say a word.
“How can I make it right?” Amity asked. Luz shook her head, and wiped a sleeve across her face as she stared at the pavement. Several agonizingly slow heartbeats went by in silence before the green-haired girl spoke again. “Luz… please talk to me?”
Luz sucked in a quick, watery breath as she covered her face with her hands. “I’m such an idiot,” she groaned in a muffled voice.
“Because… you… didn’t know who I was?” Amity guessed, just happy to have her say something.
“Because—” Luz hissed and pulled her hands away from her face to motion toward herself, “Because I forgot who I was! I’m just some— some truck driver.” She lifted her hat from her head and clutched it at her chest with both hands, her head bowed slightly, “I’m sorry if I… if I offended you at any point earlier this evening, Miss Blight.” Amity clenched her fists at her name. “I know I can be…” Luz trailed off and sniffed, a wet chuckle punctuating her movements, “intrusive and creepy when I think I’m being supportive. Please…” She lifted her head for just a moment, and a distant car turned into the parking lot, its headlights running across the shorter girl’s face to show glittering tear tracks running down her cheeks. Luz looked back down at Amity’s feet, “Please accept my apologies for overstepping any boundaries.” Amity felt frozen in place as she watched tears fall from the tanned girl’s jaw. Some landed on Luz’s wrist. Some landed on her white cowboy hat, the drops tracing short damp lines across the leather. Luz swallowed, her voice a hoarse, hollow tone, “I’ll do my best to remain professional for the rest of the trip.”
Amity bristled at her name, at the thought of Luz being dampened and dimmed, at the excruciatingly dull days ahead if she had to sit next to her previously-joyful companion treating her like goddamn royalty— She turned on her heel and stomped a few steps away, heading toward the squared-off, boxy nose of the big rig.
Luz blinked and turned to watch her, confused, then she began, “Miss—”
Amity wheeled around and pointed at her, shouting, “No!” angry tears brimming in her golden eyes. She stalked back toward Luz and leaned over the shorter girl, a fury in her voice. “If you call me anything—and I mean anything—other than just Amity again, I swear—” She closed her eyes and pinched her face in a snarl, her hands curled into claws, “I will— I will fucking end you!” She glared down at stunned brown eyes. Luz’s jaw fell open.
“You have— ugh!” The green-haired girl threw her hands in the air, “You’ve been wonderful tonight! You’ve been funny, and charming; I— I liked being just Amity to you!” She took a deep breath, her heart thundering painfully in her chest as she cast about for the right words to capture her feelings. “I felt like— like I’d finally made a friend,” Amity patted herself on the chest, her vision growing damp and blurry, “A friend just for me to have, not one to make my mother happy.” Luz blinked up at her, eyes wide and mouth still hanging, but a creeping red shame had started to paint her neck and ears with a deep, dark red.
“Do you know?” Amity breathed out and blinked, feeling hot tears run from her eyes, “How lonely it is, Luz?” She waved her hands outward, encompassing the world around them, then let them fall back to her sides. “Never knowing if the people being nice to you are just… trying to make connections to your father’s money?” The taller girl looked down as she tugged at her fingers, hands trembling at her chest, “I thought—” she paused to sniff and wipe at her face, “I thought you and I… had a…” Amity chuckled and shrugged, her head tilted with a sad smile, “Thought we had something genuine.” She looked at Luz, tears glittering in her eyes, and the brown-haired girl felt herself suddenly able to move.
“We do!” Luz blurted out, eyes locked with the taller girl, reaching out to place a hand on her pale wrist, “I— I thought we did too!”
Amity tilted her head down to squeeze her eyes closed, “Then— then why—?”
“I’m sorry, Amity!” Luz quickly put her hat back on and held her hands up, fingers spread wide as she fanned her palms around the taller girl’s arm, uncertain of what to do. “I— I didn’t mean to make you cry! It’s the last thing I wanted!” She leaned up on her toes, near Amity’s shoulder, trying to catch her eyes, “I want to be your friend, more than anything!” She bit her lip and dropped back on her heels, rubbing a hand through the back of her hair, “I-If you’ll still have me?”
Amity held one arm over the other, tight around her stomach, and for being so much taller than Luz, she felt so small in that moment, “What did I do, Luz? I must have done something.”
“I just—” Luz shook her head as she reached out to put a gentle hand on Amity’s arm, rubbing her thumb against the tense, trembling muscles there, “I felt so embarrassed. It— It makes sense who you are,” she began, talking quickly now to comfort the teary-eyed girl before her, “I just didn’t think about it, because I was so excited about getting to spend time with you. And— but when I found out, it scared me, because…” She paused, “Because…” Luz sighed and looked down at her feet, taking a long, slow breath. “When I was in middle school—” she tilted her head and shrugged, rolling her eyes with a sigh, “and high school—there were these rich, popular kids that would… um…” She cleared her throat and kicked at a crack in the pavement, “They’d pretend to be… interested in me… for laughs.” She felt the muscles in Amity’s arm go rigid, and she squeezed the other girl’s elbow and chuckled, a show of reassurance. “I wasn’t… I wasn’t popular. Like, at all,” Luz admitted, her shoulders wilted, her eyes trained downward, unable to look the taller girl in the eye as she dredged up this years-old pain. “I didn’t have any friends, and… I was desperate for someone to— to just… acknowledge my existence, so I…” the brown-haired girl closed her eyes and sighed, “I would fall for it every time.”
Amity managed to find her voice enough to offer, “Oh, Luz.”
The shorter girl waved her free hand, making a faux disaffected sound in her throat, “It’s— well… with the boys, at least, I knew what they really wanted, but the girls… they were…” Luz sniffed and wiped the edge of her hand under her eyes, and cleared her throat. “The girls would lead me on until they got bored. Then they’d look at me… like… like I was disgusting, and say… they’d— they’d say…” She sniffed again, and paused at Amity’s soft, Oh Luz. The brown-haired girl shrugged, “So… when I realized who you were, that all… came rushing back,” she looked up to meet golden eyes and gave such a sad, pained smile. “And it always, always, hurt so much, and— I felt like I couldn’t breathe— and!” Luz hooked her fingers around the sleeve of Amity’s tie-dyed t-shirt, tugging her arm to get her point across, “And you haven’t done anything wrong, okay? It’s just— I’m sorry, and—”
“Luz, it’s okay,” Amity was quick to assure her, letting her arms fall away from where she’d been clutching at her stomach, “You don’t have to apologize—”
The shorter girl kept talking, picking up speed, “—I got scared because you and I were getting along so well, I dunno, it really seemed like we clicked.” She gave Amity a hopeful grin, “And I wanted us to click! I was having so much fun talking with you, but you’re just—” Her face crumpled as she looked away, shame and self-loathing written in her eyes, “You’re just so cool and classy, and why—” Luz breathed a quick, dazed chuckle, “why would you want someone like me in your life?”
“I think I understand,” Amity’s voice was soft as she tried to interrupt.
“And my brain was telling me you had to be humoring me,” Luz was scarcely taking time to take a breath, her words running so quickly now, “because why else would you want to—”
“Luz!” Amity called out, catching the pair of nervous brown eyes, “Can I—” the taller girl gulped as Luz took another heaving breath, her cheeks red and eyes wide. “You look like you need a hug, can I—” Amity hesitated a moment, still so uncertain, “Can I hug you?”
The shorter girl dropped her eyes to the ground and whimpered, giving a short, quick nod.
Amity slowly stepped forward, looking down to see where her feet were, not wanting to ruin the tender moment by stepping on her toes. Luz stood still, hardly moving, but Amity could feel a tremble in her arms and shoulders as she slowly reached out. She leaned her head to the side when the brim of the cowboy hat poked her in the jaw, and Amity chuckled, “Here, I’m going to just… hold this, okay?” she narrated her slow movements as she lifted the hat from the smaller girl’s head, holding it in one hand as she pulled Luz close, and tight. She heard a soft, shaky exhale a few heartbeats before Luz leaned the side of her head against her chest, her ear over Amity’s heart. The taller girl frowned when Luz chuckled at the spike in her heart rate. “Here I thought I’d be nice and comfort you,” Amity groused.
“You are,” Luz hummed.
“And you laugh at me,” Amity sniffed—was that lemon?—and turned her nose up in a pout.
Luz grinned into her collar, “Sorry, you’re just… so cute.”
The golden-eyed girl sighed when she felt Luz wrap her arms up and around her back, holding her in return, just as tightly. She leaned her head down to rest the edge of her jaw against brown curls and softly spoke, “I’m so sorry all that happened to you, Luz. That’s…” Amity shook her head, “so wrong.”
The brown-haired girl’s voice was muffled by the taller girl’s safety vest, “It’s not your fault.”
“I know, but you didn’t deserve that,” Amity took a deep breath and sighed, “I… Honestly…” She rubbed her thumbs and fingertips into Luz’s back as she deliberated on whether to admit— But she’s already bared her soul, coward. “I wasn’t a nice person in high school…” Amity began, “thanks to mother dearest.” Luz huffed at the snide emphasis Amity used on the word. “She raised us to treat everyone else like garbage— and— I’ve changed since then, but I…” The taller girl closed her eyes as scenes from her school days flashed through her mind’s eye. “I was a mean girl and a bitch, and… but I wouldn’t have… I would never have done that to you.”
“Mean girls don’t give such nice hugs,” Luz mumbled as she snuggled closer, rubbing her cheek against Amity’s chest; the taller girl thought she was going to burst into flames.
She managed to laugh in response, only sounding half-maniacal, but she was more dazed than she realized when she admitted, “But I probably would have picked on you, because I would’ve been too emotionally constipated to realize I had a crush on you.”
“You—” Luz blinked her eyes open, starting to pull away, “What?!”
Amity laughed, shrill and wide-eyed, and squeezed the smaller girl back against her collarbone, “Nothing! Nothing, uh, well…” She looked down, as best she could, and tried to catch the blushing brown eyes hidden under brown curls, tucked into her throat, “I do want you as a friend, Luz.” Amity sighed, and smiled when Luz gave her a tight squeeze, “I don’t have many close friends, and I—”
“Neither do I,” Luz interrupted, turning her head to rest her chin on her tie-dyed collar, brown eyes shining up to meet the taller girl’s warm gaze.
Amity smiled, “I have the feeling you and I could be…” She blushed and chuckled softly, “Could… could have…”
Luz closed her eyes and hummed a happy note, “Friends, yeah.” She rubbed her forehead into Amity’s neck with a giggle.
Amity raised an eyebrow, “Mm-hmm, friends?” She grinned, feeling confident again after having been worried for so long, “I didn’t realize friends hugged like this.”
“Best friends, duh,” Luz breathed across the hollow of her throat and laughed at the shiver that ran through the taller girl’s frame, “I’d— I’d like that.”
“Really?” Amity felt breathless.
“Yeah.”
Amity licked her lips and smiled, her voice so soft, “I’m glad we met.”
Luz nodded, her brown curls tickling Amity’s jaw, “Me too.”
“Really?”
“Yeah,” Luz whispered.
Amity felt her phone vibrate in her pocket, and in a moment of dazed idle curiosity, she pulled it out and thumbed at the screen. A message from what must be Gus’ number, due to the attachment count visible in the notification. She tapped to reveal a new photograph, of her and Luz, wrapped up and in each other’s arms, gazing tenderly into one another’s eyes. The caption said 'I SUPPORT IT 100%', and a moment later a new message popped up, 'KISS ALREADY', followed by a string of emoji faces with heart-eyes or blowing kisses.
Artwork by the Amazing Mexfan!
Amity growled and clenched the phone in her hand, Luz wheezing an oof as she was pressed tightly against the taller girl’s chest. “REALLY,” the taller girl yelled up into the night sky.
Luz patted her back with one hand and the arm pinning her down with the other, gasping, “I— I said yeah!”
“Not you— I— Gus! You jerk!”
Notes:
I modeled some of Gus's dialogue after one of the coolest guys I know, I hope ya'll're okay with that. Especially the song he was singing when Amity came back. If you want, you can listen to King about 10 seconds in here, singing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xsEQsjtdYPE
Not sure if I translated that well to text-only format, but I tried.
Chapter Text
Emira didn’t usually work this late, but Amity’s sudden departure was a golden opportunity. She had a number of important items remaining on her latest urgent to-do list, and now she could tackle the most pressing few without raising too many questions. To be fair, she was frequently in the office until midnight or later—both to avoid Mother Dearest at the mansion and because the recliner in her office had a deep-tissue massage setting—but lately, she was “working” late because she was setting a precedent. Establishing patterns of behavior. Odalia had never so much as questioned the long hours she’d been spending in the office over the last few months, which Emira had expected and still found… bitterly disappointing. The all-hours cafeteria on the ground floor and the ostentatious espresso machine down the hall helped soften the blow, but only by so much. Hopefully, this all won’t be an issue for much longer. She tried to have hope.
She visited Amity’s floor of the building every evening to invite her sister out for dinner. Half the time her sister was too busy to leave her lab, and they would order something from the cafeteria. Sometimes Amity could join Emira for a quick half-hour break, and they’d go downstairs and sit in a quiet booth in the corner of the executive’s lounge and eat in a companionable silence. The times Emira could get Amity to talk about her project were her favorite: her sister would ramble on excitedly, talking about things that she didn’t understand at all, but… Amity would look almost happy.
Rarely, Emira would get turned down with a flustered, teary-eyed, Tomorrow, I promise. Those were the nights she knew Odalia had managed to turn Amity into a shivering ball of anxieties. She did what she could to keep their mother’s interference in her sister’s life to a minimum, but that woman would slip past her best efforts with frightening ease and regularity.
She had hummed the Mission: Impossible theme song to herself while she followed her usual dinner time routine. She had slipped into Amity’s lab and called down a meal order for two, needing only a moment to plug a homebrew device into her little sister’s main workstation. Then, cool as a cucumber, she had flopped across the battered gray leather couch in the tenth-floor lobby to wait for their— her— food. What are we doing tonight, Emira? The same thing we do every night, Emira. As far as her assistant and the cafeteria was concerned, Amity was still on-site.
Emira glanced at her watch. Twelve fifteen? Almost time to pull the disk. Any minute now, she should get a notification, and—
Lights flicked on in the wide open area beyond the frosted glass walls of her office, beyond even her assistant’s wide filing-cabinet-sprinkled sitting room. Further out in the open-desk-plan nightmare zone of the Strategic Assistance Department, fluorescent tubes flickered and popped with their sickening green glow. Motion from the elevator bank caught her eye as every wall sconce and ceiling light in the lobby blazed to life, and a faint classical music began to spill from the hallway speakers like a wrestler’s walk-on theme. Emira tilted her head in confusion, Who—? Oh. The building’s biometrics programming behaved this way for only one person. Why is she here?
A dark gray shape topped with a bright spot of green moved from the elevator toward her office, the figure shifting and warped by multiple panes of privacy glass. Emira sighed and leaned back to turn her office sound system down to a gentle hum as the ominous drone of her mother’s string quartet grew louder, closer. Note to self: add Darth Vader’s theme to Mother’s campus playlist. She only had a moment to grin and take a few calming breaths in preparation before her door swung open to clacking heels and an exaggerated sigh.
“Why do I bother having conference calls with those fools in Europe?” Odalia Blight had a frown and a slightly furrowed brow as she tugged a mocha-brown leather glove down over her fingers, a matching handbag tucked under her left elbow. She snapped her eyes up to catch Emira with an ice-blue stare as she approached her desk, “I’m closing the branch in Portugal and the Germans are worried they’re next. Honestly.” The woman ran a manicured fingernail along her hairline, brushing a strand of green back over an ear with an irritated sigh, “Scholz is digging his own grave. If I have to make one more personal appearance to reassure that man-child, I’ll fire the entire lot.”
Emira wrinkled her brow, “You’re shutting down Portugal? Why?”
Odalia waved her hand and made an exasperated noise deep in her throat, “Their metrics are abysmal. That office has been in the red two quarters in a row.” The woman shook her head, “Absolutely unacceptable.”
“In the— Mother, that whole country is struggling right now! The Portugal office is outperforming the local competitors by at least eighteen percent, and—”
“It’s already decided, Emira,” Odalia interrupted with a cloying, condescending tone, like she was speaking to a young child. She began to work her hand into her other glove. “I have a special task for you while I’m—” she rolled her eyes, “babysitting.”
Emira frowned as she swiveled in her chair, pulling a pad of paper and a pen to hand. She didn’t bother responding, she knew her mother would just—
“Amity has a grant proposal demonstration in Boston this Friday evening, and you need to make sure she arrives on time.” Odalia pulled her handbag out from under her arm to glance through its contents one last time, “Use the Gulfstream if you must, Lord knows that girl can’t get anywhere on time on her own.” Emira stiffened at the unnecessarily harsh words and watched her mother as she closed her handbag and smiled, “I’ve… already arranged for her crate delivery.”
Emira narrowed her eyes. She knew her mother’s voice—the tone she used just then… What is she up to? She scribbled notes on her pad of paper as she echoed, “Amity and crates to Boston, tomorrow morning—just to be clear,” the girl with the long green braid turned in her chair as she made a show of looking up at the clock on her wall. 12:20 AM. “Tomorrow morning, as in today, Tuesday?”
Odalia turned a carefully neutral eye toward her daughter. Emira felt a chill run up her spine at the sight. “I don’t expect Amity to be ready before Wednesday afternoon, if ever.” The woman sighed and stalked across Emira’s office to stand before the window—where Amity had stood, just that morning—gazing out over the twinkling city below. Her charcoal gray overcoat cut an ominous silhouette out of the gleaming metropolis. Emira bristled and nearly lurched to her feet when the woman growled, “She’s unfocused and wasteful, just like her father.” Odalia rubbed her gloved fingertips together, then patted down the side of her coat as she muttered, “I should have pulled the plug years ago.” She turned, a bright smile on her purplish-red lips, insincerity clearly cast across her features, “Ah well, if only I could see the future.”
Emira drummed her fingertips across the barrel of the pen in her hand. “How will her equipment be shipped?” she asked with a deliberately even voice.
Odalia just grinned.
“You… You put our expedited team on this?” Emira had better words to describe those men: Sloppy. Careless. Cruelly inefficient. Her mother used them to kill projects. “Why would you—”
“Your father’s pet projects hemorrhage millions every quarter, and hers is somehow even worse,” Odalia snapped, a sudden live-wire shift in her eyes to electric blue anger, “I’ve had an applied sciences team review footage from her laboratory and they could have a market-viable product ready to ship in three days.” The woman took a slow step forward, “They’re projecting eight-figure sales per week,” and Emira scrambled to her feet.
“You have cameras in her lab? You know she sleeps there!” the girl snarled, a blistering wave of anger sweeping across her face, “That is a violation of—”
“Don’t be stupid, Emira,” the woman hissed, red splotches blooming high on her pale cheekbones at the unexpected pushback, “She has privacy on Ten, but I will keep tabs on the progress of her work.” Odalia stopped to make a snorting, disgusted sound, adding, “Or lack thereof.”
Emira was at a loss for words, and she opened and closed her mouth several times before, “I— I— How could you—”
“Your father is incapable of steering this company, so I am forced to make the hard decisions,” Odalia used a plaintive, pitiful lilt to her voice. Emira felt no sympathy for the spiteful woman. “Amity will be better off using that mind of hers to crunch numbers in Accounting,” the woman smirked, “I might let her spend some time in R&D if she can prove herself useful.”
Emira curled her hands into fists and opened her mouth to shout, to scream— but the phone on her desk blared a sudden bleep-bleep-bleep and the green-haired girl stabbed the speakerphone button with a strangled, “Yes?”
“Miss Blight? Davis in Financials,” a tired male voice filled the thick, angry silence. “There’s been an anomalous charge on your sister’s corporate card, and—” Emira’s eyes snapped toward the telephone on her desk, and she reached for the handset.
Odalia’s gloved fingers pressed the back of her hand in place, keeping the call on speaker. “This is Odalia Blight,” the woman said with an annoyed tone, “What sort of anomalous charge?”
“Uh— oh,” the man on the other end of the phone made a muffled gulp, “It was for food, Mrs. Blight, ma’am, n-near L.A.”
Odalia turned a flat glare on Emira. The girl schooled her face into a calm, thoughtful expression while she scrambled for a plausible explanation, “I think she was visiting a vendor in Mountain View this morning, perhaps—”
The blue-eyed woman rolled her eyes and groaned, “That child lost her wallet again. Or had it stolen. Sloppy.” She glared down at the phone, “Davis. Cancel her cards.”
“Ma’am? Are y—” he gulped again when she furrowed her brow, almost as if he could see her staring down at him, “Yuh– yes ma’am.”
“It could be a delayed processing notification from lunchtime,” Emira offered, glancing down at the telephone as the man muttered a harried, Th-that could be true. “Let’s not assume she lost her—”
“Fine,” Odalia tsk’d in annoyance and stepped away from Emira’s desk, toward her office door. Then she turned and stalked back to the phone, “Davis? If another anomalous charge comes through?” She paused long enough to stare Emira in the eyes, daring her to interrupt while the man whimpered, Yes, Mrs. Blight? Odalia smiled a grim, knowing thing. “Don’t bother calling us. Just cancel her cards.” Emira scowled when her mother added, “All of them.” Before the girl with the green braid could protest, Odalia pressed the End Call button.
“If she wants to be careless,” the woman glared at her eldest daughter, “She can deal with the consequences.” Odalia straightened, “I need her in Boston by Friday. She will be unimpressive as always, and my team will take over the Tenth Floor on Saturday morning.”
“But—”
“I will be in Europe until Thursday, at least. If you can’t do as you’re told…” Odalia trailed off with an unnervingly calm expression, except for her eyes. They were a frigid blue that promised nothing good. “Don’t make me look for a new Chief of Staff.” She turned and sauntered toward the door, “This will all work out just fine,” Odalia turned as she reached the doorway, and paused to lean back in with a hand on the metal door lever. “You’ll see.”
She pulled the door shut behind her, and the frosted-glass-blur of gray and green clacked toward the elevator bank, the outer office space and hallway growing dim and quiet in the woman’s absence. Emira glanced down at her desk and leaned on shaking fists, taking a hissing breath through clenched teeth. She snatched her smartphone from her desk and pulled up Amity’s contact card. She stared at the photo of her sister: a rare, soft smile as her siblings sandwiched her in a hug, all three wearing snowflake sweaters.
Her thumb hovered over the ‘Dial’ button for a long moment before Emira shook her head at the mistake she’d almost made. I can’t call her company-issued phone from my company-issued phone right after I hear the truth from the devil’s lips! Why would she tell— Her blood ran cold and a fierce anger swelled in her chest. Emira knew why Odalia had told her—the woman didn’t think she could stop her. She snarled and muttered under her breath as she dialed the number for the satellite phone Edric had given to Luz earlier that evening. It rang, and rang, and rang. She hung up, and slowly paced toward the windows, looking out over the city as she pressed ‘Redial’. It rang, and rang, and rang.
~
The darkened living room flickered with light from the wall mounted television. On screen, Detective Columbo turned and smirked toward the camera. Eda lay in her recliner, head back and legs up, a plaid blanket thrown across her lap. She was dead to the world, snoring, just absolutely sawing logs, while a large mostly-black cat curled up on her chest and ignored the grinding, choking noise that filled the room. The phone on the lampstand beside her chair lit up for a moment with a new notification.
[Quicksilver]: wyd?
The cat stretched and rolled itself around and around, flicking its bone-white ears and scrunching its white-furred eyes in a jaw cracking yawn. Then it curled up into a tight ball on the old woman’s sweatshirt and rubbed its forehead into the pale woman’s jaw. Eda smacked her lips and grunted, “Whuzzat? L— Luz?” Then she put a hand on the cat’s back and smiled, drifting back to sleep.
Notes:
Been working on a Night-Owl Trucking playlist on Spotify, just to get in the right headspace. Meant to mention it earlier, but I forgot. If ya'll want to listen while you read, feel free :) Lemme know if it helps, lol
Chapter Text
“I— I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to hurt you! A-Are you alright?” Amity had turned a startling shade of red and stammered a string of apologies after Gus nearly became an accessory to manslaughter. He’ll be the victim next time! she silently promised the smaller girl breathing heavily with her hands on her knees.
Luz felt the heat crawling up her face as she scrubbed a hand through the back of her hair. “I’m okay, honest,” she assured her totally platonic friend as she stood upright, “You just caught me by surprise.” She reached out a comforting hand and gently squeezed the taller girl’s bicep, and decided to try to calm her own thundering pulse with a bit of levity. “Dang girl,” Luz waggled her eyebrows up at the golden-eyed girl, “you got some muscle.” Her fingertips practically sizzled at the movement she felt when Amity shifted her arm at her touch. If anything, her heartbeat hammered faster in her chest, That didn’t work! Abort! Abort! She paused to clear her throat with a hoarse, “Holy shit.” Amity looked away with a choked laugh, turning pink.
Luz grinned and cleared her throat again, suddenly a rippling ball of nervous energy; she tapped her toes and slapped her palms together as she squeaked a high-pitched, “WELP,” then tipped her head toward the truck, “Need ta’ do a quick lap around Hooty, then we can hit the road, ‘kay?” The two stood there in a quiet, loaded silence as Luz turned her eyes down to the cracked pavement at their feet, suddenly shy. She sighed, then looked up to meet Amity’s soft gaze. “Thank you for giving me another chance,” her voice hushed and delicate as she smiled up at the green-haired girl. Her whispered sentiment filled the still, peaceful air, and a gentle breeze ruffled their hair as Amity returned her smile.
“Of course,” the taller girl’s response was just as soft. Amity pointed a thumb over her shoulder, “I’ll wait for you inside, okay?” She reached out for the bag Gus had packed, brushing her fingers across the back of Luz’s hand as she added, “Let me get that for you.”
~
The satellite phone vibrated in the pocket behind the passenger seat while the girls grinned at each other under the starry sky. It slipped further down into the leather pouch with each pulse, sliding all the way to the bottom of its dark hiding place. It fell silent just before the green-haired girl climbed into the cab, and remained unnoticed.
~
The cab rocked as Luz pulled her door shut with a slam, and she turned a shy, hopeful grin in the pale girl’s direction. She twisted the key in the dashboard as she softly asked, “So…” Hooty’s engine hummed in anticipation of her question, “are we good?” the brown-haired girl chuckled when Amity looked up at the ceiling and tapped a fingertip on her lips, as if she had yet to decide.
“Yeah,” Amity smiled so wide, “We’re good.”
Luz nodded as she pressed her thumb into a button on the cherrywood dashboard, “I’m glad,” her words nearly drowned out by the roar of the diesel engine at their feet, “Y’know? I’m really glad,” she repeated with a grin.
“Yeah?” the golden-eyed girl asked, breathing out a laugh.
“Yeah. Really. Just—” Luz shook her head and made a noise of surprise, throwing her hands up in the air, “I’m just— wow, we’re friends.”
“Yup,” Amity nodded, her mouth pressed into an amused line, “Friends,” she repeated.
“Friennnnddds,” Luz emphasized as she leaned over the steering wheel and waggled her eyebrows. The light on Hooty’s radio began to blink, and the GPS screen began to glow with their route marked and ready.
Amity blinked and nodded, playfully snapping her fingers and pointing at Luz, “Good friends.”
“Such good friends.”
“Pals?”
“Duh, best pals!”
“Just a couple…” Amity lingered on the word, “of besties.”
Luz snorted and gave her a wink, “That’s right, compadre.” A soft guitar accompanied the lyrics to a song that went ignored as they bantered back and forth.
Amity pretended to hold a radio handset to her mouth, imitating a burst of static, “10-4 good buddy.”
Luz laughed and put the big rig into gear, carefully pulling out of their parking spot, “We’re a cute couple—” she paused to cough and toss Amity another wink, “o’ gals dressin’ fancy and hittin’ the road!” She looked both ways before she pulled out from the truck stop, accelerating toward the on-ramp as the music picked up the pace, drums and electric guitars joining the build-up. Luz glanced at Amity and grinned as she began to sing along—
I am just a cowboy—
Luz reached out toward the horizon, fingers outstretched…
—lonesome on the trail
then she curled her fingers into a fist and brought it down under her chin in a dramatic pose
Looorrrd I’m just thinkin’ about a certain female
Luz flashed a loaded gaze at Amity and wiggled her shoulders.
The nights we spent together—
The brown-haired girl winked, and Amity clapped her hands over her face to hide a blush.
—ridin’ on the range
The trucker motioned out toward the cold, clear desert, her hand drifting through the air.
Lookin’ back it didn’t seem so strange
The brown-haired girl steered the tractor-trailer onto the Interstate as Thin Lizzy blared inside the cabin. Amity was wide-eyed, completely captivated by the performance taking place in the driver’s seat. She felt a guilty thrill at being a witness to such an exuberant display, but she suspected Luz was purposely putting on a show. The shorter girl belted out the words along with the radio as she danced in her seat.
Amity turned down the volume slightly at the instrumental interlude and gave Luz an appraising glance. “You have a very… Muppet-like energy.”
“I’m not sures if that’s a compliments or not, Miss Amitys,” Luz gave her a smiling side-eye and used a slightly silly voice, “but I’m gonna takes it as one.” They shared a grin before the tanned girl picked up the lyrics again. Luz froze halfway through a word and turned an expression of pure horror toward Amity. “Oh noooo!” she groaned as she clenched her eyes shut for just a moment.
The green-haired girl leaned toward her, concerned, “What? What’s wrong?”
“Your snacks! I didn’t get you any snacks! Soy un idiota,” Luz slapped her palm to her cheek, glancing at the road before turning back to her passenger, “Lo siento! er— I’m so sorry!”
Amity breathed a laugh, then shrugged and pressed her mouth into a crooked line, “Guess I’ll have to eat all o’ yours.” She winked for good measure.
The tanned girl flashed a wide grin before she twisted her mouth in an exaggerated pout and huffed, “I guess!” Amity stuck her tongue out and Luz laughed, “D’ya like pretzels?”
“Yeah,” Amity smiled, “I like pretzels.”
“That’s good,” Luz nodded her head toward the storage cabinets behind their seats, “Got plenty o’ those in the back. Got some crackers too, like— whatsit— Chicken in a Biscuit?”
“Oh? Uh, I don’t know if I’ve had those.”
“They’re pretty good,” the tanned girl smiled as she shifted gears, “I don’t usually eat ‘em when I’m the one driving. They’re good with a bit of peanut butter ta’ dip ‘em in. Oh, you’re not—” She gave a worried glance over toward the pale girl, “You’re not allergic to peanuts or anything, are ya?”
Amity gave her a tender look before shaking her head, “No, don’t worry. I don’t have any food allergies.”
“Good! That’s good. Great, actually, and also lucky, furthermore how very dare you, must be those good genes again,” Luz began to ramble, “I’m actually lactose intolerant myself but you can power through that if you really wanted to, truth be told, depending on the occasion and dress code—I’m not gonna chance it if I’m wearing white—but I’ll be nice,” she turned a wide, shit-eating grin on the golden-eyed girl and gave her a cheeky wink, “I’ll spare ya.”
Amity blinked twice, then rolled her eyes once her brain caught up to her ears. “I— pfff, you can’t be— Look,” she started over, and turned slightly to face Luz, “My brother is lactose intolerant. You’ll spare me? Please,” the green-haired girl scoffed in derision as she waved a dismissive hand, “You can’t be any worse than Edric after he’s had a pint of Moose Tracks.” Luz laughed, a cheerful, happy sound that the pale girl felt deep in her chest. That bubbling warmth from earlier had returned and was burning brighter than ever.
“Still,” the brown-eyed girl grinned, “it’s rude to fart in front of a lady.”
Amity felt her face begin to heat up, half at the thought of Luz considering her a lady and half in secondhand embarrassment at the thought of farting in front of her, and muttered, “Well, tell Edric that the next time you see him, would ya?” She shifted in her seat as she put one leg over the other knee, twisting slightly to lean against the armrest and the edge of her seatback, to better see her companion while they talked. “Wait, what about Eda? Do you spare—”
Luz barked a laugh and shook her head, “Oh, please. Eda is not a lady.”
Amity gasped and laughed at the same time, “Luz!”
“What?” Luz laughed again, a light-hearted giggle working its way out of her chest, “She’d be the first to tell you that, trust me.” She glanced over at Amity for a moment before turning back to the road, a smile sitting softly on her face, “I love Eda, but she’s no lady. She’s a…” she glanced up at the ceiling for a moment, or perhaps past it, the red leather headliner merely blocking the starry night sky from her searching eyes. “Eda’s a force of Nature. If she likes you? You’re good. If she doesn’t?” Luz gave a dark chuckle as she shook her head, “Hoo boy, watch out.”
Amity felt a sudden, sickly worry that she wouldn’t measure up in the tall, gray-haired woman’s books. “Do you think she likes me?” the pale girl asked softly, a little scared to hear Luz’s response.
“Ha!” Luz looked her way and caught her eye for several seconds straight. “She loves you, alright.”
“How can you be sure?” Amity felt strange, a dizzying excitement had swelled in her chest and threatened to make her cry. Only so many people had ever told her they loved her, and at least half of those people she had a hard time trusting— but she trusted Luz. Already, more than anyone else. How sad is that? she couldn’t help asking herself, You have so few people in your life.
“Our little secret?” Luz hushed her voice slightly and leaned toward her passenger, shooting a sly look over both shoulders and under one elbow, as if she had to worry about eavesdropping gardeners, “She never lets a client on a ride-along longer’n two hours.” She locked eyes with Amity, “Never.” She tilted her chin up in a knowing nod, “So, you must be pretty high up there on her list of practically-perfect-people.”
“Or she could see how desperate I was—god, Luz,” Amity paused to scrub her palms across her face, “It’s like she could see right through me!”
Luz nodded with a wry laugh, “Yep, that’s Eda. There’s no hiding anything from the Owl Lady.”
“The— the Owl Lady?” Amity repeated, her voice tinged with disbelief.
“Yyyup,” Luz replied, popping the ‘p’ sound, “It’s all part of a theme, y’know? Hooty, the owl hood ornament, the Owl Lady, Night-Owl Trucking,” the tanned girl sighed, “Their whole family—Eda and Lily, their parents— they all have a thing about birds.” She shrugged and sighed, “I have asked Eda so many questions and got nothing as far as explanations go.” She cleared her throat and spoke in a raspy imitation of the gray-haired woman, “What can I say, kiddo, I just think they’re neat,” Amity hummed a response as Luz growled, “So disappointing.”
“Not everything has an easy explanation,” Amity replied, idly scratching her fingertips against her thumbnail, “I’ve… heard of family traditions stemming from happenstance, and handed down over generations without alteration.”
“Really?” Luz glanced her way, curious now, “Like what?”
“Oh, it was in an article I glanced at… uh… a few weeks ago,” Amity chuckled in a self-deprecating way. It had been ten years ago, and she still remembered it word for word. “The author’s husband’s mother would prepare a pot roast by cutting several inches off the end to put back in the refrigerator while the main portion went into the oven.” The brown-haired girl glanced her way with a chuckled, What? and the golden-eyed girl smiled, “Strange, right?” Luz nodded. “The author questioned her mother-in-law, and received, that’s just how my mother did it, as a response. Curious learned behavior, then. She did some more digging, questioned other family members, and the family recipe—as it were—originated with their great-great-grandmother, who would cut off a section of the roast… because her pan was too short.”
Luz gave her a wide grin for a long moment, considering the story before she laughed, “That’s amazing. So… what… you think maybe Eda’s great-great-grandmother had a pet bird, and, voila, we get to wear an owl logo on our jackets?”
Amity smiled and shrugged, and laughed in response, “That’s as good a theory as any. Maybe you can look in some old photo albums, someday.”
Luz gasped, “Oh, Amity! You’re brilliant!” She laughed, her eyes still trained on the Interstate, and missed the crimson flush that raced up the other girl’s face. “Lilith loves talking about history, maybe I can get her going about the Clawthornes family tree.”
Amity spluttered a bit before she squeaked out a strangled, “Glad I could help.” This bubbly girl and her easily offered words of kindness would be the end of her.
The brown-eyed girl glanced her way, letting her gaze drift up and down for a moment, appraising. “You’re a nerd,” Luz remarked as she pulled a sly grin, “secretly,” and Amity huffed and narrowed her eyes. “I bet… I bet you like Pocky.”
The pale girl gasped and waggled her hands, “I love Pocky!”
“Knew it!” Luz grinned and turned the radio down slightly as the next song started. A harmonica played alongside a soft blues guitar riff for several measures before the singer began to croon over the instruments. “I have some of that, too.”
“We also have our pizza,” Amity reminded her, reaching back slightly to slap her palm against the cardboard boxes sitting between their seats.
“That’s right,” Luz glanced at her twice, then gave her a sheepish grin, “Would you— uh, be an absolute gem and get a piece out for me?” The shorter girl’s stomach growled just then, a loud, angry gurgle just audible over the truck’s steady grumble. She blushed slightly and laughed, rubbing a hand to the back of her neck.
“Of course,” Amity said quickly, turning to pull the bag into her lap, “You must be hungry.” It took her a moment to pull Luz’s pizza box into her lap and unwrap the first piece. The pale girl hummed as she gave Luz a toothy grin, “Do I need to feed it to you?”
Luz flushed a bright red and squealed, “NO!”
~
They ate in a comfortable silence, broken by a few scattered sounds of appreciation for Augustus ‘Pizza’ Porter’s pizza prowess. Amity snapped a quick picture of Luz with both hands on the wheel and a piece of pizza clamped between her teeth. She’d send it to Gus later—she could feel the heat climbing her ears when she looked at his last message. She couldn’t think about that right now. Luz hummed along with the radio as she quickly worked her way through her entire pie, turning the volume up slightly when a catchy tune caught her ear. They gave each other quick glances as they ate, smiling and blushing when they caught the other already looking their way. Amity saved a few pieces of her meal for later, and carefully flattened Luz’s empty pizza box to fold into a plastic bag for garbage.
She watched the moonlit landscape roll by her window, the deep black of the night turned back only by Hooty’s headlights and running lights, and the lights from the other sparse traffic. Stars absolutely filled the night sky, more than Amity had ever seen before; it was like a handful of salt scattered across a black tablecloth. She craned her neck against the window to try and see patterns and shapes she’d learned when she was younger. Luz watched her with a smile, but gave her time to stare up at the heavens.
Artwork by the Amazing Mexfan!
~
While Interstate 15 appeared to carve a clear, straight path through the scrubby desert brush leading from nothing to nowhere, the conversation that unfolded over the last two hours had been a rambling, meandering mess of laughter. Luz had started telling stories of odd deliveries with Eda—the occasional strange, sinister client, the set of bizarre crates that twitched and smoked as they were strapped into the trailer, the one time the gray-haired woman got caught cheating at poker and they had to make a hasty getaway and find a different truckstop to spend the night. Amity had wondered aloud if that caused the tall woman to quit counting cards, and the shorter girl had laughed so hard she nearly cried.
The golden-eyed girl remembered a few pranks the twins had pulled at their private high school years before, and began entertaining Luz with story after story of their schemes, ruses, and shenanigans. There was the bucket given to the principal at graduation that the twins had filled over the course of their senior year with every non-essential screw taken from light switch plates, air-con vents, cabinets, and shelves all over the school. They had purchased a boulder from somewhere, and had it delivered to the school and placed on the sidewalk leading to the main entrance. There was the time they laminated cash to the floor in several major hallways, and a handful of tables and countertops in the lunchroom. Then—Amity sighed in irritation—there had been the time they had arranged for dandelions to be planted all over the rugby field.
“That sounds hilarious,” Luz had laughed, but trailed off when Amity shook her head.
“Well— okay, yes, it was a good prank,” Amity sighed, “But I was on the rugby team at the time, and—”
“Omigawsh!” the brown-haired girl gasped, glancing between her passenger and the road several times as a wide grin split her face, “You’re a nerdy robot-building jock?!” Hooty’s headlights flashed across a green highway sign. HALLORAN SUMMIT ROAD, 1 MILE.
Amity spluttered, “Well, not anymore—”
“That explains the muscle,” Luz muttered and the pale girl huffed.
“I’ve not played rugby in a long time, Luz,” Amity began.
“Oh, really?” Luz interrupted, “A long time ago, like, last Tuesday?” She scoffed, “Because damn girl, your arms are steel beams.”
“I— wha—” the golden-eyed girl choked on her reply, then managed to spit out a strangled, “I— do yoga.”
“HA!” Luz barked a laugh, “Yoga doesn’t turn you into a concrete slab!” Her voice turned smug, “I should know, I tried yoga once.”
“pfff, Just once?” Amity giggled and Luz turned a megawatt smile her way.
“Twice even!” A smaller green sign flashed past. ELEVATION 4000 FEET.
“Well, you’re right,” the pale girl offered, and Luz snorted, Ha! I am right, while Amity rubbed at the back of her neck, “My sister made me start Krav Maga when Mother forced me to quit Rugby.”
“Wait, your mom what—” Luz blinked then gave her a wide-eyed glance, “Hoooleee shit you can beat people up too?!”
Amity laughed as she raised her palms, “No, no, I’ve— uh— I’ve never had to actually fight someone.”
Luz’s eyes were huge and sparkling, and she would have put both hands on her cheeks if she weren’t driving, “But you could,” she gasped in wonder.
“Well…” the pale girl sheepishly nodded, “Yes.”
“Oh lordy, I already knew you were outta my league,” Luz muttered after a moment as she shifted gears, “You’ve not said anything yet to change my mind.”
The pale girl crossed her arms and frowned, “Luz.”
“Look at you, Amity!” Luz waved a hand toward the other girl, “You’re tall, you’re pretty, you’re hella smart, and you could snap me in half like a toothpick!”
Amity’s red-faced protests fell on deaf ears when Luz demanded to hear stories about her time on the rugby team. A third green sign reflected Hooty’s headlights into the cabin for just a moment. LAS VEGAS, 70 MILES.
~
Traffic grew thick and slow as they approached Las Vegas proper, the Interstate cutting a bright slash straight through the heart of the desert city. The speed limit was a suggestion that every other vehicle ignored in favor of slowly grinding along in first gear with their parking brakes on. Amity did her best to read directions off the navigation system and call out clear spots or lane blockers on her side of the truck, but the swarming schools of taxi cabs that incessantly honked and flashed their lights kept her on edge. It wasn’t as bad as it had been earlier in San Francisco, and Luz talked in a low, gentle voice for the whole slow route through the city.
They had just passed the Strip—a bright, hyper-luminescent beacon of extravagance and vice—and the girls squinted against the eye-watering brightness shining in through Amity’s window. Luz kept a cool eye on the road, hands and feet working quickly to manage their speed and direction. She sucked in a quick, ragged breath as she suddenly sat up straight. The brown-haired girl let out a long, strangled groan, catching the pale girl’s golden eyes in a worried look.
“Back there on the sidewalk, in ’Frisco… that was your dad, wasn’t it?”
Amity gave her a confused nod.
Luz grit her teeth as she scrunched her eyes mostly closed, “And I honked my horn at him,” she hissed, “Oh my gawd.”
Amity gave a bright laugh, “Yeah, you did.”
Luz rubbed at her forehead and groaned, “Richest man in the world and I gave him a double hoot.”
“Better than giving him the finger,” Amity offered with a grin.
~
Not long after the City that Never Sleeps dwindled in their rearview mirrors, Luz pointed toward a brown metal sign just as they rolled passed. VALLEY OF FIRE STATE PARK, LAKE MEAD NAT'L REC AREA, 5 MILES. “We’ll take a break at the travel stop there for a little bit, an’ stretch our legs, make a pit stop,” she shifted in her seat, trying to ease the muscles in her back while holding onto the steering wheel. “Nothin’ too long, y’know, twenty, twenty-five minutes?” She glanced over at Amity and caught a relieved nod from the golden-eyed girl. “After this, we’ll power on through to Richfield.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Amity covered her mouth as a yawn slipped out, then she tilted her head from side to side with a pop, “God, usually I’m catatonic if I’m awake this late.”
“Must be the delightful company,” Luz used a smarmy voice as she turned a smug grin on her passenger.
Amity rolled her eyes as she stretched her arms forward, working a crack from both wrists as she twisted her hands. She laughed and grunted, “Your company?” while raising an eyebrow.
“Yeah,” Luz shimmied, “my company.”
Amity narrowed her eyes for a moment before grinning, “Yes, your company is delightful,” she said cheerfully, then added a bright, “Thanks!” and turned a wide smile toward Luz.
Luz smiled back, then she wrinkled her eyebrows, her smile faltering for a moment. “Uh… yeah,” she said with a bit of hesitation, rethinking their exchange, “You’re… you’re welcome?”
~
Hooty wobbled as Luz steered the truck up into the parking lot, the sharp, short incline of the driveway sending a creak through the cab as the trailer rocked from side to side. The area around the travel stop in Moapa Paiute was brightly lit with stadium-style light poles, and several gleaming big rigs and trailers filled a portion of the angled truck parking lot. A scattering of cars and minivans sat in the closest spots near the sidewalk, several vehicles idling as their occupants prepared to get back on the road.
Luz pulled into an empty space at the end of the row of trucks, leaving a gap between Hooty and a shiny black-and-chrome Peterbilt idling in the artificial mid-day lighting. She worked the clutch and the gear shift lever, bringing the large truck to a smooth halt before pulling the parking brake and flipping a switch on the dashboard to kill the engine. The brown-eyed girl leaned forward on the steering wheel, leaning one forearm over the leather-wrapped wheel as she tipped her hat back with a thumb, squinting out the windshield, “Hey, check it out,” Luz pointed toward the building.
Amity had been examining the single-story brown stucco structure as soon as they rounded the corner of the building, and she gave a heavy sigh. I bet I know what caught her eye. Large red-text-on-yellow signs advertised CASINO on one side of the building, and above the other half, SMOKE SHOP. Directly below that sign?
“They’ve got fireworks,” Luz grinned, brown eyes fixed on the long red and yellow sign half hidden behind an enormous desert fern.
“Luz?” Amity called to catch the other girl’s attention, “No.”
“Luz, maybe?”
Amity crossed her arms.
“Fine,” Luz groused, “Bunch’a humbuggery in the air t’night.”
~
The shorter girl pulled the door open for her companion, and they both paused to look around once they stepped inside. Other travelers walked about the aisles of trinkets and food items, and through the small dining area for the short-order grill in the middle of the building, their shoes squeaking on the clean yellowish-white tile floors. A grid of fluorescent light panels spread across the ceiling, drop-panels and air-con exchange ducts painted a matte black to disappear among the lights. Standard truck stop souvenirs spread across several shelves and rotating displays to the right, and a fairly large section of handmade Native American crafts and jewelry caught the girl’s attention to their left. Amity took a step toward the crafts, then paused to look at Luz.
The brown-haired girl smiled, “Let’s look around for a bit, first, if ya want?” she shrugged her green single-strap backpack around to rest at her hip.
Amity nodded, waggling her hands in excitement, “Yes, if that’s okay, please?” She giggled and clenched her fists, hissing a yesss when Luz nodded.
The shorter girl reached out and lightly grabbed her hand, “Of course, c’mon,” and took a step backward toward the crafts. The taller girl stiffened when she felt the warm, rough hand wrap around her own, and her heart thudded painfully in her chest. Luz tugged gently at the pale girl’s fingers, careful and cautious in case she was crossing a line. She gave a brilliant white grin when Amity stumbled into motion to follow her, curling her slender hand against the tanned girl’s palm, slowly lacing their fingertips together as a furious blush crawled up her face.
Notes:
Chapter 10: Tuesday, 4:29am
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
Amity walked over to the crafts display with excitement in her step. If she were anyone else, she would have said she was skipping, but Blights weren’t known for skipping—or jumping or running, for that matter—unless playing a proper, Odalia-approved sport. She frowned as she thought, Not that there was much running in fencing or tennis. She felt lighter on her feet now than she ever had on her mother’s tennis court. Luz had begun to lead her toward the display, but she pulled even with her before they had crossed the front of the travel stop; the shorter girl turned to walk beside her, their hands still carefully tangled together. She made a distant mental note of tiny feet and long, swift steps and how easily the other girl seemed to move beside her as they walked. Luz was nothing if not comfortable in her own skin. Amity would have been jealous if she weren’t busy panicking over the warm callused fingers caught around her own.
The shorter girl bobbed her head from side to side, humming along with the tinny music drifting down from the ancient speakers in the ceiling. Amity took a deep breath and tried to sneak a tug at the front of her t-shirt; her neck and face burned with a heat that felt like it billowed out of her collar. Am I sweating? I’m sweaty, aren’t I? she felt a slow, creeping horror as she tried to catch her reflection in the rotating sunglasses display as she floated by, a subtle, surreptitious glance. I feel like I’m sweating so much.
“Me too, mi amiga, don’t worry about it,” Luz leaned up to assure her, giving the pale girl’s hand a squeeze, “We are in the desert, after all.” Amity turned horrified eyes down toward the tanned girl, and Luz gave her a timid grin, “Although it’s usually pretty cool out when the sun’s down?”
Amity blinked, then, “What.”
“You were, uh, thinking out loud.”
“What.”
“Yeah, something about feet?” the brown-eyed girl giggled. “It happens to me too sometimes,” Luz gave her a sympathetic twist of her lips and patted her elbow. “Especially when I’m holding hands with a pretty girl,” she added confidentially.
“You think I’m pretty?” the golden-eyed girl asked with a soft, astonished voice.
Luz blinked and glanced up at her, amused. “Uh, yeah. Where have you been?” the brown-haired girl tilted her head with a breathy chuckle and shrugged, “But hey, don’t change the subject—what was that about feet?” Luz snorted and made a quick dancing shuffle-step to draw their attention to her dusty black and white hi-tops, “Yours or mine is what I’m wondering, and—”
Amity groaned, “Kill me.”
“Nope!” Luz grinned.
“Just— put me out of my misery, please,” Amity begged as she squeezed her eyes closed.
“Nah, cuz then you wouldn’t get ta’ see the arts ‘n’ craaaaffffts,” Luz teased in a sing-song voice while she tugged at her fingers, and Amity grudgingly allowed the smaller girl to guide her in a gentle turn. Amity sighed and opened her eyes when Luz squeezed her forearm and whispered, Open sez-a-me, and the taller girl let out a soft breath of wonder as she looked down at the display case before her.
A brightly lit glass cabinet at her waist held long trays of brilliantly colored necklaces: electric blue turquoise, polished red and yellow stones, painted bone, or smoothed-down pieces of frosted-black glass in patterns on rugged brown cord. Some of the necklaces had small pieces of shining silver along the strands and larger worked centerpieces. One had a trio of silver feathers, bound together with a thin gold wire. One had a silver dreamcatcher, its braided silver netting decorated with small, colorful stones. Others had large pieces of polished turquoise on silver medallions, or silver disks stamped with turtles, buffalo, or eagles. A few had a strange stylized figure of a man playing a flute.
Small rotating displays sat atop the glass case, the one close at hand heavy with hand-crafted earrings. Like the necklaces, the earrings came in all shapes and sizes, with bright blues and reds and greens highlighted with black glass and silver. Amity reached out a pale finger to gently trace along the edge of a tall wedge of turquoise with chevrons of red and green stone below. She glanced sideways at Luz, smiled, and leaned closer to examine the craftsmanship. Luz watched her companion carefully as her golden eyes drank in the artistry on display.
They stepped sideways along the cabinet. Luz smiled wide at the black-haired woman behind the counter and exchanged pleasantries while Amity examined a selection of fine metal pendants, the world around her fading to a muffled blur. Several silver crescent moons were arranged around a twisted-wire golden sunburst on a wide strip of purple fabric. Luz leaned in close to examine the pieces with Amity. “That is so cool,” Luz pointed at the sun, “It reminds me of a Good Wi— um,” she rubbed at the back of her head and gave a sheepish chuckle, “Of— of a good… winter, uh, resort we’ve driven by in Colorado. The logo? heh.” Amity ran her eyes over the golden design before glancing over at the slightly-blushing brown-haired girl, too busy examining the piece to register the way she had stumbled over her words. The sun looked like a flowering compass rose, its shining arms curving as they tapered outward, a thin golden ring connecting the longest, outermost points to lend the piece rigidity.
A golden sun on purple— she glanced at Luz’s white cowboy hat— and a white hat? Amity blinked in a moment of connection; she gave the smiling, cheerful girl beside her another look and suddenly knew what had seemed so familiar about her. The kindness and consideration she’d shown Amity all day, the openness, the optimistic, upbeat attitude? The confidence and dedication to helping another on their “quest”? It was like the Good Witch Azura herself had stepped out of Amity’s treasured illustrated hardcovers and, for some reason, decided to trade her magic and her witch’s staff for a CDL and the open road. Amity bit her lip and stared at the plain white hat hiding the other girl’s bouncy brown curls. She glanced down at the sun and knew what she had to do. The gesture would be lost on the shorter girl, Amity was sure, but it would still mean the same to her; like a living tribute.
“Those crescent moons are more your style, I think,” Luz said with a sly smirk, having missed the other girl’s silent epiphany. Golden eyes flicked up to catch her brown pair, then they both looked back down at the pendants. “You strike me as more of a— a mysterious, shadowy figure.” She waggled her fingers and made a soft woooo noise, “I summon thee, pale creatures of the niiiiight,” she groaned in a threadbare imitation of an old wizard.
“I’m not that pale,” The green-haired girl chuckled. “But yes, they’re beautiful,” Amity’s voice softened as she tapped the glass over one necklace in particular. A braided-wire waning moon gleamed in the display case lights, shaped by silver-chased vines and branches, with an orange stone suspended between the points of the crescent on a narrow, knotted band of black leather. It immediately brought Hecate to mind, the book series’ moon witch and Azura’s antagonist-slash-rival; the character that resonated most sharply with her—deep down—due to the orange-haired witch’s overbearing royal family and their overwhelmingly difficult expectations. She loved Azura’s goodness and her optimism, of course, but Amity saw herself in the moon witch. She had spent long hours imagining herself in Hecate’s shoes, considering what little she would have done differently throughout the course of the series she had hidden away in her personal quarters.
She’d also spent many a quiet evening reading fan-written works expanding and exploring the understated enemies-to-friends-to-love-interest arc the author appeared to be crafting throughout her books, wishing she could find an Azura of her own. But that was a secret she would take to her grave—after a mean girl in her middle school social circle had mercilessly bullied another student for talking about fan fiction, she’d never let it slip that she also indulged.
Amity stared through her faint reflection at the pendant lying on a soft black velvet cloth, and Luz noticed. “They have some rings over here, if you wanna look at ‘em?” the brown-haired girl offered in a strangely tender voice, and Amity took a moment to blink away her misted thoughts.
“I’d love to see them, but I’m not one for wearing rings,” Amity gave an unsteady smile as she cleared her throat, “I get my hands caught in machinery every time I do.” They stepped around the corner of the cabinet to the other side of the L-shaped display. Amity held her free hand behind her back as she leaned forward, and Luz plopped her elbow on the glass—her chin in her palm—to peer down at the jewelry. They still gently held the other’s hand between them, the shorter girl swinging their hands back and forth slowly, absentmindedly, comfortingly. The casino area of the building lay further back, behind them, the flashing yellow lights and soft, ringing chimes from the machines echoing through the wide open space.
“Hmm, I bet bracelets are a no-go too,” Luz hummed as she tapped at a tray of turquoise and polished bone bangles. “You’re, what, elbow deep in robots every day?” She gave a short, sad laugh and a crooked smile, “I lost my watch to Hooty’s serpentine belt once, which was the end of On-Time Luz.”
“Not every day,” Amity quickly clarified with a half smile. She ran a thumb over a small loop of colorful stones, “I would hate to destroy something so beautiful.” She stopped to blink, “You had your hand in a running engine?”
“Your work is beautiful too, Amity,” Luz gave her hand a firm squeeze as she uttered those words, as if she were trying to press her opinion into Amity’s skin. “Your robots may not be jewelry, but they are something wonderful you’ve made.”
“Thank you, Luz,” the pale girl replied, “but my machines are made by other machines. I merely tell them what to do, I assemble them, yes, but…” She trailed off as she pointed toward a silver ring stamped with eagles, and shaped into a circle of feathers. “But to make something with your own hands, something unique and distinct? I find that… fascinating.”
Luz watched her examine the rings for several long moments before quietly asking, “Why don’t you buy a piece, to keep and remember how you feel right now?” She paused for a heartbeat before adding, “How you feel is important.” She squeezed Amity’s fingers again, and the taller girl smiled.
Amity stood up straight to consider the other girl’s words, her mouth pressed into a line as she stared down into the display case. She slowly shook her head, deciding, “No, I shouldn’t.”
“Why not?”
“These deserve to be worn, not… kept in a box.” Amity gave a great sigh, “And I would have to keep it hidden. My mother has particular tastes in fashion and accessories, and anything that doesn’t meet her approval will eventually…” Her lip curled as she muttered, “disappear,” with a pain in her voice that made Luz tighten her jaw.
“That’s not right,” the tanned girl frowned, a scowl pulling at her eyebrows.
Green hair flashed under the fluorescent lights as the pale girl shook her head, “It is what it is.”
“Amity, that’s no way to—”
“Luz,” Amity’s response hit a high, strained note. The pale girl’s voice was a taut wire bearing a heavy weight, her eyes golden shards of glass scraping at the tile floor. “I don’t… want… to think about her.” After a long moment, the green-haired girl closed her eyes and let loose a long breath.
Luz held her tongue at the downtrodden expression on the other girl’s face, and merely ran her thumb across her pale knuckles. “When you’re ready,” the shorter girl spoke softly, “we’ll get you some snacks after we use the restroom.” Amity gave her a thankful nod when she let the discussion go, then she turned back to finish examining the brightly lit works under glass. Luz caught the black-haired woman’s eye behind the counter and managed to point at herself, then nodded toward the case of necklaces without the taller girl noticing. She mouthed, I’ll be back in a minute, before Amity stood upright and looked her way.
“There’re so many people here, do we have to—?” the taller girl began to ask with a hesitant curl of her lip.
Luz interrupted with a fist pointed in the air, and a loud, “Bathroom buddy system!”
~
Luz nodded, her hands on her hips in a power pose, practically filling the open area between the sinks and mirrors and the olive-green-painted bathroom stalls with her presence. “Looks fine in here, Amity, no creepers,” the brown-haired girl said as her friend walked toward a stall near the end of the room, her voice easily echoing around the tile-wrapped room. Acoustics are great in here for— “I’ll wait for you outside, okay?” The pale girl gave a grateful nod, and Luz quickly walked out the L-shaped hallway and darted back over to the Native American crafts table, dodging other tired-looking travelers along the way. She smiled and waved at the woman behind the counter before pointing to the silver moon with the orange stone. Luz glanced over her shoulder, toward the restroom hallway, as she pulled her wallet from her jacket’s inner pocket.
~
Amity cranked another length of paper towel from the dispenser on the wall and tried to dry her hands with the useless coarse brown sheet. After a thorough scrubbing that left her hands—somehow—still damp, she growled in irritation and shoved the wad of paper into the garbage can as she stalked past. She couldn’t stand the lingering smell of the soap or the greasy sensation it left on her fingertips after three separate washings. She glanced up to see Luz leaning against the endcap of the engine oil and windshield wiper blades aisle, looking for all the world like the cat that caught the canary.
Luz met her eyes and Amity faltered for a moment at the intensity contained within her shining gaze. The brown-eyed girl brought one hand up to her mouth to breathe across her fingernails before polishing them on her t-shirt, just below her collarbone. Luz popped her eyebrows up—just once!—and smirked, and Amity felt her face erupt in a blush. Amity tried to frown as she walked up to the other girl, and crossed her arms over her chest while she managed to grind out, “What are you doing— and why are you so smug?”
“No reason—hey,” Luz said quickly, standing upright and snapping a pair of finger guns, “Why don’t yoouuu go look at the snacks while I… powder my nose.”
“Uh, suuure,” Amity drawled, stepping sideways around the other girl in the direction of the snack area as Luz backed toward the restroom hallway, swaying easily with the faint music overhead. “I’ll… meet you by the snacks?” the green-haired girl called.
“I’ll see you there,” Luz winked, and Amity felt her face flush an even darker shade of red.
“Not if— I— see you first!” the pale girl spluttered, her hands curling into fists at her sides. Luz gave a bright, delighted laugh as she turned around and waved a hand over her shoulder, giving the taller girl a peace sign. Amity watched her disappear into the restroom hallway, then swiveled on her heels and lunged in the other direction.
“Oh my, hello,” The tall black-haired woman behind the crafts table greeted Amity when she skidded to a stop at the display, breathing heavily and twisting to look over her shoulder for her companion.
“Hi? Yes, hi!” Amity’s answering laugh was pitched higher than normal, and she shook the nervous tingles out of her hands. “I’d like to buy the sun! er— This sun, here,” she tapped quickly at the glass over the pendants before looking over her shoulder again, “Sorry, it’s a surprise? I’m— trying to be sneaky.”
The woman smiled, “No problem, the price for that one is—”
“I don’t care—” Amity interrupted with a raised hand, then she blanched and waved an apology, “Sorry, not— that was rude, sorry, I mean,” Amity stuttered as she pulled her card from her phone case, “I’m not concerned about the cost?” She glanced at the woman’s name tag, “I’m sorry, Lomasi, is it? Sorry.” She glanced over her shoulder again, but didn’t see a white cowboy hat anywhere.
“It’s alright, my dear,” Lomasi grinned as if she held a secret, and quickly wrapped the gold pendant and its purple fabric band into a small tissue paper square that Amity could tuck into her jacket pocket. The black-haired woman held out her credit card reader for the green-haired girl.
~
Amity tucked a bag of Red Vines and two bags of teriyaki beef jerky under one elbow while she deliberated over the boxes of Hostess mini-donuts on the shelf. Both options looked good, but which would she like more? And would Eda want powdered sugar on her red leather seats? Will she kill me if I make a mess? Will Luz miss me when I’m gone? she suspected she knew the answer to the first two, and she didn’t want to dwell on that last line of thought.
The speakers overhead blared a classic rock song that she hadn’t given any notice until Luz appeared at her elbow, singing along as she shuffled from side to side in a smooth, spirited dance. “Everybody says she’s lookin’ good!” Luz spun on her toes and moonwalked behind Amity, getting a grin and a soft snort from the taller girl. “And the lady knows it’s understood, Strutter!” the girl in the cowboy hat spun again, hands above her head as she twirled, vocalizing along with the guitars as she slid up to Amity’s side and bumped her with her shoulder with a grin, “Strutter! What’cha lookin’ at, buddy?”
Amity closed her mouth and swallowed, “Uh, hey… pal.” She blinked and tapped at the donuts while she cleared her throat. “These.”
“Oh, good choice, amiga. Which’er’you gonna get?”
“I hadn’t decided yet, um, compadre?”
Luz grinned up at her, “Then I’ll get’cha both, friendo!”
Amity scoffed for a moment before Luz snatched two boxes of chocolate frosted and two boxes of powdered sugar donuts from the shelf and headed down the aisle. “Hey, Luz, wait!” The shorter girl turned on one heel and one toe, and peeked over the stack of boxes in her arms as she hummed a question. Amity rolled her shoulders in a shrug, “What if I don’t like them?”
“What?” Luz snorted a laugh, “Who doesn’t like…” She trailed off when she saw the other girl’s worry-creased face, “Oh, you’re serious, uh, look—” The brown-haired girl chuckled and walked back to Amity, looking up at her with understanding. “It’s okay if you don’t. I won’t feel bad, I promise. And, like, I’m not gonna lose any sleep over—” Luz glanced at the price tag on the shelf and made a face, “Oof, eight bucks?”
Amity grimaced, “Is— is that a lot?”
Luz gave a snort and shook her head, “It’s about double what it should be, but I’m not worried about that. See?” She shimmied in place as she juggled the boxes in her arms, reaching a hand into her jacket pocket to pull out a credit card, “Eda gave me her Black card for expenses.” Amity made a soft, huh, as Luz chuckled, “She said something about shaking down your sister for every red cent?”
The golden-eyed girl blinked and laughed. “Well, she should, and no offense, but I wouldn’t have thought Eda would qualify for an Amex Black.”
“Oh, none taken because she didn’t.”
“What?”
“It’s a Visa, I think?” Luz squinted at the card in her hand.
“What?”
“Yeah, it’s a Visa,” Luz twirled the card between her thumb and forefinger, “A Visa Select, actually, the black is Sharpee, see?” She held the card up for the other girl, and Amity could see wide marker strokes across its face. “I think it used to be silver?” Luz shrugged as the other girl closed her eyes and laughed.
“So what I’m saying is,” Luz reached up to tap the card against Amity’s chin and made a beep noise, “If you wanna try something, then I wanna get it for ya. Okay?”
Amity sniffed and wiped at her eyes, “Oh my god, Luz, I’m crying.”
“What?!” Luz sounded horrified, “Why?”
“I wasn’t old enough to understand, but I was old enough to remember when Mother Dearest got her Amex Black,” the pale girl gave her head a rueful shake as she scrubbed the edge of her wrist across her cheekbone, “It was probably the best day of her life. And— and to imagine,” Amity giggled a mad sort of sound, her eyes glistening, “to imagine her hearing and seeing Eda try to pass that off as a Black card?” She sniffed and sighed after rubbing a hand under her nose, “Oh, my god, she would probably explode.”
Luz giggled, then looked up at Amity as if she weren’t sure that had been the right thing to do.
The taller girl looked down at her hands as she worried her fingertips together, her eyebrows furrowed in thought. “She took us out to this obnoxiously fancy restaurant. Everyone else there was insufferably rich, and she just,” Amity made a face of disgust, “she just lapped it up, all their hushed looks and half-hidden jealousy when she handed her card to the maître d’, like,” the pale girl reached up in the air, her wrist held back in an elegant twist, “way up high so everyone around her could see it.”
“That… sounds like a bad time.”
“It was,” Amity agreed, “I didn’t understand why she was acting so strange, but I do now.” She sighed, “She only wanted to show off to everyone there.”
“I bet the food sucked too,” Luz grinned when Amity snorted loudly in a sharp, sudden laugh.
“Oh,” the taller girl nodded, “It did!”
“Well, you don’t have to worry about that with me, cariño,” Luz said with a smug tilt of her chin, managing to point her thumb at herself, “I’ll take you to the finest greasy spoons on either side of the Divide.”
“You amaze me,” the golden-eyed girl said in a soft voice. Luz blushed a furious red. “Thank you,” Amity added with a smile.
“Whaaat, no,” Luz said, her wide eyes turned away as she ran a hand through her hair in embarrassment, “It’s just snacks and diner food, c’mon, it’s— it’s no big deal.”
It is to me, Amity didn’t say it out loud, but she hoped the other girl heard it anyway.
~
Nearly two hundred miles of concrete river had poured past the big rig as Hooty growled down Interstate 15, his wheels scratching forward, hungry for more road, more. They raced toward the sunrise at a steady clip, the horizon far ahead beginning to glow a faint, brighter blue than the deep night’s black. Luz sang and talked the distance, her bubbly enthusiasm for conversation stoked by her passenger’s quick responses and ready anecdotes. Amity was a quiet, watchful, reserved individual—all learned behavior, Luz suspected, thanks to her mother—but the brown-haired trucker had started to pick up ways to frame a question or which teasing pressure points to prod to really get the pale girl rambling. She had chivvied the tall girl into recounting tales of her final year of high school rugby, and had dreamily imagined every play with a sigh. Team captain Amity Blight, a one-woman wrecking ball? Holy shit. Quick on her feet, with an incredible arm and deadly aim? Goddamn. Burgundy-and-blue-striped long-sleeved jerseys and grass-stained white short-shorts? Oh yes, please. Luz shook her head, Dammit, pay attention, Noceda!
The pale girl was still talking, “...elia had tried to tackle their Winger—but it had rained during play and she was muddy, so it was more like a shove—and she fell on my leg knees-first,” Amity frowned and pointed at her right leg, a few inches above her knee and about mid-shin, “I’d slid to capture the ball; the speed I was going, and her weight, the way she fell?” She shuddered and took another bite from her mini-donut, “Hairline fracture above the knee, and a displaced spiral fracture of the tibia.”
“Holy shit,” Luz breathed, nearly spitting out a mouthful of stick pretzels in her surprise, “What’d you do? Were you okay?! Wait, that’s a stupid question, nevermind!”
Amity chuckled, twisting slightly to face the trucker, “I was so angry at first, I didn’t feel it. I couldn’t believe I’d gotten hurt. Then… then I felt it. It took everything to keep from crying, but Blights don’t cry,” she said with a haughty tone of voice, and Luz growled low in her throat. “So I threatened my teammates with pain-of-social-death if they lost, and… probably got medevac’d to the hospital, thanks to the twins, it’s a bit of a blur, really, once the pain started.” She sighed and shrugged, “Next thing I really remember, my mother is standing beside my hospital bed, glaring at my leg in traction and bemoaning the fact that I would miss her charity dinner the next month.”
“The next month? You weren’t in the hospital that long, were you?” Luz asked with confusion wrinkling her brow.
“No, worse. I was sequestered in the mansion as quickly as she could arrange my transportation,” Amity sneered, “You don’t understand my mother, Luz. Remember the Amex Black dinner I told you about? She is entirely driven by how she is perceived by others, and a Blight showing up to a Social Gala or Industry Party with a full leg cast and crutches would be a public relations crisis.” She worried her fingertips together for a moment before adding in a hoarse tone, “Anything less than perfection is unacceptable. Always. That’s why Edric has to wear contacts instead of glasses, even though they hurt his eyes.”
“That’s awful,” Luz shook her head and frowned, “Your mom is the worst.” Then she snuck a sideways glance at the pale girl, heat climbing her cheeks at a sudden thought, “You, uh… do you need glasses too?”
“No, I have excellent eyesight,” Amity had started to dig around the donut box for another powdered sugar circle and missed the small pout that flickered across the tanned girl’s face.
Luz muttered a quiet, “Damn.”
“I was tutored at home until I had recovered, and once I was able to go back to school, I was told—in no uncertain terms—I was off the rugby team.” She held up a donut toward Luz, and the other girl made an Ooooh and plucked it from her fingers. “Mother wouldn’t let me do anything remotely physical, and pushed me into tutoring for extra credit, and to join the AP Honors classes.” She made a wistful sigh as she pulled another donut out of her box, and said, “I spent a lot of time in the library after that,” before she popped the whole donut into her mouth.
“I spent so much time in the school library hiding from the other kids, especially at lunchtime,” Luz nodded slowly as she stared toward the road, not wanting to look over and see the other girl seeing her as she exposed herself. “I was too clumsy for sports, but I wished I’d had a team to join, to find some of that comradery you read about, y’know?” She chuckled and shrugged, “I took as many art classes and creative writing courses as I could—the kids who tend to bully other kids aren’t that interested in self-expression, am-I-right?”
“I suppose not,” Amity agreed, before Luz launched into another story, this time about one of her high school art contest entries.
A green sign flashed by, Hooty’s headlights shining across white letters that read I-70 JCT 5 MILES. Minutes later, after bearing right at the fork to merge onto Interstate 70, Luz pointed toward another green sign that had three lines of text: SEVIER 18 / ELSINORE 30 / RICHFIELD 42.
~
Bright morning sunshine painted the rooftops of Richfield, Utah a golden, buttery yellow, and both girls hated it. Luz had pulled two pairs of aviator sunglasses out of a pouch on her seat, but the tinted, mirrored lenses could only do so much against the gleaming fury of the rising star. They followed I-70 as it curved around the northwest side of the city, and Amity frowned into the shadow of her palm as she tried to block the glare bouncing off the buildings and car parks passing by her window.
Coarse brown scrub dotted the gravel and red-dirt parcels of land on either side of the Interstate, a line of hills out Luz’s side of the rig covered with a smattering of dingy brown grass. Blue mountains in the distance glistened in the early morning sun, the white snow patches shining into Hooty’s cabin. “Luz, make it stop,” Amity grumbled, her face spotted by rays of light.
“Exit 40 is right up ahead, mi amiga,” the trucker tried to assure her passenger, “We’ll pull off into the Flying-J and we can get some sleep.”
Amity groaned as another truck passed them in the left lane, the sun stabbing into their eyes from every piece of chrome, strip of silver metal, and rivet on the pristine white tractor-trailer. “I hate this,” she hissed. Hooty rolled to a stop at the bottom of the offramp, wobbling from side to side before lurching into a wide right turn.
“It sucks for sure, cariño,” Luz turned the steering wheel back to center, shifting gears as they trundled up to the entrance ramp of the travel center. She slipped the truck into neutral as she braked, letting a group of late-model minivans and rusty pickup trucks pass before turning into the lane running alongside the Flying-J. Amity slouched in her seat, and ducked to the side as the morning sunshine ran across her red leather seat back. Luz glanced her way and chuckled before signaling to turn into the truck-and-trailer parking lot.
Amity glared up at her from where she hunched down beside the armrest, hiding in the shadow of the dashboard. “Why are you so cheerful,” she growled.
“Chika, I’m runnin’ on silly fumes,” Luz shook her head as she nosed into a parking space with their trailer pointing to the east, the sun at their backs. “I’m about to crash for real.”
Amity lurched upright in her seat, her wide, panicked eyes visible behind her borrowed sunglasses, “Crash?!” she yelped. Luz looked at her as she smoothly brought the truck to a halt, reaching down to pull the parking brake before she broke out into a fit of giggles. Amity opened her mouth to protest and Luz just laughed and laughed, tears leaking from her eyes as she slapped at the steering wheel, and soon the green-haired girl joined in, both girls feeling that fizzling sense of exhaustion burning in their chests.
“We’re good,” Luz managed to say without slipping back into uncontrolled laughter, “We’re parked for the night— well— Our night, at least.” She flipped a switch on the dashboard and the diesel engine at their feet rumbled into a resounding silence. “We’ll go change and use the restroom, then off to bed.” She pulled the key out of the dash and twirled the keyring on her finger as she fired a smoldering wink at the still-giggling girl beside her.
Amity snorted and shoved the tanned girl on the shoulder, giggling, “Stop it.”
Luz winked again, dropping her voice to a low, husky growl, “Now why would I do that?”
“Luz!” Amity squealed, both hands pressed over her nose and mouth as she flushed a bright red, moving her hands long enough to mouth the word Stop before she continued giggling helplessly.
Luz grinned and leaned forward with a lopsided smirk, slipping back into that same throaty croon, “¿Qué tienes, cariño?” Amity sucked in a deep breath as she turned a truly impressive shade of red. She stared at Luz for a long moment before she started to shake her head. The brown-eyed girl crossed her forearms over the steering wheel and tipped her hat back slightly, her voice still low and steamy, “El gato te comió la lengua?”
Amity opened and closed her mouth with hardly a sound coming out. She swallowed and squeaked out a high pitched, “Ferme-la!” She shook her head and managed to point at Luz, her upper lip curling on one side into a sneer, her voice still unsteady, “Tu me rends folle avec ton flirt!”
Luz blinked and pointed back at the golden-eyed girl, “I understood that word, what did you say?”
Amity crossed her arms and turned her glowing face up and away from the brown-haired girl, “N’aimeriez-vous pas savoir, ma chéri?” The pale girl raised an eyebrow and smirked when a bright red blush crawled up Luz’s neck.
“I guess… I had that coming… didn’t I?” Luz sounded strangled, but she managed to force the words out after some effort.
~
Luz and Amity stumbled out of the Flying-J, one pale arm raised to block the worst of the bright morning sunlight as the shorter girl tilted her head down to let her wide hat brim handle the job. Luz shifted the 12-pack of water bottles in her arms as she shuffled along in flip flops and a stolen pair of her mother’s blue scrubs pants. Amity glanced down at her and gave a cheeky smirk, “You brushed your teeth, right?”
Luz made an offended noise, “Uh, yes, mom.”
Amity grinned, “Dental hygiene is important, after all.”
“I know,” Luz snarled, “I make one comment about how the toothpaste tastes bad…”
“And… thanks,” Amity said, brushing at the front of her extra large sleep shirt. Edric made one for the three of them; tall white letters read, I WAS SENT ON THE BLIGHT INDUSTRIES MULTI-ANNUAL GUILT TRIP AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS BITCHIN' T-SHIRT. “You’ve been… a lifesaver.”
Luz nudged her with her shoulder and grinned, “That’s what friends do.”
“Thanks to you,” Amity replied with a single eyebrow arched, “I’m going to have unreasonably high expectations about any future friendships.”
Luz chuckled, “Maaaaybe don’t compare other people to me.”
“Oh?” Amity practically purred, “Are you going above and beyond?”
“Well, yeah,” Luz glanced up at her, her face completely open and sincere, “You’re worth it.”
Amity blinked, and managed a hoarse, “Oh.” They walked back to Hooty in a loaded silence.
~
Luz yawned, stretching her arms up and over her head, nearly knocking a fist against Amity’s legging-clad knee. The tanned girl had laid her driver’s seat back almost completely flat, the headrest just touching the side of the single sleeper mattress after she had levered the seat forward along its tracks on the floor. She rolled onto her side and mumbled an apology, a thin blanket draped over her torso as she peered up at the other girl sitting cross-legged on the bed.
Amity had her laptop out, to start some remote diagnostics on her cargo before she tucked in for the night. The pale girl glanced at Luz, red-rimmed golden eyes meeting a blurry, bloodshot pair of brown. “Go to sleep, Luz,” she said with a soft smile, “You need your rest.”
“Did you know otters hold hands when they sleep?” Luz warbled, her voice heavy with exhaustion, her eyes blinking ever slower, “I’so they don’t… drift… apart.” She trailed off into a soft snore.
Amity set her laptop on the passenger’s seat and made sure the doors were locked, then she curled up on the mattress under a warm, soft blanket Luz had given her. She stared at the other girl for a long moment, wondering, and glanced down at her tanned hands. They were so close, resting beside the other girl’s chin.
Should I?
After a time, she reached out a hesitant hand and touched Luz’s palm. The brown-haired girl made a happy noise in her sleep and immediately wrapped both hands around Amity’s fingers. Once her heart stopped hammering in her chest, the green-haired girl drifted off to a deep, dreamless sleep.
Notes:
Had a bit of a delay to this one. The day after I posted the last chapter I got news about a death in the family. Really threw me for a loop. Then we had to drive down south for the memorial service and back again, and then I picked up a bug along the way, so... yeah. Good times. I may not be able to keep up the every-week posting pace I'd been running previously, but I'll keep working on this fic :)
Oh, and because of allll that, I didn't get around to responding to many of your comments last chapter. Just know that I appreciate each and every one of you.
Chapter 11: Tuesday, 2:14pm
Chapter Text
Amity woke with a languid blink and a stretch. She rolled from her back to her side as she knuckled at the corners of her eyes with her free hand. She was stiff from sitting all night, and a little sore from the thin, semi-firm mattress, but she could hardly complain when she fell asleep sitting at her desk half the week. She was also deliciously warm, for once. Her… sleeping quarters always ran cold. Hard to call the tenth-floor corner office a bedroom. Frosted-glass walls did not hold any heat, and the nearby breakroom and open-plan work area she had slowly converted into her own private space just bled warm air out into the rest of the floor. Not to mention her parts storage and robotics labs needed to stay at a perpetually cool 62 degrees. She’d grudgingly settled for a lifetime of hoodies and slippers, and nights under a stack of blankets with a space heater chugging away at her feet.
She worked her jaw open with a crack right before she yawned, tensing her limbs in a half-curled stretch. The blanket Luz had lent her had a soft texture and a soothing citrus scent, and had kept her remarkably warm throughout the night. A small fan hummed in the top corner of the cabin to circulate air, and the steady rumble of the refrigerator trailer at her back filled her ears with a calming white noise. I haven’t slept that well in… in… She paused to think, to really consider how she normally felt when she woke in the mornings. She scrunched her eyes with another yawn and stretched again, her arms shaking with—wait, what was pulling on her hand?
Amity half sat up, propping herself up on her elbow. Luz was on her back, sprawled across the reclined driver’s seat, one hand thrown across her stomach as she snored softly in the warm truck cabin. Her other hand lay up near her head of brown curls, her wrist laying across the narrow gap between her headrest and the sleeper mattress. Amity gulped as heat rushed up her face to her hairline. Her other hand was still tangled up with Luz’s fingers. They must have held hands all night, tanned and pale fingers laced around each other like a lovingly assembled puzzle. Luz’s hand felt so warm against her cool skin; Amity always felt cold. But, she gave the sleeping girl a soft, tender smile, not right now.
What did it mean? Amity sighed, and ran her thumb gently across rough knuckles and unpainted fingernails. If she were to stretch her fingers out, she could easily touch the other girl’s bouncy brown hair. Don’t, she cautioned herself, Luz might not like that. She looked at their hands and felt a giddy smile spread across her face. Did it mean anything? Could it mean something? She wanted it to, if she were honest with herself. Whatever this was meant something to her. She’d never had a not-just-a-friend like this girl sleeping mere inches away. She didn’t know the first thing about any of this, but she knew she didn’t want to let go. No matter what happened on Friday, she knew she couldn’t let go of Luz. She wouldn’t. Not without a fight.
Speaking of Friday. Amity leaned out over the aisle and awkwardly lifted her laptop from the passenger seat with one hand, setting it on the sleeper bed at her side. A quick tap at the trackpad lit the screen, and… more than 90% of her remote calibration checks had been completed while she slept. That’s great, she smiled, glancing down the list of green checkmarks. Two yellow exclamation points and one red ‘X’ caught her eye, but she’d expected more trouble during transit. Luz had been so careful throughout the day, Amity glanced down at the sleeping girl, this is all thanks to her. She had to do something to repay her. She glanced at the clock in the system tray. Tuesday, 2:14pm.
Her stomach chose to grumble just then, unwanted and incessant. Amity sighed, but then her face lit up at a brilliant idea. I could go get some ‘breakfast’ for her, she nodded, pulling the blanket off her legs and frowning as she sat up. While the air in the truck was warm, the blanket had been like a tropical oasis. She tried not to jostle the other girl’s hand too much as she slipped her fingers free, but Luz still made an unhappy noise and twitched her hands in little grabbing motions. Amity had to cover her mouth and breathe slowly out of her nose, or else she’d squeal at how cute she was. She pulled her shoes back on, and picked her phone up off the floor, glancing at its profile; her credit card was still tucked in its slot in the leather folio case. Truck stop coffee will be awful, most likely, she twisted her mouth in preemptive distaste, but it’s the best I can do right now.
She lifted the keys from where Luz had hung them the night before, and carefully unlocked the passenger door before slipping out of the truck as quietly as possible. Amity locked the door from the outside, then tucked the keys into a small pocket on her leggings. She raised a pale hand to keep the bright afternoon sunlight from stabbing her in the eyes, almost instantly breaking out in a sweat from the cloudless Utah summer sky. She hurried across the parking lot to step inside the Flying-J and shivered at the air-conditioned indoors.
After a quick trip to the restroom, Amity wandered up and down the snack aisles until she found what she was looking for. She was making some bold assumptions, yes, but she was fairly certain her hypothesis could be supported by data points she had collected over the course of the previous day. She was 87% sure she was making the appropriate choices based on the available options. The limited selection made it easier to run her calculations. She frowned, then clicked the tongs twice before pulling another strawberry-frosted-with-sprinkles from the fresh donuts display. Four is a nice, even number. Two for Luz, and two for her. Amity glanced down at the frosting-drenched pastries and frowned. Maybe three for Luz, and one for me.
Amity drank her coffee black—mostly because she couldn’t be bothered to remember the expiration date for the milk in her fridge—but she was almost positive Luz would add sugar and cream to hers. How much was the question. After several minutes of intense deliberation, she decided to play it safe and grab five mini-creamers and a literal handful of sugar packets. She eyed the coffee dispensers, and chose both the light and the dark roast. French Vanilla was an acquired taste which she hadn’t the time or energy to entertain, and Hazelnut was universally abysmal… which really only left the other two flavors. She made a face as she reached for the cups, At least there’s no Pumpkin Spice.
She preferred a dark roast in the mornings, but Amity would gladly drink whichever Luz didn’t pick. “Join me, Luz, in the Dark Roast Side,” Amity whispered as she filled a paper cup with the near-black liquid. “And together, we will rule the highw—” she paused to sniff at the hot steam and made a soft huh before she pressed a plastic lid over the rim. “Ooh, that smells pretty good,” she shrugged, “Wow.”
She balanced her box of donuts on top of her cup carrier as she quietly shuffled through the line, three men in dusty work clothes ahead of her, and an older woman with a kind smile and graying red hair behind her. Amity set her items on the counter when it was her turn, and the sallow-faced man behind the counter in the unflattering Flying-J polo shirt brushed his greasy black hair out of his eyes as he droned, “Did you find everything you needed?” His blank stare and monotone voice were proof he wasn’t paid enough to actually care.
“Yes, thank you,” Amity responded in a polite tone, carefully setting the box of donuts beside the coffee cup carrier before pulling her phone from her pocket, “Four donuts and two coffees.” He punched a few buttons on his register, then stared at her until she slipped her credit card into the card reader. It made a strange, shrill triple beep, and the man leaned forward to squint at the rotating screen on his register.
“Can I see your card, miss?” the man asked, holding out his hand.
Amity frowned, and glanced between his face, his hand—her eyes flicked to his nametag, Hi, my name is CLeTuS, the name scribbled in atrocious block print marker—and the card reader. “Alright,” she replied, setting it in the man’s palm. He examined the card, glancing between it and his register for a moment as he compared the numbers. Then he swiveled the screen on his register for her to see, pointing at the large, blinking red-banner message. CARD ISSUER REQUIRES IMMEDIATE DESTRUCTION. CONFIRM ACTION. Amity took a half-step back in surprise. “What?!” she squeaked, “But I—”
“Miss, I am required by law to destroy this card,” Cletus said with a smarmy voice, this situation clearly the high point of his day. He pulled a heavy pair of black and silver shears from the drawer at his side.
“No, wait, don’t—” she breathed as a sickening dread churned in her stomach, clawing its way up her throat to choke her words. She clapped her hands over her mouth. He cut her card in half, then in halves again, humming a thoughtful tone as he spun the pieces and cut them a third time. Tears swam in the corners of her eyes as she took a wet, halting breath, swaying from one foot to the next as her mind screamed at her to run. “This has to be a mistake,” Amity forced out through the great lump in her throat, “I’m just getting breakfast for m–my friend, and—”
“I’m sorry, miss,” the greasy man said with a grin—clearly lying, “You’ll have to take it up with your bank.” Cletus motioned toward her items, at the coffee and donut surprise she had picked out just for Luz, and her heart twisted at the swift and utter collapse of her plans. “Do you have another way to pay for these?”
“No!” Amity snapped, her self-control frayed and brittle as she fought to keep the tears at bay, “I don’t have any cash! Why would I, when I have a corporate card?” She clawed her fingers back through her hair, tugging at her scalp to feel something other than cold panic.
“That’s unfortunate,” the black-haired man smirked as he reached toward her items, “I can’t restock these, so I’ll have to throw them away—” The woman behind her in line made an exasperated noise.
“Don’t!” Amity practically vibrated with outrage, her voice shrill, her hands outstretched toward her items, almost pleading, “I’ll be back— don’t! I’ll be— just— wait, and—” She broke off with a pained whimper and fled out the door. A Blight doesn’t cry, she could hear her mother’s mocking voice. A Blight doesn’t show weakness. She couldn’t—wouldn’t—break down in front of that sniveling worm.
The door slammed shut on the other woman’s raised voice, “Miss, wait! Cletus, you soggy-ass shit-for-brains, why—”
~
Amity blinked and blinked and blinked, her watery eyes stinging in the sun’s hot glare. She stalked along the sidewalk, squeezing her hands into fists then shaking her fingers loose. She sucked a greedy breath in through her teeth, holding it long enough to turn red-faced and dizzy, exhaling just to do it again. Her whole body burned with anger at the injustice she had just endured. Why would they cut my card? It doesn’t make— Actually, no, it made perfect sense. Her mother must be punishing her for something. The raging fury in her veins frosted over in an instant, making way for a clawing, icy fear at the thought of her mother knowing she was gone. Had her mother visited her laboratory? Had she given herself away somehow? Was treachery unavoidable? Emira would know.
She fumbled her phone from her hip pocket and shakily entered her 12-digit passcode. Before she could open her contacts, the device jumped in her fingers, vibrating across her palm with an incoming call from— Amity went still as a deer caught in oncoming headlights, pressed her eyes closed for a moment before swiping to answer, lifting the phone to her ear, “Hello M—”
“I thought you had outgrown this sort of nonsense, Amity,” Odalia Blight purred from her handset, then her voice grew an edge, “Did you even notice you lost your card?”
Amity twitched, inhaling sharply through her nose, “What? What are—”
“Sloppy. Very sloppy. I’m not sure why Emira was so insistent on waiting for another anomalous charge—” A quick, muffled yawn filtered through the phone line. “Honestly, a pizza place in… Ten Pesos? That should have been enough.” Amity felt her mother’s attitude shift—there was a different tone in her voice. Something close to pride and vindication. “I told Finances to have your cards destroyed if any more suspicious activity occurred, and they just sent me a message that read ‘corrective action confirmed’, and—ugh,” Odalia sighed, and it sounded as though she was rubbing at her forehead, “I’ve been in pointless meetings all day with these German idiots, and it’s late, so I’m just now getting around to reading their first message… of…” Her mother’s voice grew distant, as she began to read from the screen of her phone. A muffled tap… tap, tap and a click sounded in Amity’s ear as her mother switched over to speakerphone. “A five hundred dollar charge… on a— a reservation? At a casino?! I know that wasn’t you.” Odalia scoffed and Amity tried to grunt an agreeable noise during the brief moment her mother wasn’t speaking. “Edric, yes. You, at least, have the common sense not to patronize a criminal establishment!”
Then her mother’s words registered. Amity gulped, “Five— five hundred—”
“But I felt I should give you a call,” her mother interrupted again, snapping in irritation, “since it happened a third time. The money is a pittance compared to your other expenses—” Amity could just see her mother waving her hand in dismissal, “—but I am very concerned that you might have lost company data. Is your laptop missing too?” For once, Odalia stopped for a response.
“N— no! I have it r–right here!” Amity blurted out, whirling around to look at Eda’s double-brown big rig across the parking lot. She never should have gotten up. The truck was safe. “I— I-It’s safe, it never left my—”
“Oh, stop stuttering. A Blight doesn’t stutter,” Odalia sniffed in disgust, “Ridiculous behavior. Good. I’d have IT remote-wipe your laptop if it were actually—”
“No! It’s not… missing… Mother,” Amity struggled to school the tremble of fear from her voice— it wouldn’t do to make her mother think she was talking back. “I have it with me. I must have… handed my card… to… the waiter, yesterday… and left it on the receipt tray?” It wasn’t the best lie, but it would have to do.
“Mittens. You have to be more careful. What were you doing out of the Tower, anyway? Shouldn’t you be preparing for your demonstration?” Odalia crooned that last question in a subtle sing-song tone, and Amity’s eyebrows wrinkled in confusion. Why did she sound like that? Like she was teasing, like she knew something that Amity didn’t. What… What’s going on?
“I just needed some fresh air?” Amity’s chuckle was a strained, desperate noise, and her mother knew that was a lie.
“You were visiting another manufacturer, weren’t you? Spending more of your father’s money on your project, hmm? Honestly,” Odalia scoffed again, probably looking at the fingernails on one outstretched hand, and Amity knew it was pointless to protest. “Do you have time for sightseeing? You should be packing. I’m having Emira source one of our best teams to transport everything for you.”
Amity scowled at that— that was a lie, she was sure of it! Why was her mother lying to her?
“You’ll be back before you know it, and back to work in your laboratory. Just focus on your projects, and Emira and I will handle everything else,” Odalia’s voice was pitched soft and low, a soothing melody that made a chill run up Amity’s spine. “You can’t trust people these days; there are so many fools out there trying to take advantage of you, stealing from you! Be careful, Mittens.” She sighed, and added in a bored tone of voice, “I’m expecting an excellent report from your demonstration, as befitting a Blight.”
“I— yes, Mother, I’ll—”
“I’ll be in Europe until Thursday,” Odalia interrupted again, unconcerned with her daughter’s response, “Don’t embarrass the family with failure.”
“I—” Amity swallowed and whispered through grinding teeth, “I won’t.” Her phone squelched in her ear as her mother hung up without so much as a goodbye, and Amity tipped her head back and hissed an angry breath through clenched teeth. She felt sick. Absolutely sick. Just hearing her mother’s voice was enough to send her into a panic, but after having her card cut, her source of financial security stripped away, how— My card! Amity covered her eyes with her hand, What am I supposed to do now? I don’t have any— I can’t pay for anything! What if we run into trouble?
Her paralyzing worry was broken by a voice behind her, the clearing of a throat, and a soft, kind question, “Miss, are you alright?”
Amity turned to see the stocky woman that had been behind her in line, and she stiffened. How much did she hear? “I…” she began, before she gulped. Her golden gaze flicked up and down the graying red-haired woman as her mother’s latest words echoed in her memory, There are so many people out there trying to take advantage of you. There were wrinkles around the shorter woman’s green eyes, the kind made by laughter and smiles, and while she wasn’t wearing designer clothing, her jeans and olive-green runner’s jacket weren’t in bad shape. She looked concerned, not like she was going to hurt Amity.
The woman gave her a kind smile and took a step closer, looking up at the taller green-haired girl. “Listen, I tried not to overhear anything private, hon, but you look like you’re havin’ a rough afternoon.” She patted a tanned hand across her chest, fingers spread across a weathered blue Nike swoosh, “My name is Jackie, Jackie G— G for Gleeful— or Mama Jackie if you want, it don’t bother me none,” she smiled, then the older woman shuffled the plastic bags and boxes in her hand as she pointed a thumb over her shoulder, “That unbelievable jackass inside didn’t hafta treat you that way. Even I could tell you weren’t no thief!” Jackie cleared her throat again, “But'chya ran out the door before I could step in, and I’m sorry ‘bout that, hon, I should’a been quicker on the draw.”
“What…” Amity shook her head, “I’m sorry, I don’t—”
“Here now, here’s your things,” Jackie said with a smile as she held out the donut box and the coffee cup carrier that Amity had had to abandon inside, “I got ‘em for ya.”
“You—” the green-haired girl looked down at the items in the other woman’s hands, and covered her mouth. She sniffed and gave a wet laugh, “You— you didn’t have to—”
“Listen here, hon, I do what I want, and— what’s yer name, darlin’? If ya don’t mind me asking,” Jackie looked up at her kindly.
“A– Amity.”
“That’s a pretty name for a sweet gal. Amity, I heard you say you was buying these to share with your friend, and that’s such a nice thing for you to do,” the woman said with a shrug, “And I dunno what’chyer bank is up to, frankly hon, I don’t trust banks these days, they steal from you just as much as the government! Not to mention—” Jackie cut herself short, then said, “Whoops, sorry darlin’, better not get started on alllll that,” and she chuckled. Amity gave a dazed smile. “Anyway, you were doin’ a nice thing, and I wanted to help.” She held out the items again, “Now you can still have breakfast with your friend.”
Slowly, Amity lifted the donut box and the coffee carrier from the shorter woman’s hands. She took a shuddering breath and managed to ask, “Can… Can I pay you back? Uh—” She winced, “It’d have to be later.”
“Nah,” Jackie waved her hands, then tucked them into the pockets of her green jacket, “No need, hon. I gotta fuel up and hit the road,” the red-haired woman said as she pulled a set of keys from her pocket, “I hope you have a better day.” Jackie walked toward a shiny red semi parked at the edge of the lot.
Amity watched her walk away before she realized what she had forgotten to say. “Thank you!” she called. The stocky woman raised a hand and waved over her shoulder before she climbed into her truck.
~
Despite her best efforts, the truck rocked from side to side as she clambered up into the cab and swung the door shut with a muffled thump. Amity glanced around for a moment, then set the donut box on top of the squat, black CB radio on the dashboard, and gently placed the coffee cup carrier on the floor in front of the gear shift lever. Her hands were shaking too much to hold onto the items that kind stranger had rescued for her, and it felt like the thoughts in her head were swirling in one direction while her stomach churned and bubbled in the other. She said I couldn’t trust anyone, and then that happened! She didn’t know what to believe anymore. She was sure her mother had been lying to her, but why? It was all overwhelming.
Amity tipped her head back against the headrest and blinked to slow the tears that threatened to spill from her eyes. A Blight doesn’t cry. She heard her mother’s voice again, and again. A Blight doesn’t cry. A Blight doesn’t stutter. A Blight doesn’t show weakness. A Blight doesn’t trust. Is that how she wanted to live her life? But was there really another choice? Not when her mother was still in charge. She was trapped in a cage of her mother’s design that she hadn’t even noticed: she lived in the company building, her freshly cut-off source of money was a company credit card, and her projects were paid for with company funding. What did she have that truly belonged to her? Her books? The few birthday and Christmas gifts the twins had given her over the years? She had nothing and no one. She glared up at the red leather headliner and sucked in a thin, shuddering breath.
She must have been too loud, or perhaps the scent of fresh coffee did the trick, because Luz rolled over just then and blinked her eyes open. “Whuzzat?” she yawned and stretched. “Amminy?” Luz mumbled, rubbing at her sleep-blurred eyes, “Y’kay? C’mere, why’re—” she yawned again, then, an involuntary shudder running through her body, “—crying?” she finished.
Amity closed her eyes and shook her head, her hands still trembling in her lap. She couldn’t stop the embarrassing whimper she let slip when she felt the other girl lay a warm hand on her wrist. “C’mere,” Luz repeated softly and tugged on her arm. Against her better judgment, against everything her mother had ever drilled into her head… Amity gave in. She turned her knees toward the aisle and slumped to the floor as Luz pulled her close and wrapped her arms around the taller girl’s shoulders. Luz scooted closer to the edge of her seat and guided the stiff, trembling green-haired girl to lay her head on her chest, tucking her under her chin as she rubbed wide circles across Amity’s back with her palms. “It’s okay,” Luz whispered, patting gently at the back of Amity’s head, beginning to card her fingers through her hair, “It’s okay.” Amity gave a quick shake of her head as she pressed her eyes into Luz’s tee shirt, clutching at her arm as she huddled closer. “You’re allowed to feel, cariño,” Luz assured her, “It’s okay, let it out.” Permission finally given to her—for once in her life—and Amity allowed herself to cry.
Chapter 12: Tuesday, 2:43pm
Chapter Text
Luz cradled Amity close to the slow, steady beat of her heart as the taller girl sobbed against the hollow of her throat. She whispered soft sounds and gentle words as she ran her fingers through her hair. She rubbed her palms across the muscles in Amity’s shoulders, and wide figure eights into her back. She knew the therapeutic value of A Damn Good Cry™, but her heart still ached in sympathy as the other girl dredged up long-buried sorrow with every breath. Luz knew Amity kept herself stiff and reserved with other people, even while out of the public eye—thanks to her mother, no doubt. The fact that she felt comfortable enough—or safe enough—with Luz to display any sort of vulnerability filled her with a deep desire to provide shelter and protection for her new-found friend. Even now, as obviously hurt and heartbroken as she was, the green-haired girl stifled herself. Boxed herself in. Limited herself. She wept quietly, eyes closed and shoulders shaking, her hands over her mouth to muffle what few sounds she made, and Luz wondered how many nights she had spent alone and wracked with fear, wrestling her anguish into the silence her mother demanded. Never again, Luz decided— not if she had anything to say about it.
A Blight doesn’t cry. That’s what Amity had parroted the night before when she was talking about her old rugby injury. That’s wrong, that’s so wrong, Luz frowned, and pressed her cheek against the other girl’s forehead, squeezing her tightly, reassuringly. Amity clutched at her elbow with one hand, and turned her face into a fistful of Luz’s sleep shirt, burrowing deeper into her calming presence, hiding from the world that demanded so much from her.
In time, Amity’s sobbing slowed to a heavy, wet sniffling and a high-pitched whine as she drew short, ragged breaths. “Take as much time as you need, querida, está bien,” Luz repeated every so often, whenever she felt the other girl was about to force an explanation through the lump in her throat. “I’m here, I’m right here… We can talk when you’re ready,” she said, patting down the back of Amity’s head, getting a hesitant nod from the girl curled up on the floor between the seats. “If you don’t feel up to talking, that’s alright too.”
“S–Sorry, I-I’m sor– orry,” Amity hiccuped against her collarbone, trailing off into a keening whistle as Luz breathed out a soft No, no, cariño, mi dulce niña. She brushed tousled, tear-dampened hair away from her eyes.
“You have nothing to apologize for, querida. Nothing,” Luz assured her as she hooked a mint-green lock over a pale ear, then she added, “You’re not a bother or a burden, Amity. Everyone needs someone to lean on at some point, and I’m— I’m honored you chose me. Truly.” She hugged Amity close, smiling as the other girl nodded into her jaw. Luz reached down and hooked her pinky around Amity’s, gently shaking her hand back and forth, “I will not betray your trust; this I swear, as an Everlasting Oath,” Luz chuckled when the green-haired girl covered her face with her other hand and snorted.
“Oh my God, Luz,” Amity whispered through a watery smile, blinking discs of shining gold up at her, “Pinky-swear like a normal person.” Her eyes crinkled, tenderly, “You’re such a dork.”
“Takes one to know one,” Luz said proudly, giving the teary-eyed girl a brilliant smile.
“I am not a dork,” Amity pouted softly, laying her head back down on Luz’s chest. She closed her eyes and sighed, listening to the smaller girl’s comforting, rhythmic heartbeat.
“Fine. Nerd,” Luz took a moment to carefully brush the edge of her thumb across Amity’s cheekbone, swiping away the tear tracks she could see glistening in the afternoon sun before adding, “B’sides, normal’s overrated.”
Luz ran her fingers along Amity’s hair, humming a soft melody as the pale girl listened closely with the smallest twist at the corner of her lips. Eventually, those golden eyes blinked open and caught Luz’s caring gaze. “What s-song is that?”
What are the words? ‘Well I found a girl, beautiful and swee—’ Luz blinked. Shit. “Oh, y’know what? I’m not even sure,” Luz lied like the lying liar she was. Fucking Ed Sheeran mental pop-up ads!
“Sounds familiar,” Amity whispered, her breath ghosting across Luz’s neck.
“Probably something on the, uh, radio last night.”
After a few minutes of comfortable silence, Amity shifted, pulling her knees up to her chest. Luz watched Amity worry her fingertips across the fabric of her leggings before she heard a quiet exhale under her chin. “I woke up… before you,” Amity said softly, rubbing her thumbs across chipped black-painted fingernails, her brows wrinkling in thought against Luz’s jawline, “And I thought— I thought I could buy you breakfast… as a thank you, for your… for— for everything.” She took a deep, shuddering breath, and Luz rubbed at her back as she hummed a soft note of understanding. Amity blinked up at her and tried to smile, but it fell apart after a moment. “I went to pay for my things, and— and the register, it— a– then the cashier, he cut my card.” She pressed her mouth into a tight line as her bottom lip quivered. She rubbed the edge of her hand under her nose as she sniffed, “I w-was… so embarrassed,” she whispered, her voice low, scratchy, and hoarse. “It was my company card. Mother canceled it. She—” the pale girl sucked in a breath, then, through her teeth, “She knew about the pizza from yesterday, and the— uh, but she thought my card had been stolen.”
“Stolen?” Luz repeated with a confused chuckle, “Why?”
Amity tipped her head back slightly to catch the other girl’s brown eyes, “She doesn’t know I’m gone. She thinks I’m still at the Tower.” Tears gathered in her eyes as she looked away, “But— but when the cashier cut my card, he threatened to throw my items away, things I picked out just for you,” she admitted with a frustrated scowl.
Luz glanced over at the box of donuts atop the dashboard, and the cups of coffee spouting thin spirals of steam into the air. “I mean… who hasn’t eaten out of the dumpster, am-I-right?”
The pale girl scoffed—a thick, wet popping laugh directed away from Luz’s shoulder—before she whispered, sorry, and rolled her eyes, “I didn’t garbage-pick our food.” She sniffed and wiped at her face, “Gross.”
“No?” Luz laughed, “Oh, you’re missing out. Seriously.” The brown-haired girl grinned, still rubbing wide circles into Amity’s back as the pale girl huffed in disbelief. “Chow de la dumpster is like the sixth food group. Or is it the seventh? I think Redbull is the sixth, actually.” Her brown eyes sparkled as Amity snorted. “So if you didn’t dumpster dive, did you steal our breakfast?” The trucker motioned up toward the red-leather-wrapped cabin around them, encompassing the truck and trailer, “Do we need to slip away under cover of the mid-afternoon sun in the slowest getaway car in the county?”
Amity actually laughed at that, and Luz felt a hopeful twinge in her chest; maybe she was helping. “No— no,” the pale girl gave a weak smile, “I didn’t steal anything.”
“It don’t bother me none if ya did,” Luz drawled as she gave the other girl a wink, “Eda’s gotten us plenty over the years with her five-finger discount— I mean— a meal you don’t pay for is basically empty calories, right?” She smirked as she pulled a voice, and Amity smiled. “I’m impressed,” Luz gave her an appraising nod, “she’s got you doing a dash-and-dine in less than twenty-four hours. That’s a new record.”
“Luz!” Amity laughed again, swatting weakly at the other girl’s arm, drawing out a dry chuckle, “No, I’m serious, someone else paid for them. She… she was behind me in line and saw what happened… she came out to talk to me after— after my mother called.” The humor faded from Amity’s face as she spoke, her voice tightening in discomfort as soon as she mentioned the family matriarch.
Luz could feel her begin to tremble halfway through her last sentence, and she knew it wasn’t time for another joke. Whatever that hateful woman had said to her friend had been devastating, coming just after the incident with the cashier. Luz looked down at Amity and carded her fingers through the hair above her ear, pulling a soft sigh from the pale girl. “Someone else paid for our breakfast?” the brown-haired girl asked, “That was so nice.”
“Yes, she was. She was so nice, and— and my mother had just made a point to remind me that I can’t trust anyone, that everyone is out to take advantage of me—” Amity paused to scoff, “and— and then a complete stranger helped me, just to help, and— it’s— it’s all so— I’m so confused, Luz,” Amity twisted slightly as she curled a hand around Luz’s upper arm, tugging at her sleeve as she peered up at the brown-haired girl with her red-rimmed eyes. “I think my mother is lying to me— I mean, I know she is— but— but why?” She took a quick breath and shook her head, a quivering frown spreading across her face, “Why? I don’t— I don’t understand.” She bared her teeth for a moment as she inhaled, grimacing, “She told Finances to have my card destroyed, and— and I don’t— I don’t have any money, Luz!”
Luz was struck by a memory of the twins like Cheshire cats grinning at her from the captain’s seats, their hands each holding a gift. Not sure why I didn’t remember before now, Luz thought with a wry smile, But first, she leaned down and gave the pale girl a tight squeeze, rubbing a hand up and down her arm as she whispered, “It’s okay, don’t worry.”
Amity glared over her elbow and waved toward the sleeper bed with one hand, gesturing with sharp-edged fingers to emphasize her words, “It’s bad enough she’s sabotaging me at every turn, but she sounded happy about it!”
“Amity, hey, I— I don’t care about your money,” Luz said before she made a horrified face and backpedaled, “Wait, sorry— what happened is wrong, but what I mean is, yes, delivery runs have expenses like fuel and food, but I’ve got us covered.” She shifted slightly, tipping her head to the side to catch Amity’s worried gaze, “We’re still good for Boston. What your mother did is, like, super-duper shitty, but it won’t stop us.”
Amity bit her lip as her eyes danced left and right, examining the other girl’s calm, caring expression. “But what if something goes wrong?” the golden-eyed girl asked, “I can’t help; I can’t do my part!”
Luz chuckled and tapped her fingertips against Amity’s forehead with a soft, “Bap!”
“Luz, I’m— I’m serious!”
“Your ‘part’ is not paying for things,” Luz’s voice was warm and gentle yet firm as she locked eyes with Amity, making sure she was hearing. “You’re my navigator, my maps-man— er, woman. Mi mapa chica,” Luz grinned and gave the pale girl a sloppy salute, “My second in command. Remember? You’re my friend, not mi dulce mamá azucarada.”
A small blush spread around Amity’s eyes when the Spanish slipped from the brown-eyed girl, and she huffed and looked away with a lopsided grin, “Oui, mon capitaine.”
“At ease, Lieutenant Sassy-Pants. Besides…” Luz snorted before pushing herself up on her elbow to lean across the aisle and dig her hand into the pouch behind the passenger’s seat; she balanced herself with her forehead against the other seat back and used her left arm around the pale girl’s shoulders for stability. Amity tilted with her, still held against her chest, her pale cheeks reddening further as Luz began to lean on her in her search for the twins’ gifts. She found the envelope first, pulling it out to drop into Amity’s lap, “Emira gave me this yesterday—” then the satellite phone joined the envelope, “—and Edric gave me that,” Luz turned her head to look at Amity, pushing away from the seat with her elbow, “along with what I assume was their version of the shovel talk.”
“The shovel—” Amity’s face turned a shiny fire-truck red as she squeaked and sat up straight, pulling away from Luz as the shorter girl chuckled and settled back into the driver’s seat.
“Yeah, it wasn’t really a threat. Weird, right?” Luz yawned and rubbed at her eyes with her palms, muttering, “What time is it, anyway?” then glanced at her empty wrist. She scoffed and rolled her eyes, “...Right.”
“It’s about 2:45 in the afternoon,” Amity said softly, looking at the satellite phone and the unopened envelope.
Luz yawned again and levered her seat half-upright before wriggling onto her side to face the girl sitting in the aisle. “As far as I’m concerned,” the brown-haired girl tapped at the envelope with the backs of her fingers, “that money belongs to you.”
“Money?” Amity frowned, absolutely confused.
“You were being very sweet and thoughtful, and I appreciate that about you,” Luz said softly, watching the other girl hunch her shoulders, clearly unused to kind words and praise. “I appreciate the effort you went through to make me feel special, and I’m sorry it didn’t go as planned.” Amity unfolded the flap of the envelope as Luz added, “If you wanna go give that asshole a piece of your mind, I’ll happily go with you.” She shifted in her seat and muttered, “I’ll need to pee eventually.”
Amity gasped when she saw the stack of bills, her eyes widening as she dragged her thumb along one corner of the bundle. “Emira gave you this?” she asked in a wobbly voice, turning uncertain eyes up toward Luz.
“Yeah,” Luz replied softly, reaching out to run her thumb along the other girl’s pale cheekbone, catching a tear before it could fall.
Amity blinked and blinked, taking an unsteady breath as she pressed her cheek into Luz’s palm. “She… she thought of everything,” the golden-eyed girl whispered, “...didn’t she?”
“I think… she’s…” Luz shrugged carefully, “I got the feeling that she’s really trying to help you.”
Amity’s expression pinched as her brows furrowed in thought, “Mother mentioned her on purpose… twice,” she looked up at the brown-haired girl, “I— I think she’s trying to turn us against each other, at least, me against her.”
Luz frowned and made an unhappy noise deep in her chest.
The green-haired girl looked down at the envelope in her hands and took a hesitant breath, “I… I miss her,” Amity admitted in a watery voice, her words brushing warmth across the other girl’s wrist.
“Oh, cariño,” Luz breathed, running her fingers down to Amity’s jaw, pressing lightly to turn the pale girl’s chin up toward her. Luz watched as those golden eyes crumpled when they met her own, and she offered, “Why don’t you call her now? I’m sure she misses you, too.”
Amity sniffed and pawed at her eyes before the gathering tears could spill free, and after a halting breath she warbled, “Y—y–you don’t m–mind?”
“Why would I—” Luz sighed, “No, Amity. Call her. You don’t need my permission.”
Amity pressed her mouth into a tight line as she nodded, then mouthed, Okay.
“Do you want some privacy?” Luz asked, earning herself a confused Huh? The brown-haired girl hooked a thumb toward the driver’s door and clarified, “I could go outside, give you some—” Amity quickly shook her head, causing Luz to cut her sentence short and grin.
“No! um… I… mm-mmm,” the pale girl hunched her shoulders and fussed with the envelope in her hands, glancing up at Luz and away again, a guilty look on her face as she opened and closed her mouth, the words caught in her throat.
Luz thought she knew what the other girl was struggling to ask. “You look like you could still use a hug,” the brown-eyed girl’s voice was gentle, “Do you want me to hold you while you call your sister?” Amity stared at the floor and gave a quick, jerking nod as a burning red blush roared up her face. “No problem at all,” Luz chuckled, balling up her blanket to toss across the aisle to the passenger seat, as she levered her seat upright, “Alrighty, budge over—”
Amity curled her legs up against her chest as Luz put her feet down in the small space between the seats and the sleeper bed. “Okay, let’s see…” Luz turned and twisted, looking at the floor space available, patting her legs with her hands. She glanced at Amity, perfectly still and staring, and grinned. Luz sat down just behind the driver’s seat and turned toward the passenger’s side, then she patted the floor beside her, “Sit’chyer butt here,” Luz said and tipped a thumb over her shoulder toward the mattress, “and put your back against the cabinet.” The green-haired girl wrinkled her eyebrows and nodded, then pulled herself into a crouch to do as she was told. Just as she turned to sit down, Luz put her right arm and leg behind Amity, then swung her left leg over the other girl’s lap. Amity froze, her face still bright red, until Luz patted her shoulder and said, “Here, lean into me, okay?” Luz scooted closer, and Amity leaned to her left, sliding forward as she slouched, setting her head on the smaller girl’s shoulder.
Luz chuckled when the pale girl hid her face in the crook of her neck, “You doin’ alright there, cariño?”
“This— th-this is— w–what— I thought—” Amity stuttered.
Luz brushed a hand down the back of her hair and gently asked, “Is this alright?”
Amity nodded, heat boiling off her face in waves, then swallowed, “Y–yes, It’s just— I thought you’d just p–put your arm around my shoulder.”
The brown-haired girl squirmed slightly closer, grunting, “Not a whole lot of room in here,” and wrapped her arms around Amity’s torso, squeezing her with her legs as well, “Koala mode engaged!” The pale girl snorted a surprised, light-hearted laugh, and Luz grinned. She cleared her throat softly, then confided, “I’m trying to cheer you up, but let me know if— if I go too far, okay? You won’t hurt my feelings.”
Amity stretched her legs out straight, crossing her ankles as she sighed into the other girl’s throat. “Thank you, Luz,” she whispered. Luz watched her stare at the items in her hand for a few long heartbeats.
“Use the sat-phone,” the brown-haired girl suggested into her hairline, then made a soft pleh noise at the strands of green hair that stuck to her mouth.
Amity nodded and flipped the device-long antenna out of its groove, rotating it upwards until it clicked at a rakish six-degree angle. The screen lit up, the satellite phone beeped three times, and— “Oh my god,” Amity stiffened in either surprise or fear, Luz couldn’t tell. “There’s— thirty-seven missed calls from—” She dropped the envelope and her smartphone onto the floor while she clapped a hand over her mouth too late to stifle the wounded noise Luz had just heard. Surprise, then. The pale girl held the sat-phone to her ear, shaking with silent emotion, and Luz wrapped both arms around her tightly. The cabin fell still and quiet, but for the faint ringing from the phone as Amity waited for an answer.
A beep. A click-hiss of static, then a small, tinny voice reached across the miles between them: Just a sec, okay? Let me get back to my office— Janine, work with DevOps on this piece, alright? Pauline can get you the datasets. The reports should go back at least fifteen years. I’ll be back in a minute… Luz? Amity?
Amity pulled her hand from her mouth and covered her eyes with her palm, and she leaned forward into Luz’s neck as she took a deep, shuddering breath.
Amity! Are you okay?
“Emmy…” Luz felt her heart clench in her chest at the small, weak whimper that crept out of the girl in her arms.
A muffled thump from the other side, like a door had closed. Amity?
“Emmy, I miss you,” Amity whispered.
Ohhh, I miss you too, Mittens. Are you—
The pale girl sniffed and sobbed once before she could clap her hand over her mouth.
Are you okay?
“No,” Amity breathed.
Are you safe?
Amity nodded into her collarbone and mumbled, “Uh-huh,” and Luz wrapped her arms tight around the taller girl’s shoulders.
Is Luz there?
“Yeah,” Amity whispered.
Can you put me on speaker?
Amity nodded, then swallowed, her voice damp with unshed tears, “Okay.” She held the phone out to examine the buttons on its face, then pressed one with a blip. A hiss of static filled the cabin.
“Thanks, Amity, and sorry, Amity, for this— Luz?”
Luz chuckled and replied with a “Hmmmyeah?” as she rubbed her cheek against Amity’s forehead.
“Luz, can you give my sister a hug for me? I’d give her one myself, but—”
“Don’t even worry, girl,” Luz smiled, “Way ahead of you.” She glanced down at Amity, who looked up to meet her eyes at the motion, and Luz grinned, whispering, “This is from your sister,” before she squeezed a chuckle out of the green-haired girl.
“What?!” Emira sounded both scandalized and happy, which, strange. “Yes!” she crowed, then Luz and Amity heard a slapping noise and a yelp that sounded like Edric. “You owe me ten bucks,” Emira taunted, her voice muffled as she covered the mouthpiece with her hand.
Ow, shit, came her twin’s faint reply.
Luz laughed just before Amity growled in disbelief, “You bet on us hugging?!”
Mittens, Edric yelled from somewhere near Emira, I know a sure thing when I see it— we just bet on how soon.
“Do you want me to go on speaker?” Emira asked gently.
“No,” Amity sniffed, “not just yet.”
“That’s fine,” Emira replied, “Did you want me to—”
“What is she doing, Emmy?” Amity interrupted, “Why is she treating me like this? Does— does she hate me?” Her voice broke there, at the end, and Luz rubbed a hand along her hunched shoulders.
“Oh, sweetie… She only loves herself,” Emira reminded her, a deep sadness in her voice. “She thought she saw a mini-her in the making when you were younger—” Amity tensed at that, “—but when you started helping Dad in the lab it became clear who you really took after.”
The pale girl shifted and leaned more against Luz’s shoulder. Luz looked down to see Amity open and close her mouth in confusion, finally settling on, “But— I thought she liked us working together.”
“I think—” a scratching squeal, like a chair being moved, “I think she’s worried you’ll take the company from her,” Emira’s voice was hushed, conspiratorial. Luz imagined her and her twin sitting next to each other in a smoke-filled bar, whispering secrets across a wooden tabletop. “She’s worked so hard to keep Dad from having any control over things.”
“What? But— but they’re married!” Amity gave a confused laugh, “Doesn’t she… at least, like Dad?” She looked up at Luz, shaking her head, and whispered, “Why marry someone if you don’t love them?” Luz gave her a soft shrug and murmured something like I don’t know, or Maybe she did, once.
“I think she resents him most of all,” Emira sighed, “and you’re unmistakably his daughter. I… I’ve tried to shield you from her, I really have, Amity, but she’s—”
But she’s— Edric’s voice started off faint, then a grunt, as if he had pulled himself across the table to talk into Emira’s phone, “totally after your shit.” A series of thumps and slaps filtered through the line, an Ow, a Hey, quit it! followed by a Get away!
Amity shook her head in horror, “She’s trying to take my project.”
“Exactly,” Emira sounded out of breath, perhaps from relieving her brother of his knees, “She basically said as much last night.” The woman sighed, “She has it in her head that you’re holding out on her, and she has plans to earn billions with what you’ve made.” Emira growled in irritation, “She has a team ready to move into Ten on Saturday to take over, because she—”
Amity sat up, her voice a sharp spike of anxiety, “Ten?! But I— I live on Ten!” Luz had time to snarl, What?! before Amity asked, “Where will I go?” in a quiet, horrified tone.
Emira made a soft, soothing sound, “Listen, it’s okay— she said she’ll put you in Accounting and I know you’ll hate it— but she’s wrong, Amity.” Never had Luz heard someone who sounded more sure, more confident than this woman she’d met the day before. “She is.”
“She’s— she’s really trying to take everything I have,” Amity whispered, “Isn’t she?”
“That unbelievable bitch,” Luz growled, squeezing the green-haired girl tightly with her whole body.
“Exactly!” Emira said, a muffled screech and a clatter in the background, as if she’d stood too fast and tipped her chair over, “But you are ready! You’re gonna give a jaw-dropping show,” Amity’s sister paused briefly to chuckle at a Fuck yeah! from Edric, then, “I believe that more than anything!”
“What if I don’t?” came a hesitant reply.
Emira’s voice shivered with a barely repressed fury, “My little sister never gives anything less than her best!” Her tone softened into something gentle, something loving, “It’s what I find the most irritating about her… right Ed?” Amity couldn’t hold back a sniffling laugh at Edric’s yelled, Right! It’s the wooooorst! in the background. Emira wasn’t finished. “And we will do anything and everything we can from here, just say the word.” She gave a wet chuckle and a sniff, then said, “Hold on a sec, okay?” A distorted muffle of sounds, before a click and an echoing hiss. “You’re on speaker, Mittens. What can we do?”
Amity smiled against Luz’s shoulder and began to tell them everything that had happened. Luz sat quietly and listened to Amity recount her conversation with her mother, and gasped in delight when she heard who had bought their breakfast. The pale girl looked up at her with a quizzical tilt to her eyes, and Luz squealed, “You met Mama Jackie?! She’s the best!” Amity had to smile at the smaller girl’s excitement.
“So what I’m hearing is, you need fake crates packed and ready to go,” Edric sounded excited— too excited at the prospect of doing manual labor.
Amity narrowed her eyes, “Yes, definitely… why do you sound like that?”
“I just had the best idea— oh,” a quiet gasp from the man, and Emira asked, What? before he gave a dark chuckle, “Oh-ho, I just had a bad idea. Hey, Mittens—” his voice got louder, like he leaned closer to the phone in his sister’s hand, “Do you have any of Dad’s type-8’s in your lab I could use?”
Luz watched as Amity blinked, then a slow, sly grin spread across her face. The brown-haired girl felt heat rush to her cheeks at the sight of those lips twisted in a smirk like that. “Interesting,” Amity hummed, adding a low-pitched, “I like that,” which did nothing to help the cloud of butterflies in Luz’s stomach. The green-haired girl lifted the sat-phone, “Everything’s alphabetized, they’ll be in the ‘A’ cabinet.”
“Sweet! thanks, sis.” Luz felt her smile against her collarbone and gave her a squeeze. Amity hummed again and rubbed her cheekbone against her neck in return.
“I should have enough 3-S hubs for the four large and six small crates,” Amity said with a squint, trying to remember the state of her spare parts racks.
“Oh, I’ve got plenty of those,” Edric assured her, “Just not enough of the good accelerometers.”
Emira spoke up as Edric’s voice faded, as if the man had walked away, lost in thought, “We’ll get your crates packed and ready for Odalia’s hit squad to pick up.” Luz chuckled at that, and Amity gave a tight-lipped frown. “I’ll keep people here thinking you’re on-prem until Thursday, and we’ll take the G800 to Boston. We’ll meet you there Friday afternoon.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Luz replied, feeling Amity nod in agreement.
“What about M— Odalia?” Amity asked, hesitating for a moment before using her mother’s name.
“She’ll be in Europe at least until Thursday evening, our time,” Emira hummed a note as she thought, “If she calls you, don’t answer. She’ll complain to me, I’ll make up an excuse.”
“Oh?” Amity sounded worried, “O–okay.”
Footsteps sounded across the line, and then Edric breathed over his sister’s phone, “Good luck you two, see you soon.”
The pale girl smiled, her voice soft and grateful, “Thanks, Ed. For everything.”
“I’ll go get started!” He ran off, and the line clicked as Emira switched off her speakerphone.
“Amity, I am so sorry—” the woman began, but Amity interrupted, “—It’s not your fault, it never was.”
“I know, but still,” Emira replied, softly, “I love you.”
“I know,” Amity sniffed and wiped at her face, “I love you too.”
“Luz?”
“I’m here.”
“I know you are, and I— I can never thank you enough,” Emira said, a seriousness to her voice, her words completely earnest. “I didn’t want to say it when Ed was here—big baby’d be jealous—but you’re the key to this little trick we’re pulling.” She paused for a moment to breathe in and out. “You have to get Amity there by Friday. I know you can, that’s— I’m not worried about that— I mean, I guess—”
“I get it,” Luz assured her, “Don’t worry.”
“I hate to drag you into the middle of our nasty family bullshit, because this is dangerous.” Emira made a sickened sound, “My mother will do anything to get what she wants.”
“I’ve got Amity’s back,” Luz replied, feeling the pale girl wrap a hand around her arm and squeeze. “She’s important to me too, Emira.”
“I know,” the woman said softly, “I just… hate to make you shoulder such a big part by yourself.”
“But…” Luz paused, looking down to catch Amity’s golden eyes, “I’m not by myself. Amity’s gonna be there with me, every step of the way,” the tanned girl grinned, and the pale girl smiled in return. Luz chuckled when Amity burrowed her head under her chin, snuggling close.
“I’m glad you two met,” Emira sighed, sounding slightly jealous.
“Me too,” Luz replied, and laughed when “Me three,” was whispered into her neck.
“I’ll get to work,” Emira cleared her throat, “Call me if you think of anything else you need.”
Luz nodded, “Will do.”
“Bye, Em. Love you,” Amity said.
“Byeee!”
After a few long moments, Amity pulled back to peer up at Luz. “What now?” she asked, carefully.
Luz laughed, and gave her a slightly strained smile, “Well, I have to make a pit stop. Then we’ll come back and enjoy breakfast, and we have a few hours to rest before we have to hit the road.” Amity nodded and gave her a shy smile, then helped her up off the floor.
~
A tanned girl stepped up to the counter, a basket full of items hanging from one arm. She was holding hands with that girl from earlier, the one with the credit card. He chuckled to himself at the memory before he noticed how both girls were glaring at him. Cletus turned confused eyes from the shorter girl staring a hole through his face to the taller, pale girl with a frown and tear-reddened eyes. “Uh…” He gulped, tapping his fingers against the countertop in a nervous tempo, “Did— did you find— uh, everything you needed?” The short girl let the other’s hand slip free, then began to unload her basket.
A large hacksaw. Two pairs of rubber gloves. A gallon of bleach. A quart of motor oil. A large funnel. Two 3-ton tow ropes. Heavy-duty kitchen shears. A six-pack of mouse traps. Two box cutters and spare blades. A four-pack of duct tape. A basketball. Rat poison. The tanned girl set a pack of tent stakes on the counter and grinned at him, pausing for a long, unsettling moment before saying, “Almost everything.”
She continued to stare while he rang up her items. After he stammered out the total, she tilted her head slightly and replied, “Put it on the Owl Lady’s tab.” His blood ran cold. Cletus twitched backward a half step and flinched when she reached out to take the plastic bag from his hand. She didn’t pull the bag away, no. Her hand lingered there. She let her fingers barely brush against his own as she tilted her head further and asked an innocent question.
“What time does your shift end?”
Chapter 13: Tuesday, 3:09pm
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
“What are we going to do with all this stuff?” Amity held out the plastic bag Luz had pulled from the cashier’s stiff, wide-eyed grasp and gave it a shake, rattling the contents. The gallon bottle of bleach dangled from her other hand as they walked.
Luz laughed and pointed at a little panel low on the side of the truck as they approached, “There’s room for this junk in the toolbox.”
“But,” the green-haired girl leaned forward a bit to point under Luz’s other arm, “What’s the basketball for?”
“Oh, this?” Luz chuckled and dribbled the ball from side to side, sliding her feet to bounce it from one hand to the other between her legs, before she juked around Amity, breathing with noisy, rapid chuffing sounds, grunting loud, exaggerated Hoo!’s and Watch out!’s as she pushed her back into the taller, laughing girl, driving her two steps sideways—Amity raised her arms as Luz ducked underneath her elbows, letting loose a bright, happy sound of surprise—as Luz rotated around her to jump up in the air and fake a shot high above their heads. Time seemed to slow for Amity as she watched; Luz drifted, weightless, her legs curled mid-jump, a brilliant smile on her face as her brown curls floated around her eyes, glints of auburn and rich chocolate shining in the sunlight. She was dazzling, like the sun.
The tanned girl landed with a bounce and grinned up at Amity, her brown eyes sparkling as she reached up to catch the basketball. “This is for later,” she spun the ball between her fingertips, then bounced it on the ground and caught it under an arm, “I have a morning routine—you should join me—step one!” She held up a finger, “Hydration.”
Amity made a confused face.
“Those water bottles we bought this morning?” Luz hinted, pulling an Ahh, right, from the pale girl. “Sixty ounces of water with added electrolytes, vitamins, and minerals to really flush out your system and get your body ready for the day, and then—” the shorter girl waggled her eyebrows and raised a second finger, “Step number the second!” After a dramatic pause, she grinned, “A bit of exercise.”
“Hence the ball?” Amity asked with a smile.
“Hence, the ball,” Luz nodded. She waved across the parking lot, back toward the side of the Travel Stop, “There’s a hoop over there, by the picnic table. I kinda figured you’d wanna let your little goobers out for a bit?”
Amity nodded, “I– I’d like— Yes, is that alright?” She dipped her head with a shy little smile, and a hesitant laugh. “I thought we might have to leave soon— If— if we have time, I’d like to give them a check-up.”
“Is two hours enough?” Luz held up her empty wrist and mimed glancing at a watch, “We should try to be on the road by five.”
Oh, good, more time to stretch out, Amity thought as she smiled. “Yes, that’s more than enough time,” the pale girl ran her fingers back through her wind-swept hair, tucking green locks behind her ear, “Thank you, Luz.” Then she paused and tilted her head, “Is that enough time for your routine? Are there more than two steps?”
Luz chuckled and bounced the basketball as they walked, “Yeah, there’s three steps. Lots’a water, a bit of exercise aannnd…” She glanced up at Amity with a sly grin, “Any guesses?”
They reached Hooty, and Amity turned to face the shorter girl, “Uhh… like a— like a protein shake? Or maybe a V8?” At Luz’s slowly spreading grin, she waved her hands in a defeated shrug, “I don’t know, a Nutrigrain bar?”
Luz laughed and unlocked the small door to the undercarriage toolbox, “Nah, chuggin’ sixty ounces of water? Step three is, like, four trips to the bathroom!”
~
Luz hopped up into the driver’s door and leaned over the seat, tucking her work gloves back into their usual place. She felt a gentle tap-tap at the back of her leg, and looked down to see one of Amity’s robots, its long rectangular body tilted up toward her with its front limbs on the running board at her side. One foreleg hovered beside her knee. It put its leg down when she looked its way, and it waggled its body in a greeting. The flat, circular black screen on its top panel showed the same goopy purple face from the day before, with several white question marks floating above it. She was fairly certain she knew which one it was.
“Oh hey, Min, right?” Luz asked, and the mouth flashed green. “Hey girl, how are ya?” she asked as she turned and held out a hand.
The robot’s on-screen mouth flashed green green as it tapped her palm with a jointed manipulator arm.
“Awesome, hey, can you do me a favor?”
green green green green green
Luz stepped up into the truck to pull the box of donuts off the CB, pausing to glance at the radio for a moment before crouching beside the purple spider-like automaton. “Can you carry these over to your mamá?” Luz asked with a smile, holding the box over the robot. Min danced in place before stretching up taller, eagerly, going still and steady as the girl set the donut box on her broad back. “Thanks, hon, I’ll be right there!” Luz waved to the robot as Min settled her body lower to the ground, twisting her upper leg segments to create a fence-like barrier to prevent the donut box from sliding off as she swiveled on her casters and shot across the parking lot.
Luz perched on the edge of the driver’s seat and switched on the CB radio, unclipping the black handset from the dark metal case before she turned the volume up. A swell of static half-chewed through a sentence, “—that’s a Texas-sized ten-four, over.”
She waited and listened for a moment, in case that call had prompted a response. After several heartbeats of static-drenched silence, she pulled the handset up to her mouth and thumbed the transmit switch, “Breaker, break one-seven, this is the Good Witch callin’ Mama Jackie. Ya got’chyer ears on Jackie Gee, over?” Luz waited for a long half-minute, her heart thudding in her chest as she listened to the pop and crackle of the radio. She sighed and raised the handset to her mouth when a familiar voice broke through the hiss.
“Mama Jay here darlin’, sorry, readin’ the mail with my tunes on, c’mon back.”
Luz grinned, then chuckled as she replied, “Ain’t that a copy. You helped my friend about an hour ago, when she really needed it, and that was— I— I—” she cut short to swallow back a noise she didn't want to broadcast, and sighed. “Thank you. I owe you one, over.”
Mama Jackie cooed over the line, her, “Aww, shucks, ‘t’weren’t nuthin’,” nearly lost in the noisy signal. “Just doin’ what I can, sweetheart, over.”
“You’re too good for us. I’m buyin’, next time we’re at the same watering hole. Three’s and eight’s, Mama Jay, four-ten?” Luz smiled as she hung the handset back on the radio.
“Copy that, hon, three’s and eight’s.”
~
Amity sat at a picnic table in the shade of a tree, the hot late-afternoon sun painting dark shadows across the grass and concrete beside the Travel Stop; her laptop, an unrolled tools pouch, and several project components ate up most of the tabletop as she peered into a half-splayed manipulator joint, a pair of goggles making her golden eyes the size of dinner plates. Of the three error codes thrown this morning, this component had seemed the easiest to fix, but now she wasn’t so sure. She sighed and lifted the goggles from her eyes to rub along the bridge of her nose. This strut base is three millimeters out of place… but why? She could guess how it happened, but not why. Was it a fabrication error? Maybe the foam padding was too thin, and it rattled against the crate?… Or did I forget to check this one before we left? Amity turned toward the other girl and sighed, pausing her investigation to watch the muscles in Luz’s back and shoulders as she tossed the basketball from hand to hand, her tanned skin aglow in the afternoon sunlight, and… and… She blinked, then quickly turned back to the mechanical piece in her hands, her cheeks a brilliant cherry red.
Luz sat facing away from the green-haired girl on the other picnic table bench, idly dribbling the basketball between her feet as she talked to Abe. The little purple robot drifted around the tanned girl’s legs in a wide arc, probably watching her hands and the ball. It’s not like he had eyes, so how could she be sure? And if both girls could clearly see the Flying-J side entrance from where they sat? Surely a coincidence, your honor. Circumstantial evidence.
Luz tipped her head over her shoulder and watched as the pale girl worked a pair of tools into the half-disassembled component on the table before she leaned forward to peer at the readouts on her laptop. She had pulled her hair back into a messy top-knot-slash-half-ponytail, and Luz could see how her hair was actually dyed two different shades of green. So cool, Luz thought. She also caught a glimpse of the natural auburn-colored fuzz at the nape of her neck where her cute undercut had begun to grow in. Amity scrunched her nose as she glanced between the computer and the mechanism in her hands, absentmindedly gnawing on her bottom lip, and Luz gave her a soft, unnoticed smile. Absolutely adorable, she decided once more.
“Hey, Amity?” she called after a minute, getting a distracted hum in response. “Did you drink all your water?” She waved at the three empty 20-ounce bottles at her elbow, just as a segmented purple-and-black manipulator arm thumped onto the table and pushed them onto the ground with a long, drawn-out scrape. Min lurked under the bench behind Luz’s feet, rolling a newly stolen bottle back and forth in the grass, while one of the other machines held an empty bottle overhead as it struggled with the raccoon-proof lid atop the garbage bin beside the building. The third machine stood in the shade of the tree, poking at the bark with a small metal arm. One day, Luz would figure out how to tell these twins apart.
Amity made a face and looked at her, golden eyes enormous in her faceted goggles until she pulled them up to her forehead, squinting and curling her lip in disgust, “I know you let me choose the flavor—thank you, by the way—but that did not taste like strawberry.” She shot a frown at the two and a half bottles full of pinkish-red liquid on her side of the table, giving her empty coffee cup a wistful gaze.
“Oh, yeah,” Luz laughed, “they’re so bad!”
“Then why do you—” The green-haired girl slumped her shoulders and groaned, a pitiful curl in her eyebrows as she asked, “Do I have toooo?” She batted her eyes and tilted her chin, looking up at Luz with golden eyes half-hidden by dark eyelashes, her bottom lip pushed out in an adorable pout. “Pleeeaase?”
Holy shit, this girl is trouble, Luz sucked in a quick breath and counted to five. She almost gave in. “I’m sorry, cariño, finish your meal and you can have a treat,” Luz adopted a patient, parental tone, earning herself an exasperated huff.
“Not sure there’s a treat worth this,” Amity grumbled as she glared at her, but still put a water bottle to her lips and began to drink.
The other girl grinned and twisted, bending forward over the table to lean on crossed arms, “I’ll think of something,” Luz growled in a low, husky tone as she shot her a smoldering wink, and Amity’s face turned scarlet before she could look away.
The side door to the Flying-J creaked open just then, and a greasy-haired man in a too-small polo shirt slipped through the opening into the bright afternoon sun. Both girls watched as Cletus froze like a baby deer in headlights when he glanced their way and caught sight of them sitting at the table nearby. The doorknob slipped from his hand when Luz set the basketball down; he reached back for the handle with a sweaty, desperate look on his face, but the heavy security door slammed shut behind him. When Luz slowly stood to her feet and waved, a crooked smile on her face, he squeaked in fear and hop-waddled over to his beige rust-bucket Rav4 sitting at the curb.
“Most guys’d kill for a shot with two chicks as hot as us,” Luz grumbled as the sweaty black-haired man fumbled his key into the door, pulling it open with a whimper and a frantic glance over his shoulder.
“No thanks,” Amity mumbled as she prodded the joint with another specialized tool.
“You're not gonna turn me down, are ya?” Luz tossed the lighthearted question over her shoulder, just for fun. No reason.
Amity squinted at a readout, humming a “Huh-uh,” in response.
"That's what I thought," Luz watched Cletus squeal his tires on the way out of the parking lot and snorted, “Way too easy.” She bounced the ball again, then looked down at Abe and winked, “See? Like this, and thennnn—” she laughed as she bounced the ball off her bicep and onto her index finger. It wobbled a second later and she yelped as it bounced away. Amity just grinned at the happy sound, content to let the shorter girl play as she continued to dissect the mechanism.
Abe spun in a circle and zipped under the bouncing basketball, catching its downward arc at an angle and speed calculated to send it right back to Luz. The ball slapped into her palms just hard enough to sting. She grinned and crouched beside the shin-high creation, gushing, “Hey, hey! Nice catch buddy!” as she patted him on the top of his black dome. Abe swirled about in circles, before stopping to swing his rear quarters back and forth, as if he were wagging a tail. Luz giggled and held out her fist, “Aren’t you the cutest!” she cooed, and Abe nudged her fist with his front edge.
Watching the little robot wiggle and spin in front of her made Luz picture an excitable Terrier or Labrador, and she had to laugh. “Oh, who’s a good boy? You wanna play, don’t you?” At the word play, the other three robots hitched in place, then swiveled toward Luz with a whine of caster wheels. Min scrambled out from under the picnic table where Amity sat, jostling the green-haired girl with a Whoa, what the— when she bumped up against the unoccupied bench on her way to the small basketball court, dragging the whole table forward an inch. The other two robots rolled over to where Amity sat, playing their forearms across the tabletop and peering up at the pale girl to give a series of wheezing moans as images flashed across their screens.
“What was— what?” Amity blinked and pulled her goggles off, looking around in confusion, “What happened?”
Min crouched in what looked like shame behind the tanned girl’s legs, and Luz knelt beside her to pat her on the back, “It’s okay,” she whispered, then, “Sorry Amity, Min bumped the table on her way over. Is it okay if I play a game with them?”
Amity blinked at Luz, then looked down at Nate and Shawn, still wheezing beside her seat. “Wha… uh, yeah? Sure, that’s fine?” The two robots at her side backed away, then sped around the table to circle the other girl with Min and Abe.
“Are you sure?” Luz chuckled as the robots nudged her legs with their bodies, whirring around her, then she stood up to look at the green-haired girl.
“Yeah, yeah, it’s fine,” Amity said as she rubbed her eyes, “Sorry, I’m almost done.”
“It’s okay, amiga, no stress,” Luz assured her, then turned back to the robots that had assembled in a small line in front of her. Abe looked largely the same as he had the day before, a large boxy rectangle on three black caster wheels, while the other three had eight double-jointed legs attached to their long sides. Nate and Shawn had simple-looking ball-joint fixtures. Min’s “shoulders” were larger; robust, reinforced machinery up and down her limbs. Must be the heavy-lift parts Amity had mentioned, Luz thought as she smiled down at the four automatons.
“Alright, I could teach you guys a little game,” she paused to pat the basketball, “but you’re gonna, uh,” Luz scratched her neck as she stared down at the wheel-limbed robots, “You’re gonna need hands.”
Min leaned back slightly and left her front pair of casters on the ground with a set of sharp clacks. She lifted her forelegs and the ends split into three hinged finger-like extensions. “Wow, cool!” Luz bent down to get a closer look, and Shawn and Nate did the same, discarding their front set of wheels to reveal triangular manipulators. Abe rolled over the abandoned casters, and they stuck to his bottom plate with a zip and a clank, and he spun around the small court faster than before on nine wheels. The four chittered at each other for a moment as Luz stood back up.
“Alright, have you guys heard of Horse?” Luz glanced around, gauging the size of the small area they had to play in as she bounced the ball. A string of rattling clicks and whirring clunks interrupted her instructions, “It’s fairly simple, you—” She turned back to the robots and raised her eyebrows. The three robots with legs had assembled themselves into a crudely-shaped headless creature: Min’s thick boxy body made up the torso and back of the beast, two of her legs on either side joined in a ‘Y’ shape ending with three-fingered feet; Shawn and Nate hung at the “flanks”, two legs on either side tapping against the concrete. Luz laughed when Abe rolled close, and Min tipped down to snag him with a short arm attached to her front plate, lifting him up like the head of some six-legged nightmare stallion. There was a wheezing Hehh-hehh-hehh-hehh noise from somewhere in the middle of the robots, and Abe printed the word Neigh on his glossy black dome.
“I… I love your horse, guys,” Luz said slowly, a grin spreading across her face as green lights flashed across the beast’s purple panels, “but, um,” she covered her mouth and giggled, “We don’t need an actual horse, that’s just the name of the game.” She chuckled when green-red-green flashed across Min’s screen and a frowny face smeared itself across Abe’s dome. “Hey, Amity, do you see these guys?”
“Huh?” Amity looked up and squinted, then shook her head and pulled the goggles up to her forehead, “What… uh… hmm.” She glanced between Luz and the robots, tilting her head in confusion as the purple six-legged monstrosity noisily cantered around the tanned girl. “What are… you doing?”
Luz laughed as she ran a hand back through her hair, “I asked if they knew how to play Horse, and they did this.” The robots clanked and clopped around her again, and Abe nudged her in the back like a horse nosing its rider for sugar cubes. The brown-eyed girl snorted and swatted at the metal creature, hissing, “Stop it.” Amity leaned her chin in the palm of her hand and watched with an amused smile. “Okay, okay!” Luz staggered forward when the robots bumped her with their shoulder, “Fine, look, everybody needs an arm, okay? Everyone who’s gonna play needs to be able to hold the ball.” She held up the basketball and raised an eyebrow as the horse collapsed back to the ground, Nate and Shawn down to six legs each to allow Abe to borrow four. The robots lined up to listen to Luz as she smiled down at them.
“The game’s called Horse because it’s a five-letter word that most children know.” Luz chuckled as the four chittered back and forth for a moment before the word ROBOT scrolled across all four screens. “Heh, sure, we can call it ‘robot’. There’s a few ways it’s played, but the goal is to make your baskets and not get a letter.” She bounced the basketball a few times as she added, “If you miss your shot, you get a letter. If you spell the word ROBOT, then you’re out.” She turned toward the pole-mounted basket and bounced the ball a few more times, then glanced over at Amity. The pale girl was watching still, but had half-hidden her face behind her laptop screen. Luz waggled her eyebrows and called, “Check this out!” just as Amity began to duck down and pretend she wasn’t looking. Golden eyes reappeared just in time to watch her bend her knees and pop upward, letting the ball roll off her fingertips as it arced toward the basket. The ball splannged off the front of the rim and bounced back toward Luz. “Pfff!” the brown-haired girl slapped a hand over her mouth as Amity snorted, and both girls locked eyes for a moment before they began to laugh.
The robots danced from side to side, flashing little smiley faces across their screens, and Luz crouched to pick up the ball, “Okay, okay, I never said I was good at this, alright— but that’s one letter for me.” She bounced the ball once and caught it in her palm, “Who’s next?” She pointed down, “You have to be right here where I was standing.” One of the two identical machines whirred over and held up his arm. “Hey buddy, here you go,” Luz set the ball in his grasp, and stepped to the side, facing the court and Amity across the picnic table. “Whenever you’re ready,” the tanned girl said, and the robot raised the ball.
The basketball swished through the half-missing chain link net. “Great work buddy!” Luz put her fists up in the air and cheered as Amity clapped, “Good job, Shawn!” The little robot flashed green green green as the other units chirped and chittered amongst themselves.
The game progressed smoothly enough, with Luz sinking two baskets before missing another, while the robots all had perfect aim. Luz laughed and congratulated the little machines, telling them, “Okay, I’m going to ask your mamá a question, you guys keep playing. Remember, try to make shots that the others can’t copy.” She walked over to the picnic table and looked at Amity, still fiddling with the same broken component. “Amity, it’s almost time to go.”
Amity sighed and nodded, “Okay. I… Thank you, Luz.” She pushed the goggles up to her forehead and made a face, “Is it bad that I don’t want to get back on the road?”
“Nope, that’s normal!” Luz laughed, watching the other girl crack a smile. “It’s rough driving for so long, and I know it’s boring when you’re riding shotgun.”
“What? No, it—” Amity began to protest.
“You’re not gonna hurt my feelings if you say yes,” Luz waved a hand, unconcerned, “I love Eda to death, but it is monotonous being the passenger when we’re team-driving.” She sighed and rubbed her hands together, “Can’t concentrate on a book because of the radio, I feel bad taking a nap, it’s— it’s hard.” She gave Amity a fond look and a smile, “But it’s gettin’ time.”
Amity nodded and sighed, “I’ll get this packed up.”
They both paused to watch the robots play with the basketball. They had begun to make increasingly trickier shots: Abe threw the ball straight up in the air and they watched it almost float into the basket a few seconds later. Nate tossed the ball at the rim with such a sideways spin that it circled the hoop five times before slipping through. Shawn threw the ball at the ground and bounced it up through the basket. “That’s not— it has to go through the top,” Luz began to say, her hands cupped over her mouth, “but…” before the other robots began to repeat the shot. She sighed. “One last go, guys, then we better pack up.”
Min clamped the ball in her fingers, pulled back, and launched it toward the middle of the backboard. The basketball struck dead center and the eight-inch steel pipe supporting the hoop squealed as it bent backward like a pool noodle, the basketball ricocheting off over the Flying-J and into the distance. Luz jumped to her feet with an “Oh shit!” as Amity ducked her head and yelped. A faint crunch wafted on the breeze a few moments later. Min crouched, then slid under the picnic table to hide. “Shawn, Nate, bend that back straight, would you?” Luz said as she ran for the front of the Flying-J, trying to see what was on the far side of the building. An abandoned barn-like restaurant sat on the far side of the road, a gaping hole torn through the wooden awning above its boarded-up front doors. “Okay,” the brown-haired girl said, waving at the robots, “Let’s get back to Hooty.”
~
Luz leaned back against the truck’s dark brown side panel as the numbers slowly ticked upward on the gas pump. She rubbed her face with her hands and sighed, then shoved them back in her pants pockets.
“Okay— okay, right. Thanks Edric. What? You’re just gonna say that and not expl… okay. Whatever. Re— Really. Thanks,” Amity’s voice filtered through the open window above her, and she tipped her head back to watch the green-haired girl lean out the window, the satellite phone still pressed to her ear. “No, no, don’t— yeah. Thanks. I love you too. Bye.” The pale girl sighed and flipped the antenna down to deactivate the device. “Edric bought the building, no questions asked. He said he’d always wanted to be a chef,” she leaned her chin on her crossed forearms and grinned down at Luz when the brown-haired girl scoffed.
“Would you eat at his restaurant?” She asked, looking up at the golden-eyed girl.
Amity frowned and shook her head, “Nope.” She scowled a bit, and muttered, “He also said it wasn’t the first building he’d bought for me this week, whatever that meant.”
Luz made a face and snorted, “Is it your birthday soon?”
“No?”
“What an odd gift, here, have a building,” Luz used a funny voice, and Amity giggled. “I saw this skyscraper, and it made me think of you,” she added, drawing a laugh from her companion. Then she coughed, and said, “It was so tall, and it had such pale marble, it was, uh, it was… pretty.” They grinned at each other for a moment, Luz's face darkening slightly as a slight blush bloomed high on the pale girl's cheeks, Amity’s eyes growing soft as she opened her mouth to say something, but—
The gas pump pinged and the nozzle handle beside Luz snapped into its off position, and she jumped with a small shriek. “Did that scare you?” Amity asked with a grin.
“No,” Luz huffed, screwing the gas cap on harder than strictly necessary before stabbing the pump nozzle back into its cradle.
“It did! You’re a ‘fraidy cat, aren’t you?”
“NO!”
Amity laughed at her red-faced excuses all the way back to the Interstate.
Notes:
a bit o' trucker lingo in this'n:
10-4: roger that/affirmative
Break/Breaker: asking for permission/excusing yourself to begin talking
one-seven: East-Westbound truckers use channel 17, while North-Southbound truckers use channel 19 as "public" channels.
Got your ears on: are you listening?
readin' the mail: listening to the CB chatter without intending to participate
c'mon back/over: Please respond/I'm done talking
watering hole: truck stop/bar/place to eat
3's and 8's: well wishes/safe travels
4-10: did you receive/do you understand?
Chapter 14: Tuesday, 4:01pm PT / 5:01 MT
Chapter Text
Emira watched the numbers on the screen tick down to ‘10’ while she hummed an absentminded tune under her breath. The elevator car bounced slightly to a stop, then the mirror-bright doors hissed open with a cheerful ding and she walked across the lobby toward her sister’s bank-vault-shaped laboratory door. She began to sing, having hummed her way back around to the beginning of the chorus. “Life is a highway, I wanna ride it—” Emira blinked and growled, “Dammit.” She had called the Night-Owl Trucking office earlier that morning to discuss payment details and that damn earworm had been playing while she spoke to Eda, several other voices in the background singing along loudly and off-key. It had been stuck in her head ever since.
She gave herself a savage shake and forcibly thought of a different tune—the mnemonic she and Edric used to get their little sister’s keycode entered properly—while she paused with her finger poised over the keypad beside the reinforced steel door. Emira punched in a quick twenty-digit number, mouthing the first few as she went, oh one one eight, nine-nine-nine, eight eight one, the blip and bleep of the keypad a short chip-tune accompaniment to the string of numbers in her mind. Once Amity’s unnecessarily long access code had been accepted by the entryway monitor, she pressed her thumb to the biometric scanner. It beeped twice, and the door unlocked with a rapid series of loud, mechanical chunks. She stepped into an active disaster area.
Edric had taken over Amity’s wide-open motion testing range in his mad scramble to prepare a set of decoy crates. He knelt beside one of the steel-banded wooden containers, the end of his blue necktie tucked into the front of his dress shirt. Bits of black foam stuck to his clothes and his hair, and he had either smudged grease or black ink across his cheek at some point in the last few hours. Emira breathed in, paused, then gave a few shallow sniffs. Was something burning? she briefly wondered, glancing about for signs of smoke. A small pile of computer towers and laptops stood nearby, half-buried under empty plastic clamshell containers and loosely coiled black cables tipped with golden connectors. A waist-high pile of three-inch-thick shipping foam sheets had tipped over, spilling underneath a worktable covered with half-assembled control units and sensors, the remaining tabletop littered with tools.
“—broke a building?” Edric squealed in delight, a boxy gray satellite phone pressed between his shoulder and his ear. “Nice job, Mittens!” he gushed with a wide grin on his face. He snorted in a choked bit of laughter as he glanced in his twin’s direction and nodded upward, ‘sup?, then he bent back over a mid-sized computer tower laying on a thick sheet of dark gray foam. He lazily traced around the computer’s shape with a white pencil as he added, “I didn’t realize destruction of private property was one of their prime directi— oh, an accident?” He paused for a fraction of a second to switch the pencil from one hand to the other, shrugging, “No worries, I’ll buy it as soon as we get off the phone.”
Accident? A spike of concern shot through her chest as Emira leaned forward to catch his eye and mouthed, What happened?
“Yeah, yeah, no, it’s fiiine, don’t worry!” Her brother promised their itinerant sister as he held up a finger, like, just a sec, then gave Emira a quick head-shake of dismissal, a half-smushed expression that read no problem on his face as he tried to reassure her while also keeping the phone tightly pressed to his ear. “Send me the address. Yeah, uh-huh.” He twisted on his toes and leaned over to pull an open laptop close, the fingers of one hand dancing across the keyboard, “Hold on, repeat that? Okay. Uh-huh. Utah? Gross.” A map opened in a black browser window, and a satellite image of a wooden building with a sprawling parking lot filled the screen. “Oh, it’s a restaurant?” Edric gasped in surprise, “I always wanted to be a chef!”
Emira snorted into one hand and he shot her a dirty look and a middle finger. She leaned over his shoulder to look at the building, then gave him a smarmy grin, “Food poisoning for here or to go?” she whispered into his other ear, and he set his pencil down to give her a second Jersey Salute.
“Seriously, not a problem,” He said into the phone as he pushed Emira away with one of his extended fingers, rubbing his knuckles against her jaw and trying to stick his fingertip in her nose before she managed to stand upright, smacking his hand aside as she turned toward the nearby crate. “For really-real, Mittsy,” Edric chuckled, shaking his head as he reached for his white pencil, “I mean, ‘s’not even the first building I’ve bought for you this week,” he remarked as he drew another white line on the dark-colored shipping foam. He blinked, then muttered, “Oops.”
Emira wheeled around and slapped him on the shoulder as she hissed, “Shut up!” through clenched teeth.
Edric flinched and fumbled the phone, snapping, “Oi, fuck off!” before he glared at his twin and apologized to his sister. “No, sorry, not you, Mittens, our other idiot is here.” He made an obscene gesture at Emira, this time one that required both hands.
She stuck her tongue out.
“Emira says Hiiiiiiii—” he crooned in a mocking tone, receiving a middle finger in return, but then he pulled a wicked grin and winked, “—and also to give Luz a big ol’ smoochy kiss for us, okay?” The twins shared a smirk as he hastily added, “No-tongue-safe-travels-love-you-bunches, byeeee!” He pulled the sat-phone away from his ear and cut the call with a bleep. “Jerk! Don’t slap me,” he hissed, smacking her on the leg as she paced back and forth.
“Idiot!” she shot over her shoulder, “Think before you speak, sometime,” Emira growled.
“Bitch,” Edric rolled his eyes as he rubbed a palm against his shoulder, “What’s your fukken damage?”
“You’re the bitch,” Emira pointed a blue-polished fingernail in his face, “You’re gonna fuck this up!”
Edric gasped and balled his fists on his hips as he shot back, “I will not.”
“Yes, you will,” Emira threw her hands upward, like, are you shitting me, and cocked an eyebrow, “You talk too much.”
Edric’s mouth fell open and he covered it with both hands for a moment. “I— I do not,” he sniffed and tilted his chin up and away, crossing his arms with a huff, clearly offended.
“You’re gonna run your big mouth,” Emira leaned forward, glaring, “and ruin our plan.”
“I would— Never in— As if—”
“Just—” she rubbed at her forehead and sighed, “Just give me the phone next time she calls?”
“Give you the finger next time she calls,” Edric mumbled with a curled lip and a sassy wobble to his head as he tapped at his laptop. Music filled the room at the press of a button, then quieted down to a background level as he adjusted a slider. “She called me for a reason, you know,” He snipped at her as she walked past, her arms crossed tightly under her chest.
“Oh? And what was that?”
He sighed deeply, then grumbled, “You were… unavailable.”
She laughed, “I knew it.”
“And because I’m good at fixing the messes I make— Y’know what?” Edric scoffed, moving the computer tower off the foam and picking up a utility knife, “You’re banned for life from my restaurant! Good luck finding a romantic meal for two when you finally stop being such a useless bisexual.” He set the knife back down and pulled a smartphone from his pants pocket as he muttered, “Oh yeah, my restaurant.” He glanced at the address displayed on the laptop as he slowly thumb-typed a message, narrating aloud while he ignored Emira’s long, drawn-out groan, “Buy this… building… right now… comma… don’t care… three dollar signs… thanks… you’re… the best… drinks… tonight… question mark… ell… emm… kay.”
Emira glared at the far window wall for a short time as he worked, mumbling along with the words to the song. She watched the movement of the city as she took long, slow breaths, trying to settle her heartbeat. Eventually she sighed and tipped her head to peer over her shoulder. He had cut the foam to fit around the computer, and was cutting smaller slices to use as shims to hold it nice and snug. “Did you talk to Dad?” she asked her brother.
“Yuh,” he grunted, his tongue half out of his mouth as he used one of his two brain cells to not cut his fingers with the knife.
She snorted, and turned to watch him work. “He has to manufacture a few parts for Friday.”
“Yeh,” Edric repeated. With the last shim in place, he leaned back on his haunches and slapped his knees. “That’ll do, pig,” he said softly before glancing up to meet his sister’s worried gaze. “You think this’ll really work?” he asked.
“The crates?”
“No,” he made a circle with his hand, “well— All of it.”
She shrugged. “Dad seems confident.”
“Cool,” Edric patted his legs, “cool cool.”
Emira clicked her tongue and waggled her hand, “Like… seventy-percent sure.”
The green-haired man slipped one hand under the foam-wrapped computer and lifted it with a groan. “Slightly less cool.”
“Still cooler than you,” she smirked as he gently set the tower down inside the crate, then picked up another computer from the floor while he kicked a new piece of foam back to where he had been working.
“Whatever, Ira,” he scoffed, and she looked around at the mess he’d made of their sister’s meticulously organized workshop.
“She’s gonna murder you when she sees this mess,” Emira said with a smile, pulling her long braid over her shoulder; running her fingertips across the loops and knots of her hair had always been a comforting sensation when she felt stressed.
“I’ll clean it,” Edric grumbled as he leaned over the computer, drawing its shape on the foam.
“Your concept of clean is not the same as hers,” the green-haired woman chuckled as she traced the shapes of her braid.
Edric sighed, pausing long enough to give her a flat glare, “I could pretty-please use your help, then, to delay my inevitable grisly fratricide.” She leaned and waved her hand in a jaunty salute, earning herself a snort. He moved the computer to the side and began cutting the foam along his pencil marks.
He worked in silence for a time, the twins listening to the music in a companionable quiet before Emira cleared her throat, voicing the question on her mind in a low, hesitant tone: “Was she okay?”
“Huh?”
She repeated the question, louder than before.
“Who?”
Emira glanced at Edric, and rolled her eyes, Right, two brain cells, then clarified, “Amity. Was she alright? She sounded awful earlier.”
“Oh yeah, yeah-yeah, she’s cooooollll, what in— fuck,” her brother trailed off as he placed the computer in the foam cutout and found it didn’t fit. He rubbed his eyes and whined in frustration.
“You sure?” Emira crouched beside him and turned the computer around, letting it slip easily into place. Being ‘cool’ only two hours after a phone call from Mother?
“Thanks, Em. Yeah,” Edric nodded, eyeing his work again to see if he needed to cut shims, “I mean it, she sounded… happy,” he added, glancing at her for a moment to gauge her expression.
“That’s great,” Emira smiled. Luz was a certified miracle worker… and just what Mittens needs. She stepped back as Edric prepared to lift the foam-wrapped computer, and she glanced around to make sure she wasn’t going to trip herself on anything Edric had left on the floor. She hadn’t noticed the cardboard box tucked beside the crate until now, but from this angle she could see what looked like wadded-up clothing stuffed around panes of thick greenish glass. She motioned toward the items strewn about the floor. “What is all this stuff?” she asked.
Edric glanced at the floor on either side before approaching the crate, “I stole it from the mailroom.” He grinned when Emira huffed in irritation.
“Can’t steal what you own, dumbass,” she grumbled, taking a step to the side as he leaned into the crate again, placing the foam-wrapped computer beside the other, filling up an even layer of space inside. He waved at the foam sheets on the floor and she placed one in his hand as she muttered, “One day you’ll understand.”
“Fine!” He rolled his eyes and set the foam sheet on top of the computers, “I borrowed supplies from the mailroom.” He turned and pointed at his messy workspace, “Packing peanuts, shipping foam sheets, duct tape—”
Emira hummed and nodded, “I see.”
He continued as if she hadn’t interrupted, “—yardstick, cutting mat, X-Acto Knife and spare blades, rubber cement—”
“You’re enjoying yourself, aren’t you?” She grinned when he ignored her.
“—two-sided tape, staple gun, glue sticks, had to get a box of nails too, for the—”
“I haven’t seen you this happy since the second grade,” Emira nudged his shoulder and laughed.
“It’s like arts and crafts, Em!” He gushed as he pulled a thick pane of glass from the cardboard box beside the crate and set it on top of the foam, pushing it up against the cushioned inside wall of the crate, “Y’know,” Edric shrugged, “with a hint of larceny for flavor.” He set another pane of glass beside the first, then covered them both with another sheet of foam. The twins looked at each other and nodded. This decoy crate was half-full.
Emira nodded her head toward the diminishing stack of computers. “Where’d you, uh,” she began.
Edric grinned, “Dearest mother’s assistant’s office.”
“That explains the MacBooks,” Emira frowned, “but—”
“Also, Accounting.”
Emira made a face that said, well played, and gave her brother a nod of approval.
“I took their mice and power cords, too,” Edric confessed with a leer, drawing a delighted snort from his sister.
“And the glass?” Emira asked, leaning close to examine the green-tinted panes, “Why does this look familiar?”
Edric chuckled, long and low, “They’re from her bedroom window.”
“Her bedr—” Emira twisted upright to face him, “—at the mansion?”
“Yyyup,” he replied, popping the ‘p’ sound.
She put a hand on her forehead in shock, and laughed in disbelief, “So her room is just—”
“Exposed to the elements, yeah,” Edric gave a wicked grin, and they both laughed. “I shut her door so if anything got in, it wouldn’t get loose in the house.”
Emira chuckled, crossing her arms under her chest, “Yeah, that makes sense.”
Her brother shrugged, “I’d hate for some li’l guy to get lost and starve to death.” He had always cared more about cute, fuzzy animals than the rest of the family. Edric glanced around in exaggerated caution before he leaned close to whisper, always one to be dramatic, “I smeared peanut butter on her balcony railing.”
Emira let slip a decidedly unladylike bark of laughter at the whole situation, “Oh my god, Ed!” She half-turned to face him and studied his profile. “If this doesn’t pan out, you’re gonna hafta go into hiding.”
Edric nodded as well, then a smirk slowly spread across his face, “Good thing we already know someone in Witness Protection.”
Emira made a noise of distaste and rolled her eyes, “Leave that poor man alone.” He made a face like, nope, and shook his head. “So, what’s next?” she asked.
“I start small; I get him to finally say yes to coffee,” Edric answered, an incredulous tone in his voice, “Duh.” He crossed his arms and sighed.
“With the—” Emira smacked him lightly on the arm with the back of her hand, and motioned toward the half-empty container, “I meant with the crate.”
“Oh. Right,” Edric paused to brush the wayward scraps of black foam from his shirt front and his half-rolled sleeves, and Emira reached out a hand to knock a few pieces out of his hair. “I mounted accelerometers to each corner of the inside, audio and light sensors along the edges,” he pointed as he spoke, “and the control unit on the bottom; then I spray-glued a layer of foam on the inside.” He gently kicked at the loose cables stacked beside the crate, “Wireless setup’s always been a hassle, but Dad said to just daisy-chain the units which made it super easy. Wish I’d known that trick earlier,” he grumbled.
“You’re putting a lot of effort into this,” Emira narrowed her eyes as she watched her brother shrug, “If I didn’t know better, I’d think Amity was your favorite sister.”
Edric laughed before a serious expression fell across his features. “If we do this right, we can finally get the proof we need to nail those expedited shipping fuckers,” the man growled, before he locked eyes with her, “We’re the only ones who get to mess with Amity.” Emira snorted in laughter, then he grinned, “Dad can too, I guess. He said to store his new power cells in shock-proof cases to ‘prevent any unwanted explosions’,” he used air quotes along with a fairly accurate impression of their father's stilted manner of speech.
“Any unwanted what?” Emira blinked.
Edric waved a dismissive hand, “I hadn’t planned to ship any.”
“Does Amity have any?”
He shrugged, “Probably, but she’s a smart cookie. As for cargo, I’d had the idea earlier,” he said as he walked over to the worktable for a drink of water, “about taking some of Mother’s favorite paintings and vases from the mansion—”
Emira gasped aloud with an excited smile, then almost immediately frowned and added, “No, wait—”
“Yeah, same. It was the whole reason I went home,” he admitted with a shake of his head, “but then I felt bad about destroying legitimate pieces of art.”
Emira nodded, “Yeah, oh, such a good idea, though.“
“Right?” Edric scoffed, “She loves that jade collection... So I had’ta come up with something else.”
“Yup.”
“I figured I’d go around and collect office equipment from some of her enablers,” the green-haired man waved toward the pile of laptops and computer towers.
“Mm-hmm, good choice,” Emira hummed.
“But then… I had an idea,” he tugged at one bit of fabric in the cardboard box that was no longer weighed down by panes of glass, and when he pulled it free and snapped it open, Emira recognized one of her mother’s frequently-worn vicuña wool sweaters. Extremely expensive and certainly more luxurious than simple cashmere, but not borderline illegal like the Tibetan Antelope overcoats deep in her mother’s walk-in closet. And her dearly demented brother had been using it like a mover’s blanket. “I thought I’d pack some of her favorite clothes and shoes,” Edric admitted with a grin, “and if they get ruined in-transit? C’est la vie.”
Emira gasped, a wide grin on her face.
“I bet you know which ones she’d hate to lose,” Edric said as he folded the delicate fabric and placed it in the crate, “Wanna help?”
“Yeah, c’mon!” Emira motioned toward the door, “She’s got some expensive pieces upstairs, in case she gets a surprise visitor.”
Chapter 15: Tuesday, 5:33pm
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
Shadows flicked across the long nose of the truck from the power-line towers atop the ridge on the westbound side of the road; the slopes of the hills there were a dusty tan streaked with layers of red and pink, and dotted with small green shrubs and short, spindly trees. Amity’s greater portion of the wide valley looked far more inviting: the mountain range to the east tinted blue with distance and painted with the evening sunlight; actual patches of green grass and stands of trees beyond the rocky ground sprouting dry, scrubby weeds that ran beside the road; the occasional small creek, a glistening splash of blue and cloudy sky reflected from above. Luz patted her hands on the steering wheel in time to the James Gang trio’s funky beat from the radio, vocalizing a bowmp! bah-dah-bow! along with the instrumentals as she bobbed her head. Every so often she shared a glance and a grin with Amity.
The green-haired girl studied her notes for her presentation, muttering aloud as she typed details regarding her overnight diagnostics and early-afternoon examinations. She re-read her opening remarks—such as they were—deliberating on the words and phrases she would have to say in front of so many people in the hopes of continuing her work. She hated this, the— the begging to be allowed to pursue her dream. Amity wasn’t so obtuse as to not recognize the privilege of her position, the opportunities she had available to her, but… but having the produce of her blood, sweat, and tears in the uncaring hands of so many faceless businessmen? She remembered her mother—no, Odalia, she scolded herself with a frown—telling her that her project would be funded by Blight Foundation grants based on B.I. shareholder interest. If you can’t articulate why someone should use your product, then it probably shouldn’t exist, Odalia had snapped, ignoring her husband’s voiced disapproval while she drained her second flute of champagne. It had made sense at the time—not that she had had any recourse—and if she ever wanted to get out on her own, she couldn’t just depend on a blank check based on her last name. But now? After yesterday and this morning? Amity frowned again, deeper than before. It was just another leash around my neck, wasn’t it? she couldn’t help but wonder.
Luz cleared her throat softly to draw the other girl’s attention, then nodded toward the laptop. “You’re looking at the results from this morning, yeah?” When Amity nodded, Luz held an excited curiosity in her gaze, “Cool, so, uh, how are our babies doing? Are they enjoying the trip?” Golden eyes blinked her way twice in surprise, then the tanned girl stammered a quick, “Uh, your, I meant, how are your little guys doing? They’re not—” She gave a nervous chuckle, “not mine. Whoops, heh. What’s the, uh, prognosis, Doc?”
“They’re… good,” Amity offered, still blinking, “Yeah. They’re healthy. Perfect condition, really, thanks to you. The only issues I had were with some spare parts.” She ran her fingers through her hair to push strands of green back over her ear, and she watched Luz nod and say, Cool. That’s great. She wasn’t offended in the slightest by the other girl calling them “our”, she could see how much fun she’d had playing basketball with them. If anything, it— it made her feel— she felt— she didn’t know the words to describe the warmth in her chest, at the thought of Luz caring about her work—or about her—at being fond enough of what she’d created to feel the slightest bit of attachment. She had always hoped— she looked out the window and just smiled, smiled, smiled.
Luz settled into a loose tangle of other trucks and smaller vehicles trending eastbound along Interstate 70. There was a steady stream of cars and minivans that passed Hooty, most going somewhere north of the posted speed limit. Amity had looked worried at first, but Luz assured her they were on schedule and making good time. Speed limit’s eighty, which means most people do ninety-five, ‘s’just how she goes, Luz had shrugged. The other trucks were moving, at least, which suited them both just fine. The Utah summer evening was warm, and both girls hung their company jackets on their seat backs, their windows rolled down just enough to catch a breeze. They were fairly well rested—“bright-eyed and bushy-tailed” as Eda would say—with a blue sky full of fluffy white clouds out to the horizon ahead of them, and the orange evening sun beginning to set over Luz’s shoulder; it promised to be a clear night for travel.
The brown-haired girl caught sight of a pair of headlights that rapidly approached in her mirrors, and she nodded toward her window, “Watch this guy,” she said as she rolled her eyes, “He’s gonna slip in front of us, and then get right back over to pass Jolly Green up there,” she waved toward the grocery chain supply truck ahead of them with the illustration of the Green Giant mascot painted on the back doors.
Sure enough, the little black BMW roared past and slipped in front of them for a handful of seconds before swerving back into the passing lane, the foreign car’s engine spluttering into a high-pitched whine as the driver put his foot to the floor. Amity watched the vehicle disappear beyond the trucks ahead and made a soft huh noise in her chest. Luz glanced her way and grinned, “Spend enough time on the road, you’ll get a feel for the other drivers.”
A white-panel work van slowly advanced in the fast lane, pulling a few car lengths ahead of Hooty. A slight rise in the land combined with a general eastward curve robbed the van of its excess momentum, and soon it paced the big rig just ahead of their front quarter panel. They approached a line of hills covered with coarse brown grass out Amity’s window, and the two-lane river of concrete flowed around the swell of the land. The radio played a classic country tune, and Luz sang along with a wide grin on her face, glancing at Amity and winking every time Willie Nelson mentioned his friends. “We’re the best of friends,” she crooned, drawing another laugh from the green-haired girl beside her as she made a face and added, “Such good friends! Insisting that the world keep turning our way, and our way, is on—”
The song suddenly paused, leaving Luz to squawk a surprised “the road agh—!” all alone as the brown-haired girl’s jacket pocket began to harmonize a chorus of Aaaah’s over a drumbeat rhythm. The lead singer warbled and wailed an octave higher than the rest, blending in with the electric guitars that soon joined in. “Oh, Witchy Woman, that’d be Eda calling,” Luz pulled her phone out and passed it to Amity when the taller girl held out her hand and wiggled her fingers, like, gimme. “Speaker, please,” she said as she rolled up her window, keeping her eyes on the road as the pale girl swiped up on the picture of Eda winking and giving a pair of finger guns, then pressed a button on-screen. They heard a crackle of static when Amity closed her window, then faint, tinny music filled the cabin from the other end of the line.
“Heyyy, kiddo,” Eda’s familiar drawl spilled from the phone in Amity’s hand.
“Eda!” Luz exclaimed, a wide grin on her face. She tried to sound surprised at hearing the tall woman’s voice, which didn’t fool anyone. Eda chuckled, and Amity watched Luz smile out toward the traffic ahead and gave her a small, fond grin of her own.
“How ya doin’?” came a warm, raspy question.
“No, no,” the tanned girl chuckled and snapped her fingers, shooting a finger gun at the phone, “How you doin’?” She gave a sly, side-eye to her passenger and winked.
Amity covered her mouth and snorted as Eda gave a throaty chuckle, and an, “Alright, down girl.”
“You’re on speaker, Eda,” Luz said as she shifted gears, her left foot popping the clutch bar twice, pressing it halfway for a moment before slipping the stick forward, “Just so ya know.” Hooty growled into a higher gear, riding the slight downward slope of the road as the white work van drew ahead by several lengths.
“Oh?” the older woman hummed, “Is that a warning?” Luz and Amity gave a What? and a Huh? respectively. “You think I’m gonna embarrass you or somethin’?”
Luz scoffed, “Well,” then she and Amity shared a pointed look.
“Or d’ya think I’m gonna badmouth our client?”
“You would never,” Luz interrupted with a frown.
Eda sighed wistfully, “That lovely girl,” and Amity couldn’t help placing a hand over her heart as she uttered a soft aww, “whose sister paid us in advance?” the woman confessed. Amity considered whether she should let that hurt her feelings, then shrugged. Who had time for philosophy?
Meanwhile, Luz blinked; utterly confused. “She did? Why would she do that?”
Then Eda’s voice changed, a darker tone slipping into her words, “That same girl who was giving you looks of such…” she chuckled, sounding impressed, “intense longing—”
The entirety of Amity’s face turned a glistening red as she squeaked, “Wait.”
“‘S’not like you weren’t doing the same thing though, holy shit.”
Luz grit her teeth and hissed, “Eda!”
“I swear—” the woman in question laughed, “I thought she was gonna drag you onto the countertop and have her way w—”
“EDA!” Luz hit a very high note, her knuckles white around the steering wheel, and Amity tried to hide her face in her arms while still holding the phone up in the air as Eda just cackled. “I regret everything,” the shorter girl groaned.
Eda snorted through a burst of static, “Oh please, you’ve been giddy as a schoolgirl.” Luz hated how certain she sounded.
“I regret—” Luz began, opening and closing her mouth a few times before settling on, “—answering the phone!”
“Yeah, no,” Eda muttered absentmindedly, sounding for all the world like she was examining her fingernails, “that I’d believe.” Luz watched the red-streaked hills scroll by the truck out Amity’s window while the air shimmered above the pale girl with the heat of her embarrassment. After a long moment, Eda repeated her earlier question with a grin in her voice, “So, how ya dooooiiin’?”
Luz sighed, and the older woman just laughed. “We left Richfield around five,” she guided the truck through a shallow curve, then added, “We should hit Grand Junction before nine for a lunch stop, then push on through the Rockies by midnight.”
“Good work, kiddo.” Eda cleared her throat, and it seemed like her voice turned to face the other girl, “How’re you holdin’ up, kid?”
“I’m—” Amity squeaked, then coughed, “I’m… alright. Thanks— uh— for asking?”
“Luz treatin’ ya right?” Eda asked, sounding as if she already knew the answer and as if she were digging for gossip.
“Yes,” the pale girl said with zero hesitation, “yes, she is.” She caught Luz’s eye for a moment and gave her a grateful look. Luz blushed and had to turn away; Amity thought it was adorable.
“I knew she would,” the gray-haired woman sounded absurdly pleased with herself. Then she made an Oh, and a click changed the sound of her voice, a hollow echoing tone from going on speaker herself as she added, “I’m gonna send Luz a text with my cell and the office phone numbers, just so you have ‘em too.” There was a rummaging noise from her end of the line, and two thumps and a quiet groan like the woman was stretching. “Make sure you save ‘em on your phone.”
“Get’chyer feet off the desk,” Luz grumbled quietly, earning herself a distracted Hush, you. Her phone made a sound like a sad trombone as it vibrated in Amity’s palm, then a message appeared on-screen.
“Thank you, Eda,” Amity said as she pulled her phone from her jacket pocket, “That’s a good idea.”
“I have some, occasionally,” the woman said with a smirk in her voice.
“Periodically,” Luz quipped, and she laughed when a man’s voice filtered through the phone line, dimmed with an unknown distance from Eda’s desk, Annually!
Eda sighed a long-suffering, drawn-out exhale—the kind Amity heard her sister make around her brother quite often, now that she thought about it—before the woman grunted, “Shut it, Steve.”
Luz grinned and yelled, “Hey Steve!” then turned to Amity and whispered, “He’s our mechanic,” as the man in question called back, Hey Luz!
“Don’t you have anything better to do?” Eda growled, a squeak and a scraping noise from her end of the line, and Amity imagined her pulling her feet off her desk and spinning around in an old office chair to face the man.
No ma’am, came the man’s soft response, his voice growing louder as he walked closer to Eda, “I’m just waitin’ for, uh, Miss Lilith.”
“Miss—” Eda scoffed, “Why d’you sound like a suck-up?” Luz and Amity shared a glance and a quiet laugh. More vehicles drew alongside Luz’s side of the truck, and the white work van drifted into the slower lane ahead of them to let the faster drivers pass. The road curved in a sharp bend around a cliffside out Amity’s side of the truck, a tree-lined dirt service road leading up to a tunnel cut through the stone.
“You’re on— there’s— isn’t Luz with a client?” Steve sounded put out and confused.
“Yes,” Luz called out, but Eda was louder, “Yeah, but she already knows we’re a bunch of morons, so—”
“Well, I don’t know if Lily would want your client to know her nickname,” the man replied with a bit of heat, “Not ta’ mention, I was tryn’a make it sound like you ran a reputable shop.”
“How— how dare you!” Eda growled, drawing another laugh from the two girls as her voice grew heated in faux outrage. “I will not have you besmirching my bad name!”
“Lily’s back? That’s great!” Luz gave Amity a shy shrug, softly admitting, “I was worried Eda would be by herself for too long.”
“I’ve worked too hard and too long to make people think I’m a hard ass, and here you go, undermining—” Eda cut off, her voice going soft in half a moment, “Yeah, they got in early this morning, and—”
A muffled slam filtered through the line, like a door being thrown open to bounce off a cement wall, and a number of quick footsteps echoed before an angry voice snarled, Pwy sy’n gweiddi, a pham!
“Ah shit, she woke up,” the older woman grumbled, then the girls heard a loud thump as Eda put her hand over the mouthpiece to yell, “Kiki! Hush, I’m on the phone!”
Paid â gweiddi arna! the other woman yelled as Steve tried to protest, “English, Kiki, or slow down at least! I couldn’t understand half of that!” She followed up with a rapid-fire burst of Rydych chi’n siarad fel melin bupur, mae’n amser gadael!
Amity blinked in confusion and Luz just groaned a soft, “Omigawd Kiki, whyyyy.”
More footsteps, then a louder, “Ahm hungreh! Wurr’s Lilith, ah cannae wayte anneh longer!”
“Hold on, okay? We’ll go in a sec.”
“Dinnae think ahm nou’ way-steen’ away!”
“What… is… going on?” Amity asked Luz with a worried look on her face, and Luz sighed, “Half my co-workers are psychotic?”
Eda sighed and muffled the noise in the background as best she could, “Alright, kid, ya got my numbers now. Call me if you need anything, ya hear?”
“I will, I— I promise,” Amity replied with a nod the gray-haired woman couldn’t see.
“Good,” Eda said before Steve leaned in close to the phone, his voice distorted with proximity, “Real quick, how’s Hooty holdin’ up, Luz? Ow, stop pulling!”
“Ah nihd food, yeah gian’ git!”
“He’s hootin’ along, eatin’ a lot of bugs,” the tanned girl laughed, winking at Amity’s quiet eww as her two associates on the phone chuckled, “I’ll check his fluids when we stop for lunch.”
“Great! Gotta go get dinner before I get murdered.”
“Gwell hwyr na hwyrach!” screeched the angriest woman Amity had ever heard.
Eda sighed as overlapping footsteps retreated with a muffled argument between the man and the other woman, “Keep up the good work, kiddo. I’ll give ya a holler tomorrow, same-time my-time.”
“Your time?” Luz gave a long, drawn-out groan before grumbling, “Fine.”
Eda scoffed, then gave a soft, “Drive safe, Luz. Three’s and eight’s.”
“Ten-four,” Luz saluted the road ahead, “Bye, Eda!” Amity glanced down at the phone and hovered a finger over the end call button as she offered a “Bye” of her own.
“Byeee!” the older woman called out, then cut the line with a click.
Amity sat in silence for a moment as she absorbed… everything. Luz gave her a guilty shrug and offered, “So, um, that’s my work family? And they’re… they’re nice… uh… for the most part? Most of them? When they’re not hangry, at least.” The brown-haired girl shook her head and laughed, earning herself a soft smile. “I mean, we’re all a little weird, right? And Eda says us weirdos hafta stick together,” Luz added in a wistful voice.
“I guess you are a little weird,” Amity said carefully, her eyes crinkled in good humor as Luz put a hand over her chest and whispered, You wound me! “But…” the pale girl held the smartphone out for Luz, bouncing it around in her palm to turn it toward the other girl, “I’ve heard that normal is overrated.”
Luz nodded at that, a faint blush painting her cheeks at hearing her words from earlier repeated; she suddenly felt very nervous. She glanced at the screen of her phone and clicked her tongue, “Ah, jeez, I’m at twelve percent?” She stared out the windshield and furrowed her brow in thought before, “But why…? that’s— that’s right— I forgot to plug it in last night.” She dropped it in her lap long enough to slap her palm against the crown of her hat, scoffing, “Forget my ding-dang hat if it weren’t attached.”
Amity glanced around the cab as she asked, “Do you have a charger?”
The tanned girl waved toward the passenger’s side of the cherry-wood dashboard, “Yeah, it’s in one of the glove boxes, can you—” Luz spared a glance to her right and saw Amity already working the latch on the upper glove box. “Thanks.”
“Mon plaisir, Capitaine,” Amity replied with a smirk and a quick salute, and Luz felt her ears grow warm at the twist of the pale girl’s lips. The taller girl noticed and gave a wider, devious grin. Luz had been flirting with her the day before, she’d admitted as much. She could return the favor—if she didn’t chicken out. You can do this, you’ve read some great lines! How hard can it be? She adopted an innocent expression and tone of voice while she stated, “You’re driving, so it’s my job to handle everything else. Alors dis-moi, mon capitaine… where do I plug this in?” Amity tilted her head, just so, and heard Luz swallow.
“Uh… right… uh, h-here,” Luz stammered before pointing to the underside of the dashboard on the driver’s side of the navigation system, her wide brown eyes dancing from the road to Amity and back again. Amity slowly reached over, leaned closer, and plugged the charger in with an agonizingly slow push of a slender hand, her knuckles almost brushing Luz’s knee. She gave a languid blink of her golden eyes as she watched Luz turn a darker shade of pink at her proximity. The pale girl held out a hand and gave Luz a heavy-lidded stare until the tanned girl remembered the phone in her lap, and fumbled the device back to her passenger. “Do… uh… do you, um, need to plug y-yours in?” Luz managed to ask, and felt rather proud of the coherent question she had pieced together in spite of that dazzling golden gaze.
Amity shook her head as she plugged the cable into the phone, setting it in a cup holder before she turned back to her laptop, “No, I’m good for a while, I charged my phone last year.” She watched Luz blink in confusion out of the corner of her eye, and added, “Do you need a drink or a snack?” I remember the perfect line: Let me know if you need anything! And emphasize the word anything. She leaned an elbow on her armrest and set her chin in her palm, letting a smirk pull at the corner of her mouth, “Let me know i-if you—” need anything! It worked in that Azura barista AU, just say it! It had worked in that story, now that she thought about it again; things had taken a decidedly steamy turn very quickly. “I— if— you n-need—” the green-haired girl stuttered, suddenly flustered by her own audacity. Oh God, what am I doing? Amity licked her lips and opened her mouth again, but her voice failed her twice. She breathed out a short laugh and turned back to face her laptop, her shoulders pulled up around her ears as a glowing blush crawled up her face.
Luz glanced between the road and the shyly silent girl sitting beside her, her heart still pounding from Amity’s captivating behavior over the last few minutes. That smirk on her face, the tilt of her head as she had practically purred— Wait, was she going to say ‘Let me know if you need anything’? Wasn’t there a bit like that in that one Hecazura coffee shop fic? She bit her bottom lip. That would have been hot. She breathed out a chuckle and raised an eyebrow, Maybe it’s a good thing she didn’t, I’d have gone off the road. She stole a peek over at the red-faced girl in the passenger seat, steam practically whistling from her ears. She is adorable. Luz reached out, slow and careful, and laid a gentle hand on Amity’s forearm.
Amity froze, her entire body going rigid at the soft touch, her anxiety spiking for a moment until she felt the tanned girl squeeze a slow one-two-three into her arm; her fingers like a hot flame against the cool of her skin. “Thank you,” Luz’s voice was gentle, encouraging. “You’ll be the first to know if I need anything.” The pale girl gave a quick, jerking nod, still too embarrassed to respond otherwise. When Luz put her hand back on the wheel, Amity mourned the loss of her touch.
~
After a while, Luz glanced her way and asked, “By the way, what did you mean by ‘I charged my phone last year’? I can barely get two days out of mine.”
The Interstate had plunged into the southern arm of the Wasatch Range; craggy rock piles far taller than the rig blocked the direct evening sun, setting the red-leather-wrapped cabin into an early twilight. Layers of yellow and red rock and flashes of green scrub blurred by her window, while Amity blinked her golden eyes in the light of her laptop screen as she considered the question. “This is all… I… One of… My dad was…” The pale girl stumbled through the start of several answers before she turned to look at Luz.
Luz glanced over and caught her worried eyes, then shook her head, “Hey, you don’t have to tell me. Must be a company secret.” She grinned as she turned back toward the road, “I’ll just keep an eye out for new Blight Industries products in a couple years.”
“I want to tell you, Luz,” Amity admitted, “I just… need to figure out where to begin.” She paused for a moment as she closed her laptop, folding her hands over the device in her lap. Several cars streaked by as she hummed a soft tone, then she nodded and clicked her tongue, “So… a few years ago— do you remember those Elephant’s Toothpaste videos online?” Luz scrunched her face and said, What? and Amity laughed, “The— the foam geyser chemistry experiments people were doing? Like big baking soda volcanos?”
Luz blinked in recognition and snorted, “Yeah, yeah, I remember those! They were pretty hot for a summer.” She glanced at her passenger in confusion, “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Well, Edric happened to show one to my dad, and he was… well. He had to try it himself.” Amity made a face, “He— he gets… He went overboard, like always, and for months he was trying different experiments to see if he could do it better than those science channels on Youtube.” Luz giggled at that, and the green-haired girl smiled, “He’s… His sense of curiosity is amazing, and I love that about him… But,” Amity sighed, “anyway, that one channel came up with a Demon’s Toothpaste formula that was so much better than the rest, and Dad took that as a personal challenge.”
She ran her fingers along the edges of her laptop as she paused to look out her window. The nearby hills blurred, but the mountaintops in the middle distance hardly moved. “He thought he’d figured something out, and Edric had even workshopped a name for it,” Amity rolled her eyes and made air quotes, “Titan’s Toothpaste, because a Titan would be bigger than a Demon, right?”
“Sure,” Luz agreed with a smile and a nod.
Amity shrugged, “So, Dad called me one day and his Titan’s Toothpaste didn’t work out… but what it had done was even better.” She flipped her laptop over, and pointed at the battery compartment, “He had this old project, this on-again-off-again thing, for a semi-solid-fuel power cell, a new type of battery. Because who cares if your company’s robots are market leaders if they’re still tethered to an extension cord, right?”
Luz watched the road as she furrowed her brow and nodded, muttering, “Yeah, that… makes sense.”
“He accidentally created a new sunlight-reactive high-density fuel source in the mansion’s driveway with a KitchenAid mixer and a Rube Goldberg machine while Edric was recording video behind a three-inch-thick sheet of plexiglass—and not for safety, Edric just didn’t want foam in his hair,” Amity sighed, and Luz couldn’t help but laugh. “I wish I could say I was joking, but,” the pale girl shrugged, “that’s how things are with my Dad.”
“Your Dad sounds amazing,” Luz said with a half-smile.
“He’s a brilliant man, but… terminally absent, as a parent.”
Luz winced. “I’m sorry, Amity,” the tanned girl offered with an all-too-brief hand on her shoulder.
Amity leaned into the warm touch and flashed her a pained smile that soon fell away. “It is what it is, Luz.” She shrugged, then patted her laptop again, “So after he—” Amity coughed, “—fixed the driveway, he got back to tinkering and assembled a few power cells for a handful of our devices as test units. My laptop will run for at least five months on a charge now, and the phone lasts about eight.”
“¡Venga! That’s— no way!” Luz gasped.
The golden-eyed girl laughed, “It blew me away too. I’d been working on Abe’s base personality matrix for a few years by then, and the natural language processing for how he interprets commands, but he was non-mobile, just a— a desk-bound solution to a first-world problem. But then Dad offered to team up; he’d use my project as a pilot program.” She pointed over her shoulder with a thumb, “They all have large power cells in their housings, and most of the attachments and components with specialized motors have their own small, embedded power sources. I’m—” Amity groaned, “I hate the name Edric came up with, but Dad doesn’t care about the marketing side of things and he won’t tell me how they work, which is… so irritating, but, my project wouldn’t be possible without the two of them… so I’m grateful.”
“What did Edric call the stuff?” Luz wondered.
Amity sneered, “Titan’s Blood.”
Luz pursed her lips and made a face, like, bleh. “Yeah, I can see why you don’t like it.”
“Most robots are a balancing act of trade-offs,” the taller girl began, motioning with her hands as she talked, “Power consumed for work vs. run time, kinetic force applied vs. available voltage; things like that are all taken into account, unless the robot is destined for a permanent assembly line mount with fixed power, something like that.” Luz nodded as she listened. “Like, a Roomba,” Amity snapped her fingers, thinking of an example, “Do you have one of those?”
Luz shook her head and made a disinterested noise, “Nah, I don’t. But Eda has one for King to ride on.” At Amity’s confused look, Luz added, “King, her cat.”
“Cats do that, yeah,” Amity nodded. “So a Roomba takes about two hours to charge, and it might have a runtime of just over half that.” The green-haired girl waved her hand in dismissal, “At best, it could run for eleven hours a day.”
Luz shrugged and made a face, like, oh god, I don’t math, and chuckled, “I’ll take your word for it.”
“But I wanted to build something useful for the field,” Amity said in a soft voice. “Something helpful, where power would be hard to come by. Helping clean up an industrial accident site or a natural disaster zone; situations where they’ll need to run for weeks-on-end.” She stood a pale hand up on her fingertips, walking across the closed lid of her laptop. “I tried to account for any environment; that’s why they have wheels for pavement and articulated legs for uneven ground. With my Dad’s power cells, they can run for several months at a time without sacrificing any functionality.”
“That’s… you’re incredible, Amity,” Luz said with conviction. The golden-eyed girl blushed and looked away at the sureness in her voice. “We drove through Georgia once, after a series of tornadoes ripped through…” The tanned girl trailed off for a moment as she blinked away a memory. “Buildings were tore up, debris everywhere. Some roads were blocked by fallen trees, which kept rescue workers and repair crews from neighborhoods for days.” She looked over at Amity, “Your robots would have made a huge difference there.”
Amity tapped at her chin as she thought, her eyes staring off into the distance, “Min could easily lift fallen trees, or cut them on the spot with a saw attachment.” She chuckled, “Or she could break them into smaller pieces.”
“Yeah, she’s a beast. I love her… Downed power lines are always a danger, too,” Luz added with a raised eyebrow. She could see the wheels turning in the other girl’s head.
“My robots wouldn’t be susceptible to electricity like humans, they could easily terminate broken power lines—and best-case-scenario, they could capture some of that wild power to top off.”
“Could they run flood lights or air compressors for the workers, or act like emergency power stations?” Luz asked, “Like for a pop-up hospital or a Red Cross triage?” She hummed for a moment, then added, “Or what about electric stoves and heaters for an evacuation center? Maybe run a few laundry machines or boil drinking water.” She turned her eyes back to the road as she snapped her fingers, “Broken glass, too. In the roads?” Luz laughed, “Strap a couple street sweeper brushes on Abe and set him loose.”
Amity giggled at the mental image, then hummed a thoughtful tone, “Those are… those are good ideas.”
“Mamí volunteers with the Red Cross, sometimes,” Luz shrugged, “she’s told some stories.”
Amity blinked, surprised at the opportunity before her, “I— I’d love to hear more, please. And— with a big enough power cell, they could do any of those. They wouldn’t be dependent on the electrical grid, they’d be mobile, they could move their own support equipment…” She opened her laptop and began to type a series of notes and equations as she thought out loud, “They’d need multiple outlets, shielded cables, some rated for heavy machinery… weatherproofing, lightning capture? Perhaps turbine or solar input to assist?” Amity typed faster, her voice slipping into a monotone as she concentrated, “Maybe an inverted radiator system to re-catalyze the fuel mixture?... A power conversion system to stop down to two-twenty and one-ten...”
“Holy shit, they run at 440 volts?”
“Mm-mmm,” Amity muttered as she shook her head, not really listening anymore, “Higher.”
“Damn,” Luz sounded impressed, “What happened to your driveway?”
“It melted,” the pale girl said off-hand.
“Was anyone hurt?!”
“No,” Amity said, still typing away, “but Edric’s car fell in, and then it melted too.” Luz blinked at that and just muttered, Wow, as Amity shrugged, “It was bound to go sooner or later; he had a Ford Pinto.”
“What the hell,” Luz shook her head in disbelief, “Why?”
“He lost a bet.” Amity’s typing slowed before she paused completely and blinked, “Or was driving it the bet? I can’t remember.”
~
The landscape opened around them as Hooty followed the Interstate upward, emerging from the mountain pass onto the eastern shoulder of the range. The greenery fell behind as the hills turned to tan stone and sandy gray dirt, and a sun-bleached tumble of boulders on the other side of the road marked the ridgeline. Hooty rambled on, pacing the other trucks, and let the smaller, faster vehicles dart back and forth across the dotted line as they danced among the placid freight liners. Luz sang along softly with the radio, the truck’s tires ticking across the pavement in time with the upbeat country tune.
The twin lines of pavement fell toward a pass cut through the desert stone; tall, straight walls of rock hid the vehicles from the evening sun as the road began to slope downward. A series of yellow signs flashed past setting a lower speed limit and warning the truck drivers of the grade ahead. Luz worked the gear-shift lever as she began to slowly apply the brakes, the trucks ahead and behind adjusting their speeds as well. The white panel-side work van that had cruised in front of them for the better part of an hour began to accelerate, flicking on its turn signal before it pulled into the fast lane. Luz held a hand to her forehead in salute as it pulled away, joining the line of speeding passenger vehicles.
“What are you doing?” Amity asked, and Luz glanced over to see an incredulous smile on her face. The tanned girl made a face, like, huh?, and Amity made a quick, half-baked salute of her own, “With— with the thing,” she added.
“Oh, uh,” Luz looked away, feeling a little self-conscious, “I dunno, I get attached to the other cars, sometimes.” Amity blinked, then covered her mouth with a slender hand. She just stared at Luz, a smile creeping out from behind her fingers, but her silence made the shorter girl start to talk again, “We’d stuck together for a while, had a convoy through the mountain there, we were like car-buddies for a little bit, I dunno, hey, quit laughing—”
Amity had nearly doubled over in her seat, her hands clasped over her stomach as she looked up at Luz with tears in her eyes, just absolutely delighted, “Oh my god, Luz, that’s the cutest thing I’ve heard all day!”
A fierce blush bloomed high across tanned cheekbones, and Luz grumbled, “It’s not that cute,” while glaring at the road ahead. Another line of cars approached out her window, several following very close behind an old red minivan barely doing more than the speed limit.
“I think it’s adorable,” Amity teased. Luz narrowed her eyes and sent a sizzling glare in the pale girl’s direction, but Amity deflected it handily with a wide grin, “Maybe we can find you a new car-buddy at the car-pound if you get car-lonely.”
Luz choked back a laugh and schooled her face into a deep frown, and shook her head, pointing toward the other lane out her window, “No need, and no thank you, sassy pants, I picked that one already.” That one was a positively ancient Ford Aerostar that wheezed and shuddered slightly ahead of Hooty and carefully wobbled its way across the dotted line, its turn signal a dim, un-blinking amber. All the cars that had impatiently waited behind it roared past, buffeting the old minivan in their wake. Large patches of its red paint were sun-faded and peeling, rust had practically swallowed the bottom third of every surface, and a mixture of dust and mud clung to nearly everything else. A bright red sticker on the top left of the back window spelled “Rensselaer Polytech” in white letters.
Amity huffed a laugh and asked, “Are you sure?”
Luz nodded, “Yes, I love—” she peered at the mud-caked New York license plate, squinting long enough to make out ALMANAC. “I love Almanac,” Luz repeated, pointing over the nose of the truck, “I’ve only had her for a few minutes, but she’s already my favorite van.” Then she muttered, “Holy shit, New York state? That thing made it all the way out here?”
Amity watched it twitch and shiver back and forth between the lane lines, then turned large, shining eyes on Luz. The shorter girl tipped her hat back and glanced at Amity twice before she asked, “What?”
“I should have figured…” the pale girl said with a smile, “You’d pick the oldest dog in the animal shelter, wouldn’t you?”
Luz looked a bit bashful as she shrugged, “Yeah, probably. They deserve to be loved, too.”
~
I-70 continued carving a path down into the mountain range, layers of stone climbing high on either side of the rig, horizontal bands of butter-yellow sandstone, gray shale, and black flint, with hints of red in the distant ridge ahead. They reached the plain below, the flat-topped rocky piles set further back from the road in shadow-painted mesas. Amity tucked her laptop away and watched the landscape pass for a few minutes, rubbing her thumb into her palm, lost in thought. Luz hummed along with the radio. A green sign flashed past, reading EXIT 99 MILLERS CANYON, and Amity turned to watch the off-ramp disappear into the distance. She looked forward, at the distant horizon straight ahead, the glint of sunlight on the sparse traffic along the gray line stretched to the far rim of the earth, the wide, deep blue sky and brush-stroke orange clouds that fell heavy across it all. “It’s… It’s all so big,” the pale girl said, softly, catching the other girl’s ear, “I feel so small, right now.”
Luz glanced her way and hummed a response.
“In the Tower, if I have to go to the upper floors,” Amity’s words were hushed, “It’s like I’m looking down on everything and everyone. But here,” she motioned toward the desert ahead, “I feel… insignificant.”
Luz nodded, “I know what you mean,” she agreed. “Sometimes, I’ll be so… so concerned with bills, with keeping on schedule, with whatever, really, and I’ll look out the windshield and just… see… for miles.” The brown-eyed girl sighed, and smiled, “It’s… refreshing. Really puts certain things in perspective.”
~
Hooty trundled over a bridge spanning a small, muddy creek, and bright green leaves from a copse of trees flashed by Amity’s window. Moments later, everything was rock and sand once again. The road began to climb, and the big rig clawed its way upward. They passed a sign that read GREEN RIVER 61 / GRAND JCT 163 / DENVER 404. Over the next few miles, the hills and rocks began to shift color, the golden-yellow tan turning darker, to a deep, dusty red. The air in the distance shimmered from the day’s heat, blurring the wide expanse. A blue sign proclaimed SALT WASH VIEW AREA 1 MILE, with a restroom symbol.
“Do you need to stop?” Luz asked, and Amity shook her head. “We’ll keep truckin’, then.”
The wobbling red minivan put on its right-hand turn signal, the back taillight gleaming solid until it began to pull off at the scenic stop. Luz grumbled under her breath, and Amity patted her on the shoulder, “I’m sorry, Luz.”
“It’s okay,” the tanned girl replied. “I bet they were farmers.”
Amity rubbed her shoulder for a moment before her hand went still. “What?”
“Farmers,” Luz repeated, as if that would clear things up. She glanced at Amity. “Farmers?” The green-haired girl shook her head. “Farmers’ Almanac? You’ve never—”
“No,” Amity interrupted, “Stop.”
~
Eventually, the call of nature proved impossible to ignore, and Luz pulled off at the Crescent Junction Rest Area. The parking lot and the small collection of buildings stood on a bluff, and Amity could see out to a dismal, lifeless landscape below. Everything was a uniform shade of dingy yellow-brown from the wind-blown clouds of dust. Luz stepped up beside the taller girl and twisted her face into a faux grimace. “I don’t like sand,” she rasped, pulling a voice, “It’s coarse, and rough, and irritating.”
Amity turned to face her, her own expression carefully neutral. “I know,” she said after a pause. Luz’s eyes lit up in excitement.
They chatted about science fiction to and from the restroom, both girls still wrapped in conversation as Luz walked around the truck for a spot-check. They had just clambered into the cabin when Amity’s phone gave a gentle ding, and a second ding a moment later. She fished the device from her jacket pocket as it sounded a third time, and she pulled up several new messages from Gus.
[Gus 🍕 P.]: you two gonna stop and eat soon, right?
[Gus 🍕 P.]: tell Luz the beacons are lit
[Gus 🍕 P.]: please and thankya
As she read the three lines, whispering “Beacons are lit?” to herself, her phone dinged one more time.
[Gus 🍕 P.]: btw, you kiss her yet? tell me you kissed her
Amity’s jaw fell open, and she gasped, “Shut up!” aloud.
Luz was just beginning to sing along to the radio, and she paused to apologize, “Sorry?”
Amity shook her head, “Oh, not you, sorry!” She waggled the smartphone in her hand, “Gus messaged me.”
“Pfff,” Luz huffed, “Yeah, I get that.” She slipped the truck into gear and began to head back to the Interstate. “That man runs his mouth like you would not believe.”
“Oh ho, trust me,” the green-haired girl sneered, “I believe.”
Luz’s jacket pocket began to whistle the X-Files theme, and she glanced down for a second. “Well, that’s Gus texting me, too. I wonder what’s up.”
Amity shrugged, “He said to tell you the beacons are lit?” She watched as several expressions washed across Luz’s face: recognition, interest, then worry.
“Ah. Tell him I’ll call him when we stop for lunch,” Luz craned her neck to check for oncoming traffic before gunning it down the on-ramp, “Should be about an hour? Thanks.”
“Will do,” Amity replied as she sent Gus the picture she’d snapped of Luz the night before, driving and eating pizza at the same time.
:[Amity 🤖 B.]
Luz will call you in about an hour :[Amity 🤖 B.]
[Gus 🍕 P.]: sweet
and NO I HAVEN'T :[Amity 🤖 B.]
[Gus 🍕 P.]: GIRL
[Gus 🍕 P.]: u waitin’ on an invitation?
[Gus 🍕 P.]: shoulder touch
Amity glanced at Luz, making sure the other girl was still occupied operating the truck. She twisted just slightly in her seat, trying to keep the brown-eyed girl from seeing her screen as she turned back to her messages.
what? :[Amity 🤖 B.]
[Gus 🍕 P.]: do the shoulder touch
Gus, no :[Amity 🤖 B.]
[Gus 🍕 P.]: Gus, yes.
[Gus 🍕 P.]: u can’t go wrong
I have a bad feeling about this :[Amity 🤖 B.]
[Gus 🍕 P.]: put your hand on her shoulder
[Gus 🍕 P.]: look her dead-ass in the eye and say
[Gus 🍕 P.]: i wanna put my lips all up on you, for real
Amity slapped a hand over her mouth to help stifle the sudden shriek of outrage that nearly leapt from her throat. Her heart was hammering in her ears, and she could feel the blood rushing to her hairline. Luz glanced at her and raised an eyebrow, then gave a half-smile.
GUS :[Amity 🤖 B.]
[Gus 🍕 P.]: AMITY
[Gus 🍕 P.]: nothin’ bad gonna happen
[Gus 🍕 P.]: unless u *wanna* get bad 😏😈
[Gus 🍕 P.]: maybe u freaky AF, idk
Amity snarled and spluttered, “Augustus Pizza Porter!” as she typed out the same, mashing the send button.
[Gus 🍕 P.]: i just got chills
[Gus 🍕 P.]: felt like when my momma calls me by my full name cuz i’m in the shit
Amity had begun typing a long, angry message in return when Luz chuckled, “Damn, you look feral.”
[Gus 🍕 P.]: i see them three dots, I know I’m in trouble
[Gus 🍕 P.]: look, i think u 2 have a good thing
[Gus 🍕 P.]: i know u got stuff on friday
[Gus 🍕 P.]: but once that’s done
[Gus 🍕 P.]: u gotta take a chance
[Gus 🍕 P.]: for *love*
Once his words registered, Amity closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths. She cleared out her spelling-error-riddled diatribe and sent a pair of short responses:
i will :[Amity 🤖 B.]
i promise :[Amity 🤖 B.]
~
“One of these exits will have what we’re looking for,” Luz muttered as another brace of blue signs went by, one for HOTELS, one for FOOD, one for GAS.
Amity sighed, “Luz, any burger place will do.” She watched the signs of the city slide by her window, street lights flickering on in the deepening evening dim, the people walking, the children playing. “I’m not picky.” The road curved away from the city to follow a ridge line, and now it was just faded green trees and the occasional warehouse passing by. She absentmindedly read a sign aloud as they passed, “Colorado Mesa University, next right.”
“Oh hey, CMU!” Luz exclaimed cheerfully.
Amity wrinkled her brow, “Did you go there?”
“Nope!”
Amity scoffed at the wide grin on Luz’s face.
Luz leaned toward the middle aisle with a serious look, “You wanna eat something light on a trip like this— burgers and bacon are great, don’t get me wrong, but they’ll sit in your stomach like a brick.” Amity had to nod at that. Luz continued, “A chicken caesar salad or a wrap or—if nothin’ else—something from Subway’ll treat ya better than the Golden Arches.”
“There’s more than just McDonalds, Luz.”
“I know, I know, oh hey, there we go,” Luz said, pointing at another sign, “Subway!” The blue and white sign labeled FOOD - EXIT 31 had a Subway logo beside a red-and-white Freddy’s… something, Amity couldn’t make out the positively tiny text before they passed. “Alright, we’ll park somewhere and walk to the Subway. Twenty, thirty minutes tops?” Luz glanced at Amity for confirmation before she flipped on her blinker, and angled toward the off-ramp.
Notes:
I imagine Kikimora as a very short, very angry ginger from Wales.
Chapter 16: Tuesday, 9:07pm
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
Luz hummed a choppy note as she deliberated, chewing slowly to gain a few more moments to think. Amity watched her with slightly narrowed eyes, as if she were expecting the tanned girl to weasel out of answering the question. Luz nodded, swallowed, and gave the green-haired girl a blinding grin, “You ready fo’ this?”
Amity nodded.
“Alright, I’m thinking… Goats and pigeons,” Luz said with a slight raise of her chin. She watched the pale girl blink in surprise.
Amity snorted into her hand, almost losing her grip on her sandwich in the process. She gasped a bright note of delight and asked, “Really?”
“Yeah,” the brown-eyed girl laughed as she turned her sub around, finding the right angle of attack, “Wouldn’t that be hilarious?” Luz took a bite of her sandwich as Amity tapped a fingertip against her lips, her golden eyes pointed skyward as she gave the question exaggerated consideration. Luz tried not to stare at her lips, at the way they bent just so under the pressure of her fingertip. She tried, but these things happen.
“Yeah…” Amity grudgingly admitted, shrugging slightly as she grinned, “Yeah, okay. I can see what you’re going for.”
Luz chuckled through a mouthful of roast-beef-on-white, and covered her mouth with one hand as she added, “Can you imagine trying to get a hotdog in the Big Apple? Pure chaos!” She shimmied from side to side and bumped Amity’s shoulder with her own as she swallowed, “Okay, now,” she turned the question back, “what two animal sounds would you swap, if—” She waved a hand in a casually dismissive way as she took a sip of her drink, quickly adding, “—if you were, y’know, a mostly-benevolent demi-goddess of unspecified power.”
Amity chuckled, but before she could reply, Luz’s phone let out a spooky whistling tune. They leaned together to peer down at the screen when Luz pulled it from her jacket.
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: omg sorry
Luz sighed and pulled a breathy, stretched-out Southern voice, “That boy ain’t right.” She shook her head with a dark chuckle as she slid the phone back in her pocket, “Oh ho, I swear, ask me to call you and then not answer—”
A horn blared from the roundabout nearby, and if Amity hadn’t still been leaning into the shorter girl’s shoulder, Luz would never have noticed her flinch at the sound. The pale girl’s face and hands gave away absolutely nothing—which was both impressive and sad—but Luz could feel how her body stiffened at the sudden noise. She glanced over her shoulder, eyeballing the slow parade of cars working their way through the traffic circle, and felt Amity shudder again when another driver laid on their horn.
“Hey,” She reached out to wrap an arm around the taller girl’s back and rubbed her hand along her arm, her voice pitched soft and careful, “Are you okay?”
Amity looked down at the ground, carefully avoiding Luz’s eyes with her own.
“Back in ‘Frisco, the horns seemed to put you… on edge?” Luz licked her lips as she considered her words, “And that’s okay, that’s understandable, I just… want to be… considerate, and… help make you comfortable, if I can.” She gave Amity’s shoulder a squeeze and waited to listen in case the other girl felt up to speak.
“The loud… some noises… bother me, sometimes,” Amity admitted, her face still pointed down at the ground, as a red shame crept up the back of her neck, “I— I don’t know why, maybe it— it’s an overstimulation thing— but— it’s not like I could go talk to anyone about it.” The golden-eyed girl looked up, then, and Luz realized it wasn’t just embarrassment coloring her face. Amity’s voice held a bitter, angry note, “A Blight mustn’t show weakness, after all.”
Luz growled at that. “First thing I’m gonna do when I get home is punch your mama in the mouth,” she promised.
“Luz, no,” Amity frowned and shook her head, “that would be assault.”
“It’s a misdemeanor! That’s, like, a little baby crime,” the shorter girl protested, tipping her cowboy hat back as she puffed out her chest, her posture implying offended honor, “You think I wouldn’t rack up a few Fisher Price: My First Criminal Charges on your behalf?”
Amity gave her a soft, saddened smile.
“Seriously, though,” Luz began, turning slightly to face the pale girl, “We can sit in the truck and eat if the noise out here is bothering you.”
“No, no, it’s okay,” Amity assured her, “The fresh air is nice.” As Fate would have it—fickle and capricious as always—a loudly mooing livestock transport truck rolled by just then, leaving a foul, eye-watering stench drifting in its wake. They held their breath until they had to gasp for air, their shoulders shaking and faces red from holding in their laughter.
“Of course that would hap—” Luz began, then twitched and giggled as the phone inside her jacket pocket began to vibrate, the ringtone playing a stereotypical pizza-parlor tune that went swiftly off-key. “We’ll come back to the animal question,” Luz said as she pulled the phone from her pocket, waving a hand at Amity, like, just a sec, “I really want to know what you— Hello?” she tapped the ANSWER button before it would go to voicemail.
“I couldn’t pick up,” Gus sounded harried and out-of-breath, his gasping puffs of air making static on his end of the line, “Mama was talkin’ ‘bout dinner plans for Sunday, and I’m not even gonna be—”
“New phone, who ‘dis?” Luz interrupted, rubbing her fingernails against her jacket. She grinned at his sharp inhale, then tilted her head to look at Amity, “See, that’s funny,” Luz whispered, “because this is a new pho—”
“Luz, please,” Gus whined, “it’s your beautiful baby boy!”
The brown-haired girl rolled her eyes and grumbled, “I ain’t got no bebé.” She paused and hummed in thought, then leaned closer to Amity, whispering, “Unless— can I adopt Min?”
Amity was examining her sandwich, her attention momentarily absorbed elsewhere, but she gave a distracted shake of her head and responded in a similar tone, “I won’t split them up, so we’d have to co-parent.”
“We’d h-have t—” Luz began to repeat before she stuttered to a halt, her mouth falling open. Amity opened her mouth to take a bite of her lunch, her brow wrinkled in absentminded contemplation, then her eyes snapped open wide as her last few words registered. She squeaked and spun to face the other way as a deep red blush raced all the way up to her hairline.
“Luz?” Gus called, anxiously oblivious, “Luz!”
The tanned girl tore her eyes away from her companion and yelped, “What?!”
“Luz-bi-wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope!”
Luz snorted at that, “Luz-bi-wan, heh, sounds like Luz-bian.” She nudged Amity in the back with her elbow, “Get it? Luz-bian, am-i-right?” She scoffed at the static-laced groan from the other end of the line and asked, “What’s all the fuss, Gus?” She missed how Amity hid her face in her hand and breathed, That’s me, I’m luz-bian.
“We need some voice lines recorded,” the man said amidst the squeak and clatter of a door closing, “some for Kirana, and some for the Mad Visitor.” Rapid tappity-tip-taps sounded from his end, and a few clicks as well.
“Already?” Luz scratched at her jaw in confusion as she and Amity shared a glance, both girls sporting different flavors of confusion, “I thought that episode wasn’t due for another month!”
“It’s for the teaser, and we need that out this weekend!”
“I— Gus,” Luz stopped, turning to examine Amity’s expression. The pale girl just blinked, a slightly curious look on her face. “My dude… you know I’d do anything for you, but— I’m on the clock right now, and—” Amity’s mouth pressed into a small frown, and Luz cut her sentence short, unsure of how to interpret the taller girl’s change of face.
“It’s just a couple lines,” Gus pleaded, “I promise!”
Luz and Amity locked eyes, both girls watching the other for tells. Luz looked away first, turning her eyes down to the cracked pavement below her feet. “I… I only have a few minutes ‘til we hit the road, G-man,” the tanned girl tried to be firm, but her heart sank at letting her friend down.
“Ten minutes, tops,” Gus assured her, and Luz pinched her face in distaste as she prepared to shoot him down one more time.
Pale fingers touched her wrist, and Luz looked up to meet kind golden eyes. “It’s okay, Luz,” Amity whispered, “We can take a little break.”
“Hold on, Gus, bee-are-bee,” Luz tapped the mute button and turned to face the other girl. “Are— shit, are you sure, Amity?” Luz tilted her head as she questioned the taller girl, “I— I’m sorry, this is some real hey mom, can my buddy standing right next to me spend the night tonight, I told him you were cool energy, and I don’t want to be like—”
Amity shook her head, “You were prepared to tell him no, weren’t you?” Luz stopped to nod, slowly, and Amity added, “I know you’re taking my delivery seriously. Thank you, and… you said I’m the boss, right?” Her lips twisted in a sly smirk, and Luz gulped before nodding again. “Then I think we can take twenty minutes for you to help Gus.”
Luz set her hand atop the pale fingers still touching her wrist, and gave Amity’s hand a squeeze, “Thank you, Amity. I…” she ran her thumb across pale knuckles as she cast about for the right words, “I didn’t want to let either of you down.” She squeezed the taller girl’s fingers once more, then turned back to the phone in her hand. “You’re lucky my boss likes you, Gustavier,” Luz said with a wry grin and a wink to the pale girl beside her, “Make sure you say thank you to Amity.”
“You’re savin’ my life, Luz!” Gus said, drawing a chuckle and a, Yeah, yeah, from the brown-haired girl; then he added, “I need your eyes on the episode dialogue too. I dunno, it ain’t hittin’ right.”
“Send me the doc,” The tanned girl said as she set her phone on Amity’s knee, “I’ll take a look when I can.” Luz began to gather her sandwich wrappers and used napkins while the green-haired girl took a bite of her turkey club. “Might not be until tomorrow afternoon.” Luz pointed at Amity’s Subway bag and whispered, “Trash?”
Luz jogged across the grass to the garbage can beside the Subway as Gus cleared his throat, “Amity, for real, thank you.” He sighed, then explained, “We picked up some advertisers recently, so we gotta hit these dates.”
Amity covered her mouth with her hand as she said, “It’s alright, Gus, I understand. And…” she paused to swallow, “I can’t say I’m not curious to see her process.”
“Oh, ya’ in for a treat,” They shared a chuckle as Luz jogged back to where Amity sat on the curb of the hotel parking lot, along the north side of the Subway parking lot. The tanned girl tripped over the curb with a yelp and a Whoa! and she scrambled for a moment before regaining her footing, placing a hand on the taller girl’s shoulder to let her stay sitting.
“Almost ate shit there,” Luz laughed, pressing her hat back into place, “but Amity would’a caught me,” she winked, patting the wide-eyed girl on the arm. She put her fists on her hips and looked around at the sparsely populated hotel parking lot, the summer stars beginning to twinkle high above in the deepening purple sky. There was a steady stream of traffic crossing the overpass to the north, just above the roundabout, the whoosh of passing cars and the growl of engines filling the air. Luz knelt in front of Amity to speak into the phone resting on her knee, missing the fresh spots of pink that darkened her pale cheekbones, “We’ll get back in the truck in a minute, there’s a lot of background noise here.” She tipped her hat back and scratched at her scalp, “Is that gonna be good enough, y’think?”
“It’s gonna hafta be,” Amity imagined Gus shrugged as he replied, “Thank you so much.”
~
“You’re not killing off Commander ‘Dex, are you?”
“Noo, no, well—” Gus waffled for a moment, and Luz sighed. “Card’s got some thing for work starting this weekend, and since he’s gonna be incommunicado until his project is done, we thought we should bench ‘Dex for a bit.”
“That makes sense,” Luz replied, shifting her legs around to sit up on her knees, stretching her arms behind her back. Amity looked down at her laptop, keeping her eyes glued to her screen. “He’s being deployed or whatever? How long’s he gonna be gone?”
“No clue. You know how he is— bastard’s super vague all the time,” Gus actually sounded bitter.
“Now Gus,” Luz chided him gently, sending a grin at the green-haired girl. She patted Amity on the knee and leaned forward, conspiratorial, motioning toward her phone with a gleeful grin, “Gus is not-so-secretly super salty about not knowing what Cardinal does for a living.”
“Cardinal?” Amity asked, a smile stretching her own lips to match the other girl’s.
“Dick won’t tell me shit,” the man grumbled over the phone.
“Yeah, one of Gus’s Discord buddies. I think he’s military, but he won’t confirm or deny anything,” Luz explained as she twisted from side to side, “They met in a Cosmic Frontier fanserver, and started this—” she paused to throw up air quotes, “—Galactic Voyage project that is— honestly? A fairly blatant ripoff of the worst parts of Frontier and Star Trek, with a dash of Babylon Fi—”
Luz shot Amity a devious grin when Gus interrupted “—it’s an homage, bitch, and that’s rich coming from you, little miss Good—”
“ANYway,” the tanned girl interrupted the embarrassing name-drop sure to come, her cheeks darkening in anticipation of being teased about her favorite book series. Amity merely chuckled at their good-natured exchange. “Cardinal voices Commander Index, an android who joined the crew of the TFR Trailblazer after overcoming his original programming to sabotage and destroy the ship.” Luz sighed, “It was this whole thing that Card wrote, I dunno, I wanna call it some Mary Sue OC self-insert fanfiction, but it was, fuck—” she groaned and rubbed at her eyes, missing how Amity froze at the word fanfiction, “—a really fuckin’ good storyline—and don’t tell him I said that!” she snapped, pointing at her phone as the man on the other end chuckled. Amity could imagine Gus rubbing his hands together with evil glee. “His voice acting was on-point, and the viewers loved it.”
“You loved it tooOOoo,” Gus crooned in a sing-song voice.
“You still want my help?” Luz had a hint of irritation in her voice.
Gus shut his mouth and they quickly got to work. Amity set her laptop to the side to watch. Luz knelt on the floor between the sleeper bed and the seats, her phone propped up on Amity’s aisle-side armrest. She laced her hands together and tapped her raised index fingers against her lips as she quickly glanced over each line Gus sent through their chat. When Gus gave her the signal, Luz would speak the line—her features turning rigid, a determined, fierce cast to her face. Amity wasn’t sure how she managed to do it, just by changing her inflection and adopting an unfamiliar accent, perhaps, but her voice was different. She sounded like someone else entirely.
“Last one for Kirana, okay? And just a little pause there at the end, like she’s fighting to keep her temper.”
Luz nodded, and cleared her throat, waiting for Gus to say, Go. She snarled, “You’re going to help me fix this mess… Captain’s orders.” Amity shivered at the raw emotion in her voice.
“Great, that’s so good, thank you!”
Luz chuckled as she scrubbed a hand through the back of her hair, “Really? You think it’s good enough?”
“Girl! Shut the— What’chu— Amity?!” Gus called.
“Yes?” The green-haired girl replied.
“Slap her for me?”
Luz dropped her mouth open in shocked disbelief, glaring at her phone for a moment before leaning away from Amity, who had raised her hand. “Gus, you— hey, now,” the brown-haired girl raised a hand of her own, palm out, like, just hold on a minute, as she watched a smirk begin to spread across the pale girl’s lips. “You wouldn’t hit an innocent girl like me, Miss Amity,” Luz began to say, voice dripping saccharine sweet; she realized ‘Miss Amity’ was a mistake when the green-haired girl’s eyes narrowed and her jaw clenched. “I’m a fragile, delicate fl—OW!–er, you little minx,” Luz hissed, rubbing at her shoulder.
Amity looked smug as she wobbled her head and smirked, but they both knew she’d hardly tapped her; Luz was playing it up for the phone call.
~
Gus needed two laugh samples for the Mad Visitor—the Q-like being that tormented the Trailblazer crew from time to time. Gus called Go for a “diabolical” sample, and Luz threw her head back with a decidedly evil cackle. Gus asked for one last take, Something demented this time, and Luz had nodded, then pantomimed covering her ears to Amity before she began. Amity frowned in curiosity, but followed the other girl’s suggestion, covering both ears with her palms. She understood why as soon as Luz began. She was loud— Luz clawed her hands and twisted her face in a maniacal, Joker-esque peal of laughter, her face turning red with exertion while veins bulged in her neck and forehead. Amity watched as her laughter trailed off in a wheeze, then Luz coughed and wiped her mouth on the back of her hand.
“Luz, nobody does it like you.”
“Ain’t that the truth,” the brown-haired girl rasped, coughing again into a fisted hand, nodding at Amity and whispering “Thank you,” when the pale girl handed her a water bottle.
“You both did me a huge favor,” Gus sounded as though a weight had lifted off his shoulders, and perhaps one had, “Here’s a little something to show my appreciation.”
A notification popped up on the tanned girl’s screen with a ding and a cha-ching, and Luz made a surprised sound, “Gus, twenty bucks? You know I don’t need the—”
“I know, I know. You both really stepped up for a brother,” then Gus chuckled, “Go get’chyer girl some ice cream or something, my treat,” the smirk was clearly visible in his voice.
“Oh, we’re not—”
“She’s not— my—”
“—we haven’t even—”
“—maybe after—”
“—what?!”
“What?”
“Maybe after what?”
“um…”
“No? Are you sure?” Both girls blushed at that, too tongue-tied and flustered to interrupt his next smarmy comment, “Better get’chu a milkshake with two straws—”
Amity hid her furiously-red face in her hands.
“—and some cherries on top,” Gus paused to gasp, feigned innocence oozing across the miles, “Luz! Can’t you tie a cherry stem with your tongue?”
Amity squeaked as Luz growled, “Gus, you goddamn gremlin motherf—”
“—byeeee!” he interrupted long enough to hang up.
The air in the cab was thick with tension for several long moments, until Luz gave a heavy sigh and whispered, “I hate you so goddamn much, Gus, you’re not my son.” Amity giggled, and just like that, their worry and embarrassment fell away in a fit of laughter.
“So, uh,” Luz slapped her palms against her legs, then waved toward the red and white Freddy’s Frozen Custard sign just visible above the Subway building, “Did you, uh, would you like some ice cream for the road?” She pulled her hat off to run tanned fingers through brown curls, her shoulders lifting in a shrug, “I— I don’t know what they have, th–there, but we could go look, a-and—”
“That— that sounds good, Luz,” Amity decided to help the poor girl out; she looked close to rambling, “We could get a small cone to go,” she added with a smile.
Luz tripped on the curb again when they walked across the parking lot. Amity easily caught her with an arm at her waist and a gentle hand on her back, and lifted her up to her feet. If they happened to walk there and back again hand-in-hand—just in case, as one of them put it, to which the other agreed—they certainly weren’t going to give Gus the satisfaction of finding out.
~
Workin’ nine to five, what a way to make a livin’
Luz had an infectious smile on her face as she sang along with the reigning Queen of Country.
Barely gettin’ by, it’s all takin’ and no givin’
The brown-haired girl strayed from the lyrics this time, offering, “Then from almost ten, until sometime after seven!” She tapped at the clock in the upper corner of the navigation screen, the white numbers showing 9:38.
Amity giggled at that, then nodded toward the road ahead, “You think that’s when we’ll get there? Seven?”
Luz shrugged a bit, “We’re crossing the Rockies tonight, which’ll be slow going on the climb. Gravity and such.” She glanced over at the golden-eyed girl for a moment to wink before turning her eyes back to the road, “All things go well and we keep any pit stops short ‘n’ sweet, we might make it to York by seven thirty, eight o’clock.” They fell silent as they watched the tail lights from the trucks ahead shine orangey-red along the blacktop, while Dolly Parton continued to lament the modern-day business world.
They just use your mind, and you never get the credit
It’s enough to drive you crazy if you let it
That line struck a chord with the green-haired girl. They use your mind, Amity frowned, you never get the credit, do you? A high sandstone ridge blocked the sky out the driver’s side of the big rig, while the ground sloped down to neat, squared-off garden rows stretching off into the night on the other. The sky above had fallen to a deep blue, nearly black, with sparkling stars shining far above the clouds. She turned in her seat to watch Luz bob from side to side in her seat, mouthing the words along to the radio.
Nine to five, yeah, they got you where they want you
There’s a better life and you think about it, don’t you?
That hit deep, too. Amity had just been about to ask a question, but the lyrics knocked the words right out of her mind. She looked down at her hands and frowned. Luz glanced her way, and concern pulled at her expression. “Hey, Amity,” the brown-eyed girl’s voice held a soft, careful note.
Amity hummed a question.
“If you were a refrigerator—” Luz began, and Amity snorted, What, drawing a laugh from the shorter girl, “—hey, this is an important question, okay?”
“Sure,” the green-haired girl nodded, “I’m sure it is.”
“If you were a refrigerator,” Luz repeated with a playful glare, “what food would you absolutely hate to have inside you?”
~
Light twinkled from the red-roofed houses rolling by in the dark, small splashes of warm yellow and white nestled down among the deep green hills. Pine trees covered the hills, tracing a serrated silhouette in the moonlight. Luz was in the middle of one of her quote-unquote Eda stories when a blue sign flashed by in Hooty’s headlights, declaring a SCENIC OVERLOOK NEXT RIGHT. Moments later, they passed the small parking lot detour, a few parked cars shining in the running lights of an idling semi. The shorter girl cut her tale short and pointed, “—oh, this is a great view of—well, during the day, I guess.” They both caught a glimpse of dark, wooded hills, in a deeper black than the night sky.
The green-haired girl turned a kind smile her way, and rested her chin on her palm. “We’ll have to take time to stop and see the sights on the way back, I suppose,” Amity offered.
“You…” Luz trailed off as a wide smile slowly spread across her face, her eyes glittering in the moonlight. “You want to ride back with me?”
“I-is that alright?”
“Yes!”
Amity flushed slightly as she blinked, looking away from the other girl’s wide-eyed gaze for a moment, then, her voice hushed, “O-of course I do.”
Luz nodded, turning back to the windshield with a giddy laugh, “I— I was hoping you would, but— I— I didn’t know what your plans were.” She glanced at Amity twice before adding, “Maybe you’d have to fly back to ‘Frisco Friday night to save your lab, I dunno, I didn’t want to assume anything.”
“Luz.” The green-haired girl swallowed, and tried again, “Luz, I… I don’t know what’s going to happen… but…” Amity turned shining golden eyes toward the other girl, her voice soft and gentle, “I do know that I want to spend more time with you.”
Luz stared straight ahead and just smiled, smiled, smiled. “I want that too,” she admitted with a bright laugh.
~
Amity had curled up in her seat, her feet tucked up beside her legs as she leaned on her aisle-side armrest. She tilted her head toward Luz’s shoulder and snapped a selfie. Luz chuckled at the click of the camera app and bobbed her head in an upwards nod, “What’cha doin’ over there, Blight?”
“Gus wanted to make sure we were still alive,” Amity said as she tapped away at her phone, “It’s getting close to midnight.”
“Yeah, but—” Luz scoffed, “We woke up at three!” She waved forward at the darkness ahead, “This is our afternoon! It’s not even dinner time yet.”
“Does he always worry like this?”
“I guess he does, yeah,” the shorter girl hummed, “It’s kind of obnoxious.”
“Luz… said… you’re… obnoxious,” Amity spoke her latest message aloud, “And sent.”
Luz gasped, “No you didn’t.” She pointed a finger at Amity when her phone began to ring, that demented pizza-parlor tune filling the cab nearly drowning out her “You did!” of disbelief.
~
The scent of pine needles and green, growing life filled the cabin as the twin lanes of concrete wound through the mountains. Hooty had nested in the middle of a steady line of trucks, smaller vehicles passing in the left lane at a sporadic, lazy rate. Headlights streaked past in the opposite direction, painting Luz’s profile in momentary flashes of white. Yet another handful of cars flashed by, engines growling, illuminating the tanned girl’s grin. “You’re lucky, I thought he was gonna talk your ear off,” Luz laughed, “It was kind of you to play along with his interview.”
Amity chuckled at that, giving a small shrug, “It— it was fun. He’s so enthusiastic.”
Luz gasped and looked her way for a moment, “That’s such a good word for him!” They shared a laugh, then Luz added, “Y’know, I don’t follow tech news at all, but Gus eats it up.” She glanced at Amity before asking, “He didn’t seem to know anything about your project, or your dad’s batteries. You guys aren’t— oh, um,” Luz waved a hand, “You don’t have to answer if it’s a secret or whatever, but, your robots are so advanced, I guess I thought your company would be boasting about them already.” She shook her head and chuckled, “I mean, months-long battery life? Even I would’ve heard about that.”
Amity made a noise of distaste deep in her throat, “If I were letting my mother have her way, I’m sure they’d be old news by now.” She rubbed her smartphone between her palms, turning it slowly end-over-end as she spoke, “Since my goal was a charitable, humanitarian effort, she’d been content to pretend my project didn’t exist… until it got too expensive. I don’t doubt what Emira told us,” the pale girl admitted with a curl of her lip, with a sneer, “She could take what I have now and make… so much money. But I’m not done, yet.” Amity sighed, then she shrugged. “As for Dad’s power cells, they’re definitely not ready for the general public, what with the explosion risk.”
Luz blinked several times, cleared her throat, then looked at the smartphone in Amity’s hands. “The what.”
“No, no, it’s—” Amity laughed, waving her hands in assurance, “Okay, it’s true they’re a fire hazard; if the cell breaks open and the fuel mixture leaks, it can start a fire, which could cause an explosion.”
“Oh,” Luz laughed, “That sounds… well, not as bad.”
“Then he discovered that a grounded metal pole driven completely through a power cell, will—for some reason—make it detonate.”
Luz stared at her for a moment with a raised eyebrow.
“Dad believes it’s something to do with static electron flow along the length of the metal pole on both sides of the power cell,” the pale girl shrugged while Luz just snorted a soft Indubitably. “I don’t know if he has a proper theory yet,” Amity admitted.
“And… how did he figure that out?”
“He shot one with a harpoon.”
Luz struggled to formulate a response, and managed a bewildered, “Buh-why?”
Amity shrugged, “My father’s product testing regimen is thorough.”
Luz shook her head with an, “Mmm-mmm, I meant, why did your dad have a harpoon…. Launcher?”
“Oh,” Amity giggled and gave a fond-sounding sigh, “He had a small mechanized spear-fishing phase.”
“Ah… Right. Totally— totally normal thing to, uh, to get into.” The brown-haired girl took a deep breath and held it for a moment. “Well… that seems… unlikely to happen? For the general, non-whaling public?”
“But it’s not statistically impossible, so they’re lab-only for the time being,” Amity shrugged. “One day, hopefully, they’ll find a place in cell phones and laptops.”
“So your little goo-babies have jars of Titan’s Blood inside,” Luz said in a slow, deliberate way, tapping her fingers to the music from the radio.
“Don’t—” Amity frowned and shook her head, “Don’t say it like that.”
Luz grunted a sorry, and said, “Noted— and they technically have an explosion risk?”
Amity thought about her exchange with Eda the day before and sighed, “Yes, technically, they do.”
Luz gave her an appraising eye and grinned, “That means we definitely have to take Loveland Pass.”
“Is that bad?”
Amity sounded worried, so Luz was quick to reassure her, “No, no no, it’s just safety regulations.” At the pale girl’s confused look, Luz pointed forward, motioning out toward the Interstate ahead, “Up ahead is the Eisenhower-Johnson Tunnel; it’s a major traffic route that goes under the mountain.” She put her hands back on the steering wheel and patted a rhythm with her fingers. “They don’t allow hazardous materials through unless the Pass is closed for bad weather,” Luz gave the other girl a kind smile, “and I know that your guys aren’t hazardous.” She paused for a moment to lock eyes with Amity. “I’m not afraid of them or anything, okay?”
Amity slowly nodded and mouthed Okay.
“Do you believe me?”
Amity watched her for a moment, and then nodded again, the smallest smile dawning on her face.
“I still think it’s best to follow the regs,” Luz smiled back, “And it should be a great view from the top, even at night. You’re gonna love it!”
~
The fairly regular flow of smaller vehicles speeding by in the left lane had dwindled to a trickle of an occasional red-lining sports car or an exhaust-belching lifted pickup truck. Luz had let a bit of distance grow between Hooty’s bumper and the truck-and-trailer ahead of her, the better to watch for the Loveland Pass exit. Angry car horns could be heard over their conversation, and the tanned girl craned her neck to get a glimpse of the road behind them in her mirrors. A pair of dim yellow headlights slowly approached, still several truck lengths behind her, with a long line of other cars close behind.
Luz gasped, and reached over to pat at the pale girl’s arm, tugging at her sleeve, “Amity! Omigawsh!”
Amity laughed at her excitement, and struggled to catch her flailing hand, “What— what, what is it?” Eventually, she caught Luz’s tanned palm in her hands and held on tight as the shorter girl vibrated with glee.
“Look! They’re back!” Luz tipped her head toward her window as that same rickety red minivan from earlier slowly limped ahead of them. The turn signal blinked once then stayed lit, and the ancient Aerostar wobbled over into the slow lane, slowing slightly to match Hooty’s pace. The unhappy drivers trapped behind the slow-moving vehicle roared by as the brown-haired girl squealed in delight, “Almanac, I missed you! They’re like that cat in that song!”
Amity made a face, “They’re… more of a Chihuahua than a cat.”
Luz tried to wave a dismissive hand, but the other girl still had it held tight, “Aún le queda cuerda para rato.”
Their headlights trailed across a green sign out Amity’s window, EXIT 205, EAST 6 / NORTH 9, SILVERTHORNE, DILLON 1 MILE, and the traffic moved smoothly down the sloping hillside toward the lights of the city below. The Interstate curved to the right, and began across a wide valley, cutting through the glowing signs of life. Another sign passed by out Amity’s side, TUNNEL AHEAD, read the yellow bar at the top, and Luz pointed at it, reading the rest, “Hazmat must exit next right, that’s us,” the tanned girl turned toward her passenger and waggled her eyebrows, “We are hazardous material.”
“So hazardous,” Amity agreed with the slightest grin in her voice.
They crossed a bridge over a creek, the moon’s white face broken and rippling on the black water, and Luz flipped on her turn signal for Exit 205. She worked the gears as she slowed, heading toward an intersection below the Interstate. ALMANAC continued on Interstate 70, wobbling off into the night.
~
US-6 took them through downtown Silverthorne, and out through one of Dillon’s residential areas. The area was beautiful in the moonlight, the fir trees and spruce dappled hills dotted with green-roofed homes and cabins. The road began to climb. Even as they rounded Dillon Bay, they trended ever upward. Amity stared out her window at the starlight-sparkling waters. They had to slow again as they passed through a quaint little ski resort town, making it through most of the intersections on green lights. One last fancy strip mall out the passenger’s side marked the start of the real climb, when their route turned into a two-lane mountain road. Traffic heading east was sparse, but noticeably slower than on the Interstate.
Luz concentrated on the road, while Amity drank in the scenery. Tall pine trees nearly brushed the cab at times, the moonlight etching the landscape in silver and black. Misty clouds hung above, shrouding the mountaintops in a white, ghostly fog. Hooty growled and clawed his way higher and higher, Luz slowing as little as possible, when the river of concrete beneath their wheels began to turn back on itself, drawing long sloping straightaways before hairpin turns.
They climbed higher than the clouds, their headlights cutting a yellow glare through the drifting white, the greenery on either side fading out in the distance, until they were through and above, the evergreens sprouting from the white misty nothingness. They climbed higher than the trees, the forests growing thin, the trees shorter, the ground turning to scrub and rock. They climbed higher than the mountains themselves.
Amity watched as a small parking lot appeared on her side of the road, with one or two cars parked there, engines off and lights dark. “This is it, right here,” Luz said as she pointed out her side. Amity saw a staircase going up a small hill, and a stone sign. Everything was dark, but there could have been some people on the staircase. “This is the continental divide,” the brown-haired girl looked at her and smiled, “What do you think?” She worked the gears and prepared to apply her brakes, the road ahead falling back down to earth.
Amity leaned forward to stare out the windshield. She could see for miles. She could see the mountaintops ahead, glimmering with moonlight. The forests were dark patches that disappeared in a bank of silver clouds— it looked like a lake, like an ocean in the sky, lapping against the shores of an island chain. It was breathtaking. Headlights and taillights vanished into the watery depths, tucked against stone and cradled by trees, lending a hint to their true height above ground. “I… It’s…” Amity just smiled and shook her head, “It’s beautiful.”
Luz glanced over at the golden-eyed girl, her delicate features like porcelain in the light of the moon, her hair a deep shining green in the dark. “Yeah,” she had to agree, “Beautiful.”
~
They rode the concrete ribbons down into the heart of the mountain range, falling steep and sure back toward the plains beyond Denver. Small towns and cities flashed by as Luz wrangled Hooty’s gravity-borne speed, keeping the rig under control. They had passed through the deep layer of clouds, and now a slight rain had begun to fall from the misty sea high above their heads.
The rain-slick road shimmered in their headlights as they broke through a snarl of traffic, rounding a bend to get a glimpse of a mass of dark clouds in the distance. Luz frowned, muttering a disgusted, “Mierda, está lloviendo a cántaros.” She huffed a sigh, “Well, I guess we couldn’t count on clear skies the whole way, huh?” She glanced at Amity, then looked again. The pale girl sat rigid in her seat, her fingers clenched around her armrests. She stared straight toward the storm ahead, unblinking, until a flash of lightning made her flinch. “Amity, hey, Amity?” Luz called, reaching out to lay a gentle hand on the other girl’s arm.
Amity jumped at her touch, then scrambled to grab her hand, her arm, twisting in her seat to put her knees toward the aisle as she hung onto Luz’s tee-shirt sleeve with a white-knuckle grip, shivering. She whined at the next flash of lightning, the deep rumble of thunder just audible over the growl of Hooty’s engine. “Amity, what’s— Are you—” Luz twisted her arm up to pat at the taller girl’s head, when another distant flash of lighting drove the pale girl to hide her eyes behind Luz’s shoulder. Realization struck when Amity sniffed and whimpered at the boom and crash that swelled in the rain-soaked sky. “Oh, Amity,” Luz said softly.
“I— I can’t— I—” Amity shivered again at a peal of thunder, “I just— I can’t.”
Notes:
Chapter 17: Wednesday, Sometime Around 1am
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
The starlight-drenched view from the Divide had been the high point of the evening*. Amity had caught a glimpse of something vast and quiet, something far older than anything she had ever known. But they could not tarry there, atop the world; time continued to march forward and Hooty followed suit. Luz guided the big rig down through the misty sea of clouds, and soon the ageless lights in the sky had been swallowed by a slow, heavy drizzle.
Amity felt that old, familiar fear coil up her spine at the sound of raindrops pattering and pinging off the cabin, and she clamped her fingers around the arms of her seat in a white-knuckle dread. The windshield wipers flicked a steady tempo as the rain drummed harder. Just— just breathe, just— Amity swallowed, her stomach twisting itself into recursive Gordian Knots with every passing moment, breathe like you’ve read about, in and out, slow and—
Luz watched her mirrors, waiting for her opening, her fingers tap-tap-tapping on the steering wheel in time with the radio. She swung into the passing lane when a U-Haul box truck whooshed past in a spray of moisture from its tires, thin streamers of damp air trailing its squared-off edges. Hooty gave a throaty growl as Luz accelerated; they passed truck after truck, skirting a long line of rain-dripping trailers with flashing red tail lights as the drivers rode their brakes, managing their speed as they tumbled downhill behind a mud-caked red minivan.
Amity turned her head to watch while they passed the shaky old vehicle, the decrepit Aerostar’s windshield wipers swinging like mad, flinging water left and right in a largely futile effort. She turned back to Luz, about to point out who they had passed when they rounded a bend. The midnight sky had been consumed by a thunderhead, a black mountainous void blotting the stars beyond the steep hills rising on either side of the Interstate. The words froze on her tongue as lightning splintered the sky ahead, then a brilliant bolt of electricity stabbed into the land below.
Cold rain pummeled her skin.
No one was looking for her.
Howling winds knocked her to the ground.
She couldn’t move.
She couldn’t breathe.
She stared at the storm in horror.
A muffled, distant part of herself counted. Numbers were safe, they were familiar. Six… Seven… Eight… Nine… Ten… Elev— Distant thunder, barely audible over the steady rumble of the engine at her feet, but she heard it all the same. Eleven seconds. Two-point-two miles away. She felt kind brown eyes notice her distress, but she was— she had to— just take a breath, and— Another flash. She still couldn’t breathe. Her body felt heavy, like stone. Her chest weighed too much. She was frozen still as ice.
There was a thin, warbling sound from just to her left, but her heart was hammering loud enough to drown out everything else. A fierce warmth bloomed across the skin on her arm as tanned fingers touched her wrist. The panic bubbling in her chest broke loose at that soft touch, and she was clinging, clawing, she was desperate, she was—
~
She was seven years old when her class studied the weather cycle. “Learning about things that scare us can make it not so scary!” her teacher had promised when they began the bugs and insects chapter, but she didn’t mind spiders or millipedes. Loud, sudden noises bothered her, like car horns and thunder. They made her feel funny, like her body was filled with the echoing sound of jangling metal—like when she disturbed the empty hangers in the large coat closet while hiding in her father’s old overcoats. Thunder made her head buzz, it made her want to run away. Now she could learn why it made her afraid! She read the chapter in her science book over and over while the teacher spoke to her classmates.
Studying did not help after all. It began to rain that afternoon and she was still scared. She asked one of the servants to help her find a book on lightning and thunder in her father’s library, and they gave her a look she didn’t understand. “Interested in the weather tonight, are we, Miss Amity?” they asked. Maybe that expression meant curiosity? Reading from her father’s book didn’t help, although the scent and feel of its pages gave her some small comfort. Perhaps sharing the facts would help her not be afraid? She finally found her brother and sister in the third-floor lounge, sat down between them, and began to read aloud from the book. Maybe they could point out something she had missed.
She followed their sighs from room to room, still reading the weather section out loud. Some of the larger words in the book gave her trouble, but the math was easy. She hesitated by the window in the hallway as she counted the seconds after a flash of lightning. Ten seconds. Divide by five. Two miles away. The next flash of light and distant rumble counted out seven seconds—one-point-four miles away—which meant the storm was getting closer, and fast. She flinched at the next peal of thunder and ran after the twins, shoulders tight around her ears. Edric and Emira smiled and smiled. Their eyes were strange, and she couldn’t figure out what their expression meant when they looked at her like that. They put their hands on her shoulders and led her down to the door leading out to the garden. “Tell us more,” they grinned ever wider, the doorknob rattling under their hands from the wind, “While we observe the storm from the gazebo.”
She clutched her father’s book to her chest and shook her head, but they smiled again as they opened the door, and—
~
“I’m here— I’m right here, Amity, I’ve got you,” Luz promised as she did her best to hold the shivering girl clinging to her tee shirt. She couldn’t be sure if it was helping—she had to keep her eyes on the road. She tried to reach back over her shoulder to place a calming hand on Amity’s head, to pat at her hair in reassurance. “I’m right here, cariño, mi dulce niña,” Luz murmured as Amity burrowed closer; it almost seemed like she was trying to squeeze between Luz and her seat. The brown-haired girl gave a sad chuckle when slender fingers wrapped around her forearm, holding her palm tightly to the head of green hair.
The cabin flared bright as daylight for a half-second as a web of lightning danced across the face of the clouds, and the pale girl flinched, tugging at Luz’s arm and making her swerve. Luz grabbed at the wheel with both hands, pulling her wrist from Amity’s grasp with a hissed “Shit, hold on,” before steering Hooty straight and smooth in the fast lane. A horn blared from their right. Amity jumped at the sound, leaning away from Luz just in time for the rumbling crack of thunder to send her cowering in her seat.
“Sor— sorry! I’m sorry!” Amity pulled herself up stiff and straight-backed, her hands locked on her knees, “I-I-I’m in the w-way, I sh–shouldn’t have gra-abbed you! Mother always said— and I— Sorry! I—” Her breath caught in her throat at another blistering white flash, and she squeezed her eyes closed. “I’ll be good, I promise, I’ll be good,” she whimpered, “I’m—”
~
“I’m hungry,” she admitted, then immediately wished she hadn’t. She was almost eleven— she was old enough to know to keep her mouth shut. Her mother turned to look at her, and she lowered her eyes to the floor. She hunched between her mother and her sister in the back of their long, fancy black car. Her brother and her father sat on either side of the long bench facing them. No one had told her where they were going now, but she had a sinking suspicion that it would be hours yet before she could try to sneak down to the pantry.
“You might have taken the opportunity to eat your dinner,” her mother hissed between perfectly white teeth, her words clipped short by a rose-red frown. Before she turned back to the window, she added, “Sit up straight, a Blight doesn’t slouch.”
She wanted so badly to say, “What dinner?” There had been hardly any food on the plates, and it all felt wrong when she had tried to chew it. Her mother had been acting strange while they ate, with a hungry look in her eye. The twins had ignored her when she tried to talk to them, and eventually, she fell silent and just watched everyone around them, like her father did most meals. All the people seated nearby had been staring, watching them with a sour twist to their lips. She knew what that look meant.
A chorus of car horns rang out all around their limo, from the swarm of taxis along the curb, and she jumped and tried to catch her mother’s hand. Her mother tsk’d in irritation and shifted away, pulling her fingers out of reach. Several more horns blared, making her feel jangly inside. She tried to hold on to her mother’s coat. “Honestly, Mittens, keep your hands to yourself,” her mother spat the words as she shook her hands away from her sleeve, “Be good!”
She tried to sit up straight—she tried, she really did—but the more cars honked, the more she shivered. When she couldn’t sit still any longer, when she finally tired of the buzzing beneath her skin, she leaned into her sister, seeking the warmth of another. Emira crossed her arms and huffed, and pushed her away with her elbow. “Mother, she’s doing it again,” her sister’s voice dripped with venom. Her father stared out the window. Edric sat across from his sisters and watched as she went pale, cowering under her mother’s sudden piercing gaze.
“Amity, I said sit up!” her mother snapped, her face flushed red with anger. “I will not tolerate this behavior tonight!”
She had to sit so still. She locked her hands on her knees to keep from grabbing at anyone else—they clearly didn’t want her to touch them. Edric’s eyes tightened in a guilty way, but she couldn’t spare a thought to understand why. She stared at her wrist and traced the shape of the button on her coat sleeve with her eyes until the rest of the world faded away. She would be good. She would sit still, and not touch anyone, and—
~
“Hold on,” Luz passed the head of the traffic in the right lane and moved across the dotted line, Hooty’s turn signals flashing in the wet, rainy spray. She watched as Amity wobbled in her chair, swaying with the motion of the truck— rapid, shallow breaths hissing through her clenched teeth. Her breathing was far too quick to be doing her any good; the pale girl looked almost ready to pass out. Luz had been present a few times when Lilith had an anxiety-triggered panic attack and Amity looked to be going through something quite similar. Luz remembered how Eda had reached out to her older sister like she’d been a wounded animal: slow, careful movements; voice calm and caring; soothing words, gentle touch. The brown-haired girl smiled and pushed her aisle-side armrest up with her elbow, “Amity? Amity, look at me.” The pale girl lifted her jittery eyes toward Luz. Her pupils were blown wide in fear, leaving shiny black voids bound by narrow rings of gold.
Luz held out her hand toward the other girl and slowly lifted her armrest, pushing it up beside the seat-back; Amity’s eyes snapped to the motion as her breathing grew strained. “Lo siento, Amity,” she tried to keep her voice soft as she glanced between the wet road ahead and the hyperventilating girl beside her, “I didn’t mean to push you away, cariño, I’m sorry. Come back to me?”
Amity’s eyes widened and she lurched, as if she wanted to move but then recoiled in fear. She squeaked at another peal of thunder, and gave a quick shake of her head, “I– I’ll be good,” she whispered again in a broken voice.
“I know, you are,” Luz waved toward herself, “You can come here, it’s alright.” She made a counter-clockwise motion with her hand, “Swing your legs around, cariño, knees towards me.” A flash and a crack made the pale girl freeze again, and Luz gave her a kind smile, “You can do it, just look at me, okay? Look at me.” Amity slowly started to move, in fits and starts, like her body was made of lead. “Good girl; that’s it, just keep your eyes on me,” Luz repeated, risking another glance toward the other girl as the Interstate wound its way down the ridge. The fear and uncertainty in those golden eyes made her want to cry. Not now, though— she’d have to pencil that in for later. “Come to me,” she waved toward herself, “You can come back here.” Luz patted her leg then held her hand out again, “You won’t be in the way, I promise.”
Amity bit her lip and squeezed her eyes closed, going still as stone under another burst of lightning and the crash and rumble that instantly followed. “I— I-I’m not supposed to t-touch anyone, a-and—” the taller girl’s hesitant explanation was cut short by another brilliant arc of electricity.
“I could just hold your hand if you want?” Luz offered, laying a gentle hand on the shivering girl’s knee, “It’s— It’s your choice, cariño.” She rubbed her thumb across the pale girl’s knee as she navigated a turn, then she glanced back at Amity. “What can I do? I don’t want you to be alone. If you want me to hold you, I’ll hold yoooof—” Amity lunged across the little aisle to bury her face in the shorter girl’s stomach, throwing her arm across Luz’s lap and squeezing the sentence out of her chest with a wheeze.
Amity’s hoarsely whimpered, “I’m sorry!” sent a sharp twinge through Luz’s heart. She ran her hand over the taller girl’s shoulders, patting her hair as she murmured comforting sounds. Amity flinched at the next flash of lightning, and Luz covered her ear with her hand and pressed the side of the taller girl’s head into her stomach, hopefully muffling the deep, crackling groan that echoed from the sky above. The pale girl still gasped in quick, shallow breaths of air, struggling to calm herself, too frightened to cry.
“Can you hear me?” Luz asked while still holding the other girl’s head against her abdomen. Amity gave a jerking nod and tightened her arms around Luz’s torso. “You need to breathe, cariño, close your eyes, okay? Feel how I’m breathing and try to copy me.” Luz cradled the head of green hair against herself as she took long, exaggerated breaths in, and slow breaths out. It took a few tries, but the frightened girl began to breathe a little easier. “That’s it, cariño, you’re doing so good,” she rubbed at Amity’s back, repeating, “That’s it, deep, slow breaths, I’ve got you.” After a time, Luz began to pause after the inhale, holding her breath for a few seconds before letting it whistle out between her teeth. The lights of a town passed by in the rain-soaked night, small gleams of light barely visible in the gloom.
Their lane split up ahead, Interstate 70 now spread across three lanes eastbound and three lanes west. Luz angled to stay in the right-hand lane, blinkers on, to keep from having to watch for vehicles on that side. The road bore ever downward, the distant lights of Denver a dim glow painting the clouds near the horizon. “I’m looking for a quick place to stop, Amity,” Luz admitted, squinting into the distance, “Like an off-ramp somewhere, just to pull over for a minute.” The taller girl nodded into her stomach again, and Luz smiled as she carded through her green locks. Amity shuddered at a series of booms and rumbles loud enough to jostle the truck. Luz squeezed her close, rubbing her palm across her shoulder.
The constant rattle of rainfall on the double-brown big rig paused for a pair of heavy heartbeats as a twin-bridge overpass passed overhead; Luz glanced up at the great green sign bolted to the bridge, where brilliant silver symbols shimmered in a spotlight shining skyward: EXIT 253 CHIEF HOSA 3/4 MILE. Amity twitched in her lap at the choppy susurrus of rain, and the brown-haired girl hummed, “Just going under some bridges, I think I can stop up ahead.” The Interstate climbed the swell of the land, Hooty’s tires splashing and spraying the rain washing back down the lanes. Another highway merged into their three lanes driving east as the rise leveled off, and Luz signaled to drift over into the far-right exit lane, both hands on the wheel as Amity held on tighter than before. Luz pulled off at the exit and slowed to a stop at the red sign at the top of the off-ramp. To her left, a bridge to cross the Interstate; to her right, a two-lane road disappeared into the wet, gloomy dark. Just ahead, an on-ramp leading back down to I-70. “Perfect,” the shorter girl grinned, guiding Hooty to the on-ramp and off onto the shoulder.
“Amity?” Luz said as she parked, patting the taller girl on the shoulder, then rubbing along her back after she moved the gearbox to Neutral, “I need up for a sec, okay?” The storm raged outside the cab, lightning scouring the clouds as thunder vibrated the truck. Amity shook her head into her stomach as she clutched Luz tighter while the sky roared above them. Luz made a soft, sad sound in her chest as she rubbed Amity’s hair, “Oh, cariño… Can you sit up straight for me?” The taller girl scrambled away before she had finished her sentence, and Luz blinked in surprise. Did I say something wrong? Luz wondered as she moved to unbuckle her seatbelt.
She turned to keep the buckle from smacking her window as the belt retracted, and when she placed her hand near her door handle Amity yelped and clutched at her elbow. “No! No no, please, don’t go! Don’t go don’t go, no,” the taller girl whimpered into Luz’s shoulder as she pulled herself close again, clinging tightly in fear, “Don’t leave me,” she whispered.
The seatbelt clasp clattered against the doorframe, forgotten, as Luz swiveled in her seat to face the ashen-faced girl shivering in the half-lit cabin. “Never,” Luz promised, cradling Amity’s face with both hands, running her thumbs across cold cheekbones. She leaned forward to press her forehead up against Amity’s brow, gently shaking her head, “I’m not leaving you alone, I’m right here.” Amity clung to her arms, pulling her closer, tighter, after freezing completely when another flash and boom rattled the truck. Luz wrapped her arms up and over Amity’s shoulders, and the pale girl quickly hid her eyes in the crook of her neck, burrowing close. She shivered into the tanned girl’s embrace. “You’re so cold, cariño,” Luz furrowed her brow in concern, running a hand through soft green hair, “We need to get you warm. Let me get something from my backpack.”
A thunderclap shattered the sky above the truck, and Amity clutched at Luz in desperation. “I-I— I want to go home,” she hiccuped into the tanned girl’s collarbone, on the verge of tears, “m-my lab is– is soundproof, I— I can’t, I can’t—”
~
I can’t do this, she thought as her blood turned to ice. The announcer rattled off names to the roar of cheers and applause as the Banshee’s first string jogged out from the pit and onto the field. As the recently-appointed team captain—a record achievement for a sixteen-year-old, but expected of a Blight—she would emerge last. Usually, she savored the building tension in the crowd, the growing roar of the fans, but today? It just gave her more time to stare out at the dark, flickering sky lurking above the field. The air was charged, and she felt paralyzed, rooted to the ground.
Her assistant captain barked an order and the second string scarpered double-time out through the concrete portal to scattered whoops and cat-calls. The forecast had been clear today, she triple-checked every match day. You have a duty to your team, she scolded herself, you have a duty to your fans. She watched as a slinking shadow circled her silhouette on the ground, the long gray coat and hair bun cutting a nightmarishly familiar figure. You have a duty to your family, she swallowed bile and fear as Odalia loomed over her shoulder, perfectly sharp smile hissing pointed words in her ear. “Oh, Mittens,” her mother simpered, “You’re team captain, remember?” As if she could forget. It was a nagging point of failure every day until she was nominated, and now it was a measuring stick for her lack of perfection. “If you can’t handle your responsibilities like a Blight, then perhaps this little dalliance has run its course.” The severely-dressed green-haired woman glanced at her watch and sighed, “I do so hate to squander what little time I have away from the office watching your pitiful performances.”
The towering black clouds weighed heavy on her spine; there was a pressure building in her chest, behind her eyes. She can’t let her mother take this away from her too; she’s worked too hard for this. The storm is terrifying, yes… but her mother is so much worse. She forced one foot forward, then the other. Her limbs were numb, her ears filled with static. She can barely move, much less think straight. The twins are waiting outside, hiding from their mother’s line of sight. They called out to her with soft, encouraging words, tentative smiles, and a thumbs-up, but she couldn’t hear or see them. She could only see the storm.
~
Luz sat back down in her seat, her battered blue-and-tan Jansport backpack pulled open at her feet. She placed a gentle hand under Amity’s jaw and lifted her face, catching her wild pair of golden eyes. “I know you’re scared, Amity,” Luz said with a sad half-smile and a tip of her head, “It’s really scary outside right now, but you’re safe, okay?” The pale girl slid closer, knocking their knees together as she pressed into the shorter girl’s warm hand, reaching up to wrap her fingers around her tanned wrist. “You’re safe in here with me, I promise,” Luz repeated, using her other hand to brush the green hair back from her forehead, and over a pale ear, “I’m right here, you’re not alone.”
Amity nodded, slowly at first, then several times quickly. Lightning split the sky above the truck an instant before the following thunderclap rocked the cabin from side to side. The green-haired girl caught her bottom lip in her teeth and tried to stifle a whimper, but Luz could still feel how the other girl went rigid at the roar of the storm through the slender fingers around her arm.
Luz gave her a smile and pulled a white and purple hoodie from her backpack, turning it around on her lap to get its front laying across her knees. “I like to wear this on nights when I’m cold,” the tanned girl began to say as she bunched up the bottom hem and shook it out, “Bend your head down for me, cariño.” Amity tilted forward, slow and sluggish, half-dazed, but she held still as Luz pulled the hoodie over her head and shoulders, cooperating with the smaller girl to slip her arms into the sleeves. Luz continued to talk in a gentle tone, tugging the hem down to Amity’s waist, covering her plain gray v-neck, “It’s soft and cozy, I think it’ll help you feel better, and it’s hella big on me so it should fit you just— yup, perfect.”
Amity straightened up, slipping her hands into the hoodie’s big stomach pocket as she shivered again. The hoodie’s sleeves and upper chest were a rich purple, while the bottom half of the torso was a bright, spotless white. A small sky-blue teardrop-shaped gemstone was printed high on the chest, laying across her sternum, but she hadn’t noticed it yet. She closed her eyes and gave a shaky sigh as tears beaded along the corners of her eyelids. Like the blanket Luz had given her the night before, the hoodie had a soft texture on the inside. It was so warm and comforting and it smelled like Luz—like safety—like lemon and sandalwood, it was almost overwhelming, and— The storm raged outside, a flash and crash breaking over the truck to set her shaking again. Amity lurched up straight with her hands on her knees, long-ingrained habits driving her body to move, then she felt tears start to stream down her face.
Luz cooed as she brushed the tears away with her thumbs, her callused hands so gentle it made Amity’s chest tighten, like a great fist had clenched around her lungs. The shivering girl hunched her shoulders and slumped forward, letting herself rest against the smaller girl. “Oh, cariño,” the brown-eyed girl’s voice was hushed and delicate, “You’re trying so hard… but you don’t have to be brave right now.” Amity’s breath grew harsh and strained, her eyes trembled, and more tears spilled out across her cheeks. Luz brushed at her hair, her cheeks, she smiled and nodded, brown eyes locked with gold. “Let me take care of you… I’ll keep you safe.” They weren’t just words or even a promise; they both knew the shorter girl had sworn an oath. Amity let out a ragged exhale as she squeezed her eyes closed for a moment, then gave a slow, hesitant nod. Their noses bumped together with the motion, pale skin brushing against tan. Luz chuckled, and her warm breath washed across cold, pale lips.
Luz gently held the golden-eyed girl’s face in her hands, cradling her in her palms as she carefully wiped her tears away with her thumbs. “I’m going to keep driving, okay? Maybe I can get us out of this storm.” Luz’s gaze flicked left and right as she examined the other girl’s too-wide, glassy eyes. “You can hold onto me like before, just keep your lap-belt on.” Amity crinkled her eyes and shivered again at another vibrating rumble from outside. “Don’t worry, I’ll help you,” Luz gave her a soft smile, and ran a thumb along her cheek. It took a few minutes of gently encouraging the taller, shaking girl, but Luz got her wrapped in a warm blanket, burrito-style, and adjusted her seatbelt to allow her to lean across the aisle a little easier. The shorter girl settled into her seat, sat-phone and smartphone tucked into her cup holder, and beckoned toward Amity. The taller girl was sitting upright, facing her, her knees in the aisle, leaning against the backrest of her captain’s chair as she stared out into the night. She flinched again at the storm, turning her face away from the windshield.
“I think these will help,” the tanned girl pulled a heavy pair of headphones from her backpack. “Some nights Eda gets to sawing logs and holy shit,” Luz made a face, bugging out her eyes, “So loud,” and then she laughed and Amity couldn’t help the delirious giggle that bubbled out of her throat. “So, I think—I hope—these will help you too,” Luz said as she locked eyes with the taller girl. “Is it okay if I put these on your head?” Amity bit her lip again and nodded, blinking away a fresh wave of emotion from the shorter girl’s endless gentleness. Luz carefully pulled the purple hood back, off Amity’s head, and then slipped her arms around the taller girl’s neck at another brilliant flash of lightning, pressing their foreheads together as they locked eyes, “It’s okay, you’re safe,” Luz repeated, “I’m right here,” she whispered. Amity squeezed her eyes closed and trembled in Luz’s arms at the fierce rattling growl in the dark. “I’ll play some music for you, something peaceful,” Luz said as she lifted the headphones, pushing them back across Amity’s temples. She held the cups away from the pale girl’s ears for a moment to add, “Lay your head in my lap, and we’ll get on the road.”
Small, tanned fingers fit the headphones around Amity’s ears, and for a few seconds everything was muffled and tinny, a pressure in her head as she adjusted to the sensation of the heavy headset, and then— Luz pressed a switch on the side and— a click— a small pop, and— silence. Blessed silence. Just that small absence of sound had Amity ready to sob with relief. Luz sat down and said something as she buckled her seatbelt—her lips and mouth moving—but she couldn’t hear a word. That she didn’t like as much as— she flinched at another flash of light from outside, and quickly buried her face in Luz’s lap, snaking one arm out of her blanket wrap to hook her fingers around the shorter girl’s belt in a white-knuckled grip. She felt the rumble of thunder, the percussive blast of wind that rocked the truck, but she could barely hear it. Without that echoing din filling her head, she felt like she could finally breathe. She inhaled slow and deep just to prove she could, and huffed a short, broken laugh before she started to cry in earnest.
Luz patted at the back of her hair, then pulled the purple hood over her head, “Maybe this’ll keep the lightning from scaring you,” she said as she tucked the fabric down around Amity’s face, hiding her from the storm. She rubbed at the sobbing girl’s back, up and down and in wide looping circles. “I’ve got you,” she said softly, fairly certain the other girl couldn’t hear her anymore, “I’ll get you out of here, prometo.” She tapped at her phone, pulled up a playlist and tapped again. Then she checked her mirrors, released the parking brake, and slipped Hooty into gear.
~
She bumped and swayed with the motion of the truck, her head half-resting on Luz’s thigh, half-draped across her arm where she had reached across the shorter girl’s lap to tangle her fingers around her belt. Luz was right—she had been trying to be brave, to be a Blight, and tough it out in the face of nature’s fury. She’d always had to, it was demanded of her. But Luz gave her permission to be weak, to be imperfect, to lean on her just for a little while. She’d said it’s okay. She’d said I’ll take care of you. She’d said words that Amity had longed to hear her entire life. Right now, bundled up in Luz’s soft blanket, wearing Luz’s warm hoodie and headphones, listening to Luz’s gentle music… She felt like someone truly cared for her. She felt loved. Well… what she hoped love felt like. She felt the need to pull herself close and press her forehead against the smaller girl’s stomach. She felt Luz chuckle and pat the back of her head, and she sniffed and smiled at the comforting contact. A small, warm hand massaged at her shoulders for a moment before it went away—presumably to take its proper place on the steering wheel. Fresh tears welled in her eyes and she didn’t try to hold them back; Luz understood. She felt raw and bruised, like an exposed nerve that had been poked and prodded for hours. The soothing music helped; a guitar and a gentle voice, the song itself unraveling a new emotional thread in her heart that prompted more tears—good emotions this time, at least, not caused by her irrational fears. These tears she didn’t mind collecting under closed eyelids. She couldn’t help but sigh when the song ended; it left her with a sense of longing that she couldn’t begin to describe.
But then— Her eyes snapped open at the gentle violin melody that she knew so well. Once more she went rigid, this time in surprise as she clutched tightly to the warm, caring, impossibly kind girl that journeyed with her on her quest to prove herself. Luz must have felt her stiffen as a hand soon rubbed between her shoulder blades before resting there, warming, grounding. Amity twisted slightly, and turned her head to gaze up at Luz in astonishment as the soft strings of Hecate’s Regret** poured through her borrowed headphones. She blinked and blinked, tears pooling in her eyes at the utterly unexpected deluge of emotions. This track that she had played on repeat for months, quietly, of course, secretly, after the film’s soundtrack had been released; the crowning leitmotif from the second Good Witch Azura animated film that underscored Hecate’s life-changing decision after her heart-to-heart with Azura; when the moon-witch finally broke down under the strain of her obligations and then kind, ever-gentle Azura lifted her up to her feet; the track she would listen to when she felt so desperately alone, and she would wish—
Luz looked down at her with kind, crinkling eyes and a tender smile. “There you are,” the brown-eyed girl whispered.
Amity’s heart hammered painfully in her throat as she stared up at the warm brown-haired girl in something close to reverence, a faint blush coloring her cheekbones. She was completely and thoroughly unprepared to be looked at like that after a night like this, after the emotional triathlon she had just endured. So she did the only thing that made any kind of sense: she’d make making sense of this Future-Amity’s problem. She snuggled as close to Luz as she could, shut her eyes, and surrendered to her exhaustion with a contented smile on her lips.
Notes:
* These are the jokes, people. I'm not even sorry.
** This track, Goshintai, is from the anime film Your Name by Makoto Shinkai. If you’ve not seen it, please watch it.Note: the gemstone on the hoodie used to be described as "emerald-green" and "kite-shaped", I should have done a quick Google before I hit post.
Chapter 18: Wednesday, 1:38am MT / 12:38am PT
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
Luz scowled out the windshield at the cross-Denver traffic, sluggish both due to the late-late-late-early hour and slowed by the torrential downpour. She had one hand on the wheel, and cradled her most precious cargo with the other—when she didn’t have to shift gears due to another stupid—! She frowned and hissed through clenched teeth as another rain-soaked pair of tail lights slipped in front of Hooty’s headlights and immediately brightened. The inner-left lane cut almost the whole way through the city, which meant she didn’t have to jockey for position—or worse, merge into a busy lane—as long as she kept her cool. She wouldn’t have to crane her neck to see the mirrors and possibly jostle her passenger in the process. This will make it smoother for Amity. She needs her sleep. It’s just normal idiot drivers in their normal idiot environm— She tapped the brakes again and muttered a choice four-letter word while Joe Walsh’s four-piece band rocked a four-four beat in-tempo with Hooty’s windshield wipers.
She glanced down at the pale girl, half hidden in the night's dark, barely lit by her instrument panel and rimed with the dim green glow from the highway's sporadic lampposts. Amity had worn a pinched, worried look most of the way down from the Divide, and then a glassy-eyed terror when they came across the storm. Just remembering the pure, unadulterated fear in those golden eyes made her chest tighten in a truly painful way. Now, though, Amity looked peacefully asleep, her eyes flitting back and forth behind gently closed eyelids. In the middle of some dream, no doubt, Luz guessed. Her cheeks had a hint of color, and her lips… Luz glanced down again, at that small, soft smile, the tiniest bit of her bottom lip caught between her teeth as she dreamed, and—
Luz rolled her eyes and shook her head, Don’t creep on the sleeping beauty. The thunderhead above splintered the sky, and the truck rattled from the force of its breaking. She pressed her hand to the back of Amity's head, just… just holding her. She was torn; every instinct she had was screaming at her to stop, to find shelter, to hide Amity away from nature's wrath until the weather cleared… but if she did, she would fail her. She definitely didn’t have the head for numbers like Amity, but she knew she couldn't make up too much lost time on a solo run—and who knew how long this storm would last? Eda planned out a bit of a buffer, but I'm already cutting it close with 850 miles a day. Luz set her jaw and nodded. I can't fail Amity. It was unacceptable.
Irritation bubbled under her skin and simmered in her stomach. She’d been glancing at the sat-phone rattling in her cup holder for the last half hour, doing her best to resist the urge to hit redial. Oh, who am I kidding, Luz rolled her eyes and quickly snatched the plain gray device and flicked the antenna up, stabbing at the small oval button under the LCD screen. You're weak, Noceda. She wedged the sat-phone between her ear and her shoulder and listened to the tinny ringtone for a pair of long, calming breaths, then—
“Hey Mittsy, what’s up?” Edric sounded half-distracted.
"Edric, it's Luz, I'm—" she started to reply, but her words were swallowed by a flash of light and a crack and rumble from the sky above. For a half-second, the cars and trucks spread out around her were frozen in an impossible tableau, heavy rain drops hanging in the air like time itself had stopped. Luz blinked away the afterimage as her wipers swept across the windshield.
There was a staticky silence for a moment, then the sound of items clattering on his end of the line. He must have dropped a tool, something metal. "Oh shit."
Luz couldn't help but laugh. So he did know. Maybe both of the twins knew. "Yeah," she drawled, "oh shit is right." She sighed through another peal of thunder, "I found out she is absolutely terrified of thunderstorms."
"Yyyeah," he replied, slowly, like he was scratching at the back of his head, and she scrunched her eyebrows in frustration. The stupidly handsome bastard sounded stupidly guilty! "Uh, yeah, about that…"
"What did you do?"
"Look, i-is–is she okay?" Edric stammered under the weight of the anger in her voice.
"She's good for now," Luz glanced down at the pale, pretty girl sleeping in her lap and couldn't keep a half-smile from pulling at her own lips. "Took a minute to get her calmed down, but then she fell asleep listening to music." After she gave you that… intense look, Luz had a sudden recollection of a trembling pair of golden moons, widening with surprise and glittering with some deeply-held emotion. What was that about?
"She fell asleep?!" Edric gave an incredulous laugh, mostly drowned out in the rumble and roar from the clouds, "You are a miracle worker."
"Why is she scared of storms, Edric?" Luz couldn't keep the simmering frustration out of her tone, and the corners of her eyes began to burn. No, I'm not going to cry right now! She gave a quick, savage shake of her head.
"We… we told you… uh… that we weren't the best siblings… growing up," the green-haired man's voice grew soft and hesitant, like he was preparing for a difficult confession. "I need to… okay… let me start from– well? Yeah— from the beginning. I’m not—I’m not making excuses, I’m just… trying to explain, okay?”
Luz hummed a note and heard a deep sigh. She kept her eyes on the traffic ahead as he began to speak in a soft, distant voice:
“Dad’s… brilliant and spacy, shall we say. There's more to it than that, but that's enough to… set the scene. He can’t give a shit about PR stuff that Odalia considers critical, like how he appears on TV and in the newspaper. I look pretty good in a suit and I can bullshit my way through a dinner party, which is really all I needed to keep her off my back. But Emira… had to compete with Odalia’s, y'know, flawless self-image, and that… that really fucked with her head when she was younger. Emira’s smart, right? I think she'd be a lawyer if she had any say in her future. I think I’m better at reading people, but she’s got the facts and figures down. Odalia knew she's the smart one—of course, because how could she not—and spent years dropping hints about Emira inheriting the business, like ‘if you measure up’, snide, back-handed compliments... and then… and then Mittens started to blossom, uh, academically speaking. She was a genius even as a little kid... Really took after Dad, like that.”
Raindrops sparkled in the gaze of Hooty’s headlights, twinkling as they fell from the sky, or ran down the back windshield of the little blue Corolla ahead. Luz listened as Edric grew quiet for a number of heartbeats. Shuffling footsteps echoed through the earpiece, and she imagined the green-haired man pacing back and forth. He cleared his throat, then:
“Odalia… tried her damnedest to mold her into a perfect little reflection of herself, and… and… we— we saw her as a threat, y'know? To what little parental goodwill we could earn? And… Odalia made sure to exploit that when we were younger. She would say these things that… just… made you feel like you had to… like, take the first shot, like… hit them before they can hit you. Like it was so obvious, why didn't you see the danger beforehand?”
“I've spent enough time around Dad now to see the signs, and… I… Mittens is just like him. It took me so long to see that she… just… she wanted some friends. She would interrupt whatever we were doing by reading out loud from whatever random book she had, and I— I hated it. I thought— I thought she was rubbing how smart she was in my face. That's what Odalia had said and I— I— I believed that for so long. I'm so… I’m so ashamed of how we treated her. We were awful.”
Luz waited for a long, quiet moment as he considered what to say. She could almost see it in her mind’s eye: the green-haired man standing before a floor-to-ceiling window, staring out over a dark, San Francisco skyline.
“So… to your original question… there was a storm one night, a bad one. It blew in quick, lasted a long time. Lots of uprooted trees and fallen limbs around the mansion, broken windows, shingles off the garages, y’know… a–a fair bit of property damage, all said. We… didn’t find that out until the next day. We knew Mit… uh… Amity hated thunder. We'd picked up on how loud noises bothered her; siblings will… uh… figure out ways to bug each other. I know… I know now that she was just a scared little girl. Now I know she was just trying to— to calm herself down, I think, but… um… Like I’d said, when she, uh, I– I didn’t understand. I forget what Em and I were doing—probably nothing, definitely nothing too important to put on hold—and A-Amity came in, reading about the weather of all things, and the storm blew in and we saw she was nervous, and… and…” He exhaled a world-weary sigh. “We pushed her outside and locked the door.”
“Edric!” Luz gasped, her mouth falling open in shock before she could argue, “No you didn’t.”
“Luz, I’m— we were stupid kids. We were so stupid.”
There was a weighty pause before Luz asked, “How old was she?”
His voice was heavy with regret. “She was seven.”
“SEV—” Luz sucked air in through her teeth as a seething anger burned in her chest. Don’t wake her up! She clenched the steering wheel with both hands and squeezed until her hands hurt, then she exhaled long and slow, pushing it all down. She could have indigestion later, when she wasn’t driving. When she didn’t say anything else, Edric continued to speak.
“We laughed at… at… at how she screamed and pounded on the door. The storm got louder, and we couldn't hear her anymore… then we just… we walked back upstairs. I think… I guess I thought she would just run around the sunroom to the kitchen entrance. She missed dinner, which was… a while later. Odalia was furious, but we… um… we pretended not to know anything about it. Odalia demanded the butler bring Amity to her office immediately, and… we laughed our way up to our room. It was… She… One of the cooks found her a few hours later, when they were taking out the trash. The storm had passed on by then. It had been dark for a while. Amity was huddled under a pricker bush near Dad’s locked workshop, out by the garages, just… covered with scratches and mud and leaves. She wouldn't—or couldn’t—say a word. Dad’s book was ruined, of course. She got in trouble for that too. It… was… a long time before she’d talk to us.”
Luz blinked away the tears building in her eyes as she stared out at the Interstate. The traffic had thinned as she moved steadily away from the Denver city center, and the road stretched on into the night. She cleared her throat and huffed, “That was—” she gave a dry chuckle and shook her head, “Sorry man, that lore dump sucked. Goddamn.”
“You’re mad, aren’t you?” Edric sounded anxious, much to her surprise.
“I’m not mad,” Luz waffled, drumming a dissatisfied beat on the steering wheel with her fingertips, “I’m just… disappointed.”
“Wow, okay, ouch,” the man grumbled, “You sound like a TV mom.”
“You were kids,” The brown-haired girl replied, “and you were stupid—”
“Hey!”
Luz scoffed. “I was a stupid kid too, dumb-dumb.” Edric mumbled a reply before she continued, “Listen, you guys weren’t… you weren't taught to take care of Amity. You did cruel things, yes, but your mom made that seem normal, yeah?”
She heard him sniff twice before he breathed a quiet, “Yeah.”
“I’m mad for her, y’know?” Luz tried her best to shrug with the sat-phone pressed between her jaw and her shoulder. “I’m mad that that happened to her. But you— you obviously regret it, and you’re both doing your best to make up for it, so… no. I’m not mad at you, Edric.”
“Thanks,” he whispered.
“Holy shit I want to be,” Luz added, her lips splitting in a wide grin at his groan, “But that wouldn’t be fair to the Edric of now.” He hummed a flat note, and started making noise on his end of the line, while shifting objects or tools around. Luz thought twice before she said it, but sometimes things just slip out on their own. "I might still punch you the next time I see you."
"Oh, what?" Edric whined, "Like in the arm?"
"You'll just have to see."
He made a thoughtful noise before he cautioned, "I'm no lawyer, but I'm pretty sure that's assault."
"Only if you cry about it," Luz laughed, and he couldn't help but chuckle along. “If you don’t mind me asking,” she began in a gentle voice, then paused until he replied with a hmm? "When did you start patching things up with Amity?"
“I’d been feeling guilty for a while,” Edric admitted, “Every time we got her in trouble, it just… it felt awful watching her cower when Odalia scolded her.” He gave a sad, dry chuckle and asked, "Remember how I said Emira was the smart one?"
Luz channeled her best Josh Gad impersonation, "Yeah, why?"
"She tested into pre-Calc and I was stuck in Algebra 2," he replied, and laughed at Luz's low-pitched, Algebra? Gross. "Yeah, exactly!" Edric groaned, "It was awful! Em wasn't there to play pranks with me, and this stuff was— listen, I barely, barely, passed Algebra 1 on my own, right? And this is, like, harder?"
"Algebra 2 was not fun," Luz nodded, rubbing the phone against her jaw with the motion. The line crackled for a moment while lightning crawled across the bottom of the clouds overhead.
"I was absolutely lost within a couple weeks," he admitted, "Em could only help so much, and with our conflicting extracurriculars we didn't have a lot of time for her to explain things the way I needed." He paused to take a drink, then, "Meanwhile, Amity was always around the Mansion, because she had skipped a few grades and… and had no friends to speak of, partly due to that fact. She was already in AP Calculus, so I thought, this is great. I have a legitimate reason to reach out… because… she didn't trust us."
Luz made a noise in her throat, like Awww or maybe Poor baby. A small, spiteful sliver wanted to say something closer to Serves you right.
"Not that she should have, the way we treated her," Edric sighed, "But with a sheet full of unsolved math problems and my best puppy-dog eyes, I thought she'd be less suspicious."
"Still no?" Luz asked.
He agreed, "Still no. She wouldn't even open her door when I knocked, but she solved the first problem on the sheet when I tried to slide it through the gap underneath." Edric chuckled when Luz laughed at a mental image of Amity crouched by her door with a pencil and a math-hungry expression. "She glanced at it, and was all 'five x over three y, now leave!' I was desperate. I spent a couple days begging for help, and finally bribed her with a pack of those sugar cookies with the frosting on top? Like, diabeetus in a carton! One of those a week for ten minutes of her time each afternoon."
"Nice," Luz chuckled, glancing down at the slumbering girl in her lap, "Sounds like she got the better end of the deal."
“I was more than okay with that,” he admitted, “it was a start. Y’know? It was a— a beginning. She was cold, though. She would explain the math and leave with her cookies. If I tried to ask about her day, she’d stare at me, like… like she was trying to figure out a puzzle, then she’d stab a finger at the paper to get us back on track.” Luz made a thoughtful humming noise and Edric voiced an “Ah-ha, you’ve seen it too, yeah?”
“Yeah… yeah, I think I did,” Luz said, “But I didn’t really think anything of it at the time.”
“She’s just like— well— she’s not as bad as Dad. He has a real hard time reading people’s expressions and tone of voice—he’ll believe almost anything you tell him because he can’t figure out when someone’s lying to him.”
“Yikes?” Luz offered, “Head of Blight International, and—”
“But that’s just it,” Edric interrupted in a hushed tone, like he’d hunched over the phone in his hand after looking over his shoulders, “He’s not in charge, Odalia is! And when he agreed to that arrangement, he said she said it was because she wanted to protect his business from people trying to take adv—”
“Take advantage of him?!” Luz said the same words at the same time, remembering how confused Amity had been earlier that day after her phone call with her mother and her chance encounter with Mama Jackie. “She said the same thing to Amity!”
“Well why not?” He countered, “It worked with Dad, why not his daughter? And if the gaslighting doesn’t work, she’ll just brow-beat her another way!”
Luz ground her teeth and growled, “That’s not right.”
“It’s not. After a couple weeks of math tutoring, I had a lucky break,” Edric’s voice softened as he returned to his story, “well—I say lucky, but… I was in the second-floor study we used, and I could hear Odalia yelling at someone in her office downstairs, and… and Amity was late.” Luz made a grumbling noise at the implication. “When she did come in a few minutes later, she was practically vibrating with anger.” He sighed. “She stared at my math problems for a minute, just… seething. Didn’t make a sound.”
Luz glanced down at the girl in her lap, sleeping warm and safe, and gently placed a hand on the back of her head, rubbing a tender thumb across the purple fabric of her borrowed hoodie. Amity might have smiled in her sleep, but Luz figured it was just a trick of the light.
“I tapped on the table next to the page to get her attention, then I asked ‘what did Mother say?’” Edric might have shrugged then, based on the jostling sounds sent through the line. “I didn’t know if she’d actually open up, but she looked at me and I said, ‘please tell me’, and… she did. Odalia tore her a new one about an A- in her speech class. She only missed points because she didn't maintain eye contact with her audience; otherwise it was a perfectly researched presentation. Odalia ended with, ‘I had such high hopes for your public speaking abilities in the future, but Emira was right, you’ll never give a good product demonstration. I shouldn’t have expected so much from you.’”
He paused while Luz made a strangled choking sound. “Right? Em would tell me everything, and she had never said that. If anything, she was hoping Amity would want to handle the new product demos so she could do anything else. Amity saw me make a face, like bullshit, and I actually said that, and added ‘Mother lied to you,’ but she… she still couldn’t trust me.” Edric sighed and a loud thump sounded through the line, like he’d dropped into a hard plastic chair in a boneless depression. “I think she wanted to, but… she didn’t. That’s when I decided I had to make things right between her and Emira.”
"You're a good brother, Edric," Luz said with a grin, “In spite of yourself.”
“Ha haa,” the man scoffed, but after a moment he gave a quiet, “Thanks.”
The lights and sprawling urban growth of Denver had fallen behind Hooty, dimmed and hidden by the swirling sheets of rain that poured down from the skies. The land was flat, dotted with sparsely scattered trees and small houses, and what might have been open fields on the far side of the road—Luz could only see a wet, rain-shrouded darkness beyond the small pools of light surrounding the vehicles traveling in the opposite direction. A small green sign flashed by, white letters declaring HUDSON CITY LIMIT, ELEV 5024 FT, before the road curved toward an overpass with 52 WEST / 52 EAST signs gleaming in the yellow lamp post light.
Luz stifled the urge to yawn, and laughed when she heard Edric stretch and groan, a yawn of his own slipping out in the process. “How’re the crates coming?” the brown-eyed girl asked, not wanting to hang up just yet.
Edric laughed, “Almost done with the fourth. I’ve been stealing stuff from different floors to fill ‘em, y’know? I just snagged a couple crates full of coffee mugs from the cafeteria to fill in the gaps.”
Luz couldn’t help but laugh, “That’s amazing. Sounds like you’re having fun.”
“Yeah, actually, it has been fun,” he admitted, then groaned again with what might have been another stretch. “It’s so hot in here though, can you ask Amity how to turn down the— oh, right. Nevermind.”
“I can ask her when she’s awake,” Luz replied, “I… I don’t know when that’ll be, though. I’d like for her to sleep as long as possible.”
“Yeah, yeah, of course, I hope she can rest for a while.”
Luz eyed the road ahead and sighed, “I’ll have to make a pit-stop eventually… I’m… I’m hoping the storm is over by then.”
“I hope so too, Luz,” Edric said. “Drive safe.”
~
The storm still raged overhead almost an hour later and Luz couldn’t ignore the call of nature much longer. Winds buffeted the big rig as they swept over the open fields on either side of the Interstate, driving the rain nearly sideways across Hooty’s windshield. A dim glow in the near distance caught her eye, and she smiled when the sign for EXIT 89 pointed toward a truck stop. “Finally,” she muttered, guiding the big truck down the offramp and bringing Hooty to a smooth stop at the junction. She looked both ways before turning right. She worked the gear stick and pedals as she slowly rolled up and into the Love’s parking lot, pulling in a wide loop to stop with the nose of the truck pointing toward the road, and—most importantly—Amity’s door facing the building.
Luz paused her playlist and sighed. With a pained frown on her face, she reached down to shake Amity’s shoulder. It took a moment before the taller girl blinked awake; slow, sleep-heavy golden eyes turned up toward Luz, and Amity smiled— Luz felt the blood rush to her face. They stared at each other for a moment before Amity blinked again, suddenly realizing her head was still in Luz’s lap, and she quickly sat up as best she could with the one arm free of her blanket-burrito.
“WHAT’S THE MATTER?” the pale girl asked as Luz reached for her seatbelt buckle. Luz glanced her way and grinned; Amity couldn’t hear how loud she was talking.
“Sorry, Amity, but I have to—” Luz began to reply, but she stopped when Amity just stared at her with a confused wrinkle on her brow. Again, with the headphones. Luz pointed to herself and pantomimed taking off a pair of headphones, then she reached out to lower Amity’s purple hood. Amity watched her, eyes wide, spots of pink painted across her nose, and loosed a small breath across Luz’s wrists when Luz put both hands on either side of her jaw. She ran tanned thumbs across pale cheekbones and smiled up at Amity as she grasped the black headphones. She paused—just for a moment—when the sky flashed and grumbled, and Amity closed her eyes and tipped her head forward, bumping her forehead against the brim of Luz’s white cowboy hat. Luz pulled the headphones away from one of Amity’s ears, then placed her palm against her jawline. “I’m sorry Amity,” Luz repeated, “But I really have to use the restroom, and—” they both flinched at a crack from overhead, “and it's still thundering outside, I’m so sorry.”
“It— it— it’s okay,” Amity trembled, leaning into Luz’s touch, “I know you’re here, and that—” she jumped at another spider-web of lightning and shivered at the low growl that followed, “I-I– um— you’re here.”
“Listen,” Luz tipped her hat back and pulled Amity forward to rest their foreheads together, “My headphones aren’t waterproof, and— you need them in here, so we can’t take them out there.” Amity blinked and looked up, eyes shining with fresh terror as she caught the other girl's pair of warm brown eyes. Amity shook her head, just the smallest movement, and breathed the smallest, Please no, but Luz could feel it and hear it, and she felt her heart break once more for the taller girl. “I’m not leaving you alone in here,” Luz said, rubbing her thumb across the ridge of her cheek, “I know I’m asking a lot, but, can you trust me?” Amity gave a fearful nod, her eyes closing in resignation.
Luz stood in the cramped, dark cabin and pulled a pair of towels and a pair of olive green bundles from one of the storage bins above the sleeper bed. “Towels to dry off with, when we get back,” she said with a smile, then she shook the shiny folded material, “and some ponchos to help keep the rain off.” She knelt in the small aisle and put a hand on Amity’s blanket-wrapped knee. “Plug your ears on the way in, okay? Close your eyes if you need to. I’ll be with you every step of the way.”
~
Luz walked sideways through the automatic doors, one arm around Amity’s waist, the other hand at her elbow. She tossed a quick nod to the tired gray-haired man behind the counter and led her shivering companion over to the miscellaneous items aisle. Amity had her eyes clenched shut and her fingers pressed hard into her ears as she hunched over, hiding from the weather outside beneath the large hood of the poncho. Luz trailed a fingertip along the items on display before she snagged a six-pack of orange foam earplugs from the shelf and ripped them open, quickly pressing a pair into Amity’s hands. “Is that better?” Luz asked after the pale girl pushed them into her ears, and watched as Amity blinked and glanced around. She repeated her question, a bit louder, and Amity gave her a weak, uncertain smile and a hesitant nod. “Okay, let me go pay for these— oh, and—” Luz snatched a white-and-blue sleeping mask from where it hung on a rotating display, “and this too, and we’ll use the restroom, okay?”
~
Amity stared into the mirror, examining her reflection. Her mothe— Odalia, she corrected herself with a savage shake of her head— Odalia would be horrified. She knew she didn’t really look this bad; the fluorescent lights overhead cast everything in a sickly green hue that turned the blue in her veins a near-purple. Her eyes were bloodshot, rimmed with a dark red that stood out against her skin, and red blotchy patches practically glowed everywhere else on her face. She squinted against the burn in her eyes; her mascara had smeared while she was crying, and now it stung when she rubbed at her face. She huffed and re-folded the damp sheet of paper towel, ran it under warm water, and gently dabbed at her eyes. After a moment spent enjoying the warmth pressed against her eyelids, she studied herself once more. She looked better, but Odalia would say— No. She frowned at herself, then set her jaw and nodded. You know she doesn’t really care about you. It doesn’t matter what she would say, she would just hurt you. She tried to smile at herself, but it didn’t stick. She closed her eyes and sighed, and her mind turned to kind brown eyes and arms that offered safety. Think about what she would say, instead. The smile came back then, easily. She looked at herself once more and felt something close to contentment. She had pushed the over-large hood of her poncho back, but she had left her borrowed hoodie’s purple hood pulled up around her face. It made her feel like Luz was still wrapped around her, comforting her. Keeping her warm.
Motion in the mirror caught her eye, and she watched as Luz sidled up beside her. The brown-haired girl slid over so smoothly, she might have been on wheels. “Heeeey Amity, guess what?” the shorter girl crooned, grinning up at her reflection. Amity squinted a bit as she listened to the muffled words, then hummed a question in response. Luz reached up to the top of the other girl’s head, to the purple hood, and pulled up on two little flaps—carefully stitched-on purple-and-pink cat ears that she hadn’t noticed before—standing the ears upright in a quick one-two sequence as she added sound effects, “Meow-meow!”
Amity looked at herself in the mirror: red, mascara-blackened gaze, unkempt green hair framing her face, the purple hood around her hair, the cat ears standing tall, and a faint blush growing rapidly darker across the bridge of her nose and around her eyes. It was somehow the silliest thing she’d seen all day. She broke out into a wide smile and laughed, watching Luz brighten up as well. The brown-haired girl was dazzling, still, even in the putrid light of a dingy truck stop bathroom. Amity bit her lip and looked over, and down, watching as Luz did a quick twisting, shuffling dance with her own reflection, index fingers raised as she hummed a peppy tune. Luz spun on her toes and stopped with a pair of finger guns pointed at Amity. “You ready to hit the road, parrrrdner?” the girl in the cowboy hat drawled in an exaggerated southern accent.
~
Amity clung to Luz’s arm as they ran through drumming sheets of rain. The earplugs definitely helped, but she couldn’t keep herself from flinching every time lightning burned across the sky. She was trapped under a dome of noise and light, a minuscule speck waiting to be crushed beneath the dark mountains hanging above. She could feel the thunder rolling through her bones. She tucked her head down and into the shorter girl’s shoulder, eyes clenched shut, while Luz unlocked Hooty’s passenger door. Amity scrambled inside at her urging, and crouched in the aisle gasping for air as Luz climbed in after her and slammed the door shut, blocking out the storm’s wrath.
Their rain cloaks were shed and stored, and Amity found herself once again wrapped up in a warm blanket, her wet shoes and damp socks pulled off and set aside as Luz carefully dried her face and hair and hands and feet. Tears gathered in her eyes again at the thoughtful, tender care the smaller girl gave as easily as breathing, and Luz was quick to swipe a gentle thumb under her eyes to brush the tear tracks away. Luz softly placed the headphones on her head, then pushed one earcup behind a pale ear as she cradled Amity’s face with both hands, her warm thumbs brushing across her cheeks as her strong, callused fingers sent lines of heat into the cold skin of her neck.
“I’m going to keep driving, okay?” Luz leaned forward to press their heads together, humming a soft, gentle note when Amity reached up to clasp her shaking hands around steady tanned wrists.
Amity nodded, bumping their noses together. She was dimly aware of how close they were, but the storm shaking the truck made it hard to worry about such things. She felt the big rig vibrate all around them and she couldn’t help the squeak that slipped out from between her teeth. “I just— I— I need a mi–minute?” Amity stammered, her eyes growing hot with frustration, with the anger she felt at her own inadequacies. She clenched her eyes and her teeth as the spiraling thoughts began to gain speed; How could she ever hope to finish her project— how could she bring her robots to a real disaster area if she was afraid of bad weather? How could she hope to get up on stage and give a demonstration when the applause could make her freeze in her tracks? Wait, why was she even concerned about that— who would applaud anything she had to say? Her mother had made it perfectly clear that—
“Amity.” A firm voice broke through her train of thought, and small hands tightened around her face, pressing their warmth into her skin, “Amity, look at me.”
The pale girl blinked away fresh tears, and opened her eyes to see a sea of chocolate brown. “There’s nothing wrong with needing a minute to ground yourself,” Luz said softly, kindly, “But you weren’t being nice to yourself just then. I could tell.” Amity sniffed and shook her head. Her nose bumped against Luz’s again, and the tanned girl chuckled. “Amity, I’m proud of you,” Luz said, the warmth of her words and the warmth of her breath ghosting across pale lips, and Amity was shocked into stillness. “It’s true— I am. I’m not just saying that,” the smaller girl smiled up at her, “You’re trying your best, and it’s hard— it’s scary— and it may not seem like you’re making progress, but you’re not giving up either, which is just as important.”
Amity scrunched her eyebrows and studied Luz’s expression for any signs that she might be lying, or probably kidding, or maybe just attempting to pacify the frightened girl she had to put up with, because why should she want to have to deal with—
“Hey,” Luz shook her head, the slightest frown in her eyes, “I don’t want you doing that to yourself.”
Amity took a shuddering breath and shrugged. “I don’t know how to stop,” she admitted with a whimper.
“Then we’ll work on that together, okay?” Luz suggested with a smile. Amity gave her an aching, uncertain look, and Luz patted her cheek. “Listen, I think you’d be more comfortable laying down in the sleeper, and—”
“No.” Amity set her jaw and shook her head, “Uh-uh, no, I— I want to be… up here.” Golden eyes flit back and forth as they examined Luz’s face, before she offered a hesitant, “I— I can sit up this time?”
Luz gave her a kind smile, then admitted, “I… I would feel better about your safety if you were sitting up, with your seatbelt on. I…” She glanced up to meet golden eyes, and she shrugged, a pretty pink blush staining her tanned cheeks as she gave a shy smile, “But… I didn’t mind you resting on me, earlier.” She worked around the blanket-wrapped girl to adjust the passenger seat, reclining it just slightly while scooting it forward, leaving the aisle-side armrest raised in case Amity needed to reach for her. She latched the seatbelt around the taller girl’s waist and gently tucked the shoulder strap under the edge of the blanket, then Luz handed Amity the white-and-blue sleep mask and said, “This might help, I dunno?”
Amity looked down at the mask in her hands: a pure white rounded rectangle with a small bump of pink at the middle of the bottom edge, two triangular pink shapes protruding from the top corners, and blue ovals that— She looked up at Luz with a flat glare. “A cat-face sleep mask?”
Luz giggled, “Yeah.”
Amity covered her nose with one hand and struggled not to laugh, then she gently slapped the mask against the tanned girl’s face.
Luz just smiled, smiled, smiled as she slid back in her seat and motioned out at the dark night's sky, “'Tis a dark and dreary sight beyond our small campfire's light," she began to speak in a lilting accent that had boarded a plane in Britain and crashed somewhere far, far away, "But ye shall see the morrow’s sunrise, I swear this truth upon my heart.” She gave Amity a grin and a wink before she twisted the key in the dashboard, sending a loud, rumbling roar through the cabin as Hooty’s engine turned over.
She turned away just before Amity’s mouth fell open in shocked recognition—Luz had just quoted a line from the early portion of the fourth Good Witch Azura novel, when Azura and Hecate had crossed paths for the third time, amidst a raging blizzard in the mountains. They had to take refuge in a cave, in the dark and cold, and huddle close together beside their meager campfire. Hecate had thought them doomed to freeze in the night, but Azura’s boundless optimism was sure that was not what their future held. The green-haired girl pulled the blanket up to half-cover her face while she let slip an incredulous laugh. Amity’s hidden smile was a wistful, loving thing, and she curled her hands together above her heart as she whispered the orange-haired moon-witch's following line, her response drowned out by the big truck’s rumbling roar: “Would that I truly held thy heart, kind Azura.”
~
Luz drove into the night. Amity sat in the passenger seat, warm and safe, turned sideways to keep one eye on her companion. Time seemed to pass every time she blinked, but it was hard to truly tell the passing of the hours while the weather continued to rage outside the dimly lit truck cabin. The soft music from Luz's playlist filled her ears, giving her a calm place of shelter amidst the storm.
Amity peeked out from under her sleep mask, watching Luz drive the truck and sing along to the radio, and occasionally glance her way. The brown-haired girl smiled when their eyes met, and she would give the smallest nod, like, You’ll be alright, or maybe, I see you. When she could spare a hand, Luz would pat her on the leg, and spend a moment rubbing her thumb into the pale girl’s knee, calm and soothing, like, I'm right here. Amity's chest ached every time.
~
Amity blinked awake to Luz shaking her leg. She pushed the sleep mask up on her forehead and pulled the headphones down around her neck. “What is it?” she croaked.
“Your phone’s ringing,” Luz said, “Sorry, it’s— I can’t reach it, and they keep calling.”
A chill stopped her heart for a moment before she remembered, Emira said to just not answer. Amity frowned and wriggled an arm out of her blanket to lift the offending device from the cupholder on her side of the dashboard, and blinked a bleary pair of golden eyes at the screen. A familiar smirking profile photo filled the screen, and the pale girl paused in confusion for a moment before tapping the ACCEPT button. “Hello?” Amity coughed; her voice had yet to crawl out of bed.
A rough, angry voice interrupted with a “—said shut the fuck up.”
Amity’s eyes narrowed, “Excuse me?”
The pink-haired girl on-screen turned to face her camera, “Not you. Did you know—” she paused and squinted, taking in Amity’s blanket, sleep mask, and headphones, the seatbelt and red leather of the cabin around her. “Where the fuck are you?”
Amity blinked twice, then looked over at Luz. “Where are we?” she asked, and Luz called back with an exhausted, “Nebraska!”
“Neb—” the caller huffed in irritation, “Listen, your dumbass brother trashed your lab, see?” She toggled the other camera on her phone and panned around the room. Amity’s lab was filled with scraps of foam and plastic wrappers, crates and piles of random office paraphernalia, and a pair of suitcases bulging with clothes. Four crates stood near the double doors, nailed shut and stickered with Fragile and This-Side Up labels. The camera continued to circle the room, landing on a blue fabric couch where Edric sat, slumped and disheveled, stripped down to black socks, white-and-blue striped boxers, and a ribbed tank top. He barked a Hey! when he noticed the camera pointing in his direction, and pulled a pink bathrobe closed over his chest.
There was a smile in the pink-haired girl’s rough voice, “What do you want us to do with him?”
A girl with black-and-silver hair stepped into view, pounding a fist into her other palm. “Yeah!” she grinned, her gray eyes sparkling.
Notes:
Chapter 19: Wednesday, 5:50am PT / 7:50am CT
Notes:
Seven thousand hits? I am still blown away that so many of you are enjoying this fic. It's such a silly idea! Lumity trucking? C'mon.
But thank you for reading, and for your lovely comments.
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
Two young women walked through the revolving doors of the Blight Industries International tower, their soft-soled workout shoes squeaking across the freshly polished floor. The taller, muscular girl with pink hair pulled back in a ponytail grumbled as she shook the raindrops from her head, shifting all the bags she carried to one hand, the better to swipe away the water dripping from her hairline. The shorter, dark-skinned girl dancing along beside her hummed aloud with the music playing in one earbud, her long silver braids pulled back in a messy bun, exposing her closely-cropped black undercut at the nape of her neck. Small silver charms had been worked into her braids, and they jingled tiny musical notes as she danced. She slipped into a smooth moonwalk for several of her companion’s strides before she twisted back around with a wink, the taller girl walking with slow, measured footsteps and a tired groan.
They made their way to the main elevator bank and the taller girl slapped the call button. She glanced around and over her shoulders, watching for signs of light or movement from any of the six doors facing them or the six at their backs. The shorter girl was lost in the music, arms swinging as she jumped a quarter-turn in a reggaeton, her eyes closed as she followed the beat, her small backpack bouncing along with her motions, her hands raised to point skyward as she bobbed her head, her sideways heel-to-toe slide turning to a shuffle with a hint of neo-swing. A ding came from over the taller girl’s shoulder, and she put a wide palm on the shorter girl’s head and gave it a turn, the gray-eyed girl grinning and twisting around in a full spin on one toe before dancing after her to the open elevator car.
The silver-haired girl finally stilled when the doors slid closed. She kicked a foot back, grabbing her toes with both hands behind her back as she pulled to get that Damn Good Stretch™ in her quads. She glanced up at her companion with a wide smile, “Today is gonna be a great day— I can feel it.”
The taller girl thumbed the button for the tenth floor. It looked shiny and new compared to the smudged and well-used buttons for every other floor of the building. The pink-haired girl glanced down at her and shrugged, one hand in her jacket pocket, the other slung over her shoulder to carry three duffel bags. “We’ll see,” she growled, her voice rough-edged from disuse. Soft musical chimes counted the floors as they rode higher and higher.
The shorter girl switched legs, giving her left an equal time to stretch, then she twisted at the hips with a faint jingle as she replied, brightly, “She’s been doing better—”
“Not really,” came the gravelly interruption.
“—for her,” the shorter girl finished with a raised eyebrow. She frowned when the taller girl gave a mocking laugh.
“pfff, Yeah, ok~ay,” the pink-haired girl said with a sneer before the elevator doors hissed open. She took two long strides out of the car before the shorter girl slipped in front of her, one hand on her hip, the other pointing up at her face.
“Look me in the eye,” she challenged, “and tell me she’s as closed-off as she was in high school.”
They locked eyes for a long pair of heartbeats before the taller girl shrugged and rolled her eyes with a sigh, “Fine. She’s better.”
The shorter girl smiled so wide and chirped, “I knew you thought so, too,” and skipped aside to allow the pink-haired girl to walk up to the large steel door in the far wall.
“But only ‘cuz she’s living at work instead of with her mom,” the taller girl snarked over her shoulder as she pulled a badge from an inner jacket pocket.
“Still coooouuuunnts,” the shorter girl sang as she slowly spun in a pirouette, one foot raised high in the air.
The muscular girl swiped her badge with a bleep-bleep-bleep, and put her hand on the handle, looking over her shoulder to add, “My mom’s a fuckin’ saint compared to—” She took a step forward as she pushed, and thumped against the cold steel door. “Ow,” she hissed, taking a step back, “the fuck?” She swiped her badge again and watched the little screen flash a red lettered SECURITY ENABLED, PASSCODE REQUIRED. She rubbed her forehead as she turned to the other girl, “You have that stupid code, right?”
~
The door hissed open to expose a sweltering catastrophe. Four tidy wood-and-metal crates were stationed on caster-wheeled frames near the wide double doors, a liberal number of FRAGILE and HANDLE WITH CARE stickers plastered across every visible face. Everywhere else were scattered stacks of discarded plastic clamshells, and slumping sheets of thick, black foam leaning against half-torn cardboard boxes that spilled packing peanuts on the floor. Tools and nails and wires and cables littered the steel worktables nearby, and wooden crates filled with computers and keyboards and mice had been shoved into the far corner. The two girls looked around in concern—Amity would never let her work area look this way, not unless there was something truly stressing her out. Soft snores came from the blue couch pushed against the far side of the room, the gentle rise and fall of breath coming from a figure curled up under a pink bathrobe.
The taller girl scoffed, “Doing better, huh?” before looking around and pulling at the collar of her jacket. She could feel herself start to sweat; the workshop air practically rippled with heat. “Smells like unwashed feet.”
“Hush!” the shorter girl hissed, waving out to motion at the room before them, pointing at the couch across the way, “She’s right over there.”
The pink-haired girl rolled her eyes, “Whatever. She forgot to shower this week—again—and it’s a fucking sauna in here; I’m turning on the air.” She swiveled on one foot and marched over to the control panel on the wall, muttering, “Gonna find a can of Febreeze too, fuck.”
The girl with silver braids skipped over to the couch, humming a tune as she passed stacks of computers and clothing-stuffed suitcases. She bent down over the arm of the couch, near her slumbering friend’s head, and rested her chin on one palm. “Heeeyyy,” she whispered soft and sweet, reaching out a hand to shake Amity’s shoulder. “Hey girl, time to get up and greet the day—” Amity shifted slightly, the pink bathrobe sliding partially off her head, revealing short, shaggy hair. Amity’s hair wasn’t that short last week, “—oh my god,” the gray-eyed girl gasped, reaching out a hand to touch the short green locks, “What happened to your hair?”
The bathrobe slid further down, and Edric squinted bloodshot, sleep-crusted eyes up at the girl leaning close to his face. “Whuh’s wrong w’ff m’ hair, Doc?” he mumbled in sleep-drenched concern, “‘m die ugly?”
The girl lurched back in surprise and screamed.
Edric’s eyes popped open wide, and he screamed in confusion.
“Skara?!” The taller girl across the room jumped at the voices raised in alarm, dropping her duffel bags, and ran over with a yell of her own, knocking over a stack of computers in the process.
Edric looked at her—teeth bared and eyes dark with fury, a clattering din of plastic and metal in her wake—and shrieked. He scrambled upright, clawing his way half up the back of the couch as the pink-haired girl slid to a stop, her hands ready to rip and tear. The two girls looked at the Blight brother as he shot wild eyes from one to the other, his hair matted and messy from sleeping on the couch in his underwear.
“What the fuck,” Skara asked, reaching up to slap her palms against her forehead while the taller girl pointed at him and snarled, “Why are you here?!”
Edric held out a trembling hand to motion for patience as he pulled the pink bathrobe back in his lap to cover his pale-blue-and-white striped boxer shorts, “B-Boscha, I can explain—” he began to push one arm through a pink sleeve.
The silver-haired girl covered her eyes, “What the fuck.” Boscha stood up straight and clenched her fists so hard they creaked. She pulled her phone from her pocket and tapped at the screen, “I’m calling Amity.”
Edric’s golden eyes widened in fear, “No!” He quickly shoved his other arm into the short pink bathrobe as he started to stand, the Pepto-Bismol-colored fabric only serving to accentuate his state of undress. “Nonono don’t! I don’t—” He gave a dazed chuckle and a wild grin, standing up and reaching for her arm with the phone, like he might try to take it from her, “I don’t know what time it is there!” The muscular girl looked at his hands then shot him a glare that made him go pale and gulp, and slump back down on the couch. He crossed his arms over his white tank top and huffed in irritation.
The gray-eyed girl motioned toward him with both hands, like, Seriously, what the fuck, and he gave her a sheepish look and shrugged.
He glanced around the room while the faint sound of the telephone ringing came from the device in Boscha’s hand. Both girls stared at him until the ringing stopped, and a short, perfunctory recording announced “THIS MAILBOX IS FULL, GOODBYE.” The call ended with a blorp. The pink-haired girl scoffed and tapped the screen again.
Edric glanced up at Skara as the faint ringing began again, “So… uh… do you want breakfast?” He asked with an embarrassed tone of voice. “I could… uh… I could call it in, orrrr…”
“Shut the fuck up,” Boscha growled when the call ended the same as before. She hit redial and pinned the green-haired man with a frosty glare.
He gave her a worried smile, “I-If you’d just let me expl—”
The phone beeped and a tired voice answered “Hello?” just as the muscular girl looked his way and repeated, “I said shut the fuck up.”
A groggy voice croaked from the device in her hand, “Excuse me?”
“Not you,” Boscha rolled her eyes and looked down at the brightly glowing screen, “Did you know—” she pulled back to squint at the early-morning sunlight illuminating Amity’s face on-screen. She glanced out the nearby window at the dark, pre-dawn city around them, and asked a more important question, “Where the fuck are you?”
The tiny Amity on-camera sighed as she pushed a white cat-face sleeping mask farther up on her forehead, before turning to ask someone off-camera the same question—minus the swear, of course. Amity had always been a stick-in-the-mud when it came to colorful language. Boscha couldn’t make out the mumbled response, but Amity looked mildly surprised. “Nebraska,” came her unexpected answer.
“Neb—” the pink-haired girl slapped her hand over her eyes and groaned, “Listen, your dumbass brother trashed your lab.” She turned and started filming a slow sideways pan across Edric’s unfettered devastation of Amity’s practically pristine work area. “See?” She turned more and swept the phone’s camera over the green-haired man slumped against the arm of the blue couch, and he twitched upright in irritation.
“Hey!” he grunted, and flipped the edge of the bathrobe over his lap.
Boscha glared at him over the screen in her hands as she growled, “What do you want us to do with him?” She already had a couple ideas. She smiled when Skara jumped into view and pounded her fist into her palm with a Yeah! She could always count on the silver-haired girl to back her up.
Amity gave a little smile at Skara’s enthusiasm for assault and battery. “He’s helping me with… a thing. It’s fine.” She shrugged when Boscha switched back to her front-facing camera, her mouth hanging slightly open in surprise. “We’ll clean when I get home,” the green-haired girl added.
Boscha and Skara exchanged a glance; the shorter girl looked worried. Even Edric blinked in something close to shock—he had half-expected a verbal lashing for the state of things. “Yo, Blight…” the muscular girl wrinkled her brow in concern, “You good?”
“I…” Amity closed her mouth for a moment, and whoever was with her in the vehicle said something Boscha could barely hear. It sounded like it’s better to be honest. The pale girl on-screen sniffed, then, “I had… a rough night.”
“You… are… are you…” Boscha did her best goldfish impersonation as her brain struggled to make sense of the morning thus far. It was too early, and she wasn’t paid enough for this. “Ugh, here!” She dropped her phone in Skara’s hands and stalked away, “I can’t handle emotions.”
Edric scratched his head, “This early, orrr…” Boscha flipped him off.
Skara glanced around, then perched on the opposite arm of the blue couch. For a moment, she and the pale, golden-eyed girl regarded each other across the miles, and Skara examined her friend for clues. Amity sat in a loud vehicle of some kind, a red leather seat and door panel visible, a red canvas seat belt shoulder strap across her chest. A bulky pair of black headphones hung around her neck, and a white cat-eye sleeping mask had been pushed up on her forehead to tangle with her disheveled green-dyed hair. Her face was blotchy and her eyes were a dull, irritated shade of red. “Amity, are you okay?” she asked in a gentle, soothing voice.
Amity blinked, and a hint of that familiar Blight attitude surfaced in the way she lifted her jaw just so. “I’ll be fine,” she answered without answering.
Skara shook her head the smallest amount and pressed, “Are you sure?”
The green-haired girl’s face tightened, and she set her mouth in a thin line, “Yes.” A gentle hand placed itself on her shoulder; Skara could see the rough, cracked knuckles and the callouses as it gave her friend a gentle squeeze. She blinked in surprise— who would dare touch Amity Blight without asking, and— Amity glanced to her left and actually looked ashamed. Skara whispered What the fuuuck. The girl on-screen sighed, “I’m… sorry, Skara. I’m just… wrung out. Your concern is… noted… and… appreciated— but— Why are you calling?”
That actually stung a little. Skara frowned at that.
Amity watched her expression change, and her eyes widened slightly, “Was that rude?”
A faint voice beside her laughed, “A li’l bit, yeah.”
“I didn’t intend to be rude,” Amity quickly backpedaled, “I’m sorry, Skara.”
Skara glanced up at Boscha, and both girls exchanged another silent conversation. The taller, pink-haired girl had paused to listen, tapping her foot on the floor as she tried to make up her mind on whether she wanted to cross her arms or ball her fists on her hips. She crossed her arms again, then clicked her tongue and shoved her hands in her jacket pockets. She glared up at the ceiling before she pulled her jacket off to reveal a loose-fitting tank top over a burgundy sports bra; she busied her hands by tying the jacket around her waist. Skara looked back down at the small, exhausted Amity in her hands, and raised an eyebrow. “It’s Wednesday?” she offered.
Amity tightened her eyes for a moment, then repeated, “Wednesday,” like she didn’t have a clue. Boscha scoffed and muttered, She’s finally fucking lost it. Skara shot Edric a worried look; Amity had a mind like a steel trap, she never forgot anything. He met her eyes and shrugged, then waved a middle finger up at Boscha.
“Wednesday morning yoga with me,” Skara used the same gentle voice from before, doing her best to keep the concern from showing. Boscha cleared her throat, and the silver-haired girl quickly added, “And sparring with Boscha.”
The information still took two blinks to register. “Right, right,” Amity said with a breathy chuckle and a shake of her head, “My sleep schedule is— it’s been— it’s…”
“It’s okay,” Skara assured her. A very faint country tune had been playing in the vehicle where Amity sat, and a new song started with a piano and bass guitar riff that Skara recognized. She gave Amity a wide smile, “Oh my gosh, I love that song!”
“I know, right?” that same other voice from earlier chimed in, slightly louder this time, as if they were leaning closer to Amity, “It’s so good!” The other person—Amity’s driver, a woman, Skara thought, based on timbre and pitch—began to sing along, “Doctor, my eyes have seen the yeeaarrs, and the slow parade of feeeaaarrrs~”
The green-haired girl glanced her way and her face crinkled with a fond look that Skara had seen only a handful of times throughout the many years she had known Amity Blight. This particular expression had been reserved exclusively for cute animals or their photos. The gray-eyed girl gave a delicate gasp and grinned. “Amityyyy,” she crooned.
“~I have done all that I cooooulld to see the evil and the goooood without~”
Amity blinked twice and quickly schooled her soft, telling smile into a scowl. Skara noticed. Skara grinned. “What, Skara,” the pale girl grumbled.
“~You must help me if you caaan~”
Skara pulled the phone slightly closer to her face to sing-song, “Who was thaaaaaat?”
The green-haired girl pinched her eyes closed in what looked like irritation, but Skara could see the slightest upturn of her mouth. Amity looked at Skara, catching her eye across the miles that separated the two old friends, the slightest hint of pleading in those tired golden eyes. The gray-eyed girl nodded, mouthing No judgments, girl, a kind smile on her face. Amity’s worried look faded as she breathed out in relief. “That,” the pale girl replied, turning the phone toward her driver, “is Luz.”
A tanned girl with chocolate brown curls peeking out from under a white leather cowboy hat sat in the driver’s seat of the large vehicle—a truck of some kind, Skara had to assume—both hands on a wide red-leather-wrapped steering wheel. She was still singing along with the radio, a brilliant smile on her face, her eyes hidden by a pair of mirrored aviator sunglasses. Luz glanced at the phone in Amity’s hand, then did a double-take as she realized she was being watched, a friendly “Hey!” interrupting her song. She quickly pulled the sunglasses off and hung them on the collar of her tee shirt. Luz gave a little wave, glancing between the camera and the road, then squinted toward the device for a few seconds. Her tired-looking brown eyes brightened with an excited, “Omigawsh, I love your hair!”
Skara giggled and patted at her braids with one hand, “Thanks!” Edric laughed at how Boscha stiffened and swiveled toward Skara, glaring at the phone in her hands.
Luz turned back to the road after adding, “That color is so pretty on you!” Amity must have frowned, or made some other face that Skara couldn’t see from the current camera angle, because Luz glanced over at her passenger and chuckled, “Oh, don’t be peanut-butter-and-jelly, cariño, we need to build up our fellow women! Your friend is a lovely gal, but I—” a yawn cracked her jaw and interrupted her sentence for a moment, “—but I only have eyes for… uh…” She looked positively mortified for a moment as she scrambled for what to say, “Someone else. Yup.”
Amity turned the phone back to face herself, so she and Skara could share a look. “She’s cute,” Skara offered softly. “I know,” Amity replied with a dreamy sigh. “Hey, Bo-bo, c’mere for a sec,” the silver-haired girl motioned Boscha toward herself without looking away from the phone in her other hand as the view swiveled back to show Luz wiggling in her seat, bouncing along with the beat.
Boscha rolled her eyes and stomped over to peer down at the glowing rectangle in Skara’s palm. After a moment she grunted, “Who’s the stringbean?” Skara slapped her gently on the arm as Luz glanced at the phone in Amity’s hands. Her eyes popped at the sight of the pink-haired girl looming over the gray-eyed girl’s shoulder. “Strong girl!” the truck driver crowed, pointing at the camera for a moment, “Farm?!” Boscha’s face pulled in a deep frown, her eyes darkening into a scowl, and she opened her mouth to say something cutting just before the shorter girl at her side started laughing.
“She’s funny,” Skara looked up at the confused pink-haired girl, squeezing her bicep, “It’s a reference! She’s complimenting your muscles.”
The tanned girl gasped, “Oh! Can— can you flex?” Luz half-turned toward the camera, pulling one arm away from the steering wheel to make a muscle, “Like—?” Boscha breathed out a tch sound in self-satisfaction and struck a well-practiced pose, her muscles rippling under the bright white work-space lighting. Skara stepped away and held the phone out to get a better angle. “Holy shit!” the brown-haired girl’s mouth fell open, pointing across the truck cabin, “Look at her muscles, Amity!”
Amity’s voice grumbled across the line, “No, don’t— she’ll be insufferable now.”
“Hey!” Boscha growled, then her eyes caught Skara’s subtle twisting hand motion, and her mouthed Amity likes her! before the pink-haired girl’s face twisted in an impish smirk, “Yeah, I work out— but I gotta say,” she strolled closer to Skara, watching the tanned girl on-screen glance her way as she listened, “if you wanna see some nice abs, you should check out what Blight’s hiding under that blanket.”
Luz gasped, “Abs?!” sending a wide, sparkling-eyed look at the pale girl holding the phone. The camera shook as Amity shivered under her hungry eyes. “Oh! That reminds me,” the tanned girl turned back to the two girls in San Francisco, “I got to touch her arms yesterday!”
The camera swung back toward Amity as she recoiled, her face shining a furious red in the bottom corner of the screen, “Hey!”
“What?!” Edric said, starting to stand up from the couch until the muscular girl glared him back down into his seat.
“Ooh-lah-laah, tell us more,” Skara giggled into her fingers as a look of pure panic raced across the golden-eyed girl’s face.
“WELL, I—” Luz began, and Amity interrupted “—gottagobye.” She hung up with a click.
Boscha and Skara stared down at the phone in the shorter girl’s hand for a moment, until Edric broke the heavy silence with a sigh and a, “Well… that happened.”
“Shut the fuck up,” the pink-haired girl said again, but this time it was lacking any heat. She held her hand out for her phone, and Skara dropped it into her palm.
Edric ran a hand back through his hair—making it stand up on one side—and smarmed, “Apology accepted.”
Skara rotated to face him and took a long look over his ensemble, one arm across her chest, the other raised to tap a red-painted fingernail against her lips. “Why…” She started as she twirled a fingertip in his direction—taking in his bedraggled hair, his five-o’clock-shadow that had only darkened his upper lip and his sideburns, his borrowed bathrobe—and she squinted in distaste, “What’s with the shitty Howard Stark cosplay?”
“Ouch, Skara. That hurts,” Edric huffed as he tied the pink bathrobe closed over his stomach with a flourish. “I’m a slutty Howard Stark, thank you very much.”
“That’s—” Skara heaved a sigh, “He’s already a slut.”
Boscha glanced between the two as she slipped her phone into her pants pocket. “That old guy from Game of Thrones?” she asked with uncertainty.
“Nerd stuff, Bo-Bo,” Skara said as she patted the taller girl on the arm.
“Ha!” Boscha scoffed as she rounded on Edric, pointing, “Didn’t take you for a nyerrrd, Blight.”
Edric glanced between the girls, raising an outstretched hand toward Skara, like, What about her? before he dropped his arm back into his lap and grumbled, “Who isn’t these days—no, look,” he ran his hands through his hair, patting down a severe cowlick, “I couldn’t figure out how to turn the damn heat down, okay? I had to…” he motioned down at his lack of business-appropriate attire, “get comfortable.”
Both girls crossed their arms and exchanged a look. “You want to…?” Skara whispered, and Boscha nodded, whispering back, “Yeah, I want to—” she cleared her throat, speaking loud and clear, “Computer?” The room blooped. “Set temperature to sixty degrees.” A series of thuds and thumps came from the ceiling before a frigid wave of air spilled out into the room.
“Oh? What! It was that—” Edric sniffed, “Oh sweet relief!” He leaned back as tears shimmered in his eyes, and one girl gave him a look of concern while the other watched in mild disgust. “Thank you so… so much,” the green-haired man nearly sobbed.
“Riiiight,” Boscha curled her lip and took a step back, “We… better go.”
Edric snapped his eyes back open and leaned forward, “Can you not let anyone know she’s gone? It— it’s real important!”
Boscha made a face, “What’s in it for—” and Skara stepped in front of her, “Of course, Edric.” The taller girl huffed and shrugged, “What she said.”
“Wait! Um…,” Edric rubbed at the back of his hair, “Do you two want breakfast, though?” The girls shared a look as he continued, “Seriously, I could call it up for you? As a— as a thank you?”
The muscular girl walked up to the couch and looked down at him, her arms crossed over her chest. “I have to work out before I eat,” Boscha raised an eyebrow, “and if I’m working out, then so are you.”
“Oh, yup,” Edric paled, “Yeah, uh-huh, right, you guys have a good day!” He waved as she turned and picked her way back through the piled-up mess to where her bags lay, the shorter girl skipping along behind her.
“Tell Amity we’ll be back next week!” Skara called with a wave. “Okay,” Edric waved back.
“You smell, take a shower,” Boscha shot over her shoulder. Edric sighed, “Okay.”
Skara’s phone chirped from her yoga pants pocket, and she pulled it out to glance at the screen. She laughed, then held it out for Boscha to see as the taller girl pulled the door open. Boscha glanced at the message, scoffed, and shook her head, “What a fuckin’ dweeb.” The door slammed shut behind them, leaving Edric to slump against the corner of the couch.
~
Luz sang along with Jackson Browne as Amity curled up in her seat to face the trucker. The tanned girl had given her a wink before she slipped her sunglasses back on. The morning sun wasn’t as bright as it had been the day before, but it was decidedly brighter than it had been when she last remembered having her eyes open. The sky was overcast with a layer of thin, gray clouds and a haze in the distance, but the sun had climbed a fair height above the horizon to dimly shine through the windshield.
“Are you alright?” Amity asked, her voice still groggy from her interrupted string of naps.
“Yyyup!” Luz grinned, popping the ‘p’ sound, then yawned and smacked her lips. “Hooo-boy, I’m glad we’re close.”
Amity took a moment to look around. What might have been wheat fields stretched out in every direction, on both sides of the Interstate. The land was almost perfectly flat, with only the occasional line of trees or cluster of farm buildings standing out against the horizon. A long metal bridge-like shape loomed above the field out her side of the truck, and Amity examined it as they approached. Tall triangular wheeled frames bracketed a series of curved pipes stretching across the field. She squinted as they drove by, barely catching sight of a misty cloud that hung in the air below the curved pipes. The crops to one side were glistening in the indirect morning sunlight, and on the other side were dry. She hummed a quiet note of recognition; the farmers were watering their fields. A series of shapes and a sense of motion filled her mind’s eye as she absentmindedly calculated a more efficient method.
When the pale girl didn’t respond, Luz glanced her way and waggled her eyebrows above her sunglasses, “Your friends make a cute couple. You know them for long?”
Amity turned to look at the girl in the cowboy hat and snorted, “A— a couple. You think?” Luz barked a laugh, then wiped the back of her fist under her nose. She glanced at Amity’s slight frown, and just curled her lips in a half-smirk and raised an eyebrow. “What?” Amity asked.
The brown-haired girl just chuckled, but gave her a double-take when she caught her unconvinced expression. “Oh,” Luz sounded surprised, “You’re serious.”
“You think they’re… together? Dating?” Amity couldn’t keep the incredulous tone from her voice.
“Yeah!” Luz smiled and shrugged, “They looked cute together.”
“Boscha dating Sk— well.” Amity thought about that for a moment, and had to admit, “She couldn’t do better than Skara, actually.”
Luz chuckled, “Boscha’s the tall one then, eh? Ask ‘em!” she wiggled her fingers in the direction of Amity’s phone. “Prooove me wrong,” she smirked.
Amity set her jaw and sniffed, “Fine, I will.”
Are you and Boscha dating? :[Amity]
Amity squirmed deeper into her blanket as she prepared to wait for a response. Luz glanced her way, Amity stuck her tongue out, and both girls giggled. Her phone vibrated in her palm, and she tapped the screen.
[Skara]: Girl, where have you been?
Amity stared at the words on-screen in surprise, and then a mute sort of horror. How had she not known? She had been friends with… well… not friends-friends. She’d been friendly with— she’d been acquaintances of Boscha and Skara for years. They played rugby together! And Luz had seen something in a two-minute video call—half of which she wasn’t even looking at—that Amity herself hadn’t noticed in person for how long?
Luz’s eyebrows were wrinkled with worry. “Amity, you okay?” The pale girl opened her mouth to respond, but her phone vibrated once more and she looked down at—
[Skara]: Don’t get stuck in your head, Amity. Whatcha thinkin’?
Amity sighed. She looked over at Luz, and smiled when the tanned girl caught her eye, “You were right.”
The green-haired girl chuckled when Luz gasped and made a dramatic fist-pump. “Yusss,” she hissed, “The ol’ Gay-dar still gettin’ the vibes.”
Amity looked back down at her phone and tapped the text entry field.
That I’ve had my head under a rock :[Amity]
I guess :[Amity]
I’m sorry for not noticing :[Amity]
[Skara]: It’s good, don’t worry
[Skara]: Not like we were flaunting it, y’know?
Amity turned to watch Luz drive for a moment, then remembered her remark from earlier.
Luz said you two are cute together :[Amity]
And she’s right :[Amity]
[Skara]: Aww, thanks Amity
[Skara]: Speaking of cute and being together…
NOPE, GOODBYE :[Amity]
Luz chuckled when Amity tossed her phone into the sleeper bed and crossed her arms with a strangled groan. “Your friends picking on you again?” the shorter girl asked with a giggle.
“Friends are stupid,” Amity grumbled. Luz grunted in agreement. A new song started, and after a minute she began to softly sing along, her head bobbing to the music.
Somebody’s tryin’ to make me stay, you know I’ve got to be movin’ on
Luz bobbed from side to side, walking her fingers across the arc of the steering wheel
Oh, oooh big ol’ jet airliner, Don’t carry me too far away—
“I feel bad—” Amity began after a few minutes of quiet introspection, interrupting Luz’s cover of the chorus, “—sorry.”
“No, go ahead,” Luz motioned toward her, “You have the floor, Senator Blight.”
Amity cracked a smile for a moment before letting it fall. “I feel bad… because… I don’t feel that bad.” She picked at her fingernails for a moment before she glanced at Luz, “For not noticing they were together. Does that… make sense?”
“Sure,” Luz nodded.
“I know I should feel guilty, like… for being a bad… friend… but I just…” Amity shrugged, “Don’t. Not really.” She looked down at her hands as she worried at the edge of her borrowed blanket. “Does that… make me a bad person?”
“Cariño,” Luz held a soft, gentle tone as she patted the pale girl on the knee, “You have had a really rough day. I wouldn’t be surprised if you felt numb right now.” She gave Amity’s leg a squeeze, then put her hand back on the steering wheel. “You—” Luz yawned again, “sorry, you should feel better after you rest.”
“But— that’s—” Amity spluttered for a moment before her words found their footing, “that’s what I’ve been doing!”
Luz snorted, “You’ve been napping. While sitting up in a moving truck.” She peered over her sunglasses at the green-haired girl, “That’s not resting. Trust me, there’s a difference.”
“I— okay.” Amity sighed, pulling the cuffs of her borrowed hoodie sleeves up to her chin for a moment. She could still smell the lemon and sandalwood. “I do.” Luz gave her a kind, caring nod, then pointed at a sign as they approached. EXIT 353 / YORK, GENEVA / 1 MILE / NEXT EXIT 8 MILES.
“I’m sorry,” Amity stared at her chipped black fingernail polish as she spoke. She could feel the careful weight of those brown eyes as they turned her way, but she couldn’t bring herself to meet them. Her stomach churned at the thought of Luz seeing her right now, as it was. She forced her trembling lips into a frown and soldiered on, “I’m sorry for leaving you… alone. I’m supposed to help you, and—”
Luz breathed in and held for a moment, before exhaling a noisy stream of air to interrupt the other girl’s spiral. “Amity,” her voice was warm. Understanding. “Don’t beat yourself up. It wasn’t—” she clicked her tongue and huffed a breath, muttering, “how do I put this…” She paused to yawn, covering her mouth as she let loose a small squeak, “Sorry— it’s not like you decided, y’know?” Luz glanced at Amity, making sure the pale girl was listening. “You didn’t choose to take a nap instead of chatting with me.” She reached over to place a tanned hand on the golden-eyed girl’s knee, giving it some gentle pressure as she spoke, “You had a panic attack, and you needed some time to recover. It’s not— it’s nothing to be ashamed of, it’s— it’s fairly common, actually.” She caught Amity’s eye, “It’s okay.”
Amity shook her head, a quiver in her voice, “But it’s not—”
“But it is,” Luz interrupted, shaking her head, a certainty in her voice that Amity had rarely felt. “It’s okay to not be perfect.” Amity just stared at her for several long moments before she had to look down at her hands and wipe her eyes. “I know you’ve been told otherwise your whole life,” Luz added, “but that’s absolute horseshit.” She tapped a fingertip on Amity’s knee, “It is impossible to be perfect one hundred percent of the time.”
She reached out then, and gently wrapped her fingers around one of Amity’s hands, catching her eye for a moment. “And anyone,” Luz stressed, “who really loves you would tell you the same thing.”
Luz held her hand until she had to downshift at the offramp.
~
Hooty slowly pulled in beside the Westerly-facing line of trucks in the Petro Travel Center parking lot. Luz pressed the brake pedal to the floor. She leaned her forehead against the steering wheel and sighed, just… closing her eyes for a moment. She slipped the gear stick into Neutral, pulled the parking brake, and flicked the switch on the dashboard to kill the engine. She propped her elbows on the steering wheel’s crossbar and pressed her palms into her eyes with a groan. She turned her head to see Amity blinking at her like an owl, a hint of guilt in those golden eyes, the blanket pulled up to her nose. “Le’ss go… fresh’n up,” Luz mumbled, slowly pushing herself out of her seat.
~
Amity watched Luz yawn through a mouthful of toothpaste foam and sway on her feet. The shorter girl’s eyes drifted closed for a pair of heartbeats, and Amity put a hand around her upper arm before she could tip too far over. Luz blinked and sneezed white flecks across the mirror with a “Shi—” before she pulled her toothbrush out and spat into the sink. Luz stood upright and wobbled, then slowly re-packed her toiletries bag.
Amity turned her eyes back to her own reflection for a moment, staring at a bright spot of color laying across her sternum. It had been hidden under the poncho she wore into the last travel stop, but this time she could clearly see the aquamarine tear-drop printed high on the chest of her borrowed purple and white hoodie. What else could it be, but the crystal set in Azura's Staff of the Ancients. She had stolen a glance at the tag on the inner seam and felt a calm sense of satisfaction fall across her shoulders when she saw the initials “G.W.A.” printed in that tall serif font. She had felt numb—like Luz had guessed she would—but now a bright spark of excitement simmered in her chest, just left of center. She couldn’t wait to talk with Luz. I’ll bring it up tomorrow, not now, Amity glanced at the other girl in the mirror again and gave sleepy, bone-tired Luz a tender smile. She does too much for me, the pale girl swallowed a twist of guilt, I’m not worth—
Luz turned her way, and her whole face lit up in a drowsy grin when their eyes met. All of Amity’s self-deprecating thoughts fled in the light of that brilliant smile. The shorter girl reached over and grabbed a small fistful of Amity’s sleeve. “Time f’r bed, querida,” she yawned, tugging at Amity’s arm, and the pale girl’s face erupted in a furious blush at the thoughts that came to mind.
~
The cramped red-leather truck cabin was a warm, safe oasis from the too-wide-open prairie that stretched in every direction. Amity was glaring at her laptop in the passenger’s seat, her eyes focused on nothing in particular. She had remembered to start her remote diagnostics, but she still felt too frazzled to put much thought into anything else. A hint of bad weather still lurked far out to the East, and she hoped their rest would be uninterrupted.
Luz slowly put her items away, tucking their green and purple bags in the storage bins, and zipping yesterday’s clothes into her dirty laundry pouch. She made sure her phone was plugged in, this time, and pressed a button on a small Bluetooth speaker she pulled from her backpack. Music from her calming playlist filled the cabin air as she slowly lowered herself into the driver’s seat. Luz waved over her shoulder at the sleeper bed, and mumbled, “Y’had a hard night, cariño, you take th’ bed.”
“What?” Amity shook her head, “Mmm-mmm, no, we made a deal—” she paused to prop her laptop up on the floor by the gear lever, “—you get the bed tonight.”
Luz yawned and blinked, then wondered aloud, “Are y’sure?” Amity nodded. Luz rubbed at her eyes and sighed, “‘m too tired t’ argue.” She slowly picked her way back to the bed and sat down, pulling her pillow from her captain’s chair. She slipped her sandals off and started to lie down, but a trembling hand on her knee made her pause. She glanced down at the pale fingers where Amity had caught hold of her pajamas.
“Luz?” Amity’s voice was a hushed, timid thing, “um, if it— if it rains again, when you’re asleep, um, I— could— could I—” she stammered to a halt. Luz laid her hand atop Amity’s and rubbed a thumb over her knuckles while the taller girl worked up her courage. Her voice was so soft when she finally asked, “C–could I climb in next to you? I–if I’m scared? J-just— I mean— if it thunders again?”
Luz wobbled for a moment while she processed the question, and didn’t even try to keep the enormous, sleepy smile from spreading across her face. She giggled and patted the mattress beside her, “We sh’d jus’ cuddle now,” Luz offered as she tugged at Amity’s sleeve, “c’mere querida, it’s— uh—” She seemed to realize what she had just said, and a blush darkened her cheeks. She giggled again, more nervous than before, and cleared her throat, “If that— uh— would help y’sleep better?”
Amity nodded, her own face flushing a dark, glistening red.
Luz grinned again and slumped down onto the mattress, almost boneless, giggling a giddy, happy sound before a yawn cracked her jaw. She looked up at Amity, and the pale girl’s heart ached at the dizzying kindness she saw in those beautiful brown eyes. Luz held out a sluggish arm, motioning toward herself, and Amity quickly climbed in next to her, glancing around in hesitation, unsure of what to do. Luz pulled her close, slow and careful, cradling her tousled head of green hair just above her heartbeat, mumbling a comforting sound. They shifted about to get comfortable, arms placed in a tentative embrace, their legs tangling in a way that felt like something they had always known, some easily recognized, inevitable truth. Luz tugged their blanket up to the golden-eyed girl’s jaw, then placed a warm palm just below her ear, scratching lightly at the nape of her neck.
She nosed into Amity’s hair with a contented sigh. “Wake m’up… if… y’need… anythin’,” Luz mumbled against pale skin, her eyes already drifting closed. Moments later she began to twitch, tightening her limbs around the taller girl, and then she began to snore.
Amity wrapped her arm around Luz’s waist, curling her fingers into the tanned girl’s loose sleep shirt and holding on tight in a confusing mixture of relief and gratitude and longing. “Just you,” she whispered. Amity watched the languid rise and fall of Luz’s chest, and listened to the gentle drumbeat of her heart, blanketed by the soft, aching lyrics that drifted through the cabin.
Places we go to are all that we've got
So why don't we go?
After a small eternity spent breathing in and out with the girl wrapped in her arms, Amity’s eyes grew heavy, and she drifted off to a peaceful sleep.
Notes:
Boscha called when they were pretty close to their destination.
Aaaannnd that's Day 2.I'll be out of town for a smidge, so the next update might be a little bit late. We'll see how she goes. Take care!
Chapter 20: Wednesday, 3:30pm
Chapter Text
Slowly, so very slowly, she grew aware of the all-encompassing warmth that cradled her sleep-heavy limbs. She took several languid, lazy breaths, her heart beating calm and steady as she swam that fine line between still-asleep and beginning-to-wake, the swell of an ocean wave beneath her. Something had pulled her from her slumber, but… What was… Where…? She heard it then, faint and sweet, over the steady thud-thump sounding in her ear. A wistful melody broke the short silence that wrapped the air as a new song started to play.
A pair of acoustic guitars plucked and strummed a steady refrain, building up to the moment where the singers’ words began to drift across the rise and fall of the music. She drifted up and down as well, the smallest warm breeze playing across her hair.
In the morning when I wake,
And the sun is coming through…
Oh, you fill my lungs with sweetness,
And you fill my head with you…
She had yet to open her eyes, but the faint glow of the indirect afternoon sun painted her waking moments in a dim maroon glow. She struggled against sleep-stuck eyelids, forcing them open to a squint. It took her a handful of heartbeats to recognize her surroundings, for her still-drowsy mind to make sense of the shapes and lines that she could see as she adjusted to the soft, red-tinged light that filled the cabin air. She blinked twice more, slowly, and breathed in lemons and something earthy… something that made her think of home.
Shall I write it in a letter?
Shall I try to get it down?
Oh, you fill my head with pieces,
Of a song I can’t get out…
Amity stared at tanned skin shining like polished bronze in the afternoon light, the gentle sloping lines that traced shadows along her neck. She stared at the hollow of her throat, at the steady pulse tap-tapping against that honeyed skin in time with the sound of the heartbeat beneath her ear. As the puzzle pieces of her awareness slipped into place one by one, she drifted further away from sleep. This slow, methodical assembly of self was a strangely disorienting experience; almost every morning she would wake up in an instant, startled and anxious, her heart pounding in her throat, a deep-seated buzzing beneath her skin as she struggled to make sense of the sudden deluge of sensations: shivering from the cold, the stench of grease and oiled metal, the shrill squawk of her alarm. Yesterday she had been deliciously warm when she woke, and today? She was…
Can I be close to you?
Oh-oh-oh-ooh, ooh…
Her eyes drifted shut for a moment as she basked in the heat radiating from the tanned girl beneath her. She half-sprawled on top of Luz’s left side, soaking up the comforting warmth from where their legs were still tangled together. Amity’s arms had wrapped under Luz’s shoulders in her sleep; one hand curled a fist around her loose gray sleep-shirt sleeve, the other stretched up higher, caught in the soft brown curls behind the shorter girl’s ear. Amity had pressed her own ear to Luz’s chest, just below her collarbone, where she had fallen to sleep listening to the exhausted girl’s heartbeat. Their blanket was still pulled up next to Amity’s chin, and Luz had crossed her arms over her back, holding her safe and secure through the night; Amity woke wrapped in a cocoon that she never wanted to leave. Amity felt the rise of Luz’s chest as she breathed in, and her soft exhale ghosting across her forehead.
Can I be close to you?
Ooh, ooh…
Her lips bent in a smile as she watched the tap-tap beneath that molten-gold canvas, while she played with the twists of brown silk at her fingertips. She hummed along with the song in the air, absentmindedly breathing out the words that seemed to match the fierce ache in her chest. Amity was certain she had never felt like this about anyone else before.
When the evening pulls the sun down,
And the day is almost through…
Oh, the whole world it is sleeping,
But my world is you…
She must have been too loud when she sang along with that last phrase, even as soft as she was. Luz slowly twitched her chin down a few degrees to catch her eye, her voice a thick, sleepy rasp, “‘S’a pretty voice, cariño.” She paused to yawn and tighten her body in a little stretch, then Luz mumbled a quiet, “Como una… hermosa ave cantora,” as she squeezed the taller girl against her chest, running her palms across swiftly frozen muscle. She blinked her eyes open wide before they swiveled down to meet a trembling golden gaze.
Can I be close to you?
Amity had gone rigid when Luz first moved, the words to the song caught in her throat as her face burned with fresh embarrassment and years-old shame. She stared up into those shimmering pools of chocolate brown—golden eyes unblinking, afraid, Odalia’s unwanted words ringing in her ears, Stop that incessant screeching!—and Luz’s forehead wrinkled in concern after a few moments of stunned silence.
“Oh no… hey,” Luz’s voice softened, her half-smile and crinkling eyes the first signs of her impending tenderness, “I–I didn’t mean to scare you.” She rubbed her thumbs in circles across Amity’s shoulders, pressing down with palms and wide-spread fingers, easing away the spike of anxiety that had locked her body in a panicked stillness. After a moment, the pale girl managed to breathe, forcing the memory of her mother’s voice aside.
“No, you— I— singing—” Amity shook her head as she floundered. “My mother—” She sighed and closed her eyes, pressing herself down into Luz’s warm embrace. She tried once more, her voice a shaking, timid thing, “When… Growing up… I…”
“Shhh… shh,” Luz began to gently card her fingers through Amity’s sleep-tousled green hair, brushing it back away from her face and over her ear. “I think I get it,” the brown-eyed girl whispered, giving her an easy out. She huffed a disappointed sigh before asking, “She stole music from you, too?” She felt Amity nod against her chest, and she pulled her close, tightening her limbs around the taller girl lying on her, just for a moment. “That’s… awful,” she offered, before running her fingers through those soft green locks again.
Amity merely nodded once more, tightening her own grasp on the shorter girl pressed beneath her, curling her fingers up into Luz’s hair at the nape of her neck, as she rubbed her thumb across the warm brown skin hidden there.
Luz hummed a contented, sleepy sigh, and gave Amity a warm smile. “How do you feel, cariño?”
“I… I feel… um,” the pale girl trailed off as she turned the question around in her mind. How do I feel? A bit out of sorts, if she were completely honest? Like she didn’t deserve this momentary bliss. Like she was visiting some sacred place, an exceedingly rare invitation extended in spite of herself. She didn’t belong here, where care and kindness warmed the moments between people—she was from a cold place of transactions and tally marks, reciprocations and backstabbings. She was… she felt like…
Like a weary traveler in awe of Nature’s beauty as she blinked up at those curious brown eyes. Like a stranger in a strange land, Amity savored the warmth that surrounded her. She couldn’t— shouldn’t— get too used to this intoxicating taste of heaven, this— this small Arcadian corner of the world. She shouldn’t, but— She wanted it. It was— “Wonderful,” came Amity’s soft, hesitant reply, before she stammered a quiet, “Th– thank you.”
Luz worked her fingers through Amity’s hair, brushing the strands of green with an undeserved tenderness. Her eyes glittered in the afternoon light, disks of polished carnelian shot through with mahogany. The brown-haired girl stared at her in something like wonder, as if she was something worthy of wonder. After a moment, Luz nodded, a satisfied smile on her lips. “I thought you’d sleep better– like— thissss,” she trailed off with a grunt and a hiss as she stretched again, yawning, wiggling her toes and bending one arm up to brush at her face. Luz turned a blindingly brilliant grin her way as she worked the heel of her palm in the corner of an eye, brushing away the sleep that clung there.
Amity lifted her head, just enough to look at the tanned girl at less of an angle, “I did, I—” She gave a breathy laugh and smiled, “I never sleep that well, and—” Amity leaned up on her elbow to look down at Luz as the shorter girl laid back on her pillow, her raised hand pushing a mass of brown curls away from her forehead to pool around her face. Amity felt her heart lurch harsh and painful in her chest—like a slipped actuator or a shorn motor bracket—because, Holy. Shit. Luz was radiant in the red glow of the truck’s cabin. The sight nearly stole her breath away.
“Y-yeah, I-I— I did, u–uh,” the pale girl stammered, hardly able to hear her own words over the thundering pulse in her ears. Amity was all too aware—in that deeply horrifying for the love of God, please stop sort of way—that she was open-mouth staring, but she was completely frozen by the certainty that Luz could hear the forge hammering triple-time in her chest. How dare she be as pretty as she was! Amity! Stop staring! She slid the hand at Luz’s shoulder down, ready to push away, to run. “Sh–should I get up?” She was nearly certain she’d outstayed her welcome by now, what with all the leering.
Luz wrinkled her face in confusion as she tilted her head, “Why? Osito tontito.” She put both hands on Amity’s shoulders and pulled, ever so gently, until the taller girl had begun to lay back down, “Don’t be silly. You’re still resting.” Once the pale girl had settled, stiff as a board, Luz hummed a slow, contented sound as she wrapped both arms around the other girl’s neck in a loose embrace. “We are still resting, cariño,” the brown-eyed girl gently declared with a sigh that turned into a yawn, “We can be a little lazy, as a treat.”
Amity couldn’t let herself unwind until she was certain, until she was sure, “I– I’m not, um, making you un– uncomfortable?” Her hands curled in nervous fists, fearing the worst.
Luz chuckled at that and nearly rolled her eyes. “Not at all— relax, cariño.” She pulled a lazy hand from behind Amity’s head to poke at her nose, whispering a boop! at the same time. Both girls grinned, Amity blushed, and Luz whispered, “We have a long day ahead of us, let’s just… enjoy this… while we can.” She set both hands at Amity’s temples, catching the pale girl’s eyes and getting a slight nod of acquiescence before she began to card her fingers through her hair, dragging her fingernails along her scalp as she hummed with the music in the air. Amity’s eyes fluttered shut as Luz scratched long and slow across her head, as buzzing lines of static blotted out the anxious thoughts running through her mind, and a numbing, tingling sensation rushed nearly down to her toes in an unexpected, undeniable wave. Her eyes might have rolled back in her head, but she was too busy turning into a green-haired puddle to investigate.
Amity actually lost track of herself there for a moment. How embarrassing. An image of Skara appeared in her mind’s eye, arms crossed and eyes rolling in frustration as she advised, Girl, keep it together! She couldn’t know for sure, but she must have made some kind of unseemly noise when her brain shut off because Luz had stopped what she was doing, her hands caught in place cradling her head. “Oh– I– I should have, uh,” Luz stuttered, flustered for some reason, with dark spots of red high up on her tanned cheeks and spreading across the bridge of her nose, “Sorry, I-I should have asked first, um, I can stop if—”
“You— No!” Amity exclaimed before she had figured out what it was that she wanted to say. Her face flushed a bright red as her mouth flapped open and closed a few times. She glanced in every direction except at Luz, unable to meet the other girl’s surprised gaze while she took a breath or two to steady her thoughts. It’s Luz, she had to remind herself, she won’t mock you. Eventually, she turned her eyes upward and offered a hesitant, “I-I liked that… um… Please?”
They stared at each other for several long heartbeats, eyes flitting back and forth as they examined one another. Luz bit at her bottom lip before breathing out a quiet, “Okay.” She dragged her nails under Amity’s hair once more and the pale girl groaned and went limp, collapsing against Luz with a heavy sigh.
After a delightfully interminable length of time, the fingernails stopped scratching across her scalp, and the accompanying mind-numbing waves of blissful static began to fade. Gentle hands continued to run back through her hair in a soothing, comforting motion, first on one side of her head and then the other. She breathed in and out, slowly, then opened her eyes to see Luz watching her with an expression she couldn’t decipher. She felt an embarrassing heat start to crawl up her face. Oh god, what did I do? Did I say something?! Amity gulped, She scratches your head and you turn to jelly? Seriously?! Have you no self-resp—
Luz chuckled, “You good, Amity?”
“I— I’m fine!” the green-haired girl laughed, not sounding at all faked or forced, thank you. “Who’s Amity?!” Shit. Their eyes met for several heartbeats, more than enough time for Amity to start to curse herself. Luz’s face cracked in a wide, giddy smile and she giggled in delight. Amity groaned and buried her face in Luz’s shirt, her muffled Oh my gaawwddd drawing a loud, unladylike snort of laughter from the smiling brown-eyed girl.
Luz shook her head and laughed, softly, “No, no, querida, esta bien,” wrapping both arms around Amity’s neck to rub at her back, “It’s okay, it’s okay.” Amity gave a quick shake of her head and Luz tutted softly, “It’s fine. You know what, sometimes Lilith gets a tension headache—usually from Eda, but sometimes Kiki—and asks Steve to rub her shoulders.” The smiling girl ran a hand over Amity’s hair before she looked up at the headliner, lost in thought, “And he’ll hit this pressure point—or something—in the junction here,” Luz patted gently along the muscles beside the pale girl’s neck, “and Lily just melts onto the desk.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Amity spoke directly into Luz’s sternum, her petulant whine sending puffs of warm air through her sleep shirt. Luz giggled once more when the green-haired girl grumpily harrumphed into her chest.
“Because, I don’t— I don’t want you to be embarrassed just because you… uh, enjoyed something,” came the gentle reply. Luz carded her fingers through Amity’s hair again, silent long enough that Amity thought that was all she had to say. “I, um, I liked… umm…” Luz spoke with a hesitant tone, as if she were struggling to find the right words, “being— er— helping you… sleep… a-and relax.” She fell silent once more, still looking up at the ceiling, but kept brushing through Amity’s hair until the pale girl lifted her head.
“Luz?”
Luz hummed a question, then looked down to catch a glimpse of watery golden eyes.
The words were there, right there, on the tip of her tongue. The need to ask had been building for a while, since their first evening together, but there was a fresh urgency after last night. Amity couldn’t imagine Luz would offer to comfort her while they slept if she didn’t mean it— if it didn’t mean something. Right? This lovely morning had to mean something. But what if she was wrong? She’d misinterpreted people’s actions before. Did she dare ask? It could change nothing. It could change everything. I… I have to know.
“Luz?” Amity repeated with a sniff, and a weak, trembling smile, “W-why… why are…” She clenched her eyes shut, unable to look at the brown-eyed girl as she whispered, “Why are you so good to me?”
Luz’s eyes widened as the question hit home, and Amity heard a gentle gasp slip from the other girl. After a pause, she licked her lips and said, “Well… I…” She glanced at her hands for a moment as a guilty expression crossed her face. “I… don’t know if… um… if I can put it… into words?” Luz added, with hesitation.
Amity blinked and blinked, her voice hamstrung by an embarrassing wobble, “Can— can you try?” She needed to hear it out loud, and she could tell that, after a moment, Luz understood.
“Oh… O-okay,” Luz breathed, patting Amity’s hair in reassurance, “Okay. Let me, um… figure out how to start…” She scrubbed a hand back through her own hair, chewing at her lip as she thought of what to say. Amity rested there, on her chest, watching the pretty smile brighten her face as Luz met her eyes. “You… um,” Luz chuckled, a blush breaking out across her cheekbones, “You are… the most amazing girl I’ve ever met,” she admitted with a smile, her voice completely honest.
Amity had become something of an expert at reading Luz’s particular brand of expressiveness over the last two days. She had studied her face while she talked, as she told stories and Eda’s tall tales, when she joked and laughed and sang; the turn of her hands, the way her eyes would dance or her mouth would curl, all the small parts of Luz that worked to build a picture of what the girl was feeling—for the few times when her heart wasn’t bared on her sleeve. Luz was—and pretended to be—an open book, but Amity had caught a glimpse of the things she kept hidden away. And now?
Luz was telling the truth, and Amity felt her face turn several shades of red at the myriad of emotions hiding in those kind brown eyes. Luz held back a smile, then, although her own face darkened in response to Amity’s reaction.
“You’re funny… you’re fun to talk to. God, I love to make you laugh,” Luz chuckled, “You’re hella smart,” she teased as she tapped a pair of fingertips against Amity’s forehead, earning herself a small scoff. “You’re… um,” Luz blushed a deeper red now, as she chewed at her bottom lip in worry, before nodding to herself and just going for it. “You’re really— really— ding-dang pretty, like, it’s completely unfair,” the brown-haired girl grumbled, blushing a dark red, then in a louder, more dramatic voice, to play off her momentary embarrassment, “And to top it allll off—”
Amity snorted, hoping her face wasn’t quite as red as it felt, lifting a hand to half-hide behind her fingers, her smile still clearly visible.
“You… you seem to like me for me,” Luz spoke in a quiet, tender voice. She looked away for a moment and cleared her throat, running her hand in circles on Amity’s back. “Quirky… goofball… run-of-the-mill me.”
Amity stared up at her, excitement and some other unnamable emotion swelling brightly in her chest. She had to wait a few heart-aching moments before Luz would look her way, but once their eyes met, Amity gave her a soft smile and a nod, biting her lip to hold back a delirious giggle.
Luz watched her, her eyes softening as she smiled in return, but then her face crumpled. “Then… last night,” she began, a hitch in her voice, “I-I could tell… you were…” she sighed and blinked a few times before adding, “You were so afraid.” Amity watched as tears began to shimmer in Luz’s eyes, and it felt like a bucket of ice water had been dumped over her spine. Luz breathed out a wet chuckle and shook her head, “I w–wasn’t quite sure what to do? A–and— seeing that fear in your eyes?” She sniffed then, and shrugged, wiping at one side of her face when the tears grew too heavy to stay where they belonged.
Amity quickly reached up to gently brush the other teardrops away, running a pale thumb across warm brown skin. She could feel a pressure building in her own eyes, the urge to cry because Luz—beautiful, bright shining Luz—should never be so dimmed.
Luz gave her a trembling smile, and pressed her cheek into Amity’s palm for a moment before she pulled back to swipe her knuckles across her eyes, her voice shaky, “Uhm… It—” She cleared her throat, “It hurt to see you like that,” Luz admitted with a watery voice, tapping at her chest—over her heart—with her fingers as she added, “Right here.” She looked down and away from Amity now, uncertainty twisting her eyes. “And I know—I know—we just met on Monday, but I-I feel like I’ve known you longer? It— it’s like we have this— this connection that I-I’ve been missing,” Luz began to speak faster now, “A-and deep down, it— it’s probably selfish of me, because…” She shrugged, her eyes briefly meeting Amity’s gaze before she looked away again, “Be–because maybe it’s something more? And— and maybe you feel that way too? A–and I-I… I want you too?” Luz looked at Amity then, staring straight into her eyes, “I hope you do?” she gave a small grin and a nonchalant shrug, a textbook display of faux-confidence if Amity had ever seen one.
Amity examined her face and saw only the truth. Every word of it. Her eyes widened as she realized what that meant, and tears began to pool in the corners of her eyes.
Luz gave her a sad smile, and gently lifted the hand that Amity had laid under her chin. She turned them palm-to-palm and stretched her fingers out, comparing her slightly smaller hand to Amity’s for a moment before she laced their fingers together, squeezing Amity’s hand twice. “But— I just…” Luz began, taking a quick breath for courage, swallowing, “I couldn’t let you down. I had to protect you.” She paused before meeting Amity’s eyes. “Because… y-you’ve become… precious to me.”
Amity’s mouth fell open in shock—despite her hope, despite guessing where Luz had been going with her hesitant confession, hearing the words out loud that she had been desperately hoping for was enough to make her tears start to fall. She pushed herself up on her elbow, the better to wipe at her face with the edge of her hand. Luz gazed up at her, eyes shining, and whispered, “Are you alright?” as she ran a thumb across Amity’s cheek to catch another teardrop before it could fall.
Amity just smiled so wide and nodded, breathing out a soft, Mm-hmm, before tucking her head under Luz’s chin and wrapping her arms around the brown-haired girl, holding on as tight as she could. She felt Luz return the embrace, one hand rubbing at her back, and the other carefully holding the back of her head. Amity snuggled in further and used a tear-stained voice to whisper, “You’re too good to be true.”
Luz chuckled and brushed at her hair, gazing down at her with that undefinable light in her eyes, “I could say the same about you.”
They held each other in the soft red sunlight drifting through the truck’s cabin. A new song had begun to play at some point during their talk, and Luz sang along with a smile on her face. Amity pressed her forehead against the tanned girl’s throat, her heart overflowing with emotions she could hardly name. She hummed the occasional note herself, unable to contain the sheer joy that had swept her up in its thundering, rushing current. “Luz?” One more question burned in the back of her throat, but she wasn’t afraid to ask this time.
The brown-haired girl hmm’d as she raised an eyebrow.
“You said we could be a little lazy,” Amity smiled up at her, her golden eyes crinkling at the grin Luz turned her way, “How long do we have? um, to stay like this?”
The brown-haired girl’s happiness was an infectious thing, and Luz laughed, “Querida, as long as you w—” Amity jumped at the loud, rumbling gurgle that interrupted the other girl’s answer. Luz turned a bit red, and she patted her still-growling stomach with a grimace. “Oof, sorry,” she chuckled, “What a… what a moodkiller, eh?”
Amity giggled. “How will you survive with that raccoon trapped in there?” she snarked as she poked at Luz’s belly with a grin.
Luz yelped “Hey!” before she huffed and smoothed out her tee-shirt. “I dunno! Didn’t realize how hungry I was.”
Amity was fairly hungry herself, if she were being honest. She’d missed out on dinner, having napped practically half of their “day” away. She leaned back to peer up at Luz, a suspicion simmering in the back of her mind. “What did you have for dinner last night?” Amity asked in a carefully light tone of voice.
“Uhh…” Luz blinked, then lifted her arm to peer at her bare wrist, “Would you look at the time—”
“Luz?” Amity pressed.
The tanned girl squirmed a bit beneath her, before pulling an innocent expression, “Yes?”
Amity propped herself up on an elbow, “Did you eat last night?”
Luz looked away toward the dashboard and sighed. Amity leaned over just enough to catch her eye, an inquisitive tilt to her head, until Luz huffed and pouted—actually stuck her bottom lip out—and grumbled a reluctant, “No.”
Amity frowned, “Why didn’t you— oh.” She looked down at her hand and frowned, picking at her chipped nail polish with her thumb as she mumbled, “It’s my fault, isn’t—”
“Stop.” Her voice was firm as Luz set a hand to Amity’s jaw, turning her face up to look her in the eye. “Don’t blame yourself. Yes, my options were limited last night, because I chose not to leave you alone in the truck.” She patted her chest with one hand, “I chose.” She examined Amity’s expression for a moment, waiting for her to give the smallest nod. “Food was the furthest thing from my mind last night,” the shorter girl added, an emphatic note in her voice as she tried to drive her point across, “Honest. It was just you.” Luz lifted both hands to cradle Amity’s face, and the pale girl nearly melted again at the care and concern she saw in those brown eyes. “I had to make sure you were safe. So… so don’t… okay?”
Amity gulped, her voice a hoarse whisper, “Okay.” They stared at each other, inches apart, a solemn understanding building between the two. Amity knew Luz would sacrifice her own well-being to take care of her, and she would do the same, wouldn’t she? She would. It was hardly a question, more of a promise that—
Luz’s stomach interrupted again, somehow louder than the first time, and the tanned girl gasped. “Omigawd,” she whispered before she slapped her hands across her eyes in embarrassment.
“Well…” Amity chuckled, resting her chin on her palm, “Can I buy you breakfast?”
Luz dragged her hands down her face to smile up at the pale girl, “Omigawsh, yes please!”
~
Amity stood in front of the beef jerky endcap display, idly considering the quantifiable difference between the ‘Cracked Pepper’ and ‘Peppercorn’ flavors she held up for closer examination. They looked identical in regards to color and visible levels of seasoning, unlike the ‘Teriyaki’ and ‘Jalapeno Infused’ varieties—both of which had a deeper red shade or a shinier surface, respectively. I wonder if the mass spectrometer would show a difference? Actually, scratch that. If her father caught her running beef jerky through his laboratory, he might get too interested in the experiment.
Footsteps to her left caught her ear, and Amity half-turned to see Luz walk out of the restroom hallway, her white cowboy hat in one hand, the other pushing back through slightly-damp curls. She wiped her hands on her jacket after she slid the hat onto her head. Brown eyes narrowed as she looked left and right, looking around for— her face lit up when she saw the taller girl, and Amity’s chest squeezed at the sight. Then, Luz grinned and tugged her tan cargo pants up by the waist before she started ambling toward Amity with an exaggerated, arm-swinging bow-legged stroll. As she sauntered up beside the green-haired girl, she flicked the brim of her cowboy hat with a thumb and drawled a cartoonish, “Wullll, sorry— I say— sorry ‘bout th’ wait there, li’l lady.”
“Little lady?” Amity scoffed lightly, lifting a flattened hand to pretend to measure the difference in their height, one pouch of beef jerky still dangling from her fingers.
“Ooh!” Luz perked up at the snack hanging in front of her face, “Peppercorn.” She gently tugged the pouch away from Amity and turned it around, “This stuff’s pretty good.”
“Better than…” Amity twisted her other hand with a flourish, “Cracked Pepper?”
Luz snorted, “Nah, it all tastes the same.” She waggled the snack packet by its corner, “You want any?”
“No, thank you.”
The Petro Travel Center looked much the same as it had earlier that morning, with the same sort of road-weary people picking out items or pouring their coffee, the same kindly older woman at the register chatting with the customer across the counter. It struck Amity again: that close resemblance to an airport concourse, how all airports feel the same, how this truck stop shared more similarities than differences with the one where she met Gus. If she didn’t know they were somewhere else—if the view out the window weren’t completely different—she might have thought they were still in California.
The afternoon sunlight shimmered off the blacktop when they stepped through the sliding doors, patches of illusory oasis fading in and out with the clouds passing overhead. Amity folded her company jacket over her elbow. Luz was wearing hers, somehow, even in the Nebraska heat. “Bags in the truck, then breakfast?” Luz asked, sticking a thumb out over her shoulder before tugging at the strap of her green toiletries & pajamas bag, “That way we don’t have to deal with these while we’re eating.”
Amity gave her a smile and a nod. Hooty was parked in the third row, which was a fair distance through the heat-soaked parking lot. She pulled her N.O.T. hat low as they walked, the better to hide her eyes from the sun while Luz practically skipped along beside her. Amity reached into the pocket of her dark gray pants and pulled a scribble-coated piece of paper out, unfolding it as she cleared her throat. Luz glanced her way and laughed when she saw what was in her hand.
“Alright Luz,” Amity began with a smirk, raising her index finger, glancing at the list of questions Luz had written days earlier, “Least favorite food as a child, and—” she paused to hold up a second finger, “Do you still hate it?”
“Ha! Lemme think,” Luz grinned, slowing slightly as she slapped her palms together in anticipation. “I’ve got two, I guess?” She glanced up at Amity with a questioning look, “Is that alright?”
“Of course.”
“Okay, first— broccoli.” Luz made a face, and a wide side-to-side swiping hand motion, “Never liked it as a kid; hated the smell. But now I love it. Weird how that happens, right?” She smiled up at Amity, and the golden-eyed girl nodded. “The first time I realized I might actually be a whole-ass adult was when I looked down at my Chinese food and thought, This needs more broccoli.” Amity snorted at that, and Luz bumped her arm with her shoulder. “Do yoouuu like broccoli?” Luz wheedled with a grin.
Amity raised an eyebrow and peered down at her companion, “Of course, Luz. Only children don’t like broccoli,” she smirked when Luz tightened her face in a narrow-eyed frown.
“Whatever,” Luz shrugged, “Now, second— but—” the tanned girl raised a cautioning hand, “Please don’t tell Mamí about this? I’ll get my Dominican card revoked for sure—” Amity stammered some kind of response, too wrapped up in thoughts like Don’t tell your mother?! and When would I possibly meet her? to be coherent. Luz didn’t seem to notice, “—but I still can’t stand Aguacate.” She glanced up at Amity and mistook her panic for mere confusion. “er— sorry, Avocado.”
Amity huffed and croaked a small, “Avocado?”
Luz pinched her face in disgust, “Yeah, it’s like… butter mixed with grass. It’s just bleh.” Luz looked up at her and beamed, “How about you?”
“Uh…” Amity scrambled for a believable answer. “Raisins.” Luz slowly raised her eyebrows, nodding, then Amity added, “Still don’t like them.”
“Yeah, yeah,” the shorter girl nodded once more, with feeling. “I get it. They’re not the best. Hit me again?” She snapped a pair of finger-guns in Amity’s direction.
Amity looked down at the paper in her hands and gave a small, self-satisfied chuckle. Perfect. She already had a question in mind. She cleared her throat and pretended to study the list for a moment before giving a small ah-ha. “What book do you wish you could read again for the first time?” she asked, turning just slightly toward Luz while she delivered her question. She kept a close, careful eye on the brown-haired girl’s face. She watched those beautiful eyes widen in surprise at the question, then grow wider still in excitement at the answer that came to her mind… then they tightened in something like pain or resignation, her mouth forced back into a careful line after nearly breaking into a smile. Amity wrinkled her brow in concern; that was not the response she had anticipated.
“Y’know, uh…” Luz dissembled, “The… the Art of War is just such an influential book, and—”
Amity half-turned to face Luz as they walked, catching her eye at the movement, “Luz?”
The shorter girl pulled a grin just a second too slow, “—Yeah?”
“You know that’s not your real answer,” Amity stated with confidence.
Luz straightened up with an unexpected tightness in her eye. “What?” she asked, her voice and posture guarded.
Amity folded the paper in her hands as she apologized, “That didn’t come out right, I’m sorry.” She ducked her head slightly before asking again, “What was the first book that came to your mind?” When Luz gave her a confused shrug, Amity added, “The one that made your face light up.”
Luz blinked twice, caught, and looked away. “Uhmmm, Dune.” Her whole body looked nervous.
“Luz.”
“To Kill a Mockingbird?”
“Luz.”
The shorter girl waved a hand, talking faster now, an exasperation to her voice that hadn’t been there before. “What to Expect When You’re Expecting is an underappreciated classic, and—”
Amity placed a pale hand on the other girl’s wrist, interrupting one last time, “—You know I wouldn’t make fun of you… right?” After a few heavy moments of silence, the green-haired girl spoke again, quieter now, a heavy disappointment fizzling in her chest. “If you truly don’t want to answer, that’s— that’s fine.”
“No— Amity,” Luz sighed, rubbing at her eyes with a thumb and forefinger.
“I shouldn’t have pressed,” Amity admitted softly, rubbing her thumb across the tanned girl’s hand. They were close to Hooty, now. Amity could see the brown-on-brown trailer up ahead.
Luz looked ashamed, with her downcast eyes and half-hearted smile. “I— I know you wouldn’t make fun of me,” she scrubbed one hand through the side of her hair as she took a deep breath. “It’s just—!” She tipped her head back and slumped her shoulders, then whispered, “Okay.” She turned toward Amity, not quite facing her directly, but no longer purposely avoiding her eyes. “There’s… this… children’s book series no one’s ever heard about that I have loved my entire life.” Luz rubbed at her elbow for a moment, then, “And… I– I’m self-aware enough to realize that I probably love it more than most fans, because… because my— my dad bought me the first book,” Luz paused for a long, pained breath. “Just before he died.”
Amity nearly took a step back in surprise. Oh god, I’m such a fool. She’d been about to tease Luz with a guess-what and an I-already-know, but this? This went far deeper than she had ever imagined. This was a precious, cherished memory, something untouchably sacred for Luz. She didn’t dare treat this lightly.
Luz hadn’t seen her pause, too busy staring at the cracked blacktop at her feet with a hollow gaze. “It was one of the last things he gave me, and… it… It was the escape I needed then.” She turned a pained smile and glittering eyes up toward Amity and shrugged, “Y’know?”
“Oh, Luz,” Amity nearly whispered as she placed a gentle hand on her shoulder.
“It’s fine,” Luz wiped a fist under her nose and sniffed, turning toward the truck, “It’s fine.”
Amity might have called herself an expert at reading Luz’s expressions in a moment of dizzying hubris, and while Luz’s unexpected family trauma had caught her completely by surprise, she could tell with absolute certainty that Luz was not fine. The brown-haired girl had shoved her hands in her jacket pockets, kicking at the small stones in her path as she trudged toward Eda’s truck. Amity quickly caught up to her side, her hands folded at her waist. “I’m sorry, Luz,” she quickly offered.
“For what? Catching up in two steps?” Luz gave her a glance and a little scoff, but her attempt to lighten the mood rang hollow.
Amity knew she was deflecting, but played along. “One, actually.”
That pulled a snort from the smaller girl, and Amity grinned. “You big jerk,” Luz grumbled with a toothless snarl.
“The biggest,” Amity replied, waiting until they shared a laugh to add, “I wish I had been more… considerate.”
“‘S’okay,” Luz assured her before she cleared her throat, and the taller girl moved closer, brushing her arm against hers. The better to listen, of course. The brown-haired girl’s voice was somber. Drained. “I would pick one of them every time we had a book report due in school, because—” she pulled a hand out of her pocket to motion, emphatic, “—why couldn’t the other kids see how great it was! A-and maybe this time they’ll see— and…” Luz sighed, letting her hand fall to slap against her leg, “Nobody ever did. It was just one more thing my classmates used to make fun of me, so… I learned to… to hide it.” Her slow exhale was a deep, painful thing as she placed a trembling hand against her chest, “I learned that the things I loved… weren’t normal. Just like I wasn’t normal.”
Amity felt moved to reach out and clasp her hand, giving her fingers a squeeze. “They were wrong,” the green-haired girl assured her.
Luz smiled up at her, dim and subdued, but still so beautiful, and turned her wrist to lace their fingers together. After a nod, her voice was a shade brighter when she continued, “As I got older, I found people online that loved it too, like,” Luz paused to smile and shake her head, “These amazing artists and writers that made their own stories with these characters I cherished.” She chuckled, then after a moment she sighed. “But… they were always just… always… somewhere out there—” She waved her free hand at the distant horizon, “—y’know? Far away. Maybe I’d see someone walk by at a convention in a costume, but it was… never someone that I knew.” Luz kicked at another crack in the blacktop and shrugged, “Never someone that wanted me as a friend.”
They stood in the slip of shade beside Hooty’s driver’s door, the tall trailer from the truck beside them lending a sense of quiet privacy here, in the open air. Luz stared at the door handle as she absentmindedly swung their hands back and forth, and Amity waited for her to speak again. The shorter girl was baring small, shattered parts of her soul; the least she could do was listen, and gather up what pieces she could for safekeeping. Luz looked up at her, just for a moment, and tried to grin before her smile and her eyes fell. “I just… always wished I had someone to talk to that knew what I was talking about.” She sighed once more, and turned her face to the ground, hiding beneath the brim of her hat. “Sorry for… sorry for lying, Amity. It’s just… habit.”
Luz reached for the door, but paused when Amity tugged at her fingers where their hands were tangled. Amity caught her eye, rubbing at her forearm with her other hand as she spoke with a soft voice, “There’s nothing for me to forgive, Luz.”
The brown-haired girl gave her a small, heartfelt twist of the lips, and nodded. After clambering inside and stowing their backpacks, Luz knelt on the driver’s seat, half-hanging out the door to motion toward the jacket folded over Amity’s arm, “Do you want me to put that inside?”
“Yeah,” Amity chuckled as she glanced up at the bright blue sky, “I don’t think I’ll—” She was about to hand it up to Luz when she felt the small, heavy shape of the wrapped package hidden in the jacket’s inner pocket. The white cowboy hat pushed back on Luz’s forehead practically gleamed in the sunlight. Of course! She smiled up at Luz, a nervous tremor in her voice, “Wait— I just remembered… Can you come down for a second?”
Luz made a confused smile, then shrugged and swung down to stand in front of Amity. “What’s up?” she asked as she brushed her hands on her pants.
“Could I see your hat?” Amity asked with the best poker face she could manage.
“My— uhh,” Luz blinked and looked up at her, up further to her company hat, then back, not quite sure where this was going. “Yeah… here.”
Amity turned the white hat over in her hands, running her fingers across the soft, weather-beaten leather. It was well-worn, the upper surface slightly faded from an age in the sun, but brush marks on the bottom of the brim showed it was cleaned and handled with care. Inside the crown, she found the folded purple bandana Luz had tied around her face at their first rest stop. Amity felt her cheeks grow slightly pink at the memory of Luz up on her toes, her arms around her neck as her fingers tied the knot. The bandana was tucked into the brown leather sweatband, in the back, just above the faded John B. Stetson Company insignia. The golden-eyed girl hummed a question when she saw the top edge of an old photograph tucked into the front of the hat, above a set of letters stamped into the brown leather: MANNY NOCEDA. Amity looked at Luz, and the brown-haired girl shrugged with one arm, lifting a hand to wave toward the cowboy hat, “It was my dad’s.”
The importance of what she held weighed heavy on Amity’s shoulders for a pair of heartbeats. She nodded, slowly, and motioned toward the photograph, “May I?” When Luz nodded, Amity slipped the old Polaroid free, hiding it from the hungry summer sun as she examined the figures captured there. A bearded man filled the frame, skin tanned like Luz, eyes bright and smiling just like Luz, sitting on the bench seat behind the wheel of a large blue truck. He had curly brown hair sticking out from under this very same hat, and a small, unkempt, half-feral child grinning wildly in his lap with both arms outstretched to grasp the steering wheel. Amity’s eyes softened at the sight of a young Luz, and the childlike wonder shining in her eyes. She bit her lip and breathed out a laugh, then looked up to see Luz watching her with a tightly held smile, like she was waiting for some new pain. As Amity carefully—almost reverently—eased the photograph back into its proper place, she glanced up at Luz to ask, “What was he like?”
The brown-haired girl just looked at her for a moment, eyes shining in a stunned surprise. She put her hands on her hips and blinked, then croaked an “Umm…” before turning away, running a hand through her hair. While she was looking the other way, Amity pulled the little bundle from her jacket and let the garment fall to Hooty’s running board. “He… always had a smile on his face,” Luz’s voice held a wistful tone. “Always singing some old song.” She gave a wet chuckle and crossed her arms, “He played the guitar, too… I loved to sit and listen to him play for Mamí.” The wind whistled past where they stood, a thin, muted howl in the air as it rushed on by. Luz sniffed and kicked at the ground.
“Was he a truck driver?” Amity had an idea of the answer. While Luz nodded, Amity quietly unfolded the tissue paper wrapped around the golden sunburst.
“Yeah,” Luz nodded, “He was. He could— he could handle anything with wheels. Sometimes I’d get to ride with him, usually to drop the truck off at the warehouse and get his car.” She cleared her throat and wiped at an eye, “He, uh— He… I think about those times… a lot.” She turned a soft smile on Amity and sighed, “Sorry, I— I don’t mean to be a downer.”
“No, not at all—” Amity held out a hand in assurance, “I’m sorry if I upset you—”
“You didn’t,” Luz interrupted.
“—and you didn’t upset me,” the green-haired girl replied, then she used a softer voice, “Thank you for telling me about him. I… I wish… uhm…”
Luz smiled, “I wish you could’ve met him too.” Amity nodded. She took a deep breath and shoved the crumpled-up tissue paper in her pocket as Luz turned to face her. “So, um, why’d you…” the tanned girl’s voice trailed off as she watched Amity’s hands.
Amity held the hat upright, facing Luz. She slowly draped the wide purple fabric around the hat’s crown, hiding the thin white leather hatband that already sat snug around its base. The twisted-wire golden sunburst sat on the strip of purple, at the front, shining like a flame in the afternoon sun. Luz’s mouth fell open at the sight, eyes widening in what Amity hoped was recognition. “What do you think?” asked the green-haired girl.
Luz closed and opened her mouth a few times, her eyes jumping from the hat, to Amity, and back again. “It— I-It looks— l-like—” Luz stammered, and Amity watched that same shyness enter her eyes. She looked down at the ground for a moment, rubbing at one elbow with the other hand.
“Like what, Luz?” Amity used a gentle voice. Luz scrubbed her hands through her hair and rubbed at the back of her neck, still hesitant to answer. “I think…” Amity began, slowly, lifting the hat slightly to give it an exaggerated once-over, “It looks like the witches hat the townspeople made for Azura in the second book, after she traded her mother’s hat, the—”
Luz snapped her eyes upward when the name Azura crossed Amity’s lips, her eyes widening as she interrupted, “—the Crown of Heroes, to the Bandit King in exchange for his prisoners— but— how do you know—”
Amity forged onward, ignoring the question for now, “—Because she felt that if she couldn’t save them, she was—”
“—Not,” Luz said with her, both girls finishing the thought together, “a hero.”
Luz looked up at Amity with wide, awe-struck eyes, and the taller girl couldn’t help the heated blush that started to creep up her neck and ears. Luz staring at her in any sort of way made a tumultuous mix of emotions rattle about her insides, but this light shining in those brown eyes put a fire in her chest. She had to clear her throat before she could begin to explain. “I bought this for you, the other day,” Amity admitted as she tapped at the circled sun, both girls looking down at it for a moment. “You… reminded me so much of Azura, in so many ways,” the pale girl shrugged, tipping her head slightly as she breathed through a half-smile, “I thought this would be a way to pay tribute to you both… even if you didn’t understand the gesture.”
Luz stared at the golden sun, shining bright against the deep purple band, speechless, her eyes trembling in something like astonishment. Amity carefully tied the strip of fabric in the back, just enough to keep it in place while they talked. “But then you…” The golden-eyed girl locked eyes with Luz, something more than thankfulness, something far deeper than gratitude yawning within her chest as she spoke, “You protected me, last night, when you didn’t have to. I heard Hecate’s Regret in your playlist— I’ve recognized things you’ve said or done, and— then I knew.” Amity lifted her hands, emphasizing her words as she motioned with the beacon of white and purple and gold in her palms, “I knew… You would understand.” Amity bit her lip as tears began to well in her golden eyes, taking an unsteady breath as she looked down at her gift, at the offering she hoped would suffice to convey all that she felt. She cast about for words, for the right words. The emotions swirling in her heart began to settle—to take shape—as she breathed out. She looked to Luz, and finally knew what to say.
“You are my hero, Luz.”
Within moments, tears began to stream down tanned cheeks as Luz stared up at the taller girl. Amity blinked as her own tears began to fall, for in what world could she see Luz Noceda cry and Amity Blight not respond in kind? Certainly not this world. Not a world where she wanted to live.
Luz took a deep, shuddering breath and hid beneath her hands, curling her fingers over her eyes before she whispered, “Shit.” Amity almost stepped forward to comfort her, but Luz hunched her shoulders and blew out a raspy exhale. “That is so… unfair,” the brown-haired girl whined as she scrubbed at her face with her palms. Amity smiled at her, a slight tilt to her head as she watched Luz sniff and wipe her knuckles under her nose. The brown-haired girl glared up at Amity with glittering eyes above a shaky frown, before she gave an irritated scoff and motioned wide with both arms, like, How am I supposed to respond to that with words, before letting her hands fall to slap against her legs. She crossed her arms over her chest, her posture tight, and shook her head.
“Luz?” Amity asked, softly.
Luz blinked quickly and looked away, catching fresh teardrops with her thumb. “What,” she croaked.
“Are you okay?”
Luz barked a laugh that sounded close to outrage. “Amity, you—” she wiped at her face again as fresh tears fell, “You just said the—” she stopped to take a deep, shuddering breath, half-sobbing the exhale as she scoffed, her trembling hands clawed as she gestured with every word, “The most romantic thing I have ever heard!” Luz giggled then, as she pressed the edge of her hand against her face, swiping underneath her eyes. “And you—! Then—? Am I okay?!” Luz laughed up at the bright blue sky, tears glittering down her face despite her best efforts. “Yeah, pretty sure,” she said softly, covering her eyes again.
“Would a hug help?” Amity asked with a small, tear-streaked smile, her heart pounding in her chest.
“Uh-huh,” Luz whimpered, and fell forward into that waiting, welcome embrace, pressing her face into Amity’s shoulder to hide once more. Amity wrapped her arms around Luz’s slight frame, burying her nose in those soft brown curls. They stood there while the shorter girl struggled to get her breathing under control, while Amity waited, lazily inhaling that delicate scent of lemon. Something, something, a Blight never wastes an opportunity, or whatever. Amity felt Luz pull herself close, as close as she could, curling her fists into the back of the taller girl’s burgundy v-neck. She turned slightly in her arms and pressed her ear tightly against Amity’s chest.
Luz giggled, and the taller girl pretended to scowl at her for laughing at her thundering heartbeat. She blinked away tears and laughed, before turning her face upward to catch a pair of brilliant golden eyes. “You’re too good to be true,” Luz whispered.
Amity dipped her head to rub her jaw against Luz’s temple, humming a response, both girls blushing as they smiled, smiled, smiled. When she replied, her voice was just as soft, “I could say the same about you.”
~
“Luz?”
“What?”
“Luz.”
“What.”
“Hold still.”
“Aww, but—”
“It’s hard to tie this right when you keep fidgeting,” Amity grumbled as she nearly lost the purple fabric strips again. She quickly tied a square knot, leaving the two ends dangling from the back of the brim by a few inches. “Your poor mother; there, I’m d—”
Luz had hopped onto the running board to peer into Hooty’s sideview mirror before Amity could finish her sentence, twisting her head to examine her reflection. “Ooh, it’s so beautiful!” she squealed, a delighted smile breaking out across her face. She turned a dazzling grin Amity’s way, and jumped down to the ground, her arms outstretched. “How do I look?”
Amity smiled, “Perfect.”
The brown-eyed girl pulled the cowboy hat from her head, turning it around to look at the gleaming sunburst. “Te quiero mucho, papá,” Luz whispered, kissing her fingertips and pressing them to the golden sun, “Espero que estés orgulloso de mí.” The shorter girl clasped the white hat to her chest, gently cradling it there for a moment before she looked up at Amity, taking a step or two closer, reaching out to hold a pale, slender hand. “Amity…” Luz looked down, blinking rapidly as she took a breath. “Thank you… I… you…” After a moment of strangled silence, Luz scrunched her eyes and groaned, “I don’t know how to say it.”
“That’s alright, Luz,” Amity said with a soft smile, the kind she had reserved for Luz, “I think I—” The words caught in her throat when Luz took a quick step forward and leaned up on her toes, pressing a quick kiss to the edge of Amity’s cheek. Luz took a step back with a breathy laugh and froze, the two girls stared at each other with slowly widening eyes as a deep shade of red splashed across the shorter girl’s face in an instant.
“Why did I—” Luz squeaked and shoved the cowboy hat onto her head, hiding her face in her hands. Amity lifted a hand to press against her jaw, where those warm, soft lips had just touched, a wide, slow smile spreading across her face. Luz turned and stalked away several steps, shoulders hunched and hissing, “Why did I do that? Luz, you imbecile!” Amity breathed out a fond laugh as Luz lurched to a stop and groaned; she slowly, so very slowly turned around to walk back to Hooty’s still-open door. The brown-haired girl carefully lifted Amity’s jacket from the running board and folded it with care before laying it on the driver’s seat. Luz shut the door and locked the truck—all while hiding her bright red face with one hand. Once she tucked her keys into her pocket, Luz hesitated before she turned toward Amity, her head still lowered. After a moment of tense silence spent playing with the zipper on her jacket, Luz coughed, and a timid, “Uhmmm,” crept out from under the brim of her hat.
“Allons-y, ma chérie,” Amity said with a laugh, a lightness bubbling in her chest. She felt so free, like she could fly. She held out a hand toward Luz, wiggling her fingers in amused impatience until a tanned hand filled the empty spaces there. “I owe you breakfast,” Amity smiled, a dash of pink across her cheeks, “Don’t I?”
Chapter 21: Not Too Long Before In the Far-Off Land of Sunny California
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
Edric pushed through the door leading into his sister’s office, ready to deliver the carefully constructed monologue that detailed the nigh-heroic effort he’d made on Amity’s behalf in the last twenty-four hours. He had it all planned out; he would fill the air with his exploits! He’d been practicing in the elevator on the way up from Shipping, which annoyed the visiting GrubHub delivery girl to no end. She’d been there first, true—he’d squeezed through the doors before they closed—but his name was on the building. Well. His last name. He flung his arms wide and opened his mouth to proclaim—
Instead of giving him a listening ear and the applause he was due, Emira lifted a palm as soon as the door opened and held a finger to her lips. She clicked and clicked and clicked on her computer, her handset pressed against her ear as she listened to the voice chirping through her telephone. She hummed a response, glancing down at the thick, creamy-white notepad at hand, and scribbled a quick phrase and a set of numbers with a fountain pen. Edric shrugged, shedding a small cloud of dust with the movement, while Emira continued to ignore his presence—which made sense; she was wearing her reading glasses. He’d be a literal blur to her. She pointed at the seat in front of her desk as she furrowed her brow, a deep frown stretching across her features.
“Are you serious?” She asked the person on the other end, pushing her glasses up to her forehead to rub at her eyes, then, “Oh no… Put him through.”
Edric opened his mouth to ask Who? just as Emira spoke again, “Mr. Gufstouffson? I— I just heard from my assistant… Yes, no, no sir, I didn’t realize… That long?” The green-haired woman gave a soft, sad sound, and clicked once more on her laptop. “Mr. Gufstouffson, the last thing you need to worry about right now is Accounts Receivables. I’m putting you on paid leave, effective immedia— sir…” Emira listened for a moment, and frowned, “No, sir, Mr. Gufstouffson, I won’t have that. Respectfully, sir… You need time to grieve… Sir, no, sir, I— I can’t say that I have…” She sighed, “Yes, Mr. Gufstouffson.”
Edric sidled to the window wall, bits of packing foam falling from his wrinkled suit coat as he looked down at the Blight Industries Tower Campus below. People walked across the sidewalks, the parking lots; splashes of color moving about on the grays and greens, gathered around the small semicircle of food trucks in the Loop. Other employees and contractors going about their normal everyday lives as if this poor gentleman on the phone hadn’t just had his ripped away.
Emira swiveled in her chair as she listened, the older man’s voice just a barely audible buzz from where Edric stood. “Mr. Gufstouffson, you are more than welcome to call me directly, next week… Yes, I insist… Now—” Her tone of voice changed to business mode, and Edric chuckled. “Mr. Gufstouffson, do you hereby acknowledge and understand that your Blight Industries health benefits package includes a bereavement leave of no less than three calendar weeks, with additional weeks available based on your length of service at Blight Industries— sir, based on your forty years in Accounting—”
Edric turned and hissed, “Forty years?”
Emira flipped him off as she continued to recite, “—I have decided to place you on a six-month leave at full pay, with an additional lump sum equal to no less than three months’ salary to be paid immediately, to assist in covering any expenses you may have encountered in recent— No sir, Mr. Gufstouffson, we’ll handle all the paperwork come tax time.” Edric turned back to the window to give his sister the illusion of privacy.
“Mr. Gufstouffson, do you hereby acknowledge and understand that while on bereavement leave your building access codes and key cards will not function, and your network login will be temporarily deactivated,” Emira continued to read in a flat, no-nonsense tone. “Any projects you have in-flight will be put on hold until you return, and time-sensitive matters will be handled by a joint session between Legal & Risk and your direct reports… Yes, Mr. Gufstouffson, I’m sure the rest of the Accounting team can handle everything for you.” She paused to laugh, her eyes flicking toward Edric for a moment, “Yes sir, it’s certainly not as hectic there as it is in Marketing.” She sighed, then, “Sir, I’m sure you understand this is all a way to ensure that you take the time you need… Yes, yes, sir, of course. Your position will be waiting for you, nothing will have changed… Sir, I don’t want you to have to worry about anything here.” She listened and nodded, “Yes sir, if you need anything from your office, just stop in and get a temporary pass from Security.”
Emira shifted in her seat, sitting higher, leaning forward on her elbows as her voice softened, “Sir, if you need more time, let me know. My deepest condolences for your loss… yes, sir.” She cleared her throat, “I remember talking to your wife at the last Global Summit. Phyllis was such a lovely woman… yes, I agree.” She made a soft oh! sound and snapped a finger, “Sir, if I may, I’d like to arrange a catering service for your meals for a few months?... I’ll have our People team take care of everything.” She hummed a response as she scribbled a note. “Please let me know if we can do anything else… Yes… Yes, you are most welcome… Take care, Mr. Gufstouf— ha, yes, alright… I will… Take care, Albert.” She carefully hung up the phone, then continued clicking on her computer for a moment before rapidly typing out a set of emails.
“Forty years,” Edric shook his head and breathed out a wow. “I wonder if he worked with Grandpa… the stories he could tell.”
“The dirt he could find for us,” Emira scowled as she typed at a jackhammer pace, “That man probably knows everything that goes on around here, and— and now we lost our chance to grill him for details.” She rubbed at her forehead and sighed, “I think I could have convinced him to help us, if I… if I had talked to him sooner.”
Edric shoved his hands in his pants pockets and slowly paced beside the floor-to-ceiling windows, kicking at imaginary rocks in his path. “Good of you to take care of ‘im, Ira,” he said with a kind smile, and she grunted in acknowledgment. Once her burst of activity had settled, Edric slumped into the chair across from his twin. “Didn’t Odalia tell you to cut that care package?” he asked as he played with the burnt ends of his necktie.
Emira scoffed, still squinting at her screen, “Fuck that noise.” She mumbled aloud as she typed another short message, then, “While I’m Chief of Staff, our people won’t lose a dime of their health benefits.”
Edric chuckled and patted his stomach, “One of her only mistakes, really.”
“I’ve fought her on this before,” Emira ignored him again, which, expected. “Dad agrees with me.” Again, expected. Alador Blight might be too wrapped up in his experiments to truly notice his fellow workers, but he always treated them with kindness.
“Happy workers are productive work—” Edric started to recite, and Emira talked over him, “Besides, everyone knows happy workers are productive workers.”
“Pshyeah, duh,” Edric scoffed. Emira continued to type, a series of windows opening and closing on her desktop, reflected in her glasses for Edric to see. He tapped his foot on the floor, then leaned forward to ask, “How do you sneak the costs past her bean-counters?”
Emira grinned a wide, shark-like thing, made more disturbing by the shiny white glare hiding her eyes. Then she tossed her head, “Oh, y’know,” she waved a dismissive hand, “They’re scattered across Dad’s projects as recurring line items.”
Edric laughed, “Ah, I see— no questions asked?”
“No questions asked,” Emira nodded. Eventually, she half-closed her laptop and took her glasses off to rub at her eyes. She looked his way and stopped. Edric held out his arms, like, ta-daaah, his suit rumpled and hair disheveled. Emira pursed her lips, then muttered, “Whoa.”
“Crates are done!” Edric announced with a humble modicum of pride.
Emira snorted and stood, leaning back to stretch before she snarked, “So are you, little brother.” She made a face, and motioned toward her upper lip, “You’re just… gonna… walk around like that?”
He rubbed at his face, feeling the stubble that always grew a mustache first—thank you, genetics—and Edric gave his sister a smile. “Thought I’d try something new,” he smirked.
She blew a huff and shrugged, muttering, “Some things are better left untried.”
Edric chuckled and ran a hand through his hair, brushing a fresh scattering of foam adrift to his shoulders. It still felt funny, and when he shook his head, it stood up on one side. “I moved the crates down to Loading Dock A in the freight elevator.”
Emira crossed her arms and nodded, “Great,” she said as she paced back and forth behind her chair. She stopped beside her desk phone and sighed, tapping at the keypad. “I’ll let Mother know,” she sneered. She glanced at her brother and held a finger up to her mouth as the speakerphone began to ring.
“What time is it in Germany right now?” Edric whispered after the first ring.
Emira shot him a glare and hissed, “Like I care.” It rang, and rang, and—
A click and a crackle of static preceded the chilly words that wore a veneer of civility, “You’d better have good news, calling this late, Emira.”
“Good evening, Mother,” the green-haired woman donned a carefully light tone, “Amity’s crates have been readied for shipment, and—”
Her mother interrupted with an incredulous laugh, “Already?” She paused to make a sound of disbelief, “I find it so very interesting how quickly she can work once distractions have been eliminated.” Emira and Edric glanced at each other, each raising an eyebrow. Odalia continued, her voice laced with irritation, “She spends far too much time outside the Tower as it is; letting her move out of the mansion was a mistake.”
Emira narrowed her eyes at that blatant mistruth. “When should I have her credit cards—” she began to ask before her mother talked over her, “—We can revisit that conversation next quarter.”
Edric waved a raised middle finger at the telephone as Emira grit her teeth. “Yes, Mother… As for the crates, I’m having them moved to Loading Dock A. Should I arrange for—”
“No need for that,” Odalia’s voice was dismissive, “the Expedited Team is already scheduled to pick them up, I’ll inform them of where and how many…?”
“Four crates, clearly marked. Should I send you the manifest?” Emira watched as Edric mimed a groan and pulled his phone out of his pocket.
“That’s unnecessary,” Odalia might have waved a hand after placing cucumber slices on her eyes, based on her audible disinterest. “If they’re properly marked, Expedited shouldn’t have a problem finding them.”
Emira frowned, but answered with confidence, “That’s true, they’re reasonably good at their jobs.” She shot Edric a smug little grin at the tsk that filtered over the line. “I’ll have Amity packed and ready to go by tomorrow,” she added, locking eyes with Edric as they exchanged a silent conversation. He nodded. “Edric offered to look over her presentation materials, in case they—”
Odalia interrupted with a mocking laugh, which sent a fierce scowl across the green-haired man’s face. “Edric, offering help? You know she won’t want him to ruin her little PowerPoint.” The older woman scoffed, “He wouldn’t understand the numbers, anyway.” Odalia gave a pleasant sigh as the line crackled for a moment, “What could he do, make a pie chart?” Edric stood up at that, fists clenched and angry, and Emira frantically motioned for him to remain silent. “No, it’s best that Amity does this on her own. How else will she learn?”
Edric’s furious frown deepened as Emira blinked, and a slow sneer of distaste stretched her mouth. “...Learn?”
“Pardon?”
“What does Amity need to learn?” the woman repeated, glaring at the telephone on her desk.
“You’re breaking up, dear,” Odalia ignored her question as she yawned, “I have a meeting in the morning, and I think I’ll take dinner at the Italian villa. I’ll be back to the Tower by Saturday.”
Emira sucked a harsh breath in through clenched teeth as Odalia added, “—oh, and Emira… I’ll need you on-site that morning. Important changes will need your personal attention.”
Emira counted to five before she answered with a careful, “Yes, Mother.”
“Good girl,” Odalia’s saccharine tone left a sour taste in the air, “Make Mama proud, sweetie. Tata~a!”
The green-haired woman opened her mouth to protest, but the line cut off with a click. The twins stared at the phone for several long moments before they turned their eyes to each other. The same long-suffering anger burned in their twin’s gaze.
“Make Mama Proud,” Emira spat as Edric sneered, “Make a pie chart.” They both scoffed in derision.
“You have important changes to make,” Edric pulled a mocking tone as Emira rolled her eyes and copied, “You’ll ruin her PowerPoint.” They both huffed at the same time. “You wouldn’t understand the math,” Emira made a face as Edric shrugged, “Well, she’s not wrong.”
“That bitch threw you under the bus,” Emira growled.
Edric laughed, motioning her way, “And she’s gonna push you under on Saturday!” She made a confused face and grunted an uh-uhh, and he began counting on tapped fingertips. “Quote-un-quote important changes, personal attention, Saturday morning. She’s gonna make the takeover on Ten out to be your idea.” He threw his hands up, “You see it, right?!”
Emira frowned. The more she considered the conversation, the more it… but… “She wouldn’t.”
Edric stepped forward and stabbed a finger toward the phone, “She is. I’d bet almost anything on it.” He leaned his knuckles on her desktop, “If Mittens didn’t already know the truth, Odalia would have her blaming you before lunchtime.”
The green-haired woman slumped forward to rest her weight against her desk, taking several deep breaths to calm the shaking in her hands and shoulders. She turned watery golden eyes up toward her brother. “What do we do?” she whispered, “I won’t— I can’t let Amity live with her bullshit anymore.”
“It’s okay, Em,” he said, bending forward to bump their foreheads together, “We’ve just got three things to do.”
“That simple, huh?” Emira huffed a laugh as she wiped under her eyes, her voice wobbly as she asked, “What things?”
“You already got her project files, right?” he asked as he straightened his singed tie.
“Yeah, last night,” Emira gave a nod as she answered.
“Good. First, we lock down Ten,” Edric raised a finger, “I’ll go make sure I have everything that we need. I’ll seal her lab on my way out, while you reset security for the floor. Make it so Amity’s biometrics are required to unlock anything. Even the bathrooms!” Emira nodded, whispered, yeah, okay, as she laughed. Edric raised another finger, “Second, get anything you can from Amity about her presentation and send it to me. I’m gonna get my best guys spinning up designs, wireframes, what-have-you—I’ll show Mumsy what I can do to a PowerPoint.”
Emira nodded again, standing taller— confident— now that they had a set of action items. “What’s number three?”
The green-haired man grinned, a devilish glint in his eye, “We get our asses to Boston and help put on the best show the shareholders have ever seen!” He turned and jogged toward the office door.
“Anything else?” Emira called after him.
Edric waved a hand over his shoulder, “Dinner at six, don’t be late!”
~
The bell over the door chimed bright and clear, shining in the afternoon sun as Steve pushed his way into the Night-Owl Trucking office. He held a loaded cup carrier in both hands, and plastic bags swung from his elbows as he held the door open with his foot for his co-worker. He turned a big grin toward the gray-haired woman standing at her desk behind the counter and called, “Heya, boss! The clock says lunchtime!” When his usual comment failed to receive its usual response, he pushed his sunglasses up into his brown and white-streaked hair, his forehead wrinkled in concern.
Lilith stepped through the doorway, muttering a Thank you, Steve, as she riffled through a paper bag in her hands. “Edalyn, the ‘44 Burrito truck was at the Square,” the black-haired woman said in a warm tone, her long, booted stride carrying her across the shallow lobby. She glanced toward the other woman as she added, “I bought you three of the— Edalyn?”
The pale, gray-maned woman stood against her desk, leaning on her knuckles. Eda had her eyes clenched shut as she took slow, ragged breaths. Her arms were straight, elbows locked, and her face glistened a sickly pale-green under the bright fluorescent lights. Lilith quickly raised the countertop section and pushed through to stand beside her sister’s desk, the other woman opening her eyes a fraction at the sound of her approaching footsteps. Lilith pushed black hair back over her ears before holding out a hesitant hand, “Sister? Can you hear—”
“Mm-mmm, no,” Eda shook her head in a slight, jerking movement, her voice pained, “don’t— don’t touch me.”
“Is it your curse?” Lilith asked with the slightest roll of her eyes. It had taken years before she could call it that without giving the word some air quotes. She was all too aware that she still emphasized the word when she said it aloud, and winced at the angry flush that crawled across her sister’s face.
“What else would it be?!” Eda hissed in frustration and spat, “Fuck.”
Lilith huffed, and put one fist on her hip as she pushed her glasses up to the bridge of her nose with her fingertips, ice-blue eyes flashing behind circled glass, “It could be your period!”
“Ha!” Eda actually laughed out loud at that, a smile breaking across her face before she grimaced and groaned, “Ha ha, aghk— shut up.”
Steve closed the countertop and walked over, glancing between the Clawthorne sisters with worry written on his face. “Boss? Should I—”
Eda shook her head and made a face, “No.”
He set his mouth in a skeptical line, and after a moment asked, “Are you sure—”
The gray-haired woman growled through clenched teeth, and the man fell silent. They stood and listened to Eda’s labored breathing for a moment before Steve set the bags and cup carrier down and asked Lilith, “What can I do?”
“Help me move her to the couch—” Lilith began to say as Eda snarled a quick, “Don’t fucking touch me!” Steve looked at her and gave a hesitant grin, while Lilith blinked and calmly continued, “—in the breakroom.” She turned back to her sister and leaned closer, “You can’t stay here.”
“I can, and I will,” the pale woman groaned, her narrowed golden-orange eyes glittering as she glared at the other two. “I need— I have to call— Luz at— at four-thirty, and—”
Lilith clicked her tongue and breathed out a soft, “Edalyn.” She almost put a hand on her sister’s elbow, but caught herself. “That’s— you’re not going to stand here for four hours—”
Eda shook her head, her halting, “I p-promised,” nearly too quiet to hear.
Steve cleared his throat, his voice soft as he said, “Boss… c’mon.”
The gray-haired woman took a shuddering breath, “She’s gonna worry if I don’t call.”
“I’ll call her, Edalyn.”
Lilith’s tender words set her tears free, and Eda shook her head, sniffing, “No— she— I said I’d call, she’s gonna worry if it’s yoouuu—” She groaned again, a harsh, wounded sound slipping out from between her teeth before she whimpered, “I don’t want— her worrying a-about me— when she’s— on a job.”
“Edalyn,” Lilith sighed in exasperation, “She’d worry if she heard you like this.”
“Shit, you’re right,” Eda hissed, “shit, shit, shit.”
“You know she can tell when you’re in pain,” the black-haired woman couldn’t keep the smile off her face at the thought of how in tune Luz was with everyone else’s needs.
Her sister snarled, “She’s so goddamn irritating,” her gold tooth flashed in the afternoon light as she spoke. Lilith and Steve chuckled at her fake outrage.
“Boss, d’ya think you can walk?” Steve asked. She shook her head, no.
Lilith hummed and glanced about, pointing at a nearby rolling chair, “Can you sit down?”
“Mm-mmm,” Eda shook her head, swallowing, “Can’t—”
“I have an idea,” Steve waved a finger in the air as he took a few steps backward, “I’ll be back.” He turned and jogged away, opening the heavy metal door separating the office block from the mechanic’s bay. The Clawthorne sisters watched him leave, and Eda muttered something under her breath.
“That wasn’t very nice, Edalyn,” Lilith said in a flat tone.
“How do you know?” Eda grunted, “You couldn’t hear me.”
“Because I know you, Sister,” the pale, black-haired woman replied with a smirk, and Eda huffed a shallow snort.
The door creaked open once more, and Steve backed in pulling a shiny red hand truck behind him. He wheeled it over next to Eda with a great big grin on his face. She turned her head, slightly, and fired a frosty-eyed glare in his direction. He blinked and shrugged, “What?”
“Are you shitting me?” the gray-haired woman snarled.
Steve glanced at Lilith, and the two shared a silent look before he turned back to Eda. “It’s this,” he wiggled the hand truck, “or we carry you.”
“Keep your sweaty meat-hooks off the goods,” Eda spat in an exhausted voice as she slumped her shoulders, letting her chin fall against her chest for a moment.
Steve patted the chin-high metal frame with one hand, “You can lean against this, it’ll be fine.”
Lilith put a hand on Eda’s shoulder, leaving one free for her sister to grab in a tight, sweat-slick grip as she helped the gray-haired woman slowly shuffle away from her desk, toward the flat metal hand truck tray. Eda hissed in pain with every motion, muttering, “I hate you,” once her feet were planted on the metal plate. She breathed out between her teeth as the man carefully adjusted his grip on the handles. He opened his mouth to speak, and the gray-haired woman snagged his sleeve with her fingers. “If you drop me, I will fucking fire you.”
“I won’t drop you, Eda,” Steve caught her eyes as she gingerly wrapped her arms around the hand truck frame, “I promise.”
“I’ll get the door to the breakroom, Steven,” the black-haired Clawthorne said before turning toward the door in the far wall. Steve glanced her way and nodded.
“She called you ‘Steven’,” Eda said in a weak voice. The man grunted an affirmative, and she added, “She only does that when she’s worried.”
He laughed, “She’s worried about you, ya big turd.” The breakroom door squeaked open, and he nodded toward Lilith over his shoulder.
“I didn’t ask for your concern,” Eda’s whisper was damp with emotion.
“You don’t get to tell us not to care about you,” he replied in a voice just as soft. “Now, on three, I’ll tip you toward me,” Steve said as he pushed a foot out in preparation. “Lean on the frame,” He reminded her, “put your head on my shoulder if you need to.”
“Gonna— blow my nose— on your shirt,” Eda grit her teeth as he counted, “One… Two… Three—”
Steve bent his knees and pulled backward, lifting the flat metal plate of the hand truck off the floor. Eda hissed at the movement, letting out a pained gasp before she ground out another, “I hate you so much.”
“Naaah,” Steve said with a grin as he walked backward, carefully wheeling her toward the breakroom, “We got you those deep-fried burritos you love—we got there right before the truck started to pack up.” He gingerly worked the wheels over the raised bottom edge of the doorframe, muttering a soft, Sorry, for each little bump he encountered. “Those have to make up for all this trouble.”
“Hardly,” Eda groaned as he pulled up in front of the old, pea-soup-green fabric couch.
“Uhmm,” Steve glanced around, before turning a worried look toward Lilith.
“Her feet here,” Lilith pointed, stepping to the end of the couch, “Then she can lay face down.” It took them a few minutes to get Eda lowered to the long set of cushions, the pale woman hissing and spitting swears the whole way down. Once she had her weight off of her feet, she loosed a long, whistling breath, and began to release the tension in her shoulders. Eda let one hand dangle to the floor and sighed.
Steve backed away from the couch, motioning toward the hand truck, “I’ll go put this away, be right back.”
“Edalyn,” Lilith knelt on the floor beside the couch, gently wrapping her fingers around her sister’s hand, “can I get you anything? Advil? Your painkillers?”
“No— it’s not time— just—” Eda turned her wrist and squeezed her sister’s hand, “Just make sure Luz is okay?”
“I’m sure she’s fine, Edalyn,” Lilith said with a soft chuckle, “Luz has a good head on her shoulders.” She patted the back of her sister’s wrist with her other hand, then added, “You taught her well. She knows to call us if she needs us.”
Eda nodded, gasping a ragged, “Yeah— yeah— that’s true.”
“I will make sure she knows you’re…” Lilith trailed off before finishing, with emphasis, “Okay.”
The pale woman fixed her with a glare and scoffed, “Don’t say it like that, dumb-dumb!” Lilith rolled her eyes, and Eda groused, “Then she’ll really worry.”
Steve walked back into the break room carrying the bags of food. He handed the cup carrier to Lilith before he sat down cross-legged beside the couch, leaving a small empty space in between the three for their lunches. “Here, Boss,” he said as he set Eda’s paper bag within reach, “Eat something. You’ll feel better.”
Eda grumbled as she plunged a pale hand into the bag, fishing out a paper-wrapped burrito. Lilith held out a hand to help, and the gray-haired woman muttered a Thanks, Lily, before she took a bite. After a moment she sighed, and smiled. She seemed livelier then, when she opened her eyes and gave Steve a little upward nod. “So, what’d you get?”
Notes:
I remembered this time, Turtle!
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Chapter 22: Wednesday, 4:35pm
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
Luz died. That was the only explanation that made any sense: she died and went to some sapphic heaven—deposited at the gates of Galhalla by tall, muscle-bound Valkyrie, or, at least, washed up on the fabled Island of the Poets after a shipwrecked crossing of the storm-boiled sea.
By this point in her life, she had consumed an incalculable amount of fanfiction, and she’d spent long summer nights reading the literature as well. She’d seen romcoms and classic TV shows. Hell, not too long ago she and Lilith had binged the first season of Wednesday after an Addams Family film marathon during a slow spell at the office.
There was no doubt in her mind: Luz knew what it meant when the pretty girl said ma chérie like that, with a smile like that. It was the same reason she’d slipped up and used ‘querida’ the night before, when they curled up in bed. The same emotion that burned in her chest still glimmered in that bright golden gaze. She might not understand the why of it all—namely, why she was the lucky one to see that look in Amity’s eye—but she was gonna grab this opportunity with both hands. Both… trembling, sweaty hands. Gross, Luz. She tried to wipe her palm on her pants without drawing Amity’s attention, her mouth pressed in a grimace. Keep it together!
She was walking beside a breathtakingly pretty girl who for some reason liked her back, who had held out her hand and gently laced their fingers together, and— and— and! So many words wanted to spill from her mouth. She was practically vibrating with the effort it took to keep from rambling nonsense. Actually— wait. Was she about to throw up? She couldn’t tell the difference at the moment, and one question in particular was begging to be set free. She’d almost blurted it out three times in the last minute, but she managed to swallow it down once more to simmer in her stomach. Luz, no, it’s not time yet!
Amity glanced her way and breathed out a laugh, a delicate pink blush dusting her cheeks. She wrinkled her forehead in confusion and asked, “Not time for what? Breakfast?”
Luz felt an ice-cold rush of fear pour down her spine at the simple question, at the thought of Amity reading her mind, and she tried to turn her startled full-body twitch into something else as she squeaked, “What?!” Amity grinned at the strange little hop she made.
“They might still let us order from the breakfast menu, but— wait,” the pale girl squinted down at her in a contemplative way, a sly smile stretching across her face. “Were you thinking out loud?”
The tanned girl slapped her free hand across her eyes and hissed, “Dammit,” while Amity laughed and laughed. It was different this time, Luz realized, grinning and bumping the taller girl’s arm with her shoulder as Amity covered her mouth with her hand to muffle herself. Amity’s open amusement—carefree, happy, and beautiful—was like music in the air. She was laughing at a joke they shared. Luz started to giggle before she swiped a hand down her face and groaned, “Yes, I was, you— you caught me.”
She gave a wistful sigh as she swung their joined hands back and forth. Amity watched the motion with bright disks of gold; their curled wrists flashing pale and tan in the sunlight. Luz glanced her way twice, before leaning into her arm with a soft admission, “There’s… something I wanna ask you.”
“Oh?” Amity arched one eyebrow in curiosity.
Luz nodded and swallowed, her mouth dry as a bone. “Yeah,” she whispered, then had to clear her throat to add, “I wanna ask you so bad.” When did her voice get that hoarse? The building ahead was suddenly the most interesting thing she had ever seen. Wow. Who knew brown brick went so well with a forest-green metal roof?
“But…?” the taller girl gave her a gentle smile, and offered, “It’s not the right time?”
Luz felt Amity squeeze her hand, and she tightened her fingers twice. Luz nodded, “It’s not the right time.” She huffed a laugh, speaking quickly in a burst of nervous energy, her free hand gesturing at nothing in particular, “And I wanna do it right, y’know? Because you deserve it.” Amity made a small scoffing noise of disbelief, and Luz frowned at the green-haired girl’s self-deprecating response to the thought of deserving something done right.
“Well,” the golden-eyed girl glanced her way as she trailed fingertips through her hair, brushing green strands behind her ear, her lips still bent in that soft smile just for Luz. “When will it be the right time?” Her voice held only curiosity.
Luz blinked. When would it be the right time to ask Amity out on a date, a real date, like to a coffee shop or to an art gallery? The food trucks at the wharf? Or maybe to the museu— Luz blinked again, catching herself before she could get too lost in thought. Not before Friday. I can’t let her down by being a distraction when she needs to focus on saving her future. She flashed a brilliant smile up at Amity, excited to try and find the right time. “Maybe Saturday,” the tanned girl shrugged, pretending a certain nonchalance in her posture, “Maaaybe sometime next week, but—” She nudged Amity in the side, grinning at the little snort she earned, “—it’ll be soon.”
Amity smiled as she turned to face the building ahead, contentment shining in her golden eyes. “You can ask me anything, Luz,” she smirked then, and Luz felt a fresh heat bloom in her face. Amity’s voice turned to a lilting sing-song tone as she added, “Honesty is important for partners, don’t you remember?”
Luz scoffed slightly as they stepped up onto the sidewalk, and she pulled the taller girl into the shade cast by the corner of the building. A brace of clouds covered the sun’s gaze as a passing breeze ruffled the ends of their hair. “Amity, your demo on Friday is so important for your future, and— and—” She turned to face the taller girl, glancing up at her face for a moment. Amity smiled, tilting her head as she waited to listen. Luz looked down at their laced fingers and cradled Amity’s hand in both of her palms. She breathed out a soft, “Okay,” before taking a breath, deciding on her words. “I don’t want to mess things up with you— er— for you.”
“Luz,” Amity said with another squeeze of her hand, “you couldn’t.”
“I don’t wanna throw you off your game, y’know?” Luz grinned up at her when Amity chuckled, muttering, My game? under her breath. “Yeah, girl! You got— I don’t wanna—” the tanned girl stammered to a halt before making a face and deliberately changing tack, “You need to be able to focus on giving your best on Friday—”
Amity shook her head, saying, “Don’t worry, Luz.”
Luz soldiered on, “—so you can show everyone how wrong your mother is about you!” Amity blinked, her mouth half-open in surprise at the utter conviction shining in the tanned girl’s eyes. The shorter girl nodded, a firm, determined cast to her features, “So everyone can see the incredible woman I’ve had the privilege to meet.” A dark blush bloomed across her face as she spoke. Luz squeezed Amity’s hand with her fingers when she emphasized a word, “I want you to believe it too, because I believe it, and— and just know that I am with you, one hundred percent, Amity.” She paused to swallow and lick her lips, then, “Anything— anything you need, just… say the word.”
Amity blinked and blinked, then looked away when her eyes misted over. She stared out at the parking lot for several long heartbeats, at the line of colorful chrome-edged big rigs shimmering in the Nebraska heat. The green-haired girl cleared her throat and glanced down at their hands, their fingers still tangled together under Luz’s gentle touch. Luz let her other hand fall away, and Amity smiled, swinging their arms back and forth for a moment as she gathered her thoughts.
“You have already done more for me than… than I could have hoped, Luz,” the golden-eyed girl admitted in a hesitant voice tinged with disbelief, catching the shorter girl’s gaze. “More than I could have ever asked. You give of yourself so freely, it… it…” Amity tilted her face up toward the deep blue sky and closed her eyes to bask in the warmth of the summer air. “I feel like I can do anything,” Amity’s whisper drifted on a warm breeze, brushing across the brown-haired girl’s cheek as it passed.
Luz watched as determination fixed itself on Amity’s brow, as confidence straightened her back and squared her shoulders. She nodded, looking down at Luz with something akin to tenderness in her eyes. She reached out a careful hand and held pale fingertips to Luz’s jaw, brushing a thumb across the ridge of her cheekbone. “Just… keep being you,” Amity smiled, her voice heavy with things unsaid.
Luz could feel the heat crawling up her face nearly to her hairline because, damn. No one had ever looked at her like that before—she definitely would have remembered! She was a hopeless romantic after all. Unfortunately for Amity, she was also an obnoxious little shit. Luz grinned up at the golden-eyed girl while she pressed her cheek into her pale palm, dropping her voice to a husky rasp as she replied, “As you wish.”
Amity’s face flushed a brilliant red at that, because who hasn’t seen the Princess Bride? She spluttered some sort of response and Luz just barely managed not to cackle exactly like Eda did when she pranked her sister.
“So!” Luz exclaimed as she turned, pulling the tongue-tied taller girl in her wake, “I feel like re-introductions are in order, here, whaddayou think?”
Amity took two steps to her four and pulled slightly ahead, raising an eyebrow as she hummed a questioning note.
“There’s me, Luz Noceda,” the girl in question placed a palm across her chest, fingers spread as she bobbed her head a degree, “Long-time Good Witch Azura fan, full-time Hecazura shipper,” Luz gave a little bow and a grin, twirling her free wrist in a genial flourish, “aaaand part-time fan-forum cryptid—” Amity snorted at that, and Luz smiled so wide, “—pleased ta’ mee’cha!”
Amity cocked an eyebrow and crooned, “Enchantée,” allowing herself a smirk when Luz shivered at her throaty French purr. The green-haired girl laid a slender hand atop her sternum, fingers pressed together in a line as she lifted her chin, “As you might know, my name is Amity Blight.” She gave Luz an exaggerated wink, and the shorter girl made a scoffing sort of laugh. She grew less playful in a moment, glancing from side to side as if she expected to be overheard, her voice softening as she admitted, “The Azura books have held a special place in my heart since I was eight and a half. I…” She trailed off with a gentle heh, close to a whisper, “I also, uhm, ship Hecazura.” Amity blushed when those words crossed her lips, as if she had never said as much out loud. She glanced at Luz with a growing smile on her face, her cheeks a rosy pink as she ended with, “It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”
“This is so cool!” Luz practically skipped along beside the taller girl, Amity’s careful, measured stride moving at a steady pace; the brown-haired girl’s voice hit a surprisingly high note as she stamped her feet in excitement, “A real honest-to-gosh Azura buddy! Oh!” she gasped and cantered sideways, one hand holding the cowboy hat on her head as she looked up at Amity, “Which book is your favorite?!”
“The fifth,” the taller girl said with a growing smile, “It really delves into Hecate’s character and her backstory, and it casts her decisions in the earlier books in such a tragic light, especially what motivated her betrayal in book three, when— ah,” she laughed, turning the faintest shade of pink with embarrassment after glancing down at the brown-haired girl, “uh, I–I mean—”
Luz had begun to stare up at Amity with wide, sparkling eyes while she talked. “No, keep going,” she urged in an awestruck tone.
Amity smiled again, nodding, “Hecate has always been my favorite. She… she spoke to me.” There was an aching vulnerability in her voice.
The brown-haired girl narrowed her eyes, watching her friend closely for a moment before grinning, “I think I— yeah, I can see how she would do that.” Luz could feel the small, paper-wrapped packet in her jacket pocket, and remembered the glimpse of some intense emotion in those golden eyes when they landed on the silver moon pendant. She sighed and squeezed Amity’s hand before adding, “I had a feeling, at least. I’m glad you found her.”
Luz had opened her mouth to ask another question, but her jaw completely dropped open when they rounded the corner. That familiar mud-caked rusty red Ford Aerostar was parked against the sidewalk between the Iron Skillet Restaurant and the east-side Petro Station Shopping Center entrance. Luz danced in place, jumping and pointing at ALMANAC with one hand while she slapped at Amity’s arm and shoulder in excitement, “Look, look!” The smaller girl squealed with glee, “My beautiful ugly baby is back!” It was still and silent, without so much as the gentle pinging sound that an engine block would make as it cooled. The minivan must have been parked for hours. It looked empty from where they stood. Luz quickly glanced all about, leaning forward to peer around Amity’s shoulder down the pathway they had just walked, “Oh! I wonder if we’ll get to meet the farmers!”
Amity laughed at her unbridled enthusiasm, “There’s— Luz, they’re probably not farmers.” She glanced at the sun-faded minivan again, warming its pitted hide in the Nebraskan summer sun. “What are the odds they’d stop here?”
Luz looked up at her, brown eyes sparkling in the afternoon light. Her face crumpled slightly at a sudden thought, “Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” Amity rolled her eyes and scoffed, and Luz nudged her side with an elbow, grinning, “Little miss mathy-pants?”
“I’m just saying it’s statistically unlikely that we keep seeing this van,” Amity motioned toward it with an open hand.
Luz shrugged, “They’ve got New York plates, and we’re on the best route that direction.” She walked toward the restaurant entrance, turning to face Amity as she held the door open for the taller girl, “I’ve seen stranger things before.”
~
The bell above the door jingled as the two girls stepped into the Iron Skillet and breathed in the scent of grilled meat, gravy, and fried potatoes. The restaurant had a long, rectangular seating area. A number of white-topped tables filled the center of the dining room, arranged in a neatly spaced grid. A few patrons were seated in the booths that lined the white walls, the whole area decorated with framed oil-painted landscapes and cut-metal animal silhouettes that spoke to a Western theme: a trio of galloping black stallions on one wall, a pair of grazing buffalo on another; a buck and doe running across the small patch of painted grass beneath their hooves. A countertop to their left had a set of bar stools, the wall facing it featured two-person booths underneath a wide set of windows.
“Smell that, Amity?” Luz asked as she inhaled once more, her stomach rumbling in anticipation, “That’s happiness.”
The green-haired girl hummed a low, hungry note as she growled, “Hashbrowns.” She closed her eyes and lifted her chin as she breathed in long and slow, and the smaller girl stole a lingering glance at the pale slope of her neck.
Actually, scratch that earlier thought. This was sapphic paradise: holding a pretty girl’s hand while the scent of fried potatoes filled the air.
“God, I hope the breakfast menu is still on,” Luz tried to keep the whining, plaintive tone from her voice, and might have succeeded. The jury was out. To lunch, likely. “Mama needs some eggs.” She glanced up at Amity when the taller girl laughed, and grinned. They stood there for a moment, chuckling, and the brown-haired girl began to fan one side of her jacket with her free hand. It’s so hot in here! Luz could feel sweat beading on her temples.
Amity looked around for a Find a Seat or a Wait to be Seated sign, her bottom lip caught between her teeth in an expression of uncertain worry. The jukebox in the corner by the entrance crackled and popped as it played an old country record, the mournful song muffling the dull buzz of conversation in the air.
A hostess in a black apron waved at them from behind the far countertop. “Be right with you!” she called, “Grab a table or a booth if you want!” The woman pulled a small paper notepad from the countertop, then plucked a pencil from its place in her sandy-blonde hair as she bent her head to listen to an older couple place their orders.
Amity looked down at Luz fanning her jacket, and the shorter girl watched her scrunch her eyebrows. Shit. Luz let go of her jacket and breathed out a guilty sound.
“Are you alright?” Amity asked as she half-turned to face Luz. She squeezed her hand twice as she said alright.
“I’m fine!” the brown-haired girl squeaked. She could tell she hadn’t convinced the taller girl by the way her lip twisted.
“It’s very… warm in here,” Amity said with a kindly, confused tilt of her head. Luz felt a drop of perspiration start to roll down the side of her jaw, and Amity’s eyes tracked it the whole way down. The pale girl licked her lips, and her eyes went soft and unfocused for a heartbeat before she cleared her throat and asked, “Why… don’t you take your jacket off?”
“Wha-hut,” Luz couldn’t help the uncomfortable laugh that split her response, or the desperately growing urge to fan her jacket again. “What do you mean?”
Amity gave a fond huff in disbelief, “You look… uncomfortable, Luz, don’t you—”
“Nope,” Luz interrupted, “I’m fine!”
Amity tightened her eyes in suspicion and stared at Luz while more sweat traced slow trails down her neck.
Luz hung her head in shame for a moment, then turned toward Amity, “It— it’s dumb, but I— I packed in a hurry on Monday, right? And… I grabbed the wrong shirt for today.” She looked up to watch the taller girl tilt her head in confusion. “And— This— This shirt is—” Luz stammered to a halt and sighed, then glanced about in worry before pulling the side of her jacket open for Amity to see. The black, wide-neck tee shirt had a graffiti-like design: a crimson paint-splatter butterfly lay across Luz’s stomach underneath a white stencil-lettered PARAMƟRE, both halves of the artwork made to look as though the spray-paint had dripped and smudged.
“That’s not how you spell paramour,” Amity said with a snooty, academic tone, pointing her nose in the air. She grinned down at Luz when the smaller girl rolled her eyes.
“Paramore is a band,” Luz replied with a deadpan hint of a smile.
Amity shrugged, “It has more than four letters, Luz, I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
“No, look, here—” Luz groaned and giggled at the same time, which lent her a pained expression as she stretched her jacket further away from her body. She looked up at Amity and watched the pale girl’s face turn a dark red before she pointedly looked away. Luz glanced down at her shirt—at the shirt she never took out of the house. She had two shirts with this print. She thought she’d packed the good one. This one had snagged and ripped a sleeve while she was helping Steve work on Hooty one afternoon, and she’d decided to just pull the sleeves off entirely. It hadn’t gone how she’d planned, and the side seams on the torso had split almost down to her waist.
Amity cleared her throat and glanced at Luz again, catching another glimpse of smooth, honey-brown skin below a purple sports bra, a hint of muscle glistening with sweat, and— “I see,” the golden-eyed girl said in a strangled voice as she looked up at the ceiling. She peeked again when Luz wasn’t watching.
“I don’t wanna get us kicked out for indecency,” Luz grumbled as she flicked her fingernails across her jacket.
“Why didn’t you say anything earlier?” Amity asked.
“I was gonna pretend—” Luz’s voice cracked in exasperation, then she groaned, “—nothing was wrong, a–and change my shirt when you weren’t looking.” She balled her free hand into a fist and shoved it into her jacket pocket.
The taller girl laughed, drawing a smile from her pouting companion. “We’ll get our food to go, then,” Amity suggested, patting the shorter girl on the arm.
Luz sighed and fanned her jacket again, “Really? Oh, thank God.” She smiled up at the golden-eyed girl, adding, “We could get your goo-babies out while we eat, if you want?” She pointed a thumb over her shoulder, “There’s a field to the south they could play in. Oh!” The brown-haired girl bounced on her toes at a sudden thought, tugging at the taller girl’s fingers, “Let’s check the shop and see what toys they have!”
Amity nodded, her face brightening in appreciation, “That would be wonderful.”
~
The hostess walked over to where they stood, sliding the pad of paper into her apron pocket while she flashed them a wide, tired smile. She was stocky, and only taller than Luz due to the sandy-blonde bun piled on the top of her head; Luz thought she might have been in her mid-forties. “Hi gals, I’m Amanda,” the older woman said in a warm, motherly voice, “Didn’t ya’ll wanna sit down?”
“Oh! Hey there!” Luz smiled wide, a friendly note in her voice.
Amity nodded toward the woman, her voice steady in a practiced greeting, “Hello Amanda, it’s a pleasure to meet you.”
The matron bit back an amused chuckle, waving a hand toward the pale, green-haired girl, “Shucks, hun, no need to be so formal.”
Luz waved toward the windows beside the front door. “We were gonna get ours to go, is there a place you’d want us to sit?”
Amanda scrunched her nose as she laughed, glancing down at where their hands were still tangled together. “Aren’t you two the cutest?” She tipped her head toward the countertop nearby, “Ya’ll come sit at the counter ‘n’ keep ol’ Mandy comp’ny.” She slipped behind the counter as the two girls followed on the other side, and she handed them a pair of menus as they sat down. Amity grinned at how Luz had to hoist herself up onto the hard red plastic seat. “Take a gander, lemme know what’cha want.” She leaned on her elbows as her eyes darted back and forth between the pair, touching their hats and their hair before settling back on their eyes. “You look like you could do with some ice water?” Amanda said to Luz.
“Omigawsh, yes please,” Luz clasped her hands and pretended to beg. Amity smiled, and the hostess laughed as she held up a finger to say one second, as she glanced at the green-haired girl. “None for me, thank you,” Amity added before Amanda could ask.
“Do you know what you want?” Amity asked the shorter girl as she picked up her menu.
“Yyyup,” Luz popped the ‘p’ sound as she unfolded the laminated paper. “I gotta hankerin’ foorrr…” she scanned the length of the menu before she tapped on a picture in the Breakfast Classics section, “the steak and eggs, sunny side up,” she paused to read the smaller print, “with the hashbrowns.” She wiggled on her bar stool and grinned up at Amity, “What’re you in the mood for?”
Amity chuckled and gathered their menus into a stack, “If it’s good enough for you, it’s good enough for me.” She stood the menus up and tapped them into a straightened bundle.
“Are you sure?” Luz asked, placing a hand on Amity’s forearm, “You didn’t even look at the menu.”
The pale girl smiled as she set the menus down on the countertop, then leaned toward Luz to confide, “I might be the boss on this trip, but you’re the expert, and—” Amity shrugged, turning a shade of pink, “and you’re ordering it, so I–I wanted to order it too.” Luz looked up at her with large, shining eyes, her bottom lip quivering. Amity huffed and shut her eyes, growling a soft, “It sounded good, okay?”
“Good?!” Luz leaned her shoulder against Amity’s arm and exclaimed, “It’s gonna be great!”
Amanda returned with the promised ice water, and Luz greedily drank the entire glass without stopping for a breath. While she leaned her head back and groaned with the fresh brain-freeze she’d earned, Amity quietly placed their order, making sure to include a pair of large coffees in Iron Skillet travel mugs. Amanda scrawled LRG barefoot for Amity, then turned to Luz, “How d’ya take yer coffee, hun?”
“Two creams, one sugar, please,” the tanned girl croaked, holding a deep breath before blowing out slowly. “Hey, Amanda?” Luz asked as the older woman scribbled the last few details of their order. The sandy-blonde woman hummed a question. “How long’s that red minivan been parked outside?” She pointed a thumb over her shoulder toward the window, and the decrepit vehicle rusting in the sunlight.
“That heap has been there all morning,” Amanda had a touch of wonder in her voice as she slid her pencil back into her hair. “Meemaw had one of them vans when I wuzza little girl, haven’t seen one in years.” She glanced between the girls with a kind smile on her face, “I’ll put’ch’yer order in, it should only be about ten minutes, ‘kay?” They nodded, and she wheeled around to holler, “BENNY!” the veins bulging in her neck. Both girls flinched at the miniature thunderclap, and a patron in a booth across the dining room dropped their fork with a startled clatter.
A muffled man’s voice rang out from the kitchen, tied tight with a thread of irritation, “WHAT!” Luz and Amity shared a look and an uneasy grin.
“I got two cowboys, sun-up!” she called out as she bustled away, the cook grunting a loud affirmative followed by a renewed clanging of pots and pans. Once she had disappeared around the corner of the counter, Amity and Luz began to giggle.
“So I got sidetracked when I saw my rusty baby, my bad,” Luz demurred as she leaned her chin on her palm, swiveling the bar stool seat to swing her legs from side to side, almost brushing her knees against Amity’s leg. She smiled, “I was going to ask when you first found The Good Witch Azura.” Amity hummed a tuneless note and tapped her fingertips together, and Luz leaned closer to listen.
“Did I tell you that I skipped a few grades i–in school?” Amity asked in a hesitant voice, glancing at Luz from the corner of her eyes.
“Edric mentioned it,” Luz chuckled as she gave the taller girl a soft look. “Who knew you were such a smarty-pants?” she asked in a sing-song tease. “Oh wait, I did.”
Amity wrinkled her eyebrows in confusion, and asked a hesitant, “Edric? Wh-when did you talk to Edric?”
Luz could read the unspoken fear in the taller girl’s eyes, the quietly horrified, What else did Edric say about me? and she sat up straight as she turned toward Amity, reassuring, “I called him last night when we were driving through Denver— you had fallen asleep not too long before, and I was… so worried… and I…” She paused to pick at her fingernails, worrying at the fringe of her jacket cuff as she tried to capture that naked terror with such inadequate words. “I… didn’t know… if I was helping you the way you needed, and I thought he might have some answers, and… he told me how they treated you when you were younger, and about the storm at the mansion—and he was so ashamed of himself, Amity—and then he talked about how you tutored him in math?” She giggled a bit before adding, “How he had to bribe you with cookies.”
The golden-eyed girl gave a sheepish shrug and hung her head as she chuckled. “They were good cookies,” Amity offered in a half-hearted defense.
“Oh, no, cariño, I thought it was adorable,” Luz assured her with a warm hand on her wrist. They shared a smile, and the tanned girl continued, “He wasn’t spilling any secrets of yours, he was… honestly?” She paused for a moment to consider the thought, rubbing her thumb across the other girl’s pale skin, and Amity watched her with interest. “It was more like a confession,” Luz patted her fingers on the green-haired girl’s arm before pulling away, “He’s a bit of an idiot, but… I feel like he’s a pretty good guy.”
Amity snorted when Luz said idiot, but she slowly nodded when she finished talking. “Yeah, Ed and Em are both… They’re trying. I… I can tell.”
Luz leaned back on her elbow and grinned, “Yeah, so, he said you skipped grades, but that’s it. Please,” she motioned with a hand, “Go on.”
The taller girl breathed out a heavy sigh, and her shoulders slumped as she began to speak. “I would spend my lunch hour in the school library. Our cooks would pack something for me that was blandly nutritious, but not messy or sloppy, you know—a Blight must remain graceful while dining, after all,” Amity donned a mocking sneer while she quoted another family maxim. Luz reached out to rub a hand across her back, and Amity gave her a grateful smile. “I didn’t mind too much, that just meant it was safe to eat around the books.”
“Dang, lucky,” Luz quipped with a gentle laugh, and Amity hummed in agreement.
“I’d been studying every spare moment for weeks after Odalia found my progress report unacceptable,” Amity gave a sad shrug. “I’d spent all morning taking the placement exams, and at lunchtime, I was just… sitting there. Staring into space.” It took her several long heartbeats before she could finish with a soft, “I didn’t know what to do with myself.”
Luz rubbed her palm over the tense muscles stretched across the taller girl’s frame, then leaned over to give her a gentle hug. Amity glanced her way and breathed out a soft, “I’m okay.”
Luz hummed in disbelief as she tilted her head to watch Amity’s face, resting her jaw across the taller girl’s shoulder. “Did you want to move up early?”
The pale girl shrugged, then a few moments later she sighed and shook her head. “Well…” she hissed a long breath, then said, “it— it’s complicated.” She looked at Luz, and the shorter girl urged her to continue. “My classwork wasn’t… challenging. I was bored, and so I became… antsy and irritable, and… difficult.” Amity glanced sideways when Luz made a soft noise of disapproval and caught the frown on her face.
“That sounds like your mother talking,” Luz grumbled, giving the pale girl’s hand a squeeze, “You are a goddamn delight.”
Amity laughed, a wide smile breaking across her face like the sunrise. She paused to run her fingers through the hair at her temples, blushing high up on her cheeks, around her eyes. “If— well— you’re right, uhm, about m– Odalia.” She breathed another smile at Luz, appreciation shining bright in her eyes despite the sadness in her voice from the painful memories. “Odalia wanted me focused, to prove Blights were better than everyone else.”
She looked down at her hands and picked at her chipped black nail polish while she found her words. “She also wanted… me to… to stop spending time with the one friend I’d made. Sh-she wasn’t a straight-A student, a–and Odalia was convinced she was ‘dragging me down’ when I started getting demerits for talking in class or drawing on my worksheets.” Amity shrugged, giving Luz a weary look before she added, “She got what she wanted.” The green-haired girl stared into the middle distance of the kitchen as she pitched her voice lower, softer, “The first time, I tested up two grades. The classes were harder. The workload was heavier… I didn’t know anyone in my lectures.”
She fell silent for a moment, then, “...Anyway. The librarian I liked the most—Miss Toomey—set this book in front of me.” Amity smiled, “I didn’t notice her standing there. She must have said something, but I— I don’t remember.” She lifted her hands and pantomimed opening a book, “I… I started reading, and… I was…”
Luz grinned, “Hooked?”
Amity nodded, “Consumed.” Luz made a noise deep in her chest, one that conveyed understanding.
Amanda bustled past with a kind smile for the girls, and refilled Luz’s ice water from a sweating pitcher in one hand, another customer’s food balanced on a tray in her other. Luz murmured her thanks and took another sip as she turned back to Amity.
“The Good Witch Azura was… It gave me something just for myself, when everything around me was confusing, or… changing for the worse.” The pale girl smiled at a thought, her eyes lowered toward the countertop, “I read it again and again, whenever I needed to calm myself. The sequels too, when they were available.” Amity clicked her tongue and grumbled, “I had to hide it from Odalia, of course, and the friends she picked from my new classmates.”
Luz almost pulled a spit-take, catching a half-mouthful of water in her hand and coughing a bit before she could protest, “What?!”
Amity laughed and handed her a napkin to wipe her face, “Yes, children of our business associates. They weren’t readers… They liked to listen to music and gossip, or bully other kids for their interests, so I… I kept Azura to myself.”
Luz set her glass down, the ice cubes clinking with the motion. “The twins knew, right?” she asked with a grin, “Seems like they’d’ve figured it out somehow.”
Amity laughed, “Yes, Edric knew. I’m not sure how, but he knew.” She paused to clear her throat, a gentle smile on her face as she admitted, “He… he brought me a copy of the fifth book when I broke my leg. I knew it was coming out soon, but it was the middle of the rugby season and I wouldn’t have time to read it until after the State tournament. But after my accident… he…” Amity rubbed her palms together, shyly, “That made me feel… noticed.”
Luz grinned and made to ask another question, when the jukebox by the door clicked and clunked as it swapped over a new record, and within seconds Tom Jones’ cheerful voice warbled out of the cabinet speakers.
What’s new pussycat? Whoa, whoa, whooaaa
The tanned girl flinched like she had been struck, and nearly slipped off her bar stool. Amity grabbed her arm to steady her, gasping, “Are you alright?”
What’s new pussycat? Whoa, whoa, whooa, whooaaa
Luz nearly clapped her hands over her ears as she groaned, “Omigawd, I hate this song so much.” She hopped down to the patterned linoleum floor, “Sorry, Amity, I gotta change this.”
The tanned girl clomped over to the jukebox, digging a handful of change out of her pocket. She nodded upwards at the four men in dirty construction gear sitting at the table nearby, grunting, “Fellas,” as she squared up with the offending record player.
I’ve got flowers and lots of hours to spend with you
“What the hell,” Luz groused as she shoveled quarter after quarter into the machine. “Any requests?” She called to the construction workers.
One man with a beard quickly swallowed his food and yelled back, “Anything but this.”
So go and powder your cute little—
After the fourth quarter rattled into the chute, the jukebox squawked to a halt, and the mechanism began to eject the current record. A muted cheer rang out among the patrons, and Luz sent a bright, shining grin over her shoulder to Amity, who watched her from the bar. “Alright fellas, I got two plays,” she turned back to the menu on the jukebox, paging through the options available.
“Something good,” one man said with a laugh, and his buddy beside him chimed in, “A classic!” A burly man half-turned in his seat to grin at Luz, his voice purposely pitched loud enough to carry across the dining room, “God, anything but Tom Jones.”
“Hey,” Amanda’s voice rang out from the beverage station, and she walked around the cabinet holding two full coffee pots, an exaggerated scowl on her face, “Jared, you better leave my Tommy alone!” Luz shot a wide-eyed look back at Amity. The pale girl had covered her mouth in surprise, but she moved her hand long enough to mouth, Oh no! The men at the table crowed and slapped at the burly man’s shoulders, jibing him with “Oh shit, buddy!” and “You’re in truh-bullll!” The hostess swept over to their table and began to refill their coffees, glaring at the burly man in good-natured outrage.
“I’m sorry, Amanda,” Luz laughed as she pressed a few more buttons, “That song is just the worst.”
The sandy-blonde woman’s put-upon irritation vanished like a switch had been flipped, “Now don’t you worry ‘bout a thing, darlin’, even I know that’s not his best.”
The man with the beard wiped his mouth with a napkin as Amanda leaned over his shoulder to top off his drink. He aimed a shit-eating grin her way as he asked, “Isn’t Tom Jones a little old for you, anyway?” The other men at the table groaned and booed their companion, the men across from him giving him a pair of thumbs-downs. The man beside him pushed an elbow into his ribs and hissed, “You’re one to talk, mister Helen Mirren is surprisingly foxy for her age.” The table erupted in jeering laughter, and the bearded man raised both hands in red-faced defeat.
Luz chuckled as she glanced at the table, “As requested, something good,” she said in a loud voice as she pressed a button, “and a classic.” She pressed one more time, then turned and pointed at the bearded man in commiseration, “Hey buddy, I get it.” The men at the table hooted and hollered, clapping their embarrassed friend on the back and shoulders as he laughed off their attention.
The jukebox hummed as it moved a new record into place, and a jaunty acoustic guitar split the crackle-hiss of its speakers, soon followed by the rest of the unseen band.
It’s a big job just gettin’ by with nine kids and a wife
I been a workin’ man dang near all my life—
Luz walked back to Amity’s side while Merle Haggard sang his ode to the American working man with a twang, her steps in time with the tempo.
—but I’ll keep workin’
As long as my two hands are fit to use
The tanned girl sang along with the jukebox, raising her hands and waggling her fingers in the air during that last line.
I’ll drink my beer in a tavern—
Luz altered the lyrics as she lifted her glass, ice cubes clinking against the rim, “I’ll drink my water in a diner…” The tanned girl winked, “And sing a little bit of these working man blues…”
Amity grinned and they shared a fond look. The brown-haired girl’s parting remark to the table of construction workers had seemed to break something loose among the Iron Skillet patrons. The atmosphere had completely changed: the other diners had begun to laugh and chat between their tables like old friends, Amanda seemed lighter on her feet, joking and teasing her patrons, and even the raucous clanging from the kitchen had a good-natured tone. Amity looked around the dining room before turning back to give Luz a careful examination.
Luz looked up at her, then blushed a bit under her continued scrutiny, ducking her head as she laughed, “What? What, do I have something on my face?” She giggled before trailing off at Amity’s slow shake of the head.
“No, Luz, look around,” the pale girl said, motioning toward the friendly, happily eating patrons. The girls watched for a moment, then Amity caught her eye. “You did this, Luz.” The green-haired girl had a small, half-smile stretching one side of her face as she said, “I don’t understand how you did it, but… You brightened this moment, for these people.”
Luz felt her cheeks start to burn as she flapped her mouth, her words stumbling on their way up and out, “But— what do— I—”
Amity turned her eyes up above Luz’s head for a moment, a smile spreading across her face. “Just another example of that—” she paused long enough to gently trace her fingertip along the circular rim of the golden sunburst gleaming on its purple band around the other girl’s cowboy hat, a soft chiiime ringing out as she finished, “Good Witch Luzura magic.” Luz opened her mouth to protest, but Amity set her hand on the sleeve of her jacket and shook her head. “Just believe it, because I believe it.”
Her own words from earlier, thrown in her face? How very dare she. The brown-haired girl narrowed her eyes and huffed, “Fine.” Luz shrugged, and looked around with the softest grin on her face, “It… it feels good, y’know?”
Amity smiled, “It does.”
The hostess came around the corner with both hands full. “Oh, lordy,” Amanda huffed as she set a pair of large boxes on the countertop, “I’ve not laughed like that in a dog’s age, my cheeks hurt—” She flashed a brilliant grin at the girls, then, “I need’ta go git your coffees, I’ll be back in a jiff.” The hostess power-walked away, and Luz reached out a hand to pull at the lid of the closest box, leaning forward to take a little sniff of the delicious smells that poured out.
“Luz, no,” Amity hissed.
“Luz, yes,” the tanned girl replied, sticking her tongue out and blowing a raspberry.
Amanda walked back to the counter with two travel mugs and a pot of coffee, laughing at Luz’s quick retreat. “Alright gals, I’m sure you’re hungry. Let’s get’cha out of here so ya’ll can eat.” She pulled a small basket of creamers and sugar packets over for Luz with one hand and began to pour Amity’s coffee with the other. She glanced at the pale girl watching the dark liquid pool in the tall metal mug before saying, “I washed these out for ya’s while I put on a fresh pot.”
“Oh? Thank you so much,” the pale girl said with a smile.
“Now, there’s napkins in the bag,” The older woman said as she set their food containers down into a tall paper bag, reaching under the countertop for materials, “and I’m puttin’ extra forks and knives in too.” Amanda stood upright and smiled at the girls, her eyes flitting from one to the other as she said, “It’d be a shame if you… huh.”
Luz watched her stare off over their shoulders for a moment, then asked, “A shame if we what?” A grinding squeal sounded from somewhere outside, behind them, surprisingly shrill despite being muffled by brown brick and double-paned glass. She turned to look out the window—Amity swiveled sideways as well—and the three watched as two yawning, disheveled girls stumbled out of the rusty minivan’s sliding side door.
The first girl out of the van stretched and hissed, and looked as though she wanted to claw at her arms and chest. She was tanned, but her skin had a reddish tint; Luz thought she might be dealing with a two-day-old sunburn. She grit her teeth and slowly reached up to card her fingers through the tawny brown hair that fell atop her shoulders, working out the few sleep-tangled snarls she found. She had a smile on her face as she looked out at the distant scenery.
The second, sleepier girl slowly crawled to the doorway of the van and sat down on the edge, a threadbare plaid blanket still wrapped around her torso. She looked as though she had slept on the floor, based on the red lines and creases imprinted on one side of her face. She stood up slowly to stretch, letting her blanket fall to the floor of the van. She was shorter than the other girl by a few inches, her complexion a shade darker and her hair a much darker chestnut brown than her taller companion. She scrubbed her palms across her face while the taller girl tucked the plaid blanket back under the bench seat behind her, before it could fall onto the ground.
The shorter of the two yawned again, blinking bleary eyes out at the parking lot. She smiled up at something her companion said, then slipped on a pair of glasses her friend gently placed in her hand. The shorter girl slipped a hairband from her wrist and began to pull her hair back into a loose ponytail. When she turned to examine her reflection in the front passenger window, Luz could see a pair of beauty marks on her right cheek, below the rounded bottom rim of her glasses. Both of the girls looked to be in their early twenties. Second-year college students at most, Luz figured, despite always being terrible at guessing people's ages.
“See?” Amity sounded a bit smug as she leaned toward Luz with a smirk, which, hot. “Not farmers,” the pale girl added.
Luz laughed as she turned to Amity, “I’ve seen a goth girl drive a combine before, I’m still not entirely convinced.” Another squeal and a slam from outside, and when Luz glanced over her shoulder, she saw the two girls huddled close together as they walked to the gas station with bundles of clothes in their hands.
“Farmers?” Amanda chuckled as she poured Luz’s coffee, glancing between the girls with a grin, “What’re you two on about?”
Amity motioned toward the van with a hand, “Their license plate says ALMANAC, and—”
“—and I said maybe they’re farmers,” Luz interrupted with a grin.
“Oh my stars,” Amanda laughed so hard she snorted, before she agreed with a motherly, “Well, ya know what? Maybe they are.” She leaned closer to Amity and stage-whispered, “She’s funny.”
Amity blushed and nodded. “H-how much do I owe you, Amanda?” The green-haired girl asked as she slipped a folded bill from her pocket. Luz hopped from her bar stool and gathered the bag of food and their drinks, then walked around to Amity’s other side. The jukebox by the door clicked and whirred as another record settled into place. A slow strumming guitar and a jazzy piano accompanied Johnny Cash’s opening monologue about a hitchhiker and the trucker who stopped to give him a lift.
“Let’s see,” Amanda held the receipt out and squinted, “Two steak n’ eggs, two coffees, two travel mugs, that brings you to thirty-six dollars and seventy-four cents.” She blinked and said, “D’ya need change, dear?”
“No, ma’am,” the golden-eyed girl said as she slid the money across the counter. “Thank you so much for your kindness this afternoon.”
The sandy-blonde woman’s eyes popped open, “One hundr— Miss!” Amanda sounded scandalized, “This is too much.”
Amity shook her head, “Not at all.”
The older woman tried again, holding out the money, “You can’t—”
The pale girl held up a hand and said, “I want to. Have a wonderful evening, Amanda.”
Luz gave the hostess a jaunty salute as she walked backward toward the entrance, “Thanks for the food, ma’am!” she called before nodding toward the laughing construction workers. “You fellas have a good day too!” Luz waved as she pushed the door open for Amity. The four men called out goodbyes and waved as the door swung closed with a jingle, muting the long list of places where the Man in Black had been.
Notes:
"I'll get back on track, and keep chapters around 4k words"
¯\_(' 3')_/¯
Chapter 23: Wednesday, 4:55pm
Notes:
Update: The inimitable GoreMiser suggested having the translations on mouse-hover for the Spanish text, so I went ahead and added that inline.
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
Amity and Luz walked through the automatic sliding doors of the Petro Station Shopping Center for the third time that day. The third for Amity, at least. Luz had been asleep on her feet the first time around, depending on the taller girl to hold her upright and keep her from stumbling face-first into the slow-opening glass doors. If Luz didn’t remember it, did it really count?
There were only a few customers milling about the shop or standing in line waiting to be cashed out. Luz nodded at the man behind the register, tipping her hat with a slow, southern-style drawl, “Hullo, Jerry the Evening Clerk.”
“Ah, shit,” Jerry the Evening Clerk remarked, pausing with a customer’s change in hand to point at Luz long enough to say, “Be good.”
Luz looked back at Amity’s confused blink and made a noncommittal shrug, “Ignore that guy.”
They wandered past the snack section, over to the aisles full of odds & ends. Amity smiled as the shorter girl hunted up and down the shelves with excitement brightening her face and quickening her step. Luz turned the corner and gasped, hopping up in the air to see the taller girl over the shelf, waving, “Ooh, Amity! I found some!”
She rounded the aisle endcap and chuckled as she watched Luz dance from one foot to the other. The truck stop’s meager collection of outdoor toys sat on a shelf at their knees: a pair of footballs and a lone boxed basketball sat underneath a hanging stack of individually packaged frisbees and a handful of jump ropes. The lowest shelf had a set of lawn darts—an eye-catching Illegal since 1988! handwritten across the front in five-inch-tall black marker letters—sitting beside an extremely dated badminton set. Amity scoffed and waved a hand toward the battered cardboard box decorated with sun-faded photographs of rackets and a birdie, and what might have once been smiling children. “Fifteen dollars?”
Luz glanced her way, then blinked and asked, “Huh?”
Amity tapped on the badminton set, “This has two rackets, three birdies, and a net, for only fifteen dollars?”
Luz set the paper bag with their breakfast on the floor by her feet. “I know that doesn’t sound like much, but,” the shorter girl tipped the box back to see the fine print on the bottom, “this was packaged in… Wow, nineteen ninety-eight?” Luz turned and looked the taller girl up and down, “This is older than you are.”
“It is not,” Amity huffed, snatching their breakfast from the ground before Luz could stop her. She stuck her tongue out at the brown-haired girl, earning herself a laugh.
“Gosh, the nineties. I bet fifteen dollars back then was more like a hundred ‘n’ fifty bucks today,” Luz quipped as she gingerly set the box back in place, then brushed the crumbling cardboard residue from her fingertips. “I knew there were places where it felt like you stepped into the past,” she made a face like she was grudgingly impressed, “But I never thought we’d find evidence of a time pool.” She grinned and pulled her phone out of her pocket to snap a quick picture of the old boxes, “I can’t wait to tell Lilith.”
Amity eyed the other items while the smaller girl bashed out a quick text with one hand, pausing just long enough to take a sip of her coffee. “I suppose you were thinking of one of the footballs?” Her eyes flicked to the lawn darts and she added, “I hope.”
Luz laughed and lifted one of the brown pleather pigskins, “Yeah, I bet they’d have fun playing with this. Not to mention—” she paused to kick a foot toward the basketball, tapping it with the toe of her sneaker, “—I didn’t wanna make Min feel bad about the last one.”
The taller girl opened her mouth to protest but paused to reconsider why she was disagreeing. The urge had been more instinctual than rational. She was making an assumption, again. She had been about to disregard the fact that Min might be hesitant to play with another basketball, wasn’t she? Amity knew her robots learned from their mistakes; she had tested that behavior with cheap furniture and porcelain dishware while calibrating their kinematic systems. They were careful around things they knew could break, and Min had accidentally damaged a building with the last basketball. Cold logic painted them as mere machines, but clearly, they had quirks and behaviors that appeared to be emotive in origin. “You… might be right,” Amity admitted.
“I’d tell her it’s not a big deal,” Luz looked up at her and flashed a dazzling smile, “I was more worried about getting stopped by the cops for breaking that restaurant.”
“Edric’s restaurant,” Amity rolled her eyes.
Luz snorted, covering her mouth with her free hand as she guffawed, “Oh lort, we’re gonna have to stop there one day for dinner, aren’t we?”
Amity let slip a dazed giggle—Going out to dinner? With Luz? Yes, please!—and Luz grinned up at her while she gently tossed the football in the air. Amity rubbed the palm of her free hand across her cheek, failing to hide the faint blush heating her face. “I don’t know if going to his restaurant’s a good idea,” the pale girl said with a smile, once she had recovered her voice, “I’d have to see reviews first.”
“Ha! Fair,” Luz chuckled, “No sense signing up for food poisoning if you don’t have—” She cut her sentence short when those two college-aged girls from earlier walked by, the pair glancing around the shop with weary expressions laced with frustration and regret. “uh, have to… uh,” Luz trailed off as she and Amity watched the girls wander into the nearby snacks aisle, just over the shelves where they stood. “Huh. I wonder what’s eating the farmers?” she said softly, hooking a thumb in their direction.
“Luz.”
The taller of the pair held a bundle of folded clothing in her arms as the shorter of the two turned around slowly, rubbing her hands across her stomach as they stared at the food. “¿Quedan más galletas?” the girl with glasses asked, glancing up at her sun-burned friend. Luz froze at the question from the next aisle and held a finger up to her lips when Amity raised an eyebrow.
Amity watched as the tawny-haired girl sighed and shook her head, something like disappointment in her gray eyes, “No, las terminamos ayer.”
“¡Estos precios son ridículos!” the shorter girl spat, her fingertips pinched together as she gestured toward the shelves with her hands. She snatched up a medium-sized bag of beef jerky and shook it with a snarl, “¿Doce dólares? Por favor.” She turned her bright green eyes back toward her companion as she tossed the beef jerky back on the shelf, her face crumpling as she remembered, “Además, tenemos que ponerle aire a las ruedas.”
The taller girl groaned, a look of disbelief settling across her face, “¿De nuevo?”
“Sí, una esta muy baja,” the dark-haired girl nodded, guilt tightening her eyes as she growled, “¿Viste ese cartel? Un dolar y 25 centavos solo para encender la máquina.” The girls stood close to each other in a thick, weighty silence for a long moment. They leaned against one another, as though they needed the support of the other to stay standing, but they both kept their eyes turned away from their companion in a shared, silent misery. The girl with glasses shoved her hands into the pockets of her cut-off jeans, and the taller girl tugged at the hem of her sunny yellow blouse.
Eventually, the taller girl sighed and offered, “Eso fue mi culpa.” When her companion made a noise, like eh? she continued, “No me di cuenta que ese atajo nos—”
“—¡No!” The green-eyed girl quickly shook her head and grabbed the taller girl’s hand, “Eso no fue solo un atajo. Yo quería llevarte ahi.” She smiled up at the gray-eyed girl, her voice softening, “¿Recuerdas?” When the taller girl blinked and looked away, tears glittering in the corners of her eyes, the girl with glasses squeezed her hand and added, brightly, “Planeamos este viaje juntas.”
Amity glanced between the girls and Luz, the latter of whom was hanging on every word. Luz couldn’t see the girls over the shelf like Amity could; instead, she had pressed herself against the display and craned her neck to listen.
“Sí, ya sé,” the taller girl grudgingly admitted.
“No— No estoy molesta contigo, Thalia… Lo siento,” The shorter girl colored with embarrassment and motioned up in the air as she vented a growl of frustration.
The tawny-haired girl—Thalia, perhaps—turned to face the girl with glasses, placing a hand on her shoulder as she quickly countered the other girl’s apology with assurance, “Ya sé, ya sé que no estás enojada.” She rubbed a gentle hand across the tense muscles hiding under the shorter girl’s red and black tee shirt.
“¡Solo con todo esto que sigue saliendo mal!” The shorter girl curled her hands into fists as she glowered into the distance, as if the world itself had offended her. The gray-eyed girl murmured something soft and encouraging, still rubbing her thumb and fingers across the other girl’s shoulder. After a moment, the green-eyed girl huffed and nodded, puffing her chest out in a show of confidence. “¿Pero sabes qué? Podemos hacerlo.”
The taller girl pulled back as surprise and worry flickered across her face. “¿En serio creés?”
“¡Sí!” The dark-haired girl nodded, and raised a fist, gesturing now with certainty in her voice. “Repite despues de mí: Podemos hacerlo.”
The taller of the two chuckled, a slight blush breaking out across her face as she answered, “Podemos…” The shorter girl nodded up at her, and they repeated together, “Podemos hacerlo.”
“Llegaremos a casa para el Viernes…” the dark-haired girl spoke softly, but her voice was firm. Certain. “Y tu final va a ser asombroso.” She reached out to place both hands on the taller girl’s upper arms, as if she could press her assurances into her skin. “Lo sé.” The two girls stared at each other, and the taller of the two slowly darkened as a blush spread across her face.
Amity didn’t know what was going on, really, due to her long-atrophied middle-school Spanish skills, but she could tell the shorter girl had made some sort of promise. She glanced at Luz again and saw her brown eyes practically glittering with stars. The green-haired girl slowly leaned toward the brown-haired girl at her side and whispered, “What are they saying?”
Luz glanced at her, then toward where the pair’s voices came from on the other side of the shelving unit, then back again as understanding dawned on her face. “Omigawsh, I’m sorry,” she whispered as softly as she could, leaning up on her tiptoes to be better heard, “They’re hungry, and almost out of money? I— I guess.” She thought for a moment, then, “They’re worried they won’t make it home by Friday, for a final? Maybe an end-of-term test?”
Amity hummed at that. She could understand the deep-seated need to do well on a test, but that couldn’t be everything, could it? She could clearly recall the yawning fear of getting a less-than-perfect grade on an exam, but that was… that was just her school experience, right? Because of Odalia? Luz didn’t have a mother like Odalia, I’m sure she didn’t have anxiety attacks on test— Amity felt a momentary spike of shame; Luz had had problems of a different sort at school. Gus’s words from the other morning came to mind, ‘You got your perspective, be open to seeing others.’ That’s what she needed to do: try to see the situation from their point of view. She turned her attention back to the other pair of girls, examining them with a critical eye.
The taller girl was thin, with a lean, wiry build that hinted at a hard childhood. She wore resignation across her shoulders like a familiar blanket as she looked around at the brightly packaged food they couldn’t afford. She handled her hunger better than her companion, which made Amity frown; she suspected the tall girl was no stranger to days without enough to eat. A twinge of guilt ran through her chest at the realization—there were days she went without eating because she forgot, but she always had the option once she remembered. She had never known a time without food to spare, where she didn’t have that safety net. The dark-haired girl wasn’t quite as thin. She was slim for her height, but her face had softer lines when compared to her companion’s sharp features. She had been clutching her stomach with both hands, as though her hunger was a new, unfamiliar thing. The girl with glasses must have come from a family with a better financial situation—but perhaps one that might not be considered well off if their ramshackle vehicle was any indication. If Amity had to guess, she would say it belonged to the shorter of the two.
The tawny-haired girl was dressed for the weather, but her sandals and breezy summer outfit weren’t designer brands. Her sleeveless linen blouse had a few frayed edges and her jean shorts were a bit on the well-worn, threadbare side. She looked comfortable, which was more than Amity could say about any of the outfits Odalia had ever picked for her. The shorter girl was wearing slightly nicer clothes: her mostly black tee shirt had thin white stripes ringing the three-quarter sleeves and the torso, with a wide bar of red that covered the shoulders. Her denim cut-off shorts were longer than her friends’, falling just above the knee rather than upper-mid-thigh. The cut-offs appeared to be an attempt to rescue a favorite pair of jeans, but her outfit didn’t have any obvious wear-and-tear.
If she were uncharitable—if she were her mother—she would say the girls were obviously poor. Odalia would sneer, as if being ‘poor’ was contagious, then she’d make a remark about having to hear Spanish in a public place. She would have that look in her eye, the one that dared anyone to say something contrary; that hungry, leering gaze Odalia would have when she was looking for a fight… And Amity was always too much of a coward to—
She realized the blood was pounding in her veins. Luz was giving her a soft look of concern. Enough. Enough about her.
She unclenched her fists and turned back to her study, taking a deep breath to calm herself. What are the facts? Two girls surely no older than twenty, most likely in college, worried about money for food and concerned about finals? Amity thought she had a workable hypothesis: the taller girl must have a scholarship that depends on the grade she earns on Friday. She felt a small sense of satisfaction at having figured it all out. That would explain things.
The taller girl smiled down at her hand, held as it was by her companion, and gently squeezed the other girl’s fingers. “Voy a tocar la guitarra de mamá,” She shrugged, a slightly hopeful look competing with embarrassment in her lopsided grin, “Tal vez pueda conseguir un poco de plata?” The tawny-haired girl smiled before she turned and walked away, heading past the aisle where Amity and Luz quickly faked an interest in the bafflingly large selection of giant Five-Pound Gummy Bears that were right at hand.
Once the sliding doors had hissed open with a ding, Amity watched the girl with glasses heave a sigh and whisper, “Okay.” She crossed her arms and turned away from the main aisle, her shoulders slumped with the weight of her worries.
With a clatter and a bang, Luz scrambled up onto the shelving unit to perch her elbows on the highest shelf, calling out to the girl in the next aisle, “¡ey! Hermanita!”
The girl with glasses lurched backward a step, a squawk of surprise slipping between her teeth as she snatched a two-pack of Twinkies from the display to whip sidearm at the unexpected voice in the sky. The plastic-wrapped treats bounced off Luz’s face with a splap! and the brown-haired girl yelped, nearly dropping her coffee mug.
A static-laced sigh of exasperation poured from the speakers overhead, “Luz, get off my shelf.”
“Go away, Jerry!” she called up toward the ceiling. The man behind the cash register let a long, drawn-out groan filter through the truck stop sound system before muttering, I don’t get paid enough for this.
Amity grabbed at the smaller girl’s arm and hissed, “Luz! Get down!”
Luz looked away from the dark-haired girl for a moment to protest, “I can’t see her otherwise!” When she turned back, the other girl had another package of sweets in hand, her arm cocked back and ready to throw. “Hey-hey, whoa,” Luz held out a hand in caution, glancing between Amity and the other girl as she stammered, “Fine! I’ll get— Don’t—!” The brown-haired girl hopped down and jogged around the end of the aisle, leaving Amity to straighten the products she had kicked out of place on the shelves.
Luz rounded the endcap and immediately raised her hands, “Whoa, now.” The dark-haired girl in glasses held the Twinkies up, threatening another volley. “I think I put us off on the wrong foot,” Luz said with an easy grin, tipping her hat back with a nod, “Lo siento, hermanita.”
The other girl blinked and lowered her sugary ammunition. “What do you want?” she asked as wariness tightened her eyes.
“I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but there’s a Walmart up 81 a few miles,” Luz motioned toward the north-south road running past the gas station, visible out the windows nearby. She shrugged before wrapping both hands around her coffee mug, her voice dropping to a softer tone, “La comida será mucho más barata.”
The dark-haired girl glanced between Luz and Amity’s eyes just visible over the bags of pizza-flavored Combos on the top shelf. “Okay…” the girl crossed her arms under her chest, her shoulders slumping as she sighed. “Thanks. I guess.” The girl looked down at the floor and kicked the toe of her Vans against the tile, embarrassment coloring her face.
Luz took a step toward the slightly shorter girl, her hand out in assurance, “Listen, you’re doing a good thing, helping your girlfriend get home for—”
“We’re—!” The other girl interrupted with a frantic laugh, green eyes widening behind her glasses as she waved her hands, “Sh–she’s not my girlfriend!”
“Oh~ho~kay,” Luz glanced at Amity’s eyes, and raised an eyebrow to match the look the green-haired girl had pulled, “My mistake.” The tanned girl’s face twisted in a sly half-smile as she winked, “Your disgustingly platonic gal pal, then.”
The dark-haired girl huffed and screwed her face into a frown, then shot a glare toward Amity’s snort of amusement.
“Sorry,” Luz offered with a disarming grin, waving a placating hand, “But, I’ve been there, y’know?”
“Not-girlfriends?” the slightly shorter girl sassed, and gave a wicked grin of her own when Luz glanced sidelong at Amity and darkened in a blush. The green-haired girl ducked behind a large bag of pork rinds to hide her own reddening face and heard a satisfied snort of laughter from the other girl. Amity peeked over the shelf and saw the girl push her glasses up on the bridge of her nose and smirk like an anime antagonist.
“Justo en el clavo,” Luz chuckled as she rubbed the back of her neck with her palm, a sheepish grin pulling at her lips, “but that’s not what I meant.” She turned back to the shorter girl with a knowing look on her face. “I’ve been far from home and not sure if I’d make it back, and things kept going wrong. It sucks.” The girl with glasses made a noise of grudging agreement, and Luz reached for her pocket, “Can I give you a twenty to cover—”
“We don’t need your charity!” the girl snapped, an angry, stubborn pride twisting her lip in a snarl, her hands clenched in white-knuckled fists at her sides. Amity understood that reaction all too well—the need to do it herself, the need to prove she could do it, and the dizzying rage when she was continually underestimated time and time again. The need to show both herself and a certain someone else that she wasn’t a helpless child anymore.
Luz jerked her arm to a halt, then slowly wrapped her free hand back around her coffee. “I respect that,” she nodded, dipping her chin for a long moment as she added, “Sorry, I— didn’t mean to offend.” The other girl relaxed her posture—just a hair—and grumbled something unintelligible. Amity watched as a thought visibly struck Luz, and the brown-haired girl snapped her fingers, “I have a portable air compressor in my truck, at least let me top off your tires.”
“I—” The girl with the glasses held her breath for a pair of heartbeats before exhaling slowly, glaring off to the side. “Okay… That’s fine,” her voice held a sullen, petulant note. She took another breath in and out, then added, “Thank you,” in a softer tone.
“Of course!” Luz said with a wide, bright smile, “I’ll be at your van in a few minutes, okay?”
“By my van? How do— wha— hey!” the girl with glasses spluttered as Luz turned and jogged back to Amity’s side.
~
“Do you need help with that?”
Luz glanced up at Amity as she dragged the portable compressor closer to the tools-compartment door, and shook her head, “I’m good! They say lift with your knees, not your—” She heaved the scuffed blue-and-black piece of machinery up and out of the under-cabin bay, and her knees cracked with the movement. Luz hissed, “—ow. Anyway,” she turned and set the tube-shaped device on the ground and rubbed a hand on her pants, “You have diagnostics to run, yeah?”
Amity nodded, a frown deepening the crease in her brow. Her robots had gathered in a loose group nearby, propped almost upright like tombstones, giving the impression that they were listening intently as they turned to follow the back-and-forth volley of conversation.
“I’ll take care’a this,” Luz swept a hand toward the air compressor, “and you take care’a that.” The brown-haired girl grinned as she rested her fists on her hips, “Ten, fifteen minutes. Easy peasy.”
Amity made a face, like she couldn’t quite disagree with Luz’s line of logic and wasn’t at all happy about it. “Well…” she frowned, then waved at the robots, “Take Shawn with you.” One of the two identical units perked up at that, making a happy little dance in place before it bounded around Amity’s legs like an over-excited coffee table. “Please?” Amity hurried to add, as though she just realized she might be asking for something that wasn’t wanted. Shawn swiveled back and forth, looking from one girl to the other.
“Of course,” Luz’s brown eyes crinkled with her lopsided smile as she bent down to pat the robot in question, “He’ll be a great help.”
“Yes, help,” Amity leaned down to stare at the circular screen atop the robot, tilting her head sideways as she locked eyes with the digitized ooze displayed there. “Help Luz, be sure to obey her,” the green-haired girl reminded Shawn, nodding when he flashed green green. She pointed at the compressor, “And carry that for her, please.” Shawn bobbed his whole body in an up-down nod, flashing green green. Amity knelt down to place her hands on either side of his circular screen, dropping her voice to a quieter tone as she added, “China Shop protocol, understand?”
green green green green
“Good boy,” the green-haired girl said with a smile as she patted his upper plating. Shawn’s caster wheels hummed as he slid away from Amity and wheeled around Luz once or twice before hunching down low and waggling his body like a cat ready to pounce. Luz chuckled as she lifted the compressor off the ground, and the robot whirrred underneath the heavy device, pushing up and away from the pavement to let its weight rest on his back.
“Thank you, Shawn,” Luz grinned and patted his purple flank. He danced in place by bending his knees, making sure to keep his cargo still and steady. Min slowly trundled over to Luz, standing next to her for a moment before slumping heavily into her leg. The robot wheezed a petulant groan, and Luz and Amity shared an amused glance before the brown-haired girl knelt beside the bulky machine, murmuring soft reassurances. “It’s okay, Min, it’s okay. Listen,” Luz rubbed her palms across Min’s top plate as she glanced up at Amity, “Shawn’s gonna help me out, but I have an important job for you.” Min’s mouth flickered red red green. “No, it’s true,” Luz draped her arms across Min’s back and leaned her face close to Min’s black-crystal screen, “Can you do something for me?”
green red green
“I know you can,” Luz hummed as she crossed her arms under her chin, sending Amity a smug grin for just a moment. “I need you to protect your mamá while I’m away,” the tanned girl said, patting Min between her first pair of shoulder joints, “Can you do that for me?” Min bobbed up and down, flashing a series of green lights as Luz laughed and gave her a squeeze. “Good girl,” she said as she stood. Min raised a wheeled foot, holding it out for a gentle fist bump from Luz.
Amity crossed her arms and grumbled, “I can take care of myself,” her mouth settling into a pout. Luz thought it was adorable.
“I know you can, cariño,” the brown-haired girl smiled as she poked the taller girl in the bicep, “but it doesn’t hurt to know you’ve got backup.” Luz motioned toward the paper bag with their breakfast, which dangled from Amity’s arm, “Go ahead and start eating if you get hungry.”
The taller girl gave her a quizzical glance and shook her head, a strangely solemn look hiding in her golden eyes. “No. I’ll wait for you,” Amity said.
The words she spoke were simple enough, but they sat heavy with something more. Luz felt a blush start to crawl up her face at the possibilities. “Okay,” she replied in a soft voice, “I won’t be gone long.” She smiled up at Amity, and the pretty pink coloring her cheekbones. “I promise.”
~
Luz strolled back around the northern corner of the Iron Skillet, her hands in her jacket pockets as she whistled a mindless tune. No, wait— after a few more measures, she finally registered what song was running through her mind. “God… damn Eagles,” the brown-haired girl slumped her shoulders as she groaned. Shawn chittered a question and tilted his body up in her direction as he whirred along on his casters beside her, and she chuckled and gave him a shrug, “I have a song stuck in my head and just realized what it was.”
He spun in a slow circle as he continued to pace her stride, a cluster of white question marks fading in and out around his digitized purple face. Luz laughed, “Your mamá never talked about—” It struck her then how foolish that question might be. “Ah… How do I explain it…” The brown-haired girl tapped at her lips as she thought, then offered, “So, there’ll be different things people like about a song, right? It’s— it’s attributes, okay?” Shawn’s face blinked a green green, and she started ticking off fingers as she listed, “Tempo, lyrics, melody, the bass line, the feeling it evokes, yeah? Something about a song will catch your attention, and your brain will play it at random.” She glanced down at the robot at her knee and grinned, “Kinda like— did you guys ever play the word association game?”
red
“Wanna know how to play?”
green green green green
Luz chuckled as she laced her fingers together and draped her hands on the back of her neck, “You get your players in a circle, or, y’know, have an order picked out. The first player says a word like ‘drink’, and then the next player will say the first word that comes to mind, maybe it’ll be ‘juice’, right?” Shawn managed an impressive rippling shrug, flexing each pair of legs in turn without disturbing the heavy black and blue air compressor sitting on his back. “Then the third player might say ‘apple’, because apple juice. And so on.” She laughed, “It all depends on the people, on what their word associations are. And sometimes our brains do that with memories—we’ll see or hear or smell things that remind us of something else, and if it’s a song? Guess what?”
Shawn wheezed a warbling groan, and the top of the goopy face on his screen swung upward like the hinged lid of a treasure chest and a pair of music notes fell inside.
“Exactly!” Luz laughed, tapping her knuckles against his shoulder, chuckling when he nudged her leg with his side. “You got it, buddy.” She gave him an appraising glance for a few steps before she asked, “I’m really not sure how it works for you, do you… experience anything like that?”
Shawn slewed sideways as he coasted to a stop, leaving the black circular screen close to Luz as the goopy sludge face faded out. An iconographic red apple appeared, surrounded by a thin white circle with clusters of lines leading away to small blocks of dense text. The graphic shrank as a stylized half-filled drinking glass and a tree appeared, surrounded by their own cloud of text blocks. Lines began to connect the text blocks, building a small web of information. The image shrank again as more icons appeared: bananas, oranges, and pears close to the apple, different types of plants by the tree, foods and drinks like pizza and a coke can by the glass. Icons and text blocks shifted around as more lines appeared, the information connecting in a dense spider’s web that grew and grew. It all continued to shrink in size as more icons popped up and formed connections, until it all faded away, replaced by Shawn’s oozing purple and green face.
“Wow,” Luz breathed as she ran a hand through the side of her hair, “Your mamá is amazing.” Shawn’s screen pulsed green several times as he rolled after the brown-haired girl in the cowboy hat. She glanced down at him and chuckled, “You’d probably kill it at that game, huh?”
green green
The dark-haired girl with glasses stood beside the driver’s side front fender of the rusty Aerostar, facing away from Luz and Shawn. She held a well-traveled camera up to her eye and snapped a picture, then another before she paused to examine the screen. Luz walked up beside her and snuck a peek at the back-of-camera display. ‘Glasses’ had captured her totally-not-girlfriend mid-song, perched on a set of overturned milk crates on the sidewalk by the doors of the gas station, her eyes closed as she sang, half-curled over an old Gibson guitar. She slowly tap-tapped her foot to keep the beat, her open guitar case lying on the ground at her side. ‘Sandals’ sat in a shining bar of sunlight that slanted over the building, surrounded by a riot of color: the bright blue milk crates, the yellow of her blouse, the glistening cherry-red wood and brass vibrating under her fingers, the pink and purple flowers alongside the shadowed brown brick wall at her back. Luz already believed Glasses to be absolutely smitten with Sandals, and the vibrant likeness she caught on-camera all but confirmed it. “Damn, that’s a great shot,” Luz gave a soft whistle as the dark-haired girl put the camera back up to her eye, waiting for her next perfect moment.
Artwork by the Amazing Mexfan!
They watched the tawny-haired girl smile and nod at a family walking into the gas station, their young blonde daughter pulling away to try to sit and listen. The parents promised she could stop on their way out, and Sandals plucked an interstitial melody while she gently assured the girl, “I’ll still be here, chiquita, be good for mamí, okay?” The little girl smiled and waved as she trotted inside holding her thankful mother’s hand, craning her head to watch through the closing door as the girl with the guitar continued to sing. “I keep my visions to myself…” Sandals’ voice turned soft as she trailed off, still strumming, and then she tilted her head back with a grin as she reached for the next high note, “It’s only me~ who wants to wrap around your dreams, and…” She turned her smoky gray eyes toward Glasses, her lips curled in a lopsided smile as she stared through her wind-swept fringe at her companion, “Have you any dreams you’d like to sell?”
After a shaky exhale and a snap-click from the old Nikon, the girl with the glasses muttered, “Thanks.” She lowered her camera and glanced at Luz, a peculiar look on her face. “You actually came back.” She sounded genuinely surprised.
“Of course,” Luz replied, “Why wouldn’t I?” Concern gnawed at her stomach at the pained look in the dark-haired girl’s green eyes. She held out a hand, a wide smile on her face, “Luz Noceda, pleased ta’ mee’cha.” When Glasses merely wrinkled her eyebrows in response, Luz swept the hand to her side, motioning toward the robot peeking around her leg, “And this is Shawn.”
“Wha—” The dark-haired girl took a startled half-step away from Luz, turning to face her and Shawn directly. She glanced between the robot and Luz, her eyes wide in a surprised disbelief. The dark-haired girl made a jerking motion with her hands, like she wanted to raise her camera and snap a picture. She relaxed after a moment when the robot stayed motionless where he was, half hidden behind the slightly taller girl’s leg. Glasses scoffed and asked, “Shawn?”
“That’s right!” Luz said with a smile, then leaned toward the robot and grinned, “Shawn, I’d like you to meeeet…?” and motioned toward the dark-haired girl as her sentence trailed off in a question.
Glasses sighed and shrugged, a slight half-grin stretching her features. “Alma,” the dark-haired girl said, holding the Nikon in one palm as she reached out to shake hands with Luz, “Alma Salvatore-Castilla.”
“Alma,” Luz repeated, giving her a quick, firm handshake, “A pleasure.” She crouched slightly as she looked down at Shawn, “We can shake hands when we meet new people, do you—” A click and a clatter came from Shawn’s right-side foreleg as he disengaged that caster wheel, and he carefully raised his segmented manipulator arm to curl two of his fingers over Alma’s hand, following her in a pair of up-down motions.
A wide smile spread across her face as he shimmied from side to side in a happy dance, and she laughed, glancing at Luz, “He’s cute.” Alma let go of his hand, and he clacked his wheel back into place.
The girl with the guitar plucked one last chord, then took a sip from a water bottle as her instrument thrummed into a ready silence. She cleared her throat and began to play a new song. Shawn swiveled toward her, then back to Luz, question marks fading in and out on his screen. “You wanna go listen, buddy?” Luz asked, and Shawn almost pranced in place. She laughed and reached for the air compressor on his back, “Let me take that, okay? Then you can go.”
A pair of sharp clacks left two casters on the ground as Shawn waved a three-digit hand, bending an arm up to easily lift the compressor from his back. He motioned between the drivers’ side tires with one arm, wheezing a question. “Front tire, please,” Luz replied, and he turned in place, gently setting the air compressor down on the sun-faded cement. “Thanks, Shawn,” Luz smiled at the robot as he turned toward the girl with the guitar. After a long hesitation, he rotated back to face Luz, hunching slightly as he tapped his fingertips together. “Are you nervous, buddy?” Luz crouched down to rub a hand across his top panel and tried very hard not to smile. He wheezed a sad note and nodded with his whole body. “Oh, buddy, it’s okay,” the brown-haired girl said with an amused glance back at Alma, “I’m sure she’s very nice. Tell ya what—” Luz shuffled back a smidge so he could see her arms, “you just wave like this to her—” she spread her fingers and twisted her wrist in a friendly greeting, “—then if you hold your hand up like this, she’ll know you want to listen,” Luz cupped her hand around her ear, twisting her head slightly.
Alma scrunched her nose as she chuckled, then she leaned forward to assure him, “Yes, Thalia is very nice. Don’t be afraid.” Shawn perked up and swiveled toward Luz, bending his forelegs in a small questioning motion.
“Go on, buddy. I’ll fill these tires and then we’ll head back to your mamá.” Luz started to stand, but she paused to raise a finger and say, “Ah— wait— Look with your eyes, not your hands.”
Shawn slumped slightly and tilted to one side, flashing a green green red green as he wheezed like an exasperated teen groaning, Yes mo~om. The two girls stood and watched the robot whirr across the small stretch of parking lot to settle in front of Thalia, levering himself upright to face her with his circular screen. She had finished a verse, and her eyes were closed as she played the tail end of the melody as it turned into the chorus.
“Will he be okay?” Alma asked.
“Oh— oh yeah,” Luz waved a dismissive hand. “Yeeaah, he’ll be fine.”
Alma shot her a half-glare and scoffed, “You’re a terrible liar.”
“I’m not—” Luz sighed, then shrugged before admitting, “Fine. It’s my first time watching him.” She put her hands on her hips and waited a moment before adding, “I really do think he’ll be fine, though.” Alma hummed a pensive note as she raised her camera to her eye.
The tawny-haired girl looked up and saw the boxy robot sitting upright like a purple monolith marred by a single black eye, in the parking spot just in front of her square of sidewalk. He tapped his fingertips together like he was nervous, and Thalia’s music trailed off in surprise. Shawn slowly spread his long jointed fingers and gave a quick left-right spin of his wrist. A confused smile broke out across the girl’s sunburned face as she hesitantly returned the wave. Alma’s camera snap-clicked before Thalia could turn a questioning look her way. Luz waved a greeting while Alma snapped another picture, and the girl with the guitar said, “Uhm… Almita?” with a puzzled twist to her eyebrows. Shawn tapped at his casing with a finger, then curled his three-fingered hand beside his digitized face as it grew a large ear.
“You… want to listen?” Thalia pointed at herself, “To— to me?” The black background behind Shawn’s oozing purple face on-screen flickered green green as the blob of digital goop slowly turned upside down. “You can understand me?” She asked, leaning over her guitar to peer up at his glossy black display.
green
“¿Incluso si no uso inglés?”
A green ¡sí! appeared above Shawn’s purple face.
Thalia laughed, glancing at Alma and Luz one more time before curling one hand around the neck of her guitar, idly running her fingers across the warm strings to draw a lilting melody from the Gibson. “Well then… any requests?” Shawn blinked red, and folded his hands in something like anticipation.
“Yeah… thought he’d be fine,” Luz nodded in self-satisfaction as she turned to crouch beside the portable air compressor. She dragged the machine around, flipping the black plastic cover away from the controls as she glanced up at Alma, “Can you open your driver’s door?” She uncoiled the unit’s hose from where it wrapped around the compressed air tank.
“Sure?” Alma replied, turning to open her door a few inches. She hissed in irritation when empty Coke cans fell out onto the cement.
Luz leaned back with a grin and a “Thanks,” and found the faded vehicle details sticker on the inside edge of the door. “Yup,” she grunted, bending over the knobs and dials on the small control panel, making adjustments as she muttered, “Thirty-five PSI.” She grabbed the ripcord handle and looked up at Alma. “This’ll be obnoxious,” Luz promised, thumbing the starter button as she gave a quick pull. The small gasoline engine spluttered to life, and Luz clamped the hose nozzle onto the first tire’s valve. The air compressor hissed and rattled and hammered a periodic ear-numbing beat as Luz filled all four tires on the crumbling minivan. She and Alma couldn’t hear each other over the din, so they shared the occasional slow nod and flat-mouthed smile. She ran a penny through each tire’s tread and frowned at how much of Lincoln’s forehead was showing.
Customers came and went through the gas station doors. Occasionally, someone stopped to listen to the girl sing or to peer at the robot, and a few of those dropped a bit of cash into the guitar case at Thalia’s side. Luz slipped a few folded bills under the purple fabric tied around her hat when Alma wasn’t looking.
Once she readied the air compressor for storage, Luz stood up and wiped her hands on a dingy brown rag pulled from her back pocket. “You’re all set,” she smiled as she shook Alma’s hand.
“Thanks,” the dark-haired girl said, clearing her throat before adding a sheepish, “A– and sorry. About earlier.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Luz nodded before she turned serious, “Be careful on the road, okay? Your tires are gettin’ pretty bald.”
“I— should have figured—” Alma growled, tightening her fingers and shaking her hands in frustration, “urgh, I can’t deal with one more—”
“Hey, it’s okay,” Luz said, raising a hand to calm the other girl, “I should’ve— you’ve got a few months left before you need new ones. It’s gonna be alright.” Alma grumbled something that sounded like Whatever or maybe If you say so. Luz tipped her hat and drawled, “I’ll see ya ‘round, hermanita.” She lifted the air compressor and waddled over to where Shawn clapped a steady beat for Thalia as she sang a familiar song.
“...Blackbird singing in the dead of night,” the tawny-haired girl crooned, smiling at Shawn as he did his best metronome impersonation, “Take these broken wings and learn to fly, all your—” She broke off when she realized Luz was standing nearby, listening with a wistful half-smile on her face. “Time to go?”
“Oh? Uh— yeah— Sorry, uhm…” Luz stuttered as she set the compressor down. She crossed her arms and hunched her shoulders before she admitted, “Papá used to sing that to me.” Shawn flopped backward onto all six legs and swung around to lift the black and blue machine onto his back.
“Lo siento mucho,” Thalia had a solemn tone to her voice. Luz had a feeling that she knew exactly how she felt.
“You— uh— Gracias,” Luz nodded. She glanced at the guitar case beside the tawny-haired girl, but there was no way to toss her money in and not be seen—and immediately chewed out—by Alma. She sighed and waved over her shoulder as she walked away. “You sound amazing. Travel safe. Good luck on your finals!” Shawn waved one last time to Thalia, and whirred along at Luz’s heels.
Thalia scrunched her nose and asked, “How did you—?”
That family from earlier exited the Petro Truck Stop doors, the young blonde girl chattering a mile a minute. She stopped and squealed when she saw Shawn roll by, and she dashed over to Luz before her parents could stop her. She ignored their calls of Juliette! as she peered at the robot.
“Oh my GOSH!” the little girl exclaimed, holding both arms out toward Shawn like she was about to hug him, “What is that?!” The purple robot froze in place as the child stomped her feet and clapped her hands in excitement. “Is it yours? Where did you get it? What can it do? Is it really strong?” She slapped her hands on her cheeks as she looked up at Luz, “Are you a sheriff? Is this your robot horse? Can I ride your horse?!” Shawn perked up at that, trotting in place for a moment.
“Sheriff?” Luz chuckled and tipped her cowboy hat back to scratch at her hairline.
The girl’s mother put a hand on her shoulder and scolded her, “Juliette, we mustn’t interrupt people when they’re working—” she pointed toward the air compressor on Shawn’s back, “See? It’s carrying that machine for her.” She gave Luz an apologetic glance and mouthed sorry as she attempted to pull her daughter away from the robot. Juliette squirmed and fought to stay where she was.
“That’s alright, ma’am,” Luz crouched beside Shawn to speak to the girl. “Juliette, was it?” The blonde girl nodded with a big grin on her face. Luz patted Shawn’s upper surface with one hand, “His name is Shawn, my—” the little girl’s face twisted in disgust and disappointment, and Luz had to laugh.
“Who names a robot horse Shawn, that’s dumb,” Juliette grumbled. Her mother made a horrified face and hissed, Juliette, tes manières!
Shawn wheezed a sad little sound, and slumped his front panel into Luz’s arm. She chuckled and patted him with a hand, a soothing tone in her voice as she whispered, “I know, buddy, it’s okay.” The brown-eyed girl smiled at Juliette and her mom, adding, “He has some siblings, and if you say their names really fast together it sounds like Abomination.”
“He does?” The little girl’s bright green eyes grew wide and sparkled in the sun as she curled her tiny hands into fists, “That’s awesome!” She reached out to gently pat his nearest shoulder, “I’m sorry for being mean, Abominy-Shawn.” He waggled his body for a moment and lifted a wheeled limb to shake her hand. Juliette breathed out a long, “So cooooool.”
Luz peeked over the air compressor to see Alma standing near Thalia while the tawny-haired girl slowly played an old melody. “Can you do me a great big favor?” she asked the little girl, nodding her head toward the girl with the guitar. “I can’t do it ‘cuz I have to get going. When you ask her to play a song—” Luz pulled the folded cash from her hat band and held it out, surreptitiously, “—can you put this in her guitar case?” Juliette wrinkled her brow in confusion and Luz looked up at the girl’s mother, adding, “I know they wouldn’t accept it from me.” Luz looked back to Juliette and said, “It’ll be a surprise.”
Juliette snatched the money from her hand and exclaimed, “Sure thing, Sheriff! Bye Abominy-Shawn!” She waved as Luz and Shawn walked toward the south corner of the gas station, then led her mother over to where Thalia sat in the sunlight.
As Luz rounded the corner, she heard the little girl yell, “The Sheriff said to take this!” Luz hunched her shoulders up around her ears and hurried away from the truck stop.
~
All too soon, it was time to leave. When Luz and Amity pulled Hooty around to the gas pumps to refuel, the ancient, mud-caked minivan was nowhere to be seen.
Notes:
You might recognize Alma & Thalia from the incredible Broken Future AU, designed and illustrated by Mexfan12 and written by GoofyGomez. The fic they created together is a work of art, and if you haven’t read it yet, you should definitely go check it out.
My thanks to them for humoring my initial idea for the cameo, and for Goofy’s assistance with translating Thalia & Alma’s dialogue. I wanted to make sure I captured the essence of the characters properly, and Mex & Goofy’s input was invaluable.
In case you were curious, here’s their how their conversation played out:
Alma: Do we have any snacks left?
Thalia: no, we finished them yesterday.
Alma: these prices are so high!
Alma: twelve dollars? please. And we have to put air in the tires again
Thalia: again?
Alma: yeah, that one is getting flat. did you see that sign? A dollar twenty five to start the machine.
Thalia: it's my fault, I didn't realize that detour would—
Alma: no. That was not just some detour. I wanted to take you there. Remember?
Alma: We planned this trip together.
Thalia: I know
Alma: I— I'm not upset with you, Thalia… I'm sorry
Thalia: I know, I know you're not
Alma: it's how everything else keeps going wrong!
Alma: but you know what? We can do this.
Thalia: you really think so?
Alma: Yes! Repeat after me: we can do this.
Thalia: we… we can do this.
Alma: We'll make it home by Friday, and your final will be amazing. I know it.
Thalia: I'll go get mama’s guitar. Maybe I can make a little cash.
Chapter 24: Wednesday, 5:05pm
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
Amity chewed at her lip as she watched Luz and Shawn amble away. The brown-eyed girl’s last words ran through her mind on repeat. I won’t be gone long. I won’t be gone long. I won’t be gone long. Well, that’s good, because she didn’t want her to go at all. But… would she have stopped Luz from helping someone in need? No. That wouldn’t be right. What would that say about her if she had tried? Besides, it’s not that she didn’t want Luz to help. Amity knew she was being selfish, dammit. She just— She wanted her here, and—
Min whirrred to her side, balanced upright, humming and ticking like an old tape-reel mainframe at her shoulder as she turned in a slow circle. She pointed her digitized face toward Amity and wheezed a question. The green-haired girl continued to stare after the other.
A hot, dry wind blew across the wide plains to rustle the hair gathered at the nape of her neck, and she shivered while bits of brown grass tumbled across the pavement at her feet. Amity could feel the sky above her, stretching out for miles. She felt so small beneath the yawning blue. A thought struck, just then, swift and sure: she was alone for the first time in two days. Amity nearly flinched as the realization slid through her skin like a splinter of ice. She was alone. The thought lodged itself in her spine, and a frigid, tingling numbness began to creep down her limbs. She was alone, abandoned by the only person she knew within seventeen hundred miles. Luz hadn’t even reached the end of the sidewalk yet, smiling, carefree Luz, who glanced back at her with a nod and a wave. All she had to do was call out to her. Just raise her hand, and then her voice, to— to say— Move her feet— Go! Just— just go!
She couldn’t.
She couldn’t bring herself to move. She felt so cold. The only person she knew was walking further and further away, and now she was alone and paralyzed by the knowledge of being alone. The summer sun blazed high overhead in a cloudless sky, baking the gleaming row of trucks at her back, yet its steady heat did nothing to slow the numbing cold that snaked around her bones. Amity pressed her lips together in a frown, and a small whimper slipped through her teeth.
Min left a caster on the ground with a clack, and extended a single manipulator digit to prod Amity in the face. The tall girl jumped back a half step with wild golden eyes, hissing through bared teeth. The robot tilted to one side and waggled her hand, a rapid set of white symbols flickering across her black crystal screen. A small square lingered off to one side, showing a video closeup of Amity’s jawline overlaid with flickering blotches of red light, marked a moment later by a yellow bar reading 168 bpm.
“I—” Amity licked her lips and glanced about. Her mind was abuzz, her thoughts swirling in endless circles. She tried to still her shaking hands as she watched the numbers on screen climb higher. “I’m fine.”
Min made a blat of derision as she crossed a middle pair of arms.
“I was spiraling, perhaps,” the pale girl huffed, earning herself a second pair of crossed arms and a green green green, “But I— I’m fine.” A Blight doesn’t show weakness. Take control of the situation. “L– Luz said she would find us,” Amity shut her eyes and grimaced at the stutter that caught on her name. That was the wrong thing to say. She knew Luz hadn’t abandoned her, intellectually, factually, but why was everything in her chest screaming it? A Blight is self-sufficie—
Min poked her in the nostril, and Amity swatted her articulating limb away with a choked, “Min, I don’t need—” The purple boxy robot pressed up against her side and coiled her four upper arms around the tall girl. Amity stifled a sob, and a moment later Abe and Nate swung around her other side, working in tandem to balance on three legs while they wrapped the other seven around their maker. Amity gave a trembling sigh as she felt herself sandwiched between their warm metal plates, her arms pinned to her sides with a firm, comforting pressure. She took a deep, shuddering breath and whispered a hesitant, “Tighter?” They obliged, their servos humming as their limbs constricted, and for a handful of deliciously dizzying moments she could hardly breathe. Abe chittered a signal, and the three robots released their hold.
Amity inhaled as her pulse hammered through her limbs and up to her scalp, and when she exhaled, the raging whirlpool of anxieties drained away to leave a void of calming clarity in its wake. She breathed in and out, slowly and carefully, and she felt the tension in her neck and shoulders start to unwind. She looked down at the three oozing, goopy smiles pointed her way, and gave them a nod. “Thank you, I— I needed that,” Amity patted Min on the shoulder, briefly holding Nate’s wheel in her palm. She lifted the bags in her hand—her laptop, their breakfast, and the items Luz purchased from the irritated night clerk—and nodded toward the south, “Why don’t we start walking? Luz will catch up to us.”
Min swiveled away from her and settled down on all eights, bending her leg joints to set her body just below Amity’s hip. She rotated one leg up and over her back before she tapped on her upper plate, groaning a sequence of modulating tones. “Are you sure?” Amity asked, “I’m not too heavy?” she added with a grin. Min shrugged her body and rolled her eyes, wheezing a scoffing sound. Amity gave the robot a warm smile, “If you insist.”
The two smaller robots pranced in place, growing more excited with every moment that it took for Amity to climb onto Min’s back. She set her bags in her lap as she settled criss-cross applesauce, a grin spreading across her face. “Onwardst, my gallantly noble steed!” Amity called—softly of course, lest she be overheard making a Good Witch Azura reference in a public place—pointing off to her right. Min slowly wobbled from side to side as she turned in an exaggerated many-stepped circle, drawing a laugh from the green-haired girl when she turned too far. “No, no,” she giggled, tapping at her upper plating to get her attention, “Over there.”
Min motioned in the wrong direction with a foreleg and made a drawn-out noise of amused inquiry. “Min, my special girl,” Amity leaned forward to pat at her screen, “Does Abe need to lead the way?” The small domed robot chirped as he lifted one wheeled leg in salute. The purple robot slowly shook her body and Amity laughed as she bobbed back and forth with the motion. “Alright, then,” the pale girl smiled, “Take us in.” She sat up straight and relaxed her shoulders, adding, “I trust you.”
The robot pointed her front panel toward the tree-spotted field to the south and hunched her legs in anticipation. Before Amity could react, Min rotated her second pair of legs up and over her back to brace Amity where she sat. The golden-eyed girl opened her mouth to ask, “What are you doing?” But her words were smeared across the parking lot as the three robots shot along the heat-baked pavement, their casters trailing a high-pitched whine through the air as they jumped the far curb and accelerated southward.
Abe and Nate paced the girls on either side, letting their sister lead the flying-v. The three handily skipped over a double line of wheel stops and darted around a long parking lot island, brushing under the long trailing leaves of a planted fern. Amity shrieked a laugh as Min slewed in a complete circle while still bearing southbound, and slapped a hand at her hair a moment too late as her Eda-issued company hat was ripped from her head by a cross-wind. Nate dumped his momentum with an abrupt front flip, and he veered off to retrieve the hat from where it tumbled along with the breeze. Amity raised a hand to shield her eyes from the wind whistling through her fingers, and in a blink they were at the edge of the parking lot. A standard-height chain link fence stood perhaps twenty feet beyond the rim of concrete, and the robots showed no sign of stopping. Amity gasped, “Min—!” and then they were airborne. For a heartstopping moment, Amity watched the metal wire fence glisten in the sunlight before it was behind them.
A rapid clattering filled her ears as the robots stored their casters and spread their manipulators in the scant seconds they hung in mid-air, then they landed with a thundering gallop of metal feet clawing at the ground to maintain their speed. Min loped forward like an eight-legged horse, pounding a staccato drumbeat across the packed dirt dotted with patches of waist-high grass and a kaleidoscope of flowers. Amity clung to her bags and Min’s bracing arms as she rode the swift, surging mechanical beast. The wind tugged at her hair, and a wide smile pulled at her lips. She wanted nothing more than to spread her arms and close her eyes, and feel her hair streaming in her wake. She didn’t, as she didn’t want to drop their food, but maybe another time she could see if it felt like flying.
The robots slowed to a canter as they circled the field, chittering in bursts of data as they examined the immediate area. Nate stepped carefully, unhappily, having come across a patch of damp, muddy grass. “Up there, please,” Amity said as she pointed to a large, twisted oak tree near the middle of the field. It stood atop a small rise in the earth and looked to be the highest point around. “It might be dry up there,” she added, and Nate made a happy noise as he shook clumps of dirt from his fingers.
~
Amity sat in the shade of the oak tree as she watched her robots play in the field. She was hidden from the sun’s baking glare, but the warm breeze trailed a delicious heat across the always-cool skin of her arms and neck. She cradled her Iron Skillet coffee mug in her hands, rolling the nearly-hot metal cylinder between her palms. She caught herself looking up toward the truck stop again, and shook her head with a frown. She’ll be here. She’ll be here when she’s done. Luz hadn’t abandoned her. She knew it was an irrational fear, but that didn’t settle the nervous tremor in her shoulders.
The laptop balanced across her knees chimed a triple tone, and the pale girl took a sip of her coffee as she paged through the remote diagnostic reports with one hand. All four robots were showing green check marks in their preliminary tests, and the three at hand had begun a more in-depth movement routine to check their joints and motors. The previous day’s high-altitude route over the Rockies hadn’t caused any damage to their micro-pneumatics, which to date had only passed her laboratory stress-tests. The sheer number of success messages was encouraging, and in her mind it was all thanks to Luz. Amity looked to her left, her mouth open to say a ‘thank you’, when she remembered Luz wasn’t there. She felt her stomach drop, and she paused to scold herself. Amity, you know she’s not back yet. She couldn’t help but feel that nervous tingle spread across her neck and shoulders, and she scowled at her own ridiculous behavior.
The robots played in the tall grass, crouched down and creeping slowly as they played hide-and-seek. Abe’s dome glittered in the sunlight while he stalked Nate and Min through the thick, swaying brush. Amity pulled up a readout of Abe’s visual processing system, and noted the daemon’s abnormally high CPU usage as he struggled to see through the noisy motion of the tall grass. “Abe, why aren’t you using LIDAR?” Amity called, and his response printed out in her console window: too easy. She shook her head and chuckled.
The wind pushed and played with the brown wheat-like camouflage, sending ripples through the field like ocean waves. Amity had a glimpse of a thought: she and Luz sitting on the beach as the robots played in the surf and sand, the four purple automatons scuttling about like mechanical crabs. She smiled so wide she almost snorted, and she turned to Luz to say, “Do you think we should—” To her left were moss and grass and tree roots, dappled with shadows cast by the oak tree. That’s right. Luz isn’t here. The urge to stand up and find Luz was overwhelming, to an alarming degree. She had to hold her body rigid in order to stay sitting. Amity shook her head and whispered, “No, stop it, you’re— you’re an adult.” She scrubbed her fingernails back through the hair at her temples.
One panel on her laptop’s workspace showed a set of icons to triangulate the robots’ locations; Shawn sat, motionless, 623.65 feet away. Amity took a deep breath in and held it until her heartbeat thundered in her ears, then she slowly breathed out. Why was she feeling this way? Was it because Shawn was out of sight? No, she trusted Luz to take care of him. She had the other three with her; Shawn being gone wasn’t why she felt lonely. She’d kept everyone at arms length for years, because who could she trust? Why was it so hard to be by herself, now? She felt jittery without Luz being close enough for her to reach out and touch. Wait— Amity blinked. To touch?! She felt heat start to crawl up her neck. Why would she think that, specifically? And why— Shawn’s icon moved further away—632.12 feet—and the sharp pang of fear and longing at the thought of the distance between her and Luz growing made her recoil. Amity slapped the laptop shut and wrapped her arms around herself, squeezing as tightly as she could.
It’s not enough. Her heart sank at the realization. It’s not the same. Luz had held her all night long and now she wanted that reassuring sense of safety again. No, she shook her head in a savage motion, want isn’t the right word. She needed it. She craved it. Holding her hand as they walked from the restaurant had been enough, because Luz was right there. Amity leaned forward and squeezed her eyes closed as she tried to breathe long and slow, like she’d been shown so many years before. She had to center herself.
She heard the whir and whine of one of the robots as it drew close—based on the pitch of the sound, she assumed it to be—yes. Amity opened her eyes to find Min standing just below her on the small hill, one foreleg raised, a small splash of color cradled in the curl of her long, jointed fingers. Amity sniffed and wiped under her nose as Min ambled up to her knee. She gave her a weak, misty-eyed, “It’s okay, c’mere.” The robot tipped a flower into the palm of Amity’s hand: it had a wide, separated petal arrangement; it was colored the palest purple under the stamen fading to a bright cotton-blue at the outside; the petals were largely rectangular, perhaps an elongated teardrop shape, with five neat little sawteeth points in an even row on the outer edge of each petal. Min wheezed a question, gesturing with her fingers.
Amity smiled. How could she not? She recognized this flower.
“This is a Chicory,” the green-haired girl had to clear her throat twice before the words would tumble free. “Cichorium Intybus of the family Asteraceae.”
She had studied it and others like it with the only friend she’d ever truly made on her own at school. The two shy, soft-spoken girls had started an accidental friendship during their second-grade outing to the local nature preserve, when little Amity brought along her father’s Gardener’s Handbook to make sure she earned a good grade in ‘field trip’. They had spent the bus ride there and back again pouring over the book’s hand-painted illustrations, heads nearly touching as they leaned over the yellowed pages. The other girl’s love of plants and her love of books had given them some common ground; they would gather flowers and leaves during recess, then carry them inside and learn all about their collected samples from the Horticulturalists’ Encyclopedia in the school library.
Amity had been forced to leave her behind when she tested out of her grade.
Min hopped from one foot to the other, with a wait right there sort of hand movement before she cantered backward down the slope and took off in search of something. Amity turned the flower over in her hand and thought back to one of the few times she truly remembered feeling happy as a child.
Nate picked his way up the slope, careful not to leave unnecessary marks in the ground with his splayed fingers, a sprig of blue and green in one hand. Min clawed her way up beside him, completely unconcerned by the great furrows she left, using a pair of hands to hold a long stem dotted with purple blossoms. Amity grinned and held out her other hand to touch the blue petals as Nate pointed the stem toward her. “These are Virginia Bluebells,” Amity said in a soft voice, “Mertensia Virginica of the family Boraginaceae.” Nate lifted the stem higher, and gently shook the bundle of flowers. The blue bell-shaped blossoms bobbed back and forth, and the purple robot slumped in disappointment. Amity patted his shoulder, “They’re not real bells.” She traced their profile in the air as she added, “They were named after their shape and color.”
Nate stepped to the side as Min pushed forward, brandishing the brightly colored purple flowers. Amity wrinkled her nose in confusion as she examined the larger robot’s find. Six flowers were clustered on one end of the eight-inch-long stem, the points of their star-shaped petals nearly touching. “I… Uhm…” Amity scratched a fingernail through her hair, brushing the green strands behind her ear. “I’m… not sure,” the pale girl said with an inquisitive tilt to her head, holding the flowers up for a closer examination, “I don’t think I’ve seen this one before.” The center of each flower was a warm white, quickly fading to a deep, rich purple on the narrow, tapered petals.
“That’s a Clasping Bellflower,” a sunny voice called from a few steps away, “They grow pretty much everywhere.” Amity’s eyes snapped up to meet Luz’s warm, chocolate-brown gaze. “Well…” the tanned girl added with a shrug, “Everywhere it’s warm.”
Amity slowly lowered her hands as a storm of emotion thundered through her body.
Luz turned a brilliant grin her way as she walked up the rise, something new and unrecognizable in her eyes as she looked at Amity. Nate and Min stepped to either side to allow her through, chittering happily up at her. She had taken her jacket off, and let it drape over the wrist of the hand she’d tucked into her pants pocket. Her sleeveless black band tee fluttered in the warm breeze, teasing a glimpse of smooth, tanned skin as Luz brushed her hand back through the side of her hair. Amity drank in the sight of the brown-haired girl as a faint blush spread across the pale girl’s cheekbones, and she felt compelled to stand. Luz held out a palm, a lopsided smile breaking out across her face as she shook her head. “No, that’s okay, stay sitting,” Luz said, still staring at Amity, but then her face darkened and she glanced away with a nervous laugh, scrubbing her hand through the curls at the back of her head. She pointed at the mossy patch of grass beside Amity and pulled a cheesy grin, “Is this peat taken?”
Amity groaned and rolled her eyes despite the giddy smile threatening to spread across her face. “That’s not peat— that’s just— that’s clover,” she grumbled, smooshing the edges of her palms against her cheeks to try and tame her runaway grin. Stop smiling! It wasn’t even that funny! After a moment, she gave up trying to hide her delight.
Luz sat down at her side, close enough to bump her shoulder against the taller girl’s upper arm with an unconvincing oops! before offering a softly whispered, “Hey.”
Amity had to take a moment to breathe before she turned trembling golden eyes toward the smaller girl.
Luz wrinkled her forehead in concern as she half-turned, leaning on one palm, “I— cariñ—” She wheezed a ragged breath as Amity threw her arms around her, squeezing the air from her chest, “—nyoohhh-ho, are you okay?” she croaked, doing her best to work her arm around the taller girl, caught as she was at an awkward angle.
“Mmm-hmm,” Amity tucked her forehead against Luz’s jaw and let her eyes shut as she breathed in the other girl’s reassuring presence. She could feel her tension start to melt away when Luz wrapped her arm across her shoulders, letting her cheek rest atop her head. “I am now,” Amity whispered into her throat. Luz nodded, whispering good as she gave the taller girl a gentle squeeze. She let Amity have a long stretch of silence, somehow still understanding exactly what she needed. “I know— I know it’s silly, but…” Amity breathed a laugh and admitted, “I— I was worried about you. I missed you.”
Luz hummed a note, and rubbed her thumb across the muscles in Amity’s shoulder. “I don’t think that’s silly at all,” she replied after a moment’s thought. “I missed you too.”
~
Amity patted her stomach with one hand before carefully stuffing her to-go box into their paper takeout bag. Benny made a mean steak and egg, and those potatoes? She couldn’t remember the last time food had tasted so good. It was partly due to having missed a meal the night before, but nothing in the Blight Industries Tower cafeteria had ever come close to that sort of culinary experience. If only I could hire Benny and Amanda for the Tower. Luz practically inhaled her food, with a pink-cheeked shrug and a satisfied, “Gosh, I was hungry like the wolf.”
Luz had tossed the football to Shawn before they started eating, and the robots spent the last few minutes heaving it back and forth across the field below their tree. They hadn’t quite managed to get a tight spiral yet, despite Luz’s advice, but their wobbly passes were growing less erratic with each attempt. Once Luz had finished her breakfast, she sent the largest of the four on a special assignment; Min gathered several long stems from the Bellflower bushes, bringing each up to Luz for her inspection. The brown-haired girl nodded over the latest contribution and gave Min a wide smile, “Yes, great job, just like this! Maybe… three or four more?” Min waggled a pair of thumbs-up and scampered away.
Another triple chime sounded from her laptop, and Amity pulled it into her lap and opened it with a sigh. Luz leaned close and nudged her with her shoulder, giving the pale girl a half-smile, “You doin’ okay, Amity?”
“Yes, sorry, I just—” Amity sighed again, “I need to record these results and my observations,” the green-haired girl began to page through the last diagnostic readouts, highlighting sections that caught her eye and typing out quick notes for each. “I’ll be done shortly,” Amity added, her tone of voice starting to flatten out as she became absorbed in her task.
“That’s fine, cariño,” Luz offered in a soothing tone as she carefully braided her flower stems together. She watched the robots play as she added, “We should pack up in fifteen, so we can hit the road before Six.” Min clambered up the rise to her side, and she whispered a Thank you for the flowers placed in her lap. The robot hunkered down to watch Luz work.
“Fifteen minutes, got it,” Amity replied in a monotone, her fingers flying across the keyboard.
After a series of careful, practiced movements, Luz held a long section of woven flower stems studded on one side with the purple star-shaped blossoms. She draped the braid across her palms, glancing between it and Amity’s head as she adjusted the space between her hands. Eventually she shrugged and asked, “Hey Amity, can I see your hat?”
“Yes,” the pale girl replied, pulling it from her head and handing it over without breaking her attention away from her computer. Luz hummed a mindless tune as she bent her craft in a gentle arc, guiding the braided flowers in a curve to match the shape of Amity’s hat. She added the last set of blossoms to the delicate loop, and soon held a flower crown in her palms.
“Whaddaya think, Min?” Luz asked as she set the ring of purple flowers around Amity’s head. They settled above her furrowed eyebrows and her ears. The pale girl continued typing, her eyes flitting back and forth across charts and graphs as she organized her data. Luz felt her cheeks darken at the sight of Amity’s green hair circled by the dark green crown studded with brilliant purple blossoms. She looked like some woodland elf, with her pale skin and golden eyes. She was ethereal. Min gave Luz a thumbs-up, and Luz grinned. “Yeah, I thought so too,” the tanned girl laughed, standing to her feet and slapping at the backs of her pant legs.
“Okay guys,” the shorter girl said as she pulled a thin plastic disc from her Petro Shopping Center bag, tearing the cardboard-and-tape packaging from the frisbee, “Abe!” Luz called, swinging the disc back and forth with her fingertips, “Think fast!” The three robots down in the field turned toward the sound of her voice, just as Shawn threw a halfway decent pass. The football bounced off Abe’s dome with a buh-doonk as all three focused their attention on the incoming projectile.
Nate and Shawn turned slightly to watch the frisbee float by, then Abe slapped it from the sky so quickly his arm blurred. The frisbee shattered as he drove his clawed fingers through the thin plastic, into the loosely-packed dirt below. Shawn lurched back a step and clutched at his front panel with his long fingers, horrified, while Nate leaned forward to poke at the large plastic shards. Abe waggled his body in something like pride or satisfaction.
“Welp…” Luz put her fists on her hips and laughed, “I’m… not sure what I expected, really.” She shook her head and shrugged, “Good thing I bought more than one.” Luz grunted as she bent to pull another frisbee from the plastic bag at her feet. She glanced at Min and nodded her head toward the field, “You wanna show the boys how it’s done?” Luz chuckled as Min happily scrambled down the rise, positioning herself off to one side, her forearms raised in anticipation. “Ready?” The tanned girl waited for the robot’s full-body nod, then sent the plastic disc flying.
The three other robots turned to watch as Min reached out a long arm and snapped her fingers closed around the frisbee, splitting it in half with a crack. Min warbled in dismay and tried to catch the pieces, but fumbled them into the grass. Abe raised an arm and pointed at his sister, wheezing with what might have been laughter. Shawn turned back and forth between Luz and Min, tapping his fingertips together in concern. Min slowly picked up the two halves of the frisbee, cradling them in her hands with a dejected slump to her posture. Luz covered her mouth as she let loose a snort of amusement. “Min, it’s okay,” the tanned girl said as she walked down to stand beside the eight-legged robot, patting her on the shoulder. Min held the mangled frisbee up toward Luz like a guilty child with a broken cookie jar. “I’m not upset,” Luz chuckled as she picked up the pieces, “Okay y’all, gather up, gather up.” She crouched beside Min as the other robots huddled close. “Everybody, take a second and examine one of these pieces. Abe, can you— I dunno— analyze it? For, like, how strong it is?”
Abe wheezed a response and reached out to lift a piece from her hand. Several small apertures opened in his front panel, revealing an assortment of lenses and emitters. He focused a series of flickering lights on the plastic as he bent it until it broke. The robots clicked and hissed in bursts of static as they watched, each one twisting a shard of frisbee until the plastic started to stretch and fade. Min held up a piece and flexed it, letting it spring back into shape. Luz grinned at each automaton in turn, “Great job guys, okay—” she stood, brushing her hands on her knees, “—I’ll toss you another frisbee, try to catch it and then throw it to each other.”
She walked back up the slight rise and pulled another disc from her bag. “Ready?” Luz asked, spinning it above her palm.
~
Three frisbees whistled through the air in an undulating, braid-like series of near-misses that Luz could hardly follow with the naked eye. Once they’d gotten the trick of it, the robots threw them faster and faster, not letting them sit still longer than it took to redirect the plastic missiles. Luz blinked and rubbed at her eyes before leaning back on her palms, bumping Amity with her shoulder. When the pale girl grunted, Luz said, “Your goo-babies are amazing, Amity.”
“Thank you,” the golden-eyed girl replied in a monotone, her fingers dancing over the keys.
Luz shimmied from side to side as she watched the pale girl mouth words to herself while she typed, waiting a moment before leaning close and humming a sly, “But not nearly as amazing as you, hermosa.” She grinned as she pressed the edge of her jaw against the green-haired girl’s shoulder.
Amity hardly blinked as she responded with a flat, “Thank you, Luz. I find you fascinating as well,” her eyebrows furrowed in absentminded concentration. She paused her typing to bite her bottom lip, her nose wrinkling as she considered a set of numbers, and Luz tilted her head and watched with a soft smile.
After a moment, Luz wrinkled her forehead and bit her lip. “Maybe that was unfair of me, cariño, I’m sorry,” she spoke in a low, hesitant voice. Amity shook her head and mumbled, Think nothing of it, before she fell silent again. After a few heartbeats, Luz replied with a soft, “Alright,” and turned back to the field below, letting her eyes drift closed with a contented sigh, basking in the warm summer afternoon.
Minutes later, her phone chimed from her pocket. Luz pulled it out with a sigh and silenced her alarm. “Okay guys,” She called to the robots, “Time to clean up our mess. Let’s get all those broken pieces thrown away!” Luz shook the paper takeout bag with one hand, rattling its contents.
Amity finished typing her notes and closed her laptop with a satisfied nod. She laced her fingers together and stretched out her hands, cracking her knuckles, then she lifted her arms to stretch her back from side to side with a snap-crackle and a pop. She sighed and placed her chin on her palm as she watched the purple machines gather around Luz, a deep fondness pooling in her chest at the sight. The tanned girl sang a silly clean up, clean up song while the robots dropped garbage into her paper bag in exchange for high-fives.
Their last exchange ran back through her mind, and Amity froze as her face flushed a bright, shining red. “What did I—?!” she squawked.
~
The girls rode to the truck on Min’s back. Luz sat in front with her knees hooked over her second set of shoulder mounts, while Amity curled side-saddle behind her, hands clasped around Luz’s waist. She leaned against the brown-haired girl’s back, her eyes closed in something like meditation as she pressed her cheek against Luz’s shoulder. Luz whooped in delight as the four robots galloped toward the parking lot, then squealed in surprise at their initial burst of speed when they reached the pavement. She unlocked the trailer doors and chivvied the robots up and into their crates.
Amity climbed into the cab to tuck her laptop satchel away. She caught sight of her flower crown in her reflection, and stopped to blink in surprise. She considered herself an attractive woman by conventional standards, but that had never been something that mattered much to her. But now? She stared at herself in the passenger-door mirror, at the delicate twisting stems across her brow, at the purple blossoms sitting prettily atop her green locks, and she knew that Luz found her beautiful. She raised a gentle hand to brush her fingertips against a vibrant bloom, and a smile broke out across her face.
~
“Lake water?” Luz choked back a laugh as she turned to look up at Amity.
The green-haired girl sat on the floor of the cabin in front of her captain’s seat, her legs hanging out Hooty’s open passenger door as she grinned down at the smartphone in her hand. “Yes,” Amity giggled into her other palm, “Is that your answer?”
“Wha-huht? No!” The tanned girl braced one hand on Hooty’s side panel as she stepped over the gas pump hose, beckoning toward the other girl with her free hand, “Let me see that.”
“Nope!” Amity twisted away, lifting her phone away from Luz’s slow-moving grabber, “I’ll read them again.”
The brown-haired girl chuckled, “Fine,” as she leaned back against the passenger-side steps, bumping her shoulder against Amity’s leg.
“Choose your favorite beverage,” the golden-eyed girl read aloud as she raised her other hand, lifting fingers to count each option, “Red wine, Beer, Soda, Hot Chocolate, Lemonade—” she made a fist, and started counting up again, “—Tea, Lake water, or a Milkshake.”
“Omigawsh, that’s so hard,” Luz gave her an exaggerated look of horror, “I love all of those things!” They held each other’s gaze for a long moment, their eyes crinkling as they struggled to hold back laughter. Luz almost cracked, but she managed to hold out with a trembling smile.
“Lake water, then?” Amity grinned as she tapped at the screen.
Luz barked a laugh and nodded, “Yeah, yeah, you got me, Blight.” The numbers ticked higher on the gas pump as the pale girl scrolled to the next question.
“Pick your favorite school subject,” Amity began, “Civics, English, Woodworking—”
“God, I wish I’d had woodworking,” Luz interrupted.
“—Science, I hated high school,” both girls snorted at that, “Chemistry, Lunch—”
“Oh!” Luz patted her knee in excitement until Amity placed her cool palm over her fingers, “Definitely lunch.”
Amity rolled her eyes and muttered, “Of course,” but marked the answer as she gave Luz a fond smile. She scrolled a bit more, and asked, “What would you rather do in your free time?” She cleared her throat to begin reading the options, but the words caught in her throat when Luz placed her chin on her knee and batted her glittering brown eyes up at her.
“Is ‘spend time with Amity’ an option?” Luz asked in a bright, airy tone, and pulled a wide grin when Amity practically vibrated with happiness.
“Chill with friends, then,” Amity replied with a smile that lit up her golden eyes. Luz hummed in agreement as she patted Amity’s leg, then turned to lean back against the truck’s sun-warmed side. She chose Copenhagen on the Pick-a-Place-to-Visit question, and Snakes for Choose-Your-Favorite-Animal.
“What will you bring to the Magic School at Sunshire Plains? Your favorite books, your tools, a stash of snacks,” Amity paused when Luz mumbled you always need snacks, “School supplies? An agenda?”
Luz laughed, “An agenda? What, like, ‘the downfall of the patriarchy’? ‘Abolishing capitalism’?” She waggled air-quotes with both hands.
Amity snorted, and gently swatted Luz’s shoulder with the back of her fingers, “No, silly. Like a day planner.”
“That’s… that’s kinda lame,” Luz said, and smiled when Amity made a wounded noise. “I choose snacks.”
“Of course you do,” Amity grumbled and tapped the submit button at the bottom of the questionnaire. She laughed at the results.
“What?” Luz asked, turning to face her, “Who’d I get?” Amity held out her phone to show the picture of Azura in her white cape and hat, holding out the Staff of the Ancients. Luz splayed the fingers of one hand across her chest as she struck a pose, “Are you really that surprised?”
“Not really, no,” the pale girl said as she began to read aloud, “Vibrant, outgoing, and always happy, you are Azura! Nothing ever stops you for long; you’re determined, and never give up. You are always caring for your friends, and your joy is admirable.” Amity lowered her phone to her lap and looked at Luz with a half-smile, “That’s you to a tee.”
“What did you get?” Luz grinned like she already knew the answer.
“Last time I took this one I got Hecate,” Amity admitted, setting her phone on the passenger’s seat.
“I knew it,” the tanned girl nodded.
Artwork by the Amazing Mexfan!
~
“Okay, Hooty, whaddaya got for us?” Luz patted the steering wheel with both hands. The diesel engine grumbled beneath their feet, building to a steady growl that sent a buzz through their ankles and up to their knees. Amity squirmed in her seat as she adjusted her seatbelt, letting it fall across her chest at a fairly comfortable angle. The blinking light on the entertainment system turned steady as a pair of guitars started to howl a blues riff, broken up by a halting, stutter-step drumbeat. Luz grinned and bobbed her head, “Alright, good choice.” She tipped her head toward Amity and winked, “Let’s hit the road, bestie.”
Amity’s snort of amusement was drowned out by the roar of the big rig’s engine as Luz threw Hooty into gear, the tanned girl belting out the lyrics alongside ZZ Top.
Well, I was rolling down the road in some cold blue steel—
Luz checked her mirrors as she guided the truck along the south side of the Petro Travel Center.
I had a blues man on the back and a beautician at the wheel
She kept her speed low as she joined the line of other trucks exiting onto Interstate 81.
We going downtown in the middle of the night—
Luz glanced at Amity and grinned, changing the lyrics to “middle of the day”
We laughing and I’m joking, and we feeling alright
“—and we feelin’ okay,” she rhymed.
Oh I’m bad, I’m nationwide
Luz pointed at Amity and clicked her tongue, then pulled out across the southbound lanes, bearing North to catch the I-80 Eastbound on-ramp.
Notes:
Stuff's been going on here, life is crazy, my plans and schedules keep changing, and I'm not as flexible with all that as I used to think I was. I've been frustrated trying to get this chapter out, because things keep popping up that interfere with my writing time. Give your loved ones a hug, and tell 'em you love them.
I'll be pausing this fic for a few weeks while I work on a 2 (or probably 3) chapter Halloween piece. As per the norm, this one's only half of what I'd planned for the chapter, but I guess that means y'all don't have to sit on a cliffhanger like I'd originally planned ¯\_(' 3')_/¯
Chapter 25: Wednesday, 5:57pm
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
By the time Luz accompanied Billy Gibbons through the end of the second verse, she had settled Hooty in a loose tangle of other Eastward-trending trucks. She bobbed her head, tapped her fingertips on the steering wheel, and beedle-ee-dee’d her own version of the guitar solo. Amity watched the prairie rise and fall with a smile. When she felt comfortable with her relative speed and position in her new-found entourage, Luz gave the taller girl a bright smile and a nod.
They began to test each other with questions about the Azura series while the Nebraska farmland rolled by. After a rapid-fire back-and-forth that established their higher-than-average knowledge of series lore, Amity looked up the infamous GWA fan forum “Hundred Hardest” quiz. The grinning brown-haired girl accepted her challenge, and she began to read one question after the next. Luz had an impressive 30-streak of correct answers until she stumbled over the names of a little-mentioned kingdom’s monarchy.
“I have to say, Luz,” Amity leaned her elbow on her armrest as she curled a single eyebrow toward the shorter girl, “Some of those I didn’t remember, I’m just— wow.” She giggled when Luz gave her a small bow, the slight motion hamstrung by her seatbelt and the steering wheel. The pale girl tapped her phone and grinned when the card flip revealed the next question. “Oooh, okay, here’s a hard one.” Amity gave Luz a shrewd, calculating look, “What is the surname of the Blind King’s valet?”
Luz let out an oof like she’d been punched in the stomach.
“Is it—? Yes, I remember. It was only mentioned twice in book f—” Amity began reading the additional details aloud.
“Morgen!” Luz interrupted with a self-satisfied shimmy in her seat, “Morgen, of course.”
Amity let her hands fall into her lap as she laughed in surprise. She wrinkled her eyebrows and scoffed, “I can’t believe you know that!”
“Who doesn’t know Runeard Morgen?” Luz gave her a snarky grin as she emphasized certain portions of the character’s name. She held up a finger, like, ah-ha! as she added, “That is a deep-cut, I’ll grant you that. I probably wouldn’t know if I hadn’t studied her supporting character and location names a number of years ago. Featherwhyle hid clues all over the place.”
Amity paused and turned toward Luz, asking, “What do you mean?” as she brushed slender fingers through the green hair above her ear. That hint of new knowledge just within reach, at her fingertips and ready for the taking, gave her voice a familiar hungry note.
Luz cocked an eyebrow and watched her for a moment before she asked a question of her own. “What does morgen mean in German?”
Amity made a confused sound and an expression to match before she slowly replied, “…Morning?” The tanned girl grinned, and Amity almost had to audibly swallow from the light sparkling in her eyes.
“And when did Armik the Vizier try to steal the throne?”
“In…” Amity blinked, and sat back in her seat, “in the morning.”
“Runeard Morgen. Rue the morning.” Luz rolled her eyes and laughed, then waved a hand toward Amity’s phone, “Look up Armik’s name in Albanian.”
“Albanian?” The green-haired girl tap-tap-tapped on her phone with a quizzical twist to her lips before her mouth fell open in shock.
armik: IPA: [aɾmik] (masc.) (indefinite plural armiq, definite singular armiku, definite plural armiqtë), From Latin inimīcus ("enemy").
“Oh my god.”
Luz smiled so wide, “Right?”
“Oh my god,” Amity turned large, golden eyes her way, “Are they all like this?!”
“Yeah,” Luz grinned, “I think so.”
“Staring me right in the face,” the pale girl shook her head in something like muted astonishment. “How did I not notice that?”
Luz snorted and scrunched her nose, “You know Albanian?”
“What?” Amity blinked. “No.” Luz laughed again as the green-haired girl grumbled, “Anyway, I still can’t believe Runeard turned out to be loyal to Armik—”
“Loyal?” Luz interrupted.
“Oh— okay, so easily manipulated, I guess,” Amity demurred, “It’s not like Armik was blackmailing him, he just…” She trailed off, and both girls sighed at the same time. “What a— a disappointing turn,” the golden-eyed girl finished.
Luz gave her a quick side-eye before she pushed her hat back far enough to scratch the top of her head. “Well,” she laughed, pulling her cowboy hat back into place, “I don’t know what your stance is on fanfiction—”
Amity couldn’t help but freeze in place at the word. Her years-old habit of hiding her interests brought a number of responses rushing to mind that would shift the topic away to something safe and Odalia-approved. She had to clench her jaw to keep them from spilling out on their own.
Luz might have paused, just slightly, as if she’d seen the green-haired girl stiffen, “—but there’s this one I read where Runeard betrays Armik on the Bleak Morning and sets off a whole different chain of events.” She glanced over at Amity and saw the pale girl sitting stock-still, swaying slightly with the motion of the truck. Luz recognized a fear lurking in those golden eyes that she’d half expected, and gave her a warm, kind smile. She thought she should fill the air until Amity felt up to responding. “It— I forget the author off-hand, I’ll remember later, but it was really interesting. Instead of Azura and Hecate facing the Army of the Dead on their own, they rode as messengers for—”
“The One-Eyed Man is King?” Amity’s whispered words caught the shorter girl’s ear.
Luz nodded, a bright grin breaking across her face, “Yeah! That’s the one.” She waited a moment before asking, “You’ve read it?”
Amity looked down at her lap, her shoulders tight around her jaw. She nodded in a quick, jerking motion, and tried to speak twice before pausing to clear her throat. “Y– Yes.” The pale girl breathed out a hollow laugh and glanced around, like she was afraid of being seen. She nodded again, turning back to Luz with a vulnerable look in her golden eyes. Luz felt her chest tighten at the taller girl’s timid, “I did.”
Luz made sure to give a warm, encouraging smile to her friend, “Wasn’t it just so good?” She took a deep breath and sighed, “I think it’s— yeah, if anyone online ever asks, it’s on the must-read list I share.”
Amity nodded again, her fingers worrying at the leather case of her smartphone as she offered a soft, “I– I really liked it.” She giggled then, a sound of such pure happiness that Luz felt a dizzying rush of some echoing emotion in her chest.
“What was your favorite part,” Luz asked as she guided Hooty through a gentle curve, “and why was it when Malingale was arrested for stealing that cabbage stand?”
Amity laughed aloud, like music. “Well…” she began.
~
Their conversation ranged across plot points in books one through five, and they had just begun to touch on some of the deeper implications behind certain fan-favorite character choices in the middle of the fourth novel when Luz’s phone began to ring. She glanced at the clock in the dashboard and nodded, “Alright, sorry, time to check in with—” She cut off abruptly when she registered the ringtone.
I’m up at the crack of dawn and I throw the bacon on, Seems somehow my work is never through~
“Why is Lilith…” her voice trailed off in a question as she turned worried eyes toward Amity, “Oh no, Eda. Can you—?” The golden-eyed girl nodded as she lifted the phone from the cup holder. Amity glanced at the photo on-screen before she swiped on the ANSWER CALL slider. The picture showed a tall, pale woman with long black hair wearing a green and black plaid shirt under an unzipped orange puffer vest. The woman held a loaded hotdog in each hand, and looked to be stealing a large bite from Eda’s slice of pizza while the gray-haired woman was distracted. “Lilith? Is Eda okay?” Luz asked when the crackle of static filled the cabin.
“How—? Yes, Luz, Edalyn is resting,” a tired voice filled the air, and Amity watched Luz relax her white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel. “We came back with lunch and she was in the middle of a spell.”
“But she’s—” Luz sniffed, “Lunch?!” She glanced at the dashboard clock for a moment before protesting, “That was hours ago!” She made a choked laughing sound as she brushed a knuckle under one eye. “She’s okay? Is she at the hospital?” The Interstate sprouted a third lane, and Luz hugged the far-right edge of the far-right lane in her partially distracted state. Some trucks ahead slipped out into the middle lane as faster-moving passenger vehicles rushed past on their left.
“The hospital?” Lilith paused to laugh, then trailed off with a darkly amused sigh, “No, she would have stabbed someone if we tried to take her to a doctor. Probably poor Steve.”
Luz gave another wet chuckle at the joke, as she blinked and blinked. “That’s true, she’s done that before,” she replied in a weak, watery voice. Amity reached over to place a hand on her shoulder, and Luz tipped her head to press her cheek against the other girl’s fingers.
Lilith spoke in a gentle, caring tone, “She wanted me to assure you that she is fine. She was very clear about that.”
“Then you should have called me from her phone, Lily,” Luz grumbled. “I knew something was wrong when I heard your ringtone.”
“My—” the woman in sunny San Francisco sighed, “Of course. You and your music,” Lilith muttered in a good-natured way before getting down to business, “Now, how are things going, Luz?”
Luz cleared her throat, her voice still unsteady, “We got on the road a bit later than planned, but we’ll shave off time elsewhere to make it up.” She straightened up in her seat and flashed a grateful look toward Amity. The pale girl kept her hand on Luz’s shoulder, rubbing her thumb in circles over the warm skin there. “We’ll cover as much distance as we can before we have to stop for the night. Eda had a couple places marked on the route in Pennsylvania and—” Luz twisted her face in disgust, “—Ohio.”
“Oh, dear,” Lilith replied.
“Yeah,” Luz gave a heavy sigh. “Hooty’s running fine, his oil and pressure levels are green. His tires are good. We topped off this morning so we don’t have to worry later.”
“Excellent, Luz. We shall call you again tomorrow for an update.” The other woman made a noise like she’d just remembered something. “By the way, did you purchase that lawn dart set?”
Luz laughed, “No, we didn’t. Sorry.”
“That’s quite alright, my dear,” Lilith chuckled, “It would have been a collector’s item if someone hadn’t defaced the packaging.”
The girls shared a look and Luz smiled when Amity scrunched her nose and whispered, “Does she— does she collect that sort of thing?”
“Oh yeah, all the time,” Luz nodded, waving her hand, “Lily’s got all sorts of antique weapons.”
“Who are— Oh yes. My apologies, Miss Blight. Are you doing well?”
“Yes, thank you,” Amity replied, meeting the tanned girl’s gaze for a moment when Luz glanced her way, “I am doing well. Luz has made sure of that.” She gave Luz’s shoulder a squeeze, and the brown-haired girl flashed her a radiant smile that faded as soon as she turned back to the road. “I have a good feeling about this delivery,” the pale girl added as she watched her companion’s distracted expression.
“Wonderful. I regret if I come across as rude, but I’m all too aware of how distracting phone calls can be while driving,” Lilith replied, a faint scratching sound filtering through the line as if she were writing on a clipboard, “So… I… shall let you both go. Call if you need anything. Travel well.”
“We will,” Luz called out in forced cheer, “Talk to ya later!”
Amity ended the call, and the music from the radio kicked back in as she placed the smartphone in its cup-holdery resting place. She examined the brown-haired girl for a few moments as she drove in a tense, heavy silence. It was painfully clear that Luz was worried about Eda: there was a wrinkle between her eyebrows that hadn’t been there before; her smile didn’t reach her eyes; she merely mouthed the words instead of singing along with the radio. I have to do something to help, Amity thought. The Interstate curved toward the North with the hint of an Eastward swing in the far-off distance. Luz watched her mirrors and slowly moved to the inner-right lane to avoid the on-and-off ramp slowdowns. I-80 stretched across six lanes as it passed through the heart of Lincoln, Nebraska.
Well, I was sittin’ way back in the very last pew
Showin’ him to my good buddy Hugh
When that squirrel got loose and went totally berser—
“Hooty, not… not right now,” Luz pressed a button on the radio to skip the song, “I’m sad, play My Immortal by Evanescence.” She glanced at Amity as the light on the entertainment center flashed white. “Oof, My Immortal, you wanna talk about fanfiction fanfiction? That’s—”
Something other than Evanescence began to play: a strangely familiar guitar riff and backing drum, although—Amity blinked in surprise. Was that a banjo?
Luz reached out and pressed the button to skip the song, cutting off the ringing clang of a wrench on an anvil. She laughed once and sniffed, her voice watery as she shook her head, “Dammit Hooty, no, play Linkin Park, In the End.” The little white light flashed for a moment.
My chilllllldrennnn are huunngryyyy, and my dog—
Amity bit her lip to hide her smile at the singer’s exuberant performance, while Luz tipped her head back and groaned up at the red leather headliner. “Hooty, whhyyy,” the tanned girl grumbled as she pressed another button, pausing the music.
Amity laid her phone in her lap and focused her attention on the other girl. “Luz, what’s wrong?” she asked, almost positive she knew how she would respond.
“Nothing!” Luz nearly yelped, “It’s— it’s nothing.” She gulped and gave a weak, unconvincing laugh.
Just as Amity had expected, almost to the word. “It’s okay, Luz. Talk to me?” the pale girl offered in a kind voice.
Luz pressed her lips into a thin line and quickly shook her head, “N-no, it’s fine. I’m fine, it— just—”
“Luz,” Amity interrupted, drawing the other girl’s wobbly brown eyes for a moment before she quickly turned back to the road. Amity set a hesitant hand on the tanned girl’s shoulder, waiting to gauge her reaction to the touch before squeezing her fingers into her warm, honey-bronze skin, “I’m here. I want to listen.”
Luz glanced her way again, twice, before nodding. She cleared her throat and sniffed, and breathed out a wet, heavy sigh. “My dad—” Her voice broke, and she bit her bottom lip to still its quivering. After a thick silence, she managed a trembling tone. “He drove away one morning, by himself, like— like any other day… And… the next time I saw him…” The brown-haired girl slowly shook her head, frowning at the memory. “He was hooked up to a bunch of machines at the hospital.” Luz snorfed and wiped a fist under her nose as she laughed, “And Eda!” She laughed again, but it sounded more like a sob. “She’s so stubborn, she’ll— I— if she— I can’t—” She sucked a harsh breath between clenched teeth, and made a sound that Amity was sure she never wanted to hear again.
“Luz, listen to my voice,” Amity swiveled toward the aisle, swinging her feet around the gear shift with a careful, practiced motion. “Take a breath and hold it with me, alright?” The pale girl inhaled loudly, waiting as Luz did the same, and then she counted down on her fingers as they exhaled together. “That’s good,” Amity whispered, “In and out, slow. With me.”
The tanned girl kept her eyes firmly on the road, but she breathed in and out, following Amity’s lead. After a time, once she had regained some semblance of control, Luz glanced to the side and gave the golden-eyed girl an expression brimming with gratitude. “Thanks, I— I needed that. Heh,” she breathed out a joyless chuckle, “Gus does that too. ‘S’funny. I just—” Luz’s eyes crinkled as she bit her lip, then, “I try to make sure Eda’s not alone, y’know?” She made a laugh that leaned closer to a stifled sob. “It’s hard hearing that she’s in pain right now, and— and I’m…” Luz swallowed. “I’m not there to help.”
Amity rubbed her thumb across the bands of muscle in Luz’s shoulder as she considered their problem. Luz clearly wanted a chance to communicate with Eda, but Eda might not feel up to a phone call. Not to mention, Lilith implied phone calls were a serious distraction. And Luz was also concerned about making up the extra hours they had spent sleeping, so she wouldn’t want to pull over just yet. Amity turned her eyes toward the other girl’s smartphone, where it sat rattling softly in the cushioned cup holder. She lifted it from its resting place and held it up where Luz could see. “Would you like me to text her for you?” Amity asked.
“What?” Luz blinked.
“If you want,” Amity began, “I can text her from your phone.” She waggled the device in her hand, “Just tell me what you want to say.”
Luz glanced between her and the road, examining her expression before she replied with a confused, “You’d— you’d do that?” Amity frowned at the astonishment lurking in her voice. “F-For me?”
“Of course I would,” Amity used the kindest voice she could manage.
Luz gave her a small smile that finally reached her eyes. “Okay,” she breathed.
I’m glad Lilith and Steve were there :[Mochuelo]
Love you, Eda :[Mochuelo]
[_(OvO)_]: Love you too, kiddo
[_(OvO)_]: But I’ll deny it if you tell anyone I said that
“Ha ha, typical Eda,” Luz joked. She looked so much more at ease already, and Amity smiled to herself as the brown-haired girl breathed out a sigh of relief. I did something right! She could congratulate herself later; right now she had a job to do. “Tell her everyone already knows you’re a biiiig softy, and give the ‘big’ four i’s,” the smaller girl had a sly twist to her lips.
Amity nodded, repeating the message aloud as she carefully typed it in. “And sent,” she narrated her actions, then set her hands in her lap to wait. The two girls shared a glance, and Amity gave Luz a bright smile. Luz grinned as she turned back to the traffic ahead. The pale girl jumped slightly when the phone began to buzz with one response after another. She laughed at first, and then muttered a soft, “Oh, wow.” Luz hmmm’d a questioning sound, and Amity replied, “I’ve not seen that swear word in a long time.”
“What did she say?” Luz asked with a confused half-smile.
“I… don’t know if I can read this out loud.”
“Ha!” Luz snorted, “Alright, tell her—”
Is there anything I can do for you? :[Mochuelo]
[_(OvO)_]: Say hi to Cam for me
“Oooooh, oh-oh, hmmm… right,” Luz trailed off in a pensive silence, tapping her fingertips on the steering wheel as she scrunched her nose in thought.
Amity waited for more, for a moment, before asking, “Who’s Cam?” She glanced between the phone in her hands to the girl sitting beside her.
“Huh?” Luz blinked while she stared straight ahead, before she turned her eyes to the green-haired girl as she answered, “Oh, my mom. Camila. Actually, I… I was supposed to—”
[_(OvO)_]: Tell Luz, re-route before Omaha. Take I-680 N to I-29 N to I-880 E
“Sorry, uuuhm, Eda said for you to take a detour,” Amity interrupted with a raised finger, pausing briefly to read the new message with a slight squint of concern. She turned a contemplative expression toward the tanned girl. “And she knew it was me?”
“Oh, yeah,” Luz nodded, “I use a ton of emoji.” She glanced at her passenger for a moment, then, “Ask her why the detour?”
[_(OvO)_]: read this out loud:
A little squeak of surprise slipped out of her mouth at the gray-haired woman’s next message, and Amity turned bright red. Luz glanced at her and chuckled, “What? What’d she say?”
“Uuh~hm,” Amity paused to swallow, then tried to force the shaky words out past the stone lodged in her throat. “Be–Because the beauty o-of the Central Midwest… is… is s-so m-much more r-romantic with a— a— a prettygirlonyourarm!” she finished in a rush, then hid her face in her free hand.
Luz’s mouth fell open as a furious blush raced across her cheeks. “Dammit, Eda,” she whispered.
She felt the phone vibrate in her palm, and Amity peeked at the screen between her fingers.
[_(OvO)_]: is she blushing?
[_(OvO)_]: tell her I’m laughing
“Goddammit,” Luz growled and squeezed the steering wheel until her knuckles turned white, then she began rattling off a string of Spanish at a blistering pace. Amity could only pick out one in every five or six words, but they were enough to carry the gist of it all.
she’s blushing :[Mochuelo]
and ranting in spanish :[Mochuelo]
[_(OvO)_]: you’re a good kid, Blight.
[_(OvO)_]: certainly better than your mother
[_(OvO)_]: wish I could say that to her face
[_(OvO)_]: Anyway, at the risk of sounding sappy,
[_(OvO)_]: tell Luz I said “Eyes on the road, Owlet. Fly straight”
[_(OvO)_]: but not *too* straight, amirite?
Luz paused mid-sentence to listen to Eda’s final message, responding with an awww that swung down into a deep groan. “Okay, that’s— that’s enough of Eda,” the brown-haired girl sighed as she rolled her eyes. “But not too straight,” she repeated in a soft, mocking voice, “Like she’s one to talk.”
Amity chuckled as she set Luz’s phone back in the cup holder. “Are you feeling better?” she asked as she examined the tanned girl’s face. That pinched skin above her nose had smoothed out, and those chocolate brown eyes were shining in the evening sunlight, like polished mahogany. “You look like you are.”
“Yes, I am,” Luz nodded, glancing her way before she reached over to squeeze her hand. She clung to her fingers for a moment, in a meager attempt to convey the depth of her gratitude. “Thank you so much, Amity. Once again, you demonstrate just how amazing you are.”
The pale girl blushed, whispering a soft, “You’re welcome,” as she brushed through the hair at her temple. They rode in a companionable silence while Amity watched the traffic shift and flow in the lanes ahead. She listened to Luz hum in the relative quiet of the cabin and recognized one of the last songs Hooty had tried to play. She grinned at the thought that came to mind. “I think you should apologize to Hooty,” Amity said.
Luz barked a laugh, then asked, “What?”
Amity patted the cherrywood dashboard with one slender hand, “Hooty was trying to cheer you up with his last few songs.” The big rig’s tires rolled over the slightest flaw in the road—a crack, perhaps, or an uneven seam between two blocks of concrete. Hooty’s cab bounced up and down after Amity’s statement, like he was nodding in agreement. “So— I—” Amity eyed the cabin air for a moment, grinning, “I think you should say sorry.”
“Omigawsh, fiiiiine,” Luz rolled her eyes and groaned, not bothering to hide the wide, delighted smile on her face as she laughed, “I’m sorry, Big Hoots.” She reached forward to rub her palm across the dashboard with a little squeak-squeak. “You were just trying to cheer me up.” She pressed a button on the radio as she grinned at Amity, “It is so hard to feel sad when you’re singing about roadkill.”
Amity curled her lip in disgust, “Singing about what.”
Luz began to belt out the lyrics, and her joy was infectious.
~
The miles ticked by as Hooty wandered up and down the slightly rolling hills. Acres of neatly planted farmland stretched out on either side of Interstate 80, the waving fields of tall brown grain dotted with trees and buildings in the distance. The sun hung above the horizon, painting the evening sky with swaths of red and orange. Wide bars of sunlight slanted over Luz’s shoulder, drawing a shadow across the boxy nose of the truck; Hooty’s profile stretched over half the right lane from his place in the center. A green sign passed by Amity’s side of the truck, drawing her eye for a moment. EXIT 420, ASHLAND 1 MILE, NEXT EXIT 7 MILES.
She turned back to the smartphone in her hand. Once the laughing brown-haired girl finished singing wildly off-key about catching a possum for dinner—which had sent Amity into a hysterical giggling fit—Luz had handed the pale girl her phone and pointed her toward her browser’s bookmarks. Now they combed through Luz’s curated list of Azura fanfics, comparing authors and titles, gushing about certain genre standouts and the alternate universe combinations they enjoyed. Once she had taken that first, hesitant step in revealing her guilty pleasure, it was like the floodgates had opened. Amity’s excitement bubbled completely out of control, and Luz’s giddiness rose to match. They hardly noticed the slow marching miles pass, until a strange sound caught Luz’s attention.
A faint honk-hooonnnk sounded in the near distance, from somewhere behind them. It sounded like a signal, rather than something done out of anger or irritation. Perhaps fifteen or twenty seconds later, another honk-hooonnnk reached their ears, this time closer than the last. Another horn blared, closer still, less than a minute later. Luz squinted into the mirrors on her door, trying to see what was going on. A wide grin split her face as she laughed aloud, “Amity!” She pointed at her sideview mirror, “They’re back!” She glanced over at her passenger and said, “I’m gonna put my window down for a minute, okay?” The pale girl wrinkled her brow in confusion, but nodded, leaning up on her armrest to peer out Luz’s side of the cabin.
The wind rushing past the truck couldn’t hide the creaks and groans of the wobbly red Ford Aerostar as it pulled up beside Luz’s door. That tawny-haired girl in the yellow shirt leaned out of the passenger window, pumping her right arm up and down, fist clenched, like she was pulling on a handle. Luz reached up and wrapped her fingers around the leather strap of Hooty’s horn, then nodded up at Amity. The pale girl plugged her ears before Luz tugged twice, letting the big rig’s piercingly obnoxious HOOT-HOOOOT rattle the cabin. A split-second look of disgust and horror crossed the sunburned girl’s face before the decrepit minivan swerved away from the unexpected noise. She grabbed hold of the window frame and shrieked. Luz cackled as ALMANAC’s passenger yelled something at the driver, her words lost in the howling wind. The tawny-haired girl glared up at her then did a double-take at the sight of her white cowboy hat and its golden sunburst on the crown.
Thalia pushed her white plastic sunglasses up on her forehead, trapping her long brown hair behind her ears. “Hey, ‘sheriff’!” she yelled over the growling diesel engine, throwing a set of air quotes with her free hand, “What the fuck!” Luz put her hands up and shrugged, like, I don’t even know. The sunburned girl leaned further out the window to point up at Luz, yelling, “You jerk! That little girl scared me!”
“I’m sorry about that!” Luz called down to the other girl, then laughed when Alma pulled Thalia back down in her seat so she could hold up a middle finger. Luz laughed and waved as the old van wobbled faster, pulling ahead of Hooty to settle beside the truck in front of them. Thalia leaned out with a grin to pull an imaginary horn, and earned herself another honk-hooonnk. She laughed and waved to the truck driver, then sat back down inside ALMANAC. Luz slowly cranked her window upward as the Aerostar pulled away.
“See?” Amity said, patting Luz on the shoulder. “They’re alright. I know you were worried about them.”
“Yeah, I was,” Luz admitted. She glanced at Amity and gave her a grin, “And yeah, they are.”
~
Traffic clustered in the right two lanes as the large green sign for EXIT 445 drew close, two white arrows pointing off for STATE 275, L STREET. Hooty’s lights flashed along his side as Luz drifted into the inside left lane, her eyes darting between her mirrors, Amity’s mirrors, and the road ahead as she watched for the smaller, dumber vehicles that might try to slip into a blind spot. She spun the steering wheel with one hand as she upshifted, left foot half-riding the clutch as she waited for the right feeling in her hands and feet, for that good vibration in the big rig’s bones. She pointed Hooty’s nose straight through the junction toward I-80 as she accelerated. The brass-rimmed gauges set in the cherrywood dashboard gleamed in the evening sunlight as the double-brown semi surged forward. The RPM gauge swung wide, the needle brushing up against the redline before Luz eased off the gas pedal. She feathered the clutch bar with her toes and slipped the stick into the next gear when Hooty’s growl sounded right.
It wasn’t easy, driving a truck in traffic like this, day in and day out. But Luz couldn’t help the grin on her face as her body moved almost by instinct, guiding the big rig by sound and feel. “One-point-three miles until exit four-four-six,” Amity’s voice cut through the din, her warm tones catching the tanned girl’s attention. “Stay in this lane until the I-680 junction.” The pale girl tapped at the GPS screen before muttering a soft, “I think this lane breaks off there.”
“Ten-four,” Luz nodded as she slipped into the next gear with a thunk, the diesel engine’s growl dropping to a lower pitch as she urged the truck forward. “Thank you,” the brown-haired girl said, flashing Amity a quick grin.
The golden-eyed girl replied with a soft, “Mon plaisir, Capitaine.”
~
Traffic slowed as Interstate 680 sloped upward. Amity skimmed a short Princess/Knight Hecazura fic for a particular line of dialogue she wanted to share with Luz, while the tanned girl concentrated on Hooty’s climb up the grade north of Omaha. A catchy guitar riff filled the cabin, and Luz nodded. “Alright,” she grinned, waggling her eyebrows at Amity before she began to sing, “Well she’s handsome, she’s got—” A harmonica started to play a long, drawn-out train-whistle note before slipping into a quick, chugging melody. Luz gasped, “What?!” in surprise, before groaning. “Dammit, Hooty, you got me.”
Amity chuckled at her antics as Luz began to sing along with the proper lyrics.
I never read it in a book, I never saw it on a show,
But I heard it in the alley on a weird radio…
An excitement had been simmering in her chest ever since she climbed up into the cabin that afternoon. Was it for the day’s journey? They had hundreds of miles to cover today, and it would be a long and difficult stretch of road. Was it for the promise of what the future held—their future, perhaps? Amity glanced over at Luz. She looked at home in the driver’s seat, like the big truck was an extension of her own body. Could they make this work? This… whatever this was, that they had found? How could they—
The satellite phone vibrated in its cup holder as it started to ring. Luz glanced between it and Amity, then she turned the music down while the pale girl lifted the sat-phone to her ear. “Hello?”
“Mitteeennnns!” Edric’s far-too-excited voice rang out of the tiny speaker. She couldn’t help the fond laugh that pushed its way in front of the deep sigh she normally reserved for her siblings.
“Hi, Ed, is—” Amity’s golden eyes flicked sideways to catch Luz’s concerned gaze, “Is something wrong?”
“What? No. We’re just eating dinner.”
“Oh… okay,” Amity smiled at Luz and gave her a small wave, like, it’s okay. The brown-haired girl nodded, and went back to mouthing the words along with the quiet music.
If you want to know a secret, you got to promise not to tell
If you want to get to heaven, you got to raise a little hell…
A faint voice in the background chimed a bright, Hi Mittens! Edric sighed, then said “Em says hi, by the way,” before he noisily slurped at some part of his meal.
“Ew, Ed, gross,” Amity frowned while she made an unhappy sound of disgust, then she brightened up and called, “And hi Emmy!”
There was a thumping noise, like Edric had covered his phone with his hand, and his voice was muffled when he spoke to his twin, “She says ‘hi’, bitch.”
Amity rolled her eyes and scoffed, “What do you want, Ed?”
“I want you to— hold on,” She had to pull the phone away from her ear as he moved his handset from one shoulder to the other in a cacophony of small, obnoxious sounds and a gasped whoops. Edric cleared his throat, then continued, “Sorry, almost dropped ya. I want you to send me your presentation materials.”
Amity inhaled a sharp, suspicious breath. “Why,” she asked in a cautious voice.
“I’m going to help you prove Odalia wrong.” As always, Edric sounded absolutely sure of himself. That was one thing Amity had always admired—and secretly envied—about her older brother. She could hardly recall a time when he wasn’t completely self-assured, and how she wished she could have a scrap of that confidence in her own abilities. Not that she’d ever admit as much to him. He had a big enough ego as it was.
After a long pause, Amity offered a second, “...why?”
This time, his voice held a slightly vulnerable note. “So I can prove her wrong, too.”
Amity looked down at the fingernails of her free hand, and worried them against the edge of her seatbelt. Edric helped their father with his presentations on the regular, he knew what he was doing. Father will be there too, at some point. One of the crates is his after all. Her brother had organized some amazing product introductions, which she knew wasn’t one of her talents. He’s probably helping Father with whatever it is that he’s showing, it— it makes sense to have him run the whole show. She would be worse off without his help, but… Why can’t I just say yes? Amity rubbed at her forehead as she hummed a note of uncertainty. Luz looked her way, her eyebrows curled in a question. Amity raised a finger, like, just a sec, and the tanned girl reached over to squeeze her shoulder.
“I know it’s a big thing I’m asking,” Edric said as a sharp tink, tink sounded from his end of the line. Amity imagined him sprawled on the armchair in her sister’s office, idly stabbing his fork through his food while he considered his next words. “I’m asking you to trust me with your future.”
“But I… I do trust you.” It wasn’t a lie, exactly, but the words tasted like ash on her tongue.
“Okay.” Edric didn’t sound like he believed her, not with the way he cleared his throat. “I’ll need numbers and graphs, your observations. Wireframes, if you have ‘em.”
Amity gave an incredulous laugh, “You want wires.” She had only shared her wireframes with her father, and as Chief of Technology Research, he requested secrecy about his contributions to her project. Sending product schematics to Marketing? That just wasn’t done at this early stage.
“No internals, just the shells. We’ll use them as background images for the big screens in the hall.” After a heavy moment in thought, Edric offered a soft, “I’ll have Em write up an NDA. My team and I will sign it before you send anything over.”
“Ed— no, you don’t— that would make me feel better, but,” Amity sighed, “You don’t… have to do that.” She looked at Luz, and the brown-haired girl met her eyes for a moment and smiled. “I’ll send you what I have,” the pale girl decided.
“Great! I’ll get my best guys to work.”
“Edric, I… thank you. For everything.”
“Anytime, Mittens. See you Friday!” He cut the connection with a bleep. Amity lowered the satellite phone to rest the gray device in her lap. She stared at it, still wrestling with her feelings. She knew, logically, that she was making the right decision for her project. Having Edric’s help could mean the difference between success and failure, but… She had worked on it for so long, by herself. Why did it feel wrong to accept her brother’s help? Oh. Right. A Blight is self-sufficient.
The pale girl sighed, and Luz gave her a moment to put the satellite phone away before she asked, “Ed and Em doing alright?”
“Yes, they are,” Amity nodded as she opened her laptop. She logged in, adding, “They’re eating dinner right now.”
“Dinner?!” the tanned girl gasped, and played out an exaggerated glance at her watch-less left wrist, “But it’s not even lunchtime yet!” Amity breathed out a chuckle as she turned a grateful expression toward the other girl. Luz glanced at her and did a small double-take, smearing her hand across her cheek as she asked, “What? Got something on my face?”
“Thank you, Luz,” Amity said with a soft smile.
“I got’chu, girl,” Luz clicked her tongue and winked before turning back to the road.
~
Hooty trundled down the two-lane Interstate toward a glittering ribbon of blue. “Hey Amity?” Luz asked, reaching out to pat the pale girl’s shoulder. The other girl grunted a question, still typing away on her laptop. Luz repeated herself, “Hey, Amity, can you look at me?”
The green-haired girl mumbled a monotone, “Hmm, what? Luz?” Amity looked at her and blinked, taking a quick breath in surprise before speaking in her normal tone of voice, “What? Sorry, what was… yes?”
Luz smiled, “I don’t mean to interrupt, but,” the tanned girl pointed forward, down the road, and added, “I thought you’d wanna see this.”
The evening sun at their backs sent long shadows straight down the pair of blue steel bridges that swallowed the two lanes of Interstate traffic ahead. The twin bridges stretched out across an expanse of rushing water turned purple in the red evening sunlight, traced with white foam churned up around the concrete towers holding the spans in the air. A small green sign with white lettering sat beside the bridge on Amity’s side: MORMON BRIDGE, MISSOURI RIVER. She leaned forward to watch the blue-painted girder framework slide by overhead. She smiled, but turned a slightly confused frown toward Luz, “It’s a nice bridge, but…”
“But why show you?” Luz asked, laughing when the golden-eyed girl gave her a hesitant nod. “Because of that.” Amity looked to where the shorter girl was pointing. A white sign sat beside the interstate just after the bridge, with a cheerful splash of red and yellow spelling out The People of Iowa Welcome You! “Five states down,” Luz said with a grin.
Amity nodded, that simmering excitement in her chest growing brighter as she repeated, “Five states down,” with a wide smile.
~
Luz guided Hooty on a quick nine-mile jog up Interstate 29, traffic moving at a decent clip along the flat two-lane road. Farmland stretched out on Luz’s side of the cab, the evening sun shining through her window. The backlit rows of crops were set ablaze in the reddish sunlight. A line of trees followed the road out Amity’s window, with a growing ridgeline further out in the near distance. Before too long, they were passing under a green sign labeled EXIT 71, 880 EAST, DES MOINES 3/4 MILE, and soon after that, the pale girl was announcing their next turn.
“Bear right in one-quarter mile for eight-eighty east,” Amity called out her order in a posh British accent.
“Hard to starboard, heading eight-eight-zero, gyar-harr!” Luz responded with her best pirate impersonation, drawing an amused sigh from her long-suffering passenger.
Luz worked her way through the gears to bring Hooty up to the speed limit, and both girls noticed the other trucks pulling away or signaling to pass. Cars and minivans sped by somewhere far north of 70 miles per hour. Luz chuckled and waggled her eyebrows at Amity, “Looks like everybody’s feedin’ the bears. You okay with letting Hooty stretch his legs a bit?”
Amity contemplated that for a moment, and slowly nodded her head. “Sure,” she said with a small grin, “Let’s see what he can do.”
Luz accelerated down the slope, working the gearbox and the pedals as a chunky guitar riff filled the cabin, and Hooty’s engine howled along in tune with the highway.
~
They climbed a slow grade through the rolling hills dotted with red barns and farmland plots following the flow of the earth. When they crested the rise, the landscape opened up before them as their double-lane river of concrete poured down the hills to vanish in the green. Amity could see tractors dragging wide tilling frames through rich brown soil; she could see combines riding high over growing crops, dragging silver arches through the fields as they sprayed clouds of mist; she could see old pickup trucks throwing dirt and dust in the air as they bounced down unpaved roads between the plots of land. She leaned close to her window and pressed a palm against the warm glass as she studied the life outside the truck. After a time, she spoke in a quiet voice, “It looks so calm… so peaceful.”
Luz turned down the radio and tossed back a, “What was that, sorry?”
Amity repeated herself, then added, “Are they… Do you think they’re happy?”
“How do you mean?” the tanned girl wondered aloud.
“Their lives seem so much more simple than mine,” the golden-eyed girl said in a distracted voice. Then she made an ah! and waved a hand, dissembling, “I mean— planting a field versus a– a board meeting, if— if that makes sense.”
“No, yeah,” Luz hummed a thoughtful sound, “I can see what you mean.”
Amity leaned back in her seat, her forehead wrinkled in thought, and then she turned to face Luz. “Do you think they’re happy?” she asked again, some wordless emotion clinging tightly to her question. Luz glanced her way and saw some kind of fear hiding in her eyes.
“Yeah, I think so,” Luz said with a nod. “I mean, they’ve got their work to give them that, y’know, satisfaction of a job well done? They have their families to spend time with, I’m sure they have their hobbies too, maybe they play sports? So… yeah,” the brown-haired girl glanced at Amity while she talked, studying her expression. “I think they’re happy,” Luz felt confident that time.
Amity watched the farmland roll by in a frowning silence for a time, then softly admitted, “I think I’m jealous of them.”
“Oh?” Luz asked, raising an eyebrow. The green-haired girl nodded, still watching out her window. Luz considered that as she guided Hooty down a hillside, steering through a gentle curve. “They might be jealous of you, too,” Luz offered, earning herself a snort of derision. Amity crossed her arms and frowned, deeper than before. Luz tried another approach, “I think you can acknowledge that jealousy, yeah? But don’t dwell on it. Instead… like… uhm…” Of course her words would stop wording right now.
Amity turned to watch Luz tap at her lips, and wave a hand in the air as she opened her mouth, before pinching her face in a well, no, actually? sort of way as she reconsidered. Luz patted her armrest with her fingertips as she fished for the right words, “See… See the— no. Find?... uh, figure out… what it is, yeah?” She glanced at Amity, with a worried look on her face, and Amity tilted her head and motioned with a slender hand, like, go on. Luz breathed out a smile, and forged ahead, “See if you can boil it down to, like, the key of it, y’know?”
Amity hummed a non-committal response.
“So, those farmers,” Luz gestured toward the fields rolling by, “Their work seemed simple, comparatively. Is that what was appealing? The simplicity of their work?”
“Well… no?” Amity ventured after a moment’s deliberation, “I do enjoy my work. It’s complex, but I enjoy the challenge.”
“That’s good,” Luz sent a wide grin her way, “That’s great, actually, enjoying what you do? Not everybody does.” She tapped her fingertips in a rhythm on the steering wheel, matching the soft country tune strumming from the radio. “Was it the outdoors, maybe?” the shorter girl asked as she shifted gears at the top of a hill, letting the diesel engine give a throaty growl as they descended. “Workin’ outside, fresh air, and sunshine?”
Amity thought about that for a moment but shook her head. “No, I… I don’t think so?”
Hooty rolled under an overpass, the shadows from the bridges flickering over his nose. The girls saw a combine sitting in a field out Amity’s side of the cab, several side panels open as a pair of farmers worked on the machinery underneath. A rusty old pickup truck pulled up beside the larger machine, and a third man jumped out with an armful of tools. Luz watched Amity slump her shoulders at the sight, as it disappeared behind the big rig.
“Is it…” Luz bit her lip for a pair of heartbeats before pushing on, “how they help each other?” She snuck a glance at Amity. The green-haired girl was staring at her hands in her lap, rubbing her fingernails with the pads of her thumbs. “Uhm, sorry if—”
“No,” Amity shook her head, then cleared her throat. “You’re right. It’s…” She sighed. “They have a community. I’m… I don’t.” She looked at Luz and shrugged, a shaky smile on her face.
“Well…” Luz was careful to keep the anger out of her voice. She was angry for Amity, it wouldn’t do to make the poor girl think otherwise. “You can give me a call,” Luz said with a nod. Amity sniffed and wiped a hand under her eye. Luz nodded again, certainty in her voice, “Any time you want, I’ll come hang out with you. Keep ya company while yer workin’.” She tipped her head and sent the pale girl a snarky half-grin, “I’ll make sure you’re drinkin’ enough water…” That earned her a snort of laughter, and Luz grinned wider, pulling a silly infomercial voice, “Make sure your Amity gets at least ten minutes of sunlight every day.”
Amity giggled at that, and it was like magic.
“How does that sound?” Luz asked.
The golden-eyed girl nodded, “That— that sounds wonderful.”
~
Traffic thickened as they rejoined I-80 Eastbound, the other trucks and passenger vehicles slowing to linger somewhere close to the posted speed limit. Their conversation wandered back toward the Good Witch Azura, and the miles passed by unnoticed. Towers began to appear in the distance, in the fields far out on either side of the highway. A forest of bone-white blades turned in the evening sky, the turbines lit by their blinking red aircraft warning lights and by the brilliant orange sky as the sun crept ever closer to the horizon. It’s like that one anime, Luz had said while pointing at the windmills, which did very little to narrow it down for Amity.
Luz stared at the back doors of an Amazon Prime truck until she couldn’t hold the words in any longer. “I was serious,” she told her companion.
“I—” Amity blinked. “What?”
“I don’t like the thought of you being alone,” Luz clarified, catching a pair of wide golden eyes. Amity looked at her, just staring, staring, staring, and Luz gave her a firm nod, “You can call me.”
“I know,” Amity whispered.
“So call me,” Luz raised an eyebrow.
Amity snorted in indignation, “I will.”
“I mean it!” the tanned girl said as she jabbed her pointer finger at the taller girl, and Amity waved her hands in the air, growling, “I do too!”
Luz held her hand out over the small cabin aisle, her pinky finger extended. “Promise?” she curled an eyebrow.
Amity rolled her eyes and hooked her pinky finger around the one Luz had offered. “This I swear,” the pale girl said, pausing as Luz gave a bright laugh of delight, “as an Everlasting Oath.”
~
Luz pointed out a rest stop just east of Adair, where the Department of Transportation had placed a long turbine blade standing straight up in the air beside the small cluster of buildings. It’s so much bigger than you think it would be, she promised, but neither girl needed to stop, so they decided to keep moving. Amity cupped her hands around her eyes and leaned against her window to watch the installation roll by, the turbine blade like a spire of bone pointing up into the clouds.
~
Traffic grew hectic once more as they approached the Des Moines city limits. Luz could see the honking horns and screeching tires of smaller vehicles were beginning to wear on Amity’s nerves. She urged the taller girl to put on her borrowed headphones and focus on her work while they cut across the city. Luz had driven through Des Moines before; staying on course wouldn’t be a problem. She stayed in the middle lane, her right-hand blinker on as she reached the junction for 80 / 35 CHICAGO, MINNEAPOLIS, KANSAS CITY. When she had a moment to spare, she glanced over at Amity. The green-haired girl was in the zone, her fingers dancing across her laptop keyboard as she bobbed her head to the lo-fi hip-hop in her headphones. Luz glanced back, behind the passenger seat, and smiled at the green and purple flower crown resting on the sleeper bed.
~
The sun had set almost the same time Luz had put the glittering Iowa state capital at their backs. The western rim of the sky held a dim, fading glow, but the stars overhead were out in their full glory. Luz cracked her window to let in a thin stream of fresh prairie air. She breathed in the scent of growing green life and sighed. The silver moon hung overhead, giving the winding Interstate a ghostly gleam in the night. Hooty settled in a loose string of tractor-trailers, some behind and several ahead, while smaller vehicles zipped around and through the pack of slower-moving trucks. Farther up ahead, brake lights flashed, and a truck passed a slower vehicle.
Amity inhaled long and slow, then let the breath out with a sigh before closing her laptop. She pushed the borrowed headphones back on her head, letting them fall around her neck as she carded her fingers through her hair. She turned toward Luz with a soft smile, her golden eyes gleaming in the lights cast by passing cars. “Thank you again, Luz,” Amity said as she patted a gentle hand against the black headphones.
“Anytime, cariño,” the brown-eyed girl sent her a quick wink before turning back to the road. “We should probably stop soon,” Luz admitted, “It’s been almost four hours.”
A semi up ahead put on its left-turn signal, and drifted out into the passing lane, slowly accelerating while several cars sped up to its tail and slammed on their brakes.
Amity hummed a note as she nodded, “Yeah, I’m getting a bit hungry.”
“Didja want a snack to tide y’over ‘til we stop?” Luz asked, pointing a thumb over her shoulder at the above-bed cabinets.
“Sure, why not?” the pale girl grunted into the dashboard as she reached down to snag her laptop bag from the floor by her feet. She moved to unlatch her seatbelt and waited for Luz to give her a thumbs-up. Amity gingerly stepped around the gear stick and leaned her knees on the sleeper bed while she examined the food options in the cupboard. The truck in the passing lane moved back to the right, letting the small build-up of impatient drivers stream by. “Did you want anything?” Amity called over her shoulder, snagging a box of pocky.
“Oh, uh, Pringles, please,” Luz called out in response, watching the traffic thin in the passing lane as the headlights raced by, each SUV and sedan pushing at least fifteen over. A red can of chips tapped her on the shoulder, and the tanned girl lifted them from the pale girl’s hand with a Thankee-sai. Amity shut and latched the cabinet door, then turned around in the cramped aisle, her hands braced on both seats.
The big rig in front of Hooty put on its left-turn flashers and swung out into the fast lane. A familiar beaten-up Ford wobbled in the slow lane, shining in all its dusty red magnificence under their bright headlights. ALMANAC was making fairly good speed, but she was just the slightest bit slower than the rest of the vehicles sharing the Interstate. Luz made a fond noise deep in her chest and sighed. “Welp, guess we’re gonna hafta pass them, too,” she nodded toward the Aerostar as Amity picked her way forward.
The high-pitched howl of a foreign car caught her ear just then. She flicked her eyes to her mirrors to see a pair of brilliant halogen headlamps approaching at a recklessly swift speed. She looked ahead: the passing FedEx truck hadn’t yet cleared the rickety Ford, hidden as it was in the shadow of Hooty’s nose, but the truck had put a car’s length between its tail and Hooty’s shiny chrome bumper. She saw the nose of the black silhouette swing ever so slightly from side to side in her mirror, and Luz felt her blood run cold.
She could see what was about to happen. A cheerful, upbeat fiddle and banjo tune began to play.
It felt like she couldn’t get the words out fast enough as she called out a warning to the green-haired girl half-standing at her shoulder. She had less than a second before a flash of black metal roared past her door, and Luz slammed on her brakes as fear climbed up the back of her throat.
~
Amity had half-ducked under the headliner control panel, one hand on Luz’s seatback as she moved her feet around the gear stick on the aisle floor. She leaned over her captain’s chair when Luz sucked in a quick breath and barked, “Sit down Amity!” The green-haired girl recoiled in surprise, and scrambled for her seat when the brown-haired girl called out a frightened, “Buckle up!” The distinctive whine of a naturally aspirated V12 swelled in the same instant she lunged for her safety harness, and several things happened all at the same time.
Her seatbelt latch clicked between her palms.
Hooty’s brakes shrieked like a dying animal.
The air was driven from her chest as her safety belt snapped taut.
Her pocky flew from her hand. It was probably all broken, now.
A crunch, the screech of tires, and a bang.
Or did the bang come first?
Screams.
Amity heard screams, but she might have been the one screaming. How embarrassing. If she had a chance—if there was more time—maybe she’d ask Luz.
Luz.
Luz had both hands white-knuckled on the steering wheel, swearing a blue streak in her mother’s tongue. She looked between the swirling cloud of rocks and dust ahead and her door side mirrors, weighing her options, before she started to spin the wheel with both hands.
The little red minivan spun around and around, its dim yellow headlamps flashing across the grassy hills like a lost, landlocked lighthouse. It pointed straight toward their truck for a heart-stopping moment.
Amity braced her arms and legs for impact as Luz squinted her eyes and yelped, “Hooty, don’t hurt them!” The radio continued to play the absurdly out-of-place up-tempo country song.
High on the hill where the fox horns blow
And down in the grave where they lay me low
Catholic girl, pray for me
You’re my only hope for Heaven
The slightest jolt rattled the big rig as Hooty swung wide, swerving into the left lane. The bumper of the Aerostar caught on their own for two heartbeats, three, before it started to twist away from Hoot’s nose. A pop! echoed through the night as one of Alma’s threadbare tires exploded. The minivan lurched away, spinning around again as it crunched into the rocky dirt and gravel on the side of the road before slipping off the Interstate shoulder entirely, and down the grassy bank.
Amity leaned against her window and watched as the two terrified girls stared up at her before they disappeared in the night.
Notes:
sigh The map looks a little different now, thanks to the relentless march of technology. The recent iPad update changed how the highlighter looked, so, for now it's just pencil-on-map. Anyway!It's been over a year? What?! Where has the time gone. I'd like to thank you all so much for the kind comments and the encouragement. I appreciate each and every one of you.
Happy Thanksgivin', y'all, I hope you have a great holiday. I'll be back later :)
Chapter 26: Wednesday, 10:02pm
Notes:
Once again, a big thanks to GoofyGomez and Mexfan for their permission to use Alma & Thalia, and for their assistance with the translations. Their help is invaluable in capturing the essence of their characters.
As before, the often-imitated, never-duplicated GoreMiser suggested having the translations on mouse-hover for the Spanish text, so I've added that inline.
Update: I've added anchor links with superscript numbers linking to the translations in the end notes. Hopefully that's a good fallback for mobile users :)
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
The black Mercedes glistened like a shark in shallow water as it floated past Luz’s door. It lunged across the dotted line and cut around the still-accelerating FedEx truck as if it were darting after prey. The white semi was practically standing still in comparison. It struck the rear-left corner of the mud-caked Aerostar, biting off a chunk of its rusty bumper as the speeding car ricocheted onto the shoulder. ALMANAC swung hard to one side, her stunned driver overcorrecting with a squeal of tires just in time for the foreign car to strike them on the passenger-side front quarter panel as it muscled its way back onto the road. The second blow sent the rickety minivan into a spin. There was a shriek, and a thud, and a bang! In a blur of headlights and a shower of sparks, the old Ford slid off the road and down the shallow grassy bank beside Interstate 80.
“Holy shit!” Luz gasped as she swung back into the right-hand lane. She squinted at her passenger door mirrors, struggling to see the minivan left behind in the dark. Dim, flickering headlights pointed up into the sky at a shallow angle, illuminating the drifting clouds of dust and smoke left in their wake. The black Mercedes roared away into the distance as Luz sent a worried glance up at Amity, “We gotta—”
Amity turned away from her window with a frightened, “Pull over!” Her eyes were wide rings of gold in the dim cabin; she was shaking like she’d just seen a ghost. The worry etched on the pale girl’s face nearly matched the uncertainty and fear gnawing at her own stomach.
They shared a quick nod, and Luz turned back to the road with determination. “Hang on!” The tanned girl flipped toggles on the dashboard before she hit the brakes once more, pressing the pedal to the floorboard. Bright orange lights flared along the length of the double-brown big rig, flashing like the heartbeat thundering through her veins. She veered onto the narrow shoulder, setting Hooty at a slight angle away from the road. His front-right tire squelched into the grass in front of a small green sign as she centered the gear stick. She leaned over the aisle to grab the CB radio handset, broadcasting a quick, “Breaker breaker one-seven! Be advised, black Mercedes speeding away from collision, I-80 eastbound, mile marker one-nine-nine.” Luz tossed the transmitter back on the dashboard, ignoring the squawk and crackling response that hissed from the squat gray receiver.
Amity fumbled with her seatbelt as Luz flipped a pair of switches on her headliner and killed the rumbling diesel engine. Luz pointed at Amity’s knees, snapping out a quick, “First-Aid kit under your seat!” as she pulled the keys from the dashboard and unlatched her safety belt. The brown-haired girl checked her mirrors before she kicked her door open, waiting for two cars to fly past, and hopped out when the coast was clear. She pulled a mismatched pair of flashlights from under her seat, then clapped a hand over her hat to keep it on her head as a short train of big rigs rushed by on the moonlit highway, her sleeveless band tee fluttering in the wind. She slammed her door and scrambled around Hooty’s nose to run back toward ALMANAC from the relative safety of the grassy bank, Amity on her heels.
Luz flicked the switch on her boxy orange-handled lantern, waving the wide, daylight-bright cone over the wind-blown grass that reached nearly to their knees. She ran, arms and legs pumping, her heart pounding in her chest. The air was still and silent aside from their footsteps shushing and crunching through the grass, and the occasional vehicle that streaked by with a Doppler howl. She sucked air between clenched teeth while she spared a look to her left. Amity easily paced her, somehow hardly out of breath, but her face was twisted in worry as she clutched the bright red First Aid satchel to her chest. “Hhuh— Here!” Luz gasped, holding out the smaller Maglite.
The green-haired girl plucked it from her hand like a runner’s baton and found the button with her thumb. The narrow beam of light played over the side of the growling Aerostar as they approached the passenger side of the vehicle. It was buried to its rocker panels in the loosely packed earth, the rear tire slowly turning in the deep furrow carved by the minivan’s sideways slide. The windshield wipers squeaked back and forth, a flitting shadow cast across the dim silhouettes in the front seats. “Y– You help Thalia,” Luz wheezed, pointing at the passenger door.
“On it!” Amity gave the shorter girl a jaunty little salute, which, cute, but also, what the heck, she’s not even winded? Luz scoffed as she angled around the front of the minivan.
The pale girl picked through the shin-high grass, holding her flashlight up for a moment to shine into the darkened van. Her light briefly illuminated the girl in the yellow shirt before Amity angled it down, away from her face, as she reached for the door handle. She couldn’t help but notice the shining tear tracks running down the tawny-haired girl’s cheeks. “Thalia?” Amity called as she pulled the passenger door open with a creeaak, waiting for a moment before using a gentle voice, “Thalia? Are you okay?”
The wiry girl was sitting rigid in her seat, gasping for air. Her hands were clawed around her armrest and the nearby pillar, and one foot was pressed against the dusty gray dashboard. “¿Que acaba de pasar?” she whispered1. Amity thought she sounded like she was trying not to burst into tears.
“Thalia?” Amity tried again, “Can you hear me?” The other girl whimpered and squeezed her eyes closed, but managed a halting nod. Amity leaned into the passenger door and held out her free hand, making sure to keep her movements slow and deliberate. “I’m going to unlatch your seatbelt, is that alright?” She waited for another microscopic nod before moving closer, “Then I’ll help you out of here, okay?”
Thalia had to gulp down another breath before she could whisper, “Okay.”
Luz staggered around the front of the Aerostar. “Alma!” she gasped, slapping her palm along the hood as she neared the driver’s door. “A– Alma, estás bien?” She tugged the door open and found the shorter dark-haired girl slowly patting at the center console and her seat with both hands, struggling with her arms tangled in her seatbelt. She squinted up at the windshield, her bottom lip caught between her teeth.
“Mis lentes se cayeron,” Alma said2 with a frown, looking in the direction of Luz’s voice, “I— I can’t see.”
“You’re okay,” Luz soothed between deep lungfuls of air, “I gotcha. Lemme see if I can find ‘em…” She played her lantern across the driver’s seat and floorboards, and found the other girl’s black-framed glasses hiding under the brake pedal. She carefully hooked them over a finger and pulled them out for a quick examination. The lenses were intact, but the arms sat lopsided in her palm. They must have been twisted in the crash. “Here ya go, hermanita.”
Alma made a scoffing sound that crumpled on its way out, and reached for her glasses with a shaking hand. The old Ford’s engine growled when the dark-haired girl’s foot brushed the gas pedal, and she flinched away from the steering wheel as the vehicle shuddered. “Oh my god,” she whined, trying to mash the glasses on her face.
“You’re still in gear, it’s okay,” Luz assured her, reaching one foot in to press the brake pedal as she worked the steering column shift lever, the red arrow gear indicator sliding from OD to P. She turned the engine off for good measure. “Let’s get you outta here,” the tanned girl said as she released Alma’s seat belt; it retracted with a clang and a clatter.
Alma leaned out of the minivan as soon as she was set free. The dark-haired girl clapped her hands over her mouth and groaned, “I’m gonna throw up!”
“Ah-ah-ahhh, not just yet, lemme get outta the splash zone,” Luz helped her out of the Ford, one hand at her elbow as she led the shorter girl up to ALMANAC’s nose, bumping the driver’s door closed with her heel. “See? You’re good.” She glanced over the hood to see Thalia sitting down just outside the bright patch of grass under the Aerostar’s still-shining headlights, with Amity at her side. Vehicles whooshed by on the freeway above, buffeting the four girls with the rushing wind that chased their red tail lights into the distance. Luz held her hat on her head while Alma stopped at the front of her minivan and leaned on the hood, groaning into her palm.
“Alma, how many fingers am I holding up?” Luz asked, drawing a worried glance from the pale girl kneeling beside Thalia. Amity nodded toward the open First Aid kit at her knee, but Luz gave her a quick shrug in response.
Alma leaned against her van as she curled an arm around her stomach, scrubbing her other hand back through her hair. She shook her head and used a dazed voice to breathe, “You almost killed us.”
“Uhhh,” Luz shrugged and motioned with her hands, like, whoopsie-daisy. “But I didn’t?” She turned a slightly helpless look to her pale companion and asked, “Right?” Amity gave her a half-smile and a shrug of her own, like, if you say so. Thalia was breathing noisily from where she’d tucked her head between her knees, and the green-haired girl rubbed a cool hand across her shoulders.
“You—” Alma ran both hands back through her hair as she wobbled, “you almost ran us over!” Her voice cracked halfway through the accusation.
It was an unfair situation for everyone involved, Luz knew that, but— “Don’t spin out in front of my truck, then!” She tried to keep the petty anger from her voice, but she had been running on a cocktail of fear and adrenaline for what felt like hours, now, and maybe she wasn’t entirely successful.
Based on how the shorter, dark-haired girl’s eyes flashed and her nostrils flared, she wasn’t. “You don’t— get—” Alma snarled, before she turned a sickly shade of green, “Don’t— say spin—” She turned around and vomited into the tall grass behind the Aerostar’s front tire. Luz made an apologetic noise as she patted the heaving girl on the back, murmuring, You’re okay, get it all out.
Thalia grumbled something into her knees, then lifted her head when Amity whispered a soft, What was that? The tawny-haired girl squinted over the headlights to look at Alma as she called out a thready, “It wasn’t the jerk sheriff’s fault.” Amity ducked her head behind her shoulder and snorted.
“Thank you,” Luz rolled her eyes, waving a hand toward the two other girls in exasperated acceptance, “—for pointing out it was that Mercedes-asshole at fault, here. Also,” the brown-eyed girl paused to push her cowboy hat far enough to scratch at her head, “Jerk Sheriff? That’s harsh.”
Thalia mumbled, “De nada,” 3 before she laid her head back down on her crossed arms.
Alma leaned over the befouled patch of grass, groaning, and Luz gently tugged at her shoulder. “Don’t look at your lunch, it’ll make you throw up again, c’mon,” the tanned girl patted her arm, “I’ll help you sit down over there.”
The dark-haired girl spat, and replied with a weak, shaky voice, “Breakfast.”
“Pardon?” Luz said as the shorter girl stood up straight.
“We just had breakfast,” Thalia offered, her voice muffled by her arms, “and it wasn’t even that good.” Amity made an awww as she rubbed a hand on the tawny-haired girl’s shoulder.
Luz helped Alma stagger over to where her companion sat on the grass. Alma slumped to the ground with a grunt, and leaned against Thalia’s side. The tawny-haired girl tilted her head to rest against Alma’s hair, and the younger pair exhaled.
Amity stepped back and watched Luz fuss over both girls, taking their pulse and blood pressure, checking their eyes and their heads, making sure they weren’t bleeding or concussed. The brown-haired girl must have been taught by her mother; Amity swallowed that bitter twinge of jealousy. After Alma slapped her hand away during a third Follow my fingertip with your eyes, Luz sat back on her haunches and breathed out a puff of air. “God, I was worried sick,” Luz shook her head as she started to re-pack her First Aid kit, “but I don’t think either of you are injured.”
Thalia and Alma huddled close, leaning against each other to stay upright. They watched the windmills in the distance, the tall bone-white towers mere silhouettes in the evening dim, illuminated in brief flashes of red by the aircraft safety lights at the tips of their twisted-petal blades. The western rim of the sky slowly darkened, deepening the twilight overhead. “It’s a pretty picture, eh, Almita?” Thalia asked in an absentminded tone.
Alma grunted in exhausted agreement. Five seconds later, she lurched to her feet with a panicked, “Me lleva... mi cámara!” 4 She stumbled to the passenger’s side of the van and struggled to open the sliding door. Amity followed close behind, helping the short, dark-haired girl tug the door free of the dirt and grass that blocked its movement.
The contents of the minivan looked just as disheveled as its occupants: loosely-tied plastic grocery bags used to hold garbage had spilled across the floor behind the front bucket seats, and once-folded piles of clothing and blankets had tumbled everywhere in the third-row bench. Alma shoved a pile of duffel bags out of the way, revealing a squat, black hard-sided plastic case wedged under the second-row seat. She tugged the container free, turning it over in her hands for a few frantic moments. She hugged it tightly, whispering a prayer.
“Bancá, y mi gui—?” Thalia called5, hands clasped in nervous anticipation at her chest.
“—Aquí esta!” Alma interrupted6, pulling a battered guitar case out from under the bench seats. It looked well-traveled to Amity’s eye; it was hard to say if any of the scratches or scuff marks were from this accident. The pale girl followed at a respectful distance as Alma hurried back to her companion, kneeling in the grass as she laid the guitar case at her side.
Thalia flipped the latches with trembling hands and pulled out an old acoustic guitar. She sniffed and gasped a sob of relief as she examined the undamaged instrument, brushing calloused fingers across the metal strings to pluck a series of rich, ringing notes. The tawny-haired girl bent over the guitar, cradling it close as she whispered, “Seguí cuidándonos, Mamá.” 7
Alma lifted a pair of lenses from their foam-wrapped compartments, giving them a gentle shake by her ear as she listened. Out came the camera itself, and Alma peered through the viewfinder as she snapped a quick picture of her minivan. She almost laughed in disbelief as nothing appeared to be damaged. She looked at the screen, at the picture she had just taken, then sat down heavily in the grass beside Thalia as she looked up at the vehicle itself. ALMANAC sat tilted in the grass, the front and rear corners crumpled on the passenger side. Remnants of the back driver’s side tire flopped across the pavement in the wake of a passing car. The dark-haired girl shook her head, then wiped a hand under her glasses. “Oh my god, ‘Lia… que vamos hacer ahora?” 8
Thalia took a shuddering breath and shrugged, whispering, “No… no sé,” 9 before she pressed her mouth into a wobbly frown.
Luz crouched down and tilted her head, trying to catch Alma’s eye. “Do you have a spare?” Alma shook her head, pointedly keeping her eyes on her van. Luz sighed, scratching at her head, “You’re tryn’a get home, right? New York?”
“Yeah,” Alma swallowed and nodded, “New York.”
Luz hummed a long note as she tapped her fingertips together. “When do you need to be there?” she asked.
Thalia curled herself tighter around her guitar and hid her face in her arms. Alma looked at Luz, then, and nodded toward her companion while she scooted close, putting an arm around the tawny-haired bundle. “Her performance jury is Friday afternoon,” the shorter girl spoke with a tender voice. “She’ll lose her scholarship if she fails. She… If…” Alma turned her eyes back to the Ford and took a deep breath, letting it whistle out between her teeth before she could speak around the lump in her throat. “Missing her jury… She fails.”
Thalia looked up at the black sky above. She was struggling to hold back her tears as she shook her head, “No, it’s— it’s okay, Almita.” She patted Alma’s hand before she wiped the tears from her face, “We weren’t hurt, that’s what’s important.” She turned her eyes to the ground as she took a shuddering breath and whispered, “Ya sabía que no se iba a dar, igual.” 10
“Michi! Deja de decir eso!” Alma snapped11, turning to face her friend as she threw her hands in the air, “You are at the top of your class!”
Luz stood and took a step away from the pair, glancing toward Hooty’s flashing lights in the near distance. She looked up at Amity; the pale girl was frowning in contemplation as she watched the other two girls retread an old argument. She opened her mouth to speak, but the taller girl spoke first.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Amity asked.
Luz huffed a chuckle and shrugged, “We need to help them?”
“We need to help them,” Amity nodded, her scowl deepening, “We can’t leave them here.”
The tanned girl grunted in agreement, “It’s not safe, ‘side o’ the Interstate at night?” She turned to face the slanted Aerostar, and both girls examined the scene. “Who knows how long it’d take a wrecker to get here,” Luz motioned toward the minivan, “An’ with that slope, they might need a crane…” The brown-eyed girl sighed and pushed her cowboy hat back to scratch through her hair. “If the frame’s damaged, they might not be able to tow it. Probably need a flatbed.” Luz balled her fists on her hips, then shivered at a gust of wind and crossed her arms. She glanced at the younger girls, then leaned closer to Amity to whisper, “They’re already struggling to buy food and gas? They can’t afford a tow!” She sighed and rubbed at her chin, thinking out loud, “Gonna be six bills, at least…”
Amity turned to face her and held out her hand, “Can I have the key to the trailer?”
Luz looked up at her, a slow smile stretching across her face. “I like the way you think,” she said as she fished the keyring out of her pocket.
Amity looked at the keys, nodding when Luz pointed at the right one. “Thanks,” the pale girl said, brushing a slender hand through her hair to tuck the wind-blown strands behind an ear. Brown eyes followed the movement with open wonder tinged with hunger. “I’ll be right back,” Amity promised, a faint blush painting her cheeks.
She turned to leave, but Luz caught her by the wrist. “Hey…” the shorter girl swallowed and breathed out a shallow laugh, “You’re incredible. You know that, right?”
Amity stared at her for a moment before looking down and shaking her head, “Oh, I— um— I don’t know about that.”
Luz shook her head, and squeezed her arm as she spoke in a quiet voice, “Would I lie to you?”
Amity looked at her for a handful of heartbeats before whispering, “No.” Luz let her hand slip down to catch Amity’s fingers in a loose tangle before the taller girl jogged away.
Her long legs devoured the distance between the beached minivan and their waiting big rig. She flung the trailer doors open and pulled herself up onto the cargo deck. It took her a moment’s examination before she worked out how to release the ratchet straps. After she pushed the ties away from her third crate, she moved several steps back and ran shaking hands through her hair. Amity took a deep breath and called, “Abomination, rise!”
~
Luz held her hat on her head as a large group of vehicles passed on the Interstate at her back. She thumbed at her smartphone with one hand; if Maps were actually up to date, they might have some luck just down the road. What are the odds?
The ground shuddered with a strange, rhythmic vibration that persisted long after the passing cars and trucks receded in the distance. As it grew in strength, an unfamiliar sound caught her ear. Luz glanced over her shoulder and grinned. The cavalry was on its way.
Amity approached the beached Aerostar, sitting atop a hulking mass of purple metal shot through with the silver gleam of moonlight. She perched on what might have been a shoulder, if the quadrupedal monstrosity had been walking on its rear limbs. Its arms and legs looked to be a braid of articulating segments working in tandem, terminating in wide, bulky gauntlets and broad, three-toed feet. A red, shimmering glow lit the ground before its two massive arms—the swirling dust and smoke caught in the laser grid looked like digital flames breathed out by the lumbering mechanical beast. Luz could see the outlines of Min, Nate, and Shawn underneath the shifting metal plates that added volume to the assembly, suspended on a web of cables and articulating arms. Abe’s dome sat where the head would have been, his pixelated purple goop-face grinning down at the three girls by the minivan. The Abomination tipped forward, letting Amity slip off to the ground.
Thalia stared up at the robot as she muttered, “What the fuck.”
Alma squinted at the purple mass and asked, “...Shawn?”
Green light flashed from within the robot’s superstructure, and a single three-fingered manipulator pulled loose from a mounting point on the automaton’s leg to give the seated girls a wrist-twisting wave.
Luz skipped up to the Abomination and gasped, gesturing with both hands, “Holy shit, you guys are huge! You look awesome! Up top!” She raised one arm high in the air, and the massive automaton lifted a broad-fingered hand to receive a high-five. She jumped up and down, giggling, illuminated by flashes of green-green-green.
“I— I wasn’t sure what they’d need,” Amity’s uncertainty and shyness went hand-in-hand, to Luz’s delight. “So I had them bring all their extra parts.”
Alma watched the other two and sighed, “Esto es muy raro.” 12
“Creo que sí me golpeé la cabeza,” Thalia added13 in a confused monotone, still staring. “What— is going on?”
Amity waved a hand toward the cluster of machinery, “You might remember meeting Shawn earlier?” When Alma and Thalia nodded, the green-haired girl continued, “He and his siblings are going to get you back on the road.”
“What?!” Alma tried to stand, but the Abomination moved down the slope with deceptive grace before she gained her footing. It held its arms out like it was about to scoop the minivan up from the ground, bridal-style.
“Wait, wait, wait!” Luz called, jogging alongside the machine, holding her palms out, “You can’t just pick it up like that, the frame might give out!” The Abomination wheezed a questioning tone as it took a step back, green and red lights flashed from its screens. “It’d be best if you lifted it by the suspension,” Luz pointed at the corners of the Aerostar, “Ya’ get a hand up under each control arm and lift at the same time.”
The large automaton slumped its shoulders in something like disappointment, and a pair of words flickered across Abe’s dome, chased by a question mark. No scoop?
“Sorry, big guy,” Luz patted the Abomination on the arm, “No scoop.”
It turned and looked at Amity, perhaps hoping for a different answer. The pale girl laughed. “If Luz said ‘no’, you’d better listen.” The Abomination nodded its black domed head, then split open like a flower. Its arms and legs peeled apart, and the large panels forming its tapered-wedge torso folded up into stacked layers suspended over the three larger robots’ upper plates. They looked like they were wearing long backpacks. Min had an extra pair of jointed arms mounted above her front edge, and she scuttled sideways to face the nose of the minivan.
“Perfect,” the brown-haired girl grinned. “Abe, zip around and get a good look at things for the others,” Luz made a sweeping motion with her hand, and the domed automaton gave her a salute. “Shawn, Nate, get in position at the rear corners,” she ordered, and the robots clambered into place, following in their brother’s footsteps. The other three watched as the girl in the cowboy hat wrangled the robots: Alma and Thalia with a mixture of confusion and surprise, and Amity with a studious excitement, her eyes bright and her bottom lip pressed between her teeth. Luz patted Abe on the dome when he returned to her side, “Good job, Abe. Now,” she addressed the others, her hands out like she was lifting something, “It’s definitely not level right now, but get ‘er leveled out when you lift. Min’s got the heavy end, are you good to go backward up the slope?”
The heavy robot flashed a green-green-green from her screen, one road-side leg raised in a thumbs-up.
“Alright, on three? One… Two…”
~
Alma sat inside ALMANAC, staring down the Interstate into the distance from the shoulder. The Ford’s dim flashers blinked on and off, shining a cloudy orange rim light across the two women standing at the nose of the minivan. Luz talked with her hands, pointing at a map on her phone in between exaggerated motions with both arms. Her tall friend nodded, giving her a soft-spoken response. Even with their windows down, and the relative hush between clusters of passing cars, Alma couldn’t hear the words exchanged by the other two. She watched the silver moonlight play across the nighttime scene for another heartbeat, then lifted her camera to her eye.
Thalia looked out her window with a slight frown stretched across her features. “This feels weird,” the tawny-haired girl glanced at Alma before giving a slight shrug, “We’re too high.”
“Yeah,” Alma couldn’t help but agree, “It’s like we’re flying.” She leaned out her window and listened to the chirp and chatter of the purple robots holding their minivan up in the air, like the world’s unlikeliest pallbearers.
She might be sitting in the driver’s seat, but she didn’t feel like she was in control of anything. She didn’t like this at all. They were stuck in a limbo of sorts—literally, held off the ground!—at the mercy of these apparent Good Samaritans. Alma wasn’t a fool, she knew they needed help—they were stranded in the middle of nowhere! But… could they trust these women? If she wanted to keep Thalia’s dream alive, she’d need the help they appeared to offer. It seemed too good to be true; was she wrong to suspect a “But first…” of some kind was coming?
Luz and the tall woman with green hair must have come to some conclusion, as the shorter of the two stashed her phone in her pocket and pulled out her keys. Alma couldn’t help but frown—the way those two looked at each other? She narrowed her eyes as she watched. The pale woman brushed her hair back over an ear, and Luz just stared up at her. The nerve of her! Teasing her about Thalia when she was a lovestruck moron too?
Thalia made a soft aww and reached out to pat Alma on the arm, “Aww, miralas,” her companion gushed14, “Son muy tiernas.”
“Oh si,” Alma grumbled15 under her breath, “Ellas son desagradables.” She snapped another photo as the taller one laughed, her hands raised like she was holding something close to her heart, Luz giving her a pair of finger guns and a wink. The tanned woman waved a hand as she backed away, then turned and jogged toward the brown semi’s trailer glistening in the moonlight.
Artwork by the Amazing Mexfan!
The green-haired woman walked counterclockwise around the minivan, bending down to speak to her robots as flashes of green and red light illuminated the grass and pavement on either side. The top of her head appeared at Thalia’s window, and then she climbed up beside the passenger door, half-crouched on a dark purple metal plate that her largest robot held steady.
“Sorry to keep you waiting,” the pale woman said, as if she had some reason to apologize. She said it so nicely, too! Like she meant it. Alma and Thalia watched her shift her feet and settle in beside the open window, one hand clinging to the luggage rack on the roof. The woman pointed toward the tractor-trailer up ahead, “Luz said there might be a place at the next exit where we can get your tire fixed.”
Alma snorted in derision and Thalia glanced between the other two with a worried look on her face. “There’s no fixing that tire,” the dark-haired girl groused, setting her camera down before she clawed her hands in frustration, “It was shredded.”
The pale woman pressed her mouth into a solemn frown and nodded in agreement, “That is true, I… I’m sorry.”
“Why are you apologizing?” Alma growled as her anxiety gave way to a sudden, white-hot anger, “You two show up, and—”
“Almita!” Thalia hissed a sharp note that cut the other girl short, then reached out to thread their fingers together. Alma looked away, breathing heavily as she tried to calm herself. “I’m sorry,” the tawny-haired girl said to the woman at her window, pausing just long enough to squeeze Alma’s hand, “We are thankful you stopped to help us… miss…?”
“Miss—? Oh! I’m so sorry,” the pale woman gave an embarrassed chuckle, and her golden eyes flicked toward Alma when the dark-haired girl made an unhappy sound at a third apology. “My name is Amity,” she held out a hand, and Thalia gave it a gentle shake. “Amity Blight.”
Alma nearly choked on her next breath. Thalia gasped, her fingers going rigid around Amity’s hand. “A– Amity Blight?!” the tawny-haired girl squeaked.
A pained look crossed the pale woman’s face as she quickly looked away, “Just Amity, please.” Her shoulders curled up around her ears as she sighed in resignation.
“Why are you helping us?!” Alma managed to ask, looking straight-up horrified. Thalia chimed in with a quick, “We’re nobodies!”
“No,” Amity fixed them both with a firm look, shaking her head. “You and I,” she focused on Thalia, her gaze softening in understanding before she looked down at her hands, “We have to prove ourselves to other people, for— for permission to live our lives the way we want,” a faint snarl curled her lip, and Amity blinked eyes hardened with determination. “Luz has— she— she says it’s okay to need help,” she turned a fond, pink-cheeked look down the road toward the waiting truck, “and— and if you can help someone, you should.” She turned back to the girls in the minivan, their eyes still wide with shock and confusion. “So we’re going to try to get you on your way home.”
“But—” Thalia started to protest. Amity held up a hand to interrupt, like, hold on a sec, before she leaned down to pat the metal plate with a thump thump.
“Lead the way, Abe!”
~
Luz studied her mirrors as Hooty’s engine rumbled beneath her feet. The Interstate behind them was finally clear, and she flicked on her left-turn blinkers. She wrapped one hand around the gear shift, centering the stick and pushing up into first before she eased off the clutch. Hooty inched forward, a deep, throaty growl filling the cabin as he bounced and swayed back onto the pavement. Luz shifted gears once he was clear of the grass, still accelerating, and glanced out her passenger window when a shimmering red glow caught her eye.
Abe galloped along beside her truck in the grass, mapping the terrain for obstacles as he ran point for Amity and the others. Luz turned the wheel in a slow, gentle curve to settle Hooty in the right-hand lane, still working her pedals and gears as she increased her speed. Abe surged forward and hopped onto the road, pulling casters from storage compartments in a smoothly choreographed display of balance, pulling away from the big rig a moment later once all six wheels were on the concrete.
A flicker of motion caught her eye, and Luz looked out her passenger window again. This time, she watched the rickety red Aerostar trundle past the nose of her truck, braced atop the other three robots like a fat-bodied mechanical spider with an unnecessary number of legs. Amity waved at her from where she perched beside the minivan— Luz did a double-take, her mouth dropping open in surprise. “Hey!” she yelled, not that the grinning golden-eyed girl would be able to hear. “You’re supposed to be in the van!”
Min and her brothers scuttled out onto the Interstate, donning their caster wheels in a swift dance. In seconds, ALMANAC shot forward, putting distance between themselves and Hooty’s front bumper. The wind tugged at Amity’s hair as she leaned back and laughed up at the night sky; she might have been a Studio Ghibli heroine on a flying machine built with her own two hands. Luz shook her head and snorted at the sheer audacity, and continued to pick up speed.
~
The unlikely convoy managed the next several miles without incident, to Luz’s amazement and immense thankfulness. It seemed like Hooty had barely reached a respectable cruising speed before his headlights played across the green sign that marked EXIT 201 for BELLE PLAINE / WHAT CHEER.
“Belle plaine, wotch’ya ‘ear, then, eh?” Luz mangled the nonsense phrase with her excruciating British accent, waggling her eyebrows as she tossed an “eh wot, lass, d‘y’knowhatimean?! (*)” toward the empty passenger’s seat. The tanned girl laughed and sighed as she downshifted, signaling for the exit. “Oh, Amity would’ve laughed, right Hooty?” The even growl of his diesel engine was unhelpfully vague as she rounded the curve and slowed at the stop sign.
Luz checked both directions, glad to see a relative lack of headlights on this featureless county road. ALMANAC slewed across the oncoming lanes in a wide turn that just looked wrong—probably felt wrong too, given the way Alma clutched at the useless steering wheel with both hands. Luz craned her neck one way, then the other—better safe than sorry—before pulling out in a slow left turn to hug the dotted yellow line. Hooty’s cabin bobbed from side to side as she slowed for the second left turn into the Kwik Star Gas Station parking lot.
A single line of gas pumps ran along the western side of the building, close to the row of parking spots against the sidewalk and the personal vehicles parking area just to the north. The line of taller gas pumps to the south of the building had angled lanes, which would make it easier for visiting big rigs to make the right-hand turn to loop around and behind the truck & trailer parking. A 24-hour Denny’s shared the building with the Kwik Star, and the delicious scent of grilled food drifting through the air set Luz’s stomach rumbling. Lunch soon, Luz thought as she guided the brown truck along the western edge of the parking lot, aiming for the white warehouse to the north of the Kwik Star, but fiirrst…
She pulled past the cement barricades that divided the Denny’s parking lot from that of the Lone Star Truck and Tire Company, and turned Hooty to face the East, easing the double-brown big rig to a halt parallel to the temporary cement wall. As Luz set the parking brake and killed the rumbling diesel engine, she saw a flash of red and green in her driver’s door mirrors. She rolled her window down with a squeak, squeak, squeak as Amity’s robots sidled up beside her truck. Luz leaned out her window and tipped her cowboy hat up with a thumb, then fixed the green-haired girl with a smouldering grin. “Hey,” Luz’s greeting was a low, husky growl.
Amity turned red and coughed into her fist. Thalia looked up at the taller girl and smiled, while Alma rolled her eyes and made a noise out her window. The golden-eyed girl ran a hand back through her hair, tucking it behind an ear as she replied with a shy, “H– Hi.”
Luz gave her a flat glare and pointed at ALMANAC, “You were supposed to be in the van.”
“I— wha-?! I can’t just—” Amity spluttered, before motioning toward the rusty red Aerostar at her side, “—invite myself in, that’s— that’s impolite.” She had the good grace to look guilty, as if she were a child caught with her hand in the cookie jar.
“Are we a vampire now?” Luz teased as she pushed her door open, chuckling as the robots rolled away from Hooty to give her room to hop down.
Amity crossed her arms and huffed, “Not a vampire.”
“If you say so, my pale creature of the night,” Luz waved up at the star-sprinkled sky as she lent Amity a hand to step down from the robot’s metal platform, “What’s our next move?” The tanned girl twirled her keys on her finger as the green-haired girl glanced between the minivan and the truck.
“I want to see about the tire first,” Amity said as she started to climb up into the cabin, “I need my envelope, can I get you anything?”
“My jacket,” Luz called back without thinking. A moment later she blurted out, “Wait! I’ll get it!” as she clambered up into the truck after the taller girl.
~
Alma couldn’t tell if this Amity lady was impatient or just anxious about getting back on the road. The tall woman had wanted to march over to the Lone Star building as soon as they’d climbed out of the minivan—or were lifted out in Alma’s case, by an eager-to-help Shawn—but Luz talked her into a quick inspection. If she’s busted up underneath, new tires aren’t gonna do any good, she’d reasoned as she handed her white cowboy hat to her companion.
The big robot had lifted her minivan into the air, easily, like an Olympic strongman hoisting an extra large pizza, and now Luz half-crouched with slightly bent knees while she played a small flashlight across the mud-caked undercarriage. She motioned for the smaller robot with the black dome to join her, pointing at something and asking his opinion.
Alma crossed her arms and growled, “No me gusta esto, Michi.” 16 Seeing her grandfather’s Aerostar poked and prodded, watching the suspiciously friendly trucker frown up at her baby in something like distaste turned her stomach. Sure, she was old, but Scarlet had never let her down before. She just kept on going— Alma couldn’t remember Abuelo Luis ever having any issues with the old girl in all the years he’d spent behind the wheel. She was dependable. Or she was, of course. You get the keys and you send her into a ditch.
Thalia glanced her way just as she frowned and shook her head, trying to clear away those awful thoughts she heard in her own voice. “What’s wrong?” she asked, and Alma pressed her lips together and shook her head again. The tawny-haired girl lowered her voice to a soft, soothing tone, “Almita, ¿por qué estás tan enojada con ellas?” she asked17 as she motioned toward the two women.
Alma’s eyes flicked from Thalia to Amity and Luz, then back to meet her roommate’s gray eyes. The taller woman was still half-sitting on the flank of one of the other two robots, watching Luz hold her flashlight in her teeth as she used both hands to push against one of the tires. The big robot made a blatt! of displeasure, shifting her stance slightly.
“Es casi un milagro que estaban ahí para ayudarnos,” Thalia added18 with a flabbergasted tone.
“It’s—” Alma pinched the bridge of her nose between thumb and forefinger as she sighed and squeezed her eyes shut. Why couldn’t she see? It’s not— was she being paranoid? Without cause, at least? She tried again, “Es solo que—” 19 The words froze in Alma’s throat; Luz glanced their way, then turned her eyes back up to the minivan as she began to talk loudly to the domed robot at her knee. Was she just pretending to give them a bit of privacy? Amity, at least, sat still as a statue, staring off into space. She probably hadn’t noticed they were talking.
Alma turned back to Thalia and leaned close, curling a hand around the taller girl’s elbow. “Mira, tiene que haber una trampa, ‘Lia y— estoy asustada, okay?” 20 Thalia’s gaze softened, and Alma couldn’t stand to hold it anymore. She looked down at the ground as she folded her arms across her chest, “Estoy asustada de haber arruinado todo y que no puedo arreglarlo por mi cuenta, y— y no puedo confiar en ellas, es— es demasiado conveniente, yo solo—” 21 Alma unclenched her arms and jabbed both hands toward the airborne Aerostar, “Y mi van—?” 22 She paused to gulp down some air as she pushed her fingers back through her hair, “Como voy a llevarte a casa?! Y—” 23
“Respirá, Almita,” Thalia interrupted24 with a gentle shush, rubbing a hand across the shorter girl’s shoulders, “Frená y respirá.” 25
“Arruine todo, Michi,” the dark-haired girl whispered26 into her hands.
“No te rindas,” 27 Thalia pulled her close and pressed her cheek against Alma’s temple, whispering, “Lo vamos a superar juntas.” 28
Luz stepped out from under the Aerostar and glanced at the two younger girls as they huddled close, whispering to each other. She turned away, trying to give them some space as best she could; Alma looked upset, and staring at the poor girl while she cried wouldn’t help her feel any better. B’sides, one last thing to check. Luz patted the side panel of the minivan as she examined the tireless rear wheel, like she was soothing a frightened animal.
Abe whirred to her knee and tilted up to face her, then cocked his body to one side in a wordless question.
“Can you loosen these lug nuts?” Luz tapped at the bare rim, “I wanna pull this off.”
The helpful robot reached up with a pair of manipulator arms, then chirped a tone to Min when he couldn’t quite reach every bolt. His sister adjusted her footing with a low-pitched whine, and the rusty red Aerostar lowered by nearly a foot. Abe happily went to work, holding the rim still with one three-fingered hand while he pinched each lug nut with the tips of his manipulator, spinning his wrist counter-clockwise to unthread them one at a time. Most of the five were reluctant to move, and took a few seconds of increasing pressure to break loose from the rust and grime. He handed each one to Luz as they came free, and she lined them up on the edge of the rear bumper. Abe pulled the rim from the wheel hub before Luz could reach for it, and made a suave little bow when she laughed in surprise.
“Wullll, thank ye’ kindly, good sir,” the tanned girl drawled as she pulled her flashlight from her pocket, shining the beam at a shallow angle across the surface of the rotor. The metal was pitted and scored, and it wobbled slightly when she rotated the wheel hub. Luz grimaced at the thought of these girls driving another thousand miles on such thin, warped brakes. “Abe, scan this for me,” Luz whispered to the purple goo-face at her side, “How thick is this rotor?”
Abe’s laser grid played across the edge of the metal disc while she rotated the housing, and moments later a set of numbers flickered across his dome: 9.46mm.
“No shit,” Luz wrinkled her brow and frowned, “How thick’s a new one? Can you look that up?” 30.0mm. Yikes, she made a face. That was worse than she’d thought. She tucked her flashlight between her jaw and her shoulder, then pointed at the slider pins holding the caliper in place. “Loosen this top one just a smidge, and remove the bottom one completely, please,” and within seconds she was able to wiggle the caliper free and swing it up and away from the rotor. Luz hummed an idle tune while she worked the first suspiciously thin brake pad free of its retention clip, then held it up to Abe, “How’s this look?”
He had barely painted its edge with a glimmer of light before he flashed a red-red-red.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Luz handed him the brake pad and pulled a rag from her back pocket to wipe her hands. Abe dropped the worn-out brake pad on the ground beside the bare rim and brushed his fingers together, as if he too were wiping his hands.
Luz turned to Amity and nodded, then looked at the other girls as she pocketed her flashlight. “Good news first,” she said, working at a stubborn spot of grease on her knuckle, “I didn’t see any leaks or obvious damage to the drive train.” She smiled and patted the Aerostar’s flank, “Her engine was still purring when we got to you, the back tires turning too, so I think she’s alright.” Luz hunched down to pat Min on the shoulder with a grin, “Thanks, Mighty-Min!” She glanced at Abe, then to Shawn and Nate beside Amity, “You guys get comfy until we come back, I dunno how long this’ll take.”
Amity nodded, bending forward slightly at the waist to speak to the boys, “Stay still or stay hidden as much as you can,” she pointed toward the tall brown truck and trailer, “And stay on this side of Hooty.” The robots all raised a hand in a three-fingered thumbs-up.
~
The bell over the front office door jingled as Luz pushed in walking backward, holding the door for Amity to enter. “...why it’s not safe to just replace the one,” the tanned girl said, her head turning to follow the pale girl walking past, adding, “They’ll need two or four.”
“Four,” Amity decided with a nod.
“Be right with you!” a man’s friendly voice called from the back office area, hidden by a half-closed metal door. A small radio on a shelf behind the counter blared a tinny rendition of a familiar song.
Well I don’t know why I came here tonight.
I’ve got the feeling that something ain’t right
Luz stepped aside to let Alma and Thalia walk through, then jogged a few steps to lean against the counter at Amity’s side. She glanced at the envelope full of cash in the pale girl’s hands, and tapped it with the back of her knuckle as she peered up at the taller girl, “Y’know, I could put it on Eda’s card—”
“No,” Amity shook her head, her jaw set, “I’m doing this.”
“Are you sure?” Luz asked with a tilt of her head, her eyebrows furrowed in concern.
“I need to do this, with— with what I have on hand.”
“I’m good either way, just— You were scared about funds yesterday, and—”
“—but it wouldn’t mean anything if I had you pay for it,” Amity interrupted in a quiet voice before turning to face the brown-haired girl. “You’re right. I was scared yesterday. Mother—” Amity pinched her face in disgust and shook her head. “No, Odalia tries to keep me scared all the time, and I’m sick of being afraid!” She reached out with a gentle hand and placed cool fingers across Luz’s arm, “I trust you, Luz… I know you’ll take care of me,” the golden-eyed girl watched as Luz’s face flushed a dusty red, and Amity gave her a soft smile. “They need help today, and I— I’m in a position to help.” The two younger girls from the Aerostar stood a few steps away. Alma crossed her arms as she listened, clearly unhappy, while Thalia held a gentle hand on her companion’s shoulder. Amity tapped the envelope in her hands against the counter, looking down at it for a moment as she smiled, “I… I think Emmy would be happy with my decision.”
“I know she would,” Luz gave her a lopsided grin as she patted Amity on the arm, “I know I’m hella proud of you.”
Amity gave her a side-eye glance and snorted, “Who says ‘hella’ anymore?”
“What can I say?” Luz laughed as she leaned back against the counter, her hands behind her neck. She grinned, and pulled an exaggerated Los Angeleno accent, “Cali girls, chica, they amaaazin’.”
A red-haired man in a rumpled work shirt came out of the back office with a yawn and a chuckle. “Whoops, sorry,” he waved a greeting, scratching at his 10 o’clock shadow, “I’m Jordan, how can I help you tonight?” He stood just to one side of the computer sitting on the counter, then reached back to turn the radio volume down.
“I’d like to buy four tires,” Amity said.
“You cannot just buy us four new tires!” Alma protested as she rounded the taller girl’s other side.
Amity ignored the outburst and raised her chin. “Fine. I’m going to buy five tires,” the pale girl cocked an eyebrow as she gave Alma a quick glare, before letting her eyes slide down and away from the shorter girl. “Please,” she added for Jordan’s benefit.
Alma gritted her teeth and opened her mouth to speak again when Thalia placed a hand on her shoulder. The shorter girl muttered something that Luz couldn’t hear. Amity kept her face pointed forward with a deliberately placid expression fixed on her face.
Clowns to the left of me!
Jokers to the right!
Here I am stuck in the middle with you.
Jordan glanced from one girl to the next, trying to keep a hesitant grin at bay. When a few heartbeats had passed without another outburst, he cleared his throat and looked at his tall, green-haired customer, “Aaand what kind of tires do you need?”
Amity blinked twice, and her confident face fell. “Ha!” Alma crowed, taking a step backward to point up at the pale girl, “You don’t even know—”
“Almita,” Thalia scolded29, “pará un poco!”
Amity turned a fierce glare on the shorter girl, her chin raised and eyes narrowed, “What kind of tires do you need?”
The dark-haired girl shrugged, “How should I—” She cut herself short with a choked gasp of outrage when Amity’s face twisted in a self-satisfied smirk.
Luz rolled her eyes, “Girls, please.” She tapped at the smartphone in her hand, then zoomed in on a photo. She glanced at Jordan and gave a quick upward nod, “Looks like two-fifteen slash seventy, R fourteen.”
Jordan mmm-hmmm’d as he grabbed the mouse and clicked, then slowly typed with both index fingers. “Two one five… seven zero… aaaand—” he clicked again, “Fourteen-inch radial?” clicketty click. “Alright we have…” the red-haired man squinted at the screen, “We do have some in stock. Hankook All-Season or the GT Radial Touring?” He glanced from one customer to the next before adding, “That’s a summer tire.”
Luz and Amity exchanged a glance. “All-Season,” the tanned girl decided, and Amity nodded in agreement. Alma crossed her arms over her chest as she frowned.
Jordan glanced at the younger pair, and pressed his lips into a line. “Okay,” he said, trying to hide the amusement in his voice, “The All-Seasons are ninety-eight dollars each.”
“That’s not so bad?” Amity looked down at Luz and whispered, “Four ninety.” Luz huffed a laugh and rubbed her knuckles under her nose.
“There’s a five dollar environmental fee per tire—state law, sorry—and a ten dollar disposal fee for the old tires. Each,” Jordan continued, “which brings you to five hundred fifty-five dollars before tax.”
“Six percent sales tax?” Amity asked, and when the man nodded, she hummed a soft, Five eight eight point three zero.
“With mounting and installation, that brings you to six hundred seventy-six dollars and thirty cents.”
Amity narrowed her eyes, “Eighty-eight dollars for mounting and installation?” She turned an uncertain side-eye toward Luz and asked, “Is that reasonable?”
Luz shrugged with one arm, “Mounting a tire is fairly easy, but we’d be paying for his expertise.” She gave Jordan a quick appraisal, then looked up at Amity, “I’m sure he can get them done faster than I could, but we can handle the installation.”
The pale girl half-turned toward her companion and lowered her voice, “We can?”
“Yeah,” Luz gave her a half-grin, “it’ll be a good learning experience.”
Amity gave a soft gasp as she realized what Luz meant, and they shared a smile. “Oh?” the tall girl whispered, her eyes sparkling, “Okay.”
Luz winked and made a chk! noise with her teeth. Amity’s face darkened. Oh. That was a pretty shade of pink, Luz thought as she turned back to Jordan, “We’ll need new rims.”
“What’s wrong with—” Alma spluttered, “why?!”
Luz leaned on the countertop and tilted her head to catch Alma’s irritated gaze beyond Amity’s shoulder, “The one dragged across the freeway at-speed. It’s definitely bent.” She gave the dark-haired girl a gentle smile, “And if we replace one—”
“—We replace them all,” Amity finished her sentence with a nod to the man behind the counter. “Five rims, please.”
“Five?!” Alma’s voice trailed upward in confusion.
“You need a spare, bud,” Luz replied.
When you started off with nothing
And you’re proud that you’re a self-made man.
Ooooo-ooo-oooh
Jordan caught Luz’s eye over the monitor, and she shot him a wide grin. “Okay,” the man said, click-clicketty clicking, “All I have in that size are the basic steel.”
“S’fine,” Luz waved a hand.
The man clicked again and tapped a key on his keyboard, “Those are sixty-one dollars a piece,” he clicked once more, glancing around his screen. Amity mouthed, three zero five, and Luz shook her head and smiled. “Aaand the lug nut set is fifty-five dollars.”
“Fifty-five?” Luz laughed, “That’s the best you can do?” She tipped a thumb over her shoulder toward the Kwik Star Gas Station, “I bet they have lug nuts.”
Jordan made a half-embarrassed shrug, “Yeah, for seventy bucks.” He pulled a laminated chart out from under his keyboard and ran a finger down one column, “Since you’re getting rims and tires, I can give you… free mounting, a hundred bucks off the set of four aannnd the full-size spare at half price.”
“My man,” Luz slapped the countertop with both hands, “That is so cool.”
“Yes, thank you,” Amity agreed, whispering, “Seven seven nine point six eight,” as she ran a thumbnail across the bills in her envelope. Luz gave her a fond pat on the arm.
“My pleasure,” Jordan said as he clicked and tapped a few keys on his keyboard. “That brings your total to seven hundred—” He glanced up when Amity held out a small handful of bills mid-sentence, “—seventy-nine dollars and sixty-eight cents.”
“Seven eighty, keep the change.”
Jordan chuckled and held his palm up for the cash, “Boy, you’re on top o’ things, ain’t’cha?”
“She’s a bit of a math whiz,” Luz said with a grin as she nudged Amity with an elbow. The pale girl blushed under the unexpected praise, before she tucked her envelope back in her pocket.
After finalizing the sale, Jordan slid the work order printout across the counter to the green-haired girl, “Is there anything else I can help you with before I get started on those wheels?”
“Thank you,” Amity gave him a nod as she folded the work order, “If we need—”
“—Actually, it’s my turn now, budge over,” Luz interrupted, bumping Amity with her hip as she playfully pushed her way in front. The tall girl scoffed, giggling, Luz! as she took an unexpected step sideways. Luz patted her hands on the counter in a rhythm with the song and grinned, “Brake pads and rotors, all around.”
Yes I’m stuck in the middle with you…
Jordan glanced toward Alma’s noise of confusion, then clicked his mouse, “Let me ssssee…” clicketty-click “…Semi-metallic or ceramic?”
“Ceramic.”
He turned a good-natured grin Luz’s way, “You lookin’ for a high-performance kit?”
The brown-haired girl laughed, “Buddy, it’s a minivan.”
“Fair, that’s fair,” the man chuckled, squinting at his screen. “The Powerstop brand pad and rotor sets are one-sixty-five ninety-nine. You need one for the front and the back?” (**)
“Yyyyup,” Luz popped the ‘p’ sound as she pulled Eda’s Sharpie-blackened credit card from her pocket, “two sets.” She shot an amused glance up at Amity when the golden-eyed girl whispered Three five one point eight nine.
“That’ll be three hundred fifty-one dollars and eighty-nine cents,” Jordan said, sliding a card reader forward, “Whenever you’re ready.” After Luz used the chip reader, the register made a satisfied beep. He walked to a far shelf and pulled a pair of black boxes down while Luz’s receipt spooled out of the printer. The red-haired man set the boxes on the counter with a thump and pushed them to the far edge. “Is your vehicle nearby?” he asked as he tore off the receipt to hand to Luz.
“Yeah, out in your lot,” Luz nodded backward while she stuffed the receipt in her pocket, “Close to the Denny’s divider.”
Jordan grunted in acknowledgement as he clicked a few more times. “Alright, you don’t have to stay here if you don’t want to,” he motioned toward the warehouse side of the building, “I’ll bring your tires out on a cart once I got ‘em ready.”
“Thanks, Jordan,” Luz held her hand out and received a firm handshake, “You’ve been a great help. I’ve been Luz.”
“Luz,” he repeated, before nodding at the others, “Ladies.” He turned and walked toward the STAFF-ONLY door.
“Just gimme a whistle when the tires’re done,” the brown-haired girl called, “and we’ll come grab ‘em.” He waved as he passed through the metal door, and Luz turned to face the other three girls with a smile. “Well, that was fun,” she said with a bright tone. She wrapped both arms around the two boxes of brake parts on the counter and slid them off into her grasp. “Oh god!” she yelped, her knees buckling at the unexpected weight.
Amity clicked her tongue and said, “Let me, Luz,” in a fondly exasperated voice. She lifted both boxes from Luz’s trembling arms with ease and turned toward the door.
“I— I’ll get the door for you!” Thalia said as she jumped to beat the slightly taller girl to the entrance.
Alma and Luz remained standing by the countertop for a few heartbeats. Luz stifled a giggle behind her palm. “Did you… do that on purpose?” Alma asked with a frown.
“Have you seen her muscles?” Luz stage-whispered as she patted her bicep, then she smiled just a bit wider than before. Alma sighed and stomped away to follow the other two. Luz skipped in her wake as they passed through the doorway, and she pulled up beside the dark-haired girl as the door jingled shut behind them. “You know how to change a flat tire, right?” Luz asked Alma as she gave her a gentle nudge with her elbow.
Alma pulled up short, her arms and legs rigid with irritation as she hissed, “Yes!” She sucked in a quick breath and held it for several long seconds before she let the air whistle out between her teeth. She lowered her head and sighed, “Sorry… yes. Abuelo made sure I knew how.”
Luz half-turned to face her and nodded, “That’s good. Good of him to teach you.” Alma glanced up to see a kindness in the other girl’s brown eyes. “Smart man,” Luz added.
Alma nodded and licked her lips, searching for the right words. “He… called me ‘Almanac’ when I was little. I was always telling him things I learned at school.”
“That’s cute,” Luz chuckled, then tipped her head toward their vehicles waiting a short walk away, “Hence the license plate?”
The dark-haired girl nodded, “Scarlet was…” She cleared her throat. “Scarlet was his baby. Not sure why a minivan, instead of a muscle car?” The girls shared a laugh, and Alma sighed, “Abuela said he wanted me to have it, after… after he passed.”
“I’m sorry,” Luz offered, her eyes tightening with understanding.
“Thanks,” Alma rubbed at one arm with her other hand, her eyes glued to the Aerostar across the parking lot. Luz followed her gaze, and smiled at the sight of Amity and Thalia crouched down to speak to the twin robots, while Abe spun in circles around the group. After a heavy silence, Alma offered a hushed, “I only have a few things of his… Things that he held in his hands, if… if that makes sense.” She took a deep, halting breath. “When… Seeing her down in the grass? I… Siento que lo volví a perder.” 30
Luz looked down at her hands, and then over at the shorter girl’s profile. “Are you alright?” she asked in a gentle voice.
“No, I’ve—” Alma pressed her lips into a line as she shook her head, “I’ve been awful to you and your… friend.”
Luz huffed and muttered, “Not sure why you paused like that—” and coughed into her fist. “You have been a little… testy?” Luz shrugged, “But I don’t blame you.” She shoved her hands in her pockets as she took a few long, loping steps forward before twisting around on one heel and one toe. “Tonight’s been rough on you both, you’re prob’ly gonna feel like hell in the morning.”
Alma crossed her arms and grumbled, “Genial.” 31
“What I’m sayin’ is, I understand,” Luz pulled a hand from her pocket to tap at her white and purple-wrapped cowboy hat. “This was my dad’s. I’d be heartbroken if anything happened to it, but…” She lifted it from her head and shook out her brown curls, brushing a hand across the soft leather of its crown, “...but I can’t just leave it at home, either.” She looked up at Alma and caught her eye. “I hafta keep it close.”
The shorter girl nodded as she hummed a note of understanding. “También lo lamento.” 32
“Yeah—” Luz clicked her tongue as she set the hat back on her head, patting it into place, “You wanna say sorry to Amity? That’s cool. But you and I are good.”
“Thanks, Luz,” Alma tilted her head, “For everything.”
“No problem,” the tanned girl grinned and pointed a thumb back over her shoulder. “Now c’mon, I’ll teach you and the boys how to do your brakes.”
Alma’s mouth fell open before she could muster a petulant, “Oh, what?”
“Yeah, c’mon, come on!” Luz laughed, placing a hand on the other girl’s shoulder to lead her back to their waiting companions, “You’re gonna love it!”
Unfortunately, Luz was mistaken. Alma did not love it.
Notes:
(*) For Lucy
(**) In this AU, the Ford Aerostar line didn't have rear drum brakes. I do what I want.I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and New Years. I did too, just, not a whole lot of time for writing.
Thanks for reading, and have a great day!
Update: I forgot to add the translations at the bottom. Once again, my deepest thanks to Goofy and Mex <3
Thalia: What just happened? 1
Alma: My glasses fell off 2
Thalia: You’re welcome 3Alma: Oh god, my camera! 4
Thalia: What about—? (my guitar) 5
Alma: It’s here! 6
Thalia: Keep watching over us, Mamá 7Alma: Oh my god, ‘Lia… what are we going to do? 8
Thalia: I don’t know 9Thalia: I knew it wasn’t going to work out, anyway 10
Alma: Michi! Quit saying that!11Alma: This is so weird 12
Thalia: I think maybe I did hit my head 13
Thalia: “Aww, look at them,” her companion gushed, “they're adorable.” 14
“Oh yeah,” Alma grumbled under her breath, “They’re disgusting alright.” 15Alma: I don’t like this, Michi 16
Thalia: Almita, why are you so mad at them? 17
Thalia: It's almost a miracle that they were there to help us 18Alma: It’s just too— 19
Alma: Look, there’s gotta be a catch, ‘Lia, and— and I’m scared, okay? 20Alma: I’m scared I’ve messed everything up and I can’t fix it by myself, and— and I can’t just trust them, it’s too— it’s too convenient, I just— 21
Alma: And my van—? 22
Alma: How will I get you home?! And— 23Thalia: Breathe, Almita 24
Thalia: Stop and breathe 25Alma: I’ve ruined everything, Michi 26
Thalia: Don’t give up 27
Thalia: We can get through this together 28“Almita,” Thalia scolded, “that’s enough!” 29
Alma: I felt like I’d lost him again 30
Alma: great 31
Alma: I’m sorry too 32
Chapter 27: Wednesday, 10:49pm
Notes:
Once again, a big thanks to GoofyGomez and Mexfan for their permission to use Alma & Thalia, and for their assistance with the translations. Their help is invaluable in capturing the essence of their characters.
As before, the often-imitated, never-duplicated GoreMiser suggested having the translations on mouse-hover for the Spanish text, so I've added that inline. I've also added anchor links with superscript numbers linking to the translations in the end notes. Hopefully that's a good fallback for mobile users :)
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
“Are you sure?” Alma glanced up at Luz, hesitation plainly written on her face.
Luz nodded, “Uh-huh, yeah, just give ’er a good yank.” She pressed one elbow on the red Aerostar’s front quarter panel as she leaned forward to tap the caliper with a knuckle, “Abe already pulled the bottom pin out, it’ll swing up this way—” she rotated her wrist to illustrate, “—but you’ll need to put some force into it.”
“Si tú lo dices,” the shorter girl muttered1. She took a moment to find a comfortable grip, then pushed to no visible effect. She cleared her throat and planted her feet, then pushed again, leaning into the effort with shaking hands and a groan. Abe tilted his front half upward, giving her a little boost. The brake assembly squealed twice and jerked free with a puff of crumbling rust. Alma gingerly lifted it up and let it rest against the wheel’s mounting arm. “Okay, now what?”
“Best case scenario, your rotor’s still good,” Luz tapped at the metal disc, “Then you just swap in new pads. But…” She ran a fingertip over the pitted metal, tracing a line gouged into the surface, “This needs to go.” She squatted next to where Alma sat on Abe’s back, and Abe rolled a few inches to one side to let the tanned woman peer into the wheel well. “Alright, step two-point-one,” Luz said as she reached out to curl a finger around the loop of metal holding the brake pads in place on either side of the rotor. “This bracket needs to come out before we can get the rotor off, lemme—” she pushed herself upright with a grunt, and patted at her pants pockets to find her keys. “Lemme go grab a few bungee cords, bee-arr-bee.”
“Wait,” Alma twisted around to watch the slightly taller woman walk away, “Did you just say text lingo out loud…?” When Luz waved a hand over her head to flash a peace sign, the dark-haired girl looked down at Abe and muttered, “Old people.”
Luz whistled a tune as she jogged around Hooty’s nose and unlocked the under-cab tool bay. She picked a few of the shorter bungee cords from the pile, then reached for Eda’s little black bag o’ hand tools. She bumped the panel closed with her hip and strolled back to the far side of the bench-pressed Aerostar. She nodded at Nate and Shawn as they carefully removed the wheels on the rusty minivan’s passenger side. “Good job, boys!” Luz called, tossing a glance and a huh at the empty lawn chairs sitting between the two vehicles.
~
Amity slowly paced one of the aisles inside the Kwik Star Gas Station, the two-tone brown floor tiles clacking softly beneath her heel. Everything was brown, or beige, or some… just-off pastel. She couldn’t help but scrunch her forehead and frown as she trailed her eyes across the store. Fluorescent bulbs cast greenish light from the neat grid in the drop ceiling, the just-audible hum of electricity overhead mixing with the tinny voices and music coming from the—Five, six, and two, eight!—televisions hung around the oddly-shaped Kwik Shop retail section. The coffee makers and Icee machines in the far corner attracted the most bleary-eyed customers; there were only a few shoppers wandering the snacks and miscellaneous aisles. She continued to turn on the toes of one foot until she was facing the glass double doors at the front of the shop. Thalia stood beside the Fresh Fruit shelf, gingerly rubbing one hand along her other slightly red arm as she examined the bananas and oranges on display. Amity walked back toward the other girl with a question, “If you don't mind me asking, how long have you been traveling?”
Thalia hummed a thoughtful tone as she lifted an orange for a moment, setting it back down before she answered, “Just over three weeks.” She chuckled before she sighed, and then she let her shoulders slump. “It was supposed to be a two week trip, but…” The sun-burned girl shrugged. “Some stuff happened, and then… like… would we ever have a trip like this again?” She crossed her arms under her chest and breathed out a huff of what might have been frustration, whispering, “Solo nosotras dos.”2 Amity tilted her head and watched as Thalia opened her mouth to say something else, but shook her head and kept her silence instead.
After a moment, the gray-eyed girl waved toward the slightly green bananas and changed the subject, “Almita loves them like this.” She looked up when the older woman beside her softly cleared her throat. Thalia half-turned to see Amity holding out a blue plastic hand-basket, and made a sound of surprise when the pale woman pressed the basket into her hands.
Amity nodded toward the fruit, “What would you like?”
~
“It can't be that easy—” green-green-green “—well… Fine. I’m not gonna argue with you.”
Luz walked around ALMANAC’s front bumper and dropped her tool bag on the sun-bleached concrete. “Okay,” the tanned woman interrupted Alma and Abe's conversation with a grin, holding a hand out over the shorter girl's lap, “Here, bungee cord your caliper to the spring,” Luz dropped one of the tethers into her palm, while she pointed into the wheel-well with her other hand, “Keep some slack on the brake lines—the rubber hose there—we don’t want those to pop off.”
“Oh… kay?” Alma made a face, then pulled herself forward with her toes, Abe's caster wheels free-rolling under the gentle pressure. She looped the stretchy orange cable around the heavy C-shaped part, securing it to the minivan's shock absorber.
Luz reached past her shoulder and tapped at the bolt holding the caliper—and the brake pad bracket—onto the wheel hub. “Abe, this needs to come out, and this whole bit is gonna come off,” she glanced at Alma and nodded toward the brake pads, “So be ready.” She shuffled out of the way to watch the domed robot reach behind the wheel hub with a manipulator, ready to spin the second bolt free on Alma’s command. The dark-haired girl wrapped both hands around the brake pad bracket and whispered go, tightening her grip on the components as Abe’s wrist whirred in a swift spiral. The far-too-thin brake pads fell out into her hands as Abe pulled the shaped-tube bracket loose from its rust-stuck mounting point. “Good job, you two,” Luz leaned in to look at the brake pads in Alma’s palm, and flipped one over with a fingertip. “¡Ay dios, chica!” the tanned woman tapped the scuffed metal plate, “These are so thin.”
Alma scrunched her shoulders up around her ears as she made a face, like, I just work here. “Is that bad?” she asked in a guilty tone.
“Is that b—” Luz turned a flat stare on the younger girl and huffed. “Don’t let them get like this again, okay?”
“I didn’t—” The dark-haired girl sighed and let her shoulders slump, “do it on purpose,” she finished in a low grumble.
The slightly taller woman nudged her with her forearm, “Believe me, I get it. Shit piles up when you’re in school.”
“I’ve hardly driven at all this semester,” Alma groused, tossing the old brake pads on the ground before crossing her arms in a pout.
“With these brakes, ‘s’fer the best, I’m sure.” Luz pushed at Abe’s side, and he whirred away from her until she had room to grab the rotor with both hands. “If you’re lucky—” Luz grunted as she tugged on the metal disk, “Nope, it’s stuck. If you have a rubber mallet, you can just go to town to break it loose.” She shrugged and grinned at the other girl’s snort of disbelief. “But we have Abe,” Luz reached over Alma’s knee to pat the robot’s black dome. He wheezed a happy sound. “Buddy, knock it on the back like this—” she motioned with one hand as she twisted the other, “—while you turn the hub. Maybe it won’t take too much effort.”
Abe did as instructed, tapping the backside of the rotor while he turned the hub by the five bolts spaced around the center of the wheel hub. Luz hummed an unsatisfied sound as she watched, then shook her head, “No, yeah, keep going, but start hittin’er harder.” The ringing ting of his manipulator grew louder, sharper, until the rotor jumped loose with a short squeal. “Ye~heah! Good job, bud,” the brown-haired woman gave him a gentle fist bump before pulling the worn-out brake part off the hub. “Hold this for me?” Luz asked as she held the rotor out for Abe to pinch between his three-fingered manipulator. She fumbled a hand through Eda’s tool bag for a moment, and pulled a wire brush out with an ah-ha. “Gotta clean the rust and junk off’a here,” the brown-haired woman scrubbed at the metal plate that sat behind the rotor, tossing an explanation over her shoulder, “You want it to be as smooth as possible, or else the new rotor could wobble.”
Abe and Alma watched for a minute while the taller woman scraped off the caked-on grime. “Alright, Alma,” Luz nudged the open box at her feet with a toe, “New rotor goes on in its place.”
The dark-haired girl lifted the shiny, stainless-steel disc and lined its mounting holes up with the five bolts, pushing it into place. “Just… just like that?” Alma asked, still surprised at how simple it all had been. “That’s it?”
“Yeah, that’s good!” Luz pointed at the brake pads, “Now for the slightly less-easy part…”
~
Amity turned a small plastic container over in her hands, pretending to examine the celery, cheese, and carrots tumbling about within as she watched Thalia from the corner of her eye. The tawny-haired girl had placed a pair of bananas and an orange in the basket dangling from her elbow, and now she hesitated to pick from the tray of glistening honeycrisp apples. Was her indecision a learned behavior? Amity could understand that; fear of her mother’s mercurial moods prompted a double- or triple-check whenever she was presented with a choice. Thalia sent a surreptitious glance her way while she reached for an apple, as if she expected a scolding. Or was her reluctance due to— the pale woman blinked at a thought; Gus’s cryptic phrase from the other day ran through her mind once more: You can get it, but not get it. “Thalia,” Amity swiveled to face the sun-burned girl, earning herself a squeak of surprise.
“Y– yes?” The other girl pulled her hands back, worrying her fingers together in a guilty way.
That wouldn’t do—she had nothing to be guilty about. “My apologies, I didn't mean to startle you,” Amity tipped her head as she spoke, then she added, “I should have been more clear: I want you to pick out whatever you want.”
“Uhmm,” Thalia glanced down at the sparse contents of her basket, “But, I have…?”
Amity shook her head and reached in front of the gray-eyed girl to pull a full bunch of bananas from the shelf. “Are these acceptable?” the green-haired woman asked, “These appear to match the ones you—”
“No, stop, those are five dollars a pound!” Thalia held out a hand to prevent Amity from adding the cluster to her basket.
Amity tilted her head, “Is that a good price?”
“No,” the tawny-haired girl scoffed, “It’s a terrible price!”
The tall woman eyed the fruit in her hand, then shrugged, “This can’t be more than three pounds.”
“That’s too expen— I’m—” Thalia squared her shoulders as she twisted the basket away from Amity, “I’m trying… not to be wasteful.”
Amity thought of Luz smiling up at her with a stack of donut boxes tucked under her chin, Luz who wanted to provide with no expectation of a return. Luz, who had not judged her for being ignorant of how the world outside her ivory tower truly worked. “Will you and Alma eat them?” she asked in a curious voice.
Thalia glanced down at the bananas and swallowed, forcing out a hoarse whisper, “Yes.”
“Then how can it be wasteful?” Amity waited a moment before holding out the fruit.
The gray-eyed girl took a pair of deep breaths before she set the bananas in her basket. “That’s not what I meant.” Thalia’s remark was hardly more than a whisper; Amity almost missed it amid the steady drone of television audio.
“I believe I know what you meant,” Amity turned back to the fruit display, carefully examining the oranges as she picked out a handful. She gestured with her hands in emphasis as she spoke, pausing to consider her next words. “I’m trying to be… I need to be better than my mother raised me to be.” The pale woman frowned, “Stingy and cruel.” She held the oranges out to Thalia with a sad smile, “Now, how many apples would you like?”
~
“...and done?” Alma pressed the second brake pad in place, and brushed her palms together in satisfaction.
Luz handed her a grease-stained rag as she examined the brake pad placement. “Great job, hermanita. Alright, watch your head, I'm gonna pop the hood. Min?” Luz leaned down to peek at the heavy robot squatting spider-like under the minivan, getting a flash of green and a questioning wheeze in response. “I need to get at the engine, can—”
A clang and a clatter came from the far side of the Ford. Shawn scrabbled his way around the minivan, his wheel-capped legs slipping out from underneath his body in his excitement, like a foal first learning to walk. He rolled up to her side and raised his front pair of arms, pantomiming a lifting motion. SCOOP? scrolled across the black screen set into his upper plate. He tapped his feet at Luz’s happy laugh and clacked his fingertips together.
“Alright, alright,” the tanned woman waved a hand toward the nose of the Aerostar, stepping around Alma and Abe before she tugged the driver’s door open, “Wait for me there.” The hood clunked upward an inch when she pulled the release.
“What do you need to do with the engine?” Alma asked with an uncertain frown, tracking Luz over one shoulder and twisting around to follow the woman as she walked backward toward Shawn.
Luz held up both hands, like she was about to eat a hamburger. “We gotta squeeze the caliper pistons all the way open—” she pinched her fingers together, “—to fit around the new brake pads.” As soon as she reached the excitable robot, she lurched up into the air with a whoa and a high-pitched giggle. Alma pushed Abe away from the Aerostar with her heels, and they both watched with amusement as Luz dangled from her armpits like a pet cat plucked from the countertop where it didn’t belong. Luz laughed, and reached toward the minivan, wiggling her fingers and kicking with her feet, like she was swimming in the air.
Shawn rolled forward, stretching his arms, and allowed Luz to lift the hood and prop it open with the oddly shaped safety rod. She glanced down and asked, “Up?” Shawn put one hand under her feet to lift her higher, and gently set the other hand behind her calves. “Alright, so,” the brown-haired woman continued as she leaned over the engine bay, looking about with a squint, “Your brakes are a closed hydraulic system… and… when we push the calipers open, the brake fluid backs up into—ah-ha, here it is—the reservoir, aaannd…” She twisted the black cap from one of the semi-translucent plastic tanks in the middle of the bay, waggling it in the air, “We take the cap off to relieve pressure before we get started.” Luz set it to one side and smiled at Shawn, “Down?” She swung sideways as he turned a quarter circle, her legs swaying with the motion, and he set her on the ground.
Alma peered at the caliper, still strapped to the spring with the orange bungee cord. “That’s it, though?” the dark-haired girl looked over at Luz when she crouched beside her.
“Yyyyup,” Luz popped the ‘p’ sound. “We get the caliper open enough to go back into place, bolt ‘er back down, and we’re done.”
“Huh.”
“Not so bad, right?”
“Yeah,” Alma grudgingly admitted, “Not so bad.”
“Good!” Luz had a twinkle in her eye when she grinned, then, and Alma knew she wouldn’t like what she had to say next. “Then you can handle the back brakes,” she pointed at the driver’s side rear tire, “While I make sure Nate and Shawn have the other side covered.”
~
Amity had never felt comfortable making small talk at her mother’s dinner parties, with the banality of uninteresting conversation with incurious strangers. There were only so many variations of It sure is warm today that one could hear in San Francisco before wanting to scream. Talking with Luz, in startling contrast, had been a delightfully easy give and take. Thalia was not as forthcoming as the truck driver, but Amity suspected Luz was the exception to a great many rules. To her own surprise, she didn't find the thought of talking to the college student to be an insurmountable task. She was starting to see more of Thalia's personality shine through the shock and surprise of their current situation—like the scrunched nose and breathy chuckle she made when Amity repeated “if you don't mind me asking” for the third time in five minutes.
Thalia spoke with a fond smile as she stared off into the distance, following Amity as the taller woman slowly walked the Kwik Shop aisles. “Alma had the idea for her photo class portraits project, she was so excited. It… It was infectious.” The gray-eyed girl giggled, pausing to clear her throat and kick her sandaled toe at the floor. “I’m not sure what was going through her head, but… she wanted shots of me with my mother’s guitar in, you know—” She waved toward the far wall, at the landscape beyond the plate glass windows. “—In the southwest, where we grew up.”
“Did she get all the shots she needed?” the green-haired woman asked, feeling that slight tremor of second-hand academic concern.
“Yes, she did,” the tawny-haired girl nodded. “She had certain places in mind, and we had it all planned out.” She sighed, shaking her head, “It would only take us two weeks, and if we slept in the van it wouldn’t cost as much money.” Thalia looked down at the basket hanging from her elbow, and crossed her arms, “We picked up extra shifts at work to save up for the— our adventure, we called it.” She shrugged and tilted her head, “It has been an adventure.”
“Are you glad you came?” Amity suspected she knew the answer already.
Thalia nodded, a faint blush painting her cheeks. “I’m not sure why, but I think Alma planned it all for me.”
~
The sky was a dingy gray rendered starless by the bright stadium lights set up along the Kwik Stop parking lot perimeter. They hummed high above, the grid of circular bulbs surrounded by a bruise-purple halo of the cloudless Iowa evening. The dim rush and roar of traffic from the Interstate mingled with the faint classic rock that drifted from the Denny’s few half-open windows. A cool summer night’s breeze rustled her sleeveless band shirt and the brown curls at the nape of her neck. Luz had just crouched between Nate and Shawn on the passenger side of the Aerostar—to check their progress and bring them a pair of bungee cords—when a loud whistle split the night. She ugh’d and of course’d as she pushed herself to her feet to look around. A bit of motion by the Lone Star Truck & Tire warehouse doors caught her eye; Jordan waved a hand in the air, calling out “Luz!” when he spotted her from where he stood beside a low metal cart stacked with Alma’s new tires.
She waved a hand in reply, then started around the rear of the minivan with a quick, “Alma, I’ll be right back.” The dark-haired girl tossed an irritated grunt over her shoulder as the twin robots rolled around either end of the rusty Ford to watch her go. Luz turned around to walk backward, “Shawn, Nate, c’mon, let’s go geeeeh—!” Shawn hardly paused as he hooked an arm around Luz’s stomach, yanking her off the ground to race his brother toward the confused red-haired man.
“Uhh,” Jordan offered as Shawn set Luz on the ground in front of him, facing the wrong direction. Nate quickly picked her up again and turned her to face the man. She leaned her hands on her knees and groaned, Oh god. Jordan almost took a step forward, but held still when the two robots swiveled toward him. “You… alright?” the tall man asked, his eyes flitting between her and the dark purple automatons.
“Never better,” Luz wheezed, rubbing a hand across her stomach, “Thanks… for your help.”
Jordan patted the stack of tires and smiled, “Not a problem, do… uh…” He glanced between the robots, “Do you want me to bring these over—?”
Luz raised a dismissive hand, “Nah, these guys got it— Boys?” She turned to look at the robots waiting patiently just behind her. Nate angled up to face her while Shawn danced from one foot to the other. “Carry these back to Scarlet, then bring the old ones here.” Both robots flashed a pair of green-green lights before exchanging a quick conversation in chirps and bursts of static. Shawn lifted the top three tires from the stack and sped backward toward the minivan. Nate grabbed the last two in his front forearms and followed his brother. Luz and Jordan watched them place the tires around the mud-caked Aerostar, before fighting over the three discarded wheels and the fourth bare rim. After a momentary delay, they whirred back over to Luz’s side and placed the old tires in a pile on the cart.
They backed up, facing the woman as they waited for her opinion of their completed task; Nate clasped his long-fingered hands while Shawn tapped his fingertips together. “That was great!” Luz bent her knees to half-crouch, patting a hand across both robots’ upper plating, “Thanks, guys.” Nate stretched up to press into her palm as he flashed a series of green lights, and Shawn wrapped his hands around her wrist as he tapped his feet in a rhythm that Luz couldn’t place. “I’ll be right back, wait for me, okay?”
The twins raced each other back to the far side of the minivan. Luz stood up straight, gently clapped her hands together as she swung her arms back and forth. The red-haired man stared at her in open-mouthed surprise. “Uhh, so… nice weather we’re having?”
“Really? Think I won’t ask about ‘em?” Jordan crossed his arms over his chest as he raised an eyebrow. “They’re here to put me out of a job, aren’t they?”
“No!” Luz waved her hands in concern, “Not at all!” She frowned when the red-haired man laughed.
“Gotcha!” he teased, pointing a pair of finger-guns her way.
The tanned woman scoffed and crossed her arms, “Fine, maybe they are.”
“Do it,” Jordan rolled his eyes, setting his hands on his hips, “I hate this job.”
“But—” a familiar spooky tune whistled from her pocket, and Luz glanced down in surprise, her train of thought momentarily derailed. “You’re… so good at it?” she managed to say with something like confidence while she snaked a hand into her pocket to press a button on her phone, silencing the next X-Files chime halfway through.
“Yeah, I guess that’s my cue to go rethink my life choices,” the red-haired man shrugged and put both hands on the cart handle, pulling it back toward the half-open warehouse door. “Be safe on the road, Luz.”
“Thanks for your help, Jordan!” Luz waved a hand before turning to walk back to the Aerostar.
~
Amity pulled the glass door open with a squeeeak, and Thalia propped it open with her heel as the green-haired woman reached for a plastic-wrapped package of water bottles on the bottom shelf of the cooler.
“It just— it all changed…” the younger girl sighed. “We planned to pass through Albuquerque, and I wanted to show her the house where we had lived, but… Everything looked different.” Thalia rubbed at her arm with her free hand, her brow furrowed with the weight of this recent grief, “I couldn’t remember which house was ours.”
Amity waited for her to finish speaking before she pulled the twelve-pack of water from the refrigerator, getting the noisy plastic-on-plastic package settled in her arms as she offered a solemn, “I’m sorry, Thalia.”
The other girl waved a hand as she gave a quick, “It’s okay.” Amity squinted at her as she stood. She might not be able to read Thalia as well as she could read Luz, but the gray-eyed girl didn’t look okay. “I was too young, I guess. I could have asked my brother, but…” Thalia trailed off with a shrug.
“But you didn’t.”
They let the cooler door swing shut while Thalia shook her head. “I guess I didn’t want him to find out about our trip?” She patted a hand through her hair while she thought for a moment. “He would have told us not to go.”
Amity made a face, like, of course, and gave a wry chuckle. “Brothers meddle, don’t they?”
“Yes! They do!” Thalia giggled in surprise at the unexpected commiseration. “They’re so irritating!” She stared off into the distance as a soft smile touched her face, “Well… I think he would understand. He might have just had us do some things different.”
Amity turned toward the Kwik Star checkout area, and waited for Thalia to follow at her side. She kept her silence, as Thalia looked as though she had something else on her mind. A few heartbeats later, the sun-burned girl admitted, “But I wouldn’t have done anything different.”
“No?” the green-haired woman asked with a curious tilt to her head.
“No.”
Amity breathed out in amusement as they reached the end of the checkout line. “There’s nothing you’d have changed?” The older woman at the register handed a white-haired man his change, and he walked away with a whistle and a Mountain Dew. The middle-aged couple next in line began to place their items on the counter while a tall man with muddy boots hung back a few steps. Amity half-turned to face Thalia as she repeated, “Nothing at all?”
“Well… sure. Okay,” Thalia rolled her eyes as a faint blush began to color her cheekbones, “I— we— would have packed more… supplies.”
The golden-eyed woman hummed a thoughtful note. “I was told to pack light; I should have just enough clothing. But, your trip was longer—”
“Nnno, uhmm,” Thalia interrupted with a click of her teeth as her face darkened, “Supplies. Things?” She made a vague hand motion while Amity gave her a blank look in return. The tawny-haired girl blew out a breath of air and whispered omigawd before glancing around to gauge how much the other customers might overhear. She leaned close to Amity and muttered a soft, “Feminine products?”
“Oh? What k—” Amity flushed a bright red and turned her eyes down to the floor, forcing a strangled, “Oh, right. I’m sorry,” out through her clenched teeth. She ran the last few statements back through her mind, building out a new set of inferences. She blinked, then she turned a look of concern toward the younger girl. “You ran out?” she asked in an equally soft voice.
Thalia grimaced, looking away for a moment as she shrugged. “Yeah? I guess? We had… enough,” she sighed again, road weary and worn. She kicked the toe of her sandal against the tile floor as she breathed out a tired, “Tampons are so expensive at gas stations.”
Amity set her jaw and frowned. She’d spent many a day trapped in bed with a heating pad thrown over her stomach, trying to lose herself in a book to pass the miserable hours. The thought of these two girls having to endure the worst of their cycle in a minivan, having to travel with a seat belt pulled tight, without so much as the comforts of home? She felt sick, just absolutely sick. How did Luz handle it? She hummed an unhappy note as she turned the problem over in her mind. Amity was certain she had a plan for everything. After a moment, she remembered the smiling, brown-eyed woman sitting in the driver’s seat of the big rig, holding out— The backpack, of course.
The green-haired woman swiveled on one heel and stalked toward the Kwik Shop aisles, with purpose. Thalia watched her leave in surprise, glancing at the back of the man in the muddy boots as he stepped forward to greet the cashier, then hurried after the taller woman, with a “Hey, wait!”
~
Luz wiped her hands on the rag hanging from her pocket as she walked back toward Alma’s Aerostar, slowing her pace as she pulled her phone from her pocket. She tapped at the notification, and ran her eyes over the message. She hissed a soft, oh yeah, whoops.
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: lunch soon, yeah?
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: How was the script?
“Riiiight, I did say I’d read that,” Luz muttered to herself as it whistled again and again, in her palm.
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: It’s bad, right?
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: that’s why ur ghostin’ me
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: and *not* because of a pretty girl
She rolled her eyes.
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: btw, you kiss her yet? tell me you kissed her
“What?! No,” Luz scoffed as she replied with the same. Then she frowned at the dirty fingerprint she left on her screen. She tapped the microphone button, and dictated a response, “Stopped early for an unexpected thing, comma, explain later, comma, will get food soon, period. Won’t have much time to sit for lunch, comma, will have Amity help me look over your doc, period.” Then she tapped the send button with her nose. She didn't have to wait long for his flurry of replies.
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: What
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: NO!
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: She’s innocent!
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: Don’t make her read my shit!
Alma turned when Luz chuckled, and the taller woman gave her a quick upward nod as she slipped her phone back into her pocket, “How’s it going?”
“Fine,” Alma’s sullen grunt drew a smug grin from the older woman.
“Great,” Luz smarmed as she sauntered around the tail end of the minivan, twirling on one toe to lean back and watch the dark-haired girl send her a glare. Luz smiled, “I’ll check on the boys.”
“Great,” the dark-haired girl repeated in a slightly mocking tone. Abe tilted up slightly and wheezed a question, and she sighed. “Sorry, Abe, I’m— I’m so far out of my comfort zone on this—” she waved at the mostly disassembled rear brake with one hand, “It’s one thing when she’s here watching— and I— I think I forgot something?” Alma looked down at the brake pads in her hands and glanced between the wheel hub in front of her and the one at the front of the vehicle. “These next? Or— no, grease the clips, then these, right?”
A set of panels opened on Abe’s front-facing edge, and a series of emitters traced red laser light across the pavement between Alma’s feet. Abe drew a checklist, with the first several steps crossed out, and small animated wireframe images showing the brake pad assembly process. Moving thumbs-up icons swirled around a You’ve got this! floating beneath the other images.
“Oh, wow,” Alma gasped, “You’re so cool! And awww, thanks Abe,” She hummed a note and nodded as she studied the diagrams; she couldn’t help but sit up a bit straighter, and set her shoulders with something like confidence, “Okay, just a few more steps, right?”
Abe gave her a thumbs up as he flickered a green-green-green.
~
Amity paused at the hand-basket rack while she tucked the water bottles under one arm, then yanked the top blue basket from the stack. She turned briefly at Thalia’s Hey, wait! and nodded toward the far aisle. “You could have waited in line,” the green-haired woman remarked when Thalia caught up to her side, “I shouldn’t be long.”
The slightly shorter girl looked down at her full basket of fruit and snacks, “Yeah, no— What are you doing?”
Amity stopped in front of the pitifully small personal hygiene selection the gas station had to offer, and began to pluck items from the shelf. She ignored the other girl’s sputterings until a bottle of Imodium joined the two boxes of tampons, two boxes of pads, three small boxes of bandaids, and the extra large hand sanitizer in her basket. She lifted the largest Advil from the rack, and paused when Thalia waved a hand in front of her face for her attention.
“Amity, no, please,” the tawny-haired girl practically begged, “That’s too much!”
“Doubtful,” Amity mused as she turned the item over in her hand. “Do you two have any Advil?”
Thalia huffed and rolled her eyes, looking away as she admitted, “No.” She crossed her arms under her chest and grumbled, “We ran out of that, too.”
“You both might be very sore tomorrow,” the pale woman rattled the bottle in her hand, “What with the accident tonight.” The Advil joined the rest in her basket, and Amity placed a bottle of Pepto Bismol and a container of Rolaids beside it. She reached for a pack of flushable wipes but stopped at the other girl’s haltingly soft question.
“Why are you doing this for us?”
Amity looked down at her hands as she asked herself the same question. Why was she doing this? What was driving this desire, this need, to help these two strangers? Yes, she had the time and the funds to do so, but she could have easily just given them the cash they needed and had Luz keep driving to Boston. Part of it was the parallel she saw between herself and Thalia, part of it was the need to prove her mother wrong. But most of all… Amity turned to face Thalia and gave her a soft smile. “I have been… inspired by… well, by Luz.” For as sure of herself as she had been all evening, right now—in this moment—Amity felt herself shrinking a bit under Thalia’s watery, trembling gaze. She uhmm’d as she tapped the heel of her shoe on the floor. “I’ve never met anyone like Luz… She has been so kind to me these last few days, and I— I want to be more like her.” Amity raised the basket and added, “She would do this, too. I know it.”
Thalia sniffed and wiped at one eye with her palm. “Alma is very kind to me, as well,” the gray-eyed girl nodded with a wobbly smile, “She’s— she’s the best friend I’ve ever had.” She took a deep, shuddering breath before admitting, “She makes me want to be a better person, too.”
“Have you known her long?” Amity asked as she dropped two packs of wipes into her basket, then nodded toward the cash register.
Thalia grinned, “Mmm-hmm, we were in the same cabin at summer camp, when we were kids.” She gave Amity a shy side-eye glance when the taller woman made a soft awww, and her cheekbones darkened in response, “We wrote each other letters all the time, until we could meet at camp again.” The tawny-haired girl grew quiet, starting to speak twice before finding her words, “The third year… uhmm… I… couldn’t go anymore, but I was able to send her my new email address.”
Amity walked to the end of the line, and half-turned to comment, “I’m guessing email was more convenient?”
“Yeah, since that address wasn’t changing all the time,” Thalia’s grumbled response led the green-haired woman to raise an eyebrow. “We’d hang out in a web game after school, Toontown?” She paused to look up at the taller woman, “Did you ever hear of that one?” Amity frowned and shook her head; Thalia shrugged, “After that site shut down, we hopped over to Club Penguin.”
“Club— Penguin?” Amity repeated with a surprised chuckle.
“Yeah!” the sun-burned girl laughed, “you’ve never heard of Club Penguin?”
“No!”
“Oh, you know it was where the cool kids hung out,” Thalia assured her with a wide smile. The tired-looking woman in line ahead of them stepped away from the counter and walked toward the swinging double doors.
“That explains it, then,” Amity chuckled with a rueful shake of her head, placing her basket beside the cash register, “I was never one of the cool kids.”
Thalia made a face like she was sure the taller woman was pulling her leg, “I find that hard to believe.” She gave the older woman behind the counter a smile and a kind, “How’d’ya do?”
“All of these items, please, thank you,” Amity said, beginning to unload her basket for the cashier, then leaned toward Thalia to whisper, “I was one of the mean girls.”
~
“That looks great, Shawn, gimme five!” Luz held up a hand and gave the robot a quick high-five. “Abe told you what to do?”
green-green-green
“Awesome, go ahead and get that tire put on, alright?” the tanned woman pointed toward the new wheel laying on the ground behind the robot, “Do you know how much torque for the lug nuts?” The automaton gave a thumbs-up, and Luz returned the gesture. “Great, lemme check with Nate,” she said as she swiveled on her toes, a sing-song note to her voice, “Who I’m sure has done a perfect job, am-I-right?” She grinned at the other robot waiting patiently by the passenger rear wheel well.
Nate clapped his front manipulators together, then gestured toward the wheel hub like a maître d' motioning an important visitor to their seat.
Luz gave a little bow at the waist, and examined the new rotor and brake pads that he had installed. She patted the robot on the shoulder and smiled, “Like I thought, it looks perfect!” Nate turned his body away from her, slightly, and the face of animated ooze on his screen darkened, as if he were blushing. She rubbed a hand across his top panel, “Good job, and thank you for your help.” He took a step sideways, closer to her, and leaned against her side. Luz chuckled, and wrapped her arms around his body for a moment and squeezed. “Okay!” she grunted as she pushed herself to her feet, “Let’s get the shoes on this pony so Alma can take ‘er for a ride.”
She walked around the rear of the minivan to find Alma wiping her hands on an oil-stained rag. Some glowing red thing on the ground between her feet winked out of existence when a panel on Abe's front edge snapped shut, and Luz raised an eyebrow. His goopy purple face swung around to the far side of his dome, as if he were trying not to look her in the eye. “Ya’ll weren’t… cheating, were you?” Luz squinted in suspicion as she twirled a fingertip in their direction.
“How could we cheat?” Alma asked with a scrunched nose and indignation. Abe's face drifted up over the top of his dome and winked at Alma.
Luz grunted something like I ‘unno as she leaned over the wheel well to peer at the dark-haired girl’s work. “Good job, kid,” the taller woman grinned.
“Kid?” the other girl pushed her glasses up on the bridge of her nose and scoffed, “I’m not that much younger than you!”
“But’cha are younger!” Luz turned a shit-eating grin her way, “Got that little pain-in-the-ass energy too, right Abe?”
Abe’s face swung around to look at one girl, then the other, and then the lights in his dome winked out as he tried to avoid the question.
“Abe!” Alma balled her fists on her hips as she looked down at the robot, “You’re on my side, right?”
“Allllright, let’s get the wheels on Scarlet here,” Luz walked around Alma and Abe toward the tire sitting by the driver’s front wheel well, “and you take her around the parking lot a few times to see how she rides.”
~
Thalia pushed through the glass door and stepped to one side to hold it open for Amity. The taller woman gave a shallow nod and murmured Thank you as she turned toward the Northern edge of the parking lot. The slightly-shorter girl jogged a handful of steps to reach her shoulder, and fell into a matching stride beside Amity on the sidewalk. Thalia cleared her throat and offered, “I can pay you back, uhm, later. I–If that’s okay?”
“Nonsense,” Amity shut her down with a firm tone, her golden eyes flitting sideways to meet a worried pair of gray before she fixed her gaze on the double-brown semi in the near distance, “Consider it a gift.”
“But—” the tawny-haired girl threw a hand out, gesturing wildly, “I didn’t expect you to spend that much! Do you have enough left?” The green-haired woman shrugged, the barest hint of a smile touching her lips. “There has to be something, Amity,” Thalia half-turned to face the taller woman as she took quick steps to match Amity’s longer stride, “Is there anything I can do for you?”
“Well… I’m in the market for learning experiences,” Amity tapped at her lips as if she were lost in thought. “Alma said you have a performance jury on Friday?” She glanced down at Thalia's quizzical frown, before the gray-eyed girl nodded with a squint of confusion. “Do you have a song prepared?” Amity asked.
“Yyyyes?” Thalia couldn’t keep the question from tilting the end of her response upward, her eyebrows wrinkling in a slow realization.
They reached the line of concrete barriers separating the Denny’s customer parking area from the southern portion of the Lone Star lot. Amity turned to sit atop the barrier, and swung her legs over the top, the package of water bottles tucked under one arm as she held up a plastic shopping bag filled with toiletries. Thalia put one palm atop the concrete block and hopped, curling her legs up to her chest as she vaulted the waist-high wall.
“Would you play for us?” Amity asked in a hesitant voice, nearly drowned out by the tap and slap of their footwear against the concrete, “I know Shawn would love to hear you again, and—”
“Of— of course I can,” Thalia interrupted while a shy hint of pink colored her face.
“Wonderful,” the green-haired woman said as they rounded the nose of the large truck, “I had hoped to hear you as well.”
~
Luz dropped the hood with a muted clunk, then pressed both palms against the metal and pushed, feeling it latch with a ker-chank. She glanced up to see Alma staring at her over the steering wheel, and Luz gave her a wide grin. “Alright, so,” the tanned woman skipped around the front corner of the rusty Aerostar and stopped at the open driver's door, counting on her fingers as she spoke, “We primed the calipers, brake fluid reservoir cap on, Abe checked the undercarriage, now…” She caught the dark-haired girl’s eye and shrugged, “See if she starts.” The tanned woman backed away from the red minivan with slow, careful steps. “Abe!” Luz called, and the domed robot twisted to face her, “Let us know if you see anything wrong with the van, ‘kay?” He gave a jaunty little salute, then turned his full attention back to the old Ford.
Luz looked up at a flash of yellow and green, and raised a hand to wave to Amity and Thalia just as Alma turned the key. ALMANAC whirr–rrr-rrrrr’d into a muffled growl, a high-pitched whine and a whoosh of air accompanying the aged engine’s coughing rumble. After a long, tense moment, the Ford settled into a steady drone. Luz clapped once and whooped, laughing and jumping up and down as Alma wiggled a happy dance in the driver's seat. The other two girls watched with wide smiles as Luz ran up to the minivan and exchanged excited high-fives with Alma.
“Maybe she’s alright?” Alma said, running her hands over the steering wheel, “She sounds okay!”
“That's great, kid, now watch your feet,” Luz stepped back to push the door shut while Alma rolled her eyes and muttered, kid. “Take ‘er slow around the parking lot, okay?” the tanned woman motioned with one arm as she watched Alma's face for any questions. “Slow, gentle pressure while braking, especially for the first fifty-or-so miles.” The shorter girl scrunched her eyebrows, and Luz turned back to the van and waggled her hand, “You wanna give the brake pads time to settle; if they're a bit off-kilter when you slam on the brakes, you might gouge your rotors.”
“Ah,” Alma nodded as she absorbed that information, “That… makes sense.”
“Of course it does!” Luz slapped the side of the Aerostar with her palm before taking a few steps back, “Let's see how she feels!”
Alma shifted into drive with a clunk, and slowly rolled away. The old Aerostar ran in a wide loop around the parking lot, the brake lights glaring several times as ALMANAC came to a complete stop. She ran straight and smooth, with hardly the wobble that Luz had seen the few times they passed on the Interstate.
Luz nodded in satisfaction as she wiped her hands on her rag, then reached down to give Min a fist bump. She glanced over her shoulder and waggled her eyebrows at Amity, “Eh? Whaddaya think?” Amity smiled at Luz as Nate and Shawn crowded around her legs, the tanned woman bending down to hand out high-fives and head pats to her mechanical pit crew.
“I thought that would take longer,” the golden-eyed woman called.
“Yeah, we wrapped up…” Luz raised one grease-stained hand, and cocked an eyebrow at her bare wrist, “Right on time!” She walked over to the other two, and waved off a water bottle that Amity held out. “Not just yet, thanks.” She gave Thalia an upwards nod and said, “You doin’ alright?”
“Yes, thank you,” Thalia said in a shy voice as she set her bags down beside her lawn chair. She grinned when Shawn rolled over and pranced in place, holding a long, three-fingered hand up beside his body as he asked, Listen? “In a few minutes, I promise,” the tawny-haired girl giggled.
Luz turned and stood beside Amity to watch the Aerostar loop around the parking lot once more. “She looks great, Luz,” Amity said with a delighted tone in her voice.
The brown-eyed woman glanced up at her and grinned, “Yeah, she does.” Their eyes met, and Amity gently shoved at her shoulder, both girls snorting with laughter. “No, but, for real, look at her!” Luz waved at the rusty Ford as it drew close, Alma swinging wide to pull up beside Hooty once more.
“She's so smooth now!” the dark-haired girl called out through the open passenger window, throwing the minivan into park. Thalia skipped over to give excited congratulations to her companion before she pulled the sliding door open with a grunt, and lifted her guitar case from the second-row bench seat.
“I noticed!” Luz called back, cupping her hands around her mouth as she yelled. She grinned up at Amity and wrinkled her brow in confusion when the taller woman started giggling. “What?” Luz asked, looking at her grease-dark hands, “Did I get—”
“Yes, on your face,” Amity interrupted, pointing at her own cheek.
“Ah, it'll wash off,” Luz shrugged as she watched Alma shut off the Aerostar. “We'll go in and clean up, okay?” The Ford rocked from side to side as Alma climbed out and slammed her door. She made her way over to Thalia, giving the robots high-fives and thank-you’s as she went.
“Alright,” Amity replied, running her fingers through her hair to brush it over her ears, “We'll be here.”
Luz's stomach rumbled just then, and she shook her head and laughed. “I'll get something for us to eat from Denny's. You want a burger or some chicken tenders?”
Amity's face lit up as she gasped, “Chicken tenders?”
“Alright, tendies it is,” the tanned woman grinned. “Fries or onion rings?”
“Uhmm,” Amity paused to think, tapping at her teeth with a fingernail, “I'm… not sure if… Fries, please.”
Luz winked up at the golden-eyed woman. “I’ll be right back,” she said as she patted her pockets for her wallet. Amity whispered Okay with a fond smile, and moved the fingertips of her raised hand in a delicate wave. Luz backed away, firing two finger guns as she made a chk-chk! sound with her tongue.
The tawny-haired girl had pulled her guitar into her lap, and she hummed a series of notes as she tuned the strings by ear. Alma stood beside Thalia's lawn chair and glared at the two older women with barely concealed disgust while they made goo-goo eyes at each other. She quickly schooled her expression when Luz turned to face her, and the slightly taller woman laughed. “Alma!” Luz called, beckoning with a hand, “Let's go wash up.”
The dark-haired girl sighed and turned to her companion, “Ahorita vengo, Michi,” Alma said as she patted the taller girl on the shoulder.3
“Dale, te espero,” Thalia said with a smile4, as she tilted her head to bump her cheek against the other girl’s wrist. Both girls blushed at the contact, and Alma quickly trotted after the brown-haired woman toward the Denny’s, her shoulders hunched up around her ears. Thalia looked down at the ground and squeezed her eyes closed, whispering something to herself.
Amity watched their timid interaction as she sat down in the other lawn chair. The robots whirred close and settled down in a loose half-circle; Min tilted upright to sit at Amity’s elbow, while Abe and the twins were arranged closer to the musician’s feet.
After a long exhale, the younger girl blinked her eyes open and smiled at her patient audience. “I owe you a song, don’t I?” Thalia asked as she raised her guitar at a sharp angle, her left knee propped up on the lawn chair’s crossbar to support the body of the instrument against her thigh. She straightened her back and raised her chin, and turned a calm gaze from one robot to the next. “My name is Thalia Marsh,” she said in a warm, practiced voice, “and I’ll be performing an arrangement of ‘El día que me quieras’ by Carlos Gardel.” Shawn clapped his hands together, and Nate reached over to slowly press his arms back to the ground. Thalia winked at her fan, then struck a humming harmonic chord. She paused, and closed her eyes, and began to play.
Amity listened to the ebb and flow of emotion behind each careful chord and ringing tone. She watched as the younger girl mouthed silent words along with the music she drew from the cherrywood guitar, the soft smile half-hidden on her face as she lost herself in the playing. For a brief moment, Amity could have closed her eyes and found herself somewhere else; beneath an unfamiliar sea of stars that braced a foreign moon in the sky. All too soon, Thalia plucked the last set of notes, and let them fade into the cool night air. Shawn pushed himself upright and clapped with two pairs of hands, while the other robots—and Amity—made do with a single pair.
“Merveilleux !” Amity’s delighted praise brought a fresh blush to Thalia’s cheeks. After a moment, the green-haired woman asked, “What is the song about?”
“¿Cómo?” Thalia laid one arm across her guitar as she tilted her head in confusion.
“You were singing,” the pale woman made a vague motion with her hand as she leaned closer on her elbow, “Is it a love song?”
Thalia turned a brilliant crimson, “Oh— it’s, uh.” She laughed in a half-breathless way, and before she could stop herself, she glanced over her shoulder at the Denny’s. “It’s just— um, it—”
“I see,” Amity placed her chin in her palm with a sly grin while the younger girl spluttered a frantic denial. “Have you sung that to her?”
“No!” Thalia gasped like she’d been struck. “I couldn’t! She— she doesn’t—!” She scrubbed the heels of her palms into her eyebrows as she groaned, “We’ve been friends for so long, she doesn’t…” Thalia let her hands fall into her lap as she breathed a low, forlorn, “She couldn’t see me like that.” Amity gave her an incredulous scoff and tried very hard not to roll her eyes. Thalia flashed her a hurt look, one that looked like hope struggling to stay alive.
“I don’t mean to sound condescending, but I am terrible at reading people,” the golden-eyed woman leaned forward with an optimistic gleam in her steady gaze, “and even I can see how she looks at you.”
“H– how? How does she—?” Thalia worried her fingertips together as she turned doubtful gray eyes up to meet the older woman’s confident gaze.
Amity gave her a gentle smile, “Like there’s nothing more precious in the world.”
A fresh heat colored Thalia’s cheekbones, and she looked away as an incredulous grin stretched across her face. She bit her lip as she let slip a wistful sigh. “So…” the tawny-haired girl scoffed, not unkindly, and gave Amity a crooked smile, “The same way Luz looks at you?”
Amity hummed a truly happy sound, and ran her fingers back through her hair. “I should be so lucky,” she sighed up at the night sky, before she met Thalia’s eyes. She held her gaze for a moment, then folded her hands in her lap and leaned forward, serious. “You should sing it to her, tonight.”
“Tonight?” Thalia laughed, and waved up at the starlit dark above.
Amity nodded, “When you stop to sleep.”
“I’ll… uhmm…” Thalia ran hesitant fingers across the strings of her guitar, drawing a soft, musical thrum from the instrument. “I’ll think about it.”
Shawn rolled forward a few inches, rotating his wrist in a left-right-left rotating wave, then pantomimed listen? before clasping his hands together in an exaggerated display of begging. Thalia glanced at Amity, and the green-haired woman gave a soft nod and asked, “If you want?”
Thalia gave her a shy grin, and glanced between the woman and her robots, “Any requests?”
An iconographic image of a smiling, scruffy red-haired man appeared on Shawn’s screen.
“Ed Sheeran?” The gray-eyed girl snorted in disbelief, “You like Ed Sheeran?”
The other morning came unbidden to Amity’s mind: cradled under Luz’s chin, the warmth of her embrace; one arm wrapped around her tightly while the other hand ran fingers through her hair; gentle, calloused thumbs that brushed away tears before they could fall; her ear, pressed against the tanned girl’s collarbone, as she listened to her heartbeat and the unmistakable song Luz had hummed in an effort to comfort her. Amity smiled, and made a noncommittal motion with her hands as she offered, “Who doesn’t?”
Thalia chuckled at that, and shrugged, “Y’know what…? Fair. Any song in particular?” When Amity shook her head, and the robots all flashed a quick red-red-red, the tawny-haired girl wrinkled her forehead in thought as she picked a set of chords. After the third set of notes, Thalia sat up with an ah ha! and a grin. She bent down to fish a capo from her guitar case, and clamped her strings at the second fret. “Alright, this is one that I like,” she curled around her guitar and strummed a catchy rhythm, slapping her fingers against the strings in an accompanying, percussive beat.
“When I was six years old I broke my leg
I was running from my brother and his friends…”
~
“...Yeah, to go, thanks, Dennis, here—” Luz gingerly pulled a few folded bills from her pocket and added them up in her head, “—Actually, can I pay when I pick it up?”
The lanky man in the black button-up nodded, “Yeah, I can ring you up then.”
“Thanks, I’ll use my card.” The brown-haired woman raised her hands with a grin, and waggled her fingers. “I wanna wash up first.”
Dennis laughed, “Oh, yeah, no doubt.” He punched a few more buttons on the cash register, then as he waited for her order ticket to print out, he added, “There’s a powdered soap dispenser in the bathroom.”
“Oh? Duzzit take quarters?” When he nodded, Luz slid a five-dollar bill across the shallow, black-lacquered countertop, “Can I get some change?”
Luz pushed through the heavy swinging door four minutes after Alma had entered, and found the dark-haired girl at the very last sink, still washing her hands. The green-eyed girl glanced her way and scowled, scrubbing at the black stains with renewed vigor. Luz walked over to her side, her pocket jingling with silver coins. Alma rinsed her hands, then grumbled as she examined them under the bright, faintly-green fluorescent light above her mirror. “This— this won't come off!” Frustration dripped from her every word.
Luz caught her reflection’s eye and nodded toward the big metal box mounted to the wall just behind them. It looked to be six vertical partitions, each with a backlit button near the bottom of the front panel, just above angled openings. One button read Tylenol, the next read Durex, the third, Tums. “Try some of this stuff,” the tanned woman tapped at the fifth button’s logo of a blue handprint, then pulled coins from her pocket to feed into the dispenser.
“What is… Boraxo?” Alma had uncertainty stretched across her face, and she leaned away.
Luz rolled her eyes, “Get over—! Hands under the thing,” she pointed at the second in the row of silver funnels along the bottom edge of the wall-mounted box, “Cup your hands, it's a powder.” She waited for Alma to push her hands underneath the opening to press the button, and several ounces of scented powder tumbled into the shorter girl's palms.
Alma lowered her nose and sniffed, carefully, then hmm’d and sampled the scent again. “That's— that smells pretty good.”
“Yeah, this stuff is great.” Luz motioned her back to the sink, “Add just a bit o’ water to make it a paste, and then scrub it in. They should come clean after that with soap & water.”
Alma nodded, looking a little sheepish after letting her frustration get the better of her. “Thanks, Luz.”
The brown-haired woman winked at her in the mirror, “No prob!” Luz fed the machine seven more quarters for her own handful of soap, and set to work scrubbing her hands and forearms clean. After a short time spent in silence, save for the rush of warm water, Luz glanced over at Alma and said, “So? Thalia, huh?”
“Nope!” Alma shut the water off with a squeak and shook her hands dry before pointing at Luz, “I'm not talking about her with you!” She turned and ducked into a stall, slamming the door shut.
“Boooo,” Luz teased with a laugh, still working at her fingernails. “You're no fun!”
“Go away!” The dark-haired girl's voice echoed from the line of brown-painted stalls.
Luz made quick work of her hands, and after using the facilities and a second hand-washing, Alma had yet to emerge. “I'll wait for you at the Denny's, Alma,” the tanned woman called as she walked out without waiting for a response, letting the bathroom door swing shut with a thump. She plopped herself down in one of the two-person tables against the wall to wait for her name to be called. She’d hardly had the time to sigh and slump down in the hard wooden chair with her fingers laced behind her neck, when Alma came out of the bathroom. The dark-haired girl looked down at the floor as she approached, and quickly turned around to sit down in the other chair, her arms crossed on the table and her shoulders up around her ears. Luz gave the other girl a side-eye glance, but couldn’t see her eyes with the way her glasses reflected the overhead lights.
“Sorry,” Alma’s apology was hardly more than a whisper.
Luz turned her head to catch the other girls’ attention, “Hey, no, I probably shouldn’t tease you about her.” Alma frowned a little bit and shrugged. Luz laughed, and added, “I want to, though. Feels like the big sisterly thing t’do.”
“Sisters?” the green-eyed girl muttered, “Is that what we are?”
“Why not treat the people you meet like they’re family?” Luz shrugged, and turned a kind smile her way.
“Why not…? You…” the dark-haired girl paused for a moment, then looked down at the table as she hmm’d in consideration.
After a short silence filled with the gentle rumble of conversation from the other customers punctuated by the clamor and clatter from the kitchen area, Luz tossed a question out into the air, “Video games or books?”
“Uhh…” Alma thought for a moment. “Both?”
Luz grinned and turned back to watch the order screens hanging from the ceiling behind the cash register, facing to one side while Alma brooded into the gray formica under her elbows. “PC or console?” the tanned woman asked, sending a quick glance at the other girl.
Alma propped her chin on her palm and replied, “Console.” Luz nodded and opened her mouth, but before she could ask her next question, Alma interrupted with, “Nintendo.”
Luz gave her a wide smile and twisted in her chair to face the younger girl. “Mario or Pokémon?” she asked as she crossed her arms on the tabletop.
The dark-haired girl snorted at the silly question, and sat up in her chair. “Both,” Alma scoffed.
“Okay, uhh, let’s see…” Luz snapped her fingers after drumming a quick beat on the table, “Favorite first-gen starter?”
Alma tilted her head and hardly paused before she answered, “Squirtle.”
Luz’s face lit up with a grin, “Niiice, gotta love that cute little guy. Overall favorite Pokémon?”
The younger girl gave a wide-eyed blink before looking away. “R– Rowlet,” Alma admitted with a hint of embarrassment as she ran a hand through her hair.
The brown-eyed woman gasped and bounced in her seat. “I love Rowlet!” Luz patted her fingers on the table in an excited rhythm, “He’s adorable!” She put an elbow over the back of her chair and leaned back with a sigh, “I love Serperior, too, but—” she paused to laugh and shake her head, “—as cliche as it is, I think Eevee is my favorite.”
“Really?” Alma squinted in surprise.
“They can become anything, y’know?” Luz motioned wide with both hands, “They have that potential just waiting inside, if their trainer puts their heart into the journey.”
Alma hmm’d as she gave a slow, appreciative nod before she asked, “Which one?”
“Umbreon.”
The younger girl grinned, “Nice.”
The thin man in the black work shirt set a stack of takeout containers on the countertop and called, “Luz? Order up!”
~
Luz backed through the Denny’s entrance and held it open for Alma with her elbow, asking, “Mario or Luigi?” once the girl in the striped shirt had cleared the doorway.
Alma turned around and replied with a quizzical, “Mario?”
The older woman chuckled, “Only-child club?” Alma laughed and repeated Only-child club as she returned Luz’s fist bump, causing them both to briefly juggle the containers and cups in their hands. Luz sighed, and glanced up at the night’s sky. “I always wanted a little sister, but…” She shrugged and cleared her throat, “My Dad got sick. He, uh, passed when I was eight.”
“Lo lamento,” Alma offered in a kind voice5, and Luz gave her a quick nod and a smile. The dark-haired girl kicked the occasional stone off the sidewalk as they approached their vehicles. “My parents got a divorce when I was twelve. Things had been tense between them for a long time, so…” She shrugged, and waved her fingers at her chest, “Just me.”
They fell into a companionable silence as they rounded the closest end of the line of concrete barriers separating the parking lots. The faint thrum and twang of Thalia’s guitar floated on the breeze drifting over the tall wall of the trailer as they approached the nose of the slumbering big rig, and they slowed as they reached the truck’s dusty, bug-splattered bumper. The tawny-haired girl’s voice carried a clear melody over her steady finger-picked accompaniment.
“…Darling don’t you weep,
There’s a place for me…”
Alma’s red and white high-tops scuffed to a halt on the pavement as she stopped short to listen, hiding just out of sight against the truck’s grill. Luz drew up to her shoulder, glancing at the shorter girl before she peered around Hooty’s engine cowl. Thalia faced away from them, while Amity and her robots gave her their undivided attention. Luz half-turned toward the dark-haired girl and wrinkled her brow in concern when she caught a glimpse of Alma’s watery eyes. “You okay?” Luz whispered, her eyes flitting between the girl at her side and the intimate little performance just ahead.
“Yeah,” Alma took a shuddering breath and sighed, “I just… love when she sings this one.” They fell silent as they listened to the gray-eyed girl sing, and her music warmed the air around them with the summer night’s slow-moving breath.
“...I'll kidnap all the stars and I will keep them in your eyes,
I'll wrap them up in velvet twine
And hang them from a fishing line,
So I can see them any time I'd like…”
Luz gently nudged Alma’s arm with her elbow and whispered, “So… Thalia, huh?”
Alma shot her a half-hearted glare, then turned her eyes back to her traveling companion. “Yeah,” she croaked, her shoulders slumping in some long-held despair.
The taller woman made a breathy scoff as she softly asked, “Why so glum, chum?”
The dark-haired girl glanced around in worry, wary of being overheard, perhaps, before whispering, “Porque ella es— es increíble, y yo—” Alma looked up at her, her forehead creased with worry, “Solo soy yo.”6
Luz examined the other girl's face for a long moment before she chuckled and shook her head. “God, we could be related,” the tanned woman laughed as she rounded the nose of her truck and didn't bother hiding her approach as Thalia's song drew to an end. “Dinner is served!” Luz called as she neared the pair of lawn chairs, raising the take-out containers over her head in a victorious pose. She turned a smug grin over her shoulder as she teased, “She knows Spanish too, ya dingus.”
Alma hissed, “Luz! You— ugh!” before following her in an exasperated pout.
Amity and Thalia looked up and smiled, calling out excited greetings of their own, and Luz couldn't help but notice the way the tawny-haired girl's sparkling gray eyes searched for Alma. Luz handed the top-most Styrofoam container to the green-haired woman, “One for you, cariño, and one for Alma—Abe, can you hold this for her?” The domed robot rolled forward with both forelegs raised to gently cradle the dark-haired girl's food in his three-fingered manipulators.
Alma crouched between the lawn chairs and set down the styrofoam container she’d been holding, and the cup carrier balanced on top. She smiled up at Thalia when the gray-eyed girl whispered, “Hey, Almita.” The girl with the guitar brushed the hair back from her temples and over her ears as she blushed, asking, “D– Did you hear me?”
“Yeah,” Alma swallowed heavily, “I did.”
“Hey, Thalia,” Luz nodded upward and grinned when the sun-burned girl looked her way, “Do you know anything by the Eagles?”
The other girl scoffed and rolled her eyes just the tiniest bit. “Could I call myself a musician if I didn’t?” she asked before she noodled a familiar melody, dropping her voice to a low, raspy croon as she sang along, “There’s plenty of room at the Hotel California...”
Luz sucked a breath in through clenched teeth. She’d finally gotten that song out of her head, what with the accident and all. But now? “Me and my big mouth,” she groaned.
~
The four fell largely silent while they ate, aside from Luz’s idle humming. Amity sat straight-backed, her legs tucked under her lawn chair, ankles crossed; one small bite at a time, with a napkin held in her palm just in case. She held herself like she was dining with foreign dignitaries—Some habits are hard to break, Luz thought to herself.
In contrast to the pale woman's carefully proper posture, Luz was sitting cross-legged atop Min’s upper plate, alternating between leaning her elbows on her knees and slouching against one of the heavy-lift arms mounted on the robot’s front set of shoulders. Shawn and Nate were off to one side, playing a form of marbles with Scarlet’s old lug nuts.
Thalia had curled up in the other lawn chair, and Abe had allowed Alma to take a seat on his back once more, the shorter girl's shoulder almost brushing the other girl's arm with her every movement. While the older two enjoyed their food, it was obvious to both that the younger pair were savoring the simple meal. Alma practically had tears in her eyes, and nodded along when Thalia whispered, “This is so good.”
Luz chuckled, “Yeah, can't go wrong with chicken strips.” She shared a quick grin with Amity before Alma shook her head.
“No, you don't understand,” the dark-haired girl protested. Luz wrinkled her forehead and shrugged, like, Well?
“This is so much better than the sandwiches we'd been eating,” Thalia shuddered, before taking another bite of breaded chicken and nearly whimpering aloud.
Alma swallowed a bite and sighed, then added, “We ran out of lunch meat days ago.”
Luz and Amity exchanged a confused glance before Thalia explained, “But we couldn't let the rest of the ingredients go to waste.”
“Not when we were almost out of money,” Alma looked down at her hands and heaved a pained breath. “Have you ever had a cheese sandwich?”
“Love a grilled cheese,” Luz said before popping a couple of fries in her mouth. Amity made a soft hmm in agreement.
“Not grilled,” Thalia said, and Alma spoke at almost the same time, “Uncooked. With mustard and mayo to give it some kind of flavor?”
“Ew, what?” Luz made a pained, involuntary hurrk! sound when her stomach lurched. “No,” she frowned.
Amity dabbed at her mouth with her napkin, then leaned forward with a curious glint in her golden eyes, “Was there a particular order to how you assembled this… sandwich?”
“Amity,” Luz gasped, and almost dropped her food in dismay. “No!”
~
“I don't think I could eat one more bite,” Thalia rubbed a hand over her stomach as she made a groan of contentment. She smiled down at Alma when the dark-haired girl leaned her head against her upper arm, then Thalia turned her eyes to the older pair. “Thank you, I— just… Thank you.”
Luz made a friendly eh! as she waved a dismissive hand, but Amity gave the two younger girls a nod and replied, “You are welcome. We were glad to help.” She glanced at Luz and grinned at the brown-haired woman's nod of agreement.
“We were legally obligated to make sure you ate something good after hearing about those sandwiches,” Luz quipped, then winked at Amity when the taller woman snorted.
Alma laughed through a mouthful of fried chicken, and held up a hand to cover her mouth as she finished chewing her food. “The last good meal we had was at Abuela’s house,” the dark-haired girl glanced at Thalia as she spoke.
“Yeah,” the tawny-haired girl pulled a wistful smile as she spoke, “I'd missed her pozole.”
Amity tilted her head in confusion, “I thought you didn't live near each other?” Luz turned a questioning gaze her way, and the green-haired woman backpedaled when the younger pair exchanged a glance. “That is— that was my impression, at least, perhaps I misread the—”
“No, that’s true,” Thalia made a gentle, calming motion with an open hand, “I grew up near Albuquerque, and Almita lived in—”
“Winslow,” Alma interrupted, motioning toward herself, “Arizona.”
The older pair nodded as Thalia continued, “I was able to go visit Alma a few times when we were in high school, a– after, uhm,” the gray-eyed girl stumbled on her words before pushing on with a shrug, “After my brother finally got custody from the state.” Luz paused mid-bite and frowned.
“I tried to have Michi over every time school was on break,” Alma looked up at Thalia before blushing and turning away for a moment, taking a shaky breath before patting her on the knee, “Abuela knows she loves her pozole and tamales, so she made them when we stopped for a visit on our way out.”
Luz made an appreciative noise, “Ooh, I’ve not had pozole in a long time.”
Alma lifted her chin in pride, “Abuela’s won competitions at the county fair. It’s legendary!”
The tanned woman laughed as she tossed a couple of fries in her mouth. “Mamí makes a mean sancocho, but I try not to ask for it because she’s in the kitchen all day.” She shot a look at Amity and nudged the pale woman with her elbow, “You’ll have to try it sometime.”
Amity immediately blushed, but before she could do more than open her mouth to speak, Luz’s phone beep-beep-beeeeped from her pocket.
Three pairs of eyes turned her way as the brown-haired woman fished the device out of her pocket and silenced the alarm. “Alright, listen up,” Luz nodded up at the sky above, “It’s almost Thursday.” She glanced at Amity before she turned back to the other girls, “When do you two need to be in New York?”
Alma dragged her fingers through her hair and groaned, “We have to check in with our dorm supe by eleven.” She hooked a thumb over her shoulder at Thalia, “Her jury is at two-thirty.”
Amity glanced at the clock on the tanned woman's phone, and ran a quick calculation in her head, “Thirty-five hours and four minutes until check-in, thirty-eight until the performance.”
Luz hmm'd while she tapped at her screen, “Let's see, from here to RPI… iiiisss…” She sighed and muttered c’mon, you can do it, then, “Finally. One thousand seventy miles.” She turned toward Amity and raised an expectant eyebrow.
“That's fifteen-point-two-eight hours at seventy miles per hour,” the pale woman said with hardly a pause.
“What’s ‘point-two-eight’ of an hour?” Luz repeated with an amused half-smile.
Amity rolled her eyes with a good-natured grumble, “Fine, sixteen minutes and forty-eight seconds.”
“See?” Luz turned back toward the younger pair and raised her hands in confidence, “Plenty of time.”
The younger girls traded an uncertain glance.
“Now—” the brown-haired woman started to stuff her used napkins into her takeout container before hopping down from Min's back, “I plan to hit Pennsylvania tonight, and ‘I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep.’”
“Robert Frost?” Amity asked.
“Nah,” Luz shook her head, “it's something Lilith says.”
“I see,” the green-haired woman said with a knowing smile, and Luz shrugged to herself when she reached out a hand for Amity's garbage. “Does Eda have any sayings?” Amity’s question brought a sly grin to the shorter woman's face.
“Uh yeah, actually,” Luz chuckled, then her voice turned warm and scratchy as she imitated the gray-haired woman, “Kid, we gotta go; I owe people money in this town.” Her toothy grin widened when Amity's composure broke in a snort and a sigh.
“My point is,” Luz turned back to the younger girls, and beckoned for their garbage, “I'm going to get Amity to Boston by Friday morning.” She spent a moment gathering the items in her hand into a steady pile, then looked Alma in the eye. “If you two can keep up with us, you'll get to school on time.” Alma gave her a slow, worried blink, then half-turned to look up at Thalia. Luz interrupted their wordless conversation when she leaned forward with a drawled, “Unless… ya’ll’re too chicken.”
The dark-haired girl took a sharp breath in and turned a glare up at the tanned woman. “What,” Alma growled.
“Yeah, y’know,” Luz shrugged, an innocent tone of voice at odds with her words, “Maybe you drive too slow or somethin’, and you can’t keep up with a trucker. It’s fine!”
The shorter girl jumped to her feet, her fists clenched, “We can keep up!” Thalia and Amity exchanged an amused glance.
Luz barked a laugh of disbelief, “Right, okay!” She shook her head as she gave Amity an exaggerated shrug and a loud, stage-whispered, “I bet they can't.”
“I bet we can,” Alma stepped forward and set her jaw, her glasses flashing white in the parking lot light’s steady glare.
“Uh-huh, sure,” Luz grinned, then, like she’d just gotten her way. She pointed a finger at Alma’s chest, “If you can keep up, I’ll pay for your hotel room.”
Alma blinked, and Thalia turned gray eyes up at Luz as she asked, “What?”
“Incentive,” Luz replied with the snap of a finger-gun, then she turned back to Alma, “You’ve been sleeping in Scarlet for how long? How’s a hot shower sound?”
The dark-haired girl grit her teeth and grumbled, “Sounds nice.”
“It does, doesn’t it?” the tanned woman had that insufferably smug look on her face again. Luz tilted her head to catch Thalia’s eye, “Surprise, by the way.”
Alma held her hand out toward Luz, “You’re on!” Luz grinned, and gave her hand a firm shake.
Notes:
This one took longer than I'd anticipated for a number of reasons: a new project getting close to launch at work, my wife & I started watching Teen Wolf, and we're almost done with Season 3, a li'l Baldur's Gate 3 and Helldivers 2 as well. I also had a two or two-and-a-half week stretch of brainrot while I was outlining what might be my next fic. Couldn't get that outta my head until I had it mapped out, you know how it goes.
Anyway, have an extra-long chapter to make up for the extra-long wait. Thanks for reading!
Alma: If you say so 1
Thalia: Just the two of us 2
Alma: I'll be right back 3
Thalia: I'll be waiting 4
Almla: I'm sorry 5
Alma: Because she’s— she’s incredible, and I’m— I'm just me 6
Chapter 28: Thursday, 12:17am
Notes:
Once again, a big thanks to GoofyGomez and Mexfan for their permission to use Alma & Thalia, and for their assistance with the translations. Their help is invaluable in capturing the essence of their characters.
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
The sleek silver vessel listed starboard, drawing a lazy spiral through the vacuum as she bled atmosphere into the cold, unforgiving black. She was the shining centerpoint in a glittering constellation of debris, drifting amid a self-made nebula of prismatic gas and flame. A dark shape lurked ten-thousand meters off, hardly more than a silhouette against the stars. The small, brutally angled hunter devoured the intervening space in a burst of its sub-light engines, and latched its jaws on the neck of its wounded prey. The TFR Trailblazer lurched underfoot as her hull suffered a fresh breach, and invaders began to climb through from the predator’s venomous bite.
“What hit us?!”
“—show fire on decks three through seven, venting—”
“Power down across the ship, Captain, and we're—”
“Life support critical in Hydroponics!”
“—losing atmosphere on Four and Five! Where are—”
“Coolant spike in Reactor Three!”
“Automatic bulkhead failure on Seven, get a crew—!”
The ship jolted sharply to one side, and her overworked grav-system struggled to compensate. Captain Somteul Pak watched in helpless fury as her crew stumbled and fell from their stations while the red-alert klaxons shrieked overhead. The stocky woman ducked beneath a raised hand, hiding her face from a shower of fat yellow sparks. “Will somebody shut off that damned alarm?” she bellowed. The power flickered and died, leaving the bridge swallowed by a moment's darkness before the dim red emergency lights flickered to life.
“Thank you,” the Captain grunted to no-one in particular as she pulled Helmsman Dafydd(*) to his feet. He mumbled a pained Sorry, Ma’am before he climbed back into his station and fastened his emergency harness. The bridge control consoles and the main viewscreen winked back online with a sluggish, static-drenched reboot. Pak turned to survey her senior officers and repeated her question in the heavy, suffocating silence, “What hit us?”
“Two separate events, Captain,” Lieutenant Commander Index examined his tactical instrumentation, keying up a readout on another screen. “The first looks to have been a kinetic weapon strike…” He squinted in disbelief, the dim blue and white light from his display shining in his magenta-lensed eyes. “Almost like a bullet, Captain. It went through our shields at a sizable fraction of lightspeed, and—” He scowled in new-found concern, “It tore a hole clean through the shuttle bay above Engineering.”
“And what was the second?”
Major Jakarta Kirana interrupted the tall blond man’s next sentence, “—We’ve been boarded, Ma’am!” The security chief held a finger to the communicator fixed behind her ear, listening for a moment before scrambling into motion. She talked quickly as she filled pouches on her bandoleer, fastening detonators and multitools to her belt, “That second hit was an airlock being punched into the Science bays. Special Projects,” she added before Captain Pak could verbalize the question on her face. The short, red-haired woman checked her holstered plasma sidearm, and drew a beam rifle from the locker beside her station.
“Miss Jefferies, hailing frequencies!” Pak leaned over the arm of her captain’s chair and pulled her control console open. She keyed the intercom and barked an order, “All hands, prepare defensive measures! We have been boarded for reasons unknown, and—”
A shriek of feedback cut through the air, interrupting the Captain’s message. An alien tongue rolled across the bridge, shaped by guttural syllables and harsh clicking consonants. A moment later, a cold, mechanical voice ground out of the speakers set around the bridge, sending an unsettling vibration through the soles of their boots. Give us the one like us… or be destroyed.
Pak and her crew exchanged confused glances and muttered questions. “The one like you?” the stocky woman's soft confusion echoed throughout the ship. Pak gestured to her communications officer, then set her jaw and glared at the main viewscreen as she raised her voice, “Attention, unidentified aggressors: stand down. We can assist you in your search. We are an exploratory research vessel, not a ship of war. I repeat, stand down.”
That same squealing shriek of feedback rippled through the bridge before the chilling phrase was repeated. Give us the one like us or be destroyed. The digitized words echoed faintly as other sounds filled the background of the transmission, as if it had been spoken aloud inside the Trailblazer; footsteps, thumps and bangs, distant calls in unaltered Terran. There were sounds of some sort of struggle, as if the one broadcasting were grappling with another.
A crewman’s halting voice repeated part of the demand, “The one li– like you?” The bridge crew fell under a dread silence as they listened to their shipmate groan in pain, then gasp a frightened, “I— I don't— know what you mean! Wait—!”
A deafening retort shattered the transmission into a howl of static, drowning out most of the crewman's scream. The broadcast trailed off with the dying man’s gurgling exhale.
Captain Pak clenched her fists and turned to face Major Kirana. “I want them off my ship,” she snarled.
~
Amity scrolled back to the top of the document as she hummed a thoughtful tone. “Starting in medias res is a choice,” the pale girl said, drawing a chuckle from her left.
“It’s dramatic!” Luz replied, “Sci-Fi nerds love dramaaa—!” She raised a hand to grasp at the air as she drew out her last word, like she was on a stage, mid-monologue, “—aaaaaaaaaa!” She started to cough, and covered her mouth with her fist.
“You okay over there?” Amity asked with a playful drawl.
“Never better,” the brown-haired girl replied with a thin, thready voice. Her impersonation of an elderly man earned her a snort of amusement from her companion.
“You seem to love dramatic plot-twists, are you—” the pale girl gave a loud gasp, and covered her mouth with her fingers in exaggerated surprise, “—are you secretly a sci-fi nerd?” Amity teased, drawing a quick chuckle from Luz.
“Oh please,” the tanned girl said, “Fantasy nerds love drama too.” She leaned toward Amity and waggled her eyebrows, “Don’t we?”
“Yes, yes we do,” the pale girl smiled back with a blush. The girls shared a giggle and a fond glance before the shorter of the two sighed. After a moment, Amity cleared her throat and raised Luz's phone to begin reading again. She paused, first, then turned a curious look toward the other girl as she nodded toward the device in her palm. “They don't all start like this, do they?” When Luz hummed a question, Amity clarified, “It's interesting so far, but there's… more action than I had anticipated.”
“Naaah, they’re usually pretty slow.” Luz shook her head and made a face, “Have you ever watched any Cosmic Frontier or the original Star Trek?”
Amity gave her a carefully noncommittal shrug, which, suspicious.
“The episodes usually start off like those, y’know, with their ‘we found a new planet, and a new species with a problem’ situation,” Luz waved a hand before turning back to the road, pretending not to notice the taller girl’s look of relief. She hooked her thumbs over the horizontal bar of the steering wheel, letting the vibration of the diesel engine settle deep in her wrists. “But, the last couple episodes have been leading up to this one.”
“Oh?” the taller girl hummed in consideration, “They’re not separate storylines?”
“Wellll…” Luz motioned with a hand, like, maybe. “Mostly. They’re tying them together to end the season. First they had navigation issues—it was a Bermuda Triangle thing, I think? Weird space affecting their systems—but then they stumbled onto a distress signal and followed it to an empty escape pod drifting in the middle of a nebula. The next one, uhhh…” She did a double-take at the green sign that rolled past on Amity's side of the Interstate, shining bright in the passing glare of Hooty’s headlights: EXIT 230, OXFORD, KALONA VILLAGE MUSEUM, “—heh, sorry, thought that said something else—the next episode had some kinda fragmented alien computer virus infect the ship’s central core, and they were in a race against the clock to communicate with it or lock it down before they lost control of the Trailblazer.”
The golden-eyed girl hmmm’d and muttered a soft, “See, that sounds like something Dad would like,” as she settled back into her seat to read.
~
With a bleep and a hiss, the turbolift doors opened onto Main Street: the three-deck-tall stretch of trade-shop frontage, outdoor-cafe-style seating, and carefully cultivated garden pathways. Merchant explorers had volunteered to join Captain Pak and her crew, enticed by the profit possibilities found in forging exclusive trading contracts with new-found civilizations. Artisans and gourmands had likewise secured berths on the deep space mission, and all had a hand in running the community center and ship-board marketplace.
Main Street’s environmental controls were synchronized with the Trailblazer’s day/night cycle, leading to brisk morning jogs along the Strip, delightful strolls at golden hour, or the occasional summer night’s stargazing session. Deceptively simple engineering tricks with lensed glass, video screens, and air circulation systems gave visitors the illusion of wind-swept rolling hills beyond a wide, planet-side avenue built up in a blend of Old Earth architecture. Tall trees dotted the manicured river of ankle-deep grass carpeting the center of the thoroughfare, lending a fresh, calming scent and sun-dappled shade to any off-duty crew members that lounged on the lawn.
Fleet psychologists had long ago recognized the need for the crew to see something like home on deep space missions—but this artificial slice of Earth burned. Major Kirana and Lt. Commander Index stepped out of the turbolift into a knee-high drift of grayish smoke. The crackle and pop of flame filled the air as the pair of officers advanced into the hazy public space.
They took a moment to scan their surroundings; scorched lines of energy weapons fire traced the nearby walls and shops, broken glass littered the ground and crunched underfoot. The shop close at hand had been ransacked: tables and shelves overturned, storage crates broke open and emptied, discarded wares scattered across the floor.
The Major stepped over a broken chunk of perma-crete that had fallen into the walkway, her beam rifle at the ready. Index knelt to run a cold finger across a ragged line of puncture marks in the rubble. Kirana held up a hand and motioned in a circle with two fingers, and the four red-and-black uniformed members of her security team filed out of the lift with near-silent footsteps.
A crack echoed down the avenue, muffled by the trees and the drifting smoke. The Trailblazer crew tensed at the sound. “‘Dex?” Kirana asked in a wary hush, squinting into the distance, “I lost contact with Cortland’s platoon four minutes ago.”
“One moment, Major,” the android responded, and the security team formed a loose circle around the kneeling tactical officer as he pulled a quad-scanner from his belt. After a cursory examination of the damaged perma-crete, Index rose to his feet and nodded to the red-haired woman. The security chief raised a bladed hand and motioned forward with a snap of her wrist.
They advanced through drifting clouds of smoke, silent save for the soft bip-bip-blip of the mechanical crewman’s multitool. They bore to the right as Main Street followed the gentle aft-curve of the Trailblazer’s teardrop-shaped saucer section. The overhead air circulators spat showers of sparks, or thumped and choked on sticky black fumes. A haze settled around their legs in the still, stagnant air.
Kirana growled when she found the first body half-hidden in the rubble. It was one of the gardeners. Harold? Gerold? Something like that. The red-haired woman reached down to check for a pulse, but quickly pulled her hand back when the thick curls of smoke rolled away from his bloodied torso.
They paused at each fallen shipmate long enough for Index to touch his quad-scanner to the insignia pinned to their collar, and for one of the security team to close their unseeing eyes. Some sported the burn marks of a beam weapon, but at strange angles, or traced in unusual swirling patterns. The state of the other bodies brought a deepening frown to the security chief’s face. Index held his multitool over the most recently discovered corpse—a crewman in the dark orange of Engineering—as he scanned the large wound in the man’s chest.
“Well?” the Major asked, her eyes roving the smoke-shrouded street.
“Concussion mark,” Index replied in his usual monotone, but Kirana could hear the distaste in his voice. “The invaders appear to favor hand-held kinetic weapons.” He bent down to sniff at the torn edges of the man’s tunic, then pushed himself to his feet, “Chemical propellant, rather than magnetics. Strange.” He gestured to the bright red fire extinguisher laying on the ground, “Ensign Davis here surely posed no threat.”
“Doesn’t look like they're taking anything,” Kirana motioned toward the sidewalk with her head, and Index glanced at the products trampled underfoot. “They must be killing anyone who can’t answer their question.”
“Ma’am!” one of the security platoon hissed, staring into the distance. Kirana moved to his side as the man pointed forward and said—
~
Amity made an amused choking sound, drawing a grin and a “What?” from the tanned girl in the driver’s seat.
“Oh, the— well, the dialogue here,” the green-haired girl pointed at the smartphone, “It says, uhm—” Amity’s face turned two shades of pink as she read verbatim, “—some kinda Cardinal shit for bad guy spotted.”
Luz laughed again and asked, “It’s in square brackets, izzin’ it?”
Moonlit fields of grain stretched out on either side of the Interstate, their acres rolling by at a steady clip. A cluster of corrugated steel farm buildings were shining silver where they sprouted like mushrooms along a shadowed strip of forest to the North, and when Luz turned a smile her way, the pale light of the night's eye painted the rim of her jaw and the curve of her neck. Amity had to clear her throat before she could force out a simple, “Yes.”
The brown-haired girl nodded like she'd expected as much, oblivious to Amity’s choked hesitation. “Yeah, that's the sorta thing we help Gus with,” Luz shrugged as she gave Amity a warm smile, “Words are hard sometimes, y’know? It's best to get the gist of it down and keep moving.”
Amity hummed as she considered that statement. There was wisdom in the concept: keep moving, any progress is still progress, don't get bogged down in the details. There had certainly been times in the past when she had left a piece of work unfinished, with the intent to loop back around in the morning with a fresh set of eyes or a less-preoccupied mind. “Are you…” Amity had a sneaking suspicion, and paused for effect, “speaking from experience? As a writer?”
Luz barked a laugh as her eyes widened in something like panic, “Oh-ho~oh my god, uhm, I— yeah, y’know what? Yeah, I guess I am.” She scrubbed a hand back through her hair as she chuckled, her eyes firmly planted on the road ahead. “I wrote so much Azura fan-fiction when I was younger.”
“Really?” Amity leaned on her armrest as she twisted to face the other girl, a glimmer of curiosity in her golden eyes. “Anything I might have read?”
“I hope not!” Luz scoffed, bright pink dusting her cheeks as she spared a quick glance at her passenger. She pointedly locked eyes on Interstate 80 before she continued, “Fourteen-year-old me was not what you’d call a good writer. I had big dreams, big ideas, and a barely-larger-than-average vocabulary to prop them up. At best I was… enthusiastic.”
The pale girl rested her chin on her palm and hummed, “Well, now I’m curious—?”
“Nope!” the brown-haired trucker interrupted, “Sorry to disappoint, but we’re talking about Gustopher’s writing!”
Amity laughed and waved a hand, “You're right, you're—” she paused to yawn, “—you’re right.”
“Yawning?!” Luz teased, “You're not tired, are you?”
The pale girl's cheeks darkened under the starlight as she grumbled, “‘M not tired, it's just—”
“—or maybe I’m boring you, now that—”
“—I get a little sleepy after I've had a big lunch,” Amity huffed in protest.
Luz patted the taller girl’s shoulder while she glanced at the dimly lit digital clock in the corner of Hooty’s navigation screen. 12:41 AM. “It’s getting a little late for normal folks, innit?” She flashed Amity a grin when the taller girl fought back another yawn long enough to nod. “I bet we’ll hear from Gus soon, if he’s on what he calls Demon Time. I dunno if you've ever heard of Ballmer’s Peak?” Luz watched those sparkling golden eyes for a moment to catch any signs of recognition, and laughed at the other girl’s exasperated groan. “He seems to find his muse with an after-midnight Red Bull.”
“Red Bull at midnight?” Amity clicked her tongue in disapproval, “Agustus.”
Luz winced in second-hand shame and shrugged, leaving Gus’s reputation to fend for itself. “I’ll suggest dialogue for the security team—occasionally—but Card always knows the right thing to say.”
Amity squinted for a moment, remembering, “The friend you think was military?”
“There's no way he wasn't,” Luz’s emphatic irritation drew a snort of amusement from her passenger, and she shook her head in apology. “Sorry. Old argument with Gustaphacles. Anyway, Card’s off on some assignment—or as he likes to say,” Luz pulled a face and a mocking tone, complete with air quotes, “It’s Just A Business Trip, Honest—so he can't give Gus any tips.”
“Should— should we suggest something?”
Luz blinked in surprise, giving the taller girl another glance to try and read her expression. “You want to?” the brown-eyed girl tilted her head in worry, “Do you have time for that?”
“What do you mean?” Amity had a curious wrinkle in her brow; she seemed sincere enough in her offer. To Luz's second quick examination, she almost looked hopeful.
“I mean, sure, I told Gus I’d make you read it, but I was really just giving him a hard time because he deserves it every once in a while—but you don’t really have to help if you don’t want to, or ya don’t even need’ta read it, really, if you don’t have time,” Luz’s rambling explanation brought a fond smile to the golden-eyed girl’s face, “y’know, ‘cuz I’m sure you have something you need to do for your presentation, right? And—”
“No, Luz—” Amity interrupted with a gentle voice, “I need to not think about that for a little while.”
“Oh?” the smaller girl pulled a grin, “You need to not think for a bit? I got’chu, girl! I’m a pro at that.” She paused to savor Amity’s burst of delighted laughter, then Luz gave her an appraising glance. “You wanna suggest something?” When Amity nodded, Luz motioned toward the phone, “Alright, what’dja have in mind?”
The pale girl hummed as she tapped at her lip, “What about—
~
“Sir, movement ahead.”
Kirana pulled the stock of her beam rifle tight against her shoulder and peered through the electronic scope. She flicked a toggle with her thumb to switch the EVF between thermal and infra-red, settling on a mode that laid the exotic imaging over a visible-light display. Four dim sensor shadows lurked in the drifting smoke, barely eighteen meters away. The Major breathed out in irritation and cycled through her view modes once more. They were like ghosts; she could see where they were by their sensor-holes. She shot a glance over her shoulder at the android, and gave the smallest tip of her head toward the invaders. “Anything?”
Index held out his quad-scanner for a handful of heartbeats, but shook his head.
The security chief used a swift set of hand motions to direct her platoon to flanking positions: Corporal Olver and Private First Class Edard moved to the left, their red-and-black uniforms slowly fading into the haze lingering between the trees dotting the grassy Strip. PFCs Kolt and Belenne carefully picked their way into the shop front on the right, making for the back alley that ran parallel to the Avenue itself. After a slow five-second countdown on her raised hand, Kirana led Index toward the alien invaders. The officers snaked their way through the rubble and debris on the Avenue, side-lit by the dim, flickering signs that hung crooked above their scorched storefronts.
Four dark-armored humanoids picked their way down the middle of the faux-cobblestone walkway, moving with a stiff-legged gait over the smoke-shrouded obstacles in their path. They stayed in a pyramidal formation, with three of the humanoids walking shoulder-to-shoulder in a straight line, centered behind the one that appeared to be in command. That one had a glittering gold-like trim on their shiny black-and-gray helmet, its faceless curvature polished to a mirror-bright finish. The leader stopped short, and turned to one side, peering down at a large chunk of perma-crete on the walkway. The three followers rotated in a strange unison, pivoting to keep their leader at the point of their triangular formation. The leader bent at the waist to push aside the slab that lay tilted over other rocks and rubble, then the alien reached down with one hand to grasp at a timid shape that had been pinned beneath the chunk of masonry.
The commanding invader stood upright, their hand fisted in the bright blue tunic of a Trailblazer crew woman; they pulled her up from the ground, but left her knees brushing the pavement. Kirana felt her blood run cold—she recognized the woman. Despite the layers of soot and grime, and the blood running from the gash at her hairline, she would recognize her anywhere.
Saoirse Byrne was an intelligent woman on the Special Projects team, far too intelligent to fall for Kirana’s cheesy pick-up lines the few times they had crossed paths after hours. They worked well together, the times the Major had accompanied the science team on away missions. She’d never seen the taller blonde look so frightened.
Give us the one like us or be destroyed.
The bloodied woman recoiled from the full-volume demand, and the alien pulled her up to her feet, pressing a large hand-held device to her soot-smudged jaw. It had a covered grip, like the hilt of an old-Earth fencer’s rapier, fixed below a wide, angular metal barrel. The invaders’ technology no doubt had origins in a different school of thought than that of the Terran Federation and its member species, but Kirana knew what a weapon looked like. She already had her beam rifle pulled tight against her jaw and her finger on the trigger, but Index still moved faster.
The retired war-droid raised his plasma pistol and straight-arm fired twice before Kirana had made the conscious decision to pull her trigger. The gold-uniformed officer’s first shot reduced the invader’s cruel firearm to slag, while his second struck the alien in the side of the head. The bolt of plasma splashed off the humanoid’s dark, mirror-like helmet in a spray of gobbets like molten metal, and their captive shrieked in alarm. The Major’s beam of incandescent light speared the still-glowing lump of metal in the invader’s hand and scattered the bulk of its material in a cloud of atoms. Saoirse cried out once more when the alien opened their hand and dropped her to the cobblestones. The gold-trimmed invader turned to face the pair of officers as the other three aliens raised their own crudely-shaped weapons—longer, two-handed implements—again in that inhumanly synchronized unison.
“Hold your fire!” Kirana bellowed, walking a few more steps forward until she was even with a small alley opening on her right. Index drew alongside her left shoulder, and after a moment the gold-trimmed alien let its ruined hand cannon fall to the floor. The three unmarked humanoids stepped up to their leader’s shoulder, and the four aliens stood in an evenly spaced line facing the officers. The woman on the ground, apparently forgotten, began to crawl away while holding her breath.
Give us the one like us… or be destroyed.
“Explain your demands!” Index called, both his attention and his quad-scanner focused on the strange humanoids. The leader paused—holding completely still for several long seconds—before shaking their head and limbs loose, as if they had to come back to life before they could respond with a different set of harsh syllables and clicks.
We have come to take the one like us.
“A humanoid, like you?” the android attempted to clarify, and again the alien paused.
Unknown.
Kirana shot a quick glance up at the taller mechanical man on her left, feeling the same confusion she saw on his face. “What form would this one choose?” the tactical officer wondered aloud.
Unknown. We have come for the one like us.
Index sighed and tried a different tack, “Why do you believe they are here?”
This time there was hardly a pause. We tracked the signal.
“A signal?” Kirana scowled in disbelief, “No one sent you a signal.” Saoirse had almost reached a knot of oak trees in the grassy Strip when Cpl. Olver and PFC. Edard moved at a crouch to intercept their fellow crewmate. Olver took a knee with his beam rifle raised while Edard helped the injured science officer take cover behind a nearby tree.
We found the repository.
“Repository?” Index blinked, then he pitched his voice low in confusion, “Could they mean the escape pod?”
“Why would you think that?” Kirana hissed in return.
Unauthorized entry triggered the signal.
“We tried to help— it— That pod was empty when it opened!” the Major growled, keeping her beam rifle trained on the Inquisitor, “All this is for nothing! They died for nothing! Why did you kill our people?!”
The robotic translator did nothing to mask the sheer animosity rippling through the alien’s native tongue as it turned its head away from Kirana. These animals do not concern us, the Inquisitor spoke directly to Index.
The tall android took a half-step forward and held out a hand before his purpling fellow officer could wrestle her indignation into words, “We can help you locate your— the one like you.”
You will assist us, the Inquisitor stared at the mechanical man. It raised an arm and pointed toward the Major, and the other three shouldered their weapons. This one is unnecessary.
Kirana clicked her tongue in irritation and barked a command to her platoon, “Light ‘em up!”
“No!” Saoirse leaned out from behind the oak tree, her hand outstretched in a warning, “Don’t—!”
Olver and Edard had assumed a firing stance after the bloodied science officer had taken cover, and at the Major’s order, Kolt and Belenne swung out on either side of a doorway slightly behind the invaders. Kirana and her platoon pulled their triggers at nearly the same instant, like a well-oiled machine.
Five beams of white-hot energy flashed across the scant few meters separating the humans and the alien troops, and struck the humanoids in the head or the chest. The beams of focused light touched the alien’s dark, shining armor and fractured—the beams multiplied in a shimmering kaleidoscope as the invader’s armor reflected the energy like a prism. Fanned streaks of light sliced through branches and tree trunks, and burned through storefront window displays.
Kolt fell with a scream when Edard’s reflected laser fire swept across his legs. The invaders turned to face the flanking security crew, and Belenne’s sustained fire scorched the cobblestone in a misshapen arc as her target moved. Kirana yelled a wordless warning as the armored humanoids readied their weapons with a calculated indifference.
The deafening roar of automatic kinetic weapons hit Kirana like a physical blow. She’d had her fair share of experience with improvised explosives, but nothing had prepared her for this. She dropped her beam rifle when she clapped her hands over her ears, reeling backward in surprise. A sudden terror gripped her entire body at the teeth-rattling cacophony. She could hardly breathe; her heartbeat thundered up the sides of her throat, her ears rang from the incessant hammering of gunfire, and her legs were sluggish, unwieldy lumps of muscle that threatened to send her tumbling to the ground.
It hadn’t been more than a second or two, and the invaders had already cut her platoon down in a grisly crimson spray. The invaders turned their weapons on her, and she felt a great weight strike her in the stomach and torso.
Lieutenant Commander Index had begun to move while the Major’s energy weapon tumbled to the ground. In one smooth motion, the android plucked a detonator from the woman’s belt and flung it underhand toward the invaders, just before he tackled Kirana into the alleyway on her right. A brief, ear-splitting bark of the alien weapons rang out before their small patch of Main Street was swallowed by the crack of a giant’s thunderbolt.
Her whole body felt bruised and numb. Kirana tried to push herself to her hands and knees, but her limbs were hardly more than jelly. A strong arm lifted her to her feet, and she squinted blurry, unfocused eyes up at the disheveled tactical officer. “Dex?!” Kirana might have yelled, but she couldn’t hear herself speak. The tall man placed a bloodied hand over her mouth and shook his head, pressing a raised forefinger to his lips. He helped her to her feet, and they staggered toward the Emergency Exit access hatch hidden at the end of the alley.
~
The endless Iowan fields stretched out to sleep under the blanket of the warm summer night. Faint moonlight painted the crops growing to the south, and pinpoints of light marked the distant farmhouses. A small green sign flashed by Amity’s window, and she had a moment to catch a glimpse of white letters that promised WALCOTT 6 / CHICAGO 199. An orange and black sign followed swiftly afterward, and the message there drew a long groan from the brown-haired girl on her left.
ROAD WORK AHEAD
“Nooo~ho-ho-hoooo,” Luz scrunched her face in an exaggerated frown as she grumbled in a petulant tone, “But I don’t want road wor~hurrrk!” She turned an enormous pair of puppy-dog eyes on the girl in the passenger seat, her bottom lip quivering, “Amity, don’t let them do road work!”
Amity chuckled and gave an apologetic shrug, “It’s not really up to me, Luz.”
The Interstate curved slightly south, and the smaller girl grumbled deep in her chest as they passed a digital sign that alternated between a pair of messages: ONE LANE NEXT 15 MILES, and a few moments later, NARROW AHEAD / WATCH FOR LANE CHANGES.
“But you’re the boss, Amity, and— One lane?!” Luz whined, then she threw her head back and uhg’d! when they passed a set of white-and-black speed-limit signs sandbagged in place on either side of the Interstate. “Ah, boo. Fifty-five?! What is this, Ohio?”
The pale girl gave her a curious grin, “You don’t like Ohio?”
“No,” Luz answered halfway through the other girl’s question.
She waited a pair of heartbeats for the brown-eyed girl to continue, but when she didn’t offer anything more than a pout, Amity tilted her head in an amused smile. “We’ll be fine, Luz, you said it yourself: we have plenty of time.”
“Yeah, but I really want to hit Pennsylvania before we stop. Any slowdowns’ll make it that much harder,” the brown-haired girl sighed, then bobbed her shoulders in a shrug, “Oh well. It’s fine. I just thought we wouldn’t hit any construction traffic today,” Luz sighed again, then quietly grumbled, “Not until Ohio at least.”
Amity snorted the tiniest bit and gave her companion a quizzical look. “What do you have against Ohio?”
“Oh, so many things,” the tanned girl exclaimed, trying to tame the grin that was spreading across her face. She giggled as she shot a quick glance at Amity, then waved a hand before her face as she smoothed her expression into a frown, her eyebrows furrowed, like a magic trick. “Have you ever been to Ohio?”
“No.” The pale girl didn’t even have to think about it; she didn't get out much.
“Lucky!” Luz gasped, pulling an unexpected laugh from her passenger. “Never been to Ohio? Sorry I hafta to break your win-streak,” the tanned girl clicked her tongue and winked when Amity scoffed.
“Alright, tell me: what's so bad about Ohio?”
Perhaps that was a foolish question to ask, but Luz's eyes lit up with glee. “On a good day, you can experience all four seasons. On a bad day, it's just miserable and wet and gray.”
Amity hummed and fired back with, “Seattle weather, then?”
“Fair point,” Luz said, snapping a finger in emphasis, “Seattle is also the worst.” The green-haired girl giggled at her immediate pivot, while Luz forged ahead, “Not to mention all the astronauts!”
“The—” Amity blinked, “What?”
“More than twenty astronauts have come from Ohio,” the brown-eyed girl nearly whispered in a quiet, conspiratorial tone, pointing up at the sky. “What is so bad about the state that people want off the planet entirely?” When Amity laughed, Luz paused to grin. “I'm just kiddin’, bee-tee-dubs,” the smaller girl admitted with a matching laugh, “People hate on Ohio just like they hate on Nickelback.”
“Who?” Amity squinted in confusion, her voice pitched in a perfectly innocent tone. She gave Luz a sly smirk after the brown-haired girl gave a loud gasp and shot her a look of surprise.
“You—!” Luz snorted and shook her head with a low, growling chuckle, playing it up for her audience. “You fibber! You got me, oh! I can't believe you!” The pale girl looked absolutely pleased with herself, doing the littlest dance in her seat that Luz had ever seen, which, cute.
Amity began to tell a story about how she would pull the same sort of prank on Edric, drawing another laugh from the tanned girl. Luz listened with half an ear as she focused on the changing traffic pattern ahead; the sparse sprinkling of red lights along the two-lane Interstate drifting slowly to the outside lane. The radio had begun to play near the beginning of their Ohio discussion, as if Hooty had been listening to Amity read the script aloud, and tuned out when Luz started whining about traffic. Luz turned the volume down just a hair, the better to hear Amity talk over Led Zeppelin’s ode to Lord of the Rings.
Orange signs and barrels dotted the concrete ahead, and brake lights flashed in the dark. The brown-haired girl pressed the clutch bar with her left foot and let off the gas, letting the big rig bring itself down to the new, unnecessarily-low speed limit. When the vibrations in her palms and the hum under her feet fell into sync, Luz slipped the stick down a pair of gears and let off the clutch. The diesel engine beneath them growled deep as she accelerated. She checked her mirrors again—that familiar pair of dim yellow headlights followed at a safe distance. Good.
~
Amity held off on reading aloud while Luz guided the semi-truck along the narrow, single open lane of traffic. They jostled from side to side as the lane shifted onto a temporary shoulder, Hooty’s tires whining atop the grooved pavement. Concrete barriers and vertical green reflector strips blurred past the cabin on either side almost too close for comfort. She scrolled up and down through the document as a distraction, trying to give it more than the smallest scrap of her attention. Amity thought the other girl had enjoyed listening to her read to pass the time, which… was nice. Nice? That’s the best you can do? She breathed out through her nose, amused by how insufficient the word felt. But it was nice, being able to read to an eager listener; she hadn’t had the opportunity in such a long time. She did want to keep reading—she’d been around her brother long enough to appreciate science fiction—but she could tell by the smaller girl’s wary posture that Luz needed to focus on the road.
A warmth pooled in her chest when she realized what she had decided without deciding, that thoughts of helping the girl at her side were becoming something of an instinct. She wondered what this unlabeled, uncategorized feeling would turn out to be—this fizzling effervescence in her chest. How could she begin to describe it? Comparing her symptoms with what she'd read in her favorite Hecazura fics sent her heart racing, and an embarrassing heat crawling up her neck and face. She quickly tried to turn her thoughts to anything else, squeezing her eyes closed and exhaling noisily with the effort.
“You okay?” Luz asked.
“Yes,” Amity practically yelped, “I’m fine! I’m fine, here, thanks. How are you?” She twitched sideways in her seat to see the tanned girl’s grin. She must have brushed the smartphone with her thumb, because the script scrolled down farther than she had seen, yet.
Luz’s laugh was a beautiful sound filled with a fondness that still felt foreign and unearned, but then she scrunched her brows and crinkled her nose as she wondered, “What’cha thinkin’ about?”
“Uhm,” Amity blinked and glanced at the phone in her hand, “Colors?” Dammit.
“What kinda colors?”
It worked! It wasn’t a lie, exactly, but Amity still had to scramble to put her fleeting observation into words. “Yes, uh, you— you said you voiced Kirana, yes? And her lines are in purple text.”
“Yup?” Luz confirmed.
“These other lines are in purple as well.”
“Oh? Right, yeah, are they marked ‘M.V.’?” the tanned girl looked like she expected a yes. She made an ah sound when Amity nodded, “Those are for the Mad Visitor.” She watched the pale girl blink, and Luz chuckled, “That’s just what they’re called— they don’t have an official name.”
Amity scrolled up and down, humming for a moment as she scratched at her chin, muttering, “Pak is in green, Index is red, these others are blue… but yours—” she pointed at the phone with her other hand, “Your characters speak to each other, down here.”
“Do they?” Luz craned her neck for a moment to try and glance at the screen, and Amity pulled it away with a frown. Luz stuck her tongue out and made a wet pbbbt! sound.
“That must be hard, acting out both sides of a conversation,” Amity said with a curious tilt to her head. “How do you…?”
Luz nodded at first, then brightened at the hesitant question. “Oh! Well, lemme tell you about my creative process—”
~
Davenport glittered in the twilight dark to the East, out the driver's side window of the big rig as Hooty rumbled southbound along the L-shaped Interstate 280 bypass. The odometer steadily ticked over as they traveled the Quad Cities beltway, chasing the gray line of their headlights in lieu of a horizon. They plunged into a dark valley, fleeting silhouettes of scraggly trees forming walls on either side of the freeway. Cloud-shrouded stars and the large cat’s-eye moon hung overhead, silent witness to their travel. The arboreal walls fell away as the double-brown semi trundled through an interchange, eighteen tires humming across a bridge over a divided four-lane local road.
Luz called the other girl’s name in a soft tone of excited wonder. “Check it out,” the brown-eyed girl grinned, pointing for a moment out the windshield.
A green sign appeared in the dark, giving Amity enough time to read the words: MISSISSIPPI RIVER.
The pale girl leaned forward in anticipation, one hand pressed against the cherry-wood dashboard as Hooty passed another green-and-white sign: SERGEANT JOHN F. BAKER JR. BRIDGE.
In a matter of seconds they were barreling over an unbroken plane of black glass. The narrow concrete bridge hung above a giant’s mirror, the twinkling stars and summer moon glowing from beneath their feet. Amity pressed her forehead against her window, her slender hands cupped over her eyes, the better to see the mighty Mississippi far below. After a long moment, Luz floated a soft question across the cab. “Whaddaya think?”
“Well… I mean… it's…” Amity ground to a halt when the possible answers to that simple question piled up in the back of her throat. Something about the way the night's sky reflected in the water struck a chord, leaving a melancholy hanging over her shoulders. When had she first learned about the Mississippi River? Second Grade geography? Had she ever seen it, in person? Maybe from the window of an airplane. She hadn’t thought about it in years, and now it poured underneath her toward the south; toward the Gulf of Mexico, another place she’d learned about and promptly put out of mind. The world was so big. It wasn’t like she hadn’t traveled! Her family had been to New York City, to Paris, summer holidays at the Italian villa; they'd visited satellite offices in other countries. That’s not it, Amity shook her head to dislodge that wayward train of thought. It’s different this time… because it’s just me. Here she was, the furthest she’d ever been on her own, atop the latest milestone in her journey; this crooked blue line on a schoolhouse map.
No, that’s not entirely true either. She stole a glimpse of the other girl’s profile over her shoulder. I’m not alone. She’s with me. Luz caught her eye, and a wide grin split the tanned girl’s face. That line of thought suddenly felt too deep, too dizzying a topic to touch on beneath the midwest stars. Her stomach lurched like she had stepped out onto a slippery, treacherous slope. Oh god, deflect! Amity coughed into her fist as she channeled her inner-Luz, then raised an eyebrow as she turned to face the brown-haired girl, a snarky response ready on her lips. “You know, the San Francisco Bay is—”
Luz barked a laugh, “—the Bay?!”
“I’m pretty sure it’s wider there.”
“Yeah, uh, but it’s a bay,” the tanned girl scoffed, “not a– a river. The widest river in America,” Luz leaned heavily on those words in a voice tinged with betrayal, tapping a fingertip on her steering wheel.
Amity turned a beatific smile up at the single arc of steel girders that passed overhead and sighed, “Not to mention the Bay Bridge.”
“Oh, right— the Bay Bridge is— is impressive—”
“—don’t get me wrong, this one is nice, too,” the green-haired girl offered with a grin, turning back to her window to watch.
“Yeah, uh-huh, no,” Luz chuckled, trailing off in a good-natured grumble, “This is nice, you’re right. It's just the second bridge you've called nice. I see how it is; you're playing favorites… with bridges.”
The Interstate sloped down toward the far side of the river, and all too soon they were rushing between tall, shadowed trees. “Hey Amity?” the smaller girl nudged her shoulder.
Amity hummed a hmm in response, glancing at the other girl. Luz pointed again, as Hooty’s headlights caught an approaching sign. Welcome to ILLINOIS covered the upper three-quarters, with a smaller tagline printed below: The Land of Lincoln.
“That’s six.” (**)
~
Captain Pak paced the burgundy carpet in front of her captain’s chair as she listened to Major Kirana and Lt. Commander Index confront the alien strike team. She felt powerless. She wanted to be there shoulder to shoulder with her officers, but that wish ran against regulations and common sense. Her place was here, to be the stable guiding hand the ship needed. She would just have to trust her crew, as she had every day since they set out on this journey.
The invaders were little more than wraiths on her ship’s damaged sensor grid, working their way down Main Street and killing each Trailblazer inhabitant they questioned. Evacuation teams had cleared the far end of the zone, but with half the community center offline, there was no way yet to count how many were truly dead. She glanced up at the main viewscreen: a list of names and radio waveforms occupied the narrow left column, live audio from Kirana and her security platoon piped through the overhead speakers, while the main display area showed a shifting number of security camera feeds from around the ship. She pointed at one box in particular and called out, “Highlight MS-P-one-oh-three, Mr. Tariq.” The junior lieutenant standing in for the tactical officer worked his controls, offering a nervous A–Aye, Captain a moment later.
One square video filled the center of the viewscreen, pushing the other security feeds aside. Main Street, looking down from above, the avenue curving to the left in the distance. Kirana and Index faced the camera, and a set of blurry, flickering blobs at the bottom of the screen. The contact team audio feeds overlapped: whispered call and response, controlled breathing, careful footsteps on tile and stone, a woman sobbing in a strange polyphonic echo, and the Major’s barked command to Hold your fire! Pak took a step forward, as if she could see or hear better by standing closer to the viewscreen. Her tactical officer’s voice filtered through the ship, a terse Explain your demands, set in his usual monotone. Would they explain? She felt her stomach start to tie itself into a knot of worry when the invaders replied with We—
A brilliant flash of light at her back painted a set of harsh silhouettes against the main viewscreen’s curved slab of glass, momentarily washing out the images on display. The Inquisitor’s words were drowned out by a loud, obnoxious fit of laughter. To her unending displeasure, Pak recognized that voice.
She swiveled on one heel and turned to face the small, wide-eyed child floating in the air above her captain’s seat. He giggled into his fingers and twisted around until he settled down on his side, on nothing, as if he were sprawled atop an invisible couch rather than across the air above the control-studded arm rests of her angular command chair. He looked exactly the same as the last time he had interfered with their mission—dark blue and white robes hiding yellow and blue skin, red eyes above a Cheshire Cat’s smile with too many teeth, and a shock of white hair hidden under a deep-blue conical hat dotted with stars. “Hey Cap-tin! Didja find the—” He looked past her at the viewscreen, his face twisting in a frown, “Awww, you guys are playing already?” He rolled onto his back to kick his feet in the air, his voice dripping with something like indignation, “You never want to play with me.” He crossed his arms in a pout, and huffed.
“You,” Pak growled, advancing toward the strange visitor, one finger on one fist raised in a threatening point, “What have you done?” She half-turned to point toward the viewscreen at her back, “What do they want?”
“You said you like to help!” the child whooped, throwing his arms over his head and cackling aloud, “They lost their egg, and you found it!”
Pak’s eyes narrowed as she asked, “Egg?” His excited outburst and her questioning response drowned out the tactical officer on-screen, his muttered thought about the escape pod going unheard as the youthful irritant started to laugh.
“Yeah, their egg!” He twisted around and draped his legs over the back of her chair, letting his head hang down, upside-down, as he watched her grit her teeth in confusion. “I told her about you guys,” he chortled, looking rather pleased with himself, “She wanted to know allll about you, ‘cuz she's in charge, just like you!”
“Captain?” The helmsman half turned in his seat, not wanting to look away from the viewscreen.
“About— about us? Me? What egg?” the woman wondered aloud, rubbing a hand along the back of her neck as she squinted in thought.
“Captain!”
“Yes, Mr. Dafydd?” Pak turned to face the viewscreen as Kirana’s last order slipped down from the ceiling in the sudden hush: Light ‘em up.
The high-frequency shriek of Terran Federation beam rifles set the air abuzz as the main viewscreen flared a brilliant white. It took the central computer a moment to resolve the image, just in time for screams and shouts of alarm to startle the bridge crew. Bars of high-energy laser fire swept spiraling scorch marks across the pavement as the invaders raised their weapons.
Pak’s blood ran cold as Kirana’s hand-picked security team fell. Helmsman Dafydd clapped his hands over his ears at the harsh, buzzsaw cacophony that announced their fate. Index dove to one side, sparks and flecks of green peppering his frame as he knocked Kirana clear of the fusillade, then an explosion shattered the scene. The camera feed went black. The bridge crew stared at the viewscreen for a pair of heartbeats before Pak broke the silence with a hoarse whisper. “Where are they?”
The young officer at the tactical station shook his head, breaking out of his stunned stupor. “Uh— I– I’m looking, ma’am!” he assured her as he frantically worked his controls, scrolling through the grid of available camera feeds.
Pak wheeled around to face the Lieutenant, pointing at the viewscreen while fear pooled in the corners of her eyes, “Mr. Tariq, get them on-screen!”
“Ma’am, there— there are no cameras operational in that sector—”
The hissing static transmission from the security platoon broke with a groan and a gasp, before the Major voiced a loud, disoriented Dex?! Pak turned to face the viewscreen, hoping her officers would appear in one of those flickering boxes. Next came a high-pitched whine and the grinding of servo-motors as Index shushed the Major. They might still be out there. We need to move, can you stand? Muffled sounds fell from the speakers, the rubbing of fabric, bumps, and thumps of one person helping another to their feet. After a tense few moments, Index began to whisper.
Captain… I can't tell if I’m still transmitting. I’m taking Kirana to the Armory. Have a med-team meet us there. A– and send O’Miles… I’ve taken damage.
“V.I.D.A., have Dr. Chretite and Chief O’Miles head to the Armory,” Pak snapped out her order, pausing a hairs-breadth to receive the bosun’s whistle of acknowledgement before she turned to the Helm, “Dafydd, you have the conn. And you,” She turned to face the Mad Visitor lounging in the air above her command chair, “You’re coming with me.”
The white-haired child gasped and clapped his hands on his cheeks, “I get to play, too?!” He threw his little fists in the air in excitement, floating after the Captain as she stormed off the bridge.
~
Amity hummed a thoughtful tone as she stared out the windshield, the white-painted lane markers flickering in the glow of Hooty’s headlights. Luz glanced her way, and a half-grin tugged at the tanned girl’s lips. “Penny for your thoughts?” the brown-eyed girl teased.
“Hmm? Oh, well,” Amity blinked in an absent-minded way, “I understand the Q reference, but—”
“You do?” the shorter girl looked completely shocked.
“I— I mean—” Amity spluttered as her cheeks burned a bright red, “I see why Gus has one, uh—” she made a vague motion with both hands, “—a Q-like character, because he’s such a fan favorite!”
“Ah, yes, of course,” Luz nodded with a smile, giving the other girl an appraising glance.
“Not to mention Q’s traditional use in examining the human experience juxtaposed against an omnipotent, yet moral, alien viewpoint,” Amity raised one pale finger as she spoke in a warm, even tone—as if she were quoting a research paper.
Luz raised an eyebrow as she glanced at her passenger, “Ah, yes…” She curled her lips and drawled a sarcastic, “Of course.”
The golden-eyed girl ignored her tone. “But why a child?” Amity asked, turning a curious look Luz’s way.
“Oh, uhm,” Luz slid her hand up under her cowboy hat to scratch at her hair, “Gus pitched it as being quote-unquote more believable for a child to keep pestering the captain and her crew.” She made air-quotes with one hand as she replied, then hooked her thumb back over the crossbar of her steering wheel. “So he’s this immortal, god-like being, right?” Luz shrugged, glancing at Amity. “Weird, huh?”
Amity chuckled and shrugged in return, “A little.”
“But he’s been alone for a long time, and now he’s enamored with this shiny new ship full of playmates.”
“Alone,” Amity frowned.
Luz nodded, tapping her fingers on the steering wheel in-beat with the radio. “Yeah, the lore bible Gus and Card put together basically implied the Visitor is responsible for ending most of the civilizations in this arm of the galaxy,” the brown-haired girl caught the scrunched look of distaste on her companion’s face, then added, “—Accidentally.”
Amity snorted, then turned pink and covered her nose with her hand. “Accidentally?” she repeated from under her fingers.
“Yeah!” Luz laughed, giving her an amused grin before she cleared her throat, “like, oh, you guys like shooting stars, right? Oops! I brought too many meteors!” The green-haired girl gave her an awww at the high-pitched, child-like voice Luz had used. “Not to mention,” Luz continued after giving a tiny bow, “stuff a kid might do while being thoughtless or mischievous would come across as blatantly malicious if he were an adult.”
Amity nodded at that, running her fingers along the other girl’s textured smartphone case. “That’s fair. Q spent his first appearance articulating the many wrongs in the Federation’s history.”
“Yesss,” Luz gave her a suspicious side-eye, “He did.”
The green-haired girl didn’t notice. “I’m not familiar with Cosmic Frontier, did they have a Q?”
“Yeah, they had a woman,” Luz waggled her eyebrows, “Ilia. She was bald.”
“I— really,” Amity scoffed.
“Yyyup,” Luz popped the ‘p’ sound, “I told Gus the Visitor being a kid makes them all a dysfunctional little family!” Amity laughed again, and Luz grinned at how the happy sound filled the cabin. She gave the pale girl a fond look, then cleared her throat and coughed into her fist before she quietly admitted, “I, uh, ahem— I liked the voice you used for him.”
“O–oh?” Amity’s cheeks turned a dusty rose, “You did?”
“Yeah, heh, it, uh, it sounded like you were having fun,” Luz gave her a quick glance, “y’know, reading out loud.”
The green-haired girl looked down at her hands, nodding a moment later. “I— I was.”
“You’re pretty good at it, actually,” Luz watched Amity mouth stop it as she ran slender fingers through the hair above her ear, then the tanned girl paled. “Not actually like I was sure you’d be awful at it, but, like— you’re just really good at—” She began to drum her fingers on the steering wheel as she talked.
“It’s alright, Luz,” the taller girl assured her, “I understood what you meant.” Amity reached out to pat Luz’s shoulder, and the brown-haired girl slowed her nervous finger-tapping. “I was having fun,” Amity sighed, a touch of loneliness in her voice, “I haven’t had a chance to read to anyone in a long time.”
“You don't read your goo-babies a good night story?” Luz asked with a half-serious lilt in her voice, “Goodnight moon, goodnight robot jumping over the moon?”
Amity pressed her mouth into a line and shook her head. “It's not really the same,” she admitted.
Luz glanced her way with wide eyes and an excited smile, “Backstory?” she gasped, “Amity backstory?!”
“I suppose?” The pale girl giggled, then shrugged as she worried her fingertips together, “My highschool had a program where the upperclassmen would be assigned some buddies from the elementary, and we’d read to them twice a week.” Luz made a soft aww, her eyes large and glimmering in the dark. Amity smiled, “It was to get them engaged with books, with reading, but we would have to learn to manage a group of children, too.”
“I bet you were so good at it,” Luz might never have been more certain of anything.
“I— I liked it,” Amity blushed a darker pink. “It… It gave me something to— I… looked forward to it.” She was silent for a long handful of heartbeats before she hesitantly admitted, “Mother tried to make me quit.” There was an old pain in her voice.
“What,” Luz gasped.
Amity shot her a sad smile, “The administrator told her it looked good on my transcript, and that changed her mind.” She frowned at her lap, “Not… you know… that I wanted to do it.”
“I’m…” The brown-haired girl shook her head, “I’m sorry she tried to take that from you.”
Amity breathed out a faint, “It’s okay, Luz.”
But she could tell that it wasn’t.
~
They rode in a lingering silence. Luz guided the truck and trailer while Amity watched the black horizon creep ever closer in a quiet contemplation. She had looked as though she could use a moment of reflection, and honestly? Luz was grateful for the chance to focus on the shifting barriers and temporary lanes that splintered this stretch of I-80. The asphalt patchwork seemed worse than usual, for Illinois. The heartbeat drum beat of Hooty’s latest song filled the warm cabin air, the percussion tapping in-time with the flash of headlamps against the orange-and-white construction barrels passing on either side of the big rig. The tanned girl couldn't help but smile.
There were times like these, when the disparate pieces of the American Interstate intersected with her little red-leather-wrapped bubble of existence, when the physical act of traveling cross-country touched that part deep inside her chest—inside her soul—that made her think: This is it. This is why I’m here. When the wind whistling over the cab sang an eerie harmony with the radio. When the tick, tick, tick of her windshield wipers matched the four-four beat of the music. When the drumming rain filled the static in the air with form and shape as it rolled across the squared-off ‘spanse of metal sheltering five hundred and seventy-five horses. These fleeting moments were like magic. She collected each one and savored it.
When she could spare a glance, Luz bent a careful eye toward her traveling companion. Amity sat with her jaw raised, hands folded, breathing long and slow, her eyes unfocused in thought. Luz tried to give her what space she could, trapped as they were within easy arm’s reach of one another. Well… trapped was such a loaded term. She didn't feel trapped at all, as such, maybe in an enforced close proximity, although, to be completely honest… Luz raised an eyebrow as she thought, Who ever said that was a bad thing? She happened to enjoy the close company of the last few days. She was determined to enjoy it, for as long as she was able.
She eyed the pair of trucks and the half-handful of sedans snaking their way between the construction markers, easing off on the gas to keep the white Ford Contour directly ahead at a comfortable distance. Luz sang with the radio, dropping her pitch to match the scratchy-voiced singer's husky tones—
Wasn’t no easy street where I come from,
There wasn’t no sleep until the work was done.
Amity shifted in her seat, and Luz thought she caught the slightest wrinkle of discomfort in the pinch at her brow. She trailed her eyes across the clock in the center console as she turned back to the road. It had been a little over two hours since they left the Denny’s. Maybe we can’t sleep yet, the tanned girl chuckled to herself, briefly imagining the delirium in store if they had to stay awake until Boston, but there’s nothing wrong with takin’ a break. She stretched as best she could—keeping one hand on the steering wheel at all times—grunting loudly with the exaggerated effort, and Amity blinked in confusion as she turned to look at the unexpected sound.
“Boy, howdy,” Luz groaned, twisting from side to side, “I need to get up and move around a bit, how ‘bout you?” She tilted her head to catch Amity’s golden eyes, and grinned, “Time for a little break?”
The pale girl slumped the slightest bit in her seat and nodded, “Yes, if— I could use a break.”
Low, rolling hills bubbled up from the land to the north, letting the Interstate rise and fall with every mile. The air seemed cooler now, as a thin mist drifted alongside the road. Thickets and sparse woodland loomed in the dark, wet grass dotted with patches of thick reeds. Luz smiled at a memory; she could almost hear the croaks and ribbits that echoed through the woods behind the house where she grew up.
A sign appeared on Amity’s side of the truck, white reflective letters on brown metal shining in the glare of Hooty’s headlights: TO BIRTHPLACE OF PRESIDENT RONALD REAGAN / EXIT 45. Luz barked a laugh and pointed, “Oh? Hey! You wanna stop there?”
“No?”
“Not a fan of Reaganomics?”
“No!”
~
After a few more slow miles, Luz whooped in delight when they passed a pair of blinking orange lights balanced atop an END ROAD WORK sign. The left lane opened up as the construction barrels fell behind, which let sedans and small trucks dart past Hooty and the other big rigs in the slow lane. They had barely crept up to their cruising speed when a pair of blue and white signs lazily rolled by Amity’s window. REST AREA 1 MILE. Amity chuckled when she read the second sign aloud, “Next rest area, 68 miles?”
“Oof, ouch, my bladder,” Luz groaned, drawing a laugh from her golden-eyed passenger. “Yeah, we’re stopping here.”
“Thank you,” the gratitude practically dripped from Amity’s voice.
“Oh, can you, uh—” Luz pointed a thumb over her shoulder, “Can you let Alma know we’re stopping?”
“Sure,” Amity scrolled through Luz’s contacts for a moment before breathing out a quick snort. Luz glanced her way and grinned at the smile on the other girl’s face.
We're going to stop at the rest area :[Luz 🚛💨]
In less than a mile, if you missed the sign :[Luz 🚛💨]
[📷Alma 💜 Thalia🎸]: UR?
[📷Alma 💜 Thalia🎸]: O thank god
[📷Alma 💜 Thalia🎸]: Alma said her teeth R swimming
[📷Alma 💜 Thalia🎸]: 👈 Thalia 👋
Amity laughed when the next message appeared with a buzz.
[📷Alma 💜 Thalia🎸]: U probly knew that
She giggled as she tapped out a quick reply, then after a moment sent a question along after it.
I wondered 🙂 :[Luz 🚛💨]
What was that about teeth? :[Luz 🚛💨]
[📷Alma 💜 Thalia🎸]: she won’t explain 🤷
[📷Alma 💜 Thalia🎸]: “something grandpa used to say”
[📷Alma 💜 Thalia🎸]: don’t think she knows!! 🤣🤣🤣
~
The Great Sauk Trail Eastbound Rest Area was busier than either woman had expected for nearly three o’clock in the morning. A number of semis idled in the truck-side parking lot, while a handful of passenger vehicles sat spaced out along the sidewalk with at least one empty parking spot between. Luz and Amity nodded to Alma and Thalia when they entered the ladies’ bathroom, but by some unspoken agreement, all four waited until they were back outside before doing more than grunting in acknowledgement.
“You good, Marsh?” Luz bumped knuckles with the tawny haired girl, and Thalia nodded, beaming a bright smile as she replied, “Yep, you?”
“H–Hey, Amity?” Alma began with hesitation, pausing to run her fingers through the hair at her temples. Amity turned to face her and tilted her head, patiently attentive. “Uhm, th-thank you? For the bananas,” the dark-haired girl rubbed one hand across her other elbow, “I had to have one when Michi showed me the bag of fruit, it— it was perfect.”
Amity smiled down at the shorter girl and bent her neck in a slight bow, “You are very welcome, but, just so you know…” She tipped her head toward Thalia and added, softly, “She picked them out for you. Don't forget to thank her.” Alma blushed and rubbed the back of her neck as she looked down at the sidewalk, kicking the toe of her Vans against a crack underfoot. Luz caught the green-haired woman’s eye over Alma’s shoulder and grinned.
“Oi, hermanita, how’s Scarlet holdin’ up?” the brown-haired woman nudged the shorter girl with her elbow, and Alma turned toward the less-mortifying question.
“She’s—” Alma swallowed, then cleared her throat and offered a wobbly, “She's just like how I remember her.”
Luz laughed and nodded, “Ah, that's great! Gimme some low-bones.” She held her hand down at her waist and swung her arm out toward Alma, knuckles forward, but her knuckles remained bump-less when Alma just took a shuddering breath.
“No— I mean—” the dark-haired girl sniffed and pawed at one eye, pushing her glasses up on her forehead in the process, “She's just like when Abuelo was still alive, and—”
“Oh no, hey, it's okay,” Luz took a quick step forward and placed a hand on the shorter girl's arm, her voice gentle, “I get it.”
“It's like he's still here,” Alma whispered, taking her glasses off to wipe the tears from her face, “Sorry, it just hit me.”
Luz patted her shoulder and whispered a soft, “Que en paz descanse.1” She glanced up at the others; Thalia's eyes were glittering with tears of her own, and Amity chewed at her bottom lip.
“If he feels like he is, then he is, y'know?” Luz’s words were firm with conviction. “He's still there, riding with you. Tell me—” The brown-haired woman scratched at her scalp for a moment as she thought, “Would he be more impressed by the distance you two traveled,” Luz took a step back and snapped finger-guns at Alma, “or by how quickly you covered the distance?”
Alma chuckled and shrugged, “Probably by how fast I was able to go without getting pulled over.”
“Oh no, Abuelo was a speed-demon?” Luz barked a laugh when the shorter girl nodded, then she said, “You should hit Montana sometime, they don't have speed limits.”
“He’d say that was cheating,” the dark-haired girl shrugged, a lop-sided smile breaking out on her face when the taller woman groaned a soft, You’re right.
~
Luz walked the length of the refrigerated trailer, giving each tire mount, running light, and hose junction a quick visual inspection. She patted the trailer each time, and muttered what Amity thought to be Who’s a good boy. The pale girl’s smartphone buzzed in her hand, and she grinned at the string of messages.
“Whuzzat?” the brown-haired girl asked in a distracted tone before leaning down to eyeball a wheel hub, her palm braced against the trailer’s side.
“Oh, they can hear you,” Amity said, tapping four times on the trailer, then twice more after a short pause. She smiled when she heard a faint four-two knock in response.
“Really?” Luz patted the trailer and moved on to the next wheel, whispering, “They’re so cute.”
~
Thalia slammed her door shut, and Luz leaned an elbow on the minivan’s roof while she waited for Alma to roll down the window. “I was gonna stop for dinner after we hit I-90,” Luz said as she made a vague motion with the fingers of her free hand, “in a few more hours. The Travel Plaza has a few different options.”
“Sounds good,” Alma said as she clicked her seatbelt, “We'll follow you.” Luz patted the door of the Aerostar, then turned and clambered up into the cab of her truck.
“Thanks again, Luz,” the tawny-haired girl waved.
The brown-haired woman pulled her door shut, then cranked her window open with a squeak, squeak, squeak. “Last one there’s a rotten egg!” Luz called out her window.
Alma scoffed and pulled a face as she leaned over Thalma’s lap to see out the passenger window of her Aerostar, “I just said we’re following you!”
“Welp, you know what that means!” the brown-haired woman teased, pinching her nose between thumb and forefinger. She gave the two girls a grin and a wave before she cranked the big rig’s diesel engine. Hooty roared to life with a throaty growl, and Amity pressed her back into her seat to let the rumbling vibration work its way up her spine. The radio clicked on, and the little white light above the navigation screen blinked while Luz fastened her seatbelt. An upbeat percussion thumped a quick rhythm for a set of measures, then a jazz band began an old, familiar tune, as trumpets, saxophones, and trombones built up to a swingin’ big band dance number.
Amity clapped her palms on her armrests in surprise at the first blatt of the trumpets, her golden eyes wide as she looked between Luz and the entertainment center nestled in the dashboard. “Why did he—” the pale woman blinked, and whispered, “I can’t believe I’m about to ask this, but— why did he pick that music?”
“Sorry, cariño, he’s just like this when we get close to Chicago,” the brown-haired girl rolled her eyes at the big rig’s questionable behavior. She leaned forward to pat a hand across the cherrywood dashboard, “You gotta pick something with words if you want me t’ sing along, silly!” Luz pressed the next button and grinned, “I bet I know which one’s— yup.” A syncopated drum and cymbal beat a jaunty rhythm that the smaller girl recognized at once. She flashed a wry smile at Amity and asked, “I hope you like Stevie Wonder.”
“I—” Amity licked her lips as she considered the question. A bass guitar and an electric keyboard joined in with a classic riff. “He’s… great?”
“If you didn’t think so, I’d find it…” Luz paused for dramatic effect as she slipped the truck into first gear, then tipped her head back to belt out, “Almost too suspicious!”
~
Amity read aloud during the next leg of their journey, stopping a handful of times to ask a question regarding terminology used or what a particular reference might entail. Luz answered eagerly and, on occasion, at length, and Amity listened with the same level of energy. It was late, after all, and in the absence of sunlight, their bodies were running on a cocktail of wide-eyed jokes, slightly-flirtatious teasing, and serotonin.
“...so, in short,” the brown-haired girl shrugged, “It's on purpose.” Luz tapped her fingers on the steering wheel and bobbed her head along with a slow funk groove, while Amity hummed in a heavy-heartedness made heavier still by the late hour.
“Maybe… Maybe if I did a better job…” the green-haired girl wondered aloud, a despondent slump threatening to bend her shoulders.
“What, no!” Luz gasped in a voice thick with outrage, “You are amazing!” The tanned girl scoffed and added, “As always! God, you make me feel inadequate sometimes, y'know?” She held up a thumb and forefinger as Amity began to protest, and held them a half-inch apart, “Just a smidge.”
“You are— not— oh,” Amity pressed her lips into a line as she raised an eyebrow, “A smidge?”
“A smidge, a dash, a pinch!” Luz grinned wider with every new phrase in her list, “A teensy li'l bit—just like me!” Amity snorted at that, and shook her head while the smaller girl soldiered on. “The dialogue is clunky at times, but Gus does that on purpose for the flavor,” Luz explained. “It's for that golden-age sci-fi aesthetic, uh…” She snapped a finger, “Oh, what's the word? Think it starts with a ‘c’.”
“Camp?”
“Hmmmmaybe?” Luz squinted in thought.
“Cheese.”
“Oh, definitely.”
“Kitsch.”
Luz laughed, “Now you're talking.” She chuckled for a moment as a pair of sedans roared past, the sound of their engines fading faster than the red glow of their tail-lights. “Wait,” she wrinkled her brow in thought, “Is that spelled with a ‘c’?”
Amity gave her a devious grin before her golden eyes tightened in something like pain, and the smile fell from her lips. “Luz?” The way she spoke her name drew a worried glance. “I… I didn't mean to make you feel inadequate,” Amity rubbed at her knuckles as she stared at the other girl, searching her face for any sign of offense, any flicker of emotion, “That's the last thing I— I'm sorry.”
“No, Amity, I—” Luz winced before reaching out to place a palm over the taller girl's hands, stilling her worried kneading. “Listen, I didn't— I shouldn't have said that, it wasn't… I…” She sighed, then gave her pale hands a squeeze before opening her mouth again.
Amity spoke faster. “So you didn't mean it?”
“I— like…” Luz glanced her way to gauge her state of mind, but concern was the only emotion at play in the pale girl's features. “I blurted it out without thinking, I should have been more careful with what I was saying—”
“So you didn't mean it?” the pale girl pressed for an answer.
Luz couldn't help but laugh, “How could I not mean it, Amity? Look at you!” She gestured toward the other girl with one hand, “You're smart, you're funny, you're tall—omigawd girl—your biceps! Everything about you is… exceptional,” She held her passenger’s trembling golden gaze for a moment, then answered, “How could I not?” Luz sighed, and flicked her fingertips toward herself, “And I'm just—”
“You're happy.” Amity’s interruption took Luz by surprise, and the brown-eyed girl watched the other frown at her hands. “You’re kind. You know… exactly the— the type of person you want to be!” She blinked, and blinked, and blinked, then sighed before rubbing the heel of her palm under her eyes. Amity opened her mouth to speak, but it took two more tries before she could force out, “I… would… give anything—”
“You're right, you know.”
Amity fell silent when Luz interrupted her with a sigh, and she watched the tanned girl carefully choose her words.
“I… I am happy,” Luz admitted, pausing to chew at her lip. “I think— I know— I have people in my corner. And… I think— I think that's where you've…” She trailed off as she steered into a slight upward rise, one hand resting on the gear stick in anticipation. Hooty crested the small ridge, and the big rig rumbled down the gentle slope on the far side. Luz glanced at Amity, at what could only be sorrow in her golden eyes, and she placed a gentle hand on the pale girl's arm. “I think that's what hurt you the most. You've been… left on your own.”
Amity turned that phrase over in her mind, on your own. Could that begin to explain the hollow feeling in her chest when she saw the farmers working together? Abandoned might be a better word to fill that hole. She looked down at her hands and gave a quick nod. Luz continued to talk in that soft, gentle voice, the one that made tears well up in the corners of her eyes.
“I have my lonely days, too, of course,” Luz admitted while giving Amity's forearm a squeeze. She rubbed her thumb over the coiled muscles above her pale wrist as she stared forward, watching the road. “I’ll see the others online in voice chat, prob’ly watching a movie together or something and I'm, y'know, on the road, so I can't join in, and that… It stings.” The brown-haired girl sighed, a hint of a frown on her face. “More often than not, some days I feel like I'm on the outside looking in… but… I know they care about me.” She shrugged, “Eda, Lilith, Steve, maybe Kiki? I know they care, too.”
Amity remained silent as she listened, but she did set one cool palm atop the warm hand Luz had placed on her arm.
Luz gave her a soft smile. “I like helping Gus with his project, because I feel like… like I'm a part of something bigger than myself,” she said with a sigh, “What he needs me to do is easy enough, and yet I can help him reach for his dream?” She chuckled, then, and pulled a voice, “Even if it's kinda dumb?”
Amity snorted and whispered, “Stop that.”
Luz grinned, “Alright.” She paused for a heavy moment, one thick with the thoughts swirling around in Amity’s head. “You need that too, cariño.”
“What?” Amity blinked as she looked up to meet the other girl’s kind brown eyes. “Need what?”
“Purpose,” Luz said with a shrug, “Something bigger than yourself. A way to help others.”
Amity scowled as a memory of her mother's voice came unbidden to mind, A Blight lives to further the family name… Why do you think you're here? She winced at the flood of half-buried lectures that hissed in between her ears, A Blight is better than this. A Blight excels; why are you such a failure? A Blight doesn't help, a Blight leads.
Amity frowned through the sudden hot tears that stung her eyes. “Like my family’s company?” She couldn’t help the sneer that curled her lip as she spat, “That’s certainly bigger than me.” The truth tasted like ash as it crossed her tongue.
“No, that's not… uhm…” The tanned girl patted Amity’s arm, her eyes tightening with concern as she chose her words. “Maybe… Have you ever thought…” Luz had a hesitation in her voice that the pale girl found troubling, “…that’s not where you're meant to be?”
Amity stared at her in stunned disbelief.
Notes:
Luz: Rest in peace 1
(*) Just so y’all’re aware, I’m borrowing several broad-stroke elements from an actual Deep Space Nine novel that I always loved when I was young-Terra, Fallen Heroes by Dafydd ab Hugh. I thought of doing this because Cosmic Frontier is a DS9 homage to begin with, and now I’m taking it a step further :) I’ve changed parts of it up to slip in some ToH references, but if for some reason you thought it seemed familiar, you’re right.
(**) So, I didn’t notice back in chapter 10 that they cut through the tiniest bit of Arizona. Technically they’ve been through seven states, but since it was only 30 miles, I don’t think Luz would count it. (or, in other words, I don’t feel like going back and making changes)
Chapter 29: Thursday, 3:22am
Notes:
A great big THANK YOU to the Marvelous, Magnificent Mexfan12, for the wonderful artwork! If you haven’t already noticed, I’ve added artwork to Chapters 1, 7, 9, 15, 23 and 24. If I commission more pieces, I’ll make a note when and where they’re added :)
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
Luz checked on her speechless passenger as often as she could, sparing the occasional glance when she wasn't eyeballing the distance between Hooty’s bumper and the Vanek Bros. truck ahead, or keeping track of the sporadic flow of passenger vehicles that streaked past her door. Amity had hardly blinked in the meanwhile. “Just… uh…” the tanned girl squinted slightly in concern, then gave the pale girl a tentative half-smile, “Maybe think about it?”
“Not work for—” Those pretty golden eyes looked as large as dinner plates. Amity stumbled through a follow-up question, “Leave— my ffffam–ah— the company?!”
“Yeah? You could, if you wanna,” The brown-haired girl's response was light on its feet, in contrast. Why was Amity having a hard time wrapping her mind around the idea? Luz would have accused her of playing up her reaction for laughs if it weren't completely out of character for the taller girl.
The green-haired girl swallowed and gave the slightest shake of her head as she croaked, “I can’t.”
Luz frowned. Why did she look so frightened? “Sure you can!” Luz was oozing confidence, again. After all, she knew a thing or two about a thing or two. “Lotsa kids don't stick with the family business.”
“I–I— I can't do that!” Amity stammered a quick rebuttal. She was breathing quickly, now; short, shallow gasps of air whistling through her teeth.
Luz knew the possibilities were limitless for someone of Amity's caliber. “Just imagine all the—” she began, a wide smile breaking out across her face as she waved a wide-spread hand through the air.
“No!” Amity interrupted with something close to a shout, eyes wide and nostrils flaring, one hand clamped around her armrest; it might have actually creaked under her fingers. “You don’t understand.” She took a shuddering breath as she stretched her mouth in a deep frown.
Huh. Inner-Luz was making that slashing-hand-motion at her metaphorical throat in warning. Outer-Luz’s optimism began to falter, “Well, yeah— I mean— no, I guess, but—”
“You don't know my Mother! You don't know what she's like!” Amity's voice broke halfway through her vehement accusation, and she trailed off in something close to a whimper. She blinked watery eyes and snarled, pointing a shaky finger across the cramped cabin's aisle at Luz. “You have no idea!” The pale girl turned away and hunched over the smartphone in her hand, trying to hold herself steady. She squeezed her free hand into a fist, then shook her fingers loose.
“Amity, I— I’m sorry— I didn’t mean—” Luz grit her teeth and winced, trying to gauge how angry the other girl was at her thoughtless advice. The pale girl's scowl was bottom lit by the gentle glow of the device in her hand. “I overstepped there, and—”
“I am a Blight,” Amity glared down at her knees, her shoulders trembling as she took another ragged breath, holding it in for a moment. “I don't have a choice!” An angry red flush had crawled up her neck and ears. “Everything… Everything… it's always for the family— for the company.”
Luz cocked an eyebrow and wondered aloud, “Is that what you want, though?”
The pale girl recoiled from the question. “It— That doesn't— A Blight has obligations,” Amity bared her teeth in a twisted grimace; it looked as though just saying that phrase out loud had a cost, some crumbling piece of her soul. “There are expectations for someone like me!”
Luz frowned, repeating that last bit with a look of disgust. “Someone like you?” She paused long enough to watch the rest of the color drain from Amity's face before asking, “What’s that supposed to mean?”
The air felt charged with an unfamiliar, simmering tension, but Amity was powerless to stop herself now that she had begun to speak. Her mother's words were already surging up the back of her throat, like bile. “Blights are captains of industry! Blights are trend-setters!” She threw her arms out wide in the passenger seat of the double-brown semi, and gasped an ouch when her elbow bounced off the window. “All the eyes of the world are on us, to see what they should be doing next!” Amity’s breathy giggle reeked of panic, of desperation. “Blights are meant to be the global elite!”
The tanned girl in the driver’s seat scrunched her face as if she’d tasted something sour.
Amity's eyes were narrow rings of gold around blown-wide pupils. She kept her trembling gaze locked on Luz as she continued, “—Blights should be meeting with politicians and dining with royalty! We’re supposed to be entertaining heads of state!”
“Sure, but is that what you want?” Luz pressed on that sore spot again, and the green-haired girl made a wounded noise.
“That doesn’t matter!” her shout was a shrill, frightened thing, echoing in the cramped cabin. “It doesn’t matter what I want!” Amity sniffed and laughed, swiping a hand across her face. The skin on her cheekbones and around her eyes had turned a splotchy red, despite how she willed herself to keep from crying. She could feel the reins slip from her hands. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned,” she held up her index finger and sneered, “one thing Mother has made perfectly clear—it’s that what I want doesn’t matter!” She dug at both eyes with the edge of her palms, still clutching Luz’s phone with one hand. Her voice went from manic to wobbly in an instant. “I-I– I can wish— for a little house in– in the woods— but that’s— it’s not what— a– a– a Blight doesn't settle for such pedestrian, working-class things!”
Luz frowned at that, and her soft “Oh, Amity…” was heavy with disappointment.
Sorrow sparkled in the corners of her red-rimmed eyes when Amity whispered, “No matter how wonderful it sounds.”
When Luz whispered, “Oh, Amity,” the pale girl had to blink away fresh, hot tears.
“I get to look forward to dinner parties at the mansion—” Amity splayed one shaking hand across her chest, her voice trembling under some heavy burden, “—because there's nothing quite like being ignored and absolutely alone when you're surrounded by people.” She sniffed and hid a sob in her palms, breathing deep and slow to try and calm herself.
After a moment's hesitation, Luz reached out to the other girl. When the taller girl didn't flinch or pull away, she rubbed a loose circle into the back of Amity’s shoulder. If anything, the pale girl leaned into her touch, which sent a sharp twinge through Luz's chest. Her muffled sorry drew an immediate, “It's okay,” from Luz.
“‘m sorry,” Amity rubbed at her eyes, a heart wrenching quiver in her bottom lip, “I'm sorry, Luz.”
“You didn't do anything wrong, querida, don't stress… I…” She paused for a moment while she debated whether to keep going. This was a point too important to leave untouched, so she forged ahead, consequences be damned. “I said it the other day, but it’s not right,” Luz applied a gentle pressure with her fingers with each word there, at the end. “You didn’t want to talk about it then—and that’s okay—but what she’s doing to you, how she treats you? It’s not right.”
The pale girl let her hands fall into her lap. She tipped her head back to stare up at the headliner while tears drew lazy tracks down the angles of her jaw. “I know,” Amity sighed as she slumped down into the cushions of her seat. She turned an exhausted pair of dull, golden eyes toward Luz, having spent her frantic burst of energy. “But what can I do?” Amity punctuated her mournful whisper with a shrug.
The lost look in Amity's eyes and the utter defeat in her voice made Luz's blood run hot. “It’s your life, Amity!” her unexpected outburst startled her passenger. “Not your mom’s— Yours!” Luz scoffed as she waved a hand in the air, fingers clawed in irritation, “You— ugh, you shouldn’t have to hate every minute of it just to make her happy!”
Amity blinked, “But, I—”
“—You're what, twenty-four?” Luz plowed ahead, talking over the green-haired girl’s weak opposition. “Twenty-five? It doesn't matter because literally— legally— you are an adult.” She stabbed at the steering wheel with her fingertips to emphasize her words. “She should be treating you with— as— as a—”
Hooty's entertainment center crackled to life, and Luz stumbled to a halt when the Queen of Soul belted out her signature chorus.
R, E, S, P, E, C, T!
Find out what it means to me!
Both girls gasped in surprise at the unexpected interjection. Luz recovered before Amity could do more than giggle in shock. “See? Hooty knows what I mean,” Luz agreed as she turned down the volume at the follow-up R, E, S, P, E, C, T. “You're a whole-ass adult! You wanna get a nose ring, or dye your hair purple? You can! It’s your hair, after all!”
A troubled look crossed the pale girl’s face as she ran her fingers back through the hair at her temple, then she slowly pulled one twisted lock away from her head to dangle the strands before her eyes. “She makes me dye it green,” Amity admitted.
“What.”
Amity turned her eyes to meet the other girl’s open-mouthed disbelief. “To match her and the twins,” she clarified.
“What?!” The tanned girl’s jaw snapped shut with a clack. Luz looked positively incensed. Why did she look angry? “Amity, that is so not okay!” Oh.
While she might have always thought the same, deep down, secretly, in her heart of hearts, Amity had never thought she’d hear someone agree with how she truly felt. Despite the dizzying rush of relief that poured through her body—She wasn't wrong! She wasn't too sensitive! She wasn't imagining things—there was nothing she could do about it. The girl with the dyed-green hair picked at the remnants of her black nail polish as she shrugged, repeating the words she had told herself time and time again over the years, “It is what it is.”
“Well,” Luz scoffed and thumbed her nose at the universe where such hateful women grew like mold, “High time ta’ change those izzes, chica, cuz they suck!” Amity shot her a side-eye glance and breathed out in a huff.
“Luz…” Amity’s sigh blended with a mirthless chuckle. “My family name is– is— it’s a responsibility. Emmy’s right. I have a duty to everyone we employ, and— but—” She sniffed and looked down at her hands. “If I… if I really stop to think about it, I feel like… It's too much. It’s like I’m trying to swim, but I can barely tread water. I fight, and I fight, and I fight… But I keep getting pulled under from the weight of it all.”
Luz frowned and made an unhappy sound in her throat. They rode in silence for a long stretch of time, as she desperately searched for the right words to say in reply. What could she say? What would Mamí say? What would Mamí do? Prob’ly make her something to eat. Oooh, tostones. A pit formed in her stomach while she mulled it over; she had a growing suspicion there were no right words that could help. The pale girl found her voice before Luz could think of more than a weak apology.
“I’m sorry for yelling at you,” the pale girl tried to catch her eye, but her gaze drifted down to where her tanned hands were draped over the steering wheel. “Your question… caught me by surprise. It's… It's something I try not to think about, and… I– I panicked.”
“I didn’t mean to—”
“I know, Luz, it’s— it’s just—” Amity gestured toward herself with both hands, “If this is how I am with their support… How can I hope to do anything on my own?” the green-haired girl shook her head with the certainty of it. Luz made a noise of discontentment deep in her chest as Amity hung her head, mumbling, “No, I’d mess it all up, somehow.”
“I don't believe that for a second!” Luz snapped, a touch harsher than she'd intended. Amity looked away and scrubbed at her face, sniffing softly as the cabin rocked from side to side.
“And don't even lie to yourself about having her support; that's just what Odalia wants you to think!” Luz continued, gesturing with her free hand. “Why, Luz, but why, I do de-clay-yuhh!” her breathy southern belle accent pulled the smallest smile from her passenger. “I'll tell you why,” the tanned girl raised a finger as she spoke, then pointed at Amity, “She makes you second-guess yourself to keep you compliant! To control you, to keep you afraid!” She caught the pale girl's eye for a long moment, then softened her voice as she gave her a kind smile, “I know you're afraid, Amity.”
“I am afraid of thunderstorms, Luz,” the pale girl threw up a sarcastic set of air quotes at the word afraid, before glaring out her window, grudgingly confessing her most secret sin. “My mother terrifies me.”
“And she’s treated you like shit your whole life, hasn’t she?” The tanned girl had a curl in her lip when she shook her head, the sneer audible in her voice. “Such a big woman, mistreating a defenseless little girl. Since she thinks she's all that an’ a bag o’ chips, lemme ask you this—” Luz shifted in her seat to angle herself toward her passenger, and Amity couldn’t help but turn her head slightly to listen, “—Did Odalia build your robots?”
Amity shook her head.
“Did Odalia weld little purple pieces together and stick li’l goo-batteries in your goo-babies to make ‘em move?”
The pale girl made a scoffing laugh, and struggled not to smile at goo-batteries.
“Did Odalia teach them how to work together?”
Amity shook her head again, then turned in her seat to face Luz, tucking her feet in the aisle away from the gear stick. She mouthed a no.
Luz grinned. “Did Odalia program their personalities, or, y'know, anything?”
Amity laughed a single, dry exhalation, and folded her arms over her chest as she croaked, “No.”
“No,” Luz agreed with a grin, “She didn't. You did!” She paused to tap a steady fingertip on Amity's knee, “You did all that, and I can come up with more things if I need to!”
“You don't,” Amity whispered.
“You did all that— you have done everything— while dealing with her horseshit. Everything you’ve done,” the tanned girl paused to catch Amity’s eye as she spoke her next truth aloud, “you’ve done despite her.” Luz settled back in her seat to give the taller girl a moment, to let that sink in. She was silent while she steered through a shallow curve, then she laid her hand on Amity’s knee, squeezing in emphasis, “You’ve succeeded in spite of her.”
Luz spoke with such conviction, Amity could almost believe her.
“You can do anything you want to do,” the tanned girl was on a roll. “You can do anything you decide to do, you— you don't let a challenge stop you! I've seen it.” She glanced up at the taller girl and nodded, her voice steady as a rock, “I know it. I believe it.”
Amity just stared at her, eyes shining in the dark, brown disks glowing with the silver of moonlight and the red of brakelight. She wanted to believe. Oh, god, how she wanted to believe. Her chest, her throat, ached with the want of it. The air she pulled between clenched teeth burned in her lungs as fuel for the want of it.
Somehow, Luz wasn't finished. “Ed and Em are in your corner, Boscha and Skara too. Eda likes you, don't forget. And I’ve got your back—all the way.” She patted a hand on her chest as she gave the taller girl a look that left more unsaid. “You're not alone, and if you need anything— anything— someone to bring you lunch because you're in the middle of a breakthrough? Someone to hand you wrenches while you work? Or— or— if you need a cheerleader?” Luz laughed, “Oh, ho-ho, I'll be the best goddamn cheerleader you've ever seen!” She shook her head and chuckled under breath as she muttered, “I’ll wear a uniform and everything.”
“Luz, no, I couldn't ask that of y—”
“You will ask!” The smaller girl nearly bared her teeth as she growled, stabbing a finger toward the stammering girl, “You promised you'd call if you need me, so you'll call me, missy, or I'm’a be such a pain in your ass!”
“My—” Amity snorted, then half-gasped a mortified, “Luz!”
“C’mon, Hooty,” Luz leaned forward to pat at the cherrywood dashboard, “Back me up here!” The little white light on the entertainment center blinked twice, and music began to pour through the cabin. She laughed when she recognized the catchy rhythm, and she flashed a wide grin at the golden-eyed girl. “Now that’s what I’m talkin’ about, okay—” Luz locked eyes with Amity and held up a hand, like, just a sec, waggling a finger, “—listen to these words.” She raised an eyebrow and fixed Amity with a look, and the pale girl gave a quick nod in response.
“Don’t you ever…” Luz paused for a beat to match the singer’s cadence, shimmying in her seat to the rhythm of the drum and guitar instrumental track, “feel sad, lean on me—” she pressed a thumb to her chest, “—when times are bad.” She glanced at Amity and saw wide, glittering eyes fixed on her. “When the day comes and you’re down,” Luz rushed along to catch up with Sam Moore, “In a river of trouble and about to drown?” The trumpets and saxophones kicked in for the chorus, and the tanned girl’s smile widened as she sang along:
Just hold on, I’m comin’
Hold on, I’m comin’
“I’m goin’ my way, your l–luh, uh, –ver,” Luz stumbled over the word lover, and Amity giggled at the dark blush that spread across her cheeks. “If you get cold, yeah, I will be your cover!” The tanned girl regained her footing by keeping her eyes fixed on the road, and caught back up to Dave Prater. “Don’t have to worry, ‘cuz I’m here,” Luz turned to Amity then, “No need to suffer, baby, ‘cuz I’m here.” She growled the word baby, and Amity flushed a bright pink.
“Oh– okay,” the green-haired girl turned down the volume on the radio, then sat back rigid in her seat. “That's enough.”
“Nah, see? The little hand says it's build-up-Amity hours,” Luz said with an exaggerated glance at her bare wrist, holding it up for Amity to see. “And imma say it as many times as it takes for you to believe me,” she added with a slowly fading smile. “It's not right that you don't see how amazing you are.”
“Luz…” Amity blushed brighter still and looked down at her hands.
“But… I think I've… I said what I needed to say,” the brown-haired girl smiled at her pale companion, “I don’t wanna harp on it, an’ make you self-conscious or whatever. We can talk about something else, if you want.”
A heavy silence fell over the cab as Amity contemplated everything said. She rubbed her fingertips together, and after she found her voice again, she whispered, “Thank you, Luz… For believing in me.”
Luz glanced her way and gave her a crooked grin, “Of course.”
~
An explosion, a thundercrack; a towering Fomhórach struck Main Street with a closed fist, and Saoirse found herself airborne. She hit the ground hard enough to drive the air from her lungs, ears ringing, tumbling ass over teakettle across the grassy Strip. Who could say why her great-grandfather's archaic metaphor came to mind, but a memory of the obstinate centenarian flashed before her eyes.
There he was, backlit by the rising sun, sitting atop one of his antique 20th-century tractors. His eyes were closed while he inhaled the aroma of a fresh cup of coffee. He was forever smiling.
She crossed paths with a cherry tree, and felt a snap in her left arm when she crumpled around the trunk. Saoirse bit back a scream and squeezed her eyes tight against the blinding pain that shot through her body. After a shuddering exhale, she gasped for more air, trying not to cry. Despite everything else—or, perhaps, because of it all—the first coherent thought that ran through her mind was, I won't be there to help Granpop with this year's harvest. The second went something like, I can't die here, like this.
She clawed herself up to one elbow, her boot heels leaving deep lines in the soft earth. She gingerly pushed herself up against the tree trunk, and cradled her injured arm in her lap. Jostling the limb made her head spin. Main Street was hushed and still, save for the crackle of flame and the smoke drifting in the lifeless air. Saoirse caught a whimper between her teeth as she scrambled around to the far side of the tree, craning her neck to peer over her shoulder as she watched for movement and listened for signs of danger. The bridge officers had done something to make the invaders’ terrifying weapons fall silent, or perhaps they triggered the explosion. One of their projectiles might have hit a fuel line. She saw what those weapons did to the security crew, after all. She must have proof of it smeared across—
She gasped in horror at the realization. Saoirse scrubbed at her face with the edge of her muddied hand, and felt a strange slickness there. One glance at the grisly residue was enough—her stomach lurched, hard, and she fought to keep from retching into the grass.
She had to move. She had to stay alive. She had seen what these aliens did; perhaps one of her observations would help the Captain plan a course of action. You have to go, she told herself. You have to fight! Stand up, Saoirse! Stand up!
Fear kept her legs frozen in place, no matter how many times she begged them to move.
Electricity arced overhead, and a distant crash and clatter of glass-on-concrete startled her into motion. She struggled to her feet, leaning heavily on the cherry tree. The bark scratched bloody tracks in her skin and snagged on her uniform. Her legs were weak and wobbly, like the newborn foals in Granpop’s stable. She should run— well— she should head in the opposite direction, but now that she was on her feet, she could just see where the invaders had been standing…
Saoirse stared over her shoulder in the direction of the turbolift bank, toward safety, chewing at her lip in deliberation. She squared her shoulders and turned toward the heat-blackened blast zone.
She staggered from tree to tree, pausing to lean against the trunks to stay standing while she gulped great lungfuls of air. The once-lively social area tasted like ash. She started to glance down at the remains of the two security crewmen who had covered her escape, and quickly averted her eyes.
A crater had swallowed the perma-crete avenue, peeling back the planet-side facade to show the metal support lattice that lurked underneath. Jagged, angry cracks ran up the walls nearby, and an unsettling groan accompanied the pings and patterings of masonry that crumbled from the building to her left. Shorn power lines sparked and smoked from the pit, and severed data cables dangled from damaged conduits. A dark hole in the very center of the blast point opened into the storage deck below.
Strangely-bloodless remnants of the four alien invaders had been scattered to the port-side of the blast zone, and judging by their fragmented state, Saoirse was in no immediate danger. As for the security platoon members—
Saoirse hissed and looked away before turning one way, then the other, half-frantic with worry as she searched for signs of the bridge officers. Major Kirana had been there, she’d been right here. She had saved her life. Where is she? Am I… am I the only one left? No more ridiculous—yet flattering—pick-up attempts by the red-haired woman when they crossed paths after hours? She was all work, no nonsense, when she joined her marines on away-missions, but Saoirse had seen her and her friends at the Forward lounge. Jakarta. Her name was Jakarta. She'd never hear Jakarta give another comprehensive pre-mission briefing? She'd never get to see Jakarta stare at her from across a Main Street cafe? For some reason, the thought was enough to make her knees buckle.
She— she—
~
“Amity, are you okay?”
“Yeah,” the pale girl surreptitiously knuckled a bit of moisture away from the corner of her eye, “I'm fine.”
Luz didn't look convinced. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I'm fine, I mean,” Amity clicked her tongue in mild exasperation, “The science officer is absolutely convinced she'll never see her crewmate again that she's also apparently secretly crushing on, like, what's to be upset about?” The taller girl’s unconvincing laugh rang hollow, and she waved her arms in an exaggerated shrug to deflect attention while she cleared her throat. “It's not like I'm— I don't identify with the characters I'm reading about anymore, I'm an adult.”
“Oh, Amity,” Luz chuckled and patted the taller girl on the arm, “You're so cute— Gus, just tell the poor girl there's gonna be a happy ending.”
“Girl, don't make me— Do you hear yourself? Asking for spoilers?” the man scoffed from the smartphone in the pale girl's hand. They could almost hear him roll his eyes. “Just keep goin’!”
“Gusss…” both girls said at the same time in different tones of voice, then shot each other a look and a smile.
“No, I mean— Keep goin’ cuz I wanna listen! It is so fuckin’ cool to hear you read as Saoirse, it's obvious you a bookworm.”
“Well…” Amity blushed at the unexpected compliment, “Thank you.”
The Discord app made a funny blah-doonk sound, and another user's icon popped up on-screen. The profile photo was of a bright-red cardinal settling on a tree branch, a flower stem in its beak, wings extended as it came in for a landing.
“Like you not even stumblin’ on some’a the nerdy shit in there, I mean, I still get tripped up sometimes, and I’m the dumbass writin’ it.” Gus paused to sigh and laugh, and then to say, “Whaddup, Card?”
The newest member of the voice chat cleared his throat and said, “Hey bro.” Amity wrinkled her forehead as she tried to pinpoint the accent at play in those two words. Their shape suggested something from the Eastern seaboard.
Gus made a dark mwahaha kind of laugh and Amity could imagine the evil grin on his face. “Least I'm not as bad as Card’nal! Take years off’a my life listenin’ to him read shit out loud—” Luz and Gus laughed when the other man's slightly nasally voice broke in to interrupt with a Hey! Amity gave Luz a hesitant smile at their allegedly friendly banter.
“Ah didn't join the call tah get mocked, jackass,” Cardinal grumbled, “I watched the rough cut you sent over, but I guess I can just keep my thoughts to myself…” The second man’s voice had a California flavoring, but at his most irritated, there’d been a strong hint of Virginia in the way he stretched his I’s and his A’s.
“No! No no no, wait!” Gus scrambled to apologize, and Luz snorted in amusement.
“Hey, Card,” the tanned girl called across the cramped cabin aisle, and Amity held the phone closer to the smaller girl's shoulder.
“‘sup, Luzura,” the new voice replied, trailing off for a moment to listen before asking, “You’re callin’ from the road?” Cardinal sounded surprised.
“Yeah, got a hot delivery date,” the brown-haired girl waved a hand that went unseen by the men, then winked at Amity. The green-haired girl was glad her sudden blush was also unseen. “—uhh, for Friday. I hear you got a trip too?”
“Yeah, another project starting, ‘nother business trip.” There was the slightest hesitation before he said ‘business trip', just a fraction of a pause. Gus scoffed loudly in response, and when Cardinal continued speaking, the girls could hear the grin in his voice. “Leaving town for a few weeks, so I gotta give Clover a call before I—” He stopped short as a song began to play on his end of the line, muffled by the miles between, and, perhaps, moreso by the fabric of his pants pocket. “That's her right now,” he grunted as if he were struggling to free his phone from his pocket, Bill Withers crooning ~Ain't no sunshiiiine when she's gone!~ all the while. “Gus, I'll text you, have a safe trip Luzura, byeeeee.”
“Ten-four, good buddy,” Luz called before the beedle-ee-doop of disconnection. Gus sighed. “Whatsamatter, Gus-timator?” the shorter girl teased.
“They gonna talk for hours,” he whined, “I need feedback!”
“I told you, we'll watch it when we stop for dinner,” Luz assured her friend in a slightly patronizing tone of voice.
“How long until you get there?” Gus wheedled, pulling a sigh and a grin from his long-suffering friend.
“We'll get there when we get there,” Luz replied just before Amity offered a slightly more helpful, “Two more hours.”
When Gus groaned in petulant unhappiness, Amity asked, “Why don't I keep reading? That should help you pass the time—”
“Without complaint!” Luz interrupted, drawing a self-deprecating aight, I'll be good from the man on the phone.
~
She slumped to the cracked pavement as her legs gave out, catching her weight on her good arm at the last moment. Saoirse sat beside the crater’s edge in a daze, staring at the alien remains while her mind helpfully pointed out the smallest irregular details her eyes could find.
A standard-issue Terran Federation beam rifle sat on the ground nearby, next to a spattering of green and black fluid.
…It almost looked like blood.
The alien bodies weren't bleeding.
…There didn’t appear to be fluids of any kind leaking from the creatures.
They appeared to be surprisingly hardy.
…Not much remained of the one caught in the blast’s epicenter, but large pieces of the two other drones remained.
The gold-striped Inquisitor lay off to her left, missing their left-side limbs and the bottom half of their right leg.
…Crumbling red dust poured from the severed joints.
…Hollow, tube-like structures hung from their right knee, which appeared to be brittle.
…The source of the red dust?
Their mirrored armor had been compromised, their helmet cracked open like an eggshell.
…One eye stared in her direction, glowing a dim cyan.
Saoirse blinked at the realization her subconscious had labeled the three aliens as drones. She turned that thought over in her mind, the surprise observation helping to draw her focus away from her runaway grief. The three humanoids in the all-gray armor had turned in unison, acting in synchronization. Based on their behavior, what else could they be, but some type of drone? Were they a local hive-mind or were they connected to other invaders? A chill ran up her spine at that thought. How many are onboard? Do they already know these are dead?
Suspicions weren’t fact. They weren’t proof. She needed proof for Captain Pak. For herself. For her. Saoirse slowly pulled her legs underneath herself, and tried to stand. She reached for the beam rifle, leaning to one side, her bottom lip clamped between her teeth as she stretched out to snag its scorched shoulder-strap with a fingertip. She used the long weapon like a crutch, bracing the barrel against the perma-crete and pulling herself up by the stock. After a dizzying moment on shaky legs, she tottered over to the gold-trimmed Inquisitor and nudged it with the rifle in her hand.
It lurched into motion, flailing its single hand for the rifle as she jumped back with a gasp of surprise. It jerked itself onto its side like a broken marionette, clawing at the stones of the avenue as she stumbled over a piece of rubble. She fell hard with a shriek—half in fright, and half in pain—as fire shot through her broken arm. The world was spinning, and all she could see was that single eye. It flared a bright, evil blue with a hatred she could feel as it dragged itself forward. A gauntleted fist wrapped around her ankle and squeezed. “No, no no, no!” Saoirse hissed, pulling herself up onto her elbow as she kicked at the alien’s face once, twice, three times. A dull crunch sounded beneath her heel, and the Inquisitor’s head hung sharply to one side. She hefted the beam rifle by its barrel and swung the pointed, triangular shoulder-stock into its forearm. Its elbow cracked under the blow, and its forearm pulled loose with a scattering of red clay-like tubes that disintegrated into a cloud of dust.
Its upper arm collapsed under the weight of its torso, and the invader fell to its chest on the heap of rubble. The cracked helmet clattered against the rebar and perma-crete, and the faceplate fell free. The Inquisitor's head rolled to one side and those damned eyes pointed into her soul.
“Why?” Saoirse gasped, dragging herself a half-step away. Its hand still clung to her boot, slowly crumbling inside its gauntlet. “W– What did we do?”
It clicked and buzzed in its alien tongue, its head vibrating inside its helmet to make a far weaker sound than before, and pale lines of silica—like circuitry—illuminated the inside of its helmet as the translator engaged.
Killed… our… queen.
Its face looked like a stone. It was a featureless lump of rock, aside from its unblinking, glowing turquenite gemstone eyes ringed with a dark mossy growth. She heard a crumbling sound, like gravel falling into an empty well, just before its head fell from its shoulders, the hollow bands of inorganic muscle in its neck shivering to pieces. The Inquisitor's gold-trimmed helmet rolled forward, tumbling down the rubble to settle between her knees, its flickering, hateful gaze pointed up into the fake sky above.
Animals.
She lost track of how much time had passed while she caught her breath. She carefully shrugged the rifle’s shoulder strap over her neck once she was steady on her feet; she needed her good hand to carry the alien's head, after all. Saoirse began her unsteady trek toward the Main Street lifts, and, as it so happened, toward dim, hand-held searchlights moving about in the distance. Toward the raised voices of brave crewmates looking for those who might need help.
~
Gus had been quiet for far too long, and Luz had begun to grow suspicious. Silence and Gus got along like oil and water. Faint hmm’s and clicketty-clicks wafted across the miles, and a soft ah-ha! made Luz roll her eyes. “What're you up to, man?” she called, and Amity moved her arm to hold the smartphone out between the captain seats.
“uhh… nuthin’?”
The brown-haired girl narrowed her eyes and listened. She couldn't hear anything. “Gus?” Was he holding his breath?
“Whuuut?”
She shot a glance at Amity, and even the golden-eyed girl had wrinkled her nose at his guilty tone. Gus began talking faster in a half-distracted voice, typing and clicking at something on his computer. “I’m multi-taskin’ okay? I can't talk and type at the same time like some people.” The tanned girl snorted, drawing a chuckle from the man on the phone. “Shaddup. I'm still listenin’ tho! Keep, uh, keep going! …Please?”
Amity grinned and giggled, turning a crinkly-eyed smile on Luz that made the smaller girl's cheeks feel warm and toasty. “Are you sure?” the green-haired girl asked.
“Amity, Grand Slamitty, I am positive!” There was a loud slurping noise, then the clatter of an empty can being tossed into a nearby pile of other empties.
“Gus,” Amity's voice turned sharp, “How many Red Bull have you had?”
“Three, why?”
Luz barked a laugh before asking, “What time is it there?”
He slurred something that might have been ‘I dunno.’
“You got a clock on your screen, dumb-dumb,” the brown-haired girl shook her head and sighed, “The numbers, Gus, what do they mean?”
“I— I can't read that shit!”
“Why not?” Amity asked, trying to hide the worry in her voice.
“‘Cuz I had three Red Bulls!”
“Just… tch– humor him, I guess,” Luz clicked her tongue as she tapped her fingertips across the leather-wrapped steering wheel in some pattern Amity didn't recognize. After a moment's thought, she shrugged and sighed, “He'll prolly pass out soon.”
“Oh? O-okay,” Amity said while Gus protested, “Imma prove you wrong this time, Noceda!”
~
The Trailblazer’s cramped Armory was a bustling hive of activity. A meager handful of Kirana's surviving marines stripped power cells from energy weapons, to set aside for the pair of engineers up to their elbows in a rack of disassembled EVA suits. The red-uniformed security crew worked in a grim silence, communicating through simple gestures and nods, while the two clad in a dusty orange swapped muttered ideas, half-relevant warnings, and hand tools from their satchels.
Sparks jumped from hard-points and cables as they cobbled together components in a non-regulation fashion. The senior officers nearby ignored the rampant safety violations while they watched the Major dance around the Chief Medical Officer’s attempts at medical intervention.
Dr. Chretite sputtered in irritation as the smaller red-haired woman bent down to peer into a storage bay, her unexpected motion unwrapping their hastily-wrapped bandage from around her forehead. She pulled Fabricator Matter from the shelves, one heavy canister in each hand. They had tried to close the lacerations on her face with LiquiDerm, but she’d pushed the applicator away. Save the glue for someone who needs it, she growled, then delayed their best efforts for the greater part of twenty minutes as they tried to stop the bleeding with butterfly clamps and old-fashioned gauze.
“Dammit, ‘Karta,” Chretite grumbled, “I’m a doctor, not a ballroom dancer!” She ducked under their elbow and crossed the room before they had untangled the bandage. She fed her canisters into the large table-shaped Assembler as they sighed and turned to follow, holding the gauze strip ready between their thumbs and forefingers. “This would be easier if you would sit down.”
Major Kirana shook her head as she typed a series of commands into the quartermaster’s computer terminal. “I don’t have time to sit,” she replied in a half-distracted tone of voice, her eyes skimming the readout on-screen, “There are defenses to assemble.” She typed another search query and examined her results, and the Doctor took advantage of their quarry’s momentary stillness.
“You know you don’t put them together yourself?” Index offered a helpful bit of knowledge from where he sat on the far side of the Fabricator. He perched on a four-legged stool as Chief O’Miles dug shrapnel from the layers of muscle membrane in his neck and shoulders.
“Shut it, ‘Dex!” the woman snapped, her face tightening in a furious scowl. She sent him a glare, but her eyes softened after a moment.
He tilted his head slightly as he watched her work through a series of expressions before she looked away in something like guilt or shame. He wasn’t absolutely sure; he was still learning human behavioral patterns, after all.
She sighed, and keyed a few controls on the Assembler terminal, drawing a set of beeps and a soft chiming ding from the machine. Kirana set her hands on her hips and sighed again, ignoring the Doctor as they fastened the gauze head-wrap in place. “Sorry, ‘Dex.” Her voice lacked its usual fire.
“Apology accepted, Major.”
“And—” she crossed her arms as she tapped the toe of her boot on the floor. “Thanks for… getting me outta there.”
“Of course, Major,” the tactical officer gave her a small shrug, and a mechanism in his shoulder squealed in protest.
The curly-haired man at his back grunted Oi!, and tapped the flat of his prybar against the blonde android’s temple. “D’you want me to keep working?” O’Miles’ question dripped with his usual sarcasm.
“Yes, Chief,” Index replied in his usual straight-man earnestness, “My combat effectiveness has been compromised by at least thirty-seven percent—”
“‘At wasn’t a real—” O’Miles groaned in a long-suffering patience, running a dark-skinned hand through his hair before he added, “That was sarcasm.” The mechanical man loosed a soft Ah as the engineer waved his screwdriver in Kirana’s direction, offering an absent-minded, “But ‘e’s right; the Fabricators will assemble all the—”
The Major rounded on the two men with a snarl. “Chief!” she growled as she slapped her palms on the glowing, waist-high table top. She breathed out in a noisy whistle as she clenched her eyes shut, then opened her mouth to speak her mind. Dr. Chretite pressed a hypospray to the side of her neck and thumbed the injector; it clicked its medicinal payload through her skin, and the woman sucked a sharp breath through her teeth.
“That’s for the pain,” Chretite said in a drawl.
Kirana slapped a hand over her neck and glared up at the gray-haired Hykri, “I’m not in pain.”
They twirled the tube-like device over their thin, gray fingers, then slid it into a belt pouch as they fixed her with a four-eyed stare. “Then it’ll fix your attitude.”
The Major bared her teeth and pointed a finger at their face, “You’re going to be in—”
The Armory's heavy blast doors beyond Index and O’Miles slid open to admit Captain Pak and the glittering, wide-eyed Visitor floating at her side, then the double-layered steel slabs slammed shut with a dreadful, echoing clunk.
“Captain!” Kirana pushed past the Doctor, nearly toppling them as she ignored their yelp of protest.
“Index, are you alright?” Pak asked as she stepped up to the blonde android’s side. His uniform had been stained by a greenish-black fluid that wept from the score of bullet holes that riddled his back. He began to turn his head to answer her question, and some part of his damaged frame shrieked at the movement. O’Miles grabbed his head and twisted it back to where it had been with a ping, facing forward.
“I’m—” the mechanical man began, but the chief engineer spoke louder, “ —He’ll be fine. In time. The idiot took some damage.” The giggling starchild trailed off with an oooh of curiosity as he peered into the tactical officer's injuries over O’Miles' shoulder.
“Anything serious?” Pak made an abortive hand movement, like she had been about to brush the android’s hair back from his forehead. Index watched her with curiosity.
O’Miles shrugged, and grumbled under his breath, “Well, his internals are exposed to radiation, now that ‘e got himself shot to hell.”
Pak peered into his eyes for a moment, then patted a hand on his shoulder as she turned toward her Security Chief. The woman’s hair was disheveled and stained with the android’s greenish-black blood, her face bandaged, and gauze wrapped around her forehead. “Kirana, are you—”
“I need your voice-print authorization!” The security chief interrupted.
“—alright? For what?”
Kirana motioned toward the glowing table top in the center of the workspace. “Munitions.”
A handful of ancient wireframes traced their shining silver lines across the deep blue background, tagged with dimension measurements, material requirements, and related data. Kirana moved to the far side of the table and leaned over the display, tapping her fingertips over one design in particular.
“Our energy weapons were… ineffective,” the Major sneered at how inadequate the word felt; it left so much unsaid. She paused, blue and silver shining up into her watery eyes. “They carried kinetic weapons… so I picked some restricted designs from the Archive.”
“What is that,” Pak asked, pointing at the weapon lurking beneath the other woman's fingers.
“That is a twelve-gauge shotgun,” Kirana smiled. It was a hard-edged thing. “Drum-fed. Automatic.”
The Captain met her dark gaze. “I want one.”
“Yes ma'am,” Kirana's grin turned sharp and dangerous.
A bosun's whistle split the air, and the calm voice of the shipboard computer drifted from the overhead speakers, “Captain, high-priority communique.”
“Thank you, V.I.D.A.,” the stocky woman held up a finger, like, just a moment, to Kirana, and moved the three quick steps to the Comm Relay mounted on the bulkhead beside the Armory entrance. She toggled the switch beneath the blinking red light, and leaned toward the grill, “This is Pak.”
“Captain! This is Lieutenant Byrne, Exotic Materials.”
The Major stood upright and stared at the Relay. Pak raised an eyebrow at the red-haired woman’s astonished, watery-eyed expression.
“We’ve begun analysis on one of the aliens J— Major Kirana’s team encountered on Main Street.”
“Excellent work, Lieutenant,” Captain Pak turned back to the Relay, “It’s good to hear that you made it out as well.”
“As— as well? Who—? Was it— I— uh, yes,” the woman on the other Relay cleared her throat, “Thank you, ma’am.”
“Anything useful?” Pak pulled the handset hanging from the side of the Relay and turned back toward the glowing Fabricator. The Visitor raised his hand to touch something in the android’s musculature, and O’Miles gently pushed the child’s finger away.
A faint beeping sound and a steady, droning hum filled the empty space between Lt. Byrne’s words as the scientist approached her machinery. “It’s quite fascinating, actually, they’re not organic creatures— well, not entirely non-organic, as there are trace deposits of—” A shrill beeeeep cut across the line, then a clatter and a grunt as the woman cut the alarm short, “—sorry, ow, damn this arm— sorry, Captain…” Saoirse trailed off, sniffling and breathing heavily for a moment. “They appear to be sentient electricity. They’re a living electromagnetic field contained by a silica quartz grown into crystalline circuitry. Their limbs might be a molybdenum disulfide nanotube structure that can be manipulated via EMF modulations, and—”
“I’m—” The Captain squinted her eyes tight as she pinched the bridge of her nose between thumb and forefinger, “I’m going to stop you there, Lieutenant.” She glanced at her tactical officer who appeared to be listening with interest, then turned back to the Security Chief across the table. Kirana pointed down at the weapon diagrams with both hands. “Have you identified any weaknesses we can exploit?” Pak asked with a carefully-schooled frustration. She shouldn't expect a detailed report so quickly, but a righteous indignation burned harsh and fierce in her chest.
“Well…” The Relay was silent for a handful of heartbeats, aside from the soft beep, beep, beep of the Exotic Materials lab. “The explosion, um, appeared to disrupt their structural integrity?” Lt. Byrne’s hesitant offer prompted a hasty follow-up, “The invaders crumbled apart.”
Pak was silent for a moment before she asked a hard-edged question, “You suggest we use explosives on-board?”
“No, ma’am, of course not!” Saoirse’s voice held a note of hesitation. “But— no beam weapons, Captain. It must be like food to them? They absorb almost all forms of high-frequency radiation.” There was a fumbling sound, as though the science officer had set her Relay down, and then a slow, careful clicketty-clack of keys. “Due to the rigid, crystalline structures at play, I suggest blunt force… Something to hit them hard.”
Pak and Kirana locked eyes. “I think we have just the thing,” Captain Pak replied, making sure to sound confident for the shaken woman. “Keep me informed.”
“Aye, Captain.” The Relay switched off with a short whistle.
Pak nodded to her Security Chief, “Let’s get started.”
~
The starry night sky had ceded territory to a murky twilight as they approached the outskirts of Chicago. Small pools of light flicked past in the half-dark as the Interstate bore slightly to the North. The number of light-posts-per-mile had been on a steady increase the closer they drew to the city center, not that Amity was counting. Intentionally. But if she were, and if her back-of-the-napkin calculations were correct, then they should expect to see—
“Indiana, twenty-two miiilllles,” Luz drawled in a louder-than-necessary voice. Amity glanced her way, one eyebrow raised, and caught a wide grin and sparkling brown eyes. Luz nodded upward at the green sign standing just on the other side of the guardrail, the now-familiar white block letters announcing INDIANA 22 and TOLEDO 246. The radio popped, and Curtis Mayfield was cut short by a blip of static. A new song started to play, and Luz’s grin widened, somehow. Amity couldn’t help but return the brown-haired girl’s giddy smile when she leaned her head back to belt out the lyrics.
I'm goin' back to Indiana
Back to where I started from
Goin' back to Indiana
Indiana, here I come!
Luz shimmied to the beat, mouthing the lyrics to the second verse and smiling as Amity laughed. Luz’s eyes were bright as she waggled her eyebrows, clearly enjoying the pale girl’s confusion. “Why did…?” Amity began to ask, and Luz turned the radio down.
“One reason is, Eda and I will start singin’ a song when we hear or see something that, y’know, reminds us of it. Hooty likes to join the fun, and I did say ‘Indiana’.” The brown-eyed girl leaned forward to pat a hand across Hooty’s dashboard, “The more important reason is, this ol’ fella came from the assembly plant in Indianapolis.”
“So he was… born… in Indiana?” Amity asked with a slowly spreading grin.
“Yyyyup!” Luz popped the ‘p’ sound.
The golden-eyed girl patted a hand on the red leather armrest mounted to her door and whispered a soft, “Welcome home, Hooty.” The rumble of the big rig’s diesel engine might have sounded deeper, growled stronger, seemed happier for a while afterwards.
~
They passed under a steel frame that held two brightly lit signs above the Interstate. The smaller sign pointed down at the far-left lane, marking the exit for 294 NORTH TOLLWAY / WISCONSIN. Luz guided them under the larger sign that straddled the three remaining lanes for 294 / 80 EAST.
Their concrete river poured into a distributary. One narrow stream followed the terrain to the North as the main body pooled before the gates of a toll booth. Despite the early hour, a number of vehicles filled the lanes, inching forward single file under the harsh fluorescent lights. Hooty floated to the far-right lane, drifting in the wake of a Cox Transport truck-and-trailer.
Luz waited for her lane lights to switch from red to green, then slowly worked her way through the gears as she brought the double-brown big rig up to speed. Cars and passenger trucks rushed past on their way to the on-ramp. The toll booth’s exit gates funneled into a single eastbound lane that followed the gentle curve of the Illinois Tollway, until the concrete barriers fell away. Hooty joined the rush of traffic.
Decorative sound-baffling walls ran alongside the Tollway as six lanes merged into five. Amity’s hands twitched toward the headphones hanging from her neck every time a smaller vehicle sped by her door, but so far the heavy truck traffic had been silent in comparison to San Francisco. It’d be worse in the city, Luz assured her, having noticed the way her passenger tensed on occasion. Because of course she did. Almost twenty miles to the city’s heart, as the crow flies, Luz had said, pointing off into the distance. Perhaps it was too early in the morning to be blaring horns at one another. Perhaps it was because of how the homes and apartment buildings they passed were still dark, as this outer layer of Chicago slept.
“Don’t be surprised if it gets worse after we cross into Indiana, when the—” Luz cut herself short when horns and drums kicked in once more over the radio, and a young Michael Jackson began to sing. She might have rolled her eyes and scoffed, My big mouth, but Amity could see the smile tugging at her lips.
Amity watched the dim suburban landscape, punctuated by flitting pools of light cast by the passing lamp posts. She idly noticed these had eight lights arranged in a circle, while the lamp posts miles behind had only had two. Lines of houses and narrow, cramped lawns fell away, and the Interstate crossed a wide bridge hanging over a web of steel and iron. The golden-eyed girl shifted in her seat, the better to watch from her window as hulking diesel engines pulled railcars and pushed coal trucks about on long, branching tracks.
“Imagine if Abe had railroad wheels on his legs,” the brown-haired girl laughed, but it was a kindly, fond sound, tinged with pride. “He could check the tracks ahead of trains, in case there was damage… And I bet Min could get them back on track if they derailed!” Luz gave the other girl a soft smile as Amity pressed a pale hand against the glass.
“Imagine…” the green-haired girl repeated the word in something like wonder, watching a long line of railcars disappear into the distance.
Traffic tightened once again as Amity called out their next turn. Exit 16 to I-90, aye, Luz capped her response with a wink. They rolled under a massive cloverleaf junction, three-levels deep, and lit by the flashing headlights of innumerable vehicles. Amity craned her neck to watch as the far right lane curved up and overhead, to point travelers in another direction altogether. Luz tapped her fingers and sang along with Hooty’s next song of choice.
The East and Westbound lanes tightened on the far side of the junction. Spotlights lit a curved steel trellis and the large blue sign bolted to the center of the arch. MORE TO DISCOVER, it promised IN INDIANA. Luz opened her mouth and turned toward Amity, but the other girl was quicker on the draw.
Amity pointed a slender finger upward, tracking the sign. “Check that out,” those golden eyes twinkled at the pout that raced across the smaller girl’s face, then the pale girl cocked a sly eyebrow as she added, “Indiana.” Amity grinned wide when the radio crackled, and Goin’ Back to Indiana began to play for the third time.
Luz laughed in disbelief, and sighed while shaking her head. “Alright, Miss Mathy-pants,” the brown-haired girl raised her jaw in something like a challenge, “How many does that make?”
Amity pretended to count on her fingertips, then leveled a smug grin at the other girl, “One more.” Luz gasped in mock outrage, and they crossed into their seventh state in high spirits.
~
Pak placed her booted foot against the wall and pushed. The lever didn’t move. The stocky woman took a deep breath, adjusted her stance, and pushed until she began to see stars. The manual override could only resist so much, and with a jerk and a squeal, the lever snapped forward. Pak braced her gloved hands on her armored knees, panting for air, nausea coiling like a snake in her gut; she hadn’t pushed herself like that in three days. The heavy blast door unlocked with a shuddering clunk she could feel through the deck.
Her breath fogged the inside of her helmet, turning the outside world into blurred shapes painted by blood-red emergency lights, black shadows, and the small pool of golden-yellow from the flashlight mounted to her shoulder. She squeezed her eyes closed and fought the coughing fit that threatened to claw its way out of her chest. After a pause, and a few deep breaths in and out, she could see hints of the debris-strewn corridor through the fading haze.
Opening the blast door wide enough to walk through took almost as much effort as disabling the automatic environmental seal. Her EVA suit’s radiation alert started to chime while she wedged herself into the gap far enough to force it open further. “I know, I know,” Pak grunted through clenched teeth, straining, as the heavy slabs of metal crept open one inch at a time.
She slapped the gauntlet-mounted keypad to silence the rad-alarm. She stared into the dim, darkened Engineering Section, her flashlight sending long, twisted shadows leaping from every console and indistinct lump on the floor. A small, hesitant sniff sounded from behind her, and Pak turned.
The Visitor sat against the wall across the corridor, his arms wrapped around his legs, his knees drawn up to his chin. He still glittered with unknown constellations, but they were a dim, muted glow. He sniffed again and made a face. Pak glanced back at Engineering—at the now-open door, and the fresh exchange of atmosphere from both sides of the blast door—and she said a silent thanks for her air-tight space suit. She clomped across the corridor in her heavy boots, and carefully knelt before the starchild. He had always looked so young, so childlike, but his red and yellow eyes had seen far too much.
“I— I’m sure it smells, and… I’m sorry,” Pak said in as soft a voice as she could manage; rage and grief had left her hoarse. “I need to go in and see… if… If I can fix anything.” She ducked her head, drawing those ancient eyes to focus on her face. “Do you… want to wait here for me?” She asked.
The Visitor shook his head.
Pak nodded, giving him a gentle smile. “Just… hold onto me, okay?” She patted at the wide, multi-purpose handle built into the EVA suit’s chestplate, just behind the rim of her shoulder, “Float along behind me. Talk to me… if you want.”
The Visitor shook his head once more, but he reached for her shoulder before she had begun to push herself to her feet. She took her time turning back around, careful to keep her footing. She bumped some debris with her boot, and it began to drift down the corridor, a victim of mass and inertia.
Engineering was dead… in every way that mattered.
Pak set her jaw in a grim frown as she turned in place and took stock of her situation. She had no eyes and ears, because her crew… was… She had no weapons or shields, because her ship was powerless. She had no way to send a distress signal, or activate a beacon. The Fusion Plants were damaged and dark. The Central Computer Core had been destroyed, taking V.I.D.A. with it. Her Engineering crew… all of her crew… They were gone.
“Power first,” Pak whispered to herself, tracing the branching conduits in the ceiling to their origins above the three-level Fusion Plant. Her uneasiness deepened when she saw the transparent steel safety wall had snapped shut, partitioning the outer Engineering section from what should have been the Trailblazer’s fiercely burning heart.
Her narrow beam of light flashed across two dark shapes at the transparisteel barrier, and Pak felt her breath catch in her throat. Chief O’Miles knelt outside the barrier, slumped forward, raised hand and forehead pressed against the glass, his dark complexion darker still from the angry burns that spread across the exposed skin of his face and hands. Useless tools and burnt-out portable data plates lay scattered about his knees. Inside the barrier… Her chest tightened like a fist.
Index leaned against the other side of the transparisteel, a pained exhaustion etched in his soft, waxen features. He had one hand raised as well, his fingertips touching the barrier close to O’Miles’ palm. One last attempt to comfort his best friend in their final moments? Pak thought she didn’t have any tears left, after that first day. She was wrong.
When she took a hesitant step forward, she saw his eyes were still slightly open. He was looking over O’Miles’ shoulder. He was looking at her. Pak felt a chill seize her spine at how the mechanical man stared through her with malice in his— No… No. She was wrong. His eyes didn’t follow her as she knelt beside her Chief Engineer. She could see, now, that his eyes were locked on the heavy doors leading into Engineering, like he had been watching for someone, waiting for someone. Now that she'd taken another look, she could see that his gaze wasn’t set in malice… it was something closer to resignation.
“I’m sorry, ‘Dex,” She whispered as she traced gauntleted fingers down the barrier close to his face, “But… I’m here now.”
Some dormant mechanism within the android registered her movement. His mouth opened, and Chief O’Mile’s watery voice spilled out. “Cap… Captain…?”
Pak pressed her helmet against the barrier, the better to listen.
“They killed us, Cap. Used our… our engines against us. If… if… any survivors… They need to run. This is a tomb.” A coughing fit interrupted his weak monologue, and the dead man’s voice took a moment to spit something on the floor. He couldn’t seem to speak without wheezing, interrupted by shallow gasps of air. “We kept… fusion plants… from blowing up, but… still went critical. Rad spike… so high… I’m sorry, Ca– Captain. Whole ship… everyone is… There’s… there’s nothing… here.” He paused to gasp for air, his breath bubbling in his throat. “‘Dex said to… to take… his… mem’ry core with you… if… if you…”
Pak and the Visitor were frozen in a horrified silence as the man in the recording—the always-cheerful, curly-haired man that had a solution to any problem—began to drown on his knees. “Stop… stop it… Stop playback!” the woman begged as she struck the barrier with her fist, sending a hollow clang through the Engineering bay. “I don’t want to hear this!” For the first and last time, the android disobeyed an order.
Pak couldn’t reach her ears to block the noise, damn this space suit! It was too much, it was just too much. She tried to kneel, took a deep breath and prepared to slam her forehead against the floor— maybe she could knock herself out, and spare herself this torture. Maybe she’d crack her helmet, and the radiation that devoured her crew could pour in and finish the job—
Small hands and arms wrapped around her neck, and a smaller, fearful voice filled her ears. “Cap-tin! Cap-tin! We should— we should go,” the Visitor tried to push her upright, and Pak had to blink away the tears stinging her eyes. “I don’t smell any energy in here, it’s all dead!” The starchild’s words dripped with a bitter disappointment as he grumbled, “She’s gone too! I thought she’d be in here, but she’s not!”
“She? She who?!” This latest point of absolute nonsense felt like a tenuous safety-line to sanity, and Pak held on with both hands. “Seuta, what are you talking about?”
“She said she just wanted to talk to you! She said things would be okay!” the Visitor stomped his foot on the floor, and crossed his arms in a huff. The sheer ridiculousness of a child throwing a temper tantrum in the midst of all this horror brought her a slight, incredulous smile. “I’m so— I'm so mad at her!” the yellow-and-blue-skinned boy’s high-pitched growl made her shake her head in confusion.
Pak placed a hand on the starchild’s shoulder, being careful with the weight of her EVA suit’s heavy glove. She leaned to one side, catching his eye as she asked, “Who wanted to talk to me?”
“Their queen!” The little boy threw his arms wide in explanation, and he looked up at Pak like she had asked him a truly foolish question. “You found her egg, remember?”
Pak scrunched her face in a quizzical frown, before answering, “No… we found an escape pod, but it was empty. Then we had to deal with that—” Her green eyes widened as she gasped, struck by a sudden realization. “The computer virus. You— you said it was an egg? Is that why they attacked? Is this… our fault?”
The white-haired boy ignored her concern as he shook his fists in the air, his eyes glittering with tears, “She lied to me! It's not fair! I found you first!” He scrubbed the back of his hand across his face as he whimpered, “I outta go back and yell at her…”
Captain Pak breathed out an amused, yell at her, right, before two of his words registered. Go back. A jolt shot up her spine, some heady mixture of surprise and fear and disbelief and hope— “Wait, go back? Go back— before all of this? To talk with the queen?”
The Visitor sniffed and rubbed the heel of his palm under one eye, but paused to tilt his head as he replied, “Yeah?” His voice grew worried as he asked, “Why?”
“You can do that?” the woman spoke in a breathless, nauseating rush of exhilaration. “How?!” She felt like she was standing at the edge of a rain-slick precipice; if this were some cruel joke, she might fall and break.
“I… I just…” the boy raised a hand, one finger pointed up at the ceiling, then dragged his fingertip through the air like he was moving a switch on a control panel, “like that, and everything slides—” The Visitor scratched behind his ear as he wrinkled his forehead in thought. “Can’t you do it too?”
“Why didn't you do it earlier?” Pak tried to hold her tongue, but some venom-laced words slipped out of her mouth, “You could have saved my people!” The Visitor dropped his hands to his side in a sullen, hurt silence, and half-turned away from the woman in the space suit. She clenched her teeth and focused on her breathing—slow breaths, in and out—before she let herself speak again. “I… I'm sorry.”
After a long quiet moment, the little boy shrugged. “I'm not s’posed to,” he mumbled. “My… um… someone told me to never go back and change things, but… but I did… and now they're… I'm alone.”
Pak breathed out the last of her fury at the sight of the broken heart the child carried. She never would have thought she'd feel anything but irritation for the obnoxious, cackling Visitor from the stars, but now she reached out to pull him close, wrapping her arms around him in a gentle embrace. “You're not alone anymore, Seuta.” After a small eternity, he wrapped his arms around her middle and squeezed.
Her heart was thundering in her ears. Was he telling the truth? Could he help save her crew? She settled back on her haunches as best she could in the cumbersome magnetic boots, and studied this Visitor from the stars. He worried his fingernails on the cuff of his sleeve. He looked guilty, but it was an old shame, born of his mistake in the distant past. She didn’t see the tells of a liar.
“If… if you can take me back with you,” Pak began, slowly, carefully, watching the starchild’s face to gauge his reaction, “if we can talk to the queen, and— and save my crew… it would mean everything to me.”
He gulped, then whispered, “Okay.”
“Okay,” Pak smiled. “Will it take long?”
He shook his head.
Good. The sooner the better, frankly. Judging by the ache in her joints, she wouldn't have much time to make a difference. A day or two, perhaps. She had gone beyond the point where a medical intervention could have changed her trajectory, and besides… the needs of the many hung in the balance.
“Let me— let me get something first,” she patted the boy on the arm before she pushed herself to her feet. She wobbled slightly, and he held out a hand to steady her. She felt dizzy with relief, with hope. I’ll change things, she promised herself. Despite everything, she felt herself grin as she said, “I want to yell at her with you.”
A wide smile broke across the Visitor’s face. “Okay!” he giggled.
~
“...we just don’t usually stop at this one unless we absolutely have to, it’s so small, y’know? But you’ll see what I mean when we go by, it’s a li’l rinky-dink operation,” Luz’s voice filled the cabin as she carefully threaded her way through the Interstate 80 / 90 junction. It looked like a snarled rat’s nest of gray lines on the GPS display, in Amity’s opinion, and the rapidly narrowing lanes hadn’t eased her anxiety. She concentrated on her breathing and the brown-haired girl’s warm voice. Hooty leaned into a tight right-hand turn, and Amity watched the scrubby brush and trees that rotated counterclockwise just beyond her window. Points of light danced among the tall grass, and for a moment a portion of the night’s sky was just out of reach.
Luz continued talking as they crossed a two-lane bridge and bore to the right for 80, 90 EAST, OHIO. A wide curve to the right wrapped around a sea of tall, budding brown grass dotted with islands of apple and oak, fireflies sparkling like moonlight atop ocean waves. For a fleeting moment, Amity wanted nothing more than to wade out into the wheat field and chase those motes of light. She would catch one—gently, of course—and bring it back to show Luz. She could see it now: the glow in her palms; how the smaller girl would lean close to peer into her cupped hands and smile down at her treasure; warm fingers hooked over her cool wrists; that half-crooked grin, the way her eyes would sparkle and—
“You can see it right up here, doesn’t it look awful?”
Hooty’s cabin rocked from side to side as he crossed the dotted line into the left lane, accelerating, and Amity jerked awake when her chin touched her chest. She blinked and shook her head, then managed to croak a half-distracted, “What? Yes.” She gave Luz what should have been a surreptitious glance; the brown-eyed girl might not have noticed she’d dozed off.
Luz was watching her, lips pressed tight in a lopsided line as she tried to hide her smile.
Shit.
Once more, the tanned girl chose to pretend she hadn't seen anything. “See? This is what we gotta put up with on the toll roads,” Luz pointed out Amity’s window, then turned back to the road with a heavy sigh. “They think they can force-feed you these tiny stops because the toll booths are a hassle.”
Amity squinted out her window at a brightly lit parking lot that sprawled across a dozen acres. A minuscule concrete building propped up a small 7-11 sign smack dab in the middle of the patch of blacktop, wrapped about by a tiny scrap of grass. Long semi-truck parking lanes marked the far left and right of the lot, and a handful of cars and trucks inched through the angled gas pump lanes just to the east of the building. It was a pathetic sight, if she were being charitable. She coughed, then forced out a quick, “Tiny,” in agreement.
“Gimme a down-on-its-luck diner any day o’ the week,” Luz knocked her knuckles against the leather-wrapped steering wheel, then tapped a fingertip there in emphasis, “People that work there because they love what they do! Like Amanda and Benny?” The smaller girl turned wide brown eyes on Amity, and a smile to match. “If you ever find a place like that, an’ you’re not in the mood for anything in particular? Ask ‘em to make you their favorite dish on the menu.” She grinned at Amity and nodded upward, a sly confidence written clear across her face. “I’m tellin' you, cariño,” Luz assured her, “You’ll never taste anything so good.”
Amity paused for a moment to digest the worldly wisdom she’d been gifted, and slowly nodded. Luz looked rather pleased with herself, until the pale girl asked, “Are you hungry?”
Luz scoffed, twisting her face in outrage, “Why would you—” Her stomach growled, and she immediately switched gears, “—yes, yes I am. God, we had chicken tenders, not Chinese food! Why am I so hungry already?!”
“Can— I can get you… something?” Amity pointed a thumb over her shoulder as she reached for her seatbelt.
“Nah, it’s okay,” the smaller girl wobbled her head in a light-hearted attempt at deflection, “I can wait until the next rest area.”
The double-brown big rig’s headlights played across a blue sign with white letters, and Amity read its message aloud. “Next travel plaza, thirty-five miles?” the pale girl paused for a moment, then shrugged, “Well, we’ll be there in at least thirty five minutes.”
“Yyyyup,” Luz replied, popping the ‘p’ sound. Her stomach grumbled again, and she gave a nervous chuckle. “It’ll be fine.”
~
Luz sighed as they passed yet another 40 MPH speed limit sign on the right-hand shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” Amity said, holding out a half-empty packet of teriyaki beef jerky, “I thought the Interstate Highway System would be faster.”
“I did too!” the tanned girl exclaimed. She glanced to the side when the other girl shook the bag beside her ear. “No thanks, it’s the principle of the thing!”
“Alright,” the pale girl replied as she fished out another piece. She turned it over in her fingertips, on purpose, before she tossed it into her mouth. “More for me.”
“I hate you.”
“Heh, no you don’t.”
No, no she didn't.
Notes:
It's been a struggle to find the time to put this chapter together. I had a good chunk of the first half written weeks ago, but then we started some home renovations, and a quick 5-day job has turned into almost 3 months of every-spare-moment working in that blasted spare bathroom. Take my advice, and pay someone else to do it.
I hope this next chapter won’t take nearly as long, but… we’ll see, I guess. I was sorta hoping to get it all wrapped up before the 2nd anniversary rolled around, but after the Summer of George, I'm not sure how realistic that is.
See you next time!
Chapter 30: Thursday, 5:11am
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
The night sky far to the East had begun to peel away from the horizon, chased by the rising sun. Where a deep black had once blanketed the landscape beyond the pale yellow glare of Hooty’s headlights, now they could see faint silhouettes of trees crawling across a dim gray in a westward march. The Interstate poured between a rigid procession of steel giants looming high overhead, a spider’s web of lightning caught in their fists.
The speed limit had risen miles back with Luz’s mood following close behind. Her stomach grumbled every so often while Hooty growled his way down the road mile by mile, ever closer to their next stop. At present, the two girls shared a hushed laugh and a grin at the loud chainsaw snore that rattled the borrowed smartphone laying across the pale girl’s palm.
“Ohh my god,” Amity held her fingers over her mouth in a half-hearted attempt to hide her widening smile, cheeks dimpling in delight, “Should… should we hang up?”
Luz stretched her face in a frown as she waved a dismissive hand. “Naaahhh, he— heh— he sleeps better when he can still hear everyone talking. Must be an art student thing?” She laughed before she sighed, her mouth settling into a warm, crooked grin. “Card’ll move him to the AFK channel, or, y’know, boot him entirely from the VC, and he’ll be back two minutes later ‘cuz we were his white noise.”
The pale girl hmmm’d in consideration.
Luz scoffed and leaned toward the aisle as she added, mischievously, “And he puts emphasis on the white in ‘white noise’, which always makes Card irritated.” Amity laughed again—for the third time in as many minutes—and once more the musical sound did a peculiar something to Luz’s stomach. She knew that particular sensation wasn’t just because she was hungry.
That was the head-spinning, stomach-clenching twist of vertigo, like she was leaning over the edge of a cliff, one foot raised over the open air—her stomach busy filing one last grievance just before she would step off, and fall. It didn’t matter how long she clung to the railing at her back, she was going to fall. She was already falling. Hard. And how could she not? Ever since their eyes met on Monday morning, she’d felt a pull toward the pale girl. It was incontestable, something undeniable—like gravity—this tether tied fast around her heart, pulling her out and away from safety. Time spent with Amity was building up a frightening want for more. She wanted more than just—
Gus chuckled in his sleep, then mumbled a surprised—but not entirely unwelcome—Captain Avery, oh my just before he very nearly choked to death on a sudden, snorting inhale; all of which served to interrupt the brown-haired girl’s embarrassing spiral of self-examination. Amity slapped a hand over her mouth to muffle her startled wheeze. Their eyes met over the cramped center aisle, and Luz felt her entire chest ache at the sight of Amity doubled-over with silent laughter, of Amity happy and free.
For an instant—for half a heartbeat—she painted a picture in her mind of her shoebox-sized apartment* in the Castro: Amity curled up on the green, threadbare couch, wrapped in a hand-me-down tartan blanket, side-lit by the street lights humming outside the dusk-darkened third-floor windows, warm and rosy-cheeked, smiling; Chinese takeout on the coffee table and a ‘top forty funny cat vines’ compilation video paused on the TV; the rich, earthy scent of fresh-ground coffee drifting up from the Robin’s Roast on the ground floor.
She wished so hard for that vision of the future to come true, she didn’t catch what the other girl had just said.
“Uh, sorry,” Luz batted her eyelashes and pulled a lopsided grin, tilting her chin up just so—she’d watched Eda pull the same smoulder on Law Enforcement Officers over the years, surely it could work for her, too. “What was— huh?” That's right. Smooth.
“I– I said,” Amity let a breathy giggle escape before she ran a hand through the hair at her temple, carding green strands over an ear. Spots of pink dotted her cheeks as she cleared her throat to try again. “I, um, what about when we stop for dinner?”
“Hmm?”
“Gus.”
“Oh!” Luz laughed, “Right, yeah. We’ll just hang up.” She shrugged her shoulders and added, “Not much we can do at that point, unless we want him to tag along the whole time.” Her phone womp-wommped with an incoming message, and she glanced at the notification just before Amity pulled her hand away with a scowl and an ah, ah, ah! of admonition. She’d caught a glimpse of the camera and guitar emoji, and her eyes drifted to the dull headlights visible in her driver’s side mirror. “What’d she say?” Luz pouted, grinning.
“Thalia asked… if…” Amity tapped at the screen and squinted into the harsh glare of the messages app, “we were stopping at this one or the next.”
Luz glanced at the pale girl and smiled at the knowing look in those golden eyes. “This one,” they both said at the same time. Luz chuckled as Amity typed out a response, setting her hands in her lap once the message was sent hurtling back through the dawning sky.
~
Once Luz had set the parking brake and thumbed the engine killswitch, they hopped out of the double-brown big rig. A thin mist had settled above the grass ringing the Knute Rockne Travel Stop parking lot in the early morning air. It drifted eastward, driven by the passing vehicles on the Interstate, lazily curling around their ankles as it pooled in waves above the concrete. Luz tucked her keys in her pants pocket as she slung her green toiletries bag over her shoulder. She paused to readjust the backpack strap from where it fell atop the as-yet-ungiven gift sitting secretive in her inside pocket. She held her hand over the braided-wire moon necklace, pressing the weight of the medallion into her chest while she studied Amity's profile in the harsh white glare of the parking lot lights.
The air was thick with a dampness perhaps unfamiliar to the taller girl; Amity glanced around as if she'd never seen the morning dew before, anxiously wringing the purple fabric of her sling-bag in both hands. Perhaps she hadn't had a chance before now, Luz wondered, considering what little she knew of the girl's childhood.
Amity breathed out a nervous laugh as she ran a pale hand across her face, then frowned in distaste as she rubbed her fingertips together. “Do you think it– it’s going to rain?” the golden-eyed girl asked after glancing down at Luz, squinting up at the sky in concern.
“Nahhh, I wouldn’t think so,” Luz replied with a light-hearted cheer. She reached out and grabbed the taller girl’s hand—noting the nervous tremor she could feel in those slender fingers—then tipped her head toward the building as she added, “But let’s head inside before we get too damp.” She grinned up at the other girl as she tugged her forward. A matching smile and a blush spread across Amity’s face, and Luz felt that tether wrap another snug coil around her heart.
She ran her thumb back and forth across the crests and valleys of pale knuckles, and smiled when she felt their trembling subside. If she could only do one thing today, she’d do her best to keep Amity from being afraid. Well, the one other thing, she had to admit. We gotta get to Pennsylvania for some shut-eye, too.
They jogged across the small loop of parking lot marked for passenger vehicles through the thin, drifting haze. The air was cool, but it threatened to grow uncomfortably humid with the rising sun. Alma and Thalia stood at the nose of their rusty Aerostar and stretched, the taller girl covering her mouth with one hand as she stifled a yawn. Luz raised an arm to wave toward the younger two as the women threaded their way through the sedans and minivans, both pair angling for the white double-doors leading into the asymmetric building’s food court.
Plate-glass window panes wrapped around the left-hand side of the building, spaced with thin horizontal bars of red and white metal. A handful of round concrete pillars lifted the tall, sloping roof easily fifty feet into the air. It tapered to a point—Like an arrowhead, Luz thought—from this point of view, giving the building a slightly skewed appearance. She reached the door first, and Luz quickly pulled it open for Amity, leaning forward to growl a low-pitched, “After you, cariño,” as the taller woman walked through.
Amity blushed again and hissed, “Don’t start!” before she quickly stepped to one side to let Alma and Thalia inside.
A handful of travelers clustered before two of the nearby fast-food chain counters on their right, and a crowd roughly twice as large stood in a disheveled line at the Starbucks a few steps further away on their left. Luz inhaled for a long moment, then breathed out an Ahhh of satisfaction. There was nothing quite like the medley of cheap coffee, flame-broiled beef, and baked dough slathered with butter. Amity wrinkled her nose at the unexpected mixture of smells in the air. A peppy string-quartet cover of a nineties song drifted above the murmur of the crowd.
Luz twisted on her toes to face the other three before she clapped her hands, “Awwright ladies, not to be a party pooper, but pretty-please, promise not to pace yourselfs, and perhaps practice personal promptitude on your potty-break, this party’s pinching—”
Amity flicked her fingers toward the shorter woman's leg as she whispered “Luz.” The Luz in question grinned.
“—Yeah, alright, I'll drop the pee’s, but let's try to make it quick. Me and Amity got a hot date with a hot shower in Pee-Ay tonight, and—”
“Luz!” The green-haired woman hissed, her pale cheeks darkening as she flicked golden eyes from her companion to the two college-aged girls and back again. The tanned girl’s smile widened.
“—and we’re still three-hundred and seventy miles away. Yyyyes, cariño?” Luz hardly paused between finishing her thought and fluttering long-lashed brown eyes up at Amity, stretching her question in an innocent drawl, “Is something the matter?”
“You—” the golden-eyed woman paused. Does a Blight always need to be proper? And who says what proper is, anyway? Amity tilted her head and sighed, letting her eyes close for a moment. “No.”
Alma and Thalia exchanged a glance just before Luz turned back to face them. “So, should we order first?” the brown-haired woman asked, then pointed a thumb over her shoulder at the quieter half of the rest stop, “Or hit the head?” A small handful of tired-looking people shuffled in and out of the white-tiled hallways leading into the bathrooms, the soles of their shoes giving sharp, echoing calls for attention.
Alma gave a dismissive shrug, but Thalia tipped her head toward the bathroom as she said, “I wanna wash my hands before we get food.” The tawny-haired girl made a face and rubbed her thumb across her fingertips before adding, “We were eating oranges in the van.”
“Ah, yes,” Luz nodded in sage understanding, “The ol’ sticky fingers routine.”
The shorter, dark-haired girl stifled a yawn behind the back of her hand, and blinked a few times. “Mine are fine?” Alma murmured an absentminded question as she rubbed a thumb and forefinger under her glasses.
Thalia gave a breathy laugh and leaned into the shorter girl’s shoulder. “Te estaba dando de comer en la boca,” she half-whispered into the hair above Alma’s ear with a crooked smirk.
Luz let her jaw drop open with a bright-eyed gasp of delight. Amity gave her a sharp, quizzical look before turning curious golden eyes toward the dark-haired girl a moment later, and both women watched as Alma’s face turned a truly scandalous shade of red. “I— W-we—” Alma stammered to a halt, then growled an ugh! as she pushed her way past Luz, her shoulders hunched up around her ears.
~
Amity sighed as she walked out of the bathroom hallway, idly rubbing her still-damp hands together. Yet another rest area with strangely-scented hand soap, yet another rest area with ineffectual paper towels. She held the back of her knuckles under her nose and took a tentative sniff. The golden-eyed woman pinched her lips into a frown and sighed. The lingering smell didn't leave her feeling as off-kilter as it had the very first time, which she could either chalk up to personal growth or, more likely, a sort of numb resignation brought about by her unregulated immersion therapy. She still had her opinions, of course. Parts cleaner smells better than that, and how hard can it be to mass-produce an absorbent— She blinked, and that train of thought steamed off into the distance without her on board.
Luz was on her tiptoes under a line of multi-colored lights, left arm outstretched to clutch at the top edge of the cabinet—for balance—with her upper body pressed flush against the front panel of the plushie-filled claw machine. Her cowboy hat was cocked to one side, hanging on for dear life, the white leather painted different hues under the riot of colorful bulbs shining overhead. Amity tipped her head to watch in curiosity before she took a few silent steps forward. She bit her bottom lip to hide a smile when the tanned woman’s face squeaked across the glass. Luz pressed her forehead against the pane and craned her neck, the better to see the contents of the claw machine. The smaller woman must have caught sight of Amity’s reflection, because her eyes flicked sideways to catch the pale woman’s puzzled grin. “Oh, hey Amity,” Luz’s breath fogged the glass when she chuckled, and she dragged her face to one side to see better. Sque~eak. “What’s up?”
Amity giggled. “What are you doing?” she asked with naked amusement.
“I'm—” Luz wobbled as she lifted her free hand to the glass, pointing, “I'm gonna get that,” she declared. Amity followed the angle of her pointing finger to a little brown owl half buried in the slope of stuffed animals on the right-hand side of the claw machine. The owl had bright yellow eyes and a tan beak, its heart-shaped face just visible over the back of an electric blue chameleon sprawled across a very fat yellow bumblebee.
“The owl?” Amity stepped up beside her companion, the better to peer down at the adorable little brown bird. If she hadn’t known better, she might have thought its eyes held a knowing look. Her second question came soon after, once she'd had a moment to process this new information. “For Eda?”
Luz did her best to shrug, but merely wobbled against the glass. She banged her knee on the cabinet and hissed an Owie.
Amity gave a smile. “I'm…” she trailed off as she cocked an eyebrow, rubbing her chin with thumb and forefinger, “a little surprised I didn't find you with your arm stuck in the machine.”
The tanned woman snorted, “Nah, that’s Eda’s move. I—” she paused to close her eyes and press her fingertips against her chest, the colored light playing across her face, “—have a method.”
“Really?”
“Yyyyup!” Luz popped the ‘p’ sound.
Amity folded her hands at her waist and furrowed her eyebrows. “Do… you need help?”
“Nope,” Luz’s eyes danced up and down as she eyed the claw mechanism and the little brown owl in the pile of colorful plushies below. “I’m just lining up— actually, can you put change in the machine?” She chuckled again as she shifted her weight, tapping at the claw machine control panel with the fingernails of her free hand, rotating slightly on the toes of one foot, “I can’t reach the—”
“I don’t have any change,” Amity frowned as she leaned down to eye the coin slots. “Oh, it accepts a dollar? Hold on.” She fumbled her envelope of money from her pocket, and fed the hungry machine. It rattled to life with a hum and a subtle background whine.
“Thanks,” Luz raised her chin in concentration, then glanced sideways at Amity, “I’ll pay you back.”
The golden-eyed woman snorted. “Don’t worry about it.”
Luz hummed a smug note and crooned, “But I willll.”
~
Thalia appeared at Amity’s shoulder just after Luz sighed, “Okay, fourth time’s the charm.” The woman in the cowboy hat glanced over at the tawny-haired girl after feeding a dollar into the machine and gave a quick upward nod. “¿Todo bien?” She asked in a kind voice.
Thalia gave a matching upward nod and called back with a quick, “Joya!” She fired a pair of finger guns at Luz, and the tanned woman's eyes crinkled with a smile. The gray-eyed girl looked up at Amity and offered a soft, “How are you?”
“I am well,” Amity answered in an even, half-distracted tone, thumbs tap-tap-tapping away at the smartphone cradled in her palms. “I am notifying our friend that we have suggested certain changes to his script.”
“His– his script? Oh cool, is he a writer?”
The pale woman hummed a note as she shook her head, mumbling, “Pizza Emperor.”
Thalia stopped to blink, opening her mouth twice before, “He’s… what?” came out the third time. She waited, but Amity didn’t clarify.
Luz muttered a gruff dammit, standing upright to scratch at her hair before pulling another dollar from her pocket. “Almost had ‘im.”
“Him?” Thalia asked, turning to the smaller woman, her question tinged with confusion.
“This li’l guy here,” she tapped a fingertip on the claw machine as she maneuvered the crane with one hand, “I almost had ‘im last time, aaannnd… yes!” Luz giggled and punched at the air in celebration while the arcade machine clanked and clattered, the reward for her efforts tumbling into the chute beside the controls. She ducked down to pull the little brown owl free of its prison, before swiveling on her toes to face Amity and Thalia, holding the plush toward them with an exuberant, “Ta~dah!”
“Ohh, Él es tan lindo! <he’s so cute>,” Thalia grinned, petting the owl’s cheek. “Soft, too.”
“Here’s— hh— your phone,” Amity said as she tried to lean around the plush that was being pressed into her jaw. “He’s— very cute, Luz, but he might want some personal space; he was just— cooped up in that box, after all.”
“You’re right!” Luz gasped and turned the owl around in her hands to stare into his bright yellow eyes, “I’m so inconsiderate! Sorry, little friend.”
The taller woman reached out a tentative hand to pat the stuffed animal on the head, her voice confident when she offered, “I’m sure Eda will love him.”
Luz turned him around to face her and beamed over his head. “Wellll,” she drawled—flicking her eyes toward Thalia and the bathroom hallway—then leaned close to Amity, like she was sharing a secret, “She’s not the only one who likes owls.” She slid her backpack around to rest upside-down on her chest, and worked the stuffed owl inside. Once it was zipped up safe and sound, she patted the clasp twice and slung it back over her shoulder.
Amity raised an eyebrow and hummed a sound like Intriguing, while Thalia peered into the depths of the claw machine.
Luz sighed and clapped her palms together, rocking back and forth on her toes. After a minute, she raised her hand to glance at her bare wrist, then reached into her pocket for another dollar bill as she muttered, “Alma’s not out yet, I might have time to win that chameleon for Gus.”
~
“Here.”
“Hmm?”
Thalia turned her head to find Luz standing at her elbow, arms crossed over her chest. She was trying way too hard to be nonchalant, which was a bad look for Luz; it made her seem downright suspicious. Her closest hand—the one pointed away from Alma, the one tucked into the shadow of her forearm—twitched upward to catch the tawny-haired girl's attention. Luz's fingers were curled around something hidden in her hand, and idle curiosity more than anything moved Thalia to cup her palm underneath. She watched with widening eyes as the smaller woman pressed a folded-up twenty into her hand.
Thalia clicked her tongue and hissed, “Luz!”
“Oops, I dropped that,” Luz stage-whispered in response, and then she pushed her hands into her pockets, her face splitting in a wide, devilish grin as she added, “oh well, y’ can't give it back now!”
Thalia sighed, glancing at Alma and Amity standing ahead of them in line—ten minutes deep in a conversation about memory cards—then turned to face Luz. “You don't have to—”
The tanned woman pressed her lips into a firm line and shook her head. “I want to. My treat.”
Thalia examined her face for a long moment before she nodded, her voice pitched low with a heartfelt, “Thank you.”
Luz shrugged, muttering a soft, “That's what friends do.” She had a faraway look in her eyes after she spoke, and when she sighed, Thalia wondered if that was the end of the conversation. But then she blinked and met Thalia's gaze with a kind smile, adding, “We stick together.”
The woman behind the register wearing a too-large Burger King sweater heaved an utterly exhausted sigh, then called out, “Next…”
Amity stepped forward and turned on her heel to cast a fierce glare across the other three in her party. She pointed a thumb at her chest and half-snarled, “I'm paying.” The green-haired woman set her jaw, daring them to object. Alma opened her mouth to protest, but it snapped shut when Amity raised an imperious eyebrow.
Luz coughed into one fist and made a strangled “Bwuh— But I—?!” until Amity shot back with, “No buts!” Thalia laughed as she pocketed the cash.
~
Despite the early hour and the sparse crowd of travelers loitering in the immediate area, what felt like thirty minutes had passed and they still hadn’t heard their number called from the Burger King pick-up counter. The two people on duty didn’t seem to be at all worried about the “Orders in Progress” screens hanging up behind the registers, which had been blinking and bleeping at regular intervals.
“What number were we again?” Luz wondered aloud, then thought to glance at the receipt in her hand. Amity answered before Luz could read it for herself.
“Two.”
The four columns of numbers on-screen started somewhere in the mid-sixties, climbing up through the early nineties before running out of room entirely.
“Damn,” Luz sounded almost wistful. “Maybe Sbarro’s would’a been faster.”
“You can’t have cheese, Luz.”
~
Alma plopped into an empty seat at the table furthest away from the bubble of noise that enveloped the fast food counters. She sighed and straightened her tray on the shiny white plastic table, then swiveled on her matching shiny white plastic chair as Thalia slipped into the seat beside her. Luz settled into her own chair with a loud groan, and Amity might as well have been a ghost for how she silently appeared at the tanned woman’s side.
“Thanks Obama, now we gotta scarf this down,” Luz huffed underbreath, a road-weary ache in her voice. “Dine ‘n’ dash more like…” She crossed her forearms on the table and leaned on her elbows, stretching out her neck and shoulders. She sighed when her neck popped and mused aloud, “Is it still kosher to call it a dine ‘n’ dash if you don’t actually dine ‘n’ dash?” The brown-eyed woman paused long enough to catch a pair of shrugs from Alma and Thalia, then continued. “You should put a proper dine ‘n’ dash on your bucket list, Amity, it’ll change your life.” She turned toward her companion—just as the taller woman took a timid bite of her sandwich—and asked, “Wait, did you start a bucket list yet?”
Amity chewed twice, slowly, before she went completely still, like a deer caught in the unexpected glare of headlights.
Luz watched her for a few heartbeats—to make sure she was still able to blink—then waved a dismissive hand, “Y’know what? Nevermind. That’s—”
“Irresponsible?” Alma offered with one raised eyebrow, before raising a french fry to her mouth.
“—Outside of your comfort zone, thank you,” Luz gave a sassy waggle of her head to match the snark in her voice, a half-grin widening on her face. “Lissen, ignore me, a’ight? Let’s just eat, so’s we can get this road on the show.”
Alma rolled her eyes and muttered something that might have been Yes, mom, but Thalia shot her a mischievous glance before pressing her palms together, like a prayer, a sly grin curling her lips. The tawny-haired girl cleared her throat and spoke in a clear, even tone, “Itadakimasu.”
Alma coughed into her palm, then hissed, “Michi!” as she blushed a bright red all the way up to her glasses. “Really, here?!” she wheezed.
Luz barked a laugh and clapped her own hands together, calling out a cheerful, “Itadakimaaaas!”
Alma dropped her forehead into her palms and groaned, muttering something quietly to herself before leaning on one elbow, the fingers of one hand cupped over her eyebrows to block out Luz while she fixed her green gaze on the pale woman at her side. Amity glanced between the musician and the trucker, then met Alma’s eyes with an uncertain look. “Amity, I am so sorry about these nerds,” Alma hissed between clenched teeth, shooting a glare at Thalia, who was happily eating a finger of chicken. “I should’a known Luz was a weeb,” the dark-haired girl groused.
The pale woman breathed out “Daijōbu,” in amusement then schooled her face into something like resigned acceptance before she shrugged and said, “Nemiminimizu.”
Alma choked on some air at the same time that Luz gasped aloud, “I thought you spoke French!”
Amity turned to look at Luz, and settled her jaw in her palm as she smiled. “Oui, je parle français,” she pitched her voice into a low croon, batting her eyelashes. Luz gulped.
“And you know Japanese?” Thalia asked, leaning forward with bright gray eyes and a grin, “That’s so cool! How long did it take you? Have you been to Japan?”
Amity’s cheeks darkened under the unexpected attention and she looked down at her meal and nodded, offering a hesitant, “Nihon ni mo bendā ga imasu,” as explanation.
“...What did she say?” Alma asked Luz.
The brown-haired woman flapped her mouth like a fish, lost for words. “H-how should I know?” she finally replied, “I only know English!”
~
The instrumental song drifting from the speakers above the dining area trailed off and a new track started a moment later. Luz’s eyes widened and she bolted to her feet; Amity’s head swiveled to track the motion.
“Uhh,” Alma said, and Thalia finished with a “What’s up?”
“We gotta go,” Luz spoke in a rushed, worried tone while dragging her wrappers and used napkins off the table onto her tray, “I can’t get Creed stuck in my head again.”
~
“Is that rust?!”
Amity hummed. “No, that's dirt.”
“Oh. Yeah, you're right.”
Luz half-crouched behind the trailer while she played her flashlight across the tall double-doors, the green-haired woman at her side. Padlocks’re good, latches are good. She hadn't expected any signs of trouble in an Indiana rest area, but Eda had taught her to always check, no exceptions. Her phone whistled the X-Files theme, and she glanced at the notification:
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: here’s the trailer I sent Card yesterday
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: https://www.yout-ube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ**
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: Imma send you a new cut in a bit, watch it after you get some damn sleep
[mY MiDdLe nAmE IsN'T PiZzA]: plz
“Yes mom,” She sing-songed as she sent the same in reply.
Amity chuckled and asked, “What'd he say?”
Luz flashed her a grin and handed her the device.
A wilting hhhhmeppt~ caught her attention, and she glanced across the aisle to see Alma’s minivan sitting in the parking spot opposite the trailer doors. Luz looked both ways before ambling over like a bow-legged cartoon cowboy, pausing at the dark-haired girl’s open window to flick the brim of her hat with a smirk and drawl a friendly, “Howdee, ma’am.” Thalia giggled, but Alma just rolled her eyes.
“We filled up,” the green-eyed girl said, pressing her glasses up on the bridge of her nose with a smirk, “You're gonna lose that bet.”
Luz chuckled and scratched at the back of her hair, “Yeah, well… we’ll go until I have to stop.”
“Is that normal?” The tawny-haired girl in the passenger’s seat leaned over to ask, “I mean, for truckers? Aren’t there rules or something?”
The tanned woman leaned an elbow on Alma’s door and made a face. “Nnn… not always?” That was decidedly untrue— there were so many rules.
Alma looked absolutely smug, like she knew Luz was lying. She tipped her chin up toward the tall, pale woman standing by the edge of the semi trailer, ethereal in her headlights. “So… Amity, huh?”
Luz gave a disarming grin and shrugged, a wistful note in her voice when she said, “I know what I’m about.” Thalia whispered something like Awww and nudged Alma with her elbow, and the shorter girl shot her a glare.
“Drive safe,” Thalia called across Alma's lap, and Luz clicked her tongue and snapped a pair of finger-guns as she walked away.
~
“Behold,” Luz waved one hand in the air as she half-bowed toward the passenger’s seat before making a grand, sweeping gesture toward the smartphone in Amity’s hand, rolling her ‘R’s like a medieval herald, “the fr-r-r-uits of his labor, the illustrious Emperor Augustus Pizza Porter!” Her crooked half-smile drew a matching grin from the taller girl. Amity tapped the link from Gus, her head at a curious tilt.
The video started with a black screen. A faint logo appeared in the lower left hand corner: a stylised starship in an arc of stars, the words “Galactic Voyage” angled along its path. Large white letters in a block font spanned the screen as a woman’s soft-spoken voice-over repeated the phrase. Unnerving industrial music lent an undercurrent of tension.
How far would you go
Klaxons shrieked over different voices calling out, “Shields up!” and “Brace for impact!” The bridge of a starship appeared in a flash of sparks and steam, the screen shaking as crewmembers tumbled from their stations. The camera cut to an external view to the TFR Trailblazer spinning through space in a gout of flame and debris. The screen went black and the woman’s voice-over continued atop the ticking-clock music.
For the sake of your mission?
A stocky woman in a black-and-gold uniform clenched her fists before she spun to face someone off-screen, her green eyes flashing with anger behind her clear wrap-around visor. “I want them off my ship,” Captain Pak snarled. The camera cut to a viewpoint over her shoulder, and a red-haired woman in a burgundy-and-black uniform snapped back a firm, “Aye, Captain.”
Amity made a soft hmm when she recognized Pak’s voice as the woman reading the titles. She paused the trailer, and pointed at the phone, “That's your character?”
“Yup,” Luz nodded, “Jakarta Kirana.”
The pale girl smiled and pressed play.
Several short clips followed, jump-cuts timed to the music that slowly built in intensity: Major Kirana and her security crew gathering weapons, the security officers emerging from an elevator onto a damaged city street, Kirana guarding a blond-haired android as he closed a dead crewman’s eyes. One last scene of Kirana and Commander Index, both dirty and disheveled, mid-conversation. “One day you’ll learn to trust me,” the woman grumbled, to which the even-keeled android replied, “You humans and your jokes.”
How far would you go
The screen went black for a breath, then Pak continued. There was a tremor in her voice, like anguish.
For the sake of your crew?
“You’re not alone anymore,” the Captain’s voice played over a clip of Commander Index looking down at a handheld device, a frown etched on his face. Major Kirana stood in billowing smoke as fires burned in the background. “Hold your fire!” she bellowed, while keeping her chunky beam-rifle up at her shoulder, at the ready. The ship’s bridge shivered under an impact. “Evasive maneuvers, aye!” the helmsman called as he frantically worked his controls. Amity smiled when she heard Gus’s voice. Captain Pak wheeled around to face a crewman at a station near the back of the bridge, pointing at the viewscreen while fear pooled in the corners of her eyes, “Mr. Tariq, get them on-screen!”
What sacrifice would you make
“Okay,” the Captain turned her dark-green space suit helmet forward to lock its collar with a clack, “I’m ready.” It might have been a lie; she looked frightened. Jump-cut to Major Kirana, the camera tight on her eyes, her beam-rifle filling the bottom half of the frame. “Light ‘em up!” She yelled before the bright flare of an explosion wiped her image from the screen, then a quick fade-to-black as screams rang out.
To save them all?
Captain Pak looked down at the camera, her shoulders and head framed by an opening, as if she were looking into a container. A swirling nebula filled the background, shot through with a multitude of stars. A vivid green light glinted off the faceplate of her space suit, shining up into her face, making her eyes glow. “It’s the only way, right?” She looked gaunt, sickly. She licked cracked lips and said, “I accept.” A rushing, chittering sound swelled as the green lights raced up toward her helmet, a crash-zoom to her eyes before a cut to black.
How far will I go?
A thudding musical cue trailed off in a droning, dissonant chord from a group of cellos or a string bass, and one last view of the Trailblazer motionless in space, burning. Dead. Captain Pak gasped in surprise—or pain—as the screen went black again.
To the End.
Amity had to admit that Gus could put together a compelling trailer, but that last section bothered her for some reason. She dragged the progress bar back to the scene with the green lights and hit play. Something about the way Captain Pak’s voice actress spoke those two phrases reminded her of… of someone. Especially that gasp right at the end. But who? Someone from the Tower? Who else would feel so familiar?
“So?” Luz asked, breaking her train of thought. “Whad’ja think?”
“It was…” Amity paused, still distracted by that memory on the tip of her tongue.
“Uh oh. That bad, huh?” Luz made a face, like, damn.
“No! No,” the pale girl shook her head in protest, “No, it was very good. Gus has a talent, for sure. I just…” She trailed off as she furrowed her brow, tapping her fingernail on the smartphone. “It reminded me of something, but… I can’t place it. Strange.”
Luz wrinkled her forehead as she made a huh in response.
“Why would Gus think he had to fix this?”
“Ah, that one’s easy,” the tanned girl waved a dismissive hand, “He’s a worrywart.”
Amity glanced her way and smiled, “And his character isn’t?”
“Correct!” Luz shimmied in her seat as she admitted, “It’s fun to play someone different than you.”
“Like Kirana?” Amity raised an eyebrow.
“Like Kirana,” Luz confirmed. “She is a practical, down to earth, no-nonsense kinda gal.” She counted on her fingers for each characteristic.
The green-haired girl half-turned to study her for a moment, then laughed, “Don’t take this the wrong way, but that’s so unlike you.”
Luz faked a wounded noise and pressed her palm to her chest, “First of all, ouch, what the heck, and secondly—” she tightened her eyes and made a face at Amity, “—Why d’ya think I’ve been watching you so closely these last few days?” She leaned toward the taller girl with a hmmm? “You're prime method-acting material.”
Amity laughed in a self-conscious way and shrugged, “I don't know about that.”
~
While Amity was hesitant to call the rolling Indiana countryside featureless, she was hard-pressed to distinguish one particular piece of scenery from the next. Mile after flat mile passed by under the creeping dawn. Before long, the sun would be staring them dead in the face. She wasn't looking forward to that again.
Interstate 90 skirted the northern edge of yet another small town—a handful of streets in a slap-dash grid layout, a cluster of buildings here, a patch of one-story homes there. A town where people lived and died, and within a few minutes’ time it had all completely disappeared in the distance.
They rode in that strange, near-silence of the weary, yet was easy and relaxed; unlike so much of Amity’s time spent with her family or other Blight Industries personnel. She’d long since come to dread the tense, endless minutes spent trapped in her mother’s limo, where staying silent and unnoticed was the key to self-preservation. This quiet with Luz was different— but everything with Luz was different. Three days ago, Amity might have thought an extended trip of any kind would be absolute torture, but now? A not-so-secret part of her yearned for another journey with the brown-haired girl at her side.
This was a new ache in her heart. She had lived for so long without feeling its’ like, surely it would be her ruin.
Luz yawned again, for the seventh time in the last hour, this one coming only eleven minutes after the last, three minutes earlier than before—a clear indication that she was in need of sleep. Amity narrowed her eyes and made a soft sound of inquiry. Luz blinked at her across the aisle and grinned, but Amity could see the signs of exhaustion in her slumped posture and the lingering sighs that gave breadth to their conversation.
She was feeling the late hour herself. After all the fear and excitement while helping the two college girls get back on the road, the sheer normalcy of riding with Luz— again, the normalcy? How quickly your concept of normal can change, Amity. It was warmth and comfort, in the red-wrapped cabin; even as Hooty jostled over potholes and swayed across uneven concrete, being with Luz felt more like home than the Tower ever had. Yes, her things were there, her laboratory, her few personal possessions, but it was only the familiar. It wasn’t home. It was merely the place where she lived.
She must have been quiet for too long or missed some other social cue; Luz was looking at her with a curious tilt of her head, her eyes crinkling with a fondness that still felt foreign. Unearned. “Penny for your thoughts?” she asked with a crooked grin.
The tanned girl’s easy question, her apparent concern, her actual desire to know… It made it so much easier to be honest—and that much more terrifying to be known. “So… many things,” Amity answered after another long moment, “but, I was thinking about— about home.”
“Oh?” Luz shifted in her seat, playing her fingers across the steering wheel. “Missin’ sunny San Fran?”
Amity shook her head with a soft sound of disagreement, “No, more like— the concept of home.” Luz made a familiar sound deep in her chest, like comprehension, and once more Amity was struck by how fortunate she had been to meet Luz. She didn’t doubt for a moment that she truly understood. “The mansion was so big, growing up, it… it felt more like a hotel bolted onto an art gallery? My parents have their collections, after all.” The golden-eyed girl breathed out an unhappy sound. “There was always someone around; maids cleaning or the groundskeepers, or— or Odalia’s secretary… even in the wing where our rooms were, it… it’s hard to—”
“Like it wasn’t yours?” Luz offered with a shrug, blissfully unaware of her ability to cut through the noise, to the heart of the issue. “That the place you happened to live wasn’t a place for living?”
“That’s it exactly,” Amity sighed. “Even my bedroom didn’t feel like it belonged to me; I couldn’t decorate it myself, or put up anything that I wanted— I didn’t have a place I could call my own until highschool, when the head librarian gave me a key to one of the private study rooms.” She fidgeted with her hands, abruptly concerned that her next thought would make her sound ungrateful. “But… but it was just a room, not… not—”
“Not a home,” Luz finished her sentence with a nod, reaching over to place a warm hand on Amity’s arm, giving her a gentle squeeze of acknowledgement, of affirmation. “I’m glad you had that at least.” She scratched behind her ear as she stifled a yawn, then asked, “But what about the Tower? Isn’t that where you—” Luz cut herself short and scoffed, “Wait, don’t tell me: you’re just sleeping at the office. You are, aren’t you?”
Amity gave an embarrassed laugh and tugged at her shirt collar, “I mean— it’s not just an office—”
“Oh,” Luz frowned, “my god. Girl?”
Amity visibly wilted in the passenger’s seat before voicing a hesitant, “Yes?”
“Tell me you have a bed.”
“I have a bed.”
“Don’t—” Luz made a frustrated clicking noise with her tongue, “don’t just say it cuz I said to!” She wrinkled her brow so deeply her cowboy hat slid down her forehead. “You actually have a bed?”
“Yes, Luz,” Amity huffed, “I have a bed.”
“And not just a twin mattress sitting on the floor in a corner?” The tanned girl’s voice was strangely heated, as if she were angry, “Or a futon, ‘cuz that’s cheating—”
“It’s not a futon or a twin,” the green-haired girl interrupted, “I have a full-size mattress.” Luz glanced at her and raised an eyebrow. Amity looked away and muttered, “And it’s not in the corner.”
“Izzit on a frame?”
“I— have box springs?” The other girl sighed, and Amity gave her a curious glance. “You sound… upset,” the green-haired girl lent a voice to her uncertainty, “Why are you upset?”
“Because—” Luz bit back the sharp tone in her response, her words softening after a slow, deep breath. “I just had a– a– this mental picture of you sleeping on a cot under a desk, and it—” She shook her head and frowned, setting harsh furrows through the lines in her face; Amity didn’t like that she caused that expression. “The thought of you living like that, it— it made me so mad. You deserve a good place to sleep, you deserve to be safe, and—”
“Emmy ordered most of my furniture,” Amity interrupted Luz in a rush to reassure the smaller girl. She felt a tightness in her throat at the thought of all the times she’d let her sister’s kindnesses go unrecognized. She wished she could give Emira a hug right then, but she wouldn’t get to see her until she and Luz returned to California. She would be better about showing her appreciation! “A– And I can lock all the doors on Ten, so I– I feel safe at night,” the pale girl’s traitorous voice wobbled on the word ‘safe’ when her mind helpfully volunteered memories from her years of long, lonely nights, of evenings where she cried herself to sleep.
Luz noticed, of course, and let loose a sound of disgust as she rolled her eyes, “That’s not what I mean.” The tanned girl tapped the edge of a stiff, bladed hand on her steering wheel in a quick chop-chop motion as she continued, “You work at work, you live at work— do you do anything outside the Tower?” She watched Amity shake her head in silence, then she soldiered on, “Your job is— where you live right now is tied to your job, right?”
Another mute nod.
“You’re worried about losing your lab, which means you’re also worried about losing your home.” Amity opened her mouth to protest, but Luz interrupted, “—not a home, okay, your house then. Right? The place where you live. That’s what I mean.” Luz caught her eye, “You deserve that security, to have a place that’s safe from your mother— Especially when Odalia can sabotage you whenever she feels like it!”
Amity felt her eyes burn as the indignity of it all gathered at the corners of her eyes in glittering droplets. She had been avoiding that unwelcome line of thought for months. It was so much easier to pretend her presentation would be a success than to confront the realization that she could soon be forcibly removed from the one small place she had carved out of her mother’s vast empire, excised like some recalcitrant cyst. Where would she go? Moving back into her mother’s mansion was unthinkable; she would rather be homeless than— she— she would be— A terrified gasp slipped between her teeth before she could catch it.
As always, Luz heard her. Luz saw her despair and reached out a hand to clasp Amity’s trembling fingers with her own, letting the taller girl cling to their fragile human connection in desperation. “I might lose everything,” the pale girl whispered, watching as a rough, calloused thumb ran across her own slender knuckles; the thought of looking into those gentle brown eyes while she admitted this fear was simply too much to bear. “I— I can’t go back to the mansion.”
“I believe in you, cariño,” Luz squeezed her fingers with each careful word, drawing a misty-eyed smile from the green-haired girl. “I really, truly do, but— but,” She paused in emphasis, looking away from the road long enough to catch that pair of anxious golden eyes. Luz smiled, “No friend of mine will ever have to worry about where to go if I can help it.”
Amity felt a flush crawl up her neck and ears at the thought of Living— with Luz?!, swiftly followed by a nauseating swirl of emotions: joy at being called a friend, guilt at the thought of being an imposition, insecurity at the realization that she might end up a failure; it was enough to make her feel desperately ill. She couldn’t think about that right now; it was too much. “Can we— talk about something else?” The pale girl’s voice cracked halfway through her request, strained by the unexpected weight of emotion.
Luz responded like a switch had been flipped. In an instant, she was holding Amity’s hand, pressing reassurances into her cool skin with a gentle touch. “Of course,” the brown-haired girl spoke in a low, soothing tone, “Of course we can.” Her face twisted for a moment, then another yawn forced its way through her tensed jaw. “Sorry,” Luz laughed partway through, her voice stretched wide around the interruption, “Sorry ‘bout that, man, I keep yawnin’.”
Both girls paused to watch as they passed a lonely green sign standing watch over this scrap of Interstate, tall wooden poles holding it up against the dawn’s red glow: EXIT 144, I-69, ANGOLA / FT. WAYNE / LANSING, 2 MILES. A smaller green sign underneath warned travelers LAST EXIT BEFORE OHIO TURNPIKE.
“Is there anything I can get you?” Amity offered, grateful for the break and the chance to shift the conversation away from herself. “Need a snack? A drink of water?”
“Do we have any more o’ those pretzel bites?” Luz scratched at her neck while she asked, then she chuckled at some thought she kept to herself.
“No, we don’t.” The pale girl motioned at a plastic grocery bag tucked behind the drivers’ seat, half full of garbage. “We finished those already.”
“Aww.”
“By we, I mean you.”
“Ah, well,” Luz shrugged, “I’m fine— you don’t have to get me anything,” she held up a hand to stop the taller girl from slipping out of her seat, patting Amity’s armrest, “I’m good.”
“Do you… do you want me to read more?” Amity held up the other girl’s phone with one hand. She hoped Luz wouldn’t mind, because she was curious to see what Gus had in store for the Trailblazer crew.
A wide grin split the tanned girl’s face as Luz nodded, “Yeah! Uh, I mean…” A dusting of red gathered high on her cheeks as she turned a shy, hesitant smile toward the golden-eyed girl. “I— I’d like that.” Luz unlocked the device and handed it back to the taller girl. “You might hafta re-open the script, GDocs can be stupid.”
Amity hummed a thoughtful sound as she turned the smartphone around in her hands. “It’s just the one document?”
“Yeah,” Luz chirped.
Amity snorted in amusement. “Fallen Heroes vee three comma final dash one comma actual final?” She shot the brown-haired girl a grin and they shared a laugh.
“Yeah,” Luz groaned. “Gus is physically incapable of deleting anything, ever, so we get to deal with this garbage.”
~
Amity hadn’t been reading all that long before a left-hand, eastward curve pulled them out of the steady south-easterly path they had traveled for the last dozen miles. A wide white sign on the right shoulder proclaimed WELCOME TO OHIO in tall red letters. Just as they crossed the invisible line separating Hoosier State land from Buckeyes territory, the morning sun peeked above the horizon. Luz grumbled deep in her throat and muttered, “Figures. Thanks, Ohio.” She leaned toward Amity’s shoulder while she pawed around in her seat-side pouch for her sunglasses, straightening briefly to drop a pair of dark aviators in Amity’s lap before flicking her own open with a snap. She paused to waggle her eyebrows and give the pale girl an upwards nod before she slid the sunglasses into place; she grinned when Amity scowled and looked away, her cheeks darkening.
The golden-eyed girl grumbled something unintelligible as she unfolded her borrowed sunglasses.
“What was that?” Luz hmmm’d playfully, cupping a hand behind her ear.
Amity huffed as she dragged her fingers back through her hair, letting green locks fall down around her face. “I said, Thanks, Ohio,” she answered as she shot a heated glare back at the brown-eyed girl over the top of her borrowed aviators.
Luz gulped and felt her face grow warm, then forced out a thready chuckle. “Well, I did warn you.”
“You did,” the other girl admitted with a smile. She cleared her throat and began to read once more.
~
Amity watched in concern as Luz swayed in her seat, slightly more than was strictly necessary despite the fact that the Interstate in Ohio seemed to be more patch-job than actual pavement. The small truck driver had lasted longer than Amity would have thought, even with having to squint against the early morning sun for the last hundred miles. Luz yawned, followed almost immediately by another yawn, then smacked her lips. She smiled lazily into the sunlight.
“I think we should stop for the night.” Amity’s statement might as well have been an insult by the way Luz reacted.
“What?!” The smaller girl’s head snapped around so fast she said ow. “No! I just gotta—” She broke her sentence in half when another yawn cut in line, “—keep going.”
“Luz, pull over.”
“But I hate it here!”
Amity tried so hard not to roll her eyes at the tanned girl’s petulant whine. “It’s just Ohio,” she used a gentle, encouraging tone, the same tone she’d used when one of the elementary children in her reading circle was grumpy.
Luz frowned, “Exactly!”
“It’s not… ideal,” Amity’s soft response eased the fight out of the other girl’s shoulders, “but I think we should stop.”
Luz inhaled before letting it all out in a long, drawn-out groan. “Fiiiine,” she groused. “You’re the boss, boss.”
~
Luz nodded at her navigator’s directions while she downshifted, the toes of her left foot pressed against the clutch bar until the vibrations felt right in her palms. “Next right turn, one hundred feet,” Amity relayed details from the GPS before leaning forward to peer out of the windshield, pointing, “Exit ninety-one. The hotel is down there on the left.”
“Off to port, aye,” Luz replied with a grin, “I see it.” A tall sign for a Day’s Inn was just visible over the line of scrubby trees and telephone poles that ran north-east, just beyond the junction after the offramp. The brown-haired girl guided the big rig down the ramp on her right and through a shallow left-hand turn, downshifting once more as the lane climbed up and over Interstate 90 in an eastbound jog. She slowed once more as she angled for the EZ-Pass toll booth lane. “God, I can’t wait to lay down,” Luz mumbled as the lane’s light turned green and the yellow-and-black-striped barrier bar swung upward. “Didja know?” She slurred her words before rubbing the edge of her finger across her eyes, “One of my fav’rit tropes is there was only one bed?”
“Somehow I’m not surprised,” Amity gave her a grin and decided not to mention that they had had this exact conversation the day before. “That is a classic.” She smiled again when Luz yawned a soft yyyeah in reply, then the pale girl bit back a laugh. “You know…” she began.
Luz hummed a curious sound as she worked the gearshift, coming to a stop at the intersection ahead. She flicked on the left-turn flashers, then glanced at Amity.
“My, uh…” Amity huffed and shook her head, then ran her fingers back through her hair, tucking the green strands behind an ear. “The twins were teasing me about that before we left.”
“What?” Luz blinked in something like disbelief. “When?”
Amity’s face grew warm at the memory of the irritating smirk they had shared. “Remember how they were standing on the dock, when I was—?”
Luz barked a laugh, “Oooh, right!” Her eyes crinkled in amusement, “Right, they were? Ha!” She snorted as she laughed, then coughed into her fist, “Sorry, sorry, but that’s funny.” She spun the steering wheel in a wide left turn, and accelerated.
Amity couldn’t help but laugh. “At the time I was so— so worried and embarrassed, but now? Yes. It is funny.”
Hooty trundled along the two-lane state road toward the Day’s Inn parking lot, his right-turn flashers flicking off and on like a three-beat heartbeat. A smaller two-part sign hung below the brightly-lit hotel name, the first panel dim while the second, longer panel blazed bright white letters into the morning air: VACANCIES.
“Hey,” Luz had a gleeful tone in her voice, drawing a raised eyebrow from the taller girl. “Wouldn’t it be funny if…” she trailed off as she pointed a thumb toward the hotel.
After a moment, the green-haired girl broke out in laughter. “It would be,” Amity had to admit, “But… I’m not so worried any more.” Luz glanced her way with a fond smile, and the pale girl couldn’t help but shrug even as a self-conscious warmth crawled up her cheeks.
~
Luz pushed backward through the door with her shoulder, holding it open for Amity to step through. She raised a sluggish hand to wave at the two college girls as Alma parked at the sidewalk beyond the carport, then she turned on her heel and followed the taller woman up to the check-in counter. A small handful of hotel workers bustled around and through the lobby, pushing carts laden with folded sheets and towels and tall baskets piled high with laundry to wash. A middle-aged man with dark hair and a salt-and-pepper beard stood behind the desk, a friendly smile on his ruddy face. “Good morning,” he looked to Amity first, then to Luz when the shorter woman groaned. “Welcome to the Day’s Inn.”
“Thank you, garçon!” Luz wobbled as she slapped a palm on the counter, just missing the silver bell beside the check-in sign. “Your finest bed, please!”
“I’m so sorry…” Amity glanced at the man’s name tag while she moved the bell out of her companion’s reach, “Clark, she’s— very tired.”
“‘m a sleepy li’l tornado shelter,” Luz mumbled.
Clark laughed, but his eyebrows pinched in concern, “I’m… I’m sorry?”
Amity laughed as well, but took a moment to put a hand around Luz’s upper arm in case she wobbled too far. “Are you okay?” she asked the smaller girl.
“Yeah,” Luz yawned, “why?”
“A room please,” Amity repeated to the man behind the desk.
“Two rooms, actually,” Luz held up two fingers before pointing a thumb over her shoulder toward the parking lot. “I lost a bet.”
“Oh?” Clark leaned to one side, the better to watch as Thalia slammed the sliding side-door closed on the rusty red Aerostar, Alma standing nearby with an armful of duffel bags and her camera case, the tawny-haired girl’s guitar slung over one shoulder. “Ah, two rooms, of course,” he repeated before click-clicking at his computer. “Housekeeping is working through the whole upstairs right now, but I have some openings on the ground floor?”
“That’s fine,” Amity nodded.
“Alright, I have… well, only one is a double.”
Luz gasped and looked up at Amity as she whispered, “There was only one double bed.” Amity shot her a glare after she snorted into her palm. The tanned woman pulled Eda’s credit card from her wallet as she said, “We’ll take a single and the double.”
“Alright,” Clark took her card and started the transaction, then nodded toward the doorway, “They get the other room?" Both women nodded, and a moment later he held up a pair of keycards, “Which do you want? Single or double?”
Luz and Amity half-turned to watch the two college-age girls walk through the vestibule. Alma and Thalia swapped smiles and glances, both laughing at some joke told earlier, shoulders touching and hands brushing as they walked side-by-side. Luz cocked an eyebrow up at the green-haired woman, and Amity nodded. They turned back to the clerk and said, at the same time, “Double.”
~
They turned the corner in the lobby and walked almost the whole length of the ground floor, footsteps muffled on the thick, brown-and-beige patterned carpet. They passed a drinking fountain and the ice machine, then another set of four doors.
“One-eighteen,” Luz tipped her head toward the door to her left. “This is us.” Amity juggled her bags to one hand as she pulled the keycard from its envelope, and Alma leaned around the tall woman’s shoulder to peer at the neighboring door. The shorter girl furrowed her brow with a hmm.
“We’re over here, Almita,” Thalia called as she rapped her knuckles on a door across the hallway kitty-corner to where Luz and Amity stood. “One-nineteen.”
The dark-haired girl made a soft sound of recognition, but hesitated to join her friend as both Amity and Thalia slid their keycard into the door locks. A pair of beeps echoed faintly in the fluorescent-green hallway, followed by a pair of sharp clacks that broke the stuffy air. As the taller two pushed their room doors open, Luz pushed herself away from the wall to follow Amity.
A hand caught her elbow. She turned to see Alma, the girl’s green eyes creased with some private worry behind her glasses; the dark-haired girl nodded down the hallway and spoke in an apprehensive voice, “Luz? Can I see you— there— for a second?”
“Huh?” Luz blinked twice, then answered, “Yeah, uh,” as she glanced over her shoulder to catch Amity’s inquisitive eye. “I’ll be right back, cariño,” the tanned woman waved a hand and let their door swing shut as she followed Alma back to the ice machine.
Once they reached the rattling appliance, Alma wheeled about with her hands clutching her head. “Luz!” she squeaked.
“Alma?” Luz wondered.
The dark-haired girl leaned forward to hiss a question, “What am I supposed to do?”
“Uhh,” the tanned woman blinked, “Get some sleep?”
“No!”
“Gloat about the bet?” Luz yawned, missing the other girl shake her head. “Is this how you gloat? You’re pretty bad at it, by the w—”
“—About Thalia!” Alma interrupted, clawing her hands in frustration.
Luz half-turned to send a glance back at the door to One Nineteen, “What’s wrong with—?”
“Nothing!”
The two shared a charged silence, Alma breathing heavily while Luz blinked and blinked. The older woman tilted her head, “What?”
The dark-haired girl motioned down the hall with a hand, “We have a hotel room!”
“...And?”
Alma shook her head, then jabbed with both hands in emphasis, “We’re sharing. A hotel room.” She have Luz a look, like Duh.
Luz scratched her head, “You’ve… been sleeping in a van for three weeks, how is this any different.”
“It just is!” the young photographer whispered through clenched teeth, throwing her hands up in surrender.
Luz tipped her head back to yawn, and had to place a hand on the wall when she thought she’d wobble herself right onto the floor. “Look, I’m—” she wiped a fist across the corner of her mouth, “—fading fast.”
The shorter girl looked desperate, now. Alma put her hands on her head and gripped at her hair, “What am I supposed to do?”
“You jus’ gotta talk to her, hermanita.”
Alma frowned and shook her head, “It’s not that simple.”
“Yes,” Luz leaned forward, certain. “It is.”
The girl looked down at her feet and worried her fingers together, “I— I can’t.”
“Why not?” the woman shrugged.
Alma stared up into her eyes for a moment before she sighed and her shoulders slumped. “My… my parents got a divorce when I was twelve. They were so in love, and then they just… they couldn't stand each other. What if that happens to me and Thalia? She's my best friend, what if… what if, one day, she just hates me?”
Luz scoffed at that, pinching the bridge of her nose between thumb and forefinger while she winced. “That’s… okay.” She closed her eyes and sighed, letting her chin settle on her chest as she gathered her thoughts. Luz swayed slightly as she reached out to put a hand on Alma’s shoulder, but her voice was firm when she spoke, “I can’t tell you what will happen if you do talk to her, but I can tell you what'll happen if you don't.” She gently squeezed Alma’s shoulder with every point she made, “You'll. Still. Feel this way. You'll be worried sick. You won't know where you stand.” She tipped her head to one side to peer into the girl’s eyes, “Is that how you wanna live your life?”
Alma shook her head.
“No.” Luz agreed, “And she won't know how precious she is to you? Is that the right thing? The kind thing?” They both shook their heads again. “Life is too short to not tell people you love them. C’mon,” she tugged at Alma’s shoulder as she turned, and the girl followed at her elbow as Luz staggered back down the hallway. They paused in the little alcove before their doors, and Luz turned to Alma one last time. “People don't fall out of love, okay? That's a lie,” the brown-eyed woman spoke with conviction. “People get selfish. People take each other for granted. Just—” She stopped to yawn, then shook her head.
“Just what?” Alma asked.
Luz gave her a kind smile. “Just treat her right. That’s all you can do.”
~
Luz stepped aside to let the door swing shut, then she leaned back against its comforting solidity as she sighed. She could still feel the rumble of the road in her hands and feet, she felt tired right down to her bones. She rubbed at her eyes and yawned, letting her backpack slip off of her shoulder and thump on the floor.
“The bathroom is free,” Amity’s preoccupied monotone drifted down the short hallway formed by the sliding-door coat closet on Luz’s right and the bathroom entrance to her left. The pale girl had perched herself at the foot of the closest bed, the majority of her attention directed toward the computer in her lap as her fingers clicketty-clacked across the keyboard. She didn’t even look away from the screen when she added, “You should get your shower first.”
Luz had to yawn before she could ask, “Are you— sure?”
Amity quirked the corner of her mouth in a tiny smile, “You’ll fall asleep if you wait for me to shower, besides—” The green-haired girl shook her head and blinked as she looked up from her laptop to turn a kind smile toward Luz, “I want you to be first.”
The consideration in her voice was just as gentle as the kindness in her eyes, and Luz was so tired that it made her want to cry. She swiped a rough knuckle under one eye and scoffed, “You goin’ soft on me, Blight?” Inner-Luz gave her a thumbs up. Yes, deflect! Excellent choice.
Amity raised one eyebrow, and then her jaw, sending a smug, knowing look back at the other girl; she could read Luz like a book. “In your dreams,” she shot back with a smirk made potent by the soft lamplight that painted the curve of her cheekbones with gold.
Luz felt her face flush with an untamed heat, oh god, this is worse! “Oh—” her voice cracked mid-word, and the other half fell out in a wheeze, “—kay, um,” she fumbled for the bag at her feet, “I’ll just— yeah.” She darted into the bathroom before the taller girl could respond.
~
Amity half-closed her laptop when the bathroom door opened a little while later. Luz stumbled out, wrapped in a diaphanous cloud of steam and an extra-large Care Bears t-shirt, freshly washed and running on fumes. She flipped the towel up from her shoulders and began to scrub at her hair with both hands, which let a short pair of plaid boxers peek out from underneath her pale pink tee. Amity blinked. “She’s all yours,” Luz sighed as she walked by, raking her fingers back through her curls. The pale girl had to make a concerted effort not to stare at the length of her tanned legs as she paced back and forth between the beds. Luz walked by once more and leaned down to fish for something in her backpack, and Amity bolted to her feet.
“I’ll— be out soon,” Amity’s voice was a little strained as she gathered the neat stack of toiletries and folded clothes at her side.
Luz yawned again, flapping the edge of her towel against her mouth in lieu of her hand, then she gave a jaunty salute and said, “Ten-four,” before she crumpled onto the window-side bed in a boneless heap.
As the bathroom door clicked shut behind her, Amity turned to face her faded reflection in the steam-fogged mirror. Her eyes were dull and bloodshot, and noticeable bags had begun to form under her eyes from the long miles behind glass and steel. Her hair hung limp around her face, and she reached up to rub a lock between her fingertips; it was oily from going days without a wash, as well as the hours she had it tucked under a ballcap. She could feel some dust and grit when she ran her fingers through to the ends. She studied her face, this… this worn down, hard-traveled version of herself. She could see her own exhaustion in the dark red around her eyes and the curve of her shoulders, but she looked better than she had that night before in the rain. Her eyes were softer, the gold less pronounced without her black eyeliner and mascara. She looked more… herself. She liked what she saw. Amity stared up at her hair, studying the long, mint green strands and their chestnut-brown roots growing nearly a fingers-width from her scalp.
It’s almost time to dye it again.
She couldn’t keep the curl of disgust from her lip. She hated it so much; covering up one of the few physical distinctions between her and her mother, pretending to be something more like her. She balled shaking fists, leaned her knuckles on the counter, and glared down at the sink like it had forced her to skip grades in school. She closed her eyes, breathing in and out, counting heartbeats until she felt her pulse begin to slow. When she blinked them open, she couldn't help but notice Luz had left her toothbrush case behind the faucet— a garishly-colored plastic clamshell with a sticker of a cartoon tooth brushing his Danny Zuko-style hairdo. Amity huffed a laugh and thought of the other girl, a myriad of images and emotions swirling through her mind’s eye; she was always so self-assured and certain.
What would Luz do?
She carded fingers through her hair as she ran her initial calculations. She could think of thirteen different strategies the other girl might suggest—all completely and utterly Luz—and not-a-one she’d be brave enough to try.
But isn’t that the point of this trip?
What had Luz called it, ‘stepping up to the challenge’? Could she continue to stand aside, and let the decisions of others direct her life? Would she let opportunities slip through her fingers again?
Could you live with yourself if you did?
She knew the answer, she could see it in her eyes. Amity nodded to herself, then turned to start the shower. She stared into her reflection, gold on gold, and watched until she faded away in the steamy air.
~
Amity scrubbed at her refreshingly-clean hair with a towel that hung down in her face while she hesitantly walked between the bed and the tv-stand against the wall, feeling with each foot before taking a step. She turned toward the narrow aisle between the beds as she pulled the cotton away from her eyes, “That hot water felt incred—” She cut herself short.
Luz was laying on her side on the window-side bed—above the blankets—right arm curled underneath her head for comfort, and eyes nearly closed despite the ratty paperback she held up in front of her face. She jerked in surprise when Amity spoke, spluttering a startled, “Whuzzat, huh?” while fumbling her book.
Amity caught it before Luz lost control of it completely, and paused to tuck the other girl’s gas station receipt into the page where her thumb had been. “Sorry to startle you,” the golden-eyed girl said as she placed the book on the nightstand, setting it face-up beside the lamp after glancing at the cover. Empire of the East.
“Nurrr, I’m ‘wake,” Luz mumbled, scratching a hand back through the damp brown curls above her forehead. She turned a sleepy smile up at her pale companion, “Wuz waitin’.”
“For what?” Amity wondered aloud as she tipped her head to dry the back of her hair.
Luz’s smile widened, “F’r you, silly.” She giggled like a love-drunk teenager, and then she sighed. She blinked slowly, chocolate-brown eyes fixed on the girl standing beside her bed. It was enough to make a girl weak in the knees. Luz held out a wobbly hand with a grin and said, “Boop,” as she poked Amity in the leg.
Amity sat down heavily on the other bed. After a few false starts, she finished drying her hair—or, to be completely accurate, she spent additional time on a frivolous task in order to hide her traitorous jelly-legs—and then she gathered the towel in her hands. Luz watched, just smiling, smiling, smiling, her languid eyes following her movements a few heartbeats later, as if the brown-haired girl were trapped in her wake. She glanced down at her hands—suddenly shy—feeling an inexplicable timidity under such rapt attention. “Do you— uh—” She felt the desperate urge to change the subject; just her luck, the tanned girl’s towel had fallen on the floor beside her bed. “—want me to hang this up?” Amity leaned forward to snag its edge with her fingers, but Luz reached out to pat a clumsy hand against her wrist, then raised a finger to her mouth as she whispered shhhh.
They sat that way for a long moment, faces mere inches apart, Luz’s warm hand burning atop her cool skin. Amity glanced all around, unable to meet the other girl’s unfocused eyes, confused, before finally hissing a question. “What?”
“Lisss’n,” the brown-eyed girl whispered, pointing up into the air, breathing out a warm smile.
She heard it then, over the slowly settling heartbeat thudding in her ears— a faint melody from a guitar, that delicate love song they had heard earlier that evening, this time accompanied by a voice that rose and fell in harmony. Though the meaning of the words were lost among the walls and doors that lay between room One Nineteen and their own, the emotion it conveyed was undeniable. “Good for her,” Amity said.
“Yours did it, hooraaaayy,” Luz stretched and grunted that last word before abandoning the Queen’s English for yet another yawn that might have been Mine was chicken in disguise. Stretching complete, she leaned back on her pillow and sighed, catching Amity’s eye in time to share a smile. That definitely-romantic performance continued to drift across the hall, lending a certain tension to the warm air in room One Eighteen.
“I’ll, uh,” Amity bounced to her feet, both damp towels clutched in her shaking hands. “I’ll hang these up, shall I?”
Luz had burrowed under the blankets when she came back from the bathroom. Amity busied herself by moving her laptop and satchel to the desk in the corner, then she turned off the bathroom light and the light in the hall after double-checking the locks on the door. A pair of lethargic brown pools tracked her fretting around the room until she stood between the beds.
We have a double. We chose the double.
There were two beds for two people. It made sense, it was logical. She started to reach for the blankets on the other bed, but pulled her hand back a second later. It felt wrong. It wasn’t what she wanted, deep down, in that secret place where she hid the truths from the world that were too dreadful to admit. Stop it. You’re twenty-five years old. She frowned and nodded in self-admonition. She needs a good night’s sleep. Amity snuck a furtive glance at Luz before she forced herself to put a hand on the empty bed’s comforter.
Polished mahogany studied her with care. Luz always saw her. Before she could pull the blankets down on the second bed, Luz had flipped hers open. A tanned hand patted the slim empty space beside her.
Amity’s face absolutely burned with something like shame. She looked down at her feet and forced a question past the lump in her throat, “Are— you sure?”
Luz patted her mattress again and hummed, “Waited for you, querida.”
Amity felt the blood race up into her hairline as she climbed into bed beside the smaller girl, curling up under her chin as Luz snugged the blankets over her back and up to her ears. They took time to find their place close to each other, settling into a comfortable tangle of limbs; Amity’s ear pressed above Luz’s heartbeat, hands curled around her shoulders, tanned fingers carding through locks of green. The pale girl sighed into the warmth of her embrace, willing her trembling limbs to be still.
She realized her mistake a moment too late. “Oh—” Amity clicked her tongue in irritation, “I forgot the lamp, hold on—” She tried to roll away from Luz, to reach for the nightstand.
The brown-haired girl made an unhappy grunt above her ear and clamped her arms around Amity’s shoulders to hold her against her chest. Once the taller girl stopped trying to roll away, Luz patted her shoulder blade and mumbled, “Lemme jusss…” She lifted both hands free of the blanket and clapped twice.
The lights went out.
Amity scoffed into the unexpected darkness, her breath tickling the other girl’s skin. “Is that why Eda picked this place?” She wondered aloud, her lips brushing the warmth in the hollow of her throat.
Luz hummed an appreciative noise before she yawned one more time. “...Yeah,” she mumbled after a moment, “Tha’sso Eda.”
With darkness and quiet came a time of reflection, and one nagging question from earlier bubbled up from where it had been simmering ever since. She had barely time to consider the shape of the words before they crossed her lips. “You’d let me stay with you?” Amity asked in the hush of their hotel room. The warm girl in her arms breathed in, as if to muster a response, but then she began to snore, her exhale playing across the taller girl’s hair. She breathed one more question, “Did you really mean it, Luz?”
She didn’t get an answer, but that was alright. Being held like this felt like an answer. Before too long, Amity drifted asleep to the sound of Luz’s steady heartbeat.
She dreamed of two little girls picking flowers at recess, green motes of light drifting on the breeze.
Notes:
The horrors persist, but so do I
(*) In this AU, Luz can afford an apartment by herself in San Francisco’s Castro District. I do what I want.
(**) Sorry, not sorryTe estaba dando de comer en la boca = roughly, "Because I was the one feeding you"
Daijōbu = "It's okay"
Nemiminimizu = roughly, "It was a complete surprise"
Nihon ni mo bendā ga imasu = "We have vendors in Japan"my apologies if I mangled those
I just noticed today (1/31/25) that I had mixed up the ship’s name In chapter 29, due to my attempts to be Very Clever™ in the Trust. How embarrassing.
As for the day when I finally post this (
Fridaylol nope, Saturday), a few explanations. I managed to squeeze a two-week project into three and a half months, which meant the bathroom renovation took me until halfway through November. Various family get-togethers and birthdays afterward meant I had little time to write between Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years. Well, aside from the gift-fic entry (which was nearly late) On top of that, as much as I've wanted to write, I never seem to be able to write when I do find time. It's very frustrating. I felt like enough time had passed that "you'll never get back in the right mindset for this story," which let ye olde imposter syndrome flared up a smidge. I actually switched to a notebook and pen in order to scratch out a rough draft, which surprisingly helped quite a bit.All that to say, my apologies for the delay.
I had had unrealistic hopes to finish this story by its two-year anniversary, but unfortunately you’re stuck with me for a little longer yet.
I added artwork in chapter 26 a while back, do give it a glance sometime :)
That’s a wrap for Day 3!
Chapter 31: Several hundred miles further east
Chapter Text
A sleek silver aircraft streaked through the sky above Massachusetts, its gold and purple trim gleaming in the bright late-morning sunlight. It threaded a narrow passage between towering, mountainous clouds, yawing with the scudding winds. The plane angled to slip beneath the clouds, cutting through the fierce crosswinds.
Emira blinked awake as the cabin rattled around her. Bars of sunlight poured through the windows, creeping across the gold-trimmed mahogany table where Edric leaned over his laptop. She shifted in her seat and stretched, letting a gurgling groan escape the back of her throat.
Edric didn’t even look away from his computer when he asked, “Have a nice nap?”
She finished stretching, then cracked her neck and sighed, “Ehh… It was a little short.”
He grinned. “You’re a little short.”
“You’re a little—” a yawn interrupted her scathing retort. How unfortunate. “—Shit.”
The floor tilted with the aircraft’s deepening descent, allowing gravity to press Emira back into her seat. Edric had to snatch his wireless mouse from the tabletop before it could escape. The intercom crackled to life with their pilot’s voice, “We’re ten minutes out from Hanscom Field, Miss Blight. We should be at the hangar in twenty.”
Emira pressed a toggle switch on the cabin wall beside her seat and called out, “Thank you, Reynolds.” The pale woman fought to keep the faint blush from her cheeks at the uniformed woman’s warm, honey-toned, Aye, ma’am, in response. She scowled at Edric’s toothy grin.
“Oooh,” he crooned.
“Shut up.”
“Someone’s got a cruuush,” his voice dropped to a giddy whisper as Emira hissed, “Shut up!” once more.
~
Edric looked completely unconcerned by the bone-rattling vibration running through the belly of the aircraft. Emira crossed and recrossed her legs, making a pointed effort to loosen her white-knuckled grip from her armrests. The small plane bucked against the wind, jolting upward and then dropping just as sharp while an air current buffeted them to one side.
“Good thing Mittens isn’t here,” Edric remarked in a half-bored tone while he examined his cuticles.
“Y–Yeah,” Emira’s answering laugh was tinged with fear, “She would— yeah.”
~
The wind howled across the tarmac from the North-East as the Blight twins stalked down the sleet jet’s staircase, toward a man in a blue windbreaker waiting for them, a clipboard in his hands. Emira hunched her shoulders up around her ears, tucked her chin into her chest, and hid behind her upturned coat collar, her long braid swaying in the wind along with the forest of orange-and-white wind socks dotting the field.
“Ack, my hair,” Edric grumbled as a fresh gust swept it all to one side, his words almost lost amid the gale.
Emira looked over her shoulder at him and grinned. “It can’t look any worse!” she called.
He shielded his eyes from the wind and shouted, “What?”
~
The office manager led them through the echoing hangar and held the heavy metal fire door open for Emira. “Welcome to Laurence Field, Miss Blight,” the older man raised his voice to be heard over the wind, and motioned her forward. The Twins walked into the small office complex bolted onto the streetside quarter of the building, and paused to look around the reporters’ bullpen-style area with glass half-walls and worn wooden desks. A handful of Blight Industries employees filed paperwork and made phone calls, all suddenly quite busy with their tasks.
“Thank you, Mr. Jenkins,” Emira said with a kind smile as she half-turned to wait for the man to hang his jacket by his desk. She slipped out of her long coat and folded it over her arm, then put a hand on her rolling bag’s handle.
He nodded as he joined her side once more and gave her a warm smile. “You are welcome, ma’am. Now,” Jenkins flipped to the second page on his clipboard as he walked, glancing at a table of figures before he said, “If your itinerary hasn’t changed, I’ll have our men get started on the G800’s annual maintenance while she’s here.” He flipped several more pages, examining a chart. “The flight plan shows you’ll need it ready by Saturday evening?” He paused at the uncertain sound Emira made as she raised a finger, like, uhm, then asked, “—Saturday morning?”
Emira sighed, “We’ll have to leave Friday evening. I’m… expected… back in San Fran on Saturday morning.” She pinched her face in disgust when she hesitated on the word expected.
“Ah,” Jenkins nodded as he pulled a ballpoint pen from his shirt pocket and scribbled a note on the printout. “I’ll have her ready to go by Friday afternoon,” the office manager promised, turning around to push the next door open with his back, leading Emira and Edric into the building’s small public lobby.
A younger man with curly red hair sat up straight in his waiting-room chair at the sight of Edric.
Jenkins pointed his pen at the green-haired pair’s luggage and asked, “Is there anything we need to unload from the jet?”
They shook their heads. Emira had an attaché and a single rolling suitcase; Edric had his laptop bag, an oversized duffel bag slung over one shoulder, and a large pelican case plastered with stickers and warning labels—his “bag of tricks” that traveled everywhere he went. “Nah,” the Blight brother nodded his chin toward his case, “This is all I need.”
The red-haired man popped up from the hardbacked chair where he'd been waiting, throwing a grin and a wave to Edric, “Heya, boss!”
“Kevin!” Edric sounded delighted to see the man.
“Kevin?” Emira sounded surprised— and suspicious.
“Kevin McCallister, Miss Blight,” the curly-headed man quickly reached out to shake her hand, jostling her whole arm up and down. As an afterthought, he added, “No relation.”
“Yes, I know,” Emira scrunched her mouth into an unhappy crooked line and pulled her fingers from his crushing grip, “We've met before, Kevin.” There was little chance he'd heard her, as he'd already turned away to speak to her brother.
“Er, yes,” Jenkins had the good sense to sound embarrassed, “Kevin has been… waiting for your arrival.”
Emira’s eyes tightened. “Why?”
The baby-faced Irishman grinned at Edric, “I have ‘er parked at the curb.”
~
A glistening black muscle car crouched just outside the Blight Industries North-East Mass Hangar like a predator warming itself in the sunlight. Kevin trotted over to the rear of the vehicle ahead of Edric, to pop the trunk for the green-haired man.
Emira stopped just outside the Hangar and waved at the car, exasperated. “The fuck is this?”
“Em, Emmy, Ira,” Edric’s voice was muffled by the trunk while he strapped his luggage in place, “This is a Dodge Challenger SRT Demon! It’s got a six-point-two liter HEMI V8 with over a thousand horsepower! They only made thirty-three hundred of these!"
“And it’s only got twenty-two thousand miles on it,” Kevin helpfully supplied.
She could feel a headache coming on. “Ed, I don’t—” Emira pinched her nose, then turned to Jenkins, “Where is the company car I ordered?”
He held his clipboard in both hands, clearly uncomfortable with giving her the bad news, “I’m sorry, ma’am.”
Kevin jogged over to the passenger door and pulled it open, motioning toward the passenger’s seat like a maître d'. “I can put your bag in the back, Miss Blight,” he offered.
“I…” She glanced between Edric and Jenkins—the former gleeful, the latter apologetic—and sighed, whispering, “Goddammit.” She walked the four steps to the curb then let her rolling suitcase stand upright. Kevin shied away when she met his eyes with a flat stare, but she took a breath and softened her gaze, then said— in spite of the definitely-premeditated homicide freshly occupying the second-spot on her mental todo list— “Thank you, Kevin.”
The far-too-young-to-be-thirty-ish man grinned and bobbed his head, “Yeah, of course!” He lifted her suitcase and scrambled back around the Challenger.
Jenkins approached her open door as she eyed the low-slung bucket seat. He held out a helping hand with a nod and a “Ma’am.”
Emira handed him her attaché, then she turned and twisted and swung herself into the deep-blue leather bucket seat, holding onto the A-Pillar handle for balance. The older man waited for her to pull her feet inside the car, then he pressed her door shut. “Thank you, Jenkins,” she said, giving the man a strained smile.
“Of course, ma’am,” came his even reply. He handed her briefcase through the open window.
One of the other two men slammed the trunk lid shut, and Edric walked around to the driver’s door as Kevin hopped up onto the curb beside Jenkins. “Oh, you need these, Ed!” The red-haired man said before he tossed the car keys over the Dodge.
Edric snapped them out of the air with one hand and clicked his tongue, pointing a finger-gun. “Thanks, Kev.”
“You got it, boss!”
“Thanks for working on the plane, Jenkins,” Edric said as he pulled his door open.
“Of course, sir.”
Edric crossed his arms and leaned on the roof of the Challenger as he watched the graying man pluck his pen from his shirt pocket. “We’ve known each other for years, Jenkins, you know you can call me Edric.”
The corner of his mouth quirked upward as he scribbled a note, then Jenkins replied, “Thank you, sir.”
Edric rolled his eyes and popped into the driver’s seat. He took a moment to run the fingers of both hands across the leather-wrapped steering wheel before he glanced down at the floor-mounted gear shift and its shiny black-and-white 8-Ball knob. “Oh, right,” he chuckled, sounding like he’d forgotten something important, “It’s a stick.” He leaned to one side, the better to examine the three pedals underfoot.
“It’s a manual, boss,” Kevin helpfully supplied as he leaned an elbow on Emira’s open window, muttering a Sorry as he reached in to point between the bucket seats, “and the parking brake is set.”
Edric mumbled, “Yeah, thanks Kev,” in a distracted voice as he shimmied in his seat, getting one foot on the clutch, and his hands on the gear-shift and steering wheel.
“You good?” Emira asked after he made a soft vroom-vroom with his mouth, crossing her arms and fixing him with an arched-eyebrow stare.
“Yeah, yeah,” her brother tapped the pedals with his toes while he released the parking brake, “Yeah, we’re good.” He thumbed the start button and the black beast roared to life. Edric’s laugh was drowned out by the growling HEMI, so he gave the two men standing on the sidewalk a thumbs-up.
Kevin scuttled backwards and returned the gesture, while Jenkins leaned down to catch Emira’s eye. “Safe travels, Miss Blight,” he shouted over the revving of the engine. She gave him a pained wave before tightening her seatbelt.
“Alright,” Edric grinned, “Let’s—” He pressed the clutch and slid the stick left and forward with a weighty pair of thunks. “Gooo…”
The car stalled when he let off the clutch.
Edric frowned at the steering wheel in the sudden silence as if it had offended him personally. Emira raised her eyebrow, then exchanged a glance with the men beside her window. “Dammit,” he hissed, shifting back to neutral before he jabbed the start button again. He tap-tapped the gas pedal to rev the engine before he held the clutch down, and shifted into first, “Let me just—”
The Challenger stalled again. This time Emira pointed at the pedals, “You’re not giving it any gas when you—”
“—That’s just, okay, look,” Edric’s protests were drowned out by the roar of the V8, “Right, the gas.” The glossy black Dodge lurched away from the curb, and Emira jolted back against her headrest. She put a hand to the back of her head and hissed an ouch, then gave the audience to this ongoing tragedy a withering glare.
Jenkins looked downcast and Kevin waved until the muscle car limped out of the parking lot.
~
The silent Challenger rolled to a stop at the corner of Eglin and Vandenberg, and Emira did her damndest not to say anything unkind while her slightly-wilted brother restarted the engine. A slow, jerking right turn and an excruciatingly timid pause at the roundabout a half-mile later proved to be too much. She shot Edric a look and snapped, “I can’t believe you canceled the company car for this!”
He gave her a quick glance and a worried laugh, and let his smartphone finish relaying the next leg of their journey—Turn right onto MA-2A, then make a left onto Bedford road—before he shrugged and quipped, “What? You don’t like my new wheels?”
“That’s not—” She pinched the bridge of her nose between a thumb and forefinger and hissed in frustration, “I— I’m just—”
Edric hummed a note, “You’re stressin’ out.”
“Of course!” Emira threw her hands up in the air. Of course she was! Why couldn’t he see that now was the worst possible time for these kinds of games? Amity’s grant demonstration was not a laughing matter, not with Odalia threatening her future. She crossed her arms and fumed out her window at the wooded neighborhood passing by; the small single-family homes were set back from the two-lane road amid tall, thin trees and half-wild greenery.
For a moment, she let herself wonder what it would be like to live a quiet life like these people, with a normal job, with a normal family.
Her brother worked the pedals and the gear-stick in a hesitant unison and nodded to himself with a growing confidence. He opened his mouth to speak, but sighed, then tried again, “I should have told you before we landed.” Edric glanced at her twice as he followed the forested lane's gentle curve to the left, offering an, “I should know better,” after he began to slow for the traffic lights ahead. He pulled up behind a gray Volkswagen hatchback, then reached out to rap his knuckles on her arms, “Look, Em, I know what you're thinking, but I didn’t do this just to fuck with you.”
She snorted in response. He knew her too well.
He followed the cars ahead through the intersection when the light turned green. “It’s for the show tomorrow,” Edric admitted.
Emira turned to examine his profile; he had tells, but he was being sincere. “Really?”
“Honest,” he nodded, completely serious for a change. How odd. “If I didn’t need this car at the demo, I wouldn’t have cancelled our ride.”
“You should have told me,” Emira agreed as she ran a thumb across the electric-blue stitching in the deep-blue leather of her seat, idly appreciating its texture. “What did you need a rental for?”
“Rental?” He turned a look of pure confusion her way.
She groaned heavily, then repeated the important parts of her question, “What is it for?”
He grinned, “That’s a surprise.” She nearly pulled a muscle rolling her eyes. When she didn’t say anything more than a muttered, Oh my God, his grin began to fade. After he passed a few more cars in the right lane, Edric kept his eyes on the road as he said, matter-of-fact, “Dad’s gonna be there, too.”
Emira pulled a lopsided frown and looked away to watch the Massachusetts landscape out her window before she used a purposefully even voice to say, “Is he?”
“Yeah, he has, uh—” Edric coughed, recognizing he was now fighting an uphill battle, but had already committed himself. “He has something planned.”
Emira huffed, then used that same disinterested voice, “Does he?” Her tone made it clear that she was not, in fact, impressed.
“Yeah,” her brother’s voice was softer now, something close to earnest, “I think you’ll like it.”
“Oh really,” she deadpanned, “What is it?”
He almost looked apologetic when he said, “Can’t tell you yet.” He flinched when she glared at him.
“Keeping secrets from me?” Emira tried to keep her long-simmering irritation from boiling over, and might have been less than successful.
“Yeah.”
“Really.”
This time he laughed, the idiot. “Yeah.”
“Really?”
“Look, I’m not—”
Emira bared her teeth, “You’re really not gonna tell me?”
“Em,” the pale man held up a hand, “Scout’s honor, I have a reason.”
She narrowed her eyes to bright lines of gold. “You were never a boy scout.”
Edric sighed and said the two words that made everything fine: “Plausible Deniability.” Not fine like good, but fine like proper… as proper as things could get with Blight Industries. Fine like, this is just how things are done. Fine like, you’ll find out later. Fine like, Dad doesn’t trust you like he trusts me.
Fine like, Dad doesn't want your help.
Emira had to take several deep breaths in and out before she could reply with a simple, “...Ah.”
What more could be said? Alador was the Chief Technologist, at least seven steps above her in the corporate hierarchy. She might be in charge of the People division, but she wasn’t privy to what went on in Research. There was literally nothing she could do or say that could force Edric to divulge one of their father’s company secrets. Nor should she try, legally. Knowing how her mother conducted business, she might sleep better at night with fine.
The smartphone rattled helpfully in the cupholder, Take exit 127A toward Attleboro. Stay on I-95 South for eight miles.
Emira leaned back in her seat and sighed. With so many goddamn secrets in their family, it was a wonder they could trust each other at all. Another minute passed before she worked up the hope to ask, “Will he follow through this time?”
Edric gave her a sad glance, but offered a soft, “Yeah… He will.” He knew all the times their father had failed them; it wasn’t wrong for her to be concerned.
“Okay,” she examined his face for any trace of a lie, or of worry. “I… I trust you.” A heavy silence passed before she spoke again. “I just—”
Edric looked at her, and waited.
“It might…” Emira met his eyes for a moment, but then sighed and looked down at her hands. She worried her fingertips together as she said, “It might kill her if he lets her down.”
Edric turned back to the road with a slow, hesitant nod, “Yeah…” His voice was pained, “I know.”
They rode in silence until he said, “Y’know, I didn’t mean to bring the mood down… Maybe I can make it up to you.” He gave her a hesitant grin and waved at the glove box, “I had Kevin get something for you.”
Emira made a snort of derision. “Why would I want anything from Kevin?”
“What’s wrong with Kevin?”
She didn’t bother to reply as she pulled the latch on the glove box, and out tumbled a brown paper lunch bag. EmIRa was scrawled across both sides in a ballpoint pen, and a piece of tape held it closed. “Seriously?” Emira glanced at her brother.
“What?” He laughed again, clearly confused. “I don't know why he wrapped it. Open it!”
She turned it over in her hands to get a feeling for what might be inside. It felt like there were two items in the bag: one with a cardboard backing, the other in an oblong pouch. Emira shrugged, and tore the tape off the bag. She gasped when she looked inside, and said, “I love these!” Edric grinned at her as she dumped the bag out in her other palm. She ran a thumb across the Utz Potato Sticks wrapper then shook her head, “God, you’re a sap. You know that, right?”
“Yeah,” Edric nodded, “I do.”
“What’s this for?” Emira asked, turning the other item over to glance at the black block letters on white. USB-C Auxiliary Audio Cable. Edric motioned toward the radio, like, be my guest, and she cocked an eyebrow. “Really?”
“Yeah.”
“Really?” She didn’t bother to keep the skepticism from her voice as she pulled the packet open.
“Yeah, it’s not a long drive, how bad—”
“No take-backs,” Emira interrupted as she dug for her phone in her coat pocket, “No bitchin’.”
Edric tipped his head in her direction with a crooked grin, “No ragrets.”
“Your… choice…” came her half-distracted reply as she tap-tap-tapped at the device in her palm. Emira leaned back against her headrest with a sigh of satisfaction as The Best of Ed Sheeran began to play.
Edric squinched his face in disgust. “Really?”
“No ragrets,” the pale woman replied, her eyes closed in relaxation, the picture of serenity. “Mittens likes him.”
“No she doesn’t.”
“Even her robots like him.”
“They are just babies,” Edric growled as he glared at the Interstate ahead, tapping an angry fingertip against the steering wheel, “and they don’t know shit about good music.”
Emira smiled to herself in amusement. It was so easy to rile him up. “You’re welcome to educate them in your free time,” she snarked, giving her twin a crooked grin.
“Fine, maybe I will!”
“Fine.”
“Fine!” He squinted at her for a moment, but then a slow, creeping smile spread across his face. “What time do you two get dinner?” Edric asked in an angelic tone.
“No,” Emira made a quick slash with her hand, “You’re not crashing our dinners.”
“Fine,” Edric grumbled with a sassy head-wobble.
She watched him for a few seconds in silence, then said, “Good.”
They drove in silence for another mile before Edric asked, “Six p.m., right?”
~
Roughly a hundred miles southwest—as the crow flies—the early evening sun was shining down on a quiet row of mid-century houses. One home in particular rested with its shades drawn and its windows dark, waiting for its owner to return from the store. The fading yellow glare of headlights ran across the four windows in its face and the screen-door and small porch set to their left, before the sedan turned into the driveway. A woman’s voice could be heard after a car door slammed.
“...Well, it's on and on and on, on and on—”
With a rattle of keys and a click of the lock, the front door of the small two-story bungalow swung open.
“The beat don't stop until the break of dawn—”
A stocky, middle-aged woman with glasses bumped the door open further with her hip, singing, “I said a M-A-S, a T-E-R, a G with a double E—” A number of plastic grocery bags dangled from her arms, swaying as she danced into the house. She fumbled her keys from the doorknob with one heavy-laden hand, then dropped them in her jacket pocket as she pushed the door shut with her heel. “I said I go by the unforgettable name of the man they call the Master Gee—” She paused in the entryway to kick her white canvas slip-ons to the mat beside the coat closet, while bobbing her head from side to side. “Welllll, my name is known all over the world by all the foxy ladies—” She set her grocery bags on the floor and did a spin, turning to shoot herself a pair of fingerguns in the head-height mirror mounted on the wall behind the front door. “And the pretty giiiirls—” She let her jean jacket fall off both arms at once—careful not to catch her headphone cord on a button—as she sang along with the music that only she could hear. “I'm goin' down in history as the baddest rapper there could ever be—”
A black-and-white plastic nametag was pinned to the chest of her pale green veterinarian scrubs. It read Camila N.
“Now I'm feelin' the highs and ya feelin' the lows—” She hung her jacket in the closet, then moved to the beat with elbows locked and legs stiff as she turned, until she bent down to lift her groceries. “The beat starts gettin' into your toes…” She hummed along with the Sugarhill Gang as she walked by the small waist-high hallway table where her cordless telephone sat beside her answering machine. A large button flashed red on its face. She set her bags on the nearby dining room table, then went back to stand in front of the end table.
Camila let herself fall silent as she pushed the well-worn orange-foam walkman headphones back to hang around her neck, sliding them off her ears and over her curly, gray-streaked brown hair. She fished a battered iPod from her pocket and clicked the wheel to pause the tinny music still playing at her collarbone. The quiet woman rewound the tape, then she pressed PLAY on the old answering machine.
She would have pressed that button anyway, even without the new message waiting to be heard. She always stopped there when she came home— it was one of her few enduring rituals.
Gears began to turn, dragging thin magnetic tape into motion. Static crackled from the miniature cassette, before a scratchy baritone hummed from the speaker. “¡Hola, mi amor! Me atrasé en el depósito pero iré camino a casa apenas termine de hablar con Peters. Lamento que no nos cruzamos en el almuerzo… Las veo pronto. Te amo.”
A wistful smile crinkled her eyes. Camila kissed her fingertips, then tapped them on the small plastic window above the gently-turning tape. “Te amo,” she whispered once again, always, then she walked back to the dining room table to unpack her groceries.
The answering machine crackled with static, a quick half-second burst of scrambled audio, a ding, and then, “Hey Cam.”
That voice was unmistakable. Camila turned a surprised look over her shoulder. “Eda?” she wondered aloud.
The gray-and-black speaker chuckled in her old friend’s familiar way. “Just callin’ to let’cha know that Luz should be stoppin’ by your place… oh, late Friday? Early Saturday? Somethin’ like that.”
Camila set the boxes of Arm & Hammer Baking Soda down—why pass up a five-for-five deal—and turned around to lean against the nearest dining room chair, the better to hear this unexpected news. “Really?” She laughed as she propped one hand on her hip.
“She’s runnin’ a job out ta’ Boston this week, and I told her t’ take a few days off afterwards so’s she can visit. I know it’s last minute notice, but— uh— whoops, mebbe I just spoiled her surprise.”
“You may have,” Camila shook her head with an amused snort.
Eda hmmm’d for a second, and might have scratched at her jaw before she clicked her tongue and sighed an apology, “My bad.” The woman listening shrugged, like, what can you do? “Anyhoo,” the gray-haired trucker drawled, “Real reason I called wuz I paypal’d you some money.” Camila frowned as Eda continued, “Get’chyerselves takeout every night or— hell— spend it on groceries. Lord knows she eats everything in my fridge.” The brown-haired woman pulled a face and glanced at her own innocent refrigerator. “Go to that steak place on Chesterfield if it’s still open, my treat.”
“Eda,” Camila shook her head, “You shouldn’t have.”
The grin on Eda’s face was audible cross-country, at least until she covered the mouthpiece of her phone with a palm and began to cough. Camila’s face pinched with worry at the muffled wet, rattling sounds coming from her answering machine. She couldn’t help but smile at her old friend’s bleh of disgust. Eda chuckled, “You’ll prob’ly say I shouldn’t have—”
“You’d be right.”
“—but it’s, uh, it’s my way o’ sayin’ thanks. Lettin’ her come ‘cross country with me was… a choice.” Camila nodded at that, her stale fear and sadness bubbling up in her chest at the remembering. “She’s a good kid,” the woman in San Francisco added, none the wiser, “and she’s done a great job these last few years.” She tapped faint fingernails on the countertop as she hesitated for a long, tentative moment, then she softly added, “Manny would’a been proud.”
Camila pressed a palm over her heart and breathed out a handful of emotions at once. “Oh,” she whispered, “That’s good to hear.”
“I know you miss her, and she definitely misses you,” Eda promised. The gray-haired woman sighed into the microphone, sending a crackle of static on a three thousand mile journey. “And, about the money—” she began, “I know you don’t like handouts, so just don’t think of it like one.”
The brown-haired woman pushed a hand up under her glasses to rub her eyes, and huffed an unhappy breath.
Eda pressed on, “Think of it like…” she snapped her fingers, “like Luz earned a bonus!”
“Oh, please.”
“But I’m giving it to you to hold onto, so she doesn’t blow it all on truck-stop tchotchkes for our newest client.” The other woman slapped what sounded like her knee as she said, “Oh, ho ho, speaking of, ha! Your kid!” For some reason, Eda burst out laughing in great, unrestrained guffaws. “Oh my god, wait’ll you see this girl, Cammie! Luz went all bug-eyed!”
“Bug eyed?” Camila repeated in surprise. “My Luz?” But even as she questioned that, she knew in her bones it had to be true. Luz was her father’s daughter, after all, and Manuel had been a disaster.
“Anyway—” Eda paused to grunt while she stretched, then, “That’s all I was really callin’ about, y’know, the cash.” She gave a low, throaty chuckle, “I’ll call you later t’ gossip, alright? Take care, Cam.” There was a click and a second and a half of hissing static, then the answering machine went still after a beep.
Camila hummed a tune to herself while she put her groceries away. It would be a delight to have her daughter back in town for a few days, but… She opened her pantry and glanced around with a frown. I’ll have to buy some snacks. How best to celebrate the occasion? The tanned woman opened her refrigerator to take stock. Luz did love her sancocho, and also made a point not to ask her to make it. The more Camila thought about the smell and taste of her abuela’s stew, the more certain she was. “Back to the store,” she muttered to herself as she closed the fridge.
But what to do about the visit? She busied herself by flattening cardboard boxes for her recycling bin, then she stuffed the new plastic grocery bags into the plastic grocery bag full of old plastic grocery bags while she weighed her options. Should she play dumb, and let Luz believe she didn’t know? Camila pulled her phone from her purse and opened her text messages from Luz. No hints at all about a visit. Their last exchange was from the weekend, about the small half-starved white kitten that had been brought into the clinic the week before. She had to nurse the abandoned animal back to health before it could be returned to the humane society for adoption.
Play innocent, she decided with a devious grin, tapping out a new message. Besides, she had new pictures of the kitten to share.
Look who’s big enough to handle solid foods ¡Ella es tan preciosa! :[Mamí]
She attached a cute photo, then sent the message on its way. Luz would reply when she had time. Camila put her phone back in her purse, grabbed her coat and shoes, and set her orange-and-black walkman headphones on her ears. She had some unexpected shopping to do, but Manny’s old playlists would keep her company.
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